#he also told her to kill peeta who was also a child

[madeofjules]

Boggs to Katniss: "I'm planning for you to have a long life"

Boggs, 2 secs later: *sends Katniss on a suicide mission to assassinate the president, which has no chance of happening*

[burst-of-iridescent]

now that i've finished my re-read of the hunger games books, it’s even more baffling to me than before that people compare everlark to kat.aang when they are so incredibly similar to zutara.

a fundamental aspect of everlark’s characterization is that they are star-crossed lovers. and while it's true that that is a gimmick the capitol forces on them, it’s also a reflection of the reality that peeta and katniss were never supposed to fall in love, let alone make it last.

from the very beginning, the odds are stacked against katniss and peeta. their class division keeps them apart in district 12, and in the games you're naturally not expected to do anything but kill your fellow tributes. what peeta does in loudly declaring his love and respect for katniss from the beginning is revolutionary because it goes against everything he's been told his entire life. saying he's in love with her and valuing his life over hers is absolutely radical in a situation that forces you to prioritize yourself and dehumanize your fellow human beings. and this framing of love as resistance is something that repeats itself in zutara's arc, in the catacombs where zuko and katara reach out to one another against everything that tells them to do otherwise, and again in the final agni kai when zuko gives up everything for a girl he had been told was nothing.

they’re love stories because they stem, first and foremost, from love for your fellow human beings — especially in the places where it shouldn’t exist. love for a starving child from a lower class whom you’re supposed to kill. love for a weeping enemy who represents everything you were told to despise. both zutara and everlark are about the importance of unity amidst division, about coming together when the entire world is trying to force you apart. about looking at the person you're supposed to hate and saying no, i refuse, and reaching out in love, in compassion, in empathy instead because you understand that they're not as different from you as you were taught to believe.

and this carries on to the other theme that both ships represent: the need to break the cycle of violence.

one of the main themes that underlies each of these characters’ narratives is how easily (and even justifiably) they could’ve perpetuated the harm that was done to them. peeta, katniss, zuko and katara have all suffered without cause, and it would have been understandable if any of them had let that suffering twist them into vengeance and inflicted it back upon others. it would have been encouraged even, in the societies they live in, for them to unleash their rage upon those seen as deserving of it. to become like zhao or hama or gale or president coin. but what defines each of these characters is that instead of allowing their suffering to overcome them, they choose to help — not harm — others, even the people they would have every reason to hate. that’s why katniss and peeta refuse the chance to hold another hunger games with the capitol’s children, why zuko helps an earth kingdom town, why katara risks the invasion itself to free a fire nation village from tyranny. all of them have been victims of unjust violence and oppression, sometimes even at the hands of other victims, and that’s exactly why they refuse to stand by or be complicit as others suffer the way they did. both everlark and zutara are about looking at the darkest version of yourself, the person you might have been, and refusing to go down that road. to understand that you are more than what your circumstances make you into. to choose kindness over hatred, peace over war.

at their core, both ships exemplify the themes of love and unity and holding onto your humanity against impossible odds. but more importantly, they exemplify hope. the dandelion in the spring. the fire that means rebirth instead of destruction.

choosing to do better, be better, make something better, together.

[applcrumbl]

I see the way you look at her.

Pairings: Peeta Mellark X Reader Warnings: Y/N uses she/her pronouns, talk of cheating, talk of murder and death.  Author’s Note: Y/N is kind of a dick in this but that’s so slay purr for her

Summary: Peeta returns to District 12 after the 74th Annual Hunger Games to a girlfriend who wants nothing to do with him. 

The air in District 12 was thick with tension as the Reaping day unfolded, casting a shadow over the usually quiet town. The nervous energy in the square was palpable, each child from from age 12 to 18 lined up as though they were being put to death by firing squad. In a strange way, they were. Dressed in their finest garments, the kind that they would be proud to have on television, yet praying that their names were never called.

Y/N’s name was in the bowl 20 times this year. 15 as tesserae, for the grain and oil her family so dearly needed to survive, and the rest for the age she’d turned earlier that year. There were boys with twice as many in the other bowl. Her neighbour, Gale, at 18 years old, had his name in 42.

Yet, with only 5 slips of paper, Peeta Mellark was called. His eyes bore into hers as tears threatened to fall. She watched him hug Effie Trinket, clad in her Capitol Extravagance. Katniss Everdeen, the girl she’d played with since youth, stood with him.

Truthfully, she’d moved on from the shock that her lover was going to die quite quickly. He certainly was more likeable than the rest of the tributes, But there was not enough money in the entirety of District 12 to provide the sponsorships he would need to stay alive. Peeta was strong in build, but would never be able to hurt someone, let alone to the point of murder.

She sat with a group of girls in the square, watching Caesar Flickerman on the large screen.

"Well, there is this one girl. I’ve had a crush on her ever since I can remember.” Peeta says, “But I’m pretty sure she didn’t know I was alive until the reaping." 

Furrowed brow, she listened intently to his words. Who else would he be talking about, if not his own girlfriend? If not herself.

“She have another fellow?" asks Caesar.

“I don’t know, but a lot of boys like her," says Peeta.

Alice Walker, one of the girls who sat with Y/N, turns to look. “Thought you an’ him were going steady?”

“We are.” She replies—confusion as to why he was talking about her as though she were someone else.

She turns back to face the screen. Eyes trained on Peeta, looking the same as ever - only cleaner and in nicer clothes. He still wore the silver ring she’d bargained for at the market. His 15th birthday gift - She had put her name in the reaping another time to afford it.

“So, here’s what you do. You win, you go home. She can’t turn you down then, eh?"

“I don’t think it’s going to work out. Winning...won’t help in my case," says Peeta.

“Why ever not?" says Caesar, mystified.

"Because...because...she came here with me.”

From the moment of Peeta’s admission, she secretly hoped that he’d die in the games. As much as she wanted him to come back alive so that she could kill him herself, she also wanted nothing more than to see him suffer.

Everything she’d done for him. Everything she’d been put through for him. All for him to be in love with Katniss Everdeen. She stopped watching the games after that.

That didn’t mean she didn’t hear all about District 12’s star-crossed lovers and how they won the Hunger Games by means of their love. She stayed far away from the train station, and its once-dull platform, now adorned with makeshift decorations crafted from whatever materials the citizens could salvage. She stayed far away from his family’s bakery, and his shiny new home in Victor’s Village. She stayed far away from any place where the boy could find her. But, that did not mean that he did not try.

Katniss once spoke to her in the woods, explaining that it was all a rouse for the Capitol. Y/N only believed it because Gale had told her the same thing before. Katniss pleaded with her to speak to Peeta and allow him to explain. If not for her own sake, then for his. “I can’t even look at him Y/N. But he shouldn’t be alone right now”

She wondered how a victor of The Hunger Games could be so desperate for company. 

It took a lot of her pride to walk to Victor’s Village that night. The air was crisp, and the stars overhead seemed to bear witness to the storm of emotions raging within her. Unable to quell the turmoil in her heart, she found herself standing outside Peeta’s home.

It was the first time that she’d seen him. A glimpse through the front window into the warmly lit kitchen. He was baking again, decorating a cake, much like he would have been before the games. Except now, he was thinner, his eyes more sunken, hands shaking as they pressed fruit into icing. 

Taking a deep breath, she approached the door. Knocking gently, the sound echoed through the quiet night.

"Y/N," Peeta said, his voice soft with a hint of regret. "I didn't expect you."

She met his gaze, searching for answers. "We should talk."

He nodded, stepping aside to let her in. The air inside was thick with the scent of freshly baked bread, a familiar comfort that felt oddly out of place given the current circumstances.

They settled in the living room. The fire roared, illuminating the large room in an orange glow. The walls of the ground floor were taller than the height of her entire house. And one of the multiple sofa suites was bigger than the bed her brother slept on. There was more luxury in a singular room than in any 5 buildings in the seam. 

She sat, conscious of the room she was taking up. It felt like she would be whipped for even being near. Peeta sat more comfortably, the silence stretching between them like a fragile thread. The girl took a deep breath, ”How are you?”

“Where have you been?” Peeta interrupts, “I’ve been looking for you since I returned.”

“Can you blame me?”

Peeta hesitates a moment. “No.” He admits, hands wringing together, “It was for show, Y/N. For the cameras and the Capitol.”

A curt nod. Her expression remained stoic as she processed Peeta's words. The room felt heavy with unspoken tension, the crackling fire doing little to dispel the cold atmosphere that had settled between them.

"For show," she repeated, her voice flat. "So, all of it—the love, the sacrifice, the pain—it was all just a performance?"

Peeta looked pained, his eyes desperately searching for understanding in hers. "Yes, entirely. Katniss and I, we played along to survive. It was the only way."

“It was not the only way.”

“I never wanted it to be like this.”

“You could’ve fought. You could have-”

“I couldn’t kill her. And I couldn’t watch her die.” Peeta interrupts.

A bitter laugh escaped her lips. “But you could lead the careers right to her.” She deadpans, “And you did do that, by the way”

His shoulders slumped, guilt written across his face. "I never wanted it to be like this. I wanted us both to make it out alive. But they wanted a love story, and we had to give it to them."

“You don't get it, Peeta. You don't get what it's like to watch the person you love be in love with someone else, pretend or not.” Y/N shook her head, her anger simmering beneath the surface. "It was so embarrassing to hear about your 'epic love story' broadcast to the entire nation. Have people question me every single day about what happened between us.”

Peeta scoffs, standing up from his seat and pacing to the far corner of the living room. His hand rubbing his face, he forces out a laugh at her words.

“You had some uncomfortable questions forced your way, Y/N” He starts, “I was reaped for The Hunger Games. They are not the same.”

The room falls silent, save for the roar of the fire and the gentle hum of the lights.

“I did what I did, not to stay alive.”Peeta admits, “I couldn’t care less if I died in there, My family wouldn’t either-”

“That’s not true.”

“It is. But that’s not my point.” He breathes, “I needed to stay alive so that I could come back to you.”

Y/N remained seated, her eyes fixed on Peeta as he spoke. He turned to face her, his eyes pleading for understanding. "I needed to survive, not for the Capitol, not for the cameras, but for us. I wanted to come back to District 12, to you.”

She couldn't deny the sincerity in his voice, but the wounds ran deep. Having spent the latter half of the last 5 months hating his guts, she couldn’t forgive him easily. Hearing that he’d done it for her only made her feelings more scrambled.

 "Love is more than a performance, Peeta. It's more than a show for the Capitol.”

He took a step closer, his expression filled with regret. "I thought we had a better chance of making it out together than I ever would have alone.”

“But now you’re in it for life. After your victory tour, do you seriously just expect that you’ll be able to just ‘break up’? People who have suffered together like the pair of you have, don’t just call it quits.”

“We’ll figure it out, I just need time.”

Y/N leans back in her chair, eyes still trained on the broken boy before her. She tears them away to try and stop the tears that threaten to fall. “I saw the way you looked at her.” She admits. “I understand that you went through a lot together, but- But, you never looked at me like that.”

Peeta's eyes, full of remorse, met hers. He reached out, as if to touch her hand, but hesitated, fingers hovering in the air.

"I never meant to hurt you," he whispered, his voice filled with regret. "But in that arena, survival seemed like the only option. It was never about choosing her over you."

He lowered his hand. "I know I messed up. I can't change the past, but I want to make things right, Y/N. I want a chance to prove that I can be the person you need."

She shook her head, a mixture of frustration and sadness in her eyes. “I think you need time to figure it out by yourself, Peeta”

"Give me time," he pleaded. "But give me time to figure it out with you.”

The room hung heavy with silence, the fire that danced in the hearth was slowly dying. It was the kind of silence that spoke volumes, as Y/N distanced herself from him, each footstep on the plush carpet seemed to amplify the quiet. 

“I should go,” she says.

“Please don’t.” He begs. 

Y/N hesitated, her hand resting on the doorknob. She wanted to turn around, to look into Peeta's eyes and find a glimmer of the person she had once loved. Yet, the fear of more disappointment held her back.

"I need time, Peeta," she finally replied, her voice barely above a whisper. The words hung in the air, “We both need time. Alone.”

Peeta remained silent, watching her silhouette against the doorway, his expression a portrait of heartache. He wanted to reach out, to bridge the gap, but he didn’t.

“If you love someone, let them go.” He whispers, allowing her to open the door and walk down the snow-covered stairs. The hinges closed with a soft thud, and Peeta was left alone.

[miss-emmie]

Uzi and N have suffered so much together bro, I may not be a psychiatrist but those two have suffered so much psychologically it would make sense that they would be each other’s comfort person and despite being drones there’s literally no way they’re not severely traumatized

I mean Uzi has been treated like a freak and has been ignored all her life and gets left for dead by her own father and literally watches a hologram of her dad get torn in half and eaten right in front of her, sees another hologram of her first and only genuine friend betray her, has an entire emotional breakdown over her body doing things that she has no control over like killing and cannibalizing her classmates, getting held hostage and getting tortured by one of her mother’s former friends watching a person she finally built a friendship with sacrifice herself after being told she trusts her and then learning her mother was responsible for everything horrifying in her life and to top it all off being controlled by the solver and being forced to watch herself hurt the only one she genuinely loves and cares about.

Then theres N, who lost his memory has also been treated horribly by the people he knew his whole life one of them he had a crush on, also being left for dead when he starts questioning who he is what he was made for while trying to be helpful, being pulled away from his first genuine friend because her classmates didn’t like her, getting memories back just to learn he had an unwilling hand in destroying humanity that was forced by his possessed sister that he genuinely cared about, him witnessing his first crush trying to kill him unwillingly, also learning that he might have to kill his first genuine love that he felt his feelings reciprocated in, getting trapped under rocks and sawing his fucking ARM OFF saying “I deserve this” getting his arm ripped off then dragged and tormented by his sister and a hologram of the person who sacrificed herself for him and his lover then being forced to fight said lover that they both unwillingly want to do but have no choice, being forced to kill the person that presumably was like a mother to him to protect his lover just to learn she died years ago and was killed by his sister again used her skin and voice to mask as her and then attack him and his lover and watching said lover sacrifice herself and being forced to not help just so he could he safe so not only does he believe his closest and longest friend and lover are dead but the one person he first met as his own person that he probably considered his mother and not just as a friend, he probably thinks he’s responsible for everything that’s happened.

Man these two are so tragic I hope when everything’s done they get closure and feel safe enough to live with the past behind them happily,

They remind me of Everlark (Katniss and Peeta) where they are surrounded in a world of fear and everything comes down to them while they’re literally just kids being forced to kill to survive

If they ever in a thousand years ever decide to have a family It would make total sense if they had to have a long long LONGGGG talk about having children, I would too, who would want to bring a child into a world of violence and fear?

