all_inclusive | Entries tagged with zz: katniss everdeen

Any entries earlier than this were pre-reboot.

Running, running, running.

Katniss hasn't slept in days. The nightmares come and go but since Peeta left, she hasn't had the long stretches of relief that she'd had with him. The nightmares always come back. This run is particularly bad, as she hasn't slept more than a few hours in the last week. Her eyes are red-rimmed from tears and exhaustion and deep bruises beneath them show just how hard this has been on her. She's been trying to keep moving, to push herself to physical exhaustion so that the sleep she gets is dreamless. It doesn't work as well as she wants it to.

She's afraid of the doors but it isn't something she ever wants to admit out loud. She knows there's ones she can trust, ones that lead to safe places, but what if the doors change and she winds up in the Arena again? What if she winds up in the Capitol, instead, or in bombed out 12? The 12 of her dreams is never the one where she hunted with Gale or traded at The Hob. It's always the firebombed 12, the one where the walkways are paved with the bones of the people she couldn't save and where the air is scented with ashes and white roses.

Are we in the clear yet?

Today, she's working in the restaurant, bussing tables and taking orders and trying to keep afloat. Her mind is too tired to do the mental gymnastics her job requires and she drops two whole trays of glasses before the middle of her shift, glass slicing her palms as she picks it up. Still, she can't go to sleep. Sleep is where Snow can get her, where the mutts are after her, where the faces of all the people she's failed swim in front of her and scream at her in the harsh, metallic voices of jabberjays.

The buzz of the people dining starts to sound like Prim, like Peeta, like Rue. She can't take it any longer. Katniss runs, runs far back into a storage closet at the other end of the restaurant and hides. It's not her closet in 13 and it doesn't have piles and piles of smooth graphite pencils for her to break but it's good enough. It's quiet and it's dark and it's far away from everyone else.

[Feel free to have seen Katniss drop the glasses or if you're a canonmate, to know she's been having a hard time lately.]

burn_with_us

Just as she had last year, Katniss had taken on the task of planning a feast to give thanks for all the people who had come through the doors from Panem. There's a little crew of them now, slightly smaller than last year, but there's one important addition to that group - Cinna. Her heart is just a little lighter knowing that he's here and knowing that everyone in this place is happy and safe and well-fed is something to be thankful for.

She'd spent the wee hours of the morning hunting in one of the forests beyond the doors and came back with two wild turkeys. Cleaning and dressing them had taken most of the early morning hours and by late afternoon, she'd managed to have them roasted and golden brown. There's other things, too, cooked in the restaurant's kitchen and maybe while not as expertly done as Peeta would have, it's passable. Katniss has learned a few things in the past two years.

There's enough food for her invited guests and, should someone decide to crash the party, enough for a few uninvited guests. It's the way Katniss prefers it. She thinks part of the beauty of giving thanks for what they have is sharing it with anyone who happens along.

When everyone is gathered, she taps her glass lightly and makes an impromptu (and awkward) speech.

"So, I'm thankful you're all here. I'm thankful another year has passed and we're safe and sound and well-fed. Please enjoy."

With that, she slinks back into her seat.

designerebel

For the first few days Cinna stays in his room. He's suffered a loss so great that it's painful beyond the telling of it. Who can speak those words? Cinna cannot, in spite of his usual eloquence. He's had to relive his own demise right up to his death. In a sense, it leaves him numb. But a man like Cinna cannot stay that way forever. He has to feel. He has to exist. He is not an ungrateful man when he is given something so great that it's very near inexplicable. He should be dead. His life, this life in The Nexus, is a miraculous thing - the impossible made possible. He will not squander the gift that has been given to him.

He dresses well in spite of the ache in his bruised muscles as he does so. Cinna doesn't like looking anything but well put together. By his fourth day the wounds on his body have scabbed over. The bruises have turned deep purple and yellow. He doesn't try to cover them up with makeup. There is no sense in that and he knows they'll be gone soon enough. He does don some of his token golden eyeliner. It makes him feel more human. It makes him feel more like himself, tiny gold lines outlined and embellished in black that serve him as well as the greatest suit of armor ever made. He is alive. He exists. He is a fighter in his own right even without conventional weapons. He is Cinna.

