Hunger Games 1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed**

AN: So this is a story I half started ages ago. It was going to be a 'Gale and Katniss' dads don't die' thing, and a chance to look at how their personalities would've been different if they hadn't had that trauma, as well as how Madge would've handled losing her father instead, but this first part was only ever a set up with several povs and it's as far as I got. I liked the idea though, and how it turned out, when I found it hiding on my computer. This was originally the prologue, I cleaned it up some to the the point that I'm happy with it, but it's a bit dark. Mentions of suicide, just to warn you. Sorry for the long note :(

#######

Madge tries to listen at the door when her father gets the call from the Capitol in the small hours of the morning.

He'd been leaving early and coming home late for weeks now. There is trouble in the mines, rumblings about the dangerous conditions, threats of strikes…

A small crew had come by the evening before last, waiting in the kitchen for hours for her father to come home. What they'd talked about Madge didn't know, she'd fallen asleep and missed that part. She'd been vigilant since then, trying to listen and piece together what was going on that had spurred the miners to visit her father.

"I have no control over that…"

She can't make out anymore words, just the rumble of his voice, the hurried, agitated clip of it.

Madge presses her ear harder to the door. They're talking about possible strikes, that much she can figure out. Her father has often told her that strikes are only effective if all those striking are on the same page, something exceedingly difficult in the mines. No one wants to be singled out, have the Capitol's attention focused on them. There's also always the possibility that some would work anyway, unable to function without pay. A strike could, _would,_result in executions.

When she hears the phone click onto the receiver she scrambles back to her room. She jumps into her bed, and dives under the covers, feigning sleep.

The door creaks open, a sliver of light stretches in and across her.

"Magdalene."

He crosses the room and she feels the bed sag as he sat at the edge.

"I heard you, Pearl?" It's not so much a question, despite the tone of his voice. He knows she heard. He pokes her in the back. "How much did you hear?"

Madge rolls onto her back and lets a faint smile flicker across her face. "Just a little."

His eyebrows arch up expectantly.

She sighs, "The miners are going to strike?"

Her father rubs his eyes, "I don't know." He lets out a long breath. "It'll be very bad if they do. Can you tell me why?"

He always does this, makes her tell him what he already knew. It annoys her just a little, but it makes her think, which she supposes is the point.

"They'll…cut our food." She sits up, thinking. "They'll send more Peacekeepers, newer ones, ones that will be meaner. Maybe make old Cray go away." He's a pathetic Head Peacekeeper anyway, she isn't sure how he hasn't gone missing already. "Executions."

"Anything else?" Her father prompts.

Madge picks at her blanket. She knows the last bit, she's positive she does, but she doesn't want to say it. Her eyes fill, burning as she tries to blink away the tears.

"We'll go away?"

She looks up at him. His mouth is turned up in a sad smile. He pulls her into a hug.

"I'm sorry, Pearl."

He holds her for a few minutes, rocking and humming an old lullaby to her while he gathers his thoughts.

"If they don't strike there'll be an accident, those mines are a death trap and the Capitol refuses to fix the issues. It's going to happen, the when and where are the only questions. Many will die." He sighs again staring off at the bookshelf on Madge's wall, scouring his brain for a solution. "If they _do_strike, the entire District will suffer."

He looks down at her, a little crease forming between his eyes. "How do we keep that from happening?"

She knows he doesn't expect an answer from her this time. He's asking himself, forcing the unpleasant truth to his tongue even if he can't dislodge it from his mind yet.

Madge hugs him tighter. Her father is smart, he'll figure this out. She just knows it.

#######

"We have to make sure everyone is on board."

The group of men, from a dozen different crews, sit around the rickety, poorly lit table in the old black market building, the Hob.

Asher Hawthorne stares down at his hand, rough and worn from years of working the mines. He picks at a cut and thinks of his sons. Three boys, they'll all end up in the mines one day. Whatever the consequences, he has to do something so that his sons don't end up in the same deathtrap he's lowered into everyday.

"That's what the Mayor said," his eyes flicker up and onto the men around him. "When we went and talked to him. Said everyone has to be on board. We can't let them push us around, send us to our deaths, without putting up some kind of fight."

One of the older men frowns. "You also said he said it would end in executions."

"They won't execute all of us," Jude Everdeen tells him firmly. "They can't. They need us."

"But they don't need our families," someone grunts. "What's to keep them from killin' them?"

"It would take away our motivation." Asher narrows his eyes at the man. If the Capitol so much as looks at his family, he'd reign down a hell they couldn't imagine.

"We have more power than we think," Jude tells them, standing and crossing his arms. "We just need to stand together."

The group rumbles and mutters, but still seems unconvinced.

#######

The night before the inevitable, Hazelle feels her husband curl into her. It's cold out, but her fourth, and she assured him, her _last,_ pregnancy is making her uncomfortably hot, and he's leaching off her warmth.

Normally she would have pushed him off, he's making her too warm, but the heaviness of the air makes her hold him to her.

"What's going to happen tomorrow?" She asks, voice just below a whisper.

Behind her he shrugs. "We'll see."

#######

The miners don't get on the elevators that lower them, don't mine a single piece of coal that day.

Madge's father comes home suddenly, frantically heading up to his office where he begins pulling out drawers, throwing papers into his fireplace and setting them ablaze.

"Dad?"

He looks at her with dark, fearful eyes, and she knows.

He directs her to a trunk in the corner. "There's a box, green, with a little latch. Get it out."

She digs through the old trunk, through dusty papers and mementos and pictures, until she finds the box and takes it to her father.

His hands shake as he opens it.

"Magdalene," he smoothes her hair. "I love you, more than anything in the world. Remember that, okay?"

Madge nods, anxiety building in her stomach.

He takes a bottle out of the box. It's old, a paper wrapper around it. Her father opens it and pulls a pill, no bigger than a pea, and examines it sadly.

"They'll be coming for us, it may be a few days or just a few hours." He tips her chin up, "I know how we're going to keep the District from too much trouble, but it requires a little sacrifice, understand?"

She shakes her head, feels tears trickling down her cheeks. "What're you going to do, dad?"

He swallows hard. "They'll want blood. I'm the Mayor. I told the miners they had to be organized, I'm the instigator."

She stares at the pill and understands. Her father won't be there for her anymore, so he's giving her one final warning. There's no telling what will happen to her once he's gone. She'll be the child of a man who'll be convicted of treason, even if she's certain he isn't going to give them the satisfaction of executing him, and a woman in a constant haze of morphling.

There's no good end to this story.

#######

Though he warns her to stay with her mother, she'd just been given a large dose of her morphling, Madge watches as he admits his guilt, pops the tiny sphere into his mouth and bites into it, watches him drop to the floor, watches him die.

It isn't falling asleep, not by a long shot.

Madge runs to her mother, crawls into the bed beside her, clings to her and listens to the steady beat of her heart as her own races in fear.

"Mom, please…"

But she's too far into her morphling to hear.

Chin quivering, tears dripping off the edge, Madge buries her face in her mother's shoulder, and waits.

The group of Peacekeepers come in, immediately begin tossing the room, looking for evidence and names, before her father's body is even cold on the ground.

They drag Madge away from her still oblivious mother; carry her sobbing down the stairs, out and to the Justice Building. To whatever fate waits for her.

#######

With the news of the Mayor's death, his admitted treason, and the deaths of his wife and daughter, the mines quickly open again the next day. If the Capitol is willing to execute one of their own, a man tasked with enacting their laws and their will, as well as his family, who is to say they wouldn't take out the entire District, make an example of them, just like Thirteen?

"I can't believe they killed the kid too," one of the men mutters.

Asher dusts some coal from his jerky. That burned him. Not only did the Mayor take the fall for their plan, but his wife and little girl had paid for it as well.

He could still see the kid, wide eyes and shy little smile as she'd helped he and Gale at the library, let he, Jude, and a few others into the Mayor's house to wait on him, fallen asleep trying to keep them company…

He's pulled from his thoughts by the siren signaling something has gone wrong.

#######

_That would've been us_. Jude eyes the entrance, watching the dust and debris rise into the fading light of the day.

It had been their shaft, their stretch of the mines, before the strike. When they'd come back, though, every assignment had been changed. Crews were shifted, moved around, known friends separated, the strike had spurred a paranoia that was sought to be cured by keeping possible troublemakers away from each other.

Ten men had been killed. Ten families had been destroyed. Not either of theirs though. Not today anyway.

He can't help but wonder, though, if next time it might be them.

#######

Madge doesn't know how long they keep her in the holding cell. There are no windows, no light, no heat…

They bring her a filthy glass of water morning, noon, and night, as well as a ration of bread. No one speaks to her, not so much as a grunt of acknowledgment.

When they finally pull her out, dust her off, and shove her into a brightly lit room, she's grimy and greasy, smells awful, she's certain of it.

"Hello, my dear."

Madge squints into the light and sees a man. He's in a Peacekeeper uniform, tall and pale headed, with cold eyes. His chilly smile is fixed on her.

"Magdalene Undersee, is that right?"

She nods.

He shuffles some papers in front of him. "Tell me, Miss Undersee, what your father told you about the strikes."

Her mind shifts quickly. He's trying to undo her father's work, his death might've saved a lot of miners, and if she says the wrong thing she might undo it all. She won't let him down.

She tries to swallow, her mouth is so dry though…

"He didn't tell me anything, sir." She shakes her head. If she had tears she'd cry. "He didn't trust anyone."

The new Peacekeeper narrows his eyes on her. "No one? None of the miners?"

Madge pretends to wrack her brain. She thinks of every horrible thing anyone had ever said near her, to her, about anything. "Miners? No, they're just stupid grunts. He wouldn't have trusted them with something like the strike. They just-they just couldn't do it. They can't organize their sock drawers."

Her heart pounds. She prays she's telling him what he needs to know, that her woven fib is elastic enough to withstand all the stretching he'll put it through, but strong enough to maintain itself.

He writes something down, cool smile still tacked on his lips. His hand lifts in a dismissive manner.

"Take her out." He shakes his head, doesn't even look at her. "Useless brat."

She starts back the way she came, but one of the men pulls her the other direction.

"Oh no you don't, girl. We're through babysitting you."

#######

She'd been in the cell for a month, an entire month, when they toss her out at the community home.

It's a dark, damp looking, two story building made of crumbling bricks and basic forms. The inside is poorly lit, candles take the place of the infrequent electric lighting. There are scorch marks on the walls and tables where careless attendants had let them burn down or fall over, catching whatever was near on fire.

Her dress, the same dress she'd worn for a month, is taken from her when one of the old ladies forces her into the showers. Ice water blasts down at her as she rubs as much of the grim from her skin as she can. They give her a threadbare shirt and pants that are at least a size too big and do nothing to stave off the cold that permeates the drafty old building. She can already imagine how stiflingly hot it will be come summer.

The first meal she's given is stolen by a boy much taller than her.

"No more warm dinners with mommy and daddy, huh, princess?"

He has his friends hold her down while he smeared the remains of the mush down her shirt.

They threaten to do much worse, but one of the old ladies comes around and scares them off.

After that she tries to stay with groups, but none of them want her near.

"Go away," one of the girls, a little older than her, growls. "Aren't you supposed to be dead?"

In the first few days she's pushed down the stairs, locked in a trunk, has icy water dumped on her head, kicked out of her bunk, and has her blanket snatched away during the first freezing night.

After the first week she finds a small nook under the back porch steps where she can hid until bed. It's while she's there, huddling for warmth, that she hears a very loud, familiar voice.

"Listen, I got all the papers right here, lady. Just point me to the kid."

She peers out between the steps, squints to be sure who it is.

Mr. Abernathy is having a very noisy conversation with one of the old ladies in charge of the home. He's waving papers in her face, gesturing to the upper stories. He makes a wide swipe toward the house and says something very unflattering about the lady's dress before Madge has even crawled out to see why he's visiting.

"Mr. Abernathy?"

He turns, grinning, but his happy expression falters when he settles his eyes on her.

"What've they done to you, Pearl?"

Self-consciously she runs her hand through her tangled hair. It's matted on one side and one of the girls had cut off a hank while Madge was attempting to comb it out. She'd cleaned it as best she could, but the water was so cold and smelled so oddly it just never seemed to do the job right. The detergent they used in the laundry has given her a pale rash, or maybe it was from the cold, she isn't sure.

She's seen better days, she's well aware of that.

Madge hasn't even formed the full thought to tell him everything when he grabs her hand and begans pulling her with him. He turns with a final glare at the woman, "I'm taking the kid with me. If you think you can stop me, go ahead and try."

They're half-way down the entry when Mr. Abernathy grunts at her.

"Pick up your feet, sweetheart. Unless you want to stay in this hellhole."

She begins trotting beside him, he still has her hand firmly in his grasp. She'd follow no matter what. He had been friends with her parents. Wherever he's taking her has to be better than the community home. Still, she'd curious.

"Where are we going?" She asks, just above a whisper. Her voice is out of use.

He cuts his eyes at her. "My place."

She stops. "The Victor's Village? Why?"

He drops her hand, reaches up and takes her by the shoulder. "You're going to live with me, okay?"

When that doesn't get her moving again he sighs, rubs a hand over his bloodshot eyes.

"Look, I had papers made up giving me guardianship of you. I'm not going to let you rot in that place. Your father wouldn't want it."

His fingers reach up and pull a cobweb from her hair; it had probably gotten stuck there from the stairs.

"You don't belong there, sweetheart."

Madge is fairly certain _no one_ belongs there, but she nods anyway.

After a few seconds, when he's sure she's convinced, he straightens up and frowns down at her. He takes off his coat and gently throws it around her shoulders, muttering unpleasantly about the state of her clothes.

When she's tightly bundled in his cologne and liquor soaked coat, he offers her his hand. "Lets get you home, Pearl."

#######

Mr. Abernathy's house is filthy. Littered with discarded bottles and other trash, she's barely able to make it to the stairs as she follows him to where her room will be.

"Bit of a mess," he admits. "I'll, uh, pick it up. Make it easier on you."

She nods. At least it's better than the community home.

He opens the last door on the second floor. The room has large windows on the two outside walls, a heavy wooden dresser, a wrought iron bed, a rocking chair…it's bigger than her old room…

"You can paint, if you want, buy new furniture, I just drug some stuff in here."

"It's great," she forces a smile.

"I tried to get your old stuff, when they auctioned it off, but they took most of it out of the District." He looks over the bed with a frown.

Madge is glad he hadn't gotten her old things, she doesn't think she could do with the reminders.

"Mr. Abernathy," she bites her lip, "what…what happened with my parents'…"

She can't bring herself to say 'bodies', which is stupid, she'd watched her father die and she's certain they killed her mother.

"I-no one has said, and I-I just…" _hadn't had the strength to ask_.

His eyes darken, "I don't know about Dan-your dad. They got your mom up at the hospital. I'm working on getting her out."

Her chin quivers and she blinks back tears. "Oh."

She isn't sure if death might've been a kinder fate for her already world weary mother, but the odds just never have been in her favor.

Mr. Abernathy had heard she was alive, had been dumped at the community home, from an overheard conversation a group of boys from the home were having at the Hob. Both had probably been there buying liquor.

"Everyone thought you were dead too," he tells her, his bloodshot eyes watching her sadly.

She thinks of her father, sacrificing his life for his District, even though she doubts anyone in it will ever know how brave he'd been, and feels a twinge of envy.

Madge wishes, not for the first time since everything had gone so horribly wrong, that she was with him.

She swallows down bile at her own selfishness and sets her eyes on the mug of tea Mr. Abernathy had made her, unable to look him in the eye. He's a Victor. He'd survived a Hunger Games Quarter Quell, he would think she was pathetic for such a thought, even if it would've saved him from having to take care of her.

"I'm sorry." She crosses her arms over his sticky table and buries her face in them.

A hand comes to rest on her head, strokes her hair soothingly. "You don't need to be sorry, Pearl."

Her mind tells her otherwise.

She wonders, as the tears start rolling down her cheeks and Mr. Abernathy pulls her into a tight hug, if there could be any good outcome to this story or if the odds were just never in any of their favor?


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 2**

AN: So this story will get more chapters, but slowly and very sporadically. My original idea for it is lost, but I'm reformulating it since so may people on tumblr have responded asking for a continuation. Hope is isn't a complete disappointment.

#######

"Mr. Abernathy, come on!"

Madge glances at her watch. They're going to be late, or at least she's going to be late. Mr. Abernathy can, and probably would, show up late to the Reaping if not for her, but she isn't a Victor and doesn't have that luxury.

Her foot taps on the lowest step.

"I'm leaving you."

She's half out the door when he comes stumbling down the stairs, nearly tripping over his feet.

He doesn't drink as much, not since he'd taken over care of her and her mother, but impending Reapings always make him worse. He needs the alcohol to numb him for another disappointing year she supposes.

"In a hurry, sweetheart?"

"Don't want to keep the Capitol waiting." She gives his soured look a faint smile.

He hates it when she makes light of the Reaping. It scares him, she knows that. Her name is still in the bowl, even just a few slips of paper, but there's nothing she can do about it. She still has two more Reapings after this.

"Mom asleep?" She asks, checking the stairs to make sure her mother hasn't wandered out into the hall.

"Don't worry," Mr. Abernathy tells her, a little sigh escaping his lips. "I dosed her up good. She won't wake up 'til you get back."

It bolsters her, his confidence that her name won't be called, helps ease the ache of anxiety settled in her stomach. He always reassures her that she won't be taken, he won't allow it, but they both know he has no say. If her name were to be called, she would go, and most likely die.

"It'd get you out," he'd told her, right before her first Reaping, when she asked what would happen if she were called. "Nothing, not the Capitol or the President himself would keep me from it."

She hopes it never comes to that. Whatever illicit means he has up his sleeve in case of such a thing scare her, and she hopes she never has to learn anything about them.

He offers her his arm and a little smile. "Come on beautiful, let's get this over with."

Madge forces a small smile and links her arm with his.

They make the trek to the Square in a painful silence. He walks her to the line and pulls her into a bone crushing hug, pressing a kiss into her hair, but doesn't say anything though, no words of encouragement or hopeful phrases. There's nothing to say, except a whispered, "See you when I get back, Pearl."

Madge nods into his shoulder and inhales the scent of detergent and his fancy Capitol cologne, trying to memorize it until he comes back. He's her rock and losing him, even temporarily, makes her uneasy.

Ever since he rescued her from the Community Home, taken her on as his responsibility, she's clung to him. He's never seemed to mind though. Madge and her mother are his family, he's told her as much, and he promised her she was no burden to him.

"I don't do anything I don't want to," he told her after she told him he didn't have to take care of her and her mother, once they'd gotten her released from the hospital the Peacekeepers had locked her up in.

"It's okay," Madge had assured him weakly. "I'm old enough. I could find work."

He'd given her a dark look, right before downing a long drink of his favorite white liquor. "No you aren't. Any job you'd find wouldn't be fit for someone like you."

"I'm not weak."

Mr. Abernathy had chuckled at that. "No, but you _are_ a kid. And kids shouldn't have to struggle like that."

"Kids in the Seam do," she pointed out.

"They shouldn't have to," he told her as he opened another drink. "I'm not concerned with them though. I'm only concerned with you and that mother of yours."

"Besides," he shrugged, his gray eyes taking in his much less filth coated kitchen, "you two keep the house livable."

Years later she's still working out if he meant because they actually cleaned, or because he liked the company.

Madge stands awkwardly in her section, slightly apart from the other girls her age. None of them are really what she would call 'friends'. She's kept to herself since her father's death and disgrace, silently making her way through school, avoiding unnecessary conversations, trying not to make connections. No one would want to be her friend anyway. They never had, and being the daughter of a traitor, being marked and undoubtedly watched closely, only made her less friend material.

Someone bumps into her, nearly knocks her over.

"Oh! I'm sorry!" The dark haired girl pulls her back to her spot. Madge recognizes her from her literature class, Katniss Everdeen.

She's friendly enough, quiet and clipped, which Madge appreciates when they have to partner together for class or during athletics. Madge's mother has mentioned she and Katniss' mother were friends, ages ago, but if Katniss knows she never mentions it.

"It's okay," Madge mutters. It's hardly the first time someone has failed to see her.

"I'm just trying to see my sister," Katniss carries on, popping up on her toes and squinting over towards the twelve year olds section. "It's her first Reaping."

Madge nods. Firsts are always hard. Fifths weren't really all that much better, but then, at least no one would be put out if she were picked. Except Mr. Abernathy and her mother.

"I'm sure she'll be fine." Twelve year olds are hardly ever picked, after all. Another bit of wisdom Mr. Abernathy had passed on to her right before her first Reaping.

"Only got one slip in there," he'd said, more to himself than to her. "Odds are in your favor, I guarantee it."

Katniss nods anxiously, still craning her neck in her search for her sister.

When the ceremony begins, the Treaty is read, Effie Trinket plucks the names from the bowls, a pair of kids, one fourteen and one seventeen, both from the Seam, Madge sighs.

As soon as the unlucky pair are shuffled off the stage, the ropes drop and the survivors scatter, living to be Reaped another year.

Mr. Abernathy's eyes catch hers, right before he follows the cotton candy pink Effie off the stage, and he gives her a relieved sort of smile.

_Be safe, Pearl. I'll be home soon._

Madge nods to him, letting him know she'll be fine, and begins to shuffle quietly off, to start her lonely journey back to the Victor's Village, when someone catches her arm.

"My dad wanted me to ask if you wanted to have dinner with us."

Gale Hawthorne, tall, dark headed, with bright, mischievous gray eyes, is watching her, waiting for her response.

Mr. Hawthorne has asked every year since her first Reaping, since her parents had died, if she wanted to have dinner with his family. She isn't sure why. He and Katniss' father sell her berries and roots on Sunday, but other than that she has very little interaction with him.

"Probably thinks you get lonely up here. Most people don't consider your mother much company," Mr. Abernathy had told her once when she'd mentioned it.

She did, but she was use to her solitude. It was safe. It was familiar. People exhausted her anyway.

She had Mr. Abernathy and her mother, and they were all Madge needed as far as she was concerned.

"Oh, um, no, I'm sorry, I can't." She shakes her head and forces a smile. Not even Mr. Hawthorne's very attractive son was going to get her to leave her bubble of comfort.

He crosses his arms, a little crease forms between his eyes. "Why not?"

"I have to get back to my mother." It's her standard answer, has been for five years. It also happens to be the truth.

Her mother doesn't do well during the Games, never has. Mr. Abernathy's managed, over their years of living with him, to settle her nerves, make her headaches ease up somehow, but with the Games comes a fresh kind of hell. Though the most recent year wasn't so bad, her mother had managed to go outside and help with the garden even, every Reaping was a new possibility for trouble. Her headaches, her anxiety and fear, might already be back.

"She's welcome to come too," Gale tells her, crossing his arms and giving her a wary look. "If this is about last Friday-"

"No," she cuts him off, a fierce blush creeping up her cheeks.

It had been entirely an innocent, she was certain of that.

Madge had been returning some books to the library after school, a cookbook she'd found useless and several boring histories Mr. Abernathy had finally finished up. He was with her, of course, dropped her off at the Library before heading off to the Hob to procure himself a week's worth of liquor.

"Just a few bottles." He'd given her a stern look. "You wait here for me, hear? It'll be dark soon and I don't want you wandering around in the streets by yourself."

"And a drunk is going to defend me?" She'd asked him playfully.

He'd scowled. "I won't taste a drop 'til we're home."

So, after finding another book, this time one over knitting and one over computers for Mr. Abernathy, she'd settled herself down on the lowest step outside the library and started reading.

She'd just about figured out what figure 1a was trying to show her, when someone came up behind her and started reading over her shoulder.

"Looks boring," a deep voice rumbled over her.

Madge turned her head so quickly her nose nearly collided with the stubble covered cheek at her ear.

She almost fell off the step, the only thing that kept her from it was Gale's large hand catching her by the arm and steadying her.

"You scared me," she told him, trying and failing to sound annoyed. It was hard to be upset with attention from Gale, even irritating attention.

"Didn't mean to," he shrugged as he stood and straightened out. Walking around her, he plucked the book from her hands and flipped through it, making a face. "You knit?"

"Not yet." But that was the plan. She wanted to make Mr. Abernathy a scarf for his next birthday.

Gale offered the book back to her. As she reached for it though, he pulled it from her grasp with a grin.

"Give it back," she told him through gritted teeth, getting to her feet.

His grin widened. "I thought you were polite, Undersee?"

He was only winding her up, something about toying with her seemed to excite him, though she didn't know why exactly.

"_Please_," she finally managed to grind out. "Give me my book back."

Seemingly happy, Gale lowered the book, which he'd hoisted over his head, well out of her reach, and handed it back to her.

Snatching it back, Madge gives him a sharp look.

"I was only playing with you," he apologized.

She knew that, but she still wasn't in the mood for his little games.

"Maybe I can make it up to you." His expression settled into perfect innocence. "How about next week you come by for dinner? We can have strawberries; those are you favorite, right?"

Madge stuffed her book into her bag and rolled her eyes. "Like after the Reaping, next week?"

"Perfect."

"No."

His face fell. "Why not?"

Just as Madge was about to tell him it was none of his business 'why not', someone came up behind Gale, grabbing him by the collar and tugging him back. It wasn't until he was gone from it that Madge realized how much in her space Gale had been.

"Lady doesn't need a reason, boy," Mr. Abernathy growled, giving Gale a shove and nearly sending him to the ground. He turned back to Madge, giving her a worried up and down. "He hurt you?"

"No. No, Mr. Abernathy, this is Gale," Madge told him, putting herself between them. "We were just talking."

"Looked like harassment to me."

"I was just asking her to come over for dinner after the Reaping," Gale muttered, rubbing the back of his neck.

Mr. Abernathy gave him a narrow look, mumbling to himself before nudging Madge. "Let's get going, sweetheart, your mother'll be waiting."

"You kick that little bastard in the balls next time he gets near you," he told her once they were out of earshot of Gale.

"Mr. Abernathy, he wasn't bothering me." Not really. Well…maybe a little.

"He was, trust me." He cut her a look. "You don't want any part in a boy like that. I've heard about him, kid. He's only after one thing."

Madge had stopped, nose wrinkled up. "What're you talking about?"

With a groan, Mr. Abernathy had run his hand over his face, pulling down and giving her an exhausted look.

"He was _flirting with you_, Pearl."

Blinking, Madge just stared. Gale hadn't been flirting with her, she would've known if he had, wouldn't she? Then again, she'd never been flirted with before, maybe she wouldn't know.

"Gale has plenty of girls. He doesn't need to flirt with me," she'd assured him. "He was just getting a head start asking me to dinner for his dad, like he does every year."

Mr. Abernathy had rolled his eyes at that, grumbled some more to himself, before gesturing for Madge to come along.

He hadn't mentioned it again, but he had asked her about her plans for after the Reaping.

"Coming straight home, right?"

"Yes, for the tenth time, I'm coming home after the Reaping," she'd sighed as she undid her attempt at knitting for what felt like the thousandth time.

Leaning over the back of her chair, Mr. Abernathy pressed a kiss into her hair before flopping down on the couch beside her mother. "Good. People act funny after. Don't need to be worrying about you while I'm off."

He'd be worried no matter what, but she would at least give him the reassurance that she wasn't going to be out wandering the streets of District Twelve, with or without a boy.

She'd avoided Gale after that, narrowly missing him in the halls between classes, denying him to ask her to come to dinner for his dad. Even if Mr. Abernathy was wrong, which she's sure he is, she couldn't get the idea out of her head.

"I was just-I didn't mean to upset you," Gale sighs, running his hand through his hair and setting it on end. "I just figured if I started asking early I might get a different answer."

Madge shakes her head, feeling a little bad. He actually does look disappointed.

"I really do have to get back to my mother." She gives him an apologetic smile. "Tell your dad thanks, though."

With that she takes off, ducking through the crowd and out of sight.

#######

A little confused, Gale shakes his head as Madge Undersee's blonde hair vanishes into the crush around him. Asher almost laughs at his son's expression.

He's never had this much trouble getting a girl to hang out with him, and the anomaly is clearly unsettling for him.

Granted, it was Asher that had started the yearly tradition of asking her to dinner.

"Poor kid just lost her dad," he'd told Gale as he'd drug him along with him that first year, to where Madge stood alone, watching helplessly as Haymitch Abernathy was taken off to the Capitol. He'd hoped seeing someone close to her own age would put her at ease, though Gale's growth spurt made him look more like a grown man than a boy only a few years older than her. "Haymitch is the only sensible adult around…she probably needs a break."

And since it was Asher that cost her the life she'd had, her father and home and sense of security, he felt it was only right he offer her that break.

He owed her father a debt. Mayor Undersee had sacrificed his life and his family, to protect all the men that had planned the strike. Asher knew one dinner wouldn't even begin to cover the price paid for his life, but it was a start.

She'd been chewing her lip, wide, worried eyes fixed on the door Haymitch had disappeared through up at the Justice Building when Gale and his dad reached her.

"How are you today, little lady?"

Madge had looked a little wary, her expression guarded, but she'd forced a small smile for them. "I'm fine, sir."

As much as he tried not to stare at her, it was hard not to.

She was supposed to be dead. Her father had been executed, that's what the rumors were anyway, and Madge and her mother were supposed to have been dead too.

"I wish I knew why they let her live," he'd told one of the men that had formerly been on his crew in a hushed tone as they walked back from the mines a few weeks after the girl had turned up.

"To show us they have ultimate control," Jude Everdeen sighed. "They'll kill us and destroy what we love most. They killed Undersee then locked up his wife and sent the kid to that hellhole community home. Nothing he can do about it, nothing we'd be able to do about it."

It was a grim thought, but ultimately, it was probably as close to the truth as they'd get.

Looking at the girl, he remembers thinking how small she looked. Worn and pale and terrified, like some wounded animal awaiting the death blow. All because of him and a few foolish others thinking they were going to change things with one small strike.

He'd squinted down at her. Haymitch had clearly gotten her new clothes. Asher couldn't even imagine the price her dress would fetch at the Hob.

"I was wondering if you'd like to come to dinner with my family tonight?"

She'd frowned up at him, some of her pale hair escaping from her ponytail when she shook her head. "No thank you, sir."

Smiling at her unfaltering politeness, something he wished would rub off on Gale, he nodded. "The offer's always there. Just tell Gale if you ever want to take it up."

Her eyes had widened at that, flittering over to Gale and taking him in uneasily before giving him an unenthusiastic nod.

"She would've said yes the other night if her d-if Abernathy hadn't come up and manhandled me," Gale grumbled.

"What happened to all that charm you were bragging about the other night?" Rory asks with a smirk. "Or did you only have enough for one girl?"

"At least I have enough for any girls," Gale snaps back.

"Boys," Asher silences them quickly. If he doesn't they'll end up in a knock-down drag-out fight and he doesn't think Hazelle can stand the embarrassment. Besides, there are more Peacekeepers around on Reaping Day, and they aren't likely to be very tolerant of a brotherly scuffle in the middle of the Square.

Maybe next year, Asher thinks wearily, he'll get to start repaying his debt to Mayor Undersee.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine.

**So shines a good deed, pt 3**

AN: So here's a (hopefully) sweet chapter for all those who've read the first two and encouraged me to get my act together and write a little more. I hope it holds you over until I get my thoughts together.

#######

Asher gently rocks Posy back and forth. The ancient rocking chair, passed down through the Hawthorne family since before Panem, creaks with the effort.

She'd woken screaming almost an hour earlier, bringing the entire house into the tiny lean-to that functioned as her bedroom Asher and Gale had constructed only a few years before. She couldn't stay in his and Hazelle's room forever and he wasn't about to put his little girl through sharing a room with the boys.

"I had a bad dream," she'd sobbed onto Asher's shoulder as he'd picked her up and rubbed her back, assuring her everything was okay.

The boys and Hazelle had gone back to bed, but Asher had stayed up and held Posy until her breathing evened out and the tears dried on her cheeks. He didn't dare put her back in bed; it was too agonizing to see her so scared.

His eyes drift shut and he slips into a tense sort of sleep for a few hours before the loose board across the small room groans, causing his eyes to fly open.

Gale is up and dressed, has a guilty look on his face. "Didn't mean to wake you."

Rubbing his eyes, Asher gives him a weary smile. "That time already?"

It was Sunday, his only day off. Hunting day.

"I can go by myself, dad," Gale tells him, his voice a deep, hoarse whisper. "You need some rest."

Asher shakes his head and gets to his feet, shifting Posy in his arms. "I'm alright. I don't like you out there on your own anyways."

It was bad enough Gale often snuck out after school; Asher at least wanted to be there one day of the week to protect his son, especially since Gale is going to be in the mines soon. His abundance of energy, his still boyish eagerness, is going to be wiped out after a few weeks of mining and Asher wants to burn every detail of his son's happiness into his memory before that inevitably happens.

Popping his back, Asher squints at the boys' doorway. "Rory not coming?"

He'd been asking for ages and Asher was ready to let him. Gale had been about his age when he'd first taken him, it only seems fair.

Gale rolls his eyes. "I tried to wake him up, but he just went back to sleep."

He shrugs, as if to say 'his loss' then turns to start packing a few scraps of food for the trip into the woods.

Asher settles Posy in the bed beside Hazelle, giving them both soft kisses before he digs out his clothes and quietly dresses in the bathroom.

He and Gale slip under the fence as the sun starts to peek over the horizon, streaking the sky with pinks and yellows.

"We'll head to the lake first, try some fishing, then check your snares," Asher tells him as they slowly make their way through the underbrush.

"Then the strawberry bush?" Gale prompts, his eyes nonchalantly searching the trees for birds and squirrels. He's trying to not sound eager about it, but the fact that he brought it up makes Asher chuckle.

"Looking forward to the delivery?"

Gale stuffs his hands into his pockets and shrugs. "No-well, I guess, they overpay. That's not so bad."

Asher grins over at him. "So it's not the person paying you're so eager about?"

"Anyone who isn't Haymitch is fine by me," Gale answers, smoothly ignoring the question before making a face.

The look of absolute disgust on Gale's face at the thought of District Twelve's only Victor makes Asher boom with laughter. His eyes crinkle up at the edges and his smile widens when Gale's nostrils flare in indignation.

Reaching out, Asher pats Gale on the shoulder, though his comfort is probably diminished by his continued chuckling.

When they reach the edge of the woods, spotting the small lake in the distance, they both squint into the now bright morning sun, down to the water where two figures are already fishing.

"Figures," Gale mutters. "I thought we'd beat them for sure this time."

They make their way through the dew covered grass, down to the lakeside, greeting the pair of earlier risers.

"How early did you get up, Jude?"

Jude jerks his head towards his smirking daughter. "Don't look at me. Katniss seems to think getting here is a competition."

"We've already caught three fish," she tells Gale offhandedly.

Gale grumbles to himself as he jogs off to find the pair of fishing poles he and Asher had hidden away years before.

Prodding the fish with his foot, Asher gives Katniss an approving look and she grins back before turning her head back to the lake.

When Asher and Jude had first run into each other in the woods, years before either had any children, they'd had a silent agreement to leave the other alone. But after the failed strike, the Mayor's death, the reshuffling of the crews, when they'd come across one another again, this time with their kids, they'd formed a partnership.

Asher taught Katniss snares and Jude taught Gale the bow. It was the only way their families were going to survive if anything ever happened again. The kids needed to be as prepared as possible.

It was a good agreement. They caught and killed more as a group than they ever could've alone or with just their kids, and that gave them more to trade with on top of broadening their skills.

"We split everything fifty-fifty," Asher had told Jude the first time they'd gone into town with their extra bounty.

"You have two more mouths to feed than me," Jude had pointed out.

He wasn't doing anymore of the work though. Fair was fair.

They'd settled into an easy friendship. For a while Asher had even suspected that during their after school time in the woods, Gale would develop a crush on Katniss. She was pretty enough, strong, stable, but when he'd brought it up he'd just gotten a groan of annoyance and rolled eyes.

"She's like a sister," he'd said.

Asher had just laughed at him, ruffled his hair. Gale would see Katniss in a new light when he was ready. Unfortunately, Asher suspected it would only be after someone _else_ realized she was a catch. Or at least he had thought that until he realized his son enjoyed his weekly trip to the Victors' Village for a little more than the extra pay it brought.

They spend a few hours fishing before Gale and Katniss move off to find some squirrel and the men go to check the traps.

"Don't forget the strawberries." Asher gestures to the wild bush across the clearing where they'd snared a small rabbit.

Jude pulls out a small pair of bag and they head over, carefully plucking the little red berries and dropping them in.

Two bags, one to sell at the bakery and the other for the Victors' Village trip.

"You take these squirrels and strawberries to the bakery and Gale and me will go to the Village," Asher says as he straightens back up after his bag is full.

Jude nods. "Might be able to get some bread from Kolach too. He's always more generous during the Games."

It was one of the only bright spots of the Hunger Games, the fact that most people seemed to realize how close they are to death and act accordingly. Pay goes up and despite the grim programming, the Everdeens and Hawthornes eat well for a short time.

"She still not take up the offer?" Jude asks after his bag is full, a small frown causing his prematurely lined face to wrinkle more.

Asher shakes his head. He doesn't need any hints to know who 'she' is.

Jude knew about the guilt Asher felt over the Mayor and what had happened to his wife and daughter in the weeks and months after his death. He'd tried to convince Katniss to ask the girl over after school, just to give her a break from her mother and Abernathy, but that hadn't gone any better than Asher's attempts to have her over for dinner after Reapings.

"She told Katniss she really had to get home," had been Jude's explanation.

No other excuse, no elaboration, just a simple 'no, I have to get home' and she ended the questioning. Katniss wasn't nearly as persistent as Gale.

"Poor kid," Jude mutters, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Nodding his agreement, Asher sighs. He worries about the girl, out of guilt, and because it seems like no one else can be bothered to. Her mother is a chronic case, some vaguely defined illness that Abernathy tiptoes around when questioned about. Then there's Abernathy himself.

Asher doesn't like to think of himself as a gossip, but he hears things. He doesn't know Haymitch Abernathy, not well enough to form a solid opinion of him anyway, but he does know that it sits poorly with him that the Victor had just been able to go to the Community home and snatch up a child without much trouble.

It was suspicious, even Jude agreed.

"But what can we do?" He'd grunted as he'd helped Asher push a broken coal cart. "Hell, he probably just made a generous donation and-" he snapped his fingers "-here's a kid."

There were no signs he'd ever hurt the girl. She was well dressed and clean, made good grades, never said anything, but then, Asher often thought, a lot of kids don't.

The fact that she keeps to herself, according to Katniss anyway, doesn't do much to dissuade him from thinking the worst.

"But she always has a full sack at lunch," Katniss had told him one day when he'd come over to see Jude about something. "Offers me crackers and candy everyday."

A well packed lunch box and pretty dresses, thick socks and warm hats, aren't the only things in life though, and he hopes the girl knows that. He hopes his paranoia is unfounded.

"I'll see how she looks," Asher says, glancing around to see if Gale and Katniss are anywhere to be seen.

Jude just sighs.

#######

After stopping at a few places in Town, making sure sells, Gale follows his dad to the edge of Town and to their back way up to the Victors' Village.

It isn't necessary to take such a secretive track up to the Village, but it sort of is. Cray isn't a stickler for the rules really, but ages ago there had been an annoying Peacekeeper that had caused them considerable trouble when he'd questioned why they were going up there.

"Friends of ole Haymitch?" He'd asked with a nasty sneer.

They'd very nearly had to turn out their game bags, stuffed with strawberries and their week's worth of dinner, to the scrawny bastard, but had been saved when Madge and her mother had come up on the scene.

"Are you coming up to fix the porch?" Madge had asked without so much as a hint that such a thing had never been discussed.

Gale had stared at her, dumbfounded by her nonsensical question. They'd never talked to her about fixing a porch and how would they anyway? They certainly weren't equipped to do any construction.

His dad hadn't missed a beat though, nodded firmly, certainly, before looking back at the Peacekeeper.

"I am." He'd gestured to Gale. "Hope you don't mind me bringing my son along. He could use a little hard labor."

"Well I only have enough money to pay one of you," Madge had answered back, an irritatingly level expression on her face and her hands on her hips. She'd given the Peacekeeper an unimpressed half glance. "You have something in your teeth."

He'd hurried off after that, his lip carefully staying over his top teeth.

"Quick thinking," Gale's dad had sighed.

Madge had shrugged her carefully even expression never leaving her face. "You should come up the back way. It's how Haymitch comes back when he's been drinking."

His dad's happy expression had soured at that. Gale was no fan of Haymitch Abernathy, but his dad was suspicious of him.

"You don't just go get a kid from the orphanage like you get a puppy," he'd told Gale when he'd asked about it.

Gale didn't know much about puppies, other than that he wasn't allowed to make jokes about eating the neighbors', but he'd thought he understood what his dad was saying.

After that, Gale had kept a closer eye on the quiet little former Mayor's daughter, always making sure she wasn't hurt, had food, and was dressed well. Haymitch Abernathy had cleaned up his act some, but he still shouldn't have been allowed to just up and take a kid.

Madge was pretty and quiet and sweet. She tried to hand off her extra food everyday at lunch, according to Katniss. It was hard not to like someone like her once you noticed they existed.

At some point protectiveness had blossomed into a bit of a crush, even if he was hard pressed to admit it to anyone. It wasn't like it would ever go anywhere.

She was fun to talk to, even if some of the time his flirting seemed to be edging on annoying to her. Plus, she'd defended him against Haymitch's overly protective behavior on more than one occasion. If she didn't have a soft spot for him then he'd sign up for the mines early, he was that certain she liked him back.

When the back of the Victors' Village comes into view, Gale quickly finds Madge's house.

It's in better shape than the other houses, mostly, he thinks, because Madge actually has had Gale and his father do minor work on it since her lie.

First had been the back porch, then the roof, some minor plumbing issues, and once she'd had Gale come by himself to paint one of the guestrooms. That had been during the Games of course, Haymitch would've had a fit if he'd have known Gale was in his house doing work without adult supervision, other than Madge's mother that is.

As long as Gale's dad is present, Haymitch seems content to go off, taking Madge's mother to the market, and generally just staying out of their way while they work as long as they're gone at a reasonable hour.

"A man has to sleep," he'd told them when they'd asked why. "Plus the racket hurts 'Tilda's head."

At least he's looking out for someone Gale supposes.

Madge and her mother are out in their garden when Gale spots them. They aren't wearing the well made dresses Haymitch buys then, just plain brown pants and what looks to be dirt covered shirts that are several sizes too big for them. Even though they're probably Haymitch's disgusting old clothes, Gale likes the look on Madge. It's almost possible to imagine her living in the Seam, working like his mother, while she's dressed shabbily. He tries not to though. Madge, no matter how she's dressed, isn't meant for the Seam. It would be like hanging a chandelier in his family's kitchen. Beautiful, but it would never function properly and in the end it would either be stolen or broken.

Madge's mother spots them first, straightening up and giving them one of her airy smiles.

After a moment Madge turns to them, dirt smeared across her cheek and sweat trickling from under her floppy hat, down her neck and into the collar of her too big shirt.

"Brought you some strawberries," Gale hears his dad say, nudging Gale with his elbow to show the women the bag.

Shaking off his temporary distraction of watching the bead of perspiration roll down Madge's neck, Gale holds the bag out.

Madge doesn't smile, but then she rarely does, as she carefully takes the bag from him. She weighs it in her hands for a minute before jerking her head toward the house. "I'll go get your money."

While Gale follows her, his dad stays at the edge of the garden, probably to have an awkward conversation with Mrs. Undersee.

Madge's bare feet slap softly on the wood of the steps, across the back porch, before she pulls open the creaky screen door. As she disappears a way into the house, leaving the strawberries on the counter, Gale stays in the doorway, propping the screen open.

"I can fix the squeaking if you'd like?" He offers, his voice bouncing through the empty kitchen after her.

She reappears, a small drawstring bag now in place of the strawberries in her hand, her eyebrows knitted together. "That's okay. Mr. Abernathy likes the noise."

Even though Gale thinks that's a stupid reason not to fix something, he keeps his thought to himself.

She holds the bag out to him.

Gale considers letting it slip though his fingers, the coins would scatter and he'd get to spend a few more minutes with her retrieving them. Maybe he could talk her into coming to dinner, tempt her with the promise of his mother's rabbit stew, but then he remembers his dad out under the hot sun and the fact that in a few short weeks he's going to be another Capitol paid miner. It would be unfair to both of them to even start down that road. No matter how much he'd like to.

Even if he thinks one kiss would be enough, just so he could know what it was like. It would keep him for a lifetime he thinks.

He takes the bag with a soft grunt of thanks, leaving off his now customary joke that there are better things to pay him for (his dad would kill him if he ever heard that stupid little quip), then jerks his head back toward the outside. "Guess I'll go."

Her lips pucker and Gale feels his stomach lurch at the sight.

"No joke?"

Gale shrugs. "Without Haymitch here the thrill is gone. What fun is it without the threat of a possible beating?"

