THG fic: "Spin Control" [17/23]

[trovia]

Title: Spin Control
Pairings: Finnick/Haymitch, Kat/Peeta
Characters: Finnick, Haymitch, Chaff, Peeta, Gale, Kat; plus appearances by Mags, Johanna, Caesar Flickerman, President Snow, Effie, Claudius Templesmith, Beetee, Prim, Thresh, Rue, District Twelve ensemble and various OC
Rating: adult
Warnings: forced prostitution & non-con; people dealing

Comments

[roguedemon]

And last, but not least:

He could have given him a hint, Finnick supposed, all over again. They’d reached this point once before. He couldn’t make himself tell him outright, he couldn’t say, “Maybe it isn’t what it seems.” but he could make himself say something that felt smaller, put Gale’s mind to work and pray.

Or he could just put it to rest and resolve that he didn’t care, and either Gale would deal with it or he would not. The only reason he cared what Gale thought anyway was because he thought Gale was right when he called him a slut.

Gale wrinkled his forehead, but not in distaste, just working.

Yeah, that sums up the problem right there. I admit that I wish Gale would figure it out somehow, because I want Finnick to have someone his own age that understands who is really is to some extent. But Finnick's own relative peace of mind is more important.

I just loved watching Finnick deal with the mayor and start taking charge of all this. It's the competence thing. He's such a people person, his being a good teacher totally fits. And he's adorable with the kids. I love Aleese and how she seems to want to jump in and defend Finnick, and how she seems to be the only Haymitch fan in D12. :) I really like the fact that Finnick seems to be approaching this in a realistic fashion. He's not expecting it to be a duplicate of D4's program. He's trying to figure out what he can do to help, given what he wants to work with.

“She’s scared she’s going to die,” Finnick interrupted her harshly, thinking of Chaff, thinking of Mags, thinking of everybody’s refusal to deal with what was too hard to handle. How everything was too fucking hard to handle for him, but at least he was trying. “She knows you can’t protect her. Nobody can protect her. All she wants is a sense it won’t be hopeless, if it’s her. Nobody in this fucking district has as much as a sense that they could do anything.”

He was breathing hard, suddenly, as if he’d run, not all around the district, but maybe a sprint. Katniss Everdeen was fifteen, and he shouldn’t feel like this from talking to just another kid, but he did, and his skin was crawling again. One of the Six victors, Terence, who was a doctor, he’d told him once that those nightmares and triggers the victors had, those ‘post-traumatic reactions,’ were caused, specifically, by the terror of feeling helpless - by going in there and knowing exactly you’d die and knowing there was nothing you could do to stop it. It killed him, knowing that this whole district felt like this. Every child in this district thought of the Games knowing that it would kill them and knowing that it could be them. He could barely bear thinking about it.

A lot of stuff here. I like the mention of Mags -- Finnick is angry at her now that he has a new understanding of certain issues, courtesy of Caramel. D12 and their whole situation is just triggering for Finnick in general -- he's soaking in the helplessness and it's pushing him to do things. He's showing a lot of empathy and compassion for these kids and he realizes that they are all stuck with a horrible reality. I like the idea that maybe he can't solve anything, but he can make things better in this small way. He can give them something that will help them - and him -- sleep better at night. An it's great that he's feeding them. :) I just like that he's looking at it that way, rather than thinking he can do more than he actually has the power to accomplish. Just his whole, "Fuck this, at least I'm trying" train of thought made me want to cheer for him.

[trovia]

You know, I struggled a lot with the Gale/Finnick issue re: how much should Gale figure out. Me being me, I settled on the less happy option. He doesn't figure it out. For Finnick, having to learn to live with the fact that people will always have that negative image of him is a harsh lesson that he shouldn't have to learn, but that's life. He'll just have to deal. He'll have to learn to differentiate between what people see and the reality of who he is.

And he's adorable with the kids. I love Aleese and how she seems to want to jump in and defend Finnick, and how she seems to be the only Haymitch fan in D12. :)

Hah. Totally. :D Her brother too. More on it in the upcoming chapter.

The way I see it, breaking down the world into bits and then tackling the bits is a lesson Finnick learned from Mags. She's very pragmatic. It's a great thing to be taught. "Let's find a thing we can tackle."

D12 and their whole situation is just triggering for Finnick in general -- he's soaking in the helplessness and it's pushing him to do things.

Ugh, yes. I imagine Haymitch was in that same situation once before, but he'd learned the hard way that action leads to bad things and eventually, being alone in D12, all of it just overwhelmed him. And first he had Lyra with him who didn't have an interest in building D12 into a rival for D2, not when she had a daughter back home and no loyalty to 12 to begin with.

Finnick is straight on his way of finding a mode of living that works for him in a permanent way. It's not going to be Mags' way, no. The question is, will he miss the last turn. WE'LL SEE. :D

[trovia]

A lot of stuff here. I like the mention of Mags -- Finnick is angry at her now that he has a new understanding of certain issues, courtesy of Caramel. D12 and their whole situation is just triggering for Finnick in general -- he's soaking in the helplessness and it's pushing him to do things. He's showing a lot of empathy and compassion for these kids and he realizes that they are all stuck with a horrible reality.

Looking at this now, I think a big reason why Finnick feels so strongly for the kids is because a part of him understands that he himself lost himself at that age. It's the last age that he can remember feeling normal and like other people have the same experiences as him. Considering how he's such a master of projection, of course he would get fiercely protective of kids at a stage of development that he himself remembers just breaking away.