Fic: Who Says You Can't Go Home Again
Title: Who Says You Can't Go Home Again
Characters: all OCs, all the time
Rating: G
Summary: Dash is a Peacekeeper, and he's also from District Four. After the Rebellion, the second point matters far more. This is a story about chasing your dreams, and friendship, and returning home after all's said and done.
A/N: I tripped and fell in Peacekeeper feelings.
This is in the same universe as Saving Brutus so it's also in lorataprose's District Two Careers-verse, and it references it kinda, but it's mostly about Dash before and after the Rebellion. Also the kiddo dogpile is totally lorataprose's fault.
Dash is glad he's from Four.
It's a pretty good place to be from, all things considered. He's an orphan, dad died at sea when he was a toddler and mom wasted away not long after, grandparents elderly and withered from long hard lives at sea, but Four took him in and raised him. His grandparents might have been his legal guardians but the whole community pitched in to raise him, and his childhood was filled with aunts making sure he had enough to eat and enough clothes to wear, and uncles who taught him how to swim and fish and helped him with his homework after school.
He grew up safe and loved and that's more than most orphans get.
That doesn't mean it was easy. The day Dash turned twelve, he signed for tesserae for himself and his grandda and all other orphan kids - because there's love but there's no money, and that's how you get by if you have no money - and for District Four’s Career program, because if your name is in that many times you probably want to be able to do something if it comes to that.
And there, to everyone's surprise, Dash blossomed. He had always been a little kid, smart and quick but a little on the small side from not having quite enough to eat, but there they feed him and train him and soon enough he shoots up. He grows tall and strong and smart, and masters everything they teach him.
But they never call his name. In his last year, the year he might be called upon to Volunteer, the boy called is a Career too in the year below, and so Dash stays silent as agreed and another boy mounts the stage with his head held high.
It's almost a disappointment.
Dash didn't want to go into the arena, exactly, nobody does, but the training have him purpose and now he's got… nothing. He's not a very good fisherman, never has been more than indifferent to the District’s industry, and anyway even if he wanted to be he's got no boat and no relatives to sponsor him for one. The elders offer to help him, arrange for him to apprentice with the dockhands who can always use more help, or perhaps even with the shippers who pack goods for the Capitol if he wants - but he doesn't want that.
He wants to be a Peacekeeper.
It’s because he always liked protecting people. Even when Dash was little, he'd try to protect his frail grandparents, and as he grew older he always looked out for the younger ones. He would’ve Volunteered to save another boy. Being a Peacekeeper seems like it'll be the natural extension of that.
They try to dissuade him. They tell him only Twos become Peacekeepers, he'll never make it, but he used to pester the ones who patrolled his street for stories and knows that's not true. They tell him he can protect people here. He tells them he wants to protect Panem.
And so they go on and on, and Dash digs his heels in and argues his way up.
Finally, after months of stalemate, Dash plays his last card and goes to Mags. Four’s first Victor doesn’t have an official position in the district, not technically, but she is a hero and role model and much-loved by all - and she too likes protecting people. When Dash’s grandma died when he was eight, Mags stopped by and made sure he and his grandda were okay even though she didn’t have to. He’ll never forget that.
“It won’t be easy for you,” Mags warns. “Most of the other cadets at the Peacekeeping Academy will be kids from Two who’ve trained for more than half their lives in fighting. And if you make it, there’s a good chance you’ll never return to Four. Is that what you want?”
Dash stands tall, even if inside he flinches a little at the thought of never coming home again. “It’s what I want,” he repeats. “I can make a difference. Let me go.”
Mags nods, and just like that, he’s on his way.
--
At first, it’s as tough as she said. Dash misses Four like it’s a physical ache: the trees, the smell of the sea, the sound of the waves crashing on the banks at night. District Two with its mountains and granite cliffs feel like a giant cage.
His classmates mostly consist of sixteen-year-olds who have spent the last three years in the Athletics and Personal Growth Centre’s residential dorms - Two’s Career program is full-time, unlike Four’s - and while Dash is no slouch, these kids give him a run for their money. He discovers Mags wasn’t kidding when she said they’d been trained for more than half their lives; District Four only starts seriously training kids for the Games at twelve but all of these ex-Careers started at seven. It’s not that big a skill gap, not really, no Four would ever win if it was, but Dash was top of his year back home and now he’s getting demolished by girls four years his junior in the sparring ring.
Sparring, too, is something he doesn’t get. He initially overlooks it, reckons it’s just part of training, but gradually he discovers that there’s far more to it than that. It’s like a physical language, like dancing is in Four, with as many subtleties and connotations as dancing does. Once he understands he learns quickly, but just like his speech will forever mark him as a boy from Four, how he fights will always immediately set him apart.
He’s a year into his training when he’s assigned a new unarmed combat partner. Her name is Selene, and she’s different from the usual crop of cadets they get every quarter - nineteen instead of sixteen, tall and beautiful, with an edge to her smile and the kind of careless, unstudied grace that belies years of training. They shake hands and he gets the feeling she could crush his hand if she wanted and she’s just holding back.
Half a minute into their bout and Dash is one hundred percent sure she could crush him entirely if she wanted.
It’s not that Dash isn’t good, because he is. He might not have started at seven but he was a Career too, and Four doesn’t churn out Careers who are bad at fighting no matter what people say, and he’s put enough work into learning to counter Two’s tricks (using a few of his own) that he’s at the top of the class.
Selene is just better.