A tiny tug twitches at the corners of her lips, one of her rare smiles making a fractional appearance. "Who says I can't hit you?"

"I might enjoy that though," he says, leaning in just enough to catch the scent of earth on her skin, before he thinks enough to stop himself.

She snorts. "I imagine you would."

They stand there for a few more seconds, the silence filling the void their flirting had created, before Gale decides to break it by sneezing. Loudly.

"Sorry," he mutters, hoping he hadn't just sprayed spit all over her.

She just shrugs and brushes past him, the screen screeching as she holds it open for him.

When they get back to the garden Gale hears his dad's deep booming laugh roll over him as he gives Madge's mother a bright smile.

"That would solve it, wouldn't it?"

Madge's mother nods, her vacant grin turning to Gale and her daughter.

"What would solve what?" Madge asks, her eyebrows pulling together again.

Gale's dad gives him a little wink before smiling begningly at Madge. "You and your mom are going to come to dinner tonight."

She stares for a minute, blinks, then looks at her mother for confirmation.

"It'll be nice to have a real meal." Her mother tells her as she picks a cherry tomato and considers it for a moment before pressing it to her lips. "While Haymitch is gone I mean."

She pops the tomato into her mouth and smiles.

Gale glances over and finds Madge wrinkling her nose, pressing and unpressing her lips together as she tries to think of a way to escape the fate her mother has put upon her. Then, apparently seeing no escape, she sighs. With a smile that's almost a grimace, she looks at Gale's dad. "What time do we need to be there?"

#######

Madge pulls her hair up then let's it down again. It doesn't matter really, but she wants it to look nice anyways.

Her mother comes up behind her and gently places her hand on her shoulders. "You look fine either way."

Trying not to roll her eyes, even in her hazy state her mother has never really had to work at looking nice, Madge decides to pull her hair up. At least then there won't be the chance of accidentally getting food in it.

They take off, around the Town, along little footpaths Mr. Abernathy had pounded out over the years, until they come out near the old trading post, the coal dust covered building where Mr. Abernathy gets his liquor.

It makes her uneasy, being so near it. She worries about being seen, being arrested just for simple proximity and ending up back in another jail cell for the duration of the Games, until Mr. Abernathy can come and get her out.

Madge knows she can survive there, she's done it before, but she doesn't want to. Plus, her mother had nearly died during her incarceration. When Mr. Abernathy had finally procured her freedom, paying, Madge assumes, an unimaginable amount, she'd had pneumonia and nearly died before they could get Mrs. Everdeen to attend to her.

"Percussion will help," she'd told them as she'd shown them how to pound on her mother's almost skeletal back with a cupped palm. "It helps break it up."

Madge had tried to help, but she was too small and too weak herself. Mr. Abernathy had been the one to get up at all hours of the night, helping her mother cough and forcing her to drink more water than she probably had in a lifetime.

"I'm sorry," Madge had sobbed on his shoulder. He'd saved her from that horrible place and she couldn't even help him get a good night's rest.

He'd shushed her, scooped her up and smoothed down her hair, still frazzled and broken from her time in the community home.

"You have nothing to be sorry for, sweetheart," he'd told her, smiling and wrinkling up the corners of his pinkened eyes.

"But you need to sleep too," she whimpered.

He only grunted at that, a dismissive, harsh noise. "I don't sleep much anyways."

Later, over her years of living in his house in the Victors' Village, she would realize how truthful he was being. Days would go by when he didn't sleep or would wake, flailing and yelling. Though, Madge often told herself, he seemed to be getting better. She liked to think that was partly because of her and her mother's presence. He wasn't alone, and his overly active mind seemed to know that.

At the time though, she'd thought it only another comfort to comfort her.

She didn't deserve it, but she'd felt small and helpless and, damn it, she wanted to be comforted.

Mr. Abernathy had rocked her to sleep on those nights, like she was very young, carried her to bed and tucked her in with a scratchy kiss to her forehead before leaving her to help her mother.

He had done so much for them, and Madge still feels that she owed him for all of it.

That's part of the reason she hates going to the Hawthornes' for dinner. Mr. Abernathy is overprotective to a fault, but she thinks he's earned that right.

She can justify letting Gale into the house for jobs, like the painting in the guestroom, because she isn't really alone with him. Her mother is there, even if, in most ways, she really isn't. This is different though. This is leaving the safety of their house, their sanctuary, and venturing out into the nest of the people her father had died to protect, even if none of them knew that.

With a sigh, Madge starts to trail along after her mother, staring down at the little handdrawn map Gale had made.

"If you get lost just tell them you're expected at the Hawthorne house," Mr. Hawthorne had told them when Madge had hesitantly taken the scrap of paper, willing her hands not to shake as she studied it.

"Maybe I should just come and pick you up," Gale had offered, frowning down at his chicken scratch handwriting on the paper.

"We'll be fine," Madge had quickly told him, stuffing his map into her pocket.

She'd studied that stupid map for the rest of the day, not really memorizing a single thing but the slant of his 'a's and the crookedness of his 'h's.

_Stupid, silly thing to do_. That's what she'd told herself each time she'd caught herself staring at the names of the streets that twisted through the Seam, carefully printed out for her. She was being ridiculous and she knew it.

Still, when they came up on one of the rows to turn down, she recognized it. They at least wouldn't get lost.

#######

They turn up ten minutes earlier than he and Gale had told them to and Madge apologizes for the first five minutes.

"We just left early to give us time and I guess we walked a little too fast and-"

"Don't worry," Asher assures her. "There's no harm in a little eagerness."

He means it as a joke, a little jab at Gale's crush, a bit of a hint maybe if she hadn't already sensed it, and she goes scarlet. "I'm not eager."

"To see the boy, love," her mother explains unnecessarily, her eyes fixed on the clouds. She drops her gaze before Madge can say anything in her defense and holds a tin out to him. "We made chocolate dipped strawberries. Don't tell Haymitch. They're his favorite."

It takes some effort not to laugh at her transition. Matilda Undersee is a little more wily than most give her credit for. She'd been the one to suggest he invite her to dinner to convince Madge.

"He likes her, doesn't he?" She'd asked after Gale had followed Madge into the house for payment. "She's very fond of him. I can tell."

Asher had given her a long look, wondering why she was bringing it up.

"He should ask her out," she finally said, picking a little cherry tomato and popping it into her mouth.

"I don't think Haymitch would like that very much," Asher had told her, remembering Gale's tale about the library.

She turned and smiled, her eyes fixed on some empty point beyond his shoulder. "Oh, Haymitch won't like any boy asking her out. He'll respect Madge's decision, even if he doesn't like it." Her lips twitched up. "Or I'll make him."

Asher laughed, trying to keep it low as he studied Mrs. Undersee. The thought of her intimidating Haymitch Abernathy is comical, but he could picture it clearly. Finally, he gave her a small smile.

"Well, I don't think it matters much. Gale asked her to come to our place for dinner and she turned him down flat."

"Madge is wary of people," she said, her eyebrows knitting together. "She just needs someone to hold her hand."

"Hold her hand?" Asher asked, not really following her train of thought.

"If I were to go with her…" She trailed off, her eyes following a butterfly that had fluttered into the garden.

Asher grinned. "Are you trying to get an invitation to dinner, Mrs. Undersee?"

"Call me Matilda," she said simply. Her eyes drifted from the butterfly and back to Asher. "And if we both came she couldn't back out." Her lips twitch up sheepishly. "Besides, neither of us is much good at cooking. We haven't had a real meal since Haymitch left. I'm sure Madge is starved."

Asher laughed at the simplicity of her little plan. "That would solve it, wouldn't it?"

She'd been right, Madge had agreed, even if a bit reluctantly.

Matilda is definitely more wily than anyone gave her credit for.

Carefully, Asher takes the tin from her and gestures for them to follow him inside.

It's tiny and cramped, not nearly enough room for three full grown adults and one that would be sooner than either of his parents would like, but there's nothing to be done about that. It had been hell getting the permit for Posy's little room, he couldn't imagine the rings he'd have to jump through for Gale to get his own room, especially if he only ended up moving out.

Madge and her mother stand out, pale and soft in the harsh colors and dim light of the house, looking around the room in wonder.

He feels a little sting of envy for them. They've only ever lived in comfort, above the candy shop, the mayoral mansion, then the house in the Victors' Village. There were few cold nights for them.

Mentally, he slaps himself. The few cold nights they did have were his fault. Cold and hunger and fear, biting, aching uncertainty, those were things they should've never had to experience, and they had, all because of him.

His expression must worry them, because Madge gives him a soft smile. "Are you okay, sir?"

Shaking the thoughts off, he'll never make up to the Mayor for what happened to him and his family, but this is at least a small gesture, Asher smiles. "Just wondering where the kids are."

As if they'd heard his lie, Gale, Rory, and Vick come tumbling in, the older two with chairs in hand.

"Got 'em," Rory grunts, dropping the chair to the floor with a clatter.

"Don't be so ruff. These aren't ours," Gale tells him sharply as he sets his chair down gently.

"Stop telling me what to do," Rory snaps.

Not for the first time, Asher wishes the boys were a little more like Vick. It's nice to have one child with an even temperament.

"Rory," Asher steps in. "They aren't ours. Be careful."

He opens his mouth to argue, but then his eyes widen. "You really came."

Argument forgotten, Rory just stares at the women, for once in his life speechless.

The back door opens and Hazelle steps in, Posy at her heels, chattering away about her doll. They stop, just like Rory, and stare when they spot Madge and her mother.

Hazelle's mouth breaks into a grin. "I'm so glad you made it."

#######

Dinner goes easily, a little too quickly for Gale's taste.

Madge and her mother are quiet, careful, easy to please guests. They take small portions, answer questions, offer to help clean up afterwards.

"You don't have to help, 'Tilda, you're a guest," Vick had told her when she'd tried to help clear the table.

She'd stopped, stared at him for a moment, a little crease formed between her eyes.

"Matilda," she corrected him softly.

"Oh," Vick frowned. "Doesn't Haymitch call you 'Tilda?"

Her lips turned down. "Yes, but he's the only one."

She's quiet after that, clears the table despite the protests.

"It's his pet name for her," Madge explains to him a few minutes later, as she helps Rory and Vick carry the extra pair of chairs out to the porch. "She isn't mad. She just has...quirks."

Quirks, Gale thinks, is a gentle way to say she's nuttier than a squirrel, but he keeps that thought to himself. Madge is there and talking, even if only tiny amounts and mostly to Vick, he doesn't want to set her back by insulting her mother.

When they step back in Madge's mother is on the couch, hands over her ears and tears streaming down her cheeks. The Game is on, the television must've turned on by itself, mandatory viewing.

"Mom," Madge sighs as she crosses the room and drops down in front of her, getting coal dust on her dress when her knees press it to the floor. "Mom, it's okay. It's just like home. Just think of something else."

She doesn't say anything back, just nods and closes her eyes, taking deep, shuddering breaths.

After fifteen minutes, after the spectacular and bloody death of the boy from One, signaling the beginning of the end of the Games for the year, only two Tributes left, Madge finally gets her mother up. She gives the room a small, apologetic smile, then head for the door.

"Thanks for dinner Mr. and Mrs. Hawthorne," she tells them, forcing her smile up. "It was lovely."

Her mother nods then mumbles an echo, "Lovely."

"I'll walk you back," Gale says, nudging Vick out of the way.

Madge starts to protest, "No, we're fine. We have each other. I don't want you walking back alone."

"I'll be fine," he tells her. This won't be the first time he's come home after dark, and at least he won't be stumbling around, a little drunk and spirits high from an evening at the slag heap. He's got soft steps, hunter's feet as his dad calls them, and he's big. No one will mess with him.

Madge and her loopy mother on the other hand...

She doesn't look convinced, but her mother latches onto Gale's arm and doesn't let go.

While he'd rather it be Madge clinging to him, her mother is nice, even if she is a little odd, and he knows that if his mother were having some kind of breakdown he'd want someone to be nice to her.

Looking wary, Madge leads the way.

Gale follows her through the Seam, along the path he'd drawn for her earlier in the day, until they get within eyeshot of the Hob.

Madge eyes the building from a distance before she cuts across, deviating from the course.

"Where are you-"

"Shhh," Madge presses her finger to her lips. "Just follow me."

They cut into the woods. Looking down, Gale sees the dirt is worn underfoot, battered down over what must've been years. Another secret path.

It doesn't take much time to come up to the back of the Victors' Village, through the thick brush in the treeline surrounding it. Out and then up to the back porch of the house.

They'd left the back porch light on, and Gale feels a twinge of jealousy that they have almost uninterrupted electricity and his has probably already been cut off for the night.

It's hard to feel upset for too long though, when Madge's mother bustles into the house, quickly leaving Gale in the yellow glow of the porch light with her daughter.

Gale swallows hard as he tries to think of something to say.

"Did-How was dinner?"

He doubts Haymitch cooks rabbit stew for her. He can afford better, Gale thinks bitterly.

"It was really good," she answers quickly. "I liked it."

Nodding, Gale scrambles for another topic, he isn't ready to leave just yet.

"How long have you had your back door?" He finally asks, jerking his head toward the treeline and her hidden path.

She shrugs. "It's not mine, none of them are. Mr. Abernathy made it, them, before I was even born. He just showed them to me so I could...get around a little better."

_So you can avoid people._

It explains a lot about her, actually, how she ghosts around so easily. It's also a bit enabling. She might've reentered the District, made a few friends, if Haymitch hadn't encouraged her to stay in the shadows.

He probably likes it that way though. Madge staying cloistered, hiding away, keeps her with him, and Gale isn't sure what his intentions for it are.

"How many are there?" So far two. The one he and his dad use and her long path to the Seam.

"Enough," she answers, her lips twitching up.

"Any that head out to the slag heap?"

Her cheeks turn pink, darker maybe if not for the yellow light, and Gale smirks. She's pretty when she's embarrassed.

"He wouldn't tell me if there were," she answers.

"Maybe I can find one for you."

Madge tries not to smile, she knows he's only joking. Haymitch might do more than threaten and toss him on the ground if he ever caught wind that Gale had even mentioned taking Madge to the slag heap.

"I don't think so," she tells him, her mouth just barely keeping from flickering up into a smile.

"You sure?"

Her lips press together in thought, false contemplation, before she nods.

"You might like it up there," he tells her, his voice dropping a little.

She shakes her head.

He takes a step closer, just enough that he can smell her shampoo and the last traces of chocolate on her breath.

It's a bad idea. He's destined for a life of endless misery in the mines. She's going to be pampered, maybe a little detrimentally sheltered, for the rest of hers.

She isn't backing up though, and her eyes are glowing, wide with anticipation, and he feels like maybe he deserves at least one kiss. Maybe she does too.

Before he can think it through, talk himself out of it, Gale dips in and catches her lips.

The stew isn't there, just the chocolate and the strawberries she and her mother made linger and Gale wishes he'd eaten a few more himself.

She doesn't press back, and Gale thinks he may be overstepping, maybe he'd read her wrong, but when he starts to pull back she grabs the front of his shirt and keeps him in place.

That's all the encouragement he needs. Gale lets his hands slip around her waist, fingers digging into the soft material of her dress before he pulls her closer. It isn't close enough though, and he finds himself backing her up, pinning her between the wall just under the light and his body.

He moves from her mouth to her cheeks, her jaw and neck before making his way back to her mouth. He's painfully aware of her body, every curve, every patch of skin, every noise she makes, and especially her lips. They've been on his mind for years and he's glad to have finally confirmed for himself that they're every bit as soft and perfect as he imagined.

Madge makes a little squeaking noise as Gale dips again, starts nipping at her collar bone, then she gives him a gentle nudge. "Gale, stop."

There's a trace of worry in her voice and when he meets her eyes, expecting her to be preparing to let him down-they can't do this and they shouldn't have even tried-he finds them wide and worried.

"Ahem," a rough voice says from somewhere behind Gale.

_Shit._

Turning slowly, Gale finds Haymitch standing at the foot of the steps, glaring up at him.

"Mr. Abernathy," Madge squeaks, jumping between the two."You're back early."

He nods, his lips twisting up."Yep. Wasn't much use in me staying, so they sent me packing."

Madge swallows, then makes a small gesture to Gale. "Gale walked mom and I home. He's just leaving."

"Is that some funny euphemism you kids are using for 'feeling you up' that I don't know about?" He asks humorlessly.

Madge, who always seems to have an answer for everything, just stands mutely, lips parted and eyes wide, unable to come up with a response.

After a few seconds of glowering, Haymitch sighs, runs his hand over his face and glances warily at Gale. "Go on. Get, boy."

His dismissal makes Gale feel a bit like a stray being run off for daring to get his filthy paws on Haymitch's property, and really, that's exactly what it is. He isn't good enough for her and both he and Haymitch know it.

Then again, Gale thinks irritably, neither is Haymitch. He's from the Seam too. Other than one of them getting dragged off to the Capitol, winning the Games, they're the same. Before he can point it out, argue that he has as much right to kiss her as Haymitch did to swoop in and take her from the community home, he feels something warm brush against his hand. Madge's fingers.

She gives him a small smile and Gale bites his tongue.

It's her choice to flutter around the District, not talk, let Haymitch shelter her, or let Gale kiss her, and he has to let make it on her own.

Even if he'd rather just shout at Haymitch to mind his own business.

Reluctantly, Gale stuffs his hands in his pockets and let's his feet fall heavy as he descends the few steps to the ground, cutting Haymitch an irritable look as he passes him. It does no good, but it makes him at least feel like he's done something more than get visually scolded.

As he reaches the woods, Gale glances back over his shoulder just in time to see Haymitch vanish into the door. Madge is still standing there, holding the screen open as she starts around it to follow after him. Before she does though, she must feel Gale's eyes on her, because she turns.

For half a second she smiles then raises her hand and mouths the words 'bye' before ducking her head and rushing around the door, letting it screech and clatter shut behind her.

Gale stares at the now empty porch for a few seconds longer, until someone turns off the light and plunges him into darkness.

With a sigh, Gale turns and starts walking back through Madge's not so secret path. Licking his lips, he tastes chocolate and strawberries and smiles.

He hopes she chooses to tell Haymiych she plans on more kissing with him, because one definitely hadn't been enough.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 4**

AN: I'm so glad anyone is enjoying this. I almost didn't post it on here since I didn't know if I'd ever get around to finishing it. It's become my distraction from the story I'm halfway through with, sort of a mental break from timelines and such, so I'm glad y'all aren't hating it yet. Though it's still early, I still have plenty of time to ruin it. Oh, and yes, the back door squeaking is Haymitch's extra layer of security. As if Madge would be silly enough to use the door if she wanted to sneak out.

#######

Madge gently shuts the screen door behind her, then the heavy wooden one, clicking it shut with a quick turn of her wrist before turning to face Mr. Abernathy.

He stares at her, his eyes dull with exhaustion, then sighs, pressing his fingers to his eyes.

"Oh, Pearl," he mutters into his hand.

Taking a step, he reaches beside her and flips the light switch, sending the backyard, and Gale if he's still near, into darkness.

Setting her jaw, Madge crosses her arms in an attempt to look more confident than she feels. He's going to tell her she can't see Gale, even though she really isn't. One kiss isn't a date. No matter how good the kiss had been.

For a few moments she'd felt a glow of excitement in her chest, a reckless pinch of giddy eagerness.

Gale likes her, she likes Gale, why shouldn't they kiss?

And she likes everything about him at the moment.

His rough hands and how they caught on the material of her dress, his chapped lips and the scruff of his beard, the unruly way his hair falls in his eyes. She likes the deep, rough sound of his voice and even the way he makes his stupid 'w' in his last name.

It is, at least in part, hormones, she knows that, and part of it's rebelliousness. She's young after all, and while all the kids in her year are out at the slag heap, drinking and doing who knows what else, she's been at home, with her mother and Mr. Abernathy, reading and learning knitting. She hasn't toed the line at all, not once since she's lived in the Victors' Village. At least she'd been kissing Gale somewhere out in the open. Her mother could've kept an eye on her.

And really, what were they going to do on the porch?

"Oh, Pearl," he says again, shaking his head.

"Oh, Pearl, what?" She finally asks, her eyebrows arching up.

He shakes his head. "What were you doing out there? I warned you that boy is-"

"Trouble, I remember," she says, a little more sharply than she intends.

"That's right, trouble." He nods to emphasize his point. "Boys like him are only after one thing, sweetheart."

Madge covers her face with her hands. She doesn't want to have this conversation with him.

"Trust me, Gale isn't under any delusions about what he's going to get out of me." She knows full and well that the kids at school had given her the title 'ice princess'. No one with that nickname is going to be an easy mark, even for Gale Hawthorne.

"From where I was standing he might be," Mr. Abernathy mutters.

Madge gives him a withered look. "We were just _kissing_!"

"Since when do you kiss with your hands?" He snaps. "And trust _me_, I saw exactly where his filthy hands were going."

Before Madge can attempt to defend herself, which she thinks will be a hefty task considering her body still burns where Gale had touched her, her mother floats in, a faint expression on her face.

"You finally kissed Gale, love?"

Mr. Abernathy gives her a dark look. "Don't encourage her, 'Tilda."

Looking unfazed, her mother drifts over and smiles at Madge, pats her cheek. "You should ask him to shave a bit more. You're already pink from it."

Hand jumping to her face to cover the tell tale marks from Gale's kisses, Madge feels her cheeks burn.

"He doesn't need to shave 'cause he isn't going to kiss her again," Mr. Abernathy tells her.

Her mother's eyebrows pull together. "Was it bad?"

"No," Madge answers without thinking.

"Yes," Mr. Abernathy mutters at the same time.

"Oh, Haymitch," her mother coos, giving him a soft look. "He's such a nice boy. Let them be."

Crossing his arms, Mr. Abernathy grumbles something that sounds like 'delinquent', but bites back any further strictures against Gale.

Madge gives her mother a grateful smile. She isn't sure why, but Mr. Abernathy rarely argues with her mother. No matter how much he clearly would like to and the fact that they are under _his_ roof

"Is he going to take you on a date?" Her mother asks, a distant, but happy, glow in her eyes.

Cutting Mr. Abernathy a look, Madge shakes her head. "No, we just-it was just a kiss goodnight."

She doesn't miss the huff of disbelief Mr. Abernathy gives that fib, nor does her mother. She frowns at Madge then turns to him, eyebrows pulled together. "Shush, Haymitch, or I'll send you out."

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he clamps his mouth shut and glares at the ground. Madge almost laughs at him, but manages to hold it back. She isn't aiming to upset him, and that would definitely do it.

Her mother refocused on Madge, takes her face between her hands and pulls her forward, pressing a kiss to her forehead.

"He's very handsome," she says airily, earning another derisive snort from Mr. Abernathy. She cuts him a look and he pretends to cough so she ignores him and returns to Madge. "It'll be good for you to spend time around people your own age."

Behind her Mr. Abernathy rolls his eyes and mutters to himself.

"Mom," Madge begins, taking her mother's hands down and giving them a squeeze. "It was just a kiss. He may not want anything to do with me tomorrow."

Especially if Mr. Abernathy continues to act like he's rabid.

Her mother shakes her head. "Love, you're too beautiful for him not to."

Face burning, now not only from being seen kissing by Mr. Abernathy but also from her mother's enthusiastic support, Madge mumbles, "Sure."

With a final glance at Mr. Abernathy, Madge tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear and brushes past him. She just wants to go to bed and have a few sweet dreams while the possibility of Gale giving her more kisses exists, before he realizes she's a waste of time and that dealing with Mr. Abernathy makes her more trouble than she's worth.

#######

Haymitch pulls a chair out from the table, drops into it with a groan.

When did his little Pearl grow up?

Coming home early, not by choice, but certainly not unhappily, should've been a good thing. He'd planned on waking them up and making ice cream, sitting up and telling them stories about the idiots he'd had to rub elbows with, or more accurately avoid passing out on, in the Capitol. He'd wanted to forget all the insanity Wiress had spouted at him, plans and plots that are so far-fetched they'll never come to fruition.

Instead he comes back to find Madge getting her tonsils checked by some filthy little bastard.

He's pretty sure he showed unknown and profound restraint by not storming up the steps and castrating the boy.

No, not boy. Gale Hawthorne has to be eighteen or nineteen years old. That's a man, a full grown, ought-to-know-better-than-to-grope-a-girl-on-her-back-porch, man.

And Madge is just a girl. She's barely seventeen. He shouldn't be messing around with her. He'll be down in the mines by the fall and then what? He won't even have time to wash his butt let alone see her. It's cruel and unfair.

Besides, Haymitch has heard what he gets up to. Reputations might get inflated, but there's always a hint of truth hidden in them.

For a moment he entertains the idea of contacting Wiress and Bird. If anyone can help him get a handsy delinquent off Madge it's them. It might even be worth the body count they may incur.

While he's contemplating just how he can contact them, something cool brushes against his cheek and brings his mind to the moment.

Matilda is standing in front of him, her hand still grazing against his face, a little smile on her lips.

He gives her a soured look. "Don't toy with me, sweetheart. I'm not in the mood."

Her fingers fall from his cheek and her smile widens.

"She's not a little girl anymore. You can't hide her away forever."

Well he can damn well try.

Cool fingers comb through his hair and he tries not to close his eyes and enjoy the sensation, but after days of pounding music and flashing lights, strong perfumes and sickly sweet foods, his head is killing him. Her fingers against his scalp are the only thing he's found that sooth his mind.

"She doesn't have any friends. My baby deserves some friends, doesn't she? She shouldn't be alone."

Haymitch's stomach lurches.

Matilda is speaking from experience. After Maysilee died and Valencia Burdock ran off with that miner, she'd been alone. Her only friends were gone and she'd spent years existing with just her father for company. If she can keep that lonely existence from befalling Madge, she will, and there's nothing Haymitch can do to stop her.

Against his better judgment, he nods, his eyes fluttering shut as she steps forward and wraps her arms around his neck, pressing his cheek into her stomach, and begins toying with the hairs at the nape of his neck.

"I'm not going to sit back and let her get hurt," he mumbles into her nightgown. Her fingers are making him lose his conviction though as they twirl his hair. This fight is all but won, he's just avoiding the end and what she's going to make him do.

"Let her be young, Haymitch. Getting hurt is part of growing up. And you don't know she will. If you tell her not to see the boy she won't, but it won't be because she doesn't want to. That's not fair."

Even though he knows she's right, Madge _is_ young and she deserves to make her own choices, he doesn't want to admit it. She's his responsibility, he loves her too much to let her get her heart broken by some jerk boy, and he _is_ all but certain that's what's going to happen.

Madge is smart though. He knows she can handle whatever that boy throws at her.

He just wishes she didn't have to. He wishes she didn't _want _to.

#######

Madge changes her clothes, puts on her favorite old nightgown and drops down at the vanity to comb her hair.

Gale's note is sitting there, his scratchy handwriting staring up at her, distracting her from her nighttime ritual. She picks it up and begins examining it again.

It's rough and jagged, a bit like he is, but steady. There's no hesitancy in any of the words. They're solid, just like Gale. The thought makes her stomach do a flop.

Biting her lip, she wonders if he really _would _take her to the slag heap. Not that she would want to go...

Glancing at the mirror at her pale skin and light hair, the opposite of him in every way, she doesn't think so. The slag heap is for girls with fortitude, girls that can handle the adversity of life.

Not girls like her.

Frowning at her reflection, she looks back at the paper.

Gale is going to get home and realize what a mistake he's made. Madge isn't strong, not like girls from the Seam. She's a fling, nothing more, and that stings. She'd barely made it during her time in incarceration and then at the community home. If Mr. Abernathy hadn't come and saved her she might be dead now.

No, she's definitely nothing more than a passing phase for him.

She's just barely finishes combing her hair, blinking back bitter tears at the thought of Gale's realization, when there's a soft knock on her door.

Setting her comb down, she goes to the door, opens it slowly.

Mr. Abernathy is standing there, his gray eyes downcast, seemingly studying his shoes. "Can I talk to you?"

Even though she's still upset with him, she's old enough to make her own decisions, and that includes deciding who she wants to kiss, he gives her his most pathetic look and she relents.

Opening the door the rest of the way, she waves him in wordlessly.

He comes in, looks around for a second or two, then takes a seat on her bed, patting the spot next to him.

She sits, but crosses her arms and fixes him in a glare.

Once she's sitting, he reaches in his pocket and pulls out a bottle, opens it and takes a long drink before offering it to her. She rolls her eyes.

"That's my girl," he chuckles before taking another, smaller, drink then closing it and stuffing it back in his pocket.

Finally, after he's licked the last of the liquor from his lips, he sighs.

"I'm sorry, Pearl."

Blinking, once, twice, Madge frowns. "You're sorry?"

He nods. "You're, uh, mom pointed out that you aren't a little girl."

Madge frowns. Of course he'd have to have it pointed out to him. He'd asked her if she wanted a doll for her birthday. She gets the feeling she'll always be a little girl in his eyes.

"You're smart," he adds with a small smile, his eyes glancing up to her. "Smarter than me, that's for damn sure. You know best how you want to live your life."

Reaching over, he takes her hand, squeezes it in his much darker, much rougher one.

"If you want to _see_," he says the word with such disdain it looks like he might vomit, "that boy then it's up to you."

Her mother had a hand in this, Madge is certain of it. Apologizing is one thing, telling her to do what makes her happy is something separate. She's a hopeless romantic, even if she never got the fairy tale she wanted herself. For all her faults, she wants Madge to be happy, no matter who with.

"You aren't going to give Gale a hard time?" She asks, narrowing her eyes at him.

"I didn't say that," he answers quickly, his lips twitching up. "I think that's kind of my duty to harass whatever dirty minded nutsack you drag up."

Madge snorts. "He isn't a dirty minded…" She shakes her head. She isn't about to repeat him, no matter how much satisfaction it may give him.

His graying eyebrows arch up and he smirks at her. "He _is_ dirty minded, sweetheart. He's a boy. I was his age once."

Madge takes his hand and presses it between hers. When he'd been Gale's age he'd been a Victor already. There'd been no flirting with Town girls or getting told off by their families. He'd been alone, making solitary trips to the Capitol and back again with nothing but the cold bodies of Tributes to keep him company.

The fact that he's just come back from the Capitol, just lost two more Tributes, quickly and bloodily, hits Madge. He'd been expecting to come home and relax, not find her tangled so tightly with Gale, a boy he's made no secret about not liking, that she hadn't even been able to breathe. All things considered, he'd taken it well.

Leaning over, Madge presses a kiss to his cheek. "Thank you."

He glances over at her then back at their hands, giving hers a squeeze.

"Can you just-just not check each other's teeth in front of me?" He finally says, looking pained at the memory of Madge and Gale on the back porch.

A little laugh bubbles out of Madge chest and she pats his hand. Then a wave of self-pity rolls over her.

"I doubt you'll have to worry about that." Especially when Gale realizes she's weak and useless. Neither she nor her mother can cook, that was the whole reason they'd agreed to dinner. Food and cooking are life in the Seam, what good would it do him to date a girl that can only make candy, which is as impractical a food as there is?

Time spent with her is wasted, and Gale will realize that sooner rather than later.

Mr. Abernathy narrows his eyes. "Why? He talk about taking you to that slag heap? That is no place for a lady, Pearl, understand? I don't care how good looking you think he is, don't-"

"That isn't what I mean," she cuts him off. She doesn't want to know how he knows about the slag heap. Catching his confused expression, Madge sighs. "I can't cook, I can't sew, I can barely start the fire...as soon as Gale sees what a waste I am he's going to find someone better."

Someone who can survive.

Mr. Abernathy wraps his arm around her shoulder and presses a kiss into her hair.

"He'd be a fool to," he says softly.

Madge shakes her head. "He wouldn't-"

He cuts her off, "You're a pearl. Trust me, there is no one better than you."

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, inhales the scent of expensive liquor and cologne from his clothes. He's wrong, but it's nice of him to say it anyway.

#######

When Gale gets home he's grinning, ear to ear.

Asher thinks that will be wiped off his face when he tells him Rory has already fallen asleep and won't be helping carry the extra chairs back to the Everdeens'.

"You know how hard he is to wake up."

Instead of scowling, glaring at the door to the house and muttering about his useless brother, Gale shrugs.

"It's okay, I can get them."

That's when Asher knows something has happened.

He catches Gale by the shoulder and gestures for him to hand over one of the chair while giving Gale a once over. "What is it?"

It has to be something really good. His hair is a mess, and he hasn't even tried to fix it, and one of the buttons on his shirt is in the wrong hole. Normally that was a sure sign he'd been to the slag heap, but Asher is fairly certain he hasn't had time to swing by there since dropping Madge and her mother off.

Asher's eyes widen. "Gale…"

"I kissed her," he finally says, his grin widening as he looks up at the star peppered sky.

Taking in Gale's appearance, Asher frowns. "Did she put up a fight?"

Grin shrinking, Gale scowls. "No. Why would I-why would you think that?"

Gesturing to the wronged button and the wrinkles on the front of Gale's shirt, Asher frowns.

Gale's eyes fall to his shirt and his color darkens, visible even in the dark of the street. "Oh, she, uh, guess she popped a button when she grabbed my shirt. I just thought it came undone when I was fixing it."

Asher's eyebrows rise.

"It was just kissing," Gale assures him as he fixes his shirt once more, examines the loose threads his mother will have to fix when she finds a new button. "She was just holding onto my shirt. I swear."

Asher nods.

"I swear."

With a small smile, Asher hoists the chair and starts walking, waving his hand for Gale to follow.

"She's had a hard life, Gale," he starts. He needs to make sure Gale understands that this can't be one of his week-long flings. Madge Undersee is clearly stronger than he'd thought, he'd seen that during dinner and after, when she'd comforted her mother, but she's still in what he deems an unpredictable situation. Haymitch Abernathy and her mother are still unreliable in his mind, but they're all she has thanks to Asher and his grand plans. He doesn't want his son to be added to the list of people making her life more difficult than it needs to be.

"I know, dad," Gale says. "I'm not going to hurt her."

Asher doubts that. Getting hurt is part of growing up, he just doesn't want wounds that won't heal put upon the girl or Gale.

Not for the first time, he wonders if he's encouraged Gale's crush for selfish reason. It isn't fair for him to pin his failures on his son, and Asher increasingly feels like that may just be what he's doing.

Gale is a good man, but he's only eighteen. While Asher wishes he could say that's young enough to make all the mistakes he wants, even with girls, it isn't. Not in the world they live in. Lives are short and hard, they have to cram all the living into as few a years as they're given and hope it's enough. He'd been instrumental in stealing the Mayors years, cutting his daughter's time with him short.

He hopes he hasn't unconsciously thrust his desire for redemption, to protect the child of a man that had given his life to keep a reckless bunch of men safe, onto his son and stolen his years too.

"And I won't let her end up like Aunt Olive," Gale adds, quietly, almost a whisper.

Asher's stomach clenches up. Olive, his big sister. Years before Gale had been a glimmer in Hazelle's eyes, before Asher had even realized girls existed; Olive had taken on the mantle of breadwinner for the family after their dad's death.

At the time, Asher hadn't known what lengths his sister had gone to keep the family from starving, but after she'd become pregnant, given the choice between getting rid of the child or being shipped off he realized just what her sacrifice had been.

"You never do anything you aren't willing to take responsibility for," he'd told Gale, and then Rory, and would tell Vick someday. They needed to be careful.

He didn't want his boys to be responsible for someone else's Olive being taken off and never coming home.

"Good," is all Asher manages to say.

His son is a good man. Better than him maybe.

"Besides, if anyone is going to get hurt, it's going to be me," Gale carries on, not sensing Asher's shifted mood, or maybe because he senses it. "Haymitch came home when we were on the porch and I think he may be plotting my murder as we speak."

Eyebrows pulling together and mouth turning down, Asher looks at Gale. "Haymitch? Shouldn't he be in the Capitol still?"

Gale shrugs. "Said they didn't need him, and really, can you blame them?" He makes a face. "If I could snap my fingers and make him disappear I would."

Asher booms with laughter.

"Just be good to her," he tells Gale as the Everdeen house comes into view.

Gale nods. "I will."

#######

Jude whittles away the wood, shaving off shards until the design on the whistle begins to form.

It's for Prim, he'd wanted to get it finished before her first Reaping, a good luck charm, but that hope has been dashed already. His days in the mines have taken their toll, he just doesn't have the energy some days, and his daughter had paid the price.

"It's okay, dad," she'd told him, wrapping him in a hug and squeezing him tightly.

He might finish it before the end of summer, that's his new goal.

Just as he's starting on an intricate design along the side, a small primrose, he hears laughter coming from the distance.

Getting up, he squints into the darkness until a pair of figures finally come into the edges of his lamplight, both carrying chairs.

"Hey, Jude," Asher says with a grin. "Brought the chairs back."

"Made good use of them?"

Gale had mentioned that Madge and Matilda Undersee were coming to dinner, and Jude is curious how it had gone.

Asher has been trying for years to get the kid to come, mostly out of guilt over what had happened with her father. A feeling Jude can commiserate with. Jude had tried to have Katniss ask her over, just to gauge for himself how she seemed, make sure she wasn't being mistreated by Haymitch Abernathy, but that had fallen flat.

"I'm not going to keep asking her," Katniss had told him, shooting him an agitated look when he'd asked if she'd invited her over again. "She said she had to get home."

His daughter didn't notice anything wrong, and she didn't feel the need to pry, so he'd dropped the subject after a while. Katniss wasn't one to press an issue. Asher probably had the better chance anyway.

Gale is a good looking kid, doesn't seem to have many problems getting girls to agree to whatever he has to say, so Jude had assumed soft-spoken, quiet little Madge Undersee would quickly say yes the second he asked her to dinner.

But she hadn't.

Year after year, she'd said no, much to Gale's confusion.

"What is it with her?" He'd asked Jude while they'd practiced with the bow. "She doesn't even think about it."

Asher found it funny that his son was getting a taste of rejection.

"It's good for him," he'd said one day on the ride down into the mines. "He needs to do a little chasing, deflate that head of his."

From the rumors Jude had heard about Gale, his trips to the infamous slag heap and the number of girls he'd allegedly dated, or at least been connected with, Asher might've been right.

Still, he felt for the boy.

"Doesn't matter," Gale had muttered, nocking his arrow and brushing the thought away. "She doesn't need to be out in the Seam anyways."

That had struck a chord with Jude, sounding just a little too familiar.

"She's too good for the Seam," he'd told his own dad, back when he'd first noticed the apothecary's daughter.

It wasn't until after the Quarter Quell, when her friend, Madge's aunt, had been Reaped, that he'd realized how fine a line separated the Town and the Seam. The Quarter Quell had opened his eyes to how short life could be, and just how little the odds were in anyone's favor.

"I thought that about Val," he'd told Gale. "She's holding up pretty well."

Which was mostly the truth. He isn't sure how his wife would handle life if he weren't there. When the alarms had signaled and the men had been lost, all those years ago, just after the Mayor's death, she'd been an absolute mess when he'd finally gotten home. He doesn't like to think what she'd have done if _he_ had been in that mine.

Gale hadn't responded, just nodded and fired off the arrow, killing his first goose that day.

Asher smiles as he plops the chair onto the porch. "I'd say so."

He gives Gale a grin then ruffles his hair.

"Dad!" Gale tries to sound mad, but his grin makes that almost impossible. He smashes his hair back down and sets his chair on the porch.

The door behind Jude opens and Katniss steps out, glaring at the group . "Are you trying to wake the entire row?"

Gale shoots Asher a sharp look, clearly annoyed at being scolded, before rolling them at Katniss.

"What's got you in such a good mood?" Katniss asks, eyebrows high on her head as she surveys Gale, takes in the missing buttons on his shirt and the wrinkles Jude had only just noticed himself. "Did you get in a fight?"

Snorting, Gale scowls. "Why would that put me in a good mood?"

Katniss shrugs. "I don't know."

"Why do you look like the cat ate the canary?" Jude finally asks. Sometimes it doesn't hurt to be direct with kids, especially teenage boys.

Exchanging a look with Asher, who raises his eyebrows as if to say 'it's up to you', Gale looks back at Jude and gives him a small, but no less excited, smile. "I, uh, kissed Madge."

Katniss frowns. "Madge Undersee?"

"Yeah," Gale says with a flick of his eyes upward. "How many 'Madges' do you know?"

"I didn't know you liked her," she answers him before looking to Jude. "Did you?"

Honestly, it was kind of hard to miss, but if anyone could do it, it was his Katniss. She's an excellent hunter, but when it comes to catching subtle, or in Gale's case not so subtle, hints about what people like and don't, she's a bit clueless.

That's his fault, he knows that. She's been so focused on survival, helping him keep her and her mother and sister alive, learning to care for them if something were to happen to him, that she's missed out on some more basic skills of interaction. He's failed her, and he wishes he could change that.

He gives her a nod and a pat on the back, assuring her with a wink that she's not made some huge mistake by not catching onto Gale's crush. She gives him a small grin in return before looking back at Gale and Asher.

"So are you dating then?"

Gale frowns. "Well, I got run off before we could talk."

By the way the color deepens further on Gale's face, Jude gets the impression that he hadn't had actually planned much talking, even if he hadn't been run off.

"Haymitch Abernathy is back," Asher says, a hint of some indefinable unease in his voice.

Normally the Victor doesn't come back until after the Games end. His coming home early isn't necessarily ominous, but it is odd.

Odd enough that Asher will probably want to discuss it at length for the next week. The thought grates on Jude slightly.

He's had enough planning, enough trying to outwit the Capitol. He has no desire to decipher the movements of District Twelve's Victor or what it might mean in the grand scheme of things. He just wants to make amends, make sure the girl lives as happy a life as she can, and keep his own girls safe and fed.

"I have to keep trying," he'd said when Jude had asked him why he felt the need to continue trying to find an out, find a way to take the Capitol down as they chipped away coal in the dim mines. "Your girls won't end up down here, Jude. My boys will."

Maybe Jude would feel different if he had sons, but he doesn't, and he just wants to survive.

Instead of giving a confirmation, letting him know he'll think about it, try to imagine why Haymitch is back sooner than he should be, Jude just smiles warily.

"That's something isn't it."

Taking one of the chairs, he looks at Katniss. "Grab the other one, Katniss. We need to get to bed." He gives Asher and Gale a little nod goodbye. "See you in the morning, Asher."

Asher's mouth is down turned, just slightly, and Jude mentally prepares himself for the barrage he'll receive tomorrow in the mines.

_Aren't you curious? This might be important. We need to always be paying attention. _

But Jude isn't interested in a revolution, even if Asher still is.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 5**

AN: Thanks everyone! Next update won't be for a few days. Sorry, but here's a little fluff to hold you over.

#######

Madge wakes to the smell of bacon and pancakes.

Combing her hair, pulling it back and securing it with a ribbon, a new one Mr. Abernathy had brought her from the Capitol, she then quietly pads across her room, out the door, down the hall and to the stairs.

When she gets downstairs, she makes her way to the kitchen; hovering in the doorway and watching Mr. Abernathy flip a pancake expertly.

He turns when he feels her eyes on him, flashes a smile and jerks his head to the table. "Already got you a plate, kid."

Bare feet slapping softly, Madge crosses behind him and takes the seat at the table.

After a few minutes he brings the last plate over, stacked high with golden pancakes, and sets it in the middle of the table before pulling the chair across from Madge out and dropping into in with a groan.

"Gettin' old," he mutters to himself as he starts pilling pancakes onto his own plate, drizzling syrup over them, an expensive treat from his trips to the Hob. As he cuts into the stack with his fork, he glances up and jabs at Madge's plate. "Not hungry?"

She gives him a shrug.

When she'd first moved to the Victors' Village, before he'd been able to get her mother out of the hospital, he'd made her pancakes for her first breakfast.

At first she'd been hesitant to eat. Mrs. Oberst made pancakes and Madge had never much cared for them. They were dry and she never let Madge use as much syrup as she wanted. Never so much as a square of butter.

"Well mine are special," he'd explained, cutting them for her even though she could do it herself. "My mother's recipe."

Only because she hadn't wanted to offend him, she'd tried them, using as little syrup as possible.

"Drown 'em," he'd grunted before soaking the flat little cakes and the dollop of butter under his black market syrup.

After that she'd loved them. Somehow, even being made from tesserae grain, they still taste delicious. Now, she uses more butter and syrup than necessary, just because she can. It's one of a long line of indulgences he lets her have.

It's his treat for her. His apology for having to go off to the Capitol. After last night she hadn't expected him to make them for her, maybe as a way of showing her all things come at a price.

She should've known though. He's never been one to like hard lessons, especially not if he's the one handing them out.

Her mother drifts in, still in her nightgown, and settles into the seat between them. Mr. Abernathy pushes the last plate to her, pancakes already buttered and cut. She smiles at them before picking up the little glass jar and spreading syrup over them.

They eat in silence for a few minutes before Mr. Abernathy clears his throat.

