A/N: Okay, so this fic is strange. It's about an insane Clove – I don't know if that's a thing, really, but this was started about a month ago. It's not very long either. In case you were wondering, this actually exists. I should warn you that there is some language.

I don't own Hunger Games.

It was glorious

Clove was always different; different even for a career. Her biggest dream was to enter the Hunger Games, but not to glorify her district.

No, the fucking district would have to glorify itself, if it wished. She couldn't give a damn about anyone but herself, and she had absolutely no intention of surviving the Games either.

Though if she did... if she did... if she did the despair... the sadness, the loneliness, the utter hopelessness...

She shook her head and paid attention to the representative from the Capitol - some overly dressed, happy-go-lucky cur. The man (or woman, she wasn't sure) had a mass of green hair that looked as though they were snakes. Clove guessed her inspiration was Medusa of the Ancient Greek Mythlogy, only proved when said representative confirmed her theory and introduced themselves as Meduse. Clove rolled her eyes – how fucking pretentious. If there was one thing she loathed, it was a hypocrite and a conceited person.

Then again, the whole Capitol was a large game of pretend, and the districts were cast out as toys, merely used for amusement. Oh, and slavery, but that didn't bother her as much as being a toy.

She hated the morons from the Capitol. She hated that they were so vain, only caring about themselves and their appearance, no matter how ridiculous they came across. All she cared about was keeping the hair out of her eyes, so she kept her hair tied back.

She watched the hand disappear into the globe that would send one of them away to their deaths. Or riches, it really depended on who was reaped. Meduse opened the slip of paper, and read the name.

"Clarisse…" Clove didn't bother listening further, because district one only had one Clarisse.

At that moment Clove decided against volunteering. Her sister had been reaped: her best friend in the world, a girl two years younger than her.

Clarisse looked at her with expectation, and Clove looked back at her with an icy expression. Her sister would be dead soon. Clarisse wasn't strong enough to survive, even if she was exceptionally trained in hand-to-hand combat.

Clove's blood boiled – her sister was a career too, yet she expected Clove to volunteer for her? What a hypocritical bitch her sister was. Clove was honestly disappointed; she had expected so much more from Clarisse.

Clarisse's eyes went as large as football pools, realising her sister was leaving her to her own devices. She gulped and walked up the stage, her eyes finding Clove again.

What Clarisse saw terrified her even more than the prospect of the Games... Her sister, the person she loved most in the world, was smiling a demented smile at her. At that moment she realised that her sister was crazy. She was completely out of it.

Clarisse was suddenly glad she would be leaving.

Clove, on the other hand, was devastated. She was scared for her sister, knowing she would die, knowing it would be miserable for her. Even if she hated her sister at that moment, she would still be sad if Clarisse died.

She wasn't aware of her mouth curling, she wasn't aware of her eyes glinting... She wasn't aware of what was happening to her mind.

Clove watched those Games, hardly ever sleeping. She saw the suffering her sister went through: Clarisse was starving, she was alone, she was hurt, she was miserable and on the verge of killing herself.

Clove was miserable – her sister was dying one of the worst deaths possible; she'd just barely escaped her district partner, who swung an axe at her repeatedly after breaking their alliance, and she had stumbled into a field of mutts – cows. The cows were carnivorous and one had decided that Clarisse's leg was perfect for a snack. It chewed on the leg lazily until Clarisse gutted it with her hand knife. The other cows didn't seem to mind, and Clarisse ran as fast as her masticated leg would carry her.

She wasn't aware that she was leaning forward, eagerly awaiting the death, eagerly awaiting more misery and despair and eagerly awaiting the death of that treacherous bitch.

She found it when her sister's head was cut off by her district partner. He had found her in a cave, lulled her into a false sense of security and then swung his battle axe. Sadly, it was blunt, so he just kept on swinging. On the fourth swing Clarisse was dead.

Clove cried for days; not just for her sister, but for her sister's betrayal too. Her eyes were never dry and she had to blow her nose more than she liked. She stuck her thumb in her mouth to keep herself from sobbing out loud at night.

Life went on, and it went better too. Another few months would have to pass before the Games would happen again, and she had no idea who to grieve for this year.

Clove, however, was bored. She was still sad, she was still lonely, but the effect was wearing off. She was so filled with desolation anymore – it was awful. She hated it, and at one time considered killing her pet cat to feel something again.