[mrsnancywheeler]

(warning this may seem vv incoherent because i just woke up LMFAO)

Ooo while you’re working your magic for the next chapter of the river, I wanted to word vomit a bit about ch.4 LOL

I remember that the thing that absolutely broke me while reading mockingjay was after he was hijacked, Peeta had to fall in love with Katniss all over again. and the same is true for reader and Finnick, except with trust (his sweet girl still loves him even though she thinks he wants her dead☹️).

We alr knew reader was a #paranoid girlie, and snow completely exploited this in her hijacking. But another thing that hurts is realizing how he also reinforced her belief that she deserves to be punished for what she did to Conway. From the moment she won her games, she immediately told finnick that he should have let her die in that arena:(( and despite enduring so much suffering post-games (PTSD, trafficking, and sh tendencies), the guilt still, at least partially, drives her to volunteer for the quell. SO THE THOUGHT OF ALL THIS GUILT BEING AMPLIFIED BY THE HIJACKING IS ACTUALLY DEVASTATING.

And Finnick having to witness all of this :(( he was there for her for everything she went through post-games. He was able to help reassure and work through it with her. But now, he can barely help her like how he was able to before :(

AND I STILL THINK ABOUT WHAT SNOW SAID TO READER WHEN SHE WAS BEING CROWNED “You’ve really proven what these games are about” WHAT💥DO 💥 YOU 💥 MEAN 💥 I thought that he was projecting LMAO. Like he was referencing to how (according to snow) Lucy Gray manipulated his feelings as a survival tactic. Or if there’s another meaning that my brain can’t comprehend at the moment LOL

Ok my thoughts were all over the place so sorry if it was hard to read HAHA. Very excited to see what’s to come🫶

-🦅

yes yes yes, I'm sorry I'm so slow with this one, my schedule has literally been jam packed and I've been falling asleep nearly instantly when I get home 😭

yes and reader can still love finnick even though part of her thinks that he wants her dead, because she thinks it's the kind of fate she deserves. she wouldn't hold it against him if he did so that. she'd deserve it for being so manipulative and callous which inherently makes her untrustworthy. but there's still a level of subconscious preservation that kicks in to make her scared. finnick knows that he's never, for a second thought about anything even close to wanting her dead and now has to watch her own insecurities eat her alive.

because he knows that she's been self destructive since her games, that's why after it was announced the quell would be reaping from the pool of victors he felt so angry and instantly left to try to convince other people to volunteer for her. he knew that she'd see it as yet another opportunity to atone for her so called sins. even if he'd been able to live a mostly happy life with you in the chunks of time you were both left alone to be in the Capitol, he knew that at your lowest lows you'd reject the comfort and refuse to be told otherwise. until he'd basically corner you, love on you, tell you how worthy you were until you cracked enough to open up and accept his help. but now it's clear you want help, but the paranoia makes it so hard to accept it from him.

yes that's one of the meanings for what snow says, but also when gaul asks snow what the games are really about in the end of tbosas, how the games show you who we really are, how fast we go from being prey to the predator in situations like that. our true nature. and she essentially did that, she's just a child, a young girl from district 4,scared she might die, but she has a survival plan. she kills, she manipulates, turns against people, she plays conway with all she's got in order to win, her over him. she preys upon conway, she becomes the predator in her calculated game.

thank you, love you so much 💋💋💋💋

[alanfromrochester]

THG book 1 reread thoughts

THG rereads book 1

The TBOSAS movie inspired me to finally read that book and reread the originals

The start does well at setting the scene, but that might be helped by having first read knowledge to work off of.

"inside the woods is the only person with who I can be myself: Gale" is common Everthorne fodder but in context it comes right after who can be trusted with political rants. A child repeating what they shouldn't is I thought of with Posy but it's mentioned with Katniss and Prim. Tesserae did seem like part of divide and conquer within districts, and Katniss describes Gale saying just that.

There is much more to the story than the love triangle, of course, but I couldn't avoid thinking about Everlark shippers insisting it was set up already. I do see a lot of potential with Peeta and not much romantic about Gale however close they are otherwise. (At first I saw friends-to-lovers potential with Everthorne and figured Everlark happened because of shared experience with the Games)

I'm hardly starving but could still relate to the dumpster diving - the bins had just been emptied is frusting timing. I forgot the details of the all important Peeta giving Katniss bread. It was fresh but burnt, I had mentally assumed it was stale. Deliberately burnt to give away? Even if it's a lost sale rather than just giving away something that would be trashed anyway, she's still being cruel. Also note that Mr. Mellark will only trade for squirrels when she's not around. When Peeta didn't say anything to Katniss, I had assumed he was too much of a dork to talk to girls (I can relate to that too) but I got the clear impression he was scared of his mother.

Haymitch and Effie's appearances were refreshing - highlights there's more to him than a drunken idiot and more to her than being vapid about the show.

I wonder if Haymitch told Peeta about the forcefield around the tribute center because of the one at the edge of Haymitch's arena. Avoiding tributes escaping or being killed (note no fighting each other, with neutral sparring partners available) before the Games felt like a reaction to the haphazard early procedures in TBOSAS.

Katniss worrying about not helping Lavinia feels kinda like Coriolanus and the Sejanus situation from TBOSAS.

I had forgotten the beginning to middle Games because the finale was so dramatic.

I thought of Clove as the District 2 psycho, but Cato isn't the most mentally stable individual either, I had remembered him as more of a straight up meathead/jock. "I kill her in my own way" could be interpreted in a particularly sinister manner. It reminds me of the hero escaping because the villain takes his time, like monologuing to a captive James Bond. Maybe it's doubly personal because of not only his close call with the tracker jackers, but Glimmer's horrific death, a Cato/Glimmer hint perhaps.

I rmembered Rue helped Katniss by pointing out the tracker jacker nest, but I forgot how closely they worked together. Rue talking about 11 being even worse than 12 made me think of all things The Big Bang Theory - Stuart the comic book store owner is even more antisocial than the nerd main characters. Maybe dramatic contrast is part of the point. Katniss thinking that conversation might get censored made me think of how a Peeta interview in Mockingjay was quite interesting for the audience as no Victor had previously spoken publically about their experience in the arena.

Marvel killing Rue with Katniss immediately shooting him was hard to forget but I hadn't remembered he snared her first. The memorial wasn't as extensive as I recalled but perhaps that's because the movie really emphasized it.

Careers carrying minimal food and being vulnerable to disruptions was interesting as both a comment about starvation and Games strategy.

I also hadn't remembered the fire sequence. Perhaps Haymitch was able to save sponsor money for the burn ointment because Katniss is an experienced hunter and gatherer so the money didn't need to go to food.

I remembered Peeta was sick in the cave and the feast included his medicine but forgot just how dire the situation was. Blood poisoning used in the medical sense for infection complications (apparently when bacteria from the infection get into the blood) threw me for a loop because the xenophobic usage was in the news December 2023 (with Trump channeling Hitler about immigrants). "Remember, we're madly in love, so you can kiss me whenever you want" even when he's half dead I saw two ways - that crush is severe, and/or he still has the sense to play up the star crossed lovers act.

I do feel drugging Peeta when he said not to is acceptable because he's clearly not in his right mind, physical illness analogue to involuntary committment for mental illness.

In the cave she dreams about being snug at home, that seems telling.

Katniss thinking about the truth of Peeta's first day of school story is some "real or not real" already, I wonder if SC deliberately planned it that way or later decided to reference the earlier concept. I figured Peeta meant it, maybe played it up, even if Katniss didn't reciprocate.

Her not wanting to sing because it reminded her too much of her dead father is how I think I reacted to baseball for awhile.

The movie emphasized the Rue mutt if I recall correctly; the book highlighted Glimmer and Foxface. I recalled Katniss putting Cato out of his misery with the mutts but forgot that dragged on all night.

I wasn't surprised there was some sort of new victor interview, but I had forgotten about the highlight reel and the platforms and the stage being modified for two.

With a new appreciation for Everlark, the ending was heartbreaking where Peeta is shocked at it being at least partially an act/strategy on Katniss' part, highlighting how real it was for him at least. The book ending before the homecoming was an interesting dramatic choice.

[heavensbeehall]

"Mockingjay", Chapter 1

Part 1: The Ashes

Chapter 1: A month after the events of Catching Fire, Katniss visits the ruins of District 12. Only the Victor's Village is still there. "800 or so" refugees survived. Gale is a hero for saving them. Dalton told Katniss that 13 just needs new breeding stock. Katniss has not decided if she wants to be the Mockingjay or not. She worries about what she will do. She finds two things in her old house: Buttercup the cat and a rose from President Snow.

Thoughts:

-- Do you think Katniss and Plutarch are on the same side?

-- Here we learn that Gale took the survivors to the lake that Katniss' dad took her to. Since this lake also figures prominently in TBOSAS, I must consider the parallels. This is the happy place Lucy Gray took Snow. But this is also where he turned on her. It's a bit similar to the Meadow of 12 but also the meadow of the song Katniss sings to Prim and Rue. An idealized safe space. So Snow leaving there was truly him chosing the material world and ambition over safety and love.

Quotes:

The citizens of District 12 had no organized resistance movement of their own. No say in any of this. They only had the misfortune to have me.

This strikes me as part of the larger theme of innocent people being caught up in the war. Prim and Rue are two other examples. 12 was not one of the districts that revolted. Yet they were obliterated. Because it's an easier target, literally. They had no weapons. No way to fight back. And those kind of people die in every war in history.

Those over fourteen have been given entry-level ranks in the military and are addressed respectfully as "Soldier."

One thing the Capitol and 13 seem to have in common is child soldiers. If the Hunger Games is Gaul's eternal war, then the Tributes--whether they are prepared or not--are the unwitting soldiers in it. 13 doesn't start them quite as young, but in my mind 14 is still too young. (Now that I think about it, 18 might be too young in my mind.) Both probably like starting young because kids are easier to control than adults.

Despite serious reservations, I had to forgive Finnick for his role in the conspiracy that landed me here. He, at least, has some idea of what I'm going through. And it takes too much energy to stay angry with someone who cries so much.

This makes me laugh a bit even though it's sad. Finnick tried so hard to befriend Katniss at the Quell. He tried being sexy at the Chariots. He made jokes during training. He saved Peeta's life with CPR. But she was still considering killing him at the Lightning Tree. But the crying worked. They are buds now that he's being real. Even if "being real" means his girlfriend is being held hostage and he's having memory and other mental health issues.

[imaginarianisms]

i& was actually talking about this w/ els last night but sansa would be treated differently in king's landing not just bc she's a northerner or her family's at war with the Crown or a girl but also Because she's an indigenous woman, even if she has lighter skin compared to arya & jon and has red hair and blue eyes ( & this is why she would find solidarity with aurane waters & really anyone who's dornish or is seen as more of an outcast ). sansa is repeatedly abused by a white blonde haired green eyed boy king & his mother & no one bats an eye. sansa is held under the iron grip of the lannisters who keep her in their custody; one could theoretically make a comparison of this to white people adopting or straight up kidnapping n.ative c.hildren with nefarious intentions during the 6.0's S.coop to the M.illennial's S.coop in the hopes of "killing the i.ndian in the child" where they would be subject to abuse and told to forget about their culture and assimilate into the predominantly european culture & is eventually forced to marry tyrion while other individuals use sansa, oversexualize her and/or objectify her for their own gain & treat her like she's not even a person by many male figures in her life, particularly with baelish even after joffrey's death & on top of that the northerners are canonically called "savages" both publicly and in private (sound familiar? lmao); this is also not a coincidence. some of the abuse sansa is subjected to is inherently attributed to sexism, misogyny & particular antinative misogyny based upon her gender & her race & the racism she's faced is a key part of her life & is still very present in her life & that doesn't go away even if she does become lady of winterfell & the lady of the vale or perhaps even queen of the north depending on the verse.

lyanna has also faced this, too, on a much larger scale, in the sense that most are still Obsessed with lyanna to this day, particularly robert baratheon who she never particularly liked and he literally started a war simply because she rejected him & most don't even see her as a person but rather as an idea, ned even says this "you saw her beauty but not the iron underneath"; her father, rickard and her brother, brandon, try to save her after they hear the news and they are both burned alive in court of the red keep and once again, no one bats an eye and everyone watched while indigenous men are murdered in the most gruesome way possible; the same applies to eddard stark years later before the sept of baelor, another indigenous man dead and everyone in the crowd cheers as arya and sansa watch on in horror.

it's the same thing with katniss, in both her canon thg verses & other aus. katniss is treated differently than peeta is, particularly because she's brown skinned, has dark eyes and is undoubtedly a visible indigenous woman with traditional native features; this is even touched on in the books that the movies don't even talk about.

clementine experiences this too on top of mysogynoir — misogyny against black women based on race & gender; she's been parentified for literally as long as she can remember and she's expected to be that way and be strong 24/7 bc she's a Strong Black Woman™ & unfortunately whether subconsciously or not black girls are usually subjected to being more adultified than their white peers all the while that's slowly crushing her bc at the end of the day she need someone to take care of HER for a change.

these are all things i& write about & address On Purpose. make no mistake: this blog incorporates themes of racism & sexism towards woc, especially towards native women, femmes & two spirits & i won't be ignoring these issues nor disrespect my past & my communities by ignoring these issues.

[tennessoui]

would you ever do a hunger games au? like anakin and obi-wan in the arena and doing a katniss and peeta thing where they both survive? anakin maybe killing the competitors so obi-wan wouldn't have to? (just thinking that child killing is in character for him) anyway no pressure or anything I just haven't stopped thinking about a hunger games au of obikin and. I thought maybe you could do something with it!

i need you to know i shamefully snorted at the child murder thing i'm sorry and i'm also sorry this took so long and it's a bit all over the place and doesn't actually get into the Games at all (+ it's been years since I read the books so all inaccuracies should be tastefully ignored pls) this may not be what you asked for tbh but here you go!!

(content warnings: hunger games typical discussion of child murder, but nothing graphic)

(1.7k)

Anakin’s first emotion after his name is called is a strange sense of relief.

Good, he thinks. I’ll get to go with Obi-Wan. He won’t be alone.

He dutifully steps forward out of the crowd towards the stage, where the announcer is waiting next to Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan who is looking at him with an expression of naked devastation.

Anakin tries to convey that it’ll be alright, that it’s fine, that they knew this was a possibility. Sure, it’s Anakin’s last year eligible to be in the Games. Sure his nineteenth birthday is in two weeks, at which point he would become too old to qualify as a child to the Capitol, but what’s done is done.

