A/N: Enjoy, and please review. No one ever reviews.
CHAPTER TWO – RUNAWAY TRAIN NEVER GOING BACK
The waiting room was a joke. No one came to visit me. I watched people file in and out of Aviva's room, but mine remained stubbornly empty. Even the Peacekeepers, normally stone faced and implacable, seemed surprised by how little anyone cares that I will die.
Still, things are better now that I am on the train, in opulent surroundings with a huge meal spread before me. My fork clatters against the plate as I eat, adding a staccato rhythm to the rumbling of the train. Mimi is even less bearable up close and in person than she was on the stage, but our mentors, a middle-aged woman and a feeble older man, District 9's only Victors, seem nice enough.
"Can't you stop that abominable noise?" Mimi snarls, her good cheer gone.
"No," I say, raising my chin. "I can't. I have the Shakes." I wait for the blanch that usually accompanies my statement. The averted eyes, murmured apologies. I can see that Aviva looks stunned, and both my mentors apologetic, but Mimi's face doesn't change.
"So?"
"So? So?" I am immeasurably angry. "So—I'm going to die! I'm going to die slowly! I'm going to die even if by some miracle I make it out of the arena!"
Mimi snorts. "Of the Shakes? Dear boy, you can get that fixed like that." She snaps her fingers. "We're not in the Dark Days anymore, you know. They have a cure now!" She laughs merrily. I hate her more every day.
"Not in District 9, they don't." I turn away from Mimi in disgust and the silence grows palpable around us. Finally Mimi breaks it by laughing triumphantly.
"Don't you see, dear boy? Don't you see? This is perfect!"
How is it perfect? Why won't she shut up? Why can't I spend my last few days of life peacefully? I have already formed my plan—I will simply stand still in the Bloodbath and wait for someone to kill me. In the meantime, I will eat all of the delicious food that the Capitol has to offer.
Still, Mimi continues to exclaim. "You see it, don't you? If you win, they'll fix you!"
They'll…fix me.
Of course. Why didn't I see it before? A Victor is set up for life. And they'll repair any damages incurred in the arena. Or out of the arena.
If there really is a cure for the Shakes—and I don't know if I entirely believe Mimi about that. If there's a cure, why don't we know about it in District 9, where 1 out 5 citizens will die of the disease?—then, as a Victor, I will receive the cure.
For the first time since my hands started shaking, for the first time in two years, I have hope.
Hope, it turns out, can burn in your chest like a fire. Hope can give you life. But the thing is, it hurts. Because for the first time it feels like I might actually lose something in the Hunger Games. I have more reason to live, but no better chances. I'm still from District 9, still sick, still shaking, still weak.
The odds are certainly not in my favor.
