Sunrise on the Reaping

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Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins

Haymitch Abernathy wakes up on July 4th, his 16th birthday, but his birthday isn't really something to celebrate because it is the same day as the reaping for the Hunger Games. This year is a special year for the Hunger Games, it's the 50th, the Second Quarter Quell. Haymitch half-heartedly goes about his duties, not because he's lazy or mean, but because he wants to see his girl, Lenore Dove. He helps his mom with her job doing laundry and messes around with his younger brother Sid who is a good kid. In addition to helping his mom, Haymitch also works with a bootlegger, but shortly after arriving for work that day, he gets to leave early, not because it's his birthday, but kind of it is, but really, his boss doesn't want to get caught distilling by all the extra Peacekeepers in town, even though they drink her liquor just like everyone else. She gives Haymitch a bottle of liquor as a gift, but he won't drink it, he never touches the stuff. He can trade it though. 

Haymitch goes to see his girlfriend Lenore Dove who is a talented singer and musician and part of the Covey clan. She is named for a famous song (The Raven) and a color (dove gray), just like all the others in the clan. They talk about the reaping a bit, which Haymitch doesn’t want to, he’d rather kiss his sweetheart, but when he says basically that there’s nothing they can do about his birthday being Reaping Day, she questions him and wonders why they don’t try to stop reaping. Just because his birthday and the reaping are on the same day doesn’t mean they have to be. This just gets Haymitch confused and Lenore Dove apologizes and changes the topic of conversation back to his birthday. She gives him a gift, a flint striker with a snake and bird head on it. It’s really beautiful, and useful too. Lenore Dove is called back home, so Haymitch goes to trade his liquor at the apothecary and gets some gumdrops at the candy shop to share with his girl later.

Now, it’s time for the reaping. This is the 50th year for the Games, 50 years after the citizens of Panem rebelled and a civil war broke out. Since the citizens lost, each year every district is made to send one boy and one girl to fight to the death in an arena with one person crowned as the victor, supposedly bringing honor to their district, but … who wants to earn honor that way? This year is special for the games. It’s the Second Quarter Quell which means the games will be different in some way. This year’s difference is that each district must send twice as many tributes to die, two boys and two girls. Haymitch already has his name in multiple times for tesserae, extra rations for his family, so he doesn’t like his odds.

Drusilla Sickle, the District 12 escort who takes the tributes to the Capitol each year, is a horrible woman with even worse fashion sense. She draws the name of the first tribute, Louella McCoy, a feisty 13 year old girl. Second is Maysilee Donner, the snootiest girl in town. Up next is Wyatt Callow, an 18 year old who nearly aged out of the reaping. Finally, the last name drawn is Woodbine Chance. Instead of walking up to the stage to take his place, Woodbine runs. He doesn’t make it far at all before peacekeepers shoot him in the back of the head.

Chaos ensues, but the show must go on. Drusilla is outraged that the peacekeepers killed this kid right in the middle of the square and made a mess. She announces that they have a five-minute delay in their live production, so they have to get this cleaned up and fixed, quick. Obviously, the dead boy won’t work for the reaping, so they have to replace him. Lenore Dove, meanwhile, is with the dead boy’s mother who is wailing over her son’s body. Haymitch goes to help, which turns out to be a horrible decision. Drusilla selects him to replace Woodbine and Lenore Dove tries to fight to be punished instead. Drusilla demands the peacekeepers just shoot her and be done with it, but someone steps in and stops that.

Plutarch Heavensbee, the cameraman sent to film and direct the reaping, stops Lenore Dove from being shot, hoping to film her anguish when they recall the names of the boys, replacing the dead one with Haymitch. She refuses to play along, but at least she’s still alive. Plutarch tells Haymitch to just go along with what’s happening and do what he’s told so no one else has to die. After the names are redrawn and everything is refilmed, all the fakeness of Drusilla drops and she’s more horrible than ever, calling the citizens filthy animals. Plutarch makes Louella’s and Haymitch’s families stay behind for refilming while the others are pulled away by Peacekeepers. The filming is very painful and fake and after a few tries, Plutarch gives up, but will edit everything enough to try to make the district 12 tributes seem more positive because they need all the help they can get. Haymitch gets on the train to the Capitol with the other three District 12 tributes.

