they're gonna eat us alive // {willis/lyric} - train

[rook]

can you hear my heart
beating like a hammer
help i'm alive
my heart keeps beating like a hammer

I tremble, trapped in a luxurious prison, travelling faster than the speed of sound along alloy rails. My heart thunders against my chest, desperately trying to burst through my ribcage and run back to District Six. As each second passes, I get further away from my home, from where I belong, and I get closer to my death sentence. There's no denying it, no matter how many times I shake my head at the idea. This is final. It's been decided. I have no say. I want to scream. I want to open up my lungs and erupt with desperation, and I don't want to stop until my throat is raw and my eyes are streaming. I don't, though. I just sit in my tiny metal carriage, hugging my knees and wishing this was nothing more than a surreal dream.

My hands shake. Of course my hands shake. They've been shaking for three damn years. Today is no different. I try to rest them on my knees, but they tremble violently, making my knees judder with them. I tell myself that it's just psychological, and I tell myself to stop shaking. Like that ever works. I grit my teeth and my eyes threaten tears. I just want it to stop. I want it all to stop, and go away. Something tells me that it won't be long before I get my wish. When I'm out there in the Arena, and a spear has been driven through my heart, will my hands stop shaking then?

I slide open the fancy black door, slumping through the frame and into the carriage. I find myself leaning against the walls for support. Accepting this situation is draining physically, not just mentally. I would collapse with exaustion and sleep all the way to the Capitol, if I wasn't shaking so much. Ain't that the story of my life? I glance around for a distraction - for something to take my mind off of dying. My escort is sitting in a regal antique chair, sipping at a glass of cyan liquor. Looks like toilet cleaner. Alcohol is alcohol, I guess. There is no finer medicine for my condition.

"Hey, you, what's your name?" I ask the woman who picked my name at the Reaping. This is her fault. If only she had moved her hand slightly to the left, or the right. I wouldn't be here. She looks up, gazing straight through me, like I am not even here. I am a ghost to her already. Her gaunt features let no emotion betray them, and that hurts me.
"You can call me Trina, if you wish..." She says. If I wish? She makes it sound like that isn't even her real name, just an alias she can hide behind so that she doesn't feel guilty when she goes home. So she doesn't feel so bad when I'm dead, because she can remove the mask of Trina, and go back to being her normal self. It disgusts me.

"Give me some of that green stuff..." I say, reaching for the large bottle that is raised on the black marble table. Trina, clearly rejecting the notion, takes the bottle in hand and slides it further from me.
"Give me some, hey!" I say, louder. She doesn't understand, I need a drink, or I'm going to go insane.
"You are far too young to be drinking alcohol, and clearly not mature enough!" She says with bulging eyes and a vulture frown. I want to leap over this table and strangle her thin neck. It would be so easy. Isn't that what they want me to do? Kill? Why not start here. I gotta start somewhere, right? I'd kill for alcohol, don't think I wouldn't at this stage. Don't think I'm afraid of killing when I'm backed into a corner like this.

"FUCKING GIVE IT TO ME!"

if we're still alive
my regrets are few
if my life is mine
what shouldn't I do?

[maverick hale 🌧️ d5 [nyte]]

(To welcome death with open arms). 

And here it comes. The soft screech of metal dragging across it's tracks. The very sound of my death approaching at increasing speeds. How long would it take for us to arrive at the capitol? To be thrown into a luxurious suite with all we could ever hope for in a pathetic attempt to make up for the fact that in a matter of days, twenty-three of us would be dead. That the one who emerged "victorious" would be nothing more than a pawn for the rest of their days. That it would all happen again only a year from this very second I step on the train. 

(Like the good girl you are) 

My back soon rests in a velvet embrace. The cheap fabric of a dress replaced by that of white cotton and blue jean. My head rests upon my knees, pulled closely to my chest. The golden wire that falls from my scalp limply hangs in front of closed eyes. More than anything I want to feel small. To be small, insignificant, and to simply be forgotten. To ride along this train for eternity, never to see my family, never to see the districts or the games or any other fucked up thing that created the world I now lived in. Nothing could be worse than my impending death, hanging over my head like the shade of a giant oak. The anxiety that spreads throughout my veins with every desperate heart beat. My breaths are deep, as though desperate to fill experience lifetime's worth of air in the short time  I would still be able. 

(And you chose your fate)

The tight jean is stained a darker blue. The salty gems that fall down my cheeks are quickly absorbed by the coarse material. And, as scared as I am. I regret nothing of the events that had taken place. I had later learned the girl, though I have never seen her face, was thirteen. A life, a future, lay ahead of her now. And all it had cost was my own. A life filled with nothing but lies and regret. More than a fair trade. No matter how many times my own consciousness repeated that line, it did nothing to stem the tears. For it was only natural to cling to life. It is a gift, not meant to be something so easily thrown to the wind. As if placing your own head under the guillotine and ordering the string to be pulled. A death not by your own hand, but self inflicted nonetheless. And that was exactly what I had done. If I had any chance to do it over again, knowing what I know now, I would still do the same. I'm not a hero, nor am i selfish, and i will never consider myself as such. I am a puppet. 

