tinderbox
Characters/Pairings: Peeta. Some Peeta/Katniss.
Rating: PG13
Word Count: 1033
Summary: Somewhere someone is always screaming. Set during Mockingjay; Peeta in the Capitol.
There is Katniss in his head with her long braid and her voice, there is always the thread of her song running through, he can hear her singing in the back of his mind for months and he uses it to keep himself sane but then there are needles that release sparks into Peeta's blood and Katniss explodes in red flames behind his eyelids and she is snarling, her mouth lined with sharp teeth, and she uses them to rip open his flesh and Peeta screams and screams.
At night there is silence and he hears Johanna from the next cell over. "You got some lungs there, cupcake."
There is a tremor in her sardonic voice and Peeta's dry laugh is empty. Somewhere someone screams.
Somewhere someone is always screaming.
The moments when he is awake and the moments when he isn't begin to run together like colors on a palette, ingredients in a bowl. Everything is shiny-bright and sharp, candy-colored like the Capitol is. Memories tear through each other with neon yellow claws and Peeta doesn't know, doesn't know anything, Peeta is just a blur.
Katniss. Katniss is –
Katniss kills, Katniss is only half-human, Katniss is a killer, Katniss is a demon –
Katniss sings, Peeta remembers from when he was a very small boy, all the birds –
Katniss has claws like a lion and her eyes are black, demon-black –
Katniss is on fire behind Peeta's eyes and his blood burns inside him. Peeta loves Katniss. Peeta has always loved her. Peeta hates Katniss. Katniss is a killer.
The only constant is the hiss of her name. Katniss.
Peeta remembers lots of things. Remembers nothing. Remembers burning his hand on the stove when he was little and his father bandaging it and then kissing the spot. Remembers his mother slapping him for his carelessness. Remembers his father's slow sigh. His brothers – where were his brothers?
"Come on, Peeta, time to get up."
It's Portia's voice, thin and breakable, and her cool hands pressing against his cheeks. Portia will be killed at some point, he knows. They'll all be dead soon, their blood is what waters the roses.
"It's time for the cameras, Peeta, you have to open your eyes."
They've only kept her around this long for this. She knows Peeta's colors better than anyone, she joked weakly once, earlier. Who else could style him as well as her?
Her shaking hands touch his face gently, smooth over foundations and concealers to hide the worst of his bruising. She used to explain makeup to Peeta like it was painting. Something smeared around his eyes to make him look awake. Shadows brushed across appropriate places to hide his thinness. He has to look like he is not a prisoner, like he is not a rebel.
Another set of trembling hands curls his hair; he can feel the warmth of the iron so close to his scalp. Someone from his old prep team, probably. Portia's hair used to be a riot of brown curls. He sees now maybe that was natural, though they hang limply around her thin face, clean now of product and red from crying, but determined.
If this was an arena, Peeta could snatch the curling iron, use to do…something. Katniss would know better. Katniss knew how to kill with just about anything, even a look.
They prop him up in a chair, hold him there with unseen bindings. He reads words off a cue card and injects them with sincerity, because if he is convincing enough they might not shock him so hard tonight. They might not hurt Johanna again. They might not –
No, Peeta is thinking like a little boy.
It's good his family went up in flames.
It gets harder and harder for Peeta to stay awake but he has learned to dread the dreaming, which smells copper-bright and cloudy like flowers, is colorful and glossy like images on the screen they make Peeta watch, is both unreal and too real, is slicing and sharp.
Is Peeta awake when he watches them cut the fingers and toes and feet and arms and knees and elbows and ears and nose but never eyes from the redheaded Avox, from Darius?
Is Peeta awake when they inject him with drugs to keep his eyes open for days, when they make him watch video of the killing again and again?
Is Peeta awake when Johanna Mason is dipped in water and electrified and screams and finally sobs and sobs and sobs but says no words that can be translated?
Is Peeta awake when they do that to him?
Afterwards they press salves to his wounds and drugs into his skin and Portia paints another Peeta on top of him and the other Peeta says all their words.
Their voices are insidious.
Is this really what you want, Peeta? Wouldn't you rather be happy?
Peeta pretends he is in District 12, carefully frosting a miniature forest onto a little girl's birthday cake, a field dotted with wildflowers.
You can be happy, Peeta. None of this is your fault.
Peeta makes little trees out of modeling chocolate and fondant leaves.
It's her fault.
Peeta blinks and for a moment he sees the cell, cold and clinical and deceptively clean-looking. It's so white. He always thinks his blood will be on the walls, the floor, but it never is.
You know that, don't you, Peeta? It's all her fault. The mutt.
Peeta sees Katniss on a roof before an orange sunset and then feels Katniss' hands on his throat, cutting off his air, sees her grinning above him with her sharp animal teeth, blood dripping from her jaws.
No one blames you. Everyone loves you, Peeta.
It's like Peeta must claw his way out of his own skin to force out words. They think he's dumb, or dead already inside, and they delight in telling him all kinds of things just to get a rise out of him. It doesn't matter anyway, Peeta, they say. Tomorrow Thirteen burns, with everyone inside it.
Peeta looks into the camera and speaks, and thinks maybe there's something inside him left alive after all.