He understands The Nexus somewhat in thanks to his time in another very different place although similar in mechanics. Also, in thanks to the kindness of a man he is still indebted to who had helped him understand what was happening when he'd only first arrived a few days ago. He understands that it is a hub of some sort. He also understands that he cannot go home. That is a fate of his own design that he doesn't want to live through again.

It is now, four days later, that he decides to get out and explore this, The Nexus, as Aramis had called it. He can be found anywhere really, moving with an elegance and grace that is intrinsic to him, looking in rooms and shops, outside and inside. Not only does he want to become acquainted with his new home, but he's in search of food and the familiarity of a needle and thread in his hands if he can find it. That's all he needs, really. For now.

burn_with_us

Katniss still misses him every day. If asked two, three years ago when this whole journey of hers started how she felt about Peeta Mellark, she probably wouldn't have had an answer but now Katniss thinks that some way, some how, she might have loved him. She thinks that she is never going to have the chance to know that, now, since he's locked up in the Capitol and she's here - away from anything and everything dangerous.

She still goes back, though, to tempt fate and while she goes with her quiver on her back and her bow in her hand, Katniss doesn't think that's exactly going to be enough to stop a Capitol hovercraft if they really want to take her. She hasn't seen them, though. Any time she goes back to 12, she only sees meadows and ponds and trees and she never sees anything remotely resembling the Capitol's ominous presence.

Today, she sees two deer in the woods and bags them, deciding to bring them back. She's learned how to cook and her boss in the restaurant doesn't seem to mind when she brings back game to share; she guesses he just likes having someone show up to wait tables on a more or less regular basis and Katniss is fairly reliable.

She drags them through the door and pauses, wondering about her wisdom in trying to bring both of these back through without cleaning them first. Oh well. She's never been overly concerned with what other people think. When someone stares at her, she stares right back.

"You want to help me with this or do you just want to look?"

makestheplans

As soon as Katniss is sedated, I vanish. I kept it together in front of her, but once she's passed out I can feel myself start to crack. Heavensbee's looking at me; Prim's looking at me; I have to get out.

There's no booze in Thirteen, that's what they say. Coin's rules— but where there's a will, there's a way, and right now I need it so bad I don't care if I have to tear the entire place apart to find it. The kitchen's too obvious— but I know where there are storage closets, caches of supplies. An easy place to hide a bottle, if you had one you wanted to hide.

I push through door after door, barely hearing the noise of them banging shut behind me. The echoes are too loud in my head— Peeta screaming, hoarse and ragged with his hands wrapped around Katniss's throat; her sobs, desperate gulping gasps that only quieted when they put the IV in her arm. My own breath comes loud and sharp; my vision greys, my brain full of static, and I stagger, bracing myself against the wall with a trembling hand. The only thing that'll silence the noise is a drink. I shake my head to clear it, focusing on the door ahead.

I'm so focused on navigating I barely notice when the concrete beneath my feet changes to carpet. When the watery fluorescent light turns brighter, warmer, on the back of my neck. It's not til someone calls out behind me that I turn and realize, panic stabbing sharp in my side— I'm not where I was.

I plaster on a smile, hoping it'll hide the way I'm grinding my teeth. "Think I'm a little lost."

[Find him already in the bar or wandering the halls looking for it.]

shifting_skin

She could not breathe.

She could not breathe.

The smell of ozone lingered in her nose as she tried, gasping against the taste of rust in her mouth. Mystique had, in her panic, bitten the inside of her cheek and while she could not remember when, could not think of anything but of the betrayal of her body, the taste of blood only served to keep her in that frantic state.

She had been walking down the hallway in the guise of a sharp-lined man, generic enough in coloring to go unnoticed in a crowd even where months and months within the hotel had offering nothing of evidence to a danger within its walls. She had stumbled, she was sure of it, and thrown out a hand to brace herself against the nearest wall as her body shifted, one shape trading for another without the least bit of her will behind it. That loss of control had been frightening enough, but to discover that no matter how she tried, she remained in the shape into which she'd been thrown.

It was very much like her own. That blonde form she had worn as her default for so much of her life. Yet it was different, just shades of it then as she was aware. Nothing of its shape, but her hair was darker and river straight, her skin lacking the warmth of the that golden tan.

