Trigger Warning in Mystic's POV: There are many instances of profanity, and cruel slurs against women are used in conversation. Be warned, and don't attack me for doing this. Both characters involved would not, I feel, hesitate to use this kind of dirty language when in an argument.
In Arlo's POV, some foul language is also used.
Also, full credit goes to Suzanne Collins for all of this, since I haven't said that in a while.
Without further ado, I present to you the longest update this story has ever seen! (*happy cries*)
Mystic Archeron, 16, District Eight Female
The string of the quiver feels tight as I pull it back, readying the arrow to send it into the target. Already, five of them are embedded in it, and only one of them has hit the floor. The trainer is away on the other end of the station now, instructing Cassius, who doesn't seem to be getting anywhere as his face flushes. He looks from the bow, to the trainer, to me repeatedly, indecisive about where to point his eyes. Maybe I'll help him eventually, once I've mastered it myself, or get as close to that as I can. There's only so much I can do, though.
I let the arrow fly, and it shoots through the air before thudding impressively near the bullseye.
My aim has gotten quite good from all those years gone on the streets instead of in that suffocating house. Throwing rocks through windows and such, that has helped. Either I land it or I get caught. Either I make the shot, or I die. Dying. That's why I'm here, isn't it? Whether it's my fault or that of the Capitol, yes. But I don't want to die.
I shoot the next arrow as the thought courses through me. It skids past the target.
Deep breaths. That's what I need right now. I have to stay calm. Not like Cassius. He slams the bow to the floor.
"Fuck this! I'm done with archery for good!" He storms off angrily, it seems with no set destination in mind. It's a shame.
Uptight people just aren't built for life. What's the point of smiling if you can't truly feel it? Those people, they're the ones that conform to authority and uniformity, taking life over living. It removes all of the freedom from it, though. I'd much rather be there, free, loud and proud on the outside, living day to day, than there in that ugly cinderblock house with the looming threat of Dad's whipping post downstairs, or going through the same thing, day after day, year after year, constant drudgery. They don't understand.
Morgana understood… No, I can't steer myself back to that. I need to focus on what's at hand. I coax a smile onto my lips, forcing it there, because if it stays, I'll feel better. I release the arrow, and it lands nearer to the center of the target than the last two. That's better. Now it does come truly.
I have to stop myself from seeing if the careers are watching. I want them to see me right now, but I don't want to give them all of the power. But, unlike yesterday, now I don't want them to recruit me. I don't want to be a part of that disgusting bullshit. I don't need them, anyway. I can go it alone if necessary, I did so for two years.
There is nothing I want to do with that bitch from Nine. Vicious, pro-Capitol, and just the kind of person I can't stand. She isn't just the one who follows the rigid rules and never cares to live at all or do anything but put a damper on the already quite rainy day that is like. She is the one who makes them. And soon, she'll probably be the one who abuses them.
What would twelve-year-old me have done if she stood over me with that whip as I hurried did my job at the assembly line, in some alternate universe where father wasn't mean or an overseer himself? I hate to think that I would have stood there, didn't stand up to her and make my voice heard, the same way I did to father after twelve years of putting up with his shit. Even though I can feel the scars stretching on my back as I lean into the bow and pull back the quiver once again, I have no regrets. I'm me, and I'm bi, and there is nothing that I, that asshole, or anybody else could or can do about it.
The target strikes the white rim nearest the bullseye of the heart.
No. I would have fought back against her the same way I did to him. I'm not going to let them oppress me. They don't even know me. With them, I can't be myself. I'm not anything if I'm not myself. Me. Like I said, I have no regrets. Especially not killing that fucker.
Never mind. I do have one. Making up that whole disastrous plan to begin with. And then, because of that, seeing Weft laying there, dead, with that monster standing over her, and then seeing Weave's bloodied corpse, too, because some street hooligans found him and they recognized him, the youngest Archeron. It was his fucking fault, all of it.
In anger, I let go of the quiver once again, and the bow speeds faster than it has ever gone, landing in the wrist.
"Radial artery," says an annoyingly and inappropriately cheery Capitolite voice playing out of a speaker. "Lethal within minutes."
And now, all of them are dead. Nobody to love me anymore. Nobody to hold me back.
In a way, I'm free like I haven't been ever before.
I push a wild strand of jet-black hair from out of my eyes and ready my bow again. That's what I am: Wild. Hiding in the caves and alleys, running through the streets wherever and whenever I please, because they can't stop me, they can't hold me down anymore.
The target strikes the center of the bullseye, and golden fluid starts to ooze out of the tender center.
"Heart," the recording says. "Lethal within mere seconds."
I can sense footsteps behind me, murmuring, and I can see the careers approaching me, only a few yards away now, when I turn around.
I don't want to kill, and I wouldn't kill any of these innocent kids who didn't ask to be here. I would shoot any one of these fuckers, though. They volunteered to be here, just like I did, and there isn't anything that I or they can do that, however remorseful any of us are.
