Cinna's Fate Re-Told

Cinna's Fate Re-Told Part 1

She stood alone in the tube once again. Her face was set in a determined expression. Last time, she shook with fear, her lips had trembled and her body had shudder with every movement. Katniss Everdeen was entering The Hunger Games once again, but this time she was braver, powerful and had made the biggest and best entrance to the games that I could have allowed her to. The only catch is that I wasn’t allowed to let her make such an entrance.

“Ten seconds,” a loud voice said. Suddenly something louder sounder. The door fell from its hinges and peacekeepers ran in and grabbed me. I could see Katniss, she was panicking. She was falling apart just as she was coming together.

A blow to my head, took my focus away from Katniss. Repeated hits and blows to my body made blood seep from every possible place. Until one of the peacekeepers hit my temple so hard it switched the lights out.

***

I felt my eyes open but I couldn’t see a thing. I tried to open my mouth but it shut and I couldn’t open it. I had been gagged. I tried to lift my hands to untie the gag but my hands were tried down, and when I tried to move my feet, they were tied down too.

Suddenly a light was turned on and held right in my face. I blinked at the light and turned my face away. I was in my studio, sketches hang from the walls and mannequins stood in the corners. Katniss’ mockingjay dress was worn by the mannequin next to the sewing machine. The sketch for her red interview dress was sitting on an easel. Everything was as I left it this morning.

Abruptly a large face was directly in front of mine. Skin was white as a ghost with thin, red lips. The smell of blood and roses wafted through the tiny room. Snow.

He walked around me once, twice, three times, never saying a word. He picked up the mannequin with the mockingjay dress on it. He brought it over and stood it on the opposite side of the table to me. He pulled up a chair and sat next to the mannequin.

“Cinna,” he said slowly. “Last year, your work was impeccable. It was beautiful. It made quite the splash with the audience and the citizens. But this…” he tugged at the black fabric, “this has not made a splash, but a tsunami.”

I knew by making that dress that I would be getting myself into trouble. I wasn’t afraid of Snow, he seemed impenetrable  but he was just another Captiol citizen. He was just another bad guy to kill.

“Do you know the consequences for such an act as this?”  he asked me.

“Death,” I spat at him through the gag.

“Yes, but I don’t want to do that. You and your band of rebels are bringing back the Dark Days. You remember what happened then don’t you? And the Hunger Games were a result of the Dark Days. Do you want something worse than the Hunger Games? Something more gruesome, something more painful…something more powerful?” he taunted me. He picked at the fabric of the mockingjay dress; he twisted it and pulled at it. With every touch it made me shudder.

“I don’t think sentencing you to death will do much good, if you can’t suffer for what you have done. Executing you won’t teach a lesson, it may show Katniss Everdeen how is really more powerful in this rebellion she is starting. So I’m going to bring my peacekeepers in here and they will take you away, and you will suffer for the crime of treason. Do you understand?”

He didn’t wait for me to answer.

“Good,” he said. Snow leaned in close to me, his bloodied mouth only centimetres from my face. As his lips moved, I saw each and every scab in his putrid, poisoned mouth. “Take him away!” He called out.

Four peacekeepers barged through the door and untied me from the seat. As they did, Snow took hold of the mockingjay dress. He pulled so hard it ripped. He laughed an awful laugh and did it again and again. Horror was plastered over my face and wanted to jump over the table and rip him. Then he pulled a lighter from his pocket and set the remainders dress on fire.  I watched mockingjay dress burn. Each remaining thread caught fire and it spread like a bush fire, one thread after another. I watched as the fire travelled through the dress and finally the whole dress was just one massive flame.

“Now your mockingjay is really on fire!” he yelled. He laughed victorious The peacekeepers grabbed my arms and legs and carried me, kicking and screaming from my studio. They took me down a hallway and chucked in into a tiny black room.

I lay on the cold floor, listening to the screams of everyone else locked in this cold, black hallway.