capitalh | that girl is a problem

Entry tags:

that girl is a problem

Who: Finnick, Katniss, people Katniss wants to bring
Where: CONDOR holding cells can you believe this
When: March 21st/22nd whenever Katniss feels like gracing us with her presence
What: Katniss is SO RUDE and Finnick is done with this shit
Warnings: everyone's the worst

She had him fucking arrested. What kind of person does that?

Katniss, apparently.

He'd like to know how she would feel about this. Restrained, blindfolded, and thrown in a holding cell. She'd never go along with it of course, but that's because Katniss has no subtlety and only ever seems to think one move ahead, instead of three. Currently, Finnick's three moves are yell at Katniss for being an idiot, tell Katniss she's now in danger because she was too unoriginal to come up with a new fancy codename, and then sleep. He needs sleep. He stayed up the whole night before he did the time machine thing, so it's been a while.

Anyway, he's relatively unscathed because he went peacefully once he knew Katniss had sent the agents. It wasn't as if he couldn't see why she'd prefer meeting him from the outside of a holding cell, but he was mad about it so naturally he thought it was a bad move on her part. Currently he is sitting on the floor, seething about how awful this is and planning all the awful things he's going to say to her once she finally shows up.

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Katniss isn't really surprised when she gets a call back from CONDOR saying that they've apprehended the suspect. She's a little more surprised when his description actually matches that of Finnick Odair. She's not sure which she should be more afraid of.

She's been brooding for months now over the fact that no one from her home has come to get her, but now that the possibility of returning home is here, she finds herself dreading it. Conversations with Karkat come to mind all too readily - at least if this is how she goes, she just won't suddenly blip out of the timeline. But if Finnick just needed to take her home, what would call for all this secretive behaviour? Just verifying each other's identities should have been enough.

Katniss goes to the CONDOR base with her bow and wings ready, because while she doesn't anticipate a fight she needs to be ready. This could be a trick, even if he looks right. Who knows what the Capitol is capable of?

She arrives at the holding cell, looking more pale faced and tense than she would have liked. The sight of her old ally makes her stomach turn, and it isn't because she really hates him. Well, she sort of does, but not like that. She stares at him through the bars, her expression cold.

"Fancy meeting you here," she drawls.

Finnick watches her approach with a steady look on his face. He hasn't seen her in a long time, but it's definitely her. He recognizes that look on her face more than anything. It's a bit of a relief, to see her in one piece. Not because it's her, but because it means he can still see this mission through.

He gives her one of those effortless little smiles that doesn't quite reach his eyes. Finnick wants to play nice because he knows she could just deny knowing him and leave him here, but he also can't help but be a little angry. He's not sure there's any use playing nice with Katniss anyway.

"You're an exceptional pain in my ass, you know that?"

He stays on the floor. There's no point in getting up until he knows he's getting out of this cell.

"And what, you'd rather I just wander off to meet someone who could be a complete stranger because they drop a few hints about your eating habits?" she says flatly, her frown deepening. She lets out an impatient sigh. "Why are you here, Finnick?"

Edited 2014-05-19 03:20 (UTC)

He sighs, biting back all the suggestions he has for what she could have done rather than have him arrested. It's useless now - he's in the cell, and they can finally talk face-to-face, even if it's not his preferred setting. Smoothly he stands up and looks at her without any traces of a fake smile on his face.

"The Capitol knows you're here," he says. "And rather than bring you home where it's still very dangerous, they sent me here to..." - he pauses, thinking Katniss might bristle at the thought of someone 'protecting' her - "...make sure they didn't catch you unaware."

She stares at him, and suddenly she's angry. Out of all the people 13 could have sent, why couldn't it have been one of her family? Someone who she could keep safe here? They had told her that it would only be her going back due to others being a waste of resources, but now...

"So why did they send you?" she snaps, the thought process behind her question obvious in her tone. Why are they wasting her time with Finnick Odair when it could have been Gale, or more importantly, Prim.

He feels a bit guilty all of a sudden. Finnick knows he's not at the top of Katniss' list of people she wants to see, but he reminds himself that it wasn't his idea. They came to him, and now he and Katniss both have to deal with that. He fidgets a little, missing the length of rope that's sitting in his pack somewhere out of his reach.

"I don't know. Maybe they thought two victors were better than one when it comes to fighting time-travelling Peacekeepers. Maybe they thought I was too big a target to keep around any longer. I mean, I'm no Mockingjay..."

He stops himself there. Bitterness is not what he's going for here - he doesn't want to be in Katniss' position at all. The only reason he takes that tone is because he's not sure Katniss is qualified for it either, but that's not the point here. The point is that they're both victors. They both know how to survive, which is what they can get on with doing once they get this out of the way.

"Whatever their reasons, I'm here now."

