tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55664229747778619892024-02-19T00:48:25.905-08:00 Dormite, Pía!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.comBlogger62125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-65092535822019070092015-09-09T14:17:00.000-07:002015-09-14T05:59:36.942-07:00COOKIES BÁSICAS (con sólo 100g de manteca)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizGGs7_M0gqhMHf1NIeKPGk16nPZEiuq6DCUI2D90LMf5pmBxZxjbiYGN2ZY6eLTeQcRV3AWVy8X38T_-4eF1V-uuEHn3KO6jw0hpIF5X2X9YX_JJ_shY0Qo0SHaauDtWIG5GAOM9GxOM/s1600/P1080115.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizGGs7_M0gqhMHf1NIeKPGk16nPZEiuq6DCUI2D90LMf5pmBxZxjbiYGN2ZY6eLTeQcRV3AWVy8X38T_-4eF1V-uuEHn3KO6jw0hpIF5X2X9YX_JJ_shY0Qo0SHaauDtWIG5GAOM9GxOM/s640/P1080115.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Re fáciles. Como Pía está como loca con el tema de las masas, cortantes y palitos de amasar la exploté un ratito y la puse a hacer galletitas</span></label>.<br />
<label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Siempre tengo ganas de hacer galletitas, pero me frena un poco el tema de que las recetas que encuentro siempre tienen MUCHA manteca. Asíque busqué busqué y enconté ésta receta que me gustó mucho, lleva pocos pasos y pocos ingredientes. Acá va:</span></label><br />
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<b> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ingredientes</span></b><br />
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<ul>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">100g de manteca</span></label></b></li>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">100g de azúcar</span></label></b></li>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">200g de harina (yo las hice en un día con mucha humedad, y le tuve que agregar 50g más)</span></label></b></li>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 huevo</span></label></b></li>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 chorrito de escencia de vainilla</span></label></b></li>
<li><b><label class="ga" data-category="Receta" data-event="Ingrediente tachado" for="ingrediente-0"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">OPCIONAL: Chocolitos (usé aprox. 50g)</span></label></b></li>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Instrucciones: </span><br />
<ol>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Poné a calentar el horno a temperatura mediana (tirando a fuerte)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Poné en un bowl la manteca y el azúcar. Mezclá bien y agregá el huevo y la vainilla. Batí todo con un batidor de alambre.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEo-_YgCgaZlAT_u8lE9hFbvCGPuIWLAmBNKRuNltNInQVAH3VxRAEQsFgqY0a1q7SFbYn9XgdNFGvEYCt33se1rSwSiGAnQLTvEMehHNyxBXBwJupe2pSSgB9tphOd1Gg3eI9AcEpqgs/s1600/P1080102.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEo-_YgCgaZlAT_u8lE9hFbvCGPuIWLAmBNKRuNltNInQVAH3VxRAEQsFgqY0a1q7SFbYn9XgdNFGvEYCt33se1rSwSiGAnQLTvEMehHNyxBXBwJupe2pSSgB9tphOd1Gg3eI9AcEpqgs/s640/P1080102.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Agregá la harina tamizada (pasala por un colador finito para que no pasen los grumos) <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA5WkEDxCsGM16lucTQWaT4e9jhpKl6If4-S1eAnEnMJaDF6U4vYkM48Fxiw9EP1Tq1X8r9tLHVUOSc3LJ_V2OTjfA_YDM_W8jLO58hccTmM3Z77rxEsaw_pkSVPr-GN0q9QOdz48Of20/s1600/P1080105.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA5WkEDxCsGM16lucTQWaT4e9jhpKl6If4-S1eAnEnMJaDF6U4vYkM48Fxiw9EP1Tq1X8r9tLHVUOSc3LJ_V2OTjfA_YDM_W8jLO58hccTmM3Z77rxEsaw_pkSVPr-GN0q9QOdz48Of20/s640/P1080105.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Amasá un poquito y lleva 5 o 10 min. al freezer. (o 15 min. a la heladera)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Poné harina en la mesada, estirá la masa (aprox de medio centímetro) y cortá con un vaso o algún cortante que te guste.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3386HC2lqGzo2FmjSU_PznMRpVUnqk3uytDh2XRLuHZXt5MQ3pjig6WRpaVloovWYG5nxX3n3fHxw_eAFk2gZRvMWSWrjp3rXMqkF6ndCsvw4PV_CBbPDGpGxp20p_5TrtKC93cgkEs4/s1600/P1080113.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3386HC2lqGzo2FmjSU_PznMRpVUnqk3uytDh2XRLuHZXt5MQ3pjig6WRpaVloovWYG5nxX3n3fHxw_eAFk2gZRvMWSWrjp3rXMqkF6ndCsvw4PV_CBbPDGpGxp20p_5TrtKC93cgkEs4/s640/P1080113.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Rociá una asadera con rocío vegetal y poné las galletitas. No hace falta ponerlas muy separadas porque no crecen.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Si querés ponele chocolitos, clavalos en la masa para que no se salgan cuando se sequen.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ponelos 15 min. en el horno mediano hasta que la base se vea doradita.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">BUEN PROVECHO! Depende del tamaño de cortante que uses, pero salen aprox. 20 galletas grandes. No me preguntes cuanto duran en buen estado porque las terminé en una merienda jajaja. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijk4mAn6l_3Gh10PumoDQJKldm25t2FqaQDwNiYEJZ5Z6y8tm4_jNaVoggOn6t_xLlPz1qeFfFTmenGt4kwByYQfR61XDs9bcCA2cCSkVzX5ikm9lw5KIXuthtDvdzGSr9QX-LDm7x3cc/s1600/P1080114.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijk4mAn6l_3Gh10PumoDQJKldm25t2FqaQDwNiYEJZ5Z6y8tm4_jNaVoggOn6t_xLlPz1qeFfFTmenGt4kwByYQfR61XDs9bcCA2cCSkVzX5ikm9lw5KIXuthtDvdzGSr9QX-LDm7x3cc/s640/P1080114.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hasta la próxima! </span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-19133452263121260312015-06-23T07:08:00.000-07:002015-06-23T07:08:00.386-07:00LOS MEJORES BROWNIES♥<br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqAlhk-sNwYEua7UmMzhiXZGG65iAG-ZTIJvH-ZJRhXQewnR_nY8oClC6jxZfblUbTnMLPrsWICoh0bMdSt_eOlKDpRdpYyQF6q9XJlsyZow-FVoW_JjzCFlLH2E1soQVEi1FZnEYLI1I/s1600/20131011_183209h.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqAlhk-sNwYEua7UmMzhiXZGG65iAG-ZTIJvH-ZJRhXQewnR_nY8oClC6jxZfblUbTnMLPrsWICoh0bMdSt_eOlKDpRdpYyQF6q9XJlsyZow-FVoW_JjzCFlLH2E1soQVEi1FZnEYLI1I/s640/20131011_183209h.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Hay algo más rico que una buena porción brownie calentito con muchas nueces? </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Lo mejor de los brownies es que llevan pocos ingredientes y em media hora los tenés listos.Y a todos les gusta. Un éxito!</span><br />
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<u><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Necesitás:</span></u><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span></h4>
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<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><b>- 150gr de chocolate para taza.</b> (ATENCIÓN AL COMPRAR, CASI SIEMPRE VIENE EN BARRAS DE 100GR.), fijate que sea uno rico porque si le pones un chocolate medio pelo, te va a salir un brownie medio pelo. Yo compro el chocolate para taza marca Día, es EXACTAMENTE igual al Águila pero sale la mitad.</span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">- 120gr de manteca</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">. <span style="font-weight: normal;">Es un pan de manteca del más chiquito + una cucharada.</span></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">- 3 huevos</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">- 240gr de azúcar. <span style="font-weight: normal;">Me gusta más como queda con azúcar impalpable, más suavecito.</span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">- 75gr de harina.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">- OPCIONAL: 100gr de nueces o almendras o chips de chocolate o lo que se te ocurra.</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">-Media cucharadita de sal.</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">-Papel de aluminio <span style="font-weight: normal;">para forrar el molde y no ensuciar nada!!!</span> </span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><u>A cocinar:</u></span></h4>
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<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">*En un bowl poné la manteca y el chocolate, y poné a derretir a baño maría o en el microondas. Si es en el microondas hacelo en tandas de 30seg., controlando y mezclando entre tanda y tanda.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaBRBlKoaYA-UD0a_QTp46dLkPsI5ibUYbb7J-dATMETID1fkwpatDUMTwwjh6M8NE-3Zslv732jy2MnikjGXepI06mv6VeW1LeJF60Xq3DWGPvZ3tEQvRKQ_elXQC3rQhQ66PbUJBEBw/s1600/P1020879.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaBRBlKoaYA-UD0a_QTp46dLkPsI5ibUYbb7J-dATMETID1fkwpatDUMTwwjh6M8NE-3Zslv732jy2MnikjGXepI06mv6VeW1LeJF60Xq3DWGPvZ3tEQvRKQ_elXQC3rQhQ66PbUJBEBw/s640/P1020879.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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*<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Mientras se derrite lo anterior batí los huevos y el azúcar hasta formar una espumita.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBoQeYSxILdzDVtpL9NPNujEuPF7T0hKXCnI7-xaOTuOiF3hJt7UWtS-IVRMvza5pvJMx2VbQC4sbsFBr2yl6GX_UvoYghIkYMV3bnsl-MlcSPBwN82xd5o9fCIjCVdXgHvFX9aicPDL8/s1600/20131011_171355.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="512" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBoQeYSxILdzDVtpL9NPNujEuPF7T0hKXCnI7-xaOTuOiF3hJt7UWtS-IVRMvza5pvJMx2VbQC4sbsFBr2yl6GX_UvoYghIkYMV3bnsl-MlcSPBwN82xd5o9fCIjCVdXgHvFX9aicPDL8/s640/20131011_171355.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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*<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Sin dejar de mezclar, agregar el chocolate con la manteca, y de a poco el harina, la sal y por último las nueces.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Volcá toda la mezcla en el molde forrado con papel aluminio, para esta cantidad podés usar el que usás normalmente para hacer un bizcochuelo. Tiene que quedar más o menos de 2cm de alto.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Al horno bien caliente 15 a 20 minutos, hasta que la superficie se vea sequita. VAN A PARECER CRUDOS pero no lo están, hay que dejarlos enfríar para cortarlos. Que no se te pase! O vas a tener un rico bizcochuelo común y corriente. Listo!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR9tVlTyo0HxuBAIlhEFu2mz_emBt9efUxPymrqbjnAKxiOHL3gpWywoya9U0ebuMM3hvLK5QEL-GxNMcW5k8yCErLOCZqGFXj0dpHFQeLL0lpa-F3ggYJtveAFs8X7QRokkziMHO_7pI/s1600/20131011_183453.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR9tVlTyo0HxuBAIlhEFu2mz_emBt9efUxPymrqbjnAKxiOHL3gpWywoya9U0ebuMM3hvLK5QEL-GxNMcW5k8yCErLOCZqGFXj0dpHFQeLL0lpa-F3ggYJtveAFs8X7QRokkziMHO_7pI/s640/20131011_183453.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Podés cortar en cuadrados y servir sólos o con helado, o dejarlo entero en forma de torta y ponerle una buena capa de dulce de leche y merengue o crema arriba. Que rico!</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-6330285921327970362015-06-22T17:56:00.001-07:002015-06-23T07:11:01.725-07:00CÓMO COSER LEGGINGS / CALZAS♥ (Molde de 1 pieza) (Con máquina recta)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwNpDuiHSQZLc9iggIrSD4D-FHOc6BYyEmJE4rYTySWdMjnCM79yVuiQhEINzUtXOFYMIKZyYpXmacNiGHcOJgSl_kxbBT2txRlhnKs0BArhEqkfHY_lVZ5VONeQ8cJ9khCuZx0djkRM/s1600/fpgojpfjojf.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="294" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwNpDuiHSQZLc9iggIrSD4D-FHOc6BYyEmJE4rYTySWdMjnCM79yVuiQhEINzUtXOFYMIKZyYpXmacNiGHcOJgSl_kxbBT2txRlhnKs0BArhEqkfHY_lVZ5VONeQ8cJ9khCuZx0djkRM/s640/fpgojpfjojf.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> Para hacer estas calcitas (talle 6) tardé menos de media hora. MEDIA HORA. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> Y con un metro de lanilla hice dos pares de calzas y dos bufanditas. No sé a ustedes pero a mi me cierra por todos lados: es fácil, rápido y barato. (Un metro de lanilla lo consegí a $30).</span><br />
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<b><u><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Para hacerlas necesitás:</span></u></b><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Tela de punto: lanilla, lycra, plush... </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Máquina de coser familiar, no es necesario tener overlock.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Unas calzas del talle correcto para hacer el molde</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Papel, fibra y regla para el molde</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Elástico para la cintura (Para talle 6 usé 50cm)</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><b><u>Paso a paso: </u></b></span><br />
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Apoyá la calza en el papel y marcá el contorno con una fibra. Ahora apoyála mirando para el otro lado como se ve en la foto y marcá el contorno. Así formamos un solo molde. Vas a notar que en la parte de atrás la cintura es más alta, esto es para que tenga mejor calce.</span></li>
</ul>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBgC87NIzU6L6ROfHwcGdHl_ZhssDcUxZjIqryE3axwLBvjUFzcOz5VTZr6fHhAj3_1gVUGAXRCWHTD_jTnk11TnPczPa0Nqshc9IKzHzEBYTa6ESnNe1ACy9-kwfpsKqNJvGl2SImCUE/s1600/vzfbfbefb.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBgC87NIzU6L6ROfHwcGdHl_ZhssDcUxZjIqryE3axwLBvjUFzcOz5VTZr6fHhAj3_1gVUGAXRCWHTD_jTnk11TnPczPa0Nqshc9IKzHzEBYTa6ESnNe1ACy9-kwfpsKqNJvGl2SImCUE/s640/vzfbfbefb.png" width="640" /></a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Ahora hay que agregarle unos centímetros a la cintura y a los pies, para cuando hagas los dobladillos. Aprox. 1cm abajo y 2 arriba.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></li>
</ul>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs_quOzIqi941B6m0p3hCCQpFazU7OdqzpX2a0npkxdntj_M_Dlh5htvuheGly4rdUEoK4LGk1qgbndmNU4BIL2XqqksqfThUEsER8GOPLOGlpjjLlaOOFg8LwYdguO85Fvi2rovN4AlY/s1600/bjjbbbmbm.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs_quOzIqi941B6m0p3hCCQpFazU7OdqzpX2a0npkxdntj_M_Dlh5htvuheGly4rdUEoK4LGk1qgbndmNU4BIL2XqqksqfThUEsER8GOPLOGlpjjLlaOOFg8LwYdguO85Fvi2rovN4AlY/s640/bjjbbbmbm.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cortá el molde, y ahora cortá las piezas de tela. Primero cortá una pieza con el molde del derecho (mirando hacia arriba), y la otra pieza tiene que estar en espejo, asíque para cortarla tenés que apoyar el molde al revés (mirando hacia abajo)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Ahora que ya tenés las 2 piezas de tela, ponelas juntas enfrentando los derechos y, con costura zig-zag cosé la parte curva.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLVImy1TEbYJ1H9RFul3E6gJQ3koR9e2XzWT5uY-nBApzI-hGKyJmpdpg7aGNNCrDOF-nCVOs6zNR1Mm27xjtLJu_d6KsKboVse7Z37krovwR4PELUoNC1bZz_rKE9wFnmelKWWkjLgVQ/s1600/P1070196mbb.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLVImy1TEbYJ1H9RFul3E6gJQ3koR9e2XzWT5uY-nBApzI-hGKyJmpdpg7aGNNCrDOF-nCVOs6zNR1Mm27xjtLJu_d6KsKboVse7Z37krovwR4PELUoNC1bZz_rKE9wFnmelKWWkjLgVQ/s640/P1070196mbb.png" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAtqFts0NpYdV-bVSDGB38pGnp9g82eisqBfwzOWU_bWZaQvKhHc-nK2laAfgSGu-Y-37xKN0e_9SGW3fAAaOFFRznOOIZV0yiqQjBYK41gxVQRR4BX-CzuR_ZpL5-h_FJk7W116mx_Vc/s1600/P1070198lknknlkbmbm.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAtqFts0NpYdV-bVSDGB38pGnp9g82eisqBfwzOWU_bWZaQvKhHc-nK2laAfgSGu-Y-37xKN0e_9SGW3fAAaOFFRznOOIZV0yiqQjBYK41gxVQRR4BX-CzuR_ZpL5-h_FJk7W116mx_Vc/s640/P1070198lknknlkbmbm.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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</ul>
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Abrí el proyecto de calza y acomodalo de modo que las costuras que hiciste queden una sobre otra. Ya va tomando forma:<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbcZHnVH1UTbNbaeRULmtMMo55HMS2FLl7_NPQZ9TdFF4OgSv22J6r7AVuCxG7U5mPATuiZCnuEhI8ObBjzuqK4mB2MV2SfPvIKyXXDGLqxfloOrRBaeeK6HH8eeH1JnQsSNg1FXeFyGE/s1600/P1070200klnlkn.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbcZHnVH1UTbNbaeRULmtMMo55HMS2FLl7_NPQZ9TdFF4OgSv22J6r7AVuCxG7U5mPATuiZCnuEhI8ObBjzuqK4mB2MV2SfPvIKyXXDGLqxfloOrRBaeeK6HH8eeH1JnQsSNg1FXeFyGE/s640/P1070200klnlkn.png" width="478" /></a></div>
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</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cosé toda la parte de abajo. Para que no te quede torcido empezá desde la entrepierna hacia el pie. Y desde la entrepierna hacia el otro pie. Si no te queda totalmente simétrico note preocupes porque con el dobladillo se acomoda.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Doblá las botamangas hacia arriba (aprox 1 cm) y cosé los dobladillos.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Para la cintura, doblá hacia abajo la parte superior aprox. 2 cm. Empezá por el centro, pero no des toda la vuelta; tenés que dejar una abertura para poder pasar el elástico.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtUEdlNW5Oj57GX5ixvQ5Nqel_ALHw3Yb0CRiuOLH0FAG9zULJGNHURP-z3LqKawC-tPvYrh19FntdyB2Jt2V5q4JqRc1XVWX8gHQQaNxhR7WgtfjxYBr7N42cd0QCJqnR_NW4eUveXKs/s1600/PicMonkey+Collagbjkjh.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtUEdlNW5Oj57GX5ixvQ5Nqel_ALHw3Yb0CRiuOLH0FAG9zULJGNHURP-z3LqKawC-tPvYrh19FntdyB2Jt2V5q4JqRc1XVWX8gHQQaNxhR7WgtfjxYBr7N42cd0QCJqnR_NW4eUveXKs/s640/PicMonkey+Collagbjkjh.png" width="640" /></a></div>
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Ayudate con un alfiler de gancho y pasá el elástico. FIJATE QUE ESTÉ DERECHO y cosé los dos extremos con unas cuantas puntadas.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcyzW9CLzCbtmL5qlkQHUCrMVnJSWr5_Zbve7clM6xIX_Oxi2NrUeHpJMlOWzV-C5Gl1ZEiI3RL__oVF7wgcfBSAuXtkaAcIBZk2yYIF1u43mReZ775WOI_-jdKQ8ipKiOEjiP-az3u_k/s1600/P1070228lm%25C3%25B1ll.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcyzW9CLzCbtmL5qlkQHUCrMVnJSWr5_Zbve7clM6xIX_Oxi2NrUeHpJMlOWzV-C5Gl1ZEiI3RL__oVF7wgcfBSAuXtkaAcIBZk2yYIF1u43mReZ775WOI_-jdKQ8ipKiOEjiP-az3u_k/s640/P1070228lm%25C3%25B1ll.png" width="480" /></a></div>
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</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cerrá la apertura que dejaste para el elástico, cortá las hilachas, dala vuelta y terminaste!</span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Hice unos cuantos pares con lanilla, y hice algunas con friza finita. Como no se estira tanto, le agregué 1cm por todo el contorno de la calza para que quedé más cómoda. Y fue un suceso; es el pantalón favorito de Pía (ésta semana, la semana que viene les cuento)</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-38796872142765278872015-06-19T20:23:00.001-07:002015-06-23T07:10:23.199-07:00IMPRIMIBLE: Feliz día papi! ♥ (Para Candybar-tarjetas-desayunos)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Mañana es el día del padre y todavía no preparaste nada? No querés sair a hacer colas interminables buscando un regalo? Te cansaste de regalarle a tu papá calzoncillos y medias?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Con una impresora y una escapadita al quiosco, problema solucionado! </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvflzmtSt2eU03uHn84vKnr5bSl1k9uO2vxVyLfsgVKQV28v_E0YaBOi8lQJ7wGHcT-urHrKJcnw9X4dQ4X4doipFhSU6faFCkwvKDqh-z9eX3UpxNDQ54q5cmyvY2qfXuU4mM-gOjOXE/s1600/P1070326.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvflzmtSt2eU03uHn84vKnr5bSl1k9uO2vxVyLfsgVKQV28v_E0YaBOi8lQJ7wGHcT-urHrKJcnw9X4dQ4X4doipFhSU6faFCkwvKDqh-z9eX3UpxNDQ54q5cmyvY2qfXuU4mM-gOjOXE/s640/P1070326.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqpQ0ynejIFXAc0Q99vojoCuCElb6LK2QrTEmbhovlM5hztsz-y8vXVxR16evZG-mHhLCol4jgkFg0rvKYPP2fmGk9DTc39wTgGjCTckyynVq-WkepVVHH5Hay6c8s1GKJ1sSE8I3l7SM/s1600/P1070337.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqpQ0ynejIFXAc0Q99vojoCuCElb6LK2QrTEmbhovlM5hztsz-y8vXVxR16evZG-mHhLCol4jgkFg0rvKYPP2fmGk9DTc39wTgGjCTckyynVq-WkepVVHH5Hay6c8s1GKJ1sSE8I3l7SM/s640/P1070337.JPG" width="640" /></a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Podés armar un candybar o un desayuno, o simplemente una tarjeta o lo que te venga a la mente.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Todos los imprimibles que encontré por ahí eran aburridos, en inglés, o tenían corbatas o bigotes. Ninguno me convencía! Así que tuve que diseñar uno. No es "WOW, QUE CALIDAD DE DISEÑO!" pero teniendo en cuenta que es lo primero que hago y que no sé absolutamente nada de la materia, salió muy bien! </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Como tampoco sé (ni quiero aprender a) hacer una plantilla en pdf, como para pulsar imprimir y ya, van a tener que descargarlo en su pc, y darle el tamaño que quieran con word o con el asistente de la impresora que usen.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Yo imprimí uno grande, aprox. media hoja a4, y en otra hoja pegué 9 diseños más chicos, que son los multiuso. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDP8uk05YaDtdpm9jzXz4vle4uhyphenhyphen7ZELvRFrobcLw1t6WO1nKPviNV9Lg1sERFODN7S8yoN9NenRKjTF6satbfA5nNgBK3WmoKNdDVmhdf0TinT2rrQVjeI57XzSMJ2uCVTT7q_3LLod4/s1600/P1070314.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDP8uk05YaDtdpm9jzXz4vle4uhyphenhyphen7ZELvRFrobcLw1t6WO1nKPviNV9Lg1sERFODN7S8yoN9NenRKjTF6satbfA5nNgBK3WmoKNdDVmhdf0TinT2rrQVjeI57XzSMJ2uCVTT7q_3LLod4/s640/P1070314.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para ir al archivo hacé click en la imagen y descargalo en tu pc.</span><br />
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<a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1J2Pcn2FFWSMXZDV1FURTlkQ0M3TXlWaVMwdVA2NU5QR0ZB/view?usp=sharing" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1J2Pcn2FFWSMXZDV1FURTlkQ0M3TXlWaVMwdVA2NU5QR0ZB/view?usp=sharing" border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjBbsDt1mpoSR33LnkHqIN9_vYsu2kuXkfSkJ9Ao_1e8SsXQ7tSUUF4Ap7zGVsEfwiDxTNWRCVSwxlTAaYIdRyCYOMokyfXUON5-4ld4omfiQqO1dCSLOV5OaoueB_2_jYfpWn9mi_tLo/s320/81c5Pnf3TNL._SL1500_.png" width="253" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b><u>Ideas </u></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> *<u>Tarjeta:</u> Con la impresión grande hice una tarjeta; pegué la hoja en una cartulina y del lado de atrás ía escribió el mensaje para su papá.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbopnRM2SqVqWfa5s09LB-eb9IwMj1XfKXQ5JwFMKHOOi63VR8Y1XYcns4KDNTMpzHWpXIxKzia-4mqDnajtXmp3tHAoHXuvxUt7ic5bzsWXsIBlSzDADxkgpnV-8wyk3BBL7RIVG03gs/s1600/P1070343.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbopnRM2SqVqWfa5s09LB-eb9IwMj1XfKXQ5JwFMKHOOi63VR8Y1XYcns4KDNTMpzHWpXIxKzia-4mqDnajtXmp3tHAoHXuvxUt7ic5bzsWXsIBlSzDADxkgpnV-8wyk3BBL7RIVG03gs/s640/P1070343.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*<u>Paquetes:</u> Corté un poco uno de los diseños chicos por arriba y por abajo; lo pegué en un cartoncito, lo doblé al medio y con una abrochadora lo adherí a una bolsita de celofan con gomitas/caramelos.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgysZFWVfmgl7Vxqbq5dtMR4Fkl8oZA9iGNWVTyuUXYQSilsGy6XjkzV_fEATnccis7MrLGgMRG0rf4ngOsvnSVLhIyiyNcZGVj_ElFgeWRA1MT-bpDpuQVyMqp9G_8J_ueywP_Etzs-Hs/s1600/P1070315.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgysZFWVfmgl7Vxqbq5dtMR4Fkl8oZA9iGNWVTyuUXYQSilsGy6XjkzV_fEATnccis7MrLGgMRG0rf4ngOsvnSVLhIyiyNcZGVj_ElFgeWRA1MT-bpDpuQVyMqp9G_8J_ueywP_Etzs-Hs/s640/P1070315.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> *<u>Toppers para cupcakes:</u> Ya que no encontré mi compás, con un vaso marqué círculos sobre los diseños chicos, los pegué a un cartón y los recorté. También corté círculos de cartón solo para el reverso de cada topper. Pegué los diseños redondos a los círculos con un agitador de café adentro. Si no tenés podés usar palillos, palitos de brochette, bombillitas, etc. Una vez pegados les puse un broche de cada lado para que se secara bien cerrado.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*<u>Envolturas para golosinas:</u> Pegué los diseños multiuso en tiras de papel madera para envolver chocolates, cajitas de bebida, alfajores... y con los círculos armé envoltorios para medallones de menta, que también hubieran servido para monedas de chocolate.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPyWZxHVAq3oTzHb16Zh2qaPfIdyYzsneTDT45s7EW4N9AZHRahH_5KktURDnf314fDyzlbpBqfnw1Jk2w3eOzarvEAMPnRfiB3HbEwwagi5yVfxp9esWQwHU4_s7fpuVVu8MUWpshGV0/s1600/P1070340.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPyWZxHVAq3oTzHb16Zh2qaPfIdyYzsneTDT45s7EW4N9AZHRahH_5KktURDnf314fDyzlbpBqfnw1Jk2w3eOzarvEAMPnRfiB3HbEwwagi5yVfxp9esWQwHU4_s7fpuVVu8MUWpshGV0/s640/P1070340.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEHPAgGpBNHing0OQAoVWSE7_4N-_BHtHoJRvSNPjcdRU3x4ADCDESU7KVQF8f3Js4KMp6MGewzBDD_fzS3xCylt4Y3tZCkLOaQsmplfgpIYeqd2ymeZVZl0iVZpIIP-WrcQmCM_pfiIk/s1600/P1070342.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNDh8ZI7Y3RY5BCwAAcePcvCWn9V3jnbk4idVbvhnkehIOSx1UBdUUTSuvixF7-f6tCbX_I7fl4xkE5IDoxdpyKk0z7hXOqR1R7O9bjxw9vBlQuBC2vpxMmfojCkEk9R1lO5Xc-ZcUv9s/s1600/P1070341.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNDh8ZI7Y3RY5BCwAAcePcvCWn9V3jnbk4idVbvhnkehIOSx1UBdUUTSuvixF7-f6tCbX_I7fl4xkE5IDoxdpyKk0z7hXOqR1R7O9bjxw9vBlQuBC2vpxMmfojCkEk9R1lO5Xc-ZcUv9s/s640/P1070341.JPG" width="640" /></a><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEHPAgGpBNHing0OQAoVWSE7_4N-_BHtHoJRvSNPjcdRU3x4ADCDESU7KVQF8f3Js4KMp6MGewzBDD_fzS3xCylt4Y3tZCkLOaQsmplfgpIYeqd2ymeZVZl0iVZpIIP-WrcQmCM_pfiIk/s640/P1070342.JPG" width="640" /><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Espero que les haya gustado! </span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-34813471432553248412015-06-16T16:59:00.001-07:002015-06-23T07:06:54.599-07:00HACÉ TORTAS DE DIFERENTES FORMAS SIN MOLDES ESPECIALES♥<br />
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<img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjHm1mmhj1oKc6xs_JiXSrOxX1llTXTQHb4618HuV8256YTGAMid_AOndtOfmk3deJ_McDy78eB0LTGqmCg0VuhWbYj7thjqiZqbo9UmpeooY4afwM7f0t2V12KMxicpoSHI55PlolLpY/s640/P1030220b.png" width="640" /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Creo que ya se los conté... pero lo que menos me gusta de publicar acá en el blog es editar las fotos; cortar los bordes innecesarios (o "retirar los sobrantes" como dice Pía), ponerles la marquita de agua... en fin. Es un trabajo que no me gusta para nada. Primero porque me lleva un montón de tiempo y segundo porque por más que lea y lea cosas de cómo planificar el contenido del blog, lo que publico el 90% de las veces es espontáneo e imprevisto, por lo tanto saco lo que se conoce (?) "fotos de emergencia para el blog"</span>. <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Siempre son pésimas porque éstos atacazos artísticos siempre se me dan de tarde-noche, tengo un quilombito importante en la mesa de comer-trabajar y me da muuucha fiaca buscar fondos y demás artilugios decorativos. Auuunque soy consciente de que mejores fotos mejorarían el blog ampliamente, pero bueno yo les doy calidad (??????).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Les cuento brevemente la historia de ésta torta. La hice para el cumple de dos años de Pía, y como no hicimos fiesta para amiguitos, me puse super SUPER (psicóticamente) súper-creativa para que el festejito en casa saliera lindo. Entonces hice <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" target="_blank">éste número de cumpleaños</a>, <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" target="_blank">éste soporte para cupcakes</a>, banderines, globos, y cociné como una esclava. Pero a pasamos lindo eh...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> La cosa es que no quería que LA torta la hiciera otra persona, y no me quería comprar un molde de torta con forma de Kitty que iba a usar una sóla vez en la vida asíque lo que se me ocurrió es esto:</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*En una asadera hice un bizcochuelo ENORME (usé <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" target="_blank">mi receta multiuso de bizcochuelos/cupcakes</a>, pero todos los ingredientes dobles) más bien chatito.</span></b><br />
<b><br /><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Calqué de un mantel de cumpleaños la forma de la cabeza de Kitty. No hay nada peor que una cara de Kitty o de Mickey deforme.</span></b><br />
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<b><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDzjW4rChBuGaWQcuua9QhInzWFxEufD_slPmP2UfYjUumn04Mq4qyo_UzVrnJxXyLj4gx1vDqht53zx3_mMeZSXr9BOuBpYuZhwlnZijHMyTiMuHadTJT7Hd3KNjm4N0c1d5GnxLThXU/s640/P1030214.png" width="640" /></a></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Como no quería desperdiciar mucho bizcochuelo apoyé mi "molde" y con un cuchillito corté aprox. un centímetro más afuera.</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Listo! Después seguí como cualquier torta... lo corté al medio lo rellené y lo decoré con merengue instantáneo (se agrega agua y se bate, nada más!!!!) teñido con colorante para tortas.</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>*Tampoco me angustié con en bizcochuelo que me sobró porque lo desgrané, lo mezclé con dulce de leche, coco y oreos molidas y armé unas trufas espectaculares</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_Rr46C1wZFVkF6aLdaKh4gHdf5nAEDfNQ2PbfGEGznbk0kR6bnzsgY1Wa8IfCQz2ArOChskDqi2Qw3lg2FnkZyyJsp4Snb9_Qik35TGnJsX0FXYb3_LMKxqXpeglwDDFIkB7nvYS5JhY/s640/P1030230kkk.png" width="478" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Antes de irme un secretito: en dos semanas es el cumple de Pía y lo quiere hacer de Minions (me muero de amor) asíque pienso usar ésta ideota para hacerle la tortita para llevar al jardín<3 </span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-28524348413130211112015-06-02T05:35:00.001-07:002015-06-23T07:05:20.643-07:00CROCHET: GORRITO BÁSICO♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga8aFlKHRA9hwuQwfpOuQZe96FkNbp0VBDHKAfkYYjnPJW1OtlInIfgyDNGK9H4iO6lbv0IzS_Daubodw2ZGTe2ipDG6IO5Gns4ryC1uMFd15ETTU7alaideRnGajO1l8MGtxJnQRr7lc/s1600/Sin+t%25C3%25ADtulo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="638" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga8aFlKHRA9hwuQwfpOuQZe96FkNbp0VBDHKAfkYYjnPJW1OtlInIfgyDNGK9H4iO6lbv0IzS_Daubodw2ZGTe2ipDG6IO5Gns4ryC1uMFd15ETTU7alaideRnGajO1l8MGtxJnQRr7lc/s640/Sin+t%25C3%25ADtulo.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Se vino el frío! Lo bueno es que en un par de horitas podemos tejer un gorrito (Yo tardo dos horas y media aprox.) </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Lo primero que hay que tener en cuenta al hacer un gorrito: Seguir instrucciones al pie de la letra no siempre da el resultado deseado.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Como digo siempre, por más que usemos la misma aguja y la misma lana, la mano no es la misma. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para este gorro usé aguja 4.5mm y lana nachito bb. Es la más barata de LHO, a veces trae ésta etiqueta:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5hjZOS_UD2hLDAIgpyw9Jc8R5DBDMrXQlctfb133hKMW6cJTe4maRmJ94Q3HPPyA7GwNEoSXaoNvHjEkduIJJZ9QVM6A3m3LdFr31_DSl47f5EXmLqQiB_Jl9bvtb7xDTsoa1wWqX2CY/s1600/bb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="585" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5hjZOS_UD2hLDAIgpyw9Jc8R5DBDMrXQlctfb133hKMW6cJTe4maRmJ94Q3HPPyA7GwNEoSXaoNvHjEkduIJJZ9QVM6A3m3LdFr31_DSl47f5EXmLqQiB_Jl9bvtb7xDTsoa1wWqX2CY/s640/bb.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">IMPORTANTE ANTES DE EMPEZAR: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para tejer gorros, hay que hacer una serie de aumentos hasta que tengamos el diámetro que buscamos. Lo que les recomiendo es que midan la cabeza del destinatario o lean en una tabla de talles el diámetro que debe tener, y cada vuelta que terminen vayan midiendo para ver hasta donde tienen que aumentar.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Por qué es esto? Por mas que usemos la misma lana, la misma aguja, la misma mano con la misma tensión, a veces puede pasar que nos salteemos algún punto, algún aumento, o que hagamos demás. Y terminamos con un gorro muy flojo o muy ajustado. </span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">INSTRUCCIONES:</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Tejer un anillo mágicoque contenga 10 varetas. (Recuerden que para hacer un círculo plano el anillo mágico tenía 8 varetas dentro... con 10 varetas se va a formar una especie de vasija que le dará forma al gorro)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*En la 2da vuelta serán todos aumentos; en la 3ra vuelta aumento-vareta, en la 4ta aumento-vareta-vareta, en la 5ta aumento-vareta-vareta-vareta... y así seguimos, por cada vuelta que empecemos agregamos una vareta más entre los aumentos.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">*Cuando llegamos al contorno deseado, empezamos a hacer vueltas sin aumentos; sólo varetas, hasta que lleguemos al largo que queremos obtener.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ej: <u>Patrón de beanie talle toddler (aprox. 2 a 5 años)</u></span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">(con ajuga 4.5mm y lana Nachito bebé)</span></b><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Vuelta 1: Realizar un anillo mágico con 10 varetas</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V2: Todos aumentos (20 puntos)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V3: *Un Aumento- Una Vareta* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (30P)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V4: *1AU- 2VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (40P)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V5: *1AU- 3VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (50P)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V6: *1AU- 4VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (50P)</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V7: *1AU- 5VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (60P)</span> </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V8: *1AU- 6VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (70P)</span> </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V9: *1AU- 7VAR* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta (80P)</span> </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V10 a V20: Solo varetas. </span> </span></li>
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<span style="color: #ea9999;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Aclaración: </span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #ea9999;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con una lana finita tipo ajuar de bebé, tendremos que seguir haciendo aumentos aprox. hasta la vuelta número 12. Y tendremos que hacer más de 20 vueltas para llegar al mismo largo.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #ea9999;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> En cambio con una lana más gruesita, para hacer el mismo tamaño de gorro los aumentos serán hasta la vuelta 6.</span></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Listo! Ahora podemos decorar con pompones, apliques, lentejuelas o lo que más nos guste.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">(Preparadas porque estuve haciendo unos gorros de animalitos hermosos!)</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-3152953429358133522015-05-29T06:11:00.000-07:002015-06-23T07:03:40.390-07:00IMPRIMIBLE: Tarjetitas con Orgami♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHn9a9DX5mlaAxN8HWDAjaz9JbAOKsesYXOvCMpwFMayKWdJnHkPzOXxxC1plOpDhzah75KMzLcxX2rPFsSVpnE3_WtLWRrh6JZYfDsu2b_NnuecEyw9Mlr8zBcbIhAstRuu8YScUT64s/s1600/tarjeta0.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHn9a9DX5mlaAxN8HWDAjaz9JbAOKsesYXOvCMpwFMayKWdJnHkPzOXxxC1plOpDhzah75KMzLcxX2rPFsSVpnE3_WtLWRrh6JZYfDsu2b_NnuecEyw9Mlr8zBcbIhAstRuu8YScUT64s/s640/tarjeta0.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ayer fue el día de los jardines y de las maestras jardineras, y obviamente <strike>me tocó</strike> me ofrecí a hacer las tarjetitas para el regalito. Estaba por ponerme a buscar laas hojas de color, tijeras de formas, perforadoras de formitas y tooooodo lo que tengo guardadito para estas ocasiones, hasta que paveando por internet encontré éstas tarjetitas amorosas... Y cambié de planes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Habré tardado 15 o 20 minutos en imprimir, pegar, cortar y armar el corazoncito de origami. Y me quedaron así:</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJYn_vQ6Yz3YuLrhIfD-aJrc-m2u5Fx4SxldSn2WoY32lbuVNz1il1W-dLcz0daiYXdWh-kNQVg3hN9p39ss5b9Nim-3AmJz4mopGVdpCxHW1c35t9rWg3YgRDIgYJFAMGn7av990CSlw/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="406" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJYn_vQ6Yz3YuLrhIfD-aJrc-m2u5Fx4SxldSn2WoY32lbuVNz1il1W-dLcz0daiYXdWh-kNQVg3hN9p39ss5b9Nim-3AmJz4mopGVdpCxHW1c35t9rWg3YgRDIgYJFAMGn7av990CSlw/s640/PicMonkey+Collage.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Las descargé de la página <a href="http://www.designisyay.com/valentines-day-animal-card/" target="_blank">DESIGN IS YAY!</a><a href="http://www.designisyay.com/valentines-day-animal-card/" target="_blank"> (Click para ir al enlace)</a> donde hay muchas cosas lindas para imprimir y armar.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy_ydz5oqy63oXOjQblK9hah2j8CwtVHuO9Yi9Hlgikc3Hjj262_41-O8Q9g8mJqAz9ITzUTQECQw9wDP6F_fCz32S6WAjz6dyi_bJCpRvwDdHIAGZqxzUMaQ3TLnjUFc1quOkb7CtLoU/s1600/vjsdjgvs.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy_ydz5oqy63oXOjQblK9hah2j8CwtVHuO9Yi9Hlgikc3Hjj262_41-O8Q9g8mJqAz9ITzUTQECQw9wDP6F_fCz32S6WAjz6dyi_bJCpRvwDdHIAGZqxzUMaQ3TLnjUFc1quOkb7CtLoU/s640/vjsdjgvs.png" width="456" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Los pasos a seguir:</b></span></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ir al enlace y buscar el botón {Download here}. Nos abrirá un archivo en formato PDF, donde podremos guardar el archivo o imprimirlo directamente. Son dos hojas: una con tres muñequitos y otra con dos hojitas estampadas para hacer el corazón. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Pegamos (con pegamento en barra o boligima, plasticola no porque humedece y arruga mucho el papel) los muñequitos en una hoja tipo canson más gruesita un y cortamos por la línea punteada. (NO PEGAR EL PAPEL ESTAMPADO)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con un cutter cortamos la línea punteada de los bracitos para poder separarlos del cuerpo.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cortamos el papel estampado, y seguimos el instructivo para armar el origami. Si no encuentran el enlace, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnV262Egucw" target="_blank">hagan click acá para</a> ver el video. Es fácil, que no les de miedo!</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">En la página dice que escribamos el mensaje en el reverso del papel de origami, pero me da pena que lo desarmen y después lo tengan que volver a armar, asique lo escribí en las pancitas de los personajes, ya que los tapa el corazoncito. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Listo! Yo le voy a hacer una perforación en las orejas para pasar un cordón y enganchar en la bolsa de regalo.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4hhKhL0ly62rWETn-tx3ahg2Z_4-1dBO2EjX36f2ZUZ5fO8PP-EhexqD21LR2XWm0ffCrna2C_q6UQrNEoc-ksCy60cCNiYgrV1unRLG-O96an2FzxtEUQHVcaQcNcawB245qprSXx34/s1600/origami-heart-holder-valentine-card1LR.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="524" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4hhKhL0ly62rWETn-tx3ahg2Z_4-1dBO2EjX36f2ZUZ5fO8PP-EhexqD21LR2XWm0ffCrna2C_q6UQrNEoc-ksCy60cCNiYgrV1unRLG-O96an2FzxtEUQHVcaQcNcawB245qprSXx34/s640/origami-heart-holder-valentine-card1LR.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span class="st">❤</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-58926090504602446322015-03-12T06:49:00.000-07:002015-06-23T07:01:48.325-07:00INSPIRACIÓN: Jewelry dishes/ Platitos coquetos para joyería♥<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Esta es una de las cosas que veo en Pinterest y digo - <i>Qué fácil! Hoy lo re hago</i>.- *el pin queda guardado para siempre en pendientes*</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Les cuento, soy muy lectora de blogs es inglés y hay muchos términos que en castellano suenan re tontos. La inspiración de hoy es un claro ejemplo. "JEWELRY DISH" (piensa: <i>Que top! Me voy a hacer un jewelry dish!</i>) y cuando vamos a los hechos es un platito para apoyar los anillitos (no suena nada glamoroso); asíque le dejamos el término original.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Me encantan los jewelry dishes... si vamos a los hechos no son algo muuuy práctico... pero no son lindos? (n.n) Son una minipieza de decoración que de paso sirve para recolectar las cosas que siempre quedan dando vueltas (muchos de mis días los paso sin mis anillos favoritos porque me bañé y no me acuerdo donde los apoyé). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Vamos al grano (que frase horrible!), les muestro mis favoritos de pinterest y vamos a ver que se me ocurre para armar el DIY. Que tengan un hermoso día!</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYKybz9yCHuY1Y2wH4kE0ufjlCSNeN0no8l18ZnbMFeeiQLy5BGYPL5w3Fed5sY-lm_UD0F-aWbZFGGgYgoEt2yOYacbxgLybYIwvnEp1a_FgoPrxdsiyZpnMcxi9MrzxVIOelH5EIzS4/s1600/6a0134882a3940970c01543226bb35970c-800wi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYKybz9yCHuY1Y2wH4kE0ufjlCSNeN0no8l18ZnbMFeeiQLy5BGYPL5w3Fed5sY-lm_UD0F-aWbZFGGgYgoEt2yOYacbxgLybYIwvnEp1a_FgoPrxdsiyZpnMcxi9MrzxVIOelH5EIzS4/s1600/6a0134882a3940970c01543226bb35970c-800wi.jpg" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6uxIqf60zMKkihKkteFr0BowCLiu0iRcztN_4WQ5wKL_DXHQ0aZ0mnU_v6sKgScah01uYTK8yIiK1wiCBNoi1kU2T_Kt2c9O5AEwkgqazrZXyT6_8vTRcG6oSyaLnRsq6KPwk0ev4XK8/s1600/6a00d8358081ff69e2017c372d7380970b-800wi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="482" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6uxIqf60zMKkihKkteFr0BowCLiu0iRcztN_4WQ5wKL_DXHQ0aZ0mnU_v6sKgScah01uYTK8yIiK1wiCBNoi1kU2T_Kt2c9O5AEwkgqazrZXyT6_8vTRcG6oSyaLnRsq6KPwk0ev4XK8/s1600/6a00d8358081ff69e2017c372d7380970b-800wi.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-341779011406493752014-10-29T05:07:00.001-07:002015-06-23T07:00:43.744-07:00UÑAS DE DÍA DE LOS MUERTOS! ♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNcdwkM-y3xAndMGo_FyBqpoaWJzMdSu85M3oW_t6wj5m3mv1LMaIrfUg6lHJim9pidfHT-CENLSH6XaZfAKwSWskhSqVVE4eWNdolL6WJMVT1wGmj1SNeYKheF25r1OFMlVm6rFb5reM/s1600/P1060172.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNcdwkM-y3xAndMGo_FyBqpoaWJzMdSu85M3oW_t6wj5m3mv1LMaIrfUg6lHJim9pidfHT-CENLSH6XaZfAKwSWskhSqVVE4eWNdolL6WJMVT1wGmj1SNeYKheF25r1OFMlVm6rFb5reM/s1600/P1060172.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Hola amiguitos! Ya llega Halloween, y aunque en mi país no salimos a pedir dulces ni nada de eso (mala onda!) nos encanta.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para hacer las uñas de calaveras necesitás obviamente esmalte blanco, negro, y color/es. Si es posible una amiga que te ayude, sobretodo para las que no tienen pulso, pero se puede autohacer sin problema :)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Empecemos! Primero pintamos las uñas de blanco. Si te queda alguna burbujita o se te corre un touch no hay problema porque después con el dibujo arriba no se va a notar.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR4CiPoOL_4tfHVGVUp4J2dnfTCX5J2YxPdl34hN3ZuXHJbc8cx6Xq0MDKOnVu5JsmH9VrNKeyDTzyvpAhGE5QUhxKEWXD1AjhdopL3l7EtnelfplQ4QVnwkzjGSDJJgo8IuMLajs-zT8/s1600/P1060151.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR4CiPoOL_4tfHVGVUp4J2dnfTCX5J2YxPdl34hN3ZuXHJbc8cx6Xq0MDKOnVu5JsmH9VrNKeyDTzyvpAhGE5QUhxKEWXD1AjhdopL3l7EtnelfplQ4QVnwkzjGSDJJgo8IuMLajs-zT8/s1600/P1060151.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Quiero aclarar que esos dedos largos no son míos desgraciadamente, sino de mi prima Agus que se ofreció de chanchito de la India. Ok. Ahora con esmalte negro hacemos media pincelada de cada lado. No hay secreto, solo apoyamos el pincel en la uña y arrastramos hacia abajo y queda la formita:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpG7rMOwLT1DK27KG44_q-J5nanW5iYIgC3x39k20odjkNoMaqV_5XOU8Bvij75ABrVQLXSJXRBJNmIpzjI1zpvWCPOreg4sV7FM57VXCN2xich1sUQz6HMuZmW4Bo_CCnfNrMawDJgpY/s1600/P1060153.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpG7rMOwLT1DK27KG44_q-J5nanW5iYIgC3x39k20odjkNoMaqV_5XOU8Bvij75ABrVQLXSJXRBJNmIpzjI1zpvWCPOreg4sV7FM57VXCN2xich1sUQz6HMuZmW4Bo_CCnfNrMawDJgpY/s1600/P1060153.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con negro hacemos una mini francesita finita uniendo las dos partes negras. Las que no tienen pulso ni amiga a mano pueden usar un sticker para francesita o más simple un pedacito de cinta scotch.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUbIRUNKNmfY0eZjZwAodgEmXNsv2tOIhzmXgVidKrGB_juXxkM_1wKRn0svHS_LoS3KczrgBAQ_LehrM_zqUrjQrI0dAhEytSQHiLBtOcTCUtHDPCaFG6_JuNrq9WjL52KBnye8HNPqo/s1600/P1060155.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUbIRUNKNmfY0eZjZwAodgEmXNsv2tOIhzmXgVidKrGB_juXxkM_1wKRn0svHS_LoS3KczrgBAQ_LehrM_zqUrjQrI0dAhEytSQHiLBtOcTCUtHDPCaFG6_JuNrq9WjL52KBnye8HNPqo/s1600/P1060155.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con un palillo de madera/birome que no ande, vamos a mojar en un poquito de esmalte negro y vamos a hacer dos puntitos para los ojos, un corazon <b><u>INVERTIDO</u></b> para la nariz (la no-nariz) y dos filas de puntitos para los dientes (no-dientes).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitadP125H0m6JaCkgETGVxvWBxnbTI7F3aQmeoVqpD3ExuW7E0aNuV0lSU4Fmez4HiFV1bMTDhux7-P6wNgsH7xgp4vKB0FcUrm1vbZx9eozYGqIFuhSzImElCWI5VWDUryeXtYYK12VA/s1600/P1060158.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitadP125H0m6JaCkgETGVxvWBxnbTI7F3aQmeoVqpD3ExuW7E0aNuV0lSU4Fmez4HiFV1bMTDhux7-P6wNgsH7xgp4vKB0FcUrm1vbZx9eozYGqIFuhSzImElCWI5VWDUryeXtYYK12VA/s1600/P1060158.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Porqué resalté lo de corazón invertido? Porque siempre algo hago al revés y primero los hice del derecho, por ende no parecían calaveras sino gatitos. Asíque con blanco hice unos "parches borradores" para hacer los corazoncitos correctos...</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMIqTylib55WcEMQh3Bd518CoLbtXrgEQNP4HU2triv4lyicIXd9ERyaqOtHLVx9NsFCdulr4pGBzClbRiDqCTvNTAo6vdT2u3mx7YNjVrg7S8eOGSdQbUKFlg7MYLNWx_1DRIZ_sKR-A/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMIqTylib55WcEMQh3Bd518CoLbtXrgEQNP4HU2triv4lyicIXd9ERyaqOtHLVx9NsFCdulr4pGBzClbRiDqCTvNTAo6vdT2u3mx7YNjVrg7S8eOGSdQbUKFlg7MYLNWx_1DRIZ_sKR-A/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.png" width="547" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ya casi terminamos! Con los colores que que elijamos hacemos unos puntitos alrededor de los ojos, 5 o 6 puntitos es suficiente... y listo!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCvFFF6jbc548gIrw3RkyV00wki7hyphenhyphenTMy4vtDW78DUc6bSQm_tvvkP_flv9BCjzDT6WAByezFyXIqa9aphdbWNSPXQtFTlp_kMkVoMrhuGI8W1qTFvevwM2rK0CgNQJAWzSvja7_4h7wU/s1600/P1060160.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCvFFF6jbc548gIrw3RkyV00wki7hyphenhyphenTMy4vtDW78DUc6bSQm_tvvkP_flv9BCjzDT6WAByezFyXIqa9aphdbWNSPXQtFTlp_kMkVoMrhuGI8W1qTFvevwM2rK0CgNQJAWzSvja7_4h7wU/s1600/P1060160.png" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3k57EoSsUPPQUyNfG1sWcnsWme-pSgXepWlLtJCGZKj1pPfEcGwIJvL-fkVnsrAqEVpQjcKEpeIQwUyTYJhGf4q9lzL8BwN73RY_V6Y7RmEWCFgMoMl3lN9HHs0M0PFg8p_K99B4Q410/s1600/P1060176.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3k57EoSsUPPQUyNfG1sWcnsWme-pSgXepWlLtJCGZKj1pPfEcGwIJvL-fkVnsrAqEVpQjcKEpeIQwUyTYJhGf4q9lzL8BwN73RY_V6Y7RmEWCFgMoMl3lN9HHs0M0PFg8p_K99B4Q410/s1600/P1060176.JPG" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9BahTScaVR1eJGC0QclVBIRc29jqbRjt5b3369RdjXl7BJQKU797QXNUY4A5yCEQyw8syqm_zyy26Dz0vT6v6xXvFhzre_Ix4cP0hTzE1QagX3HaPnsvH2LHdBvCTNnE77oK0QNPJ3cg/s1600/P1060177.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9BahTScaVR1eJGC0QclVBIRc29jqbRjt5b3369RdjXl7BJQKU797QXNUY4A5yCEQyw8syqm_zyy26Dz0vT6v6xXvFhzre_Ix4cP0hTzE1QagX3HaPnsvH2LHdBvCTNnE77oK0QNPJ3cg/s1600/P1060177.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para las que no se animen les dejo mis otros tutoriales de uñas (click en las fotos para ir a los tutoriales):</span><br />
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/10/glitter-ombre-unas-con-degrade-de.html" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/10/glitter-ombre-unas-con-degrade-de.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGerJ-lNaUtVuqNENwVoz3B_yO4To4P8bFzMnyaQ8O2m3I6PqVDSefTQq1915xhN6Iege9V74FYs4Ibfh4k2idgbDrZNl7MPqKbTff4EkFRFfkXna4mCtGjTyjUJly4qzA1dW7HiRSzPg/s1600/006.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/10/unas-romanticas.html" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/10/unas-romanticas.html" border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiutLdNWIHhXDVpD9L1p8CfMUwPiuSQdOVh3CjUYRs3-Izxj0pjebuVoYjM6mlopubEb4XTi84aZbrO7A_-1wsAN_Oqx-tGSIJI3DcS5MYKiiGkFhJeMU9xUiSOtNOPufAqq3MlE8Ilmmw/s1600/jkg.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/12/unas-lunares.html" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/12/unas-lunares.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAVcjCnruNTDGSXgO35-m2F17DBkd7cNsu42o3bEIMxCp2xtO1XmLaNzzxu_G_AhfKlXl41cFVXtcXP11Bjci-8ptgjM7nfyPk5IQKajKiwiCyWQF3iEvlk2QbRjFoItDJul4-7m6ElCc/s1600/4.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/04/unas-con-corazones-rapido.html" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/04/unas-con-corazones-rapido.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3i8OdZ5-W_iizmlgmSCUJL4GiFs0o3hYxrE8y0e0Xo_hI6LHZhPJxpdCIciFQ51JAgzXzm5IS5w061LKRwAdBYC7Xpz6oF-QqZtFxSRmQFpJAIfjzD0zbR-zAaXJ0n_yVr169p1uOXQs/s1600/1+copia.jpg" width="320" /></a> </div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/05/unas-con-trinangulos-diy.html" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/05/unas-con-trinangulos-diy.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0LVSEDN43g2qshovjpU5xFbTHU_MKwp4pjUS2uKuyxBVUMhrAzhz9CWtYcocg6xD861G2USHnKBmsK41nP4WtWqwv9VYswOW-U9qfZ52PX4G7wWMgpnDm0Yt4brLaQB9vkD086CqCJIc/s1600/P1020929.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/04/unas-con-puntitos-diy.html" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/04/unas-con-puntitos-diy.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ2H5GXF9nYHJgGU-kJ8SlsBuHCTSxayzqifwen0I81oD57a057M1B4HOjeADtTr3Gh3YamXExY3R7itt1rhYczjCDj7RO1nSbyFzsRN9QN_VAfcGAQ1Y6eqBbyVhaC6vyv9zfCbPaZQQ/s1600/1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/03/unitas-de-leopardo.html" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/03/unitas-de-leopardo.html" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilVvIJF73ChrIg3w9X0jtwkBtJ5Ax37i1SbUFpVJzKOWeGlE7jhhP25iH1Un_GM0J3Nqt8SLpUcxwagcyVIxotDG_uZiZR0U8aVifgWdsLbWES83auj3WHs6_VgfOi5H-glntOXQiKwFY/s1600/P1020078.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-2640157627630082692014-10-17T19:17:00.000-07:002015-06-23T07:00:19.737-07:00UÑAS GLITTER OMBRÉ♥ (Degradé de brillitos) -FÁCIL!-<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGBUY1TCBG8BVPTJxUHVe9Fzl_2H0NcxXymq0cQGqDJMf4HbLdzFitWBA7YS8SWEnJWOdDkUX46VyrtBmCwsmScv1EsXWD2XWKq6QMEqrVNk01p-NsGyHywhjVfUkUEOO_F7AOSSGRR2M/s1600/006.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGBUY1TCBG8BVPTJxUHVe9Fzl_2H0NcxXymq0cQGqDJMf4HbLdzFitWBA7YS8SWEnJWOdDkUX46VyrtBmCwsmScv1EsXWD2XWKq6QMEqrVNk01p-NsGyHywhjVfUkUEOO_F7AOSSGRR2M/s1600/006.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> EXTRA-EXTRA-FÁCIL. Necesitás un esmalte color para la base de base y un esmalte de brillitos. Na-da- más!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Empezamos:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> 1- Pintamos las uñas con el color de base (Yo usé un Nude de Amodil que me encanta).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> 2- Cuando esté seco, damos una mano de glitter de la línea (1) hacia abajo. Esperamos que se seque y damos otra mano de glitter desde la línea (2) hacia abajo, lo mismo con la línea 3 y 4.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2FqiGV_MvXZwgT1XsYEDfvB1D9Evwj2Cx-WqGHpDtHVp53osxRQnMVxs7xBCAM1R0xeZUvYERg1_mxjp8lL6gbSoXevevCErZvZapV432jYtJaLiX4KvP2Zhyphenhyphenc_PDuDfT0UG6dPtKfp0/s1600/numeros.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2FqiGV_MvXZwgT1XsYEDfvB1D9Evwj2Cx-WqGHpDtHVp53osxRQnMVxs7xBCAM1R0xeZUvYERg1_mxjp8lL6gbSoXevevCErZvZapV432jYtJaLiX4KvP2Zhyphenhyphenc_PDuDfT0UG6dPtKfp0/s1600/numeros.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">3-Salimos a la calle a presumir. No hay paso 3!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>El paso a paso se va viendo así...</b> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaOSHbHmI_aS7e9XE9Uc0UfI1SOcG4c-K-vQqAcLeSyx81my9pjnh50Xonuf1HBlj2LK8DObqIbNeVkt0gLV4apNbklPP6N-5yv4NzWs0f8ZUrOg_o7TLHburWdyTf1ccoXEDnzZBLg70/s1600/collage.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaOSHbHmI_aS7e9XE9Uc0UfI1SOcG4c-K-vQqAcLeSyx81my9pjnh50Xonuf1HBlj2LK8DObqIbNeVkt0gLV4apNbklPP6N-5yv4NzWs0f8ZUrOg_o7TLHburWdyTf1ccoXEDnzZBLg70/s1600/collage.png" /></a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-26442122801190893132014-10-15T11:31:00.001-07:002015-06-23T06:59:32.493-07:00COLLAR MOSTACHOL♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKrs4eI8UMM8C95yqDWer_0AQd4fQ2EyV7-jyhxbU70VpIfsb2HHgnzaKZeEjGlOvS0e9DG31TsKkaFYfdOU-ORxbW_NNhQnkFZb3ZcTR0HmXOa9UiCKFVoZluw5Szn4haGYGbMyXf8sQ/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKrs4eI8UMM8C95yqDWer_0AQd4fQ2EyV7-jyhxbU70VpIfsb2HHgnzaKZeEjGlOvS0e9DG31TsKkaFYfdOU-ORxbW_NNhQnkFZb3ZcTR0HmXOa9UiCKFVoZluw5Szn4haGYGbMyXf8sQ/s1600/1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Pía está con fiebre, y como no fue al jardín está ABURRIDAAA... Después de "ayudarme" a hacer las camas y ordenar armamos la oficina de pinturas y pinceles y papeles y fideos.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Para no hacer el típico collarcito aburrido de fideos (igual solita solita fue lo que le salió, tiene 3 años nada más!)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsGirJ6jWNeW0fgKWAzSy_hcXwEJRSTob4VmZH6pWeLU3cQLla4m9ZArsezvvum_L5DKqmPrb6_qVQ8_JgwHBM3EBdVeYb7UfLNamR7JoopsFpebxPUsRVai3rw2u2f0JKOHCTdrUsjFI/s1600/006.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsGirJ6jWNeW0fgKWAzSy_hcXwEJRSTob4VmZH6pWeLU3cQLla4m9ZArsezvvum_L5DKqmPrb6_qVQ8_JgwHBM3EBdVeYb7UfLNamR7JoopsFpebxPUsRVai3rw2u2f0JKOHCTdrUsjFI/s1600/006.jpg" width="474" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> ...Hicimos uno con un poco más de onda, así le queda para guardar en el alhajero y no me roba los míos</span><span class="st">♥</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwHYFkJafiO4YaD-x_EJphl0t6yd9KS-baPj16eoZgcowuw2hAojq-tQNguFArqY4jfkh32PI-WZwYwWDD0jak2TGfD5kWHIX8u735lyHSkwhjOHoig3pPlFYo0LBTBgo5HQyl0qsUAA/s1600/005.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwHYFkJafiO4YaD-x_EJphl0t6yd9KS-baPj16eoZgcowuw2hAojq-tQNguFArqY4jfkh32PI-WZwYwWDD0jak2TGfD5kWHIX8u735lyHSkwhjOHoig3pPlFYo0LBTBgo5HQyl0qsUAA/s1600/005.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Entre las dos pintamos los fideos con acrílico, los sostuvimos con palitos de brochette para pintarnos los dedos lo menos posible.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHr5mYJw-XSu8xStngiKNewX1esf5YvwcQqaaMuPEHv5bRFz_ZCYBsNwfy0WLOJjIiUsSd2wEd4vVZJqFkaPrw-vAiD463aTh12dQ3zkzV3L4iF6zuc0EnchCgRt_njK4-WbiKgAdSu6I/s1600/000.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHr5mYJw-XSu8xStngiKNewX1esf5YvwcQqaaMuPEHv5bRFz_ZCYBsNwfy0WLOJjIiUsSd2wEd4vVZJqFkaPrw-vAiD463aTh12dQ3zkzV3L4iF6zuc0EnchCgRt_njK4-WbiKgAdSu6I/s1600/000.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cuando se secaron, apoyamos los fideos formando el diseño en un cartón y marcamos el contorno, lo cortamos más chico para que no se vea atrás de los fideos.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPhdHTpcAbEOaqCq0Aj7DYR49-bpv1xu7Eh03H9P5qPW1QQ_yuPJqw0hKyEwcGTqYhseGc8QyfjpPWg7euRITV2-NVtBontNy8p04D0EWK9i_FQJrPz10V6q11R59Ibu-4xXmTBHFV8vc/s1600/001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPhdHTpcAbEOaqCq0Aj7DYR49-bpv1xu7Eh03H9P5qPW1QQ_yuPJqw0hKyEwcGTqYhseGc8QyfjpPWg7euRITV2-NVtBontNy8p04D0EWK9i_FQJrPz10V6q11R59Ibu-4xXmTBHFV8vc/s1600/001.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con pegamento universal o pistola encoladora pegamos los fideos, yo empecé por los del medio para que no me faltara o sobrara cartón por los bordes. Pegamos todos excepto uno de los de arriba (derecho o izquierdo, es igual)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMukw-px1GCLDP1_dhzyL79uiRvPe6jddKx6YH4DUqeQav3aUyYGMwNCOcSI2KXSc2nnuzDQNpPSVIN-ZW2GqIB1lpwCrvg6e7X5ZhU1jyqpu7uje1-WihgsjgFRyd-HbNbPymmy035XQ/s1600/002.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMukw-px1GCLDP1_dhzyL79uiRvPe6jddKx6YH4DUqeQav3aUyYGMwNCOcSI2KXSc2nnuzDQNpPSVIN-ZW2GqIB1lpwCrvg6e7X5ZhU1jyqpu7uje1-WihgsjgFRyd-HbNbPymmy035XQ/s1600/002.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cortamos un pedacito de lana del largo que queramos el collar y lo pasamos por el mostachol de arriba que está pegado, y a continuación por el que quedó suelto. Ahora sí lo podemos pegar.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4X4WrG2nm2mZaVMYdyhIH2xTxmMZaol3r0wbskvcCfmcg7Xxr8CSJs1ki22wU9O1bn9mapSY0qy0wYM8qwmBdRyGmPnv6X2SW7JK2YJ-xZH8KWjLM2lMYMmGThyphenhyphenHB-CVlLILD0N8x_Jw/s1600/003.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4X4WrG2nm2mZaVMYdyhIH2xTxmMZaol3r0wbskvcCfmcg7Xxr8CSJs1ki22wU9O1bn9mapSY0qy0wYM8qwmBdRyGmPnv6X2SW7JK2YJ-xZH8KWjLM2lMYMmGThyphenhyphenHB-CVlLILD0N8x_Jw/s1600/003.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cuando esté sequito (Pía aguanto 15 minutos sin agarrarlo y no se despegó), queda así</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_OWEP_n7TQDpsop9fTUNLsGZI8fuV8hDrQsY6Vg0GGF2pjv2tlzJ6mZO47-Imp6HRO-My03J3SpCiLGz8CsyXYLzZ37sXTyNI826fQyTFKFMDNA6xmIgfquq6XbpabZ-kEKY0Mssqxys/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="432" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_OWEP_n7TQDpsop9fTUNLsGZI8fuV8hDrQsY6Vg0GGF2pjv2tlzJ6mZO47-Imp6HRO-My03J3SpCiLGz8CsyXYLzZ37sXTyNI826fQyTFKFMDNA6xmIgfquq6XbpabZ-kEKY0Mssqxys/s1600/2.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Y a mí me encantó también... tendré que buscar alguna alternativa al fideo para hacer uno para mí!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfPgJGZJORGNV0N3hgj_Gskli3tSHxrMes8MEiYkgLjepaM1zt1TapLIPmWtvYBxBHwvUfFYFUcBVoLKsnO0GKXthPGp3dzxGmzFfD9yn2jYbRZR4qUoSvOWRrLfJsS6lQF2b75BuNS-g/s1600/004.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfPgJGZJORGNV0N3hgj_Gskli3tSHxrMes8MEiYkgLjepaM1zt1TapLIPmWtvYBxBHwvUfFYFUcBVoLKsnO0GKXthPGp3dzxGmzFfD9yn2jYbRZR4qUoSvOWRrLfJsS6lQF2b75BuNS-g/s1600/004.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-77298721930057378342014-10-11T06:14:00.001-07:002015-06-23T06:58:30.329-07:00MÓVIL DE LECHUZAS♥ (Crochet)<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">En honor a la canción que le gusta a Pía mis lechuzas siempre se llaman Miranda o Mirón. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcUZdaHAAo4" target="_blank">(Si la quieren escuchar les dejo el link, es de María Elena Walsh, es muy linda!</a></span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcUZdaHAAo4" target="_blank">)</a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu7JYLEfBq_0kicSNWob6O2PkN6aVzHB9EatIwp8OISZ-E2YiQRI4zp8k4ZVUL23OAwtd6pN48WgX9RK-t6rqof6ExtsB1FfTYNw6HkB3aAu2iRq2lJBZn_AsTkEBYwRP-vdLHAKI0sds/s1600/4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu7JYLEfBq_0kicSNWob6O2PkN6aVzHB9EatIwp8OISZ-E2YiQRI4zp8k4ZVUL23OAwtd6pN48WgX9RK-t6rqof6ExtsB1FfTYNw6HkB3aAu2iRq2lJBZn_AsTkEBYwRP-vdLHAKI0sds/s1600/4.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Aproximadamente cada lechucita lleva una hora de trabajo incluidos detalles de bordado, ojos y demás. Para hacer las rayaditas simplemente vas cambiando de color de hebra cada dos o tres vueltas.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhv6nZ6F_PpxM-W7JNc4q7vySccWE0RXu9iqJwXBXqbQK1YNvSqq5n6ONV5H7TCJYEKzAxqgc7_WrU-VNRt9smCIfEXQIAYbBLGX3WfSan8cbrks99aMsN4UnPhRmD9mDbRxDXx2bNs7I/s1600/3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhv6nZ6F_PpxM-W7JNc4q7vySccWE0RXu9iqJwXBXqbQK1YNvSqq5n6ONV5H7TCJYEKzAxqgc7_WrU-VNRt9smCIfEXQIAYbBLGX3WfSan8cbrks99aMsN4UnPhRmD9mDbRxDXx2bNs7I/s1600/3.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">En espiral empezá con un anillo mágico con 8 puntos. Vas a tejer todo en medio punto (MP). </span><br />
