DOOMSDAY || TREECH

Treech had previously enjoyed the silences that would settle between himself and Laurel. Now that it is no longer a matter of not speaking because there is nothing for them to say, but it is because he had nobody to speak to, the quiet lost its comfortability.

Despite cleaning the girl up to the best of his abilities, Laurel's face remained unnerving, Treech swears it hadn't relaxed in the same way the rebel soldiers had as they were carried out of his house years back. Much to his horror at the ripe age of seven, Treech had learned that when someone died their eyes didn't close, even if they were dragged shut manually, they would still slip open slightly. Laurel's face did not shift with her body, instead, it remained still and unmoving. Though he finds it odd Treech has no choice but to brush it off as a falsity in his fading childhood memories.

Still, when he allowed his mind to wander and lose grip on the facts in front of him, he would wonder if she was really gone. If maybe the powers above had seen the lengths she had gone to and decided to reward her, by pausing her soul in place? Maybe she was just trapped in her body until someone could figure out how to stop it. Maybe if he takes her home with him, he might be able to figure out how to do that.

There are only six tributes left for him to outlive, including Reaper whose presence had followed him as he moved around. Currently, the other boy was lazing in the seats on the opposite side of the arena. Maybe lazing wasn't the right word, Reaper sat sprawled with his chest heaving unnaturally and twitches plaguing his body. Perhaps, Treech wondered, he might have caught the illness that had been haunting his district partner or maybe something else that lurked in the tunnels below them. Nonetheless, the boy still seemed alert, enough so that Treech could feel his burning gaze on them most of the day. Treech had wondered briefly if he should try to make his way back into the dark maze, but he was so close to the end that spending the last moments of the games down there sounded like the worst thing on earth.

 Besides, Reaper had not truly bothered them. The boy seems as though he has no intention of doing harm, and he has made no moves to collect Laurel in days. Growing tired of Treech's constant fleeing.

Despites Reaper's looming, Treech might have described the arena as serene. But serenity he quickly learns cannot last forever.

In the middle of a brief nap, which was really just Treech letting himself rest in the space between sleep and reality, a large buzzing noise filled the arena, much like the drones that delivered him gifts occasionally, but much louder. The noise begins to draw the other tributes out of their hiding places and one by one they step into the light.

First, it's the boy from District Four, Mizzen, who crawls out of a vent. Then the pair from Three, from behind a barricade. Even Reaper stands from his spot. All six of the tributes stand, mesmerized by a large drone that descends slowly into the center of the arena. Below it hangs a large container though it is hard to tell what it holds. That is until it's sides fall, the tibrutes stunned stillness is broken when millions of tiny snakes begin crawling from within it.

In a swift motion, Treech decides this is nothing but bad news and collects Laurel in his arms to seek higher ground. When he had first started in the lumberjack trade, under the guidance of his father, a number of lessons had been thrust upon him in quick succession. One of the most important being what animals to avoid in the unknown of the forest. Snakes were definitively on the avoid list, his father preaching that the fastest way to escape them was to climb a tree. And so climb Treech did, right to the top of the arena where a viewing box sat. Once he had reached the top where he and Laurel were guaranteed safety, he is able to watch the massacre unfold.

The boy from Three is gone immediately, his body swelling with disgustingly vibrant colors. Then the snakes were quick to follow after his district partner who was scrabbling up a pole, though she was fighting a losing battle as she slips slowly towards them. Treech watches the girl cry out to Mizzen, who had managed to make it out of harm's way. With wide eyes the boy shakes his head, body trembling like a leaf.

Treech braces himself, as the young girl slips slowly towards her death. Though the scene is interrupted by a noise echoing out of one of the tunnels, it sounds almost like singing. No, it wasn't almost singing, it was singing. From the darkness, Lucy Grey emerges slowly, her rainbow dress replaced by a sea of snakes. They twist and writhe around her limbs, almost dancing along with her melody. The ones that had not already joined her quickly abandoned their targets, slithering towards her. The sight is bizarre and bone-chilling.

From his height, Treech cannot make out any emotions on the young girl's face. But the cracking of her voice makes it clear that Lucy's composure is slipping. Surely it isn't her song that is soothing the pit of reptiles, if so, she's running on borrowed time. Lucy Grey must have also known this as she falls to her knees, sobbing out the last line of her song before she falls silent. Much to Treech's surprise the snakes make no move to disfigure the girl as they had done to the boy from Three, instead they stayed in place wrapped calmly around her. And so, she stays frozen in the center of the arena, a sea of colors.

a/n     not my best chapter but im just excited to get to act 3. sue me.