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call-me-strega · 2 months ago

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How to Become a Step-Dad in 5 Easy Steps: chp. 7 (Interlude: Life According to Ellie)

first, prev, next, lore, ao3

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We interrupt your regularly scheduled program for a peak at the world through Ellie's eyes.

In which I take liberties with canon and give you a peak at Ellie's backstory.

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Her earliest memories include floating.

Back when she couldn't open her eyes just yet and understand she was in a vat of liquid.

Those days are hazy. She doesn't remember much from them. Not that there was much to remember in the first place.

The most she has of that time are these cloudy impressions of a man's voice, disappointed and begrudging.

Awareness slowly crept into her, her mind filled with basic data copied over from her blueprint. Although she didn't know it at the time, her barely functioning mind wondered if that floating feeling was how it felt to fly.

She knows now that the freeing sensation of flying is not quite the same.

But a small part of her loves taking baths and going swimming. She likes to lean back, her ears submerged muffling the world, and her limbs slightly fanned out.

Sometimes, if she closes her eyes and slows her breath, she can call back that floating sensation from when everything was easy because she wasn't enough of a person to know how hard the world could be.

She remembers how nice he'd been at first.

He held her by the shoulders and gave her first name: Danielle.

He taught her everything she knew about the world: science, mechanics, ecto-biology, and all the things in her head she couldn't explain like NASA or school.

He told her place in the world: by his side. Her role was to be there for him. She was to support him, and in turn, he'd take care of her.

She was meant to be his family.

He said she was his daughter. Told her to call him dad.

And she did.

She believed it when he said he cared. She thought it was like those impressions of emotions that carried over from her blueprint. (A man who made mistakes, who was scary at times, but ultimately, who cared.)

In hindsight, maybe that's why it hurt so much when she realized it was a lie.

She remembers her intimate familiarity with death.

It was more than just a part of her nature. It was a constant presence.

She remembers how he used to invite her to help him in the lab. How he'd trust her to push buttons or hold important materials. She remembers how she watched helplessly as he spent countless nights in frustration, trying and failing again and again to create another clone.

A brother for her, he claimed.

She watched him face loss after loss. Growing increasingly desperate after each new attempt dissolved away in bubbles of green. The first time she'd seen it happen she'd felt sick to her stomach. She'd wanted to cry, but he had needed her more then. So she let him train her, get his frustrations out with a spar.

It would reassure him, he had said, if he could ensure she could protect herself. That she was stronger than her brothers. That she could beat anyone who got in his their way.

She remembers sitting in front of the cloning chambers after he'd gone back up for the night and finally crying. Letting herself silently grieve all the brothers she would never know.

Perhaps it was that frustration that led her to believe that the panic he had shown the first time she began destabilizing was genuine concern.

Perhaps that's why she believed him when he said the only way to save her was with DNA samples from her blueprint: Daniel.

Danielle remembers meeting Daniel, or rather Danny, for the first time. At first, he'd been confused, troubled, by her presence. But despite his frustrations, he was kind. He listened to her. They shared a kinship she'd only imagined having before with her brothers.

He gave her a nickname to match his own: Dani

She remembers thinking how he was everything.

Danny was her cure. Her blueprint. Her namesake. Her key to finally having a stable brother. The origin of all the thoughts and feelings she didn't quite understand. The embodiment of all that he had wanted her to be and a reminder of everything she wasn't.

And after being double-crossed and tossed aside, Danny somehow became even more.

Her "cousin".

Her savior.

Her liberator.

Her protector.

Perhaps one of the only two people in the world who genuinely cared for her at the time.

She remembers how much he cared. All the ways he tried to protect her.

The way he let her go.

Let her fly off into the night because he knew she needed to find herself. To be untethered. To experience the world and learn. To never be chained or used like that again because something deep within her would not allow it. He wanted her to stay but let her go.

She remembers his promise to always be there for her.

And she believed him.

She's glad she did.

Dani has memories of traveling the world.

Of exotic locales and exciting adventures.

She remembers the hunger and loneliness that came with independence. The nights she sought out shelter or aid and the cruelty of those who denied it to her. She remembers the faces of strangers who'd lean on each other because they had to but would leave in an instant for something better.

But she also remembers the joy of freedom. The kindness of strangers whose hearts were bigger than their budgets. Those who gave freely without expecting anything in return. Of families forged by experience who often offered her a place to return to.

She often turned them down. She already had a place to return to if she ever wished.

Danny reached out to check on her from time to time. So did Val and the others. They kept her updated. She remembers feeling a surging warmth in her chest each time they assured Dani they kept space for her in their lives.

She remembers visiting on the day they assigned her birthday (Danny's half birthday). She recalls getting a phone to stay in touch and a camera to take photos. She remembers getting hugs, and cake, and an offer to live with Jazz or Danny at one of their places.

She remembers feeling loved.

She remembers when she stopped hearing from Danny briefly. She decided to go back for a visit. To check on her family them.

She remembers that's when things changed.

She remembers being angry.

The Idiots in White had been bothering Danny for a while now. He'd been successfully avoiding them at every turn, undermining their operations, and keeping both civilians and ghosts safe. Ugh- why did these guys have to plague them so much?

She remembers being disappointed in herself.

How could she have let them get a jump on her? Those two-bit losers weren't good for much except destruction. Figures they'd resorted to ambushing her in a forest. Another thing she'd inherited from Danny was his inability to let things lie, so when she heard a cry from the forest she decided to check it out.

It had been a trap.

