The Dare, Chapter 6

Excerpt:

“Mags,” Finnick whispers, “if they’re close, I’m ready.”

Almost immediately, a parachute appears above Finnick. Caesar pops up in the corner of the screen to tell us that the parachute is carrying pork chops with potatoes and onions. “If they don’t see that or hear it, Dazzle and Shaya will still smell it!” Caesar exclaims before vanishing and returning the commentary duties to Claudius.

“I don’t know if they smell it, Caesar, but they certainly see it!” Claudius all but shouts. “Finnick is a fisherman, and he’s using himself as bait!”

“Let’s go. Kill him and get the food while it’s still warm.” Dazzle excitedly grabs at Shaya’s wrist, but Shaya hangs back. 

“His mentor has to know we’re 800 feet away and would be able to see that,” Shaya says warily. “It could be a trap.”

(A caption on the bottom of the screen informs us that Shaya and Dazzle are technically 779 feet away from Finnick. All of us jokingly shame Shaya for her lack of spatial awareness. It’s awfully impressive how well she estimated the distance through the trees in the dark.)

Dazzle protests that even if it is a trap, they still have the advantage of numbers, and it’s better to face Finnick now when they’re strong rather than later when they’ll be tired or injured. Eventually they agree to wait fifteen minutes before they approach. “That’ll be long enough for Finnick to let down his guard and just eat it,” Shaya says, and it sounds like she’s trying to convince herself more than she’s trying to convince Dazzle. The crackers Cashmere sent seem to have made them hungrier. 

They don’t quite make it the fifteen minutes, but they do move as quietly through the dark water as anyone could possibly expect.

Finnick hears Dazzle and Shaya. 

He flips the lid of the basket open and reaches inside to clink a plate against silverware.

Dazzle and Shaya hear Finnick.

Shaya slides around to the left while Dazzle stays on the right. They can’t see each other any longer, but they’re silently counting in unison. We can see their lips moving. We can see that they’re perfectly in sync. 

Twenty-five, twenty-four, twenty-three, twenty-two, twenty-one…

Dazzle grips her long dagger. She hasn’t killed since she got the girl from Eight in the bloodbath. That’s very different from not having killed at all.

Twenty, nineteen, eighteen, seventeen, sixteen, fifteen…

Shaya’s sword is easy in her hand. She killed the boy from Twelve on the first night, which wasn’t that impressive. But she got the unhinged girl from Nine, too, and that definitely took skill.

Fourteen, thirteen, twelve, eleven, ten, nine…

“Is someone there?” asks Finnick in the quietest of voices.

Eight, seven, six, five, four…

Shaya and Dazzle are absolutely still.

Three…

Finnick has the edge of his net in one hand and his trident in the other.

Two…

Shaya and Dazzle look directly at Finnick, although there’s no way of telling whether either one of them can actually see him.

One.

The girls run.

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Does anyone know if Suzanne Collins said where the arena is located in Catching Fire?

I can't think of a single place in the continental USA where terrain like that exists. Most beaches in the States don't have lush, tropical jungles-- just a few palm trees if you're on the Gulf or West Coast.

I wonder if the arena is in Hawaii or Puerto Rico?

Hi this is my first post here :). I hope I'm not repeating any questions made here

It's been a while since I've read the Trilogy, i remember the story about how Snow drank poison and so on. But i don't remember when it happened or why he actually did it. Do we know when it happened? I would love to see it as a plot point im a book, with Snow as our PoV. Was there ever a statement if we will ever get another book in the PoV of Snow?

While nothing happened between Katniss and Peeta when they shared a bed on the train during the Victory Tour, the fact that Effie brings it up as a concern suggests it was likely a topic of gossip among the stylists (Cinna excluded) and Capitol attendants. It wouldn’t be surprising if, during Peeta’s interview, the Capitol staff and stylists took it upon themselves to confirm the rumor to everyone they knew. As for Effie, while she had grown close to Katniss and Peeta by Catching Fire and wouldn’t intentionally spread harmful gossip about them, she was probably influenced by what she heard. Given how immersed she was in Capitol culture, she may have read more into their nightly routine—after all, as far as she knew, they were genuinely in love.

I'm tired of seeing people pipe up that Suzanne didn't want to write the love triangle, or that Gale was initially meant to be her cousin- he wasn't.

The love triangle was *always* a part of the story, but the important part is that it represented more than just that. They are the two paths she can choose. That is what they are meant to represent, and they are NECESSARY To show both sides of the theme she's tackling in the OG trilogy. (Just War theory)

She has never stated she didn't want the love triangle, Gale was never planned to be Katniss' cousin. These are popular fandom myths. I don't even LIKE EverThorne, but you don't need to perpetuate rumors to justify not liking it, it's pretty obvious in-text why Katniss doesn't reciprocate.