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<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V1- Todos aumentos (Dos puntos en cada punto de la vuelta anterior)</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V2- *Un MP, un aumento(AU)* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V3- *1MP, 1MP, 1AU* Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V4- *1MP, 1MP, 1MP, 1AU) * </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Repetir hasta terminar la vuelta.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V5 a </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V11- Todo MP, sin aumentos ni disminuciones.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V12, V13, V14-</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> *1MP, 1MP, 1MP, 1 disminución (Pinchá enun punto de la vuelta anterior, pinchá en el siguiente punto de modo que tengas dos lazadas en la aguja y los cerrás juntos)* Repetir hasta terminar las vueltas.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: #e06666;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V15 a V21- Todo MP; sin aumentos ni disminuciones</span></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Rellená con guata/vellón (nunca supe la diferencia entre ambos) y cerrar haciendo un pequeño frunce en el medio para generar la forma de U de arriba.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para los ojos (todo en MP): </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">+Anillo mágico con 8 puntos en color negro.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">+Todos aumentos con el color que quieras, a mi me gusta del mismo color de los detalles bordados, bien contrastante al color del cuerpo.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">+Todo MP, sin aumentos, en color blanco. Al no hacer aumentos se va a formar una especie de cuenco. Pero como es una sola vuelta y despues se cose a algo plano, se aplana.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Por último bordá unas V en la pancita para darle el "toque" y listo!</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj87N7pXJNhXknZ6tLGgUCfcsPm1kjABjJyjM-yhyphenhyphenpy__4whZWM3G4_zGC7LV4HN-8XbuCa1BeFuJc_T2kuLyBzcegN7L629pS_r3mhDpRdusfGMdJ3TDenDxF9KRfm9_-l4B42wCOsg-0/s1600/2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj87N7pXJNhXknZ6tLGgUCfcsPm1kjABjJyjM-yhyphenhyphenpy__4whZWM3G4_zGC7LV4HN-8XbuCa1BeFuJc_T2kuLyBzcegN7L629pS_r3mhDpRdusfGMdJ3TDenDxF9KRfm9_-l4B42wCOsg-0/s1600/2.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para armar el móvil enhebrá en una aguja tres hebras de lana y pasalas a traves del cuerpo de cada lechuza, insertando en la parte superior de la cabeza y sacando por la parte de abajo del cuerpo. Rematá todo con un pompón o una borla y voilá! Tenés tu móvil listo para decorar, regalar o vender.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjDzovqNSwfjw8bG3hSnUoLicu63JQNoTqmrIa1UXGMzXow_SqhVDYAp_COmKiAjZs4yCQbXZ85EwpCY4U5P5ObR7LwWDh1Zj5itJuR2MklicM8-u7XsKE5QoiZBAlq-TDSTWHL_S3aVk/s1600/1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjDzovqNSwfjw8bG3hSnUoLicu63JQNoTqmrIa1UXGMzXow_SqhVDYAp_COmKiAjZs4yCQbXZ85EwpCY4U5P5ObR7LwWDh1Zj5itJuR2MklicM8-u7XsKE5QoiZBAlq-TDSTWHL_S3aVk/s1600/1.png" width="480" /></a></div>
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-56667879490390643152014-10-10T13:32:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:55:29.371-07:00UÑAS ROMÁNTICAS♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsowN9GN3r-SrhkTW-j25JF4laypACvAiszvuL7H6RgB1lBeM8vcnhMeXH-EqAcfxpJ0wq2_CKlmaaByymmkBj9MOFu8wH1bE7kW1xuM6VMDrTkwMOKbn2tAYUkw0CE0JziBhhI_bWHk8/s1600/jkg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsowN9GN3r-SrhkTW-j25JF4laypACvAiszvuL7H6RgB1lBeM8vcnhMeXH-EqAcfxpJ0wq2_CKlmaaByymmkBj9MOFu8wH1bE7kW1xuM6VMDrTkwMOKbn2tAYUkw0CE0JziBhhI_bWHk8/s1600/jkg.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">(Hoy estaba inspirada para pintarme las uñas) Hagan de cuenta que acordé de sacarme el esmalte que quedó en los dedos, y POR FAVOR hagan de cuenta que mis dedos no son chuecos y que el esmalte blanco no me hace manos de mono. Empezamos?</span></i></b> </div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Prepará los esmaltes para tenerlos a mano: 3 tonos de rosa, 2 tonos de verde y blanco para la base. También tené a mano algo plástico para tirar las gotas de esmalte y algún palito para usar de pincel (palillos de madera, la punta de una hebilla invisible, una birome que no te ande...)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Pintá las uñas con el color de base, yo usé blanco.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Con tu super herramienta mojá en esmalte rosa clarito y hacé una manchita desprolija. Enseguida mojá en el rosa medio y "ensuciá" la mancha, la idea es que quede algo desparejo de forma y de color.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Con un palillo o algo finito mojá en el rosa más oscuro y hacé una especie de espiral tembloroso (como vieron no hace falta tener pulso, cuanto más desprolijo mejor!) sobre cada manchita.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Para hacer las hojitas mojá el palillo en el esmalte verde claro y hace una rayita apoyando desde la florcita hacia afuera para que quede con formita triangular. Yo hice dos hojitas por flor.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Para darle el "toque" mojá en verde más oscuro y repetí el procedimiento de la hoja, pero empezá al lado (pegadito) de la hoja verde claro y terminá sobre ella, para terminar de definir la forma de hoja. Por último una capa de brillo protector y listo!</span></li>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAsq_SKOjEsJqOpF6ENU_rKY7Tk3SpkRFlcmdeyoyblsoc_6e_K7MowhrmpxRKG5551IRG5wpMC5CgCb7zsJZ7E5yyfLrTUu5M-ToXg0KfY0MbXhQh6nR12J1nYGtdi8dHZncOZFyUyLQ/s1600/LE+FINI.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAsq_SKOjEsJqOpF6ENU_rKY7Tk3SpkRFlcmdeyoyblsoc_6e_K7MowhrmpxRKG5551IRG5wpMC5CgCb7zsJZ7E5yyfLrTUu5M-ToXg0KfY0MbXhQh6nR12J1nYGtdi8dHZncOZFyUyLQ/s1600/LE+FINI.png" width="459" /></a></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-86755212350662877102014-10-09T16:09:00.001-07:002015-06-23T06:53:42.978-07:00SELLOS CON GOMA DE BORRAR♥<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Confieso: Estoy obsesionada con los sellos! (Aprovechenme que como todo, va a ser mi cosa favorita una semana como mucho). Hasta fui al quiosco a comprar un cutter nuevo de la emoción!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Confieso también que hacer los sellos con un cutter de quiosco no es algo rapidito a menos que hagas un triángulo o un cuadrado. Pero lo que más me caracteriza es la paciencia asíque no fue problema para mí. Lo ideal es usar gubias y demás herramientas profesionales pero no tengo ninguna librería formal cerca y no me voy a hacer de herramientas que use una sola vez en mi vida, no me veo tallando muchas cosas...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /> Miren que primor...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTwWJjPNse3R-PXD6o9JZqbfo07_0V1iG1nB_9qZR3WY92DddWc1Sch0S-VSc0Pu5XNO0wJG8P_HVJpyMxJyOi-e5XAV0cU2b7TnCX2xUy_4uTRpTDLO5io1sMDc8BvMDrTsG21a0Ltw/s1600/P1060021.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTwWJjPNse3R-PXD6o9JZqbfo07_0V1iG1nB_9qZR3WY92DddWc1Sch0S-VSc0Pu5XNO0wJG8P_HVJpyMxJyOi-e5XAV0cU2b7TnCX2xUy_4uTRpTDLO5io1sMDc8BvMDrTsG21a0Ltw/s1600/P1060021.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Elegí ese diseño porque siempre tengo la esperanza de tener tiempo para mi PYME y estamparle un -hecho a mano- con onda. Para hacer el sellito necesitamos...</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCUlSmdNK5wFPDM8T0xyw0HFrS-GDbhFeVKea6ti1zPneMk-cZsJ6gb59H2b_rYyyh1TDJo7K8cTMzJRToL7qFyoiT-klNkngEKuog9Oc3_L7tQUL24rX_87SGlSpnQRaGR6CHJ8DOg_Y/s1600/P1060001.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCUlSmdNK5wFPDM8T0xyw0HFrS-GDbhFeVKea6ti1zPneMk-cZsJ6gb59H2b_rYyyh1TDJo7K8cTMzJRToL7qFyoiT-klNkngEKuog9Oc3_L7tQUL24rX_87SGlSpnQRaGR6CHJ8DOg_Y/s1600/P1060001.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Hoja de calcar</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cutter afiladísimo</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Lápiz también afiladísimo (no como el mío, pasa que no encontré ni un sacapuntas)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Goma de borrar grandecita (yo conseguí esas x $2 c/u)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Opcional reglita para emprolijar el diseño-</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Empezamos calcando un dibujo de líneas simples (cuando estén cancheras pueden hacer el castillo de Disney) que entre en la goma obviamente. Recomiendo empezar por una estrella o algo recto y sin mucho detalle, yo no pude con mi genio y me fui a un texto. Antes muerta que sencilla... jajaja. Si son dibujantes megaprofesionales dibujan en la goma directamente.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Ahora apoyamos el papel de calcar (con el dibujo boca abajo) sobre la goma y sin que se mueva pasamos un poco los dedos para que se transfiera el dibujo. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Si el diseño queda en tus dedos en lugar de en la goma es porque estás poniendo el papel al revés, genia.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv4KSRw1yemi2eWBcC_q9iDjlOgJbwSonrYlGML_kUQ2YPELp7clw-lo-6Bu1yC5XwXnQB0RPUbnR6MAJNZRwYWCARAyqwSHtZkcwKfYIcTCkr1uC4MiUMCV_otbULcZaYqFVms95fowk/s1600/P1060007.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv4KSRw1yemi2eWBcC_q9iDjlOgJbwSonrYlGML_kUQ2YPELp7clw-lo-6Bu1yC5XwXnQB0RPUbnR6MAJNZRwYWCARAyqwSHtZkcwKfYIcTCkr1uC4MiUMCV_otbULcZaYqFVms95fowk/s1600/P1060007.JPG" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoy0sdvvIDCADcHzDMgsjQ3w8Cwr6hlrIZZuqX11xqkroRIPX4PpYyLjSP4bMqgfXqGFTpwy3oP1WOdNlQwehU4DEujA_NQBsQZQ3WqFiIJh3cP2mRg7CQFgWc3dt_GtNLOA87r2MXNJE/s1600/P1060008.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoy0sdvvIDCADcHzDMgsjQ3w8Cwr6hlrIZZuqX11xqkroRIPX4PpYyLjSP4bMqgfXqGFTpwy3oP1WOdNlQwehU4DEujA_NQBsQZQ3WqFiIJh3cP2mRg7CQFgWc3dt_GtNLOA87r2MXNJE/s1600/P1060008.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Ahora lo engorroso: con el cutter vamos cortando la parte que no queremos que salga selladas. Sacar todo junto se me hizo imposible asíque lo fui haciendo por secciones, primero las esquinas y bordes, después lo más grande y por último los detalles.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihNXywEqeT13xfitN_PDIizzl-4BLIVEpnBnrkdhgDCu4hqdeQ1Fbk2QkVVxOW6UkiZ41FHsmdWA1sZe2AnLYhxoug6UsSvEGYfa1ml48eRTqJRTh-MU4Q4cmei3hYLj0IhdrRDl8hqhc/s1600/P1060009.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihNXywEqeT13xfitN_PDIizzl-4BLIVEpnBnrkdhgDCu4hqdeQ1Fbk2QkVVxOW6UkiZ41FHsmdWA1sZe2AnLYhxoug6UsSvEGYfa1ml48eRTqJRTh-MU4Q4cmei3hYLj0IhdrRDl8hqhc/s1600/P1060009.JPG" width="640" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Y3jdeWIpy5u0S08BrxLO0pOemqXjreVk6xEb9wQmWbxCunMO-czHM9aHAlP6OP_kEdNQLNyb7kTjbLkKhXuuCfEVOu4THK5984IXq-b-hzp46NoztJ-uAB2ANlwfzULoi6chaQZ_yls/s1600/P1060013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Y3jdeWIpy5u0S08BrxLO0pOemqXjreVk6xEb9wQmWbxCunMO-czHM9aHAlP6OP_kEdNQLNyb7kTjbLkKhXuuCfEVOu4THK5984IXq-b-hzp46NoztJ-uAB2ANlwfzULoi6chaQZ_yls/s1600/P1060013.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Para levantar las partes largas y finitas me ayudé con la punta de un cuchillo, ya que si metía el dedo o las uñas tenía miedo de levantar también alguna letra.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUWFen6jQ13c8F7SyrjXWr31H2cBVy6VelG97UFQ9smWsU_mGzsM7gp5XRA7Zcu_3rVHKXXA6r28p7OXyxEhx51hPZdoi6Zey_KGbz7qctSqTDe6LHaY7GJX4_jf3_xXyRdoSSAzxWJc/s1600/P1060015.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUWFen6jQ13c8F7SyrjXWr31H2cBVy6VelG97UFQ9smWsU_mGzsM7gp5XRA7Zcu_3rVHKXXA6r28p7OXyxEhx51hPZdoi6Zey_KGbz7qctSqTDe6LHaY7GJX4_jf3_xXyRdoSSAzxWJc/s1600/P1060015.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Finalmente terminé. Los detalles mini mini los dejé ya que mi cutter no iba a poder (todo es culpa del cutter.)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizdX8wemVHZT4yLQZq3O24KxU5GgmggnRrwL4ZEdNf-DYP-oTLCsMVv9mdgofKYRXpRIpyWh-BrMxUUDGmTSygEN3h0cfNTW50zqGUAOs533wjr6CjqsoZ4pKEaYDzaXIiIMi11Qfy6qs/s1600/P1060017.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizdX8wemVHZT4yLQZq3O24KxU5GgmggnRrwL4ZEdNf-DYP-oTLCsMVv9mdgofKYRXpRIpyWh-BrMxUUDGmTSygEN3h0cfNTW50zqGUAOs533wjr6CjqsoZ4pKEaYDzaXIiIMi11Qfy6qs/s1600/P1060017.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Como el quiosco no tenía almohadillas para tinta (le mando un beso a Paday, tengo la esperanza de que algún día me sponsoree) improvisé con acuarelas y pincel.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUtEVlPU8T0kqTCncZIP5IB21ZWMe9jMY_m7ysPTyUvmgSHLSbT8D10fy1tOFNvd0omAp-N5U6IVklK-C2HjMXF0AMZ4i5KnmmVHqcENpGNlFgSNmqL1ABlmEe3TiHalV7mIlc_4oNZ6k/s1600/P1060020.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUtEVlPU8T0kqTCncZIP5IB21ZWMe9jMY_m7ysPTyUvmgSHLSbT8D10fy1tOFNvd0omAp-N5U6IVklK-C2HjMXF0AMZ4i5KnmmVHqcENpGNlFgSNmqL1ABlmEe3TiHalV7mIlc_4oNZ6k/s1600/P1060020.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Y listo! Vieron? No gasté fortunas en gubias y otras herramientas, en tintas ni almohadillas. Si hay ganas enseguida se puede hacer algo lindo. Por si no lo vieron al principio del post les muestro lo lindo que me quedó</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st">♥</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTwWJjPNse3R-PXD6o9JZqbfo07_0V1iG1nB_9qZR3WY92DddWc1Sch0S-VSc0Pu5XNO0wJG8P_HVJpyMxJyOi-e5XAV0cU2b7TnCX2xUy_4uTRpTDLO5io1sMDc8BvMDrTsG21a0Ltw/s1600/P1060021.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTwWJjPNse3R-PXD6o9JZqbfo07_0V1iG1nB_9qZR3WY92DddWc1Sch0S-VSc0Pu5XNO0wJG8P_HVJpyMxJyOi-e5XAV0cU2b7TnCX2xUy_4uTRpTDLO5io1sMDc8BvMDrTsG21a0Ltw/s1600/P1060021.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><u><b><span style="font-size: small;">Perdón por mis uñas despintadas, las uñas prolijas y las mamás no nos llevamos nada bien.</span></b></u> </span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-13242463050036188492014-09-19T16:19:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:53:08.062-07:00TUTÚ♥ (CON CUALQUIER TELA!) (PLUS sin coser!)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2cN9SE3CQzTaqKx6TMAIpU9ALxBf93HLYz7q8948pzO2DEizXjDaOye5NailSy6Lzg9HEi-GFJnasNsqZoVh4gW50i4AuOSmLTnpYQb7KFge43x1trky-tYtPfW1xjRmbOqPCnIId15A/s1600/P10504332.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2cN9SE3CQzTaqKx6TMAIpU9ALxBf93HLYz7q8948pzO2DEizXjDaOye5NailSy6Lzg9HEi-GFJnasNsqZoVh4gW50i4AuOSmLTnpYQb7KFge43x1trky-tYtPfW1xjRmbOqPCnIId15A/s1600/P10504332.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">A qué nena no le gusta jugar a ser bailarina? A Pía. No le alcanzaba con bailarina, ella tenía que ser una payasa bailarina. Siempre tan sencilla.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2OSeWginXQmPZYmyZe327iYj3HjuPumEdE8rn1mVTTvDycIeTzoL4agjJBII0FK-SgWCBtE4NABJ6OapHMlUdKRC7NQKxMiBFh-Xu6E0ZA-2JC-9yS45TjStkgR7IzJzvwkoc14C-c7A/s1600/P1050433.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2OSeWginXQmPZYmyZe327iYj3HjuPumEdE8rn1mVTTvDycIeTzoL4agjJBII0FK-SgWCBtE4NABJ6OapHMlUdKRC7NQKxMiBFh-Xu6E0ZA-2JC-9yS45TjStkgR7IzJzvwkoc14C-c7A/s1600/P1050433.png" width="478" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Para hacer el tutú de principio a fin vamos a tardar aprox media hora. No es genial?</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Necesitamos:</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> -APROX. 2 metros de cualquier tela no muy dura (si pensabas en cuerina andá descartando...) en tiras de 60cm x 5cm (60 cm para hacer un tutú de 30cm, siempre cortar tiras del doble del largo que queramos la pollera). Podés usar una sábana vieja, tul, fliselina que es lo más barato de lo barato, si tenés diferentes retazos dando vueltas no dudes en usarlos!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> -Elástico (un poco menos del diámetro de la cintura de la modelo)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> -Tijera y regla (si sos valiente obviá la regla y cortá a ojímetro)</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1DOSeukyYTRFkmLD8L1iMfe7dCZpKReTcDTXmEDDmy0GwU1KUPf5xWwv_Ffw4VDMOVZmn6MeTr6Uc7mRRBRA0ywNp0uh7ZJkDUP1lhBSll4L6TInnFHCo2GKBRSNbJrcUqkb-9wM948Q/s1600/P1050425.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1DOSeukyYTRFkmLD8L1iMfe7dCZpKReTcDTXmEDDmy0GwU1KUPf5xWwv_Ffw4VDMOVZmn6MeTr6Uc7mRRBRA0ywNp0uh7ZJkDUP1lhBSll4L6TInnFHCo2GKBRSNbJrcUqkb-9wM948Q/s1600/P1050425.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Instrucciones: </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b> </b>-Medir la cinturita de la nena con el elástico y restarle masomenos 5 centímetros. Hacemos un nudito triple para que no se suelte nunca jamás. Si estás hacendosa lo cosés.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b> </b>-Enganchar el círculo de elástico en una silla o en dos o en donde puedas, si están los niños aburridos los podemos castigar con las manitos abiertas sosteniendo el elástico (broma broma) La cuestión es que tiene que quedar un poco tirante.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">-Ahora la parte divertida: Tomar una tira de tela y doblarla a la mitad. Pasar la parte doblada dentro del elástico:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhvqIW-CC9yHvstYA627-LG2ucs3t-Dh-uVfRZoGbITGpDShKj3kd8ZHg8nZii4GCGFpEGyGi07S8EEhBeF4dfjnGdfxhFk5TWK4OPSKad36BEzQKR05ptY-5rc55XnwHerIHPLiY2_ZM/s1600/P1050429.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhvqIW-CC9yHvstYA627-LG2ucs3t-Dh-uVfRZoGbITGpDShKj3kd8ZHg8nZii4GCGFpEGyGi07S8EEhBeF4dfjnGdfxhFk5TWK4OPSKad36BEzQKR05ptY-5rc55XnwHerIHPLiY2_ZM/s1600/P1050429.JPG" width="470" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br />-Meter la mano dentro de la punta doblada de abajo hacia arriba, para luego agarrar las puntas.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBU_RPTGhD4z42cUBQp1Cs-qTXvI0GDvOmgFCa0dK6FexEeYX0hGC2TnvsHaj3voXIPZPqlM2xT2Km74xSt2jCSHtRw1bdmsC707g5hTA6bom-2IE20qQ3m6cY_VoA702wE8JWgy-IK_s/s1600/P1050431.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="470" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBU_RPTGhD4z42cUBQp1Cs-qTXvI0GDvOmgFCa0dK6FexEeYX0hGC2TnvsHaj3voXIPZPqlM2xT2Km74xSt2jCSHtRw1bdmsC707g5hTA6bom-2IE20qQ3m6cY_VoA702wE8JWgy-IK_s/s1600/P1050431.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">-Asegurarse de que esté doblado exactamente a la mitad, agarrar las puntas y pasar por dentro de la parte doblada.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKxebMWrxKNDJ08k7FdUB3Wy-Vn3CNQV8uAaL4VHKlc6ORfbWdJ0F5EEz4AkBs0tYMzTSh7X_8U3yKB2ogf7rvFnHIZtN58PhO2rPez7VN5hWNgCj_yXukZLACtr3Y3ydZ7GNR0eOinAY/s1600/P1050430.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;">-<img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKxebMWrxKNDJ08k7FdUB3Wy-Vn3CNQV8uAaL4VHKlc6ORfbWdJ0F5EEz4AkBs0tYMzTSh7X_8U3yKB2ogf7rvFnHIZtN58PhO2rPez7VN5hWNgCj_yXukZLACtr3Y3ydZ7GNR0eOinAY/s1600/P1050430.JPG" width="480" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">-Tirar con mucho cuidado y repetir el procedimiento con todas las tiras hasta tapar el elástico. Fíjense que el nudo quede bien tapado y voilá! </span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-39734009230431327202014-09-18T17:17:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:52:09.504-07:00DISFRAZ DE ODALISCA♥ (sin coser!)<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Mañana los niños festejan la primavera en el jardincito. Además de llevar la merienda para compartir, a las señoritas se les ocurrió la grandiosa idea de hacer un día temático "PRIMAVERA GENIAL". Ergo; los nenes van disfrazados de genios y las nenas de odaliscas. Obviando que tuve que explicarle a Pía qué es una odalisca (va a sala de 2 años), en las notitas siempre recalcan que hay que llevar algo hecho en casa o un detalle, no hace falta comprar un disfraz. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> *PÁNICO* Cómo le hago un disfraz/detalle de odalisca?!?!?! Busqué todos los disfraces existentes en internet y no me cerraba ninguno. Asíque fui a lo básico MONEDITAS.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> Me dispuse a gastar lo menos posible asíque sólo compré: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -Papel glasé dorado y plateado (1 metro $6)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -Cinta bebé (2 metro $2)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -10 cm de abrojo ($1)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Y tenía en mi casa:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -Goma eva (usé media plancha) </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -Fliselina (tela de papel)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> -Cartón, tijeras, pegamento en barra, pistolita encoladora.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7LMZTiwTFjo_3gPztXZFMM0DaJWA5gg5bFKI_DXNhX_Bpr5oBSmLGYh67psDD6oNF-FRhmnmQBmxR_qW1jRf6M8EJQ-RiCltmmbv6p58F3lXRgkNLBWK0SrqhdjEgSWVuO0H_ZFqnwlw/s1600/P1050911ih.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="479" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7LMZTiwTFjo_3gPztXZFMM0DaJWA5gg5bFKI_DXNhX_Bpr5oBSmLGYh67psDD6oNF-FRhmnmQBmxR_qW1jRf6M8EJQ-RiCltmmbv6p58F3lXRgkNLBWK0SrqhdjEgSWVuO0H_ZFqnwlw/s1600/P1050911ih.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCPOibRtiqeyvvsQDC_H49nfSVOD6_mRSzLFz6BecBboVL8Zm6aXeJTSYcrQ-htYD7PLt3q5ALKP84cpdf742LlKM-tXJw7WP0OxkpY-ihqw3rHzQEZum2zgevG9hvticaeJ78bNHX-o4/s1600/P1050899.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><b> Para hacer las monedas:</b> Pegar papel glasé o cualquier otro papel brillante finito al cartón (puede ser cartón de caja de cereales o cualquiera de ese grosor) con pegamento en barra, ya que en el papél glasé se nota todo lo que hay debajo y con pegamento en barra queda prolijito. Pegar el papel de los dos lados del cartón y con un molde, que puede ser una tapa de botella marcar y cortar los circulitos.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCPOibRtiqeyvvsQDC_H49nfSVOD6_mRSzLFz6BecBboVL8Zm6aXeJTSYcrQ-htYD7PLt3q5ALKP84cpdf742LlKM-tXJw7WP0OxkpY-ihqw3rHzQEZum2zgevG9hvticaeJ78bNHX-o4/s1600/P1050899.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCPOibRtiqeyvvsQDC_H49nfSVOD6_mRSzLFz6BecBboVL8Zm6aXeJTSYcrQ-htYD7PLt3q5ALKP84cpdf742LlKM-tXJw7WP0OxkpY-ihqw3rHzQEZum2zgevG9hvticaeJ78bNHX-o4/s1600/P1050899.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Para la pollera: </b>Cortar una V en goma eva del largo del contorno de la cintura de la nena en cuestión y con pistola encoladora pegar por la parte de atrás tiras de cinta bb aprox. de 5 cm de largo. Con el frente de la pollera hacia arriba ponemos un puntito de pegamento en la punta de las cintas y pegamos una moneda en cada una. Con esto terminamos el "cinturón". </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVy8pVP0Uq7ARkt8LPi8BdH6fMahhnkm6mg3Kl2MecylbLtAJEOS0Igr1kyg4emgtMXP57YTGt-DrC9ZPKqyu3EcQe-dfJ1gkdVW3lBFCfbp88_dzpu5OssIXSoC2V4gX9-AKCxoo1vo0/s1600/P1050900kh.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVy8pVP0Uq7ARkt8LPi8BdH6fMahhnkm6mg3Kl2MecylbLtAJEOS0Igr1kyg4emgtMXP57YTGt-DrC9ZPKqyu3EcQe-dfJ1gkdVW3lBFCfbp88_dzpu5OssIXSoC2V4gX9-AKCxoo1vo0/s1600/P1050900kh.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Con una tira muy ancha de fliselina y del largo que queremos la pollera, vamos pegando del lado del revés del cinturón (sobre las cintas) haciendo algunos pliegues para que tenga un poco de gracia. Para terminar pegamos un trocito de abrojo en cada punta (no hace falta coser, solo ponemos bastante pegamento y hacemos presión hasta que se enfríe y les aseguro que no se sale). Se coloca en un extremo en el derecho, y en el otro extremo del revés. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixlMcfBLwhdjWxVTwyMya-Il1sOsltTcdPG_-Y0K9r5KYykjurE7NZtlmRby9JEm5ca9TtgzHGAL-bK4GY6RuCQfxaunhNSr3bBBEyZvQt4sSCFL7TbJ7N_lfW2g4aq2g5gaF7SqTQ-vU/s1600/P1050905lkh.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixlMcfBLwhdjWxVTwyMya-Il1sOsltTcdPG_-Y0K9r5KYykjurE7NZtlmRby9JEm5ca9TtgzHGAL-bK4GY6RuCQfxaunhNSr3bBBEyZvQt4sSCFL7TbJ7N_lfW2g4aq2g5gaF7SqTQ-vU/s1600/P1050905lkh.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Para la vincha:</b> Elegir una vincha finita y pegar con la pistolita moneditas a lo largo, superponiendo unas con otras para que no quede ningún espacio vacío.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzC-CkoXuH8w5nUL8mAHQlydi0bFRDMwaBfg75XMtyjkg032EZW_RTpEizzrrpCtyEyx8ileR9izV4_VnbDB13Xb9hv930uX4dAPbhPQiDD4SXxl5fB4Pmmxe6j7pvva1SQtkV4nVFTe4/s1600/P1050902k.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzC-CkoXuH8w5nUL8mAHQlydi0bFRDMwaBfg75XMtyjkg032EZW_RTpEizzrrpCtyEyx8ileR9izV4_VnbDB13Xb9hv930uX4dAPbhPQiDD4SXxl5fB4Pmmxe6j7pvva1SQtkV4nVFTe4/s1600/P1050902k.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para las pulseras: </span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">cortar dos rectángulos del largo del diámetro de las muñecas de la pequeña (un poquito más para tener lugar para el abrojo) y pegamos monedas sobre la goma eva y algunas tiras de cinta con monedas (de la mitad del largo que las tiras del cinturón). Pegamos abrojo en las puntas (de una punta del derecho y en la otra punta del revés).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzFkhBeamB_I79R5NRZRPDviF7Ngb1cNZUKR7qdX8pL9986Itufnk29kI11HUvX1EaCe2orKy_a2snwYi2PrpB6nqLqlao-HHGzTiUQG_udKmXCiLMM0akOOmPA85_b-AqmZrzQfpNU8Q/s1600/P1050903lig.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzFkhBeamB_I79R5NRZRPDviF7Ngb1cNZUKR7qdX8pL9986Itufnk29kI11HUvX1EaCe2orKy_a2snwYi2PrpB6nqLqlao-HHGzTiUQG_udKmXCiLMM0akOOmPA85_b-AqmZrzQfpNU8Q/s1600/P1050903lig.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Listo! Si quieren hacerlo completo y hacer también el corpiño se puede cortar un rectángulo y pegarle unas tiras de fliselina para abrochar a la espalda y a la nuca y decorar con más moneditas, algo así (JAJAJAJAJA JURO QUE ME ESFORCÉ)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigdDdroKITHe7csuK954oqfOjVWtRZ0G54FSp7zPifYRnMnUsVnogNiMOPDqOMjKzdVgtbkQczDaLYc48HYRrkwtckMTBioGDdmfpcroAQl3e2HASF89WfA3cHEI7fANLVQ4DtXTZbV94/s1600/corpi%C3%B1o.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigdDdroKITHe7csuK954oqfOjVWtRZ0G54FSp7zPifYRnMnUsVnogNiMOPDqOMjKzdVgtbkQczDaLYc48HYRrkwtckMTBioGDdmfpcroAQl3e2HASF89WfA3cHEI7fANLVQ4DtXTZbV94/s1600/corpi%C3%B1o.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Este disfraz es súper precario pero si lo quieren hacer seriamente reemplazar las moneditas de cartón por moneditas de metal (que se compran en la mercería), la goma eva por cuerina o alguna tela firme; la fliselina por gasa y la cinta por trozos de tanza con mostacillas enhebradas, una paquetería!</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7gTK9J6kX4B73KMJYGu4-bY3RW6etg9HhdMiRwKucO3ZX9TbXI-8FZAo11x6H6BUWqkV-S4L5o1j4jZwCgHc4uS6hvPE1slOZDquhWMsItjhYcLiBgRVvy5D1WcsmoWP0meOu4Bcl_No/s1600/P1050913klh.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7gTK9J6kX4B73KMJYGu4-bY3RW6etg9HhdMiRwKucO3ZX9TbXI-8FZAo11x6H6BUWqkV-S4L5o1j4jZwCgHc4uS6hvPE1slOZDquhWMsItjhYcLiBgRVvy5D1WcsmoWP0meOu4Bcl_No/s1600/P1050913klh.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> (Mi pequeña chocha con las moneditas)</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-34349779896446306802014-08-19T14:55:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:51:15.788-07:00PAJARITO AMIGURUMI♥<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Hola amigos! Hace unos cuantos días no me aparezco por acá... Hay días en que tengo que hacer algo para mi casa o me pongo a inventar y cuando termino digo NO SAQUÉ FOTO DEL PASO A PASO PARA EL BLOG! Hoy me pasó eso...</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcH6u6zpiq814YJXZXYGWVmwmnVBP3Ajhh0_Na6V5NRHx_9wKFYI18flssxOuAMxuBvXQehO34TpxuFr5wqjkJLTTHkPMczvwwuShOx-mQOCs7LDq66pD_YZMI1nYX3GE67PNMkMJJ3e0/s1600/kgugblik.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcH6u6zpiq814YJXZXYGWVmwmnVBP3Ajhh0_Na6V5NRHx_9wKFYI18flssxOuAMxuBvXQehO34TpxuFr5wqjkJLTTHkPMczvwwuShOx-mQOCs7LDq66pD_YZMI1nYX3GE67PNMkMJJ3e0/s1600/kgugblik.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><b><u>Materiales</u></b>: aguja n° 3y1/2 (o similar) y lana (re poquito!!). Opcional alambre finito</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><u><b>Puntos a utilizar y abreviaturas:</b></u> V= vuelta</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> MP = medio punto</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> D = disminución (cerrar 2 puntos juntos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> AU = aumento (Tejer dos puntos en el mismo lugar)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> MV = media vareta</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> VA = vareta</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> PE = punto enano/corrido </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">CUERPO: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V1: Tejer un anillo mágico con 6MP (6ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V2: Toda la vuelta de AU (12ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V3: *1MP, 1AU*, repetir toda la vuelta (18ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V4-5: Toda la vuelta MP (18ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V6: 1MP, 4 puntos juntos en el siguiente punto de la vuelta anterior, 4 puntos juntos en el siguiente punto de la vuelta anterior, MP el resto de la vuelta. (24ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V7: 4MP, 1AU, 4 puntos juntos en el siguiente punto de la vuelta anterior, 1AU, MP el resto de la vuelta (29ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V8: 20MP, 1D, 1MP, 1D, 4MP (27 ptos) </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V9: 20MP, 1D, 1D, 3MP (25ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">V10: 2D, 2MP, 4D, 2MP, 2D, 1 disminución cerrando 3 puntos juntos. (15ptos)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">-Rellenar-</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> V11: 3d, 1MP, 4D</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">v12 Y RESTO: Todas disminuciones hasta cerrar. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">ALAS:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hacer una cadena de 6 puntos. Volviendo sobre la cadena tejida: En el 2° punto desde el que está montado en la aguja hacer un punto enano, en el siguiente también 1PE, en el siguiente 1MP, en el siguiente 1MV, y en el último 5 varetas juntas. (Con estas 5 varetas se forma la punta redondeada y nos deja en la parte de abajo del ala) Ahora tejemos 1MV, 1MP, 1PE y 1PE en el último punto. Cerramos y Uh-lalá tenemos una alita hermosa.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">DETALLES:</span><br />
<ul>
<li> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con alambre de color o forrando un pedacito de alambre hacemos las patas (doblamos un alambre recto al medio e insertamos, con el relleno queda trabado), y las antenas, el mismo procedimiento que las patas pero con alambre más largo para poder enroscar las puntas)</span>.</li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Bordamos ojos y pico.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con una borla/pompón hacemos la cola: simplemente dejamos unas tiritas más largas para engancharla entre las hebras del tejido y hacer un nudo que luego esconderemos.</span></li>
</ul>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-11894195648498335912014-07-17T06:32:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:46:51.727-07:00INSPIRACIÓN: Revista Living Julio 2014♥<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Siempre tengo mis revistas living (LAS AMO) marcadas con las cosas que algun día con tenga tiempo y ganas podría hacer en casa. Pero nunca se da, asíque se me ocurrió compartirlo con ustedes ya que no es una revista muy ahorro-friendly y tiene muy buenas ideas. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrI1T2Rf2e90VdtGxEHHfGXbY-4esoERr0D5HNQyDzobxsvboMUN1NCMDfbH8mn153gln5DPR0EtyOv4bd6KC9Pvf4MJFmO_pyAlNMTBcecFkDQiSiKDhbdV-0ILdDehdyM8Rs0-9xqjw/s1600/P1050328.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrI1T2Rf2e90VdtGxEHHfGXbY-4esoERr0D5HNQyDzobxsvboMUN1NCMDfbH8mn153gln5DPR0EtyOv4bd6KC9Pvf4MJFmO_pyAlNMTBcecFkDQiSiKDhbdV-0ILdDehdyM8Rs0-9xqjw/s1600/P1050328.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV15QKbadyM1yfvnW9_vALga9rmsk169qCagauJCFZTBhRgbgYaVTXsSSlVSLsUKOQkWFdD_VkiCH6h2dWrh_s2I7yLCxAPnvPSlerB3zjjcaQTv5vaqTuX5lDgtgJgHo-MVzWLJUovKs/s1600/P1050329.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV15QKbadyM1yfvnW9_vALga9rmsk169qCagauJCFZTBhRgbgYaVTXsSSlVSLsUKOQkWFdD_VkiCH6h2dWrh_s2I7yLCxAPnvPSlerB3zjjcaQTv5vaqTuX5lDgtgJgHo-MVzWLJUovKs/s1600/P1050329.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Almohadón con pompones</span><span class="st">♥</span><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjmFt-K375fWPQXD85T_xuF6rmbnz753IC0b30bxl5QASl6TLRIsgnWB8wmAYZmMkbyzo645KftEmRZdb47YdXpoiz4FXUIqCgGuXnNJxax-_f12sUy-1e9WJz98fefYFMAWk2mVh3bGw/s1600/P1050330.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjmFt-K375fWPQXD85T_xuF6rmbnz753IC0b30bxl5QASl6TLRIsgnWB8wmAYZmMkbyzo645KftEmRZdb47YdXpoiz4FXUIqCgGuXnNJxax-_f12sUy-1e9WJz98fefYFMAWk2mVh3bGw/s1600/P1050330.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Repasadores coloridos<span class="st">♥</span></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sKpJd37jATuYmKU8SRcIctU4lVtwojSls8BDPgK4ktSvms4m88wM31GVDcx0Lcs5MyT9OiWMkdaxyBw5T2mZG_fC2b9XaFpX7OPbc64tNIl1cWBi4-CEW6kMduK0h3WEPSVz00-Ecbo/s1600/P1050333.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sKpJd37jATuYmKU8SRcIctU4lVtwojSls8BDPgK4ktSvms4m88wM31GVDcx0Lcs5MyT9OiWMkdaxyBw5T2mZG_fC2b9XaFpX7OPbc64tNIl1cWBi4-CEW6kMduK0h3WEPSVz00-Ecbo/s1600/P1050333.JPG" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Puff y alfombra</span><span class="st">♥</span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8ehyphenhyphen7sM3rKnZ-CoF4ZFGVEQShXIG195kmDghHZALnViim3hmxB6eWSt4GvykpKjY8hyphenhyphenF5ZKpnPdUYWPcoVaMTQS4tLMcbkndRGZlHDYxZ5C2JQNH5wLHFP5-6gUa301ulnOD6clUwtZI/s1600/P1050334.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8ehyphenhyphen7sM3rKnZ-CoF4ZFGVEQShXIG195kmDghHZALnViim3hmxB6eWSt4GvykpKjY8hyphenhyphenF5ZKpnPdUYWPcoVaMTQS4tLMcbkndRGZlHDYxZ5C2JQNH5wLHFP5-6gUa301ulnOD6clUwtZI/s1600/P1050334.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cuenco bicolor</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFIwlV2Liilgn3AaTeUXLkPvZK-nQtWm0HTw_UW0EowMQf4CROkFOvigKVC0ztT2jrJUo_tNznatEHA_ATyv15X8UsBRA11cCjD-x-CF2DTT8y5ZDulCtwEqfFbdMRgCSyxscW7njM6qw/s1600/P1050335.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFIwlV2Liilgn3AaTeUXLkPvZK-nQtWm0HTw_UW0EowMQf4CROkFOvigKVC0ztT2jrJUo_tNznatEHA_ATyv15X8UsBRA11cCjD-x-CF2DTT8y5ZDulCtwEqfFbdMRgCSyxscW7njM6qw/s1600/P1050335.JPG" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cuenco con manijas</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_5-4HmzuvR4AML3F8Kp3_EsWXdvDGuXF_FC7BZrlNOy_cbGbjmSWcbfJMOhet01koDWUmVpLiVfWJJ9L8juLEcpuzP0vM1EVUHzAFIJ_XiazRWKVV9nu4PSLqKPm7PXPUJBL1yLg8pyM/s1600/P1050337.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_5-4HmzuvR4AML3F8Kp3_EsWXdvDGuXF_FC7BZrlNOy_cbGbjmSWcbfJMOhet01koDWUmVpLiVfWJJ9L8juLEcpuzP0vM1EVUHzAFIJ_XiazRWKVV9nu4PSLqKPm7PXPUJBL1yLg8pyM/s1600/P1050337.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cuadro con frases</span><span class="st">♥</span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV2mQ6OuW5zMj0D37RyuXNh9LcNKIUVn4xzHAfbfOGX6_Jmsp-FwnZDyNHiJdk0dAkHpNf9Ivao8k1tMRcanGLSP2_73yZ5iw-duBvSQ4ATU2NGepBuAa3V4hN8b16wYmb8dwhHV1hT2s/s1600/P1050338.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV2mQ6OuW5zMj0D37RyuXNh9LcNKIUVn4xzHAfbfOGX6_Jmsp-FwnZDyNHiJdk0dAkHpNf9Ivao8k1tMRcanGLSP2_73yZ5iw-duBvSQ4ATU2NGepBuAa3V4hN8b16wYmb8dwhHV1hT2s/s1600/P1050338.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Almohadón estampado</span><span class="st">♥</span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiylYjwDhDMeHMkTqHFF-9fSZnKVP4vuHYymC1EMBIR3Cvc6x-72BE4fefzXcdzb9qirgnmnxQz2bI_wsWPoiNUbs2xzBfyhBR1WkUg3vF9WDRv5C82wawK93pX_q1wgigqzLX7JXyZAd4/s1600/P1050340.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiylYjwDhDMeHMkTqHFF-9fSZnKVP4vuHYymC1EMBIR3Cvc6x-72BE4fefzXcdzb9qirgnmnxQz2bI_wsWPoiNUbs2xzBfyhBR1WkUg3vF9WDRv5C82wawK93pX_q1wgigqzLX7JXyZAd4/s1600/P1050340.JPG" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Colgante de día de los muertos</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUTw5xhDfET0xSsz29Hhb8N0ucMtM2asA8d_n4CaiXYoXfrvGbmFcql7TYgjZ4kPuBOl9ZjjCZ26PU8B5J0m_ZRkbbrCzi2RE5bhT-VdRp5SBAVqs3bPKOCT0xvdnHqg5jmE2NEP0aIDg/s1600/P1050341.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUTw5xhDfET0xSsz29Hhb8N0ucMtM2asA8d_n4CaiXYoXfrvGbmFcql7TYgjZ4kPuBOl9ZjjCZ26PU8B5J0m_ZRkbbrCzi2RE5bhT-VdRp5SBAVqs3bPKOCT0xvdnHqg5jmE2NEP0aIDg/s1600/P1050341.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Agarraderas</span><span class="st">♥</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBVueGR55M7O82nDsLfZ9Ht1YDd5CO005qQLyzHuYtUctncT3-u1C4AJsHIUQ9mbU38SFii21Hw5fQH_EkT56ysl97gze6Rr29SnhRvlqVzmiJnWrkvYIWDs3A4_u3KyjrHOqlhUSiIkA/s1600/P1050342.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBVueGR55M7O82nDsLfZ9Ht1YDd5CO005qQLyzHuYtUctncT3-u1C4AJsHIUQ9mbU38SFii21Hw5fQH_EkT56ysl97gze6Rr29SnhRvlqVzmiJnWrkvYIWDs3A4_u3KyjrHOqlhUSiIkA/s1600/P1050342.JPG" width="480" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cubos en el rinconcito</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLhyVTaQnw49VyoSp5qlUcECT3uR6YSqBsDbdA8wu31-5wfoziiJVM8ZgZ8gJP3SxtkOll9o4RXlkmRpTzHjDrmMKfE7DILpJZGhgg08ec7eeWykuezBWl8-lc6Y6Lpq8DOliLElESyds/s1600/P1050343.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLhyVTaQnw49VyoSp5qlUcECT3uR6YSqBsDbdA8wu31-5wfoziiJVM8ZgZ8gJP3SxtkOll9o4RXlkmRpTzHjDrmMKfE7DILpJZGhgg08ec7eeWykuezBWl8-lc6Y6Lpq8DOliLElESyds/s1600/P1050343.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Pie de cama tejido y almohadones con puntillas y pompones</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjePreZ9pWPe027xoWauDFWr-Ii-X9amC2sPYVs8uNOuuaZh78mIuzmWFh6uya7dRdb13oYoReTZcAZLyuavL4PvtwIRa9v-l_NGcDbLokMjqvIyRFfhaen5jr4UZZ-8oYLu3FE5RwUH2U/s1600/P1050344.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjePreZ9pWPe027xoWauDFWr-Ii-X9amC2sPYVs8uNOuuaZh78mIuzmWFh6uya7dRdb13oYoReTZcAZLyuavL4PvtwIRa9v-l_NGcDbLokMjqvIyRFfhaen5jr4UZZ-8oYLu3FE5RwUH2U/s1600/P1050344.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Almohadones tubulares</span><span class="st">♥</span><span class="st"></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht51z_-Rq9OzjLvCgOcn43t6sAvr6r4tMjAW1WUL3HZA7rOZpnjHq1At4kHHehVDbdXHkwbya6k7RsejWcVdH5AN5xg4_B3wYSeIjIrHJHvtqqo3TsRiAWckB0SOk8CO6RvT7V4dgNRQc/s1600/P1050345.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht51z_-Rq9OzjLvCgOcn43t6sAvr6r4tMjAW1WUL3HZA7rOZpnjHq1At4kHHehVDbdXHkwbya6k7RsejWcVdH5AN5xg4_B3wYSeIjIrHJHvtqqo3TsRiAWckB0SOk8CO6RvT7V4dgNRQc/s1600/P1050345.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Cuadro con siluetas estampadas</span><span class="st">♥</span></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-64518675699563189922014-07-16T14:19:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:44:58.272-07:00CÓMO TEÑIR BOTAS DE CUERO SINTÉTICO♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7hS-YgR20UvA2f0-KJgEcAKtBGfJjUnuz2x5uDzhGaLUEkvwfBvqqkIvQFZH1VCF9sdjh0BPBXwIZQ30POIbrcgi60aQ6wMtUhdRWjN2evL-j5nmzU-yj6OsBw1xMCOW3U_d2Xf6zdSM/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7hS-YgR20UvA2f0-KJgEcAKtBGfJjUnuz2x5uDzhGaLUEkvwfBvqqkIvQFZH1VCF9sdjh0BPBXwIZQ30POIbrcgi60aQ6wMtUhdRWjN2evL-j5nmzU-yj6OsBw1xMCOW3U_d2Xf6zdSM/s1600/PicMonkey+Collage.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Casi tiro mis botitas coral, pero me iluminé! Me encantan pero las usé taanto que me cansé! Y además se me había raspado la punta, y con semejante color no lo podía disimular.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Asíque fui a una casa de compostura de calzado e hice las averiguaciones. Hoy en día volver a comprar las mismas botas costaría aprox. $500. Para teñirlas el señor me cobraba $250. Y la tinta salía $70. No lo pensé dos veces, compré la tinta y que sea lo que dios quiera, si no se salvaban compraba unas nuevas y chau. El zapatero me explicó como se usaba la tinta y me dijo que lo haga sin miedo que me iban a quedar bien. Un genio!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Usé:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzcWwIuarfBq_ibyvhzuGbEgydvEDmNscQcfmVm7_PtARFGA58NyA5mIsi9sGxynoQrKK3_VLobIB8X5PbTgoGKhNk-1aMT51soNKDgrzJf0JFnqIfsgEB08LYNmPqzhjbWq5J2fpsztY/s1600/P1050091.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzcWwIuarfBq_ibyvhzuGbEgydvEDmNscQcfmVm7_PtARFGA58NyA5mIsi9sGxynoQrKK3_VLobIB8X5PbTgoGKhNk-1aMT51soNKDgrzJf0JFnqIfsgEB08LYNmPqzhjbWq5J2fpsztY/s1600/P1050091.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Papel de diario para proteger la mesa, el producto (que trae un limpiador, la tinta y un pincelito como de felpa) y un trapo. Cinta de enmascarar y/o un pincel finito. </span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Con un trapo o algodón limpiamos la bota con el líquido. Le va a sacar la suciedad y la capa de brillo y lustre. (Por el olor es acetona asique si tenés las uñas pintadas protegelas). -LA BOTA DE LA DERECHA YA TIENE EL LIMPIADOR APLICADO-</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwCvOd-vbIF4R08SS1BU1TkO9lVLhb1AbNUh3vcs6cXlROQurz2Il5lKIe4gPcu_TAfU-fRlhFRyqyBUrMuYK_bY2DJDdB4mMq19f_sMzeXHVV4CfIwrR16jwEG5DMqP1nUxF4yTGSy3Q/s1600/P1050095.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwCvOd-vbIF4R08SS1BU1TkO9lVLhb1AbNUh3vcs6cXlROQurz2Il5lKIe4gPcu_TAfU-fRlhFRyqyBUrMuYK_bY2DJDdB4mMq19f_sMzeXHVV4CfIwrR16jwEG5DMqP1nUxF4yTGSy3Q/s1600/P1050095.JPG" width="640" /><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><b> </b></span></a></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><u>Tenés dos opciones:</u> Antes de empezar cubir la suela, hebillas y demás con cinta de enmascarar o no hacerlo y pintar con cuidado y al final emprolijar con un pincelito. Yo empecé a encintar, pero después perdí la cinta asique usé la 2da opción.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> Poné la tinta en un platito o vasito. <b>Consejo: si vas a usar la tapa del frasco, poné algo arriba del frasco destapado porque la parte de arriba se seca se le hace algo como una nata. Y de preferencia poné el recipiente en el que volcaste la tinta lejos de las corrientes de aire porque se seca rápido. </b>Ahora con el pincel de felpa mojá y empeza a pintar. Fijate que no te quede nada sin cubrir!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinaYd4JWdCeaRocj8tupUV8u0y0bagw0MPiKPxUN5LehI-c3yMpUucroxUn1NBaJUPZHgdPTicqwKup4BgHDPS4vKbdbAOl4c_4PG3yFU2l_lJorzsEYizAMrvXKcypCekz3R9scEz6rw/s1600/P1050098.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinaYd4JWdCeaRocj8tupUV8u0y0bagw0MPiKPxUN5LehI-c3yMpUucroxUn1NBaJUPZHgdPTicqwKup4BgHDPS4vKbdbAOl4c_4PG3yFU2l_lJorzsEYizAMrvXKcypCekz3R9scEz6rw/s1600/P1050098.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">En mi caso, para complicar más las cosas mis botas son caladas, si te pasa igual poné papel de diario abajo para evitar enchastres.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtLHVcoTyalLc7aOcfjsKS6xfKxG6FPN7v7fj2yzx4bVchvH5xTQT9yM5CefacdLFXqn57ep4N71v1CuAf0VhwDWTZtx3ohTEnkeozdGG-ZbMuGf6qkta5Bjo8oahWxLUAjJ-PymePHMQ/s1600/P1050099.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtLHVcoTyalLc7aOcfjsKS6xfKxG6FPN7v7fj2yzx4bVchvH5xTQT9yM5CefacdLFXqn57ep4N71v1CuAf0VhwDWTZtx3ohTEnkeozdGG-ZbMuGf6qkta5Bjo8oahWxLUAjJ-PymePHMQ/s1600/P1050099.JPG" width="480" /></a></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Con el pincel finito pintá todas las partes y detalles que te quedaron sin.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Una vez que termines de dar la primer mano (en mi caso con dos fueron suficientes), dejá secar un día al aire o un buen rato con secador de pelo lo más frío posible. Dale la segunda mano o las que necesites y listo, quedan perfectas! De todas formas guardá bien la tinta que te sobre porque en algunos lugares donde el cuero se tiene que doblar, como el arco que se forma entre el empeine y los dedos del pie, se empezó a ver un poco el coral de abajo, pero no se saltó entero, sino que da la sensación de que se hubiera gastado. Por ahora las retoqué y no se volvió a salir. Pero guardo mi tarrito por las dudas! (Abajo las botas después de la primer mano de tinta)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-77201016237011779422014-07-15T13:17:00.000-07:002015-06-23T06:41:10.754-07:00PANQUEQUES PERFECTOS! ♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpOPdY4wfw8kKZs1kXnpyrfKKsmC-K_wK9_7_UzSpGs524SXH-TNR3hTsR6xvGbSkVjPsmHPDDAdmHpn-t9Ieqc4x9vq6G8qq6YD-TfeplkoYcWfCuw1Gd8JQfkuFZRg81PnluNcotcyo/s1600/P1050054.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpOPdY4wfw8kKZs1kXnpyrfKKsmC-K_wK9_7_UzSpGs524SXH-TNR3hTsR6xvGbSkVjPsmHPDDAdmHpn-t9Ieqc4x9vq6G8qq6YD-TfeplkoYcWfCuw1Gd8JQfkuFZRg81PnluNcotcyo/s1600/P1050054.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">(Regresé!) CREO que los panqueques son una de mis especialidades. Antes de empezar les cuento los secretos:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Usar una sartén de teflón</b>. La que yo uso no es mi sartén antiadherente mas nueva y reluciente, es una viejita un poco rayada. A mi me gusta ayudarme a despegar los panqueques de la sartén con un cuchillo de untar, y no quiero rayar una sartén nueva.</span></li>
<li><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">No usar aceite. </span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Porque con un pincel de cerdas es probable que se quede alguna en la sartén y nadie quiere un panqueque con pelos de pony. Con un pincel de silicona siento que quedan muy aceitosos. Me gusta rociar un poco de aceite en spray (fritolim o cualquier marca, son todos iguales). Ojo! con un (Y SOLO UN) segundo de rociar es suficiente.</span></li>
<li><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">No distraerse! </span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Prohibido usar facebook o colgarse con alguna peli porque en segundos están listos.</span></li>
<li><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hacer la mezcla en un recipiente con manija y pico. </span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Así al final no tenemos que lavar 500 cacharros. Yo uso una jarrita medidora, un batidor, la sartén y el plato para ir poniendo los panqueques listos. Nada más.</span></li>
</ul>
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<b><u><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para la masa:</span></u></b><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Después de muchos años la hago a ojo pero lo que lleva es:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">2 tazas de leche</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 huevo</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 cda de aceite</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 cdita de sal y una de azúcar </span><b></b></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">3 o 4 cucharadas de harina (la que tengas, da igual si es leudante o no, con harina común quedan un poco mas finitos pero el resultado final no es muy diferente)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">1 cda de manteca</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Opcionales: si van a ser dulces podés agregar escencia de vainilla, canela, ralladura de limón o naranja, chocolate en polvo, café instantáneo... Si van a ser salados podés agregar, mostaza, especias, hierbas... lo que se venga a la mente es válido. </span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Primero mezclo la leche, el huevo, el aceite, sal y azúcar. Después pongo la harina en un colador y la voy poniendo mientras bato con el batidor. Por último pongo la manteca en la sartén y la derrito a fuego mínimo, y sin dejar de batir, la agrego a la mezcla.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Antes de empezar preparate un plato para ir poniendo los terminados, sino se te va a hacer un lío.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Como la sartén tiene los restos de manteca, el primer panqueque no lleva aceite extra.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> Volcamos un poco de mezcla en la sarten caliente y la movemos en circulos para que se distribuya bien (el fuego lo vas regulando segun tu cocina, deberían tardar masomenos 15 segundos y no quedar quemados o crudos). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cuando los bordes se ven doraditos y burbujas en el medio damos vuelta con ayuda de un cuchillo o espátula. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifLCsH_uJfAGzAWP4tBXhA30dRlO5mmjtIANdutqFWn0oqHyFC23q3kc2_YRlkVlHZTpLmcPu6V4RBKvS_GCi-y6KcZCEykZ161CAI18L0Zs3jsF8QVAmIU9Mw-l1jKEJ24qyjsFqS6r4/s1600/P1050047.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifLCsH_uJfAGzAWP4tBXhA30dRlO5mmjtIANdutqFWn0oqHyFC23q3kc2_YRlkVlHZTpLmcPu6V4RBKvS_GCi-y6KcZCEykZ161CAI18L0Zs3jsF8QVAmIU9Mw-l1jKEJ24qyjsFqS6r4/s1600/P1050047.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Así te deberían quedar:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXlCXLkzRfDjDc4BAsHauwn-J8E8WLqAFAT4G2jlAWjfJdkghtP7ncCC8ZKablu5IdSCJM4YQD2DbD9nSPdssQXr631ut7eXj4wDW5iOdOOzZl8vI8CutRNUjTl3wBgBDblJLuv0bwIH8/s1600/P1050046.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXlCXLkzRfDjDc4BAsHauwn-J8E8WLqAFAT4G2jlAWjfJdkghtP7ncCC8ZKablu5IdSCJM4YQD2DbD9nSPdssQXr631ut7eXj4wDW5iOdOOzZl8vI8CutRNUjTl3wBgBDblJLuv0bwIH8/s1600/P1050046.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><u><b>Rellenos:</b></u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Los que se te ocurran! A Pía le hago con dulce de leche y rodajitas de banana.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaDkOfpQUZmDrKCrwZi1TOOCeZFuV8gtu70yEp8tcSYdBs3f1UoTeF88j4V5ALWH6D1HipLKWtn1VnrqCQrill3N6TiH6BusZqZ_enBIs6idV0xFzXB09tXz9vqkSkmWRy6h9rfFJ_C-g/s1600/P1050051.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaDkOfpQUZmDrKCrwZi1TOOCeZFuV8gtu70yEp8tcSYdBs3f1UoTeF88j4V5ALWH6D1HipLKWtn1VnrqCQrill3N6TiH6BusZqZ_enBIs6idV0xFzXB09tXz9vqkSkmWRy6h9rfFJ_C-g/s1600/P1050051.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><u><b> </b></u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Y a mi que me gustan salados y ese día no tenía ganas de seguir cocinando los usé para cenar.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwiX-oUbnvLigr6cdClrINvU045lezJhCPRTM9fewb0qoi8neVQ1SZ1AzqTRovJ3m6o_XhR0kZ2nBFkCgNHjjxYDOSPT8OGXfQCdOtCGZOUik2ilR2n-NkO3GiunzG3hmQrc2_1NXdcMI/s1600/P1050061.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwiX-oUbnvLigr6cdClrINvU045lezJhCPRTM9fewb0qoi8neVQ1SZ1AzqTRovJ3m6o_XhR0kZ2nBFkCgNHjjxYDOSPT8OGXfQCdOtCGZOUik2ilR2n-NkO3GiunzG3hmQrc2_1NXdcMI/s1600/P1050061.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Para mí hice de puré de zanahorias y cebollitas caramelizadas (re master chef!!) para comer tibios. Y como a Martín no le gustan las cosas muy gourmet le hice para (comer fríos) un relleno con: atún, tomate cortadito, aceitunas y mayonesa.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwGlaxzOMncx7eSw_L7rcikWNUpX6ebfEAShtIR0rbkBBJc9FBjJt9L4Qgf77esqogLGgvujo1wxyH8E-y6fbYh2YsKBfJtBYcs98lqfqFb0eEbs6lknJEcWw8Oq5zgjvRmC4qglhq-ic/s1600/P1050057.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwGlaxzOMncx7eSw_L7rcikWNUpX6ebfEAShtIR0rbkBBJc9FBjJt9L4Qgf77esqogLGgvujo1wxyH8E-y6fbYh2YsKBfJtBYcs98lqfqFb0eEbs6lknJEcWw8Oq5zgjvRmC4qglhq-ic/s1600/P1050057.JPG" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">No fallan nunca!</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-2309250524694287402014-03-11T08:17:00.002-07:002015-06-23T06:39:56.136-07:00DESCARGAR MOCKINGJAY (INGLÉS) (EN PDF, WORD, Y EBOOK PARA CELULAR)♥<div style="text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZw40fA_NMFr_1HiaIi-RH44nEB1DNpgdabTxoyfLgiOeSmnar7MeexlaZdTWPlWFXUSfVwjHpzbk_tNaszFx-YP6J22gh63LznNTWfLIux2tXjUa19GPAU89KcFhg0AQidkFGswRSiH3t/s1600/mock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZw40fA_NMFr_1HiaIi-RH44nEB1DNpgdabTxoyfLgiOeSmnar7MeexlaZdTWPlWFXUSfVwjHpzbk_tNaszFx-YP6J22gh63LznNTWfLIux2tXjUa19GPAU89KcFhg0AQidkFGswRSiH3t/s1600/mock.jpg" width="422" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Un trabajito convertir a todos los formatos! Pero bueno, para que nadie tenga que tomarse tal trabajo facilitemos las cosas.</span></div>
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<a href="https://docs.google.com/uc?export=download&id=0B1J2Pcn2FFWSdExIcl9GVHZvNzg" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Si querés descargar Mockingjay en EPUB (para Google Playbooks) hacé click acá. </span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="https://support.google.com/googleplay/answer/3097151?hl=es-419" target="_blank">Si querés saber cómo se instala un ebook en Google Playbooks para leer en el celular hacé click acá</a> </span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-88678355754599130992014-03-09T06:58:00.002-07:002015-06-23T06:39:31.276-07:00(6/6) MOCKINGJAY PART III "THE ASSASIN" : READ IT ONLINE - LEELO EN INGLÉS ONLINE♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9umQ404-iS3fRbc6qASPCTLGVbDf9Fxc-bzRkEGxYMgwJ-gU6cg8LOYuGrIHKSIASLNAvusqlzOj5Zqoe8_qf0245awii20f2F-JYccnQ3xPkFgXrtoL_tAL4MP9ZbqJB_eINPAG1q3CP/s1600/mock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9umQ404-iS3fRbc6qASPCTLGVbDf9Fxc-bzRkEGxYMgwJ-gU6cg8LOYuGrIHKSIASLNAvusqlzOj5Zqoe8_qf0245awii20f2F-JYccnQ3xPkFgXrtoL_tAL4MP9ZbqJB_eINPAG1q3CP/s1600/mock.jpg" width="422" /></a></div>
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</xml><![endif]--><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/16-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 1/6]</a><br />
<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/26-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 2/6]</a><br />
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">24</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A chill runs through me. Am I really that cold and
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">motivated by a kind of passion. But my best friend
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unfeeling assessment of what my potential mates can offer
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It's a horrible thing for Gale to say, for Peeta not to refute.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Especially when every emotion I have has been taken
and exploited by the Capitol or the rebels. At the moment,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the choice would be simple. I can survive just fine
without either of them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the morning, I have no time or energy to nurse
wounded feelings. During a predawn breakfast of liver</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pate and fig cookies, we gather around Tigris's
television for one of Beetee's break-ins. There's been a new</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">development in the war. Apparently inspired by the
black wave, some enterprising rebel commander came up</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with the idea of confiscating people's abandoned
automobiles and sending them unmanned down the streets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The cars don't trigger every pod, but they certainly
get the majority. At around four in the morning, the rebels</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">began carving three separate paths--simply referred to
as the A, B, and C lines--to the Capitol's heart. As a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">result, they've secured block after block with very
few casualties.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"This can't last," says Gale. "In fact
I'm surprised they've kept it going so long. The Capitol will adjust by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deactivating specific pods and then manually
triggering them when their targets come in range." Almost within</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">minutes of his prediction, we see this very thing
happen on-screen. A squad sends a car down a block, setting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">off four pods. All seems well. Three scouts follow and