The wails had been from some poor ectopus they'd been torturing with a ghost trap. When she'd gone to free it, they jumped out and hit her from behind with their weapons. She recalls one of them saying they'd been hoping to catch Phantom, but she'd do. Through all her anger and annoyance a small part of her was relieved.

'At least Danny was safe' she remembered thinking.

When she woke up, Dani was in a small box of a containment unit that was keeping her in ghost form.

She remembers being scared.

She couldn't turn back. She was stuck. They refused to give her food. Dani was dead, they said. An ectoplasmic being that wasn't even truly sentient. What was the use of wasting food on her when she should be able to sustain herself with ectoplasm?

But she's not a full ghost.

Heck- she's not even a proper halfa!

She's a clone, a Mirrorborn.

She can't generate enough ecto without supplemental energy from an outside source. Usually, that'd be food, another ecto-entity, heck even a particularly ecto-dense area like Amity. But she didn't have any of those things right now.

She only had herself.

She remembers cursing her faulty biology. Danny wouldn't have these problems, nor would any full ghost. Staying in her ghost form ate up her energy faster than she could create ectoplasm to sustain herself while trapped in this cell. She couldn't even use her powers to try and escape it would drain her too fast. At this rate she'd- she'd destabilize again.

She remembered trying to reassure herself. Val knew she had been coming, she'd know something was up when Dani didn't check in. She'd tell the others. Her family Danny and his friends would come looking for her.

She wrapped her arms around her knees and rocked herself, the way she used to on those nights alone in the lab, muttering to herself that they would come.

She remembers growing weaker. Feeling sluggish and heavy as her body began to droop. Her sagging skin turned gray and green as she slowly lost sensation in her limbs. Then, just as the panic and despair began to set in, she heard the alarms and loud crashes.

She remembers the surge of emotion that coursed through her as voices approached. Two unknowns, one that belonged to him, and one more.

She remembers the flood of relief she felt.

It was Danny.

He had come for her. He'd teamed up with whoever he needed to in order to come get her. He was there.

She remembered his voice: Hard with an icy rage, trembling with fear for her, yet confident and reassuring, telling her it would be alright.

She had believed him.

Perhaps that's why even as his eyes grew wild, even as he desperately called her name Dani? Dani! Danielle, come on! Keep your eyes open! Just keep them open Dani- please! Please, Dani! DANIELLE! ELLIE! she still let her eyes fall closed.

Because she trusted him.

She remembers thinking how, even with an ice core, Danny's arms were so warm.

She remembers trying to reach out a melting hand, her destabilization only partially slowed thanks to ecto-dejecto, to caress his cheek. Using the last of her energy to pry her eyes open and give him her patented mischievous smile. She had tried to comfort him.

Dani remembers her last words to him: "Thank you."

Thank you for coming. Thank you for being so warm. Thank you for crying for me. Thank you for caring.

Thank you.

For allowing Dani's last moments to be filled with love.

Danny held a small orb weakly glowing a pale blue color. He clutched it to his torso as tears burned down his skin like acid. He phased the orb into his chest, nestling it close to his heart. He turned in a feral rage towards the agents rushing up behind him. His grief-filled eyes were glowing a toxic green. His canines elongated into fangs that curled into a snarl. His aching hands willed his gloves to become gauntlets that accommodated piercingly sharp claws. His aura grew cold enough to burn. He tilted his head back(this wasn't the first time he'd done it). He took a deep breath, (and he'd do it a thousand more for her). And then, Phantom Wailed.

She doesn't remember retreating into her core.

But she does remember being inside of it.

She remembers calloused hands that held her close.

She remembers a gentle voice singing her lullabies.

She remembers soft lips that kiss her carefully.

She remembers a familiar warm embrace, their cores vibrating in harmony.

She remembers the whispers that give her her next name: Ellie.

She's Ellie now.

She slowly grew stronger and she remembered all the things Dani knew. She looked over her knowledge and memories and then thought back to the man who cared for her so diligently. Maybe Dani hadn't known. Or maybe she had and had been scared to acknowledge it.

But she was Ellie now.

Dani knew that Danny could be scary. That Danny made mistakes. That Danny tried to be there for her in whatever ways he could. That he undeniably cared for her.

And as Ellie mulled over this knowledge, she came to a conclusion.

'This,' she realized. 'This is what a real father is like.'

And when she had finally regained enough strength to emerge from her core, albeit with her mind and body now matching the age of her core, the first thing she did was seek him.

The first word she spoke as Ellie, her arms out stretched toward him, unmistakable glee in her voice, had been,

"Daddy!"

Danny held her the young girl who'd called out to him. She was so small. Smaller than she'd been before. Her mind was younger too. But, Danny? He was older now. He had some money now. He had independence from his parents and had reliable allies, both in the Realms and in the mortal plane now. So as he held this young girl in his arms, one who reach for him and called him her daddy, he made a resolution. 'This time,' he promised himself. 'This time I'll take care of you.'

Ellie's father had a lot to do even after she woke up. She stayed with Frosty in the Far Frozen while he, Sammy, Tuck, Jazz, and Val dealt with some legal matters in the mortal plane.

Ellie would sometimes get visitors, like the young-old boy-man who smelled like ozone and the old guy with the smokey aura that helped her dad rescue her. When she was a little better her father would take her with him. Sometimes they'd go back to Amity, other times he'd leave her with a sitter while he was off doing some sort of research. She spent time learning about the realms with them. Pandy, Dora, Frosty, and Clockpa were her favorites.

Then one day her dad introduced her to a new ghost, someone she'd never met before.

She was a Neverborn.

A City Spirit.