Obi-Wan will be his mentor, because Obi-Wan has been the mentor for District Four ever since he won his own Games seven years ago when he was sixteen and Anakin was twelve.

That year’s known unofficially as the most boring Games in Panem history, but the Capitol loves how handsome Obi-Wan’s grown to be. So what if he didn’t kill his competitors messily or with a bloodthirsty joy? He’s so polite in his interviews all these years later, and look at those dimples!

It makes Anakin sick, every time Obi-Wan has to leave District Four and travel to the Capitol to be fawned over and stroked and used. His nightmares are always worse the weeks after he gets back, and he never lets Anakin hold him during them.

And it’s even worse during the actual Games, when Obi-Wan is put in charge of two children’s lives only to see them brutally murdered on screen a week later. The cameras always show his reaction when the competitors from District Four die. They must think he cries pretty or something.

Anakin hates the Capitol. He hates them for what they’ve done to Obi-Wan. What they’ve made him into

As he gets close enough to the stage, he notices that Obi-Wan’s hands are shaking slightly.

He doesn’t even listen to the name of the girl being called. She’s not important. She’ll be dead in a few days time. What’s important is Obi-Wan. What’s important is comforting him, is reassuring him. Is coming back to him.

This is the moment when Anakin resolves that these Games will become known as the quickest in history.

---

The girl is understandably sullen and upset on the train. “I should get a different mentor!” she demands. “It’s obvious you’re going to play favorites with him.”

Anakin doesn’t snap back because she’ll be dead in a few days. Though she really shouldn’t use that tone with Obi-Wan.

“I’m not playing favorites,” Obi-Wan insists. “I don’t have favorites.”

“You literally just wiped sauce off his mouth with your finger,” the girl points out. “And then he licked it!”

Anakin smirks at her. Of course Obi-Wan has favorites. Of course Anakin is Obi-Wan’s favorite. It took him years to wear down Obi-Wan until he allowed him this close, and years after that until he finally got to kiss him for the first time, just a few months ago.

If she thinks he’s going to give up any of his Obi-Wan time so she can get her hopes up about not dying in a few days, she’s got another thing coming.

But Obi-Wan shifts away from him and he looks guilty.

If Anakin could get away with killing the other person from his district, he would. But it’d probably make Obi-Wan sad.

“Is whining part of your strategy?” he asks waspishly instead. “I don’t think it’ll make you many allies.”

She has the nerve to look offended.

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan chides. Underneath the table, he squeezes his knee.

“Everyone in the district knows about you two,” she glares at him. “You haven’t exactly kept it a secret.”

Anakin hasn’t exactly tried to keep it a secret. The first night Obi-Wan had kissed him, he went straight home and told his mother, his neighbor, his schoolmates, his cat, and his ex-girlfriend.

(No one had been surprised, except maybe the cat.)

“It’s not fair,” she cries. “Who can I talk to to get a different mentor for me?”

“The ethics board,” Anakin smiles, all teeth, settling back into his seat and slinging an arm around Obi-Wan’s shoulders.

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan says again, this time more exasperatedly. “Robin, I promise I will be the best mentor you can ask for. It is my wish to see you survive as long as possible in the next few weeks.”

The girl jumps to her feet in outrage. “You can’t even say you want me to win!” she yells. There are tears at the corners of her eyes. If she were a little less annoying, Anakin would feel quite bad for her. Obviously Obi-Wan doesn’t want her to win. Anakin’s right here.

She storms out of the train compartment, her face in her hands. Anakin barely waits for the door to close before he’s slipping into Obi-Wan’s lap and throwing his arms around his neck with a groan. “God, I thought she’d never leave.”

He isn’t pushed away. Obi-Wan must realize they only have a handful of days left to be together before he goes into the arena.

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan says wearily, even as his arms encircle his waist.

Anakin presses a kiss to his nose and then another to his cheek. “It’s alright to have favorites, Obi-Wan,” he murmurs. “And she should know there’s no way she’s winning anything. Don’t waste your time.”

“I will do everything I can to make sure she survives as long as possible,” Obi-Wan repeats. “I don’t think I can survive anything else.”

Obi-Wan’s voice sounds shaky, so Anakin presses their lips together. Best not to talk for awhile.

------

“We should discuss strategy,” Obi-Wan says later that night through frantic kisses. “Sponsors, story, training--”

“I have a strategy,” Anakin murmurs back as he moves further down the bed, rucking up his partner’s shirt. “Win.”

----

“You look absolutely radiant,” Anakin tells the girl in an undertone while they’re in line for their interviews. She turns around to glare at him. The designer for their district has gone for the typical fish designs that people always associate with District Four, and they’ve dressed her up in a shimmering iridescent gown that flares at the ends like a fish’s tail.

Anakin’s own outfit is mostly a fishing net draped over one shoulder and a pair of tight pants. The designer, much to Obi-Wan’s embarrassment and Anakin’s satisfaction, had taken one look at his shirtless chest and decided to dress him in as little clothes as possible.

“Weird braid,” is all she says.

Obi-Wan had done it late last night when both of them had tired each other out and Anakin had curled up on his chest. After his Games, Obi-Wan’s hands like to do something. The repetitive motion of braiding and unbraiding Anakin’s hair soothes his demons.

It’s one of the reasons Anakin’s grown it out to his shoulders, much longer than is practical for his district.

Obi-Wan had gone to unbraid it, and Anakin had stopped him. He wanted to keep it. To wear it into the Games.

“Thank you,” he says generously. “I saw your score. 7’s not too bad.”

She sneers at him. “Did you celebrate your 11 with your boyfriend?”

“Oh sorry,” he winces. “Did you hear us? I’m just so bad at biting my tongue when he does this thing with his.”

She scoffs in disgust and turns back around. “I hope he has to watch you die.”

Anakin glares at her back. He knows he can’t kill her himself. But there has to be a way to hurt her and her chances and still have plausible deniability.

When it’s her turn for an interview, she’s vapid and pretty. She laughs and touches the interviewer’s arm.

“I’ve never spent much time in District Four,” the interviewer says jovially. “But tell me, really. Is everyone there as beautiful as the people you keep sending us? I mean. Obi-Wan Kenobi, ladies and gentlemen, am I right?” The audience laughs and hollers. Anakin hates them all. “And now you, Robin, and Anakin Skywalker. Damn!”

Robin--Anakin needs to stop forgetting her name--giggles high in her throat. “It was a very, very enjoyable train ride up,” she says with a stupid wiggle of her eyebrows. “Just this side of too long.”

The audience loses it.

Anakin loses it.

He can’t believe she’s sitting there publicly suggesting that Anakin shares Obi-Wan with anyone. With her. The nerve.

The camera pans to Obi-Wan in the crowd, who looks shocked, embarrassed, and deeply troubled.

Anakin won’t let this stand. He just hopes Obi-Wan forgives him.

The interviewer greets him excitedly when he walks out, and Anakin gives him a sheepish sort of smile.

“Lady killer Skywalker!” the interviewer says. Anakin laughs along with him. “All the girls back home must have been heartbroken to see you leave.”

“But I’ve heard they love watching me go,” he jokes with a charming smile. If that girl--Robin--can do it, he can do it much better. “There’s really only one person for me though,” he murmurs, letting his smile die.

“Oh?” The interviewer asks, leaning forward with interest.

“But sometimes I wonder if they’re only using me for my body,” he says, casting his eyes down. “I love them. Heart and soul, everything I am. But when I told them, they just laughed.”

This is technically true. The first time Anakin had told Obi-Wan that he was in love with him, the older boy had laughed his confession off, saying he was too young to know what he wanted.

“Oh, to be young and in love,” the interviewer sighs theatrically. “So your plan is to win the Games and then win her heart when you get back home?”

Anakin makes himself look sad. Tragically sad. Like he can’t bear to go on.

“They came with me,” he says.

If the audience’s reaction to Robin’s fake confession was huge, its reaction to Anakin’s words is even bigger. Of course they think he’s talking about the girl. That’s exactly what Anakin had wanted. Now he’s the broken-hearted boy and she’s the vapid, self-absorbed bitch. She'll have a hard time finding sponsors now.

It’s very, very hard to hide his smile, a task made exponentially more hard when he sees Obi-Wan bury his face in his hands.

“It’s alright,” Anakin tells the interviewer, without taking his eyes off of Obi-Wan. “I’ll survive.”

[therealvinelle]

Hey, @theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin sent me to you for some spicy opinions. Have you read the hunger games? Do you have any headcanons? Any thoughts on main characters that is different from the way the author meant to portray? I really enjoyed your thoughts on Twilight and I’ll admit I disliked Twilight but not because of the characters being too flat and boring (I don’t agree with that) but just because of the writing style and the framing of the relationships. It really annoyed me. But your headcanons made me realize that there were some hidden gems in there. So thanks for sharing your thoughts.

I like that my life has gotten to a point where I’m the Muffin’s referral point for spicy opinions. And I’m very glad you enjoy my Twilight metas!

When it comes to my spicy hunger games opinions, I don’t actually know how spicy they are. They’re definitely very spicy considering what Hollywood tried to do, but I think I’m actually pretty much in tune with Susanne Collins. Tumblr certainly agrees with me, which is very rare but quite nice. The Muffin and I don’t actually want to have spicy opinions, it’s just that we’ll say shit like “Luke’s not a real jedi” and expect it to be obvious but nope, turns out the entire Star Wars fandom begs to differ. So, I think I agree with Collins on what she wrote, which is great, but I honestly can’t tell anymore what the authors want me to think so who knows.

So, first of, there is no love triangle in those books. And I’m not simply saying that the love triangle wasn’t the focus of the books, I’m saying that the love triangle did not exist.

Katniss and Gale were close friends and if it hadn’t been for the hunger games then yeah, they would probably have ended up together. However, the hunger games happened, and Katniss was a very changed person after that. Gale was still the same, and more, he did not get it, at all. He didn’t understand the person Katniss had become and wanted the old one back. They continued to hang out because they’d grown up together, but at this point it was only the memory of their old friendship holding them together and not the real thing.

Then we get into the third book, in which Gale grows enamored with weaponry and the quest for revenge against the Capitol, proudly displaying to Katniss his sadistic device that’ll later kill Prim. Katniss is horrified, and as usual Gale doesn’t get it. Their relationship with violence are polar opposites: Katniss has been forced to kill to protect herself, Gale takes pride in designing devices that’ll kill as many civilians as possible.

On to Katniss. The first big mistake Hollywood made with her was casting Jennifer Lawrence. Katniss of the books is an impoverished and starving child. Lawrence has the wrong body type for that, and more, she has the completely wrong presence. It’s like casting Timothee Chalamet for Thor. 

Then we have Katniss herself.

Katniss, as I see her, is not a hero at all, and she’s not supposed to be. A hero is too positive a word, as heroes get to choose their own destiny. St. George chooses to go slay the dragon. Katniss is thrown into an arena and told to kill children. She has nobility, grace, and kindness, she is indubitably brave and selfless. It’s not her character I’m questioning. But to call her a hero is to play into the narrative that there’s anything glorious or inspiring about her story, and there isn’t. She’s a traumatized child who’s propped up by powerful people to be a symbol. At first it’s the Capitol making her and Peeta star-crossed lovers, and then we have the resistance making her their rallying point. Katniss has no control over any of this. The hunger games is not the inspiring story of a girl who rallies the forces of good against the evil empire, but rather the story of a child who is grossly taken advantage of by both sides.

Then there’s the fact that even before the Capitol happened, Katniss had been forced to grow up too early. Her mother failed to be a mother, and so Katniss became the family caretaker, raising Prim like a daughter rather than a sister and keeping the family alive. Her childhood died with her father, and it is an unusually jaded and sad child who enters that arena. This doesn’t make her better suited for what she endures over the course of the trilogy, but less. Katniss has had no one to rely on, comes to rely too much on Peeta, which in turn makes her crumble like a house of cards when she loses him.

Going slightly back to the love triangle debacle, Katniss ends up with Peeta not so much because they’re the star-crossed lovers the Capitol wanted, but because after the arena Katniss is really only able to connect with people who know exactly what it’s like. Peeta, Finnick, Haymitch - these three all become deeply precious to her, there is a bond forged between victors because no one else can ever truly understand. Peeta/Katniss wouldn’t have happened in a timeline where they weren’t reaped, but they were, and now they’re each other’s only real option.

Not to mention that as victors they’ll live lives the rest of their district can’t really relate to. They have nice houses and a pension, which is alienating enough, but they’ll also be forever entangled with the Capitol, either as prostitutes, mentors, or both. Gale likes Katniss, but he could never have a wife like that.

By the end of the trilogy, Katniss is a traumatized mess of a girl, and so is Peeta. They choose to have kids anyway, something I have mixed feelings about. I see what Collins wanted with that. Katniss makes it clear early on in the series that she never wanted children, because those kids might get reaped. And, to my recollection, it was also that she just thought the world was a too cruel place. The fact that she still chooses to have kids can only be seen as a sign of healing, that Katniss now feels safe enough in this world to bring others into it.  Which is nice. Except I think that losing Prim is what made the real difference to Katniss. Prim was her daughter, and having children is the closest she’ll get to getting Prim back. I’m also slightly worried Peeta will one day snap and strangle them. There’s also the fact that I really don’t think Katniss and Peeta are parent material by the time those books are through. It’s bad enough that Katniss had to be her mother’s therapy animal, she shouldn’t repeat the cycle. But maybe I should have more faith in Katniss. And damnit, I want to be happy for her. In other words, I have mixed feelings on those kids. This all being said, I’ve heard people think it’s out of character for Katniss to have kids, and I disagree with that. I think it’s a very Katniss thing to do. The question is whether becoming a mother was a good decision.

(Since your ask pretty much put a coin in the ramble box, I’ll ramble some more: the whole “children are healing” thing in the epilogue happens through Annie Cresta as well. The girl is more traumatized than anybody after her hunger games, and codependent with her lover, Finnick Odair. Finnick dies tragically, luckily it turns out Annie was pregnant so now she gets a baby too. I question her ability to raise a child on her own, but the fact that both Katniss and Annie get to have kids points to those children symbolizing healing and happiness.)

[katnissmellarkkk]

General #7

Hiiii! Okay, well I bet you thought I forgot about this! Or, more than likely, you forgot you even requested this back in Decemeber. But never fear, my child. I remembered and have been thinking of this fic and what to write for months. 

And so I’m so sorry, I’m a total perfectionist and I started and discared like 3 ideas for this before deciding on this oneshot sooo if this sucks, I’m at least comforted by the fact that I accomplished something in writing this itself? That sentence made zero sense but... I’m tired 🤷🏼‍♀️😅.

Prompt : General # 7 :

“Is that blood?” 

