My heart leaps, then sinks like a stone. I feel Louella’s crushed skull leaking hot blood into my hand. See her vacant eyes. She was good and dead in a way that defied return. So who is this girl in the doorway?
She sure looks like Louella. Same size, same height. Heart-shaped face, big gray eyes, long dark braids. Her fingernails are bitten down and there’s a scar on her forehead that matches the one the real Louella got falling off our cistern. She wears the District 12 training outfit, as if she’d dressed at the apartment with us this morning. Maysilee’s purple and yellow flower bead necklace hangs over her collar. She checks every box.
But this isn’t Louella. In the same way you instinctively know the waxed pears on the table lack juice, this girl lacks Louella’s essence.
“Come in. You know Haymitch,” the president says.
Fake Louella crosses to the end of the table. “Hello, Haymitch.” The accent’s only slightly off, but the greeting’s a dead giveaway.
Louella is a “Hey, Hay” or “How you?” kind of girl. Her cheekbones look funny, too. Like they’ve shot something into her face to make it fuller. Most of all, she won’t look me in the eye, which my sweetheart never failed to do.
“Who are you?” I ask her.
She stares at the mess of pears on the table, her eyes unfocused. “My name is Louella McCoy. I’m from District Twelve.”
“You’re not,” I tell her, then address Snow. “She’s not. Anyone can see it.”
“I doubt it. Her family, maybe a few close friends. No one outside of
the drunken audience at the parade even witnessed the accident. People will believe she’s Louella. Especially since you’ll be there by her side, coaching her, like the good ally you are. A perfect pair in what I am determined to
make a perfect Quarter Quell.”
I understand now. The people who saw the crash in person will be told Louella recovered. Incitatus Loomy, the parade master, has been killed for
his incompetence. Poisoned by a plate of oysters that Snow somehow survived. And it is up to me and Fake Louella here to cover the worst casualty of the evening.
Plutarch hustles into the room with a glass of milk and a plate of rolls.
He pulls up short at the sight of Louella. “Is that —?”
“Louella McCoy,” says Snow. “Ah, my bread.” He takes a big bite of a roll and grunts in approval. “Fresh. I think we’re done here, if you’d like to return our tributes to their accommodations. Louella, this is Plutarch.”
“Hello, Plutarch.”
“Hello.” He can’t stop staring at her.
“She’s a good body double. We were lucky,” says Snow.
“Yes, Mr. President. She certainly is. This way, kids.” Fake Louella and I follow Plutarch down a few halls of ancestors before he speaks again. “I did not know about any of this. He just said he wanted to talk to you.”
“Right,” I say. “Who is she?”
“Best guess . . . child of traitors. Could be either district or Capitol. She might not even know herself. No question they’ve programmed her. Probably drugged her as well.”
Fake Louella chimes in. “Hello, Plutarch. My name is Louella McCoy. I’m from District Twelve.”
“So, he’s going to send her in, whoever she is, and get her killed in the Games?” I ask.
“That seems to be the current plan,” admits Plutarch. “I don’t approve of this.”
“You’re my hero. I hope I’m just like you when I grow up. Oh, wait a minute, that won’t be happening.”
A Peacekeeper van idles at the entrance. I climb in before they can cuff me. Fake Louella crawls into the van and sits on the floor. “Hello, Haymitch. My name is Louella McCoy. I’m from District Twelve.”
“She’s going to knock ’em dead at the interview,” I say to Plutarch, then slam the door shut myself.
The whole way back, in the dark, I’m terrified she’s going to touch me. I hate her, and I hate what her presence will require of me, even though I know none of this is her fault.
Back at the apartment, Maysilee, Wyatt, and our mentors wait for my return in the living room. When I walk in with Fake Louella, a general gasp goes up.
I point them out. “This is Maysilee and Wyatt. And those are our mentors, Mags and Wiress.”
Fake Louella fixates on the toes of her boots. “Hello, Maysilee, Wyatt, Mags, and Wiress.”
“But they couldn’t have —” Wyatt begins. “Who are you?” “My name is Louella McCoy. I’m from District Twelve.”
After a long pause, Maysilee says, “That’s not sleeping in my room.” Mags shushes her. “Where did she come from?”
“President Snow introduced us in Plutarch Heavensbee’s library. She’s been drugged or programmed or something. We’re supposed to pretend she’s real for the cameras. I have no idea who she is.”
“She’s a stale marshmallow,” says Maysilee. “We’re supposed to sell
her.”
Mags touches Fake Louella’s shoulder. “Are you hungry?” The girl
shrinks away, then looks up at her, confused. “Let’s all have something to eat.”