Katniss falls silent. She's still angry, but it's in an aimless, impotent way and she knows it. She wonders why he agreed to come, but she figures that if she was him she would probably want to get out of that place too.

"You know," she says, glancing away. "For a second I actually thought you were here to take me home."

Finnick looks at the floor, words leaving him. He thinks it's such a foolish thing to hope for, but he'd be hoping too. Hell, if someone showed up right now he'd be hoping they'd be there to take him home, and he's barely been gone a day. When he speaks, his voice is hollow with remorse.

"I'm sorry," he says, looking up at her. He's still too fragile himself to be harsh with her.

Still, they can't do this here. It's no District 13, but he certainly doesn't feel safe enough here to let himself fall apart in any capacity. He swallows and looks around at the walls of his cell and says, "Can you get them to let me out of here now?"

She rolls her eyes, but it's not a very heartfelt gesture. The apology means something, even if she also isn't willing to do much with it at the moment. Thinking on it, she isn't even sure how much time it's been on Finnick's side. He'd been a pretty huge mess early on, she thinks.

She's too tired to be as infuriated as she could be. Ultimately, an entirely anticlimatic result when she's been fearing the idea of leaving the Trailblazers all afternoon.

"Yeah," she says, and then leans back, looking down the hall. "Hey guys, he's the real deal," she calls, and within moment a pair of agents are coming down to open the cell, though they still watch him with suspicious eyes.

His expression tightens automatically when the agents come close, but other than assuming the posture of someone who so dearly wants to say I told you so, he remains completely non-threatening. Once he's free and his things are returned to him, he digs through his pack to find that length of rope again, but he pockets it immediately. He has been told it makes him look unstable to carry it around, tying and untying and retying, and he doesn't want these agents to think he's anything other than a perfectly competent, perfectly trustworthy man from the future.

When he's finally on his way out, he strikes up conversation again. "So, you're on a team," he says. "I admit, I pictured you camping out in the wilderness, living off the land and all that."

"Harder to pull off here than you might think," she says, her posture relaxing a little now that the formality of him being in a cell is over. The agents busy themselves around the area, but don't interrupt them quite yet. "Besides...working with others has its perks."

She says it sort of ironically, knowing how ridiculous that must sound coming from her. She'll leave whether she's being sarcastic or not ambiguous.

It does sound ridiculous, and Finnick raises an eyebrow at her, but he's amused. He knows Katniss only likes to do things on her terms, so he assumes this team business is just more of the same. It's good, for her and for him. She's way more bearable when she's around people she actually likes.

"So, what do you do on this team?" he asks. "Protect the innocent? Beat up the bad guys?"

"Here and there," she says blandly. "More rescue missions than anything, lately. The past is just as dangerous as the future, don't let anyone kid you about that. You just get media attention for saving people instead of killing them in an arena."

The last part is the callous sort of quip someone makes about something that isn't funny at all, while being totally aware of as much.

Edited 2014-05-21 03:35 (UTC)

He grins, partly to hide a wince. He's not quite sure how serious she is about the relative levels of danger, but out of President Snow's reach is a much better state of being than the alternative.

"So what does that make you?" he asks dryly. "Still the people's sweetheart? Or have you faded into anonymity?" He gives her a look of mock sympathy.

She waves that off with a disinterested grunt. She doesn't keep close track of her public image, because she pointedly tries to disregard such things. But she is definitely aware that the Trailblazers have a following.

"Somewhere in between. The difference is I have the luxury of not caring. It's just all Katniss all the time here - the real, frustrating one. I'm not pretending for anyone anymore."

It is definitely a relief to say as much, and though her tone remains level and vaguely bored, some of it shows through in her voice.

Another grin, but it's short lived. He wants to remind her that she's only been a victor a fraction as long as he has, and that being able to stop pretending is the real luxury here. He's not even sure he'll be able to stop if he's ever really safe enough to do so, but maybe that makes her stronger than him. Maybe it's not that he's a better actor than her, maybe it's that he's too weak to hold on to who he is in the face of the Capitol.

Either way, being himself means relaxing, and there's no way in hell he's going to be able to do that here while Annie's fate is up in the air at home. If he stops acting like the victor he is back home, the only alternative is to break down again. So he's going to focus on the task at hand.

"Well, until the war's over, you're still the Mockingjay and I still have to make sure you stay alive. And I don't plan on taking any chances."

This time, he smiles as if to say he doesn't care how annoyed she is. He's going to be keeping a close watch on her and she's going to deal with it.

She gives him an intensely dubious look, the nonverbal equivalent of 'oh really, now?' Her lips remain a thin line.

"You could at least take me out to dinner before moving in, Finnick," she says, with a subtle note of warning not to press her. If she's honest with herself, there's a lot of things about her life right now that she likes just as it is. She is not especially open to having more future bullshit interrupt it if it doesn't mean her going back for good.