“Yes but that doesn’t matter right now, what does matter is-” 

“You are literally bleeding.”

Anyways, thank you for the prompt and here we go! 

Whispers Of Light

I don't know exactly how I got roped into this. How exactly Delly Cartwright, Peeta's best friend—and alright, my friend now too—managed to convince me to help her and Leevy and about three dozen other members of the community with sorting boxes.

Sorting boxes. Organizing contents. Decorating with "found treasures".

The type of activities Prim loved doing with our mother. The type of activities I refused to do after my father died, to punish my mother for her depression.

The type of activities I now kick myself for walking out on, that I'll never be able to take back. I'll never be able to get those moments back with my sister. I'll never know what those hours between her and our mother entailed, because I chose to exclude myself, just so I could hold onto my petty anger for something that was out of all our control.

Maybe that's why I agreed to help Delly and the others with sorting through boxes upon boxes of debrief, of the items that scarcely survived Twelve's bombing almost two years ago. Maybe I only agreed out of guilt, both for never doing this type of endeavor with my sister and for being the direct cause of the bombing itself.

But whatever my reasons were, I agreed to help nonetheless, and I always follow through my promises. If there was one part of me forged in the war, if only one minor aspect of me was amplified in the smoke and haze and blood of revolution, it was the importance of keeping your promises, against all odds.

The dire consequences of a broken promise has long lasting aftereffects, beyond anything either Haymitch or I wish to dwell on.

"Katniss!" Delly calls, holding up an old, half-ripped paper book that is completely void of a front cover. "Look! I think this book is from the old Apothecary Shop!"

I squint at the dusty, decimated item, not entirely convinced. "I don't think so?" I murmur, unable to even decipher the words on the now melted, conjoined pages. "I'm pretty sure my mother kept the only apothecary book in her family?"

Kanon Bagley turns to inspect the battered item in his girlfriend's hands as well. "I don't think this is a medicinal plant book, Dells," he says sheepishly, a small smirk playing on his lips.

She gives him an incredulous look. "What do you mean medicinal?"

I peer up at him too, not comprehending his meaning any more than Delly. "What kind of plants do you think are in here?" I ask, taking the nearly destroyed object myself and flipping through the worn pages again, seeing odd herbs that neither of my parents ever mentioned or had on hand. "These don't look like the poisonous ones my father told me about?"

Kanon bites back a laugh now and I can't help feeling a little perturbed. As kind and soft-spoken as he usually is, I'm foreign to the feeling of him laughing at me. "What?" Delly snaps at him before I even can.

He still chuckles though, in spite of both our nasty glares. "You guys, it's a book of plants that'll get you high."

It takes a full minute for the meaning to dawn on me. Long enough that Leevy and a couple guys I used to go to school with come over to inspect the book as well. Long enough that they confirm Kanon's assessment just as I realize we're talking about plants that'll make you feel akin to how the morphling made me feel while confined for I killing Coin.

While everyone else snickers—and Delly full on chortles—I pass the book back to Kanon, sliding out of the crowd and moving towards a brand new box of savaged items.

It's not that the mention of plant-based drugs is a trigger for me. It's not something I ever truly gave any thought to before, to be honest. My father likely knew of them but it's not like he was about to bestow that kind of knowledge on his eleven-year-old and my mother perhaps felt it was inappropriate to mention.

No, it wasn't the subject in itself that hit a sore spot for me. But like so many times before, it's where the subject led my mind. It's where the topic took me back to.

Snow's Execution Day. The day I chose to kill President Coin instead. Being thrown back into my old tribute room. Getting high on the morphling.

Trying to forget all that I'd lost. Trying to forget my little sister becoming a human torch before my very eyes. My district engulfed in flames. The ambiguous loss of my best friend.

The connection between me and Peeta that I believed then would be permanently severed. That I believed then to be irreparable.

I suppose I believed then I was irreparable too.

And I miss Peeta suddenly, even more than I already did. Because he always knows what to say when my thoughts turn dark, when I'm suddenly triggered out of the happy, every day events and suctioned backwards to a war torn bird with her wings clipped.

But he's not here to talk me down or scare away the ghosts haunting my mind. He's not here to comfort me or even shoot me a supportive glance. No, he's at his very busy business today.

Peeta's bakery—the Mellark Bakery—has only proven to withstand the test of time these past few months. Since someone accidentally burned down the place, with nothing more than a croissant and a fancy Capitol toaster, the rebuilt bakery has been nothing but a success.

And also extremely time-consuming, I grumble internally, as I begin to pull out stuffed toys that once belonged to dead children.

"If any of those are still intact, we can donate them to the community home," Leaf John says as he opens the box across from me.

"And what exactly are we supposed to be use as decorations from these boxes?" I murmur, peering into another cardboard container, full of half-charred papers and cloths.

The general idea of today, as Delly had pitched it to me last week, was to help the community of Twelve finally sort through these boxes, donate what we could to those in need and decorate the new Justice Building with the leftover contents inside.

Somehow though I can't imagine pinning up terrible drawings of plants that'll inebriate you or headless teddy bears is going to bode well with the district.

Delly rolls her eyes in my direction—a whole new kind of response that I never thought I'd be receiving from the girl who skipped through the town square until she was fourteen years old—before nodding towards boxes on top of the ladder. "We're decorating the Justice Building with the surviving photos from those boxes, Katniss."

"Oh." Then why am I sorting these grimy, dirt-covered playthings? Why didn't anyone give me more clear instructions on today?

And why has it taken almost two years for Twelve to get a group of people together to organize the surviving items from the bombing?

I have no idea how Peeta's managed to get two bakeries built in the time it's taken for thirty-eight of us to come to the Justice Building and look through fifty cardboard boxes. And if I'm being honest, I have no idea why I'm even still here helping. I'm clearly not contributing much to the event. There's definitely more than enough volunteers without me.

And, of course, I could be at the bakery right now. Without a doubt, I'd be of more service there than I am here, digging through dusty knickknacks. I could be helping Peeta and Thom and the other part-time employees, exerting more knowledge and authority than I have here.

After all, Peeta did say the bakery was partially mine. In his mind, at least.

The ulterior motive of getting small, fleeting moments with my boyfriend, of basking in the feeling of safety with him beside me, of the occasional stolen kiss or hand squeeze when no one is looking, runs through the back of my mind.

And sways my decision immensely.

I open my mouth to tell Delly and the others that I'm about to head out, that they clearly have it covered here and I'm just in the way, when at the worst possible second, Leevy kindly murmurs, "Katniss, do you mind starting on the box on the ladder? Seeing if any of the pictures are in decent enough shape?"

I hesitate for a long moment, realizing immediately my predicament. It'd be rude to leave right after someone just essentially assigned me a task. I did agree to be here today, to help out with this tedious project. Leaving right now would only come off as rude and inconsiderate.

This is the reason I never did enjoy group assignments in school. The longer I'm here, the more I'm rediscovering this fact about myself. The division of the workload, the bore of the standing around, not knowing if you're doing the right or wrong thing, the lack of total control.

But I still nod after waiting a beat too long and agree with the nicest flare in my tone I can manage.

I'll go through the one box at the top of the ladder and then subtly make my exit afterwards. The image I unintentionally conjured up of Peeta and the bakery is still pulling at me, making me anxious to get back to him, to see him again even though we were together only three hours ago.

Since we officially became a couple a few months back—though Haymitch scoffs at that notion, claiming we've been together since Peeta first started sleeping over in my bed—I've found myself growing far more clingy to him than I ever could have anticipated. I hate when he leaves for the bakery in the mornings now, even as I still revel in the solace I find inside the woods. I look forward to his return home every night. More than even look forward to it, I'm usually at the bakery around the closing hours, helping him clean and inventory, asking him when he's coming home. Maybe looking somewhat unconsciously flirtatious as I say it.

I grab the box sitting on the ladder's top stair and pull it open, easily maintaining my balance one rung down, the same way I maintain my balance on a tree branch while hunting.

Inside pours out a plethora of photographs, mostly of Twelve's now past citizens. Near the top of the pile I see images of Greasy Sae's daughter, Dolly. The mother of her granddaughter. The daughter who died of croup a few years before the war.

Those photos must belong to Sae, I realize. Which means more of her items are probably scattered throughout the boxes here. And despite the fact that I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that she'll tell me not of be impractical, that if she's made it two years without these things she doesn't need them now, I still make a mental note to return her lost items. If nothing else, I make a mental promise to give back to her the photos of her daughter.

I know better than anyone what kind of comfort photographs of the deceased can provide.

As if in line with my thoughts, as if I alone manifested it somehow, the next image that catches my eye is one I entirely do not anticipate.

It's a shiny photo, on the kind of glossy paper my family could never afford. In the image is a blonde man with broad shoulders and a tall build. Wrapped in his embrace stands a petite girl, with long blonde curls and mascara accentuating her already long lashes. The couple both have eyes that match the color of the sky and are dressed up in some of the nicest clothes in all of Twelve. A white dress with lace. A gray suit with a black vest. The pretty girl wears jewelry and lipstick and there's a familiar glint in the male's eyes and I find myself mesmerized.

And I can't pretend I don't see my boyfriend in both of their faces. I can't pretend Peeta isn't the spitting image of both his parents.

He has his mother's smile, I realize with startling assurance. I never saw the witch smile personally, at any point in my life so I suppose I wouldn't know where he got his charming, sweet grin from.

The mannerism looks so out of place on his mother. The kind smile Peeta has, the one that could light up a blackened sky, doesn't bode with the woman in the picture, even on her wedding day. The charming smile doesn't fit with what I know of the woman's character. With what little about her Peeta chooses to share.

But I'm even more surprised to find how much Peeta has come to resemble his father. How much Peeta has grown to favor the now deceased man.

The last time I saw the baker—the original baker, that is. Haidon Mellark—before the Quarter Quell, I resented the fact that Peeta wasn't as tall or as broad as his father. I privately believed if he'd inherited those traits, he'd be even more likely to win the games again and I could worry about him less.

Peeta was always taller than me and was always remarkably strong, after working in the bakery since childhood. But his father was a whole different level. Haidon Mellark, I'd forgotten until now, had a body that could only rival my own father's.

And as it turns out, Peeta did inherit Haidon's physicality. He just also happened to be a late bloomer. Like his mother, I imagine, staring at her tiny frame in the picture.

The change in Peeta's form occurred so gradually I barely even noticed until a couple months ago, when I woke up with my head against his heart and abruptly realized just how broad he had become. Until I couldn't even reach to kiss his jaw on my tip toe. Until he started laughing at me and had to lift me up in order to properly embrace the way I like.

"Katniss?" I hear Delly beckon, trying to bring me back to reality. Trying and failing, that is. I hear her but only in a vague, distant sense. My mind is still stuck on the image in my grasp. Still stuck on the novelty that I managed to find a remembrance for the boy who still at times questions if his memory is full of lies.

"I still cry about my family and somedays I can't even remember their faces."

I never even considered the possibility of finding a token of Peeta's departed family here. It never occurred to me, the potential finds in this box at my fingertips, that I could take home to my boyfriend. I never imagined finding him something to hold onto when the inevitable dark day came again like a storm cloud, full of thunder.

I'm so entranced what this could mean for Peeta, so lost in my own little world, that I'm barely even hanging onto the ladder. I'm definitely not as steady as I should be, standing near the top rung.

And I'm definitely not steady enough to hang on when Delly gives it a rough shake, trying to catch my attention.

/

The boxes break my fall. Sort of. Kanon and Leaf John had taken the liberty of placing the empty cardboard, already looked through and emptied, beneath the ladder.

Falling headfirst into a large, void box is better than falling plainly onto the filthy, concrete tile floor. But not ideal. Not as helpful as falling into a box of surviving clothes or toys would have been.

Delly apologized profusely for shaking the ladder. She'd even begun to cry when she noticed the blood seeping from my forehead.

Thankfully Kanon was there, as I didn't have the energy to console her much. I don't even know how I managed to cut my head at all, but it stung a fair amount and it provided me the excuse I wanted minutes prior, to escape the group project and head for the bakery.

Even after the fall, my mind still was cemented on the newfound treasure. My first instinct was still to show this memento to Peeta as soon as possible.

Kanon though, like a good friend, insisted on walking me home, despite my many protests that it was unnecessary, that I was just fine, that I could walk home blind if I had to. He insisted, foiling my intention to walk directly to the bakery and not wait for Peeta's return home, which still remained hours away.

Kanon was surprisingly stubborn when he felt strongly about something and I chose to relent, to give in and allow him to accompany me back to what used to be Victor's Village—where he now resided with Delly, inside Peeta's old home—without much fight.

Fighting for your independence and autonomy doesn't exactly present you as rational when there's a bloody gash in your forehead.

"Doesn't that hurt?" Kanon asks as we make out way up my porch.

I look up, maybe a little startled, from Mr. and Mrs. Mellark's wedding photo. "My head?"

"Yeah," he says carefully, looking at the blood like it's a mutt in an arena.

I shrug, doing my best not to indicate how dizzy I actually feel. Either from the fall or the blood still dripping out despite my attempt to plug the wound up with old cotton rags someone sorted into the trash box. "I've had worse."

He chuckles, a little sardonically. "Yeah, so have I."

I thank him for walking me home—for it was as inconvenient as it was sweet—and close the door slowly behind me, before leaning my ear against the wooden frame, waiting. Waiting for him to climb the steps down from my porch and make his way back to the Justice Building. Waiting for him to be far enough out of sight that I can sneak back out without him also trying to accompany me to the bakery.

It's not that I don't appreciate Kanon and Delly and all of my other friends' concerns. It's the fact that I wish to bestow a likely loaded item upon my boyfriend and I really don't need an audience to do it.

It's not the easiest feat, to slyly time it so Kanon won't hear me opening and shutting my front door again. And it's probably not my smartest plan, to walk alone along the rocky cobblestones and the uneven concrete, with a less than level head and body.

But I make it to the back door of the bakery still, just as I knew I would. It takes three times as long, but I make it there nonetheless.

Still clutching the photograph of his parents between my fingers too. Still with the same primary focus on my mind. To give him a token of remembrance, a token of the imperfect family he lost so tragically, that he still greatly missed, even when he can't say their names. Even when he can't conjure up their faces.

"You don't remember your family?"

"Sometimes I do... I'm not so sure other days. My memory isn't exactly top notch, if you know what I mean."

I push open the heavy-weighted back door, using all the energy my body can muster up. To my relief, Thom is already in the back room, sweeping flour off the floor.

"Hi, boss," he greets slyly as I walk in, barely glancing up at me. I shoot him an over-the-top eye roll, though I can't help smirking myself at the stupid nickname, when he beckons Peeta. "Hey, your girl is here!" He yells loudly. Too loudly to be packed with customers at the counter.