Only after recognizing that she had lost her clothes along with that borrowed shape had she managed to get to her feet, fleeing directionless until she had found the laundry and stolen something to cover herself. She sat huddled at the bottom of a stairwell then, in a too large shirt and shorts that were inexplicably lettered with the word 'juicy.' She could not breathe. She could not stop shaking.

What had been done to her?

burn_with_us

Katniss never goes into the door that leads back to the Arena except, apparently, this time she did without even realizing it. She knows the tricks of it now, though, and she survives - but it doesn't make it any less hard to know that Peeta and Johanna are suffering because of her. Because of her and her stupid berries and her stupid wedding gown and her stupid desire to thumb her nose at Snow and the Capitol whenever she gets a chance.

Katniss isn't the face of a revolution. She just gets people killed.

So now she's been in 13 for what feels like an eternity, blithely getting a schedule printed on her arm every morning and ignoring it just so she can go sit in a closet and hide for hours and hours until someone notices she's missing. It's not the best system, but it's one that works for her, and she hopes that someday she'll be able to get the sound of Peeta's voice and the smell of his skin out of her head. She thinks about being in the hotel, too, and wonders if that's just something she dreamed up when she was pumped full of drugs after being rescued.

She hopes not.

They want her to be the face of this thing, the symbol that inspires everyone to fight. Katniss thinks that Finnick would be better at it, or Beetee, or anyone but her. Everything she touches dies, more or less, except those goddamned roses of Snow's. She doesn't want to be responsible for the rebellion dying too and she thinks they need someone less damaged than she is to lead them. Much less damaged. She's not a Victor anymore. She's just a survivor.

So instead of facing her fears and doing what's asked of her, Katniss flees to the closet again. She'll nestle up next to boxes of graphite pencils and cleaning supplies and try to ignore the screaming in her head for a little while in hopes that one day it'll actually all go quiet.

She sits with her back toward the wall and closes her eyes and gains her bearing again. In and out. In and out. Eventually, she feels like she might be able to stand on two legs and gets to her feet, shaky but only a little worse for the wear. She tugs open the door and when she sees the carpets instead of the utilitarian concrete of 13, she crumples up on the carpet and just weeps.

She's back.

concierge

Throughout the day on the 14th, the Nexus staff deliver single roses and accompanying notes to designated hotel guests in celebration of the Valentine's Day holiday. For some, the gesture will be a foregone conclusion; for others, it will be a surprise. For some, they might only guess at who sent them the gift in the first place.

[Comments with deliveries ~~will follow~~ are done. You may reply to yours with a reaction if you like!]

65th_victor

Tristan seemed to be getting bigger by the day. And with every day that passed, he could see more and more of Annie in their son, something that never ceased to make him smile. It was still a wonder to listen to to Tristan laugh, or watch him wriggle around the on the ground, preparing himself to crawl, or the way he could now sit steadily on his own. Of course, it was also a stark relief that he had also decided to be ready to sleep throughout the night.

But even on those days when he had been up the entire evening trying to coax their son to stop crying, he couldn't take any moment for granted. Not when he knew that there was a story out there that said that he never got to do any of these things, that Annie raised Tristan essentially on her own.

One thing he knew he needed to do was teach Tristan how to swim. Admittedly, he was still a bit young for that, but Finnick had still packed their things and headed down to the pool for the day. Holding Tristan close, he walked carefully into the shallow end, smiling when Tristan laughed when his toes came in contact with the water.

iheartmahogany

This hotel, once she had managed to find herself employment, was a suitable distraction from the events in Panem.

Or at least, she assumed they were occurring. Separated as she had been from everyone she knew, she had found it best to simply pack, and run, and stay here. Possibly forever. What little she had managed to bring, while scarce in her opinion, at least brought her some comfort. And so many others were here, people of Panem, though they all seemed to have different recollections, not that it mattered. Time travel did not mystify Effie so much as prove to be too frustrating and distanced to concern herself with. All she really cared about was that Peeta and Katniss were safe, that they were far from the Capitol, and that she could make herself useful here.

