I have never felt so tortured before.

I was tortured by the Capitol after the Quarter Quell, I'm tortured everyday by the crying pleas of my dead, fellow tributes. I felt tortured when my Finnick was reaped in the 75th Hunger Games. I cried when I was chosen, out of a confused fear of the Games, and an intense, sudden hatred for the Capitol, but at the same time I was happy at least Finnick and I would die together. But then Mags volunteered- rest in peace, sweet mentor- and the torture started again.

But this agony overcomes all.

Two hours after the abrupt ending of the Quarter Quell- a burst of light and then pure static- two Peacekeepers burst into my house, holding guns and shouting. The voices in my head began to scream, so, naturally, I did too. I tried to scream away the raging voices, and this in turn made the peacekeepers angry. They grabbed my hands, where I had had them pressed to my skull, and handcuffed me.

Full of fear and confusion, the voices drowned me, and despite being an excellent swimmer, I succumbed to the dark pool. I fell unconscious.

When I woke up, I was blindfolded, gagged, and in a straitjacket. It was cold and damp. I could hear no outside voices. I was not able to move my arms, and my legs were cramped underneath me. This was the first form of torture. I couldn't move, couldn't yell, couldn't block out the voices physically. Mentally, I wasn't on guard. Mentally I had no control.

I felt myself zoning out, and I watched my fellow tributes die, again and again, all in my mind. I tried to scream them out of my head, I tried to block my ears. But I couldn't.

Two days later, with no food or water, the guards pulled me out from the haze. They dropped the straitjacket but I was handcuffed, and manacles were put on my ankles. They forced me to shuffle out, and into a different room. I was made to kneel down, wincing at the sore stiffness, and told to wait. I did.

The Capitol did not torture me physically. The only touch I felt was the guards roughly escorting me, in and out of different chambers, shackling me. No person, no thing, laid a harmful finger on me.

But they did not hold back hurting others.

Now that I look back, now that I've talked about it, it's clear they were mutts, sentient mutts. But I was so frightened, so confused, so alone, that I could not have figured that out on my own.

Everyday, for hours on end, they would bring in replicas of all my loved ones, my friends, all the tributes I've mentored, even my fellow tributes that I watched die right in person. And then they would kill them in front of me.

The forms of torture… I cannot say. It's all a blurred haze in my head. A part of me knew that these people were not my true loved ones. They couldn't kill Finnick and then kill him again the next day.

But they killed seemingly innocent people right before my eyes all the same.

After the endless hours of that torture, I was sent back into my chamber, and put back into the straitjacket. I would get a bowl of stew almost every night, but I had to learn to eat like an animal, for my hands were bound.

But I was never alone. The voices stayed with me.

Soon, all I knew was death. Being alive was the torture. Physically, I was weak from malnourishment, but I wasn't hurt. The worst physical pain I felt was the soreness from sitting in the same position too long, for being in a straitjacket.

But mentally I was beyond repair. It was far, far worse than death. Even a painful death would have been better. Death was final, it ends everything.

Other's deaths are inexplicably horrendous, but my own never came.

But at least then I had a tiny, slip of hope.

During the Quarter Quell, there was that little bit of hope that Finnick could win, especially since I saw the arena. Water.

During my imprisonment at the Capitol, it was obvious the guards knew, or at least thought, Finnick was alive, and with the rebels. I had no idea who these rebels were or what they were doing. But Finnick was alive, and seemingly had the upper hand. This was my hope.

But little by little, my hope shrank.

It became clear I knew nothing about the rebels. So I was bait. Because Finnick loved me, he would come after me.

I began to wish Finnick didn't love me. That he'd fallen for some flashy Capitol girl. It certainly wouldn't have hurt him, and I would have possibly gotten over my mentor. Maybe things would be different right now.

It hurt to think that, but it was just another item to add to my list of horrors.

And then, one day, after torture, gas started to come out of the drain in the floor. I could feel myself falling from consciousness, and wondered if this was it, if I was finally leaving this redundant world of continuous pain. I glimpsed the face of a man, not my Finnick but not a peacekeeper, opening my door, before I passed out completely.

I later learned it was Gale Hawthorne.

When I came to, I was laying on a bed with white sheets. I was naked, and there were male and female doctors in the room. Feeling embarrassed, I wrapped the sheet around myself. I was surprised when that didn't ache, I was used to there being a small ache from constant stiffness. And for once, I didn't hear any voices. There was complete peace.

The doctors later told me it was from the morphling.

But no morphling could have stopped the rush of feelings I had when I was allowed out.

I was wandering around, searching for any familiar face. Even Katniss Everdeen, whom I had only seen on TV, would have been a comfort. But I found someone much better.

There he was, down the hall. My Finnick. My sun. He was the only thing that grounded me, the only thing that kept my heart from freezing. His warmth made me safe, he kept me rotating. I couldn't stop myself from shrieking his name.

And when our eyes met, there was nothing else existent. I was only aware of my Finnick, standing right there, my other half.

We got married as soon as possible, with Peeta, poor, tortured Peeta, making our cake. The weeks to follow were impossibly wonderful. Even though the voices were still there, never really going away, Finnick brought me back to reality, with his soothing words and his hand in mine.

And then we found out I was pregnant. Everything was spiraling upward, and even in the midst of war and tragedy, we were able to be happy with each other.

But all good things must come to an end. All things die sooner or later.

