I .

"This is your chance to be somebody," Plutarch said, very quietly. He was extremely close to her, so close she could smell his cologne, which reminded her of a rose beaten with a well-oiled leather belt. "I don't have to tell you how important this is. This is your opportunity to become the most powerful woman in the world—you're our ringer. You're our kingmaker. What you say, it matters. You are the Mockingjay. Forget who you were before, that person never existed. You're Katniss Everdeen."

She looked at herself in the mirror and Katniss's face looked back. The face from the posters, the propaganda, the television, the advertisements. The face of the revolution. But this was not the fiery, war-torn girl who had sobbed on camera while cradling a bloodied Rue. Her expression was foreign—something lonely and confused, lost and aggressive at the same time. In all of the footage she saw of Katniss Everdeen, she never looked like this.

Plutarch rested a hand on her shoulder, almost fatherly, but there was a mild desperation in the pressure. Her heart twisted, skipping a beat, nerves jangling.

"I'm Katniss Everdeen," she whispered to her reflection. In her mind, she bid her old appearance—her old life, her former self—a small, sad farewell. She thought of a small girl with dark eyes and milk-white skin, kneeling to pick up broken porcelain. It wasn't so different, then, from the little girl who ate burnt bread in the rain. Her lashes lowered and she stood up, straightening her skirt somewhat awkwardly.

Plutarch's hand didn't move from her shoulder. "He's going to be abrasive," he told her gently, turning her around to straighten the brass Mockingjay pin on her lapel. "And the President is going to ask a lot of questions. I recommend you leave the talking to me. Let them take you in."

"Yes sir," she mumbled.

He clapped her on the shoulder and gave her a brief, tight smile that showed too many teeth and not enough heart. He was disappointed in her: she was used to knowing when people were disappointed.

"Don't call me sir."

For one brief, shining instant, Haymitch saw Katniss.

And heaven could forgive him for that, because the girl who walked through the door behind Plutarch was the mirror image. Every little detail was perfect. Her face, with the high cheekbones and pointed chin, the strong nose and large gray eyes. She had the raw, unrestrained beauty of an uncut diamond or a ploughed field, clear of makeup and free of worry. It was Katniss before the Hunger Games, before the District wars, before she had killed Coin. It was Katniss, scrubbed clean of any actions from the past few years.

In the long moment that he sat there, staring, Haymitch tried to convince himself it was Katniss. It had been over two months since he'd seen her last, and she had been raggedly withdrawing from morphling in that time. It was possible that Plutarch and his band of cronies had managed to set her on the right path, keep her hydrated and conscious long enough for the real Katniss to come back.

But that moment of blissful delusion only lasted long enough for his cynicism to take a deep breath. It wasn't Katniss—it was a copy, a fake, an actress who bore a striking resemblance. An exact resemblance, he told himself, because the devil was in the details. In this case, the devil was Plutarch. The Gamemaker who couldn't let go of the theatrics. The real Katniss didn't carry herself like that. The real Katniss wouldn't meekly follow behind Plutarch like a trained lapdog. The real Katniss wouldn't be standing—because as strong as she was, even she couldn't come out of that war in one piece.

"Plutarch, is this…?" President Paylor asked, rising out of her chair. She, too, was fixated by the Katniss impersonator who stood framed in the doorway.

The former Gamemaker didn't say anything, merely let Paylor draw her own conclusions. Haymitch saw that smug pomposity lingering in Plutarch's intelligent gaze—it was discreet, but it was there. Even half-drunk, Haymitch could tell. This was another one of Plutarch's Projects, another plan for manipulating his surroundings, another scheme to obsess over and plan every little detail.

"Pretty damn good lookalike," Haymitch grunted from the chair. Paylor swept her queerly sharp, intense gaze over to Haymitch and he saw the brief confusion. He knew it would work, then, if Paylor's military eyes were fooled. It would work, because Plutarch's Projects always worked. And it would work because the Gamemaker was equally bored and desperate. A perfect storm of creativity for him.

"Sit down," Plutarch ordered the girl quietly, and she obeyed. After a moment, Paylor followed, leaving Plutarch to prowl around the room, as usual.

"A lookalike," Paylor said, and her voice was grave. She looked much older suddenly, more tired and drawn—the lines developing around her eyes seemed to etch themselves deeper. "What are you proposing, Plutarch?"

"It's simple," Plutarch said lightly, "If we can't fix the Mockingjay, we replace her."

There was a long silence. All heads swiveled to the Katniss imposter, sizing her up. After a long moment, Haymitch burst out laughing.

The girl flinched. Paylor looked away. Plutarch seemed offended. But Haymitch couldn't stop himself—his ribs began to ache and still he laughed, bowing over the table, his whisky in grave danger of sloshing out of his glass. Replace her: replace Katniss, the girl on fire. Like she was some kind of marketable consumer doll which could just be swapped out for a newer, less defective model.