"What, am I next in line?" I ask the lot of them, but I direct it at the Nine girl, standing at the front of the line. "Gonna try and scare me, now?" I'm not afraid of her, even as she smiles her vile smile and stops walking only feet away from me, her muscular frame towering over my small and skinny one.
"We don't have to do most of the work," she says, her lips curling into a smirk. "Just look into the future. Picture yourself dead. Dead at my hands. And all because you volunteered for it yourself, you dumb little outlier wench. This is what you wanted, to feel my whip in your gut."
"Bring it on, bitch!"
I take a step closer to her, undeterred by her obvious physical power, and now I can see something like frustration flickering in her widely set eyes. I'm not scared of her. I know what I got myself into, and now isn't the time to throw a pity party for myself. I don't want to die, not in a million years, but I would rather do that than lose my morals, lose my sense of self, because that's all I have left, and I'll cling to it for as long as I can.
"Go try and intimidate somebody else, because it won't work on me," I bark to her, my voice not betraying anything but rage. "All you'll accomplish is pissing me off, and you don't want to do that, because I, unlike you, don't have anything to lose. I bet you have a nice little family back home, rooting for their daughter, worried she'll die and be a disappointment, and nobody in her district will ever think of her fondly, just a Capitol loving psychopath who failed when it mattered the most. Come on, Capitol Nazi, go ahead and underestimate me. You're all the scum of the earth, and four of you know it. You volunteered to kill children, you fucking sadists! so go ahead and kill whoever you want, just know that odds are you're all probably going to be dead in a few days."
Now I can see something deep and angry, nervous, defeated, in that ugly face of hers, and she is angrier than I've ever seen her up until now. With her hulking, muscular frame silhouetted against a dark light and her beady black, devilish eyes glinting as a clique of almost-as-scary allies stand behind her, she does look now truly fearsome. I'm not going to let myself gulp, though. I'm not going to let her win, to let her control my emotions.
"Just you wait," she says in a furious low grumble of defeat, so that only I can discern the words, "until we see each other in that arena, and then we'll see who thinks she has won."
The girl stands up and walks away.
"You shouldn't let that little shit think she won," the One boy says to her. "She didn't. Only the battle. We'll tear her limb from limb." He throws his voice back so that I can hear the last part.
Tear me limb from limb, huh? That's pretty gruesome. I won't let them get me, though.
I've got something over the district traitor girl from Nine, and that thing is freedom. I can be myself, have fun, pursue the ill-advised, because I don't give a damn about that. None of those five could ever comprehend it.
I want to live, yes, but I want to see that girl die even more. I've lit enough lanterns and lights with my fire, and I've burnt some down with its wrath, too, but I'll keep on burning. I want to see that District Nine bitch fall to ashes and hear her screams. I want to see all of the Capitol do the same. That's something to keep on living for.
Arlo Maddox, 17, District Two Male
The girl from Eight's words stick in my head long after the altercation, still echoing on a loop as Imperia, fuming, works off her anger at the knife station, trying to pass off her rage at her failure to scare the girl as strength, which, in all fairness, it is. Mystic. That was her name. And her last name was something odd, too. And now, she'll probably be dead by the time the weak is over, not that she seems like she cares as much as the average person anyway. I don't know if I do either.
"You're all the scum of the earth, and four of you know it. You volunteered to kill children, you fucking sadists! so go ahead and kill whoever you want, just know that odds are you're all probably going to be dead in a few days."
Her words ring true, and I know it. I don't want to be here. I don't want to kill these people any of them. I just let Father get the best of me, with his cruel words and his even crueler whip, and now I'm stuck in this life and death scenario. Basically, I'm fucked.
I'm a monster. It's what he made me into. I don't want to think of what Mother might say if she saw me now, bullying innocent little kids who've had lives even worse than mine, just prepping myself up to slit their throats. That's why I left her scarf on the second floor this morning. I can't bear to have either of them with me today. I know one of them awaits me after the end of the day, and it's something I'm dreading. Maybe putting up with that is worse than going down in the arena. I probably will, even if I try not to.
What's the point?
To prove them wrong, maybe. To prove myself wrong. But to do that, to advance further on, I would have to kill anyway, and I don't want to kill. I don't want to become like Father in the victory tape of his Games that he showed me to practice, don't want to become like Alessia as she smiles as she tortures those birds in the backyard. I want to be like Mother, like Galen, kind and pure, because I know neither of them could ever kill. I know both of them would rather die than lose their principles just like Mystic, but I've already lost mine. I lost them the second I let Father take hold of me, threw them down for good the second I raised my hand and said, "I volunteer." All five of us did.
I wish there was I way to twist it all around in time and pretend like it never happened. Something I could do to call myself a good person, then or now, or maybe in the future. Scylla's as close to good as any of us could get, and Talisa is alright, too.
