Written by minnie amarana#0669

The first week was questionable. Amarana noticed how the man, who she was only ever allowed to call "Sir," talked to the other girls. All he did was sit around while Raelynn, the brunette girl who seemed around Amarana's age, and Annalise, a blonde girl looking to be a few years older, did all of the work that he barked at them. He would yell and kick at Blu, who she quickly learned was the sweetest baby in the world once you gave him a few head pats.

Around the second week, she started to be able to walk around on her own, albeit wobbly. While Sir was slightly considerate of her injury, he still put her right to work doing stationary things. Most of the time, it was simply dishwashing. How one man created that many dishes, she had no idea. The other girls ate off of small plates, and they never saw him eating. But yet, large piles of dirty plates and pots met her every morning and evening. At least she wasn't working in the living room or on the floors. Yet.

After a month of dishwashing, all of the mobility she had before the fire was back, and Sir was sure to capitalize on that. Soon she was put on the rotation of washing rugs, scrubbing floors and walls and anything that could be scrubbed, and pulling weeds. She soon found herself without a moment of contemplation time. She barely found time to play with Blu, except when it was her turn to walk him up and down the road.

Her walks with Blu were also the only time she got to fully take in where she was. It was a small town with spaced out houses on the side of the mountain. None of the houses seemed to be younger than 100 years, as they were peeling and collapsing and falling apart. Half of them had vines and bushes growing in and around them. The air was at least a pale blue color to her, as opposed to the tan air inside Downhill. Blu seemed to like the air. He would always pull her down the road before jumping around, pulling on his leash. He never wanted to go back inside, but they both couldn't stay out in the free air forever.

Whatever Sir was doing in the basement, it made life way worse. He would emerge out of his cave, which the girls were forbidden to ever go into, tripping up the stairs and go after one of them or Blu. The old burn scares were soon covered by glass scrapes and deep purple bruises as the months passed by drearily. The other girls claimed that they had been doing this for years, since they were little and brought into Downhill. That the best thing to do was to just keep her head down and patch herself up before bed.

Nobody spoke anything when she turned 11. The forest parties her parents held for her already seemed so far away. The mountain path walks with Blu started to no longer remind her of the fresh air out away from her hometown. Blu's hyper running just tired her further.

When her twelfth birthday came around, Sir had lost his outside job. Not that the girls even knew he had one, but the food must have been coming from somewhere. Because it stopped. Not a week went by without Sir threatening to cut Blu open for a feast. Raelynn always stepped up to him, and was returned with a punch to the stomach and nose. But it kept Blu alive.

She assumed she was 13 when the spring flowers started dying. The days melded together into a puddle of painful mush in her brain. The only real food was what they had trained Blu to start hunting. He was always reluctant, since he wasn't eating anything either. Annalise attempted to find another town for help, but they were in the middle of nowhere. And when Sir found out what she was doing, he insisted they were going to be okay, even though there was no money flow, and the house was becoming one of the overgrown houses. She wondered if their story was the same. If there were drunk and poor starving families hiding away in the growth hoping for some sort of rescue.

Rescue didn't come in the form of a National Guard. It came in the form of fighter jets flying, and the rebellion coming to the mountains. The smoke in the distance. The repeated shouting of "blasted rebels" coming from the basement. And the fallout of ash and waste coming from behind their mountain. Even when bombs reigned on the other side of the mountain, they weren't allowed into the shelter of the basement. So, the three girls huddled in the corner of their shared room, facing the window, holding Blu, praying the fallout wouldn't fall on their roof.

It fell on the house next door's roof. That house went up in flames within an hour. Raelynn cried. She revealed that was the house she grew up in. Her mom turned to drugs and abandoned her and her sister when she was only seven. She thought someone looking after her would be better than the abandonment, but it wasn't. Raelynn pointed at the few constellations that she could make out behind the smoke pollution and wished a different way to be on her own on each star. But all three of them knew that wishes weren't real. They would be long out of Downhill if they were real.

One morning, Sir never came upstairs. They woke up to the sun filtering through the smoke clouds instead of the low bellowing before there was even light in the world. That day, they seemed to have to themselves. The bombs stopped being dropped on the north. The TV finally began to pick up a signal again. On it was an address.

"On this day marks the end of the Dark Days. District 13 has fallen. And Panem will, once again be under the best control."

Amarana didn't recognize his face, but the other girls identified him as Casca Highbottom. Minster of Information, now promoted to President.

"I will be traveling to the old Appalachian mountains to overview the terrible destruction. Our country must do better."

His eye gave a little twinkle.

"Panem Today. Panem Tomorrow. Panem Forever."

A dark thought began to sprout in Amarana's head. She had barely spoken a word aloud in three years. But she was finally proud to have a way out.

"He's our ticket out. We need his attention," she said in above a whisper.

For once, Raelynn and Annalise had no idea how to calm someone. Because Amarana was plotting murder, something they had never even dreamed of doing, no matter how horrible Sir got.

A/N I'm aware that this is all really rushed filler. I just wanted to get something posted, and it's on its way to getting somewhere.