I can't decide which is worse, the pain or the itching. Maybe they're at an equal amount of intensity. Peeta and Finnick sit to my left, clawing at the scabs the fog left on our skin. I clamp my hands in between my legs, trying to keep myself from scratching.

"Don't scratch." I warn them. "It will only bring on infection."

Finnick scoffs and Peeta slowly begins to put his hands down.

"Why don't y'all sleep, I can take watch." I suggest to them and Peeta starts to disagree. "Peeta, you need to sleep. You haven't stopped since we came in here and it's time you had a break." I finish.

Finnick looks up from the spot on his arm he had been scratching. "Actually, why don't the two of you rest. I'd rather take watch." He tells me and I see the distant look in his eyes. Mags. I know he misses her.

"Okay, thanks." I give him a smile and he nods. I lye down on the sand next to Peeta and he pulls me tightly against him.

"You should sleep." I tell him and begin to run my hands through his curls. He smiles slightly and kisses my cheek.

"I love you." He then places his hand on my tummy and kisses it softly. "Both of you." I'm startled at first, of the feeling inside of me. The feeling of hundreds of butterflies flying around in my stomach. It doesn't feel like popcorn popping or someone kicking me. But I know what this is. It's the baby. The baby, our baby is moving.

"Peeta," I whisper. He turns sleepily to look at me. "Can you feel it?"

He looks at me and waits for me to explain. I grab his hand and place it back on my tummy. "The baby, can you feel him?" His eyes lights up and he immediately sits up. He sits on the sand for a minute, maybe two, before he gets a defeated look on his face.

He shakes his head and we lie back down. "I can't feel her."

"Mom called it fluttering in the womb, it's something you feel before the baby starts kicking. It's soft, hardly noticeable." I run my hand softly up his arm. "It feels kind of like that."

He smiles and places his head right above my belly button. "Hi baby, I'm your daddy." He kisses me lightly and snuggles into my body, telling me goodnight.

The doctors place a baby wrapped in a soft blanket in my arms, the scent of baby powder fills the air. I pull the blanket back from it's head and scream when my baby slips from my arms. Falling into a pit of blackness. My eyes jerk up and scan the room for Peeta, but he's no where to be found. The baby powder smell that was so comforting is gone and is replaced with the smell of blood....and roses.

My body begins to shake and I slowly stand on two feet, walking towards the door, following the blood trail. The hallways is long and dark but I can still make out the hundreds of  doors lining the walls. A scream erupts from one of the rooms and I run as fast as I can, trying to reach him. Trying to reach Peeta.

"Peeta!"

I open every door slamming them shut when I find them empty. But the door at the end of the hallways is cracked and I can see the trail of blood flowing out. The door hits the wall with a loud thud and Peeta sits with his hands tied in front of me.

"Peeta," I whisper and drop to my knees in front of him. He shakes his head vigorously, unable to speak because of the scarf in his mouth.

"Hello Mrs. Everdeen, or is it Mellark?" His voice sends another round of chills through my spine and I will myself to have strength as I turn around. But all the strength I have is lost when I see what he is holding.

My baby.

"A beautiful baby you have here," he pauses. "It's a girl."

"Please don't hurt her, I'm begging you. Don't hurt either of them, you can take me." I plead with Snow hoping it might work.

"You can only keep one, Mrs.Mellark. The choice is yours." He moves closer and I involuntarily shrink beneath him. He places the baby in a cradle next to my husband and smiles up at me with his death filled grin. "Now choose."

I shake my head and sobs rack my body as I'm forced to choose, forced to choose between my daughter and my husband. "I can't do this." I tell him and move closer to Peeta. "Let me have both and you'll never hear from me again. I'll leave, just please let me have both."

He shakes his head and pulls a gun out from his pocket. "Wrong decision, Mrs. Mellark." And the gun goes off.

Peeta slumps to the ground and my screams fill the air as I fall at his side, trying to save him. My baby's cry stops after the second shot goes off. I struggle to breath as I beg for Peeta to return to me, but slowly he bleeds out and the room fills with his blood. Drowning anyone left inside, including me.

"Katniss! Katniss, wake up!" The voice is muffled as the blood disappears and sunlight blinds me. "It's not real, it's not real." Peeta tells me and I cry as I realize it was just a nightmare.

It wasn't real.

My stomach churns and I shake Peeta off of me as I run to the trees, and throw up what little food I had inside of me. Peeta follows me and holds my hair back, as I throw up.

"I thought the morning sickness had stopped." Peeta tells me and he sounds concerned at my condition.

But I nod my head anyways and slowly sit down wiping my mouth. "It did, but I think my nightmare made me sick."

"You were screaming and I couldn't wake you up, do you want to talk about it?" He asks me and I shake my head. This is a secret I'll keep to myself, because I know that if he finds out what I was dreaming, he'll blame himself for me getting sick.

"I'm okay now." I tell him and he pecks my lips quickly, probably afraid I might throw up on him.

Sitting on the sand next to Finnick I watch as he cracks open oysters and clams with his knife. The ocean is his safe haven, just like the woods are mine. "Where's Peeta?" He asks me and I'm drawn back from my memories of hunting.

"I told him to get some more sleep." I brush the sand off my leg, but quickly shove my hand back into my lap when I see the blood caked underneath my nails. I look sheepishly at Finnick and he laughs at me.

