AN: I decided to write another Hayeffie, but this is mostly because I'm fascinated by torture (that sounded wrong) and it seemed to make more sense to do this with Haymitch and Effie, since Caesar (my main ship with Effie) is executed in my mind after Mockingjay and we know he's in the Capitol during pretty well during this, since he's interviewing Peeta and stuff. So here it is. Don't read if you find sexual abuse, graphic violence and the like triggering or just simply gross. The M rating is there for a reason.

The Capitol

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six.

This was a game that could never be won, she knew. But still a game, which kept her conscious. Counting the seconds between each scream, transferred to her cell by the ducts in the ceiling. She didn't know who they belonged to, but she charted them. Usually there was a rhythm to it. Six of her deep, miserable breaths and there would be another scream. Three more and a kind of aftershock of a sobbing sound would sound. She often wondered if she sounded like that as well, when they came to her cell with the knives and syringes. She didn't think much of the types of physical pain they could put her through. They still thought she knew something she didn't already tell them. Her knees rested on the dirty ground. The cell hadn't been cleaned since she got thrown in here 3 weeks and 4 days ago. She charted the days as well, by counting her meals and the interrogations, which more or less just was torture now. She remembered one of the guards saying to her, that he knew she hadn't anything to say, but that he also couldn't pass an opportunity to blow some steam.

They made her do the most gruesome things. She tried to fantasize herself away to somewhere else while they touched her, but she was so used to his hands by now, that she would never be able to even just lose a tiny bit of focus during these things. They'd shown her videos of Peeta, how he talked about the rebellion. He was hijacked, they told her that as well. They threatened her. Told her they were going to do it to her as well, but she knew better. Why hijack a Capitol citizen? There was no point.

One. Two. Three. Scream. An eyebrow movement made a slight wrinkle on her forehead. They were different screams. They didn't come from the ducts. She tried opening her mouth to yell, as she realized she heard cell doors open. She heard the voices of known rebels from the Capitol. Her mouth was like sewn shut. She wanted to scream, but couldn't. Instead she clanked her wrist chain towards the wall, but nothing happened. It didn't make much of a sound.

"They left you, Trinket, didn't they?" He said as he pulled out the iron from the flame. In the dim light she couldn't see anything detailed about it other than it was glowing with head. She thought she could hear it sear, but it was probably just her imagination. This would hurt. Her body prepared for the pain by giving up. The first few weeks she had fought them, but they broke her. She knew. She could put a finger on the exact day where she stopped crossing her legs to make it difficult for them and when she started just closing her eyes, waiting for the whip to hit.

"They didn't know I was here, if Haymitch –" Effie tried to say, even though her voice was flat and monotone as a vacuum cleaner with a full bag.

"Yeah… About your little friend," His dark eyes glistened with lies and deceit, but then again they always did, even when she knew he was telling the truth. He took a hold of her shoulder and nearly smashed her face into the small table he'd set up in front of her. Normally her cell was unfurnished. He ripped at the shoulder part of the remaining part of the black dress she'd worn the day they took her. She was kind of happy it was black, that made the bloodstains sink into the fabric and disappear. Well, what was left of the fabric. She smelled the smell of burnt flesh before the pain reached her mind and she let out a scream. Then another one. No she did not wait six breaths to scream again. But she did nothing more than this. One. Two. Three. She heard herself sobbing, but felt no tears coming down her face. Maybe she was too numb to feel them or maybe they just simply weren't there. Some sort of irrational curiosity hit her. What was she branded with? Was this their new way of marking their livestock? She wished she could be killed. The man had made it very clear that Haymitch was dead. She believed him, why wouldn't she. She'd heard the screams. And even though a few of the rebels might have gotten away with the reckless rescue mission, she knew some one died. She'd seen the body be transported when one of the guards opened the door to give her a plate of food.

So she dryly cried herself to sleep once again with no desire to ever wake up.

District 13

He woke up in cold sweat. His eyes darted wildly around the room and he grabbed for the knife under the pillow. There was no one in the room.

"Goddamnit," he muttered under his breath and got out of bed. He was wide awake.

"My kingdom for a drink," he continued dramatically to the empty room. He preferred the Capitol quirkiness to this place. Sterile and clean and the only alcohol present was used for polishing shoes or tending to injuries. His room was too small. He never thought he'd miss the house in Victors Village back in 12, but he did.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. He'd made up a game as well, counting the seconds from a thought made its appearance 'till the physical illness came over him. It happened like clockwork every time she crossed his mind, which wasn't a rare occurrence. She was dead, he was convinced of that. Otherwise they'd had started using her. Unless… Unless she isn't tv-ready, the small voice in his head informed her. If they broke her down so far, she can't sit, walk or talk, they can't use her. His breathing quickened.

