"Evelyn Brinley, better known as Lady Red, victor of the 72nd Hunger Games. Won her games at 15."
"Why Lady Red?"
"Because she always wears red. Oh, and she won her games by burning the remaining tributes alive."
✮
"𝑮𝒊𝒓𝒍 𝒐𝒏 𝒇𝒊𝒓𝒆? 𝑯𝒐𝒘 𝒄...
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"AND IF WE BURN, YOU BURN WITH US."
Sasha stood back with Boggs and Paylor while Katniss spoke, staring at the rubble in front of him. The rubble in front of him. Rubble. That was all that was left. The sight inside the hospital was still burned into his mind. He had recognized so many people. He had spoken to the people lying in the beds with untreatable injuries. He had been friends with some of them. And now they were nothing. They were dead. More names to add to the list of people murdered by the Capitol.
They were fools for sending them here. Of course the Capitol was going to retaliate like this if they saw that Katniss had been in the hospital. They wouldn't care that the hospital was filled with unarmed people. Snow was never above killing innocents.
"Ward," Boggs muttered, nudging him in the side with his elbow.
Sasha looked at him, and the man nodded toward a building a few yards away. Sasha squinted his eyes and saw someone peaking their head out, but he couldn't make out who it was. Or why Boggs was telling him about it.
"What do you want me to do?" He asked Boggs.
"Go see who it is," He answered.
Sasha stood there for an extra second before heading toward the building. He still didn't know why Boggs was sending him, but he was the commander. By now, Sasha had learned to go with whatever Boggs said. Debris crunched under his boots, and he didn't like thinking about it. He didn't take time to look around at the destruction other than the hospital, he didn't want to look at his demolished district. He never liked the place, but it was where he grew up.
The person didn't move at first, but the moment they saw him coming they took off running. He wasn't sure whether Boggs wanted him to follow, but he ran after them anyway. They climbed up a ladder to one of the rooftops, and Sasha followed. They jumped from rooftop to rooftop, and Sasha reluctantly followed. He was only 25, but he felt like he was too old to do stunts like these.
Finally, the person stopped running once they landed on a rooftop farther away from the hospital, and turned around to face him. Sasha's mouth went dry and his mind went numb. The person in front of him was Evelyn, but it also wasn't. She looked similar to how she looked on the screen, but she was more cold in person. She was wearing a peacekeeper outfit and had an emotionless look as she stared at him. The only similarity between this Evelyn and the old one was her facial features. Even her hair was straightened out and put into a tight bun. She looked like some sort of robot. Someone who just blindly followed orders. Like a Capitol mutt. Boggs must've recognized who she was. That was why he sent him instead of Gale or someone else.
He stared at her for a moment before forcing words out, "I thought you were- we all thought you were- what the hell is this? What the hell is going on, Evelyn?"
Evelyn blinked a couple of times before thinning her lips, "Who the hell is Evelyn?"
That wasn't good. He froze, trying to figure out whether she was joking with him or not. Who was he kidding? Of course, she wasn't joking. None of them knew what the Capitol was doing to the tributes, but this would make sense. Brainwashing.