She was a tall woman. Her hair was an inky black bob that just brushed the string of pearls around her neck. Her skin was a splattery mix of black and white. She wore leather armor around her chest with a bat emblazoned on it. Attached to her shoulders was a short asymmetric cape that's right side ended near her thigh while the left stopped just below her hip. On her lower half, she wore a black sheath skirt with a slit in the side coming just above her knee. It's fabric had a slight multicolored sheen to it, almost reminiscent of an oil spill or a crow's feathers. These were joined at her hips by an art deco belt of interlocking diamonds attached to a buckle with a beautiful geometric design, that had numerous firearms attached to it. In her hands, she held a pike, one longer than Pandora's xyston spear. Her aura was one that was old and well acquainted with misery, yet she felt almost motherly.

She introduced herself as Lady Gotham and offered them tea.

Dad explained that he wanted them to live in Lady Gotham's city. Gotham was rich in both ectoplasm and magic, which would help sustain her even when did wasn't around. Her aura was near ancient and could mask theirs for at least a decade or two. She could protect them, hide them. She could offer them a safe place to live their lives.

She told them her qualifications. She was a well-established spirit in the realms with centuries of experience governing her haunt and exerting power over the mortal plane while still in the Realms. She had layers of protections, including a reputation most mortals wouldn't dare trifle with. Additionally, she had several Knights protecting her mortal haunt, all of varying liminality. Her greatest pride resting in one of the legends Ellie had grown fond of. (Ghosts were prolific storytellers and notorious gossips.)

The tale of Gotham's Red Prince was well known within the realms. One of her knights, whom she loved like a son, resurrected a revenant. As an Avenger. Gotham's claim on him was the strongest among her knights and her love for him was just as great. Many a denizen of the realms has heard of his drive to avenge the unavenged, to bring justice and peace. Many admire him greatly. In fact, Ellie's pretty sure Sidney and GW are part of his fan club.

Danny had also done his own research on the city, he explained to her. Once he had deemed it acceptable and shared his findings with the others. After receiving a seal of approval from the rest of Team Phantom he had come to her.

It would be her home too, her dad said. She deserved a say in it.

Ellie looked back at Lady Gotham once. Then, at the research and photos. And then, she looked back to her dad and nodded.

She believed Gotham could become a home, she told him.

Ellie remembers that the first few days were hectic.

Dad was running around like a headless chicken trying to get everything in order. They went shopping, Dad got his job, they moved in with help from Auntie Jazz and Uncle Tuck. Auntie Sammy and Auntie Val couldn't leave Amity unprotected so only the two of them had been there. Auntie Jazz had helped Dad organize and Uncle Tuck set up their documents and security system. They both had to go back after a few days though, each having their own respective internships to get back to.

Ellie was happy though. She got her own room, she already made friends with a nice girl named Sasha, and the air here tasted a bit spicy with all the magic and ecto mixing together.

It was nice. She and her dad finally felt normal.

Ellie remembers meeting Jason for the first time.

They'd been living in Gotham for about a week so far. Daddy was on the phone, talking to him, while trying to open the door when they both sense an ecto-entity enter the hall. A prominent aura filled the hall. It's presence was commanding, but it felt comforting too like fire and wood smoke. It held a sense of rightness and Ellie could tell it was probably whatever ecto-entity had claimed the Haunt nearby.

She looked down the hall and her eyes met a pair of blue-green eyes. She looked curiously at the man, quickly realizing he was at the center of the aura that fluctuated with emotion in reaction to her dad's conversation.

A revenant, she concluded. A tad surprised they had run into one so quickly.

And then they kept running into him.

And Ellie couldn't help but think he was pretty great.

Jason always made yummy food for them. He was strong and picked her up easily. He always listened when she was talking and even asked questions. He played with her and read to her and made her feel better when she was sad.

Ellie remembered the day her dad had collapsed and how scared she'd been. She remembers the scary look on his face when he had come to get them. But he wanted to help, he had come. So she called him her uncle, that way Sasha's mom would let him through. She remembers how he'd taken them home and looked after her and her dad. She remembers feeling something warm grow in her chest as he awkwardly agreed to her claims that she'd move in with him.

She remembers how he sat next to her in the hall the day she locked herself out. How he comforted her and told her about the mistakes he made too. It had made her feel better. If someone as cool and nice as Jason made mistakes, then maybe it was okay. Maybe she wasn't a failure.

Now, as Ellie lays in her bed, she thinks back to tonight. She thinks about the gift Jason gave her.

Maybe he thought it was just a pencil case but to Ellie it was proof.

Proof of how nice Jason was. Proof he listened and knew she liked aircrafts. Proof he thought of them even when they weren't around. Proof the he cared. Cared enough to do something like this without needing to be asked.

She smiled into her pillow and thought back to her dad's smile. Recently she noticed the different smiles she barely saw before making their way onto her dad's face. She saw them a lot more now when Jason was around. If Jason made her dad happy, then she was glad to keep seeing more of him. She was happy to be able to claim him as family.

She clutched her blanket tight, and she allowed herself to drift off, thinking that maybe, just maybe, she wouldn't mind if one day she could call him something other than her uncle.

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That all for now folks! No pressing notices but please feel free to hit me up in the comments. I welcome feedback and constructive criticism!

#dc x dp #dp x dc #how to become a step-dad #hbsd #HBSD #dead on main #ellie fenton #kid ellie #ellie-centric chapter #interlude #whats in a name #ellie has had a lot of names #jason todd #danny fenton

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3d-wifey · 3 months ago

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INTERLUDE

| Interlude | | Finnick |

He doesn’t remember much from those early years. Finnick’s first, and last, memories of his mother come in flashes, like glimpses of the sun blinking on the ocean’s surface—fleeting, there and gone. Moments stitched together with threads he’s held onto for so long that some of them have frayed.

