Note: Due to some confusion with the extension, I was forced to hand in my first draft instead of an edited one.
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On a happy note, me being a witch was just a dream. I didn't just skip eighty years and become this messenger of death that the Plague-Hag was back in the 1300s in Norway. I don't even know what that dream was all about, but now I want to stay on the move. No way I'm going to let any sort of gas put me to sleep again. Before you know it, I'll actually wake up as a witch and dream I'm young...huff, no, I feel happy to be young and alive (for now).
I don't know if I truly understand these Games. The only normal thing that I have experienced so far is the bloodbath. I haven't really seen any of the other tributes since then, people die ever now and then. Are they forgetting how to breathe, or can't they handle the pressure? I didn't think I would, yet here I am (that self-confidence though). Back to my strategy however, I am not going to stick around in this house anymore. Who knows, this house could be haunted and I just invited the ghosts into my dreams a few hours ago. I am not going to have that again.
The only good thing about this house, is that I find stuff I can use, like a knife or a hammer to beat anyone crossing my path (it won't end well, so just stay away please). I also find lots of food that was just left on the table as if the people living here were in a hurry. I collect what I can find until I figure I have to start moving. I've spent more than enough time here and I don't want to make myself a target to just drop dead like I feel like many tributes already have. Some of them unexpectedly because I thought they would stay alive a lot longer than they have, others more expectedly. The bigger surprised to me is how nobody has come after me yet.
I'm going to have to eat those words the moment I step outside the door of the house I've taken refuge in. Past the Shakespearean houses, I can make out a giant, think fog coming towards me. I'm no stranger to fogs. In fact, I find them rather enjoyable when hiking. I like being surprised by what the nature beyond my line of sight has to offer. I'm not so sure I am going to enjoy what this fog has to bring. I don't even know what that is, but I already know that I won't. The fog reaches me eventually, and my heart-beat is raising because of how thick the fog is, but even more so when it disappears in the blink of an eye.
"Ka faen," those are first two words to appear in my head, which I also let the whole world know of, when I open my eyes again. "Hello, child," I have to puke. I really want to, need to throw up. What the hell is that? Looks like three women, old, witchy women if I should point that out, but they look even uglier than I did as the Plague-Hag (and that takes a lot). "This has to be another dream," I let out eventually. "Seriously, I did the whole witch-thing, I don't need to do it again..." I continue as I look at them for a moment, squirming on the inside because no person should ever look like that. I guess the only comfort is that I am not the witches...I just have to look at them.
"Oh, dear child, we are not witches," one of them goes. "Dokkar ser no ut som det," I let out to myself. "We are here to deliver three of your future fates," the other one continues. Fate, really? I almost want to burst out laughing and that's not the kind of reaction you'd probably expect from someone facing three hideous-looking witches like these three (but given my recent experiences I'm a lot calmer than I should be). "Okay," I let out with a rather confused look on my face I'm sure. "And how is it that you know what my future holds," I ask them skeptically after a while. "We are Fate. We have already spun out your life and your future is already determined," the third one finally speaks.
"Well, then, as you apparently have the answers to everything, how about you tell me this – am I going to survive these Games" I ask rather nonchalantly. I'm not actually expecting them to have an answer to that, but they do. "Yes," the one who spoke first takes the word again. "Excuse me," I ask, almost not sure that I heard them right. "You will live. You will win these Games and go home to that peaceful city that you call home. You'll see your parents, your mountains and fellow hikers...you'll be at home," she answers.
It feels like a lie. It feels too good to be true when she says it like that. The worst part of it is that I am already imagining it.
"The sweat is running down my back, the wind blowing fresh in my face as I make it up the first climb. It's a different kind of struggle than the one I went through in the Games. There's a sense of happiness and accomplishment getting through the first stage of the hike. I've been seeking out bigger mountains, greater adventures as I feel like I took them for granted when I was around before the Games. I even bring city-people with me, to show them that we have the greatest treasure in the world. The fjords, the lakes, the mountains and the glaciers are all a part of our national treasure we should be better able to take care of them..."
