heed, herald of trumpets. (lore v. syren)

With each breath she draws in this place, she knows it could be her last. When she and Lore split from Castor and Sin to hunt, she is at peace with the possibility that one or both of them may not return.

Syren can't remember when it was that she became ready to die. She never would have even recognized herself a few years ago, before Talia died. It changes a person, to see your sister's raincoat and scarf in a plastic evidence bag, blood from the fabric pooling in the corners. She grew around that grief, leaving her hollow, the shell of the happy child she once was, who held Talia's hand on the way to school, who smiled and blushed when she caught the eye of Frances Eckhart at school.

"We won't go far," Syren tells Sin and Castor. "An hour, okay? And we'll be back. You can message us on our cells if we're not."

Before they go, she gives Castor's hands a gentle squeeze. She feels uneasy to abandon the boy, but Sin will protect him. He has never spoken a word to Syren, but he has not given her a reason not to trust him. (Until they start reaching the end of the Games, but they have days for that yet.)

Part of her hopes that Castor won't make it, if she is still alive towards the finale. She knows she can't kill him. She can't take away someone else's sibling, knowing how it felt to lose hers. He's just a little boy, like Talia, like Jasmine Lavoie.

Lorraine kicks at the ground while they walk away from the bank. Syren looks back, glancing at the disappearing figures of Sin and Castor.

"I'm so tired of smelling shit and piss, sis," Lore comments. "Don't get me wrong, Six wasn't much better. Next time, toots, let's just meet at a motel. Deal?"

Syren almost smiles. Half of a dimple forms in her face as her lip twitches. She never smiles around anyone but Frances. The light of her life, the moon and stars in the blackness of night.

Frances is the reason Syren is here, but she is also why she must come home. She took Jasmine's place so Frances wouldn't have to lose her sister again. Syren has better odds of survival, and even if she dies in this place, she doesn't regret her decision. She does not want to die, but there is peace in death.

After Talia disappeared, Syren spent so much time wishing that she could trade places. She would have done anything just to see her again, to hold her hand on the way to school like they used to. But then, when her disappearance was ruled a homicide, Syren wanted to fade into oblivion with her. She liked to sleep, because it was the only time she did not have to think about Talia. She found tranquility in the nothingness of sleep; it was almost like she was in a void of existence.

Most of the time, Syren doesn't feel alive. It's just the emptiness inside, so deeply hollow that she wonders if she even really has a heart. When Lore came to Six, when that spark started between them, it was the first time Syren felt anything at all in a long time.

"I miss it sometimes," she says. "When you were in Six. It was fun to break the rules for you."

Syren can't pretend that Lore didn't mean something to her. She would like to; she's with another woman now, and although she may never see Frances again, she could never be unfaithful. If Syren dies, Frances's last memory of her would be kissing Lorraine Gaultier on a silver screen. And if she lives, Frances would never forgive her.

She still hasn't worked out what her feelings were and are for Lore. Syren wonders if she will even have time before she meets her end.

"Til death do we part."

Syren's eyes flicker up to Lore's, holding her gaze for a moment before she looks out into the distance at the green-tinged sky. It looks sickly, like her poisoned body from all the radiation, like the putrid sewage lake over the ridge.

It's the words traditionally said at a wedding, something that neither Lore or Syren may never have. She would like someday to say those words to Frances. She has imagined their wedding before; they'd have their sisters as bridesmaids, flower garlands hanging across the rows of seats, delicate white dresses that touch the floor.

She'll never hear those wedding bells if every person in this Arena doesn't die. Including Lore. And Castor. And Sin.

And when Lore reminisces about the past, it makes thinking of watching her die, or even killing her, seem impossible. Syren cared about this person — and still does. She can't put a bullet in her skull. Can't throw a spear into her chest, like she did to Kane.

Maybe if she had known that Lore would be in the Games with her, she wouldn't have entered. It would have been easier to never have to see her again, especially not like this.

Syren loves Frances, she does, but she can't pretend that she and Lore don't have history. When they met in District Six, when Lore transferred, she had been Syren's first. She had been so intoxicated — yes, that's the word, not in love, she's convinced herself of that much — that she stole hormones for Lore, risked being kicked out of her program. If she could go back and choose again, she would do the same.

"Yeah," she says quietly. "I guess that'll be soon. A few days. It feels like we've been in here for longer, though."

"What do you want if you win, anyway? With the rest of your life, beyond money and fame? I never asked you before."

It's obvious what Syren wants. Lore doesn't even have to ask. She knows why Syren volunteered, what she's looking forward to when she comes home. Frances. It's always been about Frances.

She doesn't like to talk about it with Lore. There's an awkward tension between them, and Syren knows that Lore feels it, too. Every time Lore gets close to her, or touches her, Syren feels the ghost of Lore's lips against hers.