Several hours pass on the train before Plutarch comes to get Haymitch to join the others. He and Louella decide to pair up and become allies. Soon, they are brought sandwiches and Maysilee makes a big deal about not eating with her hands because she doesn’t want to be treated like an animal by the Capitol. After they eat, they watch the other reapings, Drusilla nastily commenting on everyone. Plutarch tries to make things better, but that doesn’t really help, and then they bring out a birthday cake for Haymitch which he promptly turns down. 

Drusilla starts putting them all down then, but Maysilee absolutely trashes her. She mocks her outfit and her age, making the woman go absolutely nuts. She starts beating Maysilee until Plutarch steps in, reminding her that they have to be on camera the next day. The four 12 tributes start to get to know each other a little bit after seeing a different side to Maysilee. Louella says she doesn't want to team up with Wyatt because he's a booker boy, a gambler, but he says he's not, he's an oddsmaker who can judge others well. Maybe all four of them will team up together.

When they arrive in the Capitol, they are separated by gender, stripped, hosed down and shaved. The career tributes, the ones from rich districts who train to win the Games each year, thrust around, proud of their nakedness and Haymitch, not one who would typically enjoy looking at naked guys, judges his competition even though he knows he's going to die. Really only the career tributes from Districts 1, 2 and 4 are anything impressive, everyone else is basically skin and bones. 

Everyone goes off for dressing by their stylists, but District 12 knows they're not going to get anything good to wear since nobody cares about 12. They end up with students Proserpina and Vitus for their prep team, but they're not so bad. Their stylist doesn't even show up until there is very little time left before they are to load onto chariots and parade to President Snow's mansion. Clad in cheap miner’s outfits, they are loaded into their chariot, which is also bad and pulled by untrained horses. That obviously leads to a catastrophe when fireworks and celebrations start. Most of the horses bolt and some chariots crash, killing Louella. 

Haymitch sees peacekeepers coming to take Louella away, but he doesn't want that and, well, he's going to die anyway, so he scoops up her body and runs. He takes a nicer horse and chariot team abandoned in the chaos and heads straight to President Snow’s mansion. He rests Louella before the president and gives him a slow clap, which is impressive to some, obviously, because soon sponsors are asking who he is. He never responds. It is not impressive to Snow. At. All.

Next, it's time for the Districts to meet their mentors, but 12 doesn't have any, the only winner from 12 being from 40 years ago. While they wait, a boy from district 3, Ampert, approaches Haymitch, offering to team up. He doesn't want any new allies after losing Louella, even though this kid seems to have a good idea of teaming up with several people from all the districts to even the odds against the careers. When the mentors arrive, 12 is lucky that there are some winners from other districts who step in to help. One, last year's winner, is Wiress from District 3. She won by seeing the blind spots in the arena and hiding, outlasting everyone. Haymitch doesn't want her help, though. How is she going to teach him how to fight? The other is Mags, an older woman from District 4, who hugs Haymitch and apologizes for Louella’s loss. He breaks down in tears.

The next day, Mags and Wiress treat Haymitch, Maysilee and Wyatt like actual people and ask what they want to learn or do to prepare for the games. They all basically say they don't want to die immediately and be made a spectacle of for the Capitol's gain. Haymitch goes so far as to say he wants to destroy the games so they won't ever do them again. Haymitch mentions the boy from 3 who offered to ally and they all discuss there being benefits to teaming up, so now the three remaining tributes from 12 are a team who will probably join up with the others. They are then moved to the gym for various trainings and get a chance to see everyone else in action. 12 decides to put on a show to appear to be loose cannons and will not immediately judge everyone.

Maysilee immediately judges everyone, but it turns out to be okay. Ampert compliments her ability to braid and tie so she really warms to the idea of teaming up and starts helping others intricately tie their tokens so they can wear them as necklaces inside the arena. They throw knives and Haymitch gets punched by a Career from District 1, Panache, who then gets tased by Peacekeepers. A girl from district 7 checks to make sure Haymitch is okay and then they all decide to team up because the Careers are awful. Ampert sends Haymitch to meet his dad, Beetee, there as punishment for wanting to dismantle things, sent to train his son for death. Beetee teaches Haymitch about potato batteries, sneakily and secretly gives him his own potato light kit, and they quietly discuss how to destroy the arena. They all gather together after this and Wyatt mentions the odds they'll need to take down the Careers. There are more non-Careers working together, so they might stand a chance of defeating them… but then what?