"Guess I'll go by the Hob, get some more drinks." He then glares at the last of the bag of strawberries Gale and his father had brought by, almost empty since Madge and her mother had dipped most of them and taken them to dinner the night before. He probably thinks they hadn't brought enough and is probably considering searching out more, not that he'll find any. Madge remembers overhearing Katniss say that strawberries were scarce this season.

"Madge can go with you," her mother says, her eyes fixed on something outside the kitchen window. "She can see if they have a new piece for her to play. It'll be a nice change of pace for her."

Frowning and forcing down the anxiety bubbling up in her stomach, Marge starts to tell her no, she can't go with him. Just the thought of venturing to the Hob, with or without Mr. Abernathy's protection, is terrifying, but then she feels her mother's hand reach under the table, squeezing her hand. Glancing over, her mother gives her a little smile. She's up to something, Madge just isn't sure what.

"I don't think so, 'Tilda," Mr. Abernathy says, his mouth still full of food. "The Hob isn't a place for a lady."

She frowns at him. Not that she wants to go, but something about his dismissal of it, flat out saying she doesn't belong there, annoys her.

As he's bending his head down to shovel in another mouthful, he catches Madge's disappointed expression and stares at her for a minute.

A little syrup leaks out the side of Mr. Abernathy's mouth, dribbles down his chin, as he's too busy focusing on her to notice. Madge watches as her mother licks her thumb, reaches over and wipes it away.

Startled, he sits up and shoots her a curious look. She simply smiles back.

"Please, Haymitch?"

#######

The Hob stinks.

There are too many people in it. Unwashed bodies and clothes, strange foods and the scent of dirt mingle in the air unpleasantly. Madge wrinkles her nose and glances at Mr. Abernathy.

He's unbothered by it. Of course, he comes on a regular basis, he's built a tolerance for it.

"Stay close," he warns her. It's wholly unnecessary. Her fingers have fused with the sleeve of his shirt.

They pass by a stand selling something furry and another with worn and patched clothes, all the way to the back to where a one armed woman sits, drinking from a filthy looking metal cup.

"Back already, Haymitch?" She asks, grinning at him. She's missing more than a few teeth and the ones she has are threatening to make an exit.

"I was more trouble than I'm worth," Mr. Abernathy tells her as he points to a pile of dusty liquor bottles. "My usual."

He hands her a heavy looking bag, one Madge has seen countless times over the years, and as she takes it her dull gray eyes settle on Madge.

"Brought your little princess with you for once, huh?"

Though her expression remains neutral, a talent she's honed over the years, Madge rankles at being called a princess. If they'd seen her in the community home, in the holding cell, filthy and broken, they wouldn't think she's any kind of mock royalty.

The woman squints at her. "She is a pretty one. No wonder you wanted her."

Madge isn't quite sure what she means by that, and a quick glance at Mr. Abernathy lets her know he doesn't either. He just quirks his mouth to the side and arches his eyebrows, trying to work out if he's been insulted or not.

When the bag is full and the payment made, they make their way over toward the source of a sickly smell, something close to burnt hair.

"Greasy Sae's," he tells her, tilting his head toward the stall along the wall, a wooden, makeshift bar with modge-podged stools. "Want something?"

Madge doesn't dignify that with a response, just raises her eyebrows and turns her back on the offensive smelling stall.

He leads her to a smaller booth, one with boxes all lines up along the small patch of floor.

"Here's where I usually pick up your sheets," he tells her, giving one of the boxes a gentle kick with his foot, causing dust to balloon into the air. "Go crazy, sweetheart."

For nearly an hour she picks through the boxes, coughing as she looks at the sheet music and picks new pieces to try. By the time she's through she's decided on four, but gets seven. The man looks like he could use the money and Mr. Abernathy has plenty.

"Glad you're so generous with my savings," he tells her, trying and failing to look annoyed with her.

"You could've made me put some back." She gives him a small smile.

He just chuckles and steers her away from the boxes.

The exit is in view, Madge can see a small patch of blue sky outside, when she hears her name.

At first she thinks she's hearing things. No one calls for her except her mother and Mr. Abernathy; it makes no sense for anyone else to. Still, she stops and turns, squints into the crowd milling through the building.

She spots Gale easily over the top of everyone else, he's a good head taller than most, as he makes his way from the smelly old lady's cook house.

He stops just short of stepping on her. "Madge?"

He's in his hunting clothes, brown pants and a dark colored shirt, though she supposed they may be his every day clothes. It's possible he hasn't got many choices, likely even.

Her expression must dim at the thought, because his mouth turns down. "Something wrong?"

Forcing a smile, she really is happy to see him, she shakes her head. "No, just...surprised."

"Yeah, never would've expected to see you here." He reaches up and begins rubbing his neck, glancing around. "Why _are_ you here?"

"She came with me," Mr. Abernathy grumbles, causing Madge to jump. She forgot he was there.

To his credit, Gale doesn't flinch at the rough tone, just nods and glances back at Madge. They stare at each other silently for a minute until Mr. Abernathy clears his throat and gives Gale a bored look. "Did you need something, _Gale,_ or are you just wasting our time?"

Madge gives him a sharp look which he only shrugs at.

It finally occurs to Madge that this is why her mother had said she should go to the Hob. Gale only has a short time before he's sent into the mines, there's only a few places he's going to be spending his last few free days, and the Hob is on that list.

She'd been betting on his being there, and she hadn't been wrong.

"I, uh, I was just surprised to see her here," Gale tells him.

"She shouldn't be," Mr. Abernathy grumbles. "Her mother thought it would be fun."

His tone lets Madge know he's realized just what her mother had planned, and he doesn't look thrilled with her foresight. Something tells Madge he isn't going to be such a pushover about taking her mother's prodding from now on.

Gale nods, not really understanding the irritation in Mr. Abernathy's voice, before he turns his attention back to Madge.

"Since you're out, do you want to get lunch?" He jerks his thumb over his shoulder, toward the foul smelling place against the wall.

Madge tries not to make a face. She'd rather not, but she doesn't want to offend him, and she _really_ would like to spend a little more time with him. Her mother's hard work shouldn't be for nothing after all.

Giving Mr. Abernathy a half glance, she makes her decision despite his glaring at Gale.

"I-Yeah, that sounds good."

Gale lights up, his smile dancing in his eyes, and she feels her face warm at the thought that she's the reason behind that glow.

Beside her, Mr. Abernathy grunts, but doesn't say anything, just turns his glare on her.

Giving Gale a small smile, she waves her hand toward Mr. Abernathy. "Give me a minute."

Shuffling off, Gale keeps an eye on them as Madge reaches out, takes Mr. Abernathy's hand and gives it a squeeze.

"Thought you weren't hungry?" He asks, shifting his bag of booze on his shoulder so that it blocks Gale's view.

"It isn't about the food," she mutters, her eyes careful to avoid his. "You know that."

"Yeah," he grumbles. "I do."

Popping up on her toes, she presses a kiss to his scruffy cheek. "I'll be okay."

He turns his head and narrows his eyes on Gale. "You'd better be."

Throwing an arm over her shoulder, he walks her across the stream of people and to Gale. He settles him in a narrow look before turning back to Madge and taking her by the shoulders.

"Be home before dark-"

"I'll make sure of it," Gale tells him.

Mr. Abernathy ignores him.

"-and no slag heap-"

"I'm _not _going to take her to the _slag heap_." Gale looks particularly offended at this.

"-and he touches you, kick him in the nuts, understand?"

Madge sighs. "Go find yourself some strawberries."

With one last huff and a glare at Gale, Mr. Abernathy finally leaves.

Turning her back on him, Madge gives Gale a weak smile. "So, what were your plans for the day?"

It's a stupid thing to say, and she almost cringes when the words leave her mouth, but Gale just gives her an easy smile. "Spending time with a pretty girl it seems."

#######

Haymitch taps his eye with his free hand then points to Gale while Madge turns her back. His message is loud and clear, just as his advice to Madge had been moments before.

_I'm watching you, you little asshole._

He really doesn't understand how Madge puts up with him. He treats her like she's five.

"So, what were your plans for the day?" Madge finally asks, her cheeks tingeing pink.

She's nervous, he can tell. Her arms are crossed rigidly over her chest and he's pretty sure every muscle in her body is tense, every nerve on end. She's a deer that's heard a twig snap and is ready to run. A social butterfly, Madge Undersee, is not.

Trying to put her at ease, his brain spits out one of the cheesiest things he's ever said, to anyone.

"Spending time with a pretty girl it seems."

Her lips twitch at the edges and Gale tries not to roll his eyes at his own crappy line.

"Should you go tell her you're spending the day with me instead or are you just going to leave her hanging?"

It takes him a few seconds to catch what she's said and he scowls at her when he does.

"Ha ha," he grumbles, uncertain if she's serious or fishing for compliments. Either way, he feels the need to counter it. "You do realize you're gorgeous?"

Her blush intensifies and Gale realizes she'd probably been a bit serious. He'll need to rectify that. Finding things to compliment her on shouldn't be too hard, he's catalogued every beautiful detail of her for years.

He probably won't tell her that though, at least not in so many words. It sounds a bit like a stalker.

Glancing around, he begins to feel people starting to stare.

It isn't shocking, Madge stands out. The Hob is almost exclusively Seam. There's an oddball here or there, who like Katniss' sister, Prim, have Town looks, but even so Madge is an anomaly. None of the regulars are here, and Madge's pale hair and light skin, coupled with the pretty dress she's wearing, maybe mostly because of the dress, stands out.

Before anyone can say anything, maybe not to her (even if most people think Haymitch is a drunken mess they respect him-and his money-enough not to upset her) but close enough for her to hear, Gale gestures toward Greasy Sae's. "Come on."

With a hand on her back, fingers gently settled between her shoulder blades, he steers her through the crowd and to the stall. They take one of the makeshift tables with overturned crates for chairs and he glances around him to make sure no one annoying is near.

Thom is helping his great aunt and Katniss, while not annoying really, is clueless and would be a hindrance on what may be his only chance to impress Madge, is spending the day with her sister.

He sighs. "So, want some stew? Sae's got some deer meat in it." Among other things, all purchased from him and Katniss.

She doesn't make a face, just blinks a few times before shaking her head. "No thanks, I-Mr. Abernathy made me a big breakfast."

Gale pushes down disappointment. He'd hoped she'd at least try some, see it wasn't as bad as she probably thinks. Maybe it is though. She's too used to nice meats, anything he can offer probably would taste like gravel.

As if reading his thoughts, she starts babbling. "I mean I would. I-Mr. Abernathy's cooked squirrel for me a few times, he bought it from Katniss and her dad, and I liked it well enough and-but-he makes me breakfast, a big breakfast, whenever he comes back from the Capitol, and I ate too much and it was really sweet, the pancakes, not here-I mean," she stumbles over her tongue, "It was-_is_, it _is_ sweet of you to ask me to eat with you and-"

"Madge," Gale cuts her off. She looks like she's about to cry. "It's okay."

"No." She shakes her head. "I look like a snob now. And a crazy one at that."

Gale shakes his head. "But a pretty one too."

Her cheeks glow as she stares down at her fingers, all twisted together in her lap. "Still..."

Reaching across the table, he grabs her hands before she can wring her fingers off. "Madge, this is all," he bites his lip, "an acquired taste. Try it or don't, it's your choice."

Though he hopes she gives it a chance eventually. He'll ease her into it, maybe start her with some jerky.

She gives him one of her rare, albeit, weak smiles. "This was a lot easier when it was just kissing."

He grins at her, she isn't wrong. "I'm not opposed to more of that."

Though not at the slag heap. He's too fond of all his internal organs to risk angering Haymitch by taking her there. Granted, it isn't exactly the place a girl like Madge should be taken. He knows that.

Her eyes drop back to her hands, his larger one covering them, and her smile brightens a little. "Me either."

His stomach rumbles and he feels his face heat up. His body is constantly finding ways to ruin his moments.

"First, lunch." _He_ hadn't had a big breakfast after all.

#######

Gale had originally planned on going to the woods.

There wouldn't be any more sleeping in and sneaking off in the afternoon for him come the fall, when he officially started in the mines, so he figured it was as good a plan as any.

Running into Madge had definitely put those plans on hold. Not that he minded.

After he ate his lunch, which had more deer meat in it than he'd originally thought, they headed out.

They pass along the outskirts of the Seam, narrowly avoiding Rory and Vick who are out playing a game of kickball with some of their friends. It's nothing short of a miracle, if they'd seen he'd never have a moment's peace.

Rory would want more details than he's deserving of and Vick would get confused, or worse yet, be interested, and Gale just isn't ready for his youngest brother to start being interested in girls. Unfortunately he's already asked Gale some rather embarrassing questions, which he'd deflected to his dad, so the carefree days of Vick being completely oblivious to women may be passed.

As the sun gets hotter, they end up passing through the meadow, disappearing into the cool shade of the trees around it. Away from nosy kids and their even nosier parents.

They walk until they run into the fence, the hum is gone, it isn't on.

"Don't you worry about getting caught?" She asks as she eyes the woods beyond the wire warily. "They could execute you."

"Dead one way or another," he tells her with a shrug. "One's just slower than the other."

And he'd prefer not to starve. That's the slowest way he can imagine.

She seems to think that over for a minute, rolling it around in her mind, then nods, slowly, barely enough to notice. "I guess."

Madge probably knows a thing or two about death, he thinks. Even living in the Seam he hasn't had as intimate a relationship with it as she has.

The rumor mill had said that she was in the house when the Mayor died and that her mother was on the verge of an overdose before they'd gotten to her. She'd been such a tiny thing too, maybe Vick's size, and Gale doesn't want to picture her watching her dad died or her mother slipping away, even if she hadn't. That isn't something a person, especially a little kid, gets over easily.

Considering her careful demeanor and quiet, guarded nature, maybe she hasn't.

He's never heard her talk about her time in custody, first with the Peacekeepers and then at the community home, but he thinks they're closer than he'd want to be to the edge of oblivion.

Her eyes are still focused on the woods, following birds as they dart in and out of the thick foliage, and he can almost see the worry still flickering in them.

To get her mind off all the unlikely possibilities, or perhaps all too likely, he comes up behind her and wraps his arms around her waist, burying his face in her neck. It's a simple pleasure, one he's waited ages to indulge in.

"Gale!" She squeaks, making a feeble attempt to wiggle free before she twists in his arms and grabs his face, giving him a scrutinizing look.

"What?" He asks, his grin widening. "I thought you said you missed the kissing part?"

Her entire face flushes pink and she drops her gaze, unable to meet his eyes. "Well-I-"

Before she can finish her thought, Gale dips in again, catches her lips and crushes her to his chest.

Her cool little fingers find their way to his hair, tangle in it and make him all but certain that it'll be a disaster before he's home. He doesn't care though, it's worth it to have her with him, away from distractions and crazy Haymitch Abernathy.

Somehow they end up on the ground, he honestly isn't sure how it happens, and one of his hands has wrinkled the bottom of her dress up in some half-formed plan to free her legs from it. He swears his hands have minds of their own sometimes. They're going to get him killed.

Madge has a little more restraint, or maybe it's her uncertainty shining through, but her hands have stayed at his hair, only drifting down to his shoulder every now and again, nails scraping against his skin and shirt.

Air finally becomes a necessity, and Gale pulls back, resting his forehead against hers.

Her eyes are bright, wide as they study him up close.

She runs her fingertips along his jaw, tracing the stubble up to his cheeks before running her fingers through his hair again.

While she's occupied with his hair, lulling him into a stupor with her hands, he studies her face.

She looks younger up close. There's a smattering of pale freckles over her nose, spilling onto her cheeks, just barely visible. He's probably the only person to notice them, only person ever close enough to notice them. The thought makes his stomach flip.

Leaning in, he presses a kiss to her cheek, just under her eye, on the constellation of freckles.

"Your hair is soft," she murmurs, gently tugging at it.

_Your whole body is soft_.

Carefully, he presses a line of kisses down her neck, wondering if the fading blush extends past the neckline of her dress.

"Gale," he hears her say, her hands sliding down from his hair and cupping his face, making him look at her. "Gale, shouldn't we talk?"

Talking, at least in Gale's opinion, is a bit overrated. Why talk when there are so many more pleasant things to do with your mouth?

Still, he likes her, he likes her a _lot_. If she wants to talk, he'll talk.

Propping himself up on his elbows, he tries to school his features into a serious expression. "What do you want to talk about?"

Her eyebrows knit together and her slightly swollen lips turn down. "I don't know. What do people usually talk about?"

Gale shrugs. He's never been in a talking relationship. Honestly, they've never held much appeal to him.

Madge bites her lip in thought. "Well...do you like ice cream?"

He isn't sure what kind of question that is, but he shrugs. "I guess. Only had it once."

"Maybe you can come over and have some." Her mouth tugs to the side. "If you promise to bring us more strawberries."

The temptation is too much and he dips in and presses a kiss to her lips. "Sure thing."

She gives him a small push back. "Now you ask a question."

Making an agitated noise, Gale wracks his brain for a question. It's a hard task to accomplish with Madge pinned under him. Before he can fully think it through, his mouth spits out the first thing that comes to mind. "How many dresses do you have?"

The color seems to vanish from her skin and Gale starts to backtrack.

"Sorry, I didn't mean anything by it," he tells her quickly. His mind had just been focused on the texture of her dress that he'd been rumpling in his hand only minutes before, soft and smooth, unlike anything he's ever owned. "It's just a stupid question."

The stupidest question.

Thinking he's ruined the mood, cursing himself for his mouth being faster than his brain, Gale starts to get up. There's no way she'll want to carry on with the thought that he thinks she really _is _a snob hanging over their heads.

To his surprise she catches him by the collar, her fingers holding him firmly in place.

She holds his startled gaze for a second, and he hopes she sees that he doesn't think of her as just a girl in expensive clothes. There's more to her than that, and he's a complete jerk who speaks before he thinks. Surely she can relate to speaking without full control of what's coming out her mouth.

After a few moments of contemplation she speaks.

"Not as many as Mr. Abernathy would like me to," she finally says, lifting her head enough that she's able to graze her lips over the corner of his mouth. Her eyes stay wide, focused on him as she lets her head drop back, come to a rest against the soft grass. "My turn."

They go on like that for hours, exchanging questions for kisses, until Gale realizes how dangerously close they are to sundown.

He pulls her from the ground, helps her dust the dirt and leave, tiny twigs and bits of grass from her dress and hair before they start the trek back to the Victors' Village.

"Any secret trails we can use?" He asks her, only half joking. It would be useful knowledge to have, for future reference.

She gives him a sly look, waits half a heartbeat, then grabs his hand. "Follow me."

#######

Haymitch lets the screen door screech shut behind him. "Matilda!"

She doesn't answer, so he storms into the living room, grumbling to himself the whole time.

She tricked him, that's the only explanation for it. He should've known she had another reason for wanting Madge to go to the Hob. Somehow she'd known the little bastard was going to be there and she'd batted her eyes and given him that stupid smile so that he wouldn't question it too much.

He really needs to be more firm with them; they're starting to walk all over him.

"Matilda!" He yells up the stairs. Her door is shut so he bangs up the stairs and opens it without knocking. "Matilda?"

The shades are closed, the room is cool and dark, just how she likes it when she gets a headache.

Squinting, he spots her on the bed, blanket pulled up over her head, burrowed deep into her mattress.

Quietly, he pads across the room, stopping to stare at the lump that is Matilda for a minute before he nudges her over and flops beside her on the bed. Gently, he reaches over and pulls the comforter from her head. "How's the head, sweetheart?"

Her back is to him and she has her fingers pressed to her temples as she sighs. "Better."

"Need something?" He asks, brushing a wild strand of pale hair from the back of her hand.

She tilts her head back, glancing at him for half a second before she rolls over, her hazy blue eyes settling on him as she shakes her head. Her lips press together, then unpress a few times before she puts her fingers to her temples again and closes her eyes. "I turned the television on, by accident, when I was cleaning. They were discussing how the Games will end."

Haymitch sighs and strokes her hair, twirling a strand between his fingers. So that's what started it.

There's nothing to say, just sit with her or drug her up until the pain passes.

He's heard people talking, saying it's all in her head, and that may be true. It doesn't mean it isn't real though.

If anyone knows how bad the things in a person's head can mess them up, it's Haymitch.

After a few minutes, her wide blue eyes open and she frowns. "Are you mad at me?"

He shakes his head. Maybe he had been, but he can't stay that way, not with her anyway.

"You were yelling," she mumbles, turning her face to the pillow. "You sounded mad."

Chuckling, he brushes some hair from her face. "Well, you tricked me, you minx."

Peeking up, she gives him a weak smile. "Whoops."

Haymitch settles down a little lower and works his hand under her, wraps his arm around her and tugs her a little closer.

"Whoops my ass," he mutters as he nuzzles his nose into her hair. "I forgot how devious you are."

One of her hands settles flat on his stomach, fingers flexing and relaxing against the fabric of his shirt. "He was there?"

"Mmmhmm," he grunts, letting the quiet and cool of the room settle his nerves.

"Are they on a date?"

The edge of hopefulness in her voice annoys him. What's so great about a date? Just hanging around in public with a bunch of idiots and not doing what people who date really want to do.

If he ever wanted that he'd just ask to stay in the Capitol.

His stomach lurches as he imagines Madge _not_ on a date.

The Hob suddenly seems like a lovely place considering the other options.

"Yeah," he grumbles. "They're on a date."

He can almost see the smile pressed into his side. "Good."

#######

When he wakes up it's to the sound of the screen screeching open. Madge is home.

Quickly, he rolls Matilda off his arm and tries to shake the pins and needles from it as he quietly makes his way across the room. He shuts the door softly and takes the steps as fast as he can.

He can see Madge just through the doorway, on her tip toes, digging through the icebox.

A sigh of relief almost escapes his lips, then the boy comes up behind her and lets one of his filthy hands come to a rest on her waist as the other reaches over her head and moves something in the fridge.

They're standing a little too close for his liking, the boy is pressed a little to tightly against Madge's back, so he clears his throat and starts across the living room for the kitchen.

He's pleased to see Hawthorne jump back, a flare of terror in his eyes at Haymitch's appearance.

Crossing his arms, Haymitch focuses on Madge. "What're you looking for, Pearl?"

She's completely pink, and for some reason that comforts him. Madge has been too sheltered to build up that natural immunity to parental needling. Her embarrassment, if she were ever to do anything really, truly horrible, would be painted all over her face.

"Ice cream," she says, glancing at the open fridge.

"I ate it all," he tells her. It had made him sick, probably not the best idea to mix it with his white liquor the night before, but he'd do it again if it meant Hawthorne never got a taste.

"Oh." Madge frowns at the floor before looking at the boy. "Maybe next time."

Next time? Hadn't one date been enough? One date was testing Haymitch's generosity, which was pretty thinly spread in the first place.

It isn't until Madge looks at him, her blue eyes wide and worried, that he feels a lurch of regret.

She'd had nightmares for a while after he'd brought her back from the community home and he'd spent more nights than he cares to remember sitting up with her, looking into those same bright eyes.

"What's going to happen next time?" She'd sobbed on his shoulder, soaking his shirt through. "What happens when they take you away?"

"They aren't going to take me away," he'd reassured her as he'd brushed the tears from her little cheeks. "I'm a Victor. I'm too mean to kill, remember?"

It wasn't true, not in the slightest, but it had soothed her. As a Victor he was just as vulnerable, maybe more so, than most.

He'd been safe though, made sure Matilda and Madge were safe and sheltered by an irritable Wiress who'd agreed to help him save both of them.

"Only because Birdy needs some practice," she'd complained. "This will be a good learning experience for her. Altering documents and such."

"And if anything happens, you make sure it's me they come after."

Wiress' expression had softened, if only for a flash, at that before settling back into her cool mask.

"I make no guarantees, Haymitch."

"Well, _make_ it a guarantee," he snapped. "I've messed up too much, gotten too many people killed. You promise me you'll make sure they're safe, Wiress."

She'd promised after that. He'd never seen her so sincere.

"I suppose I owe it to Mayor Undersee. He exposed some flaws in the system with his death," she'd told him, rubbing her eyes wearily. "He also diverted attention to the local governments and off of us. I doubt we'd have managed to go undetected during the 70th if he hadn't, and there's no telling where that would've landed us during the 71st."

Dead or worse, Haymitch thinks, and Wiress seems fully aware of that.

He didn't care though, if it was repayment to a dead man or penance to him that made her help, made her promise to keep his girls safe no matter what happened to him. He only cared that she did.

With the most recent Games, he and several other Victors getting ousted from the Capitol before the final two were even a certainty, old worries were brought to the surface.

"They don't want us loitering, hanging around one another," Wiress had told him. "They've even scrambled the codes. I'm having to recalibrate all my communication devices just to talk to Birdy in Two."

Wiress and Beetee, all their little trouble making friends, with all their wild schemes, their manipulating the people of the Capitol to hand pick the most recent winners, are working on borrowed time. Snow is catching on to what they're doing, and it's only a matter of time before he puts an end to their experiments in social control.

Just where that's going to land him, he isn't sure. He isn't part of their game, not really, but he isn't _not_ part of it.

If something happens to him, and he worries it will, sooner than later probably, Madge and Matilda will be thrown to the streets. He doesn't want to think what they'd be forced to do without him to protect them.

Gale Hawthorne, as annoying and dirty as Haymitch sees him to be, is strong, and if he's anything like his father is said to be, loyal and brave to a fault. He's capable, gathers and hunts enough that he has some to sell, so that's a plus. Even with his shit reputation, Haymitch thinks he'd take care of both Madge and Matilda if he had to.

He hopes he's reading him right.

It might be worth feeling out this tentative relationship if it'll keep them safe should the worst happen. Maybe that's what Matilda's been thinking about. He doubts it, she's a romantic, not a pragmatist.

Haymitch is though, and he isn't above using the handsy little bastard for his own purposes.

"Maybe after dinner," Haymitch offers, unable to keep from grinding his teeth. This is the ultimate sacrifice, getting to know the boy that's so clearly trying to get in his Madge's skirt. "How about tomorrow? Around seven?"

The boy's thick eyebrows scrunch together, probably trying to figure out just why Haymitch has the sudden urge to break bread with him. That's what Haymitch would be wondering.

Madge is giving him a confused little once over too, he'll have to come up with a good reason for her. She's sharp, unfortunately so at times.

Finally, the boy nods. "Sounds good." He holds out his hand. "See you tomorrow then."

Haymitch takes his hand, and for a second they battle over who is going to crack the other's fingers before Madge gives him a hard look.

The boy nods and Madge walks him out, probably for more kissing, Haymitch thinks irritably as he picks up a jar of green beans Matilda had apparently forgotten about on the counter.

When she comes back she narrows her eyes and frowns. "What are you planning?"

"You always think the worst of me, don't you Pearl?" He clasps a hand over his heart. "I'm wounded."

"Right," she huffs. "Please don't be planning anything horrible. Gale's-he's great and he's nice and a good-"

"If you say 'kisser' I will throw up right here," Haymitch tells her, jabbing his finger at the kitchen floor. "I mean it."

"He's a good _hunter_," she finishes, pressing her fingers to her temples.

"And that's why I want to get to know him," he says. It's the truth, or at least a version of it. "See if he's good enough to take care of my Pearl someday."

Her expression softens and her arms, which had been crossed over her chest, drop. "I'm not a baby, I don't need taken care of."

Haymitch sets the jar down and crosses over to the door, reaches up and takes her face between his hands.

"Everyone needs a little taken care of every now and then."

Even him. He'd be lying if he said he didn't get anything from Madge and Matilda's presence in his house. They made it a home, made it worth living in. Without them it was just a place to drink and pass out. They took care of him, even if they didn't know it.

He pulls her into a hug, lets his cheek rest against her hair as he squeezes her to his chest. "I only want the best for you, kiddo."

And he'll do whatever he has to for her to be safe, even have dinner with that filthy boy.

She nods against him.

"I know."


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 6**

AN: Sorry for any typos. I'm not all the way awake.

#######

Mr. Abernathy is cooking a steak for the dinner with Gale and Madge isn't sure if he's doing it to be nice or if it's an intimidation tactic.

When she brings it up to her mother, she simply shrugs and gives her an airy smile. "He's a complicated man."

Complicated isn't the word Madge would use, more like conniving. This dinner has an ulterior motive; she just hasn't worked out what it is yet.

"I can't want to do something just to make you happy?" He'd asked, feigning being wounded.

She just stared at him in disbelief. He _might,_ but not this way. Mr. Abernathy would rather eat nails than have dinner with Gale, but whatever reason he has behind his sudden change of heart, he's keeping it to himself.

Instead of staying around and trying to decipher what he's playing at, Madge heads to town, down a back path that comes out near her old home.

The new mayor took out her mother's plants, all her shrubs and rose bushes, buried their garden under a blanket of grass and knocked down the old shed since he moved in. He keeps the house up though. Where her father would let the paint get shabby and start to peel before hiring boys from the Seam to paint, just to put off buying more paint which he saw as an expensive luxury he couldn't justify when people were starving to death, the new mayor has the house painted twice a year, whether it needs it or not, by boys from town.

Mr. Abernathy has told her he's heard the mayor say he'll never use boys from the Seam, even thought the extra pay would benefit them the most.

"Filthy, all of them," he'd told Mr. Abernathy, clearly unaware that the man he was talking to was from the Seam. "Probably steal the silverware."

Mr. Abernathy had come home with a new silverware set the next year, after the newest Victor's Victory Tour, with no explanation. Not that he needed one.

There's a new housekeeper too. Mrs. Oberst had died a few years ago. Her health had taken a downturn after Madge's father's death and disgrace, and Madge suspected it was a result of the two things actually. The old woman had never believed her beloved employer would do such a thing and had died still clinging to that belief. Madge's mother had cried for days after the funeral, which she hadn't even made it through, but Madge had simply felt bad. She'd never exactly gotten along well with her family's horrible old housekeeper, but she certainly didn't want her dead.

Mr. Abernathy on the other hand...

"Good riddance," he'd muttered. "She was a hag."

It's probably the only time in Madge's recent memory that her mother had been too upset with him to speak with him. It had taken a week to finally thaw her to him.

Sometimes Madge wonders what has happened to her room. Probably set up as a guestroom or a sewing room for his wife. The new mayor has no children, he and his wife are older, dull and drab, rarely host Capitol guests as her father had been forced to do, but that doesn't mean much. He's a sycophant, nestled safely in the Capitol's back pocket; they probably don't feel the need to check up on him like they had her father.

With a sigh, she averts her eyes and walks past, down the crumbling road, patched here and there, to the center of town.

Staying to the edge, away from the chattering crowds and keeping her eyes off the screen showing the final two Tributes still clinging to life in the Arena, Madge makes her way to the bakery.

There are a few cakes, half a dozen cupcakes and some bear claws, freshly baked, displayed in the window and Madge inspects them through the glass for a minute before deciding to go in.

The bell above the door tinkles softly and someone calls from the back. "I'm coming!"

Madge is poking a rounded loaf when someone appears through the doorway behind the glass case.

"Madge!"

Peeta has flour in his hair, pink and yellow icing smeared across his apronm a patch on his cheek, and a bright smile lighting his face.

Madge gives him a small smile, wishing she could do better. He's always been kind to her and she hates that even something as simple as a smile is such a trial for her most days.

Peeta had been one of the few people that hadn't shied away from her when she'd come back from the dead. He'd offered to be her partner in their shared classes, asked her how she was feeling, and even snuck her cookies occasionally.

"You don't wish I was dead?" She'd asked him, inspecting the cookie as if he may have poisoned it.

His eyebrows had pulled together in concern. "Why would I wish that?"

While Katniss was her silent partner, her harsh reality, someone who didn't ask her questions and didn't seem interested in prying answers or idle chit chat from her, Peeta was a piece of normalcy. When he was around she could almost pretend none of the awfulness had ever happened, that her father was still alive, and that she was the same Madge she'd always been.

Even if it was only an illusion, it was a pleasant one, one she was grateful for.

"I need to pick up some cheese rolls," she tells him, squinting through the glass and not seeing any.

He jerks his head toward the doorway he'd just come through and grins. "Just in time then. I've got some cooling in the back."

Madge shifts her bag and opens it, finds the coin purse Mr. Abernathy had given her and pulls it out, anticipating how much the rolls will cost.

"I need two more than usual," she calls to him through the doorway.

Peeta reappears, giving her a scrutinizing look. "Two more?" His lips twitch up. "So you really _are_ seeing Gale Hawthorne aren't you?"

She sighs. Apparently the rumor mill of District Twelve had swiftly spread the news, and while it's nice to not be gossiped about over something horrible for once, she still wishes her private life weren't so many bored people's entertainment. She isn't sure how extra rolls translate to dating, but she nods for Peeta anyway. He's her friend so she doesn't mind him prodding. Not much anyways.

His smile widens. "That's great, Madge! When?"

Quietly, she tells him about dinner at the Hawthornes' and the kiss on the porch, their date, though she leaves out most of the details of that, and finally Mr. Abernathy's sudden, strange desire to get to know Gale.

"If I were Gale I'd watch my back," he says with a sigh. "And I'd steer clear of any drinks Haymitch offered me."

Madge rolls her eyes.

Peeta vanishes into the back again, coming back a minute later with a familiar brown bag. It's warm in her hands, heavy, smells buttery and delicious. Much more appetizing than the stew at the Hob.

She cringes at her own thought. It's the kind of thinking she needs to curb if she wants any chance with Gale.

"Congratulations, Madge," he says again. "You deserve some happiness, and Gale's a good guy. Smelly, but good."

Madge's eyebrows arch up. "Smelly?"

"Compared to me," Peeta explains. "Not all guys can smell like a buttered roll or a fresh baked cinnamon cake."

That gets a snort of laughter from her. "Very true. I take it back. All men are smelly compared to you."

"Glad we're in agreement," he chuckles.

"Peeta!" A harsh female voice yells from the back, the family living area. "Come here!"

With a sheepish grin, Peeta gestures in the direction of the screech. "Duty calls."

As Madge reaches the door, she hears her name again. Turning, she finds Peeta, once again smiling at her.

"Don't let daddy dearest kill your boyfriend," he tells her.

Madge rolls her eyes. "I won't."

#######

Asher can hear Gale talking to Hazelle from where he sits at the kitchen table. Granted, the house isn't that big, overhearing conversations isn't hard and they weren't being secretive, just discussing how long Gale needs his dress pants to be.

"I'll just let the hem out," she says after she measures them against his leg.

The bottom is frayed a little even though he's only worn them for Reapings. They're also a little short, which is why he needs them lengthened. It's never bothered him wearing them to the Reapings like that, but he's eager to make a good impression on Haymitch, even if he thinks he's an interfering busy-body.

"He's just trying to make me look bad," he'd told Asher when he'd come home from his unscheduled date. "I know he is."

"That shouldn't be hard," Rory had muttered under his breath, hiding behind his book when both Asher and Gale had shot him irritated looks.

Gale gives Hazelle a kiss on the cheek before heading to the tiny bathroom to shave, at his mother's insistence.

"Haymitch looks ten times worse than me," he'd argued.

"But Haymitch isn't trying to impress anyone," she'd countered.

"Clearly," Gale muttered.

Vick looks over at Asher from where he and Rory are working on a puzzle and screws his face up in thought. "Dad, if Gale marries Madge would he get to move to the Victors' Village?"

Rory makes a snorting noise. "No, Vick. Only Victors get to live there."

"But Madge lives there now."

"Only 'cause Haymitch lets her," Rory points out. "If she married Gale, and that's a big if considering she's _her _and Gale is, you know, _Gale_, her quality of life will take a definite hit."

Asher opens his mouth to defend Gale, he's going to make a fine husband someday, and besides, it's a little early to be talking marriage, but Vick has already given Rory's points some thought.

"I dunno, Haymitch likes Madge an awful lot. I don't think he'd let Gale make her live in the Seam," he tells Rory.

"Well Gale isn't going to live Haymitch." Rory makes a face. "Gale snores and can you imagine having him playing hide the sausage with Madge with Haymitch listening in the next room?"

Just as Asher is about to chastise him for using that kind of language, which he'd probably picked up from Gale and his friends, a little voice distracts him.

"Daddy, what's 'hide the sausage'?" Posy asks, her lips puckered in thought. "If Gale has a sausage why is he giving it to Madge? Can't her daddy give her one?"

Asher gives Rory a dark look, letting him know he's going to receive a long talk later, not only for his language but also because Posy had heard and now Asher is going to have to make something up for her. Rory at least has the good graces to sink in his chair, dipping so low only his wide eyes are visible.

"The sausage Gale is giving her isn't one you'd want," Vick tells Posy before Asher can stop him. "Trust me."

"I like sausage though," Posy starts to pout.

Asher picks Posy up and sets her on his lap. "Don't worry, baby, I'll get you a-one. Someday."

He can't bring himself to say sausage at the moment, maybe ever again now.

"Haymitch would probably buy her a house," Vick carries on, apparently oblivious to Asher's discomfort. At least he isn't talking about sausage anymore.

Deciding it isn't safe to sit with the boys anymore, Asher gets up and carries Posy to Hazelle. "Help your mom," he tells her, giving her a nudge.

He goes into the boys' room, kicking the busted ball Rory had retrieved from a trashcan in town under his bed before collapsing onto Vick's bed.

Gale comes in, freshly shaved and rubbing water off his face with a ragged looking towel.

He looks so young, too young to be only weeks from being sent into the mines. Shaving makes him seem more like the boy he is, and deserves to be.

Asher remembers the day Gale was born, during a windstorm that had nearly knocked over several houses in the Seam. The midwife hadn't even been able to get to the house before Hazelle had him out. He'd been so tiny, so perfect and unburdened, and Asher had decided right then and there, promised himself that he would do anything to keep his son, his little baby boy, from ever spending even a minute in the mines.

It's a promise he's failed to keep. Gale, and eventually Rory and Vick, will all end up in that Capitol run tomb right alongside him. His little boys are all doomed to his fate.

Brushing that dark thought away, he raises his eyebrows. "We need to talk about what you and your friends say in front of Rory."

Gale freezes, probably running through all the horrible things he, and probably the Lacewood boy, his most frequent accomplice, had said in Rory's presence.

"'Hide the sausage', Gale?" Asher finally says, completely exasperated.

Wincing, Gale averts his eyes. "Yeah, sorry."

#######

Gale gets to the Victors' Village, is on Madge's back porch, at exactly seven.

His hair is combed, battled into a respectable state, and his shave from the evening before had to be refreshed, much to his annoyance, but his pants look better, no longer grazing his ankles, and his dad had let him borrow his best shirt.

"Don't get anything on it," he'd told Gale, half serious.

"I don't always get food on my clothes," Gale had grumbled.

"Chew with your mouth closed," his mother had warned him as she'd smoothed out his shirt for the hundredth time.

He just nodded at that. Why he had to mind his manners when he could guarantee Haymitch wouldn't, he didn't know.

"Maybe that's your appeal," Rory had said as Gale had complained about having to shave, and how Haymitch didn't have to. "You remind her of him."

"That's gross." Vick made a gagging noise. Gale agreed.

He should've never started discussing his problems with idiot brothers, or at least one of them.

Knocking on the door, he waits until Madge comes to the door.

Her hair is down, which he likes. It looks soft and he has to fight down the temptation to reach out and run his hands through it. She'd gotten to mess his up the day before; he should get to return the favor.

"Are you gonna stand there all night or come in and eat?" He hears Haymitch yell from inside the kitchen.

Madge grimaces and turns, gesturing for Gale to come in.

The smell of cooked meat, spices and heat, hit Gale the moment he steps in the door. Haymitch has his back to him, one hand braced against the counter and the other poking what looks to be a thick steak.

A wave of dread floods over him. If Haymitch is trying to make him feel inadequate he's off to a good start.

Madge's mother comes up behind him, almost silently, and sighs. "You look so handsome, dear."

He almost jumps. She'd be an excellent hunter, or at maybe a spy. He can see where Madge gets her ability to vanish so easily from.

"Uh, thank you," he mutters, uncertain exactly how to respond.

Something cool brushes against the side of his hand, and he glances over to find Madge, her hand out, fingers gently wrapping around his wrist.

"Come on. Help me in the dining room."

The fact that they have a whole room apparently exclusively for dinner makes Gale's stomach turn. His family's kitchen table is almost in the living room.

When he spots the table, long and polished, almost unused looking, he deflates even more.

This relationship is doomed. He'd never take Madge out of this house, stuff her in a cramped, coal dust covered and drafty house in the Seam. It wouldn't be fair. She deserves better than he'll ever be able to offer.

He shakes his head and forces the thought away.

She's seventeen and they've only been on one date, and barely a real one at that. Any plans they'll make are a few years out, if they make it that long.

Looking at her digging out unchipped, delicate looking plate, he isn't sure they will.

A few bad trips to the handful of places he can take her, ruining a few dresses, and Madge will see what a mistake she's making. Gale needs to enjoy his time with her while he can.

When she sets the stack of plates on the table, along with the silverware, which looks to be real silver, Gale comes up behind her and wraps his arms around her waist, pressing a kiss to her neck and watching the blush blossom across her cheeks. Borrowed time is all he has with her and he needs to make the most of it, kiss her and hold her while he can. He'll need the memories to keep him warm and give him light when he goes into the mines.

#######

Dinner is agonizingly long.

Gale spends most of it avoiding looking directly at Haymitch, who seems to be cataloging every fault Gale has.

Or at least that's how it feels.

"You'll go to the mines in the fall?" He asks, his expression unreadable.

Gale nods. Where else is there to go?

"Ever thought about the geological corps? Doing the surveying, not being stuck down in a hole for the rest of your life?"

Madge looks horrified. "Mr. Abernathy!"

"Haymitch..." Madge's mother gives him a disapproving frown.

"What?" He looks completely confused by their dislike of his questioning. "I'm making conversation."

Irritation flares in the pit of Gale's stomach. He may not be good enough for Madge, but neither is Haymitch really. They come from the same miserable place after all.

"Thought about it," Gale lies. "Never got to the paperwork."

It's all bullshit. While Gale is good at math, above average maybe, his grades never have reflected it, not in any subject. Why work on homework and studying for tests when you know where you're heading?

He's never even considered applying for one of the higher level jobs. There are always too many applying, pointlessly and hopelessly, for him to ever consider it. It's a wasted effort as he sees it.

"Hmm," is all Haymitch says to that.

Madge and her mother steer the conversation after that. Talk about Gale's strawberries and ask him about Posy, offer her some of Madge's old dressed.

"They're just going to waste," Madge points out.

While Gale would rather eat coal than accept charity, the dresses were paid for by Haymitch, who was paid by the Capitol, which makes its money on the backs of men like Gale's dad. So in a roundabout way, the dresses are his family's to begin with. That's what he tells himself anyway, as he nods and swallows down some green beans. It's almost worth the bile rising in his throat at the thought of how Haymitch might hold his letting Madge give her dresses away over Gale's head, just to see the smile light up her face at the thought of helping Posy not be dressed like a boy.

When dinner finally ends Madge's mother corrals Haymitch into helping clear the table and do the dishes while pushing Madge and Gale out the back door with heaping bowls of ice cream and the last few strawberries.

They sit on the swing, gently swaying back and forth in the thick air of the summer night, insects buzzing and clicking all around them as they settle into a comfortable silence.

Finally, Madge sets her bowl on the ground and sighs.

"I'm sorry about Mr. Abernathy," she says, as though she has any sort of control over him. "He's just..."

She waves her hand vaguely out, letting it drop to her lap after a few seconds and giving him another apologetic smile.

"He loves you," Gale says before he really thinks about it.

It's true and he knows it, she knows it too. Haymitch has taken care of her since her dad died, four long years, and he's known her even longer. He's fonder of her than he is of anyone else except her mother and Ripper the liquor seller.

"He's just looking out for you."

Gale would be doing the same thing if he were in Haymitch's shoes. For all he knows, Gale sees Madge as a meal ticket, an easy future using Haymitch's money.

The thought makes the steak he'd eaten at dinner start to bubble in the back of his throat.

"That doesn't mean he can interrogate people," she mutters. "He isn't going to run my life."

Somehow Gale thinks he might. He's got enough money that he'll be able to pay off undesirables chasing after his pretty charge and keep her from their greedy hands.

Gale isn't one of those men though and the thought of being lumped with them turns his ice cream into coal dust in his mouth.

He's about to say something, though his brain hasn't exactly formulated what, maybe that he sees where Haymitch is coming from even if he hates that he can, when the screen door screeched open.

"Pearl, can you help your mother find those dresses?" Haymitch asks.

Madge's nose wrinkles up, but she stands and heads inside. Haymitch stays on the porch though and she stops inside the door and gives him a scrutinizing look.

"Are you coming too?"

Haymitch shakes his head. "I'm gonna hang out with Prince Charming here for a minute. Have a little get-to-know-you time, just us guys."

Lips pressing into a line of worry, Madge shoots Gale a look through the screen, silently asking if he's okay.

He just shrugs. Eventually he's going to have to talk to the bastard. Now is as good a time as any.

