Song Suggestion: A Perfect Circle- "Counting Bodies Like Sheep to the Rhythm of the War Drums"

A/N: It's been a long time since my last post, but I'm back in the game. I have most of it written now, so I'm going to try to update every two weeks or so. Also, I have another story in the works, this one set in the Harry Potter universe. I'll let you know when I post the first chapter!

Let the Games Begin

A strong wind blew as the countdown began.

"Sixty," the announcer called out.

The disk below her glowed red, and Prim knew that if one toe slid past the edge she'd be blown into a million pieces. Her head understood this, her vertigo had other ideas. She didn't lie when she told Snow she feared heights. As a child, she got stuck up in a tree. It took Katniss three hours to get her down.

"Forty-five."

Her upper body swayed with the sensation.

Prim tried not to glance down.

As she groaned in terror, unable to focus on the counting, several disks flew up, covering the empty sky in front of her with multi-colored polka-dots. They resembled the one she stood on, except slightly larger and glowing in three bright colors: yellow, blue, and green.

They flashed at her, and it gave her mind something to focus on. In confusion, she glanced to her right to see Gale biting his lip in thought. Her mind clicked along as well, until it landed on the only conclusion

"It's the first test," she called out. In the air, the wind drowned most her voice. "We need to be on the right color."

The colors had to mean something, good and bad, life or death.

"Twenty," the announced said, briefly pulling her out of her thoughts. Whatever it was, she had to figure it out quick.

"You're right. I think only one color is safe," Gale said again.

"Then what do the other colors do?"

He glanced at her again and shrugged.

He looked fucking terrified. And it wasn't until that moment that she realized she hadn't seen him scared since her sister had been cornered by Cato about to die.

This could be the last moments of their lives, and they both realized it. He didn't say anything else, just swallowed hard and gave a tight nod.

"Ten. Nine. Eight."

She felt her neck prickle. She glanced across her competitors to find Cato stared at her. He tried to motion something at her, but she couldn't read it.

"Seven. Six. Five."

Jace caught her eye too, as if unworried he might fall to his death. He smiled and wiggled an eyebrow above the empty socket. She remembered his promise.

"Four. Three. Two."

She breathed hard, and at the last second glanced down. The Earth tilted below her, and she fought against the darkness pooling behind her eyes, wanting to drown her in oblivion.

"One."

"No," she said out loud, and shook her head of cobwebs.

"Zero."

A loud beep and the disks deactivated. The red turned back to black.

A moment later a loud explosion rocked the air around her. She crouched, trying to keep her balance. Smoke and debris flew into the air and floated back down. Hot liquid splashed across her skin, and something hit her cheek and fell with a tink on her disk. She picked up the spongy object to discover she held a severed finger.

She screamed and flung it away, roughly pushing at her skin. Blood freckled across her body, dripping from her hair.

"Pretend it's not real," Gale called out trying to distract her from the horror. Crimson slashed across his upper body, staining his clothes. A piece of skin hung from his hair. The other tributes close to the explosion were ever more covered in gore and blood.

She'd seen violence before. Entrails falling out into hands. Blood squirting from wounds. Gangrene rotting skin. But this was different. More insidious. Prim had trouble wrapping her mind around the reality.

Prim refused to move. The disk below her was a safe place. As she looked around to get her bearings, she noticed that the other competitors refused to move as well. Only one spot stood empty: District 11, the male.

He had been brave, hasty to get off the disk and to a colored one. Though he did it without thought and the stupidity killed him.

"What color did he step on?" Prim called out to Gale.

"Yellow."

"Are you sure?"

"I counted them. There were ten and now there are nine."

Counted them? Simple, yet genius. Gale was nothing if not practical.

The tributes on the disks shifted from side to side. Nobody wanted to recreate District 11's fatal leap. Green or Blue? Green or Blue? Nobody wanted to take a chance. It was a slow start to a game, and the Gamemakers didn't like it.

"You have thirty seconds to find your positions," A voice over the loudspeaker called out.

"Well, I don't know about you," Jace screamed from his disk, "But I'm bored."

He leaped to his district mate. In one move, he landed on Ruby's disk, gripped her arm, and flung her to the nearest hovering object. Ruby grappled with thin air, mouth twisting in a grimace and landed on a Green. She slid halfway off, before finding her hold on the edge of the disk and pulled herself up. She panted against the glowing color.

"Greens are safe then," he said and leaped to the next open one.

It broke the dam. The scramble for survival began and like rats in a flood, the tributes surged forward, leaping into midair to the closest disk.

