"Dahlia Blossom. Don't let the name fool you. She's better known as the Black Dahlia. And she didn't earn that nickname by smiling and looking pretty."
"She sure knows how to perform for the camera."
"Because she knows how to play the game. She alwa...
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Over the next few days Finnick stayed faithful to his promise, helping Dahlia recover more of her repressed memories and discover the truth for herself. He was patient and compassionate, never once complaining about her constant questions and answering each one with as much detail as he could. And each day, Dahlia fell more and more in love with him. Because without Finnick, Dahlia wasn't complete. He was the piece of her that was missing all along.
"Your favourite colour is blue. Real or not real?"
"Real."
With his encouragement, Dahlia's life started to make more sense and all the stories were starting to fit together in the timeline of her existence. She remembered important people that the Capitol had tried to erase, recalled her harrowing experiences in the Games and relived some of the worst moments from her life. Finding her mother and sister dead, watching Lavender die in the Games, holding Cove as she took her last breath... She despised Snow and the Madame for stealing those memories from her. They had shaped her into the woman she was, became her reason to keep fighting. The more she started to remember, the angrier she grew.
"The Capitol taught me to wield a sword. Real or not real?"
"Not real."
That anger only increased once Finnick told her the story of Alaric Silvers. Her father. Not by blood or legality, but in everything else. The man who raised her. The man who saved her. He taught her how to survive, how to win and how to endure. And she had taught him to keep fighting. She wouldn't be alive if it weren't for him, and the Capitol had taken that away from her. They had tainted his legacy and destroyed his sacrifice. She could never forgive them for that.
And when she finally worked up the courage to watch the footage from her Games, Finnick sat by her side the whole time. Together, hand in hand, they witnessed her become a killer for the first time. Apollo, the death that became the start of a massacre. She forced herself to watch each tribute's death, every life she took, and remember their names. Because if she didn't, who would?
