Tumblr Link
They didn't sleep. They had shed their clothes and climbed into bed, but neither of them could bring themselves to close their eyes. So they stayed up in cycles of silent waiting and desperate loving, like the ebb and flow of the tide, until the first rays of sunlight appeared over the fluid horizon.
Finnick watched the pink crested waves encroach upon the sand just outside their window, and finally he spoke, "They'll be here soon. I have to go." He began to sit up, but Annie clutched him.
"Wait," she choked on the word. If she could only hold onto him, if they could only wait a moment more, perhaps they would awake from some strange nightmare and find that their worst fears were not their reality after all.
But Finnick knew that if they delayed any longer, there would only be more consequences. So he kissed her one last time. Annie coiled her arms around his neck, her fingers knotted in the back of his hair, and he ran his hands down the length of her back, memorizing her shape. Their lips lingered together for a moment longer until Finnick rested his forehead against hers and looked her in the eye. "Whatever happens today, I'm going to protect you."
Annie gazed at him wearily. There was no point in trying to change his mind now—they'd fought about it at least a dozen times, until they were screaming, until Mags could hear them from across the street and came to intervene. But Finnick had already resolved to do everything in his power to keep her safe, no matter what the cost. "I love you," she breathed, unable to conceive of anything else fitting for what might be her last words to him.
"I love you," he echoed back with as much sincerity. Then, he pulled apart from her, slipped from her bed, and headed to his own home to prepare for the Reaping.
The camera crew arrived only minutes after he did. With a brief knock, they bustled through the door and took over. The outfit they dressed him in came from his stylist—some billowy, nautical get-up that she apparently didn't feel the need to see in person. To finish off the look, the crew gelled his hair into waves and dusted his skin in shimmering gold. Then, the cameras followed him back out the door, from the Victor's Village, and towards the stage erected in the square. He was one of only a few other District 4 Victors considered important enough to need a personal camera team—the others arrived escorted only by Peacekeepers. However, the nine of them were all positioned in the same roped off area where the hundreds of children usually stood.
Finnick stared straight ahead as Annie and Mags took their places just across the square. With the Capitol watching, he had to pretend they didn't exist, pretend that his heart wasn't pounding in his ears as District 4's escort stepped up to the stage, made his speech, and started for the the women's reaping bowl. Four slips of paper stuck to the bottom of the glass. The escort reached in, grabbed the first one that touched his fingers. Not Annie, not Mags, not Annie, not Mags—Finnick couldn't breathe as the escort stepped back to the microphone. Not Annie, not Annie. Please, not Annie.
"Annie Cresta!"
A sob burst from Annie's lips. She staggered backwards and landed in the grip of two Peacekeepers. Mags started after her, looking as if she wanted to say something, but a second group of Peacekeepers held her back as the others dragged Annie to the stage. The stood on either side of her, black gloves locked around her arms as she stood before the crowd, shuddering, weeping.
Finnick swayed, dizzy, sick to his stomach. He felt the bile rising up his throat, his head felt numb. He hardly heard his own name being called. It didn't matter anyways—as soon as he'd heard her name, he knew that he was going. When he didn't respond, the nearest Peacekeeper gave him a nudge, and Finnick blinked from his daze. He hurried to the stage before anyone else had the chance to volunteer. And he smiled for the cameras, waved into the lens, tried to ignore the looks of disgust coming from the crowd before him.
Their escort stepped back so that Finnick and Annie could shake hands, but Annie couldn't even look at him, and eventually the Peacekeepers pulled her into the Justice Building. Finnick followed close behind, and when the doors shut behind them, he called out her name. But the Peacekeepers were still pushing them forward, through the back of the building where a car was waiting to take them to the train station. "What the hell are you doing?" he demanded as he tried to twist from their grasp.
"We're under orders to take you straight to the train station," the Peacekeeper by his left ear informed him.
Finnick couldn't find the strength to protest any further. It's not as if he was expecting any of his family to suddenly drop into what little was left of his life and show him sympathy. But he had hoped to say goodbye to Mags. Still, he let the current of Peacekeepers carry him out to the car and tried to suppress the thought that he would probably never see her again.
The car ride took only minutes, with Peacekeepers flanking them on either side of their seats. The only sounds were that of Annie's strangled whimpers, and the occasional shift of a Peacekeeper's armor. They arrived at the station to find that the train was already waiting, the nearest set of doors gaped open, eager to swallow them. The Peacekeepers pushed them inside and the door closed between them. Then they turned away and headed off the station platform. They no longer needed to guard the Tributes—all exterior doors were automatically locked, and they wouldn't reopen until they arrived in the Capitol. There was no way off the train.