It only took moments to realize the Green disks came in short supply. There weren't enough lifeboats for them all. A second explosion rocked the air, as another tribute missed their mark, landing on a yellow. This time most of the blood and gut were flung the other way by a gust of wind.

Both the tributes from district 7 tried to land on the same one, but the girl got there first, towering over her competitor. She shoved him to a Blue. He landed on it, giving a stare of horror. It only took two seconds and then the blue disk evaporated into thin air. The boy whisked down below the clouds without a scream. Prim was only happy that she was far enough into the air that she didn't hear him splatter on the ground.

"Come on Prim. You need to jump."

Gale held out his hand to her. Of course, Snow placed only Blues around her. The green disk hovered to her right too far to jump. Gale already stood on the disk. They would have to share. Would it even hold two people? It didn't matter because there were no other options. She wasn't sure she could get to him anyway.

"I can't," she called back. And she was truthful. Prim wasn't sure how she'd make it.

"You have to. There's no other choice."

There were three choices.

One: Fall to her death

Two: Make a leap of faith. And most likely fall to her death.

Three: Jump on blues as stepping stones to Gale and hope they held up long enough.

"Five seconds," the announcer said.

"Fucking jump, Prim." This time it was Cato who screamed at her safe on top of a green.

Prim briefly placed her hand on her lower belly before nodding her head. She leaped on to the blue. She felt the lurch under her feet, but she was prepared and leaped to the second. This one disappeared faster. She felt it give way under her feet before she could fully vault.

Shit. She thought and scrambled forward. Her face looked down. A frozen wasteland lay below her, as well as a valley of sand and a forest. Three different ecosystems dotted the ground, sectioned off. And even up high, she could see the glittering gold of the pyramid straight in the middle.

Her thoughts lengthened for just a moment before scrambling. The wind whistled below her. She extended an arm and at the last second Gale grabbed her at her elbow. She swung down hard, her stomach hitting the disk at her mid-section. Gale pulled her up on top and she had only two seconds before the green light on the disk deactivated.

"Let the games begin," Snow's voice hissed over the loud speaker. It mocked them. A last fuck you before death.

Gale pulled her into a tight hug at the exact moment the disk dropped beneath them.

"Hold on," he whispered into her ear.

Both their hands scrambled to find a handle. There was nothing except a slight dip in the disk, creating a recessed edge. Instead, they both flattened their bodies on instinct gripping their arms tight around the disk, as they watched the ground hurtle towards them.

"Close your eyes," Gale screamed.

But she couldn't. Not this time. Her eyes kept open as she experienced her deepest fears. The thing she had nightmares over since she was a child.

Fuck you right back, she thought to Snow. I will not close my eyes.

It was her last resource of strength. A slice of courage she didn't know she contained. A middle finger to the world, to cruelty. She wouldn't let him break her. Not this moment.

Her resolve almost broke toward the bottom. She saw the tops of trees. The cornucopia just to her right. The branches. And finally, the blades of grass as the disk pulled back at the last second, landing them inches from the ground. The sudden stop caused her body to whiplash up and with the force she tumbled to the side, separating from Gale.

The was a pause in the world as the tributes caught their breath. They groaned as a collective on the ground, unable to focus on killing when their bones felt crushed to their lungs. The pause snapped, and the whirlwind began again.

Cato was the first up. He rolled off the ground and sprung to his feet, one hand still clutching his stomach. He reached over and plucked a girl from the ground. Her wild curly hair obscured her face. Prim did not know her name, could not recognize her district, but she would always remember her scream. She squirmed like a mouse before he jerked to the left and snapped her neck.

She crumpled, a shell. Her face tilted to the side at an odd angle, one brown eye peeked out from under the mountain of hair.

Prim's mouth fell open, unable to comprehend what just happened.

He's always told you he's a monster, she told herself.

Cato walked calmly toward her, but she scrambled away.

"No,no,no,no,no," she scooted backwards.

His stopped walking, eyebrows drew downwards, the lines in his face hardening.

She searched for Gale, but he had already gotten up, and she had already lost him in the fray. In the distance, she saw Jace stalking away towards some unfortunate girl.

Screams and grunts and brief shouts echoed around her as the tributes began the scramble for life. Some bolted towards the glittering pyramid in front of them. Others hightailed it to the woods. She saw an endless desert in the distance, sparkling beyond the pyramid. To another side, she saw an artic wasteland, bitter icy winds rolling across the snow.

If she ran, she'd have to run to the forest. Her chances of survival in the others seemed slim, if nonexistent. It seemed most the other competitors had the same idea. Ruby Red flashed by and disappeared into the tree line.