With one last worried glance, Madge lets the door drop closed, leaving Gale and Haymitch alone.

For a few seconds they stare at each other, both sizing the other up.

Finally, Haymitch clumps across the porch, his shoes thudding on the wood, until he's beside Gale, dropping into the swing.

Once he settles in he reaches in his back pocket and pulls out a flask, opens it, then takes a long drink of it. He takes it from his lips and smacks them loudly before turning to Gale and holding it out. "Drink?"

Gale isn't sure if this is a trick, some weird test of character. Not drinking it would make him look desperate to prove something that's not true, like maybe he doesn't drink. Which is a lie, because of course he drinks, everyone from the Seam drinks don't they? It's a miserable place, dinking is an escape.

It would make him look like false, and that isn't something he can afford with Haymitch. Especially after lying about applying for the better paying jobs.

Biting back disgust at sharing a bottle with Haymitch Abernathy of all people, Gale reaches out and takes the flask.

He holds it in his hand for a minute, considers it, then takes a long drink.

It stings all the way down his throat, burns as it settles in his stomach, and he grimaces as he hands it back to Haymitch.

"I think I'll stick to beer," he tells him, his voice raspy.

"Suit yourself," Haymitch grumbles.

A few more minutes of thick silence follows, wrapping them up and swallowing them before the swing creaks and Haymitch sighs.

"I can see about getting you a talk with the foreman of the geologists. Went to school together. Kind of a dick, but fair enough. He can slip your paperwork in, maybe he can give you a nudge up as a favor."

Gale frowns as he looks over at Haymitch. "What?"

Haymitch glares at Gale out the corner of his eye. "I'm offering to help you get a better job, numb nuts. You may have been screwing with me earlier, but I'm not now."

Narrowing his eyes, Gale sets him in a scowl. "Why would you do that? You hate me."

"Very true. Madge doesn't though." Haymitch runs a hand over his face and takes another drink. "She doesn't let people get close, but she's letting you. That tells me two things, you aren't as shitty a person as I've heard, and she really likes you."

Madge not letting people close seems true enough; it explains her lack of greedy suitors and her title of 'ice princess' among most of her peers. Gale feels warmth, separate from the alcohol, spread through his chest.

Madge chose him, even if she's making a huge mistake, she chose him to open up for and that's got to count for something.

Still, Gale doesn't want special treatment just because he's dating Madge.

"I'll talk to the foreman myself," Gale tells him. "I don't need help."

And he doesn't need or want to be in Haymitch's debt.

"Don't be an idiot" Haymitch snaps. "Do you think part of getting one of the better jobs isn't mostly who you know? If I hadn't been Reaped I had an advantage because of my granddad worked with them. I didn't get to use that privilege, I'm just passing it along to you."

That doesn't make Gale feel much better. He's always resented the people from town's easy life compared to his own, getting a leg up on his own people for a job so many dream of makes him queasy.

"Everyone has a different advantage, I'm just offering you yours. Don't be too proud to save your own life, your family's, Madge's."

Gale glares at him.

"Keep this in mind though," he leans over, his breath harsh with liquor, "you take my help and you'll be tethered to Madge for the rest of your life. She's part of the deal, and 'Tilda too."

_This, _Gale thinks, _this is the test._

Does he care enough about Madge to make this deal, to trade his future, freedom, for her?

"I don't need an incentive to take care of her," Gale tells him through gritted teeth. They may have only just gotten together, but he's been looking out for her for years. He's loved her for what feels like a lifetime and he'll love her for a lifetime more, whether Haymitch helps him or not. She isn't a burden to be passed off.

"Good to know." Haymitch nods. "But it isn't incentive. She's my baby, she's my girl, and I want her taken care of. I don't want something to happen and wonder what's going to happen…to either one of them."

He holds Gale in a narrow look, willing him to understand something he can't quite say.

"So," Haymitch finally sighs, flopping back in the swing, "I want her to have a good life, be well taken care of, and as I see it you may be my best chance at that. The best way to do that is to get you a good job, a _safe_ job, one where she won't spend everyday worrying that you aren't coming home. Understand?"

Gale does. Haymitch isn't immortal, especially not drinking like he does. Madge and her mother's protection won't extend past his death, whenever that may be. He's finally seen that he can't spend the rest of his life fighting people away from Madge. He's going to need them if Madge and her mother want to have a chance when the inevitable happens.

He isn't putting Gale in his debt, he's putting himself in Gale's debt. He's offering Gale the most precious things in his life. Madge and her mother.

It's a lot of faith to put in a person you claim to hate, Gale thinks, but clearly Haymitch trusts Madge's judgment. He's trusting her to have chosen who to open up to wisely. He's trusting Gale to be a good man.

Something starts to ache in his chest at that thought.

Inside Gale hears Madge talking to her mother, muffled airy laughter and a soft chuckle, as they cut through the kitchen.

Gale thinks of his own home, small and dark and drafty, of the small bits of rabbit for dinner, maybe some deer occasionally, going to bed on an empty stomach on more nights than not.

If he wants to be worthy of Madge, ever even wants the hope of it, he has to swallow his pride.

He has to take Haymitch's help.

The backdoor screeches open and Madge and her mother appear, both with their arms full of soft, plain little dresses.

"You don't have to take all of them," Madge whispers.

Eyeing the dresses, Gale runs his hand over the expensive material, glancing at the one Madge is wearing. Even with both his and his father's pay, they'd never be able to afford even one.

His mind immediately jumps to Katniss' mother, faded and too thin, pale skin stretched over jagged bones. That will be Madge if he doesn't let Haymitch talk to his 'friend'.

Glancing over his shoulder, he catches Haymitch's stern glare, nods shortly. "I'll take you up on that offer."

When he turns back, Madge is frowning. "What offer?"

Haymitch gives her a grin. "Nothing for you to worry about, sweetheart."

Judging by the way Madge's eyebrows scrunch together and her lips pucker, she probably thinks there's plenty of reason to worry.

"Haymitch and I were just discussing my application for the geological core," he tells her honestly. "He thinks he can get me an extension."

Mostly honestly anyway.

Madge's nose scrunches up as she looks between Gale and Haymitch, searching for the lie she knows is there. Finally, unable to figure out just what they're hiding, she sighs.

"Well that's good," she says, shifting the bundle in her arms.

#######

They're hiding something, and even if Madge can't pin it down just now, she'll figure it out eventually.

Gale gathers up the dresses from both her and her mother and thanks them for dinner and the dresses before heading toward the tree line and the hidden path back to the Seam.

Madge walks with him to the edge of the yard, just outside the yellow light of her back porch, her arms crossed behind her.

"Are you going to tell me what you were really talking about?" She asks.

He turns to her, his eyes reflecting the sheen of the moon as he smiles.

"Getting me a job where I'm not stuck in a hole for the rest of my life," he echoes Mr. Abernathy's earlier words.

Nose wrinkling up again, Madge squints at him. "Really?" A smile twitches her lips up. "He must have a lot of faith in you."

More than she'd thought. Or he's up to something.

"He has faith in _you_," Gale says. "He's trusting your judgment that I'm not a complete jackass."

That actually makes more sense than that Haymitch has suddenly started liking Gale and is doing things out of the goodness of his heart.

There's more to it, Madge is certain, but she's too happy that they've called a truce, for the time being anyways, to worry too much on it. She'll decipher them later.

"Good," she finally says, popping up on her toes and pressing a kiss to his increasingly rough cheek.

He turns his head as she's dropping back onto her heels, catching her lips and freezing her in place.

It may only be a few seconds long, but it seems to stretch into minutes.

Too early, he pulls back, his breath ghosting over her cheek in hot, quick puffs, and even though Madge's eyes have fluttered closed, she can feel his smile.

"I'll see you tomorrow?"

Eyes peaking open lazily, Madge nods. "I'll come over after lunch."

After he's had time to vanish into the woods and support his family, get one of his last dwindling days of freedom.

His grin widens and he leans in again, gives her another quick kiss before turning and vanishing into the trees.

#######

Matilda settles onto the swing beside Haymitch, her eyes following Madge and Gale out to the edge of the yard.

"You're really going to help him?"

Haymitch nods, takes another swig from his flask and sighs as she settles back into her seat, leans over and rests her head against his shoulder.

"Thank you," she whispers.

Madge walks back into the yellow light of the porch, up the steps, then stops in front of them, her eyes focusing on him. "What are you planning?"

Grinning, Haymitch raises his eyebrows. "Nothing."

She clearly doesn't believe him, so he sighs, glances over at Matilda whose eyes have drifted shut and her breathing has evened out. Too much activity, cooking and preparing for the day have worn her out.

Looking back at Madge, he sighs. "Just making nice with the boy. That's what you wanted, right?"

Her eyes narrow as she nods.

He shrugs. "Well, then helping him get a better life is the nicest thing I can do."

If it has the added benefit of helping his girls then so be it.

Nose scrunching up again, she takes a few tentative steps forward before narrowing her eyes. "Really?"

Haymitch nods.

A little grin creeps onto her face and Haymitch's chest tightens at the sight. She'd hate that he's making deals, bargaining for her future, but he has to. She's strong, and Matilda is too, but even the strong need help. Besides, he thinks he's earned the right to provide that help.

If the boy is willing to accept help, even begrudgingly, then Madge will to.

She leans in kisses his cheek. "Thank you."

He doesn't deserve that kiss, not when he's toying with her future, but he'll take it. She can hate him when he's dead and she's still comfortable and safe.

"No thanks needed, sweetheart," he mutters. He glances over at Matilda, quietly sleeping on his shoulder. He jerks his head toward her. "Let's get your mom to bed."

Madge nods and heads in while Haymitch gathers Matilda up, gently shuffling her in his arms as she snuggles into his shoulder.

He'll go to the foreman in the morning, make sure Gale gets an interview for the geological corps.

He has to protect his girls, no matter what it costs.


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed pt 7**

AN: This story got put on the back-burner for gadge week, but I was still working on it little by little. It got a little long, mostly bc I couldn't find a good stopping point and then I had to do some tweaking on it bc I apparently can't remember things after a week of not writing them straight through and totally mess up my plot. So…yeah. Sorry.

#######

"They really are beautiful," Hazelle tells Gale as she goes through the stack of dresses he's brought home after his dinner.

"Madge sent them," he explains.

Hazelle looks close to tears as she picks up the first one, investigating the delicate trim along the hem. They'd never be able to afford anything this nice, not with a hundred pay checks.

"I'll have to make her something," she murmurs, more to herself than to either Gale or Asher.

"She's not paying for strawberries again." Possibly ever, Asher thinks.

Gale's expression, which has been strangely guarded, settles into worry as he shakes his head. "She won't like that."

Before Asher can tell him that he'll drop the strawberries off on the porch without her ever seeing him, he's snuck under the noses of Peacekeepers for decades, he can avoid one girl, Gale holds up his hand. "Can we just-I need to talk to you two about something."

Something about his tone, the wary look in his eyes and the tension in his shoulders, let's Asher know whatever he's about to say isn't something he's excited about. It's not about Madge then.

Hazelle cuts Asher a look, her eyebrows drawn together as she silently asks him if he has any idea what they're about to hear. He just shrugs and drops down on the broken down couch, the stack of dresses between them.

Gale stares at them for a moment, gathering his thoughts, then he settles on the rickety coffee table.

Whatever Asher could've imagined, it wouldn't have come close to what Gale tells him.

Haymitch Abernathy is offering him a way out of the mines, practically promising to gift wrap it. It's something Asher had hoped to do with the failed strike.

"It's awfully soon to be offering you help in exchange for protecting Madge, isn't it?" Hazelle asks.

Asher sighs. "He doesn't really have a lot of time, Hazelle."

The geological corps likes to pick new members from among the freshest recruits. Young men just out of school. They've taken older men, but not in years, not since before Gale was even a glimmer in Hazelle's eyes. Haymitch would know that.

There's no time to waste. If Gale wants even a chance to escape the mines he has to act now.

"He's young, Ash," Hazelle says, her forehead wrinkling up as her eyebrows rise. "He's been on one date. That's not enough to make this kind of commitment. Not enough time to know if he wants to be in Haymitch's debt for the rest of his life, to take on the responsibility for the life of a girl he barely knows."

"Mom-"

"Gale," she cuts him off, "listen to me. You're just a child-"

"I'm about to get shoved in a hole for the rest of my life." His voice is low, almost defeated.

"One way or another his choices are a bit limited," Asher adds.

Hazelle isn't done yet.

"You care about Madge, right?" She takes Gale's hand, holds him in a watery look. "How is she going to feel if she finds out you and Haymitch are bartering for her life?"

Gale's eyes drop and he starts playing with the hem of one of the dresses.

Asher feels his stomach drop. He doesn't want his son living with a secret over his head. It isn't getting an innocent man killed, but manipulating a girl by not giving her all the facts of their relationship isn't much better.

"You have to tell her," he tells Gale. "Let her know what you're doing."

Bile rises in the back of Asher's throat.

What if Madge gets angry and breaks things off with Gale? What if she thinks he only likes her for what he can gain from her?

There's no good choice in the situation.

Either Gale tells her and risks not just the relationship but also the job, or he doesn't and possibly breaks her heart when the truth inevitably comes out.

Asher wishes he could stop caring about what happens with the girl. His first priority should be Gale, no matter the cost, but he's the reason she's got a manipulative drunk watching out for her. Madge Undersee only needs her future protected because of Asher and his foolishness. He owes it to the Mayor to look out for her.

"She already knows," Gale says with a shrug. "Seemedokay with it at the time."

What she'll think I the harsh light of day might be another thing, though.

They sit in silence for several minutes, frozen in thought when Hazelle sighs.

"I still don't like it."

#######

Hazelle finally goes to bed after Gale agrees to think about his deal with Haymitch a little more.

"Promise me, okay? I don't want you rushing into anything."

"Are you going to be disappointed if I don't change my mind?"

Hazelle takes Gale's face in her hands and pulls him down slightly, gives him a kiss on the forehead. "Never."

His dad sits at the kitchen table, staring at the glass of tepid water in his hand, probably wondering if tomorrow night he'll be comforting Gale after an ugly breakup if he throws Haymitch's offer away and Madge sees what a waste he is or congratulating him on the possibility of not spending his life in the mines.

As he's about to get up and go to bed, he still has work in the morning, Gale pulls out the seat across from him.

"Do you think something is going on with Haymitch?" He asks before his elbows are even against the wood of the table.

It's been rolling around in his mind since he'd left the Victors' Village.

Despite his calm demeanor, there was desperation in Haymitch's actions.

Gale isn't the kind of man he'd pick for Madge. He's a minor, poor, without a future, Haymitch should be trying to break them up and trying to find a better man for her, but he isn't.

"Why is he wasting time trying to make me into someone who can take care of her when there are plenty of guys who would bend over backwards for her?"

"None of them have," his dad points out. "Like he said, she picked you and he thinks that counts for something."

Gale arches an eyebrow. "You don't honestly think that's all there is to it, do you?"

His dad shakes his head. "No, but that's probably the best he's going to give you."

Sighing, Gale sits back in the chair and stares at the glass rolling between his dad's hands.

"Do you think this has anything to do with him coming back from the Capitol early?"

Because Gale does. The Capitol doesn't just let its Victors go home when they feel like it. There isn't a choice on attendance and his dismissal is strange.

His dad's eyes stay trained on the glass in his hands but he doesn't say anything.

"Dad-"

"No, Gale," his dad says flatly. "We aren't speculating."

Gale grits his teeth. "I'm not a little kid anymore."

He knows his dad hates the Capitol, hates the mines, and hates how the Districts are used. He knows his dad was part of the strike that the Mayor supposedly organized.

Gale also knows that the best clues they can get about what may be going on in the Capitol is their lone, drunken, Victor. Haymitch Abernathy is a pain in the ass, but he's also the person in the District that's closest to the source of their misery. He's a weathervane, and as far as Gale can tell, he's spinning wildly in the wind.

Getting booted from the Capitol before the end of the Games, making a deal with Gale despite clearly not liking him, planning for his own absence, it all point to something going down. He just doesn't know what.

"It isn't anything that'll matter to us."

"It might," Gale whispers harshly. "You didn't see him when he was talking to me. He's desperate."

Something is happening, something has Haymitch spooked, and Gale wants to know what it is. His dad does too, he has to.

"Maybe he'll tell-"

"Don't," his dad cuts him off, standing suddenly. "Don't ask. You don't know how dangerous trying to play the system can be. You don't know what it can cost."

"This isn't like the Mayor's plan with the strikes, dad." Gale runs his hands through his hair. "This might be an opening. Maybe something is happening, in other Districts, or in the Capitol, and we don't know. If Haymitch got sent home early because of something big we need to know."

That has to be it. Otherwise why send Haymitch back? It's never happened before.

"Gale," his dad's tone is warning, "drop it."

Biting his tongue, Gale stands up. It's obvious his dad isn't going to budge on this, not now anyway, so he might as well go to bed and let his imagination run wild without a disapproving glare on him.

"Fine," he mutters. "'Night."

#######

It isn't hard for Haymitch to convince the foreman of the engineering corps to agree to let the boy put his application in late.

Money talks after all, and if there's one thing Haymitch has, it's money.

He's glad the people of District Twelve are so easily swayed. Bribery is so simple, so straightforward and uncomplicated. Not like blackmail. That's messy.

"It's effective though," Wiress had told him once.

"It breeds resentment," he'd countered.

"Existence breeds resentment in some," she replied loftily. She was referring to him, he knew that, but he didn't give her the pleasure of knowing.

He resented her because she'd adapted to her life, her mantle of being a Victor, better than he had. He resented her for sacrificing any humanity she had in order to survive, for still having her family when he'd lost his, for being able to compartmentalize her life so effectively.

Maybe she was right, he resented her existence.

Still, she's useful and effective, and if good, old-fashioned bribery hadn't worked he was prepared to ask for her help.

The sun is already up, burning off the last of the early morning clouds and revealing a clear blue sky overhead. He'd left before it had even started peeking over the edge of the earth and hoped to be home before the girls woke up, wanting to avoid any questions-Madge will probably have plenty now that she's over her schoolgirl high from the night before and can think on everything that went down properly-and when he steps over the threshold and into the living room he thinks he might've succeeded.

The lights are still off, the quiet of sleep is still settled over the house and he silently pulls his shoes off and carries them into the kitchen.

"Where have you been?"

Madge is up, arms and legs coiled tightly and her expression so icy he thinks it might take setting her in the noonday sun to thaw her.

"Went on a walk, sweethear-"

"_Don't_," she cuts him off. "Don't 'sweetheart' me, okay?"

She stands and it's then that he realizes she's shaking.

"Mom woke up and went to get you because she wanted to show you the mockingjay she's been telling you about, the one outside her window, but guess what?" She glares at him. "You weren't there. Not even a note."

He starts to ask where Matilda is, but Madge is already on a roll, anger overtaking her.

"She got upset, thought they'd come and taken you. Thought that you'd left early without asking and they'd come and taken you away in the middle of the night. She was _terrified_, and I honestly couldn't tell her that she was wrong." Her lip quivers and tears start spilling down her cheeks. "I had to give her a double dose of her morphling just to calm her down enough that I could figure out just what the _hell_ happened to you. The only reason I knew you weren't dead is because I doubt the Capitol would let you stop to get your flask when they were dragging you off."

Cold guilt settles in his stomach.

He hadn't meant to upset them, but the fact that both Madge and Matilda had realized his vanishing in the middle of the night is a very real possibility only reinforces to him that he needs to make sure things are taken care of if something really did happen.

Glancing up at the ceiling, to where Matilda is probably going to be sleeping off her morphling for the rest of the day, he sighs.

"Where were you?" Madge asks, none of the steel gone from her voice.

It's a little like he's ten again and his mother is scolding him for being out too late with his friends.

For a second he considers lying to her. She doesn't need to know what he's up to, he's a grown man after all, but then she narrows her eyes and sets her jaw and he knows that even if he weaves something believable she'll see right through it.

It's _exactly_ like he's ten again with his mother.

"Had to go see an old friend," he tells her. It's the truth, mostly.

One of her eyebrows arches up. "A friend?"

"Yeah, a friend." He has friends. Drinking buddies mostly, but that's a kind of friend.

"Before breakfast? Without leaving a note?"

She isn't going to let it rest, so he crosses the room and collapses into one of the kitchen chairs and rests his arm on the table, drumming his fingers on the tabletop as he considers what he's going to say.

"I went to see the foreman of the engineering corps for the boy, alright?" He finally gives in.

For a minute she goes quiet, her eyes wide and curious, then she bites her lip.

"Oh, that." Her eyes drop and she begins toying with the hem of her robe. "Does all this have something to do with you coming home early from the Games?" She asks, her tone softening, edging with worry.

Haymitch glances up at her. Her nose is scrunched up in concern and her eyebrows are knitted together. She presses her lips together as she gently sits back down, her eyes never leaving his. "It does, doesn't it?"

He loves that's she's smart, but he also hates it. Being too smart gets you in trouble, and with him in her life she's got enough of that.

When he doesn't say anything, just drops her gaze and stares at his hand, still tapping out some slow tune on the table, she takes that as a confirmation.

"What's happening?"

He can't tell her, because, to be entirely honest, he isn't sure himself. Wiress might be wrong, and he hopes she is, but there's always the chance she isn't, and that's what he's planning on.

"I don't know, Pearl." He looks up at her wearily. "I only have guesses."

Madge leans in, eyes widened. "Then tell me your guesses."

#######

She doesn't want to be blindsided if, when, something happens.

That's something she's grateful for in her past, that her father had given her knowledge. His death hadn't come as a shock to her. She'd had time to prepare herself for the worst.

Maybe she hadn't had enough information to destroy anything, but there was definitely enough that she could've hurt people. He'd known full well she might break, and it was a dangerous gamble to make, but she thinks that was probably a risk he was willing to take. If the screws had been put to her, if she hadn't been dismissed as nothing more than a child, she had a bargaining chip.

Her life for the lives of anyone her father had allegedly conspired with.

That same sense of foreboding, an anxious buzz in her veins, that had permeated her home all those years ago is hovering around Mr. Abernathy now.

"I need to know." She needs to prepare, plan, decide how best to protect her mother and herself, maybe others.

"You don't," he tells her firmly. "I'm taking care of it."

It takes every fiber of her being to keep from snapping at him that he can't protect her from everything. If anyone knows the limitations of one person, no matter how much they love you, it's her.

Plus, his 'taking care of it' is probably not something she'll approve of. That's why he's being evasive about it.

"What did you do?"

It sound accusatory even though she's trying desperately for it not to be.

When he doesn't respond though, she thinks maybe she should let it be, but he's obviously guilty of something. Something that might affect her. She can't just let it go.

She narrows her eyes. "Mr. Abernathy, look at me, what did you do?"

He still keeps his eyes down, following his fingers as they trace lines in the table.

"Nothing for you to worry about."

If she hadn't been before she certainly is now. Whatever he's done it's either illegal or dangerous. Possibly both. Probably both.

Madge covers her face with her hands as he gets up and pads past her, mumbling something about checking on her mother, leaving Madge to all the worrisome possibilities her imagination can come up with.

#######

Without waking Rory and Vick, Gale rolls out of bed and pulls on a shirt before stumbling into the kitchen the next morning.

His dad is packing his lunch, a few measly scraps of bread and a bruised apple, before he turns and mumbles a goodbye at Gale.

"See you tonight," Gale grumbles back.

Once he's gone, Gale quietly nibbles on a piece of goat cheese, courtesy of Prim, before getting up and getting dressed.

He's out in the woods before the first rays of sun stretch over the horizon. The air is thick, but the cool of the night still hangs over the woods, under the shade of the trees.

Katniss might come out today, but he might miss her. He wants to talk with Madge, see how she feels really about Haymitch's little proposal without a steak dinner in her belly.

A few hours burn off, Gale picks a pail full of the biggest strawberries he can find and checks his snares, one fat rabbit and one skinny one, before he decides Madge should be up. It's well into the afternoon after all.

Dragging his feet, Gale makes his way back to the fence, under it, then cuts around the town until he comes up on the path up to the Victors' Village.

Madge is sitting on the back porch when he spots her through the thick green foliage that conceals the path. Her legs are crossed and she's holding a glass between her hands, staring at it blankly.

She doesn't notice him until his boots softly touchdown on the bottommost step up the porch.

Eyes widening, she looks ready to bolt right up until she realizes who it is.

"Gale!"

The fact that she says his name so enthusiastically gives him a little hope that she's still not opposed to him taking Haymitch up on his offer and that she hasn't decided that Gale had used her for his own benefit.

She's up and flinging her arms around his back before he's fully up the steps, almost knocking them both off the porch and onto the grass below. He regains his balance quickly though, she doesn't even notice.

"I-why are you here?" She asks as she pulls back. Her nose wrinkling up.

"I said I would." Had she already forgotten that?

Her smile falters, starts to slip off her face as she scrutinizes him.

"Oh, sorry. It's been a weird morning," she finally says, her arms slipping from around his neck.

He starts to shake his head, but he can't. Something may be wrong very soon.

"Let's sit."

He guides her to the bench swing and they both sit, a small chasm between them filled with silence until he decides there is no good way to go about this.

"So about Haymitch's offer to help me get into the engineering corps..." he begins carefully.

For a moment she's quiet, staring at him blankly before her eyes widen in horror.

Then she puts her elbows to her knees and buries her face in her hands.

"I didn't ask him to," She begins, her voice muffled and shaky. "He's just-I don't know what's gotten into him..."

Finally, Madge looks up, over at him, her eyes shining.

"I swear, I promise, it doesn't matter to me what you do, Gale. I'm not like that."

Gale feels his stomach drop to his feet. This conversation isn't going like he'd planned.

He had only meant to see if she still thought it was a good idea to take the offer, not make her think he was accusing her of being too good to be with a miner. Can he not open his mouth without sounding like a jerk?

"I know, Madge-I didn't think that!" He sputters. It never would've crossed his mind that she would be like that and he's a little horrified that it had come across that way.

"Why not?" She finally whispers, her voice brittle. "Everyone else does."

"Well I don't," Gale almost snaps. "I knows what life is like in the Seam and I want better for you."

Wet eyes turn to him. "And you'd sacrifice your future happiness for someone you don't even know that well?"

He feels a little offended that she thinks he barely knows her, though it's a little true. She's guarded and quiet, she probably thinks no one has ever wanted to know her. Gale does though. Anyone that can tolerate Katniss' sometimes sullen quiet and Haymitch's obnoxious drinking, who can keep their temper in check when people are not so subtly making jokes at their expense, who can come back from the dead and not speak ill of the people who benefited from their pain, is a person worth spending a lifetime getting to know.

Besides, who says he won't be happy with her?

"I know enough," he tells her. "If you want me to go tell him where he can put it-"

"I want you to do what you _want_ to do, what's best for you and your family," she gently cuts him off, her soft hand reaching out and covering his much rougher one. "If you want it, I'll tell Mr. Abernathy to keep his promise. I'm-I don't have to be part of the equation."

And by her fragile tone, she probably doesn't think he should want her to be either.

"Damn it." Gale runs his hands through his hair. "Madge, you don't understand. You aren't some chip in a poker game. We aren't playing a game with your life. We're trying _not _to play one."

"Gale..."

"I..." Gale presses his palms to his eyes. "Just listen, alright? I'm going into the mines in the fall, and then what? Weekends. That's all I'm going to have because I'm going to be too worn out to do anything but sleep after twelve hours in the mines. That's how all the young guys are until they get worn in. Being trapped down there, not seeing you or my family, or dragging you into that hellhole, that's why I said yes. no other reason."

Not because he thinks she's a snob and not because he expected a helping hand to keep dating her. He's doing it for as many selfish reasons as selfless and she needs to see that. It's probably confirming some of the nasty things Haymitch has been saying about him, but Gale doesn't care at the moment. If it gets her to stop thinking that she's a burden to be shouldered then he'll take it.

With a late application he'll be in the mines for three months, maybe less if he's lucky. Then he'll be above ground, learning about rocks and surveying, bullshit things like that. He won't be slowly dying in a pit, too tired to appreciate life, to appreciate Madge.

He reaches out and takes her hand, running his thumb over her knuckle, hoping she can feel his sincerity through his skin.

Finally, she turns her hand over, wrapping it around his as much as she can.

"It's a pretty big gamble. What if you end up hating me?"

Gale shakes his head, letting the edges of his mouth twitch up. "Not gonna happen."

#######

_I knew he was up to something_, Madge thinks as she watches Gale's thumb trace circles on her hand.

Her mind sluggishly starts back on the path it had been on before he showed up.

Mr. Abernathy had gone out to see the foreman of the geographical corps. He wouldn't tell her about it much though, she thinks, because he wants it to fall to the back of her mind. He wants her to forget about it, or at least not think about it. It's not that Mr. Abernathy _is _helping Gale, it _why_ he's really helping him that he's trying to keep from her.

It isn't financial security. He's smart enough and devious enough that if he wanted to set her up for the rest of her life he could, man or no man. Whatever has him making offers and brokering deals must be something that could prevent him from keeping money hidden away. Worse, though, is the possibility that it isn't money he's trying to ensure, it's actual physical security.

Gale is strong and skilled, if something were to happen he could take Madge and run. He could make sure she's safe from anyone trying to take her to use against Mr. Abernathy.

Something's going on in the Capitol, that has to be it.

Her stomach churns and tightens into a ball of anxiety.

He was sent home early, now he's making deals with Gale, being secretive. Something is _definitely _going on.

Madge's eyebrows pull together. "He's scared.

Gale frowns. "Who?"

"Mr. Abernathy."

His eyebrows rise. "Scared?"

Mr. Abernathy is a lot of things, annoyingly smug and cocky are the first things that come to most people's minds, but cautious and frighteningly clever are what they should think.

That's how he got to be a Victor after all.

If he's scared, then there's good reason for it.

"What's he got to be scared of?" The 'other than liver failure that is', is clearly implied in Gale's tone.

Madge's lip puckers in thought as she turns to Gale.

"Everything." Madge stands and gives Gale a waning smile. "I'll talk to you later."

She needs to talk to Mr. Abernathy. Something is wrong and she needs to find out what.

"I'm coming with you," he says, getting up and straightening the legs of his pants.

"No, Gale, you don't need to get involved." Mr. Abernathy might be paranoid, but justifiably so. The less Gale knows about whatever sordid things have urged him into deals he'd otherwise avoid the better.

"I'm already involved," he points out, a scowl forming on his features. "Haymitch involved me when he offered to help me get a job."

"That's not the same. For all they know he's just being nice to my...you know," she feels a blush creep up her cheeks.

He doesn't budge though. She knows why.

The Capitol is just as paranoid as Mr. Abernathy, maybe more so. They'll connect the dots just like Madge has, like Gale is doing. Pretending they won't is foolish and dangerous.

The knot in her stomach twists tighter. Each new thought makes the situation worse.

"Gale…" Tears start to form behind her eyes. She should've known nothing good can come her way. She's tainted, always will be. There's only one thing to do.

"Go home. Go home and work in the mines...find someone else."

The mines might be a bleak future, but she apparently has no future, maybe she never has. Dragging him with her isn't an option. If he walks away now it might look like he was never told anything, or at least that he didn't want to be involved. She hopes they'll see that as loyalty and not complacency.

She starts to turn and go in, leave and force him to reevaluate his choices, because the one to stay with her is going to be a death sentence, but he grabs her by the hand.

"I'm not going," he almost whispers. "I told that old bastard I'd take his help back when I thought he was just being jerk because I l-like you. I'm not backing down now just because the stakes might've changed. If anything, fighting back against the Capitol for everything they've put us through is more incentive."

His eyes are hard, steely gray and narrow, and his hand burns on her skin.

Gale won't back down from a fight. Not with her, not with Mr. Abernathy and not with the Capitol. It's just not his nature. She should've never let him kiss her. It was the beginning of his end.

It's going to get him killed. She knows it.

He leans in, presses a hard kiss to her lips, trying to dissolve her resolve, but she backs up.

"Gale, this is too dangerous."

"If you don't let me come with you to talk to the-to _him_, then I'll just track him down when he goes to buy liquor," he tells her firmly, crossing his arms over his chest.

She has no doubt he will.

With one last shuddering breath, a quick rub of her eyes, smearing unshed tears across her cheeks, Madge nods. She isn't happy about this, but Gale is nothing if not persistent.

They cut through the kitchen, letting the door screech open and clatter shut as they go into the living room.

Mr. Abernathy is on the couch, pillow over his face, blocking the sun, as he snores loudly.

Madge crosses her arms and clears the thickness from her throat. "Mr. Abernathy."

He startles, grunts and chokes awake as he yanks the pillow off his face. He twists, glaring at her. "What no-" He rolls his eyes when he spots Gale, arms crossed as he stands protectively behind Madge. "Certainly don't give a man time, do you, you little asshole?"

Madge drops into the couch beside him as he rolls and sits up, rubbing his eyes before glaring at Gale again.

"You know you aren't limited to being nice to people only once a year, right?"

He mutters something that sounds like 'whatever' as he scrubs his hand over his face again before sighing.

"I thought I was being nice," he grumbles. "Making sure you didn't end up in the slums."

Gale makes a harsh noise as he drops into the over-stuffed chair diagonal from Madge and Mr. Haymitch.

"You're from the Seam too," he snaps. "Hypocrite."

"Would you want-if you literally fought for everything you have you wouldn't be so hot on your kid marrying down," Mr. Abernathy snarls back.

"Stop." Madge grabs his hand. "Mr. Abernaty what's going on?"

He gives her a flat look. Not budging.

Finally, after what must be a full minute of staring, he sighs and glares at Gale. "Alright, sweetheart, if you want something then the brat has to g-"

"No," she cuts him off. "Gale stays. You brought him into this."

She wishes he hadn't, but what's done is done and Gale isn't budging now.

The expression on his face darkens and Madge is certain he's going to get up and storm off like a petulant child, but instead he just narrows his eyes and huffs in Gale's direction.

"One word, boy, and I'll have you drawn and quartered, understand? I know people."

Madge presses her fingers to her temples. He probably does 'know people', but he isn't nearly as hard-hearted as he wants Gale and everyone else to think. He wouldn't call his so-called friends on anyone short of his worst enemy.

Gale scowls, crosses his arms, but finally nods.

Mr. Abernathy waits a moment, lets an uncomfortable silence settle over the room, before he sighs.

"Look," he starts, pulling his flask from his shirt pocket, "like I said, I've only got guesses."

"Then give me guesses," Madge pleads again. He's smarter than anyone gives him credit for, maybe even Madge at times.

After a long, tense moment, he takes a long drink from his flask and sighing.

"All I know for sure is that they wanted us out of the Capitol. That nutcase said they didn't want us hanging around each other, talking."

"They think you're planning something?" Gale asks, his eyebrows pulling together. "What?"

"Our next read for the book club," Mr. Abernathy answers snottily. "What do you think?"

Madge's stomach clenches up. This is worse than she could've imagined. The Capitol thinks its Victors, or at least some of them, are plotting against it.

"Rebellion," she says, more for her own benefit than for anything else. She'd known it, somewhere in her mind, but saying it out loud makes it real.

It's her father all over again.

The room seems to shrink in around her, makes it hard to breathe, impossible to hear, blurring the living room from the edge in until it's nothing more than a vague memory. She can picture the cell, feel the icy floor and wind through the bars of the widow, taste the stale bread and dirty water all over again.

She's eleven and helpless and being locked away again.

Warm, rough hands begin rubbing circles on her back.

"Shhh, Pearl, nothing's going to happen to you," Mr. Abernathy tells her.

He's lying though. He can't protect her, just like her father couldn't. She's at the mercy of the Capitol again.

She wants desperately to be mad at them, her father and Mr. Abernathy are playing games with her life but not giving her a choice on whether to participate. It isn't fair.

But nothing ever is. Not her father dying, not her mother's headaches, not being tossed into the community home. Not for her and not for anyone else.

That flare of anger evaporates in her chest when she thinks of the other children in the community home. Nothing has been fair for them either.

A rebellion might get Madge killed, and her participation, or at least her being implicated in it, may not be up to her, but it will save more people, children, from losing fathers, having sick mothers, and being sent to community homes. She can't doom them all. Her father wouldn't, he _hadn't_, she can't either.

Somewhere, she distantly hears voices. They could be behind a door, muffled and dull, impossible to understand.

"Sit up, sweetheart," Mr. Abernathy's voice rumbles in her ear as he wraps an arm around her and pulls her to his side.

A glass is suddenly in front of her, a little water sloshing in her lap as someone tries to give it to her.

"Stop that!" A heavy hand reaches out and snatches it from where it seemingly floats. "Idiot."

Slowly her breathing steadies out and the room begins to refocus.

"Need a drink?" A voice asks, offering her the glass.

Madge shakes her head, but takes it anyway. Her actions are disconnected from her words.

Gale is standing off to the side looking confused and worried while Mr. Abernathy continues to gently rock her.

Finally, the blurred edges of her vision clear and the tense voices sharpen.

"She'll be okay," Mr. Abernathy says, not to her, but to Gale. She feels him pull her closer and press a kiss into her hair. "You're okay."

Madge pulls away, rubs her temples. An episode like this always makes her more sympathetic to her mother. If her headaches are half as bad as the ones Madge gets when she has a...'moment', then there isn't any wonder she's tried to live in a morphling haze during so many points in Madge's life.

"Are you?" She asks, her voice strangely brittle.

"Am I okay?" Mr. Abernathy gives her an odd look. "Well-"

"Are you planning something?" She clarifies, even though she knows he doesn't really need it. He's just being difficult. "Are you planning a rebellion?"

His eyes drop from her, down to the glass still held in his hand, and he lets out a long breath.

"Madge…" He smiles weakly. "You don't have to worry about it. I'm not getting you dragged into this."

"I'm going to be no matter what," she reminds him, her voice gaining a little strength.

"We'll talk about it later," he says, standing and running a hand through his already wild hair. "You need some rest and this idiot needs some lessons on _not _drowning someone with a cup of water."

Gale opens his mouth to argue, but Madge beats him to it.

"I'm fine now," she says sharply. "I need to know."

He hesitates some more, but Madge grabs his hand and squeezes it. She isn't weak, she just knows how bad things can get and it scares her.

That's perfectly normal.

"Fine, but like I said, it's all guesses," he grumbles, dropping back down beside her on the couch. "Wiress, that pain in the ass, she's been trying to figure something out for decades. Had some wild plan about making our own Tribute-"

"Like a Career?" Gale interrupts.

Mr. Abernathy cuts him a look. "Yeah, dumbass, like a career." He rolls his eyes and continues. "Anyway, this Tribute would have all of us backing them. We could get them out, use them to spearhead the rebellion."

"Just because you all would support them doesn't mean the Districts would," Madge points out. It seems like a fickle plan.

He nods. "That's what the kid said after the Seventy-Second Games. Said it would have to be organic to be practical. It would be too big a scale to control otherwise." His hands rub over his face again. "And it doesn't seem likely to happen, anyway."

"So," Madge bites her lip, "they sent you away so you couldn't plan?"

"That's the guess," he nods. "But it probably had more to do with the fact that the nutter has it in her head that she needed to figure out what the 'twist' to next year's Games is going to be."

The next Hunger Games, the Seventy-Fifth. A Quarter Quell.

Madge barely gets the question past her lips. "Did she?"

Mr. Abernathy shakes his head. "Wiress already had some ideas, though."

When he doesn't elaborate, Madge prods him. "What ideas?"

A long sigh escapes his lips and Madge gets the impression he's doing some quick thinking. "She's convinced they're going to Reap from Victor families."

"Well," Madge's stomach rolls, Mr. Abernathy's worry about her certainly makes more sense now, "that certainly narrows the pool."

"You don't have a family," Gale says suddenly. "That wouldn't work very well in Twelve then."

That makes Mr. Abernathy flinch and Madge shoots him a dark look over her shoulder.

"Families aren't defined just by blood, Gale," Madge tells him softly. "Families are defined by the Capitol as anyone living under the same roof."

It's how her father had explained his home District's manipulation of the tesserea system. Children in their community homes were all considered one family, and with no one to stand up in their defense, their legal guardian, a District official, could take out extra tesserea on them.

Madge and her mother would be considered Mr. Abernathy's family.

Gale continues to look confused. "But you're both girls and your mother isn't reaping age-"

"It's a Quell, you dimwit," Mr. Abernathy snaps. "Regular rules don't apply."

"If mom and I can't be Reaped...then what?" Dread pools in her stomach.

She can guess what the answer is, and judging by the pitiful look Mr. Abernathy gives her, that guess would be right.

If there's no family, he would be his own. Like he said, it's a Quell, regular rules don't apply.

They all go silent after that, letting the grim possibility sink in. Then Gale makes a snarling noise.

"Then it isn't enough for me to just get a better job. Madge would have to move out." He paces. "We'd have to get married for that-"

"Well," Mr. Abernathy coughs, "that was the next little talk we were going to hav-"

"No!" Madge stands up and tries to control her breathing; her head is starting to swim again. "I'm-You two aren't marrying me off!"

Especially if it's going to guarantee Mr. Abernathy's death.

"Madge…"

"It might be the only way, sweetheart," Mr. Abernathy says sadly.

Collapsing back onto the couch, Madge presses the heels of her hands to her eyes until little stars form behind the lids and her mind whirls.

Finally, she looks up and gives Mr. Abernathy a half-hearted smile. "You know they'll just change the rules again."

It's their prerogative. There's no way they'll let a Game, a Quell no less, pass with a lower body count than normal. He won't be going back; the Capitol will make sure of it.

_Madge _is sure of it.

Torturing their current Victors on live television, showing that they have no control or way to save the ones they love, would ensure they break. It would make them impossible leaders. Because if they're proven to be nothing more than human, not great heroes beyond the Capitol's grasp, then how can they start a revolution?

All their planning over the years would be for nothing, because their credibility would be bled out.

If the people of the Districts hadn't noticed how bad their Victors' lives were, then they certainly would after the Quell, and they'd want no part in it.

Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows that too.

Minutes tick by, stretch into what must be early evening if the shadows are anything to go by, until Gale finally makes an agitated noise.

"I need to head home."

Madge gets up and follows him out, leaving Mr. Abernathy to his thoughts, whatever they may be.

When they get to the porch, Gale leans down and snatches up his game bag, he must've dropped it earlier.

"Brought you some strawberries," he mumbles as he pulls a little pail from it.

Madge stares at it for a minute, her arms and hands limp at her sides, then they come to life, flinging around his neck and nearly making him drop the pail.

"I'm sorry," she murmurs into his neck, her nose grazing the stubble already there.

He shouldn't have to deal with this. Her life is a mess, always has been and, for what little time is left, always will be. She wishes he had never kissed her. The life he had might not be a dream, but at least it wouldn't be a nightmare.

His arms wrap around her, tightening as he lifts her until only her toes scrape the wood of the porch.

"It's going to be okay," he whispers, his warm breath tickling her ear. A warm kiss presses into the patch of skin between her collar and her neck, his whiskers scratching pleasantly. "I promise."

Coming from him, it's almost believable.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 8**

Gale is waiting on the front porch steps when Asher gets home.

He'd expected more of the cold shoulder after last night and his almost nonexistent goodbye this morning, but Gale is waiting patiently for him, foot tapping anxiously. It was his preferred position when he was little and wanted to catch Asher before he went in and got bad news, usually that Gale had failed an exam or didn't turn in homework.

School work had long stopped worrying Gale, though, and never would again. Whatever has him so fidgety doesn't have anything to do with school, Asher knows that, and that makes a knot form in the base of his stomach.

If only things were still as simple as a bad grade or detention.

Stopping, he locks eyes with his oldest and sighs.

"Something the matter?"

Gale swallows, licks his lips and nods. "Yeah"

He stands, stretching his long legs and patting the coal dust from his pants, then gives Asher a little jerk of his head. Back of the house, their preferred discussion place.

Slowly, his bones are grinding against themselves, protesting each and every step, Asher follows Gale.

They stop near the woodpile in the back that's stocked for the winter already, away from any little ears and big mouths.

"It's about Madge," Gale quickly explains, before Asher can even ask.

A million horrible possibilities slam into Asher, filing through his mind sickeningly.

Had Gale taken Hazelle's words to heart and turned down Haymitch's offer? Had Madge gotten offended? Why hadn't _he_ given Gale better advice? Any advice?

He stares, worried and anxious, as Gale begins picking at a broken piece of bark on a wedge of wood. His expression is tight, pinched up in thought and that does nothing to ease the terror building in Asher's stomach.

"I'm not supposed to say anything," Gale continues carefully, "but...I need to talk to someone."

And Asher is still his go to person to talk things out with, even if he failed him spectacularly last night.

It's a small comfort to him that despite the disagreement and Asher's lack of helpful words the night before he still has his son's trust.

With a sigh, his fingers in his hair, tugging it up wildly, Gale begins.

