finnick backstory that turned into something kind of like a fic?? idk
Finnick is eleven years old before he realizes that he is an only child.
Both of his parents are the youngest of four siblings, which spreads twelve cousins out before him throughout his entire life. He spends every day with them, swinging the younger ones up on his shoulders and dogging after the older ones as they dart in the waves. Brother and sister are thrown around so often that Finnick just assumes that's what they are for him as well.
Emil and Milo are newborn twins the year he's reaped.
It's part of the reason why he gives in so easily to Snow's demands once he's won. Two parents, twelve aunts and uncles, twelve cousins, and Mags. Finnick chokes out that he'd do anything to protect them, and that evil smile that crawls across Snow's face doesn't ever leave him.
Finnick spends three months out of the year on a ship - his mother and father specialize in oysters, and the frigid winter waters hold the key to their success for the rest of the year.
He learns early on how to man a ship, being trained by his father's crew. His mother is a strong woman, not content to stay at shore and wait for the men to return - in fact, she's the one who teaches him how to throw spears and tridents. As a child, Finnick thinks it's just for fun. As he gains more duties on the ship, he thinks it's to help with the food supply.
As his name is drawn for the Hunger Games, he realizes it was a precautionary measure.
When he returns to Four, after the fanfare and the reunions, Finnick goes out to sea.
His parents are smart - after watching their son carefully on a television screen, seeing the change in his eyes as he snared those tributes in a net and stabbed them through, they don't let him go alone. They take the smaller of their three ships and cast off, just the three of them in the fading August sun.
The boy who stood steadfast on a violently rocking ship and barked orders to a panicking crew is gone. This boy doesn't look like he could man a rowboat in a swimming pool. Luckily, the sea is calm this summer, and the family can anchor and rest, fish for fun and speak carefully. The Games have changed Finnick - his public persona is as boisterous and charming as ever, but in private he is silent as he never was before.
"Smooth seas never made a skillful sailor," his father says, just as he has for Finnick's whole life.
"But they probably make a happier one," Finnick answers solemnly.
Once they knew their son was coming back to them, Arnav and Mara had time to figure out what to do with him. They decide not to force the issue, to be quiet when he is quiet and wait until he feels like talking. The shushing of the waves will be his therapy, and they'll let him fish and build rafts and tie knots until he's back- not to normal, just back.
It takes two weeks at sea before he speaks of his time in the arena. "What's the point," their son laughs hollowly. "You guys saw it all."
Still, he tells them about the friend- this word chokes him, the ally he made from Ten, a small and frightened boy named Erram. (Finnick felt pained even when he first saw him in training. A shepherd boy who couldn't be less fit to fight in the arena - even though he knew two couldn't make it out alive, Finnick felt the need to protect him.) Everyone saw him get shot by an arrow meant for Finnick. Still, Finnick tries to block that out and remember instead how kind the boy was, how he didn't want to kill anyone. Just wanted to stay alive.
He tells them about the food in the Capitol, about his lilac-skinned stylist who kept asking if he had a girl back home, about that beautiful trident.
"It was like spearing fish," the boy says, casting out his line again. It's dawn, dad is sleeping, and Mara gives him a startled look. "That's what I had to believe," Finnick clarifies, and lets his mother wrap her arms around him.
His first few months back in District Four are strange.
The people who've known him his entire life don't buy the cocky pretty boy guise, and Finnick's stuck in a personality haze. Mags reminds him to keep it up in case there are cameras, but he's still shell-shocked and it tends to slip away. His smallest cousins are scared of him. Finnick grits his teeth and bears it, puts up with all the people who flock to him for whatever they think he can give them - safety, perhaps.
"Next year will be hard," Mags tells him. "They always target the tributes from the previous winning district."
Finnick puts his head down on the table and Mags give him a few pats on the back before she returns to gutting fish.
At first, it isn't terrible. Snow makes sure that Finnick is at the Capitol for all important events, the shining golden boy that everyone can look at - but not touch. Not yet.
He tries to refuse an invitation a year and a half later. "There's a birthday party for my cousins that night," he says when the prep team comes to whisk him away. His stylist, Criselle, practically drags him to the waiting train, but Finnick digs his heels into the sand. "I'm not leaving my family behind," he insists. Capitol parties are ridiculously plush, but he wouldn't pass up the paper lanterns and sea salt ice cream for all the riches in the world.
Eventually, they leave him with pitying looks. Mags shakes her head sadly - "You should have gone," is all she says.
A week later, days before the party, Aunt Kai comes tearing into their home, a wild frenzy of tears and screams. The twins, their parents, and their older sister have been found dead in their home. Milo had just learned to walk; Finnick had been carving them tiny baby boats to keep them afloat in the surf.
He doesn't outright deny Snow after that.
Once he turns sixteen, Finnick belongs to the Capitol.
When he doesn't return to Four after two months, Mags brings a care package from his parents. Finnick returns to his new house - you could hardly call it a home - after a night out with twin beauties, his eyes red from sleep deprivation. Criselle will cover up the dark bags and remove the nail marks later, but for now, he just presses a sand dollar to his cheek. Finnick imagines it still warmed from the sun, imagines diving underwater where no one can find him, imagines being anywhere but here.