Cato only had eyes for her. He made careful steps toward her, with his hand out, as if she was a rabbit that would bolt any second. Thick blood dripped from his hands, and it struck her hard, a deep sickness that almost overwhelmed her. How could she love such a twisted thing?

A figure appeared behind him. The career girl from district 4. Her red hair twisted around her neck like a bloody wound, her face set in a demonic snarl as she raised her knife.

"Cato!" Prim warned.

"This is for Finnick, you bastard!"

Cato was ready and swung around. He dodged the strike just in time. It caught the back of his ponytail, slicing off the ends, nicking the edge of his shoulder. A small spray of blood. He ignored any pain he must have felt, grasping her neck in a forceful motion, and in two seconds he lifted her into the air and slammed her backwards. Her arms arced up. She smashed into the ground hard. Cato grasped her hand that clutched the knife, and without even shaking it free, he brought it to her throat and pushed the tip up under the jaw, sliding it in to the hilt.

She had seen the light fade from eyes before. The soul up and leave the body, and this was much the same. A gurgle of blood frothed at her lips and exploded in her whites of her eyes. She gave a random jerk. The smell of defecation tainted the air.

This was war.

This was what justified murder smelt like.

Prim couldn't see anymore. Instead, she sprang to her feet and bolted, bursting through the tree line.

She ran and ran, losing track of time and space. She thought she was alone, until Cato's voice could be heard on the wind. The snap of branches followed her, but she would not slow down, not even for him. Death chased her, and she needed to be free. Feet up, feet down. Breath in. Breath out. Branches slapped her face. At one point, a tribute crashed through a bush a few yards from her, but the boy either did not see or did not care and ran onwards, escaping each other's orbits as fast as they entered them.

"Prim," she heard behind her, but she ignored him.

She ran until the edges of the forest turned into desert. The sand licked her toes, but a giant cactus wall stopped her way into the sandy wasteland. It stretched as far down the tree line as she could see, a barrier between the different sections. She leaned forward, hands on her knees, catching her breath. She couldn't go any further. She must hide.

She could not go back. She could not go forward, or side to side.

She glanced up. It was the only option. After her free fall she didn't desire to be stuck in the air again, but the consequences of being with Cato in the games were too great. And in a warped way, facing her fear once made facing it again easier.

She gripped the branches. The bark sliced into her palms as she heaved her leg around and up. She scrambled to the next one and the next one, until she found a comfortable forked branch perfect for perching. It held a multitude of leaves that would hide her as she waited for him to find her.

For he would. She was certain of that. They only way he'd relent is if she convinced him to leave her alone. And after trying to do that before the games, she was unsure if she'd succeed.

Sure enough, five minutes later, Cato appeared. He pushed a spiky branch to the left, being careful to avoid the brambles. He went slow, glancing at the area around him, seeing something foreign to her, as if her path glowed. She knew he'd been trained in stalking prey, like the legends of the native ancients eons ago, following nothing but a footprint or a snap of a branch. He held a forest green backpack.

He walked until he touched the edge of the desert below her. She gripped the branch of the tree, a terrible emotion, made stronger by her instant vertigo, overcoming her.

He reached out and touched the trunk of the tree she sat in, as if resting, but she understood it as a calculated move. He knew where she was, though he did not look up, allowing her to hide.

"Blood really doesn't stain too long, little bird. I promise. Even horrors dim with time." He drew in a small breath. "I've never lied to you about what I am, what I'm capable of. I haven't betrayed you, though I know in your little martyr head, you think I have. So, I'm going to leave you to your thoughts for a little while. Stay up there and out of sight. I'll be back later tonight. Don't you dare leave. I'm going out to kill that fucker Jace."

He sighed and dropped his head a fraction, as if a little defeated, even though he came out victorious in battle. He started to walk away but thought better of it and turned around and set the backpack down at the bottom of the trunk. Even from a distance, she saw the maroon blood flaking around his fingers.

Nothing moved around her, not a twitter of a bird, or a flutter of leaves as he stepped back out of view, still not looking up to her hiding spot, though he didn't need to look at her to feel his stormy gaze.

She clutched the branch like a teddy bear for thirty minutes before uncurling and climbing down, swallowing the acid at the back of her throat. She picked up the backpack and swung it over her shoulder.

She knew he wanted her to wait, to stay up in the tree, safe and closeted away. But this was the games, and if Cato tried to create a cocoon for her, Snow would rip her out, destroying her ability to fly. No, she made her choice long ago, and though each step terrified her, she walked deeper into the foreboding forest.