It's almost as if the second I think of my partner, she turns her head around, flicking it up towards my direction. Her ferociously blue eyes stare up at me apologetically, that familiar, mysterious pain and fear still behind them, still wearing that silly-looking blue face paint.
"Sorry," she mumbles to me, so quietly a have to strain to comprehend it. "Just… lost it for a second."
"I know what you mean," I say in what I hope is a genial manner. People often just get intimidated by me, just by the way I look. "Everybody gets them." I walk over closer to her. I doubt I'm motivated by any natural desire to have an ally in this tower of cards of a career pack; all of the Hunger Games energy has been sucked out of me. I still don't know, though. I barely have any idea who I am anymore, and that's probably because what I am is what I want to forget. It's nice to still have a friend, a luxury never afforded to me back at home, and of course Galen was so pure and kind and handsome, and Imelda was sometimes there when Father and her parents were trying to arrange a future between the two of us, but now she is here. Maybe I'll have someone to be there for me when—if—I die.
If I did have a friend, I'd want it to be her. She seems like the best of us, between Imperia, sleezy Marvel, and overconfident Talisa. Nice and reserved and mysterious. I want to find out why she is… the way that she is, for lack of better terminology.
Scylla gives me one of those rare smiles, her eyes elsewhere but her lips strained yet sincere, and I try to return it, because it doesn't come naturally.
"You think she'll want one of us to do it next or try to redeem herself?" Scylla asks, nodding her head at Imperia, who is oblivious.
"I hope neither. If we're going to kill them anyway, the least we can do is make it nice and quick. Like Eight said, they didn't volunteer for this. We did."
"We had to," she says, and I look at her quizzically. "Some of us did, anyway," she finishes vaguely, curling her finger on something glinting on her left ear.
I didn't have to. I could have just stayed quiet, and stayed quiet for another year after that, too, and ran away, maybe with Galen, and lived my own life. Maybe if I was better.
"And now, we've got to kill," I say, resigned.
"To survive. To beat it."
"Beat what?" I look at Scylla quizzically, and she returns my gaze, embarrassed, but she doesn't get a chance to answer.
"The others." Imperia walks forward, red-faced from her grueling dummy killing spree. "Into submission."
She stands there, imposingly, a head taller than Scylla but still shorter than me, but even more muscular, that wicked scowling grin on her face. I'm scared of her, scared of her in a way I don't think any of the others are, not even the pathetic little outlier kids who she could kill with one punch or kick. I see Father when I look into her unnerving brown eyes, almost black, and that vicious look she always has. The way that she flings that whip with such glee and such rage, the same way father used to do to me after Mother went, so there was nobody to talk him out of it. Even though I don't want to, I see Alessia in the way she is so eager to kill, what he turned her into, and I'm afraid that what I see is myself, too, in just a few days. I hope I don't like it when I have to kill them. Maybe I could knock them first out to make it painless.
I think that she senses it, the way I feel, and latches onto it, with that same bullying instinct she has been using all day. Why does she have to pick on me?
"Two," she says, facing me. "I want you to go next. It's your turn."
I take an anxious gulp as Scylla looks at me in pity out of the corner of my eye. Of course she wouldn't do anything to stop it. Neither am I.
"Prove your worth. Show me if all that muscle has any meaning to it or not."
"Sure thing," I stutter out, cringing as my voice cracks in pain. I'm hesitant, and she knows it. Maybe she is still doing the bullying, and I'm her next real victim.
I look out into the crowd of outliers, all shifting around and keeping their head down, fearfully glancing at us out of the corners of their eyes and whispering to their allies. Mystic is the only one undeterred by us. She still shoots her bow and is getting better and better. Is it bad that I want her to succeed? I don't want to torment any of these people.
I start to walk around aimlessly, indecisively shifting my gaze between tribute and tribute.
"Hey! Assholes! This is my station, so fuck off!"
I look around me and see nobody.
"Didn't you hear me? Fuck off!"
The sound is coming from above me. I didn't realize where I was. I look up, and then realize that the angry little Twelve boy is perched atop the ropes course, struggling and wincing to avoid falling off. I didn't mean to stumbled onto him, really, but if I bully somebody, it might as well be a loner who started the fight. Even if he is probably scared out of his mind for what is coming, even if he is just lashing out.
"Hey kid. Look who you're telling the fuck off."
"I don't give a damn who you are. Wait your turn!"
"You think you're so big and tough and powerful, huh?" This feels wrong. I hate this. And yet the words are flowing so naturally out of my mouth. "We'll see whose so scary once we're in the arena. You want to try your luck against me when you're on the ground, maybe have a swordfight, see what happens?"
He tenses up, and his face goes a shade paler.
"You wait and see!" he yells, before hurrying through with the rest of the course. "Go ahead and underestimate me!" And then he jumps off at the finish and speeds away.
