Writer's Games Entries

Task 4: "Don't Scream"

Now the panic-thoughts are revolving inside my head because I know that I haven't gotten myself injured to the degree where I would lose my speech. At the same time, it feels as though I'm suffocating in here simply because I can't speak, which is normally something I don't do an awful lot anyway. It still makes my entire body get ready to shut down. My chest is pressing in on itself, I'm cold-sweating, short breaths dominate me. I keep trying to loosen my uniform around my throat as if something is pressing on it, but there is nothing. I back up against the wall, which for some reason is soft, before I drop the bow and slide down to the floor.

For a moment it's just dead-silent. The room is slightly dark and I can't hear a single thing because not a single sound is made...until I sense a set of arms suddenly grab my uniform and throw me further in towards the center of the room. I immediately turn around to see...me? I mean, it's not me but it is me. What is this? What's going on? "Someone got your tongue, Shadow?" She suddenly says...says! She can talk...I mean I...she can talk! I can't get a single sound out and she's talking as if nothing is stopping her. Not to mention that she's so different from me.

"Yeah, imagine that, you do have an alter-ego who's by far the better version of you...this version actually talks." I swallow as I look at her. She's everything I'm not – confident, cocky, evil...why have the Game-makers made this version of me? This is a false version. I'm the real person, this clone isn't! "Want to know something even better? The only way you're getting out of here, this tiny little room..." She starts as she takes a couple of steps closer to me and sits down on one knee. "...is if you kill me, but obviously that's not gonna happen because I will kill you first." She says as she suddenly throws a knife at me and makes a cut on my arm.

My entire body starts shaking as I look at the confident clone of me. If anything I'm just in shock of this sudden revealing and all I really want to do is lie down and somehow just wake up somewhere else. This feels like the worst nightmare I've ever had. This can't be real. "Aw, are you gonna lie down and cry? You know, you've done that so many times that it's a wonder you haven't dried out yet." I try to shake her words off me as one of the distant memories just resurfaces:

"Nobody's gonna come and adopt a weakling like her and the academy is never going to take her in. She doesn't train, she doesn't socialize...she does nothing to show anyone that she's got anything what it takes to represent her district...apart from running, but that's not career-material. She's just hiding away in the shadows instead of getting connections with what may be her future district-partner."

They hardly ever notice that I can hear every single word they say. My abilities of hiding away in the shadows have gotten better and better with the years and now they don't even know that I'm sitting here listening. With the way they're talking, is it any wonder I don't make much of an effort?

"You know, we should just pay off the Mayor's Building to put her name in the bowl so many times that she gets picked and learns the hard way that she should've put more efforts into the training at the foster-care facility rather than sticking to the shadows...the shadows won't help her there."

Right now, the shadows most certainly aren't as the words echo in my head. I even knew back then that I was nothing like the others. I wasn't big, strong, confident...I felt the comfort of the solitude and of the shadows and I was comfortable with the distance that the bow and arrow created. The tears are silently travelling down my cheeks, which I notice is only adding to the amusement of the clone who's standing in front of me. She's actually laughing at my face.

"Hah, funny, you're trying to cry but this room won't let you. Oh, pathetic, so pathetic. Yes, that's right, that's what you are...pathetic!" She's really rubbing that in my face as something I haven't felt before is bubbling up inside of me. My heart is pounding and this aggressive emotion flows through me as I stabilize my own breath and try to punch my...I mean her pretty face, but she's faster and tricks me. I end up face down on the floor just a few meters away from her when I notice vibrations on the floor coming from her increasingly closer footsteps.

I manage just in time to roll over to avoid her knife and I'm on my four limbs looking at her as she stands too close to me for comfort. "Wow, you think you have something to fight for. That's funny. You have no muscle, no confidence...what do you think is going to help you outmatch me? I for sure see nothing in you worth mentioning..." That's when I grab one of my arrows to fend off her incoming knives...

"When you have chosen a weapon, it is important to be open-minded about how to use it in more than what it is primarily designed for. If you can't do that, you have nothing to do here...and certainly nothing to do in the Games." The Master Instructor looks at me. My grip tightens around the bow. "Obviously you're dedicated to the bow and arrow, but you must learn to master them apart if you're ever in that situation that your string is cut or long range is not an option. You may think long-range is your only weapon, but if you learn to know the different ways to use it, you have so much more than a bow and arrow...you become the weapon."

I use the arrow almost like a sword to block her knife. At the same time, I manage to use the sharp end and cut up some of her skin as she backs away slightly. "That's cute, but you won't stand a chance no matter how you use your precious arrows." I want to talk back her, but I can't. I am starting to realize that speech is her weapon...apart from her knives. Whenever I try to speak and fail, and she manages it, she wins. That's why I don't try to talk back at her. I'm not a talkative person. Silence has always been my way of surviving and I need it more than ever. She can talk as much as she wants, that's her weapon. The silence however, is mine.

I swing my arrow like I've practiced millions of times back home. The clone is turning more insecure, but she manages to stop at me in the middle of a movement and stabs me in the right shoulder. The pain is piercing through my entire body, but I manage to punch her in the face to gain some distance between us. If I could say anything to this version of me, I would tell her that I've had enough of the insecurity from the back of my head. Along with the shadows, insecurities has been one of my friends ever since I was abandoned as a child. The last thing I need right now is a 'capitolized' clone telling me the same thing.

I get it together after a moment and focus on where I want to put this arrow, feeling like I'm more of a career than I've ever been before. I can see that my clone is turning rather insecure about what my next move is going to be. I move so fast and rapid that she doesn't get a chance to react as I stab her in the chest, forcing my arrow through and not stopping until I sense that it's coming out on the other end. She immediately starts to struggle with her breath and gurgle up blood. She stumbles slightly backwards and hits the wall before ending up on the floor in her own pool of blood.

I'm so used to this vacuum-sense in the room that I hardly notice anything of it before the door unlocks and opens. It's almost as if I'm filling back up with oxygen. It feels as though I've been without it for the last ten minutes before I hear someone come closer to the entrance. I immediately grab another arrow before I recognize Jem standing at the entrance. "Shadow! We thought we lost you...are you alright?" He asks. I swallow lightly as I see my clone slightly disintegrate into nothing. I can finally breathe...I can finally talk! I notice that I can finally make sounds as I sigh deeply in relief to myself, but no matter how much I've actually missed it, old habits die hard...so I simply nod at him.