thecapitol | Oh Death, can't you spare me over 'till another year?

Entry tags:

Oh Death, can't you spare me over 'till another year?

Who| Peggy Carter and Linden, then Peggy, Linden, and Jason
What| The Peacekeepers are coming for Peggy and Linden. Jason is Peggy's hail Mary to get them both out.
Where| Linden's room in the Tribute Center, then Compson Manor
When| Afternoon to Evening days before the parade.
Warnings/Notes| Jason, and (minor and breathtakingly pathetic) violence against a woman. I'll add more as they come up.

For Linden

Peggy has a lot of practice looking calm when inside she feels like melting down. After talking with Derek and destroying the letters Bucky had sent her (it stung a little, but she knows them word for word now and there can be no evidence of his survival left behind), she puts the radio Bucky had given her years ago into her bag, touches up her makeup, and goes to work like any other day.

Her girls are still working with the Stylist. Peggy wishes she could say goodbye to them, but she can't let on that she knows what's happening, and any gesture of favor from her would put them in greater danger once she's gone. She tries not to think of all the people she's probably never going to be able to see again after this.

"Linden?" She's at Linden's door, knocking gently. She doesn't really know how they'll get him out of the Capitol along with her, but she can't bear the thought of just leaving him to die and saving herself. She's making this up as she goes along, and hopefully she can just drag him along. "Linden, it's Peggy."

For Jason and Linden

Peggy explained what she could in public, which basically amounted to her taking his arm so she could lean in and whisper, "The peacekeepers are after you. Follow my lead and trust me," into his ear without it looking too weird or getting picked up by the microphones scattered through the city.

There's a blind spot in the middle of the Compson Manor's dining room. Jason doesn't know she knows about it. Hell, Peggy's not even sure if Jason knows about it. Either way, she's not sure if Bucky's instructions for escape were one-time or long-term, and if they are meant to be constant, she doesn't know if whatever system he set up could move as quickly as she needs it to and take on an extra person. She doesn't even know if District 13 would take her when she's been discovered and turned into a liability--that is, if any escape is sanctioned by D13, which she's not sure of. She's left thinking on her feet, unsure of how to proceed and going to Jason in an effort to save her and Linden.

She clicks the system to buzz her in at the gate, Linden by her side when she says, "Jason, it's Peggy. Could you buzz me in, please?"

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"Nonsense. If I let you handle it on your own, you'd go outside looking like a scarecrow." Her hands linger on his shoulders, her gaze heavy on the back of his neck. "Victors help each other, and that means making sure you look at least somewhat neat."

She's not going to leave him. She's not going to leave another friend. She squeezes his shoulders before propelling him towards the door. "The errands will be quick. I'm just picking up a few odds and ends before we pay a visit to a friend. Maybe a spot of shopping will help you rebuild your image. I was planning on buying some new clothes for myself anyway."

Essentials. Clothes without trackers, water bottles. What they need to run without looking like they were preparing to run. And she can pick up her bug out bag and hide it in her purse on their way.

If he wasn't already hesitating to intervene, Peggy's look is enough to halt Linden in his tracks. Being able to see when things are about to go from bad to worse extends to situations where he recognizes what his own involvement could potentially do, and they're on the same page, because the situation isn't what it appears to be on the surface. This isn't a man failing to rush to the defense of a helpless woman another man is beating on, as much as it looks like one.

It pays off. Jason has his moment of violent anger, and then acceptance, and in moments it's ended and he's leaving her be (even if he almost tips over the chair in the process.)

He keeps his eyes on Jason as the man paces and circles like a caged lion, with nowhere to vent his frustration and certainly no way to do as Benjy does and simply shriek his wordless curses to the sky's deaf abattoir. He doesn't have that freedom; like Linden and Peggy, he's bound by the expectation for some kind of reason and decorum.

His eyes haven't left Jason since he left Peggy's side, but he's still surprised when the man addresses him in a way that isn't venom. He shakes his head in quick, compliant answer. "No, I'm not. If it keeps me out of a coffin or crematorium, and I can fit, I'll tolerate it."

Instead of his original Arena making him hate tight places, he actually still strongly associates them with safety and concealment. This is not a problem for him and, subsequently, them.