make it safely to the end of the street. But when a group of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">twenty rebel soldiers follow them, they're blown to
bits by a row of potted rosebushes in front of a flower shop.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I bet it's killing Plutarch not to be in the
control room on this one," says Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee gives the broadcast back to the Capitol, where
a grim-faced reporter announces the blocks that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">civilians are to evacuate. Between her update and the
previous story, I am able to mark my paper map to show</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the relative positions of the opposing armies.</span></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I hear scuffling out on the street, move to the
windows, and peek out a crack in the shutters. In the early</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morning light, I see a bizarre spectacle. Refugees
from the now occupied blocks are streaming toward the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol's center. The most panicked are wearing
nothing but nightgowns and slippers, while the more prepared</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are heavily bundled in layers of clothes. They carry
everything from lapdogs to jewelry boxes to potted plants.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">One man in a fluffy robe holds only an overripe
banana. Confused, sleepy children stumble along after their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">parents, most either too stunned or too baffled to
cry. Bits of them flash by my line of vision. A pair of wide brown</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">eyes. An arm clutching a favorite doll. A pair of bare
feet, bluish in the cold, catching on the uneven paving stones</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of the alley. Seeing them reminds me of the children
of 12 who died fleeing the firebombs. I leave the window.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris offers to be our spy for the day since she's
the only one of us without a bounty on her head. After</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">securing us downstairs, she goes out into the Capitol
to pick up any helpful information.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Down in the cellar I pace back and forth, driving the
others crazy. Something tells me that not taking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">advantage of the flood of refugees is a mistake. What
better cover could we have? On the other hand, every</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">displaced person milling about on the streets means
another pair of eyes looking for the five rebels on the loose.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then again, what do we gain by staying here? All we're
really doing is depleting our small cache of food and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">waiting for...what? The rebels to take the Capitol? It
could be weeks before that happens, and I'm not so sure</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what I'd do if they did. Not run out and greet them.
Coin would have me whisked back to 13 before I could say</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"nightlock, nightlock, nightlock." I did not
come all this way, and lose all those people, to turn myself over to that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">woman. <i>I kill Snow. </i>Besides, there would be an
awful lot of things I couldn't easily explain about the last few days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Several of which, if they came to light, would
probably blow my deal for the victors' immunity right out of the water.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And forget about me, I've got a feeling some of the
others are going to need it. Like Peeta. Who, no matter how</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you spin it, can be seen on tape tossing Mitchell into
that net pod. I can imagine what Coin's war tribunal will do</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">By late afternoon, we're beginning to get uneasy about
Tigris's long absence. Talk turns to the possibilities</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that she has been apprehended and arrested, turned us
in voluntarily, or simply been injured in the wave of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">refugees. But around six o'clock we hear her return.
There's some shuffling around upstairs, then she opens the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">panel. The wonderful smell of frying meat fills the
air. Tigris has prepared us a hash of chopped ham and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">potatoes. It's the first hot food we've had in days,
and as I wait for her to fill my plate, I'm in danger of actually</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">drooling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As I chew, I try to pay attention to Tigris telling us
how she acquired it, but the main thing I absorb is that fur</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">underwear is a valuable trading item at the moment.
Especially for people who left their homes underdressed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Many are still out on the street, trying to find
shelter for the night. Those who live in the choice apartments of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inner city have not flung open their doors to house
the displaced. On the contrary, most of them bolted their locks,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">drew their shutters, and pretended to be out. Now the
City Circle's packed with refugees, and the Peacekeepers</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are going door to door, breaking into places if they
have to, to assign houseguests.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">On the television, we watch a terse Head Peacekeeper
lay out specific rules regarding how many people</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">per square foot each resident will be expected to take
in. He reminds the citizens of the Capitol that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">temperatures will drop well below freezing tonight and
warns them that their president expects them to be not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">only willing but enthusiastic hosts in this time of
crisis. Then they show some very staged-looking shots of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">concerned citizens welcoming grateful refugees into
their homes. The Head Peacekeeper says the president</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">himself has ordered part of his mansion readied to
receive citizens tomorrow. He adds that shopkeepers should</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">also be prepared to lend their floor space if
requested.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Tigris, that could be you," says Peeta. I
realize he's right. That even this narrow hallway of a shop could be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">appropriated as the numbers swell. Then we'll be truly
trapped in the cellar, in constant danger of discovery. How</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">many days do we have? One? Maybe two?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Head Peacekeeper comes back with more instructions
for the population. It seems that this evening</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there was an unfortunate incident where a crowd beat
to death a young man who resembled Peeta. Henceforth,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all rebel sightings are to be reported immediately to
authorities, who will deal with the identification and arrest of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the suspect. They show a photo of the victim. Apart
from some obviously bleached curls, he looks about as much</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">like Peeta as I do.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"People have gone wild," Cressida murmurs.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We watch a brief rebel update in which we learn that
several more blocks have been taken today. I make</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">note of the intersections on my map and study it.
"Line C is only four blocks from here," I announce. Somehow</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that fills me with more anxiety than the idea of
Peacekeepers looking for housing. I become very helpful. "Let me</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wash the dishes."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'll give you a hand." Gale collects the
plates.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I feel Peeta's eyes follow us out of the room. In the
cramped kitchen at the back of Tigris's shop, I fill the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sink with hot water and suds. "Do you think it's
true?" I ask. "That Snow will let refugees into the mansion?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I think he has to now, at least for the
cameras," says Gale.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm leaving in the morning," I say.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm going with you," Gale says. "What
should we do with the others?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Pollux and Cressida could be useful. They're
good guides," I say. Pollux and Cressida aren't actually the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">problem. "But Peeta's too..."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Unpredictable," finishes Gale. "Do you
think he'd still let us leave him behind?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We can make the argument that he'll endanger
us," I say. "He might stay here, if we're convincing."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's fairly rational about our suggestion. He
readily agrees that his company could put the other four of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us at risk. I'm thinking this may all work out, that
he can just sit out the war in Tigris's cellar, when he announces</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he's going out on his own.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"To do what?" asks Cressida.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm not sure exactly. The one thing that I might
still be useful at is causing a diversion. You saw what</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happened to that man who looked like me," he
says.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What if you...lose control?" I say.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You mean...go mutt? Well, if I feel that coming
on, I'll try to get back here," he assures me.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And if Snow gets you again?" asks Gale.
"You don't even have a gun."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'll just have to take my chances," says
Peeta. "Like the rest of you." The two exchange a long look, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">then Gale reaches into his breast pocket. He places
his nightlock tablet in Peeta's hand. Peeta lets it lie on his</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">open palm, neither rejecting nor accepting it.
"What about you?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't worry. Beetee showed me how to detonate my
explosive arrows by hand. If that fails, I've got my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knife. And I'll have Katniss," says Gale with a
smile. "She won't give them the satisfaction of taking me alive."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The thought of Peacekeepers dragging Gale away starts
the tune playing in my head again....</span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Are you, are you</span></i></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coming to the tree</span></i></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Take it, Peeta," I say in a strained voice.
I reach out and close his fingers over the pill. "No one will be</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there to help you."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We spend a fitful night, woken by one another's
nightmares, minds buzzing with the next day's plans. I'm</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">relieved when five o'clock rolls around and we can
begin whatever this day holds for us. We eat a mishmash of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our remaining food--canned peaches, crackers, and
snails--leaving one can of salmon for Tigris as meager</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thanks for all she's done. The gesture seems to touch
her in some way. Her face contorts in an odd expression</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and she flies into action. She spends the next hour
remaking the five of us. She redresses us so regular clothes</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hide our uniforms before we even don our coats and
cloaks. Covers our military boots with some sort of furry</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slippers. Secures our wigs with pins. Cleans off the
garish remains of the paint we so hastily applied to our faces</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and makes us up again. Drapes our outerwear to conceal
our weapons. Then gives us handbags and bundles of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knickknacks to carry. In the end, we look exactly like
the refugees fleeing the rebels.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Never underestimate the power of a brilliant
stylist," says Peeta. It's hard to tell, but I think Tigris might</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">actually blush under her stripes.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There are no helpful updates on the television, but
the alley seems as thick with refugees as the previous</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morning. Our plan is to slip into the crowd in three
groups. First Cressida and Pollux, who will act as guides while</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keeping a safe lead on us. Then Gale and myself, who
intend to position ourselves among the refugees</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assigned to the mansion today. Then Peeta, who will trail
behind us, ready to create a disturbance as needed.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris watches through the shutters for the right
moment, unbolts the door, and nods to Cressida and Pollux.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Take care," Cressida says, and they are
gone.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We'll be following in a minute. I get out the key,
unlock Peeta's cuffs, and stuff them in my pocket. He rubs</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his wrists. Flexes them. I feel a kind of desperation
rising up in me. It's like I'm back in the Quarter Quell, with</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee giving Johanna and me that coil of wire.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Listen," I say. "Don't do anything
foolish."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. It's last-resort stuff. Completely," he
says.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wrap my arms around his neck, feel his arms hesitate
before they embrace me. Not as steady as they</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">once were, but still warm and strong. A thousand
moments surge through me. All the times these arms were my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">only refuge from the world. Perhaps not fully
appreciated then, but so sweet in my memory, and now gone</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">forever. "All right, then." I release him.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's time," says Tigris. I kiss her cheek,
fasten my red hooded cloak, pull my scarf up over my nose, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">follow Gale out into the frigid air.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Sharp, icy snowflakes bite my exposed skin. The rising
sun's trying to break through the gloom without</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">much success. There's enough light to see the bundled
forms closest to you and little more. Perfect conditions,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">really, except that I can't locate Cressida and
Pollux. Gale and I drop our heads and shuffle along with the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">refugees. I can hear what I missed peeking through the
shutters yesterday. Crying, moaning, labored breathing.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And, not too far away, gunfire.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Where are we going, Uncle?" a shivering
little boy asks a man weighed down with a small safe.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"To the president's mansion. They'll assign us a
new place to live," puffs the man.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We turn off the alley and spill out onto one of the
main avenues. "Stay to the right!" a voice orders, and I see</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Peacekeepers interspersed throughout the crowd,
directing the flow of human traffic. Scared faces peer out</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of the plate-glass windows of the shops, which are
already becoming overrun with refugees. At this rate, Tigris</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">may have new houseguests by lunch. It was good for
everybody that we got out when we did.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's brighter now, even with the snow picking up. I
catch sight of Cressida and Pollux about thirty yards</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ahead of us, plodding along with the crowd. I crane my
head around to see if I can locate Peeta. I can't, but I've</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">caught the eye of an inquisitive-looking little girl
in a lemon yellow coat. I nudge Gale and slow my pace ever so</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slightly, to allow a wall of people to form between
us.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We might need to split up," I say under my
breath. "There's a girl--"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gunfire rips through the crowd, and several people
near me slump to the ground. Screams pierce the air</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as a second round mows down another group behind us.
Gale and I drop to the street, scuttle the ten yards to the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shops, and take cover behind a display of spike-heeled
boots outside a shoe seller's.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A row of feathery footwear blocks Gale's view.
"Who is it? Can you see?" he asks me. What I can see,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">between alternating pairs of lavender and mint green
leather boots, is a street full of bodies. The little girl who</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was watching me kneels beside a motionless woman,
screeching and trying to rouse her. Another wave of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bullets slices across the chest of her yellow coat,
staining it with red, knocking the girl onto her back. For a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">moment, looking at her tiny crumpled form, I lose my
ability to form words. Gale prods me with his elbow.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They're shooting from the roof above us," I
tell Gale. I watch a few more rounds, see the white uniforms</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dropping into the snowy streets. "Trying to take
out the Peacekeepers, but they're not exactly crack shots. It must</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be the rebels." I don't feel a rush of joy,
although theoretically my allies have broken through. I am transfixed by</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that lemon yellow coat.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If we start shooting, that's it," Gale
says. "The whole world will know it's us."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's true. We're armed only with our fabulous bows. To
release an arrow would be like announcing to both</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sides that we're here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I say forcefully. "We've got to
get to Snow."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Then we better start moving before the whole
block goes up," says Gale. Hugging the wall, we continue</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">along the street. Only the wall is mostly shopwindows.
A pattern of sweaty palms and gaping faces presses</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">against the glass. I yank my scarf up higher over my
cheekbones as we dart between outdoor displays. Behind a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rack of framed photos of Snow, we encounter a wounded
Peacekeeper propped against a strip of brick wall. He</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">asks us for help. Gale knees him in the side of the
head and takes his gun. At the intersection, he shoots a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">second Peacekeeper and we both have firearms.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So who are we supposed to be now?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Desperate citizens of the Capitol," says
Gale. "The Peacekeepers will think we're on their side, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hopefully the rebels have more interesting
targets."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm mulling over the wisdom of this latest role as we
sprint across the intersection, but by the time we reach</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the next block, it no longer matters who we are. Who
anyone is. Because no one is looking at faces. The rebels</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are here, all right. Pouring onto the avenue, taking
cover in doorways, behind vehicles, guns blazing, hoarse</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">voices shouting commands as they prepare to meet an
army of Peacekeepers marching toward us. Caught in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the cross fire are the refugees, unarmed, disoriented,
many wounded.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A pod's activated ahead of us, releasing a gush of
steam that parboils everyone in its path, leaving the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">victims intestine-pink and very dead. After that, what
little sense of order there was unravels. As the remaining</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">curlicues of steam intertwine with the snow,
visibility extends just to the end of my barrel. Peacekeeper, rebel,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">citizen, who knows? Everything that moves is a target.
People shoot reflexively, and I'm no exception. Heart</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pounding, adrenaline burning through me, everyone is
my enemy. Except Gale. My hunting partner, the one</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">person who has my back. There's nothing to do but move
forward, killing whoever comes into our path.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Screaming people, bleeding people, dead people
everywhere. As we reach the next corner, the entire block</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ahead of us lights up with a rich purple glow. We
backpedal, hunker down in a stairwell, and squint into the light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Something's happening to those illuminated by it.
They're assaulted by...what? A sound? A wave? A laser?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Weapons fall from their hands, fingers clutch their
faces, as blood sprays from all visible orifices--eyes, noses,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mouths, ears. In less than a minute, everyone's dead
and the glow vanishes. I grit my teeth and run, leaping over</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the bodies, feet slipping in the gore. The wind whips
the snow into blinding swirls but doesn't block out the sound</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of another wave of boots headed our way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Get down!" I hiss at Gale. We drop where we
are. My face lands in a still-warm pool of someone's blood,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but I play dead, remain motionless as the boots march
over us. Some avoid the bodies. Others grind into my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hand, my back, kick my head in passing. As the boots
recede, I open my eyes and nod to Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">On the next block, we encounter more terrified
refugees, but few soldiers. Just when it seems we might</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have caught a break, there's a cracking sound, like an
egg hitting the side of a bowl but magnified a thousand</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">times. We stop, look around for the pod. There's
nothing. Then I feel the tips of my boots beginning to tilt ever so</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slightly. "Run!" I cry to Gale. There's no
time to explain, but in a few seconds the nature of the pod becomes clear</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to everyone. A seam has opened up down the center of
the block. The two sides of the tiled street are folding</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down like flaps, slowly emptying the people into
whatever lies beneath.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm torn between making a beeline for the next
intersection and trying to get to the doors that line the street</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and break my way into a building. As a result, I end
up moving at a slight diagonal. As the flap continues to drop, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">find my feet scrambling, harder and harder, to find
purchase on the slippery tiles. It's like running along the side of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">an icy hill that gets steeper at every step. Both of
my destinations--the intersection and the buildings--are a few</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">feet away when I feel the flap going. There's nothing
to do but use my last seconds of connection to the tiles to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">push off for the intersection. As my hands latch on to
the side, I realize the flaps have swung straight down. My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">feet dangle in the air, no foothold anywhere. From
fifty feet below, a vile stench hits my nose, like rotted corpses</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in the summer heat. Black forms crawl around in the
shadows, silencing whoever survives the fall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A strangled cry comes from my throat. No one is coming
to help me. I'm losing my grip on the icy ledge,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">when I see I'm only about six feet from the corner of
the pod. I inch my hands along the ledge, trying to block out</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the terrifying sounds from below. When my hands
straddle the corner, I swing my right boot up over the side. It</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">catches on something and I painstakingly drag myself
up to street level. Panting, trembling, I crawl out and wrap</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my arm around a lamppost for an anchor, although the
ground's perfectly flat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Gale?" I call into the abyss, heedless of
being recognized. "Gale?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Over here!" I look in bewilderment to my
left. The flap held up everything to the very base of the buildings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A dozen or so people made it that far and now hang
from whatever provides a handhold. Doorknobs, knockers,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mail slots. Three doors down from me, Gale clings to
the decorative iron grating around an apartment door. He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could easily get inside if it was open. But despite
repeated kicks to the door, no one comes to his aid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Cover yourself!" I lift my gun. He turns
away and I drill the lock until the door flies inward. Gale swings into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the doorway, landing in a heap on the floor. For a
moment, I experience the elation of his rescue. Then the whitegloved</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hands clamp down on him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale meets my eyes, mouths something at me I can't
make out. I don't know what to do. I can't leave him,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but I can't reach him either. His lips move again. I
shake my head to indicate my confusion. At any minute, they'll</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">realize who they've captured. The Peacekeepers are
hauling him inside now. "Go!" I hear him yell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I turn and run away from the pod. All alone now. Gale
a prisoner. Cressida and Pollux could be dead ten</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">times over. And Peeta? I haven't laid eyes on him
since we left Tigris's. I hold on to the idea that he may have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gone back. Felt an attack coming and retreated to the
cellar while he still had control. Realized there was no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">need for a diversion when the Capitol has provided so
many. No need to be bait and have to take the nightlock--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the nightlock! Gale doesn't have any. And as for all
that talk of detonating his arrows by hand, he'll never get the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chance. The first thing the Peacekeepers will do is to
strip him of his weapons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I fall into a doorway, tears stinging my eyes. <i>Shoot
me. </i>That's what he was mouthing. I was supposed to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shoot him! That was my job. That was our unspoken
promise, all of us, to one another. And I didn't do it and now</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Capitol will kill him or torture him or hijack him
or--the cracks begin opening inside me, threatening to break</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me into pieces. I have only one hope. That the Capitol
falls, lays down its arms, and gives up its prisoners before</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they hurt Gale. But I can't see that happening while
Snow's alive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A pair of Peacekeepers runs by, barely glancing at the
whimpering Capitol girl huddled in a doorway. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">choke down my tears, wipe the existing ones off my
face before they can freeze, and pull myself back together.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Okay, I'm still an anonymous refugee. Or did the
Peacekeepers who caught Gale get a glimpse of me as I fled? I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">remove my cloak and turn it inside out, letting the
black lining show instead of the red exterior. Arrange the hood</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so it conceals my face. Grasping my gun close to my
chest, I survey the block. There's only a handful of dazedlooking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stragglers. I trail close behind a pair of old men who
take no notice of me. No one will expect me to be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with old men. When we reach the end of the next
intersection, they stop and I almost bump into them. It's the City</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Circle. Across the wide expanse ringed by grand
buildings sits the president's mansion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Circle's full of people milling around, wailing,
or just sitting and letting the snow pile up around them. I fit</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">right in. I begin to weave my way across to the
mansion, tripping over abandoned treasures and snow-frosted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">limbs. About halfway there, I become aware of the
concrete barricade. It's about four feet high and extends in a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">large rectangle in front of the mansion. You would
think it would be empty, but it's packed with refugees. Maybe</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this is the group that's been chosen to be sheltered
at the mansion? But as I draw closer, I notice something</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">else. Everyone inside the barricade is a child.
Toddlers to teenagers. Scared and frostbitten. Huddled in groups</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">or rocking numbly on the ground. They aren't being led
into the mansion. They're penned in, guarded on all sides</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">by Peacekeepers. I know immediately it's not for their
protection. If the Capitol wanted to safeguard them, they'd</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be down in a bunker somewhere. This is for Snow's
protection. The children form his human shield.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a commotion and the crowd surges to the left.
I'm caught up by larger bodies, borne sideways,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">carried off course. I hear shouts of "The rebels!
The rebels!" and know they must've broken through. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">momentum slams me into a flagpole and I cling to it.
Using the rope that hangs from the top, I pull myself up out of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the crush of bodies. Yes, I can see the rebel army
pouring into the Circle, driving the refugees back onto the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">avenues. I scan the area for the pods that will surely
be detonating. But that doesn't happen. This is what</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happens:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A hovercraft marked with the Capitol's seal
materializes directly over the barricaded children. Scores of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">silver parachutes rain down on them. Even in this
chaos, the children know what silver parachutes contain. Food.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Medicine. Gifts. They eagerly scoop them up, frozen
fingers struggling with the strings. The hovercraft vanishes,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">five seconds pass, and then about twenty parachutes
simultaneously explode.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A wail rises from the crowd. The snow's red and
littered with undersized body parts. Many of the children</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">die immediately, but others lie in agony on the ground.
Some stagger around mutely, staring at the remaining</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">silver parachutes in their hands, as if they still
might have something precious inside. I can tell the Peacekeepers</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">didn't know this was coming by the way they are
yanking away the barricades, making a path to the children.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Another flock of white uniforms sweeps into the
opening. But these aren't Peacekeepers. They're medics. Rebel</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">medics. I'd know the uniforms anywhere. They swarm in
among the children, wielding medical kits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">First I get a glimpse of the blond braid down her
back. Then, as she yanks off her coat to cover a wailing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">child, I notice the duck tail formed by her untucked
shirt. I have the same reaction I did the day Effie Trinket called</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her name at the reaping. At least, I must go limp, because
I find myself at the base of the flagpole, unable to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">account for the last few seconds. Then I am pushing
through the crowd, just as I did before. Trying to shout her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">name above the roar. I'm almost there, almost to the
barricade, when I think she hears me. Because for just a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">moment, she catches sight of me, her lips form my
name.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And that's when the rest of the parachutes go off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">25</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Real or not real? I am on fire. The balls of flame
that erupted from the parachutes shot over the barricades,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through the snowy air, and landed in the crowd. I was
just turning away when one caught me, ran its tongue up the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back of my body, and transformed me into something
new. A creature as unquenchable as the sun.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A fire mutt knows only a single sensation: agony. No
sight, no sound, no feeling except the unrelenting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">burning of flesh. Perhaps there are periods of
unconsciousness, but what can it matter if I can't find refuge in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them? I am Cinna's bird, ignited, flying frantically
to escape something inescapable. The feathers of flame that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">grow from my body. Beating my wings only fans the
blaze. I consume myself, but to no end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finally, my wings begin to falter, I lose height, and
gravity pulls me into a foamy sea the color of Finnick's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">eyes. I float on my back, which continues to burn
beneath the water, but the agony quiets to pain. When I am</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">adrift and unable to navigate, that's when they come.
The dead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The ones I loved fly as birds in the open sky above
me. Soaring, weaving, calling to me to join them. I want</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so badly to follow them, but the seawater saturates my
wings, making it impossible to lift them. The ones I hated</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have taken to the water, horrible scaled things that
tear my salty flesh with needle teeth. Biting again and again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Dragging me beneath the surface.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The small white bird tinged in pink dives down, buries
her claws in my chest, and tries to keep me afloat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No, Katniss! No! You can't go!"</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But the ones I hated are winning, and if she clings to
me, she'll be lost as well. <i>"Prim, let go!" </i>And finally she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">does.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Deep in the water, I'm deserted by all. There's only
the sound of my breathing, the enormous effort it takes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to draw the water in, push it out of my lungs. I want
to stop, I try to hold my breath, but the sea forces its way in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and out against my will. <i>"Let me die. Let me
follow the others," </i>I beg whatever holds me here. There's no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">response.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Trapped for days, years, centuries maybe. Dead, but
not allowed to die. Alive, but as good as dead. So</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alone that anyone, anything no matter how loathsome
would be welcome. But when I finally have a visitor, it's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sweet. Morphling. Coursing through my veins, easing
the pain, lightening my body so that it rises back toward</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the air and rests again on the foam.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Foam. I really am floating on foam. I can feel it
beneath the tips of my fingers, cradling parts of my naked</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">body. There's much pain but there's also something
like reality. The sandpaper of my throat. The smell of burn</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">medicine from the first arena. The sound of my
mother's voice. These things frighten me, and I try to return to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deep to make sense of them. But there's no going back.
Gradually, I'm forced to accept who I am. A badly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">burned girl with no wings. With no fire. And no
sister.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the dazzling white Capitol hospital, the doctors
work their magic on me. Draping my rawness in new</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sheets of skin. Coaxing the cells into thinking they
are my own. Manipulating my body parts, bending and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stretching the limbs to assure a good fit. I hear over
and over again how lucky I am. My eyes were spared. Most</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of my face was spared. My lungs are responding to
treatment. I will be as good as new.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When my tender skin has toughened enough to withstand
the pressure of sheets, more visitors arrive. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morphling opens the door to the dead and alive alike.
Haymitch, yellow and unsmiling. Cinna, stitching a new</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wedding dress. Delly, prattling on about the niceness
of people. My father sings all four stanzas of "The Hanging</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tree" and reminds me that my mother--who sleeps
in a chair between shifts--isn't to know about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">One day I awake to expectations and know I will not be
allowed to live in my dreamland. I must take food by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mouth. Move my own muscles. Make my way to the
bathroom. A brief appearance by President Coin clinches it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't worry," she says. "I've saved
him for you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The doctors' puzzlement grows over why I'm unable to
speak. Many tests are done, and while there's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">damage to my vocal cords, it doesn't account for it.
Finally, Dr. Aurelius, a head doctor, comes up with the theory</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that I've become a mental, rather than physical, Avox.
That my silence has been brought on by emotional trauma.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Although he's presented with a hundred proposed
remedies, he tells them to leave me alone. So I don't ask</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about anyone or anything, but people bring me a steady
stream of information. On the war: The Capitol fell the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">day the parachutes went off, President Coin leads
Panem now, and troops have been sent out to put down the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">small remaining pockets of Capitol resistance. On
President Snow: He's being held prisoner, awaiting trial and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">most certain execution. On my assassination team:
Cressida and Pollux have been sent out into the districts to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cover the wreckage of the war. Gale, who took two
bullets in an escape attempt, is mopping up Peacekeepers in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">2. Peeta's still in the burn unit. He made it to the
City Circle after all. On my family: My mother buries her grief in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Having no work, grief buries me. All that keeps me
going is Coin's promise. That I can kill Snow. And when</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that's done, nothing will be left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Eventually, I'm released from the hospital and given a
room in the president's mansion to share with my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother. She's almost never there, taking her meals and
sleeping at work. It falls to Haymitch to check on me,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">make sure I'm eating and using my medicines. It's not
an easy job. I take to my old habits from District 13.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Wandering unauthorized through the mansion. Into
bedrooms and offices, ballrooms and baths. Seeking strange</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">little hiding spaces. A closet of furs. A cabinet in
the library. A long-forgotten bathtub in a room of discarded</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">furniture. My places are dim and quiet and impossible
to find. I curl up, make myself smaller, try to disappear</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">entirely. Wrapped in silence, I slide my bracelet that
reads mentally disoriented around and around my wrist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old.
My home is District 12. There is no District</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">12. I am the Mockingjay. I brought down the Capitol.
President Snow hates me. He killed my sister. Now I will</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">kill him. And then the Hunger Games will be over....</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Periodically, I find myself back in my room, unsure
whether I was driven by a need for morphling or if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch ferreted me out. I eat the food, take the
medicine, and am required to bathe. It's not the water I mind,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but the mirror that reflects my naked fire-mutt body.
The skin grafts still retain a newborn-baby pinkness. The skin</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deemed damaged but salvageable looks red, hot, and
melted in places. Patches of my former self gleam white</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and pale. I'm like a bizarre patchwork quilt of skin.
Parts of my hair were singed off completely; the rest has been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chopped off at odd lengths. Katniss Everdeen, the girl
who was on fire. I wouldn't much care except the sight of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my body brings back the memory of the pain. And why I
was in pain. And what happened just before the pain</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">started. And how I watched my little sister become a
human torch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Closing my eyes doesn't help. Fire burns brighter in
the darkness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Dr. Aurelius shows up sometimes. I like him because he
doesn't say stupid things like how I'm totally safe,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">or that he knows I can't see it but I'll be happy
again one day, or even that things will be better in Panem now. He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">just asks if I feel like talking, and when I don't
answer, he falls asleep in his chair. In fact, I think his visits are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">largely motivated by his need for a nap. The
arrangement works for both of us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The time draws near, although I could not give you
exact hours and minutes. President Snow has been tried</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and found guilty, sentenced to execution. Haymitch
tells me, I hear talk of it as I drift past the guards in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hallways. My Mockingjay suit arrives in my room. Also
my bow, looking no worse for wear, but no sheath of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrows. Either because they were damaged or more
likely because I shouldn't have weapons. I vaguely wonder if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I should be preparing for the event in some way, but
nothing comes to mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Late one afternoon, after a long period in a cushioned
window seat behind a painted screen, I emerge and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">turn left instead of right. I find myself in a strange
part of the mansion, and immediately lose my bearings. Unlike</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the area where I'm quartered, there seems to be no one
around to ask. I like it, though. Wish I'd found it sooner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's so quiet, with the thick carpets and heavy
tapestries soaking up the sound. Softly lit. Muted colors. Peaceful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Until I smell the roses. I dive behind some curtains,
shaking too hard to run, while I await the mutts. Finally, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">realize there are no mutts coming. So, what do I
smell? Real roses? Could it be that I am near the garden where</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the evil things grow?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As I creep down the hall, the odor becomes
overpowering. Perhaps not as strong as the actual mutts, but</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">purer, because it's not competing with sewage and
explosives. I turn a corner and find myself staring at two</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">surprised guards. Not Peacekeepers, of course. There
are no more Peacekeepers. But not the trim, grayuniformed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">soldiers from 13 either. These two, a man and a woman,
wear the tattered, thrown-together clothes of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">actual rebels. Still bandaged and gaunt, they are now
keeping watch over the doorway to the roses. When I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">move to enter, their guns form an X in front of me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You can't go in, miss," says the man.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Soldier," the woman corrects him. "You
can't go in, Soldier Everdeen. President's orders."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I just stand there patiently waiting for them to lower
their guns, for them to understand, without my telling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them, that behind those doors is something I need.
Just a rose. A single bloom. To place in Snow's lapel before I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shoot him. My presence seems to worry the guards.
They're discussing calling Haymitch, when a woman speaks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up behind me. "Let her go in."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know the voice but can't immediately place it. Not
Seam, not 13, definitely not Capitol. I turn my head and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">find myself face-to-face with Paylor, the commander
from 8. She looks even more beat up than she did at the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hospital, but who doesn't?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"On my authority," says Paylor. "She
has a right to anything behind that door." These are her soldiers, not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coin's. They drop their weapons without question and
let me pass.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At the end of a short hallway, I push apart the glass
doors and step inside. By now the smell's so strong that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it begins to flatten out, as if there's no more my
nose can absorb. The damp, mild air feels good on my hot skin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And the roses are glorious. Row after row of sumptuous
blooms, in lush pink, sunset orange, and even pale blue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wander through the aisles of carefully pruned
plants, looking but not touching, because I have learned the hard</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">way how deadly these beauties can be. I know when I
find it, crowning the top of a slender bush. A magnificent</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">white bud just beginning to open. I pull my left
sleeve over my hand so that my skin won't actually have to touch it,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">take up a pair of pruning shears, and have just
positioned them on the stem when he speaks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's a nice one."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My hand jerks, the shears snap shut, severing the
stem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The colors are lovely, of course, but nothing
says perfection like white."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I still can't see him, but his voice seems to rise up
from an adjacent bed of red roses. Delicately pinching</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the stem of the bud through the fabric of my sleeve, I
move slowly around the corner and find him sitting on a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stool against the wall. He's as well groomed and
finely dressed as ever, but weighted down with manacles, ankle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shackles, tracking devices. In the bright light, his skin's
a pale, sickly green. He holds a white handkerchief</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spotted with fresh blood. Even in his deteriorated
state, his snake eyes shine bright and cold. "I was hoping</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you'd find your way to my quarters."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">His quarters. I have trespassed into his home, the way
he slithered into mine last year, hissing threats with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his bloody, rosy breath. This greenhouse is one of his
rooms, perhaps his favorite; perhaps in better times he</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tended the plants himself. But now it's part of his
prison. That's why the guards halted me. And that's why Paylor</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">let me in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'd supposed he would be secured in the deepest
dungeon that the Capitol had to offer, not cradled in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lap of luxury. Yet Coin left him here. To set a
precedent, I guess. So that if in the future she ever fell from grace, it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">would be understood that presidents--even the most
despicable--get special treatment. Who knows, after all,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">when her own power might fade?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"There are so many things we should discuss, but
I have a feeling your visit will be brief. So, first things</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">first." He begins to cough, and when he removes
the handkerchief from his mouth, it's redder. "I wanted to tell you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how very sorry I am about your sister."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Even in my deadened, drugged condition, this sends a
stab of pain through me. Reminding me that there</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are no limits to his cruelty. And how he will go to
his grave trying to destroy me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So wasteful, so unnecessary. Anyone could see
the game was over by that point. In fact, I was just about to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">issue an official surrender when they released those parachutes."
