#fava.

Their suite doesn’t feel safe anymore, but there’s always the roof. The wind, taking away their words before they can be overheard. Keeping them safe.

The roof makes them think of their Games, just last year. Being up here with Fava, talking without fear of being overheard, feeling like they were truly seeing each other for the first time. They’d felt desperate for it, then: something real for them to hold onto, take with them into the Games. One last good memory.

They’re still here, though, and it still feels just as necessary. That Fava sees them, and they see her.

Hudson has been put in front of the Capitol cameras so many times since their first Tribute interview a year ago. Each time, they’ve played the part: Tribute, Victor, Lover. But this time it’s different: it’s not for them, and it’s not that will be pay the price if they mess up. It’s Wren and Gage.

But, just as they did last year, they feel so small when faced with the Capitol. Like nothing they say or do can change what’s to come. But they still tried then—made a confession to Caesar Flickerman that Fava hadn’t known about, that had made her so angry at the time—and they’re not giving up now.

Only this time, they’re not alone.

“We should make a plan for the interviews.” They say, knowing that Fava must be thinking the same thing. Remembering, too. With a poor attempt at a smile in the face of what’s to come, they add: “I promise there won’t be any surprises this time—at least, not from me.”

Wren and Gage are off to training, behind closed doors where none of them can follow. Watching them go, Hudson had felt sick: in his own Games, he’d looked at the youngest of the Tributes and felt so much older, so much bigger compared to them, and so horrified by what he was expected to do—and their brother is seven years their senior. A fully grown man, with a child of his own on the way.

But Wren is still a child. As small as anyone in Hudson’s Games, but in a field full of adults.

Hudson thought the Rebels would save them. It was the only hope they had. And yet, here they all are.

It’s been fractured between them. Griffin with his bruised face, his lack of explanations. Fava with her anger. Even Nelly’s been quieter since they arrived. Maybe that leaves Hudson in the middle, to be the one to pull them all back together. Though they’re not quite sure how.

But they have no choice but to work together. Maybe they need a reminder of that. “So this is happening.” Because the Rebels failed them. “So we need—alliances, we need sponsors. We need to do something.” 

There’s an impulse, at these kinds of gatherings, to cling to Fava’s side. They’re a team, after all. She’s the one person that they trust implicitly. And, well, they still can’t forget their introduction to the Capitol after their Victory Tour, when being off on their own was enough of an opening for Teal Pittsmith to pounce, like Hudson was the weak link caught trailing behind the herd.

They have just enough pride to not let themself. They and Fava are a team, but they’re their own people, as well. They have their own relationships, they’ve cultivated their own alliances. And they need those relationships to survive—and for Wren and Gage to have any chance of surviving. 

Still, it’s a nice urge to have. To know, without reservation, that their place is at Fava’s side, and to want to be there. It feels like a far cry from the uncertainty that plagued them after the Games, when they didn’t know what was a show for sponsors and what was real. They hardly wonder that at all anymore, like the fraught situation they’ve found themself in has whittled them down to the bare essentials, left no room for doubt.

They hadn’t had any doubt in the Arena, either. That came later. But, in the Arena, it was because they didn’t know enough to doubt. Now they know enough to not.

They’ve made the rounds on their own. Long enough to feel comfortable drifting back to Fava’s side when they see her alone off to the side, like a welcome tether has pulled them back there. To check in. To let their guard down, just for a moment. “Staying out of trouble so far?” They ask, and it feels like it should have some humor in it, but they don’t know if they manage it.

The train stops. The announcement comes. Hudson watches Fava’s hands move, translating for Wren. Hudson’s own hands feel heavy in their lap, and they have ever since Wren was Reaped—they’ve been learning, but not fast enough, not for everything that’s happening now, the heavy things that they would say if they could.

They wonder if they should feel rescued. If these Rebels, the faceless voice over intercom, will actually keep them safe from the Games. Keep Wren safe. Keep Gage safe. Make it so Hudson doesn’t have to choose. (Though everyone, including their own brother, knows that they’ve already made their choice.)

Really, though, what they feel like is a pawn. They’re still being moved, only now it’s by hands on the other side of the board.

“Fava—” they say, unsure if they should feel hopeful or afraid, looking to her for her answer. “Do you think this could be the answer? Can they—” (whoever this they may be) “—really keep everyone out of the Games?”