You'd go outside in a body bag, more like. His shoulders curl forward under her gentle touch, head and eyes lowering at her words, and he realizes that whatever he says, whatever he insists, he's too tired to uphold it. His legs move under him as she nudges him toward the unknown; his eyes are wider than usual and staring, and anyone close to him can tell that his heart is beating like a bird trying to batter itself to death on the bars of his ribcage, but outwardly, he does a passable job of appearing placid, calm and normal.

He's good at this. They've both had to be.

"Rebuilding my image?" he asks. "You really think that's possible at this point? Celebrus doesn't seem to."

Obvious small talk, maybe the kind that can be productive and allow Linden to glean more details of whatever Peggy is attempting.

"You know Celebrus. It focuses on one thing before focusing on another. People will forget as long as you make amends and stay out of trouble."

She links her arm with his, looking to the world like a woman who is worried for her recovering friend's health, but really she just wants them close so she can whisper in his ear in a pinch. Or in a bigger pinch, she can pick him up and run.

"Someone else will slip up. Someone will have a scandalous affair or someone else will have botched surgery and that will be all anyone can talk about."

There's pain in her chest. Hairline fractures cracking through the surface of her heart, trying to force open cracks she had wrapped in masking tape years ago. He would have been ready to betray the Capitol for her.

Hell. It's what he's doing right now: risking his life and betraying the only home he's ever known for her. He's not even hesitating.

He pushes the chair back and turns away. She has to take a deep breath to keep her composure, and maybe the breath shudders a little in her chest.

There should be an explanation. Time to talk. They don't have that time, and he might not appreciate an explanation, perhaps seeing it as an excuse. But she'll give him one anyway, so if she dies, he won't have to wonder why she lied.

"I didn't want you to get wrapped up in this. You're my best friend, Jason." After Bucky and Steve were gone, Jason was the only one whose company and comfort she could consistently find, even if he bitched about it at times. After Bucky revealed himself as alive, she only had a few letters and a radio to remind herself that he was out there somewhere. Bucky is her best friend too, but one she hasn't been able to speak openly to in eight years. Jason has been there the whole time. "I couldn't bear the thought of losing you on top of everything else." She's not sure how many more dead friends her heart can take. She will never forgive herself if Jason helping her leads to his death.

It should be an uncomfortable admission, especially with Linden right there listening to all the feelings she's kept under wraps for years, but she doesn't care anymore. She's probably not going to see Jason again and Linden accepted a long time ago that he'll never understand Peggy's relationship with Jason. "If we both live through this, I promise to explain everything."

But they don't have time for anything more than that, so she slips on an invisible mask, takes a deep breath, and stands up from her chair. "I picked up everything we needed on our way here. I hid bags around the city full of gear just in case something like this happened and I needed to run." Admittedly, her gear is only for one person, but she'll make it work.

"Yeah, some good your friendship does," he hisses. He needs to hear it, even as it stings, as it drags him from the perfect purity of rage and betrayal into something altogether more complicated, something with jagged edges that makes swallowing painful.

He hasn't lost friends like Peggy has. He never had them to start with. He's always been alone, since childhood, his anger and unhappiness holding him at arm's length from the entire rest of the world. For the moment, rage feels, if not good, then at least as a preferable reprieve from grief for Peggy and for one of the only relationships he had any faith in.

"'If we both live through this'. If I don't, it's on your head. You shouldn't have come here, you should have called me to another blind. This can't be the last place you were seen. I can't be the last person you were with. Was that what you were thinking, Peggy, that I'd drop my whole life for your little whirlwind adventure?"

But he knows how to do it. He leaves the dining room for a moment, stomp his way to his bedroom, and returns with his phone and a suitcase large enough to fit a person.

"Sure," he says into the phone, midway through a conversation with someone. "You know it's gonna get you a tenth what they're worth, but you can't sell antiques worth a damn in the Capitol. Trends...no, you think I'd be calling you for this if I had a windfall? Do you know how much a funeral costs out here? I need to move it now because I've got creditors pawing at the damn clothes I'm wearing...yeah, two. I'll drop it off tonight. Fine."