Not that much better, not in every way - Dash has more muscle and a little bit of height, and he knows all the tricks and how to fight dirty - but she’s faster, more agile, and her technique is so precise it would blow him away if he had any spare thoughts to devote to it but all of him is focused on not getting his ass completely handed to him. Fighting her is like trying to fight a river; she’s always there, always flowing around him, always right there every time he makes a move or tries a trick, five moves ahead of him the whole way and -
And it’s irrational, but a couple of minutes into the fight, Dash actually gets angry. She’s toying with him, that’s the worst part, controlling the fight so effectively that he’s got the illusion of maybe-winning but he really doesn’t. The look in her eyes, intent but detached, says it all.
She throws him, again, but this time instead of regrouping and coming back into the fight he rolls to his feet and glares at her. “What are you playing at?” he demands.
Selene looks startled, and her eyes focus on his face for the first time. “I’m not -”
Their instructor cuts her off. “That’s enough,” he says, reproving but mild, all things considered. “Dash, five laps, go. Selene, a word.”
Dash scowls and takes off running, but not before he hears the instructor tell Selene, “You did well -” and he burns with anger at the injustice of it all.
He’s still simmering when he finishes his five laps and returns to find the instructor standing there, waiting for him. That’s unusual but not unheard of, so Dash comes to attention and waits for the rest of his punishment -
“That was very well done,” the instructor says, and Dash blinks because that was unexpected. He focuses on the trainer, who is looking at him seriously. “I want you to understand something,” he says. “We didn’t pair you with Selene so she could wipe the floor with you. We paired you together because she can’t, and you can help her do that.”
Dash says, “Sir,” bewilderedly, because what?
“Selene,” the instructor says, “aged out of the Program last year. Do you know what that means?”
Dash takes a moment to think, but he’s drawing a blank. He knows that means she could’ve been chosen as Volunteer but didn’t, just like one other cadet in Dash’s starting cohort last year (and Dash himself, back in the day, but that doesn’t seem to really count here) but not what that has to do with anything. “No, sir.”
“It means she has to retrain her fighting instincts to not go for the kill,” the instructor says, matter-of-fact, and oh. Suddenly Dash isn’t sure whether he was chosen as a worthy opponent or a sacrificial lamb. “You, on the other hand, need to learn how to deal with not being the best. You’ve gotten complacent with those seventeen-year-olds in your class; well, it’s time to fight someone your own size, son.”
That’s not fair, is Dash’s first thought; he’s worked bloody hard to get where he’s at and now they want to tear him down?
The instructor stares steadily at him, as if daring him to say what’s on his mind.
“Yes, sir,” Dash says instead.
“Dismissed.”
He walks off, resigning himself to getting his ass handed to him every day and pretending to like it, but Selene surprises him by waylaying him on the way to the showers.
“Listen, I’m sorry,” she says immediately. Her hands are in her pockets and she actually shuffles in place, body language tense and a little awkward. “I didn’t mean to insult you, back there. I just, ah -”
“Instructor Curtis said,” Dash says tiredly, because suddenly this has been a very long day, “that I needed to learn how to lose gracefully, and you needed to learn to win without killing anyone. That about right?”
Selene’s mouth twitches up into a smile. “Something like that.”
“It’s cool,” Dash says. And maybe it’s not totally, but it’s not her fault if it’s not. He’s suddenly very grateful he’s from Four, because for all the frustration and culture shock and having to fight twice as hard as anyone to get where he is, when he turned nineteen his biggest problem was trying to get into the Peacekeeping Academy and not learning how not to kill people. “Really it is. I was getting bored anyway.”
Surprisingly, after that, he and Selene get along really well. They’ve got unarmed combat together, though they mostly do drills and not free-form fighting like their first bout, but not many other modules - she’s tested out of most of the modules to do with physical training, or combat, or weaponry (even at guns, which surprises him until Selene mentions her dad used to take her shooting as a kid) but Careers in Two leave school at thirteen so she’s got to do all the academic modules that Dash completed in his first year.
(As well as some special modules that Dash never did. One day on his way to the rifle range Dash sees they have her doing takedown drills on dummies, which is kid stuff and throws Dash for a moment until he remembers the whole learning-not-to-kill-people bit.)
Plus it turns out, she’s a lot of fun.
In their rare off duty hours Selene drags Dash out to the town and insists on exploring. Dash, amused, winds up showing her all the random nooks and crannies he’s discovered over the past year. And together they discover a few more. She takes him to bars and clubs, plies him with drinks until he’s relaxed and laughing, and generally makes sure he has some fun and doesn’t just hole up in the barracks all day.
After a year of competitive scrapping and clawing his way up the class standings, of being a loner because he doesn’t fit in with his classmates, it’s nice to have a friend.
--
The next spring, Selene and Dash graduate at the top of their class and assigned to the Scouts together. All the cadets have heard of the Scouts, they’re kind of like the Capitol’s elite special division, and it’s a rare honour to be assigned there. Selene’s excited (“It’s gonna be a hell of a lot more fun than patrolling,” she told Dash, grinning) and Dash is too, but secretly he’s a little disappointed because this means he’s not going to go back to Four anytime soon.
But he knew that could happen when he started out. It’s okay. He sends a letter home to his grandda via the local Peacekeeper office in Four, along with most of his commissioning bonus, and receives a collection of scrawled notes from everyone back in reply. They congratulate him on the prestigious placement and wish him well. It’s fine.