I take that to mean the daily rush has come and gone. Which would be very convenient, as it means I can present Peeta with my finding that much faster, without having to worry about his business—or our business, as he teasingly calls it—being held up.

I hear the sound of my boyfriend's quiet laughter from the front. The sound that I akin to my father's singing or my sister's squeal of delight. The last sound still alive that can make my heart do a flip.

But it dies out the second he peaks his blonde head into the back room. The moment his baby blues, the same color as both his parents', meet my silver ones and then trail upwards.

Almost as if remembering the gash in my head, I reach to my forehead, to ensure the makeshift cloth bandage is still in place.

"Katniss?" Peeta says, his eyes looking far more nervous than I anticipated. Which I can only take to mean the red liquid has seeped through the plain fabric. "Is that blood?"

I don't want him to focus too heavily on that fact though. Like I told Kanon, I've had much worse injuries in my life. Me and Peeta both have.

Just look at his prosthetic leg.

"Yes," I reply easily, before moving closer to him, pushing the glossy photograph towards him. "But that doesn't matter right now. What does matter is-"

"You are literally bleeding."

I sigh, feeling slightly perturbed now. "Peeta, look," I insist, thrusting the image of his parents towards him, waiting for it to take anchor.

And it does. It takes a beat longer than I expect, but it happens nonetheless. I watch silently as the image captives him, as the shiny photograph takes him back to a time when this exact location was the only home he'd ever known and this business was run by the two people inside the picture.

He touches the photo, as if to test it's realism, before looking up at me in disbelief. "Where did you find this?"

"The Justice Building today. Inside the boxes, with all the things lost in the bombing."

There's a long pause as Peeta process this. The silence makes me antsy, finding myself abruptly uncertain of what could be going through his mind.

Finally, he whispers softly, "I never thought I'd see this picture again."

And the awed, tender smile that spreads across his face swiftly encompasses me in its warmth.

And I suddenly don't even feel the gash in my head anymore.

/

Read The Rest On AO3

[holidaywishes]

not all monsters do monstrous things...

Part 1: The Victor

  Summary of Series: Delly Cartwright lost her best friend, Peeta, to the games. Now, the one that took him seems to have a soft spot for her.

  Summary of Chapter: Cato wins the 74th Hunger Games but during his Victory Tour, he comes face to face with his actions. As well as a young girl who he can’t seem to get off his mind

  Warning: Some fluff, some angst, some violence

  Author’s Note: No, this was not requested but who cares. It’s my blog and I’ll write what I want 😂. I reblogged this post like a year ago about writing for Cato and Delly after reading something on FanFiction.net with them as a pairing but it didn’t conclude/continue and I wanted more. Thus, I’m writing my own take on Tumblr. I’m going to do my best to keep it has original as possible but there’s a chance I’ll use things from the story I read. So, any similarities to plot go to the original author of They Caught Fire from fanfic.net (go check it out, it’s pretty good!) Also, for some reason, there aren’t really any Cato/Hunger Games GIFs in the search bar so I found this on Google. Don’t @ me. I tried to find the owner but it wouldn’t bring me to the page. I’m not claiming it, just using it for this until I pick a graphic.

  masterlist

  the other masterlist

xx

Cato’s P.O.V.

  Seeing the look on the Mellark boy’s face as you pushed Katniss off the steel Cornucopia was supposed to make you happy. It meant you were the victor after all. Yet, as he stood in front of you, you could see the pain in his face. No trace of fear, just pain. He lost the girl he loved and you knew the feeling all too well. You took one step toward Peeta and he tilted his head slightly, as if to say I won’t fight you, before he jumped after The Girl On Fire.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen!” The voice of Claudius Templesmith boomed through the arena as the mutts disappeared and you were left alone, “I am proud to present to you, your newest victor of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Cato Berenger -- the tribute from District 2!” You watch as a hovercraft appears overhead and begins to descend into the arena, dropping a ladder for you to clutch onto and take you back to the Capitol. Whoever is there -- doctors, aids, Capitol attendants -- swarm you in preparation for the interview you’ll soon be having with Caesar Flickerman. You’ve been preparing for this your whole life, it was a priority at your parents Training Centre

  “You win the games by sheer force and brute strength, fine. But it means nothing, nothing, if you can’t connect with the audience in those interviews. They have to love you. They have to respect you. You are their victor.” Your mothers words rung through your ears and you took a deep breath before your mentor found you and explained what was happening; you didn’t pay attention for most of it though, considering you already knew.

  “Cato!” Wade, the former victor and your mentor, yelled to you, “are you listening to me?”

  “I know what to do, Wade, I’ll be fine.” you sneered

  “There’s something that you need to understand, boy,” he snaps back, forcing himself to block your path as you try to walk away, “the interview is one part of a thousand things that will happen within the next few months. The interview is easy, it’s fun even, it’s a celebration of you and your strength. That’s easy for us in Two, but the Victory Tour is where your world changes. Where you’ll realize what a monster you’ve become”

  “I did what I had to, to survive!” you yelled

  “WE ALL DID!” He shouted back, “but I’ve never quite seen someone as callous, as monstrous, as you. And neither has anyone in the districts you visit. They’ll stare blankly as you speak to them, cheering only when they fear their lives may be in danger, but they won’t appreciate your words. You killed their children, their families, their friends. You won’t deserve their kindness and they won’t show it to you. Especially not in the outer districts -- 11 and 12. Not after what you did to that little girl in 11 and 12′s precious ‘Girl on Fire.’ And after the tour is over, what comes of you? Nothing. Until you get to be in my position. A mentor for the next soldier who volunteers to sacrifice himself for President Snow.“ His words were venomous, you couldn’t deny that, but you didn’t understand why. Being a victor is all that we’d trained for in District Two, so why has he not been more grateful for his survival, you wondered. He notices the confusion on your face before continuing his ‘lesson,’ “You think being a victor is this wonderful life, right? Fancy houses and clothes, attention from the most beautiful girls in the District and glamourous parties in the Capitol; that’s what you imagine right?”

  “I--”

  “It’s like that for a while,” Wade interrupted you before you could finish your thought, “it is. And then you realize, you’re lonely. You’re completely alone. The shine of being the victor wears off quickly, especially when there’s a new batch of tributes lining up to fill your shoes. What made you special to them soon becomes a distant memory but what never fades, no matter how hard you try, are the screams from the people you killed. The blood you spilt. The faces of the families you had to look into and say ‘we thank you for your sacrifice.’”

  “So what do you suppose I do?” you said through bared teeth

  “Unfortunately,” he scoffed, “there’s not much you can do. You have to be who the Capitol wants you to be. Who you’ve trained to be. I just wanted to prepare for what’s to come.” You absorbed his words as you made your way to the waiting area before you entered the stage for your interview, hearing the booming music for Caesar’s introduction as he excitedly greeted the audience, before allowing for cheers for your team. When the plate rising you up, you adjust your suit jacket and put on a cocky smile, the one that the Capitol audience was so used to seeing, so you could charm the faces in the audience as soon as they could see you.

  “CATO BERENGER! Our newest victor of the Seventy-fourth Annual Hunger Games!” Caesar exclaimed, outstretching one arm to showcase you as you walked on the stage, “Welcome Cato!”

  “Hi Caesar” you smile

  “So, how are you feeling?” he asks, listening intently

  “I feel good. I feel like a victor!” The audience cheered and Caesar let out a congratulatory chuckle

  “Well that’s good!” he said, “isn’t it?” directing the question to the audience before turning back to you, “I must ask about your District Partner, Clove. You seemed quite upset about her death.”

  “Clove was... a dear friend. We grew up together,” you fought the urge to say you’d trained together, as it was technically illegal and the Capitol officials would be furious, “she was a talented competitor and I will miss her.”

  “Did you... love her?” he pries, leaning forward in his chair and you think about his answer for a moment. If you answer truthfully, that you loved Clove with your entire heart, then the audience might find you monstrous for letting her die when she called out to you. If you lie, and say that she was like a sister to you, they might question your authenticity

  “I did,” you admitted, “but not in the way you may be implying. We were not the Star Crossed Lovers as those two from District 12 tried to portray themselves as. I loved her like a sister, as family.” The conversation shifted quickly and Caesar made jokes, keeping the atmosphere light-hearted before the inevitable death toll was displayed on screen and the murder of 23 children was broadcast. Three hours of footage from the past 18 days. From the pre-arena events to the bloodbath that saw so many die so suddenly. They showed your death count, as well as Clove’s, before taking a moment to share the small girl from 11′s death and Katniss’ song. You weren’t sure why, as it wasn’t in keeping with your story, but nevertheless, there it was; every note of the solemn song she sang to the dying child. Soon enough, they show your win on the Cornucopia, how you easily flung Katniss from the top and how Peeta jumped after her; An act they portrayed as cowardly. The anthem plays again and the seal appears on screen as President Snow is introduced, taking the stage with a young girl who carries the crown on a red cushion. This is the first time you’ve ever been in the same space as Snow and you can smell a hint of blood, covered by a thick layer of roses. He gives you a maniacal grin, as if he has something planned for you, before he congratulates you on your triumph.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen, this years victor of the Seventy-fourth Annual Hunger Games!” Caesar exclaims once more and you wave to the crowd before being led off the stage, onto the train to take you back to District Two. Home. It feels so distant now. So much so, that you hardly recognize it. Wade was right, the first month or so was parties and affection from nearly everyone you came in contact with, but then you’d get tired of it and lock yourself in your mansion in the Victor’s Village. Preparing yourself for the Victory Tour and what ordeals would await you there. When it was finally time for you to leave, to make your way to District 12, Wade told you to prepare yourself for absolute silence.

  “When I went to District 12, even though their tributes deaths weren’t by my hand, they treated me as if they were. As if I’d directly starved them or butchered them. They treated me like I was nothing. Like I wasn’t even worth their breath, and I didn’t kill the only volunteer their district has had in years, so imagine how they’ll treat you.” He sneered his words before buttering a piece of bread

  “Maybe they won’t be silent. Maybe they’ll cause a commotion” you scoffed

  “You don’t want that” Wade replied sharply

  “Why not?”

  “Any trouble caused with you around won’t look good. Whether you cause it or not. You should still try to act as though each district is important, because they are.”

  “Who says I wouldn’t?”

  “If you want commotion, you’re saying you don’t care about their lives.” You nodded in understanding at Wade’s words just as the train pulled up to District 12. A dirty, grimy, colourless place that was as quiet as a ghost town. Nothing like your home district. You looked to Wade who shrugged at you, as if to say ‘this is it,’ earning a sigh from you before continuing on your way to the square. You were able to watch as the citizens of the coal district filed into the square, noticing the worn faces from those who had to work every day of their lives to the fresh faces of the children who had been more fortunate than their older counterparts. Your eyes found their way to the front of the crowd, just below the stage, where the families and friends of Peeta Mellark and Katniss Everdeen stood. Immediately, you recognized Primrose Everdeen, the sister that Katniss had volunteered for; she looked so frail and innocent, no wonder the district and the Capitol was invested in Katniss’ story. There was a face that you didn’t recognize, however, on Peeta’s side

  “Who’s that?” you asked Wade as you pointed to a small blonde girl with pale skin who stood beside Peeta’s brothers, “Peeta didn’t have a sister did he?”

  “No,” Wade said simply, smirking at your sudden interest in a District 12 girl, “that’s Delly Cartwright. She was Peeta’s best friend. She was his Clove.” You didn’t quite register the words at first but when you did, you could only scoff at his words, refusing to reply. You’d, of course, been prepped on what to say to the crowd but when you stepped on stage, you became tongue-tied.

  “I would first like to thank you for coming out today,” you knew they had no choice, but the words were scripted and you had to say them, “this is not an easy speech to make. The lives you’ve lost will be, uhm, will be felt by--” you looked up at the audience once, clearing your throat to force yourself to continue, “will be felt by the Capitol. Your sacrifices are -- will be missed.” You tried but stopped when you heard a small sob escape the audience, connecting it to Prim, who buried her face in the chest of a tall, dark haired boy. You were told to keep things distant, clean, and not mention the tributes by name but you couldn’t help it. Seeing the families faces changed things. Like Wade said it would, “Katniss was incredibly smart and, with the way she treated Rue, I could tell she had a big heart. Peeta had remarkable strength,” you turned to Peeta’s family, catching the stare of the blonde you’d seen before, “but for all his strength, he was kind, truly.”

  “You’re a murderer!” The dark haired boy yelled out

  “Gale stop,” clutching onto him, pleading him to stop, “please”

  “You don’t care about them. You don’t care about us!” You couldn’t apologize, the tour would be ruined and the Capitol would think their victor was weak, but what could he say to this boy shouting at you from the audience, pushing away the young girl Katniss had volunteered for. How could you stop this from becoming the commotion Wade warned you would mean you didn’t care about their lives

  “The Captiol thanks you for your sacrifices. Peeta and Katniss will be mourned.” Suddenly, the boy lunged at you, the one you heard was called Gale, a name that sounded familiar to you but you couldn’t quite place it. You knew you couldn’t be on the stage for much longer, so you turned to walk away but heard the sound of heavy footsteps sprint toward you

  “GALE!” a voice screamed out. At first you thought it was Prim, due to the high pitched tone of it but there was a different cadence to it, “GALE DON’T!” the voice repeated, causing you to turn around just in time for a fist to fly towards your face. You managed to miss it but when you pulled your arm back to return the fist, you caught sight of Wade telling you not to.

  “Don’t!” he shouted just as a fist connected with the side of your face. There was frantic movement as the Peacekeepers rushed to take Gale away and his family, as well as Katniss’, ran after him while you were pulled behind the curtain.

  “LET ME GO!” You shouted as pairs of arms surrounded you, dragging you back to the square, “I have to stop them!”

  “There’s nothing you can do!” Wade yelled

  “They could kill him!”

  “That’s his problem. He’s the one who tried to fight a victor.” You sighed and did your best to convince them that you were calm but once they let you go, you heard the sounds of a leather whip slashing through skin and you knew exactly what was happening. You ran quickly out to the square, where a whipping post had been set up and the Hawthorne boy was tied up by his wrists as Prim and Delly fought to get to his side

  “STOP!” they yelled, watching as their friend bled from the marks inflicted on him

  “ENOUGH!” you roared and the square went silent, the Peacekeeper who was laying the whip to Gale’s back stopping in his tracks while the guards restraining Prim and Delly dropped their hold. Delly was the first to run to Gale and Prim followed shortly after, the two of them frantically untying Gale wrists from the post; his body dropping onto Delly heavily that she almost crumpled under his weight. She and Prim took Gale out of the square, to safety, while you confronted the Peacekeepers

  “Mr. Berenger...” the one who had given the lashings whimpered, “sir, I--”

  “Why would you whip this boy?” you questioned, a harshness to your tone that this district had probably become all too familiar with, “because he mourns his friends? Because he is in pain?”