He shuts off his phone and grabs a few coats from the hallway closet, tossing them into the blind spot in the dining room.

"Alright," he says, loudly enough to be picked up on microphones. "I'll drop you off at the restaurant. Lockhearst, you really want me to believed that song and dance, you help me pack and carry this all. Out to my car, and if you scratch it you won't make it to the restaurant, I guarantee."

Linden had expected his presence to be upsetting and distasteful to Jason. What he hadn't expected was this scenario, essentially being relegated to the role of a spectator while two "friends" go at it, pent-up energy and resentment and something like affection all exploding simultaneously. It's strangely voyeuristic, one more reminder that he's not supposed to be here along with Peggy's single-person supplies and the last minute nature of fetching him from a suite he hadn't expected to leave again alive.

He doesn't understand why a Districter like Peggy, who never lost sight of her roots or attempted to bury them like Temple, feels anything but contempt for Jason. And he doesn't think he ever will, but even though he suspects the man is a psychopath, something about Peggy soothes and softens his edges. He can bluster and tantrum all he wants about this, but he can't refuse his self-described "best friend." He doesn't think she'd use those words lightly, even in an admittedly very desperate situation.

He has nothing to contribute. His own thoughts grind and spark behind his flinty eyes, but he says nothing, allows them to have it out and express their fear and their hurt. At first, he thinks that maybe Jason has had a change of heart, and he glances uncertainly at Peggy as the man stomps from the dining room... but then he returns with the suitcase and the phone, and as Linden eyes it, suddenly that comment about claustrophobia makes a lot more sense.

Jason's request is willful and haughty, lacking concern for the fact that Linden has no place lifting even moderately heavy objects or helping with manual labor. He's a man, but he hasn't ever truly had the strength of one. He nods briskly, not about to protest or make some kind of petty dig... not when it's shaping up to look like Jason's actually going to save their lives.

"You got it. Whatever you say."

Whatever it takes.

He nods, taking superficial heart in what she's reassuring him of. But the way she links arms with him and the briskness of their pace is consistent with the warning she's already given him.

It occurs to him that he might not see Phillip again, or Karkat. It takes him a little longer to think of Temple and Bailey, simply because they are fixtures and he's come to take their presence for granted in his life. A numb chill spreads through his stomach as Peggy goes on in her calm, cheerful way.

"That does seem... to be the way of it," he says, clearing the hoarseness from his voice mid-sentence. "It's definitely not the first time I've been the subject of their ridiculous speculation."

But it's never been this bad. The word "traitor" is a loaded one in Panem.

"So... I need new clothes," he says softly. "I agree. That's been true for awhile. But... you, too?"

Are the Peacekeepers coming for me, or both of us?

Peggy knew he wouldn't refuse them. No matter how angry he is, he can't say no to her, not over something like this. That's probably the most heartbreaking part of it all.

He's right. This can't be the last place she's seen, but she was worried that calling him to a public blind spot would have been too obvious. At least here, they have an excuse for being in a blind spot, because it covered a chunk of his dining room. She just prays to nothing in particular that she hasn't signed Jason's death warrant.

Deep breath. Slip on the mask. She can be conflicted and sad later, after there isn't an imminent threat of death for everyone involved. She mouths 'thank you' at Jason from the blind spot when he walks back downstairs with the phone and the suitcase.

"Maybe the Center won't be quite as unbearable anymore. I've been ready to kill you both for weeks," she says loudly as she slips into character. Exasperated, frustrated with her coworkers, and utterly oblivious of the danger lurking in the shadows. That's all she should be conveying right now.

"Here, let me help." She does it because it's in character for what the Peacekeepers have observed of her and also because Linden probably won't be able to carry the heavier stuff, and it will cut into their time too much if they have to playact (or perhaps not playact, since she doubts Jason would be too happy) a conflict over broken furniture. Thus, she carries the heavier things. It's fine, because she will usually use weights that are heavier than Jason's furniture, and it's no trouble to take it outside.

(Hallelujah for Linden's self-control, is all she can say. She's sure that he's been struggling to not say anything too biting or sarcastic this whole time, and if they get out of this in one piece, she owes him drinks. Or dinner, perhaps, since she's the last person to encourage him to get back into alcohol. Not that either of them will probably be dining out anywhere.)

