There was a strong, painful beating of her heart against her ribs as she stood before the two-way mirror, a hand pressed carefully to the glass as she worked the courage to enter his room.

He was thrashing, screaming to be let free, and Terra understood his fear more than anyone with the proof she continued to sport on her everywhere she went. His restraints looked gentler, not as painful, but she still hurt for him as he tossed himself forward but found himself stuck.

It was painful to see him in such a different lighting. Cleaned against the white sheets, the purples and blues blooming over his skin, now perfectly exposed, were much more terrible than they looked back when they were locked away.

She approached the door and opened it slowly, with Johanna and Annie still close at her side. It was a miracle that there was seemingly no one around here to stop them as they just continued to movr around freely. As she came in, pole first for support, Peeta froze, staring wide eyed as they came closer. It was like he drooped, relaxing into the bed as all fight left him.

"Peeta?" Terra moves forward slowly and his eyes snap to her, sharp and glazed over. She recognized that look, that distant, not really there gaze, and wondered why no one had quite realised it before, or at least attempted to help him.

The cost of surviving had always been less than what it was worth. It was stripped you of some part of your mind and sanity and even if she didn't know what hijacking was, she knew it had pulled him away from himself. She offered him an open palm, demonstrating how she wasn't going to hurt him, and slowly sat on the side of his bed. Terra couldn't remember his screams, couldn't remember anyone but her own being drowned out, but she could tell from the way his eyes flickered to the bandages on her wrists that he remembered hers.

"Terra? Johanna?" He breathed hoarsely, words quivering and broken. He leaned over, spotting the redhead that stood silently behind them. "Annie?"

He was still for a moment, and she thought everything might be fine, but his eyes turned wild and he started bucking in the bed, tossing his head wildly enough for her to fear him harming himself.

"You have to get out of here! Run! Run! You have to leave!" Peeta yells, frantic as he stops and turns to them emploring, pleading. "You can't trust anything they say! Katniss is going to kill us all! She's a mutt! A Capitol mutt!"

Glancing behind her nervously, afraid that someone will hear, Terra moves forward and cuffs his face the best she could, holding it tight. Her blood ran cold at his words, sounding very much like her own from not too long ago, and how he had fought against everything she had said so vehemently. If this was hijacking, this stealing of thoughts and feelings, then she didn't want to consider how hard it would be to get him back, to coax him back into himself.

"Peeta, Peeta, it's okay, I've got you. You're safe now. I won't let anything happen to you, no one will hurt you," Terra promised, brushing her fingers through his hair gently. "I don't trust Katniss, remember? Remember I said I didn't trust her? Relax, it's okay, I believe you. I believe you."

His eyes dart over her face, intense, before his head collapses forward, leaning against her shoulder heavily as he quivers. "You can't trust them. Don't trust anyone. Please, T, you have to leave."

Closing her eyes and breathing heavily, she brushes a hand down his back, the feeling of his spine under her fingers made her stomach drop. She wondered if he could feel any of her bones spoking from beneath her skin, if he felt as badly about all the pain she was in as she did for him.

"It's okay. Everything is going to be fine," she soothed, resting her cheek on top of his head. "Jo, can you help me undo the straps?"

Johanna hesitates at her side, waffling with uncertainty, but she looks hard at Terra, searching for some kind of answer, and she nods once. She moves to the nearest side, working on the buckle, and leans in close to Terra's ear. "I hope you know what you're doing."

"Me too," she whispers, and when her friend steps away to move to the other side, they all hold their breath for what he's about to do.

Peeta flexes his arms, moving his wrist around slowly, before he slowly wraps it around her waist, clinging. Terra encompasses him against her, trying to comfort him as best that she could.

"You're okay. Have you been tied down since you've been here?" She asks gently, and he nods against her, mumbling something about being a prisoner just as they were in the Capitol.

Annie kneels beside her, placing a hand on his knee, and he clenches his fist around her hospital gown tightly.

"They killed my family. Katniss caused the bombing in 12," Peeta states, a shiver running through his, and she watches carefully as his deteriorating muscles bulge. "They killed my family. They won't let me leave."

"There's no use in wanting to leave just yet. We'd all die on our own," Johanna mentions, sitting on the bed and pulling one of her knees up. "I mean look at us. We're all pathetic."

"Speak for yourself," Terra snapped jokingly.

"You're sporting bandage jewelry, T. You're pathetic."

Annie giggles, covering her mouth his her fingers, and Terra smiles at her, the sound lifting a burden from her shoulders. "You would barely make it up the stairs to the next level."

"What do you think you're doing?"

Terra spins, facing a disgruntled nurse as she holds the door open before she turns back around and men a flood of men in white come bursting into the room, moving immediately for the bed as other came in, grabbing Annie by her arms and hauling her away.