"Someone's got to love me out there."

Something hangs in the air, and although unspoken, both Syren and Lore know. The look in Lore's eye is all Syren needs to see to know that she's thinking the exact same thing —

Someone's got to love me out there, and it isn't you.

Because when Lore left, someone else took her place. Syren can't take that back now. It's too late for them and they both know it.

She looks at Lore again, an apology in the depths of her eyes. Cerulean blue, like the sky, but not here.

I'm sorry I can't love you, they say. I'm sorry we're trapped here together.

Syren would have said the words out loud, if only she could have mustered the courage. Instead, she swallows hard, tasting ash in her bone-dry mouth.

"I honestly thought seeing you again here would be a good thing, Syren, but... damn, was I stupid thinking that."

Silence stretches for a moment, and then Syren nods. "We're running on borrowed time. Kind of puts a damper on the reunion." Her words are blunt, spoken in that same monotone as all the others. But there's a deep sadness behind them, if you listen close enough.

Syren's hollowness has never been from a lack of feeling.

"I miss that song we played," Syren says, as an old memory resurfaces. "You know the one. I can't even remember the name, but I remember the sound."

It was a record Syren pulled from the break room at the hospital, an old classic, all violins and pianos. Syren had taught Lore how to dance in the empty back room at the end of a night shift. Lore didn't know how, but Syren's mother had taught her. She remembers taking Lore's hand in hers, leading as they glided across the floor, with Lore occasionally stepping on Syren's toes. They had laughed whenever they made mistakes, and even now Syren can hardly recall times when she had smiled like that.

Syren can reminisce all she wants about what it was like to love Lorraine Gaultier, but she can never truly relive the feeling. It died in her heart over a year ago. You can't return a spark to ashes.

She doesn't realize that she has struck a nerve until it's too late. Until pain flashes in Lore's eyes and her voice suddenly becomes strained, like she's biting back a harsh wave of unwelcome feelings.

Syren should know more than most that sadness is as uncontrollable, cold, and unpredictable as the sea. It can be steady, at ease in one second and swallowing you in the next. She didn't think bringing up that old song would stir this up in Lore, but she should have.

"I can't dance with you here. There's not even any music, Syren."

She wants to mention the radio that's growing heavier and heavier at the bottom of her backpack. She wants to mention that she had found that old classic song on the radio before, late last night when everyone had fallen asleep. The sound came out full of static, but Syren would know the tune anywhere.

But instead, she holds it in, knowing better not to press this any further.

"I know you don't love me anymore. You know that, right?"

Silence, again, as Syren pauses. She stares at Lore for a beat, until her words come back to her.

"I know," she tells Lore. Her voice softens just a bit, as much as it can in that monotone. It's like gently sinking a knife into flesh and it hurts all the same.

It is then that Syren realizes she never told Lore how she felt, and Lore never did either. They didn't need to. They both knew; I love you was in every kiss they shared, every touch between the sheets at night. It was something kept between just them, their little secret, like so many other things.

"I'm sorry," at last she speaks the apology that's been hanging on her lips, but it's too little and too late. When she finally says it, the words carry more weight than it seems.

I'm sorry I can't love you again. I'm sorry we can't get what we had back. I'm sorry one or both of us is going to die here and that's how our story ends.

But Syren has never been good with words, never been good at bearing her heart and soul to someone else. She's trying, really, to be open and speak her mind because there's only so long that she can do that before it's over.

"I guess I just — it's sinking in that I'm going to die," Syren admits. "I really thought, at the Reaping, that I had a chance. I had to volunteer — there's no way Jasmine would have survived in the Games. But it's not real until you get here."

Reliving memories is better than facing what she will never have. Syren can touch the past, with Lore, dancing in a dark break room past midnight, but she can only dream of the future with Frances that only seems to become more and more unattainable. It's a sweet, but cruel dream. Because that is only what it can be.

"Until you start hearing cannons. Until you see someone die. Until you watch all those faces in the sky."

Syren hears the click of a gun before her eyes even fall on Lore again.

Her revolver is out, but this time, it's aimed at Syren.

The reality of death sunk in last night during the anthem, but not so deep that Syren had become resigned to it. Not like this, the way its cold teeth bite through her to her core. She's staring down the barrel of the gun, like looking death right in the eye.

And she is not afraid.

Syren Steele has never been afraid to die. She has hardly even lived since Talia died; she let grief eat her up inside, let it rot and decay her heart. Empty inside for years, always waiting for something to change, to feel better and whole again, but no matter how much she loves and is loved by others, nothing can take away what she suffered. Nothing can soothe the open wound in her soul. Even if Talia's killer had been caught, even if Syren watched the firing squad put bullets in his body, it won't bring her sister back. It won't take away the pain.

