She shivered in grief and pain as she imagined it over and over. His frantic eyes and the way his fingers had felt clutching her throat. A spasm rocked through her body. Where had she reached? This was not what she'd bargained for. She knew she'd lead the rebellion, but she always hoped to have him by her side. Selfish as it may be, she'd never wanted Peeta to leave her.
Now he was gone, her Peeta was gone. He was lost somewhere in his mind, trapped, thanks to her mistake. She cursed herself as she thought of how she'd agreed to split up. She cursed herself.
She watched silently, from the corner, as they put tubes into him. She watched as he thrashed from the unfamiliar and contrasting combination of morphling and the left over tracker-jacker venom. He was violently shaking his head from side to side, clearly in pain and delirium.
She cried out, seeing him. What had things come to?
"Peeta," she moaned his name and tears blurred her eyes. No, she willed herself. She would not cry. She could not. Her hand automatically lurched forward, as if to caress him, but she stopped herself. Nothing would happen. He could not see her. She couldn't see him; she wasn't allowed.
She spat at the thought, venom spewing. A world where she could not see him, was no believable world. Yet, it was so true. He writhed in pain and there was nothing she could do because he hated her and they would not let her. Her fingernails dug into her skin, trying to draw blood. None came. It was agonizing.
She felt the ink on her skin, the schedule, but she ignored it as usual. Nothing was as important as – as what? As sitting in an invisible corner, behind a glass pane, watching your lover suffer in pain, watch him try to kill you? Her lover? The thought felt odd, like how new words felt on her tongue. She shook her head. No, nothing was more important.
The doctors seemed a little frantic as he wouldn't stop thrashing. He kept screaming something, but she could not hear through the thick glass. The way his beautiful lips curved, it sounded like her name. But the expression was off. It was anger, and pain, and fear and –Oh!
Of course, he hated her now. She sobbed again, the lump in her throat painful.
They nodded and one came out, right to her.
He whispered something, she did not understand. What was he saying? He kept pointing at her and towards her boy with the bread. She couldn't comprehend. No words reached her, only silence pressing on her eardrums.
It was too late. She saw. She didn't know what they did, but he violently jumped, screaming in pain. The glass pane shuddered with the noise. It was too much to take.
She screamed his name, throwing herself at the strong glass. The doctors turned to her, while trying to get a hold on the screaming boy. The one behind her grabbed her arms but she thrashed, too. They were in sync, violently rocking with spasms. Of course, they were always in sync.
"PEETA!" she cried out, banging her fist on the glass. Somehow, she didn't know how, he heard her.
His eyes widened, almost mirroring her expression. He threw himself at the glass too. They were pressed up, a single transparent shield between them. It was too much she thought as she pressed her hand to it. His eyes were equally frantic. Her nails scratched the glass, scraping them. They bent back, breaking and bleeding but she did not care. She cried his name. His jaw clenched and his hand scraped the glass too. Only, it was different, so different. The doctors behind him caught hold of him, but she saw. The manic laugh as his fingers clasped in a wringing motion. He was imagining those fingers around her neck, choking her.
She still banged against the glass, shouting. Alarms rang haywire, but she did not hear. She only remembered, the fingers and the eyes. The blue flames burnt her much more than the fire of the Mockingjay had.
The doctor behind her screamed something and a familiar pair of arms dragged her. A needle pierced her arm and she screamed in terror. No, she needed Peeta. She needed her sweet, murderous lover. She did not care that she could not have anything to do with him anymore. She needed to see him, to feel his eyes on hers, to survive.
She still scratched at the glass, more blood seeping her shirt sleeve.
Peeta was almost out now, but he never removed his eyes and contempt filled expression from hers.
She'd done this to him. Those arms around her, picked her now almost limp form. She knew who it was but he was no who she needed.
"Peeta," she moaned, helplessly and if it hadn't been her own voice, it would've made her heart tug to hear someone else say it.
"Shh.." Gale whispered but she leaned away from him. He made a strangled noise.
When he set her down, the morphling had done its work. Gale stroked her hair as she started drifting.
The blood was now dry, caked in her broken nails and she could only remember the wall she'd tried to scrape out. She'd try again tomorrow, or when she woke up next.
But before she fell into the darkness, she only thought one thing.
She, the girl on fire, had burnt him, had razed his mind to dust and ashes. She'd set him on fire and burnt him inside out.
That's all she thought before letting the darkness taking over, which was not one bit soothing as the pain. She supposed she deserved it.