They go to the Capitol, where they’re rotated between border patrol, street guard and Games duty. They get to watch the 74th from behind a screen in a hovercraft, which is different, and also to pull dead tributes out of the Arena which is a little disturbing, but the senior Scouts tell him he’ll get used to it. It’s all routine stuff until the Victor Games happens and they pull Brutus out and in doing so accidentally join the Rebellion.
The Rebellion wins.
Suddenly Dash can go home.
He puts it off for ages, because he’s needed in the Capitol. Paylor pardoned all the Peacekeepers who laid down their arms (on the grounds that they were trying to do their jobs, and also in the interests of not starting her tenure with a sea of blood) but her first act was still to dismantle the Peacekeepers as an organisation. Which leaves a hell of a lot to be done because there still need to be people, well, keeping the peace, and the few Peacekeepers who turned - who are trusted - are in high demand.
For the first few months Dash is run off his feet just helping make sure Panem doesn’t devolve into chaos. It’s a rough winter, especially for the Capitol people who aren’t used to any kind of hardship or deprivation at all, and he loses count of the number of people who try to bribe or threaten him (or both), but somehow they manage.
When spring starts, Selene turns to him and asks, “Do you want to go to Four?”
Dash blinks. “What?”
“We’ve gone to Two a few times, now.” Selene absently kicks a bit of wood down the street. They’re strolling about the Capitol; it’s a rare sunny day, and Marius decided they were both working too hard and kicked them out of base for the day. “And I mean, it’s because they’ve got a ton of problems still, they were the hardest-hit by the war and a lot of the survivors still support Snow, and then there’s all the work that we’re putting into recovering stuff from the Peacekeeping Academy. There’s a lot to do. But I just mean, we could find a reason to go to Four, if you wanted.”
Dash’s throat closes up for a second. He clears it. “I - we’re needed here.”
“I know.” Selene gives him a small, private smile. “I’m not saying, I don’t think they’ll let you move back to Four or anything, not just yet. But we can visit. I know you miss home.”
He does. He misses his grandda and his friends and the other orphan kids who used to congregate at his grandparents’ house by the sea, and even the kids he used to babysit. He misses his aunts and uncles and cousins. He wants to go home. He just … doesn’t really know how.
Sure he’s written home, over the years, but after the Rebellion he didn’t know how. It somehow doesn’t make it any better to know that Four was one of the first districts to rebel against the Capitol so he’s pretty sure he’s not going to face a lot of censure for doing the same. It’s just, in the past few months he’s learnt things about the Peacekeepers that makes him ashamed of ever thinking they protect Panem. Hell, he’s done things he’s not proud off, for the Rebellion, for the ‘greater good’.
After the war, Dash wrote a short note to his grandda so he knew he survived but that was all, because he doesn’t know how to say it all in a letter. If there was ever a reply he never received it.
Selene surprises him by wrapping an arm around his waist. “Would it really be so bad?” she asks, and Dash realises he’s lapsed into silence. Her expression is kind, but Dash doesn’t think she really understands, she’s been a killer since she was fourteen and Dash couldn’t ever bring himself to even tell anyone back home about gunning down the runaways from One two years and a lifetime ago. How is he going to tell his grandfather about the war?
He doesn’t even know if the old man survived.
The worst thing would be coming home to find everyone he knew and loved was dead and gone. No. The worst thing would be coming home and not being recognised.
“It’s been so long,” Dash says at last. “And the war … I don’t know if anyone made it. And, I guess, I’m not the same person I was when I left. I don’t know. Does that make sense?”
Selene grimaces. “Before I became a cadet, I went to visit my parents. It was … awkward.”
“Yeah, right? And you’ve never been back since.”
“Sure, but I still visited once,” Selene points out.
“I know,” Dash sighs. “It’s just -“
“Hard. Yeah.” Selene nods and runs her hand over the back of his jacket. “Well, just … think about it, maybe? They’ve finally cleared the tracks, so the supply trains are running again. We could be on the one to Four in a couple of weeks.”
--
Dash does think about it. He agonises about it for a full week, until Marius, exasperated, tells him he’s got half a mind to order him to go. And so Dash volunteers for train duty, because honestly the only thing worse than going home is being ordered home because his boss thinks he’s being a baby.
He’s cool, really, until about ten minutes before the train pulls into the station. And then he can’t stop worrying.
“Hey.” Selene sits down across him. “Stop panicking.”
“I’m not panicking.”
“Yes, you are.”
Dash exhales. “Okay. I am. I just, I don’t know what to expect.” What if they don’t like me, he wants to say, but there’s no possible way that won’t sound incredibly childish, so he doesn’t.
To his surprise, Selene laughs. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like this. You were less nervous storming the Capitol.”
“I didn’t care what the Capitol thought of me.” Now he definitely sounds childish, but Dash can’t help himself. “It’s not the same at all.”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry.” Selene pats his knee. “It’s just, I don’t think you’ve got much to worry about. Four supported the Rebellion right off the bat, yeah? That makes you practically a local hero.”
There are so many things wrong with that statement Dash doesn’t even know where to start, but there’s no more time because the train’s slowing, then stopping, and Dash is home.
The last time he was at this train station was the day he left District Four. How old had he been - nineteen, twenty? (Just about to turn twenty, that’s right; his birthday, the first he’d ever had away from home had been the month after.) He’d been so young then, all full of fire about how he was going to make a name for himself. The orphan boy who made it good. His grandda had clasped his hand solemnly, then pulled him into a rare hug - and then he’d boarded the train and left without looking back.