It's done. I'm just as bad as Imperia, now, and Father too for that matter. It came so easily to me, almost rehearsed. Like I was in my element. I don't deserve to live, not even over that punkish jerk of a kid. I'm a horrible person. Scum of the earth, just like Mystic said.
"Good job, Two," Imperia says, patting me on the back, like this is some big achievement. Maybe it is to her. Maybe I'm a horrible person, but I'm not as bad as her. Not as bad as Father. But I don't know what the arena will do to me, so I can't even say for sure. I don't want to win anymore. But I'd much rather win than Imperia. I guess that's something to live for. Lesser of two evils, really.
I don't want to be evil. I want to be good, so, so, so badly. When I would cry if Father scared me or hurt me or made me do something I didn't want to do when I was younger, Mother was always there to hold me, and to comfort me, tell me that I was a good person. Tell me that I had a heart of gold. Then again, she said the same thing about Alessia.
I hope so badly that she was right.
Coleus Yarrow, 16, District Nine Male
The poisonous plant section still looks tempting for some bizarre, ridiculous, unhealthy reason that I still don't want to admit to myself. I thought that I could make it through the entirety of training without touching them yesterday, and I did, even though that frightening force threatened to pull me there itself. I never want to touch any of those things again, not after what I did. Though, on the other hand, it would be good for my chances if somebody ended up dead at my hands in the arena.
That's not a good thought. The guilt about Pansy still torments me to this day, and I despised her. I don't want to kill anymore. At least if I did, it would be on purpose this time. At least I wouldn't have to keep it a secret.
What do I even know about poisonous plants, anyway? Not as much as I thought I did, that's for sure. I guess all of those times Mom took me and Carica down as little kids and taught us the plant names and how to tell the good from the bad, it didn't help with the stupid fucking prank, because it all left my mind eventually. Panem knows I sure as hell would never go back to the stream and pick some more flowers after what happened the last time, even though I still stared at it through my window at night, my gut urging me to go out. As many times as I splashed myself with that water tainted with poison and death in the dead of night, trying to cleanse myself in some odd way, nothing ever worked.
Maybe I need to learn. The dart blowing section hasn't been touched yet, and nobody seems interested. And it's right by the poison section, too.
But no, I need to practice with something else. Something that I haven't already failed at once that won't cause my hands to tremble with guilt. That's why I spent most of yesterday at the spears station, and today hopping around different survival stations, but never that one. But now I'm at the edible plants station alone, and the instructor has mentioned water hemlock. When she did, an anvil dropped in my stomach. I just hope to death that there won't be any of that in the arena.
"And that is why you should never eat anything that looks even remotely like a hydrangea. You do know what foxglove looks like, right?"
I nod absentmindedly, my eyes looking at her, but my attention drawn to my thoughts. It doesn't matter anyway, everybody in Nine knows what hydrangeas will do to a person.
"Hi, can I practice here too? I just want to test what I know."
I look up, drawn out of my thoughts, and dropping the limp artificial milkweed in my hand. The tiny Seven girl stands beside me, just a few inches taller than me even when I sit on a cushion and she stands.
"Tessa," she says, holding her hand out to shake. "And you're Coleus, right?"
I shake her hand limply, not putting much effort into a good first impression for a girl who'll probably be one of the first to go.
"Don't you have any ally somewhere?" I wouldn't be surprised if the boy dumped her, especially if he knew what was good for him. I don't want this little girl as an ally, probably coming over here to gloat. I can see that smartness in those crystal blue eyes of hers, and the way they dart to my clammy hands as I draw them back. Maybe she's here trying to stab me in the back after she earns my trust. She could be doing the same thing with her little partner. I don't care if I come off as rude, this diminutive Seven girl—Tessa—has no right trying to bother me. What did I do to her?
"Yes, he's in the boys' room over there, so I thought I'd come over here to brush up."
"Hmmm," I grumble, hoping to send a signal, but she still sits down with an innocent yet defiant air to her, like she won't leave until she makes me like her.
"Hi, sweetie, anything you want to learn?" the trainer asks merrily, excited to have a new and more blindly optimistic student for the time being.
"No," she says politely, "I think I'll just take the quiz now and ask for help on the ones that I get wrong. I am from Seven."
"I'm from Nine, you know." I don't know why I feel any sort of need to prove myself to this little girl, or why she feels any need to make friends in the life and death scenario we are both stuck in, for that matter, but I do.
"I know. The big nine on your back was a bit of a hint."
She laughs at her own joke, and that sound, despite being small, still echoes over the training facility in that daunting way that is soon becoming all too familiar. I hope it didn't alert the careers. I don't want to be next on their terrorizing list. I can still sense their presence, though, those five pairs of menacing eyes pointed at me, the same way I feel Pansy's wrath day and night, always peeking over my shoulder. Maybe she's working with them. You can't rule anything out in the Hunger Games.
