Fighter

Happiness… that's all they ever show you. The winners celebrating, going on those tours, dressed up to the eyebrows in wonderful clothes and pristine makeup. Even the males wear the makeup most of the time. I hate makeup… Natural beauty is where it's at… but I'm getting off track… yeah… In all the happiness they show on the highlights, they never show the sadness. The pain of those other Tributes. The unlucky ones. I mean, we see their deaths, sure, but they never play it over sad music. It's always part of the highlights, as if it's something to be cheered about. People dying! It's amazing! Brilliant! It's damn disgusting is what it is… and I'm sure I'm gonna be a part of those highlights… on the wrong side of them.

Moving my body with a wince, I allow myself to slow down slightly. I've been moving for a long time now… it feels like days, but of course it can't be. I'm prey. I'm being hunted. I know it. And I'm sure the world knows it. They are probably watching on their screens, cheering on those careers that are hunting me. Pack of animals. Nothing more, nothing less. Wolves, the whole lot of 'em. Never a feeling for those that they hunt. All they want is the spoils, the grandiose, the bragging rights.

And they hate me.

Of course they hate me… hah… I've taken out two of their kind already. A District Four girl was surprised when I cut open her stomach. Then I continued stabbing until the cannon fired. The next victim was a bit later, the District One male would you believe it. He got cocky. A knife to his throat, it was all over. The careers knew they were being hunted, and they certainly didn't like it.

Then I made a mistake… tried to take out two of them at a time, but it was a trap. Say what you want about the careers, but sometimes, they are smart. They caught me and starting beating me. They weren't going to honor me with a quick death because I killed some of their own. Luckily I managed to escape. They didn't tie me down or anything. The perfect moment and I was out of there.

But not without my injuries… Bruises all over my body, certainly some broken ribs and I can't feel my left hand. My face is coated in something – whether mud or blood I have no clue. But these ribs mean I can't go fast. They are following me, I know it. I should've played it smarter… but that's me… I don't play things smart. I let my heart take over.

All my life, I've lived horribly. A cheap, run down house with only one bedroom which I shared with my brother. Running water only a couple hours a day. No electricity. Nothing. I needed to win these Games, I needed the money for my younger brother. So I volunteered. I was confident. I could fight, I could run, I could sneak… Of course, Trevor hated it but I managed to persuade him this was what was right. To do this, to fight in the Hunger Games. I didn't want honor. I wanted a better life.

Now he's going to be watching me… my last moments… I'm sure he's crying, even though he's fifteen. He hates crying, but he does it. I see him all the time. He's like me, he hates the living conditions that we have to live with. But he doesn't have the guts that I have. The strength in him.

My foot hits a rock and I stumble forward. It jolts me out of my thoughts and I've realised I've walked all the way to a lake that rests in the middle of a great plain. The water is fake. The lake's surface is actually just reflective glass, to make the image of water. The careers realised this, which is why they hadn't set up camp here. A twisted joke by the Capitol. Are you thirsty? Come and drink up! Oh, fooled you! Go thirsty in a hole somewhere and die…

I feel a sharp pain in my chest and I have to stop. I've been walking for far too long… with these injuries… I just gotta rest up. I probably got some internal injuries… but that's just what happens. Allowing myself to fall to my knees, I stare down at my reflection.

Michelle Sullivan… that young woman staring up at me isn't me. Blood cakes the left side of my face with ugly purple bruises snaking its way across my skin. I've always been beautiful. It was just a fact and people envied me for it. I didn't do any work for it, that was just how my skin and my hair naturally worked. To be honest I didn't care. I wasn't beautiful because I wanted to be. I was beautiful because I happened to be. Opening my mouth, a globule of blood drops down onto the reflective surface, coating my mirror image in a shade of crimson. I'm missing a couple of teeth too. I remember that was from a vicious kick from the District Two male.

It's all over. I can't possibly go on like this. It's a matter of time, even if I wasn't being chased by those dogs. Maybe I should just… stay here. Let them have me. What good am I at this game anyway? I let my allies die… I remember Zayne's screams, Junipers gargles… Sure, I killed two Careers, but just by sneaking around… I screwed up and got beaten up and here I am… a wreck. A shadow of the girl I was. Everything seems so trivial… I've always been somewhat of a rebel. Never doing exactly what I was told by my elders. Always simply being me. I should have listened to them. Don't volunteer, you only have two more Reapings left. Don't abandon your brother. You're leaving him alone, how will he live on himself? I remember one of the people from my class who was actually abandoned by his own elder sister some years previously, shouting at me, infuriated at my decision. You're not thinking about anyone else other than yourself! What would your mother think? Your father?

My eyes drift from my beaten face down to a silver necklace, hanging down from my neck, and I feel a pang of regret. It was a pair of angel wings, attached to a thin chain. It kills me to see my district token now. Given to me by my mother two years ago, there was no way I was going to leave it at home. I took it with me into the games as a good luck charm. While she technically died of heart failure, I prefer to say that she died of grief. Grief because our father left us when we were children. My mother never got over it. I often caught her staring at his picture despite my urgings to get rid of it. He had left us, he wasn't any kind of father anymore. But I guess love isn't quite as simple as that.

I'm stricken once again from the thoughts, this time by a horribly sharp pain entering my shoulder. The force spins me around until I land flat on my back on the glass, an arrow pushing its way up through my shoulder even more. I grit my teeth as I glance at the wooden shaft covered in my own blood.

The wolves are here.