Nothing could've prepared Asher for what he says though. Haymitch's offer the day before had shocked him, but what he'd imparted on Gale today surpasses it by leaps and bounds.

The Capitol isn't known for kindness, but Haymitch's guess, which Asher thinks is probably more than fact than conjecture, is beyond cruel.

It's a measured response, that's for certain, to the likely plotting of the Victors. A calculated move to put an end to their plans and send a message.

Not even the supposed strongest among you is safe. Targeting their families, a vulnerable population to be sure, for their crimes will not only make the Victors look weak, it will discourage association with them.

It's an isolation tactic, and Asher knows the people of Panem will understand it.

It'll work, there's no doubt about that.

"Dad," Gale looks so frightened and small, so painfully young, "we can't let them do this to her."

A stone settles in the pit of Asher's stomach and his blood runs cold. Madge wouldn't be in this situation if he hadn't been so foolhardy, he owes a debt to both her and her father. It's his obligation to help, but it isn't Gale's.

"I'll figure something out," he tells Gale as he stares at the ground, as if it holds the answer to the problem he created four years ago.

"You don't have to," Gale says softly.

Asher looks up and finds Gale's expression settled, determined.

"If marrying her is what it'll take then I'll marry her."

The stone in Asher's stomach turns to coal and ignites.

"You aren't getting married," he tells Gale sharply.

He's not nineteen yet, and the girl isn't even close to eighteen. Working towards that purpose is one thing, jumping feet first into it is another.

Gale scowls. "Why not? And don't say I'm too young. You and mom were my age when you got married and at least we won't be starting with a baby."

That stings a little, but Asher keeps his expression even.

"No, but from the sound of it Madge isn't thrilled about you and Haymitch trying to gang press her into marriage."

Jaw tensing, Gale lets his eyes drop. "She may not be happy about it but if it keeps her and her mom alive she'll see it's just something that has to be done."

It's probably true. From what Asher has seen, Madge is a brave kid, one that will sacrifice her choices to keep the last tie she has in the world alive. She and Gale definitely have that in common.

She's still a kid though, and it feels even less fair to force this in her into this than it does Gale, even if it saves her life.

There has to be another way around this, they just need to think.

"Don't rush into anything," Asher finally tells Gale, holding up a hand to silence his protests. "I'm going to figure something out."

Besides, for all they know, marrying her wouldn't fix the problem, even she knows that. It might even increase the pool of possible Tributes. The Capitol could decide that instead of removing Madge and her mother from Haymitch's family, Gale and Madge's marriage will increase the number of possibilities. It's an unsettling, and all too real, possibility, and probably one Gale hasn't even considered.

Gale crosses his arms and glares at the ground. "If it doesn't save Madge then don't bother telling me about it."

"We're going to save her," Asher assures him.

He just has to figure out how.

#######

Gale eats his dinner silently, doesn't let Rory goad him into coming out and playing a game of kickball with him and Vick, and goes to bed early that night.

He's got too much on his mind to even sink into a distraction.

Madge is going to be Reaped, at least that's what Haymitch thinks is going to happen, and that's as good as a death sentence, especially if her mom is taken too. She's too loyal; she'll die rather than let her mom take a fall, even if that's the only way for Madge to even have a chance.

For hours he tosses and turns, trying to come up with a plan that'll make everyone happy but it never comes. It carries on well past when Rory and Vick turn in for the evening.

Finally, as the darkest part of the night settles, both his brothers' breathing evening out, Gale gets up.

The house is silent other than his dad and Rory's snoring and a cricket that's taken up residence in their ceiling.

Dressing silently, he carries his shoes with him and puts them on once he gets outside. Then he heads for the woods.

It's eerie, walking through the District at night. The street lamps in town have been turned off to save electricity and there isn't a soul up, not even one of the stray cats that lives near the butcher's shop.

Gale feels like each step he takes echoes loudly, even though he manages to stay to the grass for the most part.

He's nothing more than a ghost in the shadows of the buildings at the edge of town, and that suits him just fine at the moment. There's nothing he wants less than to have to talk to anyone at the moment.

There's no hum from the fence when he comes up on it, just the gentle chirps of the cicadas and croaks of the frogs, so he crawls under and out, into the outstretched arms of the woods and freedom.

He feels ten times lighter in the woods. The weight, the mines looming in his future and now Madge's uncertain fate, all crushing his chest and stealing his breath, seem to dissolve around him.

Walking aimlessly, he slinks further into the darkness until he finds himself at the strawberry patch where collapses in a bare spot beside it.

It's been a good season for them. The little plants are still fairly thick with berries, and when he'd checked them, the other patches scattered here and there through the woods were doing just as well.

Plucking one, he pops it in his mouth and chews thoughtfully.

Madge had told him once, years ago when he'd first started to notice she really _was _pretty and that her quiet was more nerves than snobbery, that her father had loved strawberries.

He'd been teasing her about sprouting a strawberry plant in her stomach, stupid as that was, just to keep her talking. Then he'd asked her how she ended up with such a taste for them.

The plan had been to tell her she'd like the flavor even more on his lips, which looking back was a bit cheesy, but at the time he'd thought he was being incredibly clever.

Then she'd answered. Her father had liked them.

"He always liked the wild ones best," she'd added, her voice so small and fragile Gale had almost missed it.

After that the mood took a decided downturn and trying to sneak a kiss seemed like poor timing.

He supposed things have worked out though.

Sighing, he runs his hands through his hair and flops back onto the trodden down grass.

There's got to be a solution to this. He'll marry her in a heartbeat if that's what it takes. His parents will accept it eventually. In June, when Madge turns seventeen, Haymitch can sign the papers and they can get married. That'll give Gale almost an entire year to make her see this is the best choice.

Better to save two lives than sacrifice them both, especially when Haymitch agrees that his life isn't as much worth saving as Madge and her mother's.

Gale wishes his dad had been a little more supportive of the plan. He doesn't mind going at it alone, but it would be a little easier if at least one of his parents had his back, and his mother certainly wouldn't. In fact, he can already imagine the look of fear and disappointment in her eyes when he tells her that he's considered what she said and that she'll have a daughter-in-law in June.

Reaching over, he picks another berry, tossing and catching it before studying it and looking around him.

He could survive out here. Easily.

There's plenty of food, he's good with a bow and snares, they wouldn't starve. Water wouldn't be a problem, there's the lake and if they needed to go further away, there are streams that must lead to larger rivers, maybe even the ocean. It would almost be too easy for him to survive in the woods, actually _live_ in the woods, far easier than inside the fence.

Madge might even be able to, but he doubts she'd like it, not really. Unlike him, she's never had to learn the skills that would make life in the woods _living. _Life on the outside really would just be survival for her, for her mother. Especially for her mother.

Running away, however tempting, isn't a real option.

When the sun's first rays start to stretch over the horizon, he gets up and heads back to the fence, under it and back to the Seam.

People are out of their houses, miners still standing with their families, gathering up children and heading toward town. Something is happening, and it can't be good.

"Gale!" Rory and Vick are rushing at him, both huffing and out of breath.

They don't ask where he's been, because this is hardly the first morning they've woken to find him gone, just give him worried looks as they start to explain.

"The Games are about to end," Rory says.

"Mandatory viewing," Vick adds, sucking in a long breath. "Mom and dad are waiting for us. Dad said if you weren't back soon he'd have to come find you, so we said we'd look for you first."

He's glad they did. His dad trudging out into the woods would've been a sure fire way to get caught, maybe thrown in the stocks or whipped for being late to a mandatory Capitol event, and it would've drawn more attention to the fact that Gale wasn't there.

Gale nods and follows them back to the house to where his relieved mom shoots him an exhausted and irritated glare and his dad just nods somberly at him from over Posy's still sleeping head.

"Well," his mom says, straightening her dress a little out of nerves, "let's go."

#######

The Square is filling up when Haymitch and Madge get to it.

They'd been in the middle of a silent breakfast, neither one of them wanting to talk about what had been said the night before and Madge and Matilda's future, or lack thereof.

He'd been silently hoping the boy was considering his words, considering what Haymitch sees as the only way he's going to have a chance of keeping his girls alive. For all he knows though, the boy is planning how he's going to break up with Madge.

Quietly he wonders if it might be too late to ask Wiress to organize a little takedown for him. He won't have Madge's heart broken on top of everything else.

Then the television clicks on.

They both freeze at the sound, Madge with her mouth full of oatmeal and Haymitch with his morning mug of white liquor half-way to his mouth when they hear the familiar electrical buzz that precedes the television screen flickering to life.

A loud noise, a thick tone of warning, came over the airwaves. An announcement.

It had woken Matilda, she'd come down the stairs, pale and worried, wringing her hands.

"That noise makes my head just throb," she'd said, her thin hands pressing to her temples. "Make it stop, Haymitch."

If he could've he would've, but the best he could do was take her back upstairs, tuck her in, and help Madge give her another dose of morphling before following the instructions from the Capitol for the finale of the Games.

It sets him back quite a lot, paying off the official that could charge her with treason for missing mandatory viewings to get her the waver, but just like with the foreman of the geologists, bribery isn't much of a hardship for Haymitch. In fact, paying for that waver is probably one of the better uses for his money.

As the square hums with curious voices, Haymitch squints up at the screen.

It's showing the families of the remaining two Tributes, beautifully clipped and pasted interviews and pictures meant to wring every ounce of emotional trauma they can. About half of it's bullshit, fabrications created to up the impact of the deaths. In the case of the Victor, though, the lies will become the truth. The families who've been trying to save their loved one will become their biggest liability.

If there were one thing Haymitch could tell them, it's to stop trying so hard. There's no Victory.

With a glance Haymitch can tell who made which. The fingerprints of the Victors in charge of each Tributes' family is transparent. It's a strange comfort to him. They aren't his friends, but they're the closest thing he has to them, and seeing their work, the assurance that they're alive, eases his mind. For the moment anyways.

Madge winds her arm around his and leans into him, her cheek pressing into his arm as she stares blankly up at the screen. Probably thinking that might be her next year, maybe not in the finale, but part of the Games, either dead, about to die, or waiting to kill. He won't let it be her though, or Matilda.

She might be right, the Capitol might, probably will, change the rules to the Game, but that doesn't mean he hasn't got other tricks up his sleeve. Or at least knows the people who do.

"Alright, sweetheart?" He asks, voice a rough whisper.

He feels her head move, nod, but she stays quiet.

Looking around he sees the crowd from the Seam, dusty and tired, wary as they mill around and wait for the program to officially start.

He spots the Hawthornes, standing at the edge of the square. The two younger boys are whispering conspiratorially while their mother, Hazelle he thinks is her name, is talking with another woman quietly behind them, her eyes keeping watch over youngest sons as she does.

Asher is holding the little girl, his lips moving by her ear, probably comforting her before the horror show starts.

A flare of jealousy lights in Haymitch's stomach that he'd never had moments like that, and never would. His chance to be a parent, to comfort and love, had died right alongside that girl from Two when he'd won his Games.

Quickly, he squashes it down. Life isn't fair, no point thinking about it. Best to ignore it, numb it, carry on.

For half a second Asher's eyes glance up, lock with Haymitch's.

There's a strange sort of sorrow, somewhere settled between anger and terror, behind his eyes, and instantly Haymitch knows that Gale Hawthorne has a big mouth. He told his dad. Little bastard. Does he not understand what 'keep your enormous trap shut' means?

Behind him someone clears their throat, deep and rough.

"Madge?"

It takes considerable effort for Haymitch to hold his groan in.

Glancing down, he sees Madge's cheeks brighten as she lets their arms pull apart and turns to face Gale.

"Hi," she murmurs, glancing around at the square. A few people have started looking, some covertly, some not, and she loathes the attention.

Hawthorne stuffs his hands in his pockets and tilts his head, studying her with a little half smile for a minute before jerking towards his family.

"You can come stand with us, if you want," he says. His eyes flick to Haymitch, and he adds, a bit reluctantly, "Both of you."

What a charmer. Really, what do girls see in him? What does Madge see in him? He isn't _that _good looking. He's a cocky bastard. And not that grades are anything to go on, but he barely made it through school. She's smarter than him, what will they even talk about?

From what he's heard, talking isn't something Hawthorne us well known for, and Haymitch forces down the urge to pull Madge away from the bastard. She deserves so much better.

"She's liked him for a while now," Matilda had said when he'd told her about his plan to save her and Madge the night before, about needing Hawthorne to marry her. He'd omitted his and Wiress' guesses on what the next Quarter Quell. That would've only upset her, probably put her in bed for days, so instead he'd simply told her that he wanted to make sure they were taken care of if something should happen to him and that Hawthorne was his best shot at that.

"I still hate pushing this on her." Even if it may be the only way to save her.

Matilda had just smiled airily. "It doesn't have to happen today, Haymitch."

He wishes it could though. The more distance between them the better the chances that they might not end up on the chopping block when the Quell is announced.

"One of the blessings of not having any family," Birdy had told him when Wiress had pulled him to the back of the bar and given him her grim guess about the possibility for the next Quarter Quell, "is that they can't use them against us."

Haymitch wishes now more than ever that Daniel were still alive. Madge and Matilda wouldn't be connected to him, not this way, if they were still living their old life, safe and sound in the mayor's home.

"You're parents won't mind?" Madge asks, her eyes subtly glancing over to where the Hawthornes are still standing.

Hawthorne shakes his head. "No. It'll be good. Let you get to know them better."

Ingratiate her with them, Haymitch thinks. As much as it pains Haymitch to think it, it is a smart move by Hawthorne. Maybe there's a brain in that thick skull of his after all.

Even if he'd rather have this time with just himself and Madge, it's wise to melt her into the Hawthornes. It's for the best.

Besides, he wants to meet them a little. He isn't just passing his girls to the boy. His family will be part of her life too, and he wants to make sure they aren't all as dimwitted as Gale.

Giving Madge a little nudge, Haymitch jerks his head toward where the boy's family stands. "Let's go, sweetheart."

Her nose wrinkles up as she glances up at him, clearly confused by his sudden need for social interaction. He just gives her a wink.

#######

Gale's mother and father don't look surprised when Madge and Mr. Abernathy walk up with Gale, so she assumes he discussed inviting them to stand with them before asking.

Still, his mother looks a little wary, and Madge gets the sneaking suspicion he's at least told her about Mr. Abernathy's offer to help Gale get into the geological corps and the stipulations that came with that offer. Namely, Madge.

She probably thinks Madge put him up to it. That she's a spoiled child that just doesn't want to fade away into the life of the Seam.

Madge feels her face burn with embarrassment at the thought. That isn't how she wants to be thought of, especially not by Gale's mother.

"How are you today, Madge?" Mr. Hawthorne asks.

He's smiling, genuinely, so Madge hopes that even if Mrs. Hawthorne thinks Madge is a brat out to change her son, he doesn't.

"As well as I can be," she answers.

He nods. No one is ever happy to be out in the Square watching the end of the Games.

Smoothing Posy's hair down, he presses a kiss into it and gives Madge another smile.

"Madge!" Vick shouts, as he and Rory stop tormenting each other long enough to notice her arrival. "You're standing with us?"

She nods and Rory snorts.

"Are you sure? People will know you're with _Gale_ if you do."

Mr. Abernathy snorts and Madge cuts him an irritable glare that he doesn't seem to take too seriously, just shrugs it off as if to say 'what?'

Gale shoot both his brother and Mr. Abernathy a dark look before crossing his arms over his chest and chewing his tongue, probably biting back saying something that will get him in trouble.

"That's okay," Madge tells him brightly, though to be honest, the same thought had crossed her mind, just not in the same way that Rory is implying.

She's still worried about him. Her fight isn't his, and it isn't fair for Mr. Abernathy to drag him into the mess of her life.

Gale is stubborn though, just as stubborn as Mr. Abernathy, and now that he's in she doubts there's anything she can do to push him away. No matter how much she knows she needs to.

She wishes she had a little more will to force him away from her, to save him, but she doesn't. For the first time in a very long time she's happy, despite the danger. It's selfish and she knows it, to be happy that Gale hadn't taken her up on her offer to make Mr. Abernathy help him without having Madge's life as part of the terms. It makes everything seem so much more real, like maybe she isn't just a passing infatuation for him.

Before Rory can add further commentary, the Anthem starts to play overhead, and then Caesar Flickerman's voice calls to them, imploring them to look at the screen for what will surely be a spectacular and bloody finale.

The crowd shifts, turns to face the screen and Madge feels something warm and rough brush against her palm.

Her eyes drop and she finds Gale's fingertips, hand offered to her, by her wrist.

He gives her a little smile.

She knows she shouldn't encourage him, her mind is screaming that at her. His blood will be on her hands or her death will be on his conscience, and that isn't fair to either of them when she has the power to at least save him from heartache. She just doesn't have the will to do it.

Eyes glancing up to the screen, she sees the two boys locked in a bloody battle to the death, cut and battered, their vitals showing them both fading faster than their appearances would ever let anyone know. It's almost more a waiting game now than anything else.

That's her fate, she thinks. Violence and death, no matter what Mr. Abernathy does or how much Gale thinks he loves her.

They can't save her or her mother. _Madge_ can't save her mother or herself.

So, she thinks sadly, she deserves a little happiness before the end.

With a little smile, she gently takes his hand, lets it wrap around hers and secure her to the moment.

After all, she doesn't have many left; she deserves to enjoy the few that remain doesn't she?


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 9**

Gale spends more and more time in the woods after the Games end. It's the only place he can think clearly.

His dad had sat him down after the finale and told him his fears, that if he marries Madge not only will it not save her, but it might also throw the whole family into whatever mess might come up with the Quell's announcement.

"I-We can't risk it, Gale." His dad had given him a pat on the shoulder. "We'll figure this out. We're gonna save her. We just need to _think_."

So that's what Gale's been doing, excessively.

He doesn't tell Madge. It would probably relieve her, though, to hear him say he's going to put his family's safety above hers and her mother's, but he also knows it will hurt her, even if she won't say it out loud. She's admitted, once, that even though she knows her time is probably short, she's happy he's with her.

Telling her that his commitment to her isn't enough to put his family in harm's way would ruin the illusion, not for her, but for Gale. He doesn't want to think of himself as someone that weighs lives in his hands and makes the choice of who lives and dies.

Katniss has asked him, a few times, what's bothering him, but he keeps his troubles to himself. This is his problem, Madge's and Haymitch's problem, and he doesn't want Katniss tangled up in it.

Instead he tells her he's just worried about the mines, his application to the geology corps, the future, which is the truth too.

The knowledge that in a few weeks he'll be trapped underground, maybe for the rest of his life if his application is rejected, has been his immediate concern. Once he starts in the mines he'll have precious little time to think about how he's going to save Madge without risking his family. Because his dad is right, marrying her would probably only increase the Reaping pool. Haymitch might not care if Gale's family is Reaping in Madge or her mother's place, but Gale does, and Madge would.

Running feels like the best option.

He hadn't thought it would be, but the more time goes by, the more he watches and learns about Madge and her mother, from up close rather than afar, the more plausible it seems.

"We'd all have to go," his dad had said when Gale had brought it up. "Anyone left behind...I don't want to think what they'd do to them."

Gale doesn't either.

His family would be okay, Rory and Vick and even Posy, eventually, would easily learn to trap and hunt, fish, track, and identify plants. Then of course, his parents would be fine. It's only Madge and her mother that would be in trouble.

He's been watching them closely, trying to pinpoint skills they might have. Despite Matilda's apparent frailty, which is all anyone seems to focus on, she's more resourceful than she seems. On more than one occasion he's watched her in her garden, growing things that no one else seemingly can.

"Oh, my father taught me, dear," she'd explain, not even bothering to look at him when he'd asked where she learned to grow her garden so well.

And she's got to be tougher than she looks. She lives with Haymitch, after all.

Madge is stronger than she's given credit for, too. She'd survived being held in lock-up while the rest of the District thought she was dead, then the community home, which is no picnic, and while that may not be the wilds, it's nothing to shrug at.

They could do it. They could survive in the wilds, in the woods. He knows they could now.

His family wouldn't take much convincing, he's sure of that.

He just needs to convince Madge

#######

Gale finishes his dinner in record time, not that there's much to eat.

Summer is ending and the heat is making the game scarce, staying to the cool during the day when Gale is able to get into the woods during the week and even on his and Asher's Sunday trip. All that's left are some dry bits of rabbit and squirrel, mixed berries and nuts, and some of Prim Everdeen's cheese on stale bread.

Before Vick has even washed down the last of his bread, Gale is up and heading out the door.

"Off to see Madge, again," Hazelle comments. She isn't mad, though Asher is sure she's a little hurt that Gale is spending his last days of freedom either in the woods or with Madge and not her. He's still her baby and losing his time stings.

"Madge is a nice girl," Asher assures her as they clear the table.

"A nice girl whose guardian is trying to control his life," she adds unhappily.

He can't argue with that, and besides, she doesn't even know the worst of it. Despite desperately wanting to, he hasn't told her Gale's grim news about the possibility for the Quarter Quell and how dire the situation may be, probably is. It would help her understand Gale's need to spend as much time as he can with Madge, because as far as Asher can tell, time is all they have.

In a few months time, if Haymitch is right, Madge and her mother will be on their way to the Capitol and certain death.

"There are worse things in life than getting a better job," Asher mumbles, avoiding the glare Hazelle shoot his way.

They do the dishes in silence, put them away, then leave the boys to a game of cards (Rory is cheating, but then again, so is Vick) and Posy to her baby dolls as Asher follows Hazelle out onto the back porch.

She drops down, onto the creaking wooden steps and rubs her eyes.

"It isn't the job and it isn't Madge, you know that, Ash," she finally says, her fingers still pressed to her eyes. "I don't want-Gale shouldn't have to chose, be in debt, so early. I don't like it."

Asher flops down beside her, sighs as he reaches over, wraps an arm around her shoulders and pulls her to him. "I know, but it's his choice. He's a man, at least in the eyes of the government. This, Haymitch's offer, the job, even with the strings, it isn't the worst decision he'll ever have to make."

He isn't sure why he's comforting her over something that won't come to pass. Gale will protect his brothers and sister, Asher and Hazelle too, even if it costs him Madge.

And it might. It probably will.

And Madge _is _a good girl; she'll make sure Haymitch helps Gale, even if it won't help her.

Even after months of racking his brain, trying and trying to come up with a way out of this mess, he hasn't come to one. He's no closer to saving Madge's life than he had been when Gale had told him about the Quarter Quell.

Resting his cheek against her coarse hair, Asher sighs.

"Not the worst decision at all."

#######

Madge is setting on her bed, cross-legged with a book resting in her lap when Gale knocks on her window.

It's become their nightly ritual.

He goes out during the day, hunts, then goes for dinner with his family before making the trek up to the Victors' Village, up the little lattice to Madge's window.

Most nights they just sit on the roof, stare up at the stars while Madge points out the summer constellations. Just like her father had taught to her.

Other nights Gale takes her out onto the paths around her house, teaching her the few plants, edible and poisonous, that surround her home. They usually end up in the meadow, hidden in the thick little clumps of trees that outline the little common.

Madge likes those days best.

There's usually a lot of kissing on those days.

Well, it isn't _all _kissing, she supposes.

Sometimes they'll just lie on the grass and talk. Mostly about nonsense.

"Favorite color?"

"Blue," Gale told her. "Like the sky."

"Gray," Madge answered, though she didn't tell him why.

"Favorite food?"

Madge groaned. "Mr. Abernathy brings back this drink." Gale instantly made a face and Madge laughed. "Not that kind. It's...it's a sweet. Liquid chocolate."

"I didn't ask for your favorite drink," he grumbled, looking uncomfortable at the thought of such a rich treat.

Poking him in the side, Madge wrapped his hand in hers and kissed his knuckles. "Fine. Mellark's rolls."

He didn't look much happier with that, but at least it was achievable.

"Now you," she prompted.

Gale sat up a little straighter, wrapped his arm around her and contemplated his answer carefully. Finally, he nodded. "Turkey jerky."

Madge snorted the instant it hit her ears.

"Turkey jerky?" She wrinkled her nose as she looked up at him through her bangs. "Do you actually like it best or do you just like to say it?"

He shrugs. "Both?"

Of course both. How could she have been so silly?

"How many kids?" Gale asked one particularly muggy night, causing Madge to freeze in her spot, hidden under the thick canopy of an ancient tree at the edge of the meadow.

That wasn't nonsense.

She'd shifted uncomfortably. There would be no children in her future, not with Gale, not with anyone, and thinking about them is painful.

He nudged her with his shoulder. "Come on. How many?"

Even though Madge knows there are no children to be had, Madge can't bring herself not to indulge him. He's too cute for that and she's too, too weak.

Madge feels her nose wrinkle up in contemplation, then she sighs. "At least two."

One is too lonely. She's always envied other kids, ones with siblings. Shouldering her life, her mother and her the death of her father, the isolation and ridicule, might've been a little easier if she'd had someone by her side, a brother or a sister.

It's a little selfish, wanting a nonexistent person, someone far more blameless than herself, to suffer through the trials of her life with her, but it's only a dream. She won't have even one child.

"At least," Gale repeated. He flopped back, staring up through the leaves at the moon. "Two sounds nice. A boy and a girl?"

She shrugged. "It wouldn't matter to me."

It sounded silly, like some mantra all parents-to-be would say, but all she really would want is for them to be healthy.

"I'd want girls," Gale told her. "Boys are too much trouble."

It took a great amount of effort for her not to tell Gale that he sounded a lot like Mr. Abernathy. He'd spent half Madge's life telling her that boys are filthy minded, dirty little bastards, and that he's glad she's a girl.

"Smell better, that's for damn sure," he'd muttered. "Better hygiene."

Tonight, as Gale grins in at her from the roof, she hopes he has less heavy topics to discuss. She doesn't feel like coming home to cry her eyes out over a lost future.

He knocks again, holds up a handful of wildflowers as Madge opens the window to let him in.

Quietly, he crawls in, his heavy boots not making a sound as they land on the wooden floor of her room.

Madge takes the flowers from him and puts them in the vase by her bedside table, mixing them with others in varying states of wilting before turning back to find him looming over her.

His arms snake around her as he pulls her flush to him. "I have a surprise for you."

Eyebrow quirked, Madge frowns. "What?"

Almost half an hour later, after shimmying down the side of her house, getting her foot stuck in the lattice and then weaving through the secret paths, she finds herself at the fence.

"What are we doing at the fence, Gale?"

He holds up a hand, shushing her as he tilts his head, listening.

A few seconds later he smiles and grabs her hand. "Come on."

"Whe-Gale, where are we going?" She asks, already knowing the answer.

Gale just grins as he ducks down, lifting the bottom of the fence for her."Out."

That one word makes her freeze. She can't go out. Out isn't safe, out is opening her up to being taken back into the cold holding cells, and she can't do that again.

"No, Gale, I can't." She shakes her head, pulls back from the fence.

"Madge," he plants his feet and locks his eyes with hers, "I'm with you. It'll be okay."

It almost makes her laugh, that he thinks his presence alone will keep her safe. It's silly. What's even sillier, though, is that she believes it herself.

Maybe it's that he genuinely seems to believe it himself, that he's got some kind of magical power to protect her, that convinces her, or maybe it's that his eyes seem more like the moon than they have at any point before, whatever it is, she finds herself letting him lead her out of the District and into the forest.

#######

Gale holds tight to Madge's hand as he leads her through the trees.

Her eyes are wide, worried, and he gives her a squeeze of reassurance. He's with her and he isn't going to let anything happen to her, he's going to protect her. All he has to do is convince her to let him.

They weave through the woods, for an hour, over up-grown roots and downed limbs from the most recent summer storm, until they reach the edge, an open hill that spreads out overlooking the lake below.

"Gale it's beautiful," she sighs.

He pulls her down, onto the soft grass and into his lap.

"Down there is a lake, and there's a cabin, then beyond that…" He waves his hand. "I don't know."

She smiles, her eyes reflecting back the starlight as she scans over the landscape, probably the first stretch of free land she's ever seen.

"There's-uh-there's a strawberry patch beyond that tree line over there, and the geese fly over in the winter and-"

"Gale," she stops him, "why are you showing me all this?"

He shrugs. "This is my happy place. This is where I'm free. I thought-I wanted you to see it."

Her forehead wrinkles up and she tilts her head, frowning a bit. "Why? It's-I'm glad, but why?"

This is it, the moment that will make or break his plans. He takes a deep breath.

"I want to run away."

For a minute she stares at him, her mouth hanging open slightly and her eyes hazy, trying to decipher his words, then she shakes her head. "Gale, we can't."

She's already trying to get up from his lap, pushing herself away, as Gale tries to keep her in place.

"We _can_," he growls.

"No-"

"_Yes_."

"You-Gale, your family-"

"-would come with us," he quickly puts that protest down. Then he adds, "And your mother, too. All of us. My dad and the boys, even my mom, we could keep us alive through the winter and then you and your mom could plant a garden in the spring when we find somewhere permanent. We cou-"

"No, Gale, we can't." Madge shakes her head, tears are about to fall from her eyes.

"We ca-"

"Gale!" She grabs his shoulders, then his face, making him look her dead on. "Gale, you don't understand. Even if we could get everyone out here, your family and my mother, what about Mr. Abernathy? I can't leave him Gale."

"Then we'll take him with us too," Gale snaps, a little more harshly than he intends.

He'll take that idiot with them all the way to the ends of the earth if he has to.

Tears are dripping off her jaw now and her face is screwed up, nose running.

"They _will_ find us, Gale. They'll find us and they'll destroy us. Just because we'd be outside the fence doesn't mean we'd be outside their control." She swats tears from her face, smearing them across her cheeks. "They'll find us an-and killing us won't be the worst of it."

Gale tries to calm her cups her face and tries to brush the tears away from her face, ask her just _what _the worst is, but she's off and stammering, already telling him. Everything.

"Maybe they'll k-kill Rory a-and Vick and P-P-Posy, your p-parents, bec-cause they'll know it was your idea. They'll kill them to pun-n-nish you." She shakes her head, sending her hair flying wildly. "They'll turn you into an av-vox. Make you live with what happened, in the Capitol."

"Then I-I don't even know what they'll do to my mother and me, to Mr. Abernathy, but it'll be worse than being sent to the Games. At least there our deaths can be fast. What-ever the Capitol would-_will_- do to us, it won't be fast."

Madge's eyes are red-rimmed and her nose is running, all her words are garbled together in a mish-mash that Gale almost doesn't understand.

She's terrified.

Terrified, but telling him the truth. Cold, hard, and ugly.

Gale's hands drop down to her shoulders as she nods absently at him.

"We can't run, Gale. There's no way out of this."

Looking down, Gale's eyes trace the pattern on her dress, delicate little lines spindling between white woven flowers on the pale blue material, memorizing the way her chest rises and falls.

Cool hands, a little damp, run over Gale's cheek, tipping his face back up, making him look at her.

"I'm sorry, Gale."

Her voice is so small, barely audible over the crickets in the distance, that Gale feels his heart begin to shatter in his chest. This fight was over before it even began, and Madge knew that. There was never a way out.

Without a word, Gale pulls her to him, buries his face in her hair and breathes in the scent of whatever fancy shampoo Haymitch bought her. Her tears start to soak through the shoulder of his shirt and he tries to memorize the way she feels pressed against him, he may not have many more chances to do it.

Fireflies flash on and off around him, reflecting off the lake down below, and Gale watches the ripples from the wind make them dance. Bugs buzz and hum while some birds, he thinks they might be mockinjays, sing a sad little song.

His arms tighten around her.

She might not have any hope left, but Gale does. He isn't giving up, not yet. He can't.

There's got to be a way.

There has to be.

#######

Gale brings her home once she's all cried out, his shirt soaked with tears and snot and probably a little spittle.

It hurt, tearing apart his hope for an escape, but it had to be done. False beliefs, though, no matter how comforting, weren't going to help them. He needs to see that they're in an impossible situation and that there's no way out. There is no magic power, not from Mr. Abernathy and not from him, that's going to save her.

He helps her up the lattice, to the roof, then through her window, still propped open with her book, cool air gently wafting out of it.

His eyes are still bright, but not red-rimmed like Madge's, he's a little better at keeping himself together than she is, clearly.

For a few minutes he just sits on the window sill, staring at the rug, his eyes moving over the vines and flowers that cover it. Then he looks up, hold his hand out to her.

She takes it, lets him pull her to his chest again and wrap her in his warmth.

Closing her eyes, Madge pretends again that she's safe. In Gale's arms, warm and loved.

It's only an illusion though.

Gale is going to the mines soon, and if Mr. Abernathy is successful, maybe to the geological corp. He's got a life ahead of him, and Madge can only hope it's a happy one.

Her arms tighten around him and she presses a kiss into the stubble of his neck.

Madge can't be a part of his future, just his present.

All she can do with her last bits of time are ensure that his life after she's gone is happy and comfortable, that Gale and his family are safe.

That's all she has left to live for.


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 10**

AN: I hope all of you have a safe and happy New Year and that 2015 is kind to you. Thanks to everyone reading this story, you don't know how much you encourage me to move this thing along. Okay, so, one quick warning in this chapter, little Madge has a rough time, meaning she gets a bit roughed up, there's the suggestion of worse, but she makes it through okay. I'm just warning you.

#######

Madge gets up, pulls on her clothes for the day, slips her shoes on, and grabs her package before propping open the window as quietly as she can.

The air is still and warm, but less thick without the sun overhead, bugs are still humming, as she crawls out and across the roof to the lattice and down.

Her feet hit the soft, dew-damp grass and she stops to straighten her dress out, smoothing a few creases from it and brushing some stray leaves away before turning and nearly screaming.

"Mr. Abernathy!" It comes out as a gasp as she stifles the yell.

"Heading somewhere, sweetheart?"

He's dressed already, too. Boots and dull colored clothes in their freshly cleaned state, Madge's mother's doing. There's a mug in his hand, probably coffee and a splash of white liquor, which is an improvement from when she and her mother first arrived.

She'd come home from school to find him gone, during the early days of her and her mother living there. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence, so she'd carried on, done her chores and tended to her mother who was still recovering from her time in the locked ward, after Madge's father's death.

Night had come, though, crept up on the Victors' Village, and he still hadn't been home.

"They've taken him," her mother had begun weeping. "They've taken him too."

Madge had tried to calm her, but in the end only a dose of her morphling had done the trick.

Hours had slipped by, and as midnight approached, she pulled on a coat and shoes to go looking for him.

After carefully traversing the paths around the Town, down to the edge of the Seam, she'd stayed to the shadows and quietly made her way to the bar.

There was only one bar in the Seam, and finding it wasn't much of a task, just follow the empty beer bottles and ruckus to the far reaches of the District.

It wasn't much more than a tin building with a flimsy door and a poor reputation, and it terrified her.

On more than one occasion, men from the mines had come from it, filthy and stinking, to yell at her house-her old house. The new Mayor's house.

Her father could've had them arrested for public drunkenness, but he never did.

"They have families to, Magdalene. What would happen to them if they lost a day of work?"

Madge had been building up the courage to go in, find Mr. Abernathy and drag his drunken self home, it was the only place he could possibly be, when someone grabbed her by the wrist.

"Where are you going, pretty?" A man, thin and coal dust coated, had grinned down at her. He was missing a tooth and his hair was a greasy mess.

"I'm-I need to find someone," she'd answered, her little fingers trying to loosen his grip on her arm which was losing circulation, getting prickly and numb.

"I'm someone." His smile had widened and he'd leaned down closer, his drink soaked breath blowing in her face and his bloodshot eyes raking over her and causing her to cringe. "I could be who you're looking for."

Her head shook and she tried harder to pull away. "Let me go!"

"Look like you could use some loosening up," he snickered, jerking her towards him as she dug her heels into the gravel. It didn't help.

"No, please," she pleaded, tears beginning to form behind her eyes. "Please let me go."

"Did 'please' work on the Peacekeepers?" He asked, lips curling up. "Did they like it when you asked nicely?"

She hadn't understood what he meant at the time, it had taken her several years for the meaning of his words to hit her, and when she did her stomach had churned. At the time though, it had only been a cold taunt.

Shaking her head, Madge continued to struggle, finally planting her feet and balling her fist, she'd swung up, hitting him hard under the jaw and making his teeth collide in his mouth with a sickening crack. It got him to let go at least.

Running, she'd made it almost to the door of the bar, which probably wasn't much safer, but that she hoped had at least one sympathetic person in it, before tripping.

Her knees had hit the gravel painfully, ripping her dress and scraping up her knees and the palms of her hands. As she struggled to her feet again, the man jumped on her.

"That's some poor manners you've got there, pretty."

Much as she struggled, he was too strong, too much bigger than her, and had the high ground. She started to yell, but he covered her mouth with his filthy hand.

"Now, let's us go som-"

Someone grabbed him by the collar, yanked him from her and tossed him away.

Too stunned to do anything, Madge stayed there, gravel digging into her back and her breathing uneven as she stared up at the star speckled sky.

"Get back here!" A deep voice, harsh and angry, yelled.

Another voice, just as deep and just as angry, called out. "Leave it, Ash. We'll deal with him later."

Madge had pushed herself up, propped on her elbows, and stared out with her tear blurred eyes to find a couple of men, probably miners, both staring off into the darkness where she assumed the man had run.

One of the men, the one closer to her, frowned and came over.

"What are you doing out here all alone?" He asked, offering her a hand.

Keeping her eyes down, Madge had pushed herself to her feet without taking his hand and ignored his question.

The other man, she finally recognized him as Mr. Hawthorne, jogged over, his face pulled into a sharp look of worry.

"Madge?" He leaned over, hand to his knees, and caught her eyes. "Hey, little lady."

All the tears that she'd managed to keep in during her fight, all the worry and fear, spilled out, down her cheeks and off her chin.

"I was-s jusht looking f-for Mr. A-Ab-bernathy," she sputtered. "He d-didn't come ho-me."

Swatting at her face and cursing herself for how absolutely pitiful she was, Madge had shaken her head, taken several deep breaths. There was no time to fall apart.

Mr. Hawthorne reached in his pocket, pulled out a yellowed handkerchief and held it out to her.

Giving him a grateful smile, Madge carefully used as little of it as she could, blotting the edges of her eyes and tracing the paths the tears had taken to soak them up.

"I'm better now," she told them, her voice still thick, as she handed the cloth back.

"He's in there?" Mr. Hawthorne had asked, stuffing the handkerchief back in his pocket, his eyes narrowed and focused on the bar, glowing with cigarettes and buzzing with drunkenness.

Madge shrugged. "I think so."

She hoped so. If he wasn't she wasn't sure where he'd be.

Without waiting for another word, Mr. Hawthorne had stomped off, up to the door and into the bar.

"Get her home, Jude. I'll get him."

As the door dropped closed behind him Madge thought she saw Mr. Abernathy sitting at the bar, slumped over.

"Come on," the other man, Madge recognizes him vaguely as one of the men that had come to her father before the strike, told her. "Asher will get Haymitch."

While she hadn't felt like she should trust anyone after the night she had up to that point, Madge just nodded and let him lead her back through the Seam.

They'd made it back to the house and sat on the back porch steps, Madge studying her skinned knee and ragged palms while Jude fiddled with a chunk of wood, carving delicate looking patterns into it.

"You should keep that knee covered," he had told her.

"It's just a scratch," Madge muttered, picking at a sliver of skin barely still attached. "It doesn't matter."

Silence had stretched out, filled with the lonely noises of the wild dogs outside the fence and the radio playing softly inside, until Jude sighed.

"I'm sorry."

Madge looked to him, eyebrows high on her forehead. "You didn't do anything."

He nodded. "I did." His jaw tensed and he frowned, forehead creasing in worry. "You know I was one of the men that organized the strike? It's my fault your dad is dead."

And by extension, his fault she'd ended up in the Seam looking for her drunken guardian, at least in his mind.

Reaching out, Madge had patted his hand, tried to force a smile.

Her father had made his choice. Madge wished he hadn't had to, wished she were still in her old home, but wishes weren't reality and even she knew that.

She tried to say it was okay, but it wasn't, not for her. Out of everything that had happened, Madge felt she'd gotten the rawest deal. Getting mad wouldn't change that, though, yelling at one of the men wouldn't change that, so she stayed quiet.

When Mr. Hawthorne finally came up, helping a stumbling Mr. Abernathy, Madge ran out to greet them.

He had been wet, soaked to the bone, and one of his eyes was swollen shut.

"Fell," he mumbled as he struggled up the steps to the door. He'd given her a sad little half glance as he'd pulled the door open and waved her in. "Come on, sweetheart."

Before she'd gone in, she'd turned and given Mr. Hawthorne and his friend a forced smile. "Thank you."

A few days later, after he'd dried out, both of drink and from whatever puddle he'd managed to land in and his black eye had begun to fade in places to a sickly yellow and green and purple, they'd been sitting down for breakfast, in the bright, crisp light of morning and Madge had noticed a tremor in his hand.

"Why are your hands shaking?" Madge had asked as she sat at the kitchen table, watching him struggle with his fork as he tried to cut his egg.

"Just-uh-just nerves, sweetheart," he'd told her, his eyes focused on the seemingly impossible task of his breakfast.

Madge had gotten up, walked around the table to his seat and taken the fork from his hand carefully before carefully cutting his egg for him. She smiled and handed the fork back, glad to be even a little bit useful to him.

With a smile, he'd taken the fork back into his still unsteady hand. "Thanks."

As she'd turned her eyes had caught on his mug, half full with dark liquid.

She'd gone to the cabinet, pulled one of his bottles of white liquor from where her mother had decided a proper place for them was, and walked back to the table. "Here."

The cap was off and the bottle's lip was to the mug when he'd grabbed her hand.

"Stop."

His eyes were staring strangely at the bottle, warily, and Madge finally noticed the beads of sweat along his forehead.

"Are you sick?" Her heart began hammering in her chest. She turned quickly and ran to the sink, grabbed up a clean rag and wet it under the tap before running back to him and starting to mop up his face. "Hold still."

"I'm not sick," he grumbled, taking the rag from her. "I just-I'm trying to quit with the drinking."

Madge stopped trying to wrestle the rag from him. "Why?"

Mr. Abernathy's eyes had dropped to the rag, twisting it in his hands. "Don't want a repeat of last week." He reached out and cupped her cheek, gave her a worn smile. "I love you too much."

Madge's heart had cracked.

"It was okay-"

"It _wasn't_," he snapped.

Madge took a step back and his expression softened.

"Sorry," he muttered, running his hand over his face. Bloodshot eyes peeked out at her. "I'm not very good at this parenting thing."

She shrugged. Neither was her mother, but Madge still loved her. "It's okay."

He'd reached out, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "I don't want you to ever come out looking for me again. I don't want to ever be out like that again. No more drinking."

Turning back to his plate, he'd taken the bottle and pushed it toward her. "Need to dump all this crap."

Madge had stood there, watching his hand shake as he struggled with his egg, watching the sweat on his forehead, that strange look in his eyes, before uncapping the bottle again.

"Dad said that mom couldn't just stop the morphling because the withdrawal would kill her." There are no medications in Twelve like there are in the Capitol that could augment the violent symptoms of removing something that's become as vital as air to someone. She couldn't let Mr. Abernathy do something that might kill him. "I don't think you can just stop, Mr. Abernathy."

She'd tipped the bottle up and filled the other half of the mug with white liquor.

"Maybe just, you know, drink a little less. Go out a little less."

And he had. For her and for her mother.

The unfortunate side effect of his decreased drinking was that he didn't sleep nearly enough.

He takes a sip of his coffee and grins at her, waiting for her answer.

Taking a deep breath, Madge nods. "It's Gale's first day in the mines. I wanted to see him. Wish him luck."

Mr. Abernathy takes another sip of his coffee and sighs. "Figured as much."

He's going to tell her no, that it's still dark out and not safe and that she needs to go back up stairs and go to bed.

After a minute, several sips of coffee and a stretch of quiet only interrupted by his slurping, he makes a little gesture, telling her to come to him. "Let's go then."

Madge's nose wrinkles. "What?"

His bushy eyebrows rise. "I said 'let's go'."

"Why?" He doesn't want to see Gale and Gale certainly doesn't want to see him.

"I'm not stupid, kiddo. You and that idiot have been sneaking out to do who-knows-what for the past couple of months, when you were supposed to be sleeping. Doesn't matter what I say, you'll go out, but I'm not going to let you go alone."

Madge tilts her head, studies him for a second, before taking a step forward.

"Really?"

He nods. "Really."

A little grin forms on Madge's lips as she lunges forward and throws her arms around his neck. "Thank you"

She feels a quick kiss on her temple before he presses his nose into her hair. "Anything for you, Pearl."

#######

Gale gets up and sighs.

Rory and Vick are still blissfully asleep as he gathers up his clothes, a new, blue mining uniform and heavy boots, a dented helmet with a headlamp affixed to the front, and quietly dresses.

When he exits, gently shutting the door, he turns to find his mom and dad waiting for him.

His mom is crying already, tear stains are streaked down her cheeks despite her attempts to wipe them away and she's sniffling as she softly walks across the room and takes his face in her hands.