Jason doesn't say much as they get the furniture in the car. He just storms about, having chosen things that he can argue were valuable enough to sell and that he won't care if they go missing. It's mostly things from Ben's room anyway. He glares at Linden but refrains from anything else.

He feels sick with anger, with the kind that can't explosively emerge in a vindictive fury against the nearest target, with the kind that has to be crumpled and squeezed into servility by circumstance. And loss, too; he just lost his mother, putting his world on a sort of tilt-a-whirl, and now he'll be losing Peggy. The anger takes a persecuted turn as he thinks that Peggy honestly couldn't have timed this better to cut the legs out from under him.

"Get in," he says when the decoy furniture has been loaded. "Let's make this quick, I told you I had a buyer waiting for me tonight and it's a few hours out."

He'll have to come up with some excuse for why he bothered to do an illegal transaction in front of people, one of whom he doesn't like. Peggy can be passed off as an issue of trust, but Linden...?

They'll have at least three hours of driving to figure it out, and then Jason will have the whole ride back to come up with something. It isn't the first time he's had to hide money or belongings or people. He starts the car and doesn't wait to make sure either of them are strapped in before going towards the nearest blind spot.

Linden catches that surly, dark look, and meets it levelly, his own expression remaining blank and unchanging. He's resigned himself to this; even if everyone in the room knows that he can't truly make nice with Jason, given their history, he can keep from being outright hostile. Even the socially abrasive and peculiar Linden is well aware that it would be wildly inappropriate when the man is risking so much, especially when a significant part of him very clearly doesn't want to. Therefore, Linden defaults to simply not reacting, when he's afraid that the only other option is reacting badly or childishly.

Loading up the car is a trial and a half, even with Linden loading the lighter articles. His back is still a mess even after having some time to recover, but just because he's no longer facedown and panting through the worst of it doesn't mean the lashing didn't do significant damage to his insubstantial frame. There's no fat or muscle on him to absorb the wheals or keep them from cutting him straight to the bone. They'll obviously scar hideously, but for now, even healing is very slow going. Every time he raises and lifts something, he can feel the scabs pulling, sometimes tearing, a warm trickle down his back, and it occurs to him that three hours in a suitcase is going to be a lot more than merely uncomfortable.

Maybe he doesn't have to go that far yet. At Jason's barked order, He climbs into the backseat, leaving shotgun for Peggy, folding himself up next to a chair that's almost as spiny and angular as he is. Hopefully the blood won't soak through his shirt and vest and stain the upholstery.

"Oh, you know the Capitol. I have to get new clothes every season to keep up."

Both of us.

"I know you don't do well with shopping, so I figured maybe we could do it together. Don't worry, I'll make sure to get something nice and comfortable for you. I don't expect you to go out in sequins."

This is what she's good at. Talk and brush off the things that bother her until it looks like she doesn't think anything's wrong. She's done it for years. It's how she's survived so long in a place she hates with every fiber of her being.

He nods, keeping his eyes focused forward, mind racing as he considers the implications of that. This will either save or kill them both, just because Peggy thought to go back for someone slower, weaker, and less capable of running and surviving. He has extremely mixed feelings about knowing that to stay is certain death, but leaving means that Peggy is taking him on as a risk and liability that she considers worthwhile.

"You know my size," he says, deciding to try one more time, knowing that guilt will eat him alive if he doesn't. "If you went alone, it'd be easy for you to get everything you need. I worry that I'll slow you down."

It's worth a try, even though he's still walking with her at their brisk pace.

"I trust your choice," he adds softly, "but the last thing I want is to cause you trouble. I'm not good at these things like you are."

Normally, Peggy would scold Jason for driving Linden so hard when he's still recovering, but considering the situation, Linden can suck it up and Peggy will try to give him some medical attention when they have breathing room.

Peggy settles into the shotgun seat and hurriedly clicks her seat belt buckle when Jason peels out. She starts talking because it would look strange if she didn't and chances were that there were recording devices in Jason's car.