He was three, maybe four.

There were summers by the water, his mother cheering him on as he splashed and kicked—learning to swim, her laugh loud enough to echo across the shore. He’d wade in, stumbling in the shallows, and she’d be there, not in the water with him but just close enough to watch.

“Go on, Finnick,” she’d call out, laughing as he fought the gentle push of the waves, his little arms flailing in the sunlight. And she’d sit on the rocks and clap, calling out “Almost, Finn! Just a little farther!” as he tried to paddle back toward her, legs churning until he couldn’t keep his head above the water any longer. She was there, always there to scoop him up and lift him high, the salt drying on her freckled arms, her wet hair dark and wild as seaweed. She had big blue eyes, just like his, but they were always, always sad.

When he would make it himself, swim to and fro without her help, he’d turn to see her there, cheering him on, her smile so wide it made her cheeks dimple. He remembers being so sure then, remembers thinking that he was as powerful as the sea.

At home, there was her humming—a quiet song threading through the dusk-lit room as she sat in her chair by the window, knitting needles in her hands, moving as surely as waves. He’d rest beside her, wrapped in the sounds of thread slipping, her voice lulling him to sleep, her fingers brushing his curls when she thought he was already gone. Her hands were rough and calloused, familiar as the salt air. He’d watch her work until his eyes closed, the needles casting small, sharp shadows on her cheeks and the blue beneath her eyes.

He remembers his father returning from sea every few weeks, how the house would fill with warmth and his father’s laughter. He remembers the way his mother’s face would light up, like the sun breaking through a storm. He’d throw Finnick up into the air, higher than anyone else, his big hands rough from working the boats but gentle as they caught him. Finnick’s arms flailing and legs kicking while he shrieked in delight.

He’d always bring gifts from his trips. “Look what I brought back just for you,” his father would say, handing him something smooth and polished—a shell, a carved fish, the tail of a gull’s feather, a strange charm that he’d say was to protect him.

He’d be half-swallowed in his hug, pressing his small face into his father's shirt as he asked him, “How’s my boy?” He doesn’t remember what he would answer, only the feeling of being whole again, and feeling, for a while, like everything was as it should be. The way he’d reach out a hand to Finnick’s mother and give her a smile that made her eyes look a little less sad.

But she slept so much, his mother. More on the days his father was home, when he’d take Finnick out on the boat or carry him to market, his little arms looped tight around his neck. She was always tired. The older he got, the more he noticed it, the way she’d linger in bed on the mornings his father was home, only stirring to pull Finnick close under the blankets, holding him like he might drift away if she let go. Sometimes she’d hum him back to sleep, and other times, she’d just lie there, arms around him, her breathing so soft he’d wonder if she was really there.

Sometimes, he'd snuggle close, whispering stories to keep her entertained while her gaze drifted somewhere far, far away. He’d tell her about the sandcastles he built on the shore or the strange shapes he saw in the clouds. She would smile, faintly, a ghost of a thing that flickered in and out of the room. “That’s wonderful, Finn,” she’d murmur, her voice soft as a lullaby, and he’d keep talking, filling the quiet between her breaths.

Then, one night, she woke him up.

She woke him in the dark, her hand gentle on his shoulder, her eyes softer than he’d ever seen them—tugging him from his bed that he’d only just started sleeping in by himself, whispering his name, her voice gentle. So gentle, he can still hear it in the early morning tide if he listened for it. He never does.

The world was bathed in silver moonlight, shadows stretching long and thin, and she was there, holding his hand.

The night air was cool as she led him barefoot down the path toward the old couple’s house at the edge of the village. He didn’t understand, not really, but did what he always did. He took her hand and followed, stepping through the sand with her. The rough grains pressing between his toes as he swung her hand, talking about nothing and everything.

Chattering sleepily about the stars, the patterns he’d spotted, and how high his father had tossed him when he’d come home last. About the shells he found, the way the tide sounded like it’d tell him its secrets if he listened close enough. He doesn’t remember what he talked about exactly—he was always talking when she was quiet—but he remembers the sound of her breathing, steady and close, as they made their way to the old couple’s house. She listened, nodding, her smile barely visible in the moonlight, soft and no dimples in sight.

She knelt beside him on their neighbor’s front step, folding herself down until her blue eyes were level with his. She said something to him, her mouth moving around words he’s never been able to remember no matter how many times he tries, only that they made her eyes glassy with a sadness he didn’t understand. Then she pulled him close, hugging him, a long, quiet embrace that he tried to wriggle out of, impatient to go home. But she held on, her hands sliding down from his shoulders to his hands. It felt like it would go on for forever. He wishes it had.

He remembers her chin resting on his head, her fingers pressing into his back, holding him so close it was like she wanted to memorize him. She said something else to him, but the words are lost, fading into the sounds of the night and the rush of the ocean nearby.

Then she let go, and he watched her walk away, her figure fading into the darkness, swallowed by the night.

The next morning, the old woman held him in her lap, murmuring to him words he didn’t understand about Poseidon and “the sea’s calling.”

He stayed with them for days, maybe weeks, maybe even months. He’s not certain how long the old couple watched him for—doesn’t remember when he stopped expecting his mother to come back for him.

His father came back from sea not long after, though it, like everything, felt like forever, like he had spent years in that little house, waiting by the window, looking for her down by the shore.

When his father came to get him, he didn’t look like himself. His face was drawn, his eyes hollow, and he held Finnick close—closer than he’d ever held him before. He asked his father where she’d gone, why she hadn’t come back. He pulled him into his arms, whispering against his hair, “The sea took her, Finnick.” That was all he said. All he would ever say.

