Snowbaird Valentine Event

Another day another prompt 💃

Snowbaird Valentine Event

This is the first story in chronological order! I am super excited to post. It's more heavy then the others, but, oh well...

As usual thank to @snowbaird-events and @burntblueberrywaffles and all the discord snowbaird server 🥰

6. Rainbow

He remembers it as if only one day had passed.

The slow search in the forest, the rifle weighing in his arms, the growing concern for Lucy Gray who did not answer his call. The orange shawl on a bramble, dirty and abandoned; the terror that paralyzed him and then the pain of the snake bite.

And then his head, which split in half.

Kneeling on the hard ground of the forest, looking at the wound on his arm, time stretched on and on. The damn birds began to sing. The terror that Lucy Gray is lost or hurt is swept away by the burning sensation of betrayal; the rain falls and he feels it like bullets on his head, on his body. 

"Lucy Gray!" a scream filled with frustration as rejection takes hold of him, as it paralyzes him, as he cannot believe that, that she, that....

And, then, two arms wrap around him.

"I'm here," Lucy Gray murmurs, her head resting on his back, "I'm here, Coriolanus. It is not poisonous. It's not poisonous, I swear."

Coriolanus does not know whether it is reality or a dream - a nightmare - and he crumples in on himself, grabs his head. He closes his eyes and the world is a kaleidoscope; he is in a house of mirrors, where Lucy Gray's songs bounce and taunt him, where those damned birds do not stop tormenting him. He sees them, even with his eyes closed. He sees their beaks now pointed, their little legs full of deadly claws.

"Make them stop" he sobs, as he cries in agony "Make them stop".

The only foothold he has with reality is the grip of Lucy Gray's arms on his waist. She anchors him, holds him still, shuts off all excess as he feels himself dying inside little by little, as betrayal mingles with rejection and finally pain.

As he turns back, slowly, one labored step at a time.

She, who is singing, perhaps to try to console him, perhaps to stem the enormous panic attack that has pervaded him, stops. The Mockingjays echo her notes for the last time and then the forest fades away; only the sound of rain remains.

Coriolanus calms down. Slowly, as the minutes tick by, he comes to recognise what is tangible and what is not. The grip on his waist. The weight of Lucy Gray on his back.

Real or not real?

With difficulty he pulls his fingers away from his head, frees his ears from the hands he had pressed against them, in an attempt to turn off any noise - real or imaginary. He opens his eyes. He straightens his back, one painful inch at a time.

He turns around, inhaling at the top of his lungs.

And she is there.

Lucy Gray is there. She's still holding him by the waist but she's flinched, to be seen.

"Forgive me" she tells him, the tears on her face mingling with the rain "I was afraid".

Coriolanus bursts into tears again and holds her in his arms. Lucy Gray caresses him, comforts him. She no longer sings, does not allow the birds to imitate her, to torture him again. She merely waits for him to vent everything with tears, until Coriolanus feels drained and without strength.

Eventually, they break away. They stand up. Lucy Gray grabs the rifle and Coriolanus grabs the shawl. They hold each other's hand.

They walk back to the hut by the lake.

The rain slows down and, by the time they arrive, it has disappeared completely. They sit on the shore of the lake, indifferent to the wetness. They are already soaked from head to toe.

Lucy Gray puts the gun down behind her and takes the shawl from his hands; she drapes it around her shoulders again. She smiles, but her eyes are still sad.

"You lied to me, Coriolanus" she tells him, neutral, without accusing him "And then I saw it. I saw, in your eyes, when we found the weapons, that you were thinking of leaving me."

Coriolanus has no excuse. What Lucy Gray is telling him is true.

He turns his face away, stares at the horizon, for he does not have the courage to look her in the face.

"... I was lying to myself" he whispers finally "Because if I say it, I must also admit that it is true".

Lucy Gray sighs.

"Sejanus?"

Coriolanus nods.

"I thought his father saved him" he finally admits "I tried to save him. They denied me the call" he turns again to look at her "I swear, Lucy Gray" he concludes, fiery.

Because it is the truth. It is the truth and also the only way he can live with himself now.

Lucy Gray caresses his cheek and smiles. She is still sad. There is still the second unfinished business between them.

"You are not made for this life, Coriolanus."

Coriolanus closes his eyes and leans against her hand. He inhales deeply, and then turns back to the horizon.

The rainbow has sprung up.