The conversation falls into nothingness as I proceed to work on sorting plants into the boxes, cleverly dubbed "edible" and "inedible", so Tessa goes back to her quiz. Good. I don't want to talk to her anyway, and I've lived through so many awkward silences in life that the feeling does not phase me.
As I lift my hand over the edible box to drop a dandelion weed in, Tessa chimes up again: "Er—Coleus, that's a mountain dandelion. It belongs in the other box."
"Thanks," I say, not bothering to look at her or put that false sweetness in my voice.
What is her game? What is she doing, trying to be a smartass, to make a fool out of me in front of the other tributes, in front of the careers, so that they'll target me because they think that I'm weak? If that is her motive, then she is sorely mistaken, trying to attack my plant knowledge.
What am I saying? Of course I need help. Look at what happened to Pansy. I don't want that to happen to me! Maybe I do need this little girl.
"Coleus?"
I look up at Tessa quizzically to see a softer, yet equally confused face staring back at me.
"Huh?"
"You were mumbling. Were you trying to tell me or the trainer something?"
"Oh." I was rambling again, subconsciously, but maybe that was what slowed it to a halt: Hearing my own voice. Maybe it's self-centered, but I still need it when my emotions get ahold of me. "Did you catch anything of it? I already forgot what I was saying." I can feel my cheeks heating red, even under my caramel skin.
Tessa doesn't mention it, instead just smiling and saying, "We all do that sometimes."
Feeling embarrassed, I hunch back over my station and ask the trainer to inspect what I've done. Maybe I shouldn't have been so rude earlier, because now if made her mad at me. Scratch that, because she still smiles at me just as warmly, just as persistently, and she may still be up to no good.
"Yes! Ninety-seven percent correct!" Tessa pumps her fist in ecstasy as she tells the trainer what she made.
"Excellent job! Would you like to be told why you got what you got wrong?"
"No, I think I know what I did already. I see my partner coming over there, and I think he wanted to go to the shelter-making station. Thank you, though."
Good. She's finally going. She shouldn't have come to this station anyways, since I was here. But I still feel sad as she stands up to walk away. Maybe because she reminds me of my little sister Carica a little, even though she is two years younger than her. But she's also some nice company. I need to forget that. I'm enough company for myself, I always am when I sit alone at school. But this isn't school, this is the Hunger Games, where anyone can kill you or trap you or stab you in the back at any time, in any place.
"Feel free to come with us, Coleus," Tessa says, still grinning in that annoyingly friendly way. "We could always use another ally. The more, the merrier."
I don't know why she is doing this. I've been a complete asshole to her. And I almost want to take it, but no, because maybe she suspects I've done something wrong, or she thinks that I'm stupid, or she just wants another body to throw in front of her as a shield. I don't think she wants any of that. But I still decline.
"No. And Tessa… sorry."
"That's totally fine," she says. "Feel free to ask to join if you reconsider, we'll totally take you in."
With that, she walks off, leaving me to ponder whether or not I regret my decision. As I watch her greeting her partner fifty feet away, I stand up, and I catch the boy's eye, and it looks like he almost thinks he'll join us. I can see Tessa pointing at me, probably telling him what a complete jerk I've been or that I'm hopeless and am going to die in the opening minutes. No, she isn't, because she turns and I can see her profile, and she is smiling in that bittersweet kind of way. I still don't—can't—trust her, or anybody.
I take one tiny step towards them, and then change my mind, walking at a brisk pace in the other direction. To where, I have no clue until there I am, standing right in front of the poisonous plant section, the kinds that aren't just lethal if eaten. It's almost as if it's a dark magnet for me.
Don't you dare touch those! Pansy's voice echoes around in my head, toxic things she never said but without a doubt would playing back in my head. How could such a sweet person like Laurel be friends with her? Go back to the edible plants station and eat some, you fat little pig! Maybe you'll accidentally eat a poisonous one too and die.
She's right. I'm right. I can touch those, I'm scared to, I'd be too dangerous, like a baby snake that can't control its venom.
I turn around, searching for a station as I run, and there I see the Sevens at the shelter station nearby. No. I can't be with them. I could hurt them, or they could hurt me, or we could make too much noise and alert others or something!
"Don't hang out with them, Coleus," I mutter in one rambling breath. "Be by yourself, Coleus, nobody understands you Coleus, run away, they'll only hinder you, the nice ones will die first."
There, the camouflage station is fairly isolated. I break out in a jog to it.
My voice starts up, in a different tone. "You foul monster, how could you not confess to what you did to her. Isn't that what you want, to be freed of your burden? How could you turn a sweet little girl just looking for a friend away? Isn't that what you want? You need to get into shape, or you'll die, you fat bastard, you're already exhausted just from jogging."