Characters/Pairings: Peeta. Some Peeta/Katniss.
Rating: PG13
Word Count: 1033
Summary: Somewhere someone is always screaming. Set during Mockingjay; Peeta in the Capitol.
There is Katniss in his head with her long braid and her voice, there is always the thread of her song running through, he can hear her singing in the back of his mind for months and he uses it to keep himself sane but then there are needles that release sparks into Peeta's blood and Katniss explodes in red flames behind his eyelids and she is snarling, her mouth lined with sharp teeth, and she uses them to rip open his flesh and Peeta screams and screams.
At night there is silence and he hears Johanna from the next cell over. "You got some lungs there, cupcake."
There is a tremor in her sardonic voice and Peeta's dry laugh is empty. Somewhere someone screams.
Somewhere someone is always screaming.
The moments when he is awake and the moments when he isn't begin to run together like colors on a palette, ingredients in a bowl. Everything is shiny-bright and sharp, candy-colored like the Capitol is. Memories tear through each other with neon yellow claws and Peeta doesn't know, doesn't know anything, Peeta is just a blur.
Katniss. Katniss is –
Katniss kills, Katniss is only half-human, Katniss is a killer, Katniss is a demon –
Katniss sings, Peeta remembers from when he was a very small boy, all the birds –
Katniss has claws like a lion and her eyes are black, demon-black –
Katniss is on fire behind Peeta's eyes and his blood burns inside him. Peeta loves Katniss. Peeta has always loved her. Peeta hates Katniss. Katniss is a killer.
The only constant is the hiss of her name. Katniss.
Peeta remembers lots of things. Remembers nothing. Remembers burning his hand on the stove when he was little and his father bandaging it and then kissing the spot. Remembers his mother slapping him for his carelessness. Remembers his father's slow sigh. His brothers – where were his brothers?
"Come on, Peeta, time to get up."
It's Portia's voice, thin and breakable, and her cool hands pressing against his cheeks. Portia will be killed at some point, he knows. They'll all be dead soon, their blood is what waters the roses.
"It's time for the cameras, Peeta, you have to open your eyes."
They've only kept her around this long for this. She knows Peeta's colors better than anyone, she joked weakly once, earlier. Who else could style him as well as her?
Her shaking hands touch his face gently, smooth over foundations and concealers to hide the worst of his bruising. She used to explain makeup to Peeta like it was painting. Something smeared around his eyes to make him look awake. Shadows brushed across appropriate places to hide his thinness. He has to look like he is not a prisoner, like he is not a rebel.
Another set of trembling hands curls his hair; he can feel the warmth of the iron so close to his scalp. Someone from his old prep team, probably. Portia's hair used to be a riot of brown curls. He sees now maybe that was natural, though they hang limply around her thin face, clean now of product and red from crying, but determined.
If this was an arena, Peeta could snatch the curling iron, use to do…something. Katniss would know better. Katniss knew how to kill with just about anything, even a look.
They prop him up in a chair, hold him there with unseen bindings. He reads words off a cue card and injects them with sincerity, because if he is convincing enough they might not shock him so hard tonight. They might not hurt Johanna again. They might not –
No, Peeta is thinking like a little boy.
It's good his family went up in flames.
It gets harder and harder for Peeta to stay awake but he has learned to dread the dreaming, which smells copper-bright and cloudy like flowers, is colorful and glossy like images on the screen they make Peeta watch, is both unreal and too real, is slicing and sharp.
Is Peeta awake when he watches them cut the fingers and toes and feet and arms and knees and elbows and ears and nose but never eyes from the redheaded Avox, from Darius?
Is Peeta awake when they inject him with drugs to keep his eyes open for days, when they make him watch video of the killing again and again?
Is Peeta awake when Johanna Mason is dipped in water and electrified and screams and finally sobs and sobs and sobs but says no words that can be translated?
Is Peeta awake when they do that to him?
Afterwards they press salves to his wounds and drugs into his skin and Portia paints another Peeta on top of him and the other Peeta says all their words.
Their voices are insidious.
Is this really what you want, Peeta? Wouldn't you rather be happy?
Peeta pretends he is in District 12, carefully frosting a miniature forest onto a little girl's birthday cake, a field dotted with wildflowers.
You can be happy, Peeta. None of this is your fault.
Peeta makes little trees out of modeling chocolate and fondant leaves.
It's her fault.
Peeta blinks and for a moment he sees the cell, cold and clinical and deceptively clean-looking. It's so white. He always thinks his blood will be on the walls, the floor, but it never is.
You know that, don't you, Peeta? It's all her fault. The mutt.
Peeta sees Katniss on a roof before an orange sunset and then feels Katniss' hands on his throat, cutting off his air, sees her grinning above him with her sharp animal teeth, blood dripping from her jaws.
No one blames you. Everyone loves you, Peeta.
It's like Peeta must claw his way out of his own skin to force out words. They think he's dumb, or dead already inside, and they delight in telling him all kinds of things just to get a rise out of him. It doesn't matter anyway, Peeta, they say. Tomorrow Thirteen burns, with everyone inside it.
Peeta looks into the camera and speaks, and thinks maybe there's something inside him left alive after all.