We gather around the table in the kitchen, where Wiress ladles stew into our bowls. Mags places a spoon in Fake Louella’s hand. She grasps it in her fist, wraps her arm protectively around her bowl, and begins shoveling in the stew while little whimpering sounds escape her lips.
“They’ve starved her,” says Wiress. “Among other things.”
She’s right. While Louella’s wrists were lean, Fake Louella’s tend toward bony. No wonder they had to plump up her face. The irrational anger I’ve held against this girl dissolves into pity as she lifts her bowl to lick it clean like a dog.
“Would you like some more? We have plenty,” says Mags.
“Bread?” Wiress holds out the basket of assorted rolls to her.
Fake Louella stares in fascination at the offering, then her fingers
close on a dark crescent-shaped roll dotted with seeds. She holds it to her
nose and inhales the scent, her breath coming in short gasps.
Wiress and Mags exchange a look. “Are you from District Eleven, child?” Mags says softly. Fake Louella begins to cry, pressing the roll against her lips and pawing at her ear. “It’s all right, little one. Come with me.” She wraps an arm around the girl and leads her out of the kitchen.
“Whoever she is, I guess she’s ours now,” says Wyatt.
I’m surprised to hear something this kindhearted coming out of an oddsmaker, but we all feel it. We can’t pile any more hurt on Fake Louella. I guess I’ll do my best to look out for her, just think of her as another District 6 dove.
“You’re right,” I say. “But I can’t call her Louella.”
“Something too different may confuse her further,” warns Wiress. “How about Lou Lou?” suggests Maysilee. “I used to have a pet
canary by that name.”
I know this about Maysilee because Lenore Dove caught wind of it and was infuriated that anyone would ever cage a bird, in particular a songbird. But that doesn’t seem a reason to reject the name. “I think I can handle that,” I say. Louella McCoy was definitely not a Lou Lou.
Mags returns, troubled. “I put her to bed. There’s some sort of device attached to her chest, pumping a drug into her, I think. I was afraid to
remove it. That might kill her. I’ve seen something similar before.”
“Why did you ask if she was from Eleven?” says Maysilee. “The roll she chose. With the seeds. It’s theirs.”
The arrival of Lou Lou has steamrolled the boost we got from joining the Newcomers. A couple of hours ago we had a clear direction, but Snow’s gift has reminded us of our frailty and the futility of opposing him. I can’t remember what our feeble plan was, or why it mattered. We eat supper in silence, each occupied with our own dreary thoughts.
Dreary. Lenore Dove taught me that word. It’s in the first line of her song. What I wouldn’t give to see her one more time.
There was a moment, when Snow said he had a gift for me, that I thought he meant Lenore Dove. The way he was going on about the flint striker and the Covey. Glad it wasn’t, though. She’s much safer in that “ghastly wilderness” around 12.
Mags and Wiress try to get us back on track. After supper, we gather in the living room and talk through our day. Mags seems pleased with the alliance and encourages us to pursue it. I feel better about teaming up with Wyatt and Maysilee as well. Wyatt’s more honorable than he has any right to be, given his family, and Maysilee won a lot of points by helping the other tributes with their tokens.
Wiress asks if there are any clues about the arena we might have picked up in training.
“Tarps,” says Wyatt, without missing a beat. “Like . . . sheets of plastic?” I ask.
“Yeah. Did you see that one lady’s booth? All she did was show you different things to do with a tarp. Make a poncho, collect rainwater, turn it into a pack. Made me think it was going to be wet in there. Because in the mines, we use them to keep things dry.”
“I think you may be onto something,” says Wiress. “What about you, Maysilee?”
“I didn’t get to many booths. I was too busy making tokens. Trying to complement people’s outfits. But you know how we’re all in different
colors? They’re the same colors we were wearing last night in the chariots. Red for Ten, peach for Eight. And if they end up dressing us like that in the arena, which they might do to help the audience keep us straight, then being in black could be a real plus. Especially at night. We may be able to move about to gather food or whatever, while other districts have to hide.”
“Also very good,” says Wiress. “Haymitch, did you notice anything?” “Well, right about now I’m noticing how good Wyatt and Maysilee
are at noticing things. I need to pay more attention. But there’s this.” I tell them about Beetee and the potato, fudging the science part. “All I can glean from that is it could be dark and root vegetables might come in handy.”
“If it’s wet, like Wyatt thinks, then there may be no dry wood and building a fire for light won’t be an option, so we’ll have to plug into
potatoes,” says Maysilee.
Wyatt considers this. “Or maybe we’ll have to dig for food.” “That’s an interesting connection,” says Mags.
He shrugs. “It’s no great shakes. I dig for a living.”
At bedtime, we stand outside the girls’ room, watching Lou Lou sleep, unsure what to do.