I stand there, panting from the rambling and out of breath. "Raagh!" I let out a scream of emotion, just trying to force some of it out. The Sevens and the Fives nearby look over, and it feels like a million eyes are on me, judging me, glad they aren't allying with me.
At last, I make it to the camouflage station. Nobody can see me in the arena of wooden trees clustered around me now. I can't escape the feelings, though, of gut-wrenching guilt as I see the poison station, and the longing and embarrassment when I make out Tessa, laughing again and freely, not awkwardly, with her partner.
I don't deserve this. I don't deserve them. I deserve to be alone.
Aleyn Garsow, 14, District Eleven Male
I wake up at the sound of the gong. For one horrifyingly bizarre moment, as I get my bearings and try to find out where I am, I think that I'm the Hunger Games, standing on a pedestal, and my twenty-three competitors are all poised to kill me. But no. My feet are on solid, black cement, and the other tributes are all clearing out of the training center.
Fuck.
Seconds ago it seemed to be… what, two o'clock in the afternoon?
"Get moving." I jump at the sound of the Peacekeeper's barking voice as I feel his eyes boring into my head even from behind his helmet, still in that constant state of fear or paranoia that Simon, or Dad, or Second is there.
Second. He's why this is happening.
So what, I took over for a few hours, what's the harm of it. We share this body now, get used to it. It's not like I did anything awful.
His voice is like nails on a chalkboard to my ears, and good lord I can't stand it! All my rage and fury for being taken over countless times, over and over again, like some sort of puppet by him, makes me just want to scream. But I don't, and I don't talk to him either, because I don't want any of these people to think that I'm crazy, as much as I want to tell him off. If they did, they might target me. If they did, they probably wouldn't like me anyway, but even though I'm in the fucking Hunger Games I still desperately want somebody to.
Sierra does, but I can't be around her. Be around them. I'm too dangerous. Second could still harness control me, and then I wouldn't want to know what he would do to them.
At a brisk walk, I make it to the end of the line at the elevators, the last one out, and the doors shut behind me so loudly I feel a gust of wind brush through my sweaty hair. Sweaty hair. My hair wasn't sweaty two minutes ago. And then I fully process where I was then, standing in front of a bunch of hacked at, bleeding dummies, a silver knife glinting on a metal stand beside me.
Of course that was what Second took over me to do: Play with the knives. I don't want to hurt anybody, to kill anybody. I think that is what is coming if I can't somehow get ahold of this mess that I call my mind.
Really, not going to put up any sort of a fight at all, Second's voice gloats unhampered in my head, with that smug air to it that's ever-present after one of these bouts of him being there without me. That's a shame. You need to learn, Aleyn. To fight, that is. We're in the Hunger Games. Weakness won't get you anywhere.
Both elevators open at the same time, and the last of the tributes get in except the odd Ten girl. I doubt she's paying attention to me anyway, so I dare to whisper a retort: "You're the one who got both of us here in the first place. Stop trying to force yourself onto me, it's my body, you're just a visitor."
We share this body now, get used to it. Why should I not be able to pursue some of my interests?
This isn't his body, it's mine, it will always be mine, and I want him to leave, but I don't dare say it, because I'm scared he would just resort to possessing me again. But I'm aware that he is aware of what I think, so there really isn't any point now. I don't want to just give up, and lay down, and let him have control, but… I can't see any other solution, unless I die before he can fully.
The elevator in front of me slides open, and I run in, pressing the button to close the door before the Ten girl can hop in so that I can finally voice my opinions as loud as I want. She doesn't make any effort to board it. She probably wants to be alone too. But no, I can't talk freely now, because of that tiny black orb hovering in the corner of the box. They're still watching me.
My mind flashes back to when Sierra was complaining about never feeling like she had her privacy before Syracuse shut her up, the first useful thing he's done since we boarded the train. I overheard him telling her that there was a place that most victors didn't even know about, one where nobody could hear you on a gusty night. For once I'm grateful for the mean old drunk I got as a mentor. He reminds me of Father, probably sitting in the bar at this very moment. I see a mysterious button at the top, unlabeled, unlike the number "12" right below it. I didn't catch the location. Maybe this is it. I tap the button.
Looking for a little adventure, huh? Second asks. I don't know why you won't just talk to me. It's not like they'll think you're the craziest, not with the Nine girl, the Ten girl, and the chick with the face paint running around.
"Shut up, Second," I say daringly in front of the cameras, my voice quivering.
Don't tell me to shut up until you put some meaning into those words. You don't know how frustrating it is to look like you: small, skinny, weak. You need to be strong, put some muscle on, prove that you're worth more than just another worthless kid destined to spend his days working his ass off in a field for nothing. You can't keep on going on like this, keeping your head down in fear, cowering and trembling and crying. Man up!
"Maybe you have a point, but this wasn't exactly the best way to give me a push."