"You be careful," she whispers. A little smile flicks up at the corners of her lips. "I love you."

Gale leans into her touch, lets his arms wrap around her and pull her to him.

He doesn't want to go. He's never wanted to go. The mines have always been his future, but such a distant one that he's hoped that he might be saved from them.

Just like Madge and the Games though, there's no escaping this fate.

Something cold rolls down his cheek and he realizes he's crying and buries his face in her shoulder. He doesn't want his dad to see him being such a baby about this. This is life, and Gale knows he needs to get used to it.

Early mornings and late nights, no more days in the woods except weekends, no more lazy evenings with Madge, this is his life.

Before he can think better of it, a few words slip out.

"I'm scared," he breathes into his mom's hair, his voice brittle, like the little kid he suddenly feels like. He wants to be brave, but being lowered into what may very well be his grave has zapped his bravery for the moment.

"I know, baby," she murmurs back. "I know."

She smoothes his hair down and pulls back, a bit reluctantly, gives him a watery smile.

"Remember, they review the applications in a month. You may get out of there soon."

Despite her misgivings, she's warmed to Haymitch's offer, embraced it and the fact that it will save at least one of her boys, if not all three, from the mines.

"Rory and Vick will have a better chance if they apply and have a family member in the corps," she'd said. "If you still want to. I don't want you doing something just to-"

"Mom," Gale had stopped her. "I'm not exactly easily swayed."

She'd grinned. "No, I suppose you aren't. Always did have your mind set."

And he wasn't likely to change his decisions without a good reason.

Gale nods. "Soon."

She presses another kiss to his cheek, fusses with his name badge, which she'd sewn herself, for a moment longer before his dad clears his throat. "Time to go, son."

Taking a deep breath, Gale gives her one last kiss on the forehead before crossing the room with her on his heels.

"Take your lunches," she says, handing both of them little metal boxes she's packed with what little food there is to spare.

Gale's dad leans over and kisses her cheek before opening the door. He gives Gale a tight look. "Come on."

Outside, other men are already heading out, some dressed in ragged uniforms, and others, the new graduates, dressed in newly distributed ones, not tattered and tested during a full shift.

"Good to see you, Gale," Jude, helmet bouncing against his leg, says as his road intersects with Gale and his dad's.

Gale just grunts. His voice has stopped working.

His dad gives him a bracing pat on the shoulder and an apologetic look.

_Sorry you're here. Sorry you're going into the mines. Sorry things aren't better. Sorry_.

No one talks after that. The only noise is the soft trampling of miners' boots walking through the Seam and towards the mines. A somber processional of gray men and soon-to-be gray men.

When the gates are in view, the gaping mouth of the mines, dozens of them, barely visible in the haze of the slowly waking sun, his dad grabs his shoulder.

He expects some words of advice, reiterations of warnings he's been giving Gale for the past year or more, but instead he gets a grin.

"Look over there," he says, pointing toward the tree line that pushes up against the fence around the mine.

For a second Gale doesn't see anything, just dust from the men's feet and early morning mist, then he spots her.

She's in a tan dress, almost blending in with the dull bark and burnt leaves of the bushes around her, one of her arms still clinging to the trunk of an ancient tree as she squints out to the road where the men are walking.

With a little shove, Gale's dad smiles, jerks his head toward the trees and bushes along the edge of the road. "Go, you have a little time."

Gale stares at him for a minute, eyebrows knitted together, then back at Madge still waiting by the edge of the road and back again. Backing up, he gives his dad a bright smile. "Thanks."

He almost trips on the gravel, gets yelled at by one of the older men as he cuts in front of him, before he reaches the tree line and Madge.

His feet stop at the edge of the road, the break between the gravel and the dark soil and he stares at her, still certain she'll evaporate in the mist.

"Good morning," she finally says, pulling her hand from behind the tree and revealing a little bundle clutched in her fingers. She chews her lip as she makes her way through the bushes. "I brought you a first day gift."

Her hand shoots out, holding the cloth wrapped package to him.

Gale takes a step, onto the soil, then to the dew-damp grass, reaches out and grabs her, pulling her into him.

"You haven't even seen what it is yet," she jokes, her voice muffled in his shoulder.

It could be a rock and he wouldn't care. He's getting to see her, and he hadn't thought he'd be able to. He'd already told her he'd be too tired after his first day to come out and see her, and she'd promised she wouldn't come out to the Seam to see him.

"It'll be dark and I don't want you out there without someone." And Gale would be too exhausted to take her home, and his brothers were just plain out of the question.

Much as he'd love to have her in his bed after the pain his first day is sure to hold, he doubts his parents would be very happy with that arrangement. Plus, Rory is perverted and Vick's eyes have begun to linger on girls a little too long. No way is he making her stay in the room with those idiots.

Pressing her to him, letting his body imprint her curves into his angles and his hands memorize the texture of her dress and the way it moves across her skin when he clutches it in his fists, he buries his face in her hair. She smells like shampoo he'll never be able to afford and sunshine, like life, and that's going to be in short supply in the mines. He wants to absorb every ounce of it he can.

Much too soon, Gale hears the first bell, there'll be two more before he's late, something he can't afford being new.

Madge pulls back, her hand running over the patch with his name on it before she looks up and grins at him.

"You look very handsome."

He rolls his eyes. He looks like every other guy, well, every other new guy.

"I just wanted to wish you good luck," she adds quickly, focusing on his name, eyes tracing the red embroidering on the white canvas.

"Thanks," Gale murmurs, leaning in and catching her lips. He doesn't want to talk. All he wants is to taste her and feel her and pretend that when the second bell rings he isn't going to be that much closer to having to face his fate.

"You shouldn't've come," he mutters into her neck as he nips at the skin, down to her collar bone. Just like if she comes to his house, she's going to have to get home on her own. It isn't safe.

But damned if he isn't happy she did.

The second bell goes off and his stomach drops as he tightens his arms around her.

Tears begin to build behind his eyes and he blinks them back. This is how it is. He's not any better than anyone else. Even if Haymitch gets him out of the mines, everyone spends at least a few months in the hole.

That's life.

"Don't worry," she whispers, her hot breath against his ear. "Mr. Abernathy is waiting for me back on the path."

While he doesn't relish the idea of Haymitch watching him disapprovingly from the shadows, at least Madge had the good sense not to come alone.

She pulls back again, and presses the cloth package into his hand. "Here. You're going to be late."

Her feet step from him, back into the dusty gray-brown of the bushes and trees, then, she lurches forward, pressing a hard but too brief kiss to his lips. "I'll see you this weekend."

Before Gale can protest, she's already several feet deep in the bushes, vanishing behind the tree line.

"Gale!" His dad calls to him, giving him an anxious wave of his hand. The third bell is probably close to ringing.

Running to his dad, they start up again, toward the gate.

"What did she bring you?" He asks, eyeing the package curiously.

It's thick material, sky blue and tied up with what he recognizes as one of her ribbons.

He pulls one of the tails of the bow, unraveling it, tucking the ribbon into his pocket before unwrapping the rest of the material.

It's a little dented tin, a couple of inches deep and about as wide as his hand, Gale's name has been painted across the top in black. Carefully, he pops the lid and peaks inside. It's half a dozen strawberries, carefully dipped in chocolate and sealed up.

"That'll make for a nice lunch," his dad comments as he steers Gale towards the foreman assigning the new miners to their crews.

Gale stares at the strawberries for a minute, as he waits in the line, before opening his metal lunch box and carefully nestling it in with the bit of hard bread and chunk of cheese his mother had packed him before clipping it shut again. He takes the material and puts it to his nose. It has just the hint of her scent lingering on it, and he smiles. Folding the it, he pulls out the ribbon and wraps it around before putting it in his pocket.

It isn't heavy, but he can feel it in his pocket, and that might just make the elevator ride down a little more bearable.

#######

Madge carefully steps over a fallen branch, back onto the path where Mr. Abernathy is waiting for her.

"Hope he appreciates my strawberries," he grumbles.

Linking her arm with his, Madge rolls her eyes. "I'm sure he'll savor each and every bite."

Mr. Abernathy snorts at that.

They wander along the path, around the Town and back towards the Victors' Village as the sun streaks the sky with oranges and pinks, brushing against pale blue and the wisps of clouds.

"He's going to be okay," Mr. Abernathy says suddenly, as the path opens up and the rows of houses come into view. "Too stubborn for anything to happen to him."

Madge nods, not certain how much stubbornness will help if there's a mine collapse.

"I'm gonna get him out," he continues on. "Don't worry about that, alright?"

He's still hoping Gale can save her, and she hasn't brought up the fact, again, that the Capitol will just change the rules on them even if she were to marry Gale. Either it would put her and her mother back into the pool or add Gale's family, she sure of it.

The hope, the delusion that he's going to save her may be the only thing keeping him going and she can't break him like that.

Instead she nods, pops up on her toes and presses a kiss to his scratchy cheek. "I love you."

Tilting his head, he gives her a half smile before wrapping his arm around her shoulder and pulling her firmly to his side and pressing a kiss into her hair. "I love you, too, Pearl."


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 11**

Mr. Abernathy walks Madge to within sight of the Hawthornes' house before he stops and turns to her.

"I'll be back at nine to get you," he says. "Don't take a step without me."

She nods, giving him an indulgent smile. "I know."

"I mean it."

"I know."

He grumbles something, she can't make it out, then shoots the house a dark look before gesturing for her to go.

Since he isn't likely to leave before he's sure she's inside, out of the brisk fall wind and the sprinkles of rain, she pops on her toes, gives him a quick kiss on the cheek, then runs for the house.

The porch creaks as she jumps up the two small, almost rotted through, steps and lands with a soft clatter. Knocking on the door, she waits for Mrs. Hawthorne to open it and let her in.

"Oh, Madge!" She smiles brightly. "I wasn't expecting you until later. Why aren't you at school?"

Madge shrugs, her cheeks burning. "I-I'm taking the day off."

Mr. Abernathy has never been very strict with her attendance, especially after the rough treatment the other kids had put her through when she'd first started back. He probably pays someone off for her, and she knows it's unfair to have him do it, but he's always quelled her worries with a shrug and a few words of comfort.

"What are they teaching you anyways? Not a damn thing. I've got money and if this isn't a good use of it then I don't know what is."

Giving her a sheepish grin, Madge tells her quietly, "I just wanted to help."

She turns and waves to Mr. Abernathy before stepping in, out of the damp cold.

Pulling off her scarf, then her heavy coat, Madge stuffs them behind the door, out of view. She hates any of the Hawthornes having to see the expensive, if slightly worn, coat everytime she comes for a visit.

The house smells of cinnamon, a rare luxury that Madge imagines Mr. Hawthorne had traded for specifically for this occasion. Gale's birthday.

"Madge!" Posy squeaks as she emerges from her room, rubbing her eyes, clearly just waking from her afternoon nap, before running across the room and flinging herself at Madge's middle. "You came to play?"

Making as regretful an expression as she can, Madge shakes her head. "No, Posy, I came to help your mom get ready for Gale's birthday."

Posy thinks for a moment, frowning to herself, before she lights up again. "Oh, yeah." She grabs Madge's hand and pulls her towards the kitchen, past her mother. "We're gonna make him a cim-anon cake, right momma?"

Mrs. Hawthorne laughs lightly, following after them, nodding. "Yes, Posy. Daddy got us some spice just for it."

The little jar probably has less than a thimble's worth of cinnamon in it, but Gale's mother picks it up and looks at it lovingly, as if it were enough to make several cakes.

"Asher got me a little extra flour and some baking soda," she tells Madge as Posy pulls a chair over to the counter to watch. "It should be enough for at least a small cake."

Madge wishes they'd have let her bring some supplies. She could easily get flour and soda, even more cinnamon, for them, but they won't accept her help. No matter how much she wants to give it.

"You've already done enough," Mr. Hawthorne had told her, when she'd offered to bring a dessert for dinner one night, something she's done at least three times a week since Gale started going into the mines. "You gave Posy those dresses and Haymitch is getting Gale out of the mines. You don't need to overextend yourself."

Seeing as that's all she can do, Madge wants to. Her dresses would've gone to waste and Mr. Abernathy's help had been out of a selfish need, she wants to help them more, do nice things for them, without having to justify it.

For the next few hours, Madge 'helps' Mrs. Hawthorne, which mostly amounts to keeping Posy from dipping her fingers in the batter, setting the table, and watching the small cut of deer Gale and his father had killed a few days before cook on the stovetop.

"I can do more," Madge tells her. "I mean, I'm not a great cook, but I can do…something."

"You're doing more than enough," Mrs. Hawthorne says, smiling as Posy watches the cinnamon cake rise through the warm window of the oven. "I may not have finished without you here to watch Posy."

While Madge doubts that, she appreciates the sentiment.

Rory and Vick blow in, wet and cold and bursting with energy.

"We couldn't go out for recess," Vick explains as he pulls off his almost too small boots. "I sat with Maple Rosen and started reading that story about blackberries Mrs. Cherry assigned."

"It's a sad book," Madge warns him, remembering the story from when she was in Vick's year.

"That's boring," Rory butts in. "I was in detention and overheard Mr. Knott flirting with that new secretary. Albie says she'll be knocked up by Christmas." He gives Madge a serious look. "We have money riding on it."

Madge gives him an exasperated sigh as he struggles with his socks, both of which are soggy, water had leaked into the broken end of his toe.

"That's not a very nice thing to be making bets on."

He grins up at her. "Then I won't tell you about the bet I heard Chesney Shumard has about you and Gale."

Biting her lip, she'd dearly love to hear what horrible, gossipy thing Chesney had come up with, Madge ignores the bait and settles into the couch next to Vick to help him with his homework.

It's a history assignment, which is laughable. The schools in the Districts aren't allowed to teach anything truthful about anything, so a report is pretty pointless.

"History is written by the winners, Pearl," is what Mr. Abernathy had told her, back before everything had gone so terribly wrong, when they'd sat at the little table in her kitchen during a snowstorm and he'd helped her write her own history report. "Whether that history is true, doesn't matter."

Still, Vick's a good student, even if he doesn't believe even half of what he's being taught, and he happily flips through pages and makes notes.

Rory isn't quite as studious, tossing his backpack wildly into his bedroom and promptly forgetting about it, regardless of if there's homework to be done or not.

He plops next to Madge after getting himself a glass of water and bothering Posy for a few minutes.

"So, Madge, beautiful," Madge rolls her eyes at him, "have you finally seen the light and decided to drop Gale for, his smarter, much more handsome brother?"

"I'm a little young for her," Vick pipes in, earning a filthy look from Rory.

Sighing, Madge ignores him. Any sort of acknowledgment is enough to get him going and she doesn't want him to needle Gale when he gets home.

Posy, feeling left out, pads over, a ragged looking doll under each arm.

"Gale is much more handy-somer than you, Rory," she tells him, her nose wrinkled up.

Rory smirks. "Well, right _now_, yeah. He's hit puberty, but if I'm this good looking now, just imagine how amazing I'm going to look once my beard starts coming in." He gives Madge a disappointed look. "You should get your claws in me before my animal magnetism makes me too hot a commodity."

His confidence is nothing if not impressive.

Madge stifles a snort. "I guess I'll just have to live with the regret."

"Suit yourself. I'll just have to be the one that got away." He nods to himself. "Your great could've been while you're stuck with smelly, scruffy Gale."

"How will I survive?" Madge rolls her eyes again.

He consoles himself over what must number Madge's hundredth snub, by helping Vick look up facts in his battered textbook, and by the time the front door open and blast them with icy wet air, he's all but forgotten the conversation for the day.

Gale and his dad are almost identical in their mining uniforms. The crisp blue of Gale's brand new uniform has become dingy over the last month, fading to a well worn cool blue-gray that seems to make his olive tones even warmer, which is a blessing, his color had suffered for the first few weeks and Madge had worried he'd been getting ill.

"It's called being stuck in a hole for twelve hours," he'd muttered grumpily. "I haven't seen the sun in days two weeks."

Once he'd gotten acclimated to the work, the long hours and the harshness of the mines, he'd been able to go out to the woods with his dad on his second weekend, he was less testy and much more affectionate.

"Gale," Madge muttered as he kissed her in the shadow of her house one evening. "Watch your hands."

Because if Mr. Abernathy caught them with Gale's hands in those particular spots, holding a pick in the mines was going to be a lot more taxing.

He'd nodded, more than a little disappointed, but helped her straighten herself out before walking her to the porch and giving her one last, very chaste, kiss good night.

There has been no more talk of marriage, not from Mr. Abernathy, who seems to know Madge will argue him blue and refuse, and not from Gale, who finally seems to understand that there is no happy ending in their future, just the here and now.

"Happy Birthday, Gale!" Posy yells as she launches herself at her older brother, squealing with delight when he tosses her up in the air and catches her.

He passes her off to his dad, who promptly begins tickling her, while Gale gets bombarded by Vick and Rory.

"I found you these feathers for you," Vick says, presenting Gale with a small satchel filled with dozens of dully colored feathers. "For your arrows."

"I got you this." Rory holds up a length thread. It's not much, but it's still impressive. "To go with Vick's feathers."

"Where did you get that?" Mr. Hawthorne asks, his mouth turned down as he eyes the string warily.

"It's better if you don't know," Rory answers cryptically, putting the thread into the palm of Gale's outstretched hand.

His parents exchange a look, but don't question him further. It probably really is for the best they not know whatever shady dealings Rory is apparently involved in.

"Thanks," Gale says, a little warily, as he examines the feathers and then the thread.

Stuffing them into his pockets, he nudges Vick out of the way and latches his hand around Madge's wrist.

"I missed you," he murmurs before he dips in, kissing her with a little more force than she thinks is probably necessary, especially with his family watching. She doesn't care though. Every kiss, every touch they get, is precious.

Rory makes a low whistling noise and Posy giggles, and finally Gale lets her go.

She knows she's probably completely red, from effort and from the giggles coming from both Vick and Posy.

Mr. Hawthorne clears his throat, giving Madge a little wink, before herding the group to the table.

"Let's try this birthday dinner we've been looking forward to for the last week."

#######

Haymitch trudges through the soggy roads of the Seam, under the slate gray sky, then around the Town before cutting up to the Victors' Village.

By the time he reaches the backdoor his nose is running and the spittling of rain has made him uncomfortably damp. All he wants is a warm cup of coffee and a long soak in the tub.

The lights in the kitchen are on and he sees Matilda's shadow floating around inside, carrying what looks to be the kettle over to the table. He grins to himself. He'll take tea if that's what she's got made, no sense being picky.

Banging his feet loudly with each step up to the porch, he's gotten most of the wet muck off the bottoms of his shoes by the time he opens the door.

"Don't worry, sweetheart, I'm taking the boots off," he yells in as he leans into the doorframe and quickly yanks his boots off, tossing them onto the little dirty rug she'd put out ages ago for the sole purpose of keeping Haymitch from dragging dirt across her clean floors.

He kicks the door closed as he pulls his long, heavy coat off and carefully hangs it up on the little hook, before turning around with a grin.

"Have me a cup of…"

His question dies in his mouth when he spots just who Matilda has actually been boiling water for.

Wiress is in her customary drab, narrow skirt, stiff looking button up shirt, and well-worn flat bottomed shoes, with her woolly looking coat draped over the back of the chair.

"Hello, Haymitch," she says, taking a small sip from one of Matilda's favorite cups, her face pulling back when she apparently finds it still too hot to drink.

For a second Haymitch is speechless, just stares at her, sitting in _his _kitchen, drinking _his_ tea, with _his _Matilda.

"Will you be staying for dinner?" Matilda asks, smiling airily, as though Victors stop by on a regular basis.

When Wiress opens her mouth to answer, Haymitch cuts her off.

"No, she won't," he growls, crossing from his spot by the door to the table, putting himself between Wiress and Matilda. "She's leaving."

"But she only just got here," Matilda says, tilting her head and wide hazy eyes drifting between the two Victors. "You're being rude, Haymitch."

"Yes, Haymitch," Wiress smiles coolly, blowing on her tea. "Very rude."

Shooting Wiress a dark look, Haymitch turns his back to her, blocking her from Matilda's view.

"'Tilda, sweetheart," he begins softly, cupping her face in his hands and running his thumbs across her cheeks soothingly. "I need to talk to Wiress for a minute or two alone. Can you go wait in the living room?"

"Just because you aren't rude in front of me, doesn't mean I don't know you're being rude at all," she tells him softly, her nose wrinkling up. "We never get guests."

And for damn good reason. If all Haymitch's guest were as big a pain in the ass as Wiress, he'd rather never deal with another human so long as he lives.

"I won't be rude," he lies.

She gives him a disbelieving frown.

"I won't be _too_ rude."

Matilda deflates a little, her wide eyes dropping as she sighs. "Best I can hope for I guess."

He grins and presses a kiss to her forehead, then to the tip of her nose before nudging her toward the living room.

Once she's safely away, hopefully she'll fall asleep on the couch and think Wiress' visit is just a bad dream, Haymitch turns back to Wiress.

"What do you want?"

Wiress surveys Haymitch over the top of her cup as she sips, eyes narrowed and dark.

"Can't a friend stop by for a drink?" She asks.

Haymitch snorts. "I don't have friends and neither do you."

She shrugs, unbothered by his dismissal.

Silence stretches between them, Haymitch glaring and Wiress drinking her tea with a smirk, as though she has all the time in the world.

"Wiress," Haymitch grinds her name out through gritted teeth. "Why are you here?"

She finally sets her teacup down, in the matching little saucer with pink roses that Haymitch had brought Matilda back for her birthday one year, before letting out a long breath.

"They're going to take our families," she says evenly, as though she's not said anything more interesting than point out it's cold and miserable outside.

Jaw tensing, Haymitch nods. "Just like you thought."

Her dark hair barely moves as she nods. "Just like I thought."

Why that was so important that she needed to spirit herself out to see him, ride in on her magic coach or however the hell she manages to show up out of the blue, he isn't sure. She'll probably be coming through with the Victory Tour in a few months, why not tell him then?

"You're little plan to marry the girl off isn't going to work," she tells him bluntly. "I'm glad at least she sees it's ridiculous."

"It could work," Haymitch snaps. It probably won't, but he has to try something.

Her eyebrows rise and her lips flatten out. "We aren't the type for fantasy, Haymitch. You can try, but you and I both know she's as good as Reaped, her and your poor, sweet 'Tilda."

Dragging his hand over his face, Haymitch glowers at her. He presses his tongue to his teeth and lets out a long breath before dropping into the seat across from her.

"You're awfully calm about that," he points out.

"I'm always calm," Wiress counters. "It's one of my more charming qualities."

One of her only good qualities, if you asked Haymitch. Charming, though? Not really.

"What's your plan, doll face."

Lip curling in distaste, Wiress folds her hand on the table, settling Haymitch in a steady gaze.

"There's no way out of it, we're all pretty sure of that," she begins. "That leaves us only one choice."

Curious, Haymitch's bushy eyebrows rise. "And that is?"

She straightens up and takes a deep breath. "Kill Snow."

For a stunned second Haymitch just stares at her, waiting for her to crack a smile or give him any hint she's joking, but it never comes. She's Wiress, after all, she never jokes and if she smiles at you it usually means she's about to make your life a living hell.

"Kill Snow," Haymitch finally repeats. "The president?"

"Do you know another Snow?" She asks impatiently.

Her ever steady eyes flicker to the doorway Haymitch had ushered Matilda out and then back to him.

"This is a matter of life or death, Haymitch, for your family, for mine, for all of ours." She licks her lips. "They know we're too smart for them and they want to break us, want to make us look weak and useless. The only way we're going to win this thing is if we strike first and strike hard."

"By killing President Snow?"

She's lost her marbles.

"Yes," she nods frantically. "It's the most practical, straightforward thing we can do."

A war, as they'd planned it, with their carefully crafted figurehead and the support of the Districts would take too long, and time isn't on their side.

"Besides," she shakes her head, "I've been doing the numbers, for a couple of years now, and the amount of deaths, civilian and otherwise, the damage that would be done to the infrastructure, would be catastrophic."

Killing Snow would leave a vacuum of power, but Wiress thinks that, and the ensuing chaos, would be preferable.

"We can control it; you know how easy it is to sway the people of the Capitol." She smiles faintly. "They're sheep and we're their favorite people. They trust us."

"They also use and abuse a good chunk of us, or have you forgotten what the end result of your work is?" He asks sharply.

"I haven't. If _we_ took hold of the government, though, if we ran it, then we could put a stop to all of that, without the mess of a war. A quiet revolution."

He gives her an incredulous look. "Do you honestly think Snow's cronies are gonna let you walk in and take over after you kill him?"

Or at least _try _to kill him, because Haymitch can see the end of Wiress' plan, and it isn't favorable to any of the Victors.

Her lips twitch up into a dark smirk, undaunted by his concerns.

"Do you think I haven't taken that into consideration? That I haven't considered every possibility?" She jabs her finger into the table. "I've planned this down to the minute."

The air in the room gets thick with tension, the buzz of what may come to be fills it uncomfortably as Haymitch considers the mad woman across from him.

Finally, he picks up Matilda's teacup, swirls it, then brings it to his mouth and tips it in, downing it in one gulp.

"Let's hear it then, sweetheart, I have a kid to pick up in a few hours."

#######

Gale walks Madge out, grabbing her and pulling her to him the second the door closes behind him.

"I wish you didn't have to go," he murmurs, hot breath ghosting over the skin of her neck as he places frantic, open mouthed kisses along the curve of it.

She's too distracted to say anything, barely manages to get out a breathy noise of agreement, before he catches her mouth again.

Her hands weave through his hair, tugging at it as he presses her into the rough wood of the house to the left of the door, letting his fingers and palms roam under her coat, tugging up and untucking the end of her shirt from her skirt so that his warm hands can grip at the skin underneath.

"I wanted to get you a present," she finally says. "But I knew you wouldn't want anything."

"Mmm," he grunts, nosing the collar of her shirt out of the way and nipping at her collar bone. "Don't need anything. Just you.'

And if she weren't absolutely certain Mr. Abernathy was about to come up on them, dropping in like some kind of silent menace, she'd tell him she wants to go to the woods, down by the lake and the little cabin and spend the night. There's nothing she wants more than to spend her last few months completely with him.

He'd tell her she's being ridiculous, because it's his birthday and because he wouldn't let her buy something, and that her body and a night was way more than he needed.

Still, ache that washes over her everytime they kiss, each time he presses into her, with each touch that burns through her clothes, she hopes he lets her convince him that she's thought through her actions before their time runs out.

Right on cue, a throat clears and Gale's kisses come to a standstill.

They linger, sharing each other's breath, for a few seconds before Mr. Abernathy clears his throat again.

Face burning, Madge lets her hands drop from Gale's hair and he presses one last, soft kiss to her cheek before she steps around him and gives Mr. Abernathy a forced smile.

"Ready," she says with forced verve. The smile slips from her face, though, the minute she sees the grave expression he's wearing.

His mouth is a thin line, eyebrows knitted together, and the lines at the edges of his eyes are pinched together , and though part of it is probably to do with how Gale had been pressing into her, a little obscenely, there's something more to it.

"Mr. Abernathy, is something wrong?" Madge asks, jumping from the porch and grabbing onto his arm.

He blinks, gives her a sad little smile, then pats her arm, but doesn't say anything.

Panic starts to rise in Madge's stomach.

"_Mr. Abernathy_." He's scaring her.

Finally, his eyes refocus and he leans in, pressing a kiss to her forehead. He smoothes out her hair, Gale had apparently messed it up, and his smile ticks up a little.

"Nothing's wrong, sweetheart," he tells her, his voice a bit raspy, as though he's been yelling. "Just thinking."

She gets the distinct impression whatever he's been thinking along isn't his normal line of 'castrate Gale', and for once, that worries her.

He takes her hand and grips it gently in his, then looks up to Gale, still watching warily from the porch.

"I need to talk to you and your dad," he says, sounding more like him, irritated and unhappy. "Tomorrow. Dinner."

Gale eyebrows pull together in a scowl. "Why?"

Mr. Abernathy rolls his eyes. "Because I've missed your charming personality, dickweed."

Madge shoots him an exasperated look and he shrugs.

"Fine." He schools his expression into one of deep reverence. "_Gale,_ will you and your dad please come by tomorrow and have dinner with us. I need to discuss some things with you both. You should be able to guess what about."

Madge's stomach curls in on itself. He wants to talk to Gale about marriage again, she's sure of it.

What's spurred his sudden renewed interest in what she's assured him is a terrible and faulty plan, she isn't sure, but she's apparently going to have to get it out of him before dinner tomorrow night.

Gale apparently catches the hint too, his body stiffens and his eyes, which had been lazy with food, beer, and kissing, are suddenly sharp and alert.

He nods. "We'll be there."

"Seven," Mr. Abernathy grunts at him. Turning, he gives Madge a tug, away from Gale's family's home. "Let's get home, sweetheart. My bones are aching and your mother's got a pot of coffee on for me."

Pulling her coat a little tighter around her, Madge gives his hand a squeeze then jumps back up the steps and gives Gale one last kiss. "I'll see you tomorrow."

She bounds off the porch, landing with a thud next to Mr. Abernathy and linking her arm with his, letting him lead her away, as worry eats her from the inside out.

Something has changed, and she needs to find out what.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 12**

AN: Two things. First, my google searches for this story are probably going to get me on a government watch list. The world of the Hunger Games is pretty scary though, so please, I'm just trying to fact check, and poorly at that. Second, this is going to be the last update for a couple of weeks. It's vacation time again, so I'll be gone for a while. I've got this story more or less plotted out, but my energy level has been low and it took me ages to get this written. Hopefully when I get back I'll feel a little perkier.

#######

Gale spends the entire night wondering just what Haymitch suddenly needs to talk to him about.

"Maybe he's figured out a way to save Madge," he wonders aloud, as he walks beside his dad to the mines in the cold damp morning, not really believing it.

His dad shakes his head. "You didn't describe a man that's got good news, son."

Flicker of hope squashed, Gale drags through the day, right up until lunch.

He'd already finished his jerky and was nibbling on the small remains of his birthday cake his mother had insisted he take, when the crew boss yells out for him.

"Hawthorne!" He'd pointed at Gale, to make it perfectly clear which 'Hawthorne' he wanted, then jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Get your ass up top!"

Confused and more than a little worried, Gale gathers the last of his lunch, a few crumbs from the cake, tidily into his lunch pail, before exchanging a wary look with his dad and heading down the tunnel and towards the elevators.

A bright, cold blue sky greets him, the first time he's seem daylight during the week in a month, as he shifts his pail under his arm and squints into the light.

There are a few men up top, hauling the coal up and crating it, preparing it for transport to the Capitol. Others are filling out papers, stamping the coal crates with the insignia of the Capitol, and helping to load them onto carts to be pushed and pulled by another group of men to the waiting train.

It's been pointed out that there are probably more efficient ways to do just about everything that goes on with the mines, but any efforts to improve things are met with hostility.

"They don't want it to get better," Jude had told Gale when he asked why. "We're dumb labor to them. The more like animals they can treat us, the better for them."

Watching the team of men struggling with the enormous cart of crates, looking down at his own hands, embedded with dirt and dust, broken nails and jagged cuts, Gale thinks Jude isn't wrong.

"Gale Hawthorne?"

A gangly man with Seam black hair, liberally streaked with silver and gray, wearing ill-fitting clothing and wire glasses, is staring at him, face pinched up as he waits for Gale's response.

Finally, Gale shakes himself out of his daze. "Yeah, that's me."

The man gives him a once over, apparently confused by who he's found, then holds out his hand.

"Amos Lane," he introduces himself with a reedy voice. "Foreman of the Geological Corps."

It's hard for Gale to imagine frail looking Amos ever being in the mines, though it _is _very easy to picture Haymitch strong arming him into letting Gale slip his application in late.

"Well, come along," he says suddenly, taking off toward the battered offices at the edge of the yard.

He's a lot quicker than he looks, but Gale easily catches up with a few long strides.

Without a word, Amos hops up the pair of rotting wooden steps and yanks open the flimsy little door, waving Gale in.

Ducking, Gale steps in and surveys the office.

It's a small, less than half the size of the room Gale shares with Rory and Vick, and cluttered from wall to wall, floor to ceiling.

Every wall is lined with filing cabinets, cheap and chipping metal ones, some of the drawers are bursting open with yellowing papers. Amos' desk looks like one of the cabinets regurgitated its contents onto it, though for all Gale can tell, there may not be a desk under the piles of papers at all.

"Sit," Amos commands, pointing at a chair so small and so ancient looking Gale isn't sure it'll support him.

Still, he sits.

Amos drops into the chair opposite Gale and stares at him over the piles on his desk.

"So, you're the boy Haymitch's girl is slumming it with?"

Heat floods Gale's face and he's too shocked by what Amos has just said to say anything. He can only stare at him darkly, trying to think of just the right thing to say about his slight against Madge.

Before he can spit out something, _anything,_ and stomp off, to hell with the job, he isn't going to listen to this asshole insult Madge, Amos makes a grunting noise and begins shuffling papers, clearly catching the signs that he's said something to upset a man twice his size and much stronger.

Licking his lips, Amos' beady eyes fall to the mess on his desk, reaches out and scatters a few before picking up a sheet Gale recognizes. His own application.

"A few run-ins with Peacekeepers for underage drinking..." Amos shrugs. Almost everyone in the Seam has been harassed about drinking, whether they really had or not, it isn't an indication of anything. "...but you grades are more than sufficient. Exceeding expectations for your math and science classes, which are really the only ones we're worried about."

Amos is distractedly flipping through papers, then digging through the little drawer at the center of the desk, and misses the fleeting look of shock that crosses Gale's features.

His grades weren't bad, but certainly far from 'exceeding' any kind of expectations.

When his paperwork gets tossed aside during Amos' search, from his grumbling Gale gathers he's seeking out some kind of stamp, Gale leans forward slightly and cuts his eyes to the papers.

They look unextraordinary, smudged and worn looking, official even, but the grades, other than the miserable ones in literature and grammar, and his fairly good one in woodworking, have been altered. Someone had gone through four years of high school grades and adjusted them.

Finally, Amos finds his stamp and snatches the papers back from the desk.

"So, you think you'll add anything useful to the corps?"

Gale nods. "Yes, sir."

"Why didn't you turn your papers in before the deadline?"

Swallowing hard, Gale tries to keep his breathing steady. "Didn't figure I had much of a reason."

Plus, the odds weren't even remotely in his favor. Everyone knows the corps is tightly controlled. Sons follow fathers, the job passed down, and only a few men make the cut that don't have family ties. Trying is setting yourself up for failure.

"Until the girl?" He prompts. Not waiting for a response, he chuckles. "She's a pretty one. Lucky she only takes after her mother in looks. Although, pretty with an empty head might not be so bad, huh?"

He gives Gale a conspiratorial wink and an obnoxious smirk.

Irritation boils in Gale's gut. Madge's mother may not be exactly normal, but she definitely isn't empty headed. He'd dare the asshole to say that in front of Haymitch.

Before Gale can say something he'll regret, tell Amos where he can shove his job, two insults in less than ten minutes is more than Gale's self-control can handle, he's slamming the metal stamp down on them with a click, leaving red words across the top of Gale's file.

'Candidate'

"I was a bit worried," Amos begins, stacking the papers carefully. "Wasn't quite sure what Haymitch was shoving off on me. Figured he was just meddling with the girl's life." He coughs dryly, all over the papers in his hands, before looking back up and giving Gale an appraising look. "You don't seem to be as useless as I expected."

Too shocked to say anything, Gale nods again.

"Get back to work then," Amos tells him, waving his wrinkled hand dismissively. "You'll be called back up for secondary interviews next month. I wouldn't get too worried about it though."

Stunned and angry, Gale stands, ducks back outside, letting the thin metal door fall shut with a rattle behind him.

By the time he gets back to the elevator, down into the mine, he's fuming.

"Matilda's not exactly the brightest," he mutters to his dad as they chip away at the coal. "But she's not stupid. She's nice."

In her own weird way.

"There are different kinds of intelligence, Gale," his dad calmly tells him. "Matilda's got a pretty sharp memory from what I remember from school. Good grades, too. She was just always a little awkward."

Gale doesn't see how that gives people the right to pick on her, at least Madge's mother is a nice weird and not violent like some of the people that he's met. Drunks and hard luck cases that can't or won't control themselves.

He doesn't dare mention the 'slumming' comment. It'll only make him do something he'll regret.

Shaking his head and glaring at the handle of his pick, Gale forces Amos and the likelihood that he'll be saving Gale from a lifetime of backbreaking work, even though he's a pig and it turns Gale's stomach to accept his help, from his mind.

He's got Haymitch's cryptic meeting and Madge to worry about.

#######

Mr. Abernathy refused to tell her anything on the walk home, not when they were safely inside, not even after Madge changes into her pajamas.

"You're worrying me," she'd told him as she settled onto the couch and rested her cheek against his arm and peered up at him through her drizzle damp bangs. "Please tell me what's going on."

He'd held firm though and refused to utter so much as a syllable.

Madge almost went into her mother's room and woke her. She'd been home with Mr. Abernathy while Madge had been out; surely she knew what was going on.

The prospect of upsetting her mother, though, possibly having to sedate her when she'd gone to sleep, all on her own apparently, didn't sit well with Madge. She decided to wait until the morning. She'd catch her before Mr. Abernathy got up.

When she wakes, though, it's to the sound of clattering downstairs and the smell of bacon.

Since her mother is barely a wisp, hardly makes a sound, and never cooks without supervision, there's only one explanation.

Mr. Abernathy had anticipated her move, and cut it off.

Instead of getting up, Madge stays in bed, late into the morning, until he comes upstairs to check on her.

"Sick, Pearl?"

Madge grunts from under her comforter in the negative.

She feels the bed dip, a hand reach out and pull the blanket from over her head.

"Sulking isn't gonna do you any good," he tells her. The wrinkles on his face deepen as he frowns at her stubborn silence.

Finally, Madge sighs.

"_Please, _please tell me what's wrong. Whatever you're planning, I want to know before you tell Gale."

So she can come up with a proper excuse for him not to get pulled under more than he already has by Mr. Abernathy.

"It isn't me doing the planning, sweetheart."

Something about the wording, about the way he keeps his eyes down, tracing the quilting on her comforter, makes Madge even more uneasy.

If it isn't him doing the planning, then who is?

He must sense the question caught in her throat, because he smiles sadly and takes her hand, squeezing it gently.

"Listen close, Pearl, 'cause I'm not gonna repeat myself. No question. Just listen."

Nodding, Madge sits forward and crosses her legs and waits expectantly, hoping the knot in her stomach is wrong, and whatever he tells her puts her at ease.

She doubts it though.

#######

Asher follows Gale quietly up through the path up to the Victors' Village, feet sliding in the wet earth underfoot.

Water drips from the few remaining browned leaves still clinging to the tree branches, off and onto Asher's cap and down the back of his shirt, making the already cold evening seep icily into his skin. His bones hurt he's so cold.

It doesn't bother him, though, his mind is too consumed with whatever it is that Haymitch finds so important that he'd invite both Gale and himself up. There are only a few possibilities, and none of them are good.

When the only occupied house in the Victors' Village comes into view it's glowing. Yellow light burns warmly from the kitchen and the living room windows and the back porch light is pooling out into the yard.

Gale runs his hand through his hair and stares for a minute, a tense expression settling on his face. He hadn't said much since he'd been called out of the mine, since his rant about Amos Lane. Asher isn't sure if his quiet is from worry about the surely upcoming interview or from whatever shadowed thing Haymitch has planned for the night.

Taking a deep breath, Gale's feet start up again and Asher waits a beat before treading after him, across the damp yard and up the step before knocking solidly on the back door.

Madge answers. Her face is paler than usual, cheeks tinged pink and eyes a little raw to Asher's view.

"Have you been crying?" Gale asks immediately, his eyes widening as he takes in her worn look.

Her lips curve up, into a gentle smile, eye shining up at him. She reaches out and takes his hand, looks between the two men before sighing.

"No matter what they say, don't agree to anything without thinking about it first, okay?_ Promise me _you'll think about it first," she tells them gravely.

Before Gale can ask her what she's talking about, Haymitch comes up behind her, looking just as worried and just as worn.

"Get in, letting all the heat out."

Stepping in behind Gale, Asher stops when his son grabs his arm.

"Take your boots off," he tells him quietly, pointing to a little rug to their left where what must be Haymitch's boots and Madge's much daintier looking shoes sit.

Following Gale's lead, Asher begins unlacing his boots and carefully sets them next to his son's before following him off the entry rug.

Madge is waiting by the stove, toying with the sleeve of her sweater, eyes focused and preoccupied with the tile at her feet.

Gale reaches out and covers her hand, stills it, and waits for her to look up at him.

Her eyes finally rise and her mouth opens to say something, but she's cut off again by Haymitch coming back from the living room.

Standing in the doorway from the kitchen to the living room, Haymitch stares at Gale and Asher for a minute before sighing and walking over to them.

"Look, whatever happens tonight, you can't talk about it to anyone, ever, alright? Not just for Madge and me, for yourself too. This is dangerous stuff-"

"What's going on, Haymitch?" Gale cuts him off. "This secretive shit is getting old real quick."

"If you'd keep your trap closed for five minutes, I'm trying to tell you," Haymitch snaps back. He runs a hand over his face before shooting Gale another dark look. "Just don't treat this like you treated my offer to help you with the corps. You'll get us all killed."

Asher is about to question that, it isn't just vaguely ominous, it's solid. Whatever Haymitch is about to involve them in is deadly and he isn't sure he wants any part in it.

He doesn't get to ask though, because Haymitch jerks his head back towards the living room and takes Madge by the shoulders.

"Come on, Pearl."

Exchanging increasingly anxious looks, Gale and Asher follow them through the doorway and into the living room.

It looks unextraordinary. There's a cozy looking fire burning happily in the fireplace and pictures of a woman and boy Asher recognizes as Haymitch's mother and brother, as well as several of Madge in her school uniform and with her mother, lined up along the mantle, smiling happily out at the room. A couple of overstuffed chairs sit invitingly as well as a worn, but still expensive and well cared for, couch, all facing towards the coffee table, away from the government issued television, which is hidden in the corner, ignored and unwanted.

It all looks in order, neat and clean and matching, except for one thing.

Perched on the couch, with a saucer in her lap and a delicate looking teacup up to her lips, is a woman.

Asher is certain he's never met her, but he gets the nagging feeling he knows her from somewhere.

She's thin, not a pinched kind, unhealthy and dying, but a natural kind, as if she has enough to eat but moves too much, a perpetual motion machine that burn off what she does consume and forgets to take in more when she should. Her clothes are clean and well tailored, narrow, dark skirt and a plain, stiff looking shirt buttoned all the way up and under her chin. Her dark hair is pulled back severely into a tight bun and her sharp, dark eyes scan over both Gale and Asher.

For a minute she just studies them, tilting her head and sipping her tea, before she finally sets the cup back in the saucer and places it on the table.

"Well, are you going to sit down, or stand there the whole evening?"

Haymitch blows out a long huff of air before nudging Madge forward. She shoots Gale a look over her shoulder, gestures with her head for him and Asher to come before she lets Haymitch guide her to the couch.

He keeps her close, makes her sit with him on the couch, placing himself between Madge and the woman.

After a few seconds, Gale carefully follows, dropping into one of the chairs and looking to his dad.

Asher eyes the woman, now smiling coolly, before crossing in front of the fire and taking up the second chair.

The woman picks up her teacup again, takes a final sip then glances at Haymitch.

"Well, since it's become glaringly obvious that Haymitch isn't going to introduce me, I'll do it myself." She sets her cup down and straightens her skirt. "My name is Wiress. I'm a Victor, if you haven't guessed."

Of course, Asher thinks. That's why he felt like he knew her. Victors, even ones from Games a lifetime ago, are on the television at least during the festivities. He's probably seen her face at least once a year his whole life.

"I'm here to propose a deal. One that will benefit everyone involved." She pauses, waiting for a response, and when none comes, she gives them another little chilly smile. "It won't be easy, though, and it _will _be dangerous. Possibly deadly."

Gale sits forward, elbows to knees, fixing her in a narrow look. "It's going to save Madge, though, right?"

Wiress' lips twitch. "Sharp boy. Yes, your cooperation will help _all _of our families, Mr. Hawthorne."

Madge's lips press together and Asher gets the impression she want to say something, but a look from Haymitch keeps her quiet.

A look of complete determination settles on Gale's face and he nods. "What's the plan?"

Something like victory, certainty, flickers in Wiress' eyes. Madge's life may depend on what she says and Gale is going to be an easy sell on whatever the plan is.

"We're going to kill Snow."

The way she says it makes it seem like it's as simple as a sell at the Hob. An easy assassination.

"How _exactly_ do you plan on doing that, ma'am?" Asher asks, an edge of distrust in his voice.

Her thin eyebrows rise and she tilts her head. "I'm getting there, Mr. Hawthorne."