It's an easy enough arrangement: three months in the Capitol, three months at home. When people back home ask what he's doing there, Finnick's been trained to flash his charming smile and explain that when you live in the Capitol, it's all party, all the time. There's no shortage of things for a victor to do.
He and Mags do their best with the tributes they're given. One almost makes it to the end of the 68th Games, but a girl named Johanna Mason throws an axe at him. At his face, to be precise. With fantastic aim.
Finnick gapes at the television as Haymitch laughs so hard, he chokes on his drink. Engle's brains are splattered on the tree behind him, and they all watch as Johanna carelessly picks her axe back up and walks off. She's terrifying.
Finnick changes course immediately and places all his bets on her.
"We all know what you do," Johanna sneers. Her first time in the mentor's lounge and she's already making enemies. Finnick shrugs and picks at the lint that doesn't exist on his perfectly pressed suit. She goes on to call him weak, says she didn't give into that, and that catches his attention.
Finnick turns his eyes on her and says quietly, "Then I don't want to know what you had to do instead."
"Yeah, you really don't."
An uproar breaks their tension, and both of their heads whip to look at the screen. Johanna's girl just bludgeoned one of Haymitch's kids to death - impossible to tell if it was the boy or the girl, she really did a number with that boulder. Beetee is the only one not shouting, just cleaning his glasses and looking sharply at Finnick. He was listening. Right. Best to not talk to Johanna about it now. So all Finnick does is offer her a smile - not the plastered one that everyone sees, but a real one. She doesn't return it, but she doesn't slap him either, so Finnick figures he's okay.
The 69th Games drag on and on and on and on. When both of his tributes go down in flames, literally, Snow starts renting Finnick out again. As long as he's in the Capitol, right?
One of the retired Game Makers has him for two whole days - Finnick doesn't want to even imagine what she must have paid for that, but what he got in return is more valuable than money. As soon as he steps out her front door, he's face to face with Johanna, of all people.
"My girl bit it," she says scornfully. "Tracker jackers."
"I bet that was ugly," Finnick says, and tries to sidestep her, but it doesn't work.
Johanna grabs his arm with more force than necessary and steers him in the opposite direction of their headquarters. "Come on, let's get lunch." He laughs despite himself, being dragged around by such a small (but scary) girl. "Somewhere I can get beef stew - you can get a salad, you're a girl anyway."
"As long as you pay," Finnick grins. "I mean, if you're the man here and all…"
She punches him in the arm, and when Criselle is restoring him to Body Base Zero the next morning, she gasps at the huge bruise. "Did the Game Maker do that?"
"No, one of the other mentors - ugh, not like that."
Snow's rules seem to get more strict as the years go on. If Finnick's persona fades for even a second, terrible things happen. The electricity in Four is cut off for two months. Tesserae promised to poor families never comes through. Horrendous storms sweep in and uproot entire villages.
His family's ship casts off as usual in October, and it never returns. His mother, father, three uncles, a handful of cousins, and the rest of their crew.
Mags had a stroke recently, so she isn't much comfort when he returns to Four. Still, she clutches his hand in her own gnarled one as the walk through the docks. The odd pair pauses next to the wooden sign bearing faded paint that reads ODAIR, two smaller ships and the space where the work ship used to be.
"Games are coming up," Mags slurs.
Finnick squeezes her hand, and it's a long time before he speaks. "I'll take the tributes this year," he says, his voice empty. "You should rest."
She smiles up at him. "Good boy, good boy," and it's all he can do to not break down right there.
After that, he's perfect. He never falters for even a second. The only time he lets himself crack is in the shower, facing the wall, with all the lights off. Other than that, no one sees him shed a single tear. He learns how to numb his face into a permanent smile. He spends most of his waking hours working out, and the hours when he should be sleeping entertaining his clients.
What an empty life, he thinks, but never speaks it aloud again.
It's been five years since he won the Games, and Finnick is ready. Snow sinking his family's ship was the last straw - he will get one of his tributes out alive this year, come hell or high water. He will be the perfect mentor, the perfect escort, the perfect golden boy until Snow loses interests and finds someone else.
Of course, when it's all said and done and he stands onstage with a severely shaken Annie Cresta at the end of it all, Finnick realizes he has to change course once again. Re-chart the stars, re-plot the map, turn about-face and go back the way he came. He won't let Snow take advantage of this poor maddened girl, no matter what he has to do for her.
Returning to Four is like playing Russian roulette. Finnick's always uneasy, always trying to avoid unwittingly striking disaster on his loved ones. (Though the family he has left distance themselves from him anyway.) He marches straight to the Victors' Village, to the place they put up Annie and her family.
It's an immense relief to find all five of them still there, still alive and well.
As well as Annie can be.
Still, they have a base level of trust left over from training, so she lets him into her bedroom. She sits hunched on the bed, long hair covering her face, not looking at Finnick.