Unfortunately after this, as everyone else is escorted back to the apartments they share before the games, Haymitch is taken by Plutarch to see President Snow. Plutarch shows Haymitch around a very cool library full of his own family's books and other belongings. They discuss The Raven, Lenore Dove’s song, while they wait and then Snow arrives. Soon though, he starts vomiting blood and Plutarch sends Haymitch to get some milk for him. Instead of giving the milk over, Haymitch drinks all of it and pretends there isn't any while obviously wiping away his milk mustache. Plutarch leaves to get some more and while he's gone, Snow talks knowingly of District 12 and the type of person he thinks Lenore Dove is. It's all very threatening. Before he takes his leave, Snow gives Haymitch a gift. It is Louella.

Louella is weird and dumb and robotic and obviously not actually Louella. Snow says that not many people saw what actually happened to her. They are going to pretend that she didn't die violently by horse and are going to use this young, brainwashed body double girl as her replacement. This is beyond creepy, but Haymitch is dismissed. Plutarch tells Haymitch he had no idea about any of this and it's obvious he also thinks it's creepy. Same for everyone in the 12 apartment. They decide that they will take care of this girl, whoever she is or wherever she's from, because this isn't her fault, but they can't call her Louella or even Not Louella, but it has to be something similar so as not to confuse this tiny brainwashed child. They decide to call her Lou Lou. Wiress notices she has some sort of device on her chest that is probably drugging her and is afraid to remove it while Mags offers her extra helpings of food because she's also clearly starving. 

They decide to practice keeping watch at night and all sleep in the girls’ room. Haymitch stays up and is accidentally dozing and dreaming of The Raven. When he gets to the part about someone gently rapping, rapping at his chamber door, he realizes that is actually happening and that the power is out. Beetee has come knocking with electrified boiled potatoes to ask if Haymitch is serious about wanting to break the games. Wiress has taken down the power in the building so no one will be monitoring them for a few minutes. Beetee tells Haymitch about a secret level under the arena that controls a lot of systems that they never show when reporting about the games, obviously. They will plan to drown it. Beetee has an elaborate plan and Haymitch is key. He will blow a hole in a water tank in the sublevel after sneaking through a tunnel for Muttations, Mutts, the horrifying hybrid animal creatures created to do horrible things to the tributes in the arena. Others are already on board as well and will help, including his son, but Haymitch doesn't trust many people and doesn't say anything about the plan to the others from 12.

Another day of training and learning with the other tributes gives the Newcomers, what the group opposing the Careers come to call themselves, a chance to gather the tributes from District 6, so now they have pretty much everyone who is not from a Career district, 1,3, and 4. The Careers also convinced 5 to join them, leaving the Newcomers as more or less everyone else. That definitely increases their odds, Wyatt confirms. Panache, the Career from District 1, bullies and threatens a bunch of people but doesn't do anything because Peacekeepers are watching since they had to tase him that time that he punched Haymitch. 

All the tributes are judged and ranked and have interviews with sponsors at the end of this session. The Careers of course get high rankings, a lot of the Newcomers get midranges, but Haymitch gets a one. No one has ever gotten a one before, but in his interview, he did tell them that he wasn't even supposed to be a part of the games because he was illegally chosen and that basically they're all murderers, so of course his odds will be pretty low. That's pretty suspiciously low though.

After this, it's soon time for interviews with Caesar Flickerman and Drusilla has to help them prepare. She is horrible as always but suggests that Haymitch play up a role as a rascal, a bad boy, to make people like him. She at least wants everyone from 12 to be memorable in some way, so he should go that route, Maysilee will be a catty shrew whether anyone wants her to be or not, Wyatt will show off his mathematical oddsmaking skills and Lou Lou, who Drusilla doesn't even realize is a creepy stand-in, will be the lunatic. They all privately decided before that they won't say anything of any import around Lou Lou because she obviously has listening devices implanted somewhere and an earpiece controlling her. They might use her to their advantage though. 

When it's time for them to get ready and their prep team comes, they are freaking out because the main one who didn't show up earlier, Magno, was found flailing around his home, probably dying, after licking a toad. This guy is clearly nuts. Proserpina, one of the makeup artists who are students and are afraid they're going to fail because of the toad-licker, calls her older sister for help. She's very fashionable and already making waves at the Capitol even though she's pretty young, just in her 20s, so they are sure she will be able to help. She arrives soon and it is none other than Effie Trinket. She has armloads of black clothes from her great aunt that will work perfectly for the Caesar interviews. 