(And who you are doesn't matter)

And soon the gentle humming of death lulled me into uneasy rest. And just as a sense of peace had begun to settle onto my shoulders, as if an old friend had laid a blanket over them, I am jolted out of my stupor. 

"FUCKING GIVE IT TO ME!"

My feet are soon firmly set upon the group. Whether fear, or plain stupidity fueled me I am unaware, yet I still find myself following the direction which the commotion had sounded. My hands braced a wall, keeping my balance as the floor seemed to move beneath me. My fingers find the handle, leading into the next compartment. It occurs to me the shout had been entirely masculine, meaning that it could only be my district partner, as our escort was undoubtedly feminine. Willis Keeni. I had not heard much of the boy, as we traveled in two separate crowds. And, if this scream foreshadowed anything of what he shall become in the arena, I can only hope we do not cross paths

(Because you are already dead.)

The metal door slides backwards easily, a large clatter reverberating about the carriage. And there they are, Willis and the escort. Tightly clung in her manicured hands is a familiar green bottle. And the rage that had escaped in his roar is suddenly much more frightening. The white blonde wire that clings to his head, his pale complexion, resemble mine so closely. But the rage, radiating from his gaze into that of the escort's, the pure desperation that this scene conveyed, was something that I had felt within me, ever since I had shouted out my name to the crowd. 

(And the games will begin.)

[rook]

can you hear my heart
beating like a hammer
help i'm alive
my heart keeps beating like a hammer

I'm causing trouble again. The look in Trina's eyes is not one of fear, or hatred, but annoyance. She has seen this before, I bet. Judging by her age ( late forties?) she has seen her fair share of different Tributes. Somewhere down the line there was bound to be another low-life desperate for a drink. You'd be mad to accept a death sentence whilst sober.

My escort stops shouting at me as her eyes glance over my shoulder. I pause, turning around and seeing a flash of pale skin and bright blonde hair. I take a step back from Trina, embarrassed. Look what I have become. I am obsessed with washing away anything that resembles emotion. I spend my days drinking foul liquors until I become a machine, and even then I keep drinking until my body rusts and my mind is obsolete.

Lyric Woulf volunteered. She was not the girl who was picked from the Reaping, that girl was very much afraid. What was it that possessed this other girl to take her place? What made her take a death sentence for this girl? She must know her, or have some connection with her, because no one in their right mind would volunteer for a complete stranger. It's just unheard of in the middle-districts.

I clear my throat, eyes flickering between Lyric and Trina. I find myself feeling quite flustered, so I attempt to loosen the collar on my Reaping shirt, which is very difficult when my hands are shaking this much. I do manage it though, not that it makes me feel any less embarrassed or ashamed.

"Sorry," I say to Trina, who still clutches that bottle like she's as desperate for it as I am. I raise my hands and force a laugh. It's a sad laugh.
"I was out of line, right?" I force back the tears.

if we're still alive
my regrets are few
if my life is mine
what shouldn't I do?

[maverick hale 🌧️ d5 [nyte]]

"I was out of line, right?" He steps away, our escort still clutching the bottle as if it were somehow a trophy for her victory over this boy. And when my eyes meet his, I see nothing monstrous about him. He's not a killer, he didn't throw himself onto these tracks. He was tied down, wrists bound to the cool metal, awaiting the incoming train. And I had laid next to him, I tied a blindfold about my eyes, and I waited. I could have left. I could have said nothing and let a child die. Continue living, the same monotonous path, over and over again. 

My eyes fly to the escort, narrowed in scrutinizing anger. "No." I reply, taking a step towards the two, "She was." I address her now "Don't act like you give a fuck about our well being." My voice is calm, almost sweet as I take slow steps towards the two. "If you did you'd take us off this train. You wouldn't make it your life's work to kill children. If we're old enough to die, we're old enough to drink, yes?" Get off your high horse and pour us a tall one." I flash a smile at Willis, pulling out a chair and sinking into it as my eyes find her, wide and expectant. 

My voice shakes a little, but I don't think she noticed. Defiance was my specialty, an act I was quite used to. And, although i loved giving her hell, I was testing Willis. To know how to perform. What act I should convey. I don't even like to drink. I hate the bitter liquid, it's taste like that of poison. I hate it's smell, and the bottles it comes in, so easily shattered. And how it makes me loose control, how my words become slurred. They lose their power. My words are all I've ever had. If I lost control, if I lost any control, the person hidden beneath may just come out to play.

And I can't have that.