maskformask robinaspen

I will remember the night with fondness. The way the fireworks had illuminated everything around us, and the echo of Reece Jackson's song moving through the trees. His lips against mine, and every inch of the world at our fingertips. All of it for the taking. We were the kings of a kingdom we made for ourselves. I fell asleep in his arms, and I wanted for nothing.

Except the sunrise, and the warmth of him beside me. But morning comes wearing the same midnight mask it has grown so accustom to, throwing a black veil over all my surroundings. Somehow, it seems even thicker than before. More difficult to breathe. The first thing that terrifies me is when I reach up to rub my eyes, feeling the rubber material spread over my skin. It makes me gasp, bolting into a sitting position, clawing at whatever has attempted to cage me.

"Reece? What the fuck is happening?" I reach out a hand into the pitch black emptiness, curling my fingers around the absence of him. Swallowing hard, a spark of fire igniting in my chest. I wait for his voice, for the warm tone that is so capable of calming me. And I wait, and wait, and the second of my fears hits me like a gut punch. I force myself to my feet, holding my hands out in front of me, gathering my spears into my arms, using one of them as a walking stick for good measure.

My heart drums wildly, and even my limbs begin to shake in rhythm. My mind makes sense of it before I can — faces glare down from the sky, too many dead tributes to count on both hands. There are so many ghosts in this arena now, and so few enemies. Of course I know what this means. They're setting the scene how they see fit. That's how powerless I really am. If anything, it disturbs me. The way I could so easily vanish from his embrace. Without so much as a cry for help, forced into whatever mask now covers my head.

On the eighth day, we are spirited away from our shelters, and left to face the darkness alone. Every snap of a branch, every shape in the shadows, all of it is a danger I can't name. I stumble into the unknown. Struggling for air, unsure of where I'm going, feeling the rage build inside of me. Because I don't want them to win. The puppet strings dig into my wrists, and I hate myself for the way I can't pull them off. Not yet. I jerk back as an unfamiliar voice breaks the silence, explaining our situation.

Which only makes me hiss in frustration, trying to dig at the mask once more to no avail. I feel sick to my stomach, anxious for so many reasons. Because I want to watch the sun rise again, and I want this thing off my face, and I don't want to kill someone because they tell me I must. But there's blood on my hands already, and I'm nothing if not a hypocrite. There's a blur of light on the horizon, pulsing with enough life that I step towards it, drawn like a moth to the flame. Before I break into the clearing, I pause.

I glance down at myself; the strands of blonde hair peeking out from my rubber prison, and the way I am so armed for war. The bright shadows of a fire streak through the woods, flickering like the beating heart of a very real beast. I know what this moment means. I know what's waiting for me just past these trees. And, yes, I should turn and run. Faster than I ever have before. Until I have moved so far, even the darkness can't remain. That's what I'm chasing.

Moving into the space, bathed in the soft glow of embers, I am just in time to see a stranger make the same choice as me. It takes everything in me not to recoil, unsure of what to focus on between the grotesque mask and the scrawny figure beneath it. A monster, and a victim. I stare at my own reflection. "Fuck." That much, I can agree with. It's the blade that follows the small voice that really annoys me.

Quick as a bug buzzing around my cheek, whistling in the air as I shift my head to the side. I can hear it thud against bark behind me. A warning shot, I'll assume. "Who are you?" The question makes me grimace, wondering if what might seem fair to this boy is fair to me. Because I don't want to know him, and he shouldn't want to know me. He has to know what this means. I know he does. He knows exactly why we're here. Only us.

And maybe that's why he can't stop himself from asking. Knowing the name of your killer, or even your prey, is a very sacred thing. There's power in it. To stare up at a terror so keen on ending your life, and knowing it. Naming it. As desperate as I am to be free, I am grateful that the mask gives me the perfect excuse to extend the silence. The fire crackles between us, and I lift my spear from the ground, tilting it forward. I clutch the others so tightly that my knuckles turn white.

How frightening I must seem. How cruel that I cannot give him the one thing he asks for. At least not yet. Inhaling deeply, I confirm one thing with myself. The stranger across from me is not Reece. My mind plays with that longer than it should, thumb running across the steel surface of my weapon. He is not Reece Jackson, and he is standing in my way, and he has to die. This boy has always had to die for me to live. I am the same obstacle he is to me. I am a threat. I am vulnerable.

"Would that make it easier for you?" I ask before I can stop myself, not completely able to bring myself to completely ignore the other tribute. As much as I want to get it over with, there's a reckless part of me that wants to press further, tiptoeing across the thread that has been stretched between us. I want to know why he thinks knowing is better. Because if I kill him, and I make out, I don't think I'll ever be able to handle knowing him.