"Don't scratch, it brings on infection." He tells me with a serious face, but a smile manages to appear.

"So I've heard."

Standing up and stomping my foot on the ground I look up at the sky. "Hey Haymitch, if you're not too drunk we'd really appreciate something for the itching!" I yell.

My eyes haven't even left the sky when the silver parachute floats down and lands directly in my hand.

"Love you too, Haymitch." I whisper, missing my mentor.

Attached to the parachute is a tube of ointment. I grab it and unscrew the cap. My nose crinkles at the foul smell that immediately reaches my nostrils. Tar and pine needles. Odd combination and yet extremely potent. The ointment itself is a dark green color, and I stare at it for a moment before squeezing it onto my arm and rubbing it in. Just like all other Capitol medicines, the effect is immediate and the itching is gone.

The ointment leaves my skin a greenish-gray color, which is not appealing to the eye. Though it doesn't  bother me. Unlike Finnick, who is eyeing my swamp-colored skin with disgust. "It looks like you're decomposing," he says distastefully, grimacing.

I toss the tube to him anyway, knowing that the itching will win over the will to stay pretty. Finnick caves within thirty seconds and begins to slather his skin in the ointment. I can't help but laugh at the pained expression on his face. "Poor Finnick," I tease. "Is this the first time in your life you haven't looked pretty?"

"It must be," Finnick retorts. "The look and thought is completely new. How have you managed it all these years?"

I shrug. "Just don't look in mirrors and you'll get used to it."

"Not if I keep looking at you."

We busy ourselves with coating our skin in the ointment, taking turns rubbing it into each other's backs where our undershirts leave us unprotected. Our routine is interrupted when Peeta walks up and looks shocked to say the least.

"I thought the sun was decomposing you." He says and both Finnick and I laugh.

I motion for him to sit down. "Come here, I'll do your back."

I end up sitting in between Finnick and Peeta, an arrangement that I'm sure is not coincidence, but I can't find it within myself to be annoyed by their overprotectiveness. I expected this from Peeta, but I'm mildly surprised by Finnick. I'm torn from my thoughts when I hear an aggravated voice yelling. All three of our heads turn toward the direction of the sound.

"What's that?" I ask. Peeta doesn't answer, instead placing a hand at the small of my back and steering me toward the jungle. Realizing that something is wrong, I don't ask anymore questions. We don't go far into the greenery, just far enough so that we can't be seen.

"What are they?" Peeta asks, his eyes trained on something in the distance.

I follow his gaze and see three figures stumbling around on the beach two wedges over. They're coated in a dark red, almost a rust color from head to toe. One of the figures is turning absently in slow circles, while a second is dragging the third onto the beach.

"Mutts, maybe?" I reply as I eye the trio. I begin to load an arrow, but I pause when the one being dragged collapses. The dragger stomps the ground in frustration and in a fit of temper shoves the one spinning in loopy circles to the ground.

Finnick smiles and yells across the beach. "Johanna!"

"Finnick!"

Finnick takes off running toward them, but Peeta and I take our time. "How are you today?" he asks softly. "Tired?"

"More than I should be," I reply with a huff of frustration. "It's annoying."

Peeta doesn't say anything. He simply takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. I love the fact that he knows when to shut up. His words can be so soothing and comforting, but there are times when I don't want to hear them. Like now.

My eyes focus on Johanna's two companions. "It's Wiress and Beetee."

"One of them doesn't look so good," Peeta notes and I leave his side to rush to Beetee, who still hasn't moved from his position lying face down in the sand.

As I kneel beside him and begin to look him over, I listen to Johanna speak rapidly to Finnick, "We thought it was rain, you know, because of the lightning, and we were so thirsty. But when it started coming down, it turned out to be blood—thick, hot blood. You couldn't see. You couldn't speak without getting a mouthful. We just staggered around, trying to get out of it. That's when Blight hit the force field."

"I'm sorry, Johanna," Finnick says, as I try to place Blight. No picture comes to mind. I don't even think he came to any of the training.

"Yeah, well, he wasn't much, but he was from home," Johanna shrugs. "And he left me alone with these two," she says nudging Beetee with her shoe.

I bite my tongue to keep from snapping at her. An even angrier Johanna Mason is the last thing I need to deal with, and Beetee requires my attention. "He got a knife in the back at the Cornucopia," Johanna continues. "And her . . ."

I glance up to see Wiress, who's still spinning in dazed circles, murmuring, "Tick, tock. Tick, tock."

"Yeah, yeah, we know. Tick, tock. Nuts is in shock," Johanna says snidely. This seems to send Wiress stumbling into Johanna, who shoves her violently to the ground. "Just stay down, will you?"

"Lay off her," I snap, jumping to my feet, unable to keep quiet this time.

Johanna turns on me, anger making her brown eyes seem black. "Lay off her?" she hisses at me, but I don't flinch. "Why you—" Johanna raises her hand as if to slap me, but Peeta grabs her wrist and glares. Something I hardly ever see him do.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Joanna."

Finnick throws a now screaming Johanna over his shoulder and then tosses her into the sea, where he continues to dunk her underwater as she yells insults at me.

A.N. What did you think! Let me know in the comments below and make sure to give it a ⭐️! See ya later alligators. Xoxox Me.