He doesn't quite know what he was doing. Why he is doing it was evident. Because he has to. There is no other way things could play out, and he knows that all too well.
Gale's hunting boots crunch on the dead leaves and the brisk wind bites his cheeks. It is late autumn, a couple months after the rebellion. The guilt of what he might have done––no, what he probably did is still fresh, weighing down on his back like a thousand stones. A million different feelings attack Gale's heart at once, multiplying with each step he takes: guilt, sorrow, rejection, pity, regret. Cold feet makes him want to turn around and rejoin the warmth of his new home in District 2.
But he can't go back. He's gone much too far now. Weeks, months, of travel, a sort of insanity from hunger and thirst make it difficult to remember just now long Gale has been walking. But somehow he knows the way.
Gale walks through the familiar streets of what is now a ghost town. Down past the ashes of a bakery he can't get himself to look at. His old home now reduced to embers. A wave of memories from that night comes flooding back into his mind. Carrying little children –– Prim, Rory, more Seam kids from burning buildings. Watching miners who used to ride the elevators down into the coal mines with him along with their homes and everyone inside them. How little people lived, how much more he could have saved.
Those memories should have warned him. The same terror that overtook Gale when District 12 must have been worse for those in the Capitol who weren't quite accustomed to it. The areas he and Beetee had blown up, full of children. He should have showed some more humanity.
Peeta wouldn't have done it, he thinks, shaking his head in shame. Peeta would've talked the country out of war. But then where would we be now?
Then the inevitable, Katniss is better off with someone like him.
Quickly, silently past the meadow where she might be. No sound of children's laughter, no sound of sobs. It is peaceful.
Another wave of memories crashes to the front of Gale's mind once he's in the woods. The long days spent hunting. When fighting for food didn't seem like such a hassle. When he was the only one who could get Katniss to smile. All those roles he used to take on –– protector, friend… –– he wishes he could be that again... But it's useless now. Food isn't too hard to come by, he could see it in Katniss' eyes the way she last looked at him, he knew they would never be the same again and besides, Katniss has someone less destructive, less emotionally driven than himself.
Exhaustion takes Gale to his knees when he reaches a tree deep in the woods. Clutching the pit of his stomach, he lets himself sob, something he could never do in front of his family. But he doesn't have to be strong now. Not anymore.
Gale gets himself back to his feet. His fingers skim a lower branch, stroking the groves in the wood. It's been a long time since he's been in the woods. And not some other district's woods, his woods.
He ties the rope around a higher branch, pulling it tight to make sure it will stay.
Something stops him, freezes Gale halfway through tying the noose. A small sound that grows louder, fuller.
The four note tune.
Mockingjays.
Gale closes his eyes and waits for the mockingjays to finish, trying to keep himself together. But there's no use in holding it all in anymore, so he lets the tears stream down his cheeks.
But then he vigorously wipes them away. He has to be strong again, brave again. He can't die a coward. He has to die himself.
So stoically looking forward at the woods around him, where strange things did happen, so close to breaking, Gale grasps the tree branch and pulls himself up, and holding his body up with his arms, he snakes his head into the noose.
You know, it wouldn't be so strange if she found me here, he thinks, almost smiling at the thought of some closure for her. It's what she deserves, and it's all he can give her now.
With that, Gale took his last breath and let his fingers slowly slip from the branch.