Now, nearly five years later, the Peacekeepers are gone and he’s returning in a uniform with Paylor’s insignia on it.
The man that meets them isn’t anyone Dash knows - which isn’t surprising, Four’s a big district and a prestigious posting, or at least it was, he’s got no idea anymore, and wow he totally missed the man’s greeting. Good thing Selene’s with him, because she does most of the talking. “No point you hanging around,” he tells them, after they all sign off on the paperwork. “Be a few hours before the boys are done unloading. District office’s that way, they’ll take care of you.”
Dash knows exactly where the district office is. He doesn’t want to go there, but he also doesn’t want to explain where he wants to go -
Selene saves him. “Thanks. We’ll be back in a few.”
She strides off in the direction of the district office, and Dash follows her on autopilot, wondering - but as soon as they’re out of earshot she turns back to him. “Your village isn’t that far, isn’t it?”
“Well, no, but,” Dash falters. “What, you’re thinking of just - walking there?”
“You told me you used to do that when you were little,” Selene points out.
“Yeah,” Dash says, with a startled laugh. They haven’t talked about home since they were cadets, and Dash had nearly forgotten, but Selene has always had a fantastic memory. “We used to watch the trains come in.” The tesserae trains, to be precise - it was always a thrill, and even if it wasn’t your day to collect, sometimes if you were good the Peacekeepers would slip you something. Especially in Finnick’s year, they’d give out goodies at the station, so all the kids wanted to be first.
He suddenly wonders if Selene ever took tesserae. He doubts it. The only child of a high-ranking Peacekeeper would have had no need for it, even if she hadn’t gone to the Centre.
“Then let’s walk.” Selene threads an arm through his and smiles, and Dash knows what exactly she’s doing but it’s somehow comforting, because she’s doing it for him. “It’s not like the district office cares, so long as we’re out of their hair. So Tell me about Four?”
Dash laughs. “Okay. When the tide is really high, the water comes up to just over there …”
--
It seems to take no time at all until they’re rounding the bend and Dash’s breath catches because it still looks exactly the same. Selene squeezes his arm, briefly, and steps away a little bit, because she understands he needs to do this himself - and Dash walks slowly down the street he grew up on.
At first, there’s nobody there he recognises. It’s a little bit eerie, and he panics a bit before he realises it’s mid-morning and that means the boats are still only just pulling in at the docks and everyone will be there to help unload and sort -
“Dash?” a boy asks suddenly, incredulously. Dash blinks and focuses on him. It’s a sandy-haired boy, maybe eleven or twelve, and Dash has no idea who he is - until the boy grins, gap-toothed and happy, and Dash blinks because he knows that grin. He knows it on a seven-year-old, liberally smeared with mud, but of course that little kid has grown up. Time passes so quickly for children, and he’s been away a while.
“Nicky,” he says, testing the name on his lips. It’s more tentative than he likes, but of course he hasn’t seen him in five years, and he’s not sure -
“Dash! It is you!” Suddenly a very excited kid collides with Dash’s midsection and, ow, that was hard. It’s hard to be angry at the laughing boy who wraps his arms around him, though. “Hey, everyone, Dash is back!”
“Dash! Dash!” Suddenly Dash is surrounded by kids of varying ages, crowding at him and hugging him. He remembers them all - there’s Katie, who he last saw with a cast on her arm from falling off a tree; Cale, his littlest cousin, who had only been five when he left and had pouted so much Dash had to leave the room or die laughing; even -
“Dashy!” Tina runs full-tilt into him, wrapping her arms around his waist. Dash is surprised she remembers him at all - she was only two when he left - but evidently the older ones have been telling tales of him.
“Ow, you guys,” Dash laughs. He is laughing, and he feels like soaring and like a huge weight has been lifted off his shoulders, and possibly gut-punched too (but maybe that’s Tina’s fault). “It’s so good to see you, but really. Give me some room to breathe!”
They draw back just far enough for the older kids who were too dignified to dogpile him, like Nate who’s fourteen now and tall (Dash makes a show of looking up at him, and Nate laughs) or Marina who’s thirteen and grown shy. Dash knows them all. He remembers them all.
Selene is laughing with him, or possibly at him, but Dash doesn’t mind; she doesn’t understand, he knows she doesn’t, but she pushed him here anyway because she knew it was important to him, and that means more than anything.
And, shards and shells but there’s his grandda. He’s a little old man still, stooped and gnarled from a lifetime at sea, and he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day since Dash last saw him.
For a second Dash is afraid. Then his grandda smiles, warm and inviting, and opens his arms, and suddenly Dash is running at him like he’s Tina’s age all over again. “Welcome home, child,” his grandda whispers in his ear, and suddenly Dash realises he’s crying too, laughing and crying, so happy he might burst.
He’s in District Four. He’s home.
--
All too soon, they’re on the train back to the Capitol.
After the boats came in and the adults returned to town Dash was swept up in a whirlwind of reunions - his cousins, his aunts and uncles, his friends - and the day feels like it took no time at all, but Dash is okay with that. He’ll come back again (he’s promised to come back) and be certain of his welcome this time. Maybe he can take a whole weekend off…
Selene comes in and grins at his dreamy, happy expression. “Good day?”
“Hm? Yeah.” Dash glances up and grins back. “Yeah. Yeah, the best.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Selene tells him, affectionately, slinging an arm around his shoulders.
“Maybe just a little.” Dash leans into her. “And Selene? Thanks. For suggesting this, and for letting me decide to do it, not just sort of manipulating me into it like you probably wanted to.”