And here I am, just laying here, giving up… me, giving up? I realise far too late that this isn't me. I don't give up, no matter what. I didn't give up when dad left. I didn't give up my mom died. I didn't give up raising my brother and living a crappy life. Why should I give up now? Why should I abandon them? It's not like me to be sentimental… to think about the past. With a small grunt, I force myself to my feet and I see the four of them appearing out of the tree line. District One's male, both of District Two's tributes, and the District four male. One has a bow, another a steel mace, and the last two both have swords.

What do I have?

Nothing but the clothes on my back.

Blood loss has made me dizzy, had made me think about the former times. Had tried to make me give up. But Michelle Sullivan is not going to give up. I'm not going to be just another victim for the winner's highlight reel. Besides, my legs aren't hurt. I can force myself to run. But not away.

With that one thought, and once again thinking with my heart and not my head, I sprint forward across the glass and then onto the grass. My ribs grate against me and a droplet of blood leaks into my eye, but I don't stop. I'm faster than them. More athletic than them. Smarter than them. I know it. Now I just got to prove it.

The one with the bow fires off an arrow, but I'm already ducking by the time she lets go of the string, the arrow soaring harmlessly over my head. My allies were killed by this group. Juniper, Zayne, Christy… all of them murdered. And before I know it, I'm already at the careers. I'm really not thinking about my actions anymore. Anger and pain has taken over. I don't usually let my emotions get the better of me, but perhaps just this once… perhaps now is a good time.

I step to the side to avoid the downward swipe from a sword before jabbing my elbow into his outstretched arm. The sword clatters down the floor. Getting in close to the District Two male, I reach to his side and pull a dagger from his waist. It's in his neck before he knows what his him. BOOM! I feel a horrible pain in my left arm, but ignoring it I spin around and throw my head forward, connecting with the other male's nose. As he rears back in pain, I feel another arrow thud in my back. But at this point, I'm running on pure adrenaline. It doesn't even faze me. As the one I head-butted steps backwards, I use the dagger that is still in my hand to jab it into the middle of his chest, straight into his heart. I let him – and the dagger – fall to the floor. BOOM!

Just as his cannon fires, a fire burns in my stomach. Looking down, I see the sword through my stomach. All the way through. Blood spills from my mouth as I stand down, looking at the blood-coated weapon. I hear a laugh, a million miles away. Any normal person would've given up by now. A sword through my stomach… tearing up my insides… I'm lucky they missed my spine otherwise it would have been over… I should just give up, that'd be the sensible option. Save myself some pain… but screw that.

I'm a fighter.

Ignoring the pain, I grab a hold of the blade with both hands, just noticing the huge gash on my left arm. The skin is wide open, the muscle torn apart. I think I can see some bone. Huh, interesting. It doesn't hurt. That's probably a bad sign. Who cares? Not me. Cutting my palms on the blade, I step forward and pull the sword – still through me – out of the hands of the District Two female. I push it all the way backwards, allowing it to drop to the floor and letting more blood spill to the floor from the hole in my stomach. This should be it. I should just let myself go. Why not?

Because I'm a fighter.

From behind the District Two female, I see the District One female stretch back the bow string. I leap forward and push the District Two female in the way of the arrow. With a thunk, it goes into the back of her head and out of her eye. BOOM! Letting her drop to the floor I face my final opposition, and I feel a feral grin on my face. I have no sense anymore. I just see bodies, my friends, even the strangers, slaughtered by these wolves. My body is using the last of its energy and I've lost more blood than I'll be able to recover from. It coats the floor, coats my legs, my chest, my face… I've probably lost more than half… my body is broken. Is torn. Is unfixable. I shouldn't be able to keep on going…

But I'm a goddamn fighter!

Reaching down, I pick up a sword and sprint to to the District One female, a buzzing intense in my ears, as if a fly has gotten in my head. She fires off another arrow, this one missing slightly, carving a line into my cheek. This doesn't stop me. Nothing will stop me.

From the beginning of the game, with my allies, we made the decision to take out the careers. Sure, they have died, but I am not going to die without living up to that decision. That's how I work. I never give up on something I decide to do. And I've decided to take out the careers, give someone else a chance of winning. She fires off another arrow and this one hits home. Straight into my chest, just under the collar-bone. I stumble forward, my legs losing balance. Even as I fall, I lift the blade high and my momentum drives it into the wide-eyed District One female's throat. Her blood coats me, mixing with my own, as I fall with her.

BOOM!

That's it. My energy is gone. But she was the last. I killed them. The careers are no more. I killed them. I told told myself and I would. None of them would get to feel the happiness of living, or get the bragging rights.

But something niggles at my brain. Something important. And I'm just not sure what it is. Something important, I'm sure… but what is it… I stare up at the blue sky and my sluggish mind starts pieces things together. Eight people died at the beginning of the game. The next day claimed another two. Over the coming days, I remember seeing more faces. From the ones I killed, to my allies. Nineteen faces… nineteen… me and the careers… we were… we were the last?

And I smile.

My cannon hasn't gone off. Of course it hasn't. I'm not dead quite yet. But the other four are… I heard their cannons… that means twenty-three currently dead.

I allow myself another grin. My body is completely numb and I can't move. I can almost imagine my brother smiling as well, despite the circumstances. I told him that I would do it… sure, I didn't expect it to be like this, but I told him. Then I hear those words:-

"And the winner is-"

But I've already gone. I've allowed myself to be sucked into Oblivion.

That's me. I'm a fighter. I lived as a fighter and I went out as a fighter… I wouldn't want it any other way.

A/N:- Just a quick one-shot to do a character justice from a story (likely) never-to-be. The character of Michelle Sullivan belongs to Princezzshell101. Hope you enjoyed. I had fun writing this short little thing. 'Till another time!