And we run

Behind me, a massacre

a warning: this chapter includes very violent descriptions of death (and there will be more in the following chapters, I'm sorry guys)

Terra nods, stiff and sure, brief enough that I'm soon unconvinced it even happened. She begins to jog back to the cornucopia, reaching back for an arrow as she does, and, partially unwillingly, I follow. 

Apollo stands on the very tip of the cornucopia, maybe twenty feet in the air, his sword raised to the heavens, laughing in a way that could only be described as grotesque, blood and spittle flying from his mouth and creating interesting patterns on the silver metal beneath him. A girl scrabbles up the side to meet him, but she can't seem to climb the slick surface, cursing as her hands miss the holds and she falls once again. Apollo stops his show of egotistical pride to watch her, the smirk never leaving his face. 

"I'm not going to fight," I tell Terra, but she doesn't even acknowledge me, stopping in her tracks to aim her arrow straight at Apollo's head. 

"Don't kill him, he's my district," I say, but again, she doesn't seem to hear. Maybe it's ignorance, or maybe it's the screams that ring through my ears, unstoppable and horrible. 

"Don't kill him!" I say, and my voice is almost a scream now, too, shrill, drying out my throat. She doesn't listen. Of course she doesn't listen. 

I throw myself into her, knocking the arrow from the bow, watching her fire empty, the string pulling back to hit her in the hand. 

"Fuck!" curses Terra, turning on me. Which she really has every right to do, and yet still I am insulted. "What did you do that for, Daphne?! He needs to die! If not now, it will be later! And he's an easy target right now. Do you not want to win?"

My mind whirls, confused with my own actions and unsurprised at hers, however much I'd like to be shocked. "I won't be an innocent bystander to a murder," I say, "legal or not. If he dies he'll die, but not when I can prevent it!"

Terra shakes her head, retrieving her arrow from the ground. "That's the logic that gets you fucking killed in these games, Daphne. Trash it. He's gonna die now, just like all of them, and you're going to accept that."

With that she notches the arrow and fires, missing her mark by maybe a foot, the arrow lodging itself instead in Apollo's arm, knocking the blonde boy forward, to the point where I can no longer see him. 

"Oh, look, he's not dead," she says, and even has the nerve to smile. I stare for a second, maybe a second too long, because Terra's gaze moves off mine, glaring into the cornucopia. 

"Duck!" she yells, and I throw myself to the ground, mourning my hair as it rubs itself into the mud, sure to be disgusting in a few days. 

If I even make it that long. 

Which I will, I think. With Terra and with the careers I could, if they don't kill me first. 

A pair scampers off into the trees beside me, running for their lives, hand-in-hand. Their heads point towards Tupelo as they run, until he is out of their sight and they are gone, whisked away by the forest and the promise of safety. 

I envy them and their alliance that most likely won't end in betrayal, though is similarly doomed to violence and death. I will survive, but they will live. 

"Vulcan!" Terra shouts, turning to watch a tall boy tear his sword out of a girl's stomach with a wet squelching sound. My stomach churns, and I try not to meet her empty gaze as she falls to the ground, blood pooling around her body. 

He scowls and ignores Terra, swiping the blade across the back of the girl's neck for good measure and then moving on quickly, off to murder more innocent children. 

She turns to look at me now, a hardness in her eyes I've been seeing since the cannon first went off but am still not expecting. "Go to the island," she says, repeating it louder when I don't move. "Go to the island, hide behind a bush or some shit! I'll find you later."

This time I heed her warning and sprint towards the waterline, diving in without a second thought. Water is my home, my happy place, and no one but Apollo--and maybe not even Apollo, with his Capitol beginnings--can swim faster than me. 

It's cold and salty, like the ocean, and I notice a fish or two jumping farther away from land, which is good. Seafood will keep us alive, even though with everything in the cornucopia, we won't need it. 

It hits me that I am going to be a part of the careers--the people who represent exact opposite of my goal, killing for opportunity, not necessity. 

They're monsters, all of them, and I don't want to let myself stray down that path; but I won't survive without them.

The sand of the island is soft beneath my feet, cold despite the warm sun shining above. I lean against a palm tree, bracing myself with one hand. 

When I am turned towards the edge of the arena, the world is a paradise, ocean stretching out infinitely, shining with little glimmers of sunlight, wispy clouds floating peacefully throughout similarly blue skies. 

Behind me, a massacre. 

A shiver runs through my body and I shove myself to standing, stumbling over to the other side of the island. It's not very big, but is definitely a slope, meaning that if a person doesn't look very hard, there are hiding places here. 

My mind whirls and spins and does a backflip. It's weird, mainly because I don't think I've been hurt at all but also because it is a feeling that I am not used to and don't want to get used to, at all. 

My head makes its way onto my knees and stays there for a while, a long while. It rises only when a hand lands on my shoulder, gentle but firm. 

I look up. It's Terra. 

A cannon sounds behind her, and then another, and another. I don't bother to count them--someone else will have, and what do I care, anyways?

"It's over," she says, but her voice is hazy and blurred, like she's a hundred feet away, talking through a megaphone. 

I take a deep breath, but my lungs don't agree, contracting and expanding in succinct form and ignoring my mind telling--ordering--them not to. 

"Daphne," says Terra, and then her hand is away from my shoulder and someone else's footsteps fill my ears as another shape looms above her, tall and blurry from tears yet most likely Vulcan. 

His sword, smelling of copper and dripping red, rests beneath my chin. "We need to kill her," he says, mostly to Terra but maybe also a little bit to me. "She's no use to us, just dead weight. Don't got a reason to keep her around."

Terra tilts his sword away from me, meeting Vulcan's gaze with a glare. "Who said she's useless? We talked during training, and I've got a feeling she's not what she looks."

She's wrong, though. I am exactly how I look. I am a girl struggling to breath, terrified in the face of the boy who could very well be her end. 

Vulcan hesitates, and then moves his sword back to his side, resting the bloodied tip against the sand, leaving behind only a few drops of red on my dark clothing. "Fine. But she's not staying long, got it? Not unless she can fucking prove herself."

He walks away, and Terra doesn't move for a second. I mimic her breathing, slow and steady, and then wipe my eyes, the world becoming clear again, almost. 

"Don't make me regret this, Four," she says, and then extends a hand to help me up.

"I won't."

thanks for all the support oxceen <3 you're the best