Struck by Lightning {F&T/E/S; Day 5}

You spend the night under pale stars and howling winds. There are no other bodies to warm you, no sleeping figures to huddle against. Noises sound and faces appears in the sky, and you wonder if this is how it feels to know there is no one else left in the world for you. Atlas comes first, and you think there is no saving those that have been damned. The night has claimed five, and tomorrow could be just as many (this breakneck pace has not slowed the river of blood since the first day). Were you meant to have saved any of them?

An honest question, considering you have done nothing but bring misfortune to your allies. Gentian was not safe from Riven, nor Molly from the careers. You want to talk about purity and love, and life—yet all that seems to surround you is death. Only faith has kept you moving forward, your heart so certain you could keep those that you wished alive, you had not seen all of the signs appearing. Perhaps you had done one good deed in keeping your district safe, and that would have been enough. Your vow to live for others and to keep your friends safe as long as you could was just empty words. That’s all words ever were, you suppose. A promise meant only as much as what action provided; Atlas’s face a testament that even the strongest were melted down to nothing in time.

So do you give up?

The stories that remain in the games seem so much more fulfilling than the girl from eleven. A pair of lovebirds, desperately aching to hold onto one another. A boy who was saved and now fighting for his life—another, against him, her strength no less inspiring. The trios that fight for a crown (do they all?), or to prove to family (and for family) that they will be remembered. A pair that serves to love and save one another, as though they now are one and the same. A child no longer scared, but growing into a girl beyond her years; a boy who’s lost his love; and one who’s last name inspires, delights, and scares other tributes.

Your path feels less conventional; you think about what you have accomplished, save for waking up on a fifth morning and breathing life. There are faint glimmers of light, and you sit with the ruffles of your flamenco dress and strum on your guitar. Loneliness is more frightening than all the fights you have ever faced. Is it that you must finally know yourself, Salome? And when you ask just who the girl is that sits here now, do you have an answer? Funny that you should have pushed so hard to know all the others in this place, only to find the answer about yourself so lacking.

Salome—so much time spent hiding behind, becoming part of the footnotes and shadows of the seventy-fifth games, you believed it fitting to become an afterthought. Life was not meant to be taken, shredded and ruined unless it was taken from you. That helped to keep you on the same path as Benat, who spent five days in the sixty-third doing no more than helping his allies, until he was killed (by them, without having harmed a soul).

Do not believe that because you are alone, that there is a reason to be lonely. A journey begins with two feet—one in front of another. You may have shared so much with so many—what about them? And what about you? As the sun starts to rise and you angle yourself in the little basket of your balloon bicycle, you wonder just what it would mean for you to keep going. Your sister wants you home—that might be selfish, but it’s not unfair. You are no saint (only in your own mind). Not all is black and white. You can live for others without sacrificing yourself so fully.

The wind picks up and the orchard sways. You had planned to stay here for another day to get your head clear, but it’s soon apparent the game makers have other plans. Rose petals fly in circles around, you and you start to press your feet against the pedals of your bike. The wheels seem to turn on their own, and soon enough you can’t keep up with the pace of the pedals. You lift your feet as the bike screams across the sands, and are glad your helmet protects you from the storm of red petals that thwack into your face. You shift to steer the bicycle, hoping to slow it down, though it hits a dune and spends a few seconds in the air.

When you crash against the earth, your heart beats double time. The storm seems to subside, and you take a moment to step out onto the sands to survey the damage.

It’s then you see the little girl from five nursing Tamron. You want to say something, to apologize for packing up and leaving them. Could they know you thought you were of no use to them? Or that you were too tired to go much further? But the words don’t come before Tamron charges. He races beyond you, striking the girl from eight. Fallon follows. Her blow is clean and deep, hitting Eva without pity.

“She lost her cousin…” You say at first, hazy. Tamron would understand. He was from the same place as you, he’d lost flesh and blood like you, too. “Leave her be—let her go. Tamron, tell her—” You press forward, hands empty but wanting to stop Fallow from slicing apart the girl who fought for Gentian. She was alone. Had your words broken apart her and Riven? You move to grab Fallon.

“Get off of her, or I’ll…”

[Salome Izar attacks Fallon Payne, unarmed]
MSW4jivCunarmed
[5120 -- Gash/Bruised Left Arm -- 3 damage]

You spent so much time believing you were whole; you barely noticed what was missing. Loneliness was not a symptom of whom you lacked at your side, but what you lacked inside. The cheer and confidence boasted in the training center chipped and cracked away each passing moment in the arena. The lines were all there—evidence of fragility, your soul set to shatter from the stress. Your opponents were wholly formed, with faces showing the nerve you sorely lacked. In truth, doubt was poison for a child fighting for her life. Swallowed down like cyanide capsules, doubt made hands shake and feet heavy, until death swooped in to carry you away.

