For the first time in forever, I'm actually alone.
Everyone else is downstairs asleep, preparing themselves for the attack on the President and the Gamemakers. I had tried, but no matter what I did sleep wouldn't come. All I was doing was lying on the couch awkwardly with my eyes wide open, gazing into the setting sun through the cracked windowpane. It hadn't been long before I had gotten up and climbed out to the elegant steel fire escape, climbing to the roof to see the sunset from a different perspective.
The view from up here is much better then the glimpse of sky I got from overtop the building across from us. In the pale orange light I can see much of the Capitol, even in its tattered and broken state still beautiful. Lines of dark grey smoke shoot upwards into the orange sky, scattered all across my view. Smoke lines and skyscrapers make for a very interesting horizon, though they're slowly disappearing as night looms closer. No matter what, everything will fade into darkness someday. You can't outrun it, it's always right there.
Always.
I've tried to run from the darkness for so long. For my first sixteen years, it was easy. Then I made a mistake that night with Eryn, and all the sudden it was at my doorstep. Fighting, the rebellion, they were all ways of keeping the darkness out of my mind. Now however I stand alone, the youngest member left of this so called army. Everyone I care about is dead. I've signed our last hope up for a suicide mission. It's all my fault, and no matter what I do that fact will not change.
Rising to my feet I approach the edge of the building, staring straight into the darkness ahead of me. Most nights the Capitol would be alive with colourful lights and many exciting parties, but since the rebellion started once night arrived all there is has been bleak darkness. A once happy place has been ripped from its hinges and thrown off a cliff, taking the very fibre of what it's known for and taking it away. The damage I've caused here is irreparable, no matter how hard people will try. There will always be scars or casualties, lives ruined because of me.
That's why when I step off the edge of the building, I'm not thinking twice.
For a millisecond or two I'm flying through the air, letting all my worries go. It's not long until the fire escape interrupts my fall however, leaving me with nothing but a slightly sore foot from the impact. I can barely see the ground below me, but I know enough that if I had chosen a different location to jump I wouldn't be walking away.
I sit down cross legged on the steel of the fire escape, letting my thoughts run through my head like a giant stampede. I have no idea what I was just thinking. The darkness had been so close to consuming me, controlling my every move. I had actually just tried to kill myself, which would have cost us a soldier. One less person to fight against the President, once less person to defend the others. We're so close, yet I just tried to give up my only shot at firing a bullet into one of those gamemaker's heads.
The fact that I would feel guilty for trying to kill people who every year kill almost thirty children is almost comical.
Just imagining how close we are lights a burning feeling inside of me, an odd mix of how I felt the day I signed up for the Rebellion and the day they cut out my tongue. Excited and angry. Hopeful and seeking revenge. The darkness is being chased away by a blazing inferno, that nobody can stop. All at once my mind starts racing, a plan forming in my mind. The Capitol's lost its colour recently, and as my mind seems to fill my head with words and images from our time attacking the Capitol I know exactly what I'm going to do.
I rise to my feet in an instant and bold down the stairs of the fire escape, my eyes quickly using what light's left from the setting sun to plan out my idea. It's disappearing fast however, but being under the cover of darkness doesn't intimidate me. It gives me an odd rush of adrenaline, just thinking about it. How well it'll work, I don't know. It's worth a shot.
The moment my feet hit the ground I'm instantly sprinting towards the north end of the street. The only sounds are my tagged breathing and the echoes of my feet against the cracked pavement, creating a rhythmic beat that echoes through the darkness. I imagine some intense action song so going along to the beat as I run, bringing a thin smile to my face. I'll show them. I know I will.
Soon enough I find what I was looking for, a small art store on the side of the road. I step through the broken glass door and head to the back, quickly turning on my wristband. I say nothing, but the eerie green light helps me to see what is behind the counters. There are several cans of spray paint, in many different colours. The girl who I ran to District Thirteen with had enjoyed using spray paints to make beautiful works of art on canvases with spray paint, so the fact that there are many colours just sitting here is no surprise.
After shoving all the cans I could get into my bag I step outside the door, looking at the building in front of me. Each one is unique and different, each having the ability to because a work of art that I could use to remind people of the rebellion they've fuelled.
I've never spray painted before, but I know how to draw. It was one of my hobbies back in Thirteen, before I had met Meri and Eclaire. I had been too scared to try and make friends, so I spent my free time inside my room drawing on some spare paper I'd found. My work now is more sloppy with the spray paint then it is with a pencil, but before long in I have words scrawled in bright red across the street, surrounded by small tongues of what is supposed to be flame.
IF WE BURN, YOU BURN WITH US.
I've heard the line many times before, but as I sit and stare at it on the pavement I can't help but smile. Before long I'm painting flames crawling up the sides of the buildings that surround the section of the street that the words are on and coals and little stick people on fire. It's giving me an odd sort of rush to see it, making a colourful mark on the Capitol.
I take several steps forward and begin to write again, this time in a bright blue. This once's a flooded version of the Capitol, saying "You cannot drown us out," all in capital letters once again. The pattern repeats in many different colours, from bright greens to deep browns. Soon enough the entire street is covered in colour, each sentence shouting out against the government and the Gamemakers.
They're each different, yet each eerily the same. There's an obvious pattern, a theme of rebellion in every word and image. Yet they're all different, some things added and some taken away. It's stunning to see how I could take something so similar, and add things to each one to make it unique.
Looking at each one almost reminds me of our little rebellion. It started as just one idea, one thing. One goal, to end the games. Yet, we've made so much more of it. Friendships, alliances, families to replace the ones we've lost. We've become stronger every time, and yet we'e changed a bit too. The theme is still the same, but we've added to it more then anyone could have ever imagined.
I find myself pulling out another can of spray paint, and before long I'm writing even more. This time however it's not sentences, or drawings to express the rebellion. Soon my drawings are surrounded with the names of the people who got us here, of the people who helped us add to this. Just as we've added things we've taken things away, but even when it doesn't appear like things will work out we remain strong.
I stop for a moment as I write Eclaire's name, taking a moment to remember my friend. She died so that we could go on, so that we could finish what we started. I take my time writing hers down so every letter is perfect, so that it can for sure be read. I do the same with Meri's name, making sure it's completely readable. While it's hard to do that in the dark, as I stroll down the street and look at everything in the bright green light from the machine around my wrist I say it's a job well done.
It's then that I notice the sun coming up over the tops of the buildings. I'd spent all night out here on the streets, making my own mark. For some reason even though I've likely been up for more then twenty four hours I feel no fatigue, as if I could keep going forever. There are no signs of stopping, no reason to go back up to the room and try to get a wink of sleep on the coach. Yet I do it anyway, preferring to take the fire escape once again instead of the stairs. The view of the words from higher up in the pale morning light is even better then what I'd imagined in the dark, the entire street lit up with rainbow coloured acts of rebellion.
I manage to quickly get through the window without cutting myself on any of the shards of glass, quickly heading for the couch. Despite feeling like I could power through everything like a freight train without sleep, the moment my head sets down on the armrest of the coach I cannot seem to keep my eyes open. Within an instant everything that is keeping me awake shuts down and I'm out like a light, the world quickly fading into darkness as the first rays of morning light come in through the window.