Battleborn

Wasted

 Everything is wrong.

 I remember being stood outside the surgery, waiting for news on Zach. He’d been in there for a long time, long enough that several surgeons had to swap over, wracked with exhaustion. Mrs Everdeen, the Mockingjay’s mother, was one of the surgeons working on him, and she saw me waiting outside the practise room, and came over to see me.

 “We’re doing everything we can, but he’s weak,” she told me “He lost a lot of blood.”

 I nod weakly, trying to remain optimistic, but fully prepared for the worst. I grew used to being ready for the worst outcomes during that year. After all I’d been through, it seemed the natural response. Mrs Everdeen peeled her gloves off and washed her hands at a sink, before patting me on the shoulder.

 “You’re very brave. I hear you led part of the team on the rescue mission.”

 And I lost nearly half of them there. The actual death toll had been relatively low whilst we were there, but on the flight back to 13, the amount of casualties that turned to deaths was overwhelming. There weren’t enough medical staff on board to treat everyone. I tried my best to help, but I watched soldier after soldier slump quietly against the wall, fight leaving their bodies as they slipped into a sleep they wouldn’t wake up from. Some of them couldn’t take the pain. They took their nightlock pills to stop their suffering. When I returned, I was so distraught, covered in blood and exhausted, that I was offered a pill to help me calm down and sleep, but I wanted to be around for when Mellark woke up. After all, it was him that my men had risked their life for. I wanted to know that they died for a good reason.

 “I did. I led the team.”

 “And you brought him back? Peeta?”

 “Yes, ma’am.”

 Mrs Everdeen’s face broke into a smile “That’s fantastic!”

 I stared at her “You…you haven’t heard?”

 She frowned “Heard? Heard what? He’s back, you said he was!”

 “Yes, ma’am. But…there’s something wrong.”

 I remember waiting beside Gale by the window to Peeta’s hospital room. Only Katniss, Haymitch Abernathy and a few others had been allowed in, because Peeta was still recovering and needed rest, but Gale and I had been allowed to watch from outside. I wish now that I’d never witnessed what happened.

 I quickly told Mrs Everdeen what happened. How Peeta’s fingers had locked around Katniss’ neck. How they fought and how Peeta pressed harder and harder on Katniss’ windpipe. Immediately, I had rushed for the door to the room, but it had been locked, and I screamed while Gale pounded on it, trying to get through. It was Boggs who rescued the Mockingjay, knocking Peeta out with a single blow. I stood perfectly still, frozen, as they took Katniss away to be tended to. I watched as Peeta was put back in bed. They restrained his arms. Like he was still a prisoner.

 Something was wrong. I tried to ask the doctors why, but they didn’t seem to know either. Peeta Mellark, the sweet boy who’d been thrown twice into the Games, was gone. Replaced by something cruel in his body. I watched until I was forced away by Plutarch Heavensbee and a team of doctors.

 The moment I finished my grim tale, Mrs Everdeen thanked me and rushed to check on her daughter. I sat outside the surgery, waiting, hands restlessly wringing together. I picked at dry skin on my chapped lips and on my raw fingers, trying desperately not to think of anything. At some point, I must have drifted into a dreamless sleep, because the next thing I remember is the surgeons exiting the room with a trolley. On it, a body, covered with a sheet.