@arainydream and I have a problem in that we’ve been taken over by the wild west role switched version of violent delights 🦇🩸🌵(also half of this is A’s ideas so blanket credit to her and also specific credit on a couple bits as noted)
it goes like this
True Grit + Rango + that aesthetic you think of when you think Wild West and desert and like a bit of steampunk? that one. it’s that one.
vampires are a known entity, but only to a few higher ups
Katniss is a bothersome vampire known as Lady Mockingjay (picture Megan Fox in Jonah Hex, but more elegant, more black and white)
when young, kind, lonely, recently cheated upon by his ex wife, Sheriff Mellark hears tell that Lady Mockingjay may be making her way to Seamtown, he decides to take matters into his own hands
and luckily, he knows an awful lot about vampire lore and has a silver cross necklace of binding that’ll fit the bill
so when Lady Mockingjay shows up at Effie’s saloon looking for a victim, Sheriff Mellark (undercover as a hapless citizen) volunteers to accompany her upstairs
after the necessary amount of bar flirting during which Katniss calls him a “pretty little thing” and he tries to hide how much he likes it
so they go upstairs
and this should be the moment when under pretense of seduction Katniss attacks him and he kills her
but then they run into a problem
because ever since his wife left Peeta hasn’t felt a connection with a woman like he does with this spunky girl and he just can’t stop kissing her
and every time Katniss has lured a man away under false sexual pretenses (though she never lets them get further than maybe a grope or a kiss before she bites) they’ve been aggressive, self serving, but this one
is taking her hair down?? and stroking her shoulders and back?? and she’s never?? felt so genuinely wanted?? and he’s so?? tender?? gentle?? she isn’t used to gentle
Peeta comes back to himself before she does and with a tiny twinge of regret he slips the silver necklace of binding around her neck and she knows immediately she is IN TROUBLE but now she can’t do anything about it because dammit this necklace saps her power! and she can’t! get it off!
so he takes her away to the tiny town jail
and she spends the whole night just bickering with him through the bars until Haymitch (who practically lives in the jail for starting drunken fights so frequently and is begrudging friends with Peeta) complains “you bring her into my house and you don’t shut her up?” (credit to A)
and since he can’t kill her after a while he just gags her and takes her home (a cabin all on his lonesome)
PLOT CONTRIVANCES HAPPEN
character growth
she helps him track down criminals
and then when a really bad vampire (or some other supernatural desert entity) shows up they work together to handle that
and she establishes a place in town, making friends, finding a community
and they grow to trust each other
and then, you know, classic enemies to lovers
they have this beautiful intimate moment that’s a mirror of the truncated one they had when they met and he takes the silver necklace off and apologizes for ever doing that to her and is ready to take whatever punishment or violence she feels he deserves (because trust but also because he feels awful about what he did) and she just throws her arms around him and holds him and it’s great
and then they make it official, at least common law
and later actual law (it’s a cute wedding, very aesthetic)
he drops the necklace in the canyon later for symbolism purposes (credit to A)
also he gives her a gift he would have given his ex wife, a pair of ruby earrings (credit to A)
she becomes a part of town life and no one suspects sweet Miss Katniss who makes Sheriff Mellark so happy is anything but an average, pleasant woman
not the secret bad cop vigilante of town
she gets in a moral quandary about changing him and ultimately decides against it
until he gets bitten by a feral vampire or something
and that forces her hand
eventually, they have to leave Seamtown to avoid suspicion (credit to A)
and become outlaws
because if there’s anything better than sexy gothic vamp!lark it’s gunslinging horse riding rattlesnake stompin’ sexy vamp!lark 😆
they ride off into the sunset
it’s great
also
bat!Katniss living in a cactus (credit to A)
oh and @white-dandelion-seeds’s love bites headcanon comes into it, even though Katniss mostly eats others (maybe she can eat animals in this one too); she gets in a sip occasionally (okay more than occasionally but this AU has less lounging time than the OG) as a treat.
half of this will change I can almost guarantee it
look away from my nonsense
I still have no self control with these edits