She says a few things about better work environments, tolerating people you hate for the sake of professionalism. Enough so that falling into complete silence doesn't seem unnatural. She feels Jason bursting to rage at her, at the world, but she knows he's going to control himself because he knows just as well as she does that she will die if he doesn't.

Once again, she wishes they had the time and privacy to talk. Jason would scream and interrogate and sling abuse at her, but then she'd have time to give him a little more to hold on to after she left. She doesn't want to leave him reeling and wondering the way Bucky did to her.

(But she's not, she reminds herself. Jason knows what's happening, even if he doesn't know all the details he'd like to. That's what she has to tell herself.)

Jason doesn't say much during the trip, aside from a few snide comments that are just as genuinely pissy as they are for show. His knuckles are white along the steering wheel, his cheeks blotchy with pink and white from gritting his teeth. There's a sheen of sweat along his forehead, as if the anger is so desperate to be released that it is escaping his very pores.

When they pull into the restaurant parking lot, he makes sure to park the car in one of the areas he knows is blind, has a long stretch of roofing that blocks any view from cameras. He's pretty sure microphones don't work here either, but he lowers his voice anyway.

He holds up his phone and types out a message on the notepad function. I need to disable tracking chips or you need to cut them out. Your choice.

He switches it over to the program for Escorts that allows them to program and collect data on a Tribute's whereabouts, inside the Arena or out of it. Linden and Peggy wouldn't have had theirs removed after their victories. It won't take him long, just a moment of disabling the functions after scanning theirs in. He'll have to come back to the logs later and delete it from the phone history.

Peggy, you crawl under seat. Linden, suitcase. SILENCE. Car is bugged for audio.

Once they've managed that, he'll pretend to bid them adieu and then start driving.

Linden's been doing a good job sucking it up, so far. He's been as quiet as the furniture he's sitting with, not bothering with a safety belt, curling up and thinking about how much he could use rest while admitting privately that his heart is beating too quickly to allow his eyes to close for even a moment. He listens to the sound of Peggy's voice, pulling his knees closer to his chest and resting his cheek against them as her words blur and blend into a series of pleasant, meaningless sounds until they dwindle and fade back into a natural-sounding silence. While it's easy to feel the way the air around Jason seems to vibrate with his pent-up anger, the desperation in Peggy's performance also radiates. Linden doubts that he's exuding anything on this trip, but it's only because he's so blanched, raw and beaten, here only because Peggy cared enough to pocket the cooling, ashy ember of his will to live and take it away from the Capitol before it could finish smothering him.

When the car finally stops after what feels like weeks in the stifling environment, Jason starts typing a message, and Linden pulls himself forward so he can read the glowing screen. He quickly holds up two fingers, indicating that he'd much prefer that the chip was disabled. He'd not hesitate to cut it out, ordinarily, but at the moment he doesn't feel that he can afford to lose any more blood. After he's done whatever's needed to scan the information into the program, he slips outside the car, pulling the large suitcase down with some effort and unlatching it. He'll fit inside with room to spare, but he glances over his shoulder, expecting that one of them will follow to help latch and stow him since no one could do this alone.

He's so thin and wasted. It isn't even cramped once he's inside the suitcase, just uncomfortable, with the boniness and the scabs on his back that regularly tear and bleed every time he moves in a way that isn't perfectly careful and delicate. What remains of the trip will be very difficult, and if any dogs even come near them, that blood that makes his shirt stick to his back will draw them directly to his location. He tries to take comfort in thinking about safety in 13, but of course there's no guarantee that he won't be shot, or worse, rejected and left to fend for himself in the wild until he is caught or killed.

Edited 2015-10-12 05:28 (UTC)

It would be easy to leave him behind and save herself. The thought had occurred to her when she first got the information. It would be easy, but then he would die, and the guilt would haunt her for the rest of her life. She doesn't want to commit to that. She doesn't want to add another name to her list of lost friends.

"Nonsense. Some fresh air will do you good, and I'm good enough for both of us."

She doesn't care if she has to carry him on her back all the way to District 13. She will do it because she wouldn't be able to live with herself if she didn't at least try.

