((A/N: Be warned, this is weird- it changes tense and setting a lot, because I am a flashback person. I try to avoid flashbacks, but goddang, they're so fun. This story starts off in the Block, during Mockingjay, but it flashes her back to her final Hunger Games kill, her time in the Capitol, and my vision of the quote, "There's no one left I love." I tried to split it up, but it still might be confusing- I don't know, this was all late night rambling. But enjoy, anyways. :D))
"Are you ready?" she whispers to me as another soldier goes into the Block to be assessed on whether they are capable of joining the fighting forces of District 13.
"Ready as I'll ever be ," I reply with a shrug, picking at the dirt and grime under my fingernails. My heart is pounding, despite the fact that I know that I'm well prepared after those grueling weeks of brutal training that could be the equivalent of being sent back into the Games. To fight the Capitol, all I have to do is pass this test in the Block—that's all there is to it. The man at the door calls my name, and I stand up, trying not to be too anxious as I enter, remaining emotionless and steady. The citizens of District 13 already think I'm crazy, and I know that I've gone crazy. Why prove it more?
For the past months, nothing but emotions have been raging inside me and pounding at the inside of my head, yelling, screaming to come out. My rage for the Capitol is endless; they've taken everything away from me and threw out what I thought would be a chance for at least a semi-normal life out the window.
I hate them more than anything.
I stand in the Block, clutching the gun in my hand so nervously that my knuckles start to turn white. I listen into my headset, and someone is at the other end, speaking the commands that I must follow for this mission, explaining the destination of the rendezvous point that I must find. I step into a dark alleyway and make my way through the fake city. Just as I am about to exit, a body jumps off of a roof, landing almost soundlessly behind me. Immediately, I spin around, facing a Peacekeeper. My hands bring the gun up.
I can barely hear the gun click before the bang.
The white-outfitted man crumples to the ground, the wound on his heart starting to drip crimson red.
I take out the Peacekeepers I encounter one by one, jogging through the city and trying to navigate through the tall buildings that tower over me and making sure that I am not being followed at the same time. The endurance training that District 13 has provided me with is helping, despite the grueling five miles that we would have to run every day. But I want my axe. The gun feels unsteady in my hands as I reload and watch out for incoming threats.
Out of nowhere, a Peacekeeper appears behind me, trying to sneak up, but as he draws closer, I elbow him in the stomach and shoot him in his moment of hesitation. More of the Capitol's police advance towards me, and I shoot the group down quickly. Adrenaline courses through my veins as I break into a run down the path. I continue at a steady pace for a while until a voice yells into my headset, "Pod!"
Too late.
I trip over a rigged pod and a mutt jumps out, a slithering snake with eyes that look human, dark, green eyes that stare into mine. They are familiar in a chilling way, and I suddenly recall the last person I killed during my Hunger Games. She was a Career by the name of Teresa, and she died with an axe lodged in her throat.
I had waited for her in the trees as she sought me, her final kill, her ticket to fame and glory. When she saw me up there, I jumped down, landing soundly by tucking and rolling and avoiding the bracing shock that would have stunned me for moments otherwise.
"Well, look here," the girl from District 4 said with a sneer, raising her sword and stepping towards me to fight. I had my axe and my dagger, both of which I had obtained from previous kills. "I thought you weren't going to be any competition, but I guess I was wrong." She chuckled softly, as if this was an amiable meeting, but it was nothing of the sort. Her green eyes showed nothing but hate and evil—she wanted to win, she wanted the glory.
All I wanted was survival.
I remained silent. The views in the Capitol probably wanted me to say some epic phrase that would unleash monsters in both of us, but I just stepped forward and lunged at her with the blade in my right hand. She, too, struck at me with her dagger, but I side-stepped just in time. Again, I tried to pierce her skin, hitting a vital organ, but she dodged right out of my reach. The game of jabbing and slashing went on for minutes until she managed to catch my cheek with her knife, and I felt a hot, searing pain on my cheeks. I grit my teeth and ignore it, lunging once more at her. Near the end, I felt like I could fall over any second, and I almost begged for the end. She stared at me, breathing heavily, those haunting eyes fixated on my dying face. They glinted with the golden sunlight behind us, far too happy for such a terrible day.
Desperation—that's what I was feeling as I finally threw the axe, and by some luck, it lodged into her neck and made a place into her throat.
She fell to the ground.
Fireworks played.
I had won.
The end had come.
—-
And now, once again, I'm in that position to kill. I shoot at the giant snake and it thrashes, squirming as blood squirts out of its large body. Hissing sounds come out of its mouth, and endless cry of pain and sorrow. I shoot it again, and just as it falls to the ground and I believe it to be dead, it starts to glow eerily in the spots where it had been shot. A neon green veil surrounds the creature before it regenerates. It fixes its glowing eyes right back at me, and with a quick snap, it bites out of my leg. I cry out because of the stabbing pain, but clench my teeth and go on. I pull the trigger once more, feeling the impact of the gun moving back in my hand. Over and over, it regenerates, but when I shoot it for the final time, I hit its heart, and it does not rise again.
Panting, I continue through the Block, seeing the rendezvous point that is a hundred yards away. Like a shadow, I sneak through the alleyways. I'm in the home stretch until I hear a rumbling from beneath me, and suddenly, the ground starts to shake. From the sewers and the buildings, nothing but water gushes out, pulling me into a tidal wave of nightmares, reliving the moments as if they were happening right now.