I didn't know the mission was dangerous. I guess no one told me for my own protection. It was awful enough for him to leave me- who would protect me against my mind? I loved him, how could he leave again? But he promised he would be back.

He held my face in his hands, reciting his poem from the Quarter Quell. He promised me he would come back to be a father to our son.

I don't blame him for breaking his promise. He couldn't help dying, especially for his cause. I know he wanted a better life for me, a better life for everyone; this was his cause. To help others gain victory, so others would have a chance at life.

I didn't believe it when I watched the Capitol air it on TV. I knew in my heart, somehow, he had escaped. Because my Finnick is the smartest, sneakiest, cleverest man out there. He couldn't have been dead.

And he wasn't. He lived a little bit more.

But then Gale Hawthorne and Haymitch Abernathy visited me. Gale because he was present when it happened. Haymitch because we're friends.

Haymitch seemed awkward, and I could see the pity in his eyes. Gale would seem awkward if he could, but even I must admit, Gale is too handsome and fierce to seem anything close to awkward. Haymitch staggers into the seat across from me on my bunk, and Gale leans against the door-frame. I put down my book, and try to quiet the voices in my head.

"Hello, do you men need something?" I ask.

Haymitch sighs. "Annie…" He starts, but Gale cuts him off.

"We have some… bad news, Annie. More than bad."

The voices in my mind grow. Help help help… Annie! Annie Cresta! I blink a couple of times before I answer, "What?"

"Way to mince the words, Hawthorne," Haymitch mutters. I don't acknowledge him.

"What's wro-" I start, but I can't complete my sentence. My mind is screaming too loud, filled with the voices. Too many familiar ones to distinguish them all.

No, no, no, help us! No, NO! Why can't you help me? Why do you hate me? Annie, Annie, they're torturing me, they're…

I drop out of reality, overcome with the terror again, and press my hands to my head, trying to squeeze out the demons, before they swallow me whole. I cannot drown again. I've been swimming so well lately, treading water, even with my Finnick gone. The voices haven't really left, not often anyways, but I've been holding on. Holding onto my Finnick's hand.

Someone grabs my hand.

I am brought back to reality.

And my other hand is now holding someone's, too.

I open my eyes, and stare into not one, but two pairs of eyes. Gale's and Haymitch's stunning gray eyes. Nothing like Finnick's but… calming. The calm before the storm.

I clear my throat. "What's wrong?"

And then they tell me everything. Gale, Katniss Everdeen, Finnick, Boggs, who I know, and some others, going on a mission. Getting ambushed by unmarked traps. Two deaths. And then running, escaping, trying to outrun capture. Their supposed deaths, this I know. But what happens afterwards is all new.

Heading underground, lead by an Avox. The evil mutts hissing the name of Katniss. Others stopping to take on the mutts, possibly hold them back, to make sure Katniss can get out, to complete her mission. And then the climbing of the ladders. And Finnick never making it.

Gale tells me Katniss tried to go back for him, for the others. They watched him die. And then, to get her revenge and kill off any remaining mutts, she blew up their hologram map. All suffering ending, except her own.

And, just two days ago, they all got back, even Gale, who was captured. Currently, most of the remaining members of the squad are being treated for whatever wounds they might have acquired during their mission, those who are not dead. And that Gale is leaving tomorrow. He received two gun-shots, but he was patched up, quickly and cleanly, in a matter of hours.

I am pregnant. Panem is falling before our eyes. And I am all alone. No husband. No one to guard me, to whisper hope into my ears. No hope. No protection against the inward battles. No love.

My Finnick is truly gone. Forever and ever. I am trapped, for ever and ever and ever and ever…

This is the true torture.

…

I am now in labor, and I feel as if I could die. I want to die.

Everything is going downhill for me. Coin's, and Snow's, death, the chaos everywhere. There will be another Hunger Games, which is truly awful. Why must we encourage death and pain? Why can't human beings be done with this?

And Finnick is gone. Forever.

I feel like screaming every time I think of him, which is almost always. Sometimes I do let myself scream. But then I imagine I'm scaring my little unborn child, and I quiet to a ragged whimper.

I see him in everything. My green wedding-dress, which is stored in my drawer, the little curly-blonde-haired children that run around 13. I see him in my head. His death, his hand in mine.

I begin to scream as I give birth. But mostly out of mental pain. I cry as I howl, and taste the salt in my tears. Sea-salt.

It will never, ever end.

…

It's all over. I am now holding precious Finnick Oceanus Cresta Odair in my arms, Fin for short. My little baby boy.

As I stare into his eyes, I am so reminded of his father. The calm-yet-stormy green eyes, as vivd as the sea itself, mixed with little slivers of blue and gray and the ocean.

I begin to cry as I cuddle my baby boy. He truly is a little piece of Finnick in my arms. I croon his name as I sob, out of sadness or out of joy, I cannot tell.

…

Little Fin is growing fast, and learning new things everyday. I am so proud of him.

The government is back in order. People are more happy than ever. The Hunger Games came, and went. I didn't watch. I wasn't forced.

Things are better now.

When the voices get bad, I have to clutch my baby boy, and then he grounds me. Brings me back to reality. Just like his father.

I miss my baby's father, my Finnick. I will never stop mourning him. But, as I've learned, that's okay.

And now… I will continue. I will love my baby Fin. I will continue to hold on for dear life when I am dragged away from reality. I doubt I will ever fall in love again, but that's okay.

I will continue, on and on, until my own death.

Here's hoping it will be sweet.