"Look, I don't like any part of this either," he says. "And I certainly don't want to get in the way of anything you've got going on here," - he gestures around them - "but this is how it is. We can co-exist peacefully, or I can be the world's most irritating babysitter, because I don't really trust you with your own life."

He doesn't give her time to retort.

"So, this team you're on. Is it an official thing, or do you and your band of little friends just run around fighting crime when you feel like it?"

Oh, now you did it. Try as Finnick might to just segue straight into another conversation, the flash of fury on Katniss's face makes it clear it isn't going to work. She ignores that last question in favour of lunging towards him and getting right up in his face. He's just lucky that she decided she was going to try to avoid any more sudden violence for the moment.

"You made that clear when you lied to me in the arena," she snaps. "So I'm going to make this clear - this is my life, and I'm not just going to patiently wait around for 13 to decide they want me back when they left me here for seven months without telling me anything."

Edited 2014-05-21 19:40 (UTC)

He pulls away from her a little and looks around. The last thing he wants is to be thrown back into a cell because he upset Katniss. "Seven--?" he hisses.

Seven months. It's only been two for him. But that's not the point here. He does his absolute best to keep his voice steady, but it's clear he wants to snap at her, because if she only knew. "It's not my fault 13 decided to send you here, and I wasn't the one who thought you couldn't be trusted in the arena. None of this was my choice, Katniss, but I'm still not going to let you screw it up for me."

"Screw what up for you?" she growls. "What exactly are you getting out of this?"

"The hostages, Katniss," he snaps. "I made Coin promise that they be rescued, and that they wouldn't be put on trial or subject to any questioning until I returned."

It's... mostly true. He asked primarily for Annie. He did ask for the others, but it was made clear to him that they were much more challenging because they were of higher value to the Capitol. He leaves that out, for now.

She scowls for a moment in angry surprise. She clenches her fists at her sides and speaks through her teeth.

"Why wouldn't you tell me that?"

He takes a deep breath. He knows mostly it was because he didn't want to talk about Annie and risk another break down. He hesitates, looking a bit uncomfortable as he tries to come up with another reason.

Finally, he says, "I thought it might upset you. To know that you're still stuck here while they finally do something about it. About him."

There's no preconception in his voice, just a hint of genuine sympathy beneath a frustratingly even tone. He still hasn't figured it all out - the whole Katniss and Peeta thing - but he knows that if she feels a fraction for him what he does for Annie, it has to hurt. Knowing that she could finally be safe and protected in the future only gives him some consolation. He doesn't trust Coin to take care of her. He doesn't trust Coin with anyone.

Edited 2014-05-22 17:43 (UTC)

It's one of those things where the only solution she's had as of late is to just not think about it, and with Finnick fresh from the front lines its hard not to feel guilty. But what else is she supposed to do? Peeta has been further away than ever, and she's been stuck here having to live her life in isolation. It's not easy to forget, but it's easier to forget than it ever has before, and it's a hard thing to pass up.

It's in this moment that Katniss realizes that, to some degree, she had given up on all of that. In some ways, given up on ever seeing any of them again.

"He's better off without me," she says, some of the anger receding in the place of weary bitterness. "I was never going to be the one to save him. Not when I'm supposed to be the Mockingjay."

Edited 2014-05-22 18:24 (UTC)

Finnick relaxes a little, satisfied that Katniss isn't going to turn this on him. Focusing on Peeta is an easier way to talk about all of this without showing anyone how weak he feels.

"Well, Katniss, if you don't let me do this... if you don't at least let me pretend to do the job I was sent here to do, he might not be safe in 13. Coin will want to know if they gave information to the Capitol, and you know she'll find any excuse and any means necessary to find out. Even if you're still alive. If she thinks I didn't follow orders, the deal could be off."

That part just sounds ridiculous. She doesn't like the idea that Coin supposedly has any control over here.

"That's stupid, Finnick." She raises her hands in an exasperated gesture. "None of them are even here - how could they know about anything we do here?"

"I don't know, Katniss," he says, tired of arguing. "I wouldn't put anything past them. The point is, I'm not taking any chances, so we can work this out or you can keep wasting your breath."

She stares at him for a long few moments, the fire in her eyes down to a simmering bitterness.

"You can talk to CONDOR about it," she says. "They're still going to want to question you."

Finnick glances around at the agents. He's a bit uncomfortable being left here alone, but he's certainly not about to ask her to stay. He still has his pride, even though it's just Katniss.

"Fine," he says lightly. "I'm sure they'll be very... sympathetic."

Is he being sarcastic? Even he is not entirely sure. He is confident in his abilities to make people feel sympathy for him, but he is also very aware of how ridiculous all of this is going to sound when he tries to explain it to someone who doesn't know anything about it.

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