❝ never trust a survivor
until you find out
what they did
to stay alive ❞
―Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard
[ the maze runner × the hunger games ]
No one was ever happy in District 12. They were the poorest among the distric...
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THROUGH THE RINGING in her ears, Rosalind could still hear the sickening sound of the knife plunging into Newt's chest. Though the victim on the other end of the blade wasn't her, she felt a pain in her heart so sudden it was as if she had been stabbed instead.
She watched, disbelieving, as Newt's figure slumped, and he collasped sideways. There, he laid in a crumpled heap on the sandy dune, unmoving.
A cannon went off.
Thomas dropped the knife, the blade now riddled with dark crimson blood at the sharp edges, looking shellshocked to his core. He clutched at his own heart, as if he too, could feel the gaping hole left behind by Newt's departure.
Gasping for breath, he held up his trembling hands and stared at them as if he couldn't believe what he had just done. Then very slowly, his eyes lifted and they met Rosalind's.
She could hear the distinct roaring noise of a motor overhead―it must be the machine that collected the dead tributes' bodies. She glanced up and sure enough, she could just make out the machine's silhouette in the bright blue sky, so contrasting to the drastically dark situation below on the desert ground.
She glanced back over to Newt's body, where he still laid unmoving. The fact that he was never ever getting up again still couldn't settle in her. All those moments they spent together, those intimate moments they shared with each other―all gone, just like that.
Just as the machine was about to scoop Newt's body up, Rosalind found herself moving towards him. She felt disconnected from herself, like her body was moving without her knowing what has happening. And before she knew it, she reached over and closed Newt's eyes. And the machine finally took him away, his limbs dangling in the air as his body was whisked away to the Capitol headquarters.
Rosalind felt numb. She felt Newt's absence like she had lost a limb. It still didn't seem real to her, as if everything that had happened was a dream.
She forced herself up, wincing at every single tiny movement that she made. Exhaustion tugged at every bit of her, making her slow and tired. She couldn't even stand up properly, and instead wobbled on uneven sandy ground as her head swirled around in a confusing daze.
Thomas still sat on the ground, staring down at his bloody hands. Rosalind staggered over to his side and offered her own hand. Very slowly, he glanced up to it, to her blood-stained, dust-streaked hand, his dark eyes now full of misery and regret and guilt. A moment passed where neither of them moved, then Thomas started to shake his head.
"What's the point?" He said. His voice cracked, and he hung his head to hide his crying face. "What's the point in winning the games anymore? Now that he's―he's gone..."