  “Because he attacked you, sir!”

  “I don’t need your protection, sir!” you countered, making yourself big enough that you were peering down at him, “I release him of any and all charges. And you are not to hurt him again. Is that understood?”

  “Yessir--” they mumbled

  “I SAID IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?!”

  “YES SIR!” they repeated, now with more urgency. You left the square not sure how to feel. President Snow was probably not going to like this very much and your parents wouldn’t be too pleased about it either. But it was her that you were worried about. Her opinion that you cared about. You felt like you searched for hours but the screams coming from the apothecary let you know that Gale was there and Delly likely was as well. When you found them, he had already passed out from the pain and Delly was clutching his hand as tears streamed down his face, gasping suddenly when she felt your presence

  “Please,” she pleaded, standing up to block your path to him, “he didn’t mean it. He wouldn’t have gone further than a punch, he was just upset..”

  “It’s okay,” you assured, holding up your hands to try to ease her mind, “I’m not going to hurt him or take him away. I just wanted to see how you-- how he was doing...” She furrowed her brow at your confession, unsure of how to proceed, but took her seat next to Gale.

  “The lashes have exhausted him and he lost a lot of blood” she said, rubbing his hand with her thumb. You examined more now that you were closer to her. Her blonde hair looked almost yellow in the square, but the lighting in the apothecary made it appear golden. Her pale skin translucent in the unforgiving light of the district but here it was dewy, a radiance that you wouldn’t expect from a coal-mining district. She must be a merchant’s daughter.

  “I’m sorry” you said quietly and she looked at you hastily, shocked at your apology. Her blue eyes beaming from across the room. They were close in colour to Peeta’s, but also to yours, only hers were deeper. Like an ocean you could get lost in, surrounded by dark rings that you feared you’d never escape. They were beautiful. Enticing. Enchanting. But you could feel that she was holding back pain. Pain from the loss of her best friend. Pain from the toll the Hunger Games had taken on her district. A pain you desperately wanted to take from her, “you must think I’m a monster...” you said after a period of silence had overtaken the two of you

  “Because of this?” she questioned, “this was the Peacekeepers, not you.”

  “Because of the games,” you corrected, “I’ve watched those deaths more times than I care to admit. I saw how they portrayed me. How everyone else must have seen me.”

  “I don’t envy you at all,” she said, turning her body a sliver to face you, “having to train your whole life to be taught to kill other children. Many your own age or younger. I’ve never understood why death, and the deaths of so many children, was the price the Capitol wanted to collect. You had to do awful things to bring pride to your district and I am very very very...” you prepared yourself for the viscous words she would hurl your way, surprised with what came “sorry.”

  “Sorry?” you questioned

  “Yes.” she replied, “to have your life mapped out for you, without your say, couldn’t have been easy. I’m so very sorry that this is the life you were led to believe was all you could have”

  “You’re so kind...” you said, scrunching your eyebrows together, “no one has shown me this much kindness in my life.”

  “I don’t think you’re a monster, Mr. Berenger, I think you’re lost. Trying to fit an image that the Capitol and your own District has created for you.” Just then, Wade stormed through the door

  “CATO!” he barked, “you can’t be here. We have to go. Now!”

  “Take this,” you said to Delly, taking out a small silver box from your jacket, “it’s not much but it should help with his healing.”

  “Thank you” she smiled at you as you were torn from the room and back to the train.

  “With what’s happened here, we’ve been forced to move up our timeline. You’ll be going to District 11 now. Staying for two days more than we’d planned.” Wade said

  “Can I see her again?” was all you said, unable to remove Delly from your mind

  “Focus, Mr. victor,” Wade snapped, “are you hearing what I’m saying to you? You will be staying in the District of the tribute who killed Clove for two days.”

  “Fine. I’ll say a nice speech, enjoy their festivities and then keep to myself on the train”

  “What if something happens, as it did here in 12.”

  “Then I stay back. I don’t get involved”

  “Easier said than done apparently,” he sighed, “that’s what you were supposed to do in 12 as well. But we see how that worked, now, don’t we?”

  “That was different”

  “Because of some girl?”

  “She’s not just some girl...”

  “You don’t know her. You cannot get involved with her, with anyone.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s complicated... you’ll understand once you make it back home.”

  “Tell me now.”

  “You’re not free to do as you please, Cato, none of the Victors are. Why do you think we’re all miserable?” Wade replied, pushing you aside so you would pay attention, “it is better to keep a distance from anyone we could possibly hurt than be selfish and risk their lives.”

  “Risk their lives?” you questioned

  “Just trust me!”

  “How can I trust you when you’re not telling me anything?”

  “I have been there! Trust my experience, boy, or you will slowly go mad.” You inhaled sharply, wanting to argue, but trusting that Wade knew what he was talking about; he was a former victor after all. But it still didn’t make sense. You still wanted to find comfort in the kindness of Delly again and you couldn’t understand that, if you could have everything, why couldn’t you have her?

[hockeysweetheart]

This is just An idea I am playing around with a bit  ** Please don’t kill me**

Please note this is a partly in a hospital and their may be some triggers but in this part nothing really should be 

I look at my wife who is pregnant with our third child. I work at the bakery here… I have been my whole life.. My wife works a part time job at the local market…One of our children is in school already…  My wife is sitting there in a chair she is  overdue… If I learned anything from having 2 others and the 3rd on the way. Sometimes women don’t like to be touched when they are this far along… So I have to ask… Sometimes I wonder if I stayed a safe distance away and threw some baked goods that would work out… She tells her belly “ I want you out” ever since she has been over due… I am  patient with her… After a while she  noticed my starting and asks “What” I tell her “ Nothing just looking at my beautiful wife”…That comes up with a smile and she says “ You’re just a suck up aren’t ya…” I walk up to her and she accepts my kiss and I tell her “Maybe”… she snaps “ That doesn’t help this baby come now does it”… I tell her “Nope but it helps you relax a little according to these books a stressed mamma to be doesn’t help the baby come any faster”… She looks at me and says “ You believe those books? Because I don’t the doctors told us and from our experience every baby is different”...Her surgery to get the baby out is next week if  she doesn’t go into labor before that her self… We don’t know if we are having a boy or girl we already have 1 of each so this time we wanted to be surprised… Our oldest is A girl we named  Jocelyn she is 6  the second one our boy is Named Lucas he is 3… We have been married for 7 years… Later I take her to the hospital … They send us back home it is kinda a disappointment since she is just a few days over 40 weeks…   we go to bed I wake up early in the morning send Jocelyn to school and take Lucas to daycare.. and Head off to work… During the day I get a call from my wife “  You need to bring me to the hospital my water broke”… I stupidly ask her “ Are you sure”.. She says “ Peeta of course I am sure  there is water on the floor plus I have done this twice hurry please”.. I tell her I am on the way… I make a call for arrangements to pick up the children and tell them that the bags  are in our front room… I arrive home and we go right to the hospital… we arrive there and we are put in a room...The nurse asks us a bunch of questions and tells us the doctor will be here shortly… we are in the room alone  for a bit she has a few contractions … Then I see her pass by our room her Braid you cannot miss it… Then she walks in and Say’s in a professional voice  looks down at her sheet, Hello Mrs Johanna  Mellark I will be delivering your baby today My Name Katniss Everdeen…

My wife looks at me and her and says “ Well is this a love fest or are we gonna have a baby here” I ask “ Where is our regular doctor?”.. Katniss Tells me “ He is unfortunately unable to be here today”… Johanna just says “ I don’t care if you two fu**** in the past I don’t care if our doctor isn’t here… I am in a lot of pain and Feel the need to push so one of you better deliver this baby before I do it myself”… Katniss gets on her gloves on and checks on the baby… A bunch of other people come in to be there… Katniss says “ Whenever your ready you push” a few short minutes later Katniss says “ almost there” Johanna gives one more push and the baby… Katniss holds up the baby who is crying... we find out it’s a girl… and she put the baby on Johanna…  Katniss asks me if I want to cut the cord this is the first time she has looked at me in the eyes since she came in to deliver the baby… After I cut the cord she takes the baby  and then goes and washes her off and weighs her and does other checks on the baby then puts then hands the baby to me… which I bring to Johanna… Katniss Asks “do you have a name for her?…” I look at Johanna and she say’s “ Scarlett  May Mellark”.Katniss nods and says “ Congratulations”  and is off out of the room.. I am holding Scarlett yet my mind is some where else because it’s been so long since I’ve seen her … I just shake my head and then I look down at Johanna and give Scarlett to her… A little later our families come and Meet Scarlett…

Katniss’s side… When I looked at who’s baby I am delivering my heart drops. I haven’t seen him in years.. I get suited up before I go into the room.. Today I happen to be taken over for Doctor Anderson… I take a deep breath and get into my mode… I walk in and I know he is staring at me… But I just tell them who I am and I know both of them… I avoid making eye contact with Peeta  the whole time Until the its time to cut the umbilical cord… I look at him right in the eyes he has a few tears in his eyes… But I ask him if he wants to cut it… I clean check the baby make sure she is healthy, I tell them Congrats  then I am out of the room… Another nurse checks on them… Madge meets me in the break room and says  “ So Heard you ran into your ex boyfriend who is now married with 3 children and you delivered the third…” I tell her “ If I knew it was him I would of gotten you to cover for me” Madge says in a joking voice “ Well I would of said no honey you have  to face him at some point since coming back here to 12”… I tell her “ Yes I Guess but I didn’t expect to deliver his baby” we are talking about other stuff… Then Finnick comes in who is also a doctor says “ Katniss I heard you delivered your ex’s baby.” He looks at us and says “ Ah you already talked about it didn’t you I cannot believe I missed the best gossip of the day”…  I roll my eyes…We hear a code Pink Location Delivery  Recovery room Room 501 over the loud speaker and all are on our feet…

[miaouerie]

[coda] a pyrrhic victory/an elpidian daydream

this coda marks my first multichapter fic wrapped up and completed!!! so here’s some more related ramblings as a way for me to commemorate this milestone n___n

with the nonlinear narrative I thought I’d include a linked timeline for the chapters in case anyone (like me lol) wants to read the story in chronological order. then there’s some further explanation of what I’ve dubbed ~the jeron’s death conspiracy~ and notes from characterization I wasn’t able to include directly in the story, but were still important regardless...

furthermore, I want to thank @ninelanterns, @atthelamppost, and @sadieandor for following along with this story, as well as anyone else who came along for the adventure. this is definitely a darkfic as far as rebelcaptain goes but I hope that both endings were satisfying in their own ways !!

1. an actual chronological table of contents

Before Cassian is reaped:

day 15

Cassian’s time in the Games:

days 2, 9, 5, 18

What came after that:

days 6, 7, 11, 13, 14, 22, 26◆

Jeron dies:

days 20, 8, 25

Jyn is reaped and Cassian mentors her:

days 1, 3, 4, 12, 10, 16, 17◆, 19◆, 21, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 30

After Jyn wins her Games:

bonus chapter, day 31

◆ = chapters that are about trauma concurrent to most of the story, and loosely placed chronologically

2. the Jeron conspiracy

I decided to do a summary for this because I changed my plan slightly after posting day 8: “don’t say goodbye”/abandoned due to some inspiration from @ninelanterns; originally I was going to have snow have cassian brainwashed into genuinely believing that irga and his father were killed by someone with a grudge against them and the capitol (aka someone closely related to a tribute who died under their mentorship) in order to use him as a mouthpiece against those plotting against the capitol; the angst would’ve been from him finding out the truth and hating that his dad’s suicide was used for the capitol’s means. but then I got the idea to have snow brainwash cassian into believing that the “accident” his father and irga died in was actually his fault, because he told jeron the truth of what snow was doing to him in the capitol:

Snow sells Cassian “under the table” until he turns 19, which is when he has Cassian adopt a new persona that can be better capitalized on. Jeron realizes that Cassian’s faking it, suspects that Cassian has been hiding his victimhood this entire time, and when he confirms it realizes there’s no other way to get Cassian out of it; Snow certainly won’t let him sub in to mentor. Suicide is his solution to both Cassian’s problem and his guilt over not being able to protect his son.

Snow has Irga killed in the same way that Jeron kills himself to let Cassian and Lila know that Snow knows it was a suicide. Suicide is the ultimate refutation of Snow’s power—as well as the complete antithesis to any victor’s innate clinging to survival—so Snow has it covered up: Cassian, as one of two people to know the truth about Jeron’s suicide and Irga’s death, is tortured and brainwashed into believing that Jeron and Irga were killed in a power plant explosion as retribution for him disobeying Snow. Doing so serves two purposes: installing the cover-up and guarantees Cassian’s submission.

Before his death Jeron wrote a suicide note, knowing that he couldn’t kill himself and leave Cassian without an explanation. He knows that Snow will have their house stripped and searched, so he hides the note in what was designated to be Cassian’s house. He couldn’t have known it would be the one thing that would break through the brainwashing; if Cassian hadn’t found it, he would have continued to believe that it was all his fault.

Draven does his own investigation into Jeron and Irga’s deaths after witnessing the whiplash that was Cassian’s first three years as an unwilling victor whore, his outrageous personality flip after turning ninteen, and how his demeanor changed after undergoing “therapy” to cope with Jeron’s death. He finds out that Jeron’s death was a suicide, Irga’s death was retribution, and that Snow has an entire program to monetize and exploit victors after their Games.