Gale represents one side ideologically of the Just War theory, and Peeta represents the other. Gale believes that Any Means Necessary is justified, that hurting innocent members of the opposition is justified in the pursuit of justice. That Revenge and Justice are intertwined.

Peeta represents the opposite side of that- That you cannot justify hurting the innocent, that you cannot stoop to the levels of the people who do you harm. And both sides have their points, but overall Katniss chooses Peeta, because she does not believe in doing harm to the innocent, no matter what their governance may be complicit in (we see this with the capitolites she gets to know through the series.)

Gale and the love triangle were always in the script. I am so certain that there is no interview where she states she didn't want to write the triangle that I'm willing to pay someone if they find it from a credible source. The only thing I've found is that her editor told her that she wanted *more* of it. Which clearly means it existed in the initial draft.

Sorry for the rambling but I am very tired of this misinformation being spread around as fact.

Gale is extremely attractive. He is also winning material. I have no doubt he would have been a winner if he was selected. In which case his next phase would be getting pimped out to the Capitol like Finnick bc of his looks. He would have rebelled and his whole family would have been killed. And likely Katniss and her family as well, as it is no secret how close he is to them. Gale for tribute would have been a whole different story 😂

One of my favorite moments in Catching Fire, is after Katniss gets stuck outside the fence and has to jump back over. When she gets home, Peeta and Haymitch are there playing it so cool, cracking jokes and making everything seem normal in front of the Peacekeepers. I think it is before the QQ is announced and Peeta and her aren’t on amazing terms but he still shows up for her in the most important ways. The scene really demonstrates to me just how good with words Peeta is & how well he and Haymitch play the game. (Book and Movie both welcome!)

In thi

Keep in mind that I haven’t read the book in quite a while so I may have forgotten if the answer was obvious.

I'll go first - I feel myself reflected in the depiction of the capitol more and more with every re read.

That is such a sad line and shows how low her self esteem is. The hijacking is naturally so painful and it hurts so much to see what they have done to Peeta and how different he is and his words while hijacked cut deeply.

However her reaction is finally after all these months of taking for granted that he sees me as wonderful, now he can see me for who I really am instead of the brainwashing's consequence is that he doesn't know who I really am at this point as his perception is all warped.

If the allies (Beetee, Finnick, Johanna) knew the plan and the day they were coming (the bread roll code in the books told them day & time), why would they split Peeta and Katniss up for the plan that night? I can’t rap my head around why that would be remotely logical to go through with the plan to kill the TWO maX FOUR people that were left? against all of them? Maybe there’s a part I am forgetting or an explanation.

Just happened to come across a repost of this art on IG and immediately thought of Katniss and how much she had to suffer being the symbol of the rebellion at 17 years old (like omg I would crumble at the responsibility, to which she kinda did)

I’m assuming the answer is no, but even family and friends from districts can sponsor tributes, so could mentors potentially sponsor their tributes? What if they slipped money to someone else for them to sponsor a tribute? Do you think the Capitol would catch on?

plzzzzz how do i campaign for this man to audition/book the role of young haymitch

Do y’all ever think about what happens during the games that they don’t televise??? Like do you think some of the tributes find time to fuck around during the games? I personally feel like Glimmer and Cato would have fooled around some time towards the beginning of the games. Is it just me? Am I the weirdo?

Edit: I bring this up because I rewatched the first movie with my family, and Cato and Glimmer seemed very more than friendly during their shots. Just before Katniss dropped the TrackerJacker nest on them, Glimmer was sleeping on Cato’s arm all cuddled up. Do I think that the tributes/victims actively sought each other out to hook up? FUCK NO!! But if they all go into the game with the mentality “this could be my last day alive” with a mix of their teenage hormones, it’s not wildly far-fetched that things could transpire between any of them whether consensual or non-consensual - because let’s keep it a buck, some of the tributes/victims are psychopaths.

does peeta ever call katniss by a specific nickname or pet name? asking because I always see those "book men and what they call their girls" trend so im curious

The most accepted answer here is that the Capitol didn't destroy 13 because they wanted to keep their facilities if they ever won. I saw this as weird and contradictory to how the capitol has been set up in the books. I mean, the Capitol would ruthlessly and needlessly kill / torture to prove a point, even setting up something as rage inducing as the Hunger Games. The Capitol felt like a short sighted tyrannical government who would not care about the future if it meant losing power.

There might be other explanations. The easiest one being the capitol wasn't as strong as they appeared to be, and harsh punishments and cruelty were all meant to appear strong. We could see this with how quickly the Capitol lost air control during the rebellion and how they relied too heavily on District 2. Another explanation, which IMO sounds more appealing, is that there were Capitol leaders who felt some sentimentality / connection to 13 that prevented them from ever considering complete annihilation. If I'm not mistaken, even Snow's dad had invested heavily into 13 before the rebellion, so it could have been more of a psychological reason as to why they never tried to destroy them outright.