But time passed quickly and she didn't get the chance to murder her pet. She was sixteen now, she was eligible to volunteer and at the top of her class in combat skills and weapon usage. When she was officially announced as the head of her class, it was just in time for the new Games too. She would be volunteering this year; she had earned the honour when she let her sister die.

She could've stopped it, because she had a higher chance of survival was larger than Clarisse's had been. She wasn't as thin and dainty as Clarisse had been, she wasn't as scared and she was far more agile and trained.

She also had a strategy. The rumours had it that Cato would be volunteering for the boys, and it made sense in a way, Cato was the strongest career they had. He was also agile, his muscles were firm and incredibly fit – but, she had to say, he was an idiot. He couldn't plan, and she could. So her strategy was him. She would use him, and when they were the only ones left... Oh, the idea was glorious.

Her plan was flawless. At least that was what she thought.

The woman (or man, Meduse had been replaced by someone dressed in a dazzling pink toga and who had a rather odd fluffy moustache) from the Capitol's hand only hovered over the bowl when Clove's voice pierced the air like a dagger. They made a path for her as she leaped from the crowd and jumped on stage in a leopard stance. She pulled herself up to her full height and gave the crowd the same smile she had given Clarisse just a year previously. She just didn't know how much of her sanity had leaked away in her yearning for utter despair.

. . .

In the arena she grew close with Glimmer, the idiot from district one. She couldn't even hold a bow properly, much less shoot it. But she liked her, they shared a lot of viewpoints and opinions, and she was shocked when Glimmer admitted feelings for Cato.

Glimmer died the next day. Clove's heart was broken. She hid tears from Cato, crying into her jacket as she took her turn sleeping, stuffing a fist on her mouth to stop the sobs from wrenching from her body. She was aware of her shaking body and hands, though.

And it was glorious.

She used Cato as a tool. He was like a little puppy, eager to please and easy to manipulate and twist to her will. Not that she acted that way, of course, Cato (and the Capitol) had to think he was in control and she was just a stupid little girl relying on the muscles around her to save her. She was quite apt at things, and more things than throwing a bloody knife around. She was a career, for crying out loud, and one of insane ones too.

And then it came. The meal – she didn't really need anything, but Cato sorely wanted armour to cover his massive biceps and shoulders. She agreed, but only if she got to cause agony, glorious agony, to the entire twelfth district in the killing of their brave tribute.

Despair on that scale – it was… it would be fantastic. She would be destroying everyone's hope, because twelve finally had a tribute worth something, a tribute that knew how to fight and wasn't just brawn, but had something between her ears too.

Despair would fall over all the districts too, she knew, because Katniss Everdeen, that fucking girl on fire, had become a symbol of hope to them. A symbol she would crush into ashes and scatter into the wind.

Clove knew that the districts were suffering, except maybe three of them, were suffering, and it would only get worse. She revelled in it and danced with the information in her heart.

And she wanted to destroy their ONLY beacon of hope left. She knew that if Everdeen won, the districts would be happier. She knew that if Everdeen won, something would happen. The districts would rise up and fight, because Everdeen was one of a kind.

And that was her thought when she pummelled Everdeen – that the death of this girl, who was exactly her age, would cause despair on a massive scale.

Clove sat on Everdeen's stomach, her feet firmly on the other girl's hands, keeping them to the floor. Of course Everdeen tried to put up a fight, but Clove was stronger and had sliced a deep cut into Everdeen's eye.

"Where's lover boy?" She kept teasing, knowing that placing the boy into the minds off the viewers and then killing Everdeen, would cause despair in the Capitol too. Everyone loved a good love story, even her, but she loved anguish more.

She was knocked back, a large brute was slamming her around, and it was as if time froze for her.

She had failed?

She had FAILED?

How could she have failed? Her plan of causing sadness and hatred and distrust in the entire Panem had failed, just like that. After planning it for an entire year, and then adapting her plan in the arena had failed… Just. Like. That.

And all of it by the hand of a tribute she didn't deem as important, who never registered a dangerous to her, simply because of his district number and the fact that was a nobody. There was nothing special about him – absolutely nothing – and he was killing her.

It was… it was… it was GLORIOUS. The despair that filled her heart and mind as the rock collided with her skull caused a serene smile to appear on her face. She screamed Cato's name, grasping the last bit of despair she could cause the world, by making them think that she and Cato had more than they ever did.

I love the despair that fills my air… envelopes my every thought… in this net I am eternally caught.

…

A/N: So, yeah. I have actually met individuals who claims that sadness makes them happy, and I thought to write a fic around it.