How could my name ever comfort him? What is Aspen Peake but a knife at his throat?

"Knowing who I am, I mean. We could just stay strangers." My voice is full of quiet rage, trying so hard to be bigger than itself. I want him to listen to me carefully, to recognize everything I am trying to say. I don't want to be cruel, but there's a stubborn part of me that refuses to dig my wounds any deeper than they have to be. I am so tired of the hurting. I just want to go home. I am so tired of being here. Escape blurs on the horizon, a fuzzy spot of color in a sea of nothingness. It calls out to me.

"I have to kill you, either way."

And I answer.

"Anonymity only takes away responsibility."

Wisdom speaks into the nothingness, and I am forced to listen to it. For all the senses this mask has stolen from me, my hearing is not one of them. Lady Luck blows me a kiss, and it turns to ash on the wind. Enough to choke me up. Like the sound of his name coming from his own lips, hidden behind a rubber prison, giving shape to stranger in front of me. I see his arm twitch, can sense the moment where a warning shot must become retaliation.

I see where my javelin pierced his skin, and the terrible mess of scars there, haloed by the campfire light. My mind flashes back, watching the blood drip into the darkness where the sun has been completely dethroned. That first day, high off winning the wealth, finding this place with Reece on my heels. Joking about roasting marshmallows, thinking of home. Now it's shifted into this, standing across from a boy named Robin; a boy who I must kill.

A boy who asks for my name, even knowing this.

And a boy who does not bargain with his advantages — quicker than I can react, a small flash of silver streaks through the pitch black, and an explosion of pain moves through every nerve in my neck. I gasp for breath, fire igniting inside of my throat, fingers reaching to wrap around the hilt of the knife, wanting so desperately to pull it out and deal with the damage. But I'm still vulnerable, and I don't have the supplies needed to tackle this wound. The time.

Stabbed in the neck, and I am not even allowed the good grace to pull the dagger out. That's the line we're tiptoeing here, these are the rules of the game. I can't save myself because doing so means death. That's the sick joke of it all. I have to accept this pain, pack away the trauma of being unable to force anything but gasping breaths out of my throat. Even my agony is masked, reduced to a wailing sound, and the way I nearly collapse to my knees.

Because I am terrified of dying, and of what surviving truly means. I can see the girl I need to be to escape this arena, and I know what that requires. But I can think of five graves on the top of my head that would haunt my every waking minute. I can already feel the callouses forming on my hands, the way I'll trace every letter that writes out their names. Willa. Nora. Chad. Waverly. Reece, if I leave him here. The memories I'll have to lock away.

Dreams I'll never get the chance to achieve.

The worst part is knowing I'm hardly worthy of being the one to escape this place. What makes me deserve life more than anyone else? Am I not an awful person? A killer. Angry girl who never quite learned how to solve an argument without using her fists. And now that's all I'll ever be. Full of rage. Capable of the worst crimes. The Capitol does not want me, and even the world, fuck — I don't know where I'll belong in it. I don't know what I'm going to do.

I can't be Aspen Peake ever again. However this ends, I lose myself.

There's nothing I can say to Robin. To this sixth grave being dug in front of me.

Because there's a knife in my throat. I can taste my own blood. The thing I hate most is crying in front of people, and now my eyes are stinging with tears, and I'm still struggling to breathe. I can feel the sticky heat on my fingers. It's not new. That's the worst part. I am so familiar with dying. I have looked down at it so many times, and now it's looking back up at me. It's robbing everything from me.

From him, too.

But even bleeding out, I cannot yield. Fuck if I'm unworthy.

I shout as I throw another spear, and it says this; I promise to mourn you, even if that means closing the casket lid over your screaming face.

"I asked your name. Please."

The worst part is that all I can share is my own agony. Even then, it is a warped, quiet sound. All I want to do is scream, but that would be a nuisance. A knife lodged in my throat, and I need to swallow my pain. Choke down every ragged gasp for breath, so that it's not obvious that I'm losing my advantage here. That, and I should speak up. Say my name. It all makes perfect sense, huh?

We're dying on television, for the fun of it all, and we don't even have a say in the script. I am fighting a boy named Robin, a boy whose name and face don't exist in my memory, and I have to listen to him ask for my identity. As if the cards have already been played, like there's no possibility that he could be the killer here. I still taste the blood. I can still feel the way my skin meets steel.

And it burns, and makes me cry, and he can't see any of it.

He must think me cruel. Savage thing howling in rage, stubborn enough to try and beat him at his own game. It's obvious that he's faster than me. Reflexes like a cat, reducing what could have been a fatal wound to a scratch, all the while still asking for my name. Like that's gonna make any of this easier for us. I can see him standing over me in my mind, staring down at this horrible mask, and the pool of blood under me. Staining my hair.

