.Stone And Lumber (Johanna Mason X F.OC).

-Lashing Out-

What is faster then a human's reaction time?

The fury of another.

The impact so loud it bounced off the walls in wails of agony, the metal of the walls flinching in pain and the lights shuddering from imagined suffering.

It always looked like he was flying, hovering off the ground before the greedy hands of gravity dragged him back down into free fall, smacking into the tiled floor, head bouncing off.

It was a simple punch but it came from the incarnation of fury and pain, the knuckles of the gauntlet lacerating through the guard's cheek, the cheek bone dipping in as blood flying from his mouth, landing in a twitching heap.

One single punch, rendering a human useless.

She looked at him with pinpoint pupils, already heaving breaths in furry and that smile, that smile akin too something Capitol created, a monster that was never meant to be set loose.

It was like the earth cracked open and a beast from its depths crawled out, scaling up the walls of the sheer drop with claws cutting their way up.

And such a beast didn't let malice rest until the offending soul breathed.

Athena, hunched forwards, lunged at the man that barely gathered his few remaining thoughts, lifting his crushed face to look at the monster he created, just about long enough to see the clawed paw slam into his face, crushing his nose into his face as his head was yanked up before it was slammed into the tile so hard that either his skull or the tile made that breaking sound, the echo of his own brain bouncing in his head deafening him too his torment.

After the third slam, arms wrapped around her but she threw her leg back as they yanked her up, body checking them backwards, the hand grabbing at her clothes as the assailant fell, the fabric ripping.

"AAAH!!" Letting out a pure scream of hate, one of the only sounds not stolen from her, stepping back with a terrifying tremor running through her arms as she tried to cover herself, the tatters hanging off her front, relieving her front and bra.

CAN THEY JUST STOP UNDRESSING HER?!!

Sling.

The claws were the last things that poor man saw, screaming an ear piercing scream as the swipe blinded him as his head was grabbed and something hard, probably a knee, was driven in his face, breaking teeth.

She threw the body down face first and stomped on the back of his neck, making the head snap back and stick too that position.

She lifted her arms, threatening all that would approach, all the screaming deafening as she tried to make sense of it.

There was no fucking escape, where is the door? Where is the fucking door?!

She needs to survive, she needs to get out of here, where is the fucking exit?!

The room was spinning, strangling.

She lashed out, grabbing the gun aimed at her and hit upwards on the elbow, snapping it around before using the same hand to strike at their neck, seeing the muscle seize up around the hole she put there.

She yanked the body in front of her, holding the front, using it as a shield as the bullet impacts were felt through it.

She picked it up and threw out, stepping backwards.

Someone grabbed her arm, immediately aiming up a side kick, catching the person in the throat, sending them both tumbling.

"STOP!!"

That voice cut through the panic.

Athena swung out at the leg, too close, it was too close.

But despite the claws cutting flesh like butter, they bounced off metal.

----------------------------------------------

"STEP DOWN BEFORE YOU GET SHOT!!"

"I will not let you."

It was not Finnick, it was not Johanna, nor was it Heymitch or even Plutarch.

It was the man that Athena knew the least of all and that had yet again stepped up for her.

"Sir Cinna, move it before we shoot you too!!" The reinforcement forces called in to neutralize the threat was not being really convincing.

Despite the claw stuck in his leg in a deathly grip, despite the blood soaked corpses that made him nauseous, despite the live rounds in the guns aimed at him, this man didn't move.

"I said no, drop the guns, now."

A life for a life.

This woman, this child, had given so much for him, this is the least he can give back.

Others might see a thoughtless monster but he saw her descent into madness at the hand of the Capitol, he should have interfered sooner but that is now too late to think about.

This was a child that coped with what she lived through with violence, the lack of complete and utter autonomy lashing out when others tried to tell her what to do. The violence being the only thing to protect her, to keep her alive and they need to understand it.

And he'll be damned if he lets that be her end.

Despite the crazed look on her face, the ragged breathing and the blood covering the girl, beneath all the hurt and loss, beneath all the pain and anger, there was a girl that was just terrified that all situations would cause her more pain if she didn't eliminate the source of it... And after all, he promised someone would protect her.

The still quite sore older woman he knew as Mags grabbed his arm to help herself stand but she joined his side, ignoring the yelling.

"All of you out!! OUT!!" Heymitch called when he got to the scene, waving violently at the crowd and guard force. "Out you useless fucks!"

Finnick crouched near, ratcheting Athena's fingers off Cinna to free the man.

Athena swung up in blind anger... Or better called, fear, but being a victor that knew how to fight her, simply ducked under it and hugged it against her.

"Someone get her a damned jacket or something!" He yelled as Heymitch was still kicking up a storm to chase the people out, the man able to be quite persuasive when needed.

"She is a victor yeah? Well let us victors deal with it!" He'd tell the guards.

Johanna, not far behind, shrugged hers off, giving too Finnick as he wrapped it around Athena who made another useless swing, just scratching up the ground.

"Hey ssh... We are here and they are gone." Johanna sat next too Athena on the other side of where Finnick was crouching, grabbing her face. "The mean man are gone."

It felt like waking up from a nightmare, like the darkness in her mind was swept away, like the shapeless monster were gone, like the hands choking her let up before another feeling replaced those hands.

Athena sniffling before just full on sobbing without a care as too who was around her.

"What happened?" Katniss asked in a morbid awe at the blood scene and mess in front of her.

"Why don't you ask her sweetheart?" Heymitch said mockingly for once, using Katniss' nickname but hearing that word only made Athena cry even more.

She is not free and she'll never be free.

Why did she survive the 66th?!