I'm in the Capitol cell once more, and the guards drag me from my chair, and drop me into a tank of water. I flail, I try to get out, but they resist, holding me under until my lungs burn and I feel myself getting lightheaded. But before I can be soothed with death, they bring me back up again, and I gasp for air.
"Please, no," I croak, tears starting to stream down my face.
"First, where is she?" the woman on the right says as I shiver on the floor.
"No," I cry, despite the fact that if I just give up, maybe I'll be allowed to leave. Maybe I can go home. I'll be safe.
But they won't. Panem won't.
"No," I whisper again.
"No?" the other asks.
I stay silent, refusing to answer them now. Let them kill me. Why ever not?
I want to die.
—-
I recall another time that I felt this way, the time that I watched my Hunger Games for the final time, transporting myself back into the nightmares that I had tried so hard to forget. I was wearing a deep violet dress that shimmered whenever I stood in the light, my brown locks left down for once, curling around my shoulder and falling gracefully down my back. I may have looked pretty, but I felt grotesque. I felt like a monster as I watched the final battle where I killed that girl and tried not to break down in front of the nation.
When I was finally let back into my room, I started to cry, tears freefalling out of my eyes and hitting the floor like raindrops that could drown a city.
23 had died.
I was the sole survivor, a murderer of many, a monster. How could I live with myself?
Heading to the bathroom to clean my face of the tears that have dried on, I stared into those brown eyes that showed nothing but fear and misery. My dark hair fell in messy, tangled strands and I looked like a complete and utter mess. In my moments of self-loathing, I spotted a blade in the corner of the room.
That morning, they had come to my room to prep me for the final interview. When they had shaved my legs, I supposed they left it there by accident.
Before I even knew what was happening, the blade was already piercing the fair skin on my thigh. Pain seared through my body, but I ignored it. I deserved it for letting myself give in. I deserved it for letting myself win. I deserved it for letting myself become a monster.
A little pain is nothing compared to what people really should have done to me, what those families that I've broken should have done.
Bloody red scars run down my leg, the deep red spelling out two words in a scrawled, haunting handwriting-
CAPITOL HELL
My life was a living hell, in fact. They had transformed me in more ways than one. I never wanted to be that sexy, smart, yet cruel tribute who had so viciously killed the other children in the arena. I didn't want to be known as a victor.
They had stripped all that I was away and burned it so it could never rise again.
I didn't realize as the tears started rolling out as I sat on the bathroom floor, stained with my blood.
—-
As I resurface from my nightmare, fire surges through my veins and I let out a scream, a piercing, torturous sound that reverberates off the walls of my cells. When the electricity stops, I am shaking with excrutiating pain and loss of breath, my heart pounding. I feel myself shaking, shattering and falling to pieces, bit by bit.
"Tell us," they scream at me.
"Never," I spit in their face, and electricity courses through my body once more, plunging me back into another flashback.
—
I came home from the Victory Tour, after the celebration at the mayor's house that commemorated my memorable win at the Games. My entire family and best friend, Luke, walked back to our houses together, seeing as he lived right outside Victor's Village. My mother, father, sister, and brother all headed inside as I walked Luke home. He was laughing at a joke I made, when he suddenly reached for my arm and pulled me into a tight hug. For once, I didn't push away.
"You look beautiful tonight, by the way," he says with a smile, glancing at the strapless light green dress I was wearing, and I smiled weakly back, for I did not feel beautiful. I felt like, and still feel like the monster that I was in the arena.
But monsters never die.
The sound of footsteps jarred me from my thoughts, and a gunshot resonated in the air. My friend fell limp in my arms, the life gone from those bright blue eyes.
I couldn't process what was happening as I saw the two Peacekeepers make their way toward me. Instead, I made a strangled animal noise as I ran at them, almost quivering as my fists clenched together.
They saw. I knew that they saw my leg before the final interview, but I didn't think that they would truly understand. They were ignorant, they were innocent.
Yet, my best friend was dead on the ground, surrounded in his own blood, a bullet lodged in his brain.
"You-" I screech, my voice rising with temper and anguish. "Why?" I shout, my voice cracking with my cries of mixed emotions. With that, I swung, and managed to break one of the Peacekeeper's noses. The man yelled out in pain, but still grabbed me and took hold of my wrists, so I was only struggling as they led me home, where my family was probably preparing for bed.
"No!" I yelled as the realization dawned on me. "No, no, no!"
Busting down my door, they found my mother, father, sister, and brother all in the living room, chatting quietly over that night's events. A family, together, happy, proud, thankful.
My world shattered as the guns were fired and life was snatched out of the hands of my family.
I shrieked as the life died out of their eyes, as the ones who loved me back unconditionally died, were killed, were murdered because I had become a victor who had thought to rashly. There went five more who died because of my hands, because of what I had done.
"Never again," the other Peacekeeper whispered as she walked out the door, as a warning. But why would it matter anymore? There was no one else I loved, so they couldn't hurt me in that way anymore.
"Never again," I repeated, choking out the words in between the sobs that clawed at my throat. They dropped me to the ground and promptly marched out of my house, leaving me with only the memories of times past, surrounded by death.
—-
When I open my eyes again, I am in a hospital, and both Katniss and Finnick are staring at me with worried expressions. Katniss is here again with another bunch of pine needles from the forest, and I take in the soft scent of them, being reminded of home and the happiness that I had been so deprived of.
Maybe it's not that bad, I think, seeing as I am with friends. Maybe, once more, there are people I love.