so it goes // the careers v. wendihoes v. axyl | day five

Somehow, I register the world thawing. The snow stops falling some time through the night. I see the moment the storm settles into a light flurry before the sky turns still altogether through the misty haze of my shedding corneas. I see every artificial change of the weather the Gamemakers put us through, because I don’t sleep all night.

Maggie stays awake with me for most of the night, but she’s smarter than me, eventually deciding to retire. She knows she’ll need her energy for tomorrow. I guess I realise it too; I guess I don’t care. She spends her waking moments trying to distract me with stories of her life back home. Her family. Her past. And I listen, hanging onto every word, wishing I could have given Harley the same respect.

I thought surviving in here meant distancing myself from everyone around me. But now that she’s gone, I want to know Harley more than I’ve ever wanted to know anyone before. I want to hold her memories close and carry them through with me to my end. My punishment feels watered down to have met her as a stranger.

“My mom’s watching this out there somewhere.” I breathe Maggie in, breathe Harley out. Think about my own mother – mothers, the adoptive and maternal figureheads I have known and yet not known at all. Maybe one day I’ll be able to talk about them, too. But that day is not today.

Morning comes, and I’m no more weary than I was the day before, surprisingly. Maggie watches me like an anxious parent as we walk on the defrosting slush. She’s stopped trying to talk to me; I can’t speak anyway. Still haven’t stopped crying, either. But I’ve reconciled with the fact that I might just leak grief until my body dries up completely, and even then, I won’t really be free of the bitter emotion, will I?

Maggie was the one who saved me yesterday, dragging me out of the cabin as soon as my knife burrowed deep into Harley’s chest. The mutts had vanished as soon as her cannon sounded – I remember that much. I remember Rita, too, but I can’t see her face through the fog of regret. I don’t know the extent of her rage towards me for killing her ally.

Killing. The sin bubbles up inside of me, inevitable, and I knock Larsen out of my way as I dive for the side of the path and dry heave the meagre contents of my empty stomach.

Maggie is at my side in an instance, pulling my hair back out of my face, whispering to me under her breath. I shake my head at her – a protest, don’t help me, this is what I deserve.

I wish she had been the one who killed Harley. I can’t pretend there’s not a faint trace of resentment at her for making me be the one to do it.

Really, I didn’t want it to be this way. It’s naïve, and stupid, I know, to think you can get through this nightmare with your humanity intact. I saw Maggie and Azure as warrior princesses, far stronger than me, ready to take on the world and cut down anyone who stood in their way. I thought the best way to survive was to lay low, do as I’m told, ride someone else’s coattails. Now I realise I was only delaying the inevitable.

I wipe my mouth on the back of my hand, willing my stomach to settle as the only memories of Harley that I have play on repeat: her crawling up the stairs, stuck somewhere between wanting to live and accepting defeat. The horror in her eyes as the mutant dolls parroted at us in eerie, distorted voices, before the light finally left her once and for all.

Maybe I would have noticed the other tributes closing in if I wasn’t so fixated on the last twenty-four hours. But maybe this is just the rest of my punishment. Maybe this is exactly where I need to be.

The Careers descend on us immediately – if I didn’t recognise them from the Bloodbath, it would have been the shiny spiky weapons and hoard of armour that gave them away. And if there was any doubt remaining after that, the air of arrogance and entitlement was the final nail in our coffins. The blonde head of Rita swims into view, and I feel myself stagger on my feet, held up only by Maggie’s tight grip. The rope that bound us a few days ago as we navigated the mines sits untouched in my bag. It’s something reassuring to know we don’t need the flimsy thing to keep us grounded to each other, yet I can’t bring myself to throw it away quite yet.

“Maggie,” I start to speak, to beg, knowing how this game works. “I can’t...”

Please don’t make me do it again.

It’s her turn to shake her head at me. “You need to tighten up.” And that’s that. She charges forward to meet their waiting weapons and barbed words, sneers spread across all their faces. The girls lash out at... Axyl? On my right, alone now, no trace of Maggie’s district partner in sight. I’m half expecting to see Lionel and Felicity pulling up the rear, coming to the rescue, and maybe then it would be a fair fight. But there’s nobody else emerging from the darkness.

The second wave of the war breaks out; we’re on the losing team. Does Maggie know it yet?

I’m not ready to fight. I’m not ready to die.

I’ll never be ready for the way this ends.