² MANIA ─ catching fire

PROLOGUE: things fall apart

IN, OUT, IN, OUT. Gunfire blazing, ringing in his ears, hot flashes of heat flaring against his skin, wolves come crashing down on all sides. Deep breath in... hold four counts. A flash of teeth in periphery. One, two, three, four. Blood spraying onto the snow, hissing with steam, red rubies dotting the glittering white. Out... one, two, three, four. So much of it... gurgling from the throats of children, a river tearing a deep gash of carmine froth across the endless white. In... hold four counts.

Things fall apart before sunrise.

The world's getting too small. Closing in, swallowing the air. It's getting harder to breathe. Crumbling all around him, pieces to pieces, memory as sharp as a knife, slicing through his skull, flashing behind his eyelids. There's too much dark ebbing at the corners of his vision. Too much dark. Too much blood. Blood everywhere. Slashed across the snow, staining his hands... so much of it... a sea of blood and guts drenching the sky. Everything's red.

Somewhere in the world outside, a bird squalls like it's trying to wake something beneath the ground. Somewhere in the world outside, a girl is bleeding from her temple, bruising her knuckles on the baker boy's nose. Somewhere in the world outside, the rising sun bathes the snowy-capped mountains in an iridescent halo. Light pours over District 2, sending the night-shadows back to their hiding places, creeping through parted curtains, and with it, the weighted knowledge that this is another beginning where innocent children pay penance for sins that were never theirs to repent for.

Somewhere in the world outside, silver banners are being put up over the Square where the Reaping ceremony would take place later in the afternoon but Atlas can't hear all of that in his world of shadows and darkness inside the closet. Can't hear all of that as the murderous fingers of memory carded through his hair, staking into his scalp so every time he shuts his eyes all he sees is the blood on his hands and the same scene that haunts his fever dreams. Crouched at the bottom of his closet in the dark, knees drawn to his chest, hands clapped over his head, pulse roaring in his ears, heart pounding so loud against his ribs like it's threatening to punch its way out, every heave of his chest sending the pain piercing through his body, every panicked inhale feeling like he's losing all the oxygen in his lungs, every sobbing exhale feeling like the world is crashing down on him again and again. Rocking back and forth, back and forth—

Back in that fucking arena. Snow for miles and miles, all silver lining but no luck on the horizon with a sun that never sets. A snowstorm blowing in from the North, and with it, the girl from District 1. When the storm hits it is without mercy. When the girl closes in on him with her spear in hand, his feet are stuck in the thick snow, and they're the last two tributes standing.

In all his fever dreams before his helpless sight, she plunges at him. Guttering, roaring, choking on her own blood. White eyes writhing in her face, sagging like a devil's sick of sin, drowning in her own doom. He forgets her name, but he knows she's equal parts vicious and victim.

Back and forth, back and forth. It comes to him in flashes. The war cry tearing from her throat. Breathe in, hold four counts. The arc of her spear flashing in the unerring light. One, two, three, four... His blade knocking it out of the air. Breathe out, four counts. The girl lunging, a second spear in her other hand. One, two, three, four. His blade running through her ribs, slicing her in half. In, four counts. Blood and guts spilling onto the snow, writhing in a puddle of red. Out, four counts. The canon booming, signifying his victory. But there's so much blood he can't tell if he's dead or buried or both.

"Fuck this," Atlas grunted, slurring his words. Drawing in a shuddering breath, his chest trembles, and he shoves the closet door open and tumbles out into the bomb site of his bedroom, clutching at the corner of his bed and getting to his feet shakily, like a newborn deer learning the mechanisms of its scrawny legs. "Fuck this."