They dress Haymitch in a fancy shirt with cocktails on it and he leans into his rascal role by playing up his alcohol distilling and bootlegging in 12 in the interview. He's the last one to be interviewed, and while everyone is waiting for their turn, Beetee quietly discusses more of the plan with him, to go north, that Ampert will find him, and that the necklaces that District 9 wears have been made into explosives, but he has to stop short when the toad-licker arrives. He tries to dress his tributes but only succeeds in giving Lou Lou a snake to wear as a living scarf. 

The interviews go well and the Careers end up looking like meathead idiots while the Newcomers really seem to support each other while subtly showing off their skills. When it comes to 12, Maysilee snootily comments on everyone's outfits but everyone loves it and Lou Lou hisses like a snake before screaming that they're all going to be murdered and then probably is knocked out by whoever is controlling her. Wyatt's turn comes and he suggests everyone should bet on Haymitch because he was ranked the lowest. His odds will pay off the most. Haymitch is very rascally in his interview, but charmingly and impressively so. Unfortunately Plutarch comes for him after it's over and takes him away again, this time for a phone call, but comments on what he's up to along the way, mentioning that Haymitch can trust him. Haymitch thinks the call is from President Snow, but it's Lenore Dove.

Lenore Dove has been arrested in 12 for playing music that goes against the Capitol, but she wasn't playing alone. Others were joining in and singing along. She says she'll be released the next day so not to worry but also that it's her fault that Haymitch is in the games and why he was ranked so low and hints she wants to die, but he stops that line of thinking. After the phone call ends, Plutarch tells Haymitch that he has to go through with the plan to drown the games and tells him that he's learned some things about the arena. The sun there is the same sun they have, which Haymitch would have assumed anyway, but means that he can now tell directions. Beetee told him that the tank he must destroy is to the north, so that's a great clue. Plutarch also mentions where and how they might release Mutts into the arena, beneath a berm, a type of flowerbed, and that if he can follow a Mutt when it returns after attacking, he can get down to the sublevel.

When they go back to the 12 apartment for a photoshoot Plutarch planned that goes awry because of the scarf snake, Maysilee questions Haymitch’s desire to go on his own in the arena. He hasn't told anyone about Beetee’s plan and is going to stick to it. Obviously he's still going to help them and they will help him, too, but he doesn't want anyone to get hurt because of him and he knows that Snow wants him dead. As a sort of apology, Haymitch gives Maysilee the potato light kit that Beetee gave him.

Finally, it's time to enter the arena. The tributes from 11 and 12 are flown in together and Lou Lou recognizes one of the 11 tributes’ token necklaces and begins singing a district 11 song, which catches everyone off guard. Well at least now they know she's a stolen child from 11, but the 11 tributes don't recognize her. It's very tragic, but they don't have time to dwell on it because it's time. They are escorted down a long hallway with doors on one side and pipes on the other and Haymitch believes they are in the sublevel. They are each sent into their own small chambers and soon they are sent up tubes and into the arena. 

After staying the mandatory 60 seconds on their platforms, thanks Effie for mentioning that before they are sent up, the bloodbath begins. Haymitch runs as north as he can and grabs a backpack of supplies along the way. About two miles away, after listening to all the murder and the cannon fire that signals tribute deaths, Haymitch stops and looks at his supplies in his backpack. He finds that he has a hammock, binoculars, two gallons of water, a dozen apples, a dozen hard-boiled eggs, six potatoes and charcoal tablets. Great, he can maybe use the potatoes for Beetee's light source, but he'll probably eat them instead.

After checking his pack, Haymitch looks around as he continues his trek north and notices that he's in a beautiful woodland with birds and rabbits and flowers and a nice stream. He decides not to eat anything until he learns more, but does get a drink from the stream. He sees a small rabbit doing the same, but then the rabbit dies immediately. Oh no, the water is poisonous. Probably everything outside of his pack is. He remembers his mamaw using charcoal when she was sick, so he eats some, hoping it is enough to dispel the poison. He feels horrible and stumbles his way into a berry bush to hide. 

When night falls, the national anthem plays and the fallen tributes are displayed in the air for everyone to see. Of the 48 children in the arena, 20 did not survive the first day - 4 Careers and 16 Newcomers. Luckily Ampert survived, but many of the little ones that Haymitch would have been looking after if he had not felt the need to go on his own to keep everyone safe from Snow and to complete Beetee's plan have died. From his own district, Wyatt, the oddsmaker, did not survive. Haymitch tucks back into his berry bush and goes to sleep.