The dilemma of what a truly brave person would do batters itself in a strange, one-sided tennis match in Linden's freshly sober brain. Would it be to face the perils of the unknown and risk the life of someone he would much rather see live, or is to go back and face certain death? They're both intimidating and promise fear and unpleasantness in spades.

But it's true that Peggy is strong. Maybe enough for the both of them, as she claims, but she is certainly stronger than Linden. If she's made up her mind, he's done all he can to resist, and the only thing left to do is follow her lead and trust that she knows what she's doing.

It should be easy. He has nothing at all to lose.

"Fresh air," he says resignedly. "Let's get out, then."

Peggy nods and presents her arm to Jason to scan. A part of her wants to tell him no and dig it out herself so he can keep his name off the logs entirely, but that would mean that her blood would be all over the inside of his car. Even if he scrubbed it away, trace amounts of her DNA could still be found and used to implicate him. It's better that she let him deactivate it now and take care of covering his tracks himself. She can dig it out later when she's not going to get blood somewhere important.

She waits until Jason has finished and Linden has left the car before opening the door itself. "Thank you for driving us, Jason," she says for the audio surveillance's benefit more than for anyone else's. Getting out to latch Linden into the suitcase and carefully put it away also has the benefit of making it sound like she has left the car, just as long as she leaves the door open while she works outside of it so she doesn't have to open it again.

She closes it when she climbed back inside and curls up under the seat. Her body is bulky from all the lean muscle she has tirelessly maintained, so it's a tight fit, but she manages it. She wishes she could close her eyes and relax, but she can't. Her eyes stay open, vigilant for any sign that they've been figured out, for a sign that she has helped sign their death warrants.

Jason turns on the radio as he drives, something he rarely does, if only to cover any sounds his smuggled persons might make. It's some talk radio program about how subsidies to the Districts are raising capital gains taxes in the Capitol. He isn't really listening to it or absorbing anything.

The first border check is easy, him flashing some credentials, a license to travel, an explanation that he has to head out to find a relative on vacation in the Districts for some post-funereal business of his mother's. Still, it's two hours before he crosses the border and gets out far enough to get them out of the car. By the time he pulls over in the middle of a forested area, his hands ache for having been clenched for so many hours.

He doesn't explain anything to Peggy and Lunden as he kills the car and leaves it. For all he knows, Linden's suffocated by now. Good, he thinks. At a scheduled meeting point, he reconnoiters with a man who has an unkempt beard and the sort of glassy eyes that look like marbles in most lights.

"I thought that niece of yours run off."

"She did. That's not what I'm here for. I just need you to not ask questions, alright?" Jason runs his hands through his hair and marches back to the car. "Just help me unload the furniture."

It's not about the furniture; that's not what this man is here for. He's here to dispose of the antiques and make sure the smuggled people get to a drop-off point - even if it is the middle of the woods - without incident. And he doesn't say much, either, just undoing the seat Peggy's under and grabbing the suitcase and dragging it out a good distance from the car.

Jason helps Peggy untangle herself from the seat and leads her towards the bushes.

Once Linden's encased in leather and securely stowed, the car starts moving again. It feels like longer than it is as the air in the suitcase begins to thin out and grow stale, and he nods off into an uneasy sleep as the vehicle rocks and bumps along their road's smooth and rough patches.

He's dreaming of Karkat yelling soundlessly, with only steam coming out of his mouth as his horns glow neon, when a jolt of sudden, erratic movement startles him awake. The car's stopped and the suitcase is being handled, dropped, and dragged along the ground and left while footsteps retreat.

He slept awkwardly and put kinks in his already hurting body. He's more than a little lightheaded from breathing the same stale air for two hours, but he remains still, not knowing the circumstances of this dropoff or if they're among friends.

Peggy both wishes that she could fall asleep and has a deep anxiety at the thought. Her muscles start to cramp, but she stays silent, biting her tongue. She has gone through worse pain. She remembers sleeping under machine guns.

She feels the bumps in the road and waits. Waits for a sign that they're either safe or the peacekeepers have stopped them. Waits for a sign that they'll live or die.

They stop. She holds her breath. Jason starts talking to someone. It doesn't sound like a peacekeeper.

