The Ninety-Sixth Hunger Games

The Train

Thea

Tears stream down my face like raindrops on leaves of a maple tree. Quick, fast and ongoing. How am I here? Why am I here? Realization hits me like stone plunging into water. My mom. No, that woman does not deserve to be called that. She is now the traitor. I remember hearing the whispers, the tears. How could she live like this? Knowing that she sent her daughter to her death? Then again, does she even care, or is she just glad she got her "lovey love" out of the house with no extra cost of university tuition or trade school? I try to refocus my energy to winning the games. Maybe I could bulk up! I drop to my knees, fully expecting to do some push ups. But instead I splay my fingers on the floor and try not to throw up all over the pristine white carpet.

"Are you sure?" A muffled voice comes through the door. Peacekeepers. "The president will want to know about this."

A loud smack makes me jump. Suddenly I'm not glad that I changed my batteries in my hearing aids. Is this how they treat  Peacekeepers? The ones that are loyal to the president?  Chills creep over me like a nest of spiders has hatched on my spine. What do they do to the rebels?

"No, he won't!" Another voice comes from the door, this time higher and younger. A metal and plastic groan, like a chair being pushed back.

 "The president has enough to do already with the Games this year." The first voice is ice cold. "Plus, it doesn't help that of all people, we get her." 

I stuff my hand in my mouth, trying to keep from sobbing, and stabilize myself on a chair when my knees buckle down.

Me?  Whats wrong with me? Is it because of my hearing aids? Fury swallows my sadness like a tsunami. I storm to the door. Right as my hand touches to the ornate brass doorknob, a loud bang shakes the train. What was that? A gunshot? Even before the Games, it's a death trap. A slightly ruffled Avox with dark brown hair pulled up in a bun ambles toward me with a lot of laundry in her plump arms. She beckons toward me, her blue eyes wide. I trudge to her and she points to her ears, looking both annoyed and surprised at the sleek metal contraptions in my ears.

"Oh, I'm fine! totally fine," I say, rubbing at my face in a modest effort to conceal my red-blotched cheeks and tear-streaked face, but to no prevail. The Avox's eyes soften and she pats my hand before opening the door to my quarters. The feathery-looking bed looks beautiful but does nothing to aid my mood. I flop down on the bed anyways, and contemplate my fate.

I could buy my way out? Try to get sponsors? I pucker my lips and wrinkle my forehead up. What is Sailor playing at? What angle? Sweet, sour, grumpy, stubborn, or something that I haven't even thought of yet? Will I have to kill him?

Will I have to watch him die?

The thought of his lifeless face triggers a bout of wet, snotty sobs. I bury my face in an expensive pillow, covering it with tears. The Avox is visibly uncomfortable. Usually District Three tributes are well-prepared and focused, going over lists of names and statistics, hoping to strategize their ways out of this. One year, a boy from our District reactivated the bombs under the pedestals.

Too bad the poor kid's neck was broken when a rebel sabotaged it, blowing up the Career's supplies...

Reliving the moment on screen when we knew that our district wasn't going to win, I imagine my own head getting snapped to the awkward angle the boy died in, my eyes growing wide and my body getting cold. I imagine death as eternal sleeping most times, but now it is a time not to dare step close to at all. The thoughts overwhelm me until I am buried in them.

 Despite my hyper quick heart racing I slowly drift off, relishing the relaxation and normalcy of exhaustion.

I open my eyes to the sight of a woman so surgically altered that it looks grotesque. Skin dyed a hideous magenta, smile stretched too wide and rose-gold and black pearls stud her ears and adorn her purple corkscrew wig. She seems too happy for anything, much less my funeral in a few weeks. She opens her wide mouth, revealing gem-embedded, extra sharp incisors.

"Happy Hunger Games! You must be Tee-uh, Sailor's sister!"I want to tell her the correct pronunciation of my name, but her smell is so strong, it makes my eyes water. It reminds of hair dyes and bleach and vodka blended together. She offers out a hand, with three-inch nails adorning her otherwise stubs of fingers. I gratefully take it, just before it explodes into tiny black spiders.

They creep up my arm and onto my chest. I cant pull away or shake them off. Horrified, I fall backwards. Her thin arms multiply and her smile gets wider and wider until more spiders spill out of that, encasing my body in tiny, wriggling legs. I scream with no sound, loud and long, until the spiders bore into my eyes, emanating tiny humming noises. Just as they reach a low crescendo, I wake up in a cold sweat.