"Madness"

I didn't like that day. It was one of those grey, cloudy days where it felt like the sun couldn't find the earth and left you wondering if it ever would. The crowd had formed to listen to their new president's speech, and to watch the murder of their old one. President Coin had made it mandatory to attend and watch. Of course, there was more than enough excitement for it. The Capital had fallen and we'd destroyed the games. Yet still, this bloodlust runs deep in the citizens of every district.

I wanted to throw up.

Looking around though, I could see faces in the crowd mirroring mine. Those who saw past the facade of "justice" that Coin had deemed this to be, and was equally disgusted with the murder this was. It was windy and grey, and I could feel the rain on the back of my neck. Waiting in silence, fixing my eyes on the podium where Snow would be executed I felt the presence of unwanted bodies surrounding me. I didn't need to look, as the scents of cinnamon and lemon and other idiotic perfumes filled my nose. Capitol citizens were always the same, and always terrible in my eyes. Snow had it right to keep the districts separated. I clenched my hands into a fist until my knuckles turned white, and stared at the podium. Their conversation wasn't quiet, and their squeaky voices echoed their enthusiasm for the events that were to take place. A few minutes in, I felt their eyes on me, and almost instantly, their voices dropped. I no longer cared to hear their conversation, and instead focused on the slow beating of a distant storm as it approached.

After a long while of constant murmuring and endless chatter before, her shrill voice cracked through the air like a whip. I always thought it was a fitting voice. That terrible shrill was never pleasant in my ears but the fearful squeals of my capital company made me, for a second, find it bearable. Followed by silence, she began to speak.

"Citizens of the United Districts. We have fought and won our rebellion! No more capital, and no more oppression. We have finally rid ourselves of the tyrants who preceded us."

Her speech brought about a roar of cheers. I was silent.

They dragged out the body of our formant tyrant. Broken and weak, yett somehow still standing tall, President Snow.

"If only that whole podium could crumble," I thought to myself.

They had his hands and feet bound with heavy shackles that rattled with every step. The crowd had fallen silent, in fear or some other emotion. I did not know.

There was movement on the higher podium where Coin was delivering her speech, and a few moments later the crowd began to cheer again. The rain began to fall as the districts' Mocking Jay walked down towards the crowd with her bow in hand. I hadn't seen her since the capital fell but I knew this couldn't be okay.

There was something in her eyes that drew me closer to where she was moving. A crack is the best way that I could describe it. If I had understood what it had meant then, maybe I could have prevented the events that followed. But I didn't, so all I can do is continue.

Katniss walked with her head high as she always did. Looking around, she caught my eye for a brief moment. I lost her a moment later, and the crowd was relentless in letting me pass.

I broke into a sprint backwards as Coin began to speak again. I needed to see, I needed her to see me. Pushing past the crowd I found myself at the base of a large stone statue. I hadn't noticed it before. Over 20 meters wide, spread the wings of a Mocking Jay. It stood taller than any of the makeshift podiums. Soaring above the crowd, watching the horror that was about to occur. A few who had been following me saw the statue and had begun to climb for a better view. Standing for a moment I realized the silence that had spread throughout the crowd.

My hand grasped the cold stone as I hoisted myself up and over the crowd. I held the base of one enormous wing as it cast a shadow on the crowd. I had barely turned myself around towards her, as I watched the slender arrow break through the rain and plunge into the heart of the president. Coin fell, and with her, so did order. There were screams of fear and terror, and roars of victory as the crowd broke through the barricades and towards the scene.

I did not move. I watched it all happen. The arrow left her bow and sunk into the heart of their president. Snow had died shortly after from what I did not know. All I remembered was that laugh. A blood-curdling laugh. Alone and centred in the mass of the maddened crowd, was the maddest of them all. Her laughter broke through the crowd, and perhaps it was only because it was her, but it was all I had heard. A hard maddening laugh that repelled the crowd when they got near her. Maybe I should have gone, maybe I should have done something or said something but I stood there.

The rain beat down hard on the wings of the Mocking Jay that night."

...

"Thank you, Mr. Hawthorne," said a man in a white lab coat as I finished my account. He hadn't looked up from his clipboard but remained to scribble down as I spoke, telling him everything of that day.

I looked around at the small metal box where we had been talking. It was small and cold and felt like that basement we had slept in while hiding in the capital. I closed my eyes and remembered that time. Peeta had been on the road to sanity, and although I did not know him well, I still mourned his death.

He had had another "episode" as the men in the coats called it, shortly after the events in the square, and had tossed himself in front of one of those magnetic capital trains. They called him insane, but I understood him. A world without the sun was not one I would wish to live in either.

I had said as much to the men and had prescribed myself a dozen mental assessments before I could be free on my own again.

I walked out of the metal box and into the city. I walked down the streets watching as life returned to district 3, and people began to go back to their daily lives. The sun never shone following that day.

Somewhere in another metal box in district 12, Katniss Everdeen sat in a room of pillows, grabbing onto a small wooden chair as she said,

"My Name is Katniss Everdeen. I am from district 12. My mother is dead. Peeta is dead. Primrose is dead. My name is Katniss Everdeen-"