Haymitch is startled awake by Lou Lou who has found him and was made to find him by the voice in her ear. Great. He shares his food with her and plans to continue his search for the right berm, of which there are many with nice labels marking each type of flower, so he can go beneath and blow up the water tank, but he tells Lou Lou, and whoever is listening, that they are going to go in search of her snake. Lou Lou finds some flowers that she must recognize from home and climbs inside the patch only to nearly immediately die from whatever poison comes from the flowers. Haymitch holds the tiny girl as she dies. 

When Lou Lou is dead, Haymitch, at first, decides to run away with her body and not let the Capitol take her, but then he rethinks and decides that's probably not what a rascal would do, and then he gets electroshocked by butterfly mutts. He uses flowers from another berm that create a brief fire to barbecue them away and in doing so, realizes a couple of things. One, his clothing is somewhat fireproof. Two, he should follow these butterfly mutts back to their berm so he can continue his mission, and three, needs to keep up his rascal charade. He decides revenge is rascally enough and chases the butterflies to the Butterfly Bush berm with the torch, scorches a lot of them, and manages to keep the trap door where some escaped open just a little bit. Part of his mission accomplished, now he just needs to wait for Ampert. 

Haymitch shouldn't really go looking for Ampert as it doesn't fit his narrative, so he climbs up a tree to rest. When he wakes, it's to a sponsor gift of rolls, cheese, grape juice and a wineglass to drink it from. He enjoys a meal and then spots Ampert coming. He decides he will pretend he's only after information on the mountain side of the arena where Ampert came from and not about anyone or anything else to keep up the loner persona. Ampert picks up what Haymitch is putting down and gives various clues to how their friends are faring. Wyatt was killed by Panache in the first rush of everyone dying. Another two tributes have died according to last night's announcement, a Career and Lou Lou, and Maysilee is on her own somewhere. 

After the update, Ampert and Haymitch wait for nightfall when most of the audience and game makers will be asleep then get to work. Ampert has two of the explosive District 9 necklaces and Haymitch has found a way into the sublevel, so now they can explode the tank. Haymitch pries open the butterfly mutt hatch and climbs a ladder way down into the sublevel. He finds the water tank, sets the explosives and runs, knowing he doesn't have much time before the tank will explode. As he climbs the ladder, looking up at a waiting Ampert, bat mutts swoop in and attack and then the tank blows. Haymitch somehow makes it back into the arena but only to find another set of mutts, squirrel mutts this time, and they have devoured Ampert, leaving nothing behind but his bones. 

With his friend gone, Haymitch thinks he's failed, but then the arena starts to go haywire. Streams are steaming, trees are throwing sparks, the fake sky fuzzes out and reveals the real night sky beyond. Haymitch cheers but then there is what feels like an earthquake and the mountain, where literally everyone else in the arena presumably is, explodes into a volcano.

The volcano coats the arena in a weird, crystalline ash and it probably killed a lot of tributes, but he couldn't hear the cannon fire because of the explosions. Haymitch toys with seeking out survivors or continuing his mission of ending the games. He opts to search for the arena’s generator which would, according to Beetee, be located outside of the arena to the north. Haymitch travels as far north as he can and comes across a prickly holly bush that he thinks is probably guarding the edge of the arena where the generator is. He works his way into the bush but gets hopelessly lost and confused in a maze.

Until he spots a rabbit. He follows the rabbit out of the bramble and directly into three Careers, two unnamed from District 4 and Panache from 1. They attack, and Haymitch, without thinking, kills the girl from 4 with a knife to the gut and kills the boy from 4 with a hamstring slash and neck chop with an ax he took from Ampert’s skeleton. Now only Panache is left and he nearly takes Haymitch out. Luckily, just before he kills him, Panache gets hit in the throat with a dart and collapses.

Maysilee puts away her dart gun and offers to ally with Haymitch. Even though he knows Snow is going to get him in the end, he agrees. The two remaining tributes from 12 share their food and all their supplies and then watch the report at the end of the day showing who died, and there were a lot of them. After their Career kills and the volcano and everything else that happened that day, there are only 10 left from the original 48, and only 2 of those are Careers. Soon, a sponsor gift of bean and ham soup, a 12 favorite, lands nearby.