Selene laughs. “Anytime.”
Characters: all OCs, all the time
Rating: G
Summary: Dash is a Peacekeeper, and he's also from District Four. After the Rebellion, the second point matters far more. This is a story about chasing your dreams, and friendship, and returning home after all's said and done.
A/N: I tripped and fell in Peacekeeper feelings.
This is in the same universe as Saving Brutus so it's also in lorataprose's District Two Careers-verse, and it references it kinda, but it's mostly about Dash before and after the Rebellion. Also the kiddo dogpile is totally lorataprose's fault.
Dash is glad he's from Four.
It's a pretty good place to be from, all things considered. He's an orphan, dad died at sea when he was a toddler and mom wasted away not long after, grandparents elderly and withered from long hard lives at sea, but Four took him in and raised him. His grandparents might have been his legal guardians but the whole community pitched in to raise him, and his childhood was filled with aunts making sure he had enough to eat and enough clothes to wear, and uncles who taught him how to swim and fish and helped him with his homework after school.
He grew up safe and loved and that's more than most orphans get.
That doesn't mean it was easy. The day Dash turned twelve, he signed for tesserae for himself and his grandda and all other orphan kids - because there's love but there's no money, and that's how you get by if you have no money - and for District Four’s Career program, because if your name is in that many times you probably want to be able to do something if it comes to that.
And there, to everyone's surprise, Dash blossomed. He had always been a little kid, smart and quick but a little on the small side from not having quite enough to eat, but there they feed him and train him and soon enough he shoots up. He grows tall and strong and smart, and masters everything they teach him.
But they never call his name. In his last year, the year he might be called upon to Volunteer, the boy called is a Career too in the year below, and so Dash stays silent as agreed and another boy mounts the stage with his head held high.
It's almost a disappointment.
Dash didn't want to go into the arena, exactly, nobody does, but the training have him purpose and now he's got… nothing. He's not a very good fisherman, never has been more than indifferent to the District’s industry, and anyway even if he wanted to be he's got no boat and no relatives to sponsor him for one. The elders offer to help him, arrange for him to apprentice with the dockhands who can always use more help, or perhaps even with the shippers who pack goods for the Capitol if he wants - but he doesn't want that.
He wants to be a Peacekeeper.
It’s because he always liked protecting people. Even when Dash was little, he'd try to protect his frail grandparents, and as he grew older he always looked out for the younger ones. He would’ve Volunteered to save another boy. Being a Peacekeeper seems like it'll be the natural extension of that.
They try to dissuade him. They tell him only Twos become Peacekeepers, he'll never make it, but he used to pester the ones who patrolled his street for stories and knows that's not true. They tell him he can protect people here. He tells them he wants to protect Panem.
And so they go on and on, and Dash digs his heels in and argues his way up.
Finally, after months of stalemate, Dash plays his last card and goes to Mags. Four’s first Victor doesn’t have an official position in the district, not technically, but she is a hero and role model and much-loved by all - and she too likes protecting people. When Dash’s grandma died when he was eight, Mags stopped by and made sure he and his grandda were okay even though she didn’t have to. He’ll never forget that.
“It won’t be easy for you,” Mags warns. “Most of the other cadets at the Peacekeeping Academy will be kids from Two who’ve trained for more than half their lives in fighting. And if you make it, there’s a good chance you’ll never return to Four. Is that what you want?”
Dash stands tall, even if inside he flinches a little at the thought of never coming home again. “It’s what I want,” he repeats. “I can make a difference. Let me go.”
Mags nods, and just like that, he’s on his way.
--
At first, it’s as tough as she said. Dash misses Four like it’s a physical ache: the trees, the smell of the sea, the sound of the waves crashing on the banks at night. District Two with its mountains and granite cliffs feel like a giant cage.
His classmates mostly consist of sixteen-year-olds who have spent the last three years in the Athletics and Personal Growth Centre’s residential dorms - Two’s Career program is full-time, unlike Four’s - and while Dash is no slouch, these kids give him a run for their money. He discovers Mags wasn’t kidding when she said they’d been trained for more than half their lives; District Four only starts seriously training kids for the Games at twelve but all of these ex-Careers started at seven. It’s not that big a skill gap, not really, no Four would ever win if it was, but Dash was top of his year back home and now he’s getting demolished by girls four years his junior in the sparring ring.
Sparring, too, is something he doesn’t get. He initially overlooks it, reckons it’s just part of training, but gradually he discovers that there’s far more to it than that. It’s like a physical language, like dancing is in Four, with as many subtleties and connotations as dancing does. Once he understands he learns quickly, but just like his speech will forever mark him as a boy from Four, how he fights will always immediately set him apart.
He’s a year into his training when he’s assigned a new unarmed combat partner. Her name is Selene, and she’s different from the usual crop of cadets they get every quarter - nineteen instead of sixteen, tall and beautiful, with an edge to her smile and the kind of careless, unstudied grace that belies years of training. They shake hands and he gets the feeling she could crush his hand if she wanted and she’s just holding back.
Half a minute into their bout and Dash is one hundred percent sure she could crush him entirely if she wanted.
It’s not that Dash isn’t good, because he is. He might not have started at seven but he was a Career too, and Four doesn’t churn out Careers who are bad at fighting no matter what people say, and he’s put enough work into learning to counter Two’s tricks (using a few of his own) that he’s at the top of the class.
Selene is just better.
