*/ CLOVE KNEW SHE WAS GOING TO DIE. from the moment her eyes caught the rock gripped ominously within thresh's white-knuckled paw , she knew . dangling nearly a foot off the ground , too stunned to even kick or squirm , his other hand was firmly around her windpipe . it tightened with every cry or whimper she dared utter until her desperate pleas of ' no ! it wasn't me ! ' were nearly impossible to squeak out .
clove was meant to be clever , nimble , and far too fast to ever be caught . she'd thought herself the cat that'd finally cornered its pesky mouse ; only , she'd played with her food a second too long and , now , some dog had her between its jaws .
the girl from district two had failed . maybe if she had been as big as brutus she'd have fought back . brutally animalistic as enobaria . shrewd as lyme . then , maybe , she wouldn't have been reduced to this crying child caught beneath the reaper's blade a couple decades too soon .
it's true what they say about life flashing before a dead man's eyes . except , instead of seeing that which she'd already lived , clove experienced the world she'd be leaving behind . a trillion minutes squashed into one : enobaria's fangs bared in discontent. her parents' bitter smiles, their expectations of another failure met. cato's thick hands pressed down on peeta's neck, hearing the cannon's echo . . . not knowing until it was too late.
desperation crawled up her throat , shooting past her lips , echoing through the trees . " cato ! cato ! " she fought against thresh's hold , screaming so loud her vocal cords nearly snapped like taut thread . the taste of iron prickled her tongue . he'd come , maybe . clove thrashed harder .
his rock came hard against her skull . the impact was followed by a nauseating crack , but all clove could hear was ringing . she knew her body had crumpled back to earth by the cold grass that tickled her palms , yet the world had otherwise gone dark . she could see nothing . she could hear nothing . and , soon enough , the tribute would be nothing . just another casualty . fodder for the capitol to momentarily regale before the world ultimately abandoned her .
her fingers spasmed uncontrollably . a hot tear caressed her cheek . mercy !
something was touching her . someone . the feeling felt far away , though , like her consciousness was free-falling , slipping away from its host .
had thresh decided to finish her off ?
was katniss toying with her soon-to-be corpse ?
she choked on her own tongue , pathetically gurgling through the blood that puddled in her mouth . but the harder she fought inevitability , the quicker death's cold hands pulled her further down to hell .
soon , her twitching would slow and tears run dry and strained whimpers cease .
it was horrible to think , as she floated down the river styx , how no one would remember her right . they wouldn't celebrate how she'd gotten top marks in the academy . that her freckles were always darkest in july , decorating her nose like confetti . no one would recall her favorite color being magenta , or how her big brother used to save his allowance to buy her cinnamon sticks .
they would remember the lives she stole . the blood coating her hands . the knives strapped to every inch of her lithe frame . they'd condemn her rotten soul over deeds once praised . and then , after patting themselves on the back for the narrative they'd spun — pleased with the sick character they'd made her — clove's body would be unceremoniously tossed atop the pile of one-thousand-six-hundred-and-ninety-seven others before her . forgotten .
clove wouldn't forget , though . even in death she'd haunt herself . clove had let ego consume her , so , like sisyphus and his rock , she would spend death wondering what could've gone differently . reliving her defeat . reducing herself to shortcomings and faults and failures for all eternity .
everything was dark and cold , and the young girl died in this empty void feeling utterly alone .