In the absence of cameras and spectators and Peacekeepers, Finnick rushed towards his love, "Annie. Annie!" He tried to catch her as she collapsed to her knees, sobbing anew. "Annie, listen to me," he pleaded. "I'm going to get you out of there. I'm not going to let you die." He tried to reach out and hold her as the promises tumbled off of his tongue one after the other. But she pushed him away, his words, his hands. Every attempt to comfort her only brought her more distress, for she knew that every promise he swore to her was another nail hammered into his coffin.
Finnick sat helplessly and watched her suffer. Then, the door connecting their car from the next opened, and he saw Mags hurrying to their side. "Mags?" He stared at her for a moment, and then it occurred to him—they might be Victors, but they still needed a Mentor, someone to stay in the Capitol and pull for sponsors, to instill hope in the betting pools. He wasn't sure how effective she'd be at it now, but he was nonetheless relieved to see her. Kneeling, she gathered Annie into her arms and rocked her. She looked to Finnick, and tears immediately sprung to his own eyes. He could smile for he camera, he could act brave for Annie, but in front of Mags, his masks only crumbled. He was distraught, scared. He didn't want to die. His head came to rest on Mags' other shoulder, and she held them both, her own tears slipping down her cheeks. The train began to move, and they sat together in a quivering knot, slick with tears.
Gradually, Annie found it harder and harder to breathe, until her sobs escalated into panic. When Mags could no longer calm her, she rummaged through the bag she'd left on the floor until she produced a small pill bottle. Tranquium. At times, it was the only thing that could calm Annie down. At the hospitals, they injected the stuff straight into her arm. She'd be out for days, and when she awoke, her mind would be so scrambled that she could barely string a sentence together. Annie had come to hate the stuff—the doctors had used it to keep her quiet and out of their concern, but she knew that the pills, much smaller, gentler doses, could help her breathe again, could help her sleep. So she held out a trembling hand for Mags' bottle. Finnick jumped up and retrieved a glass of water for her. She sipped at it before she swallowed the pills, and after. Mags continued to rock her until her breathing returned to normal and her head began to sink down into her chest.
"Do you want to sleep?" Finnick asked her quietly, and she nodded dazedly. He picked her up and carried her to the car designated for the female Tribute. He laid her down on the bed and draped a blanket over the mermaid-themed gown she'd been wrapped in for the reaping. By the time he had finished tucking her in, she was already out, tears still dampening her eyelashes as she slept.
Finnick returned to the other car to find Mags still sitting on the floor staring despondently at the wall. He helped her to her feet. "We should see who we're up against," his voice cracked over the words, but he didn't care. He dropped onto the nearby couch and turned on the TV to view the other District reapings. Over and over, they watched a parade of familiar faces reluctantly take their respective stage—the brother and sister Victors from one, two of the most popular Victors from two, the geniuses from three, Johanna Mason from seven, the closest thing Finnick had to a friend, all the way down to the new kids from twelve. They'd only just won their Games the year before, the first two people to walk out of one arena in the history of the Games. But now they were being sent back in to finish the job, because if anything was for certain, it was that only one Tribute was going to be alive by the end of this Quell. By the end of the entire broadcast, he had only reached one other conclusion: "There's no way this wasn't fixed."
Finnick stayed up for hours to watch experts and gamblers and citizens on the Capitol streets speculate who had the best chance of winning. People were ranking him high on the list of most likely winners; at least he had the satisfaction of knowing that his death was going to piss off a lot of people when they lost the money they'd bet on him. It was long after midnight by the time he finally cut off the TV and returned to Annie's room. He crawled into bed beside her and put his arms around her gingerly, sure that, with the help of the drugs, he wouldn't wake her. But just as he began to close his eyes, she spoke up, her voice hoarse and forlorn, "We should just kill ourselves…"
Finnick ran the thought through his exhausted brain before shaking his head against her hair, "They'd kill our families."
"We'd be dead," she told him. "It wouldn't matter to us anymore."
"What about Mags?"
Annie fell silent. There wasn't a sliver of relief in the world that was worth risking harm to Mags. She thought for another moment before speaking again, "What if we knew Mags would be safe?"
Finnick sighed, "Then I wouldn't want to feel it. We could take all of those tranquium pills. Then we'd just fall asleep, and we wouldn't wake up."
"Did Mags leave the bottle out?" Annie asked him.
"She took it with her."
"She knows us too well…"
Finnick pressed his lips to the back of Annie's hair. "Go back to sleep. You need to rest."
Annie's eyes fluttered shut, and she slept again. Finnick, however, couldn't bring himself to it, and eventually he gave up trying. Instead, he watched the shadows of trees outside rush past the window, watched the stars fade as they neared the city. And finally, he watched the train pass under the Capitol's welcome arch illuminated against the night sky, glittering and glamorous like the gates of Hell.