all_inclusive | if we can make it to the morning

It burns.

Her lungs burn as she runs, pushing her body to go further with every stride. She doesn't know how long she's been running, but it makes her muscles quiver and tremble and make her feel like she's doing something. She hasn't wanted to face the reality of going back, but that door still lurks there and it's showing up more and more, lately. Every time Johanna pulls open a door, she has to close it on the cannons of the games and the countdown that seems to want to draw her back in. This morning, she'd woken up and she couldn't take it anymore.

Once the doors had been cleared of danger, she'd put on her running shoes and she'd taken off. That had been two hours ago and now she's breathless as she pulls in deep wracks of desperate breaths, thinking that if she runs a little harder, she can escape the demon on her back that's so eager to yank her back. Eventually, she can't do anything more and when her legs give out from under her, she's near the garden where she'd buried her axe. Her hands collapse in the dirt and she leans forward, thinking that if this were the Games, this would be the perfect time to take out the competition.

And that's the problem, isn't it?

No matter how far she runs, no matter how hard, they're always going to be there. This place is a happy little hideout, but it's not reality. One day, Johanna is going to go back, if only so she can bury her axe in Snow's face and that thought, more than anything else, is what drives her to start digging with her shaking hands to get lower and to find her axe. Sweat pours over her forehead as she works, her determination stubbornly driving her on and maybe it's the adrenaline, but she's starting to think that even if she does have to go back eventually, she might just be okay.

Denial, though, has always been a victor's best friend and Johanna is far too aware of that sad little fact.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Most people are that way, but perhaps Johanna more so. He watches, keeping his distance. Once she offers her explanation, he nods. "Planning on keeping it at hand?"

He'd accidentally stepped through that door, ended up in the arena with Finnick. He understands that drive to protect yourself. Of course, Peeta's drive to protect himself and those he loves generally drive him to make allies.

"With those doors showing up more and more? I'd be an idiot not to," she says, her sharp-edged bitterness not meant for Peeta, but for whatever cruel fate is driving them towards that place again. She's been narrowly avoiding it, but one of these days she's going to trip and fall back into the arena and she's not going helplessly, not this time. "This place, it's only ever been a reprieve, isn't it?" she admits. "It's just delaying the inevitable."

He nods a little. He does understand in the way that only someone who has lived through the Games can. He doesn't take her bitterness and sharp edges personally. Hell, at this point, he expects sharp edges from Johanna. He'd wonder what she was trying to get out of him if she were any other way. He hesitates because he doesn't like to think of it that way, but she's right. He finally nods. "Yeah. Eventually, we have to go back and deal with what we left behind."

Whatever that is, and he's not looking forward to it.

if we can make it to the morning

no subject

no subject

no subject