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Underground. He hated it. The walls felt too cold and the ceilings too low, the air too stale and the people around him too... confusing. He had no idea who to trust or if he could ever trust anyone again but himself - though even then he doubted himself. There were days when kindness challenged the tumbling mess of memories in his mind full of nightmares and images he was unable to separate from fantasy or reality.

He had lashed out at Katniss more times than he could count and although the shackles strapped to his body at night helped him stay in bed, they did not help him sleep in peace. Why was he even here? Why had they saved him? Especially her... She had looked so happy to see him yet all he could think about was the pain and suffering she had caused so many people.

The violent thoughts had calmed somewhat after the wedding, but they would still poke at his mind every now and then, tempting him. He still trusted no one.

Yet here he was now, guarded constantly and chained, but able to walk out of his room at least. He was headed down a corridor out of the wing that held the hospital rooms, not sure where he was going really... just anywhere that had better air. The guard following close behind was a constant reminder of his current state of mind, though a part of him was whispering that it was probably best like this.

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Peeta shifts against the hard floor but doesn't move away, his voice still that soft and wary thing in the dark.

"You don't think you have?"

"I protected Prim. And for what? 12 is...." She trailed off. She still couldn't think about it. Not without her mind going to places to dark, even now.

"And you? How well did I protect you?"

"Maybe it's time to realize it isn't your forte," he was trying to joke around but it sounded far more bitter than he'd intended.

"Well, what the hell else am I suppose to do?" She asked, twisting to look at him in the dim light. "Just sit here and let everyone be hurt? Everyone tells me I'm so powerful...and I have none."

"The harder you try, the more people seem to get hurt," he added bitterly, not looking away from her. The tone kept changing just like that and it didn't go unnoticed to him, nor the ones who were watching, he figured. "So yeah, maybe you should just stop."

"And do what, then? How do I 'just stop'? Because I never really wanted to start!"

I volunteer. Was that the only choice she'd made? No, of course not. But sometimes it felt like it.

Was she suppose to have just let them reap Prim, slaughter her. The thought it's self, even thought it didn't happen, brought hot tears to her eyes, and she wiped at the angrily.

He felt a twitch at that in his fingers, tightening their grip into fists as he tried to remind himself to breathe. He knew his words were cruel and affecting her more than he should have wanted but that was the point wasn't it?

"I don't know," was all he could offer lamely, his head starting to throb again.

"Neither-" She paused, the bitter words dropping away from her mouth, slipping away back to quite despair. "Neither do I."

What she wanted...everything she wanted summed up in that thought. To just not. To be home, to not have been in a rebellion. To not be the Mockinjay.