For years, he believed him. He thought she must’ve gone to work on the water like his father did, her hands lifting nets from the ocean, pulling fish from the deep, going to places he’d see one day when he was older. He waited for her, so sure that she’d come back when the tides turned, arms open, eyes bright again.

But she never did.

He told himself she’d be back, that maybe she’d gone far away but would return with gifts, with seashells or stories of strange fish and far-off places. She’d come back someday.

But when he turned seven, some kids at school told him the truth. They laughed as they said it, their voices sharp as coral, taunting as they whispered what they’d overheard from their parents.

Your mother walked into the sea, they said. She left you behind.

They talked and talked about the night she’d walked into the water and kept going, farther and farther out, until the waves had taken her under.

He didn’t say anything, didn’t tell them they were wrong. He just felt something crack inside, a tiny fracture that spread through him, leaving an emptiness he had never known before.

He remembers the hot, sick feeling in his chest as he ran home, the words catching in his mind like shards of glass. He didn't want to believe them. He didn’t want to imagine the dark, icy pull of the water, the way it must have swallowed her whole. But that night, he looked into the mirror and saw his own eyes staring back, sad and blue as the sea, and he understood. He understood that this was the closest he’d get to seeing his mother again.

And he never asked his father about her again. He kept it all inside, this hollow, gnawing grief, and learned to carry it the way she carried him—to keep it safe, to hold it close, a memory wrapped in silence.

He knows he looks like her.

Not from his own memory, not even from photos, but from the mouths of people who knew her. Finnick isn’t sure who he really is; he’s only ever known himself through her reflection. The way they’d tilt their heads, smiling softly, every time he laughed too easily or went quiet and lost himself in thought. “Your mother used to do that,” they’d say, watching him with sad eyes he learned to ignore.

But he knows he looks most like her when he cries. That’s how he remembers her best—those blue eyes heavy with something he was too young to name. He knows it in the way he sees strangers’ faces soften, how their pity shifts as they look into his sad, sad eyes and see not him, but the grief his mother left behind.

He can feel her there, lingering in the corners of his gaze, as if her sadness seeped into him and stained him like a watermark he can never quite wash away.

His walk, his laugh, the way he cocked his head—he wondered if any of it was his own or if it all belonged to her. He worked hard to make sure the rest of him was hers, too. He let the sun bleach his hair light, coaxing it toward the same dusky blond his mother’s used to be, the kind that hovered between brown and gold, and he’d walk along the shore until his skin took on the same sunburnt freckling that she had. He’d turn to the sea, hoping the waves would tell him how to hold himself like her, hoping the tide could bring her back even if only in the small ways he carried her.

People used to tell him this, too—how much he was like her, how he must carry so much of her inside. But what was he supposed to say to that? How was he supposed to feel? How much of me is her? he would think, feeling hollowed out by all the ways he could never quite tell where she ended and he began. She haunted him, and yet he clung to her memory, the way his father clung to the sea. He hated it—he hated how much of himself wasn’t his own, but what else did he have of her?

He loved her, yes, but sometimes it made him angry. He hated that his whole life had been spent waiting for a mother who had chosen to leave him, and for a father who drifted off whenever he felt the pull of the ocean.

Maybe his father was angry too. Maybe that’s why he kept leaving Finnick behind, alone in that little house with its cold, empty rooms—like something he’d left in the sand to be worn away by the waves. Maybe that’s why he left him to scrape together dinner on his tiptoes, left him to the elderly couple down the road who’d feed him soup and pat his head with hands too frail to lift him.

Maybe that’s why he’d let him wait in the sand for hours, sitting on the shore with his small fists clutching the shells and stones his father used to bring back from sea, hoping he’d come home and bring his mother back with him. But the years went on, and Finnick stopped waiting for him, stopped waiting for anyone.

The comparisons—a fact of his life, a rhythm, as steady as the tides—they stopped, too.

It all stopped once he won his Games.

After that, people stopped saying he was like her, stopped comparing him to the woman with the soft voice and the sad eyes.

Sweet, poor Finnick, they’d whisper with pity, shaking their heads as if he were something fragile, something broken. That Odair boy, practically an orphan. And he understood because the person he became in those Games—that wasn’t his mother.

People no longer told him he looked like her. No, they couldn’t see her in him any more—not in Finnick, who had lied. Finnick, who had cheated. Finnick, who killed to survive. And he understood why. His mother had never had a violent bone in her body, and would never have raised a weapon. She hadn’t survived, hadn’t done the things he had to in the arena. They couldn’t imagine her in his place, fighting and clawing her way back. And he wondered, sometimes, if that’s what kept her from surviving. If maybe she’d still be here if she’d been able to do what he did.

And sometimes he’d get so angry at her. He’d think, how could she leave her child? Her husband? They needed her. He needed her. And he hadn’t been enough to keep her here, not even her own son, her little boy with her blue eyes and her sad, sad smile. He hated her for it, sometimes, and other times, he just felt hollow, the way he’d felt when they told him he looked just like her. That she walked into the sea. That the ocean and its waves had more of a claim over Finnick’s mother than he did.

And sometimes, that thought makes him angry too. Angry at her. Because sometimes, he thought she was the one who was weak. That if she’d had it in her to fight, she might have stayed. Stayed for his father, for him. If she could have fought her own sadness, she might have been there to protect him. Sometimes, Finnick wonders if she would still be alive if she’d had that edge, that brutal instinct he learned in the arena. Maybe it wasn’t his fault he wasn’t enough to anchor her, maybe it was something in her that let her drift away, too light to stay.

