shenevermisses | 11th Throw

11th Throw - [ written ]

[There are too many nightmares. Too many nights spent thrashing herself awake. Sometimes she fully wakes Cato, sometimes she just has to assure him she's okay before he fall back asleep. She's tried to run, she's tried to just go as far as she can, she's tried to roll over and go back to sleep. She can't ignore it, she can't escape it, she can't get over it.

So, late at night or early in the morning, she opens her journal.

She's tired but wide awake. It's a kind of exhaustion, really. She doesn't know how many people will see this, but she wants to ask.]

The Malnosso are always fighting their war, right? There's always battles and killing.

Is there any way to volunteer? To join them? I want to. There has to be a way, so I want to know.

As long as I'm fighting, I don't have nightmares.

[After about two hours, she'll strike out the entire last sentence. It's too private, too personal. It was stupid to ever write it, but at least it will be gone. Some of them have seen it, but she can deny it later. Sort of.]

Threaded | Flat

Fighting is an excellent distraction. However, it seems rather a waste to simply do it without a longer view.

[Funny, Leonhardt actually asked Specialist Davis about it. Though he'd say it was more to get some information out of the man, but he admits that he wouldn't mind joining the Malnosso and actually being able to do something more towards getting back home. While he can't speak openly of that conversation on the journals, he can at least give the same advice the specialist gave. And then a bit of his own because he understands nightmares well.]

Volunteer for what you can is all we truly can do. When you're out there, show how well you can fight.

In between, use the Battle Dome to practice. It is even open at night if you can't sleep.

Joining them is the exact opposite of what you should be fighting for. Which is your freedom, by the way.

[He cannot even begin to understand why anyone would want to volunteer to join the Malnosso. Missions were one thing. But that wasn't what she was asking.]

If you ever want to talk before you go to bed, I can talk to you. I'll sing you lullabies, even!

[ The handwriting is rough; Astrid can write, but she doesn't take the time for carefully formed letters. She's never been one for sitting down and taking notes. ]

According to the guide, the only real ways of doing that are signing up for missions or being drafted.

Why would you want to fight in a war? War sucks majorly, what with the people trying to hurt you and everyone you know bit.

You can't avoid nightmares forever.

Fighting is a stopgap measure at best.

Clove of Panem, the girl with the excellent knive skills! I am glad you have made it out alive.

Do not join the Malnosso. It would be foolish and they probably end up using you. They seem to be very fond of using us for their own sick amusement.

Fighting will not make nightmares disappear. It will distract you. But they will not disappear.

[She sees this before Clove opts to cross out the last statement, the sentence mentioning her nightmares. A sentence that strikes all too close to home for her.

Haymitch drinks. Peeta banks. She hunts. And Clove fights.

They all have their own way, their own method of dealing with the nightmares of the arena. Of the cruel life they had been handed by no fault of their own. She can understand. She might not agree, might not like the idea of helping the Malnosso in any way, but she can understand that overwhelming need to keep the nightmares away.

She can't fault her for that. Not now. Not ever.]

Have you tried the missions?

A rather interesting theory...

Though it can only be assumed that you have tried every alternative correct? [Spock is a Vulcan, and though he does not make assumptions, violence is a last resort for him.]

[Clove is safe. This is good news to Sakura, even if she had told herself she was sure earlier. Still, this is nothing like what they'd spoken about before...it worries the fighter, definitely. Sakura has been having trouble sleeping after the draft, but it doesn't sound nearly as bad...and she wonders if it has much to do with the draft at all.

Since she's awake, she pens a reply. Her handwriting is very deliberate, very elegant. It's very legible, but it does contrast her brutish appearance. The glow surrounding Sakura's picture isn't electronic; it may be of little importance, but she's writing by candlelight.]

Is that what you truly want, Clove?

Clove.

[There's not much concern in his tone beyond the typical panic of a bad dream (since they didn't have any other kind) and the absence of her. It's not that he's clingy he just knows this could all be gone in a second if the big wigs felt like sending her (or him) back to their world.

To what? Rot in the ground? And if they got to come back again, would they be whole or partially decomposed? It's the big questions that keep him up at night. The admittedly disgusting ones. He physically shakes to try and get his brain to switch gears and scratches at his scars.]

Clove?

[He knows she leaves the house sometimes when she has a really bad one. And she'll either answer him or she won't. But he wants to know.]

Volunteer for missions. That's the most they'll allow right now.

Threaded | Flat

[Written, before the last sentence disappears]

[Written]

written;

written. before Clove edits the entry.

written.

[written] (set after the strike out)

[Written - before the strikeout]

[Written] [that strike-out has been noticed]

[written]