Here she was able to keep control, keep organized, and help run a small kingdom of information and frustratingly strange and changing architecture. It was diverting, though, and not just for the fact that something new might happen every day; the front desk was a rather lively place. Effie saw so many faces - some of which were greatly in need of makeovers, though in an attempt to be sympathetic, she did not mention it (especially if they were startled newcomers). And it was interesting watching the movements of the hotel at large. At the moment they were celebrating a hodgepodge of wintry holidays, and she quite liked how there was added glitter and pomp to the hotel as a result.

She could usually tell if someone was new by the way they looked at her - as if she was rather out of this world, which was both correct, and actually rather flattering. Some, of course, had no reaction to her at all, and that was fine too. Effie was starting to enjoy life on a more simple note, for while the hotel was luxurious to some, it was several steps down than what she was used to.

She sat behind the front desk, finishing up organizing the way the rooms were listed (they seemed to change and, at the same time, bafflingly not alter themselves at all; it was hard to keep track). She would be done soon, at which point she supposed it would be time for a drink, before a long regime of personal beauty care (her wigs, after all, did not style themselves).

burn_with_us

November 27th, 2014 | Nexus Hotel

Katniss and the Victors celebrate a holiday that nobody in the Districts has ever heard of.

In Progress | All Ages

burn_with_us

The Nexus is a strange place. Food is free. Lodging is free. And unlike living in the Capitol, it doesn't seem that Katniss is under anyone's thumb or that anyone is pulling the strings. She's been here almost eleven months now and it's the same thing every day - trying to see where the strings are and not finding anything wrong.

She still doesn't trust it, because that's asking to be killed, but she relaxes a little more. She smiles a lot and she spends an awful lot of time with Peeta when she thinks nobody else is looking. It's sort of sweet and secret and safe and she'd like to keep it all three of those things.

Today, she's gone back through the forest door that she and Peeta like to frequent to find that it's been blanketed in fresh snow. It's the time of year that game would be getting harder to find but it's also the time of the year that game gets flushed out because it's looking for better places to spend the winter and that's what Katniss is hoping for.

She doesn't need to hunt to survive anymore but it seems to take the edge off things and today is no different than any other day. She sees a turkey and nocks her arrow, letting it fly and killing it easily. Deer are another story and it's times like these that Katniss wishes she had a gun; she hates guns but they kill quicker than bows. She spots a few but doesn't take a shot, instead just watching them until the cold seeps in past her leather and fur and she has to head back in to warmth. She brings the turkey along with her. She's a bakery assistant now and Peeta's her boss but maybe Peeta can figure something out to do with it. If nothing else, Katniss can clean it and roast it. That's not so hard.

Her time in the woods seems to have recharged her instead of making her melancholy and Katniss wonders why that is. She thinks Peeta could deal with idle chatter and small talk all day without losing his patience but she can barely manage a few words with someone she likes, much less continued conversation with someone she doesn't feel like talk to. It's not a strong suit.

Maybe she won't run into anyone between here and the kitchen.

65th_victor

He'd been careful. He'd been really careful, because the last thing he wanted to do was go back into the arena.

But maybe he'd gotten complacent since the last door that had been special had been weeks ago, resulting in him being a girl for a couple of days. But since then, there'd been nothing. So maybe he hadn't been as diligent about watching where he was going, and maybe he'd been more than a little tired because Tristan hadn't slept well the night before and Finnick had been up with him for most of the night, trying to calm his son back down.

When Finnick did look up and found himself looking out into the jungle instead of into his room at the Nexus, he took a step back, his heart stuttering in his chest. Reflexively, he looked down: He was wearing the wetsuit he'd arrived at the hotel in.

He was back in the 75th Games.

"No, no," Finnick said out loud before he could stop himself. He turned around, desperately looking for the door that had led him in. He had to get back out. He couldn't be here. He couldn't be back here.

His brain suddenly snagged on a horrific thought: What if this wasn't a door at all? What if he had been sent back. It was something he couldn't even begin to fathom. It meant losing Annie and Tristan, and that was something he couldn't contend with.

