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Real or not real? (M/N) was on fire. The balls of flames that erupted from the parachutes shot over the barricades, through the snowy air, and landed in the crowd. He was just turning away when one caught him, ran its tongue up the back of his body and transformed him into something new. A creature as unquenchable as the sun.
A fire mutt knew only a single sensation: agony. No sight, no sound, no feeling except the unrelenting burning of flesh. Perhaps there were periods of unconsciousness, but what did it matter if he couldn't find refuge in them? He was Keigo's bird, ignited, flying frantically to escape something inescapable. The feathers of flame that grew from his body. Beating his wings only fanned the blaze. He consumed himself, but to no end.
Finally, his wings began to falter, he lost height, and gravity pulled him into a foamy sea. He floated on his back, which continued to burn beneath the water, but the agony quietened to pain.
Deep in the water, he was deserted by all. There was only the sound of his breathing, the enormous effort it took to draw the water in, push it out of his lungs. He wanted to stop, he tried to hold his breath, but the sea forced its way in and out against his will. "Let me die. Let me follow the others," he begged whatever held him there. There was no response.
Trapped for days, years, centuries maybe. Dead, but not allowed to die. Alive, but as good as dead. So alone that anyone, anything no matter how loathsome would be welcome. But when he finally had a visitor, it was sweet.
Morphling. Coursing through his veins, easing the pain, lightening his body so that it rose back towards the air and rested again on the foam.
Foam. He really was floating on foam. He could feel it beneath the tips of his fingers, cradling parts of his naked body. There was so much pain but there was also something like reality. The sandpaper in his throat. The smell of burn medicine from the first arena. The sound of his mother's voice. These things frightened him, and he tried to return to the deep to make sense of them. But there was no going back. Gradually, he was forced to accept who he was. A badly burned boy with no wings. With no fire. And no sister.
In the dazzling white Capitol hospital, the doctors worked their magic on him. He heard over and over how lucky he was.His eyes were spared. Most of his face was spared. His lungs were responding to treatment. He would be as good as new in due time.
One day he awoke to expectations and knew he would not be allowed to live in his dreamland. He must take food by mouth. Move his own muscles. Make his way to the bathroom. A brief appearance by President Kaina confirmed it.
"Don't worry," she said. "I've saved him for you."
The doctors' puzzlement grew over why he was unable to speak. Many tests were done, and while there was damage to his vocal cords, it didn't account for it. Finally, a head doctor came up with the theory that he had become a mental, rather than physical, Avox. That his silence had been brought on by emotional trauma. Although he was presented with a hundred proposed remedies, he told them to leave (M/N) alone. So (M/N) didn't ask about anyone or anything, but people brought him a steady stream of information. On the war: the Capitol fell the day the parachutes went off, President Kaina was leading Panem now, and troops had been sent out to put down the small remaining pockets of Capitol resistance. On President Nezu: he was being held prisoner, awaiting trial and most certain execution. On (M/N)'s assassination team: Ryuko and Tamaki had been sent out into the districts to cover the wreckage of the war. Shoto, who took two bullets in an escape attempt, was mopping up Peacekeepers in 2. Denki was brought to the hospital after the war ended, he was much better now. Katsuki was still in the burn unit. He made it to the City Circle after all. On (M/N)'s family: his mother buried her grief in her work.
Having no work, grief consumed (M/N). All that kept him going was Kaina's promise. That he could kill Nezu. And when that was done, nothing would be left.
Eventually, he was released from the hospital and given a room in the president's mansion to share with his mother. She was almost never there, taking her meals and sleeping at work. It fell on Shota to check in on him, making sure he was eating and using his medicines. It wasn't an easy job. (M/N) took to his old habits from District 13. Wandering unauthorised through the mansion. Into bedrooms and offices, ballrooms and baths. Seeking strange little hiding places. A closet of furs. A cabinet in the library. A long forgotten bathtub in a room of discarded furniture. His places were dim and quiet and impossible to find. He curled up, made himself smaller, and tried to disappear entirely. Wrapped in silence, he slid his bracelet that read MENTALLY DISORIENTATED around and around his wrist.