Not that much better, not in every way - Dash has more muscle and a little bit of height, and he knows all the tricks and how to fight dirty - but she’s faster, more agile, and her technique is so precise it would blow him away if he had any spare thoughts to devote to it but all of him is focused on not getting his ass completely handed to him. Fighting her is like trying to fight a river; she’s always there, always flowing around him, always right there every time he makes a move or tries a trick, five moves ahead of him the whole way and -
And it’s irrational, but a couple of minutes into the fight, Dash actually gets angry. She’s toying with him, that’s the worst part, controlling the fight so effectively that he’s got the illusion of maybe-winning but he really doesn’t. The look in her eyes, intent but detached, says it all.
She throws him, again, but this time instead of regrouping and coming back into the fight he rolls to his feet and glares at her. “What are you playing at?” he demands.
Selene looks startled, and her eyes focus on his face for the first time. “I’m not -”
Their instructor cuts her off. “That’s enough,” he says, reproving but mild, all things considered. “Dash, five laps, go. Selene, a word.”
Dash scowls and takes off running, but not before he hears the instructor tell Selene, “You did well -” and he burns with anger at the injustice of it all.
He’s still simmering when he finishes his five laps and returns to find the instructor standing there, waiting for him. That’s unusual but not unheard of, so Dash comes to attention and waits for the rest of his punishment -
“That was very well done,” the instructor says, and Dash blinks because that was unexpected. He focuses on the trainer, who is looking at him seriously. “I want you to understand something,” he says. “We didn’t pair you with Selene so she could wipe the floor with you. We paired you together because she can’t, and you can help her do that.”
Dash says, “Sir,” bewilderedly, because what?
“Selene,” the instructor says, “aged out of the Program last year. Do you know what that means?”
Dash takes a moment to think, but he’s drawing a blank. He knows that means she could’ve been chosen as Volunteer but didn’t, just like one other cadet in Dash’s starting cohort last year (and Dash himself, back in the day, but that doesn’t seem to really count here) but not what that has to do with anything. “No, sir.”
“It means she has to retrain her fighting instincts to not go for the kill,” the instructor says, matter-of-fact, and oh. Suddenly Dash isn’t sure whether he was chosen as a worthy opponent or a sacrificial lamb. “You, on the other hand, need to learn how to deal with not being the best. You’ve gotten complacent with those seventeen-year-olds in your class; well, it’s time to fight someone your own size, son.”
That’s not fair, is Dash’s first thought; he’s worked bloody hard to get where he’s at and now they want to tear him down?
The instructor stares steadily at him, as if daring him to say what’s on his mind.
“Yes, sir,” Dash says instead.
“Dismissed.”
He walks off, resigning himself to getting his ass handed to him every day and pretending to like it, but Selene surprises him by waylaying him on the way to the showers.
“Listen, I’m sorry,” she says immediately. Her hands are in her pockets and she actually shuffles in place, body language tense and a little awkward. “I didn’t mean to insult you, back there. I just, ah -”
“Instructor Curtis said,” Dash says tiredly, because suddenly this has been a very long day, “that I needed to learn how to lose gracefully, and you needed to learn to win without killing anyone. That about right?”
Selene’s mouth twitches up into a smile. “Something like that.”
“It’s cool,” Dash says. And maybe it’s not totally, but it’s not her fault if it’s not. He’s suddenly very grateful he’s from Four, because for all the frustration and culture shock and having to fight twice as hard as anyone to get where he is, when he turned nineteen his biggest problem was trying to get into the Peacekeeping Academy and not learning how not to kill people. “Really it is. I was getting bored anyway.”
Surprisingly, after that, he and Selene get along really well. They’ve got unarmed combat together, though they mostly do drills and not free-form fighting like their first bout, but not many other modules - she’s tested out of most of the modules to do with physical training, or combat, or weaponry (even at guns, which surprises him until Selene mentions her dad used to take her shooting as a kid) but Careers in Two leave school at thirteen so she’s got to do all the academic modules that Dash completed in his first year.
(As well as some special modules that Dash never did. One day on his way to the rifle range Dash sees they have her doing takedown drills on dummies, which is kid stuff and throws Dash for a moment until he remembers the whole learning-not-to-kill-people bit.)
Plus it turns out, she’s a lot of fun.
In their rare off duty hours Selene drags Dash out to the town and insists on exploring. Dash, amused, winds up showing her all the random nooks and crannies he’s discovered over the past year. And together they discover a few more. She takes him to bars and clubs, plies him with drinks until he’s relaxed and laughing, and generally makes sure he has some fun and doesn’t just hole up in the barracks all day.
After a year of competitive scrapping and clawing his way up the class standings, of being a loner because he doesn’t fit in with his classmates, it’s nice to have a friend.
--
The next spring, Selene and Dash graduate at the top of their class and assigned to the Scouts together. All the cadets have heard of the Scouts, they’re kind of like the Capitol’s elite special division, and it’s a rare honour to be assigned there. Selene’s excited (“It’s gonna be a hell of a lot more fun than patrolling,” she told Dash, grinning) and Dash is too, but secretly he’s a little disappointed because this means he’s not going to go back to Four anytime soon.
But he knew that could happen when he started out. It’s okay. He sends a letter home to his grandda via the local Peacekeeper office in Four, along with most of his commissioning bonus, and receives a collection of scrawled notes from everyone back in reply. They congratulate him on the prestigious placement and wish him well. It’s fine.