The arena provided suitable distraction though: the sound of a cannon booming in the distance jolted Finnick back to the present. Door or home, he needed to stay alive. Weapon and water, Finnick thought, years of training fall back into place. The cornucopia was still in the middle of the arena, looking strangely deserted. He ran hastily across the beach and headed out into the water. He swam as fast as he could, reaching the cornucopia where a trident still sat, gleaming. He wrapped his hands around it -- just as he heard footsteps behind him. He turned, brandishing the trident in front of him.

ex_bequethen149

She's dead on her feet.

As time passes, that fact is becoming harder and harder to ignore. Running on pure adrenaline can only carry one as far as running on fumes; eventually, there's a limit, and then there's a crash. The not-even-two-hours of sleep she'd managed on the bus, wedged between Lydia and the window, aren't even close to what she'd need to recover from the whirlwind of the past twenty-four. There'd been the battle against the alpha pack, trying not to lose the bus, the race against time to stitch up Scott before he'd let himself bleed out completely, the entire night at the Glen Capri -

She's starving.

That is also becoming harder and harder to ignore, especially when the smells coming from the Bistro are so tempting. With the all-consuming anxiety that had been tearing away at her, food had been about the last thing on her mind, and now, it's hard to remember the last time she'd even eaten anything. Yesterday morning? Had it really been that long? It's a wonder she's still moving at all.

Unease is something that continues to linger somewhere in the background, behind fatigue and lightheadedness. It isn't surprising, given that, after everything that's just happened, she's found herself in a hotel, of all places. One that's strange in every way, even if it doesn't feel half as dingy or creepy as where she's just come from. There's still an impetus to move, to find people, to not waste time grabbing a bite. But she knows that, realistically, she can't be useful for much of anything without food, at least.

So, that's what leads her here: standing outside the restaurant, rummaging through her purse for some cash.

(Looks like nobody's told her the buffet is free yet.)

burn_with_us

Today is her birthday. Birthdays aren't usually anything special in 12 and, if it's turning 12, it's usually something to dread. The only birthday Katniss has ever cared about was 19 and she's not there yet. Instead, she's turning 18 today and if nothing had ever changed, she would be lining up for the Reaping for her last time this year. She'd have so many names in the ball that she'd be bound to be picked but Katniss likes to think she'd be lucky. After all, she made it to sixteen without ever getting Reaped, didn't she?

It had been Prim who was Reaped that year, Prim who only had one name in the ball and had the best shot out of any kid in the Seam to never get Reaped. Prim, for whom Katniss had sacrificed everything.

On her birthday, Katniss always thinks of Prim. She thinks about how Prim always made it a point to give her something on her birthday even if she didn't have the resources that Katniss had. Somehow magically, there was good flint for starting fires or a little tinder box. Her boots got patched or there was good, pliable wood for new arrows. Prim always managed to make something out of nothing.

Today, so she doesn't think about Prim, Katniss decides to work. She's taking orders in the dining room, bussing tables, working back in the kitchen. Anything to keep her hands and mind busy so that homesickness doesn't threaten to eat her from the inside out. It's always been the mental things she's struggled with. She can deal with pain, hunger, death but she never, ever has been able to deal with thinking about just how much she misses her sister each and every day.

themadgirl

Slowly but surely over the last few months, Annie had been learning to trust the Nexus. Her faith was tentative, fragile, but she could not live the whole of her life inside a hotel room, no matter how lush or large. Not in general, and certainly not when she was only a month from being a mother. Holding Finnick's hand needed to be a comfort but not a crutch.

Still, it was an ongoing process, and she always opened doors with care.

From their windows she could see the sprawling gardens, her feet itching to wander amongst the blooms, but the space out there felt far too large, too open and exposed, and she hadn't quite managed going alone yet. Inside was seldom better, a maze of corridors and dead ends, but the library she liked. Quite a lot, actually.

Annie liked books to begin with, but the balcony was what she really loved, here. Sitting at the top of the spiral staircase, she could see the entire room and still get up easily with the help of the railing. A watchful bird on her perch.

She was there now, stack of books beside her on the top step and another open in her lap as she referenced the little notebook she'd taken to carrying around with her here. Everything was so different, and she was eager to learn as much as she could. The music she'd discovered on her telephone was particularly confusing.

