11

THE SCAR

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An arrow whizzed past her face and found home in the monkey's eye socket; making it fall backwards to let go of the grip that it held on Evelyn's arm. Evelyn fell back into the water as Finnick attacked the third monkey that charged the wounded girl, hitting it lethally with his trident and watching it rip open.

Evelyn finally stood up with a pained groan and slashed downwards at another monkey that ambushed her, watching as the blade cut through its flesh and what was left of the body landed in the water. She had no sympathy for the creatures, they were just genetically modified animals made by the Capitol to kill the tributes in the arena. 

The mutts were the hunters, the victors the prey. 

It all seemed to be going well, no one else was severely injured and the monkey bodies continued to pile up around them. But no matter how hard they tried or how many they killed, the monkeys kept coming to attack them; even pinning Katniss under the water with a monkey trying to kill her with nothing but her bow to stop it.

Evelyn screamed out, her arm still dripping with her blood, and thrusted her sword into the monkey's skull before Peeta pulled his wife out of the water and began to shout. "We have to get to the beach!"

They started to sprint to the beach before getting followed by the mutts, one of them cornering Peeta to a tree whilst another jumped down on Finnick's back. Evelyn grabbed its fur and ripped it from his back, her dagger quickly found itself running across its neck. She looked up to hear a feminine scream, her heart dropping at the thought of Katniss. But Katniss was fine.

An unknown tribute had sacrificed herself for Peeta, allowing the monkey to attack her instead.

"Help Peeta!" Evelyn screamed across at Katniss so that she and Finnick could fall back momentarily to hold off the mutts. They needed to protect them so that the District 12 tributes could run to the beach with Peeta's saviour over their shoulders. Maybe she could be saved.

She felt Finnick grip her wound, making her yelp, as he dragged her to the sand of the beach. Evelyn and Finnick threw their bodies onto the sand, weapons raised at the mutts who followed. They didn't lower their blades until a canon above sounded; signalling the passing of the morphing who had saved Peeta. The mutts retreated as though their purpose had been fulfilled; leaving only confusion.

The two victors dropped their weapons to the sand and brought each other into a bone-crushing hug. It felt good. She felt good to feel his body pressed against hers. Her mind memorising the way his arms shielded her from harm, holding her tight as though he would dive before an attacker if it meant saving her. A whimper threatened to leave her lips as he pulled back, his hands gently gripping her wounded arm as he inspected the damage silently.

The teeth of the mutts had ripped through her uniform and pierced her skin deeply; oozing blood down her hands and staining the sand at their feet. He was quick to rip the bottom of his own sleeve and tied it around the wound like a bandage, "It didn't look like it hit anything major and the bleeding is beginning to slow down, so we just need to change that every-"

She cut him off and held his cheeks, pulling him into a kiss that caught him off guard. It wasn't long before he started to return the embrace; even tilting his head lower as he gently raised her head with a finger under her chin. Evelyn felt his lips pull back into a grin momentarily before he embraced her once more; one finger under her chin and the other on the small of her back. They only pulled back as the hovercraft descended to retrieve the body of the fallen tribute, as though the rushing of air brought them back to reality. As though it brought them back to the arena.

A small giggle slipped her lips, her bloody hands covering her mouth to stop it.

"Was it really that bad? I know its been a few years since-" he stopped talking, a smile still on his face, as her laughs passed her fingers. 

"Flickerman-" another laugh slipped her lips as his brows contorted. "Imagine his reaction- Putting all the pieces together- Not an easily man to surprise-"

His chuckles harmonised with hers as he brought her back in, his chin resting on the top of her head as she burrowed her head into his chest. Her laughs subsided slowly and were replaced with deep, wavering breaths. Breaths that tried to stop the tears from slipping past her eyes.

Years of love that they never would get back. Years that slipped past with pain and misery. Years that her daughter fell victim to the most.

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Finnick had managed to catch several fish from the water using his trident, leaving the group to eat it as he tried to catch more. They had no way of cooking it as they didn't want to use a fire and alert and other tribute to their presence, so they had to eat it raw. But she didn't mind, she was starving.

A smile grew on her face after watching Peeta pop open a clam and gave Katniss a pearl, "For you."

"Thank you," she smiled.

But what she really saw was the pure happiness on his face afterwards, the smile was as big as it could be and he had stars glistening in his eyes. It was pure love. Evelyn chuckled once Peeta noticed she was staring and his cheeks blushed a crimson red.

Screams echoed from the other side of the beach, alerting all of the alliance. "That's new," Peeta remarked as they stood up hastily with their weapons in hand.

In the treeline on the opposite end, a large wave of water towered over the trees and approached them. It hit an invisible barrier before washing over the cornucopia. A single cannon echoed. The water washed over their feet calmly before the whirring of the helicarrier filled their ears as it collected the body from the deceased tribute. 

She hoped it wasn't Chaff, he didn't deserve to go out like that. No one did, but especially not the man who volunteered for her father.

"Someone's here," Katniss informed as she perched an arrow in her bow and ducked into the treeline, all of the others following her pursuit.

Evelyn scanned the people who entered the beach, drenched in blood head to toe. One more came out from the trees and then it hit her. It was Johanna, Beetee and Wiress. "It's Johanna," Evelyn smiled before running over to her with Finnick behind her.

"Evelyn! Finnick!" Johanna screamed with joy before pulling the girl into a tight hug.