Then they take the seat off of her. She needs the help Jason offers--her legs have fallen asleep and she has to use him to balance as feeling rushes back to them. They're not in the Capitol anymore. Her heart thuds in her chest.

She lets Jason lead her. She hopes Linden is okay in the suitcase.

"Thank you, Jason."

She could thank him a thousand times and she doesn't think that it'd be enough.

"Yeah, you'd better. If I end up with my brains blown out on public television it's going to be your fault," he mutters, once they're far enough from the car. He sets her against a tree, trusting her to hold herself up while he finishes the matters he needs to, mainly payment. The man helps Linden out of the suitcase and puts the thing back in the car, leaves Linden to stretch out and unfold himself in the damp grass.

Jason peels off bills from his money clip for the coyote, but it's not enough even after he's stripped the whole thing down, so he has to go digging in the car and grab from his stash in the glove compartment. He grabs his cigarette and tries in vain to feel calmed as he sucks it deep, then stretches his hands and wrings them like an old rag.

"Where they going?" the coyote asks.

"I don't know. Just keep them out of the surveillance zones and let them figure it out once you get them far enough away from the roads." Jason sounds callous, more than usual, even, laying on thick that anger that smothers everything else. Anger is so easy. It's simple, pure, a radiant and undiscriminating glow that bathes everything around it in blinding red.

He sure as hell doesn't break it for Linden. In fact, as if he can't even help himself, as he passes Linden he gives him a disdainful nudge with his foot towards the welts. He hopes it hurts.

But when he reaches Peggy - God, he wants to hit her again, and his hand hurts in longing and sympathy to do so - instead he pulls her close and holds her to his chest for a moment, stiff and wordless, tight, and then he kisses the crown of her head.

"I hope I never see you again," he says, and he means it to be vicious but it's entirely true. If he sees her again it'll probably be on television before her execution. He hands her the rest of the money from the stash in his car; it's a day's wages in the Capitol, and she probably has some stowed away, but it'll last a long time in the Districts. He feels sick, sick behind his eyes, even, like he wants to cry but can't and won't as another brick is pulled from his rotting foundation.

"This way," the coyote says, to Linden and Peggy both. "Not far before I leave you."

Feeling left his extremities a long time ago, and even though the rush of cool, fresh air is welcome, as well as (surprisingly) Jason's help getting out of the suitcase, and once he's free of the confining space, he stretches painfully and slowly while a variety of other things go on above and around him. Some concern him, like that vicious kick that renders him speechless and breathless by merit of coming so close to the tender whip-wheals. Some, like whatever Jason has to say to Peggy, do not, and as the blood and sensation rushes back into his cramped limbs, he focuses on the scent of the grass, slowly counting these brief seconds he's been afforded for the purpose of recovery.

He cranes his head back; it looks like an embrace. The kink in his neck prevents him from staring too long.

At the prompting of the coyote, he wills his cramped and aching legs to hold his weight and staggers to his feet, knowing that the journey will be long and difficult from this point forward but hopefully worth it in the end.

Her eyes sting and her throat closes when Jason kisses her, but she doesn't cry. That, perhaps more than anything else, communicates how much Jason cares. He doesn't need to say it (he'll never say it), but she knows. She won't cry because it won't do any of them any good, and she'll need to stay hydrated for the coming journey. She embraces him briefly, then separates, taking his money and putting it carefully in her pocket.

"I hope I never see you again either." Unlike Jason's, her voice is soft, pained. She's not trying to be cruel.

She doesn't expect to live past the war. If she sees him again, it's because he's being executed on television or has been paraded as a casualty of war by either side. Neither of them should expect to see the other alive and well again.

She bows her head and adjusts her grip on her bag. "Live well, Jason." She really, really hopes that he'll be able to find something to make him happy. Is that possible? She's not so sure, but she hopes so.

Then she turns around and reaches to take Linden's arm. It's partially to help support him, partially to help support herself as she says goodbye to another beloved friend. "I'll dress your wounds once we're a safe distance, okay?" she says to him while she gives him a visual check up. She's not sure how long he'll be able to walk, but they will need to walk as far as possible, so she resolves to carry him if she must.

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Oh Death, can't you spare me over 'till another year?

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