Illusions protected you from seeing that you did not have all the answers. Perhaps Magdalena could have talked some sense into you. There was an answer for everything, you contended, no matter the circumstance. Well—as the battle raged between the wayward children, you were at loss. Tamron brought memories of laying in fields of grain, whispering secrets to cousins in front of bonfires, and rhubarb pie in winter. Home, a word so foreign now you wondered if the meaning was the same. Fallon was a mystery to you, but your heart still ached for the child. Even if you were all of sixteen, you’d still see each of them as children with their own destinies, wants, and fears.

What you told me better have been true. I left them, and I'm probably going to die now.

Who were you, Salome? (I’m just sixteen.)

What was the truth? (I don’t get to decide who lives or dies.)

“I held Gentian while he died.” You say over the din, right as she cuts across Fallon. Tamron doesn’t waste an instant, and his knife digs deep and through Eva’s armor. Fallon follows across Eva’s cheek, blood now scattering across the ground. History repeats itself; you watch them tear apart someone that had thrown apart what had kept her safe so that she could listen to you. “She killed him, and I—” Who are you, Salome? “I wish I had killed her.”

The words come out rough, and rather than repulsion, you feel better just speaking them.

So much time wasted living up to expectations. Had you called yourself a Steel magnolia? Pain and sadness were no less real than joy. You were allowed to have the same anger, to be as unforgiving. You were allowed to live, in spite of whether the good or the wonderful, the bold and amazing inspired. You were allowed not to know, for one of the best lesson’s for a girl’s heart was that she did not truly know herself. You were ashamed at wanting to kill Riven, but not enough to banish those feelings forever.

“You’re right, Fallon.” You look to Tamron. Does he know how much it hurts you? This much you know: you’d never hurt the boy from home, hard as you could try. Your heart was certain there was only one walking away with a crown, and in spite of what you did not know, you were certain it was not you.

“We can’t both go home.”

[Salome Izar attacks Fallon Payne with unarmed]
lK0i|mWdunarmed
[result: 5101 -- Broken Right Foot -- 6.5 damage

(Unarmed)]

You tumble down on her foot with a crack. Body weight against bone, the armor of your glove strikes with such a force, you’re certain it’s broken. This hit was more than a warning. You can see in the whites of Fallon’s eyes that she runs ragged. Eva nips a cut across her hip and flecks of blood splatter across your helmet. Tamron swings again at the girl from eight, and you wonder whether the menagerie of bodies look more like ants crawling over one another. They all desperately cling to life, scars across their bodies, fight within their hearts.

Fallon manages to rise, clutching to Tamron for strength. Her words tumble out of her mouth, and you strain to hear. Something about staying safe, but—you can’t make out the words. She looks at you though, her eyes like a knife, hoping to strike you down. Not her, is all you hear. There’s nothing else from her, but her eyes do not lie. You are persona non grata, and why would you not be? Even with her limp, Fallon slices Eva’s hand clean off. The world spins as you watch a cursive squirt of blood from what used to the girl from eight’s wrist.

They are warriors, knights—the nobility that lords over others with their strength. That has never been district eleven. The girl from eleven tilled fields, mended dresses, and healed wounds. She stood with brothers in arms to protect and serve, observing the laws as they had been written. Not that she didn’t question the world as it were, but better to do good than cause harm. Where had that good gotten you, Salome? Gentian, Molly, Ronnie, Ophelia, Atlas—all dead. Good, you had believed, meant saving others, and sacrificing what you had to help them live one more day.

There was only so much a peasant could keep on her back before it broke.

You remember the words that Sampson would use. Us versus them; of the boys and girls from the upper districts getting what they needed to survive. That it took so many years for district eleven to have one victor (and now three was too many). You went hungry just so that your sister would have something to eat. You carried Molly, prayed with Atlas, and felt pity for Tamron and Fallon. Yet all of it was woven into the games, by men and women who would laugh at your pathetic attempts to do good. It was time to wake up. There was no one to feel sorry for but yourself, Salome.

Rebellion was the tool of the underclass to throw off the chains, to stand against the unjust. You had stood for your district at the pain of making sure none of them would die so that you could live. Yet here you were, tangled in the same web that wove every games. Feeling sorrow for the life you had to take, district partners turning against one another. There was no one innocent here; just as good and evil were not as clear as the black of your helmet or the white of Eva’s face. Anger was too good a word for what you felt in your heart. Perhaps they could try to write you out of the narrative.

But you were not disappearing.

Atsekabe – a word that you’d learned from bisabuela, was the name of the sword thrown over your shoulder. Grief, without rest. Bittersweet its color, just as you felt thinking about drawing it.

“I felt sorry for you.” You say to Fallon, to Eva, to Tamron. “And for everyone here. But I know what’s wrong with that. I should’ve been thinking about the people back home.” They were real now, their voices ringing in your ears. “Sampson was right. Good, bad—” You shake your head, both hands now clutching the hilt of your lightning bolt shaped blade.

“You don’t get to decide that. It’s what they taught you. And I’m finally done with those illusions.”

[Salome Izar attacks Fallon Payne with her sword]
cKd46jthsword

1105 -- Deep Gash on Right Calf -- 8.0 damage
(Sword)