She stops and straightens her skirt again, adjusts herself on the cushion, then takes a deep breath.

"There are tunnels under the Capitol, the oldest part-where the Presidential Mansion is-like a subterranean tracker jacker nest from before Panem. Over the years we've found ways to get into those tunnels, discovered the weak spots in the structure. We know how to collapse it in on itself."

"Collapse the Mansion?" Gale asks, cutting Asher a disbelieving look.

Asher frowns across the table at her. "Why not-aren't there better ways to do it? Ways that don't involve destroying a building?"

The potential for loss of life is too great. Years in the mines have given Asher a good idea of just how bad a collapse can be. Even it is mostly President Snow and people like him, there are bound to be others, innocent collateral damage.

Wiress' eyebrows rise and she gives him an appraising look.

"It's a very calculated move, Mr. Hawthorne. We don't just want Snow dead, we need a show of power. We need to show the Districts and the Capitol we're clever enough to get right to those in charge's door and take them out." She lets out a long sigh. "Taking out the Mansion and everyone in it will not only take out the opposition's leader, it will prove to everyone that we aren't to be trifled with. We can fight and we can change the power structure, almost bloodlessly."

"You're saying there isn't another way to stop this?" A way not to become murderers themselves.

She closes her eyes, apparently overwhelmed with their hesitancy then opens them and fixes Asher in a scrutinizing look.

"I understand you're squeamish about this. The last revolt didn't end well-"

"The last revolt is why we're in this mess!" Madge almost yells, apparently unable to keep quiet anymore. She looks between Gale and Asher frantically. "This is insane. She's going to get more people killed than the Games ever could. It's not worth it, Gale."

While Asher is inclined to agree with her, there's almost no chance that whatever this woman has planned will work and it's only going to end with everyone involved and their families being very publicly executed, Gale looks determined.

"Taking the fight right to the Capitol would spare the Districts a lot of grief, right?" He asks, ignoring Madge's tearful looks.

"Exactly," Wiress nods. "The fighting would be at their doorstep, not ours. Plus, we'd simultaneously take out the communication for the military and take over the television waves, cutting off their ability to refute anything we say."

How she plans on accomplishing that, she doesn't say, but Asher gets the impression it wouldn't be hard for her.

"That doesn't mean the Peacekeepers won't start fighting in the Districts," Madge points out, glaring icily at Wiress.

"We're working on that, child," she answers simply. "It shouldn't be hard. Most of them are from District Two. All we have to do is redirect a few missile silos at the major quarries in their home District and I'm sure they'll settle down."

Again, the calm of her demeanor, as if the idea of threatening to kill hundreds, thousands, of innocent people doesn't bother her in the least strikes Asher. Her life must be a cold one to so easily dismiss the lives of others without so much as a hitch in her voice.

Madge challenges her again. Narrowing her eyes she asks, "And how do you know Snow will be killed in the building collapse? People can survive all sorts of things you know."

Wiress rewards that with a little chuckle. "Such a smart girl. You certainly do take after your father, don't you?"

There's more behind her words than what she's saying, Asher can sense that, but what that is he can't quite work out.

Haymitch shoots Wiress a dark look while she ignores him and carries on, apparently ready with an answer for Madge's question.

"We certainly wouldn't leave Snow's death to chance. He'll be killed before and removed for proper public display, proof he is dead."

It's pretty grisly to Asher, pretty Capitol, every inch of what she's saying. He supposes that makes sense though, Wiress has been wrapped up in the Capitol since she was a teenager, their ways are tangled up in her ways at this point.

"Then why destroy the building?" Asher asks again, trying to distract himself from the plan to kill Snow.

Wiress' look plainly tells him she ranks his intelligence somewhere below a slug.

"I've already told you, strategy. Just because we cut off the head doesn't mean there aren't more waiting to take over. They need to see how serious we are, what we're capable of. This will be a show of power and it will keep the Districts from suffering the full brunt and out of a possible war."

Gale nods, clearly sold on this insane plan. "Who's going to kill him?"

She chuckles. "There's a lottery for the pleasure, but in the end I think several of us will be sent in."

"Victors?" Asher asks.

Nodding, Wiress' eyes flick to the clock by the door, a tall, heavy looking monstrosity, ticking noisily.

"And now for why we're recruiting you," she begins, but Asher already knows what she's going to say.

"You need us for the explosives." Because they're miners. Charges are used to create mines and break up earth on a regular basis. Every District has their area of expertise, and since Twelve uses specialized explosives on a regular basis, something none of the other Districts can claim, they're the best choice.

"You're the only District with any knowledge of how to use explosives, in a nontheoretical sense," she agrees. "Other than Two, that is, but they aren't exactly trustworthy for the most part. We can determine placement, but set up and detonation would probably be best left to people who've actually done it. I need the two of you to come up with a list, men who can, who _will_, be willing to help us. Don't say anything to them yet, just come up with names. When I come back I'll have more details for you, if you accept the offer."

A cold dread fills Asher from his feet to his throat.

"If we fail," he begins quietly, "they'll do worse than kill our families, you know that right?"

Wiress' cool expression doesn't change.

"Then we must not fail, Mr. Hawthorne." With that she gets up and straightens her skirt. "I'll be back with the Victory Tour, and you can give me your answer then."

Though it doesn't seem like she's giving them much choice. Asher has the feeling Wiress rarely fails to get her way.

"How exactly do you plan on sneaking all the explosives you need to the Capitol? Even if you plan on steeling them from Two, that's not going to go unnoticed," Madge asks, still trying desperately to poke holes in the woman's plan.

For a moment Wiress ignores her, focuses on her coat and gloves, then, as she's winding the scarf around her neck, she turns and smiles.

"Now child, if I can get myself from Three _all the way _out to Twelve without a soul noticing, what makes you think I can't steal a little explosives?" Her eyes cut to Gale. "But if you really must know, ask your boyfriend what his grades in geometry were. I think he'll have a hard time answering thanks to me and I think you're clever enough to figure it out from there."

Asher frowns and turns to his son to ask what she's talking about, but Gale is already standing, gaping at the woman.

"You changed them," he says accusingly. "How? Why?"

"I know a very clever girl who is very good at altering documents, and a friend asked me for a favor," she answers simply. "I'll see you in a few months."

With that and a quick nod to Haymitch, she turns on her heels and goes to the door, opens it and steps out without a word.

#######

Madge feels hot tears building up behind her eyes as the cold wind blows in with Wiress' exit.

She's never hated a person so soon after meeting them, but she's certain that the burning feeling building in her chest is just that.

Wiress is a monster who is going to try to play on Gale's fear to get him and his dad to help her with her plan, and it's going to get them and everyone they love killed.

"Don't do this, Gale," she says the moment the door clicks shut.

This plan is doomed, it's insane and destined for failure, and she doesn't want Gale anywhere near it.

"It could work," he says, almost as if he doesn't hear her. "If she really does have tunnels under it, then we could take out the Mansion. We could get to Snow."

And just like Wiress said, that will show everyone, Capitol and District, that the Victors aren't to be trifled with. The Mansion is a symbol of the Capitol's wealth and power, destroying it would show everyone that the Capitol isn't unstoppable, there are limitations to their power and those limitations can be exploited.

If it works.

"It's dangerous," Mr. Hawthorne finally says. "We have to think of your mother and the kids."

Madge nods emphatically. At least Gale's dad is seeing reason.

"I am," Gale practically growls. "If we take out the Capitol's power structure that will save the kids. Rory and Vick and Posy someday. They'll never have their names in the Reaping bowl; they'll never have to worry about being sent to the Games-"

"At the risk of losing you and your dad, Gale," Madge cuts in. "This plan, it has a very low chance of success-"

"-but a high payout." He crosses his arms over his chest and looks between Madge and his dad, who has stood and is watching Gale warily. "It's a payout worth the gamble."

Shaking her head, Madge bites her lip and looks to Mr. Abernathy.

He isn't going to talk Gale out of this, she knows that. This is another wild grasp at saving Madge and her mother and he isn't going to give it up, he wouldn't have brought them in on it if that were even the remotest of possibilities.

That doesn't mean Madge can't beg him to change his mind.

"Please," she whispers, holding onto his hand and pleading with her eyes. "You know this is useless. Don't sacrifice more people."

Not Gale. Not his family.

"This whole District will be punished if they help and this fails."

Just like Thirteen. The actions of a few will be revisited on the many. Twelve will be wiped off the map before the traitors are even executed, an insult to injury.

Mr. Hawthorne's color, which had faded throughout the conversation with Wiress, pales further.

"Gale," his voice cuts through the quiet of the room, "we can't do this. The risk is too much."

For a minute Gale just stares at his dad before looking to Madge. He seems to be debating something, fighting a battle in his head, for several long seconds before coming to a decision.

"Marriage isn't going to work and running away isn't going to work, this-" he gestures to the door "-lady's plan is the best shot we have. We just have to play it right."

There's a fire, low and dangerous, behind Gale's eyes.

He hates the Capitol, for what it's done to the District, his family, to Madge, and this is something solid he can do. A way to fight back.

No matter what Madge says, what his dad says, Gale has made his decision.

"Wiress is smart," Mr. Abernathy finally says. "Crazy, but smart."

"She changed my grades," Gale says again.

Mr. Abernathy nods. "She's good at what she does, all kinds of tricks up her sleeves, and she's determined. Her family is on the line, too. I haven't seen her fail yet, but there's always a first time for everything."

It's the closest Madge is going to get him to telling Gale not to do this, to enjoy the time he and Madge have left and let history and the Quell take their natural course, but she wishes he would warn Gale off more. This is a terrible idea and she knows where it'll end.

"We'll come up with names," Mr. Hawthorne says, cautiously, unenthusiastically. "Then we'll see what this plan of hers really looks like, alright?"

He's hoping to talk some sense into his son, Madge can see that, but Gale apparently can't. He's already nodding eagerly.

"Yeah, I think Thom, Bristel's dad, and Jude should be on the list."

The wheels are already turning in Gale's head, planning for the takedown of President Snow and the Capitol, and it terrifies Madge.

Disaster is brewing, she can sense it, and there doesn't seem to be anything she can do about it.


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 13**

The longer Asher thinks about the plan, all the danger it entails and lives it can, probably will, destroy, the less he likes it.

Hazelle hates it too.

"We have to talk him out of it," she'd said, more to herself than to him when he'd first told her about the meeting with Wiress. "Gale can't do this, Ash. Madge is a sweet girl, and I love her dearly, but I won't sacrifice my children for her."

She'd looked a little disgusted with herself for that, and Asher understands the sentiment. He hates _himself_ for shying from helping. Madge's position is, at least in part, his doing. She'd be safe and sound, protected from the Capitol's manipulations, or at least this twisted Game, if she weren't under Haymitch's care. That's Asher's fault, and he knows it.

Hazelle is right though, he can't make amends for her life with the lives of his children. It simply isn't a deal he's willing to make.

It doesn't seem like he's going to get a choice, though. Gale is determined to do this, no matter his parents' feelings on the matter.

"The payoff is worth the risk," has been his constant mantra.

Saving Madge is saving Rory and Vick and Posy in Gale's mind, even if saving her could also potentially be signing their death certificates, as well as everyone else's they know.

In the end, Asher knows he's going to have to go along with it. Even if it's a suicide mission, he can't let his son fight this battle on his own. They'll go marching to their doom together, because even if it's going to be the death of them and everyone they know, he can't let Gale take on that burden alone. Asher set this in motion years ago, and now he's got to take responsibility for his actions.

"I want to know how she plans on getting us to the Capitol, and when," Gale wonders aloud, but quietly, as they toil away in the mines. "I wish I knew more of the strategy than just kill Snow and take out the mansion. There's too much Capitol bullshit in this thing, makes it hard to know what's really going on."

Asher thinks so too. He wants to know more of the plan as well, if only so that he can make his own contingency plans for this disaster.

"Madge doesn't know, or if she does she won't say," Gale adds, grumbling darkly.

Madge probably doesn't know anything. If she did she'd be telling Gale, even if only to point out the flaws.

If anyone is more against this plan than Hazelle, it's Madge.

"She's bound and determined to change my mind," Gale had complained. "I'm trying to save her life and she's having crying tantrums."

While Asher hopes Gale has enough sense to have never called Madge's crying a 'tantrum' to her face, he gets the impression one night, when Gale comes home grumbling about 'hormones', that his son isn't particularly sensitive to that particular thing. Probably why he's never had a long term relationship, Asher things dimly.

Madge has told Asher and Hazelle that she doesn't want Gale to have any part in this doomed plan. More than once, she's come to Hazelle in tears, trying to think of a way to stop him.

"There's got to be something we can say to him. Something to change his mind."

So far though, they haven't managed to sway him.

No number of stories about the kids suffering for his actions, the District being wiped out for the insolence of a few, the painful future that surely awaits everyone he's ever met, seem to sway him though.

"Have you ever thought about respecting her wishes?" Asher finally asks, when Gale continues to speculate and grumble after the work whistle blows.

Madge's concern for Gale, her efforts to keep him from getting himself and everyone else killed, is the only way Asher sees out of the dilemma his past actions have created. Gale listening to her, letting her talk him into letting her face her fate, is his best chance at something close to a pardon from this death sentence, not just for himself, but for his entire family.

"I can't sit at home and watch them murder her on television, dad," Gale says as they walk home from the mines. He runs his hand over his face and sighs, looking out at the sinking sun. "You couldn't do that with mom, could you?"

As much as Asher would like to tell him, no, but it's different, that Hazelle is his wife, the mother of his children, at one point the only bright spot in his life, he can't. Once upon a time Hazelle had just been his girlfriend, like Madge is to Gale now, and even then he'd have walked into hell and back for her. He can't lie to his son.

So with a sigh and a half glance around, to make sure no one is listening, he gives Gale a little smile.

"Not a chance."

He's in this with his son, for better or worse. No matter how little he likes it.

#######

Amos Lane catches Gale as he's leaving one evening.

"We'll be announcing the men chosen for the corps before the Victory Tour rolls in," he says as he rubs at a smudge of what looks to be ink on his cheek. He grins, a little knowingly at Gale and explains, "Gives the chosen few a little more to celebrate during the festivities."

Gale almost snaps that the last thing he feels like thinking about is the stupid corps, that there are lives on the line, lives worth a thousand of his, but he just nods curtly and thanks the slime ball. It at least gives him something not upsetting to talk to Madge about.

He's outright stopped asking her about the plan. It doesn't get him any answers, assuming she has any, and it just makes her cry which in turn makes him uncomfortable.

"Gale, please, _please_," she'd sobbed, nose running and eyes pink and bright, red rimmed and puffy. "Don't do this. It's a disaster waiting to happen. She's completely insane and she doesn't care what happens to anyone else. You're just a piece in the game to her and a weak one at that."

While he doesn't doubt that, Wiress is cold and calculating and he gets the impression she'd as soon gut him as help him, he's not stupid. She's got the access, she's got the inside track, and he needs that for his own purposes. It's the only way to save Madge and her mother and he's got to grab onto it with both hands and hold on.

"So the announcement will be soon then," his dad says with a nod. "That's good."

Gale shrugs, grunts something affirmative and stuffs his hands into his pockets as he repositions his lunch pail under his arm and trudges on. The announcement won't make a difference to him. His mind won't be able to focus on the work after the new year when he'll be expected to start, all his energy and thoughts will be on Madge and how he's going to save her. Assuming Wiress comes through on her promise to get in touch with them when the Victory Tour rolls through.

"Going up to the Village?" His dad asks as they come up on one of the hidden paths to the Victors' Village when it becomes clear Gale isn't going to continue discussing his nonexistent future.

Gale nods. It's one of his 'Madge nights', after all. Even if she's still upset with him, it's the single best part of his day, seeing her rubbed, red nose and hearing her tear-thick voice.

And even if she's angry with him, if he missed a promised day she'd end up down in the Seam, terrified and banging on his parents' door and crying harder than usual. He's already wearing her thin with his agreeing to be part of the plan to save her life, he's been trying not to add to it if he can help it.

His dad pats him on the back, gives him a tired smile, then heads off towards home as Gale cuts into the trees.

Body sore from the day's work, Gale slowly makes his way through the underbrush, stepping into a few soggy spots and splashing mud and damp leaves onto his legs, halfway to his knees. It makes the already frigid day even more unbearable.

When the Victors' Village comes into view, one lonely house pouring golden light out onto the lawn, Gale takes a deep breath.

Haymitch has a fire started. The air is thick with the pleasant smell of warmly burning wood, keeping the living room comfortable and cozy. Matilda has probably roasted some marshmallows, something Gale had no experience with until she'd pressed one, smashed messily between some crunchy graham crackers with a flat chunk of chocolate, into his hands a few weeks ago.

"Are you and Madge fighting, dear?" She'd asked airily, fixing him in her hazy gaze.

It made Gale a little uncomfortable. It wasn't his place to explain to her that her life and Madge's were in very real danger and that Madge is angry because of Gale's agreeing to help save them. That explanation needs to come from Haymitch or Madge, not Gale.

"Just a little disagreement."

She'd nodded, still holding him in a narrow, if somewhat fuzzy, look.

"You're a good boy, Gale," she smiled vacantly. "Madge loves you so much. I'm glad she has you."

His heart had twisted up at that, imagining Amos Lane calling her 'empty headed'. She wasn't brilliant, not like Madge, but she was sweet. That counted for something, at least in Gale's mind.

Thinking about the possibility of sweets and Madge's mother from his mind, Gale tramples through a few more puddles and up the back steps.

Before he can even knock, the door flies open and Madge grabs him, pulling him in and onto the rug.

His heart does a little stutter and he instantly worries she's going to try something stupid…again.

About a week earlier she'd met him at the back door, in almost the exact same way, with her robe pulled tightly around her.

"My mom and Mr. Abernathy are at dinner in Town," she'd quickly said before opening her robe.

Under it she was practically naked. A matching bra and panties, peach and perfectly pushing her breasts up and temporarily silencing any and all questions that had formed in his mind.

She'd almost lunged at him, thrown her arms around him and smudged coal dust on her front, and begun kissing him, pulling him with her toward the living room and the stairs up to her bedroom.

Despite the ferocity of her lips, the forcefulness of her hands as they pulled him toward the living room, there was a tremor in her. She was shaking.

"Madge," he'd managed to say her name between kisses, finally taking her by the shoulders and forcing her to stop and look at him. "What are you doing?"

Her breath had been shaky, shallow, and she'd forced an unsteady smile for him.

"I just want to-don't you want to-you know...don't you want me?" She'd turned a vibrant shade of red and looked down at her bare feet.

"Uh…" Gale had never been more speechless than he had been at that moment. Of course he wanted her, and if he looked down at her for too long she'd be able to see just how much he wanted her.

She'd reached up with a shaky hand and gently run her fingertips over the stubble forming on his cheek.

"We can-um-you know-as a, um, you know…" she'd bitten her lip and looked up at him through her bangs, "...a trade?"

That had deflated Gale quite a lot and caused anger to flare up in his stomach.

"I'm not letting you trade sex to keep me from helping you," he'd snapped, his voice a little sharper than he'd intended.

It had hurt, that she'd think he'd be willing to use her and let her go, that she could manipulate him like that. Her body wasn't a bartering chip, he didn't want it like that, no matter what anyone thought.

At his tone, her eyes had widened and filled with tears that had quickly spilled down her cheeks and onto that aggravatingly wonderful bra as her face had crumpled and she'd reached out blindly for him. "Gale…"

He'd started to storm out, yanking his arm from her grasp and letting her trail after him as he'd stomped out of the kitchen and through the back door, leaving her calling after him through her tears.

Once he'd gotten to the tree line his feet had turned to lead.

She hadn't meant anything by it, at least not anything insulting. She was scared, _terrified_ for him, and she was grasping at even the remotest way to keep him safe, just like he was doing for her.

He supposes if the tables were turned and she were putting her life on the line for him, he'd be just as desperate, do something equally as stupid.

Swallowing down bile and anger, he'd turned back to the house, slowly walked back up to the porch, taking each step with deliberate concentration, focusing on Madge and the fear she was struggling with that had made her do something so painfully desperate.

When he pushed the back door open he'd found her collapsed in front of the door, a puddle of tears and snot, her face buried in the sleeves of her robe as she sobbed.

Dropping down, Gale had taken her face in his hands and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

"It's not going to be like this, Madge." He frowned deeply. "_I'm _not like that."

He'd hoped she'd know that he wasn't that kind of guy.

"I know," she blubbered, wiping her nose on her sleeve again. "I _know_, Gale. I ju-just-I'm so scared and I d-di-didn't know what else to do. I just-I thought if we-you know-then you'd listen to me…"

Pulling her into his lap, he'd righted the shoulders and wrapped her robe tightly around her, despite an immature voice in the back of his head telling him that looking was probably alright, and rocked her, rubbing soothing circles on her back as she cried herself out, again, on his shoulder.

Once she was through, only a few hiccups punctuating the silence of the kitchen, Gale had made her look at him.

"Madge," he'd smoothed out her hair where she'd obviously tugged at it after he'd stormed out. "I love you. I'm not going to trade for sex with you."

She'd nodded and pressed her fingers to her eyes. "I know. I just...panicked. You won't listen to reason and I thought…"

"You thought you could bribe me with," he'd gestured toward her robe with a frown.

Nodding, her face deepening a shade or two, she'd pulled the front of her robe a little tighter to her.

"You're nuts," he murmured, pressing a kiss to her temple. "But you're my nut."

She's devious, he realized, and he decided to keep a tighter watch on her after that little episode.

He'd made her get up after that, if Haymitch had caught them sitting on the kitchen floor, Madge less than half dressed and clearly finishing a good hard cry, Gale wouldn't have the option to keep her from being dragged off to the Capitol. Haymitch would have him dead and buried under Matilda's garden before the sun came up the next morning.

She's been calmer since then. The crying has lessened and she hasn't begged him to change his mind. The change in her demeanor has had him more than a little worried.

Today, she's dressed in one of her winter skirts, simple, with long sleeves and a high neck. Seduction isn't on the table then.

Unlike that day, she's not shaking, there isn't so much as a tremor in her hand as she pulls Gale over to the table as he struggles to kick off his boot before he tracks coal dust and fall debris onto her mother's floor.

"I have a plan," she says as they reach the table and she drops into one of the chair, releasing Gale from her vice-like grip and letting him finally get his boots off, throwing them back to the mat, then pull off his coat.

"A plan?" He asks, frowning as he leans over her back, bracing his hand on the table and squinting down at the papers she neatly stacked in front of her.

She nods, her eyes flicking up to him before she begins shuffling the papers.

"If I can't stop you then I can help, I guess, right?" Her nose scrunches up and she nods to herself. "I-This plan of Wiress' is leaving the District open to too much danger. We have to do something to protect everyone that's going to be left behind, your family included."

With a sigh, she spread the papers out.

There are diagrams, maps, and carefully handwritten notes in the margins of sketches that Madge glares at.

"The Capitol might still have enough time to strike back, and we're going to be their first target. We're small and weak and not nearly as important as a lot of the other Districts. We need to figure out how to get everyone evacuated, preferably the moment everything goes down in the Capitol."

Flopping into the chair next to her, Gale pulls one of the maps towards him.

It's of the District, she's added little dots of color with her pens to sections of the fence, labeling them 'weak spots' or 'exits'. He picks up another. It's ancient, probably from the beginning of Panem, badly drawn, approximating the landmarks of the wilds. It isn't wholly inaccurate, but then, it isn't exactly _correct _either.

"This is the main housing unit for the District's electricity," Madge tells him, pushing a diagram towards him. "I just need to read up on wiring, or circuits, and electricity a little more, and maybe I can get the power for the entire District down."

Gale doesn't point out that she'll be in the Capitol by the time they'll need the electricity down, she's trying to help as best she can and he isn't about to burst her bubble with reality.

"Are you planning on getting everyone into the woods?" He asks. "Didn't you already decide that running away isn't an option? They'll find an entire District a hell of a lot easier than a few people, you know?"

Lip puckering, she nods. "I know, but I think that with everything going on in the Capitol they'll be too busy. I'm banking on them only focusing on destroying the District, not going in after the people specifically."

That makes no sense to him, but he continues to stay quiet.

"Once everyone sees what's happening in the Capitol, if everything goes even close to plan, the Districts will start rebelling. They won't have time to mess with Twelve's missing population." She sighs. "And if things _don't _go according to plan, then they'll be focused on the photo ops they can get from the smoldering remains, not chasing down everyone, at least not initially. They'll be too busy with…"

Her eyes start to water and she takes a shuddering breath. "They'll be too busy with the instigators."

The instigators. Gale and whoever else he manages to drag into the Capitol with him.

"They won't be busy with us," he assures her, taking her hand and wrapping it in his. "This is going to work."

Wiping her eyes with her free hand, Madge nods. "I hope so."

Gale leans towards her and kisses her cheek, tasting some of the tears that have managed to leak out the corners of her eyes. "It _will_."

He won't accept anything but success.

Sitting back, he studies the diagrams again, trying to figure out how to tell her that to carry out _her _plan, she'll have to recruit more people and teach them how to cut electricity to the entire District and take down a fence, assuming she can figure out those things herself, but he can't. This is constructive for her, and she's needed something to keep her mind steady since the meeting with Wiress. It's better than crying and her last plan, he supposes.

"Have you talked about this with Haymitch?" He finally asks.

She shakes her head. "No, I want it to be perfect. Nothing he can pick apart."

Because she knows as much as Gale does that Haymitch is going to try to as far from this mess as he can. He probably won't even want her making plans for other people. Still, she might be able to convince the old bastard to give her some help if she cries enough.

Wincing, Gale sits forward and rests his elbows on the scrubbed surface of the table. He hates to be the one to tell her, but he wants to help her, and this is the best way how. "Well then, I guess I should point out that you're going to need help for all this, since, you know…"

… _you won't be here._

He can't bring himself to say it, but she seems to hear his unspoken words.

"Yeah, I know." Her expression dims a little more and she frowns over at him. "You're getting your recruits, and I'm going to get mine."

A little smile tugs at the edges of his lip. There's his clever girl. He's missed her.

"And who exactly are you recruiting?"

His smile starts to infect her and she gives him the smallest twitch of her lips.

"Katniss and Peeta."

#######

Gale is supportive of her little endeavor, which is both surprising and unsurprising.

She'd expected a little resistance at least, he's overprotective to a fault, and her jumping feet first into the murky world of rebellion isn't a safe path to chose. On the other hand, he's probably relieved that she's stopped arguing with him, working against him, coming up with completely ridiculous ways to manipulate him into changing his mind. This is a positive move for her, the first one she's done since the meeting, and he seems grateful for it.

Once she finishes explaining that she needs to check out even _more _books from the library, which will probably annoy Ms. Poteau, leaving out that she hasn't really understood much of what she's read in the one's she has at this point, he shuffles through her notes and points out places along the fence where it would be easiest to move large groups of people through.

"My other problem is going to be convincing people to listen when Katniss and Peeta tell them it's time to leave."

"Convincing _Katniss _will probably be good practice," Gale says, his eyes never leaving the complicated diagram of a circuit Madge had carefully copied out of one of her library books. "She's not going to be an easy sell."

"Aren't you asking her dad to help with...you know?" Madge asks, chewing her lip. She'd thought that if Katniss' father got on board with Gale that Katniss would easily follow.

He nods. "That doesn't mean he's going to say yes."

That's true. Considering how things had turned out the last time Mr. Everdeen had been involved in something working against the government, he may be more than a bit hesitant to dip his toes into another attempt.

Still, Madge thinks that if Katniss' father's name ends up on Gale's list, Wiress will make sure he's part of her plan. She isn't the kind of woman to take 'no' for an answer from what Mr. Abernathy has told her.

"I'll see what happens then," Madge finally sighs, tucking a wild strand of hair behind her ear. "All else fails, Peeta will help."

Peeta is reliable, he's loyal, and he's selfless. There's no way he'll tell her no, even if he should.

On top of all that, he'd convincing. If anyone can get the entire District on their feet and ready to leave, it's Peeta Mellark.

Gale drops back, rubbing his hands over his face and nodding. After a few seconds, he spreads his fingers and peaks out at her, his dark hair falling in his eyes.

"Amos Lane caught me today," he begins, a little grin pushing the apples of his cheeks up. "Said they'll have the list of men picked for the corps out before the Victory Tour."

He doesn't actually care, Madge knows that. He's told her more than once that he thinks Amos Lane is a parasite and that his priority isn't the corps at the moment, but on _her_, but he knows it gets her mind off things for a moment. It's a future they'll never have, but one they could've had, and the fantasy of it calms her.

His hands drop and his dimples deepen as he grins over at her. "Made it sound like a sure thing."

"So I may get to hang out with a member of the geology corps at the Harvest Festival?" Madge stands and takes a few steps around his chair, wrapping him in a hug from behind and kissing his hair, which smells of sweat and smoke and cold air. "How exciting."

Lightening quick, his arm wraps around her middle and yanks her into his lap, causing her to squeak in surprise.

"It_ is_ exciting," he mutters into her neck as he nips at the skin under her ear. "Seeing the look on Thom's face is gonna be great."

Madge snorts. _Of course._ The world is essentially falling apart and he's still looking forward to irritating his friend with his good fortune. It's a little annoying, but wholly comforting.

The rough skin of his fingers start to skim across the patch of skin where her shirt has pulled from the top of her skirt, when he freezes.

"Where's your mom and Haymitch?"

Leaning back, Madge gives him a calm smile.

"Dinner."

Mr. Abernathy has been taking her mother out to dinner at the lone restaurant in Twelve, at least once a week since the meeting with Wiress. Part of it, she thinks, is him trying to squeeze in as many nice things for her as possible before the Quarter Quell announcement. He's offered to take Madge as well, but she always has to turn him down.

"It's Gale's night to come out," she has to point out each and every time.

Invariably, he rolls his eyes and shoots Madge's mother a suspicious look. "Of course it is."

Then he usually stomps off, complaining that 'nobody tells him anything'.

Which is a little true.

Madge's mother seems to specifically pick days that Gale will be coming over for her and Mr. Abernathy's dinners. When Madge had asked whether she was doing it on purpose, though, her mother had simply smiled.

"Why would I do that, love?"

If Mr. Abernathy is to be believed, it's because she's devious, but Madge decides that it has to do with her mother being a hopeless romantic.

She's helping Madge get at least one evening with Gale away from both their families, and Madge is grateful for it.

Gale lets out a long, relieved breath and chuckles. "Good."

"We have a few hours," Madge says, standing and pulling him from his seat and towards the living room, toasty from the fire Mr. Abernathy had started before heading out to dinner. "My mom left marshmallows and chocolate."

Grinning, Gale swiftly catches her and hoists her up and against his chest, letting her legs dangle over his arm as he carries her out of the kitchen.

"Let's toast them, then."

#######

Matilda is dragging her feet, Haymitch knows that, trying to buy Madge and that _boy _more time.

"It's such a pretty night out," she says through chattering teeth as she blinks up into the inky sky, at the stars peeking out from behind the wisps of gray clouds.

"It's cold as hell," Haymitch points out irritably.

Her nose wrinkles up as her eyes fall from the sky and settle hazily on him.

"In the summer you say it's 'hot as hell'," she says. "Is hell hot or is it cold?"

Trying not to roll his eyes, Haymitch takes his hand out of his pocket and reaches out, taking her icy fingers in his and tugging her along. "It's only an expression, sweetheart. There is no hell."

Or if there is, he's pretty sure they're there already.

Matilda frowns as she considers his words, letting him tug her along quietly, sidestepping a few puddles of murky water as he does, then she sighs. "Oh."

They trudge along for a few minutes before she deliberately slows again, stopping to stare behind her at the Town below with Haymitch's hand still tightly clamped in hers.

"'Tilda, come on." He's cold and his full belly is making him tired. All he wants is to go home, have a nightcap, and go to bed, not stare at the dim lights behind him.

When she doesn't budge, he sighs and reaches out with his free hand, running tips of his fingers over the exposed bit of skin on her neck, just below the rim of her woolly hat, causing her to shiver.

"Stop that, Haymitch."

"Then come on." He glares at the back of her head. Taking a step towards her, he leans in, his lips just behind her ears, blowing hot breath and rustling wild strands of hair dangling free from under her hat into her face. "I know what you're doing."

She shivers again and turns, her expression perfectly innocent. "What?"

He narrows his eyes and drops her hand, crosses his arms over his chest, huffing. "You're wasting time to give that little bastard time to do who knows what with Madge."

Probably defiling her as they speak. Pervert.

Matilda blinks, smiles lazily. "You like Gale."

Haymitch would 'like' to castrate Gale, but since he needs the little nuisance, he can't. "He's useful."

For now, anyways.

"He's sweet."

No boy, in the history of Panem or before, has ever been sweet, Haymitch is ninety-nine percent sure of that. He is a boy, he should know.

"He's a dick."

"You think all boys are dicks," she laughs lightly.

"They are."

"Are you?"

"You know it."

She smiles airily at him for a moment before sighing and crossing her own arms, running her hands up and down her the thick sleeves of her coat to build up warmth.

With a huff, Haymitch reaches out and pulls her to him, wrapping her in a hug as he steers her toward the Victors' Village.

"Haymitch?"

"Hn?" He grunts, his nose buried in the scratchy material of her hat.

"Are you and Madge going to tell me what your friend wanted?"

She tries to make him stop, but he manages to keep her moving as he considers her question.

He and Madge had decided that it was for the best to keep Wiress' information about the Quell quiet until it becomes unavoidable. The less time Matilda has to dwell on what may, what probably will, come to pass, the better. There's no reason to ruin the last few months of peace she has with worry over something that's seemingly unavoidable.

"It's going to be bad enough building up to the Reaping," Haymitch had reasoned, imagining Matilda's headaches getting worse and her time in a morphling daze increasing. "Let's just let her have the next few months, what do you say, Pearl?"

Madge had simply nodded sadly, fighting off tears as she did.

"It's bad, isn't it?" Matilda asks again.

The house is in view, but Haymitch stops and cups her warm cheeks in his cold hands.

"It isn't anything to worry about yet, sweetheart," he reassures her, leaning in and kissing her forehead.

A sad smile flicks up at the edges of her lips. "You wouldn't tell me if it were though, would you?"

People don't think she knows just what they think of her, that she can't handle things, but she does. It hurts that he and Madge are being lumped in with everyone that have so little faith in her.

The truth of the matter is, though, that Matilda has a lot of strength, just not the kind she needs when they tell her she's going to face the same fate as her sister. She needs a little protecting, and she knows that, even if she hates it.

"I'll tell you when the time is right," he tells her, letting his forehead rest against hers.

"I wish that were now," she whispers, her eyes getting glassy.

Pulling her tight against him, Haymitch lets his chin settle on the top of her head. "I know you do."

The cold settles around them, the smell of the fireplace giving the air a little texture, for a few minutes before Haymitch remembers that Madge is waiting at home.

"Let's get a move on."

She nods into his chest, letting out a warm sigh that ghosts through the front of his shirt before she lets him tug her towards the house.

#######

As soon as Gale hears the latch on the front door click, he jerks away from Madge.

Not that they'd been doing anything, just eating melting marshmallows and chocolate, a treat if there ever was, and studying Madge's books over breakers and circuits. They'd been a little close, very close though, and Gale had been smearing sticky marshmallow and chocolate on Madge's lips with his fingers when she'd been too preoccupied with her papers to notice, and then kissing away the evidence.

He doesn't feel like having Haymitch glaring at him over something so silly, though.

Madge snots as the door swings open and Haymitch and her mother come in, followed by a chilly breeze and more than a few leaves.

Haymitch's eyes instantly narrow on Gale, as though he knows he's been doing something he'd disapprove of, until Matilda gently begins taking his coat off.

"Boots, Haymitch."

Looking as though breaking eye contact with Gale physically pains him, Haymitch grumbles something before he starts struggling with his boots, kicking them off and onto the little mat beside the door.

"I should head home," Gale tells Madge lowly as he pushes himself up from the floor, discreetly brushing graham cracker crumbs from his shirt as he does.

Madge lets him pull her up beside him, shielding him from Haymitch's still sullen glare, before leading him toward the kitchen.

"Leaving so soon, dear?" Matilda asks, her lips turned down in a puckered little frown.

"Yeah," Gale answers, a little too loudly. "Uh, yeah. Work in the morning."

She nods absently and begins picking at a thread on Haymitch's sleeve. "Maybe next time."

Nodding, Gale let's Madge usher him out before Haymitch can say anything coarse, which despite their alliance, he's done more and more often lately.

"He's just worried," Madge had said in way of an apology about a week after Wiress' meeting, after Haymitch had nearly bitten Gale's head off when he'd blamed him for Madge's crying. "He doesn't like Wiress and he's worried about me and my mother. He's afraid of how things are going to turn out."

Which had translated into being increasingly irritable with Gale.

"Keep your hands where I can see them," he'd snapped one day, when Gale had been helping Madge with her algebra.

"If I catch your eyes lower than her shoulder, I'm getting a spoon and goring them out."

"You so much as have a dirty dream about her and I'll know."

He's lost control of the situation, which before Wiress he'd had a tight rein on, and he's making up for the loss by being unbearable about everything left under his thumb.

Gale's happier just leaving as soon as he comes home or hiding in the study with Madge and listening to her practice her piano or helping her with homework, which usually just involves memorizing the look of concentration on her face as she studies.

Still, the old bastard has his uses, and Gale gets the impression he's not nearly as dense as he plays it most of the time. Wiress, who seems sharp as a knife and just as deadly, thinks enough of him to include him in her plan, so he has to be at least smart enough to draw her in.

"You should talk to Haymitch about your little project, even if it isn't perfect yet," Gale tells her as he pulls his coat on and adjusts the collar. "He might know something useful."

Madge just nods, still licking chocolate and marshmallow from her lips.

Gale leans in and kisses her, enjoying the fruits of his labor.

His hands have just started inching around her waist, forgetting that he's supposed to be leaving, pulling her flush against him, when he hears a throat being noisily cleared from the entry to the living room.

"Didn't you say you had work tomorrow?" Haymitch asks, his thick eyebrow high on his forehead.

Madge rolls her eyes and gives Gale a small, apologetic smile before popping back on her toes and kissing his cheek. "I'll see you in a few days?"

Gale nods, and just to annoy Haymitch, leans in and gives her one last lingering kiss, before reaching for the door handle.

"Goodbye, dear," Gale hears Matilda call to him, and he catches a flash of her pale hair and her hazy eyes over Haymitch's shoulder before he pulls the door shut behind him.

Hitching his coat a little tighter, Gale heads toward the path to the Seam, Madge's maps and diagrams floating through his head.


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too. It's all hers.

**So shines a good deed, pt 14**

"You don't need to be messing around with this crap," was Mr. Abernathy's initial reaction when Madge showed him all her plans for evacuating the District, after her mother was soundly sleeping.

"It concerns me," Madge pointed out, smashing a warm marshmallow between a couple of graham crackers, licking melting chocolate from her fingers as she handed it to him. "If you and Gale are going to work to save mom and me, then I'm going to work on saving Gale's family."

It's the very _least_ she can do.

He'd given her a sharp look, jabbing the fire roughly with the poker, then shook his head. "You need to focus on school and parties, that kind of crap."

Madge had rolled her eyes. "I'm not learning anything in school, you said so yourself. I barely have any friends, and even if I did, you'd never let me go to a party."

Poking the fire a little more irritably, he'd grumbled something to himself, then picked up one of her diagrams. After a few minutes of studying it, his eyes tracing the lines carefully, he'd sighed.

"I'll see if I can get a hold of Wiress. If anyone will know about this crap, it's her."

Over the next few weeks he'd slowly started coming in during her and Gale's brainstorming, though for the most part he kept his actual help restricted to times when it's only Madge sitting in the study.

"You can do more than complain about Gale needing to shave and having terrible penmanship, you know?" Madge points out after she walks Gale out one evening.

"He does need to shave," he mutters.

"So do you, Haymitch," her mother tells him gently from her place at the sink, elbow deep in suds.

Mr. Abernathy glares at her before nudging Madge out the entryway and back towards the study.

"And he has the handwriting of a drunk."

Madge almost says 'takes one to know it', but keeps her mouth closed.

"I don't think that cutting the power is going to be simple," he says, dropping with a groan into the seat Gale had vacated minutes earlier and rubbing his pinkened eyes roughly. "Nothing is ever that easy with the Capitol."

Plopping back into her seat behind Mr. Abernathy's heavily scratched desk, Madge nods, her eyes focusing on a map Gale had been making notes on.

"Yeah, there seems to be some kind of fail safe in place. From what I can tell, it's to keep the electricity from going out during required viewing." She wrinkles her nose up. "There has to be a way around it though."

Mr. Abernathy straightens his stack of papers and hands them to her, the lines of his face tight and more severe than usual in the hash light from the table lamp.

"There might not be, then what?"

He's trying to gauge just what she's willing to sacrifice, _who_ she's willing to sacrifice, to save the District.

She doesn't have an answer, though. Madge isn't willing to concede defeat just yet, not if it means getting her friends killed, even if it may be the only way to save the District. There's got to be a way around this, she just has to find it.

"There will be." There has to be.

"That idiot's optimism is rubbing off on you," Mr. Abernathy mutters, tossing his pile of crumpled papers gently towards her.

Taking them, Madge gives him a small smile. "Is a little hope such a bad thing?"

He snorts. "Hope? He's delusional, kiddo."

She doesn't bother pointing out that hope and being more than a little delusional is what made him recruit Gale into his half-baked plan in the first place, made him offer to get him into the geological corps and made him all but promise to marry Madge. He'll find a way to rationalize it and she doesn't feel like debating his motives with him.

Instead she gets up and walks around the desk, wraps her arms around his neck from behind and kisses his scruffy cheek.

"Mom's right," she tells him as she straightens up. "You need to shave, too."

#######

Gale almost tells Katniss about the plan, _plans_, several times, but doesn't.

There are too many unknown factors and he doesn't want to drag her into it until all the finer details are hammered out. She's his best friend, he's doesn't want to ruin her days like his and Madge's have been until it's absolutely necessary.

When he shows up in the Victors' Village one afternoon, when the mines let out early for a cart malfunction, and finds Peeta Mellark, the baker's youngest son, sitting in the study beside Madge he reconsiders his choice.

"Peeta helps work on his family's ovens," Madge explains to Gale in the hall, when she spots his soured expression focused on Mellark's dumb blond head.

"That doesn't translate to understanding complex circuitry, Madge." By that logic, Gale butchering a deer meant he could do surgery. One skill doesn't imply the other.

Chewing her lip, Madge nods. "I know, but...it's better than either of us know, and I was going to ask him and Katniss to help anyway."

Gale frowns. "You asked Katniss already?"

She shakes her head. "No. She's-You two are better friends. I figured you should do it, when the time comes."

And seeing as Mellark is already in on this mess, Gale thinks the time may be upon him. Katniss can at least keep an eye on the Gingerbread Man, make sure he's keeping his eyes and his hands to himself, since Haymitch's over protectiveness clearly doesn't extend to boys from Town. Idiot.

"Yeah," Gale mutters, running his hands through his hair.

Madge's eyes soften and she frowns. "Is something wrong?"

Scrubbing his hands over his face, Gale sighs. "No."

"Yes, there is." Her nose wrinkles up and a faint blush forms on her cheeks. "Are you mad I asked Peeta for help before you asked for Katniss?"

He isn't, not really. He's _annoyed_ that while he's stuck in the mines, losing fingernails and getting coal dust ground into his skin, Mellark is getting to sit in Haymitch's expensive chairs in a well lit room, drinking hot chocolate and eating candies, with Gale's girlfriend. Gale is the one trying to save her life, but he isn't even getting to see her half as much as a guy who decorates cookies in his free time.

Forcing a smile, Gale shakes his head. "I'm just tired."

Which is true, too.

Before he can stop her, Madge leans into him and wraps him in a hug, her winter pale cheek smudging with black from his uniform.

"You can go upstairs and take a nap," she offers.

"Haymitch would love that," Gale chuckles, letting his coal dust covered arms wrap around her, marking her further.

She shrugs against him. "As long as I'm not with you, he'll tolerate it. My mother likes changing the sheets in the guestroom anyways."

Much as he'd like to take a nap, he'd rather do it on the little couch in the study, with Madge, while Mellark walks home. Preferably in the rain.

That seems unlikely to happen, though, so he decides to go to the kitchen and get a glass of water.

"You want something to drink, too?" He asks as he lets her go and turns toward the kitchen.

"No, but Peeta might," Madge says, turning back to the study as if to yell in and ask.

Gale chooses to ignore that and vanishes down the hall.

Since Gale had come through the kitchen earlier, Haymitch has come in and is sitting at the kitchen table, drinking something from a mug and reading the newspaper. He glances up when Gale comes in but doesn't say anything.

Opening the cabinet, Gale finds one of the tall glasses Matilda always gives him and fills it at the sink. Running water, he thinks irritably, must be nice to have this all the time.