"What the hell happened to you?" she gasped out, wiping a finger down Johanna's arm to see blood between her fingers.

"Well, we were all the way deep in the jungle where I thought we would be safe and then the rain started. I thought it was water, but it turned out to be blood; hot, thick blood. It was coming down and choking us," she pushed away Wiress who started to mutter in her ear a repeated phrase, "We were stumbling around, gagging on it, blind. That's when Blight hit the forcefield. He wasn't much, but he was from home."

Evelyn shifted her attention to Wiress as she stumbled around on the sand repeating "Tik Tok," like she had gone mad, perhaps she did. The games threatened to plague her mind too. When it felt as though it grew to be too much, she repeated the names in her head. Silently repeating the names over and over until it brought her back to reality.

"What's wrong with her?" Katniss asked as she watched Evelyn place her sword in its sheath and take Wiress' arms softly to check her over for any wounds.

"She's in shock," Beetee replied from the water where he washed the blood from his skin silently, "Dehydration isn't helping. Do you have fresh water?"

"We can get some," Evelyn informed as Wiress broke out of her grip and began to agitate Johanna again. Making the District 7 girl push her away from her harshly.

"Hey! Stop it!" Katniss shouted at her, gripping Johanna harshly before Evelyn and Finnick interfered to pull them away from each other.

"Break it up!" Evelyn muttered as Johanna continued to shout at her. Wincing from the tugging on her wounded skin.

"I got them out for you!" she screamed at Katniss as Finnick dragged her away and into the water to cool off.

"For me? What does that mean?" she asked Peeta and Evelyn who had just let go of her.

"You did want them as allies," Peeta shrugged his shoulders simply and sat back on the sand with a defeated look.

"Come on, let's get you cleaned up," Katniss took Wiress into the water and began to clean her off from all the blood that had stained her skin and hair a deep red.

Evelyn sighed and dropped next to Peeta with her hand in her lap to avoid putting unnecessary pressure and strain on the wound, she only hoped for a sponsor to help heal the bite mark. Never once did she doubt that Atlas and Elodie were racking up her sponsors. She had made many friends in the capitol, friends that would stop at nothing to help. But she knew that she had more enemies in the ranks; the biggest enemy being the most powerful. She was also thankful that it was her non-dominant hand that had been wounded in the first place, it meant that she could still fight. Her fingers flexed as if it was spinning her blade.

"I'm guessing that Katniss didn't want me as an ally," Evelyn joked lightly to break the tension. Peeta awkwardly laughed as his eyes drifted down to the ring on her finger that she played with self-consciously.

"Honestly, she was just scared of you. I mean, so was I, to begin with, we all were," he smiled and scratched his hair, "We had watched your Games growing up and let's just say it left as much of a scar on us as it did on you."

She felt Peeta look down at her abdomen where the light breeze brushed against her abdomen. Evelyn looked down to find that her uniform had ripped perfectly over the jagged scar that damaged her soft skin. The scar that she inflicted herself for survival int he 68th Games. The scar that angered the President and the humanity it gave the watchers of her Hunger Games. How could a child do such a thing?

"I doubt it," she muttered as Finnick sat beside her and noticed her hand rubbing her scar on her stomach. She had spent seven years hiding it from everyone because it fascinated them so much and caused controversy within every conversation. People were terrified of how she could do such a thing to win, but none of them had been in the arena. They had no idea the lengths that people had to go through just to win. But even when they had won, they didn't get to live.

Finnick took her hand and rubbed a pattern over the back of her knuckles, soothing away the frustration that built up within her every time the topic came up. He too had made the mistake of asking about it one night.

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They lay in her bed together, the covers hiding their bodies as he stared at her resting features. He had spent his time like that, watching over her as she slept. Others would think it was weird or creepy, but it was only a year, maybe not even that, since she had won the Games and he knew how the nights went. They were sleepless, terrifying and almost as traumatic as the arena itself.

And he was right, she began to tense up in her sleep and mutter incoherently. She quietly begged for forgiveness, muttering apologies through her sobs. Sweat began to drip off her head again before Finnick shook her arm to wake her, making Evelyn gasp before sitting upright in the bed, covering her body with the blanket.

Her other hand instinctively went to her abdomen where the was just beginning to scar over correctly, forming a vicious, pink line across her skin. It didn't go unnoticed by Finnick, his eyes shifted to her hand where it hid the mark from his view.

"That's the mark, isn't it? The one everyone talks about?" he asked quietly as he gently pulled her back onto the pile of pillows against the headboard, she had brought both her hands up to her head to cover her eyes in embarrassment. She only nodded. "If you don't mind me asking, why do you hide it?"

She smiled weakly, fakely, before turning to face him, he did the same to make the conversation more real and authentic, "Because after being in the arena, your life is no longer private. The Capitol knows everything about us and so does the rest of the country. When I got the scar, it was a game-changing moment for history according to Snow. It showed fear and commitment to a whole new level. And now, it is the only thing people want to see. They only want to know why I did it."

"So you want to keep it a secret so that at least a part of you is hidden?" he asked again, pushing a strand of her locks behind her ear.

"It sounds stupid, I know. But I can't stand that everyone seems to know everything about me before I have a chance to find out myself," she smiled to peck his lips, "Anyway, let's change the conversation, yeah?"

"But-"

"I said that we should change the conversation," she spoke again, her voice no longer sweet and innocent. It was scared and harsh, just as he thought he had managed to help her break down her walls, she had just as quickly built them back up again.

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