His eyes are glued on me, unblinking, so as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">not to miss a second of my reaction. But what he's
said makes no sense. When <i>they </i>released the parachutes?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, you really didn't think I gave the order,
did you? Forget the obvious fact that if I'd had a working hovercraft</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at my disposal, I'd have been using it to make an
escape. But that aside, what purpose could it have served?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We both know I'm not above killing children, but I'm
not wasteful. I take life for very specific reasons. And there</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was no reason for me to destroy a pen full of Capitol
children. None at all."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wonder if the next fit of coughing is staged so that
I can have time to absorb his words. He's lying. Of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">course, he's lying. But there's something struggling
to free itself from the lie as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"However, I must concede it was a masterful move
on Coin's part. The idea that I was bombing our own</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">helpless children instantly snapped whatever frail
allegiance my people still felt to me. There was no real</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">resistance after that. Did you know it aired live? You
can see Plutarch's hand there. And in the parachutes. Well,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it's that sort of thinking that you look for in a Head
Gamemaker, isn't it?" Snow dabs the corners of his mouth. "I'm</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sure he wasn't gunning for your sister, but these things
happen."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm not with Snow now. I'm in Special Weaponry back in
13 with Gale and Beetee. Looking at the designs</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">based on Gale's traps. That played on human
sympathies. The first bomb killed the victims. The second, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rescuers. Remembering Gale's words.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Beetee and I have been following the same rule
book President Snow used when he hijacked Peeta."</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"My failure," says Snow, "was being so
slow to grasp Coin's plan. To let the Capitol and districts destroy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one another, and then step in to take power with Thirteen
barely scratched. Make no mistake, she was intending</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to take my place right from the beginning. I shouldn't
be surprised. After all, it was Thirteen that started the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rebellion that led to the Dark Days, and then
abandoned the rest of the districts when the tide turned against it.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But I wasn't watching Coin. I was watching you,
Mockingjay. And you were watching me. I'm afraid we have both</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been played for fools."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I refuse for this to be true. Some things even I can't
survive. I utter my first words since my sister's death. "I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">don't believe you."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow shakes his head in mock disappointment. "Oh,
my dear Miss Everdeen. I thought we had agreed not</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to lie to each other."</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">26</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Out in the hall, I find Paylor standing in exactly the
same spot. "Did you find what you were looking for?" she</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">asks.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I hold up the white bud in answer and then stumble
past her. I must have made it back to my room, because</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the next thing I know, I'm filling a glass with water
from the bathroom faucet and sticking the rose in it. I sink to my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knees on the cold tile and squint at the flower, as
the whiteness seems hard to focus on in the stark fluorescent</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">light. My finger catches the inside of my bracelet,
twisting it like a tourniquet, hurting my wrist. I'm hoping the pain</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will help me hang on to reality the way it did for
Peeta. I must hang on. I must know the truth about what has</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happened.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There are two possibilities, although the details
associated with them may vary. First, as I've believed, that</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Capitol sent in that hovercraft, dropped the
parachutes, and sacrificed its children's lives, knowing the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">recently arrived rebels would go to their aid. There's
evidence to support this. The Capitol's seal on the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hovercraft, the lack of any attempt to blow the enemy
out of the sky, and their long history of using children as</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pawns in their battle against the districts. Then
there's Snow's account. That a Capitol hovercraft manned by</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rebels bombed the children to bring a speedy end to
the war. But if this was the case, why didn't the Capitol fire</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on the enemy? Did the element of surprise throw them?
Had they no defenses left? Children are precious to 13,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">or so it has always seemed. Well, not me, maybe. Once
I had outlived my usefulness, I was expendable.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Although I think it's been a long time since I've been
considered a child in this war. And why would they do it</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knowing their own medics would likely respond and be
taken out by the second blast? They wouldn't. They</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">couldn't. Snow's lying. Manipulating me as he always
has. Hoping to turn me against the rebels and possibly</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">destroy them. Yes. Of course.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then what's nagging at me? Those double-exploding
bombs, for one. It's not that the Capitol couldn't have</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the same weapon, it's just that I'm sure the rebels
did. Gale and Beetee's brainchild. Then there's the fact that</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow made no escape attempt, when I know him to be the
consummate survivor. It seems hard to believe he</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">didn't have a retreat somewhere, some bunker stocked
with provisions where he could live out the rest of his</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">snaky little life. And finally, there's his assessment
of Coin. What's irrefutable is that she's done exactly what he</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">said. Let the Capitol and the districts run one
another into the ground and then sauntered in to take power. Even</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">if that was her plan, it doesn't mean she dropped
those parachutes. Victory was already in her grasp. Everything</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was in her grasp.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Except me.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I recall Boggs's response when I admitted I hadn't put
much thought into Snow's successor. <i>"If your</i></span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">immediate answer isn't Coin, then you're a threat. You're
the face of the rebellion. You may have more</span></i></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">influence than any other single person. Outwardly, the
most you've ever done is tolerated her."</span></i></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, I'm thinking of Prim, who was not yet
fourteen, not yet old enough to be granted the title of soldier,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but somehow working on the front lines. How did such a
thing happen? That my sister would have wanted to be</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there, I have no doubt. That she would be more capable
than many older than she is a given. But for all that,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">someone very high up would have had to approve putting
a thirteen-year-old in combat. Did Coin do it, hoping</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that losing Prim would push me completely over the
edge? Or, at least, firmly on her side? I wouldn't even have</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">had to witness it in person. Numerous cameras would be
covering the City Circle. Capturing the moment forever.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No, now I am going crazy, slipping into some state of
paranoia. Too many people would know of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mission. Word would get out. Or would it? Who would
have to know besides Coin, Plutarch, and a small, loyal or</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">easily disposable crew?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I badly need help working this out, only everyone I
trust is dead. Cinna. Boggs. Finnick. Prim. There's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta, but he couldn't do any more than speculate, and
who knows what state his mind's in, anyway. And that</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">leaves only Gale. He's far away, but even if he were
beside me, could I confide in him? What could I say, how</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could I phrase it, without implying that it was his
bomb that killed Prim? The impossibility of that idea, more than</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">any, is why Snow must be lying.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Ultimately, there's only one person to turn to who
might know what happened and might still be on my side.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">To broach the subject at all will be a risk. But while
I think Haymitch might gamble with my life in the arena, I don't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">think he'd rat me out to Coin. Whatever problems we
may have with each other, we prefer resolving our</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">differences one-on-one.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I scramble off the tiles, out the door, and across the
hall to his room. When there's no response to my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knock, I push inside. Ugh. It's amazing how quickly he
can defile a space. Half-eaten plates of food, shattered</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">liquor bottles, and pieces of broken furniture from a
drunken rampage scatter his quarters. He lies, unkempt and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unwashed, in a tangle of sheets on the bed, passed
out.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Haymitch," I say, shaking his leg. Of
course, that's insufficient. But I give it a few more tries before I dump</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the pitcher of water in his face. He comes to with a
gasp, slashing blindly with his knife. Apparently, the end of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow's reign didn't equal the end of his terror.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh. You," he says. I can tell by his voice
that he's still loaded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Haymitch," I begin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Listen to that. The Mockingjay found her
voice." He laughs. "Well, Plutarch's going to be happy." He
takes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a swig from a bottle. "Why am I soaking
wet?" I lamely drop the pitcher behind me into a pile of dirty clothes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I need your help," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch belches, filling the air with white liquor
fumes. "What is it, sweetheart? More boy trouble?" I don't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know why, but this hurts me in a way Haymitch rarely
can. It must show on my face, because even in his drunken</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">state, he tries to take it back. "Okay, not
funny." I'm already at the door. "Not funny! Come back!" By the
thud of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his body hitting the floor, I assume he tried to
follow me, but there's no point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I zigzag through the mansion and disappear into a
wardrobe full of silken things. I yank them from hangers</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">until I have a pile and then burrow into it. In the
lining of my pocket, I find a stray morphling tablet and swallow it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dry, heading off my rising hysteria. It's not enough
to right things, though. I hear Haymitch calling me in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">distance, but he won't find me in his condition.
Especially not in this new spot. Swathed in silk, I feel like a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">caterpillar in a cocoon awaiting metamorphosis. I
always supposed that to be a peaceful condition. At first it is.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But as I journey into night, I feel more and more
trapped, suffocated by the slippery bindings, unable to emerge</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">until I have transformed into something of beauty. I
squirm, trying to shed my ruined body and unlock the secret to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">growing flawless wings. Despite enormous effort, I
remain a hideous creature, fired into my current form by the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blast from the bombs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The encounter with Snow opens the door to my old
repertoire of nightmares. It's like being stung by tracker</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">jackers again. A wave of horrifying images with a
brief respite I confuse with waking--only to find another wave</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knocking me back. When the guards finally locate me,
I'm sitting on the floor of the wardrobe, tangled in silk,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">screaming my head off. I fight them at first, until
they convince me they're trying to help, peel away the choking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">garments, and escort me back to my room. On the way,
we pass a window and I see a gray, snowy dawn</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spreading across the Capitol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A very hungover Haymitch waits with a handful of pills
and a tray of food that neither of us has the stomach</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for. He makes a feeble attempt to get me to talk again
but, seeing it's pointless, sends me to a bath someone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has drawn. The tub's deep, with three steps to the
bottom. I ease down into the warm water and sit, up to my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">neck in suds, hoping the medicines kick in soon. My
eyes focus on the rose that has spread its petals overnight,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">filling the steamy air with its strong perfume. I rise
and reach for a towel to smother it, when there's a tentative</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knock and the bathroom door opens, revealing three
familiar faces. They try to smile at me, but even Venia can't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">conceal her shock at my ravaged mutt body.
"Surprise!" Octavia squeaks, and then bursts into tears. I'm puzzling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">over their reappearance when I realize that this must
be it, the day of the execution. They've come to prep me for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the cameras. Remake me to Beauty Base Zero. No wonder
Octavia's crying. It's an impossible task.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They can barely touch my patchwork of skin for fear of
hurting me, so I rinse and dry off myself. I tell them I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hardly notice the pain anymore, but Flavius still
winces as he drapes a robe around me. In the bedroom, I find</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">another surprise. Sitting upright in a chair. Polished
from her metallic gold wig to her patent leather high heels,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gripping a clipboard. Remarkably unchanged except for
the vacant look in her eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Effie," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Hello, Katniss." She stands and kisses me
on the cheek as if nothing has occurred since our last meeting,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the night before the Quarter Quell. "Well, it
looks like we've got another big, big, big day ahead of us. So why</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">don't you start your prep and I'll just pop over and
check on the arrangements."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Okay," I say to her back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They say Plutarch and Haymitch had a hard time
keeping her alive," comments Venia under her breath.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She was imprisoned after your escape, so that
helps."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's quite a stretch. Effie Trinket, rebel. But I
don't want Coin killing her, so I make a mental note to present</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her that way if asked. "I guess it's good
Plutarch kidnapped you three after all."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're the only prep team still alive. And all
the stylists from the Quarter Quell are dead," says Venia. She</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't say who specifically killed them. I'm
beginning to wonder if it matters. She gingerly takes one of my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">scarred hands and holds it out for inspection.
"Now, what do you think for the nails? Red or maybe a jet black?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Flavius performs some beauty miracle on my hair,
managing to even out the front while getting some of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">longer locks to hide the bald spots in the back. My
face, since it was spared from the flames, presents no more</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">than the usual challenges. Once I'm in Cinna's
Mockingjay suit, the only scars visible are on my neck, forearms,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and hands. Octavia secures my Mockingjay pin over my
heart and we step back to look in the mirror. I can't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">believe how normal they've made me look on the outside
when inwardly I'm such a wasteland.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a tap at the door and Gale steps in. "Can
I have a minute?" he asks. In the mirror, I watch my prep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">team. Unsure of where to go, they bump into one
another a few times and then closet themselves in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bathroom. Gale comes up behind me and we examine each
other's reflection. I'm searching for something to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hang on to, some sign of the girl and boy who met by
chance in the woods five years ago and became</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inseparable. I'm wondering what would have happened to
them if the Hunger Games had not reaped the girl. If</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she would have fallen in love with the boy, married
him even. And sometime in the future, when the brothers and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sisters had been raised up, escaped with him into the
woods and left 12 behind forever. Would they have been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happy, out in the wild, or would the dark, twisted
sadness between them have grown up even without the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol's help?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I brought you this." Gale holds up a
sheath. When I take it, I notice it holds a single, ordinary arrow. "It's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">supposed to be symbolic. You firing the last shot of
the war."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What if I miss?" I say. "Does Coin
retrieve it and bring it back to me? Or just shoot Snow through the head</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">herself?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You won't miss." Gale adjusts the sheath on
my shoulder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We stand there, face-to-face, not meeting each other's
eyes. "You didn't come see me in the hospital." He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't answer, so finally I just say it. "Was it
your bomb?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know. Neither does Beetee," he
says. "Does it matter? You'll always be thinking about it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He waits for me to deny it; I want to deny it, but
it's true. Even now I can see the flash that ignites her, feel</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the heat of the flames. And I will never be able to
separate that moment from Gale. My silence is my answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That was the one thing I had going for me.
Taking care of your family," he says. "Shoot straight, okay?" He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">touches my cheek and leaves. I want to call him back
and tell him that I was wrong. That I'll figure out a way to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">make peace with this. To remember the circumstances
under which he created the bomb. Take into account my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">own inexcusable crimes. Dig up the truth about who
dropped the parachutes. Prove it wasn't the rebels. Forgive</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him. But since I can't, I'll just have to deal with
the pain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Effie comes in to usher me to some kind of meeting. I
collect my bow and at the last minute remember the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rose, glistening in its glass of water. When I open
the door to the bathroom, I find my prep team sitting in a row on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the edge of the tub, hunched and defeated. I remember
I'm not the only one whose world has been stripped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">away. "Come on," I tell them. "We've
got an audience waiting."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm expecting a production meeting in which Plutarch
instructs me where to stand and gives me my cue for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shooting Snow. Instead, I find myself sent into a room
where six people sit around a table. Peeta, Johanna,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee, Haymitch, Annie, and Enobaria. They all wear
the gray rebel uniforms from 13. No one looks particularly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">well. "What's this?" I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're not sure," Haymitch answers. "It
appears to be a gathering of the remaining victors."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're all that's left?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The price of celebrity," says Beetee.
"We were targeted from both sides. The Capitol killed the victors</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they suspected of being rebels. The rebels killed
those thought to be allied with the Capitol."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna scowls at Enobaria. "So what's she doing
here?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"<i>She </i>is protected under what we call the
Mockingjay Deal," says Coin as she enters behind me. "Wherein</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Katniss Everdeen agreed to support the rebels in
exchange for captured victors' immunity. Katniss has upheld</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her side of the bargain, and so shall we."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Enobaria smiles at Johanna. "Don't look so
smug," says Johanna. "We'll kill you anyway."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Sit down, please, Katniss," says Coin,
closing the door. I take a seat between Annie and Beetee, carefully</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">placing Snow's rose on the table. As usual, Coin gets
right to the point. "I've asked you here to settle a debate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Today we will execute Snow. In the previous weeks,
hundreds of his accomplices in the oppression of Panem</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have been tried and now await their own deaths.
However, the suffering in the districts has been so extreme that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">these measures appear insufficient to the victims. In
fact, many are calling for a complete annihilation of those</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who held Capitol citizenship. However, in the interest
of maintaining a sustainable population, we cannot afford</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Through the water in the glass, I see a distorted
image of one of Peeta's hands. The burn marks. We are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">both fire mutts now. My eyes travel up to where the
flames licked across his forehead, singeing away his brows</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but just missing his eyes. Those same blue eyes that
used to meet mine and then flit away at school. Just as they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">do now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, an alternative has been placed on the table.
Since my colleagues and I can come to no consensus, it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has been agreed that we will let the victors decide. A
majority of four will approve the plan. No one may abstain</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from the vote," says Coin. "What has been
proposed is that in lieu of eliminating the entire Capitol population,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we have a final, symbolic Hunger Games, using the
children directly related to those who held the most power."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">All seven of us turn to her. "What?" says
Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We hold another Hunger Games using Capitol
children," says Coin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Are you joking?" asks Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. I should also tell you that if we do hold
the Games, it will be known it was done with your approval,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">although the individual breakdown of your votes will
be kept secret for your own security," Coin tells us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Was this Plutarch's idea?" asks Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It was mine," says Coin. "It seemed to
balance the need for vengeance with the least loss of life. You may</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cast your votes."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No!" bursts out Peeta. "I vote no, of
course! We can't have another Hunger Games!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why not?" Johanna retorts. "It seems
very fair to me. Snow even has a granddaughter. I vote yes."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So do I," says Enobaria, almost
indifferently. "Let them have a taste of their own medicine."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"This is why we rebelled! Remember?" Peeta
looks at the rest of us. "Annie?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I vote no with Peeta," she says. "So
would Finnick if he were here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But he isn't, because Snow's mutts killed
him," Johanna reminds her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," says Beetee. "It would set a bad
precedent. We have to stop viewing one another as enemies. At this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">point, unity is essential for our survival. No."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're down to Katniss and Haymitch," says
Coin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Was it like this then? Seventy-five years or so ago?
Did a group of people sit around and cast their votes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on initiating the Hunger Games? Was there dissent? Did
someone make a case for mercy that was beaten</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down by the calls for the deaths of the districts'
children? The scent of Snow's rose curls up into my nose, down</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">into my throat, squeezing it tight with despair. All
those people I loved, dead, and we are discussing the next</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Hunger Games in an attempt to avoid wasting life.
Nothing has changed. Nothing will ever change now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I weigh my options carefully, think everything
through. Keeping my eyes on the rose, I say, "I vote yes...for</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Haymitch, it's up to you," says Coin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A furious Peeta hammers Haymitch with the atrocity he
could become party to, but I can feel Haymitch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">watching me. This is the moment, then. When we find
out exactly just how alike we are, and how much he truly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">understands me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm with the Mockingjay," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Excellent. That carries the vote," says
Coin. "Now we really must take our places for the execution."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As she passes me, I hold up the glass with the rose.
"Can you see that Snow's wearing this? Just over his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">heart?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coin smiles. "Of course. And I'll make sure he
knows about the Games."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Thank you," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">People sweep into the room, surround me. The last
touch of powder, the instructions from Plutarch as I'm</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guided to the front doors of the mansion. The City
Circle runs over, spills people down the side streets. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">others take their places outside. Guards. Officials.
Rebel leaders. Victors. I hear the cheers that indicate Coin</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has appeared on the balcony. Then Effie taps my
shoulder, and I step out into the cold winter sunlight. Walk to my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">position, accompanied by the deafening roar of the
crowd. As directed, I turn so they see me in profile, and wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When they march Snow out the door, the audience goes
insane. They secure his hands behind a post, which is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unnecessary. He's not going anywhere. There's nowhere
to go. This is not the roomy stage before the Training</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Center but the narrow terrace in front of the
president's mansion. No wonder no one bothered to have me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">practice. He's ten yards away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I feel the bow purring in my hand. Reach back and
grasp the arrow. Position it, aim at the rose, but watch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his face. He coughs and a bloody dribble runs down his
chin. His tongue flicks over his puffy lips. I search his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">eyes for the slightest sign of anything, fear,
remorse, anger. But there's only the same look of amusement that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ended our last conversation. It's as if he's speaking
the words again. <i>"Oh, my dear Miss Everdeen. I thought we</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">had agreed not to lie to each other."</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He's right. We did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The point of my arrow shifts upward. I release the
string. And President Coin collapses over the side of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">balcony and plunges to the ground. Dead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">27</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the stunned reaction that follows, I'm aware of one
sound. Snow's laughter. An awful gurgling cackle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">accompanied by an eruption of foamy blood when the coughing
begins. I see him bend forward, spewing out his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">life, until the guards block him from my sight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As the gray uniforms begin to converge on me, I think
of what my brief future as the assassin of Panem's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">new president holds. The interrogation, probable torture,
certain public execution. Having, yet again, to say my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">final goodbyes to the handful of people who still
maintain a hold on my heart. The prospect of facing my mother,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who will now be entirely alone in the world, decides
it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Good night," I whisper to the bow in my
hand and feel it go still. I raise my left arm and twist my neck down</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to rip off the pill on my sleeve. Instead my teeth
sink into flesh. I yank my head back in confusion to find myself</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">looking into Peeta's eyes, only now they hold my gaze.
Blood runs from the teeth marks on the hand he clamped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">over my nightlock. "Let me go!" I snarl at
him, trying to wrest my arm from his grasp.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I can't," he says. As they pull me away
from him, I feel the pocket ripped from my sleeve, see the deep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">violet pill fall to the ground, watch Cinna's last
gift get crunched under a guard's boot. I transform into a wild</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">animal, kicking, clawing, biting, doing whatever I can
to free myself from this web of hands as the crowd pushes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in. The guards lift me up above the fray, where I
continue to thrash as I'm conveyed over the crush of people. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">start screaming for Gale. I can't find him in the
throng, but he will know what I want. A good clean shot to end it all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Only there's no arrow, no bullet. Is it possible he can't
see me? No. Above us, on the giant screens placed around</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the City Circle, everyone can watch the whole thing
being played out. He sees, he knows, but he doesn't follow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through. Just as I didn't when he was captured. Sorry
excuses for hunters and friends. Both of us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm on my own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the mansion, they handcuff and blindfold me. I'm
half dragged, half carried down long passages, up and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down elevators, and deposited on a carpeted floor. The
cuffs are removed and a door slams closed behind me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I push the blindfold up, I find I'm in my old
room at the Training Center. The one where I lived during those</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">last precious days before my first Hunger Games and
the Quarter Quell. The bed's stripped to the mattress, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">closet gapes open, showing the emptiness inside, but
I'd know this room anywhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's a struggle to get to my feet and peel off my
Mockingjay suit. I'm badly bruised and might have a broken</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">finger or two, but it's my skin that's paid most
dearly for my struggle with the guards. The new pink stuff has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shredded like tissue paper and blood seeps through the
laboratory-grown cells. No medics show up, though,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and as I'm too far gone to care, I crawl up onto the
mattress, expecting to bleed to death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No such luck. By evening, the blood clots, leaving me
stiff and sore and sticky but alive. I limp into the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shower and program in the gentlest cycle I can
remember, free of any soaps and hair products, and squat under</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the warm spray, elbows on my knees, head in my hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My name is Katniss Everdeen. Why am I not dead? I
should be dead. It would be best for everyone if I</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">were dead....</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I step out on the mat, the hot air bakes my
damaged skin dry. There's nothing clean to put on. Not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even a towel to wrap around me. Back in the room, I
find the Mockingjay suit has disappeared. In its place is a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">paper robe. A meal has been sent up from the
mysterious kitchen with a container of my medications for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dessert. I go ahead and eat the food, take the pills,
rub the salve on my skin. I need to focus now on the manner</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of my suicide.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I curl back up on the bloodstained mattress, not cold
but feeling so naked with just the paper to cover my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tender flesh. Jumping to my death's not an option--the
window glass must be a foot thick. I can make an excellent</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">noose, but there's nothing to hang myself from. It's
possible I could hoard my pills and then knock myself off with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a lethal dose, except that I'm sure I'm being watched
round the clock. For all I know, I'm on live television at this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">very moment while commentators try to analyze what
could possibly have motivated me to kill Coin. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">surveillance makes almost any suicide attempt
impossible. Taking my life is the Capitol's privilege. Again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What I can do is give up. I resolve to lie on the bed
without eating, drinking, or taking my medications. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could do it, too. Just die. If it weren't for the
morphling withdrawal. Not bit by bit like in the hospital in 13, but cold</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">turkey. I must have been on a fairly large dose
because when the craving for it hits, accompanied by tremors,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and shooting pains, and unbearable cold, my resolve's
crushed like an eggshell. I'm on my knees, raking the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">carpet with my fingernails to find those precious
pills I flung away in a stronger moment. I revise my suicide plan</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to slow death by morphling. I will become a
yellow-skinned bag of bones, with enormous eyes. I'm a couple of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">days into the plan, making good progress, when
something unexpected happens.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I begin to sing. At the window, in the shower, in my
sleep. Hour after hour of ballads, love songs, mountain</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">airs. All the songs my father taught me before he
died, for certainly there has been very little music in my life</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">since. What's amazing is how clearly I remember them.
The tunes, the lyrics. My voice, at first rough and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">breaking on the high notes, warms up into something
splendid. A voice that would make the mockingjays fall</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">silent and then tumble over themselves to join in.
Days pass, weeks. I watch the snows fall on the ledge outside</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my window. And in all that time, mine is the only
voice I hear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What are they doing, anyway? What's the holdup out
there? How difficult can it be to arrange the execution</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of one murderous girl? I continue with my own
annihilation. My body's thinner than it's ever been and my battle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">against hunger is so fierce that sometimes the animal
part of me gives in to the temptation of buttered bread or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">roasted meat. But still, I'm winning. For a few days I
feel quite unwell and think I may finally be traveling out of this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">life, when I realize my morphling tablets are
shrinking. They are trying to slowly wean me off the stuff. But why?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Surely a drugged Mockingjay will be easier to dispose
of in front of a crowd. And then a terrible thought hits me:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What if they're not going to kill me? What if they
have more plans for me? A new way to remake, train, and use</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I won't do it. If I can't kill myself in this room, I
will take the first opportunity outside of it to finish the job. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can fatten me up. They can give me a full body polish,
dress me up, and make me beautiful again. They can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">design dream weapons that come to life in my hands,
but they will never again brainwash me into the necessity</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of using them. I no longer feel any allegiance to
these monsters called human beings, despise being one myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think that Peeta was onto something about us
destroying one another and letting some decent species take</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">over. Because something is significantly wrong with a
creature that sacrifices its children's lives to settle its</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">differences. You can spin it any way you like. Snow
thought the Hunger Games were an efficient means of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">control. Coin thought the parachutes would expedite
the war. But in the end, who does it benefit? No one. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">truth is, it benefits no one to live in a world where
these things happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After two days of my lying on my mattress with no
attempt to eat, drink, or even take a morphling tablet, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">door to my room opens. Someone crosses around the bed
into my field of vision. Haymitch. "Your trial's over," he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">says. "Come on. We're going home."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Home? What's he talking about? My home's gone. And
even if it were possible to go to this imaginary</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">place, I am too weak to move. Strangers appear.
Rehydrate and feed me. Bathe and clothe me. One lifts me like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a rag doll and carries me up to the roof, onto a
hovercraft, and fastens me into a seat. Haymitch and Plutarch sit</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">across from me. In a few moments, we're airborne.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I've never seen Plutarch in such a good mood. He's
positively glowing. "You must have a million questions!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I don't respond, he answers them anyway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After I shot Coin, there was pandemonium. When the
ruckus died down, they discovered Snow's body, still</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tethered to the post. Opinions differ on whether he
choked to death while laughing or was crushed by the crowd.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No one really cares. An emergency election was thrown
together and Paylor was voted in as president. Plutarch</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was appointed secretary of communications, which means
he sets the programming for the airwaves. The first</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">big televised event was my trial, in which he was also
a star witness. In my defense, of course. Although most of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the credit for my exoneration must be given to Dr.
Aurelius, who apparently earned his naps by presenting me as</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a hopeless, shell-shocked lunatic. One condition for
my release is that I'll continue under his care, although it will</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have to be by phone because he'd never live in a
forsaken place like 12, and I'm confined there until further</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">notice. The truth is, no one quite knows what to do
with me now that the war's over, although if another one should</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spring up, Plutarch's sure they could find a role for
me. Then Plutarch has a good laugh. It never seems to bother</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him when no one else appreciates his jokes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Are you preparing for another war,
Plutarch?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, not now. Now we're in that sweet period
where everyone agrees that our recent horrors should never</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be repeated," he says. "But collective
thinking is usually short-lived. We're fickle, stupid beings with poor</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">memories and a great gift for self-destruction.
Although who knows? Maybe this will be it, Katniss."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The time it sticks. Maybe we are witnessing the
evolution of the human race. Think about that." And then</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he asks me if I'd like to perform on a new singing
program he's launching in a few weeks. Something upbeat</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">would be good. He'll send the crew to my house.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We land briefly in District 3 to drop off Plutarch.
He's meeting with Beetee to update the technology on the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">broadcast system. His parting words to me are
"Don't be a stranger."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When we're back among the clouds, I look at Haymitch.
"So why are you going back to Twelve?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They can't seem to find a place for me in the
Capitol either," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At first, I don't question this. But doubts begin to
creep in. Haymitch hasn't assassinated anyone. He could</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">go anywhere. If he's coming back to 12, it's because
he's been ordered to. "You have to look after me, don't you?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As my mentor?" He shrugs. Then I realize what it
means. "My mother's not coming back."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," he says. He pulls an envelope from his
jacket pocket and hands it to me. I examine the delicate,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">perfectly formed writing. "She's helping to start
up a hospital in District Four. She wants you to call as soon as we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">get in." My finger traces the graceful swoop of
the letters. "You know why she can't come back." Yes, I know why.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Because between my father and Prim and the ashes, the
place is too painful to bear. But apparently not for me.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Do you want to know who else won't be
there?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I say. "I want to be
surprised."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Like a good mentor, Haymitch makes me eat a sandwich
and then pretends he believes I'm asleep for the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rest of the trip. He busies himself going through
every compartment on the hovercraft, finding the liquor, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stowing it in his bag. It's night when we land on the
green of the Victor's Village. Half of the houses have lights in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the windows, including Haymitch's and mine. Not
Peeta's. Someone has built a fire in my kitchen. I sit in the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rocker before it, clutching my mother's letter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, see you tomorrow," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As the clinking of his bag of liquor bottles fades
away, I whisper, "I doubt it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I am unable to move from the chair. The rest of the
house looms cold and empty and dark. I pull an old</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shawl over my body and watch the flames. I guess I
sleep, because the next thing I know, it's morning and Greasy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Sae's banging around at the stove. She makes me eggs
and toast and sits there until I've eaten it all. We don't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">talk much. Her little granddaughter, the one who lives
in her own world, takes a bright blue ball of yarn from my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother's knitting basket. Greasy Sae tells her to put
it back, but I say she can have it. No one in this house can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knit anymore. After breakfast, Greasy Sae does the
dishes and leaves, but she comes back up at dinnertime to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">make me eat again. I don't know if she's just being
neighborly or if she's on the government's payroll, but she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shows up twice every day. She cooks, I consume. I try
to figure out my next move. There's no obstacle now to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">taking my life. But I seem to be waiting for
something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Sometimes the phone rings and rings and rings, but I
don't pick it up. Haymitch never visits. Maybe he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">changed his mind and left, although I suspect he's
just drunk. No one comes but Greasy Sae and her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">granddaughter. After months of solitary confinement,
they seem like a crowd.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Spring's in the air today. You ought to get
out," she says. "Go hunting."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I haven't left the house. I haven't even left the
kitchen except to go to the small bathroom a few steps off of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm in the same clothes I left the Capitol in. What I
do is sit by the fire. Stare at the unopened letters piling up on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the mantel. "I don't have a bow."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Check down the hall," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After she leaves, I consider a trip down the hall.
Rule it out. But after several hours, I go anyway, walking in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">silent sock feet, so as not to awaken the ghosts. In
the study, where I had my tea with President Snow, I find a box</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with my father's hunting jacket, our plant book, my
parents' wedding photo, the spile Haymitch sent in, and the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">locket Peeta gave me in the clock arena. The two bows
and a sheath of arrows Gale rescued on the night of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">firebombing lie on the desk. I put on the hunting
jacket and leave the rest of the stuff untouched. I fall asleep on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the sofa in the formal living room. A terrible
nightmare follows, where I'm lying at the bottom of a deep grave, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">every dead person I know by name comes by and throws a
shovel full of ashes on me. It's quite a long dream,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">considering the list of people, and the deeper I'm
buried, the harder it is to breathe. I try to call out, begging them</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to stop, but the ashes fill my mouth and nose and I
can't make any sound. Still the shovel scrapes on and on and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on....</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wake with a start. Pale morning light comes around
the edges of the shutters. The scraping of the shovel</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">continues. Still half in the nightmare, I run down the
hall, out the front door, and around the side of the house,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">because now I'm pretty sure I can scream at the dead.
When I see him, I pull up short. His face is flushed from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">digging up the ground under the windows. In a
wheelbarrow are five scraggly bushes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You're back," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Dr. Aurelius wouldn't let me leave the Capitol
until yesterday," Peeta says. "By the way, he said to tell you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he can't keep pretending he's treating you forever.
You have to pick up the phone."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He looks well. Thin and covered with burn scars like
me, but his eyes have lost that clouded, tortured look.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He's frowning slightly, though, as he takes me in. I
make a halfhearted effort to push my hair out of my eyes and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">realize it's matted into clumps. I feel defensive.
"What are you doing?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I went to the woods this morning and dug these
up. For her," he says. "I thought we could plant them along</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the side of the house."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I look at the bushes, the clods of dirt hanging from
their roots, and catch my breath as the word <i>rose</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">registers. I'm about to yell vicious things at Peeta
when the full name comes to me. Not plain rose but evening</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">primrose. The flower my sister was named for. I give
Peeta a nod of assent and hurry back into the house,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">locking the door behind me. But the evil thing is
inside, not out. Trembling with weakness and anxiety, I run up the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stairs. My foot catches on the last step and I crash
onto the floor. I force myself to rise and enter my room. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">smell's very faint but still laces the air. It's
there. The white rose among the dried flowers in the vase. Shriveled</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and fragile, but holding on to that unnatural
perfection cultivated in Snow's greenhouse. I grab the vase, stumble</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down to the kitchen, and throw its contents into the
embers. As the flowers flare up, a burst of blue flame</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">envelops the rose and devours it. Fire beats roses
again. I smash the vase on the floor for good measure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Back upstairs, I throw open the bedroom windows to
clear out the rest of Snow's stench. But it still lingers,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on my clothes and in my pores. I strip, and flakes of
skin the size of playing cards cling to the garments. Avoiding</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the mirror, I step into the shower and scrub the roses
from my hair, my body, my mouth. Bright pink and tingling, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">find something clean to wear. It takes half an hour to
comb out my hair. Greasy Sae unlocks the front door. While</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she makes breakfast, I feed the clothes I had shed to
the fire. At her suggestion, I pare off my nails with a knife.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Over the eggs, I ask her, "Where did Gale
go?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"District Two. Got some fancy job there. I see
him now and again on the television," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I dig around inside myself, trying to register anger,
hatred, longing. I find only relief.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm going hunting today," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, I wouldn't mind some fresh game at
that," she answers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I arm myself with a bow and arrows and head out,
intending to exit 12 through the Meadow. Near the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">square are teams of masked and gloved people with
horse-drawn carts. Sifting through what lay under the snow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this winter. Gathering remains. A cart's parked in
front of the mayor's house. I recognize Thom, Gale's old</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crewmate, pausing a moment to wipe the sweat from his
face with a rag. I remember seeing him in 13, but he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">must have come back. His greeting gives me the courage
to ask, "Did they find anyone in there?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Whole family. And the two people who worked for
them," Thom tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Madge. Quiet and kind and brave. The girl who gave me
the pin that gave me a name. I swallow hard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Wonder if she'll be joining the cast of my nightmares
tonight. Shoveling the ashes into my mouth. "I thought</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">maybe, since he was the mayor..."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't think being the mayor of Twelve put the
odds in his favor," says Thom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I nod and keep moving, careful not to look in the back
of the cart. All through the town and the Seam, it's the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">same. The reaping of the dead. As I near the ruins of
my old house, the road becomes thick with carts. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Meadow's gone, or at least dramatically altered. A
deep pit has been dug, and they're lining it with bones, a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mass grave for my people. I skirt around the hole and
enter the woods at my usual place. It doesn't matter,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">though. The fence isn't charged anymore and has been
propped up with long branches to keep out the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">predators. But old habits die hard. I think about
going to the lake, but I'm so weak that I barely make it to my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">meeting place with Gale. I sit on the rock where
Cressida filmed us, but it's too wide without his body beside me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Several times I close my eyes and count to ten,
thinking that when I open them, he will have materialized without</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a sound as he so often did. I have to remind myself
that Gale's in 2 with a fancy job, probably kissing another pair</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of lips.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It is the old Katniss's favorite kind of day. Early
spring. The woods awakening after the long winter. But the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spurt of energy that began with the primroses fades
away. By the time I make it back to the fence, I'm so sick and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dizzy, Thom has to give me a ride home in the dead
people's cart. Help me to the sofa in the living room, where I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">watch the dust motes spin in the thin shafts of afternoon
light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My head snaps around at the hiss, but it takes awhile
to believe he's real. How could he have gotten here? I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">take in the claw marks from some wild animal, the back
paw he holds slightly above the ground, the prominent</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bones in his face. He's come on foot, then, all the
way from 13. Maybe they kicked him out or maybe he just</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bones in his face. He's come on foot, then, all the
way from 13. Maybe they kicked him out or maybe he just</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">couldn't stand it there without her, so he came
looking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It was the waste of a trip. She's not
here," I tell him. Buttercup hisses again. "She's not here. You can
hiss</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all you like. You won't find Prim." At her name,
he perks up. Raises his flattened ears. Begins to meow hopefully.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Get out!" He dodges the pillow I throw at
him. "Go away! There's nothing left for you here!" I start to shake,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">furious with him. "She's not coming back! She's
never ever coming back here again!" I grab another pillow and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">get to my feet to improve my aim. Out of nowhere, the
tears begin to pour down my cheeks. "She's dead." I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clutch my middle to dull the pain. Sink down on my
heels, rocking the pillow, crying. "She's dead, you stupid cat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She's dead." A new sound, part crying, part
singing, comes out of my body, giving voice to my despair. Buttercup</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">begins to wail as well. No matter what I do, he won't
go. He circles me, just out of reach, as wave after wave of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sobs racks my body, until eventually I fall
unconscious. But he must understand. He must know that the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unthinkable has happened and to survive will require
previously unthinkable acts. Because hours later, when I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">come to in my bed, he's there in the moonlight.
Crouched beside me, yellow eyes alert, guarding me from the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the morning, he sits stoically as I clean the cuts,
but digging the thorn from his paw brings on a round of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">those kitten mews. We both end up crying again, only
this time we comfort each other. On the strength of this, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">open the letter Haymitch gave me from my mother, dial
the phone number, and weep with her as well. Peeta,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bearing a warm loaf of bread, shows up with Greasy
Sae. She makes us breakfast and I feed all my bacon to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Slowly, with many lost days, I come back to life. I
try to follow Dr. Aurelius's advice, just going through the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">motions, amazed when one finally has meaning again. I
tell him my idea about the book, and a large box of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">parchment sheets arrives on the next train from the
Capitol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I got the idea from our family's plant book. The place
where we recorded those things you cannot trust to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">memory. The page begins with the person's picture. A
photo if we can find it. If not, a sketch or painting by Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then, in my most careful handwriting, come all the
details it would be a crime to forget. Lady licking Prim's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cheek. My father's laugh. Peeta's father with the
cookies. The color of Finnick's eyes. What Cinna could do with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a length of silk. Boggs reprogramming the Holo. Rue
poised on her toes, arms slightly extended, like a bird</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about to take flight. On and on. We seal the pages with
salt water and promises to live well to make their deaths</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">count. Haymitch finally joins us, contributing
twenty-three years of tributes he was forced to mentor. Additions</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">become smaller. An old memory that surfaces. A late
primrose preserved between the pages. Strange bits of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happiness, like the photo of Finnick and Annie's
newborn son.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We learn to keep busy again. Peeta bakes. I hunt.
Haymitch drinks until the liquor runs out, and then raises</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">geese until the next train arrives. Fortunately, the
geese can take pretty good care of themselves. We're not</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alone. A few hundred others return because, whatever
has happened, this is our home. With the mines closed,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they plow the ashes into the earth and plant food.
Machines from the Capitol break ground for a new factory</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">where we will make medicines. Although no one seeds
it, the Meadow turns green again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta and I grow back together. There are still
moments when he clutches the back of a chair and hangs</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on until the flashbacks are over. I wake screaming
from nightmares of mutts and lost children. But his arms are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there to comfort me. And eventually his lips. On the
night I feel that thing again, the hunger that overtook me on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the beach, I know this would have happened anyway.
That what I need to survive is not Gale's fire, kindled with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rage and hatred. I have plenty of fire myself. What I
need is the dandelion in the spring. The bright yellow that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">means rebirth instead of destruction. The promise that
life can go on, no matter how bad our losses. That it can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be good again. And only Peeta can give me that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So after, when he whispers, "You love me. Real or
not real?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I tell him, "Real."</span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">EPILOGUE</span></b></div>
<br />
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the
dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his
chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first
felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but not much.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The questions are just beginning. The arenas have been
completely destroyed, the memorials built, there</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are no more Hunger Games. But they teach about them at
school, and the girl knows we played a role in them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The boy will know in a few years. How can I tell them
about that world without frightening them to death? My</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">children, who take the words of the song for granted:</span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Deep in the meadow, under the willow</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A bed of grass, a soft green pillow</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Lay down your head, and close your sleepy eyes</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And when again they open, the sun will rise.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Here it's safe, here it's warm</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Here the daisies guard you from every harm</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Here is the place where I love you.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My children, who don't know they play on a graveyard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta says it will be okay. We have each other. And
the book. We can make them understand in a way that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will make them braver. But one day I'll have to
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">really go away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'll tell them how I survive it. I'll tell them that
on bad mornings, it feels impossible to take pleasure in anything</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">because I'm afraid it could be taken away. That's when
I make a list in my head of every act of goodness I've</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seen someone do. It's like a game. Repetitive. Even a
little tedious after more than twenty years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But there are much worse games to play.</span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">THE END</span></b></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-30947751454986777152014-02-26T06:15:00.000-08:002015-06-23T06:39:09.412-07:00(5/6) MOCKINGJAY PART III "THE ASSASIN" : READ IT ONLINE - LEELO EN INGLÉS ONLINE♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/16-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">[Click acá para ir a la parte 1/6]</span></a><br />
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<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/46-mockingjay-part-ii-assault-read-it.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">[Click acá para ir a la parte 4/6]</span></a><br />
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">PART III</span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"THE ASSASSIN"</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">19</span></b></div>
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sprawling tent encampment until our squad is far</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">behind us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"He'll try and kill me anyway," I say.
"Especially here. Where there are so many bad memories to set him</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">off."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'll keep him contained, Katniss," says
Boggs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why does Coin want me dead now?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She denies she does," he answers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But we know it's true," I say. "And
you must at least have a theory."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs gives me a long, hard look before he answers.
"Here's as much as I know. The president doesn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">like you. She never did. It was Peeta she wanted
rescued from the arena, but no one else agreed. It made</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">matters worse when you forced her to give the other
victors immunity. But even that could be overlooked in view</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of how well you've performed."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Then what is it?" I insist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Sometime in the near future, this war will be
resolved. A new leader will be chosen," says Boggs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I roll my eyes. "Boggs, no one thinks I'm going
to be the leader."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. They don't," he agrees. "But
you'll throw support to someone. Would it be President Coin? Or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">someone else?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know. I've never thought about it,"
I say.</span></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If your immediate answer isn't Coin, then you're
a threat. You're the face of the rebellion. You may have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">more influence than any other single person,"
says Boggs. "Outwardly, the most you've ever done is tolerated</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So she'll kill me to shut me up." The
minute I say the words, I know they're true.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She doesn't need you as a rallying point now. As
she said, your primary objective, to unite the districts, has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">succeeded," Boggs reminds me. "These current
propos could be done without you. There's only one last thing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you could do to add fire to the rebellion."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Die," I say quietly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes. Give us a martyr to fight for," says
Boggs. "But that's not going to happen under my watch, Soldier</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everdeen. I'm planning for you to have a long
life."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why?" This kind of thinking will only bring
him trouble. "You don't owe me anything."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Because you've earned it," he says.
"Now get back to your squad."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know I should feel appreciative of Boggs sticking his
neck out for me, but really I'm just frustrated. I mean,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how can I steal his Holo and desert now? Betraying him
was complicated enough without this whole new layer of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">debt. I already owe him for saving my life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Seeing the cause of my current dilemma calmly pitching
his tent back at our site makes me furious. "What</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">time is my watch?" I ask Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She squints at me in doubt, or maybe she's just trying
to get my face in focus. "I didn't put you in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rotation."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why not?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm not sure you could really shoot Peeta, if it
came to it," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I speak up so the whole squad can hear me clearly.
"I wouldn't be shooting Peeta. He's gone. Johanna's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">right. It'd be just like shooting another of the
Capitol's mutts." It feels good to say something horrible about him,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out loud, in public, after all the humiliation I've
felt since his return.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, that sort of comment isn't recommending
you either," says Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Put her in the rotation," I hear Boggs say
behind me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Jackson shakes her head and makes a note.
"Midnight to four. You're on with me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Jackson shakes her head and makes a note.
"Midnight to four. You're on with me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The dinner whistle sounds, and Gale and I line up at
the canteen. "Do you want me to kill him?" he asks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bluntly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That'll get us both sent back for sure," I
say. But even though I'm furious, the brutality of the offer rattles me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I can deal with him."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You mean until you take off? You and your paper
map and possibly a Holo if you can get your hands on it?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So Gale has not missed my preparations. I hope they
haven't been so obvious to the others. None of them know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my mind like he does, though. "You're not
planning on leaving me behind, are you?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Up until this point, I was. But having my hunting
partner to watch my back doesn't sound like a bad idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"As your fellow soldier, I have to strongly
recommend you stay with your squad. But I can't stop you from coming,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can I?" He grins. "No. Not unless you want
me to alert the rest of the army."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Squad 451 and the television crew collect dinner from
the canteen and gather in a tense circle to eat. At</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">first I think that Peeta is the cause of the unease,
but by the end of the meal, I realize more than a few unfriendly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">looks have been directed my way. This is a quick
turnaround, since I'm pretty sure when Peeta appeared the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whole team was concerned about how dangerous he might
be, especially to me. But it's not until I get a phone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">call through to Haymitch that I understand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What are you trying to do? Provoke him into an
attack?" he asks me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Of course not. I just want him to leave me
alone," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, he can't. Not after what the Capitol put
him through," says Haymitch. "Look, Coin may have sent him</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there hoping he'd kill you, but Peeta doesn't know
that. He doesn't understand what's happened to him. So you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can't blame him--"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't!" I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You do! You're punishing him over and over for
things that are out of his control. Now, I'm not saying you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shouldn't have a fully loaded weapon next to you round
the clock. But I think it's time you flipped this little scenario</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">around in your head. If you'd been taken by the
Capitol, and hijacked, and then tried to kill Peeta, is this the way</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he would be treating you?" demands Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I fall silent. It isn't. It isn't how he would be
treating me at all. He would be trying to get me back at any cost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Not shutting me out, abandoning me, greeting me with
hostility at every turn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You and me, we made a deal to try and save him.
Remember?" Haymitch says. When I don't respond, he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">disconnects after a curt "Try and remember."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The autumn day turns from brisk to cold. Most of the
squad hunker down in their sleeping bags. Some</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sleep under the open sky, close to the heater in the
center of our camp, while others retreat to their tents. Leeg 1</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has finally broken down over her sister's death, and
her muffled sobs reach us through the canvas. I huddle in my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tent, thinking over Haymitch's words. Realizing with
shame that my fixation with assassinating Snow has allowed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me to ignore a much more difficult problem. Trying to
rescue Peeta from the shadowy world the hijacking has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stranded him in. I don't know how to find him, let
alone lead him out. I can't even conceive of a plan. It makes the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">task of crossing a loaded arena, locating Snow, and
putting a bullet through his head look like child's play.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At midnight, I crawl out of my tent and position
myself on a camp stool near the heater to take my watch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with Jackson. Boggs told Peeta to sleep out in full
view where the rest of us could keep an eye on him. He isn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sleeping, though. Instead, he sits with his bag pulled
up to his chest, clumsily trying to make knots in a short</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">length of rope. I know it well. It's the one Finnick
lent me that night in the bunker. Seeing it in his hands, it's like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick's echoing what Haymitch just said, that I've
cast off Peeta. Now might be a good time to begin to remedy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that. If I could think of something to say. But I
can't. So I don't. I just let the sounds of soldiers' breathing fill the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After about an hour, Peeta speaks up. "These last
couple of years must have been exhausting for you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Trying to decide whether to kill me or not. Back and
forth. Back and forth."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That seems grossly unfair, and my first impulse is to
say something cutting. But I revisit my conversation</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with Haymitch and try to take the first tentative step
in Peeta's direction. "I never wanted to kill you. Except when I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thought you were helping the Careers kill me. After
that, I always thought of you as...an ally." That's a good safe</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">word. Empty of any emotional obligation, but
nonthreatening.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Ally." Peeta says the word slowly, tasting
it. "Friend. Lover. Victor. Enemy. Fiancee. Target. Mutt. Neighbor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Hunter. Tribute. Ally. I'll add it to the list of
words I use to try to figure you out." He weaves the rope in and out of
his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fingers. "The problem is, I can't tell what's
real anymore, and what's made up."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The cessation of rhythmic breathing suggests that
either people have woken or have never really been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">asleep at all. I suspect the latter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick's voice rises from a bundle in the shadows.
"Then you should ask, Peeta. That's what Annie does."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Ask who?" Peeta says. "Who can I
trust?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, us for starters. We're your squad,"
says Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You're my guards," he points out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That, too," she says. "But you saved a
lot of lives in Thirteen. It's not the kind of thing we forget."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the quiet that follows, I try to imagine not being
able to tell illusion from reality. Not knowing if Prim or my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother loved me. If Snow was my enemy. If the person
across the heater saved or sacrificed me. With very little</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">effort, my life rapidly morphs into a nightmare. I
suddenly want to tell Peeta everything about who he is, and who I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">am, and how we ended up here. But I don't know how to
start. Worthless. I'm worthless.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At a few minutes before four, Peeta turns to me again.
"Your favorite color...it's green?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's right." Then I think of something to
add. "And yours is orange."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Orange?" He seems unconvinced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not bright orange. But soft. Like the
sunset," I say. "At least, that's what you told me once."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh." He closes his eyes briefly, maybe
trying to conjure up that sunset, then nods his head. "Thank you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But more words tumble out. "You're a painter.
You're a baker. You like to sleep with the windows open. You</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">never take sugar in your tea. And you always
double-knot your shoelaces."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then I dive into my tent before I do something stupid
like cry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the morning, Gale, Finnick, and I go out to shoot
some glass off the buildings for the camera crew. When</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we get back to camp, Peeta's sitting in a circle with
the soldiers from 13, who are armed but talking openly with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him. Jackson has devised a game called "Real or
Not Real" to help Peeta. He mentions something he thinks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">happened, and they tell him if it's true or imagined,
usually followed by a brief explanation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Most of the people from Twelve were killed in
the fire."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real. Less than nine hundred of you made it to
Thirteen alive."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The fire was my fault."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not real. President Snow destroyed Twelve the
way he did Thirteen, to send a message to the rebels."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This seems like a good idea until I realize that I'll
be the only one who can confirm or deny most of what</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">weighs on him. Jackson breaks us up into watches. She
matches up Finnick, Gale, and me each with a soldier</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from 13. This way Peeta will always have access to
someone who knows him more personally. It's not a steady</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">conversation. Peeta spends a long time considering
even small pieces of information, like where people bought</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">their soap back home. Gale fills him in on a lot of
stuff about 12; Finnick is the expert on both of Peeta's Games,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as he was a mentor in the first and a tribute in the
second. But since Peeta's greatest confusion centers around</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me--and not everything can be explained simply--our
exchanges are painful and loaded, even though we touch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on only the most superficial of details. The color of
my dress in 7. My preference for cheese buns. The name of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our math teacher when we were little. Reconstructing
his memory of me is excruciating. Perhaps it isn't even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">possible after what Snow did to him. But it does feel
right to help him try.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The next afternoon, we're notified that the whole
squad is needed to stage a fairly complicated propo.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's been right about one thing: Coin and Plutarch
are unhappy with the quality of footage they're getting from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Star Squad. Very dull. Very uninspiring. The
obvious response is that they never let us do anything but playact</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with our guns. However, this is not about defending
ourselves, it's about coming up with a usable product. So</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">today, a special block has been set aside for filming.
It even has a couple of active pods on it. One unleashes a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spray of gunfire. The other nets the invader and traps
them for either interrogation or execution, depending on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the captors' preference. But it's still an unimportant
residential block with nothing of strategic consequence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The television crew means to provide a sense of
heightened jeopardy by releasing smoke bombs and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">adding gunfire sound effects. We suit up in heavy
protective gear, even the crew, as if we're heading into the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">heart of battle. Those of us with specialty weapons
are allowed to take them along with our guns. Boggs gives</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta back his gun, too, although he makes sure to
tell him in a loud voice that it's only loaded with blanks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta just shrugs. "I'm not much of a shot
anyway." He seems preoccupied with watching Pollux, to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">point where it's getting a little worrisome, when he
finally puzzles it out and begins to speak with agitation. "You're</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">an Avox, aren't you? I can tell by the way you
swallow. There were two Avoxes with me in prison. Darius and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Lavinia, but the guards mostly called them the
redheads. They'd been our servants in the Training Center, so they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrested them, too. I watched them being tortured to
death. She was lucky. They used too much voltage and her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">heart stopped right off. It took days to finish him
off. Beating, cutting off parts. They kept asking him questions,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but he couldn't speak, he just made these horrible
animal sounds. They didn't want information, you know? They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wanted me to see it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta looks around at our stunned faces, as if waiting
for a reply. When none is forthcoming, he asks,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real or not real?" The lack of response
upsets him more. "Real or not real?!" he demands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real," says Boggs. "At least, to the
best of my knowledge...real."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta sags. "I thought so. There was
nothing...shiny about it." He wanders away from the group, muttering</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something about fingers and toes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I move to Gale, press my forehead into the body armor
where his chest should be, feel his arm tighten</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">around me. We finally know the name of the girl who we
watched the Capitol abduct from the woods of 12, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fate of the Peacekeeper friend who tried to keep Gale
alive. This is no time to call up happy moments of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">remembrance. They lost their lives because of me. I
add them to my personal list of kills that began in the arena</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and now includes thousands. When I look up, I see it
has taken Gale differently. His expression says that there</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are not enough mountains to crush, enough cities to
destroy. It promises death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">With Peeta's grisly account fresh in our minds, we
crunch through the streets of broken glass until we reach</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our target, the block we are to take. It is a real, if
small, goal to accomplish. We gather around Boggs to examine</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Holo projection of the street. The gunfire pod is
positioned about a third of the way down, just above an</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">apartment awning. We should be able to trigger it with
bullets. The net pod is at the far end, almost the next</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">corner. This will require someone to set off the body
sensor mechanism. Everyone volunteers except Peeta, who</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't seem to know quite what's going on. I don't
get picked. I get sent to Messalla, who dabs some makeup</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on my face for the anticipated close-ups.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The squad positions itself under Boggs's direction,
and then we have to wait for Cressida to get the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cameramen in place as well. They're both to our left,
with Castor toward the front and Pollux bringing up the rear</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so they'll be sure not to record each other. Messalla
sets off a couple of smoke charges for atmosphere. Since</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this is both a mission and a shoot, I'm about to ask
who's in charge, my commander or my director, when</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida calls, "Action!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We slowly proceed down the hazy street, just like one
of our exercises in the Block. Everyone has at least</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one section of windows to blow out, but Gale's
assigned the real target. When he hits the pod, we take cover--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ducking into doorways or flattening onto the pretty,
light orange and pink paving stones--as a hail of bullets</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sweeps back and forth over our heads. After a while,
Boggs orders us forward.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida stops us before we can rise, since she needs
some close-up shots. We take turns reenacting our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">responses. Falling to the ground, grimacing, diving
into alcoves. We know it's supposed to be serious business,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but the whole thing feels a little ridiculous.
