When The Canary Sings

Let The Freedom Bells Ring.

First Person Point of View: Becca Blue: 

*

A snake is manipulative. A snake sheds their skin when it's needed. A snake is sly and quiet until it sinks its venomous jaws into your trusting hand.

Everywhere is green. One moment, it's green like Finnick's eyes. Then, it's green like the meadow. There's no feeling, yet I can feel everything. Someone's holding my hand, that person is gone. A poking, a prod, then the sweetness of the medicine I recognize all too well.

Morphling.

A snake knows when to strike. I know when to strike. When your opponent is down and distracted. A snake is manipulative. I am manipulative, I killed a man by becoming his fear. His weakness. A snake sheds their skin. I feel like I've been shedding skin my whole life. Becoming a new person time and time again, and bleeding for the causes I believe in.

I'm floating now. In the green, but this is dark green. Like the green of forests at midnight. I can't figure out which way is up, or which way is down. All I can hear is silence. That's how you know you're really doped up on drugs. You can hear the silence.
When I wake up, I am met with a pristine hospital. Not the walls of Thirteen, but the walls of the Capitol. "No, no, no, no." I mutter to myself, ripping the wires out of my body. I stumble to my feet, and throw open the door.

There he is, in all his glory.

"Will!" I breathe, he jolts to his feet, wrapping his hands around my waist. With no regard for his health, or my own, he swoops down and kisses me. Somewhere, a camera flashes.

When he finally pulls away, both of us are gasping for air, but in a good way. Not like the other day when it felt like my lungs were full of sand. "War is over."

"What?"

"War." He says, "is," he pauses. Saying the words I've been longing to hear for so long.

"Over."

I can't think of anything else to do but kiss him.

War is over?

The world has turned upside down. The impossible has been accomplished. David has defeated Goliath.

We won!

Later, Coin comes along and fills me in on everything. How the Capitol surrendered, the bombs, and now she rules Panem now. "Ms. Blue." She says with a calming smile. "The Capitol has surrendered. You are in a free Panem."

The thought baffles me. Free? Me? I am free? That is a word I never thought I'd hear. Free. Freedom. Let the freedom bells ring. "Free?" I ask, tears flooding my eyes.

"Free." She nods, I get a good look at her before she exits, and the doctors fill me in. She rules Panem now, and then I realize we will never be free unless we are rid of her too.

Will is curled up on the hospital bed, his body curled into mine. Apparently the sickness I had was from swallowing the sewer water, but even though I was flat out dying, they had an easy fix for it. Man, not like thousands of people died from drinking dirty water in the districts. Wish we had that there!

He's passed out, but I lie awake, gently moving my fingers through his hair. The second he got here, I could tell he didn't sleep at all while I was gone. The bags under his eys and the paleness spoke for him. For some reason, it brings me more comfort to comfort him, than for him to comfort me.

As I play with his hair, I can feel him stir awake. "Love you," the poet mumbles into my neck, his arm loosely draped over my stomach. I smile.

My paper hospital gown is pulled down to resemble an off the shoulder gown because I'm hot as hell. I can't even bring myself to care about the ugly scars that plague my body. From the mutts to the gunshot, to the whippings and beatings, to getting branded with the rose.