And sometimes, when it was quiet, he’d wonder if he would have ended up like her if he hadn’t fought, if he hadn’t been forced to harden himself. Forced to tear out all those soft parts of him and leave them buried in that arena. He knows what it’s like to be carried away by something you can’t control, a force so much bigger than you. Sometimes, he thinks the Capitol is his ocean, dragging him into its depths, forcing him to fight for every breath. The Games hardened him in a way she never had the chance to be hardened, and in that way, they will never be the same. In those moments, when the anger faded and the silence settled over him, he’d think, maybe, just maybe, he could understand her.

As he grew older, his face changed, his shoulders grew broad and his jaw sharpened, his reflection growing more and more like his father’s. His voice deepened, his steps grew heavy and certain. He started tanning instead of freckling, and his eyes developed a green tint.

No more being called that Odair boy.

Instead, he’s just Finnick. Capitol Darling, Charming Career.

His mother only exists in faded memories, now, in the way he looked as a child—soft, sad, open to the world. His baby photos, where he’s her twin.

But she lingers, too, in the way he looks after those he cares for, in the fierce way he defends them or softens his voice. She’s there in the way he hates being told what to do. He sees her hands in his own as he holds others tight in his arms, just like she used to hold him. He whispered stories to keep them safe, telling them everything and nothing, like he had with her all those years ago, her memory flickering at the edges of every word. She lives on in those small rebellions, in his quick temper, in the way he loathed authority.

She was there in the way he always felt the sea pulling at him, just out of reach.

She lived on in the curve of his lips, the strength of his hands, and in the depths of his sad, sad sea glass eyes—the ones that stared into the ocean like they could see something just beyond the horizon.

When he looked in the mirror, he sometimes saw her still. Not her face, but her spirit. And that was something no one could take from him.

| Interlude | | You |

You grew up in a place where life is as fragile as the cotton plants that grow on the outer reaches of the district—shrouded by the shadows cast by the Capitol. But life was tougher too, with roots that burrow deep into the soil of Eleven.

Your earliest memories are filled with the scent of Earth, of wild herbs, and the way your mama's voice carried through your little shack as she cooked, singing songs she said her mama used to sing. You don’t have many memories untouched by death or hunger, but the ones you do have are stitched together by the voices of your people, by the warmth they’d create when the cold nights set in.

Life is hard, yes, but it is shared.

Death finds you early in Eleven. It’s woven into the air, in the soil you turn with calloused hands, in the empty spaces left by people who once sat beside you by the evening fire. But it comes down like a hammer for those who work the hardest.

Mr. Laramie is the first person you know to die, your friend’s daddy. You’re four or five, and it’s the first time death really takes hold in your mind. Mr. Laramie, a good, quiet man, his skin worn and cracked from the sun, his back bent with years in the fields. He tried to steal food for his family, just a couple of tomatoes, they said.

When they caught him in the act, they made a show of it, a warning for everyone watching. They dragged him into the rows, pressed a gun to his temple, and left him there in the dirt like a broken tool, his blood soaking the earth he spent his life tending. You’re there when they deliver the news to his son. You remember your friend’s face afterward, eyes empty, shoulders slumped, the wooden toy yall were playing with still clutched in his little hands.

It was the first time you really understood what hunger could drive a person to do.

Death is everywhere in Eleven. You were born into it, welcomed by it like an old friend. Even on the day your mama brought you into the world, someone else was leaving it—a neighbor, an old woman a few doors down who finally slipped away after years of sickness and hunger. “She went quiet in her sleep,” they told your mama, as if slipping away in silence was the most anyone could hope for.

You’re six the first time you see someone die, up close and too real. The girl is barely older than you, her hands blue from the cold, her breath shallow. It’s winter, the frost settles on everything, and the crops are stunted, thin, a poor harvest even for Eleven. She’s bundled in all the clothes she has, but it’s not enough. She collapses in the middle of the rows, and no one has the strength to lift her. They just leave her there, a thin frame curled among the plants, her mouth open, her eyes staring at nothing. You don’t cry. You barely feel it. Death is just another shadow here, another thing to step around. And you learn early on that tears don’t bring anyone back.

But the first time you do cry, the first time something in you breaks because of death, is the day they hang your daddy.

Your daddy was tall and strong. You remember him best as someone who held his head high, even when it wasn’t safe to do so. His voice calm and steady as he taught you how to slip through the shadows of the district’s boundaries to forage wild herbs and roots. He’d pick up a leaf and explain, “This one can ease a fever. Remember that.” Your small fingers would mimic his, brushing over the leaves and flowers as you learned how to heal wounds and ease hunger with the plants that grew wild in your corner of the world. But your daddy didn’t only know plants; he knew something deeper, a fire you couldn’t yet understand.

He was part of the underground, something they called the Resistance—a quiet movement of whispers, songs sung in fields, messages passed under cover of night. He’d tell you stories about freedom, about how one day you’d all be able to live without the watchful eyes of the Peacekeepers. Whispering truths about the Capitol that most dared not say out loud, his words carried in secret meetings held late at night when you’d listen from your bed, holding your breath to catch each word.

You’re young—freshly eight—when they take him. Peacekeepers came to your shack, their white uniforms gleaming in the midday sun, their faces hidden behind visors that caught your reflection like a mirror. They dragged your daddy out into the square, forced him up on the platform, and made the whole district watch. It wasn’t just him. They had a whole line of people you recognized all lined up at the steps of the gallows with guns at their backs. Friends and neighbors, faces you’ve seen in the fields, neighboring Shacktowns, or in your own home passing around laughter and mason jars of moonshine.

