Deep in the Meadow

|23| tortured by mutts

The mutts go to their assigned person to torture, and retrieve a tray of shots from the cart before entering our cells. I can tell that mine is a girl from the shape of her face and the way her suit fits.

West stands in front of all our cells watching joyfully as the mutts carry the shots. Selena is still standing beside him not wanting to be here at all. I'm positive that she would rather do anything than to watch us get hurt they way we are going to be. Asher is still swaddled in her arms asleep. I'm sure that West is going to make Selena hold him throughout the whole torture session to punish Johanna by making her son be there at that moment. I can only hope that he doesn't get any ideas about hurting Asher. That would hurt me to watch, nonetheless Johanna. Especially since I've watched Willow and Rye get tortured with me, and it hurts terribly.

All the mutts set down the trays on the floor of each of our cells in unison. I see maybe nine shots on each tray, all lined up vertically beside each other. Then I notice that each shot has a different color ribbon around the midsection, probably to indicate the level of pain.

Willow starts to cry as her mutt scoops her off the ground and plops her roughly on the table. Mine does the same except that she doesn't pick me up, just grabs my arm shoves me on top the table. Her arms are hairy and her hands which probably used to be skinny and small, are now larger with long nails. I tear my arm from her grip and get up on the table myself, but she grabs it again and forces me to lay down. I realize that Johanna isn't putting up a fight with her mutt and is letting him push her down on her table. I immediately know why. She doesn't want to bring down trouble on her son. She wants to do what she's told to save him. To not anger West.
I decide that it's a good tactic and that I should do it. For a second I think of Peeta and that maybe will put up a fight, but I ward the thought away knowing that out of all of us, Peeta is the one who would care about the children's well-being and safety the most. Granted, me and Johanna gave birth and love our children unconditionally, but Peeta has a love for children far beyond what anyone could gain. So I don't think he will put up a fight at all knowing that he could bring down more pain on his children by doing so. And Asher.

"Ok mutts." West sneers once we are all laying on our tables. I hear Willow's scared sniffles. The mutt probably looks like a monster to her.
"Start with the minimum pain shot, then move your way up the pain scale! Remember, hurt is good!" He orders. Then with that said, the mutts pick up the first shot on their tray. The pink one. Mine raises the shot and starts to point it at my forearm.
Just as she steadies it at a vein, Rye starts to cry. Then I close my eyes and flinch as the shot enters my vein and the cold liquid is injected into me. Almost immediately I start to sweat like a bucket of lava was just pored over my arm and is spreading to the rest of me. It burns and my skin feels like it is burning off leaving only the bones of my body left. A burning smell fills my nose and I realize it must be my skin although it's not really burning.
I try to hold in my winces and screams, and it works. I let out a tiny pain filled moan but that's it. I have a feeling Johanna and Peeta are doing it to because all I hear from Peeta is a gasp and Johanna is completely silent, the visible part of her face showing the only signs of the burning pain.
Willow and Rye both cry and I want to punch West for doing this to them. They are both younger than 3 years old. No one deserves this.

The burning feeling is still poured over me and I have to bite my lip to stop the painful shrieks from escaping my mouth. My mutt leans down to get the next shot. A yellow one. I realize that the rest of the mutts already have injected the yellow shot into their victim.

"Marlie! There isn't time for dilly-dallying! Get on with the next shot already! Hurt is good! Especially when causing it!" West yells. It's not until my mutt casts an irritated glance at West, is that I notice that the mutt that West was yelling at is mine. She rolls her eyes and quickly pushes the cool liquid into my forearm. I find it interesting that she actually resisted West. She still hates him even though they are not supposed to. I can't help but wonder if the other mutts still hate him through the tortures that they get put through and all the false things they get forced to believe.

My thought gets stopped abruptly as the liquid injected in my arm starts to bubble. It feels like it's bubbling under my skin and causing my blood to do the same. Soon I'm clenching my teeth to keep in the yelps building in my throat. My blood feels like it's literally boiling under my skin. I try to see if my skin is actually bubbly, but when I go to raise my head, my throat gets bubbly too. It hurts like crazy and an unexpected yell escapes. The tension on my vocal cords almost makes me want to gag like there is something stuck in my throat.
My mutt doesn't look amused like West wants them all to be, but instead she looks sick. Not the ill kind of sick, but the kind where you feel terribly bad and want to puke because of what you are doing. I feel bad for her having to be forced to be a wear-wolf mutation, and being forced to have her personality taken. These mutts are people, not an army of mutations.

Within the next 6 shots, I've been frozen, nearly suffocated, feeling disembodied, lost all feeling, felt electrical shocks, and given just pure pain.
Rye and Willow have been wailing in pain the whole time and I heard Willow call me once out of pure hope that I could rescue her. It took all my strength not to get up and break my way to her. But I know that I wouldn't make it very far if I did that. Plus, it would bring more torture down on us.

My mutt finally picks up the last shot. It's black with red watery liquid in it. I bite my tongue to retract any noise that might escape my lips. So far we have been doing a great job of keeping quiet and not putting up a fight. Asher is awake and just stopped crying. Selena insisted on keeping West out of his line of vision.

My mutt puts the final shot to my arm and pushes it in almost rushing to get this whole ordeal over with. When all the red stuff is out of the shot and into me, she pulls it out and is relieved to drop the final torture devise onto the tray. Shaking, I wait for the final wave of pain, but there isn't much waiting because it comes quickly. I gasp as my lunges tighten abruptly. Peeta's muffled gasp follows. My hands shake harder uncontrollably as my lunges get tighter. My throat is desperately trying to drag in air but to no surprise I can't get anything. A slushy feeling starts to develop where my gut would be, then my heart seems to feel like someone is squeezing it and trying to punch the liveliness out of it.
I still can't drag in air, and my shaking hands find my neck and I feel for something, anything, that could be blocking my air way. Nothing. Just my lungs hardening and closing up. There isn't a way to stop it. I get sweaty as my vision goes blurry. My heart is still being squeezed and it hurts terribly. I try to grasp in air again but can't, I can only weakly gag on my saliva.
My mutt steps away as if ashamed of what she has done but doesn't want West or even me to know.

When I squeeze my eyes shut and once again try to take in a gulp of oxogen, the scariest thing that has ever happened to me happens.

Just as I fade to blackness, still trying to draw in air but can't, My children's pain filled screaming and crying stops. Their lunges not able to get air anymore just like mine. Then I blackout.