wheelchair. I feel fine, really. Except for my head, and my leg, and the soreness from the bruises, and the nausea that hit a couple minutes after I ate. Maybe the wheelchair’s a good idea.
As they wheel me down, I begin to get uneasy about what I will face. Gale and I directly disobeyed orders yesterday, and Boggs has the injury to prove it. Surely, there will be repercussions, but will they go so far as Coin annulling our agreement for the victors’ immunity? Have I stripped Peeta of what little protection I could give him?
When I get to Command, the only ones who’ve arrived are Cressida, Messalla, and the insects. Messalla beams and says, «There’s our little star!» and the others are smiling so genuinely that I can’t help but smile in return. They impressed me in 8, following me onto the roof during the bombing, making Plutarch back off so they could get the footage they wanted. They more than do their work, they take pride in it. Like Cinna.
I have a strange thought that if we were in the arena together, I would pick them as allies. Cressida, Messalla, and—and—«I have to stop calling you ‘the insects,’» I blurt out to the cameramen. I explain how I didn’t know their names, but their suits suggested the shelled creatures. The comparison doesn’t seem to bother them. Even without the camera shells, they strongly resemble each other. Same sandy hair, red beards, and blue eyes. The one with close-bitten nails introduces himself as Castor and the other, who’s his brother, as Pollux. I wait for Pollux to say hello, but he just nods. At first I think he’s shy or a man of few words. But something tugs on me— the position of his lips, the extra effort he takes to swallow—and I know before Castor tells me. Pollux is an Avox. They have cut out his tongue and he will never speak again. And I no longer have to wonder what made him risk everything to help bring down the Capitol.
As the room fills, I brace myself for a less congenial reception. But the only people who register any kind of negativity are Haymitch, who’s always out of sorts, and a sour-faced Fulvia Cardew. Boggs wears a flesh-colored plastic mask from his upper lip to his brow—I was right about the broken nose—so his expression’s hard to read. Coin and Gale are in the midst of some exchange that seems positively chummy.
When Gale slides into the seat next to my wheelchair, I say, «Making new friends?»
His eyes flicker to the president and back. «Well, one of us has to be accessible.» He touches my temple gently. «How do you feel?»
They must have served stewed garlic and squash for the breakfast vegetable. The more people who gather, the stronger the fumes are. My stomach turns and the lights suddenly seem too bright. «Kind of rocky,» I say. «How are you?»
«Fine. They dug out a couple of pieces of shrapnel. No big deal,» he says.
Coin calls the meeting to order. «Our Airtime Assault has officially launched. For any of you who missed yesterday’s twenty-hundred broadcast of our first propo—or the seventeen reruns Beetee has managed to air since—we will begin by replaying it.» Replaying it? So they not only got usable footage, they’ve already slapped together a propo and aired it repeatedly. My palms grow moist in anticipation of seeing myself on television. What if I’m still awful? What if I’m as stiff and pointless as I was in the studio and they’ve just given up on getting anything better? Individual screens slide up from the table, the lights dim slightly, and a hush falls over the room.
At first, my screen is black. Then a tiny spark flickers in the center. It blossoms, spreads, silently eating up the blackness until the entire frame is ablaze with a fire so real and intense, I imagine I feel the heat emanating from it. The image of my mockingjay pin emerges, glowing red-gold. The deep, resonant voice that haunts my dreams begins to speak. Claudius Templesmith, the official announcer of the Hunger Games, says, «Katniss Everdeen, the girl who was on fire, burns on.»
Suddenly, there I am, replacing the mockingjay, standing before the real flames and smoke of District 8. «I want to tell the rebels that I am alive. That I’m right here in District Eight, where the Capitol has just bombed a hospital full of unarmed men, women, and children. There will be no survivors.» Cut to the hospital collapsing in on itself, the desperation of the onlookers as I continue in voice-over. «I want to tell people that if you think for one second the Capitol will treat us fairly if there’s a cease-fire, you’re deluding yourself. Because you know who they are and what they do.» Back to me now, my hands lifting up to indicate the outrage around me. «Thisis what they do! And we must fight back!» Now comes a truly fantastic montage of the battle. The initial bombs falling, us running, being blown to the ground—a close-up of my wound, which looks good and bloody—scaling the roof, diving into the nests, and then some amazing shots of the rebels, Gale, and mostly me, me, me knocking those planes out of the sky. Smash-cut back to me moving in on the camera. «President Snow says he’s sending us a message? Well, I have one for him. You can torture us and bomb us and burn our districts to the ground, but do you see that?» We’re with the camera, tracking to the planes burning on the roof of the warehouse. Tight on the Capitol seal on a wing, which melts back into the image of my face, shouting at the president. «Fire is catching! And if we burn, you burn with us!» Flames engulf the screen again. Superimposed on them in black, solid letters are the words:
The words catch fire and the whole screen burns to blackness.
There’s a moment of silent relish, then applause followed by demands to see it again. Coin indulgently hits the replay button, and this time, since I know what will happen, I try to pretend that I’m watching this on my television at home in the Seam. An anti-Capitol statement. There’s never been anything like it on television. Not in my lifetime, anyway.
By the time the screen burns to black a second time, I need to know more. «Did it play all over Panem? Did they see it in the Capitol?»
«Not in the Capitol,» says Plutarch. «We couldn’t override their system, although Beetee’s working on it. But in all the districts. We even got it on in Two, which may be more valuable than the Capitol at this point in the game.»
«Is Claudius Templesmith with us?» I ask.
This gives Plutarch a good laugh. «Only his voice. But that’s ours for the taking. We didn’t even have to do any special editing. He said that actual line in your first Games.» He slaps his hand on the table. «What say we give another round of applause to Cressida, her amazing team, and, of course, our on-camera talent!»
I clap, too, until I realize I’m the on-camera talent and maybe it’s obnoxious that I’m applauding for myself, but no one’s paying attention. I can’t help noticing the strain on Fulvia’s face, though. I think how hard this must be for her, watching Haymitch’s idea succeed under Cressida’s direction, when Fulvia’s studio approach was such a flop.
Coin seems to have reached the end of her tolerance for self-congratulation. «Yes, well deserved. The result is more than we had hoped for. But I do have to question the wide margin of risk that you were willing to operate within. I know the raid was unforeseen. However, given the circumstances, I think we should discuss the decision to send Katniss into actual combat.»
The decision? To send me into combat? Then she doesn’t know that I flagrantly disregarded orders, ripped out my earpiece, and gave my bodyguards the slip? What else have they kept from her?
«It was a tough call,» says Plutarch, furrowing his brow. «But the general consensus was that we weren’t going to get anything worth using if we locked her in a bunker somewhere every time a gun went off.»
«And you’re all right with that?» asks the president.
Gale has to kick me under the table before I realize that she’s talking to me. «Oh! Yeah, I’m completely all right with that. It felt good. Doing something for a change.»
«Well, let’s be just a little more judicious with her exposure. Especially now that the Capitol knows what she can do,» says Coin. There’s a rumble of assent from around the table.
No one has ratted out Gale and me. Not Plutarch, whose authority we ignored. Not Boggs with his broken nose. Not the insects we led into fire. Not Haymitch—no, wait a minute. Haymitch is giving me a deadly smile and saying sweetly, «Yeah, we wouldn’t want to lose our little Mockingjay when she’s finally begun to sing.» I make a note to myself not to end up alone in a room with him, because he’s clearly having vengeful thoughts over that stupid earpiece.
«So, what else do you have planned?» asks the president.
Plutarch nods to Cressida, who consults a clipboard. «We have some terrific footage of Katniss at the