You were afraid to move, afraid to breathe, because you knew this would be the last time you'd see him, and part of you didn’t want to see at all. They slipped the rope over his head, and you were forced to stand there, held tight by your mama as you tried to look away. But your daddy’s eyes found you in the crowd and you couldn't move, couldn't look away as his eyes held yours for one last time. He gave you a look you’ll never forget, steady and sad, like he wanted to tell you something that the words couldn't hold. A look that said so much without words, holding all the things he never got to teach you. And then he was gone, his life snapped away in a moment, and you felt your own breath turn ragged as you stood there.

You cried then, in a way you’ve never cried before, not even realizing the tears were yours until you felt them burning your cheeks. Standing still in the newfound silence of a world without his voice.

“Remember, baby,” he’d say, voice low but certain. “The land gives, and we survive. One day, it’ll be ours again.” But they took him from you, took him from everyone, and after that, life grew even harder.

After that, something in you changed. You learned to hold your heart close, like a seed buried in deep soil, protected from the harshness of the world. From then on, death became a part of you, a constant presence that shaped the way you saw—it was everywhere, as familiar to you as hunger, as certain as the morning light. It was in the fields where the workers toiled without end, in the eyes of the children who grew up knowing they might not live. You learned the value of life through its fragility, understanding that every kindness, every shared meal, was an act of defiance. Eleven is a place of suffering, but it’s also a place of quiet resilience.

By the time you were ten, you knew almost every plant that grew in the fields, every root and leaf that could heal a wound or ease a fever. Your daddy had taught you a bit before he was taken, and the rest you learned from the women in the fields, the ones who knew how to draw life from the land when there was nothing else. You’d spend hours with your hands in the dirt, learning to listen to the plants, to coax medicine from the earth itself.

But the brightest memories in your mind aren’t the lessons or the plants—they’re the people. You remember the way you’d come together after a long day in the fields, your mama’s voice blending with the others as they sang old songs, songs older than Panem, full of voices and harmonies that filled up the night like the stars.

They were the same voices that filled your daddy’s old stories—the kind of tales that made you believe in things, even when believing felt dangerous. “One day, baby, we’ll be free. That’s the promise of this land.” You didn’t know if it was true, but you carried those words in your heart, a flame that wouldn’t die.

Life went on after your daddy died. It had to. You buried your grief as best you could, learned to carry the emptiness inside you like something precious, because survival in your district demanded strength. You became good at it, at finding ways to keep going even when the world felt like it was pressing down on you. The people around you were good at it too. You learned to find strength in your neighbors, your cousins, the elders who shared stories and knowledge when the day’s work was done. There was an understanding: you took care of your people, no matter what.

Your mama would make big pots of gumbo from whatever she could scrape together—okra, wild greens you foraged, a handful of beans. “We got somethin’ to share, y’all come on by,” she’d call to the neighbors, the kindness in her voice as warm as the meal itself.

Each person would bring a bowl and what little they could spare—a handful of berries, a sprig of rosemary, a single ear of corn. It wasn’t much, but together, it was enough. Sharing was survival. The people were bound together by blood, by hardship, and by the quiet defiance of simply helping each other stay alive.

And that’s how you learned the real rules of Eleven: you survive because of each other.

But the people in power—well, they understood that too, and they twist that knowledge into something ugly. Giving favors, they call it, but everyone knows it’s just a way to keep you in their debt. If you’re useful enough, polite enough, if you play along, you might earn a little extra, a small mercy that can mean the difference between going hungry and getting by. Favors from those in power are never given freely. There’s always a cost, a debt owed, and often, that debt is paid in the currency of the body. The overseers—the landowners, Peacekeepers, and government workers—carry a thin veneer of friendliness, but it’s a kindness that feels more like a trap. There’s an unsettling familiarity to the way they touch young farmhands, resting hands too long on shoulders, fingers lingering at the nape of a neck.

You’re one of the lucky few to learn early on that Eleven is ruled by people who wield authority like a twisted kindness. The “friendly” ones in power carry themselves like they’re doing the district a favor just by noticing someone.

They walk through the fields, through the classrooms, the streets, offering advice or singling out a worker for a nod or a rare word of encouragement. The attention feels like a gift to those who receive it, a rare touch of warmth in a place so starved of mercy. But everyone knows the truth beneath it. The slightest offense, the wrong word or a moment’s defiance, and that smile would vanish in an instant, leaving only the hollow threat of punishment behind.

It’s a careful game of give and take. They’ll do favors, as long as you do something in return. The doctor might “forget” to write down an illness if you keep his family supplied with extra rations, or maybe the mayor’s wife will spare you a blanket during the winter in exchange for a few hours of free labor. The mayor himself often shows up to gatherings, his sleeves rolled up as if he’s one of you, his tone full of practiced empathy. “You’re my people,” he’d say, with an indulgent smile, watching your faces for a response, always a little too invested in your gratitude. For some, it’s easy to fall into the trap. To believe that these scraps of attention mean something, that the people in power have a genuine care for them.

But favors in Eleven come with invisible chains. Those who agree find themselves indebted, their lives bound by unspoken rules they’re expected to follow. It’s a kind of currency that binds families to one another, legacies of obligation passed down like heirlooms. Certain businesses—a tailor’s shop, a mill, a farm—stay within families because they’ve earned the protection of those above. If there’s no heir, the district’s lawyer, a ratty little bastard with slick hair and an even slicker voice, might suggest adopting one of the orphans running barefoot through the fields, a child who can work the land and keep the family name alive. In return, loyalty is expected, unquestioning and constant.