“I can take your bed,” I tell Maysilee. “No,” she says. “It’s okay.”
“We could come sleep on your floor,” offers Wyatt. “Probably closer to what the arena will be like anyway.”
So that’s what we do. Mags helps Wyatt and me haul our bedclothes and some sofa cushions in and we make up pallets on the floor.
“Do you think we should practice being on watch?” asks Maysilee when we’re all ready for lights-out.
“Good idea. I’ll go first.” I settle in cross-legged with a blanket over my lap.
Mags checks on Lou Lou one last time, tells us good night, and turns out the lights as she closes the door behind her.
After a time, Wyatt falls asleep and starts up the chain saw. Maysilee’s so buried in her covers I can’t tell her status. My ribs ache and I lean back on Lou Lou’s bed, stretching out my arms and letting her mattress take their weight.
Lou Lou stirs fitfully, and I hear her murmuring something but can’t make out the words. Don’t really want to know. It won’t be good. Dog- tired, I start to doze off but startle at the feel of frigid little fingers clutching mine. In her sleep, Lou Lou’s rolled over onto her side. She holds on to my hand for dear life, her pulse beating fast like a baby bird’s heart.
I remember Louella’s hand taking mine on the train, and resist the impulse to pull away. “It’s okay, Lou Lou,” I whisper, sort of patting her side. “No one here will hurt you.”
I could try a lullaby to soothe her, but I don’t want to wake the others.
Not much of a singer anyway, and I’m supposed to be practicing keeping watch for the arena. I think how Lenore Dove sings to me sometimes.
Lonely for her, I close my eyes for a moment and let her voice find me. . . .
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door — “’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door —
“Only this and nothing more.”
I jerk awake. Was that a tapping? Or did I dream it?
The strip of light under the door, the numbers on the bed-table clock, even the blinking green light of the device on the wall — a camera? A
smoke detector? A temperature controller? — have all vanished. Only the faint glow of the Capitol city lights through the window blinds keeps the dark at bay. The humming of the apartment has been stilled; no purring machines or soft currents break the silence. Far away, a car honks. Then
nothing. Under my blanket, I sweat. The warm, stagnant air smells like the inside of the cistern and stale supper.
And someone’s definitely rapping at my chamber door. Gently. I hear the turn of the knob, the brush of the wood against carpet.
A figure comes around the door, holding something that emanates a thin beam of light. It’s a pair of boiled potatoes, connected to a pea-sized bulb. Beetee raises a finger to his lips, then tilts his head for me to follow. Careful not to wake anyone, I detach my hand from Lou Lou’s and slip out of the bedroom. Moving away from the door, Beetee and I speak in hushed voices.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
Beetee’s slightly short of breath. “I came up the utility steps from the third floor. Wiress knocked out the power in the building. The surveillance
cameras are down. She estimates we have about ten minutes left. Are you serious about breaking the arena?”
“Yes! Just tell me what I have to do. What breaks a machine?” “Time, usually. With it comes fatigue, wear and tear, erosion, creep.
But we don’t have the luxury of time, so we’ll need a different approach. You saw Wiress’s arena last year. Did you wonder how they ran it?”
“From the Capitol, right? They show the control room during the Games. ”
“Yes, they show the commands being issued, and some can be triggered remotely. But these days, there’s also a Gamemaker level at the actual arena to carry out certain orders. An entire sub-terranean floor, nicknamed Sub-A, that they never show the audience. It destroys the illusion of the arena being controlled from afar. On Sub-A they manage manual tasks, like unleashing the mutts or stocking a feast. You’ll be launched from there in a few days. But all of that is secondary to the real job of managing the onsite computer system that’s essential to the running of the Games. That’s our team’s target. The arena’s brain.”
My whole life I’ve watched the Games without even questioning how the arenas actually worked. I don’t know what I thought breaking the arena meant — me chopping at some cable or something with an ax? Anyway, it didn’t involve an underground computer that, even if I could reach, I
wouldn’t know how to break . . . unless I could go at it with the aforementioned ax.
But Beetee mentioned a team. Maybe I can be the brawn, and Ampert can do the breaking.
“So we’re going to try to find this computer and pull its plug? Enter bad commands?”
Beetee shakes his head. “It would be virtually impossible for one of you to reach it. The computer’s in a restricted area with high-tech security systems in place. But the brain can’t operate unless other parts of the body are sound. Like this building tonight. When the electricity is cut off, the
place goes dead.”
“We’re going to knock out the power?”
“Oh, no, Haymitch. Even if we happen to, they have an enormous backup generator at the top end, just outside the arena itself.”
“So what, then?”
“We’re going to drown it.”