My name is (M/N) (L/N). I am nineteen years old. My home is District 12. There is no District 12. I am the Mockingjay. I brought down the Capitol. President Nezu hates me. He killed my sister. Now I will kill him. And then the Hunger Games will be over...
Periodically, he found himself back in his room, unsure whether he was driven by a need for morphling or if Shota ferreted him out. He ate the food, took the medicine and was required to bathe. (M/N) couldn't escape the memories of pain. And why he was in pain. And how he watched his little sister become a human torch.
Closing his eyes didn't help. Fire burned brighter in the darkness.
A doctor showed up sometimes. (M/N) liked her because she didn't say stupid things like how he was totally safe, or that she knew he couldn't see it but he would be happy again one day, or even that things would be better in Panem now. She just asked if he felt like talking, and when he didn't answer, she fell asleep in the chair. In fact, (M/N) thought her visits were largely motivated by her need for a nap. The arrangement worked for both of them.
The time drew near, although (M/N) couldn't determine exact hours and minutes. President Nezu had been tried and found guilty, sentenced to execution. Shota told him, he heard talk of it as he drifted past the guards in the hallways. His Mockingjay suit arrived in his room. Also his bow, looking no worse for wear, but no sheath of arrows. Either because they were damaged or more likely because he shouldn't have weapons. He vaguely wondered if he should be preparing for the event in some way, but nothing came to mind.
Late one afternoon, after a long period in a cushioned window seat behind a painted screen, he emerged and turned left instead of right. He found himself in a strange part of the mansion, and immediately lost his bearings. Unlike the area where he was quartered, there seemed to be no one around to ask. He liked it, though. Wished he had found it sooner. It was so quiet, with the thick carpets and heavy tapestries soaking up the sound. Softly lit. Muted colours. Peaceful. Until he smelled the roses. He dived behind some curtains while he awaited the mutts. But he realised there were no mutts coming. So, what did he smell? Real roses? Could it be that he was near the garden where the evil things grew?
As he creeped down the hall, the odour became overpowering. Perhaps not as strong as the actual mutts, but purer, because it wasn't competing with sewage and explosives. He turned a corner and found himself staring at two surprised guards. Not Peacekeepers, of course. There were no more Peacekeepers. But not the trim, grey-uniformed soldiers from 13 either. These two, a man and a woman, wore the tattered, thrown-together clothes of actual rebels. Still bandaged and gaunt, they were now keeping watch over the doorway to the roses. When he moved to enter, their guns formed an X in front of him.
"You can't go in, sir," the man said.
"Soldier," the woman corrected him. "You can't go in, Soldier (L/N). President's orders."
He just stood there patiently waiting for them to lower their guns, for them to understand, without him telling them, that behind those doors was something he needed. Just a rose. A single bloom. To place in Nezu's lapel before he shot him. (M/N)'s presence seemed to worry the guards. They were discussing calling Shota, when a man spoke up behind him. "Let him go in."
(M/N) knew the voice but couldn't immediately place it. Not Seam, not 13, definitely not Capitol. He turned his head and came face to face with Sasaki, the commander from 8.
"On my authority," Sasaki said. "He has a right to anything behind that door." They were his soldiers, not Kaina's. They dropped their weapons without question and let him pass.
At the end of a short hallway, (M/N) pushed apart the glass doors and stepped inside. By now the smell was so strong that it began to flatten out, as if there was no more his nose could absorb. The damp, mild air felt good on his hot skin. And the roses were glorious. Row after row of sumptuous blooms, in lush pink, sunset orange and even pale blue. He wandered through the aisles of carefully pruned plants, looking but not touching, because he had learned the hard way how deadly these beauties could be. He knew when he found it, crowning the top of a slender bush. A magnificent white bud just beginning to open. He pulled his left sleeve over his hand so that his skin wouldn't actually have to touch it, took a pair of pruning shears, and had just positioned them on the stem when the voice spoke.
