Something Worth Living For [THG] // Finnick Odair

LV

The show starts with the anthem being played and Caesar greeting the crowd, which goes wild with applauses and cheers, that only makes my stomach turn and I start to feel sick again.

My prep team is presented then, Trenk, Viola and Polish. The audience claps and cheers at them as they bow to thank them. They are always extravagant but I have never seen them so... elegant, they are wearing their best clothes and their hairs are in perfect condition, I'm not surprised at that though, it's their job to make people look good.

The next one to be presented is Enebry, who is wearing a night blue dress and her purple hair is up in a fancy bun. I can tell she's feeling like a star now, from the way she walks to the way she waves, she thinks she's a diva, I bet she's having the time of her life.

The next one is none other than Carlyne. He is not smiling like Enebry, he just walks elegantly to the middle of the stage and gives a single bow to the crowd. He is wearing fancy clothes too and his long blond hair is perfectly straight, except for the tips that curl a bit by his shoulders. He is the one that receives more applauses, even more than Brutus and Lyme, who are the one that supposedly kept me alive, the ones who mentored me, but they really did nothing, if Finnick wouldn't have helped me I would have died.

Then I feel like the plate I'm standing on starts to lift, so it means I'm next. My hands start shaking and I swear I'm going to be sick. I don't want to do this. The bright lights blind me for a few seconds and I feel like I'm again in the Hunger Games, in the arena, right when my plate took me there and the bright fake sun blinded me before I could look around the place I lived in for thirty-two days.

The crowd and everything else vanishes as I see myself standing on my plate just next to sand and sea water and I see the Cornucopia and every other tribute ready to run towards it as soon as we hear a gong. I blink several times to get the image out of my head because I know it's not real and I need to be in reality if I don't want to be send to a psychiatrist hospital, even though I know I have gone mental.

I don't even smile or bow at the crowd which might be taken as rude, I just walk towards Caesar and shake his hand, he just smiles at me as he welcomes me.

I sit on this big, nice, ornate chair, the victor's chair. Caesar makes some more jokes before the show starts. The lights dim and I can see the seal of the Capitol appear on the screen, so this is it, what I have been dreading is about to start.

The video lasts exactly three hours and every person in Panem is made to watch it. I turn to look at the crowd, looking for Finnick for some kind of support and encouragement but I can't find him, the place is so dark I can't really spot him.

The first half hour of the video shows everything pre arena. We watch the reaping, the chariot ride, our training scores and interviews. I thought this part wouldn't be so tough but I feel like someone has grabbed my heart and crushed it when I see Kellen for the first time and it doesn't get any easier when I see the bright blue eyes of Ryle, and my eyes start to tear up when I see Kade.

And the tears finally fall from my eyes as I'm watching Kellen's interview again, when he admitted he liked me, something inside of me tells me he did mean every word, at the time I couldn't believe someone like him could like someone like me, he was older than me and he was very good-looking, and I was just ... me.

"So Kellen, do you have a girlfriend or someone that has caught your eye?" The Caesar in the video asks Kellen.

"Not really, there is no one at the moment." He says smiling.

"No one? No way!" Caesar asks shocked. "What about one of the tributes?"

"Well, lots of them are really pretty." Kellen admits.