Especially when it turns out that I'm not the worst actor in the squad.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Not by a long shot. We're all laughing so hard at
Mitchell's attempt to project his idea of desperation, which</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">involves teeth grinding and nostrils flaring, that
Boggs has to reprimand us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Pull it together, Four-Five-One," he says
firmly. But you can see him suppressing a smile as he's doublechecking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the next pod. Positioning the Holo to find the best
light in the smoky air. Still facing us as his left foot</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">steps back onto the orange paving stone. Triggering
the bomb that blows off his legs.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">20</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's as if in an instant, a painted window shatters,
revealing the ugly world behind it. Laughter changes to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">screams, blood stains pastel stones, real smoke
darkens the special effect stuff made for television.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A second explosion seems to split the air and leaves
my ears ringing. But I can't make out where it came</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I reach Boggs first, try to make sense of the torn
flesh, missing limbs, to find something to stem the red flow</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from his body. Homes pushes me aside, wrenching open a
first-aid kit. Boggs clutches my wrist. His face, gray</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with dying and ash, seems to be receding. But his next
words are an order. "The Holo."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Holo. I scramble around, digging through chunks of
tile slick with blood, shuddering when I encounter</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bits of warm flesh. Find it rammed into a stairwell
with one of Boggs's boots. Retrieve it, wiping it clean with bare</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hands as I return it to my commander.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Homes has the stump of Boggs's left thigh cupped by
some sort of compression bandage, but it's already</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">soaked through. He's trying to tourniquet the other
above the existing knee. The rest of the squad has gathered</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in a protective formation around the crew and us.
Finnick's attempting to revive Messalla, who was thrown into a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wall by the explosion. Jackson's barking into a field
communicator, trying unsuccessfully to alert the camp to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">send medics, but I know it's too late. As a child,
watching my mother work, I learned that once a pool of blood has</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">reached a certain size, there's no going back.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I kneel beside Boggs, prepared to repeat the role I
played with Rue, with the morphling from 6, giving him</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">someone to hold on to as he's released from life. But
Boggs has both hands working the Holo. He's typing in a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">command, pressing his thumb to the screen for print
recognition, speaking a string of letters and numbers in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">response to a prompt. A green shaft of light bursts
out of the Holo and illuminates his face. He says, "Unfit for</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">command. Transfer of prime security clearance to Squad
Four-Five-One Soldier Katniss Everdeen." It's all he</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can do to turn the Holo toward my face. "Say your
name."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss Everdeen," I say into the green
shaft. Suddenly, it has me trapped in its light. I can't move or even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blink as images flicker rapidly before me. Scanning
me? Recording me? Blinding me? It vanishes, and I shake</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my head to clear it. "What did you do?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Prepare to retreat!" Jackson hollers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick's yelling something back, gesturing to the end
of the block where we entered. Black, oily matter</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spouts like a geyser from the street, billowing
between the buildings, creating an impenetrable wall of darkness.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It seems to be neither liquid nor gas, mechanical nor
natural. Surely it's lethal. There's no heading back the way</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we came.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Deafening gunfire as Gale and Leeg 1 begin to blast a
path across the stones toward the far end of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">block. I don't know what they're doing until another
bomb, ten yards away, detonates, opening a hole in the street.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then I realize this is a rudimentary attempt at
minesweeping. Homes and I latch on to Boggs and begin to drag</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him after Gale. Agony takes over and he's crying out
in pain and I want to stop, to find a better way, but the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blackness is rising above the buildings, swelling,
rolling at us like a wave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm yanked backward, lose my grip on Boggs, slam into
the stones. Peeta looks down at me, gone, mad,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flashing back into the land of the hijacked, his gun
raised over me, descending to crush my skull. I roll, hear the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">butt slam into the street, catch the tumble of bodies
out of the corner of my eye as Mitchell tackles Peeta and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pins him to the ground. But Peeta, always so powerful
and now fueled by tracker jacker insanity, gets his feet</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">under Mitchell's belly and launches him farther down
the block.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a loud snap of a trap as the pod triggers.
Four cables, attached to tracks on the buildings, break</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through the stones, dragging up the net that encases
Mitchell. It makes no sense--how instantly bloodied he is--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">until we see the barbs sticking from the wire that
encases him. I know it immediately. It decorated the top of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fence around 12. As I call to him not to move, I gag
on the smell of the blackness, thick, tarlike. The wave has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crested and begun to fall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale and Leeg 1 shoot through the front door lock of
the corner building, then begin to fire at the cables</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">holding Mitchell's net. Others are restraining Peeta
now. I lunge back to Boggs, and Homes and I drag him inside</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the apartment, through someone's pink and white velvet
living room, down a hallway hung with family photos,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the apartment, through someone's pink and white velvet
living room, down a hallway hung with family photos,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">onto the marble floor of a kitchen, where we collapse.
Castor and Pollux carry in a writhing Peeta between them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Somehow Jackson gets cuffs on him, but it only makes
him wilder and they're forced to lock him in a closet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the living room, the front door slams, people
shout. Then footsteps pound down the hall as the black</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wave roars past the building. From the kitchen, we can
hear the windows groan, shatter. The noxious tar smell</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">permeates the air. Finnick carries in Messalla. Leeg 1
and Cressida stumble into the room after them, coughing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Gale!" I shriek.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He's there, slamming the kitchen door shut behind him,
choking out one word. "Fumes!" Castor and Pollux</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">grab towels, aprons to stuff in the cracks as Gale
retches into a bright yellow sink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Mitchell?" asks Homes. Leeg 1 just shakes
her head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs forces the Holo into my hand. His lips are
moving, but I can't make out what he's saying. I lean my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ear down to his mouth to catch his harsh whisper.
"Don't trust them. Don't go back. Kill Peeta. Do what you came</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to do."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I draw back so I can see his face. "What? Boggs?
Boggs?" His eyes are still open, but dead. Pressed in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my hand, glued to it by his blood, is the Holo.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's feet slamming into the closet door break up
the ragged breathing of the others. But even as we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">listen, his energy seems to ebb. The kicks diminish to
an irregular drumming. Then nothing. I wonder if he, too, is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"He's gone?" Finnick asks, looking down at
Boggs. I nod. "We need to get out of here. Now. We just set off</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a streetful of pods. You can bet they've got us on
surveillance tapes."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Count on it," says Castor. "All the
streets are covered by surveillance cameras. I bet they set off the black</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wave manually when they saw us taping the propo."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Our radio communicators went dead almost
immediately. Probably an electromagnetic pulse device. But</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'll get us back to camp. Give me the Holo."
Jackson reaches for the unit, but I clutch it to my chest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. Boggs gave it to me," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't be ridiculous," she snaps. Of course,
she thinks it's hers. She's second in command.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's true," says Homes. "He
transferred the prime security clearance to her while he was dying. I saw
it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why would he do that?" demands Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Why indeed? My head's reeling from the ghastly events
of the last five minutes--Boggs mutilated, dying,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dead, Peeta's homicidal rage, Mitchell bloody and
netted and swallowed by that foul black wave. I turn to Boggs,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">very badly needing him alive. Suddenly sure that he,
and maybe he alone, is completely on my side. I think of his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">last orders....</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't trust them. Don't go back. Kill Peeta. Do
what you came to do."</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What did he mean? Don't trust who? The rebels? Coin?
The people looking at me right now? I won't go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back, but he must know I can't just fire a bullet
through Peeta's head. Can I? Should I? Did Boggs guess that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what I really came to do is desert and kill Snow on my
own?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I can't work all of this out now, so I just decide to
carry out the first two orders: to not trust anyone and to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">move deeper into the Capitol. But how can I justify
this? Make them let me keep the Holo?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Because I'm on a special mission for President
Coin. I think Boggs was the only one who knew about it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This in no way convinces Jackson. "To do
what?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Why not tell them the truth? It's as plausible as
anything I'll come up with. But it must seem like a real</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mission, not revenge. "To assassinate President
Snow before the loss of life from this war makes our population</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unsustainable."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't believe you," says Jackson.
"As your current commander, I order you to transfer the prime security</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clearance over to me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I say. "That would be in direct
violation of President Coin's orders."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Guns are pointed. Half the squad at Jackson, half at
me. Someone's about to die, when Cressida speaks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up. "It's true. That's why we're here. Plutarch
wants it televised. He thinks if we can film the Mockingjay</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assassinating Snow, it will end the war."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This gives even Jackson pause. Then she gestures with
her gun toward the closet. "And why is he here?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There she has me. I can think of no sane reason that
Coin would send an unstable boy, programmed to kill</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me, along on such a key assignment. It really weakens
my story. Cressida comes to my aid again. "Because the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">two post-Games interviews with Caesar Flickerman were
shot in President Snow's personal quarters. Plutarch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thinks Peeta may be of some use as a guide in a
location we have little knowledge of."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I want to ask Cressida why she's lying for me, why
she's fighting for us to go on with my self-appointed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mission. Now's not the time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We have to go!" says Gale. "I'm
following Katniss. If you don't want to, head back to camp. But let's
move!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Homes unlocks the closet and heaves an unconscious
Peeta over his shoulder. "Ready."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Boggs?" says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We can't take him. He'd understand," says
Finnick. He frees Boggs's gun from his shoulder and slings the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">strap over his own. "Lead on, Soldier
Everdeen."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't know how to lead on. I look at the Holo for
direction. It's still activated, but it might as well be dead for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all the good that does me. There's no time for
fiddling around with the buttons, trying to figure out how to work it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know how to use this. Boggs said you
would help me," I tell Jackson. "He said I could count on you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Jackson scowls, snatches the Holo from me, and taps in
a command. An intersection comes up. "If we go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out the kitchen door, there's a small courtyard, then
the back side of another corner apartment unit. We're looking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at an overview of the four streets that meet at the
intersection."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I try to get my bearings as I stare at the cross
section of the map blinking with pods in every direction. And</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">those are only the pods Plutarch knows about. The Holo
didn't indicate that the block we just left was mined, had</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the black geyser, or that the net was made from barbed
wire. Besides that, there may be Peacekeepers to deal</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with, now that they know our position. I bite the
inside of my lip, feeling everyone's eyes on me. "Put on your</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">masks. We're going out the way we came in."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Instant objections. I raise my voice over them.
"If the wave was that powerful, then it may have triggered and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">absorbed other pods in our path."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">People stop to consider this. Pollux makes a few quick
signs to his brother. "It may have disabled the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cameras as well," Castor translates. "Coated
the lenses."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale props one of his boots on the counter and
examines the splatter of black on the toe. Scrapes it with a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">kitchen knife from a block on the counter. "It's
not corrosive. I think it was meant to either suffocate or poison us."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Probably our best shot," says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Masks go on. Finnick adjusts Peeta's mask over his
lifeless face. Cressida and Leeg 1 prop up a woozy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Messalla between them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm waiting for someone to take the point position
when I remember that's my job now. I push on the kitchen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">door and meet with no resistance. A half-inch layer of
the black goo has spread from the living room about threequarters</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of the way down the hall. When I gingerly test it with
the toe of my boot, I find it has the consistency of a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gel. I lift my foot and after stretching slightly, it
springs back into place. I take three steps into the gel and look</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back. No footprints. It's the first good thing that's
happened today. The gel becomes slightly thicker as I cross the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">living room. I ease open the front door, expecting
gallons of the stuff to pour in, but it holds its form.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The pink and orange block seems to have been dipped in
glossy black paint and set out to dry. Paving</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stones, buildings, even the rooftops are coated in the
gel. A large teardrop hangs above the street. Two shapes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">project from it. A gun barrel and a human hand.
Mitchell. I wait on the sidewalk, staring up at him until the entire</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">group has joined me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If anyone needs to go back, for whatever reason,
now is the time," I say. "No questions asked, no hard</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">feelings." No one seems inclined to retreat. So I
start moving into the Capitol, knowing we don't have much time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The gel's deeper here, four to six inches, and makes a
sucking sound each time you pick up your foot, but it still</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">covers our tracks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The wave must have been enormous, with tremendous
power behind it, as it's affected several blocks that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lie ahead. And though I tread with care, I think my
instinct was right about its triggering other pods. One block is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sprinkled with the golden bodies of tracker jackers.
They must have been set free only to succumb to the fumes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A little farther along, an entire apartment building
has collapsed and lies in a mound under the gel. I sprint across</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the intersections, holding up a hand for the others to
wait while I look for trouble, but the wave seems to have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dismantled the pods far better than any squad of
rebels could.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">On the fifth block, I can tell that we've reached the
point where the wave began to peter out. The gel's only</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">an inch deep, and I can see baby blue rooftops peeking
out across the next intersection. The afternoon light has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">faded, and we badly need to get under cover and form a
plan. I choose an apartment two-thirds of the way down</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the block. Homes jimmies the lock, and I order the
others inside. I stay on the street for just a minute, watching</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the last of our footprints fade away, then close the
door behind me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Flashlights built into our guns illuminate a large
living room with mirrored walls that throw our faces back at</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us at every turn. Gale checks the windows, which show
no damage, and removes his mask. "It's all right. You can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">smell it, but it's not too strong."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The apartment seems to be laid out exactly like the
first one we took refuge in. The gel blacks out any</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">natural daylight in the front, but some light still
slips through the shutters in the kitchen. Along the hallway are two</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bedrooms with baths. A spiral staircase in the living
room leads up to an open space that composes much of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">second floor. There are no windows upstairs, but the
lights have been left on, probably by someone hastily</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">evacuating. A huge television screen, blank but
glowing softly, occupies one wall. Plush chairs and sofas are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">strewn around the room. This is where we congregate,
slump into upholstery, try to catch our breath.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Jackson has her gun trained on Peeta even though he's
still cuffed and unconscious, draped across a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deep-blue sofa where Homes deposited him. What on
earth am I going to do with him? With the crew? With</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">everybody, frankly, besides Gale and Finnick? Because
I'd rather track down Snow with those two than without</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them. But I can't lead ten people through the Capitol
on a pretend mission, even if I could read the Holo. Should I,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could I have sent them back when I had a chance? Or
was it too dangerous? Both to them personally and to my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mission? Maybe I shouldn't have listened to Boggs,
because he might have been in some delusional death</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">state. Maybe I should just come clean, but then
Jackson would take over and we'd end up back at camp. Where</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'd have Coin to answer to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Just as the complexity of the mess I've dragged
everybody into begins to overload my brain, a distant chain</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of explosions sends a tremor through the room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It wasn't close," Jackson assures us.
"A good four or five blocks away."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Where we left Boggs," says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Although no one has made a move toward it, the
television flares to life, emitting a high-pitched beeping</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sound, bringing half our party to its feet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's all right!" calls Cressida. "It's
just an emergency broadcast. Every Capitol television is automatically</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">activated for it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There we are on-screen, just after the bomb took out
Boggs. A voice-over tells the audience what they are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">viewing as we try to regroup, react to the black gel
shooting from the street, lose control of the situation. We</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">watch the chaos that follows until the wave blots out
the cameras. The last thing we see is Gale, alone on the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">street, trying to shoot through the cables that hold
Mitchell aloft.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The reporter identifies Gale, Finnick, Boggs, Peeta,
Cressida, and me by name.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"There's no aerial footage. Boggs must have been
right about their hovercraft capacity," says Castor. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">didn't notice this, but I guess it's the kind of thing
a cameraman picks up on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coverage continues from the courtyard behind the
apartment where we took shelter. Peacekeepers line</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the roof across from our former hideout. Shells are
launched into the row of apartments, setting off the chain of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">explosions we heard, and the building collapses into
rubble and dust.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Now we cut to a live feed. A reporter stands on the
roof with the Peacekeepers. Behind her, the apartment</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">block burns. Firefighters try to control the blaze
with water hoses. We are pronounced dead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Finally, a bit of luck," says Homes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I guess he's right. Certainly it's better than having
the Capitol in pursuit of us. But I just keep imagining how</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this will be playing back in 13. Where my mother and
Prim, Hazelle and the kids, Annie, Haymitch, and a whole</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lot of people from 13 think that they have just seen
us die.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"My father. He just lost my sister and
now..." says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We watch as they play the footage over and over. Revel
in their victory, especially over me. Break away to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">do a montage of the Mockingjay's rise to rebel
power--I think they've had this part prepared for a while, because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it seems pretty polished--and then go live so a couple
of reporters can discuss my well-deserved violent end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Later, they promise, Snow will make an official
statement. The screen fades back to a glow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The rebels made no attempt to break in during the broadcast,
which leads me to believe they think it's true.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">If that's so, we really are on our own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, now that we're dead, what's our next
move?" asks Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Isn't it obvious?" No one even knew Peeta
had regained consciousness. I don't know how long he's been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">watching, but by the look of misery on his face, long
enough to see what happened on the street. How he went</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mad, tried to bash my head in, and hurled Mitchell
into the pod. He painfully pushes himself up to a sitting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">position and directs his words to Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Our next move...is to kill me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">21</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That makes two requests for Peeta's death in less than
an hour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't be ridiculous," says Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I just murdered a member of our squad!"
shouts Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You pushed him off you. You couldn't have known
he would trigger the net at that exact spot," says Finnick,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trying to calm him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Who cares? He's dead, isn't he?" Tears
begin to run down Peeta's face. "I didn't know. I've never seen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">myself like that before. Katniss is right. I'm the
monster. I'm the mutt. I'm the one Snow has turned into a weapon!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's not your fault, Peeta," says Finnick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You can't take me with you. It's only a matter
of time before I kill someone else." Peeta looks around at our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">conflicted faces. "Maybe you think it's kinder to
just dump me somewhere. Let me take my chances. But that's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the same thing as handing me over to the Capitol. Do
you think you'd be doing me a favor by sending me back</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to Snow?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta. Back in Snow's hands. Tortured and tormented
until no bits of his former self will ever emerge</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">again.For some reason, the last stanza to "The
Hanging Tree" starts running through my head. The one where the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">man wants his lover dead rather than have her face the
evil that awaits her in the world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Are you, are you</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coming to the tree</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Strange things did happen here</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No stranger would it be</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'll kill you before that happens," says
Gale. "I promise."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta hesitates, as if considering the reliability of
this offer, and then shakes his head. "It's no good. What</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">if you're not there to do it? I want one of those
poison pills like the rest of you have."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Nightlock. There's one pill back at camp, in its
special slot on the sleeve of my Mockingjay suit. But there's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">another in the breast pocket of my uniform.
Interesting that they didn't issue one to Peeta. Perhaps Coin thought</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he might take it before he had the opportunity to kill
me. It's unclear if Peeta means he'd finish himself off now, to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spare us having to murder him, or only if the Capitol
took him prisoner again. In the state he's in, I expect it would</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be sooner rather than later. It would certainly make
things easier on the rest of us. Not to have to shoot him. It</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">would certainly simplify the problem of dealing with
his homicidal episodes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't know if it's the pods, or the fear, or
watching Boggs die, but I feel the arena all around me. It's as if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I've never left, really. Once again I'm battling not
only for my own survival but for Peeta's as well. How satisfying,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how entertaining it would be for Snow to have me kill
him. To have Peeta's death on my conscience for whatever</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">is left of my life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's not about you," I say. "We're on
a mission. And you're necessary to it." I look to the rest of the group.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Think we might find some food here?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Besides the medical kit and cameras, we have nothing
but our uniforms and our weapons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Half of us stay to guard Peeta or keep an eye out for
Snow's broadcast, while the others hunt for something</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to eat. Messalla proves most valuable because he lived
in a near replica of this apartment and knows where</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">people would be most likely to stash food. Like how
there's a storage space concealed by a mirrored panel in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the bedroom, or how easy it is to pop out the
ventilation screen in the hallway. So even though the kitchen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cupboards are bare, we find over thirty canned goods
and several boxes of cookies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The hoarding disgusts the soldiers raised in 13.
"Isn't this illegal?" says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"On the contrary, in the Capitol you'd be
considered stupid not to do it," says Messalla. "Even before the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Quarter Quell, people were starting to stock up on
scarce supplies."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"While others went without," says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Right," says Messalla. "That's how it
works here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Fortunately, or we wouldn't have dinner,"
says Gale. "Everybody grab a can."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Some of our company seem reluctant to do this, but
it's as good a method as any. I'm really not in the mood</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to divvy up everything into eleven equal parts,
factoring in age, body weight, and physical output. I poke around in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the pile, about to settle on some cod chowder, when
Peeta holds out a can to me. "Here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I take it, not knowing what to expect. The label reads
Lamb Stew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I press my lips together at the memories of rain
dripping through stones, my inept attempts at flirting, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the aroma of my favorite Capitol dish in the chilly
air. So some part of it must still be in his head, too. How happy,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how hungry, how close we were when that picnic basket
arrived outside our cave. "Thanks." I pop open the top.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It even has dried plums." I bend the lid
and use it as a makeshift spoon, scooping a bit into my mouth. Now this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">place tastes like the arena, too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We're passing around a box of fancy cream-filled
cookies when the beeping starts again. The seal of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Panem lights up on the screen and remains there while
the anthem plays. And then they begin to show images of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the dead, just as they did with the tributes in the
arena. They start with the four faces of our TV crew, followed by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs, Gale, Finnick, Peeta, and me. Except for Boggs,
they don't bother with the soldiers from 13, either</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">because they have no idea who they are or because they
know they won't mean anything to the audience. Then</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the man himself appears, seated at his desk, a flag
draped behind him, the fresh white rose gleaming in his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lapel. I think he might have recently had more work
done, because his lips are puffier than usual. And his prep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">team really needs to use a lighter hand with his
blush.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow congratulates the Peacekeepers on a masterful job,
honors them for ridding the country of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">menace called the Mockingjay. With my death, he
predicts a turning of the tide in the war, since the demoralized</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rebels have no one left to follow. And what was I,
really? A poor, unstable girl with a small talent with a bow and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrow. Not a great thinker, not the mastermind of the
rebellion, merely a face plucked from the rabble because I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">had caught the nation's attention with my antics in
the Games. But necessary, so very necessary, because the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rebels have no real leader among them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Somewhere in District 13, Beetee hits a switch,
because now it's not President Snow but President Coin</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who's looking at us. She introduces herself to Panem,
identifies herself as the head of the rebellion, and then</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gives my eulogy. Praise for the girl who survived the
Seam and the Hunger Games, then turned a country of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slaves into an army of freedom fighters. "Dead or
alive, Katniss Everdeen will remain the face of this rebellion. If</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ever you waver in your resolve, think of the Mockingjay,
and in her you will find the strength you need to rid</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Panem of its oppressors."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I had no idea how much I meant to her," I
say, which brings a laugh from Gale and questioning looks from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Up comes a heavily doctored photo of me looking beautiful
and fierce with a bunch of flames flickering</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">behind me. No words. No slogan. My face is all they
need now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee gives the reins back to a very controlled Snow.
I have the feeling the president thought the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">emergency channel was impenetrable, and someone will
end up dead tonight because it was breached.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Tomorrow morning, when we pull Katniss
Everdeen's body from the ashes, we will see exactly who the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mockingjay is. A dead girl who could save no one, not
even herself." Seal, anthem, and out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Except that you won't find her," says
Finnick to the empty screen, voicing what we're all probably thinking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The grace period will be brief. Once they dig through
those ashes and come up missing eleven bodies, they'll</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know we escaped.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We can get a head start on them at least,"
I say. Suddenly, I'm so tired. All I want is to lie down on a nearby</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">green plush sofa and go to sleep. To cocoon myself in
a comforter made of rabbit fur and goose down. Instead, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pull out the Holo and insist that Jackson talk me
through the most basic commands--which are really about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">entering the coordinates of the nearest map grid
intersection--so that I can at least begin to operate the thing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">myself. As the Holo projects our surroundings, I feel
my heart sink even further. We must be moving closer to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crucial targets, because the number of pods has
noticeably increased. How can we possibly move forward into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this bouquet of blinking lights without detection? We
can't. And if we can't, we are trapped like birds in a net. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">decide it's best not to adopt some sort of superior
attitude when I'm with these people. Especially when my eyes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep drifting to that green sofa. So I say, "Any
ideas?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why don't we start by ruling out
possibilities," says Finnick. "The street is not a possibility."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The rooftops are just as bad as the
street," says Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We still might have a chance to withdraw, go
back the way we came," says Homes. "But that would mean</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a failed mission."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A pang of guilt hits me since I've fabricated said
mission. "It was never intended for all of us to go forward.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">You just had the misfortune to be with me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, that's a moot point. We're with you
now," says Jackson. "So, we can't stay put. We can't move up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We can't move laterally. I think that just leaves one
option."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Underground," says Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Underground. Which I hate. Like mines and tunnels and
13. Underground, where I dread dying, which is</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stupid because even if I die aboveground, the next
thing they'll do is bury me underground anyway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Holo can show subterranean as well as street-level
pods. I see that when we go underground the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clean, dependable lines of the street plan are
interlaced with a twisting, turning mess of tunnels. The pods look</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">less numerous, though.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Two doors down, a vertical tube connects our row of apartments
to the tunnels. To reach the tube</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">apartment, we will need to squeeze through a
maintenance shaft that runs the length of the building. We can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enter the shaft through the back of a closet space on
the upper floor.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Okay, then. Let's make it look like we've never
been here," I say. We erase all signs of our stay. Send the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">empty cans down a trash chute, pocket the full ones
for later, flip sofa cushions smeared with blood, wipe traces</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of gel from the tiles. There's no fixing the latch on
the front door, but we lock a second bolt, which will at least</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep the door from swinging open on contact.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finally, there's only Peeta to contend with. He plants
himself on the blue sofa, refusing to budge. "I'm not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">going. I'll either disclose your position or hurt someone
else."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Snow's people will find you," says Finnick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Then leave me a pill. I'll only take it if I
have to," says Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's not an option. Come along," says
Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Or you'll what? Shoot me?" asks Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We'll knock you out and drag you with us,"
says Homes. "Which will both slow us down and endanger us."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Stop being noble! I don't care if I die!"
He turns to me, pleading now. "Katniss, please. Don't you see, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">want to be out of this?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The trouble is, I <i>do </i>see. Why can't I just let
him go? Slip him a pill, pull the trigger? Is it because I care too</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">much about Peeta or too much about letting Snow win?
Have I turned him into a piece in my private Games?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That's despicable, but I'm not sure it's beneath me.
If it's true, it would be kindest to kill Peeta here and now. But</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for better or worse, I am not motivated by kindness.
"We're wasting time. Are you coming voluntarily or do we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knock you out?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta buries his face in his hands for a few moments,
then rises to join us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Should we free his hands?" asks Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No!" Peeta growls at her, drawing his cuffs
in close to his body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I echo. "But I want the
key." Jackson passes it over without a word. I slip it into my pants
pocket,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">where it clicks against the pearl.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When Homes pries open the small metal door to the
maintenance shaft, we encounter another problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's no way the insect shells will be able to fit
through the narrow passage. Castor and Pollux remove them</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and detach emergency backup cameras. Each is the size
of a shoe box and probably works about as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Messalla can't think of anywhere better to hide the
bulky shells, so we end up dumping them in the closet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Leaving such an easy trail to follow frustrates me,
but what else can we do?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Even going single file, holding our packs and gear out
to the side, it's a tight fit. We sidestep our way past</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the first apartment, and break into the second. In
this apartment, one of the bedrooms has a door marked utility</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">instead of a bathroom. Behind the door is the room
with the entrance to the tube.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Messalla frowns at the wide circular cover, for a
moment returning to his own fussy world. "It's why no one</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ever wants the center unit. Workmen coming and going
whenever and no second bath. But the rent's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">considerably cheaper." Then he notices Finnick's
amused expression and adds, "Never mind."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The tube cover's simple to unlatch. A wide ladder with
rubber treads on the steps allows for a swift, easy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">descent into the bowels of the city. We gather at the
foot of the ladder, waiting for our eyes to adjust to the dim</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">strips of lights, breathing in the mixture of
chemicals, mildew, and sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Pollux, pale and sweaty, reaches out and latches on to
Castor's wrist. Like he might fall over if there isn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">someone to steady him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"My brother worked down here after he became an
Avox," says Castor. Of course. Who else would they get</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to maintain these dank, evil-smelling passages mined
with pods? "Took five years before we were able to buy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his way up to ground level. Didn't see the sun
once."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Under better conditions, on a day with fewer horrors
and more rest, someone would surely know what to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">say. Instead we all stand there for a long time trying
to formulate a response.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finally, Peeta turns to Pollux. "Well, then you
just became our most valuable asset." Castor laughs and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Pollux manages a smile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We're halfway down the first tunnel when I realize
what was so remarkable about the exchange. Peeta</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sounded like his old self, the one who could always
think of the right thing to say when nobody else could. Ironic,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">encouraging, a little funny, but not at anyone's
expense. I glance back at him as he trudges along under his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guards, Gale and Jackson, his eyes fixed on the
ground, his shoulders hunched forward. So dispirited. But for a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">moment, he was really here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta called it right. Pollux turns out to be worth
ten Holos. There is a simple network of wide tunnels that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">directly corresponds to the main street plan above,
underlying the major avenues and cross streets. It's called the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Transfer, since small trucks use it to deliver goods
around the city. During the day, its many pods are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deactivated, but at night it's a minefield. However,
hundreds of additional passages, utility shafts, train tracks,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and drainage tubes form a multilevel maze. Pollux
knows details that would lead to disaster for a newcomer, like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">which offshoots might require gas masks or have live
wires or rats the size of beavers. He alerts us to the gush</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of water that sweeps through the sewers periodically,
anticipates the time the Avoxes will be changing shifts,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">leads us into damp, obscure pipes to dodge the nearly
silent passage of cargo trains. Most important, he has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knowledge of the cameras. There aren't many down in
this gloomy, misty place, except in the Transfer. But we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep well out of their way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Under Pollux's guidance we make good time--remarkable
time, if you compare it to our aboveground</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">travel. After about six hours, fatigue takes over.
It's three in the morning, so I figure we still have a few hours</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before our bodies are discovered missing, they search through
the rubble of the whole block of apartments in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">case we tried to escape through the shafts, and the
hunt begins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I suggest we rest, no one objects. Pollux finds a
small, warm room humming with machines loaded</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with levers and dials. He holds up his fingers to
indicate we must be gone in four hours. Jackson works out a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guard schedule, and, since I'm not on the first shift,
I wedge myself in the tight space between Gale and Leeg 1</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and go right to sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It seems like only minutes later when Jackson shakes
me awake, tells me I'm on watch. It's six o'clock, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in one hour we must be on our way. Jackson tells me to
eat a can of food and keep an eye on Pollux, who's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">insisted on being on guard the entire night. "He
can't sleep down here." I drag myself into a state of relative</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alertness, eat a can of potato and bean stew, and sit
against the wall facing the door. Pollux seems wide awake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He's probably been reliving those five years of
imprisonment all night. I get out the Holo and manage to input our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">grid coordinates and scan the tunnels. As expected,
more pods are registering the closer we move toward the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">center of the Capitol. For a while, Pollux and I click
around on the Holo, seeing what traps lie where. When my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">head begins to spin, I hand it over to him and lean
back against the wall. I look down at the sleeping soldiers,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crew, and friends, and I wonder how many of us will
ever see the sun again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When my eyes fall on Peeta, whose head rests right by
my feet, I see he's awake. I wish I could read what's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">going on in his mind, that I could go in and untangle
the mess of lies. Then I settle for something I can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">accomplish.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Have you eaten?" I ask. A slight shake of
his head indicates he hasn't. I open a can of chicken and rice</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">soup and hand it to him, keeping the lid in case he
tries to slit his wrists with it or something. He sits up and tilts</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the can, chugging back the soup without really
bothering to chew it. The bottom of the can reflects the lights from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the machines, and I remember something that's been
itching at the back of my mind since yesterday. "Peeta,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">when you asked about what happened to Darius and
Lavinia, and Boggs told you it was real, you said you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thought so. Because there was nothing shiny about it.
What did you mean?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh. I don't know exactly how to explain
it," he tells me. "In the beginning, everything was just complete</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">confusion. Now I can sort certain things out. I think
there's a pattern emerging. The memories they altered with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the tracker jacker venom have this strange quality about
them. Like they're too intense or the images aren't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stable. You remember what it was like when we were
stung?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Trees shattered. There were giant colored
butterflies. I fell in a pit of orange bubbles." I think about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Shiny orange bubbles."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Right. But nothing about Darius or Lavinia was
like that. I don't think they'd given me any venom yet," he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, that's good, isn't it?" I ask.
"If you can separate the two, then you can figure out what's true."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes. And if I could grow wings, I could fly.
Only people can't grow wings," he says. "Real or not real?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real," I say. "But people don't need
wings to survive."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Mockingjays do." He finishes the soup and
returns the can to me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the fluorescent light, the circles under his eyes
look like bruises. "There's still time. You should sleep."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Unresisting, he lies back down, but just stares at the
needle on one of the dials as it twitches from side to side.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Slowly, as I would with a wounded animal, my hand
stretches out and brushes a wave of hair from his forehead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He freezes at my touch, but doesn't recoil. So I
continue to gently smooth back his hair. It's the first time I have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">voluntarily touched him since the last arena.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You're still trying to protect me. Real or not
real," he whispers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real," I answer. It seems to require more
explanation. "Because that's what you and I do. Protect each</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">other." After a minute or so, he drifts off to
sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Shortly before seven, Pollux and I move among the
others, rousing them. There are the usual yawns and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sighs that accompany waking. But my ears are picking
up something else, too. Almost like a hissing. Perhaps</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it's only steam escaping a pipe or the far-off whoosh
of one of the trains....</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I hush the group to get a better read on it. There's a
hissing, yes, but it's not one extended sound. More like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">multiple exhalations that form words. A single word.
Echoing throughout the tunnels. One word. One name.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Repeated over and over again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss."</span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">22</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The grace period has ended. Perhaps Snow had them
digging through the night. As soon as the fire died</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down, anyway. They found Boggs's remains, briefly felt
reassured, and then, as the hours went by without further</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trophies, began to suspect. At some point, they
realized that they had been tricked. And President Snow can't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tolerate being made to look like a fool. It doesn't
matter whether they tracked us to the second apartment or</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assumed we went directly underground. They know we are
down here now and they've unleashed something, a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pack of mutts probably, bent on finding me.</span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss." </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I jump at the proximity of the sound. Look frantically
for its source, bow loaded, seeking a target</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to hit. <i>"Katniss." </i>Peeta's lips are
barely moving, but there's no doubt, the name came out of him. Just when I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thought he seemed a little better, when I thought he
might be inching his way back to me, here is proof of how</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deep Snow's poison went. <i>"Katniss." </i>Peeta's
programmed to respond to the hissing chorus, to join in the hunt.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He's beginning to stir. There's no choice. I position
my arrow to penetrate his brain. He'll barely feel a thing.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, he's sitting up, eyes wide in alarm, short
of breath. "Katniss!" He whips his head toward me but</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't seem to notice my bow, the waiting arrow.
"Katniss! Get out of here!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I hesitate. His voice is alarmed, but not insane.
"Why? What's making that sound?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know. Only that it has to kill
you," says Peeta. "Run! Get out! Go!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After my own moment of confusion, I conclude I do not
have to shoot him. Relax my bowstring. Take in the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">anxious faces around me. "Whatever it is, it's
after me. It might be a good time to split up."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But we're your guard," says Jackson.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And your crew," adds Cressida.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm not leaving you," Gale says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I look at the crew, armed with nothing but cameras and
clipboards. And there's Finnick with two guns and a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trident. I suggest that he give one of his guns to
Castor. Eject the blank cartridge from Peeta's, load it with a real</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one, and arm Pollux. Since Gale and I have our bows,
we hand our guns over to Messalla and Cressida. There's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no time to show them anything but how to point and
pull the trigger, but in close quarters, that might be enough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's better than being defenseless. Now the only one
without a weapon is Peeta, but anyone whispering my name</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with a bunch of mutts doesn't need one anyway.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We leave the room free of everything but our scent.
There's no way to erase that at the moment. I'm</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guessing that's how the hissing things are tracking
us, because we haven't left much of a physical trail. The mutts'</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">noses will be abnormally keen, but possibly the time
we spent slogging through water in drainpipes will help</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">throw them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Outside the hum of the room, the hissing becomes more
distinct. But it's also possible to get a better</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sense of the mutts' location. They're behind us, still
a fair distance. Snow probably had them released</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">underground near the place where he found Boggs's
body. Theoretically, we should have a good lead on them,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">although they're certain to be much faster than we
are. My mind wanders to the wolflike creatures in the first</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arena, the monkeys in the Quarter Quell, the
monstrosities I've witnessed on television over the years, and I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wonder what form these mutts will take. Whatever Snow
thinks will scare me the most.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Pollux and I have worked out a plan for the next leg
of our journey, and since it heads away from the hissing,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I see no reason to alter it. If we move swiftly, maybe
we can reach Snow's mansion before the mutts reach us.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But there's a sloppiness that comes with speed: the
poorly placed boot that results in a splash, the accidental</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clang of a gun against a pipe, even my own commands,
issued too loudly for discretion.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We've covered about three more blocks via an overflow
pipe and a section of neglected train track when</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the screams begin. Thick, guttural. Bouncing off the
tunnel walls.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Avoxes," says Peeta immediately.
"That's what Darius sounded like when they tortured him."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The mutts must have found them," says
Cressida.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So they're not just after Katniss," says
Leeg 1.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They'll probably kill anyone. It's just that
they won't stop until they get to her," says Gale. After his hours</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">studying with Beetee, he is most likely right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And here I am again. With people dying because of me.
Friends, allies, complete strangers, losing their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lives for the Mockingjay. "Let me go on alone.
Lead them off. I'll transfer the Holo to Jackson. The rest of you can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">finish the mission."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No one's going to agree to that!" says
Jackson in exasperation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're wasting time!" says Finnick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Listen," Peeta whispers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The screams have stopped, and in their absence my name
has rebounded, startling in its proximity. It's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">below as well as behind us now. <i>"Katniss."</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I nudge Pollux on the shoulder and we start to run.
Trouble is, we had planned to descend to a lower level,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but that's out now. When we come to the steps leading
down, Pollux and I are scanning for a possible alternative</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on the Holo when I start gagging.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Masks on!" orders Jackson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's no need for masks. Everyone is breathing the
same air. I'm the only one losing my stew because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm the only one reacting to the odor. Drifting up
from the stairwell. Cutting through the sewage. Roses. I begin to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tremble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I swerve away from the smell and stumble right out
onto the Transfer. Smooth, pastel-colored tiled streets,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">just like the ones above, but bordered by white brick
walls instead of homes. A roadway where delivery vehicles</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can drive with ease, without the congestion of the
Capitol. Empty now, of everything but us. I swing up my bow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and blow up the first pod with an explosive arrow,
which kills the nest of flesh-eating rats inside. Then I sprint for</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the next intersection, where I know one false step
will cause the ground beneath our feet to disintegrate, feeding</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us into something labeled Meat Grinder. I shout a
warning to the others to stay with me. I plan for us to skirt</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">around the corner and then detonate the Meat Grinder,
but another unmarked pod lies in wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It happens silently. I would miss it entirely if
Finnick didn't pull me to a stop. "Katniss!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I whip back around, arrow poised for flight, but what
can be done? Two of Gale's arrows already lie useless</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">beside the wide shaft of golden light that radiates
from ceiling to floor. Inside, Messalla is as still as a statue,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">poised up on the ball of one foot, head tilted back,
held captive by the beam. I can't tell if he's yelling, although his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mouth is stretched wide. We watch, utterly helpless,
as the flesh melts off his body like candle wax.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Can't help him!" Peeta starts shoving
people forward. "Can't!" Amazingly, he's the only one still
functional</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enough to get us moving. I don't know why he's in
control, when he should be flipping out and bashing my brains</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in, but that could happen any second. At the pressure
of his hand against my shoulder, I turn away from the grisly</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thing that was Messalla; I make my feet go forward,
fast, so fast that I can barely skid to a stop before the next</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">intersection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A spray of gunfire brings down a shower of plaster. I
jerk my head from side to side, looking for the pod,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before I turn and see the squad of Peacekeepers
pounding down the Transfer toward us. With the Meat Grinder</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pod blocking our way, there's nothing to do but fire
back. They outnumber us two to one, but we've still got six</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">original members of the Star Squad, who aren't trying
to run and shoot at the same time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Fish in a barrel, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think, as blossoms of red stain their white
uniforms. Three-quarters of them are down and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dead when more begin to pour in from the side of the
tunnel, the same one I flung myself through to get away</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from the smell, from the--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Those aren't Peacekeepers.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They are white, four-limbed, about the size of a
full-grown human, but that's where the comparisons stop.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Naked, with long reptilian tails, arched backs, and
heads that jut forward. They swarm over the Peacekeepers,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">living and dead, clamp on to their necks with their
mouths and rip off the helmeted heads. Apparently, having a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol pedigree is as useless here as it was in 13.
It seems to take only seconds before the Peacekeepers are</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">decapitated. The mutts fall to their bellies and
skitter toward us on all fours.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"This way!" I shout, hugging the wall and
making a sharp right turn to avoid the pod. When everyone's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">joined me, I fire into the intersection, and the Meat
Grinder activates. Huge mechanical teeth burst through the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">street and chew the tile to dust. That should make it
impossible for the mutts to follow us, but I don't know. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wolf and monkey mutts I've encountered could leap
unbelievably far.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The hissing burns my ears, and the reek of roses makes
the walls spin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I grab Pollux's arm. "Forget the mission. What's
the quickest way aboveground?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's no time for checking the Holo. We follow
Pollux for about ten yards along the Transfer and go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through a doorway. I'm aware of tile changing to
concrete, of crawling through a tight, stinking pipe onto a ledge</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about a foot wide. We're in the main sewer. A yard
below, a poisonous brew of human waste, garbage, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chemical runoff bubbles by us. Parts of the surface
are on fire, others emit evil-looking clouds of vapor. One look</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tells you that if you fall in, you're never coming
out. Moving as quickly as we dare on the slippery ledge, we make</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our way to a narrow bridge and cross it. In an alcove
at the far side, Pollux smacks a ladder with his hand and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">points up the shaft. This is it. Our way out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A quick glance at our party tells me something's off.
"Wait! Where are Jackson and Leeg One?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They stayed at the Grinder to hold the mutts
back," says Homes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What?" I'm lunging back for the bridge,
willing to leave no one to those monsters, when he yanks me back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't waste their lives, Katniss. It's too late
for them. Look!" Homes nods to the pipe, where the mutts are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slithering onto the ledge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Stand back!" Gale shouts. With his
explosive-tipped arrows, he rips the far side of the bridge from its</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">foundation. The rest sinks into the bubbles, just as
the mutts reach it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">For the first time, I get a good look at them. A mix
of human and lizard and who knows what else. White,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tight reptilian skin smeared with gore, clawed hands
and feet, their faces a mess of conflicting features. Hissing,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shrieking my name now, as their bodies contort in
rage. Lashing out with tails and claws, taking huge chunks of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one another or their own bodies with wide, lathered
mouths, driven mad by their need to destroy me. My scent</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">must be as evocative to them as theirs is to me. More
so, because despite its toxicity, the mutts begin to throw</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">themselves into the foul sewer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Along our bank, everyone opens fire. I choose my
arrows without discretion, sending arrowheads, fire,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">explosives into the mutts' bodies. They're mortal, but
only just. No natural thing could keep coming with two dozen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bullets in it. Yes, we can eventually kill them, only
there are so many, an endless supply pouring from the pipe, not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even hesitating to take to the sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But it's not their numbers that make my hands shake
so.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No mutt is good. All are meant to damage you. Some
take your life, like the monkeys. Others your reason,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">like the tracker jackers. However, the true
atrocities, the most frightening, incorporate a perverse psychological</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">twist designed to terrify the victim. The sight of the
wolf mutts with the dead tributes' eyes. The sound of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">jabberjays replicating Prim's tortured screams. The
smell of Snow's roses mixed with the victims' blood. Carried</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">across the sewer. Cutting through even this foulness.
Making my heart run wild, my skin turn to ice, my lungs</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unable to suck air. It's as if Snow's breathing right
in my face, telling me it's time to die.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The others are shouting at me, but I can't seem to
respond. Strong arms lift me as I blast the head off a mutt</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whose claws have just grazed my ankle. I'm slammed
into the ladder. Hands shoved against the rungs. Ordered</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to climb. My wooden, puppet limbs obey. Movement
slowly brings me back to my senses. I detect one person</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">above me. Pollux. Peeta and Cressida are below. We
reach a platform. Switch to a second ladder. Rungs slick</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with sweat and mildew. At the next platform, my head
has cleared and the reality of what's happened hits me. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">begin frantically pulling people up off the ladder.
Peeta. Cressida. That's it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What have I done? What have I abandoned the others to?
I'm scrambling back down the ladder when one</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of my boots kicks someone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Climb!" Gale barks at me. I'm back up,
hauling him in, peering into the gloom for more. "No." Gale turns</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my face to him and shakes his head. Uniform shredded.
Gaping wound in the side of his neck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a human cry from below. "Someone's still
alive," I plead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No, Katniss. They're not coming," says
Gale. "Only the mutts are."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Unable to accept it, I shine the light from Cressida's
gun down the shaft. Far below, I can just make out</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick, struggling to hang on as three mutts tear at
him. As one yanks back his head to take the death bite,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something bizarre happens. It's as if I'm Finnick,
watching images of my life flash by. The mast of a boat, a silver</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">parachute, Mags laughing, a pink sky, Beetee's
trident, Annie in her wedding dress, waves breaking over rocks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then it's over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I slide the Holo from my belt and choke out
"nightlock, nightlock, nightlock." Release it. Hunch against the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wall with the others as the explosion rocks the
platform and bits of mutt and human flesh shoot out of the pipe</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and shower us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a clank as Pollux slams a cover over the pipe
and locks it in place. Pollux, Gale, Cressida, Peeta,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and me. We're all that's left. Later, the human
feelings will come. Now I'm conscious only of an animal need to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep the remnants of our band alive. "We can't
stop here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Someone comes up with a bandage. We tie it around
Gale's neck. Get him to his feet. Only one figure</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stays huddled against the wall. "Peeta," I
say. There's no response. Has he blacked out? I crouch in front of him,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pulling his cuffed hands from his face.
"Peeta?" His eyes are like black pools, the pupils dilated so that
the blue</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">irises have all but vanished. The muscles in his
wrists are hard as metal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Leave me," he whispers. "I can't hang
on."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes. You can!" I tell him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta shakes his head. "I'm losing it. I'll go
mad. Like them."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Like the mutts. Like a rabid beast bent on ripping my
throat out. And here, finally here in this place, in these</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">circumstances, I will really have to kill him. And
Snow will win. Hot, bitter hatred courses through me. Snow has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">won too much already today.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's a long shot, it's suicide maybe, but I do the
only thing I can think of. I lean in and kiss Peeta full on the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mouth. His whole body starts shuddering, but I keep my
lips pressed to his until I have to come up for air. My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hands slide up his wrists to clasp his. "Don't
let him take you from me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's panting hard as he fights the nightmares
raging in his head. "No. I don't want to..."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I clench his hands to the point of pain. "Stay
with me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">His pupils contract to pinpoints, dilate again
rapidly, and then return to something resembling normalcy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Always," he murmurs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I help Peeta up and address Pollux. "How far to
the street?" He indicates it's just above us. I climb the last</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ladder and push open the lid to someone's utility
room. I'm rising to my feet when a woman throws open the door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She wears a bright turquoise silk robe embroidered
with exotic birds. Her magenta hair's fluffed up like a cloud</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and decorated with gilded butterflies. Grease from the
half-eaten sausage she's holding smears her lipstick. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">expression on her face says she recognizes me. She
opens her mouth to call for help.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Without hesitation, I shoot her through the heart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">23</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Who the woman was calling to remains a mystery,
because after searching the apartment, we find she was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alone. Perhaps her cry was meant for a nearby
neighbor, or was simply an expression of fear. At any rate, there's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no one else to hear her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This apartment would be a classy place to hole up in
for a while, but that's a luxury we can't afford. "How</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">long do you think we have before they figure out some
of us could've survived?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I think they could be here anytime," Gale
answers. "They knew we were heading for the streets. Probably</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the explosion will throw them for a few minutes, then
they'll start looking for our exit point."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I go to a window that overlooks the street, and when I
peek through the blinds, I'm not faced with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peacekeepers but with a bundled crowd of people going
about their business. During our underground journey,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we have left the evacuated zones far behind and
surfaced in a busy section of the Capitol. This crowd offers our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">only chance of escape. I don't have a Holo, but I have
Cressida. She joins me at the window, confirms she knows</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our location, and gives me the good news that we
aren't many blocks from the president's mansion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">One glance at my companions tells me this is no time
for a stealth attack on Snow. Gale's still losing blood</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from the neck wound, which we haven't even cleaned.
Peeta's sitting on a velvet sofa with his teeth clamped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down on a pillow, either fighting off madness or
containing a scream. Pollux weeps against the mantel of an</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ornate fireplace. Cressida stands determinedly at my
side, but she's so pale her lips are bloodless. I'm running</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on hate. When the energy for that ebbs, I'll be
worthless.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Let's check her closets," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In one bedroom we find hundreds of the woman's
outfits, coats, pairs of shoes, a rainbow of wigs, enough</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">makeup to paint a house. In a bedroom across the hall,
there's a similar selection for men. Perhaps they belong</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to her husband. Perhaps to a lover who had the good
luck to be out this morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I call the others to dress. At the sight of Peeta's
bloody wrists, I dig in my pocket for the handcuff key, but he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">jerks away from me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," he says. "Don't. They help hold
me together."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You might need your hands," says Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"When I feel myself slipping, I dig my wrists
into them, and the pain helps me focus," says Peeta. I let them</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Fortunately, it's cold out, so we can conceal most of
our uniforms and weapons under flowing coats and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cloaks. We hang our boots around our necks by their
laces and hide them, pull on silly shoes to replace them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The real challenge, of course, is our faces. Cressida
and Pollux run the risk of being recognized by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">acquaintances, Gale could be familiar from the propos
and news, and Peeta and I are known by every citizen of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Panem. We hastily help one another apply thick layers
of makeup, pull on wigs and sunglasses. Cressida wraps</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">scarves over Peeta's and my mouths and noses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I can feel the clock ticking away, but stop for just a
few moments to stuff pockets with food and first-aid</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">supplies. "Stay together," I say at the
front door. Then we march right into the street. Snow flurries have begun to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fall. Agitated people swirl around us, speaking of
rebels and hunger and me in their affected Capitol accents.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We cross the street, pass a few more apartments. Just
as we turn the corner, three dozen Peacekeepers sweep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">past us. We hop out of their way, as the real citizens
do, wait until the crowd returns to its normal flow, and keep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">moving. "Cressida," I whisper. "Can you
think of anywhere?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm trying," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We cover another block, and the sirens begin. Through
an apartment window, I see an emergency report</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and pictures of our faces flashing. They haven't
identified who in our party died yet, because I see Castor and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick among the photos. Soon every passerby will be
as dangerous as a Peacekeeper. "Cressida?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"There's one place. It's not ideal. But we can
try it," she says. We follow her a few more blocks and turn</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through a gate into what looks like a private
residence. It's some kind of shortcut, though, because after walking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through a manicured garden, we come out of another
gate onto a small back street that connects two main</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">avenues. There are a few poky stores--one that buys
used goods, another that sells fake jewelry. Only a couple</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of people are around, and they pay no attention to us.
Cressida begins to babble in a high-pitched voice about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of people are around, and they pay no attention to us.
Cressida begins to babble in a high-pitched voice about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fur undergarments, how essential they are during the
cold months. "Wait until you see the prices! Believe me, it's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">half what you pay on the avenues!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We stop before a grimy storefront filled with
mannequins in furry underwear. The place doesn't even look</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">open, but Cressida pushes through the front door,
setting off a dissonant chiming. Inside the dim, narrow shop</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lined with racks of merchandise, the smell of pelts
fills my nose. Business must be slow, since we're the only</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">customers. Cressida heads straight for a hunched
figure sitting in the back. I follow, trailing my fingers through</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the soft garments as we go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Behind a counter sits the strangest person I've ever
seen. She's an extreme example of surgical</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enhancement gone wrong, for surely not even in the
Capitol could they find this face attractive. The skin has been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pulled back tightly and tattooed with black and gold
stripes. The nose has been flattened until it barely exists. I've</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seen cat whiskers on people in the Capitol before, but
none so long. The result is a grotesque, semi-feline mask,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">which now squints at us distrustfully.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida takes off her wig, revealing her vines.
"Tigris," she says. "We need help."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris. Deep in my brain, the name rings a bell. She
was a fixture--a younger, less disturbing version of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">herself--in the earliest Hunger Games I can remember.
A stylist, I think. I don't remember for which district. Not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">12. Then she must have had one operation too many and
crossed the line into repellence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So this is where stylists go when they've outlived
their use. To sad theme underwear shops where they wait</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for death. Out of the public eye.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I stare at her face, wondering if her parents actually
named her Tigris, inspiring her mutilation, or if she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chose the style and changed her name to match her
stripes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Plutarch said you could be trusted," adds
Cressida.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Great, she's one of Plutarch's people. So if her first
move isn't to turn us in to the Capitol, it will be to notify</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch, and by extension Coin, of our whereabouts.
No, Tigris's shop is not ideal, but it's all we have at the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">moment. If she'll even help us. She's peering between
an old television on her counter and us, as if trying to place</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us. To help her, I pull down my scarf, remove my wig,
and step closer so that the light of the screen falls on my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris gives a low growl, not unlike one Buttercup
might greet me with. She slinks down off her stool and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">disappears behind a rack of fur-lined leggings.
There's a sound of sliding, and then her hand emerges and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">waves us forward. Cressida looks at me, as if to ask <i>Are
you sure? </i>But what choice do we have? Returning to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the streets under these conditions guarantees our
capture or death. I push around the furs and find Tigris has slid</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back a panel at the base of the wall. Behind it seems
to be the top of a steep stone stairway. She gestures for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me to enter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everything about the situation screams <i>trap</i>. I
have a moment of panic and find myself turning to Tigris,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">searching those tawny eyes. Why is she doing this?
She's no Cinna, someone willing to sacrifice herself for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">others. This woman was the embodiment of Capitol
shallowness. She was one of the stars of the Hunger Games</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">until...until she wasn't. So is that it, then?
Bitterness? Hatred? Revenge? Actually, I'm comforted by the idea. A</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">need for revenge can burn long and hot. Especially if
every glance in a mirror reinforces it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Did Snow ban you from the Games?" I ask.
