Before you kill me... yes, I'm publishing another story, but I've not given up on anything else. This is something I will update on an every-month-or-two basis until I'm caught up with all the rest of my current fan fiction stories, and then I'll focus entirely on this.

So, what is "this?" It's the first in a trilogy I'm calling "Insanity." The trilogy itself will be based on the 65th Games and on past Mockingjay, entirely in Annie's POV first person past tense. The first book, "Inseparable," should be based roughly on Finnick's Games, up to the reaping of the 70th Games. The second, "Indestructible," will focus on Annie's Games and on to the announcement of the Quarter Quell. The last, "Irreplaceable," will be the 75th Games until after her son's birth. And then that will be over with. ...Sadly, this is all planned out in my head, not written down on paper. Hence the every-month-or-two updates. Fun stuff.

I've tried to write Annie's story so many times, but I've never had enough inspiration to follow through with it. This time I can hopefully delve into the depths of Annie's story without returning to the shallows. I'd love it if you'd give me advice on whether or not this story is all for nothing, and whether or not my characters are suffering from OOC disease. Please enjoy!

We came here on his back

-From Finner, Of Monsters and Men

My home made me feel magical.

There was nothing magical about the place. It was a miniscule hut that sat close to the ocean, but I wished it were closer. The door wasn't quite the right size and the windows didn't shut all the way, if not completely shattered. The welcome mat was worn to threads, the bathroom infested with roaches, and a part of the house had collapsed at some unfortunate moment. But once I ripped down the striped curtains and had thrust open the windows that were partially intact, angled the moth-eaten couch into the sunbeams, sat upon it, and watched the dust particles dance about in the still air, I knew it was still my home and that I would always feel magical inside of it.

Dust particles always held my attention. They were only to be seen when illuminated by the bright rays of the sun, and could be disturbed easily by the wave of a hand. Sometimes, when I was very little, I would try to catch them. They always escaped me. Coraline had wondered aloud many times why I was so fascinated with dust, since such idle things never held her attention for long. It was one of the many things about me she never understood. Like why the beauty of Danny's laughter could captivate me. Like why I became so stunned by Finnick's kindness and bravery. To Coraline, appearance was the extent of one's character. Dust appeared to be a substance meant to cover up the beauty of an object, and so it would never become anything more in her eyes.

But I was Annie Cresta, and I knew appearance was not the extent of one's character. So therefore, the dust could become anything it wanted to be. If the dust wanted to be magical, so be it. If my house wanted to feel magical, so be it. If I felt magical inside of my house… so be it.

I knew it just wasn't right for any sane person to feel magical inside their house. But the house wasn't just any old house, and I wasn't sane. I had never been sane. Coraline used to tease me mercilessly about the way I would stare curiously at the dust, or anything that captured my attention the way the dust did- but she didn't know she was teasing me for being insane. Not completely insane, that is. Nobody is completely sane, and nobody is completely insane; just like there is no true black, and there is no true white. We are all in the middle. We are all gray. And I was right smack in the midst of the value scale, if not leaning a bit towards the insane side.

Well, I assume you are thinking. We now know Annie Cresta was (and is) partially insane. We now know that she was sitting in her house, looking at the dust particles, while feeling magical. But what was she doing in her house in the first place?

The question is not what was I doing, but why was I doing it, you see. I was sitting on that moth-eaten couch, in the centre of a house that was definitely falling apart and was certainly mine, but there was a reason for this. It was because I needed to feel magical. I wanted to feel magical. I required the magical abilities to help me get through the day. That's the thing about (mostly) insane people- they're always attached to something, if not multiple somethings. If they did not see that certain something when it was required to be seen, they would, and will, fall apart. I would, and will, fall apart.

It was like medicine. My house was my medicine. It was a medicine that made me feel magical.

But it was also a special medicine. I didn't need it every day- only the bad days, or the really bad days, or the absolutely terrible days. That day counted as an absolutely terrible day. It was the day of my first reaping, after all. Not everyone was frightened on their first reaping… I'm sure kids in District Two put little red X's on their calendars signaling the day they would be eligible. People in District Four didn't go to that extent, but a fair few did celebrate one's eligibility for their first reaping. I didn't celebrate mine. I was scared. I was panicked. I was petrified. I was terrified. I needed my medicine... so I got my medicine.

As I stared at the dust particles, I wondered why time slipped away so fast. Why time even existed at all. They told us in school about the Very Ancient Times, aeons ago when there was no Panem and there was no America and there was no Earth. Just a group of people who didn't know who they were and what they were and why they were. Just a group of people, placed there by magical beings known as "gods," who were placed in the heavens by a magical being known as "the God." It took my mind so long to wrap around it that I would think about the concept for hours and still get nowhere in my musings.

But it is said that, before "the God" was created, there was nothing. There was no time. And when "the God" was created, he created time. I wished he hadn't created time. I wished we could all just be; not been, not will be, but be; live now, live then, live forever, without aging, or being. My musings were truly wondrous. If there were no time, I would never age. If there were no time, I would never have been born. If there were no time, it would still be nothing, and there would be no "the God" to create it, and the world would be the most amazing nothingness there ever was.

I thought of ways to forget time; to banish time. I wondered about the existence of District Thirteen, and developed a theory about the creation of nuclear bombs so powerful that they would destroy anything and everything: even time, even "the God." I delighted in the thought that I could raze nothingness itself! If we the people of Panem, and Panem, and the world, and time, and "the God," and nothingness, and anything and everything were all destroyed, then there would be a simple void of… space… in which we would all be gone, gone, gone.

The benefits of that void of space were that I would never have turned twelve, and would never have to be in the reaping in the first place, and I would never be anything, and I wouldn't be nothing, either. I simply wouldn't exist.

I thought I would be happier that way.

But that way wasn't possible because there was no chance anyone could create a nuclear bomb so powerful it would wipe out anything and nothing. So I simply sat there, awaiting the doom that would come eventually, in a certain expanse of time that I hated with an indescribable amount of passion, soaking in the magic that my house gave me. Watching the dust. Wishing I was the dust. Wishing the dust wasn't anything- wasn't nothing- wasn't there.

I wasn't sane. I wasn't insane, either. I had a depth no one could understand- I couldn't even understand it myself. Nobody understands depth… not even time, not even "the God."

I didn't really understand anything, after all. I never did. I still don't. There are many things us humans aren't supposed to know. And I was a human, just twelve years old, who understood the dust particles, but not depth, or time. I was just a girl stuck in between black and white, sane and insane, like everyone else. I was Annie Cresta.