They go to the Capitol, where they’re rotated between border patrol, street guard and Games duty. They get to watch the 74th from behind a screen in a hovercraft, which is different, and also to pull dead tributes out of the Arena which is a little disturbing, but the senior Scouts tell him he’ll get used to it. It’s all routine stuff until the Victor Games happens and they pull Brutus out and in doing so accidentally join the Rebellion.
The Rebellion wins.
Suddenly Dash can go home.
He puts it off for ages, because he’s needed in the Capitol. Paylor pardoned all the Peacekeepers who laid down their arms (on the grounds that they were trying to do their jobs, and also in the interests of not starting her tenure with a sea of blood) but her first act was still to dismantle the Peacekeepers as an organisation. Which leaves a hell of a lot to be done because there still need to be people, well, keeping the peace, and the few Peacekeepers who turned - who are trusted - are in high demand.
For the first few months Dash is run off his feet just helping make sure Panem doesn’t devolve into chaos. It’s a rough winter, especially for the Capitol people who aren’t used to any kind of hardship or deprivation at all, and he loses count of the number of people who try to bribe or threaten him (or both), but somehow they manage.
When spring starts, Selene turns to him and asks, “Do you want to go to Four?”
Dash blinks. “What?”
“We’ve gone to Two a few times, now.” Selene absently kicks a bit of wood down the street. They’re strolling about the Capitol; it’s a rare sunny day, and Marius decided they were both working too hard and kicked them out of base for the day. “And I mean, it’s because they’ve got a ton of problems still, they were the hardest-hit by the war and a lot of the survivors still support Snow, and then there’s all the work that we’re putting into recovering stuff from the Peacekeeping Academy. There’s a lot to do. But I just mean, we could find a reason to go to Four, if you wanted.”
Dash’s throat closes up for a second. He clears it. “I - we’re needed here.”
“I know.” Selene gives him a small, private smile. “I’m not saying, I don’t think they’ll let you move back to Four or anything, not just yet. But we can visit. I know you miss home.”
He does. He misses his grandda and his friends and the other orphan kids who used to congregate at his grandparents’ house by the sea, and even the kids he used to babysit. He misses his aunts and uncles and cousins. He wants to go home. He just … doesn’t really know how.
Sure he’s written home, over the years, but after the Rebellion he didn’t know how. It somehow doesn’t make it any better to know that Four was one of the first districts to rebel against the Capitol so he’s pretty sure he’s not going to face a lot of censure for doing the same. It’s just, in the past few months he’s learnt things about the Peacekeepers that makes him ashamed of ever thinking they protect Panem. Hell, he’s done things he’s not proud off, for the Rebellion, for the ‘greater good’.
After the war, Dash wrote a short note to his grandda so he knew he survived but that was all, because he doesn’t know how to say it all in a letter. If there was ever a reply he never received it.
Selene surprises him by wrapping an arm around his waist. “Would it really be so bad?” she asks, and Dash realises he’s lapsed into silence. Her expression is kind, but Dash doesn’t think she really understands, she’s been a killer since she was fourteen and Dash couldn’t ever bring himself to even tell anyone back home about gunning down the runaways from One two years and a lifetime ago. How is he going to tell his grandfather about the war?
He doesn’t even know if the old man survived.
The worst thing would be coming home to find everyone he knew and loved was dead and gone. No. The worst thing would be coming home and not being recognised.
“It’s been so long,” Dash says at last. “And the war … I don’t know if anyone made it. And, I guess, I’m not the same person I was when I left. I don’t know. Does that make sense?”
Selene grimaces. “Before I became a cadet, I went to visit my parents. It was … awkward.”
“Yeah, right? And you’ve never been back since.”
“Sure, but I still visited once,” Selene points out.
“I know,” Dash sighs. “It’s just -“
“Hard. Yeah.” Selene nods and runs her hand over the back of his jacket. “Well, just … think about it, maybe? They’ve finally cleared the tracks, so the supply trains are running again. We could be on the one to Four in a couple of weeks.”
--
Dash does think about it. He agonises about it for a full week, until Marius, exasperated, tells him he’s got half a mind to order him to go. And so Dash volunteers for train duty, because honestly the only thing worse than going home is being ordered home because his boss thinks he’s being a baby.
He’s cool, really, until about ten minutes before the train pulls into the station. And then he can’t stop worrying.
“Hey.” Selene sits down across him. “Stop panicking.”
“I’m not panicking.”
“Yes, you are.”
Dash exhales. “Okay. I am. I just, I don’t know what to expect.” What if they don’t like me, he wants to say, but there’s no possible way that won’t sound incredibly childish, so he doesn’t.
To his surprise, Selene laughs. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like this. You were less nervous storming the Capitol.”
“I didn’t care what the Capitol thought of me.” Now he definitely sounds childish, but Dash can’t help himself. “It’s not the same at all.”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry.” Selene pats his knee. “It’s just, I don’t think you’ve got much to worry about. Four supported the Rebellion right off the bat, yeah? That makes you practically a local hero.”
There are so many things wrong with that statement Dash doesn’t even know where to start, but there’s no more time because the train’s slowing, then stopping, and Dash is home.
The last time he was at this train station was the day he left District Four. How old had he been - nineteen, twenty? (Just about to turn twenty, that’s right; his birthday, the first he’d ever had away from home had been the month after.) He’d been so young then, all full of fire about how he was going to make a name for himself. The orphan boy who made it good. His grandda had clasped his hand solemnly, then pulled him into a rare hug - and then he’d boarded the train and left without looking back.
Now, nearly five years later, the Peacekeepers are gone and he’s returning in a uniform with Paylor’s insignia on it.