Johanna jumped up, wobbling and screaming at them as they made to grab her. Terra felt someone grab at her arms and tug, yanking at her, but Peeta held hard, screaming something about Capitol mutts and people trying to kill them as they tried to pin him down.

"Don't touch me, please, don't touch me," her pleads come out a whimper and she wiggles in their hold, trying to push herself closer to Peeta as he starts to panic again, freaking out at all the people invading the room, and he flings out his arm, fist colliding with her jaw just in time with her push forward.

Terra stumbles back, grunting miserably at the pain, and spirals into the man on the left, face planting into his chest. Pushing away as he tries to hold her, they grab her wrists and she whimpers, rasping at the sickening pain that shouts through her and makes her knees weak, crying out as they continue to drag her.

"Let go. Let go, let go, let go, please," she wails, trying to get away from the cruel hands. "Stop touching me, don't touch me."

She feels a slow trickling down her arms as they pulled her into the main room with all the beds. She looks over and the red trail that slides down the inside of her arm, reaching the crevice of her elbow and splinters. It was much, much different from seeing it on someone else, when she didn't have to touch it, but as she looked at it staining her skin, practically smell the iron and feel the thick, slick feeling of it that never goes away, a scream built at the base of her spine, filling her veins with a burning freeze. It's shrill, literally ripping from her throat, searing her with a stabbing pain.

"Terra! Terra!" Annie screams, jumping and throwing her head back as she tries to get back to her.

"You're hurting her, you idiots! Let her go!" Johanna yells, snapping at them and cursing before they finally let her go.

They let her go and she pushes away, scrambling over the floor as she scraps at her arm frantically trying to clean the blood away.

Someone reaches toward her, hand covered by a rubber glove and Terra kicks at them, bumping into a wall and she knocks as many things as she could at them to keep them away.

"Don't touch her! Just leave her alone!" Johanna is still shouting,trying to push past the whoever was blocking her from approaching. "Give her a minute! Leave her alone!"

"You're scaring her!" Annie cries, and Terra winces at the sound, shaking her head as though she was trying to physically shake away the sight of the blood as she tried to locate her friends.

"Annie? Jo?" She calls weakly and she makes the mistake of looking down, finding her arm riddled with scratches, droplets of blood slipping down as her hand was wet red.

She cried out again, rubbing against the hospital gown, but someone grabbed her arms to stop her, gentle but firm, and a towel pressed over the scratches, collecting the blood, and she looked up to Johanna with her brows furrowed in concentration and her lips pursed tightly together.

"Let me see her," Annie screeches. "Terra!"

"Annie?" His voice makes her still, choking on her breath with a cough. "Annie!"

"Finnick!" She turns to the redhead with in time to see her throw herself at him, rambling and crying and pointing in her general direction, and her heart jumps to her throat.

"Finnick," Terra croaks, pushing herself away from Johanna as she climbs to her feet, swaying unsteadily. "Finnick!"

He drops Annie, spinning to face her and she pushes herself towards him, tripping over herself.

"Terra . . . Terra!" Finnick cries, catching her in his arms and lifting her off the ground, enfolding her in his arms and he loses his balance, slamming into the wall where he stays, clinging to her.

She grabs at him, pulling him closer and she presses her forehead against his, running a hand through his hair and grabbing at the back of his neck. His hand presses into her spine, fingers digging into the skin of her thighs, dragging her closer, feeling her as though scared she would disappear.

"You're safe, you're safe," he breathes, and she wipes at his tears, brushing her thumbs over his cheeks.

Finnick moves into her, capturing her mouth, breathing her in, and Terra runs her hands over him, feeling him so perfectly there and alive and safe.

There was no way for her to describe what it was like to have him here in person again, like every moment they had spent apart, since they had parted in the arena -

Since they had . . . in the arena . . . Terra pushed him away, shoving him as she struggled to breathe, her head spinning.

"You left me," she mutters. "You left me there."

"No, no, my heart, no. I didn't want to, my heart, my Terra," he cries, leaning back in as she stumbles away. "I wanted to go back for you. I wanted to bring you back!"

She makes some kind of noise in her throat, and she collapses into him, dragging him to the floor and he lets her, curling together.

"I was so scared, Fin," she confesses, digging her face into his neck. "I wanted to die. I thought I was going to die."

Finnick plants kisses all over her head, coaxing her head up and peppers kisses all over her face. "I'm never leaving you again. You're never leaving me again."

Terra grabs his face, kissing him firmly, desperately. She was still having trouble wrapping her head around the entire thing, what was true or wasn't, and what was fed to her by Snow, but she always knew thay she loved Finnick, that she would always love Finnick, and knew that he would never have purposely left her behind. She could trust him, she had to be able to trust him.

"Don't leave me again," she breathes against his mouth.

"I'm not going anywhere. I promise."

Terra believes him, even if she thinks she shouldn't.

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2019-02-28