The Runaway Victor | Book II

Chapter One | Morphling & Liquor

        Quinn laid there in her bed, staring up at the cieling. She had been home from her Victory Tour for no more than a week, and she had already made a nasty habit of what she had learned in District Six from the Morphlings. Two of the Victors in Six who turned to morphling after they won. But while she was in Six, she found that it really did help. It numbed everything, her body, her mind-- her thoughts seemed to completely stop whenever she took enough to put her under.

        It was in no way something she was proud of. She wasn't proud of the person she had become in such a short amount of time. But she hadn't found another way to deal with things yet. She assumed she had convinced Snow she wasn't going to cause any problems ever again during her tour. She was really talking up the Capitol and even him even though everyone knew that she hates him.

        Quinn pushed her blanket off of her, and she still laid there in her bed completely still. Her leg was completely healed, well actually everything was healed by now. Everything besides her sanity. Quinn had promised Annie that she'd get some sun this weekend. It had been proven that when people did get enough, depression would get much worse and that was one thing Quinn didn't need on top of everything else.

        Another thing she had picked up on over the past few days that helped her was something Annie told her to do. Make a list. A list of things she was positive about. So on her way down the flight of stairs, she made her usual list.

My name is Quinn Maverick, my family died in the smallpox epidemic, I lived in the old warehouse. My friends were Jenson and Rosa, I was chosen for the seventy-third annual Hunger Games, I made President Snow hate me and rebels think I wanted to fight with them, Snow killed all of the orphans, and now I use morphling and alcohol to make myself feel a bit better.

        It was a lengthy list, but it was all she knew was a fact. And for the time being, it was all she needed to know.

        Quinn pulled open the cupboard next to her sink and reached to the back of it. She pulled out a glass jar that an old woman in Four had given her. It had a greenish tinge to it and sea shells were embedded in the glass. Inside it though was what she was really after. It was stacks of dried paper, it looked a bit wrinkled because it had been soaked in morphling and then left there to dry. She took out one and then closed the jar and put it back in it's place. Then she felt around for a second jar, this one had come in the house. So there was nothing too special about it. She pulled it open and the raw smell of tobacoo hit her. Having it was illegal, but it wasn't too hard to get down at the market in Four. Especially when everyone knows you've got a good lump of money you can spend on anything. She put some on the small piece of paper, and then put away the rest and grabbed a cheap old lighter she had gotten off one of the Peacekeepers for a few bucks.

        Then she grabbed a half empty bottle of moonshine she had gotten from an old man who had been making it literally under his house for years. He gave it to her in exchange for food, which she didn't mind. She had plenty of it to spare. Then she quickly rolled up the morphling paper, grabbed the lighter and made her way out the back door to the small patio that matched every other house in Victor's Village. She plopped down on the multicolor long chair that was screwed to the patio to keep it from being stolen.

        She let out a long sigh as she set down her drink and then lit her homemade morphling paper. The Morphlings had taught her the trick when she was meeting the Victor's in Six. She leaned back in the chair and took a long drag of the paper, it didn't taste all that great. But after a few drags from it she didn't care, it didn't put her to sleep. It just sort of...made her dazed and out of it.

        Quinn looked out at the ocean, her house had the perfect view of the ocean and the clean beach that was kept that clean for the Victor's. She could watch the fishing boats leave the docs and come back multiple times, and she could hear workers shouting orders at one another. It was actually pretty nice considering the circumstances...

"You know, that's killing you, right?"

Quinn sighed as she listened to her back door close and shut again. "Remind me to lock my front door again." she replied as she took a drag again just so Finnick could see that she didn't care.

"You saw the Morphlings, it doesn't help any."

Quinn shrugged, "Do you have any better suggestions?" she replied.

Finnick sighed as he sat down in the long chair beside her. "I'm just sayin', you're killing yourself from the inside out."

Quinn glared at him, "Don't tell me how to kill myself, I'll kill myself however I want, alright Finnick?" she retorted sharply, "Besides, we all die anyway. It doesn't matter."

Finnick scoffed, "If that's how you want to look at it."

Quinn nodded, "It is, don't worry." she sighed, "Did the list come?" she asked, "I don't check."

"Yeah, because the only time you leave your house is when you need something," Finnick paused, "And yeah...yeah it did."

        Quinn sighed, she had been dreading that list. But Finnick had explained that it came every year. It was a list of mentor's for the next games. Even though her games had just ending. They were already preparing in the Capitol for the next ones. It made Quinn want to puke, twenty-three kids just died and they already couldn't wait to watch twenty-four more kids fight it out until one of them was left.

"Who are the mentor's for Four?" Quinn asked sheepishly, it was a stupid question.

"Annie and you."

Quinn felt her stomach begin to churn, "Maybe I'll be lucky-- end up with someone like me." she said lightly towards the end trying not to sound all that terrified of trying to help some kid get home.

Finnick thought for a moment, silence surrounded them. Until a light-hearted chuckle from Finnick broke the silence. "I don't think Snow could handle that," he smirked. "Might give him a heartattack."

Quinn snickered, "I don't think I'll help much either, every time I've been on with Ceasar I piss him off." she sighed.

"That's just your thing,"

"What do you mean by that?" she asked looking at him as she picked up her drink and took a drink. Then she held it out to Finnick, he took it and then set it back down between the two of them.

"Your thing," he echoed. "We all have our thing that everyone knows us for. Annie is quiet, and shy. Mags, motherly and loving-- my great looks--"

"Someone's riding a high horse." Quinn said as an eyebrow arched up her forehead.

Finnick smirked, "And you...you just piss of Snow. That's your thing-- the people who hate the games love you."

Quinn frowned.

        That was her problem. Rebels loved her, they thought she was something she wasn't. In District Seven, during her tour, they caused a riot against the Peacekeepers just because she was there. It wasn't that Quinn didn't agree with them, she agreed with them completely. She wanted to do something, she wanted to be one of them. But she wasn't, they looked to her as a leading force because she made a statement that she didn't even mean to make. They seemed to think that she was part of this underground rebellion that she didn't know anything about. It was just by chance that she happened to end up in this position as the Rebel Victor. She didn't try to do any of it.

"Do you think he'd take it out on my tribute?" she asked, "In the arena, I mean...or on their families?"

Finnick was quiet, "I don't know," he stated. "But I wouldn't put it past him."

Quinn felt her from get even more prononced, if that was even possible. "I can't wait." she sighed, her voice was dripping with saracasm.

"Yeah, it's a blast." Finnick replied in the same tone.

        Silence fell over the two of them again, and this time Quinn let it linger. She didn't mind the quiet, she didn't mind being able to hear the waves, the seagulls, the boats, the workers-- it was peaceful. But that easily could have been the morphling that was making her so relaxed even after learning that she would be a mentor for the seventy-fourth Hunger Games.