Mockingjay: Prim [Completed]

Chapter 7: Not Alone (Prim)

We land in the outskirts of District 8. The doors open, and we're spit out onto the asphalt. And when the last person comes out, the hovercraft leaves immediately as if we're just a package it had to deliver. Four bodyguards arm Rory and I, including Boggs, who Rory seems to have taken a liking to. The TV crew is with us too, made of former Capitol cameramen with mobile cameras that encase their bodies like insect shells. Their leader, our director, Cressida's head is shaved with tattoos of green vines alone the sides. Her assistant Messalla is a slim young dude with lot's of earrings, with a tongue piercing as well. Like Plutarch, they've come over to our side but still give off a Capitol vibe.

The next hovercraft is full of medical things and honestly I feel like I should be in there too. I'm no Mockingjay, I'm a medic. I watch as they unload crates of medical supplies and many medics in distinctive white outfits disembark. Together, we all walk down an alley between two grey warehouses onto a street. And kid you not, it's like entering a new world. And coming from me, who's been from the outskirts of 12 to the Capitol, the heart of Panem, that's pretty major.

[The wounded from this morning's bombing are being brought in. On homemade stretchers, in wheelbarrows, on carts, slung across shoulders, and clenched tight in arms. Bleeding, limbless, unconscious. Propelled by desperate people to a warehouse with a sloppily painted H above the doorway. It's a scene from my old kitchen, where my mother treated the dying, multiplied by ten, by fifty, by a hundred. I had expected bombed-out buildings and instead find myself confronted with broken human bodies.] (page 86 lines 1 through 10)

This is my field, my expertise, I think to myself. I smile and walk confidently though I don't know the way.

"I'm ready for this," I tell Boggs with a huge smile.

"Oh I'm glad," he replies, "Though your very presence will do more for them than any doctor could."

She smells of sweat and metal. A woman approaches us and her stench is familiar and somehow soothing to me. But Rory scrunches his eyebrows and I know he doesn't feel the same.

"This is Paylor, commander of Eight, and this is commander soldier Primrose Everdeen, and this is commander soldier Rory Hawethorne," Boggs introduces us.

Paylor looks to be in her thirties, a bit young to be a commander (funny I should say that...). But her tone of voice is full of authority, and she was clearly chosen for a reason.

"She wants to see your wounded," Boggs tells Paylor as I watch her intently.

"Oh we've got many of those," Paylor replies and gestures for us to follow.

"You sure about this," Rory whispers, pointing at the warehouse. "Contagious diseases would spread like wildfire."

Paylor must have heard because she tells him, "We thought it would be a little bit better than leaving them to their demise."

Rory's cheeks turn a slight shade of pink. Honestly it's cute.

"Enter, Mockingjay," Paylor commands, "And bring your friends with you."

[I glance back at the freak show that is my crew, steel myself, and follow her into the hospital. Some sort of heavy, industrial curtain hangs the length of the building, forming a sizable corridor. Corpses lie side by side, curtain brushing their heads, white cloths concealing their faces.] (page 87 lines 24 through 28)

"Don't leave me," Rory whispers even quieter, grabbing my wrist. He's adorable when he's scared.

The hospital is so much worse than I expected and honestly I wouldn't want to describe it.

"It smells like someone died in here," Rory whispers. I laugh.

In District 12, we die peacefully in our homes, but I suppose the citizens of Eight lost their houses to the bombing. The smell reeks but I remind myself I'm here for a reason and march down the aisle between rows of patients.