The Quarter Quell

An important visit

Katniss POV:

It's been 10 months since I became a Victor, a survivor, fought against the odds and saved my fellow tribute Peeta. Everything is different now. I live on a 2 story house with air conditioning, bathtubs, queen beds and everything I need. It looks so Capitol like to me, that's why I hate it. I don't even have to go hunting anymore since I got all the food I need in just a few steps. I haven't seen Gale since me and Peeta came back to District 12. He's a miner now, and has to go deep into the earth to mine our mountains from dawn to night. Not everything has changed. My younger sister, Prim, still goes to school and gets treated the same and my mother still works as a nurse, curing the injured and sick; who are mostly the miners. The citizens of District 12 have gone back to normal now. Everyone was enjoying the shower of gifts the Capitol gives to the District from which the Victor is from. The gifts is just a bit of more food and anything else we need. The Capitol is the true winner. The citizens from my home work like a regular day now. But really,there waiting just like everybody else for the next day that the old warehouse in our district is turned into a studio with lights, cameras and screens for the reaping once a year. That old warehouse is our town square. This year is the 3rd Annual Quarter Quell. A Quarter Quell is a Hunger Games but different. Every 25 years, the Capitol does something different in the games. They can multiply the amount of tributes or make an insane arena or anything that comes into there minds, but there has to be always, 1 Victor. Haymitch won the 2nd Annual Quarter Quell of 48 tributes; meaning that there were 4 tributes from each district. I don't know how Haymitch won but the odds must've been on his favor. I also don't know what happened to his family, did the Capitol do something? Did he ever know love? I don't know. I must have been so young that I can't even remember. Prim couldn't possibly remember since she was a baby. Now that the parties are over and the cameras have left, all I do is cuddle up in a chair, drinking tea, even though in just a few minutes the warmth from it disappears. I can't sleep at night since the nightmares always wake me up. It starts with me rising into the arena and all the tributes looking at each other; then we all start running and I see Peeta run into the opposite direction. I turn back around and see tributes killing each other and fighting. Then I see the girl from 4, Tara, run off with a bag. I run to take a bag I spotted and I trip. The boy from 9, Imanol, almost kills me but Clove gets him and almost gets me. I skipped to the Tracker Jackers; I see Glimmer screaming and trying to shoot some of the Tracker Jackers but it's hopeless and she collapse on the ground. I look down and I see Rue, I start singing her the lullaby my father taught me, while tears stream down my cheeks and she dies. I skip to the mutts devouring Cato. Then I stare into Peeta's blue eyes, thinking of the kiss we had on the cave. I pour some nightlock berries, that killed Foxface, into his hand and as we are about to eat them a voice rings through the whole arena saying that we both have won & that's when I wake up screaming and sweating. As tears stream down my face, my door opens and Prim walks over to me and gives me a big hug to calm me down, which it works just a bit, while my mother gets me a drink and medicine to help me sleep but nothing helps me. I try to forget it, like nothing ever happened, but the memory haunts me. As I sit with my knees up to my chest, while holding my cup of tea, I see dawn peering through the woods and bringing me to a day I wanted to avoid but can't. I slowly put both of my feet to the ground, stretching my muscles and bones. I get up slowly and walk up the stairs to my room. I put on my boots, shirt and pants. I fix my braid from the mess it is and walk downstairs without even thinking of brushing my teeth. I walk up to the door and hold the handle that's cold as ice. I twist it open and step outside into the cold breeze that hits me directly. I hear the Mockingjays whistle from a distance, as in there singing a beautiful morning lullaby. I go down the front steps the little rays from the sun shooting across my face. I haven't gone outside in a long time! I start walking through the Seam, where I used to live and I stop dead in my tracks. It's my house. My old house I use to live in. It brings a grin into my face, remembering the good memories I had there and dreading the bad ones. I slowly walk inside with the floor creaking every time I step a foot on the floor. I look around knowing the big difference between this house and the one I live in now. I walk upstairs into the room that me and Prim use to share together. Our beds are still there. I sit on Prim's bed, remembering the day of the reaping that Prim woke up with a terrible nightmare and I was calming her down and we both sang the "District 12 lullaby". I get up and walk up to my closet where I find my father's hunting jacket. I pick it up and shake all the dust from it that makes me cough.I slowly put it on and look at myself in the mirror, and what I see is a 16 year-old girl. I look the same as I did before the games. I have my brown hair, gray seam eyes and I only grew a few inches without knowing. I walk out of the house and start jogging over to the woods. Still knowing the path surprises me since I haven't been through it in such a long time. I see the electric fence. Never on, I go through it and go into the woods. I find the tree where I keep my bow and arrows. I pull them out from the roots of other plants and take away the cobwebs that covered it. I trace my fingers on the bow and then an arrow. I put the arrows behind my back and hold my bow tight to go hunting. As I run through the woods and try and find something I find rue flowers. I stare down at them, my eyes filling themselves up with tears. The image of Rue dying in my arms makes the tears escape. I wipe them away and go on. As I'm about to give up, I see a tree filled with groosling birds. The birds that me and Rue shared in the arena. I shake my head to let the memory escape before I start crying in the middle of the woods. I slowly walk into the exact angle my arrow can shoot a bird down. I pick up a small rock and throw it into the trees's branches, making all the birds fly away. I quickly take an arrow and put it into the bow and I shoot. By my surprise it takes a big bird down. I walk over to it and pick it up. It's a bit heavy, which means it has a lot of meat and that's good. I pull the arrow slowly from the birds eye and throw it away. I walk up to the tree where I hide my bow and arrows and leave them there. I walk out of the woods holding the bird in my arms. I walk through the Seam and I find Gale's house. I don't expect to see him, he might be already down on the mines. As I walk closer, I see a little girl, very much like Prim, but with brown hair. It's Posy, Gale's little sister. She's jumping up and down against the wall with a rag, trying to reach something.