3. getting from day 1 to 31?!

when I originally thought of this AU it was more about the angst that growing up in the limelight of the capitol as the son of a victor would be like, with constant camera crews as cassian was growing up, betting pools on when he was going to be reaped, etc. and more of an emphasis on the issues that cassian (as part of the pseudo-celebrity class that victors occupy in the capitol) would have trying to promote this fake relationship with jyn during the games to save her. there was also going to be a straight downer ending, with the closing scene being cassian telling jyn that they have to fake a relationship now in front of the cameras and jyn having a “what have you done?” moment

I deliberately did not go in depth with what jeron’s life as a victor was like, partly because plotting both jyn and cassian’s hunger games was already a Lot (I found out pretty quickly that you have to start with planning the arena first, in order to plan tribute deaths and sponsor gifts...) but jeron was an underdog winner, as are most of the victors from non-career districts. lila was pregnant around the time that jeron was reaped and esperanza, their first child, was born some time before jeron’s victory tour. snow had their daughter killed because of something jeron did/didn’t do on the tour; even though jeron and lila are shaken from the loss they agree to be open to having another child, provided that jeron doesn’t do anything to put the child at risk ever again.... but cassian would’ve gotten reaped regardless because there is no way snow wouldn’t have exploited the family drama!!! but cassian’s reaping creates a rift that is referenced in day 15: accidents. and even though jeron is successful in saving cassian that isn’t the end of it; while lila isn’t privy to what cassian is going through she can feel a marked difference each year he comes back in the way that mothers do, as well as the tension between father and son (cassian’s fear of jeron finding out as he’s dragged deeper and deeper vs. jeron’s suspicion that something wrong is happening that has to do with cassian), which all culminates in the year that cassian turns nineteen with jeron’s death. when her husband arrived in district 5 before cassian did he didn’t tell lila about their son being a horndog in the capitol, but lila seeing cassian after he finally gets back five weeks later confirms her worst fears. then she’s the one that discovers jeron’s body and is present when the peacekeepers come to take cassian back to the capitol. her son is gone for a month....... then when he comes back he’s spouting lies about jeron’s death even though both of them saw the body??? yeah, that’s why she nopes on out of victors’ village. after jeron’s death her and cassian don’t see each other for four years until cassian brings jyn home from the games

jyn’s backstory came together quickly but I had considered having bodhi be one of the tributes who died under cassian’s mentorship. bodhi and jyn would’ve been close friends so jyn would have already had that vendetta against cassian; it would’ve made hitting that original ending easier but having jyn be against cassian from the very start would’ve made it less plausible that they could earn each other’s trust before the start of jyn’s games............. while I wanted this story to be dark and depressing I still wanted it to have a reciprocated rebelcaptain end game, so :’)

it wasn’t until day 28 (the cassian/finnick noncon) that I got an idea for a not-so-horrible ending, and I blame the completely depressingly hopeless whump in that chapter for making me think “hmm maybe this shouldn’t end terribly” :’D btw, if anyone noticed I forgot annie cresta is in canon the 70th hunger games victor. for someone who’s neurotic about looking up details I have no idea how this fact escaped me because I didn’t notice until at least halfway through whumptober, so we’ll just say in this AU she’s the 71st victor. this weaves in nicely with my headcanon that after snow saw how easily cassian was manipulated when someone he loved was on the line, he had annie reaped to exert more control over finnick (which happens to be my favorite kind of odesta fic tbh). anyway after writing 3k of depressing andair (andor/odair ship name? ok i’m shutting up) cassian/finnick I had a lovely mental image of cassian and jyn cuddling on the train back home to district 5, relieved and alive, and thought that would be a more uplifting note to end on. then I remembered that I was writing this for whumptober, and decided to write the terrible ending too :’)

4. some chapter commentary because why not

[ETA later!]

5. is there no escape?

yes!!! yes they do escape:

in a pyrrhic victory, post-day 31, draven succeeds in absconding with cassian and meeting up with jyn, saw, lyra, and the rest of their resistance cell (an underground, pan-panem organization fittingly called.... the alliance). draven has to cut out cassian’s implant before they rendezvous with the group, which he ropes a medical professional into doing (he may or may not kill them afterwards); it’s the only mark cassian bears on his body until he starts getting freckles from being in the sun again. similar to mockingjay in how peeta’s hijacking was treated with therapy in district 13, cassian undergoes actual, legitimate therapy after he and draven settle in with the alliance HQ. draven hovers anxiously for the first several sessions because “therapy” in the capitol has a stigma, even before he read the term “extensive in-patient therapy” in cassian’s intendance records, and it does take a good while before they make any remarkable progress. but unlike katniss and peeta cassian is alright in jyn’s presence, and in fact prefers it. they’re almost always seen together, and while jyn has a good amount of guilt for leaving him behind the first time her motivation for staying with him is out of a genuine desire to help him get better so they can be with each other the same way they were in an elpidian daydream again.

in happily ever after!an elpidian daydream, cassian and jyn are able to escape together in between arriving home in district 5 and what was supposed to be jyn’s victory tour. jyn was never aware of what snow did with desirable victors because it’s really only the top 1% of panem and the victors who know about it; she and cassian escape after he tells her that he wants to leave with her, but he doesn’t tell her the real reason why he wants to escape until much later and jyn never sees the recording of cassian and finnick (but he does tell her it exists when he’s explaining the details of how snow exerts his control over the victors). their relationship progresses steadily, but the secret doesn’t come out until jyn points out that cassian is extremely passive in bed and only mirrors her desires. there’s varying attitudes towards sex in the districts vs. the libertine views in the capitol but cassian’s shame stems from his powerlessness in what he had to do Before. he receives therapy for it but jyn is patient and firm with reminding him that he had absolutely zero choice in the matter, and that she could never hate or be disgusted with him for it. there’s a lot to work through there as a result of cassian having to lie to himself about it for the first couple of years of it happening and then willingly choosing to engage with it when he was trying to save jyn, but their relationship comes out all the more stronger for it. as for what happens to draven?.... because this is the happily ever after ending I like to think he’s able to stay in the capitol and work as an agent codenamed fulcrum 🤪🤙 and that after his extraction when things get too dangerous for him in the capitol he and cassian are able to reunite again as part of the alliance/rebellion !!

[everlarkficquestions]

Sunday Stumped Day 29

It’s another Sunday Stumped Day!

Sometimes we straight out get stumped. So every few months we will pick a Sunday when we’ll post of a list of asks that we need your help on.

This time around we have focused on Asks that are looking for specific fics. 

If you know the answer to any of these asks please shoot us a message/ ask/  with the Post number and the fic details and we’ll add it and give you a shout out with our thanks. Any links you can provide will also be super helpful.

Thanks!

Post 1 , Post 2 , Post 3, Post 4, Post 5, Post 6, Post 7, Post 8, Post 9, Post 10, Post 11, Post 12, Post 13, Post 14, Post 15, Post 16, Post 17, Post 18, Post 19, Post 20, Post 21, Post 22 , Post 23, Post 24, Post 25, Post 26, Post 27 and Post 28 can be found here - and there are still fics we need your help with. 

495. theman189-blog said:

Also looking for a growing together fic where peeta and katniss are painting a room ar one point and they get in a paint fight, at the end when peeta has katniss over his shoulder she draws a heart in paint on his lower back

494. theman189-blog said:

Hi there, just read a fic where katniss and peeta were peacekeepers and fall in love called protect and serve, and I could have sworn there was another one where they're peacekeepers and fell in love but had a more concrete ending and I cant remember it... any thoughts?

493. breakmeaswitchson said:

Hi! So I posted asking about this on a sub in Reddit and got directed here, it's not specifically an Everlark one (I don't think) but if you could help I'd be so thankful! Basically, it took the characters from the 74th Hunger Games, but the twist was that they all had to work together in designated groups? And (I think) weren't allowed to turn on each other until nobody else was left. I'm pretty sure Rue and Clove were on a team together, and I think the setting involved abandoned buildings.

492. jayana90 said:

Hi! I'm looking for a specific fic from Peeta's POV. I read it about a year ago & now I can't find it. It begins at his house in 12 with his family, then traces nearly all of the Hunger Games trilogy. It ends with a chapter with Peeta & Katniss living in 12 years later with their kids and a bakery. I think they loved cheese bread? It was really long and so good, I hope to find it again. V smutty.

FOUND! The Sexual Frustrations of Peeta Mellark by PeetasAndHerondales, which has sadly been deleted. - thank you, mistressnightshade!

491. allflowerscatchthesunlight said:

Fic name needed: I recall Peeta was taken by the capitol and then there was trackers embedded into his skin or something and he was found by the squad while in the capitol to kill snow. They cut it out of him. Also katniss was pregnant, but miscarried.

Found!  Secret Wishes, Secret Kisses by @katnissdoesnotfollowback -- thank you KDNFB!

490. jsth2obooks said:

Hi I read this fix a while ago and now I'm trying to find it. It's Modern day Katnisss and Peeta have to go to a high school reunion an they pretend to be either together/engaged. At the end they end up with a child. Thanks in advance

FOUND! Somewhere That’s Green by Jlala. Thank you, @fangirlingoverquotes

489. uglydora15 said:

I read this fancition about Katniss and Peeta post mockingjay and Katniss was pregnant I think for the second time and Peeta has a flashback and Katniss caught him kissing someone else in the bakery and he had to beg for her forgiveness

Possibly There Are Still Worse Games to Play- The Second Part of Our Journey by panskiss123.  Thank you, @sunsetsrmydreams

488. bad-fad said:

Hi so I think there’s a fix where mr. Mellark like takes in katniss when she’s young (I don’t think prim existed in the story but I could be wrong) and she grows up with the Mellarks but I can’t remember?? If not maybe some recs along those lines

Possibly - “Kinship” by Misshoneywell - thank you @endlessnightlock

possibly Star by HGRomance  - thank you @nightlock-89

Possibly the deleted Lion’s Tooth by Alexabee

487. craftydiva0828 said:

Looking for a story where after the war, Katniss rides the trains searching the districts for Peeta; people search for loved ones by posting their pictures at the train depot bulletin board.

FOUND!  when the far-gone dead return - writingforhugs (Thanks, @ladymurphyevermore!)              

486. bookworm06 said:

I was wondering if you guys know about a fic where Peeta woos katniss slowly, they dare secretly for a long time i think. And then Katniss comes out in this beautiful orange dress(peeta’s favorite color) to announce their engagement. She’s dressed up for a feast or party in the district or something! I loved this story but can’t even remember the name 🤦🏻‍♀️

FOUND! -  I Knew This Would Have Happened Anyway by @abk1973 - thank you, @litharalen

485. cowrintimrousbeastie said:

Hello! This is actually the first time I'm posting a question, I usually enjoy doing the detective work. This time though, I've looked high and low and can't find it... it's a drabble posted on tumblr in several parts. Peeta is living with his girlfriend Delly but during one of his baking workshops discovers that this longtime best friend Katniss is in love with him (she has him as her phone screen saver). She works at the library? He confronts her and she says forget it as he is happy w/Delly..

FOUND!  By @cowrintimrousbeastie herself!  It is How Long by @ra3lynn3.  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 , Part 4 and Part 5.

484. beautiful-harmony1 said:

Hello! Thank for your great work. I am looking for a fic I read a while ago. Post-mockingjay. Katniss is really sick and Peeta comes homes a realises. He takes care of her. On her “death bed” she talks about this that would have happened between the two. I’m pretty sure some bursts in and say “we found a cure”. Thank you so much

483. thehopefuldandelion said:

So I’ve been craving to read this fic that hopefully I didn’t make up and I’ve been trying to remember it’s name. All I remember is that Katinss and Gale(I think) are dating but when Gale would go to sleep Katinss would text Peeta. I’m pretty sure they were coworkers and couldn’t date bc of this. I know that she broke up with Gale but that’s all that my brain can remember. I’m sorry if this is vague or you can’t find it. I just wanted to read this again. Thanks for all you do for the community❤️

FOUND! This is After Hours by SoThere -thank you, @mendontprotectyou!

482. redhoodhungergames said:

I’m looking for a fic where peeta goes to this hotel (or something) and finds Katniss who works there as a singer. I remember when talking we hear that Katniss is from Virginia

481. just-absolutely-super said:

There’s a pre-epilogue fic I read about Katniss and Peeta growing back together. I can’t remember all the details but I think in the fic Katniss finds out Peeta painted Prim and it upset her? Toward the end she’s outside his bedroom door and confesses to him that she loves him. Thank you!

Possibly - The List of Words by MyKonstantine - thank you, @jennagill

480. peetniss27 said:

OK i must be going crazy, but this fanfic is about panem being a bunch of islands and they all do a computer session and are matched with their spouses after being “reaped” and Katniss was dating peeta and ended up with gale. It was called the islands but idk the new name please help!!!!!

FOUND!

Are You Leaving Me? - iloverueforever (*Thank you, @superchocovian!)

479. uniquepizzacollectionblog said:

Hi, i"m looking for a fic where katniss and peeta and best friends and have slept with each other in the past and now the sexual tension is coming back, maybe you guys know of this story?

478. xgetawaycar13 said:

Hiiii so I’m looking for a fic in which Katniss and Peeta get married in catching fire by order of snow and they are also forced to have children but I remember that at some point someone told Katniss about how all the girls at school liked Peeta so she got jealous and have him a blowjob Thank youuu I already look through your master list about marriage in catching fire but I couldn’t find it:(

FOUND.  This is Have Heart, My Dear by monroeslittle.  Thanks @finestunicorn.

477. ochri said:

Hi i'm looking for this fic from fanfiction It's a post-MJ fic and there's this one chapter where katniss peels? her skin off her fingers and then Peeta takes her to hospital. That's all I really remember :/

476. nikki-pondtheauthor said:

hey im curious if there are fanfics in which peeta learns how to use a bow and shoot arrows (taught by katniss). bonus if he does this in hunger games. im sure ive a read a fanfic before, that was awesome in my opinion because it is a bit out of character for him but highlighting the fact that he is a survivor too and can handle weapons even if he is more a friendly persona

475. white-dandelion-seeds said:

Hey, can you find me this story- Peeta helped Katniss to escape when her family was being killed. But he got captured and was made a slave. Later he helps Katniss to take revenge of the death of her family

474. chippedcupsandbrokenhearts said:

Ok do you know the name of Fic where Katniss finally gets away from her abusive marriage with gale and goes back to her family. They didn’t know she was being abused. She falls in love with Peeta and I remember at one point gale found her and her family drives him out of town. I read this YEARS ago and now I just randomly had the urge to reread it but can’t remember the name. Thank you!!!

Possibly - A Safe Place by HavishamWard,but this fic has been deleted. Thank you, @endlessnightlock

473. jillpill55 said:

Hi, I love your page and have read probably a hundred fics because of it. I hoping you can help me find this fic I read a couple of months ago. Peeta was captured and when he came back he couldn't kiss Katniss because of a implant snow had put in peeta's leg. I would be a mutli-chapter and may or not be finished. Thanks

Possibly - Rekindling by ShiningCity.  Thank you, @sunsetsrmydreams

472. svmn14 said: 

There was a story about Peeta suffering from an undetected hijacking attack timed 10 years after the last Games where he was designed to hurt Katniss 

FOUND!  This is Broken:  Scenes from the Sequel by MockingJayFlyingFree.  Thanks @sunsetsrmydreams

471. hiyosakura said: 

Hello! I was wondering if you could help find this everlark fic. I’m not sure if it’s completed or not but it also has hayffie in it a bit I think. So the story is that k and p fall in love before their games and they meet at their tree in school or something but then they get reaped and I can’t remember what happens after that but during the quarter quell Katniss is actually pregnant and Peeta and Katniss are able to communicate with their lips touching.