After a nice meal, sharing everything 50-50 and a night of rest, Haymitch and Maysilee have to decide what to do next. Haymitch wants to go back north to the holly bush maze and try to destroy the generator but Maysilee wants to go back to the cornucopia for supplies and try to find the rest of the Newcomers. Haymitch convinces her to go north, but they do stop to gather the supplies left by the three Careers first. With a little more food and a blowtorch now in their possession, they head to the holly.

Haymitch thinks they should just hack straight through the bushes and that seems like a great plan, until the holly berries come to life as bloodsucking exploding ladybugs. Within moments they are both covered in the mutts and have to back out to pick them off. Well, that was a terrible idea, and because it was so bad, they decide to head for the cornucopia instead. Unfortunately, along the way, they hear a weird baby crying and a male tribute screaming. They know all the male Careers are dead, so they try to help the Newcomer. 

It's a lost cause. The male Newcomer and two others, not Careers though, are in a losing battle with a metallic porcupine the size of a bear making baby sounds. Haymitch throws his ax at the mutt but all that does is make it shoot its poisonous quills. Luckily Haymitch and Maysilee don't get hurt too bad, but the other three don't make it. They scavenge their supplies and settle down to rest. 

When the Capitol report plays that night, they see that five more Newcomers have died, leaving five tributes left. Them, one Newcomer and two Careers. They decide that they will work together to make sure they win and that the games stop. They will try to rescue the other Newcomer and hope that one of them will survive. Before going to sleep, Maysilee shares a rhyme that is stuck in her head when Haymitch jokingly asks for a lullaby. Instead of putting him to sleep, the song, about ladybugs in a frying pan, gives him an idea of how to get through the holly ladybug maze.

The idea is of course to blast through it with the blowtorch, but Haymitch has to convince Maysilee to go back and there's a lot of talk about making posters for themselves, like their own way of showing themselves off and sharing what actually happens in the arena. They start north again but before they make it to the holly maze, they encounter the two Careers and, as they run from them, they all come across three Gamemakers doing some maintenance on a berm. The Gamemakers threaten the tributes but one of the Careers throws a trident, killing one, Maysilee kills another with a dart, and the third falls into the berm and down to the sublevel to their death. Before Haymitch, Maysilee or the Careers can kill each other, the Capitol steps in, dropping bombs and tear gas, so everyone scatters. 

The Careers are followed by the bombs, so Haymitch and Maysilee go to the holly maze and torch their way through it. They make it through and find themselves on the edge of a cliff. Way down below, Haymitch spots the generator, but there's nothing he can do to break it from so far away. A rock falls off the cliff and, instead of clattering to the ground, it flies right back up. Haymitch throws another rock down to see what happens and it bounces off some sort of forcefield, following its exact reverse trajectory right back into his hand. Resolved that there's nothing he can do, Haymitch decides, since they are technically outside of the arena now, he's going to stay out there and make the Gamemakers come for him to show how despicable they are. Maysilee agrees to split up because really, neither of them wants to kill the other and they might've had to if they stuck together. 

Unfortunately, almost immediately after they separate, Maysilee is killed by pink bird mutts. She gets a few of them with a knife, but they stab her to death with their beaks. They, just like Ampert's squirrels, want nothing to do with Haymitch, except to kill his friend. He stays with Maysilee as she dies and then takes her blowgun and her token necklace. After her body is retrieved, a sponsor gift falls to him, strawberry ice cream and coffee, two of Maysilee’s favorites. Haymitch enjoys them, thinking of how much he came to love Maysilee like a sister in the end. He sorts through her pack and finds the potato light kit that Beetee gave him and he gave to her before entering the arena.

Haymitch decides to go looking for the only Newcomer left, a girl from 6 called Wellie. He's determined to keep her safe from the one Career, Silka, left and make sure the Newcomer wins, thinking that's what Maysilee would've wanted. Surprisingly it doesn't take long to find her hiding up in a tree. He climbs up to see Wellie has nearly starved to death. Soon a sponsor gift of food comes and Haymitch uses the potato kit to share some light with this tiny frail girl. Below on the ground, Haymitch hears Silka crying and so he drops some food down to her. 

After resting in the tree overnight, Haymitch realizes his hands are black with soot and that Maysilee's necklace was another explosive fuse like Ampert had. He decides that he's going to try to get Silka to follow him to the cornucopia and blow them both up. It's not a bad plan, but what is bad is that Wellie refuses to let Haymitch leave her, not even to go make food or gather wood for a fire. He gives Wellie Maysilee's blowgun for protection and hides her, hoping he'll be back soon to get some food in her and then they can both go to the cornucopia. 