"Wow, hold up, you're messing with my head. You can't possibly know that I am going to win these Games," I let out eventually. I am trying to push away the images of my home because they could be alive. However, the more I think about it, the more it feels like a memory rather than something completely made up (and that confuses me a lot). "Does it feel like a lie, child? Do you really think we would be lying to you," the first one who spoke asks me. Do I think you would be lying to me? Yes, I absolutely do because these are the Hunger Games. Anything we hear, see or feel can be made up. Do I think it actually is? Now that is the million-dollar question (and I don't really know the answer).
What I do know for sure now is that I've been made curious of what the other two witches have to say. For sure, this can be a hoax and I'll be made a fool of in the end (by dying), hopefully I'll be too dead by then to actually have to live through it. On the other hand I actually do prefer to live. I want to get through these Games and go back to being the invisible girl that I am, and that I actually like. "Well, I suppose if there are three of you, there are three fates," (because that's how good I am at math). "I guess winning these Games involves some things that I won't like doing, right? Like killing another human being," I lead them on. The middle witch, who now snatches the eye from the first witch to speak looks at me (with the borrowed eye). "Have a look for yourself, child,".
"The person completely caught me off guard. I didn't know what happened or why, but the moment it did I was fighting for my life. I didn't spend much time thinking because the person kept its hands around my neck squeezing as hard as possible. I'm lucky to be able to get one of my own hand to weaken the person's grip while my other hand grab for the rock just a few centimeters away from my fingertips. I scratch the grass, I feel the tip of my fingers touch the rock, but I can't get to it. My sight is about to go dim, but somehow my fingers manages to grasp the rock and I hit the person on the temple and knock him/her down.
I see that the person is hesitating in getting back up so I find the knife from my backpack. "Don't come after me again! Please, I don't wa-...I don't want to hurt anybody," I let out desperately, but this person doesn't care and tries to launch at me again. This time I'm prepared and I stab the person before he/she can make another move. The person collapses, blood pours out of him/her, but for some reason I don't stop. I get down on my knees beside the person's body and keep stabbing him/her. I don't even notice how tired my arm becomes, it just keeps on going until the gong goes off.
It's the one thing I've come to fear with these Games – me killing someone. I don't think there is any fate worse than the moment you allow yourself to become a monster. You'll try to fight it for as long as you can, but in the end you have to surrender. "No, no, I have made it very clear to myself that I won't let that happen. I am not going to allow myself to become a monster," I tell the witch with the eye. "It is not a matter of choice, child. We are not offering you fates to choose from, these are your fates regardless of how you decide to respond to them. They will happen, one way or the other," I shake my head in denial. I won't fall down. I won't sink to that level, not ever.
"You have not even heard the worst part of it," the witch continues. "What could possibly be worse than me killing another person? A person who, like me, was probably scared the moment she was reaped for the Games and was only trying to stay alive," I yell at her. My heart is really pounding at this point and I don't know how to control it. "A fate even worse, is you liking it," why does the sound of that feel so familiar to vision she just showed me. I didn't stop. I just kept on going, I didn't even think twice. "I li-liked it," I question more in fear than anything else. If I like something, I make sure to do it again, and again (in this case it'll make me a murderer).
I fall down to my knees, dropping the bag down next to me. How would I ever fall so low that I would enjoy killing another human being? I can't imagine myself ever doing that, let alone kill a person in the first place. Apparently that is what the future holds for me (if these witches are legit). "That feeling will haunt you for the rest of your life, child," the last witch starts to speak. "But you will find peace," she adds. "How can I find peace if I enjoy killing people," I ask her, tears are streaming down my face. I didn't want to show a vulnerable side to me, but I'd be damned if I was the only one doing that at this point.
I'm imagining this last fate to be a bad one too. I can't imagine anything improving from killing a person and actually enjoying it. "There will just come a moment when the wind doesn't hit you so hard, and the rain doesn't bother you as much, and the woods will return to the state of sanctuary that it once was. Your demons will bother you in the beginning, but you will get past them," she continues. Despite of how ugly she looks, I keep my eyes on her, almost desperate for her words to be the truth (if the rest of them are that is).
"One question does remain unanswered to the three of us, child," she then says. This feels like the 'but' you always wait for in any other sentence with supposed good news. "What," I ask, dreading that I ask. "Whether you'll be able to let it go because you simply move on, or because you come to accept the person you've become, the killer," she says...