Finnick and Annie

Beetee's Plan

I slept only a few hours, and not by choice. Johanna threatened my life if I didn’t get some rest, and though I knew she was joking, I also knew she had other ways to get me to rest.

I woke a few hours of later. I didn’t recall any nightmares but I was probably too exhausted to dream. I saw the silver parachute sailing towards us. I opened it to count twenty-four rolls from District Three. It would still happen on midnight of the third day. I met Johanna’s eye and then Beetee’s. Everything was going according to plan, and if everything worked out, we’d be out of the arena soon. 

We ate the rolls in silence. Katniss sat next to Peeta, the other three of us sat in isolation, alone with our thoughts. After all of us had finished our bread rolls Katniss pulled Peeta to his feet and led him towards the water to teach him how to swim.

I eyed them suspiciously, as I didn’t trust Katniss to be alone with him, but I couldn’t think of a way to split them up without her getting suspicious of me. She didn’t even take off the purple belt that kept him afloat, so Peeta wasn’t actually doing anything.

I got bored after a while and gathered some grass to weave a net. I sat down and focused on making knots, though my hands were so used to the process I barely had to think about it.

Johanna wondered off to take a nap and Beetee played with his wire, making sure that it was in perfect conditions, as if there was something wrong with it, our plan would go to hell.

“Hey, Finnick, come on in!” she waved. I lifted my eyes from the net and saw her sitting on the sand, rubbing sand onto her arms. “We figured out how to make you pretty again!”

I laughed sarcastically and rolled my eyes. “I never stopped being so,” I muttered which caused her to roll her eyes back at me. The three of us scoured our scabs, helping with each other’s backs. Once we were done our skins were pink and scab less, so we applied another coat of medicine, mainly to protect us from the sun.

Beetee called us over a while later. He claimed he had figured out a plan to get rid of Brutus and Enobaria, though the plan had been made long before that point. “I doubt they’ll attack us openly again, now that they’re so outnumbered,” he said about the two careers. “We could track them down, I suppose, but it’s dangerous and exhausting work.”

“Do you think they’ve figured out about the clock?” asked Katniss.

“If they haven’t, they’ll figure it out soon enough,” replied Beetee. “Perhaps not as specifically as we have. But they must know that at least some of the zones are wired for attacks and that they’re reoccurring in a circular fashion. Also, the fact that our last fight was cut off by Gamemaker intervention will not have gone unnoticed by them. We know it was attempt to disorient us, but they must be asking themselves why it was done, and this, too, may lead them to the realization that the arena’s a clock. So I think our best bet will be setting our own trap.”

“Wait, let me get Johanna up,” I said, spotting her on the ground a few feet behind were we were talking. “She’ll be rabid if she thinks she missed something this important.”

“Or not,” muttered Katniss. I rolled my eyes and shook Johanna’s shoulders.

“Wake up, he’s explaining the plan,” I whispered so that they couldn’t hear.

“What do they think?”

“Nothing yet,” I said. I went back to the circle and Johanna followed a few steps behind.

When she joined us, Beetee shoed us away so that he’d have space to work. He drew a circle and divided it into twelve wedges. “If you were Brutus and Enobaria, knowing what you do now about the jungle, where would you feel safest?” he asked in a teacherly manner.