The landowners are masters of the game and you learned to fear the ones with the friendly smiles more than the ones that kick you down. They walk through, inspecting their crops, watching their workers, always with an eye on the young ones. They’re friendly, too friendly, letting their hands linger on bare skin, giving out compliments that stick to you like the greasy film that humidity leaves behind. “Good job, sweetheart,” they’ll say, or “You’re a fine worker, just like your mama.” Sometimes, if you laugh at the right moments or smile in just the right way, they might give you an extra ration or an afternoon off to rest, a rare “privilege” dangled as if it were something earned, rather than something extracted.

Sometimes it’s subtle: a landowner complimenting the way a girl ties her kerchief, calling her “pretty” or “sweetheart” while his gaze drags over her in ways that make her skin crawl. Other times, it’s more direct, with a hand sliding over a back or squeezing an arm, testing the boundaries of what they can take. These people, they hold power over your livelihoods, your rations, your families. A farmhand might go along with it, hoping that a coy smile or a quiet “thank you” will keep the landowner’s eyes off his younger siblings, off the others who work the fields. But the really unlucky ones—the ones who catch too much attention—don’t come back with stories. They come back silent, eyes empty, like they’ve left a part of themselves behind.

And the Peacekeepers—they’re worse. They’ll flirt with you, lay on the charm thick, calling you “darling” or “pretty thing,” like they’re doing you a kindness by noticing you. They know how to play the part of the protector, watching over you with a smile, their hands heavy on your back, their voices so smooth once they’re free of those helmets. They’ve got pretty faces to match those pretty words. Their faces aren’t gaunt from too many missed meals, skin undamaged from the sun, hailing from either District Two or the shiny Capitol itself—far too used to getting what they want. But that pretty exterior, much like their kindness, is a trap, and it can turn on you in an instant. The same Peacekeeper who laughs with you one day, who praises the way you work, or how precious you are might sneer at you the next, calling you “filthy” or “an animal,” worse than an insect, something that crawled out of the mud.

And you’ve seen them snarl with disgust, heard them mutter that they “wouldn’t touch you with the muzzle of their gun.” And yet he’s the same Peacekeeper who swore to “look after” you the day before if only you’d give him a little something to make it worth his while. You’ve heard them ask for a hand behind the barn, seen them lead friends to where the hay stands tall—tall enough to hide away from view—only to return five, maybe ten minutes later as if nothing happened.

You learn to play along, to laugh when they laugh, to duck your head when they get too close, but you never forget what they think of you.

And when someone tries to resist, to deny the favor being demanded, the backlash is swift and brutal. Rations are withheld, assignments become harsher, and public humiliation is wielded like a weapon, a warning to anyone else thinking of defiance.

Even those in good standing know that every privilege is fragile. And every month, they hold court in the square, a grim spectacle of justice for all to see. They’d line up the “criminals” in a single row like animals on display—workers who’d dared to defy orders, or simply hadn’t shown the right respect—pulling them to their knees for the crowd. Sometimes it’s a whipping, the crack of the lash sharp as glass, and everyone is forced to watch as their bodies flinch under the blows. Other times, it's hard labor with no rations, a punishment that meant starving while you worked to the edge of collapse.

And for the worst offenses, there was the gallows.

They're a show of power, the hangings. Each time, you feel the weight of the rope like it’s wrapped around your own neck, a reminder that in Eleven, survival is conditional, a privilege granted only to the obedient.

In the quiet moments, you remember your father’s voice, the steady way he’d speak of freedom, of the day when life wouldn’t be dictated by hunger or fear. It’s a dream you tuck away, safe in the hollow place you carry inside. And you keep going, your spirit rooted in the land beneath your feet, in the warmth of your mama's soup pot, in the unbreakable bonds between those who understand that survival here is something you share.

They tell you kindness is a gift, something you should be thankful for, even when it’s twisted, tainted by the intentions of those who hold the power. But you know the truth. You learned it the day they took your daddy from you. Kindness here is a fragile thing, a small fire shared in the darkness. The warmth of a neighbor passing a ration, a mother’s soup pot stretched to feed three families. You take those small gifts and hold onto them, because they’re yours, unbought, untaken, given without cost. Because kindness isn’t theirs to twist or take away.

You learned to stay quiet, to avoid their notice, to keep your head down even when their eyes lingered on you. You thanked them for things you didn’t want, laughed politely when you wanted to scream, forced yourself to smile when every muscle in your body was tense with fear. You learned that survival was a balance, that sometimes it meant swallowing your pride, and sometimes it meant helping others do the same. It's a constant negotiation between dignity and survival, because standing up for oneself could mean risking the safety of everyone else.

And when punishment day comes in the square, it’s often those who didn’t “play along” who are lined up first. Those who refused the touches, who rejected the offers, who dared to assert their humanity in the face of their oppressors’ twisted intimacy. The community knows this, but they’ve learned not to speak of it directly. Instead, y'all share your strength in quieter ways—an extra ration snuck to a defiant farmhand, a shared blanket or whispered words of reassurance to a young worker who caught the Peacekeeper’s eye that day. Whispers of hope or survival plans exchanged when no one is looking.

You share what little you have, gather around the evening fires, sing the old songs that tell stories of endurance, of hardship, of quiet defiance. Because you’ve learned that kindness isn’t something they can take. No matter how they twist it, no matter what they do, the small acts of care that you give to each other are yours. You hold onto them with both hands, because kindness is a rebellion all on its own.

#finnick odair #and they'd find us in a week #finnick odair x reader #hunger games catching fire #interlude #finnick x reader

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