#deezee001

The Training Center is crawling with Peacekeepers. They’re there, around every corner, and it’s hard for Hudson to not shrink away when they see them, like they aren’t halfway afraid that they know everything already, that they can look at them and just tell.

The biggest cluster of them is outside of the Training Center, and Hudson isn’t sure if that’s because of the Tributes inside or because DeeZee’s there, too.

They’ve been meaning to talk to him. They’ve been meaning to patch things up with Gage. Now the Games are here and it’s almost too late for both of those things and it’s their fault because they wasted so much time, because things with their family always felt hopeless and so the Games felt doubly hopeless and so they waited and they buried their head in the sand and hoped that something would happen, that they would suddenly know what to do—

But the Games are here, and they still don’t. If they think back to the dry-eyed goodbyes with their family in the District 12 Justice Building, they can’t remember what Gage said to them, what he thought his last words to Hudson would be. All too soon, they’re going to have to say something to Gage that could be the last words they ever say to him. How do they even begin to figure out what those will be?

And despite their audience, despite the fact that DeeZee’s always been one of the kind of Victors that Hudson’s intimidated by, the kind that they can’t imagine seeing much value in them, it’s easier to find words to say to him: “Do you have a moment? I wanted to—I wanted to say thank you. For what you’ve done for Gage.”