Nothing good ever happens to Haymitch though, and while he's gone gathering firewood, he receives another sponsor gift. It's milk. This one has to be from Snow and it's definitely poisoned. He knows that Snow knows everything he's been up to this entire time and that he drank his milk earlier in the library and now he's paying him back and setting him up to look like a villain. No one watching at home will know that the milk is poison so if he pours it out instead of giving it to starving Wellie, everyone will hate him. He is about to decide to drink it himself even though he knows he'll die, but luckily?, the cannon goes off. Either Wellie or Silka is dead. Hopefully, it's the Career. He tosses the milk aside and runs. 

It's not the Career that is dead, it's Wellie. Silka has decapitated her. Haymitch flies off the handle and the two begin to fight, brutally, with axes. They each get in a couple of strikes, but then Haymitch's gut gets sliced open. He turns to run and Silka grabs him in a headlock. Just before he passes out, Haymitch plunges his dagger over his shoulder, breaks free as Silka screams, and runs away from her. She follows as Haymitch runs toward the canyon edge where the generator is. He gets far enough away to check the damage to his gut and it is bad. When he realizes Silka is coming, he at least sees that his dagger found her eye socket, so they're probably both going to be goners soon. Then she throws her ax directly at Haymitch. 

Haymitch drops down and the ax sails over his head and down toward the generator. Which is protected by a forcefield. That returns whatever is aimed at it directly back along its same trajectory. Silka gets taken out by her own ax lodging itself into her head. Haymitch knows he's about to die, too, even though he's just won the Hunger Games, so he decides he's going to go out with a bang, literally. He uses Maysilee's fuse and the other explosive flower token from 9 that Ampert gave him and lights the fuse with Lenore Dove's flint striker. Trumpets blare declaring Haymitch the winner and then Gamemakers shoot at him, demanding he stop what he's doing. Too late. Haymitch tosses the bomb down toward the generator’s force field and everything explodes. Haymitch dies happily with his intestines in his hands.

Except he doesn't die. Haymitch wakes in what must be the laboratory where they create the mutts. He sees several throughout periods of blackouts and injections and pain. When he really wakes up, who knows how long later, he's back in the tribute apartments and his gut is stitched up and healing. He's all alone and shambles to the kitchen to find something to eat but all that is there are some rolls and milk. He spends days alone, being watched on several cameras, thinking of Wiress and Mags and Beetee. Are they dead? Punished? What about Plutarch? Whose side is he really on? 

More days pass and Haymitch starts spending most of his time in the bathtub, soaking in hot water. His food goes bad but he still eats it. Soon the television starts turning on and off all on its own, and it’s playing clips from old Hunger Games, from back before they were so showy and full of pageantry. Then he sees a girl in a rainbow dress singing. She reminds him of Lenore Dove and he thinks she must be the winner from District 12 back in the tenth Games. She reaches to someone offstage and Haymitch can see that the person looks familiar. He does some quick math and realizes that President Snow would have been 18 during the tenth Hunger Games and that he must be the person offstage. That's why he spoke so knowingly of District 12 before. Now Haymitch thinks of Lenore Dove and how Snow will punish her for his winning the Games because he clearly hates District 12 for some reason having to do with the singing girl who is probably somehow related to Lenore Dove.

After some raging and destroying of furniture, Peacekeepers come to stop Haymitch, but with them are Effie Trinket and his prep team. It's now time to get him cleaned up for the Victor’s Ceremony. Haymitch is bathed and styled and dressed in Effie's uncle’s clothes again and brought to an area underneath Caesar Flickerman’s stage. There are others down there with him, like Drusilla and Magno, who is wobbly from toad licking, and Proserpina and Vitus. Also there are Mags and Wiress. Mags is in a wheelchair and Wiress looks weird and jittery. Clearly bad, bad things have happened to those two. They are all put on platforms and lifted up on Caesar's stage.

Haymitch rises to tumultuous applause. He's the hero of Panem as far as the crowd is concerned. Haymitch watches as a clip show of the Second Quarter Quell plays, showing the arena in full, looking exactly like a giant eye. Everything is very, very heavily edited. Nothing rebellious that he did is seen. There's nothing with the water tank explosion or the generator explosion. Full days are edited out and everything is pieced together so the Capitol, with its giant literal eye on everything, controls the narrative. Haymitch is a victor but not a rebel. Snow has won and the citizens eat up the propaganda. Soon the president arrives and crowns Haymitch as a victor. Snow leaves Haymitch with a menacing “Enjoy your homecoming.”