Selfishly, desperately, I do not want that person to be Aspen Peake. As much as I'm terrified of the opposite — crouching beside him, removing my mask, watching him die in front of me with nothing to hide behind. I can only imagine how terrifying that must be. Either way, it's traumatic, and I can't quite figure out how to tackle it. I can only turn to the side, narrowly catching the side of a blade with my bicep. It stings.

Still. What's a candle to a forest fire?

I stab one of my two remaining spears into the earth by my feet, finally able to remove my free hand from the knife's hilt. My fingers are shaking, knuckles white, and everything in me feels like it's unraveling. I don't know how to give him what he wants — as much as I'm sure he has no interest laying down his life for me. There has to be a fight. We have to hurt. And it fucks me, it really does, but I'm too prideful. Too afraid of hearing what I'll sound like.

Could I even say my name? What would it sound like from a torn throat?

It scares me. More than the way the sun has gone missing, and this mask I can't remove from my face, and the fact that I can no longer feel Reece beside me. Only the absence of him. I whimper, and inhale another rasping breath, and that's all I can give to Robin. Pull the blade out, and I have to deal with the bleeding. Croak out my name, and where's the dignity? Fuck. And where is my honor? Readying my weapon, ignoring what could be his final request.

'Please,' his voice echoes in my mind. 'Please, please, please.'

After this, I'll be down to my last spear. I'll have to close the distance between us, and it won't be as easy as hoping that I might knock him into the shadows — falling to the ground in a swell of cannon fire. I don't get to walk away from this. Part of me is always going to be trapped here, robbed of my voice and my kindness, forced to relive my death. Or the way I had refused a dying boy even the smallest mercy. I can only imagine how heavy the crown might be.

But I'll carry the burden. All of it. Whatever it takes for me to go home.

I throw the javelin in silence, and share nothing but my own pain, and fears. Even nameless, Robin will know me. Like a reflection across broken glass. I am sharp, and I am familiar.

Even in the darkness.

"Just answer me."

He speaks the words, and something inside of me ignites. Even though he's just taken a javelin through his arm, he still insists on knowing my identity. I listen to his screams fade into a guilt trip. My cheeks flush behind my mask, and I reach for the only spear I have left. My fingers shake. More than anything, I'm pissed. Because he's the entire fucking reason I can't answer him.

I stomp forward before I can reconsider it, carrying my weapon into battle like a warrior out of one of Areto's stories. Which hurts to think about, considering I've made myself the villain now. She must be going through this same situation, maybe even against Reece, and now I'm left alone with a knife through my throat, wanting to murder a boy who only wants to know my name.

The blood gets thicker inside of my mouth.

As I approach, he throws another blade in my direction, but I'm close enough now that we're both in range of the campfire light. I see the flash of silver just in time to duck to the side. I wait for a new explosion of pain to erupt somewhere on my body, but everything remains static. Like there's an electric rope around my throat, distracting me from any other discomforts. They all pale to this.

When I'm close enough, I reach up to the bottom of my mask with my free hand, grunting in agony as I dig my fingers into the sensitive skin trying to find a way underneath the rubber. I lift up as much of it as I can, craning my head to the side to try and show him that I can't fucking answer. I scream for good measure, howling with pain and frustration because I have every right to break down.

He stole my voice from me. My suffering doesn't have to be graceful.

Using the pause after my outburst to my advantage, I take a few steps back. Just enough that when I stab my spear point into the earth, it's just bright enough that he can make out the number I'm tracing in the dirt. 7. Spelling out my name to a kid trying to murder me doesn't seem like the wisest choice, so I settle for giving him the smallest piece of myself that I can share. The part of myself that I hate the most.

I'm the district seven female. Just an interchangeable pawn in a game.

But my rage keeps burning, like all of my bones have become matchsticks, and all I feel on the inside is the way my body is so close to giving out. I want to cry, and run away, and find all the people I have lost; in so many different ways. I think of my ghosts, and the girl I lied to, and the boy I kissed. When I do these terrible things, I reflect on the good. All my reasons to keep living.

Enough of them to guide my hand as I strike.

His name is Robin, and he must die.

It's bad enough when he speaks my name. Looks at me with shadows over his eyes, and sees through the blood and the rubber, and knows me. Some idea of me. Aspen Peake, girl who cannot voice her pain. Or grief, or rage. It makes my skin crawl. My stomach flips when he insists, "I'm sorry."

I don't want him to be sorry.

I don't want to be anything to him.

Because I have to be his killer; that's the role I'm playing here. That, or he's going to kill me in a matter of minutes. And both options terrify me.

There's a shift of gravity; and I strike at the abyss.

[ filler ]