She just stares back at me. Somewhere her tiger tail flicks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with displeasure. "Because I'm going to kill him,
you know." Her mouth spreads into what I take for a smile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Reassured that this isn't complete madness, I crawl
through the space.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">About halfway down the steps, my face runs into a
hanging chain and I pull it, illuminating the hideout with a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flickering fluorescent bulb. It's a small cellar with
no doors or windows. Shallow and wide. Probably just a strip</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">between two real basements. A place whose existence
could go unnoticed unless you had a very keen eye for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dimensions. It's cold and dank, with piles of pelts
that I'm guessing haven't seen the light of day in years. Unless</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris gives us up, I don't believe anyone will find
us here. By the time I reach the concrete floor, my companions</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are on the steps. The panel slides back in place. I
hear the underwear rack being adjusted on squeaky wheels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris padding back to her stool. We have been
swallowed up by her store.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Just in time, too, because Gale looks on the verge of
collapse. We make a bed of pelts, strip off his layers</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of weapons, and help him onto his back. At the end of
the cellar, there's a faucet about a foot from the floor with a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">drain under it. I turn the tap and, after much
sputtering and a lot of rust, clear water begins to flow. We clean</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale's neck wound and I realize bandages won't be
enough. He's going to need a few stitches. There's a needle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and sterile thread in the first-aid supplies, but what
we lack is a healer. It crosses my mind to enlist Tigris. As a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stylist, she must know how to work a needle. But that
would leave no one manning the shop, and she's doing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enough already. I accept that I'm probably the most
qualified for the job, grit my teeth, and put in a row of jagged</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sutures. It's not pretty but it's functional. I smear
it with medicine and wrap it up. Give him some painkillers. "You</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can rest now. It's safe here," I tell him. He
goes out like a light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">While Cressida and Pollux make fur nests for each of
us, I attend to Peeta's wrists. Gently rinsing away the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blood, putting on an antiseptic, and bandaging them
beneath the cuffs. "You've got to keep them clean,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">otherwise the infection could spread and--"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know what blood poisoning is, Katniss,"
says Peeta. "Even if my mother isn't a healer."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm jolted back in time, to another wound, another set
of bandages. "You said that same thing to me in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">first Hunger Games. Real or not real?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real," he says. "And you risked your
life getting the medicine that saved me?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Real." I shrug. "You were the reason I
was alive to do it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Was I?" The comment throws him into
confusion. Some shiny memory must be fighting for his attention,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">because his body tenses and his newly bandaged wrists
strain against the metal cuffs. Then all the energy saps</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from his body. "I'm so tired, Katniss."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Go to sleep," I say. He won't until I've
rearranged his handcuffs and shackled him to one of the stair</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">supports. It can't be comfortable, lying there with
his arms above his head. But in a few minutes, he drifts off, too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida and Pollux have made beds for us, arranged
our food and medical supplies, and now ask what I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">want to do about setting up a guard. I look at Gale's
pallor, Peeta's restraints. Pollux hasn't slept for days, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida and I only napped for a few hours. If a troop
of Peacekeepers were to come through that door, we'd be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trapped like rats. We are completely at the mercy of a
decrepit tiger-woman with what I can only hope is an allconsuming</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">passion for Snow's death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't honestly think there's any point in
setting up a guard. Let's just try to get some sleep," I say. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nod numbly, and we all burrow into our pelts. The fire
inside me has flickered out, and with it my strength. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">surrender to the soft, musty fur and oblivion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I have only one dream I remember. A long and wearying
thing in which I'm trying to get to District 12. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">home I'm seeking is intact, the people alive. Effie
Trinket, conspicuous in a bright pink wig and tailored outfit,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">travels with me. I keep trying to ditch her in places,
but she inexplicably reappears at my side, insisting that as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my escort she's responsible for my staying on
schedule. Only the schedule is constantly shifting, derailed by our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lack of a stamp from an official or delayed when Effie
breaks one of her high heels. We camp for days on a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bench in a gray station in District 7, awaiting a
train that never comes. When I wake, somehow I feel even more</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">drained by this than my usual nighttime forays into
blood and terror.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida, the only person awake, tells me it's late
afternoon. I eat a can of beef stew and wash it down with</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a lot of water. Then I lean against the cellar wall,
retracing the events of the last day. Moving death by death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Counting them up on my fingers. One, two--Mitchell and
Boggs lost on the block. Three--Messalla melted by the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pod. Four, five--Leeg 1 and Jackson sacrificing
themselves at the Meat Grinder. Six, seven, eight--Castor,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Homes, and Finnick being decapitated by the
rose-scented lizard mutts. Eight dead in twenty-four hours. I know</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it happened, and yet it doesn't seem real. Surely,
Castor is asleep under that pile of furs, Finnick will come</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bounding down the steps in a minute, Boggs will tell
me his plan for our escape.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">To believe them dead is to accept I killed them. Okay,
maybe not Mitchell and Boggs--they died on an</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">actual assignment. But the others lost their lives
defending me on a mission I fabricated. My plot to assassinate</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow seems so stupid now. So stupid as I sit shivering
here in this cellar, tallying up our losses, fingering the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tassels on the silver knee-high boots I stole from the
woman's home. Oh, yeah--I forgot about that. I killed her, too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm taking out unarmed citizens now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think it's time I give myself up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When everyone finally awakens, I confess. How I lied
about the mission, how I jeopardized everyone in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pursuit of revenge. There's a long silence after I
finish. Then Gale says, "Katniss, we all knew you were lying</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about Coin sending you to assassinate Snow."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You knew, maybe. The soldiers from Thirteen
didn't," I reply.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Do you really think Jackson believed you had
orders from Coin?" Cressida asks. "Of course she didn't.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But she trusted Boggs, and he'd clearly wanted you to
go on."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I never even told Boggs what I planned to
do," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You told everyone in Command!" Gale says.
"It was one of your conditions for being the Mockingjay. <i>'I kill</i></span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow.'</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Those seem like two disconnected things. Negotiating
with Coin for the privilege of executing Snow after</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the war and this unauthorized flight through the
Capitol. "But not like this," I say. "It's been a complete
disaster."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I think it would be considered a highly
successful mission," says Gale. "We've infiltrated the enemy camp,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">showing that the Capitol's defenses can be breached.
We've managed to get footage of ourselves all over the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol's news. We've thrown the whole city into chaos
trying to find us."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Trust me, Plutarch's thrilled," Cressida
adds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's because Plutarch doesn't care who
dies," I say. "Not as long as his Games are a success."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida and Gale go round and round trying to
convince me. Pollux nods at their words to back them up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Only Peeta doesn't offer an opinion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What do you think, Peeta?" I finally ask
him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I think...you still have no idea. The effect you
can have." He slides his cuffs up the support and pushes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">himself to a sitting position. "None of the
people we lost were idiots. They knew what they were doing. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">followed you because they believed you really could
kill Snow."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't know why his voice reaches me when no one
else's can. But if he's right, and I think he is, I owe the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">others a debt that can only be repaid in one way. I
pull my paper map from a pocket in my uniform and spread it</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out on the floor with new resolve. "Where are we,
Cressida?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris's shop sits about five blocks from the City
Circle and Snow's mansion. We're in easy walking</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">distance through a zone in which the pods are
deactivated for the residents' safety. We have disguises that,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">perhaps with some embellishments from Tigris's furry
stock, could get us safely there. But then what? The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mansion's sure to be heavily guarded, under
round-the-clock camera surveillance, and laced with pods that</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could become live at the flick of a switch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What we need is to get him out in the
open," Gale says to me. "Then one of us could pick him off."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Does he ever appear in public anymore?"
asks Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't think so," says Cressida. "At
least in all the recent speeches I've seen, he's been in the mansion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Even before the rebels got here. I imagine he became
more vigilant after Finnick aired his crimes."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That's right. It's not just the Tigrises of the
Capitol who hate Snow now, but a web of people who know what</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he did to their friends and families. It would have to
be something bordering on miraculous to lure him out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Something like...</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I bet he'd come out for me," I say.
"If I were captured. He'd want that as public as possible. He'd want my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">execution on his front steps." I let this sink
in. "Then Gale could shoot him from the audience."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No." Peeta shakes his head. "There are
too many alternative endings to that plan. Snow might decide to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep you and torture information out of you. Or have
you executed publicly without being present. Or kill you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inside the mansion and display your body out
front."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Gale?" I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It seems like an extreme solution to jump to
immediately," he says. "Maybe if all else fails. Let's keep</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thinking."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the quiet that follows, we hear Tigris's soft
footfall overhead. It must be closing time. She's locking up,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fastening the shutters maybe. A few minutes later, the
panel at the top of the stairs slides open.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Come up," says a gravelly voice. "I
have some food for you." It's the first time she's talked since we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrived. Whether it's natural or from years of
practice, I don't know, but there's something in her manner of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">speaking that suggests a cat's purr.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As we climb the stairs, Cressida asks, "Did you
contact Plutarch, Tigris?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No way to." Tigris shrugs. "He'll
figure out you're in a safe house. Don't worry."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Worry? I feel immensely relieved by the news that I won't
be given--and have to ignore--direct orders from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">13. Or make up some viable defense for the decisions
I've made over the last couple of days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the shop, the counter holds some stale hunks of
bread, a wedge of moldy cheese, and half a bottle of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mustard. It reminds me that not everyone in the
Capitol has full stomachs these days. I feel obliged to tell Tigris</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about our remaining food supplies, but she waves my
objections away. "I eat next to nothing," she says. "And</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">then, only raw meat." This seems a little too in
character, but I don't question it. I just scrape the mold off the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cheese and divide up the food among the rest of us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">While we eat, we watch the latest Capitol news
coverage. The government has the rebel survivors</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">narrowed down to the five of us. Huge bounties are
offered for information leading to our capture. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">emphasize how dangerous we are. Show us exchanging
gunfire with the Peacekeepers, although not the mutts</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ripping off their heads. Do a tragic tribute to the
woman lying where we left her, with my arrow still in her heart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Someone has redone her makeup for the cameras.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The rebels let the Capitol broadcast run on
uninterrupted. "Have the rebels made a statement today?" I ask</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris. She shakes her head. "I doubt Coin knows
what to do with me now that I'm still alive."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Tigris gives a throaty cackle. "No one knows what
to do with you, girlie." Then she makes me take a pair of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the fur leggings even though I can't pay her for them.
It's the kind of gift you have to accept. And anyway, it's cold</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in that cellar.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Downstairs after supper, we continue to rack our
brains for a plan. Nothing good comes up, but we do</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">agree that we can no longer go out as a group of five
and that we should try to infiltrate the president's mansion</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before I turn myself into bait. I consent to that
second point to avoid further argument. If I do decide to give myself</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up, it won't require anyone else's permission or
participation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We change bandages, handcuff Peeta back to his
support, and settle down to sleep. A few hours later, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slip back into consciousness and become aware of a
quiet conversation. Peeta and Gale. I can't stop myself</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from eavesdropping.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Thanks for the water," Peeta says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No problem," Gale replies. "I wake up
ten times a night anyway."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"To make sure Katniss is still here?" asks
Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Something like that," Gale admits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a long pause before Peeta speaks again.
"That was funny, what Tigris said. About no one knowing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what to do with her."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, <i>we </i>never have," Gale says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They both laugh. It's so strange to hear them talking
like this. Almost like friends. Which they're not. Never</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have been. Although they're not exactly enemies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She loves you, you know," says Peeta.
"She as good as told me after they whipped you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't believe it," Gale answers. "The
way she kissed you in the Quarter Quell...well, she never kissed me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">like that."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It was just part of the show," Peeta tells
him, although there's an edge of doubt in his voice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No, you won her over. Gave up everything for
her. Maybe that's the only way to convince her you love her."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a long pause. "I should have volunteered
to take your place in the first Games. Protected her then."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You couldn't," says Peeta. "She'd
never have forgiven you. You had to take care of her family. They matter</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">more to her than her life."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, it won't be an issue much longer. I think
it's unlikely all three of us will be alive at the end of the war.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And if we are, I guess it's Katniss's problem. Who to
choose." Gale yawns. "We should get some sleep."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah." I hear Peeta's handcuffs slide down
the support as he settles in. "I wonder how she'll make up her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mind.""</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Oh, that I do know." I can just catch Gale's last
words through the layer of fur. "Katniss will pick whoever she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thinks she can't survive without."</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/03/66-mockingjay-part-iii-assasin-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 6/6] </a></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-87796564730016031272014-02-23T17:56:00.001-08:002015-06-23T06:38:47.116-07:00(4/6) MOCKINGJAY PART II "THE ASSAULT": READ IT ONLINE - LEELO EN INGLÉS ONLINE♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/26-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 1/6]</a><br /><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/16-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 2/6]</a><br /><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/36-mockingjay-part-ii-assault-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 3/6]</a> </span></b><br />
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">15</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The implications of what Gale is suggesting settle
quietly around the room. You can see the reaction</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">playing out on people's faces. The expressions range
from pleasure to distress, from sorrow to satisfaction.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The majority of the workers are citizens from
Two," says Beetee neutrally.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So what?" says Gale. "We'll never be
able to trust them again."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They should at least have a chance to
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, that's a luxury we weren't given when they
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol here," says Gale. By the look on Lyme's face,
I think she might shoot him, or at least take a swing. She'd</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">probably have the upper hand, too, with all her
training. But her anger only seems to infuriate him and he yells,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We watched children burn to death and there was
nothing we could do!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I have to close my eyes a minute, as the image rips
through me. It has the desired effect. I want everyone in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that mountain dead. Am about to say so. But then...I'm
also a girl from District 12. Not President Snow. I can't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">help it. I can't condemn someone to the death he's
suggesting. "Gale," I say, taking his arm and trying to speak in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a reasonable tone. "The Nut's an old mine. It'd
be like causing a massive coal mining accident." Surely the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">words are enough to make anyone from 12 think twice
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But not so quick as the one that killed our
fathers," he retorts. "Is that everyone's problem? That our</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enemies might have a few hours to reflect on the fact
that they're dying, instead of just being blown to bits?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Back in the old days, when we were nothing more than a
couple of kids hunting outside of 12, Gale said</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">things like this and worse. But then they were just
words. Here, put into practice, they become deeds that can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">never be reversed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You don't know how those District Two people
ended up in the Nut," I say. "They may have been coerced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They may be held against their will. Some are our own
spies. Will you kill them, too?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I would sacrifice a few, yes, to take out the
rest of them," he replies. "And if I were a spy in there, I'd say,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">'Bring on the avalanches!'"</span></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know he's telling the truth. That Gale would
sacrifice his life in this way for the cause--no one doubts it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Perhaps we'd all do the same if we were the spies and
given the choice. I guess I would. But it's a coldhearted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">decision to make for other people and those who love
them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You said we had two choices," Boggs tells
him. "To trap them or to flush them out. I say we try to avalanche</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the mountain but leave the train tunnel alone. People
can escape into the square, where we'll be waiting for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them.""</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Heavily armed, I hope," says Gale. "You can
be sure they'll be."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Heavily armed. We'll take them prisoner,"
agrees Boggs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Let's bring Thirteen into the loop now,"
Beetee suggests. "Let President Coin weigh in."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She'll want to block the tunnel," says Gale
with conviction.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes, most likely. But you know, Peeta did have a
point in his propos. About the dangers of killing ourselves</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">off. I've been playing with some numbers. Factoring in
the casualties and the wounded and...I think it's at least</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">worth a conversation," says Beetee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Only a handful of people are invited to be part of
that conversation. Gale and I are released with the rest. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">take him hunting so he can blow off some steam, but
he's not talking about it. Probably too angry with me for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">countering him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The call does happen, a decision is made, and by
evening I'm suited up in my Mockingjay outfit, with my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bow slung over my shoulder and an earpiece that
connects me to Haymitch in 13--just in case a good</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">opportunity for a propo arises. We wait on the roof of
the Justice Building with a clear view of our target.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Our hoverplanes are initially ignored by the
commanders in the Nut, because in the past they've been little</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">more trouble than flies buzzing around a honeypot. But
after two rounds of bombings in the higher elevations of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the mountain, the planes have their attention. By the
time the Capitol's antiaircraft weapons begin to fire, it's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">already too late.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale's plan exceeds anyone's expectations. Beetee was
right about being unable to control the avalanches</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">once they'd been set in motion. The mountainsides are
naturally unstable, but weakened by the explosions, they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">once they'd been set in motion. The mountainsides are
naturally unstable, but weakened by the explosions, they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seem almost fluid. Whole sections of the Nut collapse
before our eyes, obliterating any sign that human beings</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have ever set foot on the place. We stand speechless,
tiny and insignificant, as waves of stone thunder down the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mountain. Burying the entrances under tons of rock.
Raising a cloud of dirt and debris that blackens the sky.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Turning the Nut into a tomb.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I imagine the hell inside the mountain. Sirens
wailing. Lights flickering into darkness. Stone dust choking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the air. The shrieks of panicked, trapped beings stumbling
madly for a way out, only to find the entrances, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">launchpad, the ventilation shafts themselves clogged
with earth and rock trying to force its way in. Live wires</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flung free, fires breaking out, rubble making a
familiar path a maze. People slamming, shoving, scrambling like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ants as the hill presses in, threatening to crush
their fragile shells.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss?" Haymitch's voice is in my
earpiece. I try to answer back and find both of my hands are clamped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tightly over my mouth. "Katniss!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">On the day my father died, the sirens went off during
my school lunch. No one waited for dismissal, or was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">expected to. The response to a mine accident was
something outside the control of even the Capitol. I ran to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim's class. I still remember her, tiny at seven, very
pale, but sitting straight up with her hands folded on her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">desk. Waiting for me to collect her as I'd promised I
would if the sirens ever sounded. She sprang out of her seat,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">grabbed my coat sleeve, and we wove through the
streams of people pouring out onto the streets to pool at the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">main entrance of the mine. We found our mother
clenching the rope that had been hastily strung to keep the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crowd back. In retrospect, I guess I should have known
there was a problem right then. Because why were we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">looking for her, when the reverse should have been
true?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The elevators were screeching, burning up and down
their cables as they vomited smoke-blackened</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">miners into the light of day. With each group came
cries of relief, relatives diving under the rope to lead off their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">husbands, wives, children, parents, siblings. We stood
in the freezing air as the afternoon turned overcast, a light</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">snow dusted the earth. The elevators moved more slowly
now and disgorged fewer beings. I knelt on the ground</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and pressed my hands into the cinders, wanting so
badly to pull my father free. If there's a more helpless feeling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">than trying to reach someone you love who's trapped
underground, I don't know it. The wounded. The bodies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The waiting through the night. Blankets put around
your shoulders by strangers. A mug of something hot that you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">don't drink. And then finally, at dawn, the grieved
expression on the face of the mine captain that could only mean</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What did we just do?</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss! Are you there?" Haymitch is
probably making plans to have me fitted for a head shackle at this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">very moment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I drop my hands. "Yes."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Get inside. Just in case the Capitol tries to
retaliate with what's left of its air force," he instructs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes," I repeat. Everyone on the roof,
except for the soldiers manning the machine guns, begin to make</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">their way inside. As I descend the stairs, I can't
help brushing my fingers along the unblemished white marble</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">walls. So cold and beautiful. Even in the Capitol,
there's nothing to match the magnificence of this old building.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But there is no give to the surface--only my flesh
yields, my warmth taken. Stone conquers people every time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I sit at the base of one of the gigantic pillars in
the great entrance hall. Through the doors I can see the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">white expanse of marble that leads to the steps on the
square. I remember how sick I was the day Peeta and I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">accepted congratulations there for winning the Games.
Worn down by the Victory Tour, failing in my attempt to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">calm the districts, facing the memories of Clove and
Cato, particularly Cato's gruesome, slow death by mutts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs crouches down beside me, his skin pale in the
shadows. "We didn't bomb the train tunnel, you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know. Some of them will probably get out."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And then we'll shoot them when they show their
faces?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Only if we have to," he answers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We could send in trains ourselves. Help evacuate
the wounded," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. It was decided to leave the tunnel in their
hands. That way they can use all the tracks to bring people</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out," says Boggs. "Besides, it will give us
time to get the rest of our soldiers to the square."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A few hours ago, the square was a no-man's-land, the
front line of the fight between the rebels and the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peacekeepers. When Coin gave approval for Gale's plan,
the rebels launched a heated attack and drove the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol forces back several blocks so that we would
control the train station in the event that the Nut fell. Well, it's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fallen. The reality has sunk in. Any survivors will
escape to the square. I can hear the gunfire starting again, as the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peacekeepers are no doubt trying to fight their way in
to rescue their comrades. Our own soldiers are being</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">brought in to counter this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You're cold," says Boggs. "I'll see if
I can find a blanket." He goes before I can protest. I don't want a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blanket, even if the marble continues to leech my body
heat.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss," says Haymitch in my ear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Still here," I answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Interesting turn of events with Peeta this
afternoon. Thought you'd want to know," he says. Interesting isn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">good. It isn't better. But I don't really have any
choice but to listen. "We showed him that clip of you singing 'The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Hanging Tree.' It was never aired, so the Capitol
couldn't use it when he was being hijacked. He says he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">recognized the song."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">For a moment, my heart skips a beat. Then I realize it's
just more tracker jacker serum confusion. "He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">couldn't, Haymitch. He never heard me sing that
song."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not you. Your father. He heard him singing it
one day when he came to trade at the bakery. Peeta was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">small, probably six or seven, but he remembered it
because he was specially listening to see if the birds</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stopped singing," says Haymitch. "Guess they
did."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Six or seven. That would have been before my mother
banned the song. Maybe even right around the time I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was learning it. "Was I there, too?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't think so. No mention of you anyway. But
it's the first connection to you that hasn't triggered some</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mental meltdown," says Haymitch. "It's
something, at least, Katniss."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My father. He seems to be everywhere today. Dying in
the mine. Singing his way into Peeta's muddled</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">consciousness. Flickering in the look Boggs gives me
as he protectively wraps the blanket around my shoulders.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I miss him so badly it hurts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The gunfire's really picking up outside. Gale hurries
by with a group of rebels, eagerly headed for the battle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't petition to join the fighters, not that they
would let me. I have no stomach for it anyway, no heat in my blood.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wish Peeta was here--the old Peeta--because he would
be able to articulate why it is so wrong to be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">exchanging fire when people, any people, are trying to
claw their way out of the mountain. Or is my own history</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">making me too sensitive? Aren't we at war? Isn't this
just another way to kill our enemies?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Night falls quickly. Huge, bright spotlights are
turned on, illuminating the square. Every bulb must be burning</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at full wattage inside the train station as well. Even
from my position across the square, I can see clearly through</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the plate-glass front of the long, narrow building. It
would be impossible to miss the arrival of a train, or even a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">single person. But hours pass and no one comes. With
each minute, it becomes harder to imagine that anyone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">survived the assault on the Nut.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's well after midnight when Cressida comes to attach
a special microphone to my costume. "What's this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch's voice comes on to explain. "I know
you're not going to like this, but we need you to make a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">speech."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"A speech?" I say, immediately feeling
queasy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'll feed it to you, line by line," he
assures me. "You'll just have to repeat what I say. Look, there's no sign
of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">life from that mountain. We've won, but the fighting's
continuing. So we thought if you went out on the steps of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Justice Building and laid it out--told everybody that
the Nut's defeated, that the Capitol's presence in District Two</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">is finished--you might be able to get the rest of
their forces to surrender."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I peer at the darkness beyond the square. "I
can't even see their forces."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's what the mike's for," he says.
"You'll be broadcast, both your voice through their emergency audio</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">system, and your image wherever people have access to
a screen."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know there are a couple of huge screens here on the
square. I saw them on the Victory Tour. It might work,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">if I were good at this sort of thing. Which I'm not.
They tried to feed me lines in those early experiments with the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">propos, too, and it was a flop.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You could save a lot of lives, Katniss,"
Haymitch says finally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"All right. I'll give it a try," I tell him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's strange standing outside at the top of the
stairs, fully costumed, brightly lit, but with no visible audience</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to deliver my speech to. Like I'm doing a show for the
moon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Let's make this quick," says Haymitch.
"You're too exposed."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My television crew, positioned out in the square with
special cameras, indicates that they're ready. I tell</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch to go ahead, then click on my mike and listen
carefully to him dictate the first line of the speech. A huge</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">image of me lights up one of the screens over the
square as I begin. "People of District Two, this is Katniss</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everdeen speaking to you from the steps of your
Justice Building, where--"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The pair of trains comes screeching into the train
station side by side. As the doors slide open, people</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tumble out in a cloud of smoke they've brought from
the Nut. They must have had at least an inkling of what would</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">await them at the square, because you can see them
trying to act evasively. Most of them flatten on the floor, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a spray of bullets inside the station takes out the
lights. They've come armed, as Gale predicted, but they've</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">come wounded as well. The moans can be heard in the
otherwise silent night air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Someone kills the lights on the stairs, leaving me in
the protection of shadow. A flame blooms inside the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">station--one of the trains must actually be on
fire--and a thick, black smoke billows against the windows. Left with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no choice, the people begin to push out into the
square, choking but defiantly waving their guns. My eyes dart</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">around the rooftops that ring the square. Every one of
them has been fortified with rebel-manned machine gun</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nests. Moonlight glints off oiled barrels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A young man staggers out from the station, one hand
pressed against a bloody cloth at his cheek, the other</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dragging a gun. When he trips and falls to his face, I
see the scorch marks down the back of his shirt, the red</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flesh beneath. And suddenly, he's just another burn
victim from a mine accident.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My feet fly down the steps and I take off running for
him. "Stop!" I yell at the rebels. "Hold your fire!" The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">words echo around the square and beyond as the mike
amplifies my voice. "Stop!" I'm nearing the young man,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">reaching down to help him, when he drags himself up to
his knees and trains his gun on my head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I instinctively back up a few steps, raise my bow over
my head to show my intention was harmless. Now</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that he has both hands on his gun, I notice the ragged
hole in his cheek where something--falling stone maybe--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">punctured the flesh. He smells of burning things, hair
and meat and fuel. His eyes are crazed with pain and fear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Freeze," Haymitch's voice whispers in my
ear. I follow his order, realizing that this is what all of District 2,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all of Panem maybe, must be seeing at the moment. The
Mockingjay at the mercy of a man with nothing to lose.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">His garbled speech is barely comprehensible. "Give
me one reason I shouldn't shoot you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The rest of the world recedes. There's only me looking
into the wretched eyes of the man from the Nut who</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">asks for one reason. Surely I should be able to come
up with thousands. But the words that make it to my lips are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I can't."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Logically, the next thing that should happen is the
man pulling the trigger. But he's perplexed, trying to make</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sense of my words. I experience my own confusion as I
realize what I've said is entirely true, and the noble</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">impulse that carried me across the square is replaced
by despair. "I can't. That's the problem, isn't it?" I lower my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bow. "We blew up your mine. You burned my
district to the ground. We've got every reason to kill each other. So</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">do it. Make the Capitol happy. I'm done killing their
slaves for them." I drop my bow on the ground and give it a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nudge with my boot. It slides across the stone and
comes to rest at his knees.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm not their slave," the man mutters.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I am," I say. "That's why I killed
Cato...and he killed Thresh...and he killed Clove...and she tried to kill me.
It</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">just goes around and around, and who wins? Not us. Not
the districts. Always the Capitol. But I'm tired of being a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">piece in their Games."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta. On the rooftop the night before our first
Hunger Games. He understood it all before we'd even set</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">foot in the arena. I hope he's watching now, that he
remembers that night as it happened, and maybe forgives me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">when I die.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Keep talking. Tell them about watching the
mountain go down," Haymitch insists.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"When I saw that mountain fall tonight, I
thought...they've done it again. Got me to kill you--the people in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">districts. But why did I do it? District Twelve and
District Two have no fight except the one the Capitol gave us."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The young man blinks at me uncomprehendingly. I sink
on my knees before him, my voice low and urgent. "And</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">why are you fighting with the rebels on the rooftops?
With Lyme, who was your victor? With people who were</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">your neighbors, maybe even your family?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know," says the man. But he doesn't
take his gun off me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I rise and turn slowly in a circle, addressing the
machine guns. "And you up there? I come from a mining</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">town. Since when do miners condemn other miners to
that kind of death, and then stand by to kill whoever</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">manages to crawl from the rubble?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Who is the enemy?" whispers Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"These people"--I indicate the wounded
bodies on the square--"are not your enemy!" I whip back around to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the train station. "The rebels are not your
enemy! We all have one enemy, and it's the Capitol! This is our chance</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to put an end to their power, but we need every
district person to do it!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The cameras are tight on me as I reach out my hands to
the man, to the wounded, to the reluctant rebels</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">across Panem. "Please! Join us!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My words hang in the air. I look to the screen, hoping
to see them recording some wave of reconciliation</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">going through the crowd.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Instead I watch myself get shot on television.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">16</span></b></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Always."</span></i></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the twilight of morphling, Peeta whispers the word
and I go searching for him. It's a gauzy, violet-tinted</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">world, with no hard edges, and many places to hide. I
push through cloud banks, follow faint tracks, catch the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">scent of cinnamon, of dill. Once I feel his hand on my
cheek and try to trap it, but it dissolves like mist through my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fingers. When I finally begin to surface into the
sterile hospital room in 13, I remember. I was under the influence of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sleep syrup. My heel had been injured after I'd
climbed out on a branch over the electric fence and dropped back</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">into 12. Peeta had put me to bed and I had asked him
to stay with me as I was drifting off. He had whispered</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something I couldn't quite catch. But some part of my
brain had trapped his single word of reply and let it swim</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up through my dreams to taunt me now. <i>"Always."</i></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Morphling dulls the extremes of all emotions, so
instead of a stab of sorrow, I merely feel emptiness. A</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hollow of dead brush where flowers used to bloom.
Unfortunately, there's not enough of the drug left in my veins</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for me to ignore the pain in the left side of my body.
That's where the bullet hit. My hands fumble over the thick</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bandages encasing my ribs and I wonder what I'm still
doing here.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It wasn't him, the man kneeling before me on the
square, the burned one from the Nut. He didn't pull the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trigger. It was someone farther back in the crowd.
There was less a sense of penetration than the feeling that I'd</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been struck with a sledgehammer. Everything after the
moment of impact is confusion riddled with gunfire. I try to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sit up, but the only thing I manage is a moan.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The white curtain that divides my bed from the next
patient's whips back, and Johanna Mason stares down</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at me. At first I feel threatened, because she
attacked me in the arena. I have to remind myself that she did it to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">save my life. It was part of the rebel plot. But
still, that doesn't mean she doesn't despise me. Maybe her</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">treatment of me was all an act for the Capitol?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm alive," I say rustily.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No kidding, brainless." Johanna walks over
and plunks down on my bed, sending spikes of pain shooting</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">across my chest. When she grins at my discomfort, I
know we're not in for some warm reunion scene. "Still a little</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sore?" With an expert hand, she quickly detaches
the morphling drip from my arm and plugs it into a socket</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">taped into the crook of her own. "They started
cutting back my supply a few days ago. Afraid I'm going to turn into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one of those freaks from Six. I've had to borrow from
you when the coast was clear. Didn't think you'd mind."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mind? How can I mind when she was almost tortured to
death by Snow after the Quarter Quell? I have no</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">right to mind, and she knows it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna sighs as the morphling enters her bloodstream.
"Maybe they were onto something in Six. Drug</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">yourself out and paint flowers on your body. Not such
a bad life. Seemed happier than the rest of us, anyway."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the weeks since I left 13, she's gained some weight
back. A soft down of hair has sprouted on her</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shaved head, helping to hide some of the scars. But if
she's siphoning off my morphling, she's struggling.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They've got this head doctor who comes around
every day. Supposed to be helping me recover. Like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">some guy who's spent his life in this rabbit warren's
going to fix me up. Complete idiot. At least twenty times a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">session he reminds me that I'm totally safe." I
manage a smile. It's a truly stupid thing to say, especially to a victor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As if such a state of being ever existed, anywhere,
for anyone. "How about you, Mockingjay? You feel totally</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">safe?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, yeah. Right up until I got shot," I
say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Please. That bullet never even touched you.
Cinna saw to that," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think of the layers of protective armor in my
Mockingjay outfit. But the pain came from somewhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Broken ribs?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not even. Bruised pretty good. The impact
ruptured your spleen. They couldn't repair it." She gives a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dismissive wave of her hand. "Don't worry, you
don't need one. And if you did, they'd find you one, wouldn't they?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's everybody's job to keep you alive."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Is that why you hate me?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Partly," she admits. "Jealousy is
certainly involved. I also think you're a little hard to swallow. With your</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tacky romantic drama and your defender-of-the-helpless
act. Only it isn't an act, which makes you more</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unbearable. Please feel free to take this
personally."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You should have been the Mockingjay. No one
would've had to feed you lines," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"True. But no one likes me," she tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They trusted you, though. To get me out," I
remind her. "And they're afraid of you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Here, maybe. In the Capitol, you're the one
they're scared of now." Gale appears in the doorway, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna neatly unhooks herself and reattaches me to
the morphling drip. "Your cousin's not afraid of me," she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">says confidentially. She scoots off my bed and crosses
to the door, nudging Gale's leg with her hip as she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">passes him. "Are you, gorgeous?" We can hear
her laughter as she disappears down the hall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I raise my eyebrows at him as he takes my hand.
"Terrified," he mouths. I laugh, but it turns into a wince.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Easy." He strokes my face as the pain ebbs.
"You've got to stop running straight into trouble."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know. But someone blew up a mountain," I
answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Instead of pulling back, he leans in closer, searching
my face. "You think I'm heartless."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know you're not. But I won't tell you it's
okay," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Now he draws back, almost impatiently. "Katniss,
what difference is there, really, between crushing our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enemy in a mine or blowing them out of the sky with
one of Beetee's arrows? The result is the same."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know. We were under attack in Eight, for
one thing. The hospital was under attack," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes, and those hoverplanes came from District
Two," he says. "So, by taking them out, we prevented</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">further attacks."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But that kind of thinking...you could turn it
into an argument for killing anyone at any time. You could justify</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sending kids into the Hunger Games to prevent the
districts from getting out of line," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't buy that," he tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I do," I reply. "It must be those
trips to the arena."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Fine. We know how to disagree," he says.
"We always have. Maybe it's good. Between you and me,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we've got District Two now."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Really?" For a moment a feeling of triumph
flares up inside me. Then I think about the people on the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">square. "Was there fighting after I was
shot?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not much. The workers from the Nut turned on the
Capitol soldiers. The rebels just sat by and watched,"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he says. "Actually, the whole country just sat by
and watched."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, that's what they do best," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">You'd think that losing a major organ would entitle
you to lie around a few weeks, but for some reason, my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doctors want me up and moving almost immediately. Even
with the morphling, the internal pain's severe the first</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">few days, but then it slacks off considerably. The
soreness from the bruised ribs, however, promises to hang on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for a while. I begin to resent Johanna dipping into my
morphling supply, but I still let her take whatever she likes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Rumors of my death have been running rampant, so they
send in the team to film me in my hospital bed. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">show off my stitches and impressive bruising and
congratulate the districts on their successful battle for unity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then I warn the Capitol to expect us soon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As part of my rehabilitation, I take short walks
aboveground each day. One afternoon, Plutarch joins me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and gives me an update on our current situation. Now
that District 2 has allied with us, the rebels are taking a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">breather from the war to regroup. Fortifying supply
lines, seeing to the wounded, reorganizing their troops. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol, like 13 during the Dark Days, finds itself
completely cut off from outside help as it holds the threat of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nuclear attack over its enemies. Unlike 13, the
Capitol is not in a position to reinvent itself and become selfsufficient.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, the city might be able to scrape along for a
while," says Plutarch. "Certainly, there are emergency</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">supplies stockpiled. But the significant difference
between Thirteen and the Capitol are the expectations of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">populace. Thirteen was used to hardship, whereas in
the Capitol, all they've known is <i>Panem et Circenses.</i>"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's that?" I recognize <i>Panem</i>, of
course, but the rest is nonsense.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's a saying from thousands of years ago,
written in a language called Latin about a place called Rome,"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he explains. "<i>Panem et Circenses </i>translates
into 'Bread and Circuses.' The writer was saying that in return for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">full bellies and entertainment, his people had given
up their political responsibilities and therefore their power."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think about the Capitol. The excess of food. And the
ultimate entertainment. The Hunger Games. "So</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that's what the districts are for. To provide the bread
and circuses."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes. And as long as that kept rolling in, the
Capitol could control its little empire. Right now, it can provide</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">neither, at least at the standard the people are
accustomed to," says Plutarch. "We have the food and I'm about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to orchestrate an entertainment propo that's sure to
be popular. After all, everybody loves a wedding."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I freeze in my tracks, sick at the idea of what he's
suggesting. Somehow staging some perverse wedding</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">between Peeta and me. I haven't been able to face that
one-way glass since I've been back and, at my own</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">request, only get updates about Peeta's condition from
Haymitch. He speaks very little about it. Different</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">techniques are being tried. There will never truly be
a way to cure him. And now they want me to marry Peeta for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a propo?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch rushes to reassure me. "Oh, no, Katniss.
Not your wedding. Finnick and Annie's. All you need to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">do is show up and pretend to be happy for them."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's one of the few things I won't have to
pretend, Plutarch," I tell him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The next few days bring a flurry of activity as the
event is planned. The differences between the Capitol and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">13 are thrown into sharp relief by the event. When
Coin says "wedding," she means two people signing a piece</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of paper and being assigned a new compartment.
Plutarch means hundreds of people dressed in finery at a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">three-day celebration. It's amusing to watch them
haggle over the details. Plutarch has to fight for every guest,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">every musical note. After Coin vetoes a dinner,
entertainment, and alcohol, Plutarch yells, "What's the point of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">propo if no one's having any fun!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's hard to put a Gamemaker on a budget. But even a
quiet celebration causes a stir in 13, where they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seem to have no holidays at all. When it's announced
that children are wanted to sing District 4's wedding song,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">practically every kid shows up. There's no shortage of
volunteers to help make decorations. In the dining hall,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">people chat excitedly about the event.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Maybe it's more than the festivities. Maybe it's that
we are all so starved for something good to happen that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we want to be part of it. It would explain why--when
Plutarch has a fit over what the bride will wear--I volunteer to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">take Annie back to my house in 12, where Cinna left a
variety of evening clothes in a big storage closet</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">downstairs. All of the wedding gowns he designed for
me went back to the Capitol, but there are some dresses I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wore on the Victory Tour. I'm a little leery about
being with Annie since all I really know about her is that Finnick</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">loves her and everybody thinks she's mad. On the
hovercraft ride, I decide she's less mad than unstable. She</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">laughs at odd places in the conversation or drops out
of it distractedly. Those green eyes fixate on a point with</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">such intensity that you find yourself trying to make out
what she sees in the empty air. Sometimes, for no reason,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she presses both her hands over her ears as if to
block out a painful sound. All right, she's strange, but if Finnick</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">loves her, that's good enough for me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I got permission for my prep team to come along, so
I'm relieved of having to make any fashion decisions.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I open the closet, we all fall silent because
Cinna's presence is so strong in the flow of the fabrics. Then</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Octavia drops to her knees, rubs the hem of a skirt
against her cheek, and bursts into tears. "It's been so long,"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she gasps, "since I've seen anything
pretty."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Despite reservations on Coin's side that it's too
extravagant, and on Plutarch's side that it's too drab, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wedding is a smash hit. The three hundred lucky guests
culled from 13 and the many refugees wear their</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">everyday clothes, the decorations are made from autumn
foliage, the music is provided by a choir of children</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">accompanied by the lone fiddler who made it out of 12
with his instrument. So it's simple, frugal by the Capitol's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">standards. It doesn't matter because nothing can
compete with the beauty of the couple. It isn't about their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">borrowed finery--Annie wears a green silk dress I wore
in 5, Finnick one of Peeta's suits that they altered--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">although the clothes are striking. Who can look past
the radiant faces of two people for whom this day was once</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a virtual impossibility? Dalton, the cattle guy from
10, conducts the ceremony, since it's similar to the one used in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his district. But there are unique touches of District
4. A net woven from long grass that covers the couple during</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">their vows, the touching of each other's lips with
salt water, and the ancient wedding song, which likens marriage</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to a sea voyage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No, I don't have to pretend to be happy for them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After the kiss that seals the union, the cheers, and a
toast with apple cider, the fiddler strikes up a tune that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">turns every head from 12. We may have been the
smallest, poorest district in Panem, but we know how to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dance. Nothing has been officially scheduled at this
point, but Plutarch, who's calling the propo from the control</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">room, must have his fingers crossed. Sure enough,
Greasy Sae grabs Gale by the hand and pulls him into the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">center of the floor and faces off with him. People
pour in to join them, forming two long lines. And the dancing</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">begins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm standing off to the side, clapping to the rhythm,
when a bony hand pinches me above the elbow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna scowls at me. "Are you going to miss the
chance to let Snow see you dancing?" She's right. What could</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spell victory louder than a happy Mockingjay twirling
around to music? I find Prim in the crowd. Since winter</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">evenings gave us a lot of time to practice, we're
actually pretty good partners. I brush off her concerns about my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ribs, and we take our places in the line. It hurts,
but the satisfaction of having Snow watch me dance with my little</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sister reduces other feelings to dust.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Dancing transforms us. We teach the steps to the
District 13 guests. Insist on a special number for the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bride and groom. Join hands and make a giant, spinning
circle where people show off their footwork. Nothing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">silly, joyful, or fun has happened in so long. This
could go on all night if not for the last event planned in Plutarch's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">propo. One I hadn't heard about, but then it was meant
to be a surprise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Four people wheel out a huge wedding cake from a side
room. Most of the guests back up, making way for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this rarity, this dazzling creation with blue-green,
white-tipped icing waves swimming with fish and sailboats,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seals and sea flowers. But I push my way through the
crowd to confirm what I knew at first sight. As surely as the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">embroidery stitches in Annie's gown were done by
Cinna's hand, the frosted flowers on the cake were done by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This may seem like a small thing, but it speaks volumes.
Haymitch has been keeping a great deal from me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The boy I last saw, screaming his head off, trying to
tear free of his restraints, could never have made this. Never</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have had the focus, kept his hands steady, designed
something so perfect for Finnick and Annie. As if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">anticipating my reaction, Haymitch is at my side.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Let's you and me have a talk," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Out in the hall, away from the cameras, I ask,
"What's happening to him?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch shakes his head. "I don't know. None of
us knows. Sometimes he's almost rational, and then, for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no reason, he goes off again. Doing the cake was a
kind of therapy. He's been working on it for days. Watching</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him...he seemed almost like before."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, he's got the run of the place?" I ask.
The idea makes me nervous on about five different levels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, no. He frosted under heavy guard. He's still
under lock and key. But I've talked to him," Haymitch says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Face-to-face?" I ask. "And he didn't
go nuts?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. Pretty angry with me, but for all the right
reasons. Not telling him about the rebel plot and whatnot."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch pauses a moment, as if deciding something.
"He says he'd like to see you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm on a frosting sailboat, tossed around by
blue-green waves, the deck shifting beneath my feet. My palms</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">press into the wall to steady myself. This wasn't part
of the plan. I wrote Peeta off in 2. Then I was to go to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol, kill Snow, and get taken out myself. The
gunshot was only a temporary setback. Never was I supposed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to hear the words <i>He says he'd like to see you. </i>But
now that I have, there's no way to refuse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At midnight, I'm standing outside the door to his
cell. Hospital room. We had to wait for Plutarch to finish</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">getting his wedding footage, which, despite the lack
of what he calls razzle-dazzle, he's pleased with. "The best</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thing about the Capitol basically ignoring Twelve all
these years is that you people still have a little spontaneity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The audience eats that up. Like when Peeta announced
he was in love with you or you did the trick with the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">berries. Makes for good television."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wish I could meet with Peeta privately. But the
audience of doctors has assembled behind the one-way</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">glass, clipboards ready, pens poised. When Haymitch
gives me the okay in my earpiece, I slowly open the door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Those blue eyes lock on me instantly. He's got three
restraints on each arm, and a tube that can dispense a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">knockout drug just in case he loses control. He
doesn't fight to free himself, though, only observes me with the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wary look of someone who still hasn't ruled out that
he's in the presence of a mutt. I walk over until I'm standing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about a yard from the bed. There's nothing to do with
my hands, so I cross my arms protectively over my ribs</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before I speak. "Hey."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Hey," he responds. It's like his voice,
almost his voice, except there's something new in it. An edge of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">suspicion and reproach.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Haymitch said you wanted to talk to me," I
say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Look at you, for starters." It's like he's
waiting for me to transform into a hybrid drooling wolf right before</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his eyes. He stares so long I find myself casting
furtive glances at the one-way glass, hoping for some direction</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from Haymitch, but my earpiece stays silent.
"You're not very big, are you? Or particularly pretty?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know he's been through hell and back, and yet
somehow the observation rubs me the wrong way. "Well,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you've looked better."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch's advice to back off gets muffled by Peeta's
laughter. "And not even remotely nice. To say that to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me after all I've been through."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah. We've all been through a lot. And you're
the one who was known for being nice. Not me." I'm doing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">everything wrong. I don't know why I feel so
defensive. He's been tortured! He's been hijacked! What's wrong</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with me? Suddenly, I think I might start screaming at
him--I'm not even sure about what--so I decide to get out of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there. "Look, I don't feel so well. Maybe I'll
drop by tomorrow."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I've just reached the door when his voice stops me.
"Katniss. I remember about the bread."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The bread. Our one moment of real connection before
the Hunger Games.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They showed you the tape of me talking about
it," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. Is there a tape of you talking about it? Why
didn't the Capitol use it against me?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I made it the day you were rescued," I
answer. The pain in my chest wraps around my ribs like a vise. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dancing was a mistake. "So what do you
remember?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You. In the rain," he says softly.
"Digging in our trash bins. Burning the bread. My mother hitting me.
Taking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the bread out for the pig but then giving it to you
instead."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's it. That's what happened," I say.
"The next day, after school, I wanted to thank you. But I didn't know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We were outside at the end of the day. I tried
to catch your eye. You looked away. And then...for some</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">reason, I think you picked a dandelion." I nod.
He does remember. I have never spoken about that moment</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">aloud. "I must have loved you a lot."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You did." My voice catches and I pretend to
cough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And did you love me?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I keep my eyes on the tiled floor. "Everyone says
I did. Everyone says that's why Snow had you tortured. To</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">break me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's not an answer," he tells me. "I
don't know what to think when they show me some of the tapes. In that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">first arena, it looked like you tried to kill me with
those tracker jackers."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I was trying to kill all of you," I say.
"You had me treed."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Later, there's a lot of kissing. Didn't seem
very genuine on your part. Did you like kissing me?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Sometimes," I admit. "You know people
are watching us now?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know. What about Gale?" he continues.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My anger's returning. I don't care about his recovery--this
isn't the business of the people behind the glass.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"He's not a bad kisser either," I say
shortly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And it was okay with both of us? You kissing the
other?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. It wasn't okay with either of you. But I
wasn't asking your permission," I tell him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta laughs again, coldly, dismissively. "Well,
you're a piece of work, aren't you?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch doesn't protest when I walk out. Down the
hall. Through the beehive of compartments. Find a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">warm pipe to hide behind in a laundry room. It takes a
long time before I get to the bottom of why I'm so upset.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I do, it's almost too mortifying to admit. All
those months of taking it for granted that Peeta thought I was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wonderful are over. Finally, he can see me for who I
really am. Violent. Distrustful. Manipulative. Deadly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And I hate him for it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">17</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Blindsided. That's how I feel when Haymitch tells me
in the hospital. I fly down the steps to Command, mind</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">racing a mile a minute, and burst right into a war
meeting.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What do you mean, I'm not going to the Capitol?
I have to go! I'm the Mockingjay!" I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coin barely looks up from her screen. "And as the
Mockingjay, your primary goal of unifying the districts</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">against the Capitol has been achieved. Don't worry--if
it goes well, we'll fly you in for the surrender."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The surrender?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That'll be too late! I'll miss all the fighting.
You need me--I'm the best shot you've got!" I shout. I don't usually</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">brag about this, but it's got to be at least close to
true. "Gale's going."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Gale has shown up for training every day unless
occupied with other approved duties. We feel confident</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he can manage himself in the field," says Coin.
"How many training sessions do you estimate you've attended?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">None. That's how many. "Well, sometimes I was
hunting. And...I trained with Beetee down in Special</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Weaponry."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's not the same, Katniss," says Boggs.
"We all know you're smart and brave and a good shot. But we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">need soldiers in the field. You don't know the first
thing about executing orders, and you're not exactly at your</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">physical peak."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That didn't bother you when I was in Eight. Or
Two, for that matter," I counter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You weren't originally authorized for combat in
either case," says Plutarch, shooting me a look that signals</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm about to reveal too much.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No, the bomber battle in 8 and my intervention in 2
were spontaneous, rash, and definitely unauthorized.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And both resulted in your injury," Boggs
reminds me. Suddenly, I see myself through his eyes. A smallish</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seventeen-year-old girl who can't quite catch her
breath since her ribs haven't fully healed. Disheveled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Undisciplined. Recuperating. Not a soldier, but
someone who needs to be looked after.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But I have to go," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why?" asks Coin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I can't very well say it's so I can carry out my own
personal vendetta against Snow. Or that the idea of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">remaining here in 13 with the latest version of Peeta
while Gale goes off to fight is unbearable. But I have no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shortage of reasons to want to fight in the Capitol.
"Because of Twelve. Because they destroyed my district."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The president thinks about this a moment. Considers
me. "Well, you have three weeks. It's not long, but you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can begin training. If the Assignment Board deems you
fit, possibly your case will be reviewed."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That's it. That's the most I can hope for. I guess
it's my own fault. I did blow off my schedule every single day</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unless something suited me. It didn't seem like much
of a priority, jogging around a field with a gun with so many</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">other things going on. And now I'm paying for my
negligence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Back in the hospital, I find Johanna in the same
circumstance and spitting mad. I tell her about what Coin</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">said. "Maybe you can train, too."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Fine. I'll train. But I'm going to the stinking
Capitol if I have to kill a crew and fly there myself," says</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Probably best not to bring that up in
training," I say. "But it's nice to know I'll have a ride."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna grins, and I feel a slight but significant
shift in our relationship. I don't know that we're actually</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">friends, but possibly the word <i>allies </i>would be
accurate. That's good. I'm going to need an ally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The next morning, when we report for training at 7:30,
reality slaps me in the face. We've been funneled into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a class of relative beginners, fourteen- or
fifteen-year-olds, which seems a little insulting until it's obvious that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they're in far better condition than we are. Gale and
the other people already chosen to go to the Capitol are in a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">different, accelerated phase of training. After we
stretch--which hurts--there's a couple of hours of strengthening</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">exercises--which hurt--and a five-mile run--which
kills. Even with Johanna's motivational insults driving me on, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have to drop out after a mile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's my ribs," I explain to the trainer, a
no-nonsense middle-aged woman we're supposed to address as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Soldier York. "They're still bruised."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, I'll tell you, Soldier Everdeen, those are
going to take at least another month to heal up on their own,"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I shake my head. "I don't have a month."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She looks me up and down. "The doctors haven't
offered you any treatment?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Is there a treatment?" I ask. "They
said they had to mend naturally."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's what they say. But they could speed up
the process if I recommend it. I warn you, though, it isn't any</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fun," she tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Please. I've got to get to the Capitol," I
say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Soldier York doesn't question this. She scribbles
something on a pad and sends me directly back to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hospital. I hesitate. I don't want to miss any more
training. "I'll be back for the afternoon session," I promise. She</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">just purses her lips.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Twenty-four needle jabs to my rib cage later, I'm
flattened out on my hospital bed, gritting my teeth to keep</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from begging them to bring back my morphling drip.
It's been by my bed so I can take a hit as needed. I haven't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">used it lately, but I kept it for Johanna's sake. Today
they tested my blood to make sure it was clean of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">painkiller, as the mixture of the two drugs--the
morphling and whatever's set my ribs on fire--has dangerous side</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">effects. They made it clear I would have a difficult
couple of days. But I told them to go ahead.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's a bad night in our room. Sleep's out of the
question. I think I can actually smell the ring of flesh around</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my chest burning, and Johanna's fighting off
withdrawal symptoms. Early on, when I apologize about cutting off</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her morphling supply, she waves it off, saying it had
to happen anyway. But by three in the morning, I'm the target</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of every colorful bit of profanity District 7 has to
offer. At dawn, she drags me out of bed, determined to get to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">training.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't think I can do it," I confess.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You can do it. We both can. We're victors,
remember? We're the ones who can survive anything they throw</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at us," she snarls at me. She's a sick greenish
color, shaking like a leaf. I get dressed.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We must be victors to make it through the morning. I
think I'm going to lose Johanna when we realize it's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pouring outside. Her face turns ashen and she seems to
have ceased breathing.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's just water. It won't kill us," I say.
She clenches her jaw and stomps out into the mud. Rain drenches us</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as we work our bodies and then slog around the running
course. I bail after a mile again, and I have to resist the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">temptation to take off my shirt so the cold water can
sizzle off my ribs. I force down my field lunch of soggy fish</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and beet stew. Johanna gets halfway through her bowl
before it comes back up. In the afternoon, we learn to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assemble our guns. I manage it, but Johanna can't hold
her hands steady enough to fit the parts together. When</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">York's back is turned, I help her out. Even though the
rain continues, the afternoon's an improvement because</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we're on the shooting range. At last, something I'm
good at. It takes some adjusting from a bow to a gun, but by</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the end of the day, I've got the best score in my
class.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We're just inside the hospital doors when Johanna declares,
"This has to stop. Us living in the hospital.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everyone views us as patients."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's not a problem for me. I can move into our family
compartment, but Johanna's never been assigned one.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When she tries to get discharged from the hospital,
they won't agree to let her live alone, even if she comes in for</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">daily talks with the head doctor. I think they may
have put two and two together about the morphling and this only</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">adds to their view that she's unstable. "She
won't be alone. I'm going to room with her," I announce. There's some</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dissent, but Haymitch takes our part, and by bedtime,
we have a compartment across from Prim and my mother,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who agrees to keep an eye on us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After I take a shower, and Johanna sort of wipes
herself down with a damp cloth, she makes a cursory</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inspection of the place. When she opens the drawer
that holds my few possessions, she shuts it quickly. "Sorry."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think how there's nothing in Johanna's drawer but
her government-issued clothes. That she doesn't have</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one thing in the world to call her own. "It's
okay. You can look at my stuff if you want."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna unlatches my locket, studying the pictures of
Gale, Prim, and my mother. She opens the silver</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">parachute and pulls out the spile and slips it onto
her pinkie. "Makes me thirsty just looking at it." Then she finds</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the pearl Peeta gave me. "Is this--?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah," I say. "Made it through
somehow." I don't want to talk about Peeta. One of the best things about</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">training is, it keeps me from thinking of him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Haymitch says he's getting better," she
says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Maybe. But he's changed," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So have you. So have I. And Finnick and Haymitch
and Beetee. Don't get me started on Annie Cresta. The</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arena messed us all up pretty good, don't you think?