"We'll make it work," he replies, his mind back to work - healthy again, ready to look for the best way out.

"How?" asks Lucy Gray.

Coriolanus begins to speak, staring at the rainbow. The serenity after the rain. The promise of a thousand colors.

Lucy Gray, his girlfriend.

Whom he plans to save, paying any price.

***

At the base no one noticed his little outing that morning. The nurse to whom he shows his arm reassures him that the bite is not poisonous, and that it is normal for snakes to come out of their lair during the rain.

Coriolanus faces his last days as a Peacekeeper in District Twelve, before being transferred. The searches are still going on; Mayor Lipp is still inconsolable, wracked with grief - he is still staring at the Covey house, eyes out of their sockets, looking for a culprit he will not find. The weapons are safe at the bottom of the lake. Lucy Gray stands guard over their grave, waiting for the all-clear.

Coriolanus searches the Coveys' wretched house under the watchful eye of the mayor and manages to tell Barb Azure in half a voice where Lucy Gray is and why she is there. The house is clean. The Peacekeepers continue their tour.

And, finally, they arrive at the mayor's house. Coriolanus did not even have to make an effort to get the general to accept his suggestion. "It's obvious the mayor didn't kill his daughter, but wouldn't it be a smart move for the Rebels to hide the weapons in the one place we'll never check?" The search is approved. Coriolanus slips into the kitchen with an excuse.

He recognised the signs, in the pallor of Mayor Lipp's face, in his bloodshot eyes, in his never-quenched anger. He has spent a lifetime behind Professor Sickle's skirts, he can tell when a person has decided to drown their pain in a bottle. And slipping white powder - rat poison - into the half-open bottle in the kitchen is child's play.

The next day he will be in District Two. Less than a week and Lipp will already be dead.

Lucy Gray will be able to go home.

***

Things went better than expected.

Coriolanus wasn't sent to Two, but he went home. He won the Plinth Prize and Dr Gaul has taken him under her wing. He'll pretend to follow her and her beliefs to exploit her connection with President Ravinstill and, then, when he's sure of his role in society - Coriolanus Snow, future president of Panem - he'll end the charade and get rid of her too.

Meanwhile, he just took care of old Dean Highbottom. That was personal, of course, but still related to Lucy Gray. If he hadn't sent her home, if he hadn't expelled him and forced him to join the Peacekeepers... If, if, if.

He risked losing her. His Lucy Gray, his precious songbird.

He risked losing her in more ways than one - he doesn't like to think about it, he doesn't want to admit it even to himself, but Coriolanus knows that as his head cracked, if Lucy Gray hadn't been ready to grab hold of him and keep him grounded in reality, he would have risked stepping beyond the insane and the unforgivable.

For this, Highbottom deserved to die.

That is why Coriolanus knows that, from now on, he will do whatever it takes to achieve his goals. Without any more qualms; without any more moral restraint.

Coriolanus walks the streets of Capitol City, hugging himself in his red coat to counter the air that has become crisp. Dawn has dawned a few hours ago, but it has rained during the night, and the winter sun has failed to chase away the moisture that now seeps into his bones.

He reaches the huge roundabout before the Corso, imagining the Dean writhing as the poison-corrected Morphamine takes effect, and suddenly he sees it: behind the Statue of Justice a rainbow rips through the sky, filling it with hope.

Coriolanus smiles. He thinks about how Dr Gaul approved not only his Victory Tour project, but also his request to have Lucy Gray move to the capital, and then perhaps the Coveys, the following year. What better way to introduce Panem to its Victor than to have her seen happy and surrounded by the loved ones she risked losing in the Hunger Games? Hope, mixed with the pain of remembering those who did not survive. Bread with which to nourish Panem and its Districts, in a way that is congenial to his Mentor and at the same time allows him to hold on to his Lucy Gray.

“Of course I will take care of everything,” recalls the conversation with Dr Gaul “Lucy Gray and the Coveys will be my welcome guests. Pluribus Bell has offered its club to allow them to practice and perform for curious citizens. Don't worry, I have everything under control”.

Control.

Gaul's favorite word, the sure way to gain her approval.

Wonderful as the rainbow after the rain; Lucy Gray and her colors, which he will see again in a few days.

Wait for me, my love , he thinks, eager to fulfill the promise he made to her on the shores of the lake, I will come for you.

And then nothing will be able to separate us any more.

💖💖💖

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