Chapter 51- Silver Bellcreek

The first part of the film focuses on the events before the Games. I see me volunteering for Flaire and it's like seeing a much younger version of myself. The other tributes are shown briefly and it's like a knife is thrust into my stomach with each one. Everyone on the screen is dead. When they show me and Glow with our linked hands at the reaping, I feel sick. I've returned alive, Glow will not.

Then the tribute parade, with all of us in our silly costumes. So long ago. I remember being so happy that day too. I didn't know.

Then they show our scores after the training, mine stays on the screen longer than anyone else's, that glowing 9. Did the scores really mean anything? Violet only got a 5 and she stayed alive until the end.

Then the interviews and Violet stays in my mind in her light purple dress. "I'll win the Games on my own terms, and I'll go home," she said. I fight back tears. I see the others that had stuck in my mind: Osa, Birches, Tulsee… all gone.

Then the before segments end and the Games begin.

First there's a wide shot of the arena with all of us standing on our plates. I see the mountain and the prairie and the Cornucopia.

Then the gong sounds and the killing begins. I watch the bloodbath all over again, but this time it feels twice as horrible. I see me kill the District 6 boy- I killed the first tribute in the Games. And the last. I put that thought aside.

It's all as gruesome as I remember. Then the tributes scatter, our alliance is formed, and the others go off for wood. I remember that.

Then it's dark and we kill Keek, and I see the girl from 4, Cass, attack and attack Sanguin from 12, and then he's killed by Willow from 11, and then the girl from 7 is chased to the mountains by some mutts, and then I kill the boy from 5… the list goes on and on.

To some degree, though, it's interesting to see what happened when I wasn't there. I watch Cass and Willow team up, and I watch that girl, Birches, head for the mountains too.

Day 3 comes around; Curia and Beade fight over the goggles. The District 4 boy gets stung by tracker jackers. Buck wades around in that grass field. Buck…

Meanwhile the District 7 boy arrives on the mountains too, and hides. Willow dies, as gruesomely as it was when I was there. I feel sick watching her arm melt away. Then Beade and Lar die, and then Cass dies, and Birches dies by the mountain. I'm biting my nails again. I don't want to watch this. I pull my knees up to my chest and hug them as tight as I can.

Nobody dies day 5. The District 7s ally, and I escape and find Violet. Just seeing her onscreen makes me want to cry. It's interesting watching the rockslide though. I'm surprised nobody died in that. Rigg wakes up at some point and stumbles around, then I watch the battle at the prairie and I feel just as sick as ever watching the whole thing. Some people in the audience cheer when I shoot the boy from 9 but I close my eyes. At some point Rigg from 4 gets killed by Buck.

I get hit by the bugs and I immediately start brushing them off my arms, even though I know they're not there. And I see what I missed while I was unconscious; the fire, the fights, then I wake up.

Now I see what happened at the feast; Buck killing Glow, Curia killing Oak, the boy from 7 killing Curia, Buck killing 7… I have to avert my eyes from the gore. So much blood. The last bit of the film goes by in a flash- Violet's death, me killing Buck. Then me winning.

The lights come back on and I'm blinking back tears. I can't show it, not here. The audience cheers and Octavio pumps my hand up and down, but it doesn't matter to me. The feeling of winning is so different from what I envisioned back in District 1. I feel hollow. But I smile anyway.