After The Storm (A Hunger Games Fanfic)

Ring of Fire - 2

"I'm checking for Capitas!" she shouts, "If the Capitas get you it'll be bad! They can take over your brain!"

The bossy girl sighs and moves on and Ever smiles. This happens every day and she always wins.

Her head jerks backwards; her ponytail is caught on a branch. It's only a small twiggy branch, so she snaps it off and carries on, the stick poking her in the neck every so often. In the distance, a baby is crying.

There are no Capitas in this tree either. Satisfied that she's doing her job well, she starts to climb back down, to where the girl is still sat, leaning against the tree and crying. Something solid but not painful hits her on the arm.

"Stay there!" a voice hisses. It sounds scared. Ever doesn't like when people sound scared because it means something bad is going to happen and then there's no way that people will be happy. She turns around to see whoever threw the thing at her and sees a girl, armed with a slingshot, perched opposite her in another tree. She has sharp, beady eyes and tucks the slingshot quickly into her waistband, pointing down the gap between the rows.

A man in white is striding towards her. Ever blinks; he stands very straight and tall and scary, and she knows somehow that the man being here is bad news. She reaches up for the branch above her, to scamper out of his reach, but the girl hisses "Stay still and hide your basket!" at her and she freezes, leaning on her empty basket. It scratches at her back. She doesn't dare to move. If she moves the man in white will see her.

"Down. Now. All of you."

The man's voice is scratchy and sounds like two rocks crashing into each other. Over the sound of the baby crying and the groaning and shouting comes a rustling noise as everybody climbs out of their trees, dropping lightly to the ground and bowing their heads. Even the bossy girl does. You always have to do this to the men in white, though nobody has told Ever why. Don't ask questions, Ever, just do it.

She can't get down; the crying girl is sat on the branch with her head in her hands. Ever can see that the back of her neck is very very white. "Move please!" she hisses, but the girl doesn't even twitch. Strange sounds are coming from her, broken and sad.

The man in white is looking directly at her, his eyes blue and cold. He has deep ridges in his forehead; he's cross. And when the men in white get cross, people get hurt.

"Please don't hurt me!" she bleats, "I can't get down! She won't move!" A sudden thought strikes her and makes her feel squidgy and cold inside. "Maybe the Capitas got her!"

She thinks that maybe he'll frown a bit more at her, or say something to her like most people do when she mentions the Capitas, but he doesn't. He just points to the crying girl.

"You there. With me."

The noise gets louder and the girl is rocking backwards and forwards so badly that Ever thinks that she might fall out of the tree. Everybody is facing forwards in rows, too scared to look. Some people in the other rows are closing their eyes, screwing them up tightly against the sun. Ever wishes that she could but if she closes her eyes she thinks she will fall. And she has to look out for the Capitas that got the girl anyway, so she can warn the others if they approach.

The man barks something into a little black box and takes a few steps towards them. Ever decides to lower her head anyway, but that means that she's looking at the man. He doesn't seem as scary from above. He looks smaller than her.

He's looking at the crying girl. "You're not working; you know the rules," he snaps. "Come down or we'll make you."

"Come down, lass," urges a stooped and wrinkled old woman, with cracked lips and a wonky nose. "Come on down and get it over and done with."