Second is right, I know it. And I'm scared, because I'm so weak, terrified that I'm going to die in that arena. But maybe there is something else better at the end of the long, tough rainbow, a life without Second, a life with some degree of actual quality. Something to fight for.
We can work on your motives later, Second says in that bossy demeanor of his that infuriates me. At least you're actually willing to put up some sort of fight. Maybe now you have a chance of not dying in the opening minutes. You should be thanking me.
"Floor eleven," says a Capitolite voice over the speaker.
The elevator door whizzes open to reveal my floor, and all of that resolve from seconds ago falls away as I try to hide as much of myself behind a wall as I can, furiously pressing the close button. I can see Sierra, oblivious, looking nice but still melancholy, strained. Belladonna and Helga are obscured by the wall, but there is Syracuse, and I know that he sees me. His eyes meet mine and for one nervous moment it's like I'm staring into my father's, but he discreetly gives me a nod. Maybe he isn't so bad.
The doors shut, and we shoot past the Twelves to the top. This time, when the doors open, I'm shocked, though I shouldn't be, to be outside. It's the roof. The brisk, mountainous night air hits my face.
"I'll be in control of my own destiny, thanks." It feels nice to finally talk, my voice still hoarse from hours of quiet, hours of Second being in control.
I could do good things, if you let me. I could kill them all without you ever even having to live through it. Wouldn't that be nice?
"I don't want you to kill anyone."
Despite saying it, I do, against my own will, take it into consideration. It would be so easy, to just relinquish control. That way I may never wake up. But no. These are, for the most part, good people. I would still feel the guilt.
Don't be so soft. We're in a death game. You have to kill to win.
I can't stand him talking to me like that, not anymore! I need to fight it, I have to, because even if I survive, no world is worth living in with this. All my compressed rage from the moment that they snatched me out of the room in the Justice Building comes flying out, and it feels so satisfying, to be free of it all, and the weird or pitying or disgusted looks that everyone has been giving me.
"I wish that I could kill you! You deserve to die! I would kill myself just to kill you!"
Do it then! Second's voice comes out in an angry yell, one that I can't believe that I myself could make if I was… like him.
"Maybe I will," I say slowing, running to the edge of the roof to look down at the cars below. I stand up on the ledge now, having scaled the railing.
Well. It's all or nothing. Second waits in an expectant silence, waiting to see if I'll actually have the guts to do anything. But I don't. I'm afraid, wimping out, standing mere inches from certain death, just like what awaits me in just days. I always do. Second is right.
I told you so. I knew you were bluffing. If you weren't, you would have gone ahead and done it. Better that than what you are.
I avert my eyes from the loud colors below as tears blur them, wiping them on my arm. Then I see her. The flashing neon lights illuminate a figure shrouded partially by the shadows of potted plants ten feet to my left. I can't see who it is, but it is feminine, and tall. I can see her lips moving against the light, but only that. I hop down and move closer to her. She must be a career, with muscles that I can see from a distance, so I turn to leave.
"Even if you did jump, you wouldn't have died."
I twist my head back to look at her. Her eyes don't meet mine.
"There's a forcefield. It's a shame, really."
I take a step closer. She isn't exactly inviting, but definitely not hostile. The light shines against her blue face paint. It's the girl from Two.
"What," I ask, working up my nerve. "Were you thinking about doing it too? But—but you're a career."
"Yes, I have more of a chance than you, if both of us are being honest. I don't mean to be blunt, sorry. But when it comes down to it, we all bleed the same."
Silence follows. She's right, of course, but it doesn't help much knowing that.
She mutters something unintelligible, and once again it seems more to herself than to me. That's odd. For one quick moment, I think that maybe she's like me. Maybe she has second. But I quickly suppress it.
"Tell me," she starts, "was there somebody behind you back there? Is that who you were talking to?"
"No. Just talking to myself."
Her face is unreadable in the dark, especially since she purposefully avoids my gaze, still awkward despite being a career.
"Can I ask you something?" I request to her.
What, going to have a little lovey dovey heart-to-heart with a career girl, Aleyn? Second asks mockingly.
I force down a retort to voice my question. I can see that she picks up on my conspicuous swallow.
"Did you notice if I was acting weird this afternoon? A change in behavior?"
She looks confused at my answer, mulling it over.
"Sorry," I say. "I know it's a weird question to ask. I just thought that maybe you would be observing the others, trying to pick out who to scare."
I don't mean for it do come out cold, but it does. It doesn't seem to affect her.
"You went from the survival stations to the weapons ones, and you started… um… acting tougher, meaner, if you know what I mean. The Sixes seemed a little put-off."
I was acting just like the careers, then, if what the girl says is correct.
I was taking notes, Second stays in a confident, antagonistic way. It only makes the job easier.
"Thanks," I say.
"What are you doing up here?" she asks me.