Or do you still feel like the girl who volunteered for your</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sister?" she asks me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's the one thing I think my head doctor
might be right about. There's no going back. So we might as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">well get on with things." She neatly returns my
keepsakes to the drawer and climbs into the bed across from me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">just as the lights go out. "You're not afraid
I'll kill you tonight?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Like I couldn't take you," I answer. Then
we laugh, since both our bodies are so wrecked, it will be a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">miracle if we can get up the next day. But we do. Each
morning, we do. And by the end of the week, my ribs feel</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">almost like new, and Johanna can assemble her rifle
without help.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Soldier York gives the pair of us an approving nod as
we knock off for the day. "Fine job, Soldiers."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When we move out of hearing, Johanna mutters, "I
think winning the Games was easier." But the look on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her face says she's pleased.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In fact, we're almost in good spirits when we go to
the dining hall, where Gale's waiting to eat with me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Receiving a giant serving of beef stew doesn't hurt my
mood either. "First shipments of food arrived this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morning," Greasy Sae tells me. "That's real
beef, from District Ten. Not any of your wild dog."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't remember you turning it down," Gale
tosses back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We join a group that includes Delly, Annie, and
Finnick. It's something to see Finnick's transformation since</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his marriage. His earlier incarnations--the decadent
Capitol heartthrob I met before the Quell, the enigmatic ally</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in the arena, the broken young man who tried to help
me hold it together--these have been replaced by someone</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who radiates life. Finnick's real charms of
self-effacing humor and an easygoing nature are on display for the first</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">time. He never lets go of Annie's hand. Not when they
walk, not when they eat. I doubt he ever plans to. She's lost</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in some daze of happiness. There are still moments
when you can tell something slips in her brain and another</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">world blinds her to us. But a few words from Finnick
call her back.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Delly, who I've known since I was little but never
gave much thought to, has grown in my estimation. She</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was told what Peeta said to me that night after the
wedding, but she's not a gossip. Haymitch says she's the best</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">defender I have when Peeta goes off on some kind of
tear about me. Always taking my side, blaming his</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">negative perceptions on the Capitol's torture. She has
more influence on him than any of the others do, because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he really does know her. Anyway, even if she's
sugarcoating my good points, I appreciate it. Frankly, I could use a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">little sugarcoating.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm starving and the stew is so delicious--beef,
potatoes, turnips, and onions in a thick gravy--that I have to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">force myself to slow down. All around the dining hall,
you can feel the rejuvenating effect that a good meal can</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bring on. The way it can make people kinder, funnier,
more optimistic, and remind them it's not a mistake to go</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on living. It's better than any medicine. So I try to
make it last and join in the conversation. Sop up the gravy on my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bread and nibble on it as I listen to Finnick telling
some ridiculous story about a sea turtle swimming off with his</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hat. Laugh before I realize he's standing there.
Directly across the table, behind the empty seat next to Johanna.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Watching me. I choke momentarily as the gravy bread
sticks in my throat.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Peeta!" says Delly. "It's so nice to
see you out...and about."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Two large guards stand behind him. He holds his tray
awkwardly, balanced on his fingertips since his wrists</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are shackled with a short chain between them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's with the fancy bracelets?" asks
Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm not quite trustworthy yet," says Peeta.
"I can't even sit here without your permission." He indicates the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guards with his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Sure he can sit here. We're old friends,"
says Johanna, patting the space beside her. The guards nod and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta takes a seat. "Peeta and I had adjoining
cells in the Capitol. We're very familiar with each other's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">screams."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Annie, who's on Johanna's other side, does that thing
where she covers her ears and exits reality. Finnick</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shoots Johanna an angry look as his arm encircles
Annie.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What? My head doctor says I'm not supposed to
censor my thoughts. It's part of my therapy," replies</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The life has gone out of our little party. Finnick
murmurs things to Annie until she slowly removes her hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then there's a long silence while people pretend to
eat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Annie," says Delly brightly, "did you
know it was Peeta who decorated your wedding cake? Back home,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his family ran the bakery and he did all the
icing."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Annie cautiously looks across Johanna. "Thank
you, Peeta. It was beautiful."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"My pleasure, Annie," says Peeta, and I hear
that old note of gentleness in his voice that I thought was gone</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">forever. Not that it's directed at me. But still.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If we're going to fit in that walk, we better
go," Finnick tells her. He arranges both of their trays so he can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">carry them in one hand while holding tightly to her
with the other. "Good seeing you, Peeta."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You be nice to her, Finnick. Or I might try and
take her away from you." It could be a joke, if the tone wasn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so cold. Everything it conveys is wrong. The open
distrust of Finnick, the implication that Peeta has his eye on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Annie, that Annie could desert Finnick, that I do not
even exist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, Peeta," says Finnick lightly.
"Don't make me sorry I restarted your heart." He leads Annie away
after</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">giving me a concerned glance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When they're gone, Delly says in a reproachful voice,
"He did save your life, Peeta. More than once."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"For her." He gives me a brief nod.
"For the rebellion. Not for me. I don't owe him anything."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I shouldn't rise to the bait, but I do. "Maybe
not. But Mags is dead and you're still here. That should count for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah, a lot of things should count for something
that don't seem to, Katniss. I've got some memories I can't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">make sense of, and I don't think the Capitol touched
them. A lot of nights on the train, for instance," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Again the implications. That more happened on the
train than did. That what did happen--those nights I only</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">kept my sanity because his arms were around me--no
longer matters. Everything a lie, everything a way of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">misusing him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta makes a little gesture with his spoon,
connecting Gale and me. "So, are you two officially a couple</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">now, or are they still dragging out the star-crossed
lover thing?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Still dragging," says Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Spasms cause Peeta's hands to tighten into fists, then
splay out in a bizarre fashion. Is it all he can do to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep them from my neck? I can feel the tension in
Gale's muscles next to me, fear an altercation. But Gale simply</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">says, "I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't
seen it myself."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's that?" asks Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You," Gale answers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You'll have to be a little more specific,"
says Peeta. "What about me?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That they've replaced you with the evil-mutt
version of yourself," says Johanna.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale finishes his milk. "You done?" he asks
me. I rise and we cross to drop off our trays. At the door, an old</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">man stops me because I'm still clutching the rest of
my gravy bread in my hand. Something in my expression, or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">maybe the fact that I've made no attempt to conceal
it, makes him go easy on me. He lets me stuff the bread in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my mouth and move on. Gale and I are almost to my
compartment when he speaks again. "I didn't expect that."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I told you he hated me," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's the way he hates you. It's so...familiar. I
used to feel like that," he admits. "When I'd watch you kissing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him on the screen. Only I knew I wasn't being entirely
fair. He can't see that."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We reach my door. "Maybe he just sees me as I
really am. I have to get some sleep."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale catches my arm before I can disappear. "So
that's what you're thinking now?" I shrug. "Katniss, as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">your oldest friend, believe me when I say he's not
seeing you as you really are." He kisses my cheek and goes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I sit on my bed, trying to stuff information from my
Military Tactics books into my head while memories of my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nights with Peeta on the train distract me. After
about twenty minutes, Johanna comes in and throws herself</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">across the foot of my bed. "You missed the best
part. Delly lost her temper at Peeta over how he treated you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She got very squeaky. It was like someone stabbing a
mouse with a fork repeatedly. The whole dining hall was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">riveted."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What'd Peeta do?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"He started arguing with himself like he was two
people. The guards had to take him away. On the good</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">side, no one seemed to notice I finished his
stew." Johanna rubs her hand over her protruding belly. I look at the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">layer of grime under her fingernails. Wonder if the
people in 7 ever bathe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We spend a couple of hours quizzing each other on
military terms. I visit my mother and Prim for a while.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I'm back in my compartment, showered, staring
into the darkness, I finally ask, "Johanna, could you really</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hear him screaming?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That was part of it," she says. "Like
the jabberjays in the arena. Only it was real. And it didn't stop after an</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hour. Tick, tock."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Tick, tock," I whisper back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Roses. Wolf mutts. Tributes. Frosted dolphins.
Friends. Mockingjays. Stylists. Me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everything screams in my dreams tonight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">18</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I throw myself into training with a vengeance. Eat,
live, and breathe the workouts, drills, weapons practice,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lectures on tactics. A handful of us are moved into an
additional class that gives me hope I may be a contender</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for the actual war. The soldiers simply call it the
Block, but the tattoo on my arm lists it as S.S.C., short for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Simulated Street Combat. Deep in 13, they've built an
artificial Capitol city block. The instructor breaks us into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">squads of eight and we attempt to carry out
missions--gaining a position, destroying a target, searching a home-</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">-as if we were really fighting our way through the
Capitol. The thing's rigged so that everything that can go wrong</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for you does. A false step triggers a land mine, a
sniper appears on a rooftop, your gun jams, a crying child</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">leads you into an ambush, your squadron leader--who's
just a voice on the program--gets hit by a mortar and you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have to figure out what to do without orders. Part of
you knows it's fake and that they're not going to kill you. If you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">set off a land mine, you hear the explosion and have
to pretend to fall over dead. But in other ways, it feels pretty</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">real in there--the enemy soldiers dressed in
Peacekeepers' uniforms, the confusion of a smoke bomb. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even gas us. Johanna and I are the only ones who get
our masks on in time. The rest of our squad gets knocked</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out for ten minutes. And the supposedly harmless gas I
took a few lungfuls of gives me a wicked headache for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the rest of the day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida and her crew tape Johanna and me on the
firing range. I know Gale and Finnick are being filmed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as well. It's part of a new propos series to show the
rebels preparing for the Capitol invasion. On the whole,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">things are going pretty well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then Peeta starts showing up for our morning workouts.
The manacles are off, but he's still constantly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">accompanied by a pair of guards. After lunch, I see
him across the field, drilling with a group of beginners. I don't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know what they're thinking. If a spat with Delly can
reduce him to arguing with himself, he's got no business</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">learning how to assemble a gun.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I confront Plutarch, he assures me that it's all
for the camera. They've got footage of Annie getting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">married and Johanna hitting targets, but all of Panem
is wondering about Peeta. They need to see he's fighting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for the rebels, not for Snow. And maybe if they could
just get a couple of shots of the two of us, not kissing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">necessarily, just looking happy to be back together--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I walk away from the conversation right then. That is
not going to happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In my rare moments of downtime, I anxiously watch the
preparations for the invasions. See equipment and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">provisions readied, divisions assembled. You can tell
when someone's received orders because they're given a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">very short haircut, the mark of a person going into
battle. There is much talk of the opening offensive, which will</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be to secure the train tunnels that feed up into the
Capitol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Just a few days before the first troops are to move
out, York unexpectedly tells Johanna and me she's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">recommended us for the exam, and we're to report
immediately. There are four parts: an obstacle course that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assesses your physical condition, a written tactics
exam, a test of weapons proficiency, and a simulated combat</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">situation in the Block. I don't even have time to get
nervous for the first three and do well, but there's a backlog at</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Block. Some kind of technical bug they're working
out. A group of us exchanges information. This much</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seems true. You go through alone. There's no
predicting what situation you'll be thrown into. One boy says, under</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his breath, that he's heard it's designed to target
each individual's weaknesses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My weaknesses? That's a door I don't even want to
open. But I find a quiet spot and try to assess what they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">might be. The length of the list depresses me. Lack of
physical brute force. A bare minimum of training. And</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">somehow my stand-out status as the Mockingjay doesn't
seem to be an advantage in a situation where they're</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trying to get us to blend into a pack. They could nail
me to the wall on any number of things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Johanna's called three ahead of me, and I give her a
nod of encouragement. I wish I had been at the top of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the list because now I'm really overthinking the whole
thing. By the time my name's called, I don't know what my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">strategy should be. Fortunately, once I'm in the
Block, a certain amount of training does kick in. It's an ambush</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">situation. Peacekeepers appear almost instantly and I
have to make my way to a rendezvous point to meet up</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with my scattered squad. I slowly navigate the street,
taking out Peacekeepers as I go. Two on the rooftop to my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">left, another in the doorway up ahead. It's
challenging, but not as hard as I was expecting. There's a nagging</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">feeling that if it's too simple, I must be missing the
point. I'm within a couple of buildings from my goal when</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">feeling that if it's too simple, I must be missing the
point. I'm within a couple of buildings from my goal when</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">things begin to heat up. A half dozen Peacekeepers
come charging around the corner. They will outgun me, but I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">notice something. A drum of gasoline lying carelessly
in the gutter. This is it. My test. To perceive that blowing up</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the drum will be the only way to achieve my mission.
Just as I step out to do it, my squadron leader, who's been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fairly useless up to this point, quietly orders me to
hit the ground. Every instinct I have screams for me to ignore</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the voice, to pull the trigger, to blow the
Peacekeepers sky-high. And suddenly, I realize what the military will think</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my biggest weakness is. From my first moment in the
Games, when I ran for that orange backpack, to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">firefight in 8, to my impulsive race across the square
in 2. I cannot take orders.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I smack into the ground so hard and fast, I'll be
picking gravel out of my chin for a week. Someone else</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blows the gas tank. The Peacekeepers die. I make my
rendezvous point. When I exit the Block on the far side, a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">soldier congratulates me, stamps my hand with squad
number 451, and tells me to report to Command. Almost</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">giddy with success, I run through the halls, skidding
around corners, bounding down the steps because the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">elevator's too slow. I bang into the room before the
oddity of the situation dawns on me. I shouldn't be in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Command; I should be getting my hair buzzed. The
people around the table aren't freshly minted soldiers but the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ones calling the shots.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs smiles and shakes his head when he sees me.
"Let's see it." Unsure now, I hold out my stamped</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hand. "You're with me. It's a special unit of
sharpshooters. Join your squad." He nods over at a group lining the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wall. Gale. Finnick. Five others I don't know. My
squad. I'm not only in, I get to work under Boggs. With my friends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I force myself to take calm, soldierly steps to join
them, instead of jumping up and down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We must be important, too, because we're in Command,
and it has nothing to do with a certain Mockingjay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch stands over a wide, flat panel in the center
of the table. He's explaining something about the nature of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what we will encounter in the Capitol. I'm thinking
this is a terrible presentation--because even on tiptoe I can't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">see what's on the panel--until he hits a button. A
holographic image of a block of the Capitol projects into the air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"This, for example, is the area surrounding one
of the Peacekeepers' barracks. Not unimportant, but not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the most crucial of targets, and yet look."
Plutarch enters some sort of code on a keyboard, and lights begin to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flash. They're in an assortment of colors and blink at
different speeds. "Each light is called a pod. It represents a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">different obstacle, the nature of which could be
anything from a bomb to a band of mutts. Make no mistake,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whatever it contains is designed to either trap or
kill you. Some have been in place since the Dark Days, others</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">developed over the years. To be honest, I created a
fair number myself. This program, which one of our people</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">absconded with when we left the Capitol, is our most
recent information. They don't know we have it. But even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so, it's likely that new pods have been activated in
the last few months. This is what you will face."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm unaware that my feet are moving to the table until
I'm inches from the holograph. My hand reaches in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and cups a rapidly blinking green light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Someone joins me, his body tense. Finnick, of course.
Because only a victor would see what I see so</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">immediately. The arena. Laced with pods controlled by
Gamemakers. Finnick's fingers caress a steady red glow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">over a doorway. "Ladies and gentlemen..."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">His voice is quiet, but mine rings through the room.
"Let the Seventy-sixth Hunger Games begin!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I laugh. Quickly. Before anyone has time to register
what lies beneath the words I have just uttered. Before</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">eyebrows are raised, objections are uttered, two and
two are put together, and the solution is that I should be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">kept as far away from the Capitol as possible. Because
an angry, independently thinking victor with a layer of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">psychological scar tissue too thick to penetrate is
maybe the last person you want on your squad.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't even know why you bothered to put
Finnick and me through training, Plutarch," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah, we're already the two best-equipped
soldiers you have," Finnick adds cockily.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Do not think that fact escapes me," he says
with an impatient wave. "Now back in line, Soldiers Odair and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Everdeen. I have a presentation to finish."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We retreat to our places, ignoring the questioning
looks thrown our way. I adopt an attitude of extreme</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">concentration as Plutarch continues, nodding my head
here and there, shifting my position to get a better view,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all the while telling myself to hang on until I can
get to the woods and scream. Or curse. Or cry. Or maybe all three</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at once.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">If this was a test, Finnick and I both pass it. When
Plutarch finishes and the meeting's adjourned, I have a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bad moment when I learn there's a special order for
me. But it's merely that I skip the military haircut because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they would like the Mockingjay to look as much like
the girl in the arena as possible at the anticipated surrender.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">For the cameras, you know. I shrug to communicate that
my hair length's a matter of complete indifference to me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They dismiss me without further comment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick and I gravitate toward each other in the
hallway. "What will I tell Annie?" he says under his breath.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Nothing," I answer. "That's what my
mother and sister will be hearing from me." Bad enough that we know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">we're heading back into a fully equipped arena. No use
dropping it on our loved ones.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If she sees that holograph--" he begins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She won't. It's classified information. It must
be," I say. "Anyway, it's not like an actual Games. Any number</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of people will survive. We're just overreacting
because--well, you know why. You still want to go, don't you?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Of course. I want to destroy Snow as much as you
do," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It won't be like the others," I say firmly,
trying to convince myself as well. Then the real beauty of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">situation dawns on me. "This time Snow will be a
player, too."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Before we can continue, Haymitch appears. He wasn't at
the meeting, isn't thinking of arenas but</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something else. "Johanna's back in the
hospital."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I assumed Johanna was fine, had passed her exam, but
simply wasn't assigned to a sharpshooters' unit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She's wicked throwing an ax but about average with a
gun. "Is she hurt? What happened?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It was while she was on the Block. They try to
ferret out a soldier's potential weaknesses. So they flooded</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the street," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This doesn't help. Johanna can swim. At least, I seem
to remember her swimming around some in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Quarter Quell. Not like Finnick, of course, but none
of us are like Finnick. "So?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's how they tortured her in the Capitol.
Soaked her and then used electric shocks," says Haymitch. "In</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Block she had some kind of flashback. Panicked,
didn't know where she was. She's back under sedation."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick and I just stand there, as if we've lost the
ability to respond. I think of the way Johanna never showers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">How she forced herself into the rain like it was acid
that day. I had attributed her misery to the morphling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">withdrawal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You two should go see her. You're as close to
friends as she's got," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That makes the whole thing worse. I don't really know
what's between Johanna and Finnick. But I hardly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know her. No family. No friends. Not so much as a
token from 7 to set beside her regulation clothes in her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">anonymous drawer. Nothing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I better go tell Plutarch. He won't be
happy," Haymitch continues. "He wants as many victors as possible</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for the cameras to follow in the Capitol. Thinks it
makes for better television."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Are you and Beetee going?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"As many young and attractive victors as
possible," Haymitch corrects himself. "So, no. We'll be here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick goes directly down to see Johanna, but I
linger outside a few minutes until Boggs comes out. He's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my commander now, so I guess he's the one to ask for
any special favors. When I tell him what I want to do, he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">writes me a pass so that I can go to the woods during
Reflection, provided I stay within sight of the guards. I run</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to my compartment, thinking to use the parachute, but
it's so full of ugly memories. Instead, I go across the hall</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and take one of the white cotton bandages I brought
from 12. Square. Sturdy. Just the thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the woods, I find a pine tree and strip handfuls of
fragrant needles from the boughs. After making a neat</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pile in the middle of the bandage, I gather up the
sides, give them a twist, and tie them tightly with a length of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">vine, making an apple-sized bundle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">At the hospital room door, I watch Johanna for a
moment, realize that most of her ferocity is in her abrasive</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">attitude. Stripped of that, as she is now, there's
only a slight young woman, her wide-set eyes fighting to stay</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">awake against the power of the drugs. Terrified of
what sleep will bring. I cross to her and hold out the bundle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's that?" she says hoarsely. Damp edges
of her hair form little spikes over her forehead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I made it for you. Something to put in your
drawer." I place it in her hands. "Smell it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She lifts the bundle to her nose and takes a tentative
sniff. "Smells like home." Tears flood her eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's what I was hoping. You being from Seven
and all," I say. "Remember when we met? You were a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tree. Well, briefly."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, she has my wrist in an iron grip. "You
have to kill him, Katniss."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't worry." I resist the temptation to
wrench my arm free.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Swear it. On something you care about," she
hisses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I swear it. On my life." But she doesn't
let go of my arm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"On your family's life," she insists.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"On my family's life," I repeat. I guess my
concern for my own survival isn't compelling enough. She lets go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and I rub my wrist. "Why do you think I'm going,
anyway, brainless?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That makes her smile a little. "I just needed to
hear it." She presses the bundle of pine needles to her nose</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and closes her eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The remaining days go by in a whirl. After a brief
workout each morning, my squad's on the shooting range</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">full-time in training. I practice mostly with a gun,
but they reserve an hour a day for specialty weapons, which</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">means I get to use my Mockingjay bow, Gale his heavy
militarized one. The trident Beetee designed for Finnick</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has a lot of special features, but the most remarkable
is that he can throw it, press a button on a metal cuff on his</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wrist, and return it to his hand without chasing it
down.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Sometimes we shoot at Peacekeeper dummies to become
familiar with the weaknesses in their protective</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gear. The chinks in the armor, so to speak. If you hit
flesh, you're rewarded with a burst of fake blood. Our</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dummies are soaked in red.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's reassuring to see just how high the overall level
of accuracy is in our group. Along with Finnick and Gale,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the squad includes five soldiers from 13. Jackson, a
middle-aged woman who's Boggs's second in command,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">looks kind of sluggish but can hit things the rest of
us can't even see without a scope. Farsighted, she says.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's a pair of sisters in their twenties named
Leeg--we call them Leeg 1 and Leeg 2 for clarity--who are so</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">similar in uniform, I can't tell them apart until I
notice Leeg 1 has weird yellow flecks in her eyes. Two older guys,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mitchell and Homes, never say much but can shoot the
dust off your boots at fifty yards. I see other squads that</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are also quite good, but I don't fully understand our
status until the morning Plutarch joins us.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Squad Four-Five-One, you have been selected for
a special mission," he begins. I bite the inside of my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lip, hoping against hope that it's to assassinate
Snow. "We have numerous sharpshooters, but rather a dearth of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">camera crews. Therefore, we've handpicked the eight of
you to be what we call our 'Star Squad.' You will be the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on-screen faces of the invasion."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Disappointment, shock, then anger run through the
group. "What you're saying is, we won't be in actual</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">combat," snaps Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You will be in combat, but perhaps not always on
the front line. If one can even isolate a front line in this</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">type of war," says Plutarch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"None of us wants that." Finnick's remark is
followed by a general rumble of assent, but I stay silent. "We're</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">going to fight."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You're going to be as useful to the war effort
as possible," Plutarch says. "And it's been decided that you</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are of most value on television. Just look at the
effect Katniss had running around in that Mockingjay suit. Turned</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the whole rebellion around. Do you notice how she's
the only one not complaining? It's because she understands</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the power of that screen."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Actually, Katniss isn't complaining because she has no
intention of staying with the "Star Squad," but she</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">recognizes the necessity of getting to the Capitol
before carrying out any plan. Still, to be too compliant may</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arouse suspicion as well.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But it's not all pretend, is it?" I ask.
"That'd be a waste of talent."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't worry," Plutarch tells me.
"You'll have plenty of real targets to hit. But don't get blown up. I've
got</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enough on my plate without having to replace you. Now
get to the Capitol and put on a good show."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The morning we ship out, I say good-bye to my family.
I haven't told them how much the Capitol's defenses</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mirror the weapons in the arena, but my going off to
war is awful enough on its own. My mother holds me tightly</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for a long time. I feel tears on her cheek, something
she suppressed when I was slated for the Games. "Don't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">worry. I'll be perfectly safe. I'm not even a real
soldier. Just one of Plutarch's televised puppets," I reassure her.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim walks me as far as the hospital doors. "How
do you feel?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Better, knowing you're somewhere Snow can't
reach you," I say.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Next time we see each other, we'll be free of
him," says Prim firmly. Then she throws her arms around my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">neck. "Be careful."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I consider saying a final good-bye to Peeta, decide it
would only be bad for both of us. But I do slip the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pearl into the pocket of my uniform. A token of the
boy with the bread.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A hovercraft takes us to, of all places, 12, where a
makeshift transportation area has been set up outside</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the fire zone. No luxury trains this time, but a cargo
car packed to the limit with soldiers in their dark gray</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">uniforms, sleeping with their heads on their packs.
After a couple of days' travel, we disembark inside one of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mountain tunnels leading to the Capitol, and make the
rest of the six-hour trek on foot, taking care to step only on</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a glowing green paint line that marks safe passage to
the air above.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We come out in the rebel encampment, a ten-block
stretch outside the train station where Peeta and I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">made our previous arrivals. It's already crawling with
soldiers. Squad 451 is assigned a spot to pitch its tents.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This area has been secured for over a week. Rebels
pushed out the Peacekeepers, losing hundreds of lives in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the process. The Capitol forces fell back and have
regrouped farther into the city. Between us lie the boobytrapped</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">streets, empty and inviting. Each one will need to be
swept of pods before we can advance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mitchell asks about hoverplane bombings--we do feel
very naked pitched out in the open--but Boggs says</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it's not an issue. Most of the Capitol's air fleet was
destroyed in 2 or during the invasion. If it has any craft left, it's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">holding on to them. Probably so Snow and his inner
circle can make a last-minute escape to some presidential</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bunker somewhere if needed. Our own hoverplanes were
grounded after the Capitol's antiaircraft missiles</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">decimated the first few waves. This war will be
battled out on the streets with, hopefully, only superficial damage</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to the infrastructure and a minimum of human
casualties. The rebels want the Capitol, just as the Capitol wanted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">13.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After three days, much of Squad 451 risks deserting
out of boredom. Cressida and her team take shots of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us firing. They tell us we're part of the
disinformation team. If the rebels only shoot Plutarch's pods, it will take the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol about two minutes to realize we have the
holograph. So there's a lot of time spent shattering things that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">don't matter, to throw them off the scent. Mostly we
just add to the piles of rainbow glass that's been blown off the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">exteriors of the candy-colored buildings. I suspect
they are intercutting this footage with the destruction of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">significant Capitol targets. Once in a while it seems
a real sharpshooter's services are needed. Eight hands go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up, but Gale, Finnick, and I are never chosen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It's your own fault for being so
camera-ready," I tell Gale. If looks could kill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't think they quite know what to do with the
three of us, particularly me. I have my Mockingjay outfit with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me, but I've only been taped in my uniform. Sometimes
I use a gun, sometimes they ask me to shoot with my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bow and arrows. It's as if they don't want to entirely
lose the Mockingjay, but they want to downgrade my role to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">foot soldier. Since I don't care, it's amusing rather
than upsetting to imagine the arguments going on back in 13.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">While I outwardly express discontent about our lack of
any real participation, I'm busy with my own agenda.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Each of us has a paper map of the Capitol. The city
forms an almost perfect square. Lines divide the map into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">smaller squares, with letters along the top and
numbers down the side to form a grid. I consume this, noting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">every intersection and side street, but it's remedial
stuff. The commanders here are working off Plutarch's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">holograph. Each has a handheld contraption called a
Holo that produces images like I saw in Command. They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">can zoom into any area of the grid and see what pods await
them. The Holo's an independent unit, a glorified</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">map really, since it can neither send nor receive
signals. But it's far superior to my paper version.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A Holo is activated by a specific commander's voice
giving his or her name. Once it's working, it responds</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to the other voices in the squadron so if, say, Boggs
were killed or severely disabled, someone could take over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">If anyone in the squad repeats "nightlock"
three times in a row, the Holo will explode, blowing everything in a fiveyard</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">radius sky-high. This is for security reasons in the
event of capture. It's understood that we would all do this</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">without hesitation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So what I need to do is steal Boggs's activated Holo
and clear out before he notices. I think it would be</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">easier to steal his teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">On the fourth morning, Soldier Leeg 2 hits a
mislabeled pod. It doesn't unleash a swarm of muttation gnats,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">which the rebels are prepared for, but shoots out a
sunburst of metal darts. One finds her brain. She's gone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before the medics can reach her. Plutarch promises a
speedy replacement.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The following evening, the newest member of our squad
arrives. With no manacles. No guards. Strolling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out of the train station with his gun swinging from
the strap over his shoulder. There's shock, confusion,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">resistance, but <i>451 </i>is stamped on the back of
Peeta's hand in fresh ink. Boggs relieves him of his weapon and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">goes to make a call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It won't matter," Peeta tells the rest of
us. "The president assigned me herself. She decided the propos</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">needed some heating up."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Maybe they do. But if Coin sent Peeta here, she's
decided something else as well. That I'm of more use to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her dead than alive.</span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/56-mockingjay-part-iii-assasin-read-it.html" target="_blank"> <span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">[Click acá para ir a la parte 5/6]</span></a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07672034184116962349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5566422974777861989.post-50357001312266478422014-02-22T17:58:00.000-08:002015-06-23T06:38:23.300-07:00(3/6) MOCKINGJAY PART II "THE ASSAULT": READ IT ONLINE - LEELO EN INGLÉS ONLINE♥<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3vEYUmdRJRoHz64oNJOuHAtzY_HuxHs6_QuLw9wXIRigo5nyBQQ7USAxFa9IRkytnaObZZI37UCITKHkXmFElNp7NSR3q8u_Fu4HLOQzmA6JjrKDZv4icaztGslJpCdlNQIBU7hpuJfaM/s1600/mock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3vEYUmdRJRoHz64oNJOuHAtzY_HuxHs6_QuLw9wXIRigo5nyBQQ7USAxFa9IRkytnaObZZI37UCITKHkXmFElNp7NSR3q8u_Fu4HLOQzmA6JjrKDZv4icaztGslJpCdlNQIBU7hpuJfaM/s1600/mock.jpg" width="422" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/16-mockingjay-part-i-ashes-read-it.html" target="_blank"><br /></a></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">PART II</span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"THE ASSAULT"</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">10</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The scream begins in my lower back and works its way
up through my body only to jam in my throat. I am</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Avox mute, choking on my grief. Even if I could
release the muscles in my neck, let the sound tear into space,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">would anyone notice it? The room's in an uproar.
Questions and demands ring out as they try to decipher</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's words. <i>"And you...in Thirteen...dead
by morning!" </i>Yet no one is asking about the messenger whose</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blood has been replaced by static.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A voice calls the others to attention. "Shut
up!" Every pair of eyes falls on Haymitch. "It's not some big</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mystery! The boy's telling us we're about to be
attacked. Here. In Thirteen."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How would he have that information?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why should we trust him?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How do you know?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch gives a growl of frustration. "They're
beating him bloody while we speak. What more do you</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">need? Katniss, help me out here!"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I have to give myself a shake to free my words.
"Haymitch's right. I don't know where Peeta got the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">information. Or if it's true. But he believes it is.
And they're--" I can't say aloud what Snow's doing to him.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You don't know him," Haymitch says to Coin.
"We do. Get your people ready."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The president doesn't seem alarmed, only somewhat
perplexed, by this turn in events. She mulls over the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">words, tapping one finger lightly on the rim of the
control board in front of her. When she speaks, she addresses</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch in an even voice. "Of course, we have
prepared for such a scenario. Although we have decades of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">support for the assumption that further direct attacks
on Thirteen would be counterproductive to the Capitol's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cause. Nuclear missiles would release radiation into
the atmosphere, with incalculable environmental results.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Even routine bombing could badly damage our military
compound, which we know they hope to regain. And, of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">course, they invite a counterstrike. It is conceivable
that, given our current alliance with the rebels, those would be viewed as acceptable risks."</span></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You think so?" says Haymitch. It's a shade
too sincere, but the subtleties of irony are often wasted in 13.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I do. At any rate, we're overdue for a Level
Five security drill," says Coin. "Let's proceed with the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">lockdown." She begins to type rapidly on her
keyboard, authorizing her decision. The moment she raises her</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">head, it begins.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There have been two low-level drills since I arrived
in 13. I don't remember much about the first. I was in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">intensive care in the hospital and I think the
patients were exempted, as the complications of removing us for a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">practice drill outweighed the benefits. I was vaguely
aware of a mechanical voice instructing people to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">congregate in yellow zones. During the second, a Level
Two drill meant for minor crises--such as a temporary</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">quarantine while citizens were tested for contagion
during a flu outbreak--we were supposed to return to our</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">living quarters. I stayed behind a pipe in the laundry
room, ignored the pulsating beeps coming over the audio</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">system, and watched a spider construct a web. Neither
experience has prepared me for the wordless, eardrumpiercing,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fear-inducing sirens that now permeate 13. There would
be no disregarding this sound, which seems</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">designed to throw the whole population into a frenzy.
But this is 13 and that doesn't happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs guides Finnick and me out of Command, along the
hall to a doorway, and onto a wide stairway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Streams of people are converging to form a river that
flows only downward. No one shrieks or tries to push</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ahead. Even the children don't resist. We descend,
flight after flight, speechless, because no word could be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">heard above this sound. I look for my mother and Prim,
but it's impossible to see anyone but those immediately</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">around me. They're both working in the hospital
tonight, though, so there's no way they can miss the drill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My ears pop and my eyes feel heavy. We are coal-mine
deep. The only plus is that the farther we retreat</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">into the earth, the less shrill the sirens become.
It's as if they were meant to physically drive us away from the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">surface, which I suppose they are. Groups of people
begin to peel off into marked doorways and still Boggs</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">directs me downward, until finally the stairs end at
the edge of an enormous cavern. I start to walk straight in and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs stops me, shows me that I must wave my schedule
in front of a scanner so that I'm accounted for. No</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doubt the information's going to some computer
somewhere to make sure no one's gone astray.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The place seems unable to decide if it's natural or
man-made. Certain areas of the walls are stone, while</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">steel beams and concrete heavily reinforce others.
Sleeping bunks are hewn right into the rock walls. There's a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">kitchen, bathrooms, a first-aid station. This place
was designed for an extended stay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">White signs with letters or numbers are placed at
intervals around the cavern. As Boggs tells Finnick and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me to report to the area that matches our assigned
quarters--in my case E for Compartment E--Plutarch strolls</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up. "Ah, here you are," he says. Recent
events have had little effect on Plutarch's mood. He still has a happy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">glow from Beetee's success on the Airtime Assault.
Eyes on the forest, not on the trees. Not on Peeta's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">punishment or 13's imminent blasting. "Katniss,
obviously this is a bad moment for you, what with Peeta's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">setback, but you need to be aware that others will be
watching you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What?" I say. I can't believe he actually
just downgraded Peeta's dire circumstances to a setback.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The other people in the bunker, they'll be
taking their cue on how to react from you. If you're calm and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">brave, others will try to be as well. If you panic, it
could spread like wildfire," explains Plutarch. I just stare at him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Fire is catching, so to speak," he
continues, as if I'm being slow on the uptake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why don't I just pretend I'm on camera,
Plutarch?" I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes! Perfect. One is always much braver with an
audience," he says. "Look at the courage Peeta just</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">displayed!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's all I can do not to slap him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I've got to get back to Coin before lockdown.
You keep up the good work!" he says, and then heads off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I cross to the big letter <i>E </i>posted on the wall.
Our space consists of a twelve-by-twelve-foot square of stone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">floor delineated by painted lines. Carved into the
wall are two bunks--one of us will be sleeping on the floor--and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a ground-level cube space for storage. A piece of
white paper, coated in clear plastic, reads <i>BUNKER PROTOCOL</i>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I stare fixedly at the little black specks on the
sheet. For a while, they're obscured by the residual blood droplets</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that I can't seem to wipe from my vision. Slowly, the
words come into focus. The first section is entitled "On</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Arrival."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">1. Make sure all members of your Compartment are
accounted for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My mother and Prim haven't arrived, but I was one of
the first people to reach the bunker. Both of them are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">probably helping to relocate hospital patients.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">2. Go to the Supply Station and secure one pack for
each member of your Compartment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Ready your Living Area. Return pack(s).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I scan the cavern until I locate the Supply Station, a
deep room set off by a counter. People wait behind it,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but there's not a lot of activity there yet. I walk
over, give our compartment letter, and request three packs. A man</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">checks a sheet, pulls the specified packs from
shelving, and swings them up onto the counter. After sliding one</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on my back and getting a grip on the other two with my
hands, I turn to find a group rapidly forming behind me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Excuse me," I say as I carry my supplies
through the others. Is it a matter of timing? Or is Plutarch right? Are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">these people modeling their behavior on mine?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Back at our space, I open one of the packs to find a thin
mattress, bedding, two sets of gray clothing, a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">toothbrush, a comb, and a flashlight. On examining the
contents of the other packs, I find the only discernible</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">difference is that they contain both gray and white
outfits. The latter will be for my mother and Prim, in case they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have medical duties. After I make up the beds, store
the clothes, and return the backpacks, I've got nothing to do</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but observe the last rule.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">3. Await further instructions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I sit cross-legged on the floor to await. A steady
flow of people begins to fill the room, claiming spaces,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">collecting supplies. It won't take long until the
place is full up. I wonder if my mother and Prim are going to stay the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">night at wherever the hospital patients have been
taken. But, no, I don't think so. They were on the list here. I'm</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">starting to get anxious, when my mother appears. I
look behind her into a sea of strangers. "Where's Prim?" I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Isn't she here?" she replies. "She was
supposed to come straight down from the hospital. She left ten</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">minutes before I did. Where is she? Where could she
have gone?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I squeeze my lids shut tight for a moment, to track
her as I would prey on a hunt. See her react to the sirens,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rush to help the patients, nod as they gesture for her
to descend to the bunker, and then hesitate with her on the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stairs. Torn for a moment. But why?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My eyes fly open. "The cat! She went back for
him!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, no," my mother says. We both know I'm
right. We're pushing against the incoming tide, trying to get</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out of the bunker. Up ahead, I can see them preparing
to shut the thick metal doors. Slowly rotating the metal</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wheels on either side inward. Somehow I know that once
they have been sealed, nothing in the world will</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">convince the soldiers to open them. Perhaps it will
even be beyond their control. I'm indiscriminately shoving</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">people aside as I shout for them to wait. The space
between the doors shrinks to a yard, a foot; there are only a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">few inches left when I jam my hand through the crack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Open it! Let me out!" I cry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Consternation shows on the soldiers' faces as they
reverse the wheels a bit. Not enough to let me pass, but</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">enough to avoid crushing my fingers. I take the
opportunity to wedge my shoulder into the opening. "Prim!" I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">holler up the stairs. My mother pleads with the guards
as I try to wriggle my way out. "Prim!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then I hear it. The faint sound of footsteps on the
stairs. "We're coming!" I hear my sister call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Hold the door!" That was Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They're coming!" I tell the guards, and
they slide the doors open about a foot. But I don't dare move--afraid</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they'll lock us all out--until Prim appears, her
cheeks flushed with running, hauling Buttercup. I pull her inside and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale follows, twisting an armload of baggage sideways
to get it into the bunker. The doors are closed with a loud</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and final clank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What were you thinking?" I give Prim an
angry shake and then hug her, squashing Buttercup between us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim's explanation is already on her lips. "I
couldn't leave him behind, Katniss. Not twice. You should have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">seen him pacing the room and howling. He'd come back
to protect us."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Okay. Okay." I take a few breaths to calm
myself, step back, and lift Buttercup by the scruff of the neck. "I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">should've drowned you when I had the chance." His
ears flatten and he raises a paw. I hiss before he gets a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chance, which seems to annoy him a little, since he
considers hissing his own personal sound of contempt. In</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">retaliation, he gives a helpless kitten mew that
brings my sister immediately to his defense.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, Katniss, don't tease him," she says,
folding him back in her arms. "He's already so upset."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The idea that I've wounded the brute's tiny cat
feelings just invites further taunting. But Prim's genuinely</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">distressed for him. So instead, I visualize
Buttercup's fur lining a pair of gloves, an image that has helped me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deal with him over the years. "Okay, sorry. We're
under the big <i>E </i>on the wall. Better get him settled in before he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">loses it." Prim hurries off, and I find myself
face-to-face with Gale. He's holding the box of medical supplies from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our kitchen in 12. Site of our last conversation,
kiss, fallout, whatever. My game bag's slung across his shoulder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"If Peeta's right, these didn't stand a
chance," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta. Blood like raindrops on the window. Like wet
mud on boots.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Thanks for...everything." I take our stuff.
"What were you doing up in our rooms?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Just double-checking," he says. "We're
in Forty-Seven if you need me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Practically everyone withdrew to their spaces when the
doors shut, so I get to cross to our new home with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at least five hundred people watching me. I try to
appear extra calm to make up for my frantic crashing through</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the crowd. Like that's fooling anyone. So much for
setting an example. Oh, who cares? They all think I'm nuts</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">anyway. One man, who I think I knocked to the floor,
catches my eye and rubs his elbow resentfully. I almost hiss</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">at him, too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim has Buttercup installed on the lower bunk, draped
in a blanket so that only his face pokes out. This is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how he likes to be when there's thunder, the one thing
that actually frightens him. My mother puts her box carefully</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in the cube. I crouch, my back supported by the wall,
to check what Gale managed to rescue in my hunting bag.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The plant book, the hunting jacket, my parents'
wedding photo, and the personal contents of my drawer. My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mockingjay pin now lives with Cinna's outfit, but
there's the gold locket and the silver parachute with the spile and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's pearl. I knot the pearl into the corner of the
parachute, bury it deep in the recesses of the bag, as if it's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's life and no one can take it away as long as I
guard it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The faint sound of the sirens cuts off sharply. Coin's
voice comes over the district audio system, thanking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The faint sound of the sirens cuts off sharply. Coin's
voice comes over the district audio system, thanking</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us all for an exemplary evacuation of the upper
levels. She stresses that this is not a drill, as Peeta Mellark, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">District 12 victor, has possibly made a televised
reference to an attack on 13 tonight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That's when the first bomb hits. There's an initial
sense of impact followed by an explosion that resonates in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my innermost parts, the lining of my intestines, the
marrow of my bones, the roots of my teeth. <i>We're all going to</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">die, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I
think. My eyes turn upward, expecting to see giant cracks race across the
ceiling, massive chunks of stone</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">raining down on us, but the bunker itself gives only a
slight shudder. The lights go out and I experience the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">disorientation of total darkness. Speechless human
sounds--spontaneous shrieks, ragged breaths, baby</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whimpers, one musical bit of insane laughter--dance
around in the charged air. Then there's a hum of a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">generator, and a dim wavering glow replaces the stark
lighting that is the norm in 13. It's closer to what we had in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our homes in 12, when the candles and fire burned low
on a winter's night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I reach for Prim in the twilight, clamp my hand on her
leg, and pull myself over to her. Her voice remains</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">steady as she croons to Buttercup. "It's all
right, baby, it's all right. We'll be okay down here."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My mother wraps her arms around us. I allow myself to
feel young for a moment and rest my head on her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shoulder. "That was nothing like the bombs in
Eight," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Probably a bunker missile," says Prim,
keeping her voice soothing for the cat's sake. "We learned about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them during the orientation for new citizens. They're
designed to penetrate deep in the ground before they go off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Because there's no point in bombing Thirteen on the
surface anymore."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Nuclear?" I ask, feeling a chill run
through me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not necessarily," says Prim. "Some
just have a lot of explosives in them. But...it could be either kind, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guess."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The gloom makes it hard to see the heavy metal doors
at the end of the bunker. Would they be any</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">protection against a nuclear attack? And even if they
were one hundred percent effective at sealing out the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">radiation, which is really unlikely, would we ever be
able to leave this place? The thought of spending whatever</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">remains of my life in this stone vault horrifies me. I
want to run madly for the door and demand to be released into</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whatever lies above. It's pointless. They would never
let me out, and I might start some kind of stampede.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're so far down, I'm sure we're safe,"
says my mother wanly. Is she thinking of my father's being blown</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to nothingness in the mines? "It was a close
call, though. Thank goodness Peeta had the wherewithal to warn</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The wherewithal. A general term that somehow includes
everything that was needed for him to sound the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alarm. The knowledge, the opportunity, the courage.
And something else I can't define. Peeta seemed to have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been waging a sort of battle in his mind, fighting to
get the message out. Why? The ease with which he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">manipulates words is his greatest talent. Was his
difficulty a result of his torture? Something more? Like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">madness?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Coin's voice, perhaps a shade grimmer, fills the
bunker, the volume level flickering with the lights.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Apparently, Peeta Mellark's information was
sound and we owe him a great debt of gratitude. Sensors indicate</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the first missile was not nuclear, but very powerful.
We expect more will follow. For the duration of the attack,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">citizens are to stay in their assigned areas unless
otherwise notified."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A soldier alerts my mother that she's needed in the
first-aid station. She's reluctant to leave us, even though</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she'll only be thirty yards away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We'll be fine, really," I tell her.
"Do you think anything could get past him?" I point to Buttercup, who
gives</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me such a halfhearted hiss, we all have to laugh a
little. Even I feel sorry for him. After my mother goes, I suggest,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why don't you climb in with him, Prim?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know it's silly...but I'm afraid the bunk
might collapse on us during the attack," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">If the bunks collapse, the whole bunker will have
given way and buried us, but I decide this kind of logic</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">won't actually be helpful. Instead, I clean out the
storage cube and make Buttercup a bed inside. Then I pull a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mattress in front of it for my sister and me to share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We're given clearance in small groups to use the
bathroom and brush our teeth, although showering has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been canceled for the day. I curl up with Prim on the
mattress, double layering the blankets because the cavern</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">emits a dank chill. Buttercup, miserable even with
Prim's constant attention, huddles in the cube and exhales cat</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">breath in my face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Despite the disagreeable conditions, I'm glad to have
time with my sister. My extreme preoccupation since</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I came here--no, since the first Games, really--has
left little attention for her. I haven't been watching over her the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">way I should, the way I used to. After all, it was
Gale who checked our compartment, not me. Something to make</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up for.I realize I've never even bothered to ask her
about how she's handling the shock of coming here. "So, how</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are you liking Thirteen, Prim?" I offer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Right now?" she asks. We both laugh.
"I miss home badly sometimes. But then I remember there's nothing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">left to miss anymore. I feel safer here. We don't have
to worry about you. Well, not the same way." She pauses,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and then a shy smile crosses her lips. "I think they're
going to train me to be a doctor."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's the first I've heard of it. "Well, of
course, they are. They'd be stupid not to."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They've been watching me when I help out in the
hospital. I'm already taking the medic courses. It's just</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">beginner's stuff. I know a lot of it from home. Still,
there's plenty to learn," she tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's great," I say. Prim a doctor. She
couldn't even dream of it in 12. Something small and quiet, like a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">match being struck, lights up the gloom inside me.
This is the sort of future a rebellion could bring.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What about you, Katniss? How are you
managing?" Her fingertip moves in short, gentle strokes between</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup's eyes. "And don't say you're
fine."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's true. Whatever the opposite of fine is, that's
what I am. So I go ahead and tell her about Peeta, his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deterioration on-screen, and how I think they must be
killing him at this very moment. Buttercup has to rely on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">himself for a while, because now Prim turns her
attention to me. Pulling me closer, brushing the hair back behind</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my ears with her fingers. I've stopped talking because
there's really nothing left to say and there's this piercing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sort of pain where my heart is. Maybe I'm even having
a heart attack, but it doesn't seem worth mentioning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss, I don't think President Snow will kill
Peeta," she says. Of course, she says this; it's what she thinks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will calm me. But her next words come as a surprise.
"If he does, he won't have anyone left you want. He won't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have any way to hurt you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, I am reminded of another girl, one who had
seen all the evil the Capitol had to offer. Johanna</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mason, the tribute from District 7, in the last arena.
I was trying to prevent her from going into the jungle where the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">jabberjays mimicked the voices of loved ones being
tortured, but she brushed me off, saying, <i>"They can't hurt</i></span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me. I'm not like the rest of you. There's no one left
I love."</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Then I know Prim is right, that Snow cannot afford to
waste Peeta's life, especially now, while the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mockingjay causes so much havoc. He's killed Cinna
already. Destroyed my home. My family, Gale, and even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch are out of his reach. Peeta's all he has
left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, what do you think they'll do to him?" I
ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim sounds about a thousand years old when she
speaks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Whatever it takes to break you."</span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">11</span></b></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">What will break me?</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This is the question that consumes me over the next
three days as we wait to be released from our prison</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of safety. What will break me into a million pieces so
that I am beyond repair, beyond usefulness? I mention it to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no one, but it devours my waking hours and weaves
itself throughout my nightmares.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Four more bunker missiles fall over this period, all
massive, all very damaging, but there's no urgency to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">attack. The bombs are spread out over the long hours
so that just when you think the raid is over, another blast</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sends shock waves through your guts. It feels more
designed to keep us in lockdown than to decimate 13.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cripple the district, yes. Give the people plenty to
do to get the place running again. But destroy it? No. Coin was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">right on that point. You don't destroy what you want
to acquire in the future. I assume what they really want, in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">short term, is to stop the Airtime Assaults and keep
me off the televisions of Panem.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We receive next to no information about what is
happening. Our screens never come on, and we get only</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">brief audio updates from Coin about the nature of the
bombs. Certainly, the war is still being waged, but as to its</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">status, we're in the dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Inside the bunker, cooperation is the order of the
day. We adhere to a strict schedule for meals and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bathing, exercise and sleep. Small periods of
socialization are granted to alleviate the tedium. Our space</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">becomes very popular because both children and adults
have a fascination with Buttercup. He attains celebrity</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">status with his evening game of Crazy Cat. I created
this by accident a few years ago, during a winter blackout.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">You simply wiggle a flashlight beam around on the
floor, and Buttercup tries to catch it. I'm petty enough to enjoy it because I
think it makes him look stupid. Inexplicably, everyone here thinks he's clever
and delightful. I'm even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">issued a special set of batteries--an enormous
waste--to be used for this purpose. The citizens of 13 are truly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">starved for entertainment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's on the third night, during our game, that I
answer the question eating away at me. Crazy Cat becomes a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">metaphor for my situation. I am Buttercup. Peeta, the
thing I want so badly to secure, is the light. As long as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup feels he has the chance of catching the
elusive light under his paws, he's bristling with aggression.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">(That's how I've been since I left the arena, with
Peeta alive.) When the light goes out completely, Buttercup's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">temporarily distraught and confused, but he recovers
and moves on to other things. (That's what would happen if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta died.) But the one thing that sends Buttercup
into a tailspin is when I leave the light on but put it hopelessly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out of his reach, high on the wall, beyond even his
jumping skills. He paces below the wall, wails, and can't be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">comforted or distracted. He's useless until I shut the
light off. (That's what Snow is trying to do to me now, only I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">don't know what form his game takes.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Maybe this realization on my part is all Snow needs.
Thinking that Peeta was in his possession and being</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tortured for rebel information was bad. But thinking
that he's being tortured specifically to incapacitate me is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unendurable. And it's under the weight of this
revelation that I truly begin to break.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After Crazy Cat, we're directed to bed. The power's
been coming and going; sometimes the lamps burn at</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">full brightness, other times we squint at one another
in the brownouts. At bedtime they turn the lamps to near</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">darkness and activate safety lights in each space.
Prim, who's decided the walls will hold up, snuggles with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup on the lower bunk. My mother's on the upper.
I offer to take a bunk, but they make me keep to the floor</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mattress since I flail around so much when I'm
sleeping.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm not flailing now, as my muscles are rigid with the
tension of holding myself together. The pain over my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">heart returns, and from it I imagine tiny fissures
spreading out into my body. Through my torso, down my arms</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and legs, over my face, leaving it crisscrossed with
cracks. One good jolt of a bunker missile and I could shatter</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">into strange, razor-sharp shards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When the restless, wiggling majority has settled into
sleep, I carefully extricate myself from my blanket and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tiptoe through the cavern until I find Finnick,
feeling for some unspecified reason that he will understand. He sits</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">under the safety light in his space, knotting his
rope, not even pretending to rest. As I whisper my discovery of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow's plan to break me, it dawns on me. This strategy
is very old news to Finnick. It's what broke him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"This is what they're doing to you with Annie,
isn't it?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, they didn't arrest her because they
thought she'd be a wealth of rebel information," he says. "They</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know I'd never have risked telling her anything like
that. For her own protection."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, Finnick. I'm so sorry," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No, I'm sorry. That I didn't warn you
somehow," he tells me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, a memory surfaces. I'm strapped to my bed,
mad with rage and grief after the rescue. Finnick is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">trying to console me about Peeta. <i>"They'll
figure out he doesn't know anything pretty fast. And they won't kill</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him if they think they can use him against you."</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You did warn me, though. On the hovercraft. Only
when you said they'd use Peeta against me, I thought you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">meant like bait. To lure me into the Capitol
somehow," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I shouldn't have said even that. It was too late
for it to be of any help to you. Since I hadn't warned you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before the Quarter Quell, I should've shut up about
how Snow operates." Finnick yanks on the end of his rope,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and an intricate knot becomes a straight line again.
"It's just that I didn't understand when I met you. After your</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">first Games, I thought the whole romance was an act on
your part. We all expected you'd continue that strategy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But it wasn't until Peeta hit the force field and
nearly died that I--" Finnick hesitates.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think back to the arena. How I sobbed when Finnick
revived Peeta. The quizzical look on Finnick's face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The way he excused my behavior, blaming it on my
pretend pregnancy. "That you what?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That I knew I'd misjudged you. That you do love
him. I'm not saying in what way. Maybe you don't know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">yourself. But anyone paying attention could see how
much you care about him," he says gently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Anyone? On Snow's visit before the Victory Tour, he
challenged me to erase any doubts of my love for</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta. <i>"Convince </i>me," Snow said. It
seems, under that hot pink sky with Peeta's life in limbo, I finally did. And
in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doing so, I gave him the weapon he needed to break me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick and I sit for a long time in silence, watching
the knots bloom and vanish, before I can ask, "How do</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you bear it?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick looks at me in disbelief. "I don't,
Katniss! Obviously, I don't. I drag myself out of nightmares each</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morning and find there's no relief in waking."
Something in my expression stops him. "Better not to give in to it. It</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">takes ten times as long to put yourself back together
as it does to fall apart."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Well, he must know. I take a deep breath, forcing
myself back into one piece.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The more you can distract yourself, the
better," he says. "First thing tomorrow, we'll get you your own rope.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Until then, take mine."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I spend the rest of the night on my mattress
obsessively making knots, holding them up for Buttercup's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inspection. If one looks suspicious, he swipes it out
of the air and bites it a few times to make sure it's dead. By</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">morning, my fingers are sore, but I'm still holding
on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">With twenty-four hours of quiet behind us, Coin
finally announces we can leave the bunker. Our old quarters</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">have been destroyed by the bombings. Everyone must
follow exact directions to their new compartments. We</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clean our spaces, as directed, and file obediently
toward the door.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Before I'm halfway there, Boggs appears and pulls me
from the line. He signals for Gale and Finnick to join</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us. People move aside to let us by. Some even smile at
me since the Crazy Cat game seems to have made me</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">more lovable. Out the door, up the stairs, down the
hall to one of those multidirectional elevators, and finally we</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrive at Special Defense. Nothing along our route has
been damaged, but we are still very deep.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs ushers us into a room virtually identical to
Command. Coin, Plutarch, Haymitch, Cressida, and</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">everybody else around the table looks exhausted.
Someone has finally broken out the coffee--although I'm sure</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">it's viewed only as an emergency stimulant--and
Plutarch has both hands wrapped tightly around his cup as if at</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">any moment it might be taken away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's no small talk. "We need all four of you
suited up and aboveground," says the president. "You have</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">two hours to get footage showing the damage from the
bombing, establish that Thirteen's military unit remains</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">not only functional but dominant, and, most important,
that the Mockingjay is still alive. Any questions?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Can we have a coffee?" asks Finnick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Steaming cups are handed out. I stare distastefully at
the shiny black liquid, never having been much of a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fan of the stuff, but thinking it might help me stay
on my feet. Finnick sloshes some cream in my cup and reaches</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">into the sugar bowl. "Want a sugar cube?" he
asks in his old seductive voice. That's how we met, with Finnick</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">offering me sugar. Surrounded by horses and chariots,
costumed and painted for the crowds, before we were</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">allies. Before I had any idea what made him tick. The
memory actually coaxes a smile out of me. "Here, it</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">improves the taste," he says in his real voice,
plunking three cubes in my cup.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As I turn to go suit up as the Mockingjay, I catch
Gale watching me and Finnick unhappily. What now? Does</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he actually think something's going on between us?
