Edit: Most of the song lyrics were cut out of this piece to make it legal for FF.
'Cause I've seen blue skies,
Through the tears in my eyes.
And I realize I'm going home.
~Tim Curry, I'm going home
They told me I had an hour with each one of my family and friends. They would walk through the door, lead by one of the cruel Peacekeepers who apparently 'guarded' over our District. My loved ones would see me and break down. I was just little Rue to them, the girl who flew in the treetops, just a young one in these cursed games.
Everything I had ever wanted to say began getting jumbled up in my head, words that were supposed to come out as heartfelt and filled with love, started to sound like a broken record. After a while I didn't even say anything, we would sit on the plush, blood red couch and hold each other, Silent tears coursing down our faces. It was the worst few hours of my life, and also some of my last.
Goodbyes were always the hardest part of it all.
On the train ride around the other districts, it was torture. There was only one person who was almost as young as me and he was huge, with bristling muscles. It scared me I would be fighting against him and twenty-three other people in a fight to the death soon.
The whole time I wasn't spending practically crying from nervousness was spent thinking about what my family was doing. Were they continuing on? Still working in the orchards? Were they happy?
That was the main thing, were they happy? It made me sad to think about them crying over me, probably knowing my inevitable fate, I would die soon.
But I couldn't think of that, I carried on smiling, even though I was already dead on the inside.
One day in the orchard around a year ago, I remember the sky was overcast and cloudy. The wind was whipping around; creating a tangled mess of your hair and the coldness would bite at your warm flesh. We still had to work though and I leapt up into the trees, as I did every day, surprising everyone again with the easy way I could conduct myself. I grabbed some apples and then jumped into the next tree; I loved feeling like I had wings. Suddenly I felt the wind pick up, it threw me off balance and I fell out of the tree. Its gentle branches which had always been my second home discarded me with little care at all.
I landed on the ground with a hard thud, sending waves of terrible pain going up and down my leg. I was screaming with an unearthly shrill sound. Blackness seemed to be crawling over the edges of my vision but I didn't want to die. I couldn't die. I felt warm arms gently pick up my limp body, it felt like I was somewhere else, this wasn't my body.
The faces around me were speaking quickly, worriedly it seemed. I couldn't bear the pain; I closed my eyes and felt myself being put down onto something soft.
I woke up the next day in my soft bed, filled with the feathers I would gather off the ground with my brothers and sisters.
I knew this was home.
The arena was the worst thing of my life. Knowing that there were twenty-three other killing machines out there absolutely petrified me.
I stuck to the trees, only leaving them when there was absolutely no choice. Leaping through them like I used to do at home, I saw so many deaths. The careers were bloodthirsty and would not stop at killing someone, but had to mutilate them too. The wounder's screams haunted me every night.
But when I joined up with Katniss, everything seemed to be great. I trusted her and even though I knew either we would be forced to kill each other, or someone would kill us, for the time being we felt safe.
But in the arena, you can't feel safe for too long. It bores the audience that takes pleasure in watching us die for their own entertainment.
I heard Katniss screaming my name, I yelled back. I didn't think anyone was near, I just didn't think at all.
I saw the boy a second before he threw the javelin. It was an accurate shot and landed in my side. As I fell to the ground I saw her launch an arrow to his neck, his eyes which had just been open in what seemed to be a primal glee had gone glassy. He was dead.
She ran over to me, my hero. Anguish in her eyes. She could see it, she wasn't a simple girl, she was a hunter. She knew I was going to die.
"Were there anymore? she asked, hysteria shading her tone, "I need to know if there was more!"
"No... No... no there wasn't any more." I told her, a small whimper left my mouth
She walked over, her bow and arrow slung over her shoulder.
"You're not going to die, you're not going too," she said an almost hysterical note in her voice.
"It's okay, I knew it would happen."
Suddenly my side which had been previously numb started to scream. I felt like there was a fire in me, a fire which could never be quenched.
"Please... sing to me," I told her, silent tears racking my body. I needed music, something to distract me from my death.
She nodded, tears also flowing down her face. Her voice was beautiful. A song to the world, a song of hope.
I felt my conscious slowly begin to disintegrate. "You have to win, you have to."
"I will... for you Rue." She replied, her voice heavy with sadness.
I felt myself going down the void that is death. The earth had no ties on me; I was a bird in the wind, a note of perfect music.
I was dead.
And I was going home.