Eyes narrowing at the page, Annie frowned. She glanced to her notes and then back again. "This makes no sense at all," she murmurred, and then jerked her attention up as someone else entered the room.

[THG cast mates, please read this first. <3]

withbread

Peeta has gotten his hands on some painting supplies. It was a beautiful day and Peeta hadn't spent many of those outside because he'd been busy baking and exploring the hotel. However, today he was wearing a tee shirt and a pair of ratty jeans; the shirt as well as his arms and hands were smudged with paint. The scene slowly emerging on the canvas was one of a meadow with mountains, the sun just setting beyond them. His brow was furrowed as he focused on getting just the right shade and light in the sunset.

Peeta was adjusting here. He was beginning to live a life. He enjoyed his job baking for the hotel. He was beginning to branch out and open some of the doors, no longer terrified that every one would bring an army of peacekeepers from the Capitol down on them. He was still wary about the Capitol finding them, and he probably always will be, but it no longer paralyzed him in his daily life here.

After several moments, he took a step back, lips pressed together as he contemplated the scene. He was missing something, but he wasn't quite sure what yet. After several moments of studying the canvas, he put his brushes aside and toe-heeled his shoes off to wiggle his toes in the grass. Maybe taking a break would help.

iheartmahogany

Effie could walk in anything, so long as she was wearing the proper wig - otherwise, her balance was thrown completely off. But that was how she liked it; everything had its proper place, from train schedules to mealtimes to even the weight proportions of her dresses which, in some instances, were so large they practically engulfed her.

That's why she liked to keep her skirts above the calves, so that her shoes may never be missed by anyone who might be looking (and she expected many to do so). Even now her feet, tipped in five-inch high monstrosities that made her clip along as if she had hooves, were in full display. The rest of her dress curled in generous lines around her but, like her golden wig, was rigid and composed. In fact, the only real movement was Effie's face and hands, but that was fine; she was a very animated creature, always had been, and it worked well on camera, she liked to think.

Her main concern just then, though, was the fact she had gotten lost on her way from the restroom. There were always places to watch the Games and she usually had a front seat, but though they were soon to start, her real concern was to find Haymitch. Peeta and Katniss were going to need sponsors again, and it was her duty to make sure the right people were spoken to - though, to his credit, Haymitch had gotten a bit better in the charm department as of last year.

The largest Capitol buildings could turn anyone around, and Effie had no idea where she was. She recognized absolutely nothing, and even her sense of direction seemed off. The result was that Effie, while composed, was beginning to get anxious. She hated being late, anywhere, and she had places to be not just for decorum, but for her Victors! In fact, she was so distracted with concern, one could forgive her for missing the fact she was technically not in the Capitol anymore - nowhere near it at all, in fact.

withbread

Peeta's first couple of days here had been rough, but he'd begun to settle in. He'd begun to accept and hope that what Finnick, Johanna, Annie and Katniss had said about being safe from the Capitol here were true. He'd done a good deal of exploring and if this place is everything it seems, then he's grateful to be here. He's grateful that Katniss is here. He's been looking for a door back to District 12 as well, with the intent to check on Prim for Katniss. So far, all he's found is a door back to the arena and that's somewhere he definitely doesn't want to go.

After doing a little bit of settling, one of the first things he'd done was to apply for a job in the kitchen as a baker. Baking had always been a way for him to cope with his emotions, and that hasn't changed here. It helps calm him, helps settle him and makes him feel like he's got a purpose.

He's in the kitchen today working on loaves of bread (because a place like this uses an astounding amount of bread). He's got a chef's jacket on that covers the bandage on his arm, a wound still raw from when his tracker was dug out. In general, he looks content verging on happy. If he can hold everything together here, if he can keep Katniss and this isn't some game, he's hopeful for what this place could mean to him.

All Inclusive

Reboot Marker

are we out of the woods

what i'm thankful for

open § everything i'm not made me everything i am

we can light a match and burn it down

come on in and save me; come on

Chameleons don't shed their skin

faster than my bullet

Valentine Delivery Service

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no subject

what we're thankful for

no subject

no subject

come take my pulse, the pace is on a runaway train

no subject

You're a little bit damaged, I'm a sucker for that.

no subject

this isn't very festive!

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