It seems random, but maybe she's in need of some conversation. I've been lusting for one not with Second for the whole day. I'm not going to let this opportunity go, even if she is a career, because I have no one this good downstairs.
"I just came up for some quiet. A nice little reprieve. You?"
"The same. Shame some of us can't get it even when we try."
Oh. Maybe she wants me to leave. I should have realized earlier. Of course she does, she's a daunting and undaunted career. What would she want to do with me? I turn to leave.
You're right, you know, Second says. About nobody wanting anything to do with you. Try to be cooler, tougher.
"Wait," she says hurriedly. "Don't go. I'm sorry. I didn't mean for it to sound like that."
"Oh… my bad." I edge closer to her awkwardly.
"You said you didn't have anyone with you when you came up?"
"Yes."
She shivers, whether in the cold night air or in anxiousness I don't know. We're both still only in our training outfits. "Do you hear the voices too?" she asks.
The question takes me aback, and against the yellow light of traffic underneath us, I can see that she is blushing. I have no idea what she means, and yet now it all makes sense: the mumbling, and the distant, afraid look in her eyes, and possibly even the face paint and the overwhelmingly scabbed right arm. Maybe our voices are the same. Not in the literal sense, but in the sense that we both have them.
"Yes," I say after a hesitant, pregnant pause.
Something in her face change in the darkness, like exultation or relief. "You understand?"
"I understand."
"It really fucking sucks."
"You're right." I push out all of Second's objections.
We meet each other's eyes, now, something like bravery, passion, contentment in hers. It reflects what I feel.
"I'll get my allies not to hurt you," she says, looking down at me.
"Thanks. That means a lot. I think I'm ready to get my dinner, if you don't mind."
"No. I'm famished, too."
We walk to the elevator, at a distance and yet together, tied by our similar struggles. I press the button, and the door on the left swings open. As I'm about to walk in, she stops me.
"You have to be strong," she says. "You have to fight them. If you win, you'll beat it. You beat them. Show them how strong you really are."
"I will."
"Good." She holds out her hand. "Scylla Frigard."
"Aleyn Garsow." I shake it.
We step in the elevator together.
I want to do like she says. We can do it, together, even if I never talk to this girl—Scylla—again. Even if she kills me, because even then it would be an act of mercy. I want to fight Second. I want to get rid of Second, and show him, and show them all. I have to beat it, like she said. He's only here because I was weak after Mom died in the accident, because I'm still weak now. In a fucked-up way, he's right, because if I become impenetrable, I'll lock him out forever. I can see that future now, and the end of the path. I just have to fight for it.
I'm glad I ran into Scylla. It's nice to know that I'm not alone, even when I'm never alone because of Second. We can beat it together.
I nod to her as the doors to my suite open and step wordlessly inside, ignoring Second, and not making any effort to be indiscreet as I walk to the dinner table. This is only the first step to beating him. I'm going to take all of them.
This chapter is literally almost 9k words! Take that in! 9,000! The best I had done before was 7.3k. I'm so sorry to everyone reading this for putting you through this tornado of a chapter, my writing is just getting longer and longer. I know Aleyn's POV is unbalanced in length compared to the rest (Which are all likely in the top ten longest I have ever written.), I just had a lot to get across there, and I got a bit carried away. I don't like for my writing to feel strained. MY POVs are probably going to get to be around 2k each, which I know is a lot, so take this is small doses if you want. They'll probably be a bit shorter in the arena to fit more into each chapter. This also marks the average chapter word count for the story going above 5k, and also 100k words for this story! You guys, I didn't even know if this story would reach that many, let alone in the pre-Games, so I just want to thank you all for reviewing and being there to support me, you are all amazing. (I just tried to do a smiley face thing and THAT happened, new update I guess. Don't think I'm some sort of tech wizard. Anyone on the discord chat will fervently deny that.)
Speaking of discord, if you aren't already on the site, go check it out. It's amazing, and it makes this community so much better. You can really find your internet fam there, so click on this link and go create an account. DON'T ask me how though. Here is a link: /channels/710111880932360234/800162353681006613
What did you think of the chapter itself? Mystic took a stand in her morals and went toe to toe with the queen bee herself, Arlo contemplated his worth as a human being, Coleus let his anxiety and paranoia fester and was a bit on an ass to Tessa, and Aleyn and Scylla became unofficial friends on the roof. Please leave all your thoughts and comments, positive or negative, in the reviews, I love hearing from you guys! If you haven't already, head back to chapter 19 or 20 and look at the check-in, and PM or DM me the answer to the question or just leave it in a review. Vote in the poll, too!
Questions:
What do you think of the chapter lengths? Would you like to read shorter chapters, or do you enjoy the lengthier ones that go more in-depth?
What station was Rooker at when Arlo was forced to try to scare him (and succeeded)?
Have a wonderful day or night wherever you are, I'll be seeing you in a week or so with the next update!
-Mills