Break The Rules But Be Smart About It: The Second Quarter quell

chapter seventeen

6:30

The train where it started.

The train where I met Effie, where I didn't know what would happen, how it would happen, or if it would even happen. Where I doubted my odds for winning the games and wanted to save fauna, all that changed in a matter of seconds, and now I am responsible for her death.

I am on the train where we told Fauna that you didn't die in the games, Where my nightmares started, where my arrogance grew, where my principles left me, and where my life made a one-eighty. I am on the train where my district self left, and my capitol self had to start to shine. This is where the madness began.

Ask to look around. The train hasn't changed a bit... the marble table still has its shine, and the light always finds a way to make the seats hot. I sit down on the chair I first sat on. It still has a mark of dirt on it from earlier that day of the reaping. I smell happiness, I smell the memories, and I can hear them, I hear Effie giggling, and I can see Maysilee braiding Faunas hair. I can see Ajax putting on a show but, deep inside, terrified and worried. I can see it all and smell it all, and it hurts me.

I wave my hands across the sides of the couch, and the colors change, Fauna always would play with it, and she would draw flowers and happy faces on it. The capital, well, Evian didn't expect a seven-year-old, the odds of receiving a seven-year-old were significantly off, most of the names drawn are teenagers who put their names in time after time can receive money and grain.

Why did fauna get picked? Why did the capitol choose her... I repeatedly asked myself that they couldn't choose someone who wouldn't care about living a life, or someone who has done all wrong... they chose an innocent lamb and blamed the lamb guilty and sent the lamb to the butcher. The innocent lamb stood there as a symbol for their glory and not her own. All the criminals, all the suicides, all the homeless, all the unhappy... no, they chose the innocent lamb.

As I look out of the window, I call an Avox, "Excuse me, can you get me a glass of white wine?" The Avox signs with her hands, "yes," and she brings me the glass. The Avox comes with a glass and a bottle. She puts the glass on the marble table and fills it with ice, and adds the liquor. The Avox leaves me and the bottle alone.

I wonder what the Avox feel, not having a tongue... I wonder how much things they've seen the capital do to the victors and how much information and secrets they have hidden in their brains. I talk too much, and I like it. I can't imagine being able to speak to anyone for the rest of my life. I would simply go insane. They seem nice, but frightened... like when a puppy stares at you after you hit it, the puppy looks frightened but hat in a way... a weird analogy, but that's how I picture the Avoxs.

Time passes, and soon enough, the glass slips from my hands, and I fall asleep. Nightmares, nightmares. My three loved ones get shot in the throat by peacekeepers. Boom boom boom... but we are in the Arena, and a glass divides us so that I can't reach them. I can feel the green grass against my body as I run to them, but I smack myself against the forcefield and wake up.

I scream... the Avox races out of nowhere, frightened, but I say, "it's just a dream, Haymitch, just a dream" I grab the liquor bottle and take a large gulp. The Avox is terrified by my lack of people skills, but I stare her away because she has no idea what this is like. Dripping in sweat and waterfalls of tears flowing from my eyes, I stand up, not even controlling my body at this point, and I fall over, and my head lands smack between a flower face, I trip over the table ahead of me. And fall straight to the marble ground... I can feel the glass in-between my skin, and I can hear loud ticks of clocks form all around me... I try to stand up several times, but the glass is so sharp I barely touch it, and it cuts me. I've learned my lessons when it comes to blood, so I rest my body, and I fall asleep there.