Katniss looked at the screen, hoping to see them concur with her, but instead she watched herself get shot.
The only thing she could feel other than emptiness in her unconscious state was pain. An ember of fire that would start at her chest and spread out. In her state, she could think, hear, and feel, but they all felt very far away. It seemed like an eternity, just looking at the darkness surrounding her, with nothing to do, with no one there with her. Will it be like this forever? I mean, it could have been a year for all I know. But along with the rest of her thoughts, it faded away to the never ending gloom. After what seemed to be perpetuity, she felt something. But it was very painful. You know that feeling you get when you're at a really high level in the sky, chest heaving after the climb, but then you lose your balance and fall down? How your breath gets knocked out of you when you hit the ground, multiply that by a hundred and add the painful breathlessness. That was how she felt. Then, she felt everything slip away. Her remaining hope and happiness. The joy she vaguely remembered when she would go hunting. The last thought that slipped away from her was of the man she never got the chance to tell she loved him. Peeta.
/X/
Peeta sat in the chair he had occupied for weeks, holding Katniss's hand. Unpermitted tears were rolling down his cheeks and his hair was disheveled from when he would run his hands through his hair, a habit that would show up whenever he was nervous or stressed.
"I remember everything, Katniss. I remember how we kissed, even though it was only for the cameras. I remember when you would be so humble. I remember the picnic we had when we were on the train. We watched the sunset together." Tears were falling down faster now. "I remember that your favorite kind of bread would be the one with the cheese on top. I remember how much you hated it when you heard of what the Capitol was doing for the Quarter Quell. I remember that you risked your life for me." His voice got hoarse. "I remember thinking it was the end of the world for me when I saw your bloody body get whisked into that hovercraft, thinking that I'm never going to see you again." He paused and took a gulp. "I remember that I love you." He whispered. Suddenly her heart monitor started beeping rapidly. "Katniss? Can you hear me? It's me, Peeta. Please, Katniss-"
He was interrupted when he felt her squeeze his hand and he smiled for the first time in weeks. His Katniss was going to make it. His hopes rose up and next thing he knew, he was beaming.
"Katniss, hang in there, you can do it. Please wake up, for me." He reached to press a button to call the doctors, but he felt Katniss's hand go limp. A long dragging sound came from the heart monitor. His heart dropped and broke into a million pieces.
"No, please no." He grabbed her hand with both of his. "Please, no," He sobbed. "You can't go Katniss, your mom needs you, your sister needs you; the world needs you!" His voice dropped to a whisper. "But most of all, I need you." He sobbed harder than he ever had before. He gasped for breath, but it was no use. His world, his everything, was slipping away from her. He pressed the button to call for the doctors and kept whispering to Katniss. One of them came in and gasped. She quickly called in more doctors and they performed CPR on her. A nurse tried to push him out, but he resisted.
"No, I can't leave her! I told her, I-I told-" He broke down in tears. A doctor led him out and sat him somewhere, but he didn't know and he didn't care. All he wanted to do was be with his Katniss. The next thing he knew he was unconscious.