Mockingjay

The chapter opens on a distressed Katniss, whom Haymitch has just told that she won’t be allowed to join the final rebel mission to the Capitol. Katniss confronts Coin and demands a chance to participate in the fight. Coin reluctantly agrees to let Katniss train for three weeks, after which the district’s Assignment Board will assess her battle readiness. Johanna is allowed the same opportunity, and the two begin training together. Though the practice is physically painful, Katniss is uplifted by the prospect of being allowed to fight.

After a week of training, Katniss and Johanna are in high spirits. Over dinner one night, they are joined by Peeta, shackled and accompanied by guards. Peeta initially appears calm but makes a rude comment about Annie, which causes Finnick to leave the table. He then asks Gale and Katniss if they are officially together. Katniss notices that he is trembling. Gale says that the way Peeta hates Katniss is familiar. It’s how Gale used to feel when he watched her kissing Peeta on screen during their first Hunger Games. That night before bed, Johanna informs Katniss that after she left the table, Delly lambasted Peeta for his unkindness. Peeta began “arguing with himself like he was two people” (208). Katniss falls asleep and has nightmares about her time in the arena.

Katniss dedicates herself to training in the weeks leading up to her assessment. Peeta begins to join in on some sessions, still accompanied by guards. Plutarch reassures Katniss that it’s all for show. The people in the districts need to see footage of Peeta alive and participating in the rebel effort, but he won’t be allowed into actual combat.

Katniss and Johanna are approved for the final exam, which uses simulations to test potential soldiers’ greatest weaknesses. Katniss is thrown into a battle with Capitol Peacekeepers. After spotting a way to blow up a nearby gas tank and kill the Peacekeepers, she is ordered to hit the ground. Recognizing that the rebels perceive her impulsivity and defiance as liabilities, she obeys the order and passes her exam. Along with Gale and Finnick, she is assigned to Unit 451, a special unit of sharpshooters led by Boggs.

Unit 451 is called to Command, where Plutarch shows them a holographic map stolen from the Capitol. He points out the many booby traps, or “pods,” that litter the streets. The pods are designed to kill anyone who triggers them. Katniss and Finnick are instantly reminded of the booby-trapped Hunger Games arenas.

Katniss learns that Johanna failed her exam because part of the test caused her to have a traumatic flashback to her torture by the Capitol. Katniss visits her in the hospital, where Johanna makes her reaffirm her promise to kill President Snow.

Over the following days, Katniss meets the rest of her squad. Plutarch assigns Unit 451 to a special mission. They are to be the “Star Squad,” the on-screen faces of the revolution. In the Capitol, they will be kept away from the front lines and will film propos. The group reacts in indignation, but Katniss remains silent because she plans on splitting off from Unit 451 as soon as they reach the Capitol.

Unit 451 journeys to the Capitol, where the rebels have set up a camp near the outskirts and pushed the Capitol fighters back into the city. Three uneventful days pass with the unit filming propos; they are instructed to act as if they don’t know the pods’ locations, as doing so would reveal Plutarch’s betrayal of the Capitol. Katniss quietly plans her defection. Soldiers all receive paper maps, but commanders have Holos, devices that project a holographic map of the Capitol and the pods. Once activated, Holos respond to the voices of soldiers in their commander’s squadron. As a failsafe in case the wearer is captured, a Holo will explode if anyone says “nightlock” three times. Katniss knows that stealing Boggs’ Holo would be a near-impossible feat.

Plutarch’s maps contain some inaccuracies. On the morning of the fourth day, a soldier named Leeg 2 is killed by a mislabeled pod. The group is shocked when Peeta arrives as her replacement, assigned by Coin herself. Katniss wonders if Coin wants her dead.

Boggs assigns a rotation of soldiers to watch Peeta around the clock. Katniss asks Boggs outright if Coin is trying to have her killed. Boggs tells her that in Coin’s eyes, Katniss has already achieved her main goal as the Mockingjay: unification of the districts. If the rebels win the war, Coin suspects that Katniss won’t support her politically. The only remaining way for Katniss to help Coin is to die, giving the rebels a martyr to fight for.

Gale confronts Katniss about her plan to desert the unit. If she’s leaving, he wants to go with her. Katniss entertains the idea.

Over dinner that night, Haymitch notices Katniss acting coldly toward Peeta. He reminds her how hard they have worked to save his life and emphasizes that Peeta’s hijacking is not his fault. Katniss approaches Peeta while the others stand guard, and they have a brief conversation. Peeta tells her he can no longer distinguish between the real Katniss and the lies implanted by the Capitol. The next day, a soldier named Jackson invents an exercise called “Real or Not Real,” which involves Peeta describing a memory and the others telling him whether or not it truly happened.

Coin and Plutarch aren’t satisfied with the latest propos from Unit 451, so the group is sent to film on a residential street with a few active pods. Peeta meets Pollux, which triggers his memory of watching two red-haired Avoxes being tortured to death in the Capitol; one of them was Darius, a Peacekeeper from 12 who once saved Gale’s life.

The TV crew begins filming Unit 451 as they make their way down the street, disarming pods as they go. When they stop to take close-up shots, Boggs accidentally triggers a bomb that blows off both of his legs.

Katniss runs to Boggs, who transfers ownership of his Holo to her. A wave made of a strange oily substance starts to sweep through the block, blocking Unit 451’s path of retreat. The chaos triggers Peeta’s hijacked memories. He tries to bludgeon Katniss to death with his gun but is tackled by a soldier named Mitchell. Peeta launches Mitchell off of himself and into another pod, a barbed-wire net that kills him. The unit manages to restrain Peeta and take shelter in an abandoned apartment. They lock Peeta in a closet, where he falls unconscious. Katniss kneels by Boggs as he dies. His last words to Katniss are “don’t trust them. Don’t go back. Kill Peeta. Do what you came to do.” (237).

Jackson reaches for Boggs’ Holo, but Katniss says it belongs to her now. Unsure whether she can trust the rebels after Boggs’ words, she covers by claiming that Coin gave her a special mission to kill President Snow. Jackson doesn’t believe her and orders her to hand over the Holo, but Katniss refuses. The squad draws guns on one another, and it seems like someone may die until Cressida pipes in supporting Katniss’s claim. She says that Plutarch and Coin want Snow’s execution to be broadcast live, which is enough to turn the group in favor of Katniss, and she becomes their de facto leader.

Katniss orders the group to exit the block the same way they came in; she theorizes that the wave of oil may have triggered the pods in its path, leaving the street safe to traverse. As they cautiously make their way down the street, she is proven correct; all of the traps touched by the oil have discharged. Once they reach an area untouched by the oil wave, they take shelter in another apartment. The television suddenly turns on with an emergency broadcast from the Capitol, showing security camera footage of the scene that erupted on the street right after Boggs triggered the bomb. Amid the chaos, the oil wave covers the camera, obscuring the group’s escape. The Capitol reporter identifies the members of Unit 451 by name and pronounces them all dead. The fact that Beetee doesn’t interrupt the broadcast makes Katniss think the rebels must believe it.

Gale asks what they should do now that they’re dead. Peeta, who has regained consciousness, says that their next move is obvious—they have to kill him.