The man that meets them isn’t anyone Dash knows - which isn’t surprising, Four’s a big district and a prestigious posting, or at least it was, he’s got no idea anymore, and wow he totally missed the man’s greeting. Good thing Selene’s with him, because she does most of the talking. “No point you hanging around,” he tells them, after they all sign off on the paperwork. “Be a few hours before the boys are done unloading. District office’s that way, they’ll take care of you.”
Dash knows exactly where the district office is. He doesn’t want to go there, but he also doesn’t want to explain where he wants to go -
Selene saves him. “Thanks. We’ll be back in a few.”
She strides off in the direction of the district office, and Dash follows her on autopilot, wondering - but as soon as they’re out of earshot she turns back to him. “Your village isn’t that far, isn’t it?”
“Well, no, but,” Dash falters. “What, you’re thinking of just - walking there?”
“You told me you used to do that when you were little,” Selene points out.
“Yeah,” Dash says, with a startled laugh. They haven’t talked about home since they were cadets, and Dash had nearly forgotten, but Selene has always had a fantastic memory. “We used to watch the trains come in.” The tesserae trains, to be precise - it was always a thrill, and even if it wasn’t your day to collect, sometimes if you were good the Peacekeepers would slip you something. Especially in Finnick’s year, they’d give out goodies at the station, so all the kids wanted to be first.
He suddenly wonders if Selene ever took tesserae. He doubts it. The only child of a high-ranking Peacekeeper would have had no need for it, even if she hadn’t gone to the Centre.
“Then let’s walk.” Selene threads an arm through his and smiles, and Dash knows what exactly she’s doing but it’s somehow comforting, because she’s doing it for him. “It’s not like the district office cares, so long as we’re out of their hair. So Tell me about Four?”
Dash laughs. “Okay. When the tide is really high, the water comes up to just over there …”
--
It seems to take no time at all until they’re rounding the bend and Dash’s breath catches because it still looks exactly the same. Selene squeezes his arm, briefly, and steps away a little bit, because she understands he needs to do this himself - and Dash walks slowly down the street he grew up on.
At first, there’s nobody there he recognises. It’s a little bit eerie, and he panics a bit before he realises it’s mid-morning and that means the boats are still only just pulling in at the docks and everyone will be there to help unload and sort -
“Dash?” a boy asks suddenly, incredulously. Dash blinks and focuses on him. It’s a sandy-haired boy, maybe eleven or twelve, and Dash has no idea who he is - until the boy grins, gap-toothed and happy, and Dash blinks because he knows that grin. He knows it on a seven-year-old, liberally smeared with mud, but of course that little kid has grown up. Time passes so quickly for children, and he’s been away a while.
“Nicky,” he says, testing the name on his lips. It’s more tentative than he likes, but of course he hasn’t seen him in five years, and he’s not sure -
“Dash! It is you!” Suddenly a very excited kid collides with Dash’s midsection and, ow, that was hard. It’s hard to be angry at the laughing boy who wraps his arms around him, though. “Hey, everyone, Dash is back!”
“Dash! Dash!” Suddenly Dash is surrounded by kids of varying ages, crowding at him and hugging him. He remembers them all - there’s Katie, who he last saw with a cast on her arm from falling off a tree; Cale, his littlest cousin, who had only been five when he left and had pouted so much Dash had to leave the room or die laughing; even -
“Dashy!” Tina runs full-tilt into him, wrapping her arms around his waist. Dash is surprised she remembers him at all - she was only two when he left - but evidently the older ones have been telling tales of him.
“Ow, you guys,” Dash laughs. He is laughing, and he feels like soaring and like a huge weight has been lifted off his shoulders, and possibly gut-punched too (but maybe that’s Tina’s fault). “It’s so good to see you, but really. Give me some room to breathe!”
They draw back just far enough for the older kids who were too dignified to dogpile him, like Nate who’s fourteen now and tall (Dash makes a show of looking up at him, and Nate laughs) or Marina who’s thirteen and grown shy. Dash knows them all. He remembers them all.
Selene is laughing with him, or possibly at him, but Dash doesn’t mind; she doesn’t understand, he knows she doesn’t, but she pushed him here anyway because she knew it was important to him, and that means more than anything.
And, shards and shells but there’s his grandda. He’s a little old man still, stooped and gnarled from a lifetime at sea, and he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day since Dash last saw him.
For a second Dash is afraid. Then his grandda smiles, warm and inviting, and opens his arms, and suddenly Dash is running at him like he’s Tina’s age all over again. “Welcome home, child,” his grandda whispers in his ear, and suddenly Dash realises he’s crying too, laughing and crying, so happy he might burst.
He’s in District Four. He’s home.
--
All too soon, they’re on the train back to the Capitol.
After the boats came in and the adults returned to town Dash was swept up in a whirlwind of reunions - his cousins, his aunts and uncles, his friends - and the day feels like it took no time at all, but Dash is okay with that. He’ll come back again (he’s promised to come back) and be certain of his welcome this time. Maybe he can take a whole weekend off…
Selene comes in and grins at his dreamy, happy expression. “Good day?”
“Hm? Yeah.” Dash glances up and grins back. “Yeah. Yeah, the best.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Selene tells him, affectionately, slinging an arm around his shoulders.
“Maybe just a little.” Dash leans into her. “And Selene? Thanks. For suggesting this, and for letting me decide to do it, not just sort of manipulating me into it like you probably wanted to.”
Selene laughs. “Anytime.”