Maybe he saw me go to Finnick's last night. I would've</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">passed the Hawthornes' space to get there. I guess
that probably rubbed him the wrong way. Me seeking out</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick's company instead of his. Well, fine. I've got
rope burn on my fingers, I can barely hold my eyes open, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a camera crew's waiting for me to do something
brilliant. And Snow's got Peeta. Gale can think whatever he</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wants.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In my new Remake Room in Special Defense, my prep team
slaps me into my Mockingjay suit, arranges</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my hair, and applies minimal makeup before my coffee's
even cooled. In ten minutes, the cast and crew of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">next propos are making the circuitous trek to the
outside. I slurp my coffee as we travel, finding that the cream</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and sugar greatly enhance its flavor. As I knock back
the dregs that have settled to the bottom of the cup, I feel a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slight buzz start to run through my veins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">After climbing a final ladder, Boggs hits a lever that
opens a trapdoor. Fresh air rushes in. I take big gulps</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and for the first time allow myself to feel how much I
hated the bunker. We emerge into the woods, and my hands</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">run through the leaves overhead. Some are just
starting to turn. "What day is it?" I ask no one in particular. Boggs</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tells me September begins next week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">September. That means Snow has had Peeta in his
clutches for five, maybe six weeks. I examine a leaf on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my palm and see I'm shaking. I can't will myself to
stop. I blame the coffee and try to focus on slowing my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">breathing, which is far too rapid for my pace.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Debris begins to litter the forest floor. We come to
our first crater, thirty yards wide and I can't tell how deep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Very. Boggs says anyone on the first ten levels would
likely have been killed. We skirt the pit and continue on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Can you rebuild it?" Gale asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not anytime soon. That one didn't get much. A
few backup generators and a poultry farm," says Boggs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We'll just seal it off."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The trees disappear as we enter the area inside the
fence. The craters are ringed with a mixture of old and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">new rubble. Before the bombing, very little of the
current 13 was aboveground. A few guard stations. The training</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">area. About a foot of the top floor of our
building--where Buttercup's window jutted out--with several feet of steel</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on top of it. Even that was never meant to withstand
more than a superficial attack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How much of an edge did the boy's warning give
you?" asks Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"About ten minutes before our own systems
would've detected the missiles," says Boggs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But it did help, right?" I ask. I can't
bear it if he says no.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Absolutely," Boggs replies. "Civilian
evacuation was completed. Seconds count when you're under attack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Ten minutes meant lives saved."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I
think. <i>And Gale. </i>They were in the bunker only a couple of minutes before
the first missile hit. Peeta</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">might have saved them. Add their names to the list of
things I can never stop owing him for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida has the idea to film me in front of the ruins
of the old Justice Building, which is something of a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">joke since the Capitol's been using it as a backdrop
for fake news broadcasts for years, to show that the district</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no longer existed. Now, with the recent attack, the
Justice Building sits about ten yards away from the edge of a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">new crater.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As we approach what used to be the grand entrance,
Gale points out something and the whole party slows</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down. I don't know what the problem is at first and
then I see the ground strewn with fresh pink and red roses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't touch them!" I yell. "They're
for me!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The sickeningly sweet smell hits my nose, and my heart
begins to hammer against my chest. So I didn't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">imagine it. The rose on my dresser. Before me lies
Snow's second delivery. Long-stemmed pink and red</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">beauties, the very flowers that decorated the set
where Peeta and I performed our post-victory interview. Flowers</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">not meant for one, but for a pair of lovers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I explain to the others as best I can. Upon
inspection, they appear to be harmless, if genetically enhanced,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flowers. Two dozen roses. Slightly wilted. Most likely
dropped after the last bombing. A crew in special suits</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">collects them and carts them away. I feel certain they
will find nothing extraordinary in them, though. Snow knows</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">exactly what he's doing to me. It's like having Cinna
beaten to a pulp while I watch from my tribute tube. Designed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to unhinge me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Like then, I try to rally and fight back. But as
Cressida gets Castor and Pollux in place, I feel my anxiety</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">building. I'm so tired, so wired, and so unable to
keep my mind on anything but Peeta since I've seen the roses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The coffee was a huge mistake. What I didn't need was
a stimulant. My body visibly shakes and I can't seem to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">catch my breath. After days in the bunker, I'm
squinting no matter what direction I turn, and the light hurts. Even in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">catch my breath. After days in the bunker, I'm
squinting no matter what direction I turn, and the light hurts. Even in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the cool breeze, sweat trickles down my face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, what exactly do you need from me
again?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Just a few quick lines that show you're alive
and still fighting," says Cressida.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Okay." I take my position and then I'm
staring into the red light. Staring. Staring. "I'm sorry, I've got
nothing."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida walks up to me. "You feeling okay?"
I nod. She pulls a small cloth from her pocket and blots my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">face. "How about we do the old Q-and-A
thing?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah. That would help, I think." I cross my
arms to hide the shaking. Glance at Finnick, who gives me a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">thumbs-up. But he's looking pretty shaky himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cressida's back in position now. "So, Katniss.
You've survived the Capitol bombing of Thirteen. How did it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">compare with what you experienced on the ground in
Eight?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We were so far underground this time, there was
no real danger. Thirteen's alive and well and so am--" My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">voice cuts off in a dry, squeaking sound.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Try the line again," says Cressida.
"'Thirteen's alive and well and so am I.'"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I take a breath, trying to force air down into my
diaphragm. "Thirteen's alive and so--" No, that's wrong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I swear I can still smell those roses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss, just this one line and you're done
today. I promise," says Cressida. "'Thirteen's alive and well and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so am I.'"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I swing my arms to loosen myself up. Place my fists on
my hips. Then drop them to my sides. Saliva's filling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my mouth at a ridiculous rate and I feel vomit at the
back of my throat. I swallow hard and open my lips so I can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">get the stupid line out and go hide in the woods
and--that's when I start crying.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's impossible to be the Mockingjay. Impossible to
complete even this one sentence. Because now I know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that everything I say will be directly taken out on
Peeta. Result in his torture. But not his death, no, nothing so</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">merciful as that. Snow will ensure that his life is
much worse than death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Cut," I hear Cressida say quietly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's wrong with her?" Plutarch says under
his breath.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She's figured out how Snow's using Peeta,"
says Finnick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There's something like a collective sigh of regret
from the semicircle of people spread out before me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Because I know this now. Because there will never be a
way for me to not know this again. Because, beyond the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">military disadvantage losing a Mockingjay entails, I am
broken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Several sets of arms would embrace me. But in the end,
the only person I truly want to comfort me is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch, because he loves Peeta, too. I reach out for
him and say something like his name and he's there,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">holding me and patting my back. "It's okay. It'll
be okay, sweetheart." He sits me on a length of broken marble</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pillar and keeps an arm around me while I sob.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I can't do this anymore," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"All I can think of is--what he's going to do to
Peeta--because I'm the Mockingjay!" I get out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I know." Haymitch's arm tightens around me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Did you see? How weird he acted? What are
they--doing to him?" I'm gasping for air between sobs, but I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">manage one last phrase. "It's my fault!" And
then I cross some line into hysteria and there's a needle in my arm</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and the world slips away.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It must be strong, whatever they shot into me, because
it's a full day before I come to. My sleep wasn't</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">peaceful, though. I have the sense of emerging from a
world of dark, haunted places where I traveled alone.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch sits in the chair by my bed, his skin waxen,
his eyes bloodshot. I remember about Peeta and start to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tremble again.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch reaches out and squeezes my shoulder.
"It's all right. We're going to try to get Peeta out."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What?" That makes no sense.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Plutarch's sending in a rescue team. He has
people on the inside. He thinks we can get Peeta back</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">alive," he says.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why didn't we before?" I say.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Because it's costly. But everyone agrees this is
the thing to do. It's the same choice we made in the arena.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">To do whatever it takes to keep you going. We can't
lose the Mockingjay now. And you can't perform unless you</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">know Snow can't take it out on Peeta." Haymitch
offers me a cup. "Here, drink something."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I slowly sit up and take a sip of water. "What do
you mean, costly?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He shrugs. "Covers will be blown. People may die.
But keep in mind that they're dying every day. And it's</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">not just Peeta; we're getting Annie out for Finnick,
too."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Where is he?" I ask.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Behind that screen, sleeping his sedative off. He
lost it right after we knocked you out," says Haymitch. I</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">smile a little, feel a bit less weak. "Yeah, it
was a really excellent shoot. You two cracked up and Boggs left to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arrange the mission to get Peeta. We're officially in
reruns."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, if Boggs is leading it, that's a
plus," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, he's on top of it. It was volunteer only,
but he pretended not to notice me waving my hand in the air,"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">says Haymitch. "See? He's already demonstrated
good judgment."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Something's wrong. Haymitch's trying a little too hard
to cheer me up. It's not really his style. "So who else</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">volunteered?"</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I think there were seven altogether," he
says evasively.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I get a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.
"Who else, Haymitch?" I insist.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch finally drops the good-natured act. "You
know who else, Katniss. You know who stepped up first."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Of course I do.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">12</span></b></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Today I might lose both of them.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I try to imagine a world where both Gale's and Peeta's
voices have ceased. Hands stilled. Eyes unblinking.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm standing over their bodies, having a last look,
leaving the room where they lie. But when I open the door to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">step out into the world, there's only a tremendous
void. A pale gray nothingness that is all my future holds.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Do you want me to have them sedate you until
it's over?" asks Haymitch. He's not joking. This is a man</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who spent his adult life at the bottom of a bottle,
trying to anesthetize himself against the Capitol's crimes. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sixteen-year-old boy who won the second Quarter Quell
must have had people he loved--family, friends, a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sweetheart maybe--that he fought to get back to. Where
are they now? How is it that until Peeta and I were thrust</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">upon him, there was no one at all in his life? What
did Snow do to them?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No," I say. "I want to go to the
Capitol. I want to be part of the rescue mission."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They're gone," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How long ago did they leave? I could catch up. I
could--" What? What could I do?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch shakes his head. "It'll never happen.
You're too valuable and too vulnerable. There was talk of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sending you to another district to divert the
Capitol's attention while the rescue takes place. But no one felt you</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could handle it."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Please, Haymitch!" I'm begging now. "I
have to do something. I can't just sit here waiting to hear if they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">died. There must be something I can do!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"All right. Let me talk to Plutarch. You stay
put." But I can't. Haymitch's footsteps are still echoing in the outer</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hall when I fumble my way through the slit in the
dividing curtain to find Finnick sprawled out on his stomach, his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hands twisted in his pillowcase. Although it's
cowardly--cruel even--to rouse him from the shadowy, muted drug</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">land to stark reality, I go ahead and do it because I
can't stand to face this by myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As I explain our situation, his initial agitation
mysteriously ebbs. "Don't you see, Katniss, this will decide</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">things. One way or the other. By the end of the day,
they'll either be dead or with us. It's...it's more than we could</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hope for!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Well, that's a sunny view of our situation. And yet
there's something calming about the idea that this torment</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could come to an end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The curtain yanks back and there's Haymitch. He has a
job for us, if we can pull it together. They still need</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">post-bombing footage of 13. "If we can get it in
the next few hours, Beetee can air it leading up to the rescue,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and maybe keep the Capitol's attention
elsewhere."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes, a distraction," says Finnick. "A
decoy of sorts."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What we really need is something so riveting
that even President Snow won't be able to tear himself away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Got anything like that?" asks Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Having a job that might help the mission snaps me into
focus. While I knock down breakfast and get</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">prepped, I try to think of what I might say. President
Snow must be wondering how that blood-splattered floor and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his roses are affecting me. If he wants me broken,
then I will have to be whole. But I don't think I will convince him</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of anything by shouting a couple of defiant lines at
the camera. Besides, that won't buy the rescue team any time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Outbursts are short. It's stories that take time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't know if it will work, but when the television
crew's all assembled aboveground, I ask Cressida if she</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">could start out by asking me about Peeta. I take a
seat on the fallen marble pillar where I had my breakdown,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wait for the red light and Cressida's question.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How did you meet Peeta?" she asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And then I do the thing that Haymitch has wanted since
my first interview. I open up. "When I met Peeta, I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was eleven years old, and I was almost dead." I
talk about that awful day when I tried to sell the baby clothes in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the rain, how Peeta's mother chased me from the bakery
door, and how he took a beating to bring me the loaves</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of bread that saved our lives. "We had never even
spoken. The first time I ever talked to Peeta was on the train</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to the Games."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But he was already in love with you," says
Cressida.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I guess so." I allow myself a small smile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How are you doing with the separation?" she
asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not well. I know at any moment Snow could kill
him. Especially since he warned Thirteen about the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bombing. It's a terrible thing to live with," I
say. "But because of what they're putting him through, I don't have any</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">reservations anymore. About doing whatever it takes to
destroy the Capitol. I'm finally free." I turn my gaze</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">skyward and watch the flight of a hawk across the sky.
"President Snow once admitted to me that the Capitol</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was fragile. At the time, I didn't know what he meant.
It was hard to see clearly because I was so afraid. Now I'm</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">not. The Capitol's fragile because it depends on the
districts for everything. Food, energy, even the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peacekeepers that police us. If we declare our
freedom, the Capitol collapses. President Snow, thanks to you,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm officially declaring mine today."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I've been sufficient, if not dazzling. Everyone loves
the bread story. But it's my message to President Snow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that gets the wheels spinning in Plutarch's brain. He
hastily calls Finnick and Haymitch over and they have a brief</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but intense conversation that I can see Haymitch isn't
happy with. Plutarch seems to win--Finnick's pale but</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">nodding his head by the end of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As Finnick moves to take my seat before the camera,
Haymitch tells him, "You don't have to do this."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes, I do. If it will help her." Finnick
balls up his rope in his hand. "I'm ready."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don't know what to expect. A love story about Annie?
An account of the abuses in District 4? But Finnick</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Odair takes a completely different tack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"President Snow used to...sell me...my body, that
is," Finnick begins in a flat, removed tone. "I wasn't the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">only one. If a victor is considered desirable, the
president gives them as a reward or allows people to buy them</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">for an exorbitant amount of money. If you refuse, he
kills someone you love. So you do it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That explains it, then. Finnick's parade of lovers in
the Capitol. They were never real lovers. Just people like</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">our old Head Peacekeeper, Cray, who bought desperate
girls to devour and discard because he could. I want to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">interrupt the taping and beg Finnick's forgiveness for
every false thought I've ever had about him. But we have a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">job to do, and I sense Finnick's role will be far more
effective than mine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I wasn't the only one, but I was the most
popular," he says. "And perhaps the most defenseless, because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the people I loved were so defenseless. To make
themselves feel better, my patrons would make presents of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">money or jewelry, but I found a much more valuable
form of payment."</span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Secrets, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I
think. That's what Finnick told me his lovers paid him in, only I thought the
whole arrangement</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was by his choice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Secrets," he says, echoing my thoughts.
"And this is where you're going to want to stay tuned, President</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow, because so very many of them were about you. But
let's begin with some of the others."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick begins to weave a tapestry so rich in detail
that you can't doubt its authenticity. Tales of strange</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sexual appetites, betrayals of the heart, bottomless
greed, and bloody power plays. Drunken secrets whispered</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">over damp pillow-cases in the dead of night. Finnick
was someone bought and sold. A district slave. A</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">handsome one, certainly, but in reality, harmless. Who
would he tell? And who would believe him if he did? But</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">some secrets are too delicious not to share. I don't
know the people Finnick names--all seem to be prominent</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol citizens--but I know, from listening to the
chatter of my prep team, the attention the most mild slip in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">judgment can draw. If a bad haircut can lead to hours
of gossip, what will charges of incest, back-stabbing,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">blackmail, and arson produce? Even as the waves of
shock and recrimination roll over the Capitol, the people</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">there will be waiting, as I am now, to hear about the
president.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And now, on to our good President Coriolanus
Snow," says Finnick. "Such a young man when he rose to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">power. Such a clever one to keep it. How, you must ask
yourself, did he do it? One word. That's all you really</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">need to know. <i>Poison.</i>" Finnick goes back
to Snow's political ascension, which I know nothing of, and works his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">way up to the present, pointing out case after case of
the mysterious deaths of Snow's adversaries or, even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">worse, his allies who had the potential to become
threats. People dropping dead at a feast or slowly,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">inexplicably declining into shadows over a period of
months. Blamed on bad shellfish, elusive viruses, or an</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">overlooked weakness in the aorta. Snow drinking from
the poisoned cup himself to deflect suspicion. But</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">antidotes don't always work. They say that's why he
wears the roses that reek of perfume. They say it's to cover</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the scent of blood from the mouth sores that will
never heal. They say, they say, they say...Snow has a list and no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one knows who will be next.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Poison. The perfect weapon for a snake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Since my opinion of the Capitol and its noble
president are already so low, I can't say Finnick's allegations</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shock me. They seem to have far more effect on the
displaced Capitol rebels like my crew and Fulvia--even</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch occasionally reacts in surprise, maybe
wondering how a specific tidbit passed him by. When Finnick</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">finishes, they just keep the cameras rolling until
finally he has to be the one to say "Cut."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The crew hurries inside to edit the material, and
Plutarch leads Finnick off for a chat, probably to see if he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">has any more stories. I'm left with Haymitch in the
rubble, wondering if Finnick's fate would have one day been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mine. Why not? Snow could have gotten a really good
price for the girl on fire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Is that what happened to you?" I ask
Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. My mother and younger brother. My girl. They
were all dead two weeks after I was crowned victor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Because of that stunt I pulled with the force
field," he answers. "Snow had no one to use against me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm surprised he didn't just kill you," I
say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, no. I was the example. The person to hold up
to the young Finnicks and Johannas and Cashmeres. Of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what could happen to a victor who caused
problems," says Haymitch. "But he knew he had no leverage against</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Until Peeta and I came along," I say
softly. I don't even get a shrug in return.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">With our job done, there's nothing left for Finnick
and me to do but wait. We try to fill the dragging minutes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in Special Defense. Tie knots. Push our lunch around
our bowls. Blow things up on the shooting range. Because</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of the danger of detection, no communication comes
from the rescue team. At 15:00, the designated hour, we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stand tense and silent in the back of a room full of
screens and computers and watch Beetee and his team try to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dominate the airwaves. His usual fidgety distraction
is replaced with a determination I have never seen. Most of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my interview doesn't make the cut, just enough to show
I am alive and still defiant. It is Finnick's salacious and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gory account of the Capitol that takes the day. Is
Beetee's skill improving? Or are his counterparts in the Capitol</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">a little too fascinated to want to tune Finnick out?
For the next sixty minutes, the Capitol feed alternates between</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the standard afternoon newscast, Finnick, and attempts
to black it all out. But the rebel techno team manages to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">override even the latter and, in a real coup, keeps
control for almost the entire attack on Snow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Let it go!" says Beetee, throwing up his
hands, relinquishing the broadcast back to the Capitol. He mops</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">his face with a cloth. "If they're not out of
there by now, they're all dead." He spins in his chair to see Finnick and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me reacting to his words. "It was a good plan,
though. Did Plutarch show it to you?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Of course not. Beetee takes us to another room and
shows us how the team, with the help of rebel insiders,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will attempt--has attempted--to free the victors from
an underground prison. It seems to have involved knockout</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gas distributed by the ventilation system, a power
failure, the detonation of a bomb in a government building</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">several miles from the prison, and now the disruption
of the broadcast. Beetee's glad we find the plan hard to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">follow, because then our enemies will, too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Like your electricity trap in the arena?" I
ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Exactly. And see how well that worked out?"
says Beetee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Well...not really, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I think.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick and I try to station ourselves in Command,
where surely first word of the rescue will come, but we</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">are barred because serious war business is being
carried out. We refuse to leave Special Defense and end up</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">waiting in the hummingbird room for news.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Making knots. Making knots. No word. Making knots.
Tick-tock. This is a clock. Do not think of Gale. Do not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">think of Peeta. Making knots. We do not want dinner.
Fingers raw and bleeding. Finnick finally gives up and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">assumes the hunched position he took in the arena when
the jabberjays attacked. I perfect my miniature noose.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The words of "The Hanging Tree" replay in my
head. Gale and Peeta. Peeta and Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Did you love Annie right away, Finnick?" I
ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No." A long time passes before he adds,
"She crept up on me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I search my heart, but at the moment the only person I
can feel creeping up on me is Snow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It must be midnight, it must be tomorrow when Haymitch
pushes open the door. "They're back. We're</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">wanted in the hospital." My mouth opens with a
flood of questions that he cuts off with "That's all I know."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I want to run, but Finnick's acting so strange, as if
he's lost the ability to move, so I take his hand and lead</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him like a small child. Through Special Defense, into
the elevator that goes this way and that, and on to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hospital wing. The place is in an uproar, with doctors
shouting orders and the wounded being wheeled through</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the halls in their beds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We're sideswiped by a gurney bearing an unconscious,
emaciated young woman with a shaved head. Her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flesh shows bruises and oozing scabs. Johanna Mason.
Who actually knew rebel secrets. At least the one about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me. And this is how she has paid for it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me. And this is how she has paid for it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Through a doorway, I catch a glimpse of Gale, stripped
to the waist, perspiration streaming down his face</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as a doctor removes something from under his shoulder
blade with a long pair of tweezers. Wounded, but alive. I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">call his name, start toward him until a nurse pushes
me back and shuts me out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Finnick!" Something between a shriek and a
cry of joy. A lovely if somewhat bedraggled young woman--</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dark tangled hair, sea green eyes--runs toward us in
nothing but a sheet. "Finnick!" And suddenly, it's as if there's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no one in the world but these two, crashing through
space to reach each other. They collide, enfold, lose their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">balance, and slam against a wall, where they stay.
Clinging into one being. Indivisible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A pang of jealousy hits me. Not for either Finnick or
Annie but for their certainty. No one seeing them could</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doubt their love.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Boggs, looking a little worse for wear but uninjured,
finds Haymitch and me. "We got them all out. Except</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Enobaria. But since she's from Two, we doubt she's
being held anyway. Peeta's at the end of the hall. The effects</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of the gas are just wearing off. You should be there
when he wakes."</span></div>
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<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Alive and well--maybe not well but alive and here.
Away from Snow. Safe. Here. With me. In a minute I can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">touch him. See his smile. Hear his laugh.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch's grinning at me. "Come on, then,"
he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I'm light-headed with giddiness. What will I say? Oh,
who cares what I say? Peeta will be ecstatic no matter</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">what I do. He'll probably be kissing me anyway. I
wonder if it will feel like those last kisses on the beach in the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">arena, the ones I haven't dared let myself consider
until this moment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta's awake already, sitting on the side of the bed,
looking bewildered as a trio of doctors reassure him,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flash lights in his eyes, check his pulse. I'm
disappointed that mine was not the first face he saw when he woke,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">but he sees it now. His features register disbelief
and something more intense that I can't quite place. Desire?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Desperation? Surely both, for he sweeps the doctors
aside, leaps to his feet, and moves toward me. I run to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">meet him, my arms extended to embrace him. His hands
are reaching for me, too, to caress my face, I think.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My lips are just forming his name when his fingers
lock around my throat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">13</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The cold collar chafes my neck and makes the shivering
even harder to control. At least I am no longer in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the claustrophobic tube, while the machines click and
whir around me, listening to a disembodied voice telling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me to hold still while I try to convince myself I can
still breathe. Even now, when I've been assured there will be no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">permanent damage, I hunger for air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The medical team's main concerns--damage to my spinal
cord, airway, veins, and arteries--have been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">allayed. Bruising, hoarseness, the sore larynx, this
strange little cough--not to be worried about. It will all be fine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Mockingjay will not lose her voice. Where, I want
to ask, is the doctor who determines if I am losing my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mind? Only I'm not supposed to talk right now. I can't
even thank Boggs when he comes to check on me. To look</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me over and tell me he's seen a lot worse injuries
among the soldiers when they teach choke holds in training.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It was Boggs who knocked out Peeta with one blow
before any permanent damage could be done. I know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch would have come to my defense if he hadn't
been utterly unprepared. To catch both Haymitch and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">myself off guard is a rare thing. But we have been so
consumed with saving Peeta, so tortured by having him in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Capitol's hands, that the elation at having him
back blinded us. If I'd had a private reunion with Peeta, he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">would have killed me. Now that he's deranged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">No, not deranged, </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I remind myself. <i>Hijacked. </i>That's the word I
heard pass between Plutarch and Haymitch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">as I was wheeled past them in the hallway. <i>Hijacked.
</i>I don't know what it means.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim, who appeared moments after the attack and has
stayed as close to me as possible ever since,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">spreads another blanket over me. "I think they'll
take the collar off soon, Katniss. You won't be so cold then." My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother, who's been assisting in a complicated surgery,
has still not been informed of Peeta's assault. Prim takes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one of my hands, which is clutched in a fist, and
massages it until it opens and blood begins to flow through my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fingers again. She's starting on the second fist when
the doctors show up, remove the collar, and give me a shot</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of something for pain and swelling. I lie, as
instructed, with my head still, not aggravating the injuries to my neck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch, Haymitch, and Beetee have been waiting in
the hall for the doctors to give them clearance to see</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me. I don't know if they've told Gale, but since he's
not here, I assume they haven't. Plutarch ushers the doctors</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out and tries to order Prim to go as well, but she
says, "No. If you force me to leave, I'll go directly to surgery and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tell my mother everything that's happened. And I warn
you, she doesn't think much of a Gamemaker calling the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">shots on Katniss's life. Especially when you've taken
such poor care of her."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch looks offended, but Haymitch chuckles.
"I'd let it go, Plutarch," he says. Prim stays.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, Katniss, Peeta's condition has come as a
shock to all of us," says Plutarch. "We couldn't help but</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">notice his deterioration in the last two interviews.
Obviously, he'd been abused, and we put his psychological</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">state down to that. Now we believe something more was
going on. That the Capitol has been subjecting him to a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rather uncommon technique known as hijacking.
Beetee?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm sorry," Beetee says, "but I can't
tell you all the specifics of it, Katniss. The Capitol's very secretive about</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">this form of torture, and I believe the results are
inconsistent. This we do know. It's a type of fear conditioning. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">term <i>hijack </i>comes from an old English word that
means 'to capture,' or even better, 'seize.' We believe it was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chosen because the technique involves the use of
tracker jacker venom, and the <i>jack </i>suggested <i>hijack</i>. You</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">were stung in your first Hunger Games, so unlike most
of us, you have firsthand knowledge of the effects of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">venom."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Terror. Hallucinations. Nightmarish visions of losing
those I love. Because the venom targets the part of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">brain that houses fear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I'm sure you remember how frightening it was.
Did you also suffer mental confusion in the aftermath?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">asks Beetee. "A sense of being unable to judge
what was true and what was false? Most people who have been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stung and lived to tell about it report something of
the kind."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Yes. That encounter with Peeta. Even after I was clearheaded,
I wasn't sure if he had saved my life by</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">taking on Cato or if I'd imagined it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Recall is made more difficult because memories
can be changed." Beetee taps his forehead. "Brought to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the forefront of your mind, altered, and saved again
in the revised form. Now imagine that I ask you to remember</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">something--either with a verbal suggestion or by
making you watch a tape of the event--and while that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">experience is refreshed, I give you a dose of tracker
jacker venom. Not enough to induce a three-day blackout.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Just enough to infuse the memory with fear and doubt.
And that's what your brain puts in long-term storage."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I start to feel sick. Prim asks the question that's in
my mind. "Is that what they've done to Peeta? Taken his</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">memories of Katniss and distorted them so they're
scary?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee nods. "So scary that he'd see her as
life-threatening. That he might try to kill her. Yes, that's our</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">current theory."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I cover my face with my arms because this isn't
happening. It isn't possible. For someone to make Peeta</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">forget he loves me...no one could do that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But you can reverse it, right?" asks Prim.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Um...very little data on that," says
Plutarch. "None, really. If hijacking rehabilitation has been attempted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before, we have no access to those records."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, you're going to try, aren't you?"
Prim persists. "You're not just going to lock him up in some padded</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">room and leave him to suffer?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Of course, we'll try, Prim," says Beetee.
"It's just, we don't know to what degree we'll succeed. If any. My</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guess is that fearful events are the hardest to root
out. They're the ones we naturally remember the best, after</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"And apart from his memories of Katniss, we don't
yet know what else has been tampered with," says</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch. "We're putting together a team of
mental health and military professionals to come up with a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">counterattack. I, personally, feel optimistic that
he'll make a full recovery."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Do you?" asks Prim caustically. "And
what do <i>you </i>think, Haymitch?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I shift my arms slightly so I can see his expression through
the crack. He's exhausted and discouraged as</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he admits, "I think Peeta might get somewhat
better. But...I don't think he'll ever be the same." I snap my arms</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back together, closing the crack, shutting them all
out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"At least he's alive," says Plutarch, as if
he's losing patience with the lot of us. "Snow executed Peeta's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stylist and his prep team on live television tonight.
We've no idea what happened to Effie Trinket. Peeta's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">damaged, but he's here. With us. And that's a definite
improvement over his situation twelve hours ago. Let's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">keep that in mind, all right?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch's attempt to cheer me up--laced with the news
of another four, possibly five, murders--somehow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">backfires. Portia. Peeta's prep team. Effie. The
effort to fight back tears makes my throat throb until I'm gasping</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">again. Eventually, they have no choice but to sedate
me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When I wake, I wonder if this will be the only way I
sleep now, with drugs shot into my arm. I'm glad I'm not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">supposed to talk for the next few days, because
there's nothing I want to say. Or do. In fact, I'm a model patient,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my lethargy taken for restraint, obedience to the
doctors' orders. I no longer feel like crying. In fact, I can only</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">manage to hold on to one simple thought: an image of
Snow's face accompanied by the whisper in my head. <i>I</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will kill you.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My mother and Prim take turns nursing me, coaxing me
to swallow bites of soft food. People come in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">periodically to give me updates on Peeta's condition.
The high levels of tracker jacker venom are working their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">way out of his body. He's being treated only by
strangers, natives of 13--no one from home or the Capitol has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been allowed to see him--to keep any dangerous
memories from triggering. A team of specialists works long</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hours designing a strategy for his recovery.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale's not supposed to visit me, as he's confined to
bed with some kind of shoulder wound. But on the third</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">night, after I've been medicated and the lights turned
down low for bedtime, he slips silently into my room. He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't speak, just runs his fingers over the bruises
on my neck with a touch as light as moth wings, plants a kiss</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">between my eyes, and disappears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The next morning, I'm discharged from the hospital
with instructions to move quietly and speak only when</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">necessary. I'm not imprinted with a schedule, so I
wander around aimlessly until Prim's excused from her hospital</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">duties to take me to our family's latest compartment.
2212. Identical to the last one, but with no window.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup has now been issued a daily food allowance
and a pan of sand that's kept under the bathroom</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sink. As Prim tucks me into bed, he hops up on my
pillow, vying for her attention. She cradles him but stays</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">focused on me. "Katniss, I know this whole thing
with Peeta is terrible for you. But remember, Snow worked on</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">him for weeks, and we've only had him for a few days.
There's a chance that the old Peeta, the one who loves</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">you, is still inside. Trying to get back to you. Don't
give up on him."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I look at my little sister and think how she has
inherited the best qualities our family has to offer: my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother's healing hands, my father's level head, and my
fight. There's something else there as well, something</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">entirely her own. An ability to look into the
confusing mess of life and see things for what they are. Is it possible</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">she could be right? That Peeta could return to me?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I have to get back to the hospital," Prim
says, placing Buttercup on the bed beside me. "You two keep</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">each other company, okay?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Buttercup springs off the bed and follows her to the
door, complaining loudly when he's left behind. We're</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about as much company for each other as dirt. After
maybe thirty seconds, I know I can't stand being confined in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the subterranean cell, and leave Buttercup to his own
devices. I get lost several times, but eventually I make my</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">way down to Special Defense. Everyone I pass stares at
the bruises, and I can't help feeling self-conscious to</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the point that I tug my collar up to my ears.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale must have been released from the hospital this
morning as well, because I find him in one of the</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">research rooms with Beetee. They're immersed, heads
bent over a drawing, taking a measurement. Versions of</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the picture litter the table and floor. Tacked on the
corkboard walls and occupying several computer screens are</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">other designs of some sort. In the rough lines of one,
I recognize Gale's twitch-up snare. "What are these?" I ask</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hoarsely, pulling their attention from the sheet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Ah, Katniss, you've found us out," says
Beetee cheerfully.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What? Is this a secret?" I know Gale's been
down here working with Beetee a lot, but I assumed they were</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">messing around with bows and guns.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not really. But I've felt a little guilty about
it. Stealing Gale away from you so much," Beetee admits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Since I've spent most of my time in 13 disoriented,
worried, angry, being remade, or hospitalized, I can't</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">say Gale's absences have inconvenienced me. Things
haven't been exactly harmonious between us, either. But I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">let Beetee think he owes me. "I hope you've been
putting his time to good use."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Come and see," he says, waving me over to a
computer screen.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This is what they've been doing. Taking the
fundamental ideas behind Gale's traps and adapting them into</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">weapons against humans. Bombs mostly. It's less about
the mechanics of the traps than the psychology behind</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">them. Booby-trapping an area that provides something
essential to survival. A water or food supply. Frightening</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">prey so that a large number flee into a greater
destruction. Endangering off-spring in order to draw in the actual</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">desired target, the parent. Luring the victim into
what appears to be a safe haven--where death awaits it. At</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">some point, Gale and Beetee left the wilderness behind
and focused on more human impulses. Like</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">compassion. A bomb explodes. Time is allowed for
people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">more powerful bomb kills them as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That seems to be crossing some kind of
line," I say. "So anything goes?" They both stare at me--Beetee</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with doubt, Gale with hostility. "I guess there
isn't a rule book for what might be unacceptable to do to another</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">human being."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Sure there is. Beetee and I have been following
the same rule book President Snow used when he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hijacked Peeta," says Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Cruel, but to the point. I leave without further
comment. I feel if I don't get outside immediately, I'll just go</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ballistic, but I'm still in Special Defense when I'm
waylaid by Haymitch. "Come on," he says. "We need you back</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">up at the hospital."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What for?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They're going to try something on Peeta,"
he answers. "Send in the most innocuous person from Twelve</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">they can come up with. Find someone Peeta might share
childhood memories with, but nothing too close to you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">They're screening people now."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I know this will be a difficult task, since anyone
Peeta shares childhood memories with would most likely be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">from town, and almost none of those people escaped the
flames. But when we reach the hospital room that has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been turned into a work space for Peeta's recovery
team, there she sits chatting with Plutarch. Delly Cartwright.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As always, she gives me a smile that suggests I'm her
best friend in the world. She gives this smile to everyone.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss!" she calls out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Hey, Delly," I say. I'd heard she and her
younger brother had survived. Her parents, who ran the shoe shop</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in town, weren't as lucky. She looks older, wearing
the drab 13 clothes that flatter no one, with her long yellow hair</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in a practical braid instead of curls. Delly's a bit
thinner than I remember, but she was one of the few kids in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">District 12 with a couple of pounds to spare. The diet
here, the stress, the grief of losing her parents have all, no</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doubt, contributed. "How are you doing?" I
ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, it's been a lot of changes all at
once." Her eyes fill with tears. "But everyone's really nice here in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Thirteen, don't you think?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Delly means it. She genuinely likes people. All
people, not just a select few she's spent years making up</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her mind about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They've made an effort to make us feel
welcome," I say. I think that's a fair statement without going</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">overboard. "Are you the one they've picked to see
Peeta?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I guess so. Poor Peeta. Poor <i>you</i>. I'll
never understand the Capitol," she says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Better not to, maybe," I tell her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Delly's known Peeta for a long time," says
Plutarch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, yes!" Delly's face brightens. "We
played together from when we were little. I used to tell people he was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my brother."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What do you think?" Haymitch asks me.
"Anything that might trigger memories of you?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We were all in the same class. But we never
overlapped much," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Katniss was always so amazing, I never dreamed
she would notice me," says Delly. "The way she could</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">hunt and go in the Hob and everything. Everyone
admired her so."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Haymitch and I both have to take a hard look at her
face to double-check if she's joking. To hear Delly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">describe it, I had next to no friends because I
intimidated people by being so exceptional. Not true. I had next to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no friends because I wasn't friendly. Leave it to
Delly to spin me into something wonderful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Delly always thinks the best of everyone,"
I explain. "I don't think Peeta could have bad memories</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">associated with her." Then I remember.
"Wait. In the Capitol. When I lied about recognizing the Avox girl. Peeta</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">covered for me and said she looked like Delly."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I remember," says Haymitch. "But I
don't know. It wasn't true. Delly wasn't actually there. I don't think it can</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">compete with years of childhood memories."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Especially with such a pleasant companion as
Delly," says Plutarch. "Let's give it a shot."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Plutarch, Haymitch, and I go to the observation room
next to where Peeta's confined. It's crowded with ten</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">members of his recovery team armed with pens and
clipboards. The one-way glass and audio setup allow us to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">watch Peeta secretly. He lies on the bed, his arms
strapped down. He doesn't fight the restraints, but his hands</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">fidget continuously. His expression seems more lucid
than when he tried to strangle me, but it's still not one that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">belongs to him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When the door quietly opens, his eyes widen in alarm,
then become confused. Delly crosses the room</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tentatively, but as she nears him she naturally breaks
into a smile. "Peeta? It's Delly. From home."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Delly?" Some of the clouds seem to clear.
"Delly. It's you."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes!" she says with obvious relief.
"How do you feel?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Awful. Where are we? What's happened?" asks
Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Here we go," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I told her to steer clear of any mention of
Katniss or the Capitol," says Plutarch. "Just see how much of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">home she could conjure up."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well...we're in District Thirteen. We live here
now," says Delly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's what those people have been saying. But
it makes no sense. Why aren't we home?" asks Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Delly bites her lip. "There was...an accident. I
miss home badly, too. I was only just thinking about those</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">chalk drawings we used to do on the paving stones.
Yours were so wonderful. Remember when you made each</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one a different animal?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah. Pigs and cats and things," says
Peeta. "You said...about an accident?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I can see the sheen of sweat on Delly's forehead as
she tries to work around the question. "It was bad. No</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">one...could stay," she says haltingly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Hang in there, girl," says Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"But I know you're going to like it here, Peeta.
The people have been really nice to us. There's always food</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and clean clothes, and school's much more
interesting," says Delly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Why hasn't my family come to see me?" Peeta
asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They can't." Delly's tearing up again.
"A lot of people didn't get out of Twelve. So we'll need to make a new</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">life here. I'm sure they could use a good baker. Do
you remember when your father used to let us make dough</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">girls and boys?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"There was a fire," Peeta says suddenly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yes," she whispers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Twelve burned down, didn't it? Because of
her," says Peeta angrily. "Because of Katniss!" He begins to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pull on the restraints.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Oh, no, Peeta. It wasn't her fault," says
Delly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Did she tell you that?" he hisses at her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Get her out of there," says Plutarch. The
door opens immediately and Delly begins to back toward it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">slowly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"She didn't have to. I was--" Delly begins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Because she's lying! She's a liar! You can't
believe anything she says! She's some kind of mutt the Capitol</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">created to use against the rest of us!" Peeta
shouts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No, Peeta. She's not a--" Delly tries
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Don't trust her, Delly," says Peeta in a
frantic voice. "I did, and she tried to kill me. She killed my friends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My family. Don't even go near her! She's a mutt!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A hand reaches through the doorway, pulls Delly out,
and the door swings shut. But Peeta keeps yelling. "A</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mutt! She's a stinking mutt!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Not only does he hate me and want to kill me, he no
longer believes I'm human. It was less painful being</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">strangled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Around me the recovery team members scribble like
crazy, taking down every word. Haymitch and Plutarch</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">grab my arms and propel me out of the room. They lean
me up against a wall in the silent hallway. But I know</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peeta continues to scream behind the door and the
glass.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Prim was wrong. Peeta is irretrievable. "I can't
stay here anymore," I say numbly. "If you want me to be the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mockingjay, you'll have to send me away."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Where do you want to go?" asks Haymitch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The Capitol." It's the only place I can
think of where I have a job to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Can't do it," Plutarch says. "Not
until all the districts are secure. Good news is, the fighting's almost over in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all of them but Two. It's a tough nut to crack,
though."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That's right. First the districts. Next the Capitol.
And then I hunt down Snow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Fine," I say. "Send me to Two."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">14</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">District 2 is a large district, as one might expect,
composed of a series of villages spread across the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mountains. Each was originally associated with a mine or
quarry, although now, many are devoted to the housing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and training of Peacekeepers. None of this would
present much of a challenge, since the rebels have 13's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">airpower on their side, except for one thing: At the
center of the district is a virtually impenetrable mountain that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">houses the heart of the Capitol's military.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We've nicknamed the mountain the Nut since I relayed
Plutarch's "tough nut to crack" comment to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">weary and discouraged rebel leaders here. The Nut was
established directly after the Dark Days, when the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Capitol had lost 13 and was desperate for a new
underground stronghold. They had some of their military</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">resources situated on the outskirts of the Capitol
itself--nuclear missiles, aircraft, troops--but a significant chunk</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">of their power was now under an enemy's control. Of
course, there was no way they could hope to replicate 13,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">which was the work of centuries. However, in the old
mines of nearby District 2, they saw opportunity. From the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">air, the Nut appeared to be just another mountain with
a few entrances on its faces. But inside were vast</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">cavernous spaces where slabs of stones had been cut,
hauled to the surface, and transported down slippery</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">narrow roads to make distant buildings. There was even
a train system to facilitate transporting the miners from</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the Nut to the very center of the main town in
District 2. It ran right to the square that Peeta and I visited during the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Victory Tour, standing on the wide marble steps of the
Justice Building, trying not to look too closely at Cato's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and Clove's grieving families assembled below us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It was not the most ideal terrain, plagued as it was
by mudslides, floods, and avalanches. But the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">advantages outweighed the concerns. As they'd cut deep
into the mountain, the miners had left large pillars and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">walls of stone to support the infrastructure. The
Capitol reinforced these and set about making the mountain their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">new military base. Filling it with computer banks and
meeting rooms, barracks and arsenals. Widening</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">entrances to allow the exit of hovercraft from the
hangar, installing missile launchers. But on the whole, leaving</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the exterior of the mountain largely unchanged. A
rough, rocky tangle of trees and wildlife. A natural fortress to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">protect them from their enemies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">By the other districts' standards, the Capitol babied
the inhabitants here. Just by looking at the District 2</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">rebels, you can tell they were decently fed and cared
for in childhood. Some did end up as quarry and mine</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">workers. Others were educated for jobs in the Nut or
funneled into the ranks of Peacekeepers. Trained young</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and hard for combat. The Hunger Games were an
opportunity for wealth and a kind of glory not seen elsewhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Of course, the people of 2 swallowed the Capitol's
propaganda more easily than the rest of us. Embraced their</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">ways. But for all that, at the end of the day, they
were still slaves. And if that was lost on the citizens who became</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Peacekeepers or worked in the Nut, it was not lost on
the stonecutters who formed the backbone of the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">resistance here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Things stand as they did when I arrived two weeks ago.
The outer villages are in rebel hands, the town</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">divided, and the Nut is as untouchable as ever. Its
few entrances heavily fortified, its heart safely enfolded in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mountain. While every other district has now wrested
control from the Capitol, 2 remains in its pocket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Each day, I do whatever I can to help. Visit the
wounded. Tape short propos with my camera crew. I'm not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">allowed in actual combat, but they invite me to the
meetings on the status of the war, which is a lot more than they</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">did in 13. It's much better here. Freer, no schedules
on my arm, fewer demands on my time. I live aboveground in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the rebel villages or surrounding caves. For safety's
sake, I'm relocated often. During the day, I've been given</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">clearance to hunt as long as I take a guard along and
don't stray too far. In the thin, cold mountain air, I feel some</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">physical strength returning, my mind clearing away the
rest of the fogginess. But with this mental clarity comes an</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even sharper awareness of what has been done to Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Snow has stolen him from me, twisted him beyond
recognition, and made me a present of him. Boggs,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">who came to 2 when I did, told me that even with all
the plotting, it was a little too easy to rescue Peeta. He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">believes if 13 hadn't made the effort, Peeta would've
been delivered to me anyway. Dropped off in an actively</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">warring district or perhaps 13 itself. Tied up with
ribbons and tagged with my name. Programmed to murder me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It's only now that he's been corrupted that I can
fully appreciate the real Peeta. Even more than I would've if</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he'd died. The kindness, the steadiness, the warmth
that had an unexpected heat behind it. Outside of Prim, my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he'd died. The kindness, the steadiness, the warmth
that had an unexpected heat behind it. Outside of Prim, my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mother, and Gale, how many people in the world love me
unconditionally? I think in my case, the answer may now</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">be none. Sometimes when I'm alone, I take the pearl
from where it lives in my pocket and try to remember the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">boy with the bread, the strong arms that warded off
nightmares on the train, the kisses in the arena. To make</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">myself put a name to the thing I've lost. But what's
the use? It's gone. He's gone. Whatever existed between us is</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gone. All that's left is my promise to kill Snow. I
tell myself this ten times a day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Back in 13, Peeta's rehabilitation continues. Even
though I don't ask, Plutarch gives me cheerful updates</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">on the phone like "Good news, Katniss! I think
we've almost got him convinced you're not a mutt!" Or "Today he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">was allowed to feed himself pudding!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When Haymitch gets on after, he admits Peeta's no
better. The only dubious ray of hope has come from my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sister. "Prim came up with the idea of trying to
hijack him back," Haymitch tells me. "Bring up the distorted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">memories of you and then give him a big dose of a
calming drug, like morphling. We've only tried it on one</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">memory. The tape of the two of you in the cave, when
you told him that story about getting Prim the goat."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Any improvement?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Well, if extreme confusion is an improvement
over extreme terror, then yes," says Haymitch. "But I'm not</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sure it is. He lost the ability to speak for several
hours. Went into some sort of stupor. When he came out, the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">only thing he asked about was the goat."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Right," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How's it out there?" he asks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No forward motion," I tell him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We're sending out a team to help with the
mountain. Beetee and some of the others," he says. "You know,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the brains."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When the brains are selected, I'm not surprised to see
Gale's name on the list. I thought Beetee would</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bring him, not for his technological expertise, but in
the hopes that he could somehow think of a way to ensnare a</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">mountain. Originally, Gale offered to come with me to
2, but I could see I was tearing him away from his work with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Beetee. I told him to sit tight and stay where he was
most needed. I didn't tell him his presence would make it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even more difficult for me to mourn Peeta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale finds me when they arrive late one afternoon. I'm
sitting on a log at the edge of my current village,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">plucking a goose. A dozen or so of the birds are piled
at my feet. Great flocks of them have been migrating</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">through here since I've arrived, and the pickings are
easy. Without a word, Gale settles beside me and begins to</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">relieve a bird of its feathers. We're through about
half when he says, "Any chance we'll get to eat these?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Yeah. Most go to the camp kitchen, but they
expect me to give a couple to whoever I'm staying with</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">tonight," I say. "For keeping me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Isn't the honor of the thing enough?" he
says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You'd think," I reply. "But word's
gotten out that mockingjays are hazardous to your health."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">We pluck in silence for a while longer. Then he says,
"I saw Peeta yesterday. Through the glass."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What'd you think?" I ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Something selfish," says Gale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That you don't have to be jealous of him
anymore?" My fingers give a yank, and a cloud of feathers floats</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down around us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. Just the opposite." Gale pulls a
feather out of my hair. "I thought...I'll never compete with that. No
matter</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">how much pain I'm in." He spins the feather
between his thumb and forefinger. "I don't stand a chance if he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">doesn't get better. You'll never be able to let him
go. You'll always feel wrong about being with me."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"The way I always felt wrong kissing him because of
you," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale holds my gaze. "If I thought that was true,
I could almost live with the rest of it."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"It is true," I admit. "But so is what
you said about Peeta."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale makes a sound of exasperation. Nonetheless, after
we've dropped off the birds and volunteered to go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">back to the woods to gather kindling for the evening
fire, I find myself wrapped in his arms. His lips brushing the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">faded bruises on my neck, working their way to my
mouth. Despite what I feel for Peeta, this is when I accept</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">deep down that he'll never come back to me. Or I'll
never go back to him. I'll stay in 2 until it falls, go to the Capitol</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and kill Snow, and then die for my trouble. And he'll
die insane and hating me. So in the fading light I shut my</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">eyes and kiss Gale to make up for all the kisses I've
withheld, and because it doesn't matter anymore, and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">because I'm so desperately lonely I can't stand it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale's touch and taste and heat remind me that at
least my body's still alive, and for the moment it's a</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">welcome feeling. I empty my mind and let the
sensations run through my flesh, happy to lose myself. When Gale</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pulls away slightly, I move forward to close the gap,
but I feel his hand under my chin. "Katniss," he says. The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">instant I open my eyes, the world seems disjointed.
This is not our woods or our mountains or our way. My hand</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">automatically goes to the scar on my left temple,
which I associate with confusion. "Now kiss me." Bewildered,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">unblinking, I stand there while he leans in and
presses his lips to mine briefly. He examines my face closely.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"What's going on in your head?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I don't know," I whisper back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Then it's like kissing someone who's drunk. It
doesn't count," he says with a weak attempt at a laugh. He</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">scoops up a pile of kindling and drops it in my empty
arms, returning me to myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"How do you know?" I say, mostly to cover my
embarrassment. "Have you kissed someone who's drunk?" I</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">guess Gale could've been kissing girls right and left
back in 12. He certainly had enough takers. I never thought</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">about it much before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He just shakes his head. "No. But it's not hard
to imagine."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So, you never kissed any other girls?" I
ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I didn't say that. You know, you were only
twelve when we met. And a real pain besides. I did have a life</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">outside of hunting with you," he says, loading up
with firewood.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Suddenly, I'm genuinely curious. "Who did you
kiss? And where?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Too many to remember. Behind the school, on the
slag heap, you name it," he says.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I roll my eyes. "So when did I become so special?
When they carted me off to the Capitol?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"No. About six months before that. Right after
New Year's. We were in the Hob, eating some slop of Greasy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Sae's. And Darius was teasing you about trading a
rabbit for one of his kisses. And I realized...I minded," he tells</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I remember that day. Bitter cold and dark by four in
the afternoon. We'd been hunting, but a heavy snow had</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">driven us back into town. The Hob was crowded with
people looking for refuge from the weather. Greasy Sae's</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">soup, made with stock from the bones of a wild dog
we'd shot a week earlier, was below her usual standards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Still, it was hot, and I was starving as I scooped it
up, sitting cross-legged on her counter. Darius was leaning on</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the post of the stall, tickling my cheek with the end
of my braid, while I smacked his hand away. He was</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">explaining why one of his kisses merited a rabbit, or
possibly two, since everyone knows redheaded men are</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the most virile. And Greasy Sae and I were laughing
because he was so ridiculous and persistent and kept</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">pointing out women around the Hob who he said had paid
far more than a rabbit to enjoy his lips. "See? The one</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">in the green muffler? Go ahead and ask her. <i>If </i>you
need a reference."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A million miles from here, a billion days ago, this
happened. "Darius was just joking around," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Probably. Although you'd be the last to figure
out if he wasn't," Gale tells me. "Take Peeta. Take me. Or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">even Finnick. I was starting to worry he had his eye
on you, but he seems back on track now."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"You don't know Finnick if you think he'd love
me," I say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale shrugs. "I know he was desperate. That makes
people do all kinds of crazy things."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I can't help thinking that's directed at me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Bright and early the next morning, the brains assemble
to take on the problem of the Nut. I'm asked to the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">meeting, although I don't have much to contribute. I
avoid the conference table and perch in the wide windowsill</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that has a view of the mountain in question. The
commander from 2, a middle-aged woman named Lyme, takes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">us on a virtual tour of the Nut, its interior and
fortifications, and recounts the failed attempts to seize it. I've</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">crossed paths with her briefly a couple of times since
my arrival, and was dogged by the feeling I'd met her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">before. She's memorable enough, standing over six feet
tall and heavily muscled. But it's only when I see a clip of</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">her in the field, leading a raid on the main entrance
of the Nut, that something clicks and I realize I'm in the</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">presence of another victor. Lyme, the tribute from
District 2, who won her Hunger Games over a generation ago.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Effie sent us her tape, among others, to prepare for
the Quarter Quell. I've probably caught glimpses of her</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">during the Games over the years, but she's kept a low
profile. With my newfound knowledge of Haymitch's and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Finnick's treatment, all I can think is: What did the
Capitol do to her after she won?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">When Lyme finishes the presentation, the questions
from the brains begin. Hours pass, and lunch comes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and goes, as they try to come up with a realistic plan
for taking the Nut. But while Beetee thinks he might be able</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to override certain computer systems, and there's some
discussion of putting the handful of internal spies to use,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">no one has any really innovative thoughts. As the
afternoon wears on, talk keeps returning to a strategy that has</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">been tried repeatedly--the storming of the entrances.
I can see Lyme's frustration building because so many</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">variations of this plan have already failed, so many
of her soldiers have been lost. Finally, she bursts out, "The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">variations of this plan have already failed, so many
of her soldiers have been lost. Finally, she bursts out, "The</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">next person who suggests we take the entrances better
have a brilliant way to do it, because you're going to be</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the one leading that mission!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gale, who is too restless to sit at the table for more
than a few hours, has been alternating between pacing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and sharing my windowsill. Early on, he seemed to
accept Lyme's assertion that the entrances couldn't be taken,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and dropped out of the conversation entirely. For the
last hour or so, he's sat quietly, his brow knitted in</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">concentration, staring at the Nut through the window
glass. In the silence that follows Lyme's ultimatum, he</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">speaks up. "Is it really so necessary that we
take the Nut? Or would it be enough to disable it?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That would be a step in the right
direction," says Beetee. "What do you have in mind?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Think of it as a wild dog den," Gale
continues. "You're not going to fight your way in. So you have two</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">choices. Trap the dogs inside or flush them out."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We've tried bombing the entrances," says
Lyme. "They're set too far inside the stone for any real damage</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">to be done."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"I wasn't thinking of that," says Gale.
"I was thinking of using the mountain." Beetee rises and joins Gale
at</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the window, peering through his ill-fitting glasses.
"See? Running down the sides?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Avalanche paths," says Beetee under his
breath. "It'd be tricky. We'd have to design the detonation</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">sequence with great care, and once it's in motion, we
couldn't hope to control it."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"We don't need to control it if we give up the
idea that we have to possess the Nut," says Gale. "Only shut it</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">down."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"So you're suggesting we start avalanches and
block the entrances?" asks Lyme.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"That's it," says Gale. "Trap the enemy
inside, cut off from supplies. Make it impossible for them to send</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">out their hovercraft."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">While everyone considers the plan, Boggs flips through
a stack of blueprints of the Nut and frowns. "You</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">risk killing everyone inside. Look at the ventilation
system. It's rudimentary at best. Nothing like what we have in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Thirteen. It depends entirely on pumping in air from
the mountainsides. Block those vents and you'll suffocate</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">whoever is trapped."</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"They could still escape through the train tunnel
to the square," says Beetee.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">"Not if we blow it up," says Gale brusquely.
His intent, his full intent, becomes clear. Gale has no interest in</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">preserving the lives of those in the Nut. No interest
in caging the prey for later use.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">This is one of his death traps.</span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><a href="http://dormitepia.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/46-mockingjay-part-ii-assault-read-it.html" target="_blank">[Click acá para ir a la parte 4/6] </a></span></div>
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