No one ever heals from death. People go on about their lives every day, and try to forget, but there will always be that emptiness in their life where there loved one once was. For Syren, the emptiness manifests in Talia's room, untouched since her death. The bed is still made with her favorite stuffed animals, the door still open like she left it.

There's still an empty dining room chair where Talia used to sit. Still coats in the downstairs closet that she'll never wear again. Still tiny shoes lining the hall right outside her door.

Syren is not afraid, no, but her disbelief is apparent on her face when she meets Lore's eyes once again. Her throat tightens up and her body stiffens, a natural reaction to being held at gunpoint.

She goes silent for a few seconds, looking down at the revolver in Lore's hand. The barrel is pointed right at her heart. One shot, and Syren will be dead in seconds.

As calm as she tries to be, Syren cannot help the way her heartbeat soars into a frantic rhythm, spiking so rapidly that for moment it feels like it has jumped into her throat.

She can't feel her body, only pins and needles in her fingers and temples. Everything else feels numb except for this frenzied tingling and a cold rush of shock that breaches down to the marrow of her bones.

Syren should reach for her gun. She should reach for her gun and shoot Lore now. But she can't. She's frozen in place, so still that she could have been made of stone. Even if she weren't petrified with shock, Syren couldn't shoot Lore. She isn't some kid Syren has never met. She's Lorraine Gaultier, Syren's first love. She's the first person who ever made Syren feel something.

When moments pass and Lore doesn't take the shot, Syren begins to settle. The breath she was holding in releases, and her muscles slightly relax. Her sanity returns, and she begins to rationalize.

Lore won't shoot me. If I can't do it, there's no way she can.

After everything she and Lore have been through, it can't end like this. It won't. Lore won't kill her. Syren just has to talk her down, and she'll listen. Lore's emotions are just running high and Syren misstepped and made her snap. She'll calm down. They will work this out.

Above anything, Syren knows that Lore does not want to be alone. She doesn't deal well with solitude. The two of them always stuck together in the medical program, and now in the Arena. Lore can't go back to Castor and Sin if she pulls that trigger. There would be no going back; it's too suspicious, for Syren and Lore to go off alone and she returns without her.

"Don't you realize if you do this, you're going to be left alone?" she tries to keep her voice steady, but it wavers against her will.

Syren has not cried since her sister's funeral, but her eyes begin to well up with tears. Whether it's heartbreak or desperation, she doesn't know, and she doesn't have the time nor the clarity to decipher the two.

And almost like clockwork, the skies open up and acid rain begins to drizzle down on them.

She struggles to grasp how someone so familiar can suddenly be so much like a stranger.

Lorraine phases like the moon. A trusted friend and ex-lover in one second, and a hostile enemy in the next. As she holds that revolver right in front of Syren's heart, there's something so wildly unhinged in her eyes. Syren has never seen her like this before — this isn't the Lore she knew. This isn't the Lore she loved.

It would be so much easier if she could truly convince herself of that.

Then, she could just shoot Lore, maybe even without blinking, and this could be over. As hard as she tries, she can't look at her and pretend that it's a stranger wearing Lorraine's face.

There is a moment of hope when Lore lowers the gun, but then she brings it up to point at Syren's heart again, her gaze hard and gleaming with intent.

"I want to be loved."

The gunshot never comes. Syren is still standing there, in front of Lore, gazing at her with watery, sorrow-filled eyes. Finally, Syren understands. She invoked emotions in Lore that she didn't want to face, and now this is the price. She's opened the floodgates — with the death of Lore's district partner yesterday, part of which is Syren's fault, she can't handle the pain of nostalgia. It's breaking her, all those memories she would rather bury.

So her resolve, then, is to bury Syren, and take the pain and nostalgia to the grave with her.

"Lore," the name is hoarsely whispered in a cracked voice. "Lorraine."

It's the name she always called her in only the softest moments between them. Syren can't remember the last time she spoke that name instead of just her nickname. Maybe it was the day before Lore was arrested and sent back to District Eight. It was the morning before work when they laid in bed under the light of dawn, and Syren planted a kiss on her forehead to say goodbye. She didn't know that it would be the last time she saw Lore — at least, until the Training Center a year later.

There is a plea behind Syren's words. "Lorraine," she said, but "Don't do this" lies underneath. Because she's beginning to think that Lore actually might kill her.

Syren blinks at her through the rain. She can't kill Lore. She can't even imagine putting a bullet through her head, and yet the hand by her side is slowly reaching for her revolver.

fillering so we can finish this up tomorrow, syren's death will be here

- dies within seconds, but not without a lot of drama and final thoughts
- blood pooling in her chest and around her body
- gasping quietly for air as blood leaks out of her mouth, dies staring up at the sky and lore standing over her, revolver still smoking