"This is for you," he says quietly, handing her a small gold bracelet. He holds up his wrist to show a matching one. "Annie, I need you to listen to me."
She's shaking her head, murmuring "not here, not here" over and over. Finally, Finnick suggests they go for a walk, and though it takes no small amount of coaxing to get her out of the house, once her bare feet find the surf, she's in better shape.
"Beetee made them," Finnick says, staring straight ahead at the endless expanse of sand and sea. "If anyone from the Capitol tells you to do anything, say that you will. And then use these to call me."
Annie stops and bends down to poke at a dead jellyfish.
He waits a bit, but she doesn't look up at him or even acknowledge he's there. Finally, Finnick crouches in the wet sand and locks eyes with her. "You just hold it up like this," he demonstrates with his own, "And say my name. Okay?"
It takes a few seconds, but Annie's eyes clear and she nods. She tests it. She smiles, just a little at him. Finnick grins back.
Honestly, it's backup. The first thing Finnick did after the victor tour was meet with Snow himself to strike a deal - he'll live in the Capitol full-time, work as much as Snow tells him to, but no one can touch Annie. Snow flat out laughs in his face, reeking of blood and roses - "That shell of a girl is useless," he intones.
That's as much of an agreement as Finnick needs.
He pays dearly for that agreement, too. Finnick's busy morning, noon and night with barely a day off to recover. He doesn't understand how the bracelets work - something about an old satellite Beetee jacked, something about science, Finnick tunes out when they get to the specifics.
Luckily, they never have to use them. After the first year of peace for Annie and her family, Finnick thinks he could take it off - but he doesn't. That girl could find herself in a tight situation faster than she could say anything but his name, and Finnick knows he needs to be prepared.
He gets one week off every six months - that pretty generous, Criselle tells him snidely as they work to turn him good as new for his trip home.
With his childhood home preserved as something of a relic and his living family shirking away at the news of his arrival, Finnick spends the majority of his time with Mags. They're leaving early in the morning to fish on the Odairs' old boat when Annie wanders out of her house, barefoot with her hands twisted in a flimsy white dress.
"May I come?"
Finnick blinks back his surprise and looks at Mags, who shrugs, distracted by the cans of bait in her arms. "Of course," he says, and gallantly holds out an arm for her. Annie takes it gingerly.
At first, he's unsure of how she'll fare, but Annie seems more than comfortable on a boat. She sways with it, never once losing her balance, and sews the holes in Mags' clothes while the two fish.
This becomes something of a ritual when Finnick rolls into town with the waves, and eventually Mags lets the two go alone, a knowing smile on her aged and scarred face.
"Sometimes I think of saying your name," she confesses as Finnick adjusts the sails. They should get back to shore before dark, join Annie's family for dinner.
He laughs, and it feels so good to do that genuinely after six months of nonstop Capitol frivolity. "I'm curious how they work too," he says. "But I don't question Beetee's work. He's a genius, you know."
Annie's laughing too. It's unfamiliar, soft and sweet. "I know."
Things are so good at sea that Finnick nearly forgets what a wreck Annie can become. She has panic attacks at night and her sister forcefeeds her medicine sent from the Capitol to calm her brain. "She's better when you're here," the family always tells him. They too seem to genuinely like him, and leaving gets more painful each time.
When he's with his clients and finds that he can't detach, that his mind won't stop racing with thoughts of ships and home and Annie, Finnick begins to put the pieces together. He's usually so good at keeping these thoughts where they belong until he's in private, but no matter where he is or who he's with, his mind is taken with her.
"Idiot," Finnick says to himself in the mirror with a secret smile.
Johanna rolls her eyes so hard, Finnick's pretty sure they're going to stick that way. "Really? What's she going to mentor them in, how to scare off the other tributes with a mental breakdown?"
Finnick heaves a huge sigh as Annie covers her ears and begins babbling to herself. "Good to see you too, Johanna."
Still, he's pretty sure this is an ingenious plan. Annie's taking the place of Mags as a mentor - for formality's sake only, of course. Finnick's mentoring both tributes in the 72nd Games, but this way Annie can stay by his side. Is it ideal? Definitely not - they're on land, in an unfamiliar place, and Finnick still has his work to attend to. Still, he's worked it out so she doesn't have to watch the Games themselves. She tunes out and sews with fabric gifted from pitying stylists.
"Do you like living here?" she asks one night. One of their tributes is dead, but one seems like he has a fighting chance.
Finnick opens his eyes - she's much closer than she was when they first laid down. "I don't," he admits. "I wish I could live on a ship."
Annie's eyes are wide. "You should." One hand skitters out and touches his own. "The Capitol doesn't suit you."
"You either," Finnick laughs, unsure of what to do at the sudden contact. "But I have a job here." Her smile drops, and after considering it, Finnick takes her hand in his own. Leading on a mad girl is nothing short of disgusting, but Finnick's starting to realize that this perhaps isn't as one-sided as he assumed. "I'll come back more often this year," he promises, and Annie hums a happy tune, an old sailing song that puts both of them to an unusually peaceful sleep.