"That's a nice one."
(M/N)'s hand jerked, the shears snapped shut, severing the stem.
"The colours are lovely, of course, but nothing says perfection like white."
(M/N) still couldn't see him, but his voice seemed to rise up from an adjacent bed of red roses. Delicately pinching the stem of the bud through the fabric of his sleeve, (M/N) moved slowly around the corner and found him sitting on a stool against the wall.
"I was hoping you'd find your way to my quarters."
His quarters, (M/N) had trespassed into his home, the way he slithered into (M/N)'s last year, hissing threats with his rose breath. This greenhouse was one of his rooms, perhaps his favourite. Perhaps in better times he tended the plants himself. But now it was part of his prison. That was why the guards halted (M/N). And that's why Sasaki let him in.
(M/N) assumed he was being secured in the deepest dungeon the Capitol had to offer, not cradled in the lap of luxury. Yet Kaina left him here. To set a precedent, maybe. So that if in the future she ever fell from grace, it would be understood that presidents - even the most despicable - got special treatment. Who knows, after all, when her own power might fade?
"There are so many things we should discuss, but I have a feeling your visit will be brief. So, first things first." He began to cough, and when he removed his handkerchief, it was redder. "I wanted to tell you how very sorry I am about your sister."
Even in his deadened, drugged condition, this sent a stab of pain through (M/N). Reminding (M/N) there were no limits to the ex-president's cruelty. And how he would go to his grave trying to destroy (M/N).
"So wasteful, so unnecessary. Anyone could see the game was over by that point. In fact, I was just about to issue an official surrender when they released those parachutes." His eyes were glued to (M/N), unblinking, so as not to miss a second of his reaction. But what he said made no sense. When they released the parachutes? "Well, you really didn't think I gave the order, did you? Forget the obvious fact that if I'd had a working hovercraft at my disposal, I'd have been using it to make an escape. But that aside, what purpose could it have served? We both know I'm not above killing children, but I'm not wasteful. I take life for very specific reasons. And there was no reason for me to destroy a pen full of Capitol children. None at all."
(M/N) watched him as he went into another coughing fit. He was lying. Of course, he was lying. But there was something struggling to free itself from the lie as well.
"However, I must concede it was a masterful move on Kaina's part. The idea that I was bombing our own helpless children instantly snapped whatever frail allegiance my people still felt to me. There was no real resistance after that. Did you know it aired live? You can see Kan's hand there. And in the parachutes. Well, it's that sort of thinking that you look for in a Head Gamemaker, isn't it?" Nezu dabbed the corner of his mouth. "I'm sure he wasn't gunning for your sister, but these things happen."
(M/N) found himself reliving those memories in Special Weaponry with Tenya and Shoto. Looking at the designs based on Shoto's traps. That played on human sympathies. The first bomb killed the victims. The second, the rescuers. He remembered Shoto's words.
"Tenya and I have been following the same rule book President Nezu used when he hijacked Katsuki."
"My failure," Nezu said, "was being so slow to grasp Kaina's plan. To let the Capitol and districts destroy one another, and then step in to take power with Thirteen barely scratched. Make no mistake, she was intending to take my place right from the beginning. I shouldn't be surprised. After all, it was Thirteen that started the rebellion that led to the Dark Days, and then abandoned the rest of the districts when the tide turned against it. But I wasn't watching Kaina. I was watching you. And you were watching me. I'm afraid we've both been played for fools."
(M/N) refused this to be true. He uttered his first words since his sister's death. "I don't believe you."
Nezu shook his head in mock disappointment. "Oh, Mr (L/N). I thought we had agreed not to lie to each other."
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