Leaning against the counter, Gale takes a long drink and tries to bite his tongue, but then he hears Mellark's obnoxious laughter coming from the study and he can't do it.

"So I'm the only guy that gets parental supervision?"

Haymitch doesn't bother looking up from the paper as he turns the page noisily.

"Yep."

Squeezing his glass, Gale imagines it shattering and throwing the pieces at Haymitch's smug face.

"_Why_ exactly?"

Taking a long drink from his mug, Haymitch shrugs. "Peeta's a good boy."

"And I'm not?"

"You're a filthy minded man with wandering hands," Haymitch says simply, before taking a deep drink from his mug. "So no, you aren't."

Letting out a long growl, Gale puts his glass down a little too forcefully and stomps over to the table.

"But I'm the guy you helped get a better job so I could take care of her when something happens to you. I'm the guy you're trusting her life to."

"Not by choice," Haymitch grumbles. "You're incidental."

"Because Madge picked me."

"Exactly." Haymitch put the paper down and glares. "You wouldn't've even made the short list of guys I'd let _look _at her."

Gale would bet his paycheck that Mellark, with his stupid laugh and his dingy blond hair, would've made that list though.

Dropping into the chair across from Haymitch, Gale grinds his teeth.

"You trust Madge, don't you?" He finally asks, receiving an indifferent grunt in response. Focusing on the grain of the table's wood, Gale carefully grinds out his next thought. "She's smart, you know that, you told me yourself she wouldn't like me if I were a shit person-"

"Well she likes me too, so maybe she's just soft-hearted for bastards," Haymitch snaps. He points his thick finger at Gale, his eyes narrowed. "All those rumors I've heard over the years, even if you're not playing a game now, doesn't mean you aren't a genuine article dick. It's only a matter of time before your true colors come blazing through. I just have to hope you keep it under wraps until Madge is safe."

Gale almost asks just what he'd planned on doing if his old plan, marrying Madge to Gale and setting her life up for when he's gone, had come to fruition, but doesn't. Haymitch is only goading him, and doing a damn good job of it. Gale can just barely string his defense together.

"People talk," Gale snarls. "And not all of it is true."

Gale's good-looking, he knows that. Being a 'catch' as Greasy Sae always says, comes with a price. Girls have pretended to have gone to the slag heap with him and guys, sometimes his own supposed friends, turned him into some kind of idol. Someone to aspire too.

It had never bothered him when it had started, he'd never realized the consequences a reputation might have. Haymitch is showing him though.

"Some of it is true, thought," Haymitch counters. "Question is, how much of it?"

"How much of the rumors that people tossed around, still _do_, about why you took Madge are true?"

Haymitch pales a little and his jaw tightens. Gale would swear he can hear his teeth cracking.

"Not a damn word." He glares across the table. "I would never hurt her."

It's dangerous ground he's treading, bringing up the wild speculations that had spread through the District when Haymitch had stomped into the Home, taken Madge, and then practically fought the officials holding Matilda. It has to be done though, Gale is through with his disparaging.

"I know," Gale finally says. "And I won't either. I'm willing to die for her, you asshole. How many guys on your list are you one-hundred percent sure would risk everything for her?"

They hold each other's glare for a minute, waiting for the other to blink as the sink drips, breaking the silence, before Haymitch finally sits back, nodding.

"I still don't like you," he concedes.

"Feeling is mutual," Gale mutters.

A few minutes pass before the big clock in the living room chimes and Haymitch points his thick finger at the refrigerator.

"Go get you a beer, like a man," he grumbles.

Stretching his legs, Gale goes to the fridge and grabs an amber bottle.

It's cheap, from the Seam, and he wonders briefly if Haymitch keeps it as a nod to where he's from.

With a sharp twist, he opens it and takes a long drink before dropping into the seat again.

It's a truce, sort of, and Gale will take it.

"You give Mellark beers?" He asks.

Haymitch shakes his head. "Nope."

Gale feels a triumphant grin twitch up on his lips. "Good."

#######

Gale sits on the little couch by the window for the rest of the afternoon, occasionally shooting Peeta dark looks.

Madge isn't sure why, Peeta's never done anything to him. From what she's been able to tell, his dad has always made fair trades with Gale and his dad, bread for squirrels. There's really no explanation for it.

When Peeta finally leaves, about the time Gale would normally be getting to the Village, Madge goes back into the study and frowns at him from the doorway.

"What's wrong?"

He doesn't answer at first, just keeps staring out the window, apparently watching Peeta vanishing down the road and back to Town. Then he shifts, his mouth in a sharp turn down.

"How long has Mellark been coming up here?"

Smiling, Madge crosses her arms. "Only the last two days."

His eyebrows scrunch together. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Fighting the urge to laugh, Madge keeps her smile even. Is that's what's been bothering him?

"I was planning on telling you tonight. If you remember, I haven't seen you in a few days."

He's been at work late because of the stops during the day for mandatory viewing of the Victory Tour. It's made coming by to see her the last three days difficult.

Grumbling an acknowledgement, Gale takes a long drink from his beer and goes back to staring out the window.

Crossing the room, Madge drops beside him and rests her cheek against the rough fabric on his shoulder. She tilts her head so that her chin is against his arm and she's staring up at him.

"Are you jealous, Gale?"

He grunts in the negative.

"You are, aren't you?" She smiles, twisting and wrapping her arms around his shoulders and pulling him back and into her chest, one of her legs dangling off the couch and the other pinned between Gale and the back of the couch. Once he's secure, his arms crossed sullenly and his jaw set, Madge nuzzles her nose into his dusty hair. "You don't have to be jealous of Peeta."

If anyone needs to be jealous of anything, it's Madge with Katniss. They're out in the woods together, maybe not as often as they had been before Gale started in the mines, but there's still something special about their connection that Madge knows she'll never be able to touch. She can't dwell on that though. It would take from the precious little time they have and she won't have that.

There has never been a chance of anything more between her and Peeta, not the least of which is lack of chances. She and Peeta aren't nearly that close, and their interactions have always been under the nose of either his parents or Mr. Abernathy. They've never seen each other that way, and they never would. She just needs to make Gale understand that.

"He's not stuck in a hole twelve hours a day. He doesn't have Haymitch breathing down his neck everytime he's near you." Gale's scowl deepens. "I'm not jealous. I'm envious of the bastard."

Resting her cheek against the crown of his head, Madge sighs.

She wishes he didn't have to be. She wishes that when that foreman tells him he's got the position with the corps that they could relax, that he could have his nice, safe job, that they'll have time to spend with each other.

They don't though.

Time is a luxury they don't have, and Gale seems acutely aware of that. That's what he envies of Peeta, that he's getting the time that's so precious to them, that's slipping away faster than they realized.

Tilting her head, Madge kissed his dark, scratchy cheek.

"I know."

It won't be long though, only a few more days, before the number of their days is given. Wiress will come with the Victory Tour and round up the men he's decided will help them and, if Mr. Abernathy has convinced her, find out if she's going to help save the District from the consequences of her plan.

Much as Madge would like to whisper that it's going to be okay, that would be an empty promise. It won't be okay. No matter what happens, it's going to end badly.

Gale finally relaxes, his shoulders slumping into her and his head lolling onto her shoulder as he sighs, sending a warm breath across her neck.

"I wish I could sit up here all day and help you, not Mellark."

Madge lets her fingers trace lazy lines on the front of his work shirt and nods. There's nothing to say to that, nothing to make it better.

He shifts, turns and puts the window at his back as he slouches into the couch and pulls Madge onto his lap and buries his face in her messy hair.

"_I'm _gonna save you though," he whispers as he presses a kiss to her head. "I can't be up here helping you, but I'm gonna save you."

Mr. Abernathy was wrong, Gale's hopefulness hasn't rubbed off on her, not as much as he thinks it has. She can't make promises that have no chance of becoming reality, Gale can. Because he truly believes what he's saying, that he's going to stop the inevitable.

She knows it's silly, but she can't bring herself to break his heart by telling him he needs to prepare for the worst, it's the only comfort he has for her right now. She can't take it from him. Part of her even feels a little guilty. He probably thinks she has more faith that everything is going to happen than she does because of all her planning, that things will fall into place and by this time next year they'll be free from the Capitol. Trying to find a way to save the District from the consequences of their actions may only be reinforcing his belief that she thinks there's a chance, even though she doesn't.

It's nothing more than her futile efforts to pay him back for everything he's going to sacrifice for her.

His blind hope is a comfort though. She can't let go of that just yet.

"I love you," she murmurs as she adjusts herself, pressing her ear against his chest and letting his heartbeat echo in her head.

Even if all their plans fail, even if he can't really save her, at least they have that. Love and cold comfort may be enough. She hopes so.

#######

Madge walks him to the edge of the backyard and kisses him goodbye as she shivers in the briskly blowing wind, drizzle dampening her hair.

"Get back inside and warm up, Gale murmurs against her lips, even if all he wants to do is scoop her up and carry her away.

She's seemed a little low all afternoon, and he hopes it isn't his little admittance about Mellark that ruined her day.

Telling her that he wishes it were him and not her bakery best friend had started a slight downward turn in her mood, and he regrets that. He hadn't meant to upset her, just vent his frustration at being so far away from her all day while Mellark can see her before, during, and, most irritatingly, after school. That's his problem, not her, and he shouldn't have put his insecurities on her. She has enough to deal with at the moment.

He hopes that once the Victory Tour comes, through and that Wiress woman gives them more of an insight into her plan, that he can do something to make up for the last few miserable months. Maybe take her out to the woods, which have been frustratingly off limits since the start of the Tour, and down to the lake. There's a cabin and he's constructed a lazy afternoon in his mind filled with wrapping up in a fur in front of a warmly burning fire and smoked fish.

They just need to make it that far. Past whatever they learn when the Victory Tour rolls in and just what their future holds.

Wet slush splashes up onto his leg when he accidentally steps in a dark puddle and he swears. At least it's only his work clothes. They're filthy anyways.

When he opens the front door to the house, his brothers are sitting at the coffee table across from their dad, who has Posy on his lap, apparently playing a card game. Gale would guess poker, Rory has been obsessed with it lately.

Gale puts his lunch pail on the counter and drops down at the table next to his mother and reaches in the battered laundry basket at her feet, pulling out a worn looking undershirt, his undershirt. It's personal laundry day then.

She gives him an exhausted smile as she shakes out one of Posy's little dresses.

"You can go play with them, you know?" She tells more than asks him.

Nodding, Gale shrugs. "Don't really feel like it."

They sit and quietly fold the laundry while his dad and the kids play, right up until the tv flickers on. An update on the Tour.

It isn't mandatory viewing, not like the actual Tour, which they shut down work almost every other day to make the Districts watch, but they do make sure the electricity and television is on during them just the same.

Gale ignores it, like every night, and so does his family.

It goes on for an hour, ridiculous drivel that no one but people from the Capitol cares about, before Caesar Flickerman and Claudius Templesmith sign off, flashing toothy grins at the cameras before the television dies, leaving a strange emptiness where the hum of electricity had been.

"Okay," Gale hears his dad say as he stands, shifting Posy in his arms and popping his back loudly. "Time for bed kids."

Posy is half asleep anyway and simply nods as he carries her to her room, but Vick and Rory protest.

"It's not even late," Rory grumbles.

Vick nods vigorously.

"You have school in the morning, boys," their mother reminds them tiredly. "You can't be falling asleep in class."

"I'm not a baby," Rory mutters. He shoots Vick a calculated look. "Not like Vick."

It takes a minute of thought, then-

"I'm not a baby!" Vick shouts, glaring at Rory. He looks at their mother. "Mom, tell him I'm not a baby."

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Gale watches his mother grasp for what's left of her energy for the day.

"Boys..."

Posy's door shuts softly as their dad steps back into the room, a slight frown on his face, clearly already aware that two out of three of his sons are causing trouble.

"Rory, Vic-"

Before he can even ask just what they're arguing about there's a small knock on the door.

Everyone stills, frowning at each other and glancing at the clock. It's late, too late for anyone with any good news to be coming by.

The last time Gale remembers getting a visitor this late, it had been after his grandmother had died. Since he's out of grandparents, and his aunts and uncles have either died or vanished, there's no one for them to be bringing bad news about. That means it can only be Peacekeepers.

Tensely, Gale's dad crosses the room, shooting both Gale and his mother a worried look.

He doesn't want to open the door, there are several possibilities as to just who is on the other side, and none of them are good, and all of them know that. Between jumping the fence, illegal hunting and trading, and plotting to overthrow the government, Gale and his father have more than a few reasons to be getting a late night visit from Peacekeepers.

When his dad opens the door, though, there are no white uniforms or guns.

Instead, they find a girl.

She's probably close to Gale's age, though a little short, wearing an ill-fitting dress that looks like one of Posy's normal hand-me-downs from the neighbor girl, before Madge had given her the new ones with a large, tattered looking bag thrown over her shoulder. Her hair is long and dark, straight, dull, and in need of a wash.

None of that is strange though, she looks like most girls in the Seam, worn and lackluster, if a little pale than usual, like she's spent too much time out of the sun, more time than the miners even, and her skin has grayed out from it.

There's something very deliberate about her unkemptness, though, that Gale doesn't like. He doesn't recognize her, which may not mean much, he gets the impression blending in is a particular talent of hers, but her sudden and strangely timed appearance give her an air of danger.

She stands at the door for a moment, squinting up at the patched roof over the porch, before her gaze drops to Gale's dad, as if a little bored.

"Oh, good, you're still up," she says simply, stepping around Gale's dad and into the room, without waiting for an invitation. "This District turns in with the sun."

With that she goes to the coffee table and picks up the cards, left face down, and examines the hand that had been Vick's, her eyebrows raising a fraction as she does.

Shrugging, she drops them and goes to the kitchen table, plopping her filthy bag down before digging through it and ignoring the curious stares she's receiving.

Finally, Gale hears his dad clear his throat.

"Miss?" He frowns at her back. "I think you're lost."

She turns, gives the room a quick half glance, then gives him a dewy smile. "No, I'm not."

Without an explanation, she goes back to her bag, pulling out what looks to be battered files and slapping them onto the table.

"I think you've made a mistake," Gale's dad tries again, stepping between the clearly mad girl and the rest of the family.

Jaw tensing, she shakes her head and doesn't look up from the papers she's shuffling. "Asher Hawthorne, Row 314, house 42."

Gale feels his stomach lurch. Without thinking he steps past his dad and narrows his eyes at her. Something isn't right and he's going to find out what.

"Who the hell are you?" He finally snaps. Whoever she is, she's playing some kind of game and he isn't interested.

"Gale," his dad whispers, low and harsh, a warning tone.

"Language, Gale," his mother adds weakly, arms tightening around Vick and Rory's shoulders, though her eyes don't leave the girl.

As the girl turns from the table and faces him, she grins, a bit wickedly, revealing perfectly straight and painfully white teeth. Not the teeth of anyone from the Seam, no matter how she's dressed.

Taking a few step, she's in front of him, toe to toe, nose wrinkled as she tilts her head and stares up at him. "Cranky. Such an attractive quality. No wonder Haymitch's girl likes you. You're his youthful twin."

Gale's teeth grind together as he glares at her.

His dad grabs him by the back of the shirt and away from the girl, stepping between them in one move.

"Miss-"

"Alameda," she says before Gale's dad can finish his sentence.

"What?" He frowns down at her, eyebrows pulled together in confusion.

Her hand shoots out, perfectly manicured fingernails making her otherness complete. "Phoebe Alameda, Victor."

Gale watches as his dad reaches out and takes her hand, giving it a careful squeeze as he continues to stare at her warily.

"Now," she gives him a mild look as she drops his hand and turns her back on him, striding back to the table. "We have a lot of details to hammer out."

She digs through her bag again, making a triumphant sound before turning and holding up a small paper bag. "It's gonna be a long night, so I brought refreshments. I hope everyone likes rattlesnake."


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

**So shines a good deed, pt 15**

Asher watches the girl as she holds out the little paper bag, smiling out at the bewildered family.

Like Wiress, she's not quite what he expected of a Victor, but then, he supposes, maybe that's why they're friends. Not being what people expect may be their tie that binds.

Not beautiful, not graceful, not strong, just odd and, he assumes, clever.

When no one takes her offer she shrugs and pulls it back to her, opening it and reaching in, pulling out a dry looking piece of meat.

"More for me then," she says brightly, ripping off a chunk with her unnervingly perfect teeth.

Cautiously, Asher takes a step towards her, shooting Gale, still fuming at the intrusion, a look and letting him know to watch his words. This girl is an unknown. So far she seems a little loud, pushy, and certain of herself, all bundled in a seemingly harmless little package with messy hair and badly fitted clothing.

She _is _dangerous though. Despite how she looks, Phoebe isn't weak or fragile, she isn't a kid. She's a Victor, like Haymitch and Wiress, and that makes her anything but harmless.

"Miss Alameda," he begins softly, keeping himself between her and his family, treating her like the wild animal she is. "You're here because of the-because Wiress sent you?"

Tapping the end of her nose then pointing to him, she grins.

Gale steps up and around Asher, crossing his arms and narrowing his eyes.

"The Victory Tour won't be in Twelve for two more days-"

"Well aren't you just a budding detective," Phoebe chirps, rolling her eyes.

"-what did she send you here early for?" Gale grinds out, clearly just barely able to keep his tone civil.

For a minute she seems to have decided to ignore him as she concentrates on chewing her jerky, to Gale's increasingly obvious annoyance, then she takes a long breath.

"First off, Gale, you have a stupid name. Gale is a girl' name-"

"It is not!" Gale snaps as Rory and Vick begin snickering.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it is." She holds up a hand to silence him, clearly enjoying his frustration, and continues. "Anyway, second, and more importantly, I'm _not_ early. I'm right on time. They send a prep team before the Tour reaches each District to get things camera ready. And this District needs more help than most, trust me. Since my usual job is pretty solitary, Wiress asked me to get things rolling."

Turning on her heels, she begins shuffling papers on the table. After a couple of silent seconds, she turns back and frowns, eyebrows high on her forehead.

"Well? Are you going to get over here or do you want me to shout everything at you?"

Exchanging a look with Hazelle, Asher catches a minuscule nod of resignation.

There's no turning back now, and they both know it.

"Boys, go to bed," Hazelle tells Rory and Vick softly, giving them both a nudge towards their room.

"But-" Rory starts to protest, but quiets when he catches the stern look Asher shoots him.

Huffing, Rory shoves his hands into his pockets and stalks off towards his room, but Vick stays, eyes fixed on Phoebe.

"How did you know Gale's name?" He asks, his mouth turning down and his nose wrinkling up.

Smiling, she shrugs. "I know a lot of things, Vick."

Eyes widening, still fixed on her, Vick nods.

Jerking her thumb towards the bedroom, Phoebe tilts her head and clicks her tongue. "Get to bed, kid"

Continuing to nod, Vick starts toward the room, bumping into the couch and stunning himself back into attention. He grins sheepishly, then scurries off after the baffled looking Rory.

Once their door is shut, clicking when Hazelle goes over and pulls it completely closed, Asher turns back to the unwanted guest.

"Well, what do you have there, miss?"

#######

There are papers spread out on the table, the margins around the maps crowded with neat but cramped handwritten notes.

Asher glances at Gale, studiously staring at each paper, committing each word and every line to memory.

He's got the blueprint for the Presidential Mansion. It's crisp and professional looking, not like the smudged, though carefully drawn, map Asher has setting in front of him.

It's the Capitol's underground, pieced together judging by the various textures and different handwriting on it. Parts of it are old, faded and retraced, while other parts are dark and fresh, new additions to the collection.

"You boys will be coming with me, up through here," Phoebe explains, standing and leaning over the table, pointing out a narrow looking passage that apparently runs under the mansion. "See? We've made a way into the basement through here. We sneak in, place the explosives, then head back out."

She makes it sound so simple, straightforward and easy, that's for a minute Asher almost thinks it might work.

Looking up at her, he frowns as he watches her plop back down in her chair and begin sifting through notes.

"Will it work?" He asks without thinking.

Eyebrows arching up, she shrugs. "Won't know until we try."

That isn't much of a comfort, but he supposed it's at least honest.

"Sound real confident," Gale mutters beside him.

"Gale," Hazelle scolds him softly as she sets a cup in front of their guest.

Phoebe frowns at the chipped cup and then up at Hazelle. "What's this?"

"Tea," Hazelle answers simply, with a tight smile. She isn't happy that the girl is there, or more specifically _why_ the girl is there, but her innate need to be at least a pleasant hostess has overcome her dislike.

Squinting up at Hazelle, Phoebe picks up the cup and sniffs it. "What's in it?"

Smile slipping off, Hazelle tilts her head slightly. "Tea."

Looking certain that she's being lied to, Phoebe sniffs the tea again, then sets it down and grabs up her bag.

While she digs through it, Hazelle cuts both Asher and Gale a confused look.

As Asher is about to ask if she doesn't like tea, Phoebe shoots up, a small, flat plate in her hand.

At first, Asher thinks it's a coaster, something he's only seen during his trades with some of the people in Town, but then it flips it open and slides what looks to be a small, square piece of paper from it.

Dipping her finger into the tea, she smears it across the paper and waits. When nothing happens, she smiles up at Hazelle.

"Oh, it is just tea." She laughs. "Thanks."

Gale makes a huffing noise as she starts sipping cautiously.

"Nutcase," he mutters, shaking his head and letting his eyes drop back to the papers in front of him.

Asher gives him a small kick under the table and Gale looks up, a murderous expression etched on his face.

"What?" He snaps.

"Don't," Asher softly warns him.

Before Gale can say anything back though, Phoebe snorts into her cup.

Smiling brightly, she shrugs.

"Don't worry, Mr. Hawthorne. Nutcase is hardly the worst thing I've ever been called."

Asher feels his stomach roll slightly.

Though she doesn't seem bothered by it, and really, he thinks she started the name calling with her slight against Gale's name, Asher can't help feeling the tiniest bit sorry for her. She reminds him a little too much of Posy. A little girl trying to play at being bigger and tougher than she is, but still just a kid.

He quickly shakes the thought off. Phoebe and Posy are nothing alike, and he needs to keep them separate in his mind. Twining the two is dangerous.

"We've run the numbers, and for this little excursion, for safety and security, we're only going to involve the fewest number of miners possible," she begins, smoothing out a severely creased paper in front of her.

Gale nods, looking slightly less agitated, reaching into his back pocket to where Asher knows he has a crumpled piece of paper with a short list of names, men he trusts to be part of the plan.

"I approve of Mr. Everdeen and Mr. Lacewood with son, though I've still got my misgivings, but Vawtner has a sick kid and I don't want to give him something to bargain for Capitol meds with, and Sanderson, well, he's got a gossipy wife and we can't -"

"What?" Gale's head snaps up as he pulls his wallet out. His lips thin and he narrows his eyes. "How do you know those names?"

They're all names on the list Gale has carefully written out over the last few months, but as Gale opens his wallet and pulls out the paper, smudged with coal covered fingerprints, Asher knows just what Gale means. There's no way for her to know those names.

"The list is still here," Gale says lowly, suspiciously. "How do you know those names?"

After taking a sip of her tea, Phoebe sets the cup down and folds her arms over the papers in front of her, lacing her fingers and smiling.

"Well, I'm smarter than you," she answers simply. "Did you think we'd let you just hand us a list of names and not check them? We've been, well, _I've _been watching you and determining which men you'd choose, and it seems like I did a pretty good job, huh?"

Asher actually thinks so. He doesn't say that though, since Gale's stormy glare makes it clear he isn't as impressed as Asher is.

"You've been spying on my son?" Hazelle asks suddenly, her eyes wide in horror.

Phoebe tilts her head in thought for a moment, then nods. "Yeah, you could say that." Her eyes cut to Gale. "So you'd best start kissing my backside a little, Dorothy. I've got some pretty saucy pictures of you and Mr. Haymitch's little princess that you probably don't want either one of your parents to see."

Gale's glare doesn't falter, even when Asher coughs uncomfortably and Hazelle looks away in embarrassment.

He makes a low growling noise, but is cut off by a laugh.

"Clean out your ears and zip your trap, puddin'. Here on out you're gonna listen, 'cause I don't have time to spoon-feed you all night."

#######

By the time midnight rolls around Gale is certain that there's a thread of obnoxiousness that runs through all Victors and that he's met the two who managed to get it in spades.

After she points out every flaw each of his friends possess, she again tells them that Jude, Thom, and Thom's dad are the least objectionable choices.

"I'll let you know when to meet up again, and don't worry, I'll let the others know when and where to meet up when the Tour comes through. So for the love of chocolate covered bacon, don't mention anything to them, we need everyone to be as paranoid as possible coming in. Helps with security. Wiress will have the rest of the details when we all meet up," she says as she heads out the door, taking her disgusting bag and her irritating personality with her.

"Where's your coat?" Gale's dad asks her when she's finally started to open the door.

Alameda glances down at her thin dress and frowns, as though just now realizing she doesn't have the proper attire for running around in the dead of winter.

"I'll live," she tells him with a shrug.

His dad isn't having it though, going to the trunk in the corner and pulling out one of his old coats that had been slated for rags by Gale's mother.

"Here, take this. You can give it back when we meet up again."

She takes it hesitantly, examining it like the tea, then looks up, her eyebrows knitted together tightly. "Why?"

Gale's dad looks confused, and Gale almost rolls his eyes. His dad has always been too nice at times, giving a coat to a girl that doesn't give a damn about them past what they can do for her is just a symptom whatever strange compulsion for compassion he has.

Mouth pulling into a tight frown, his dad glances at the window and the light snow coming down, then back at Alameda.

"It's cold."

Looking thoroughly confused, Alameda puts the coat on before giving Gale's dad a small, bewildered smile. "Thanks."

And with that she's gone, hopefully far, _far_ away.

"These dimensions are pretty tight," Gale says, trying to pull his dad's attention away from their departing guest, jabbing the map she'd left behind on the table for him to study. Hopefully Thom's dad will fit through. Tiny may be his nickname, but tiny he is not.

His dad drops down beside him and takes the paper, nodding.

"He's crawled through worse."

Handing the paper back, he stands and pops his back. "Let's get to bed, son. We still have work tomorrow."

Rolling up the papers, Gale stuffs them into the cylinder Alameda had given them and hands them to his dad. His parents' room is safer from nosey little boys than Gale's, seeing as those nosey boys are sharing Gale's room.

His mother gives him a quick kiss on the cheek and a worn smile before gently nudging him towards his room.

Pulling off his filthy work shirt and pants, Gale collapses onto his worthless bed without washing up more. He'd scrubbed himself at Madge's, and he's too physically and mentally exhausted to go out in the cold and clean himself up more. It's more work for his mother, and he regrets that, but he'll make it up to her.

Wishing he could talk to Madge sooner than the next afternoon, he tries to think of what she's going to say. Seeing physical proof of what is going to happen in the Capitol and just how far this thing has come is bound to cause her fear, which he's started to feel settle, flare back up.

Then his stomach rolls.

That awful Alameda woman will probably go by the Victors' Village and he can only imagine how horrible she'll be to Madge.

He almost gets up and gets dressed, ready to stomp up to the Village to keep her from harassing Madge, but thinks better if it. Haymitch may be a useless lump, but he won't let her upset Madge or hurt her. It's quite literally his one redeeming quality in Gale's eyes.

Heavy lids finally drop shut and his wildly spinning mind continues to run over the maps, but right as he's at the cusp of a restless night of sleep, someone plops on his bed.

"Gale, are you awake?" He hears Vick whisper loudly, lightly poking Gale in the ribs.

Opening one eye halfway, Gale doesn't answer, just gives his brother an irritable grunt.

Vick grins and turns toward Rory.

"Come on, Rory, he's awake!"

Before he can even roll to his side and properly ignore them, Rory climbs out of bed and jumps onto Gale's.

"What's going on? Why is a Victor coming to our house? Did you piss her off?" He rattles off his questions.

"Are you in trouble?" Vick manages to squeeze in, his eyes wide with worry.

Reluctantly, Gale sits up, rubbing his hands over his burning eyes.

"Nothing is going on," he lies. "She's just one of Haymitch's pain in the ass friends. He sent her to annoy me."

Rory and Vick exchange a look that plainly lets Gale know they don't believe him.

"Gale, don't insult my intelligence," Rory says, crossing his arms and staring down his nose.

Gale tries not to roll his eyes at him. It's impossible to insult something that doesn't exist.

"We were standing right there when you were talking about someone named 'Wiress'. Who is she? What are you and dad up to? Is this what you two are always whispering about?" Rory asks, narrowing his eyes.

Damn. Gale had forgotten they'd been in the living room.

"She's-shes just another Victor. Like I said, Haymitch crap." He quickly adds, "And we aren't up to anything, or whispering."

Rolling his eyes and huffing, Rory gets up and clomps back to bed, muttering that Gale is 'withholding information' and 'such a dick'.

Vick frowns and stares at his hands for a second before sliding off Gale's bed and sighing. His wide gray eyes reflect the thin sliver of moonlight that slips through the thin curtains over the window as he turns them on Gale.

"Whatever it really is, be careful, Gale."

Gale takes a deep breath. He actually doesn't like lying to Vick. Unlike Posy, who forgets what is and isn't a secret, and Rory, who doesn't care, Vick keeps his mouth shut. He's the easy sibling to talk to.

"I will, buddy," he whispers back, reaching out and pulling his youngest brother into a hug. "I will."

#######

Madge is deep in a dream, something about a lake and strawberries with Gale, when she hears something crash in the kitchen.

Bolting up in bed, she squints around the room, into the dim pink light of the flower shaped lamp Mr. Abernathy had bought her for her thirteenth birthday.

Crawling out of bed, she tiptoes to the door and opens it as quietly as she can.

Her mother's door is still firmly shut, probably in a morphling deep sleep, but Mr. Abernathy is already in the hall, the heavy crowbar he keeps beside his bed gripped tightly in his hands.

He's slept with it, at least as far as Madge knows, since her and her mother had moved in with him.

"Little assholes are always trying to break in," he'd told her. "Think there's something up here to steal."

Madge had wrinkled up her nose and looked around the house. There certainly had been things worth stealing, at least in her mind, but when she'd pointed that out he'd waved her off.

"I can buy more stuff." He'd smiled and patted her cheek then given her a kiss on the forehead. "You and your momma, though, that's all I really worry about, and scared idiots trying to rob a place don't think too clearly."

He'd chased off a few would-be robbers, people who thought that he'd be an easier mark since he had people to look after, people to distract him. That had shown a remarkable lack of understanding on their part.

Instead of being distracted, Mr. Abernathy had become almost hyper-vigilant. He hadn't just chased people off, he'd filed charges against a few. Something he'd apparently been hesitant to do before.

"Didn't want to ruin anyone's life," he'd explained with a huff. "Can't play soft with 'em now, though. Gotta show them I'm not playing around anymore."

Since their arrival, he's yet to forget to set the alarm on the house or lock the doors.

That hadn't stopped whoever was currently in their kitchen though.

"Back in the room, kid," he rasps at her as he slowly, softly steps down the stairs.

Ignoring him, Madge creeps up beside him and follows him, despite the irritable look she's getting.

As they get down the stairs, Madge spots the kitchen light on, spilling out into the living room. Whoever is in there is quieter now, running water and opening the fridge.

Before Madge can stop him, Mr. Abernathy hoists his crowbar over his head and runs through the opening, yelling incoherently as he does.

"Mr. Abernathy!" Madge half shouts as she runs after him, trying to keep from tripping over the edge of her nightgown as she does.

She freezes in her steps as she hears his gruff voice rumble in confusion.

"What the _hell_ are you doing here?"

Worried at what she's going to find, Madge softly treads to the opening between the living room and the kitchen and peaks in.

Mr. Abernathy is standing at the center of the kitchen, crowbar held loosely in one hand and the other rubbing at his temple. Across from him, taking what looks to be a rather large bite of what appears to be a well filled cold-cut sandwich, is a girl.

She isn't much older than Madge, though several inches shorter, with dry, dirty looking dark hair and a ragged dress.

At first, Madge thinks she's just a hungry kid from the Seam, and maybe a little sick, judging by the grayed pallor of her skin, but quickly thinks better of it. No kid from the Seam would know how to get past Mr. Abernathy's alarm system, and none of them would be foolish enough to simply stand around in the kitchen they've just broken into with a madman wielding a crowbar only feet away.

After several seconds, the girl swallows her bite of sandwich and smiles, perfectly straight, unnaturally white teeth.

"Wiress warned me you were extra friendly during house calls," she says, her lips widening wickedly.

Mr. Abernathy growls, "You scared the shit out of me, you little-I should kill you!"

She shrugs. "Get in line."

Taking a deep, agitated breath, Mr. Abernathy sets his crowbar down with a clank on the table and crosses his arms.

Feeling more than a little out of the loop, Madge clears her throat.

Seeming to finally remember that she's there, Mr. Abernathy and the girl look at her.

"Oh," Mr. Abernathy grunts. He jerks his head toward the girl to introduce her. "Madge, this pain in the ass is Bird. She's here to prepare the District for the Victory Tour."

Madge's nose wrinkles her nose. "Prepare the District?"

He nods. "Yeah, every year they come through and get things 'camera ready', you know, make us look as completely pathetic as possible, but clean, can't have anything dirty sullying the Capitol's precious eyeballs."

Leaning around him to get a better look at the girl, Madge's frown deepens. "You come out every year, but I've never seen you. That means you're here to help with the plan, right?"

Bird finishes chewing a chunk cheese and washes it down with what looks like water, but may be some of Mr. Abernathy's white liquor, the cabinet where he keeps it is open, and sighs.

"Boy, she and Detective Hawthorne should start a PI business. Couple of Sherlock Holmeses," she mutters, rolling her eyes and setting her glass down on the counter.

"Hawthorne?" Madge sputters. "Gale?"

Nodding her head, Bird laughs. "Yeah, your brain dead boyfriend is actually why I'm here so late. He's cute, but not too bright, and kinda cranky." Her gaze cuts to Mr. Abernathy and she shrugs. "But you know, like mother like daughter."

Before Madge can comment on that or even ask about Gale, Bird has crossed the room and dropped down at the table and begun pulling papers from a filthy and frayed gray bag.

She plops papers out, several stained and singed at the edges, and begins shuffling through them before looking up at Madge and Mr. Abernathy.

"Well? Come on, I haven't got all night."

Exchanging a look with Mr. Abernathy, Madge slowly walks to the table and sits down across from the stranger and picks up one of the papers she's tossed across the table.

Eyebrows pulling together, Madge looks up and clears her throat. "Um, Bird?"

"Birdy," she corrects, looking up with a calm, almost sleepy smile. "And, yes?"

Holding out the papers to her, Madge bites her lip. "Well, these are maps of the District. I thought-aren't you helping with the plan for the Capitol?"

A wicked grin twitches up on Birdy's lips and she sits back, nodding. "I am, but you aren't, are you?"

She waits half a second before carrying on.

"Mr. Haymitch tells me you've been trying to come up with a way to save this dump if we don't succeed, and let's be honest, that's more likely to happen than us actually getting anywhere with this impending disaster. I've been trying to get around your little problem with the override in the electric." She points at a diagram, hand drawn and sloppy. "I've had several people look into it, and there's no way around it."

The brief flash of hope that had flared up in her chest quickly dies. There's no way to cut the electricity.

"Well, other than someone frying themselves shutting it off manually, but that seems..."

"Deadly?" Mr. Abernathy supplies, his lips curled in disgust. "Please tell me you didn't wake me up at one thirty in the morning just to give me bad news, kid?"

Giving him a flat look, Birdy arches her eyebrows. "I would love to, but happily, I've found a work around."

Madge's deflated slouch perks up. "A work around?"

Birdy nods and pulls out what looks like a ledger. "I figured while I was stealing explosives for our little project in the Capitol, I might as well take a few extra."

One of Mr. Abernathy's thick eyebrows arches up. "Your plan is to blow it up?"

The question hangs in the air for a moment while Birdy crosses her arms over her mess of papers.

"Yeah, pretty much," she finally says.

Mr. Abernathy's eyes roll. "I should've listened to Wiress when she told me it was hopeless."

Looking offended, Birdy straightens up.

"Why? This is a good plan. Sort of. Mostly." She slouches back down. "I mean, it's better than sitting here and waiting for them to bomb the daylights out of everyone, plus, the smoke plays hell on the Capitol planes visibility. So much for their superior technology. That's what they get for having the people they're stepping all over help build their weapons."

"You think we should blow up the breaker house?" Madge asks to clarify, her stomach rolling slightly. She'd hoped for a less violent way around the Capitol's failsafe.

Birdy nods. "Then you take down the fence and head west. District Eleven should be able to absorb you by the time you reach them."

"Not including our ghost friends in this, then, are we, Bird?" Mr. Abernathy asks, getting up and sauntering to the cabinet, pulling out a bottle of white liquor and taking a long drink from it.

Madge isn't sure what he means by that, but Birdy apparently does. Her nose wrinkles up in disgust.

"No...we're not," she answers flatly, standing up and reaching across the table to where Mr. Abernathy has just flopped down, snatching the bottle from his hand and taking a long drink and gagging, her tongue sticking out in dislike. "That's awful. Can't you afford something decent?"

One of his eyebrows rises. "Yep."

Thrusting the bottle back at him, Birdy sits down and shoots him a dark look before turning her attention to Madge.

"Since you're clearly the only reasonable person in this hellhole of a District, let's talk, Magdalene."

#######

Birdy isn't as awful as Madge initially thought.

She isn't the most pleasant person, a little blunt, but having to work with the Capitol on a frequent basis has probably frayed her a bit. Mr. Abernathy is proof that even the best people can be broken by the twisted minds that reside there.

"You make is seem simple," Madge sighs, eyes tracing over the layout showing where Birdy and whoever she'd enlisted to help her had decided the explosives need to be placed under the mansion. Biting her lip, she looks up. "Do you think it's going to work?"

Birdy shrugs. "Maybe. Probably not."

Madge grinds her teeth. "If you don't think it's going to work then why are you helping?"

Shouldn't she believe what she's helping orchestrate is going to save lives?

Shrugging again, Birdy takes a drink, this time of water, sucking a piece of ice into her mouth as she does and crunching it thoughtfully.

"I think we need to do something, and this is the best we have. Everyone's family is at risk otherwise."

"Even yours," Madge murmurs sadly.

Shaking her head, Birdy spits a large chunk of ice back into her glass. "Not my family."

Before Madge can ask her what she means, Mr. Abernathy shudders awake, rubbing his pink eyes and glaring around in confusion.

"You still here?" He grumbles. "Damn it, girl, go darken someone else's doorstep already."

Ignoring him, Birdy begins gathering up her things.

"I'll be contacting the miners that are going to the Capitol and have them, and your surly boyfriend and his poor dad, meet here the night after the festivities. It'll be up to you to get that adorable baker-what's his name? Peeta, right?-here for me. You'll need help with this breaker _thing_ and Daddy Dearest here probably won't be much help."

Shoving papers into her bag, she stands up and goes to the door, quietly slipping on her shoes.

"You won't be coming back before that?" Madge asks, a little let down. She'd felt so much more involved with Birdy there. Even though everything is still terrifying, for Gale, his family, Madge's family, she can feel a little hope creeping up inside her.

This isn't some slapdash plan that'll fall apart. Wiress and the other Victors in her group have clearly been working on this for a while, chiseled out every detail with care, and Madge's efforts for the District are shaping up to be not entirely in vain.

Despite what she'd thought, this plan has a chance of succeeding, more than a chance, and she's desperate to know more.

"I've got my official job to do," Birdy explains, straightening the strap of her bag and tossing her hair over her shoulder. "I only managed to get out to talk to you and Windy the Amazon because I may have slipped something in my Capitol watchdogs' drinks."

A wry smile twists up on Mr. Abernathy's lips.

"You never bring your fun stuff when I need to make a run for it," he says, half playfully.

Lips flicking up wickedly, Birdy pulls a ragged coat on. "I don't like you very much."

Mr. Abernathy lifts his almost empty bottle up and tilts his head, giving her a tiny salute. "Feeling is entirely mutual, sweetheart."

Rolling her eyes, Birdy opens the door, throwing a 'don't call me _sweethear_t' over her shoulder before vanishing out into the dark cold.

#######

Hazelle can't sleep.

She stays up after Asher goes to bed, mending some of Rory's socks to work off some nervous energy.

Seeing the plan, actual ink on paper with what appears to be several years, maybe decades, worth of effort, hasn't served to ease the tension twisting inside her about what her son and husband are tangled up with. It may be carefully thought out, but that doesn't help her fears.

Closing her eyes, she takes several deep breaths, trying to calm herself. It doesn't help though.

Her baby is going to go off on what may end up being a death march for a girl he hasn't even been dating that long.

"He loves her," Asher has told her, more than once.

"They haven't even been dating that long," Hazelle had snapped. "He can't love her."

She knew she'd sold her son's feelings short the moment the words left her mouth.

Gale isn't one to make a commitment without being willing to pour his heart into it. He wouldn't have agreed to accept Haymitch's help with the geology corps if he didn't love Madge, truly and completely. From that moment on, Hazelle had known he'd go to the ends of the earth for that girl, and it had terrified her.

What kind of mother would she be if she hadn't been frightened of a girl with the power to take her son away?

Madge is a good girl, sweet and kind, and Hazelle loves her dearly. She hates what's hanging over her and her mother's head, but she isn't good enough a person to be willing to sacrifice any of her babies for her.

Helping her might even cost her entire family their lives. If this plan fails, all of them will suffer, and truthfully, she'd resented Madge just a little for that at the beginning.

"I don't want Gale to get hurt," she'd sobbed on Hazelle's shoulder the day after Hazelle learned of the plan. "He won't listen to me. I'm trying to talk him out of this, I promise you I am, Mrs. Hawthorne."

Hazelle had wrapped her in a hug and shushed her. "I know, Madge, I know."

Their desire to keep Gale from sacrificing himself, which is what his mad plan amounted to, was a thread of connection between Hazelle and her son's girlfriend. She might hate the problems that the relationship had thrust upon them, and she might begrudge Madge's family for the troubles they bring with them, but she can't hate Madge. Not really.

"We're working on something," Gale has told her, several times, trying to assuage her fears. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you all."

While she's certain he's being sincere, he can't make that promise while simultaneously creating a cloud of danger, the reason that terrible things may come down on them.

Getting up, she checks in on Posy, sleeping soundly, before going to the boys' room.

Vick is curled into a ball and Rory is half off the bed, snoring softly with his face smashed into his pillow.

Smiling at them, she turns toward Gale's bed.

He'd outgrown it ages ago, but there's never been the money to get him a new mattress, and his feet are dangling off the end. On his stomach, (_he's always slept like that_, she thinks to herself, ever since he was a baby) he's out cold, letting out a rattling snore every few seconds.

Brushing some of his dark curls from his face, Hazelle smiles at him. He's enormous and handsome and still her baby.

And he's a good man.

Her baby isn't a baby. He's all grown up, brave and smart and he's going to save them all. She knows that somehow, watching him sleep noisily, his cheeks stained with dark stubble and a little bit of drool pooling by his mouth.

Madge and her connection with him may be what gave him this opportunity, but Gale would've found a way to fight with or without her. It's just how he is. This was inevitable, and suddenly she knows that.

As little as she likes it, Hazelle understands it.

Asher has fought back against the Capitol in his own quiet way since Gale was a baby, and now Gale is following his lead, albeit in a much more dangerous way.

She may not have much faith in the plan, but she has a great deal of faith in her son. Once he sets his mind to something, he succeeds; this time will be no different.

Leaning down, she presses a kiss into his hair.

"I love you, sweetie."

He must still be half awake, or he still talks in his sleep, because he murmurs something unintelligible into his pillow before rubbing his face with his hand, his stubble making a scratchy noise as he does.

Smiling, Hazelle backs out of the room and shuts the door, quietly padding into her room.

Slipping into bed, she snuggles into Asher, wrapping herself around him and burying her face in the back of his shoulder.

"Finally gave up on those socks, huh?" He mumbles as he rolls over.

Hazelle laughs softly. "Yeah."

A warm breath ghosts through her hair as he chuckles and snakes his arm around her, pulling her tightly against his body.

Settling her ear against his chest, she closes her eyes and tries to imagine a life where they aren't cuddling to fight off the cold, where her son isn't sleeping in a bed he doesn't even fit on, where her husband's soft-heartedness, handing out a coat that she could've patched up for Rory or Vick, doesn't wear her nerves thin.

That reality might be close, and she hopes it is. Gale and Asher are certainly going to try to make it so.

She hopes all of them are there to enjoy it if it does come.

"I love you," she whispers into his holey shirt, mentally cataloging all the hemming she's going to have to do to it tomorrow.

"Love you, too, H'zelle," he murmurs back, his voice thick with sleep.

Smiling to herself, Hazelle wiggles more tightly against him and closes her eyes.

Maybe her sleep will be a little more restful than it has been. She hopes so.


End file.

Hunger Games, Family