He petered out, finally subsiding to a few chuckles, before taking another sip. "Replace the Mockingjay," he repeated, and laughed. "Whoo, boy, Plutarch, I can't wait to hear how you're gonna explain that."

"She's not going to wake up, Haymitch," Plutarch answered, and there was a bite of steel in his words. "You keep denying it, but postponing the inevitable isn't going to work. If you want to drown yourself in wine and let the world collapse in on itself, be my guest. But you're the cornerstone to this. If we don't have you, then it all falls apart."

He had let defensiveness creep into his voice for the last few words, and it amused Haymitch to no end. "Go ahead, go ahead, I'll be quiet," Haymitch said, waving Plutarch on. "Tell us how you're going to convince the Districts, the Capitol, Peeta, and the rest of the world that Katniss Everdeen is back in fighting shape."

Plutarch resumed pacing. "It's not going to be simple," he admitted. "But this is the best solution I could come up with. Katniss is in no shape to perform her duties as the Mockingjay, when we need her most desperately. These next few years—next decade, really—is going to be critical for the development of Panem. We're in that sweet spot of not wishing to repeat the mistakes of the past, but if we don't nip it in the bud now, everything's going to fall apart. The Districts and the Capitol citizens are already breaking out into spotty skirmishes all over the place; there's a vacuum that needs to be filled. They need to be reminded of why they revolted in the first place. Why they all came together."

"They need Katniss," Paylor mused. "I see."

"And with respect to Katniss, she is in no condition to go around uniting people," Plutarch said. "This way, the burden of being the face of a revolution is off of her shoulders. She can have all the time she needs to…recover."

"Which she will," Haymitch broke in, raising a glass and pointing it at Plutarch, "And when she does, you're going to have a pair of identical twins running around."

"I'm confident that if Katniss recovers fully from her injuries—"

"When she recovers fully," Haymitch interrupted, eyes flashing.

There was a soft pause, pregnant with pity. Poor Haymitch, said the silence in a condescending tone, there he goes again, living in his world of delusion.

"Yes, of course," Plutarch said carefully. "When Katniss recovers, she would doubtless appreciate her…anonymity. I can offer her that. If I know Katniss, then I know she does not want to be a symbol of hope and peace for much longer—she wants to live a private life, alone, and not be hounded by the press and the civilians for the rest of her life."

He circled around once more and then stopped behind the girl's chair. "This gives us a chance to keep the Districts united, to keep the Capitol citizens alive, and make sure that things stay on track. We need someone to make public appearances, to visit hospitals, to kiss babies, talk to soldiers. The people need a hero, not just a leader. They've had enough of legislation and governments telling them how to live. They need a hero to tell them what to live for."

"And you think she can do that?" Paylor said simply.

"With the proper training, yes."

"How do you propose she receives this training?" Paylor queried, leaning back in her chair.

Plutarch took a breath. "With my assistance, of course. But the burden of the training would have to come down upon Haymitch."

"What now?" Haymitch said, sitting up. "Just hold on—"

"Of the people who can be trusted, you know her best," the Gamemaker said evenly. "You built her into what she was. What she is. You, Haymitch, turned Katniss into the Mockingjay. You can do it again."

"Katniss turned herself into the Mockingjay," Haymitch snarled, awake and venomous, leaning forward in his seat. "You think you can just slap some surgery onto a random girl, get her to say a few pretty speeches, and things are gonna be all patched up, nice 'n pretty. That's not how it works. Do you realize the implications of this? If this gets out—if people find out you have the real Mockingjay strapped to a bed for her own safety—they'll tear us apart. You're askin' me to deceive the whole world, to make some kid into a martyr."

Plutarch smiled thinly. "You've done it before, Haymitch. A dozen times before."

At this, Haymitch lapsed into grumbling, uneasy silence. Paylor tucked a strand of coarse hair behind her ear and then cleared her throat. "If Haymitch will train her, then we should move forward. You're right. A Mockingjay is needed, and sometimes…sometimes, heroes need to be created."

All eyes turned towards the girl in the chair, the lookalike of Katniss Everdeen.

"All right," Haymitch said at last. "All right, yeah. Fine. I'll try. But if this all goes down, if it all comes crashing around your ears, then I'm outta here on the first train, got it?"

Plutarch's narrow smile flitted again. "Got it."

I always return, invariably, to this fandom and this ship. This is an expansion of my one-shot, duplicity, which is unrelated to this work but definitely inspired by the idea. I always wanted to expand on the concept of a created Katniss and what Panem would look like after the war, and of course, more Aberdeen angst. -Nylex