FOUND! That’s 74th Hunger games Challenge: We Always Were - Jamie Sommers(*Thank you, @superchocovian!)

470. ptx-holic said:

 Hi, i’m looking for a fic where katniss is in a relationship with gale and then she met peeta and they are in a relationship but they caught katniss having two relationship and katniss move to somewhere and then she came back few years later and met peeta again. I’m sorry if this is confusing for you but i can’t find it. Thank you :) 

Do any of these fics ring a bell? Please let us know!

[everlarkbirthdaygifts]

Happy Birthday, jobanana7!

Today, we wish a very Happy Birthday to @jobanana7! We hope you had a wonderful day, and got just exactly the presents you wanted. To end your special day with a flourish, the lovely @mega-aulover has written a story just for you!

PROMPT: I would love a little story that talks about mental illness, ik is kinda weird but I would love to see like a growing back together after dealing with the process of going and dealing with a mental illness?? Idk of that makes sense. But I would love that. Thanks!!!!!-Jobanana7

RATING/WARNINGS:  Rated T / Cannon Growing Angst- Trigger Warning mentions of suicide

A/N:

●       Special thanks to @Booksrocksmyface for her guidance, encouragement and beta skills.

●       Feliz Cumpleaños  to @Jobanana7 Espero que tengas un día maravilloso! I hope I did justice to the prompt.

Fractured Glass:

1st Year Together:

A scream pierced the night air. Peeta gripped the pillow in his hand. He twisted it as he listened to Katniss’s blood curdling cries. Swaying back and forth, he put his hands to his ears to block out her screams. He can’t listen to her anymore, cannot hear her hurting. But as much as he wanted to go to her, to comfort her, Peeta was emotionally paralyzed, he wasn’t right just yet. Yesterday he had his worst episode, he’d held on to the back of the chair until it splintered in his hands.

“My name is Peeta Mellark, I am eighteen years old. I survived two Hunger Games,” he whispered to himself. “I live in district twelve. Snow is dead, and can’t hurt me.” He repeated the mantra Dr. Aurelius taught him to keep himself from having a hijacked episode. His breathing is ragged, and is holding onto reality by a thread.  “I am not a mutt. I am no longer a piece in their games. I am safe.”

His lips quivered as he tried to speak the next sentence, but he choked on his words. “Katniss is not a mutt,” his fists curled up as he pictured Katniss covered in flames. “She is not the enemy. I once loved her.”

 His mind breaks and he shakes from the violent images that began filling his brain. Katniss’s face contorts into a fierce demonic creature, pure fear raced through his body.

 “It’s not real, it’s not real,” he whispered to himself over and over again. He uses one of the memories he knows to be true.

 Tears fell from his eyes.  Peeta conjured up in his mind the girl with the twin braids and the voice of an angel. He could clearly visualize her in the red dress, the shiny mary-jane shoes, rosey cheeks, and innocent eyes. His attack slowly ebbed away as he was able to distinguish the shiny Capitol memories from the real ones.

 He didn’t go to her but Peeta vowed he would, one day.

 Second Year Together:

 Peeta stood at the entrance of the bedroom, he ran his hands through his hair.  After a year of slowly becoming friends once more, they decided to try sharing a bed. His mind flashed to the footage he’d seen of his hijacked self choking Katniss.  His breathing became labored and he opens and closes his fits to keep control.

 “Katniss, I don’t know if this is a good idea.”

 Her face fell, he could see it in her expressive eyes, how much she needed him. Katniss always kept her guard up, she only allowed him to see straight into her soul. He closed his eyes and pictured her at eleven, sitting by the empty trash bins. The icy slush could have killed her but didn’t. It was that vacant look, as death crept into her bones that he saw, that drove him to throw her the bread. He’d been willing to get a beating for it.

 He couldn’t let her die then, and it still stands true today. However, he couldn’t do this with her tonight, Peeta was too afraid of physically hurting her. His mind was still like fragmented pieces of glass. Unable to look at her, he turned around to leave.

 “Peeta.”

 Her voice was desperate, it caused him to pause his retreat.

 “You can stay in my mom’s old bedroom it’s just down the hall.” Her voice was hoarse. He turned around and saw she was combatting tears. “I just need you to be near, will you allow that?”

 It was a solution that sounded too good to be true, but one he could live with.  “I could do that.”

 “Okay.” Katniss nodded. “I’ll go fix up the room for you Peeta.”

 She pushed herself against the door jam as she slid by him. He was thankful she didn’t touch him. Right now touching, holding, intimate things were beyond his scope.

  That night neither one could sleep. He was worried that he would get up and hurt her. And she feared  the nightly terrors that plagued her sleep. They ended up downstairs. He made bread, she watched him, and in the morning they finally fell asleep sitting on the sofa sitting beside each other.

 Peeta thought to himself this was a great start, they were at least under the same roof.

 Six months later:

Katniss was moving in with him. She’d had her worst episode yet, she tried to cut her wrists. Katniss had gone inside of her sister’s room chasing the cat. Being in her sisters room triggered her nervous breakdown. Dr. Aurelius suggested she move in with Peeta as there weren’t any triggers at his house.

 All that Katniss brought with her was her bow, the game bag with a  few pieces of clothing, the plant book,  and the memory book they’d made. Trailing behind her was that ugly, mangy cat who took off when he saw some of Haymitch’s geese.

 That night Peeta was in his room, counting down until the moment his eyes slid shut, and the nightly terrors to start.  He’s left the door opened just in case she needs him. He closes his eyes and when he awakes he sees a slight figure standing by the foot of his bed.

 Katniss stands with her head cast low, her dark hair covering her face. He can see her hands are klutched together.

 “Peeta.”

 Her voice sounds scared and child like. Peeta realizes she's just as broken as he is. He lifts the blanket and she climbs into bed with him. He holds her trembling form. He vows they will never sleep apart.

 3rd Year Together:

 Sleeping together has helped them both. They comfort each other during the night as they face the onslaught of horrific memories and Capitol-spun lies.

 They've become inseparable. During their joint therapy sessions with the doctor, they've learned the art of communication. He talks. she listens, her hand grips his, and her eyes reflect the care she feels for him. When she speaks, her words are few, but Peeta makes sure to be attentive and supportive.

 Katniss isn't a talker she's much more of a doer, she acts on instinct. Peeta acknowledges he’s the one with the words, he is also a planner.  Lately he's been speaking about the bakery, and the idea of possibly starting one again. He feels if he can have the same land then he can somehow have a piece of his family, of his old self back.

 Unannounced, Katniss went out and filled out the paperwork to reclaim his family's old plot in town. She handed him the documents and told him, “For when you're ready.”

 Peeta cried. She gave him back his family. He discovered he needs her strengths.

 They've fallen into a routine: she hunts and he bakes.  They take tentative steps every day as the doctor has ordered. They keep a journal of the good things and read it every night before they go to bed to remind them that life can be good.

 His episodes don't last as long and the frequency diminished.  He's able to see the girl who used to trade with his father at the back of the bakery. A shy girl, a smart girl, a girl that many people looked up to, including himself.

 “Peeta.”

 Her soft voice brings him out if his wanderings.   His face contorts to make a smile. Peeta watches in awe as a blush blooms on her cheeks. He relaxes and his smile widens even more when he sees the shy glittering glance she gives him.  Just like she did whenever she came to trade. Peeta notices how his hearts melts, and his hands shake not from fear but from the rush of emotions.

 That night as they share a bed, he wonders if he's falling in love with her.  He questions if it is even possible for his hijacked mind to fall in love with a creature he was conditioned to fear. His heart tells him yes.

 4th Year Together:

 Peeta rushed home from the main part of town. He saw the lightning race in the clouds ahead right before he heard the roar of thunder. He hurried his steps, he needed to get home quickly. The lightning illuminated his steps as he made his way through the darkened path to the Victors Village. The clap of thunder caused him to run.

 Thunder is one of Katniss’s triggers. The noise reminds her of all of the awful things she suffered in her past, the death of her father, in her fractured mind the noise of the explosive Gale made when it took her sister Prim’s life, and it was also the cannon of the arena and the explosion she experienced right before they were separated and he was captured by the Capitol.

 “Katniss,” he shouts into the still house. Closing the door he runs up the stairs toward her safe place. The closest in is his studio.

 Everything's been going well between them. They were growing closer emotionally, romantically and physically. With each passing day they grew more intimate with the other but they were not ready to make the jump to make love, he often stopped short because not only was Katniss not ready he wasn’t either. The intensity between them was like blinding white light and he often slipped out of bed to take care of his hard-on.  

 It started with a shy kiss on the cheek. It developed to tender brushes on lips when they parted for the day. One day those soft shy brushes deepened. Soon lips parted, tasted and suckled. Kisses that made his heart fly and his hands shly wonder. Kisses that heated his skin. Kisses that inspired him to think of more than just innocent platonic meanderings, these were riveting thoughts like bright emotional colors on the canvas of his soul.

 Today he’d been in town finalizing the bakery drawings with the architect when he saw the storm clouds roll in from the window. He made it to the house just as the rain fell, but the crackling, rumbling and the exploding echo engulfed their home in the Victors Village.

 “Katniss,” Peeta called as he reached the room.

 “Peeta,” she called, flying into his arms. Her face washed with tears, her  fingernails bit into the flesh of his arms. “You’re real.”

 “I’m real,” he whispered into her hair.  He sat with her in the closet facing her terror together, because that’s what they did best. From the beginning they faced all obstacles as a team. The victory tour he recalled how she bravely took the microphone to speak to Rue’s mother. The way her voice started off quiet but grew as she gathered her courage. He didn’t know that it was due to his pledge to give a portion of his money away.

 He could still picture her standing in that dress, clutching microphone stand, speaking her eyes showed a slice of her compasion. It fed the masses. It fed a rebellion. It also made him fall a little harder for her.

 “I thought you were gone,” Katniss muttered.

 “I’m here, Katniss, I’m always here.”

 “Always,” she affirmed looking into his eyes. He gasped at the whirling emotions in her eyes, right before her lips touched his.  

 That day they had a small victory, but Peeta vowed that he would never leave her alone to weather the storms because they were a team.

 The 5th Year Together:

 Peeta opened his eyes, his hands ungripped the back of the chair. He’d suffered another episode.  His body was weak, but at least he was able to weather another one.  Today was their fifth year anniversary since he came back home.

 Five arduous years where they had grown back together. Last night around midnight Katniss and he had finally made love and declared their love for one another. He was ecstatic but also panicked as this meant they were now an official couple. It also meant emotionally he was at his most vulnerable.

 What if she didn’t want him? What if he wasn’t good enough?

 “Peeta.” Her hands wrapped around his middle.

 He closed his eyes.

 “I still want you.”

 Her soft words, caused his beating heart to slow down. “Katniss why would you want a broken, one legged, burned man.”  Her hands slipped on top of his. Her darker ones contrasted with his paler ones. “You have every right to leave me, and find yourself a man who will value you.”

  She hugged him tighter, her face nuzzled his back. “You tried giving me the same speech during the Quarter Quell, and It didn’t work then and it’s not going to work now.”

 “Katniss,” he sighed heavily.

 “Peeta, I love you.” Her hands splayed on his chest. “I do not want another man, I just want you. When you came back that’s when I came back, went hunting, that’s when I mourned my sister. You were the only one who acknowledged that she…” Katniss paused her voice was thick with raw emotions. “Passed away.”

 Peeta turned her around and cupped her face. He recalled Katniss with her sister Primrose staring at the cakes in the display case. They were younger, but he recalled how the sun shone down on Prim’s golden hair and the love in Katniss eyes. He wanted to be loved like that.   “Prim helped me become un-hijacked. She was good and sweet. I’m sorry for her death. It was pointless.”

 Katniss had tears falling from her eyes, she nodded. Despite her sadness he saw a deep profound love displayed in her eyes.  “You understand me better than anyone else. You fought to come back to me. You calm the rage within me.”

 Peeta kissed her lips, they were soft, warm and they tasted like home. He was loved

 15th Year Together:

 Their laughter fills the air. Peeta’s little girl, with the twin braids that flap in the air as she runs. She’s laughing, stops and begins to dance. Her arms are spread wide as she leaps in the air and twirls in the tall grass of the meadows. His son’s blond head bobbing up and down as his chubby little legs run toward his sister. He’s just started to run. Katniss says he looks like Peeta but Peeta thinks he looks like his brothers.    

 Katniss is sitting underneath the tree, watching them, a picnic blanket spread around her.

 “Hey.” Peeta leaned in and pecked her on the lips before settling down besides her. He was glad to be out of the bakery. He wanted to enjoy his time with his family.

 “Hi, how was the bakery?”

 He rubbed his face, “You were right, Joey, was the reason for the shenanigans down at the bakery.”

 Katniss gave him an all knowing look.

 “I can’t put him on the rotation on a Saturday.”

 “He’s much too immature.” Katniss leaned forward and began fixing him a plate.

 “Do you remember how different it was for us at that age?”

 She sat back, a pensive look on her face, as she glanced at their children. Their little girl was making a crown of dandelions. His little boy was sitting yanking grass out of the dirt. Her fingers gripped the plate.

 “It’s going to be ok,” Peeta put his arm around her shoulders.

 “Peeta they’re playing on…”

 “I know, the remains of our past.” Off to the side of the meadow was a small plaque with all of the  names of the people that were lost to the bombings. The line of trees still has the long beams that once supported the electric fence.

 Peeta remembers a time when we went to bed in fear of reapings. Of being called to the games thinking it was the luckiest day of his life. He remembers lying by the bank of the river silently wishing he would die. Then thinking he was seeing an angel appear from the heavens knowing he was dying. The way she fought him hand and foot and brought him back to life. He fell for Katniss when she kissed him for real in that cave.

 He’d felt it, felt the moment she melted into his arms, and something more was happening between them. He never forgot that kiss or the one at the beach. Never forgot his brave girl, she was a woman now but he saw her lurking in the background of the fear that was in her eyes. “They will be alright, all of the arenas have been torn down. They are never going to have another Hunger Games.”

 Katniss nodded. She handed him the plate.

 “Come here,” Peeta took the plate and put it on the side. He opened his arms to her and she snuggled up to him. “We have each other, we’re a team you and I.” He could feel her relax. “Besides we have the book and when the time is right we’ll tell them about it.”

 He wasn’t scared of the past anymore. It had taken him a long time to heal. Seeing their first born child in his arms cured his worry about the fractured glass that was his past. His daughter and his son were his future. And if they had any questions they had the book, written in their own words and not in the words of others to explain what they went through.

 For now he was going to enjoy the angel in his arms and watch his children play in the meadow.