Before Haymitch is taken back to District 12, he has to go to an after-party where he is held in a gilded cage. Capitol citizens stop by to feed him weird foods and make him pose for photos. He plays everything up and acts like he's enjoying himself, but he's only doing it in the hopes that it will keep his loved ones back home safe. Finally he sees Plutarch and asks him what's going on with Lenore Dove, but as far as he knows, she's still locked up. So she lied to him about being released the next day before the Games started? Or she was lied to herself and was never set free? Haymitch is worried.

Soon Haymitch is loaded onto the train that will take him back to 12 but he sits forever, waiting. A peacekeeper shows up and Haymitch asks why they haven't left yet and finds out it's because they were waiting on his friends to arrive. His friends? Just then, three plain wood coffins are loaded onto the train and they set off. All along the journey back, Haymitch thinks of the songs that Lenore Dove sings, especially the forbidden ones, like The Hanging Tree. Will he and Lenore Dove hang together when he returns?

Finally the train stops in District 12. Haymitch exits the train and starts walking toward his home. He's going to see his mom and brother again soon! Then, oh no. He sees his house… and it's on fire. Everyone in the district is helping to put out the fire but it's no use. Haymitch's mother and brother are dead. Welcome home. His friend Burdock Everdeen gets his girlfriend Asterid to give Haymitch some sleep syrup to knock him out.

Haymitch wakes up at Louella’s house. He wants to rush to Lenore Dove but Louella’s mom says she's got a hearing and Haymitch going won't help her, plus they've got a funeral to attend. There are five graves dug and waiting, one for Haymitch's mother and brother who held each other as they died, one for Louella, Maysilee and Wyatt, and one for Wyatt's dad who just hanged himself the day before. Burdock sings a mournful song about seeing loved ones again after death and then the funeral is over.

Haymitch starts for home and then realizes his home is gone. He knows that Snow is responsible for the fire because everyone in District 12 is very careful about fires since they work in the mines with explosives. Burdock and another friend Blair help Haymitch to his new house in Victor's Village and Asterid gets more sleep syrup. That night, Haymitch sneaks out past his watching friends and heads toward the meadow where he knows Lenore Dove will show eventually after being released by the Peacekeepers. He wants to run away so Snow will stop hurting everyone he loves, but he doesn't want to leave without seeing Lenore Dove one more time.

Finally Lenore Dove arrives in the meadow and she sees the bag of gumdrops Haymitch got for her before he left for the Games. She picks them up and twirls around and he can't wait any longer. He rushes to her and they embrace and he feeds her gumdrops. She excitedly eats a couple and can't wait to eat the ones he gave her, too, that she's been holding onto. Wait what. These aren't those gumdrops? No. They are not. They are poison sent by Snow. As soon as Haymitch realizes, he gets Lenore Dove to vomit up the candy but it's too late. She's already dying. Her last words to Haymitch are about not letting the sun rise on another reaping.

Time passes for Haymitch after this in nightmares, sleep syrup, and when the sleep syrup runs out, alcohol, and Lenore Dove's song, The Raven. Eventually he has to go on the Victory Tour and is retrieved by Effie and Plutarch. Effie has now replaced Drusilla as 12’s escort, thanks to Plutarch. As they travel throughout the Districts, Plutarch finally gets Haymitch alone where there are no cameras watching to tell him that they need him to continue fighting against the Games and the president. Haymitch doesn't think he's the right person for the job, but Plutarch assures him he is. Haymitch doesn't trust him because of all the propaganda he's continually producing for the Capitol and prefers to be left alone. 

Many years pass for Haymitch with the ghost of Lenore Dove and lots of alcohol. His friend Burdock has a baby girl he's very proud of but then he dies in an explosion and the girl trades things to care for her family. This girl is Katniss, of course, and soon Haymitch watches as she volunteers as tribute in the Games. She and Peeta were the ones to finally beat Snow and end the sunrise on the reaping. More years pass and Haymitch finally tells Katniss and Peeta his whole story about his lost love Lenore. He doesn't know how much time he has left, but he knows that he'll spend the rest of his days with the ghost of his girl by his side. Only this, and nothing more.