The screen hummed. It bothered him more than he would like to admit. He'd think a district with this kind of technological advantage could make a goddamn computer screen stop saying sounds. He'd been on surveillance duty for a few hours now. Watching the corridors of the cellar where the Capitol kept the remaining prisoners. Nothing much happened here, but he had been playing that game a lot during the time. Every time he heard a scream he thought of her. If she'd thought of him, during her time there.

One. Two. Three. His game was interrupted by something that made him equally sick to his stomach and spiked his brain with a sort of hope. He knew that body. He heard the guard shout at her and place her in the corridor. She could run. She could crawl. She could make a run for it, but she didn't she stayed put, while the guard called on a few others.

Haymitch yelled for someone. The hope in him was replaced by anger. He didn't know who stood in front of him, but who ever it was had to deal with him.

"Get me Plutarch, right now! And Coin. Get me the whole damn army!" He demanded harshly.

"Sir… Mr Abernathy, sir…" The tiny woman in front of him tried to reason with him. She looked at his screen and shook her head. She didn't recognize the bubbly escort from 12.

When Plutarch finally reached the surveillance room, Effie had been thrown back into her cell.

The Capitol

The cell floor had caught on fire. She didn't know how it happened, because the only thing in there, which had the potential to catch fire, was her. And the stuff she left on the floor, being it blood, food or excrement. She was never good with chemistry and stuff, but she couldn't really see what could catch fire. After all she didn't care. It was good for her to get some relatively fresh air outside her little, isolated cell. They had to clean it too, but they said they'd do that tomorrow. She got another cell until then. Shared with someone.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Scream. This was obviously where the screams came from, the ones she'd made her little game over. The man in front of her had a faint resemblance to someone she once saw win the games. Probably an old victor. She didn't care. Couldn't care. A part of her really wanted to feel sympathy towards the man, but looking between her own injuries, scars and wounds and his she couldn't. Compared to her, he was treated like a king. She didn't really talk much to him. She didn't want to know him, if one day the screams stopped and she was forced to deal with the loss of him. If she didn't know him, she wouldn't have to care. He seemed to have the same idea, so he kept quiet.

District 13

"You need to go back," Haymitch said and clenched his hand into a fist. He felt his face heated with anger.

"We can't go back, Haymitch… I'm very sorry for the loss, but-"

"It's not a loss yet, Plutarch!" Haymitch shouted at him, not caring for the silence his raised voice left in the room. Nobody moved. Nobody dared even click a ball pen.

"She was never crucial for the plan, it sounds cold, but she is just another Capitol citizen," Plutarch closed his eyes for a few seconds, but the blinding hit from the enraged man in front of him gave him other things to think about than the impending headache. He staggered back a few steps.

"You! are nothing but a Capitol citizen, Plutarch, don't forget where you came from!" Haymitch yelled so loud he felt some of the small blood vessels in his eyes burst. He wanted to beat the man again, but he was held back by the bystanders, who had first reacted when he laid hand on their boss.

"Get him to the hospital," Plutarch Heavensbee told them. "Tell them the truth and say that I gave the order to calm him down,"

Haymitch didn't fight the restraints they put on him on the way to the hospital wing. He didn't fight when one of the medics gave him a small dose of calming medicine. But he did want to fight, when a heavy, dreamful sleep began to take him. He fought to stay awake. He knew what the dreams had for him if he fell asleep.

One. Two. Three. He felt ill. The memory of her soft lips on his. He wondered what they'd done to her. It wasn't as much the thought of her still being there, well it was, but what bothered him the most was the resigned look of her. She was broken. Maybe it was better for her just to die. Don't think like that! something inside him screamed. If you think like that, you're killing her. He fell asleep.

"There is no way… I know, listen Beetee, I don't really know the depth of this… Relationship they had going, but it would be so much better for him if he forgot," At first Haymitch couldn't figure out who this voice belonged to, but as he slowly regained more and more of his wits he realized it was Gale. They must have sedated him even further, bit he didn't remember being violent or doing anything to cause that. He kept his eyes closed.

"She is one of them after all,"

"Oh, I don't think you know what she did for this, Gale" Beetee said with a slight spark of anger in his voice.

"Well, to me, she's the mean monster who came and led children to their death with a smile on her face," Gale said and Haymitch heard the echoing steps of him leaving. He dared open his eyes and looked up at Beetee.

"He didn't mean that, Mitch," Beetee said nervously. "Listen. I know … I have this machine, it's still in it's experimental phase, but… It has to be tested somehow, don't it?"

He explained quickly how he'd built some kind of mech suit down in the armory. You could sit in the district and use the built in cameras to look and walk using motion sensors. The suit or robot or whatever wasn't much bigger than a small child and was built with a chameleon feature to blend in with its surroundings. Haymitch listened to everything Beetee said, even though he only understood about half of it.

"If I can get it on the next hovercraft going to the Capitol it shouldn't be too hard," he concluded, "We just need to convince Coin," He said the next thing with more insecurity.