I should not be doing this
Alright, magical plot bunnies, I suppose you win. I'm adding an extra disclaimer to this. I haven't read the book yet so my only source of canon is the movie. Don't flay me alive if I screw this up. Oh and also, this is something of an early birthday present for a friend.
Title: Choke
Fandom: The Hunger Games (movie)
Rating: M
Genre: Tragedy/Angst
Pairings: Katniss Everdeen, Peeta Mellark, KatnissxPeeta
Warnings: spoilers for the end of the movie/book even though the fic is an alternate ending, also there is suicide
Summary: Katniss always knew she was going to choke when the pressure was on.
Choke
Her blood turns ice-cold when she hears the announcement. She's already notched another arrow in her bow, the instinct so engrained into her that it's a reflex. She looks at Peeta and feels her heart drop straight into her stomach. It sits there like a rock, like some heavy and indigestible thing. Conversely, the little food in her stomach threatens to come up through her digestive tract as if to replace the loss of her heart. Katniss knew going into this that it would be difficult. She told herself that this was a game and she had to play to win. She had to win for Prim and her mother. It's only now that she realizes how badly she was getting played throughout this entire ordeal. She can't win in a game like this, not when it means doing something she knows she'll never be able to do.
Life is full of unfairness. If the world is just a giant board and life is all a game then it has some extremely unfair rules. It puts you in the most terrible of positions and there's simply nothing you can do about it. Katniss knows she'll never win. Oh sure, she played at being confident and stoic for her family and she tried to play nice for the cameras to get some sympathy but she knew somewhere in the back of her head that she was going to lose. She knew that it would come down to this and the moment she realized she couldn't pull the trigger was the instant she knew she was going to lose. When it mattered most, she knew she was destined to choke.
"Go ahead," urges Peeta and she strains her ears to make sure she heard him correctly. "One of us should go home. One of us has to die. They have to have their victor."
She stands there and looks at him in sheer bewilderment. There's a part of her brain that screams at her to do it. After all, Peeta was the one who was going to sell her out to Cato and his other new best friends. It's not as if she can trust him, not when he's stuck in this nightmare with her and the poisonous nature of the Games has corrupted both of them. At least if she does it, she'll be able to go home. Yet there's another, more forceful part of her brain that reminds her of the truth and she remembers their conversation what seems like forever ago. If she lets go of that bowstring and makes the shot, she will have become something she knows she clearly isn't. The Games will have changed her so irrevocably that she might as well kill herself if she kills him.
She loves this boy. Somehow, some way, she loves him. She thinks maybe her brain is still screwed up from that tracker jacker venom or maybe it's because she hasn't eaten very much ever since she got into the Games. She's starving and has been for a long time though not always in a physical sense. Fine then, if she's already been poisoned by the Games and she's already starving then she might as well just eat something and get it over with.
"No, they don't," she tells him after having already put her bow away since it's plainly obvious she won't be using it. "Why should they?"
Katniss Everdeen has been starving for a long time but it's not a hunger that will be satisfied by anything in this world. She clasps her hands in his and gives him some of the nightlock berries. The world will just keep spinning and the Games will go on and on until the end of time. Ever since she left her district with him, Katniss thought maybe she was just starving for affection but it wasn't just that. She wants freedom. She wants it so bad that she can taste it and she thinks that maybe Peeta wants it too. She's spent so many nights imagining what life could be like without electrified fences, without the Games, without this gnawing ache in her heart. She's salivating for the chance to finally find out.
"No," says Peeta, reading her intentions clearly.
"Trust me," she tells him.
Katniss heard once that love makes people selfish. It's one of the reasons she's tried to avoid it for almost all of her life. Being selfish wouldn't have helped keep her family alive and she's been doing that for such a very long time. Yet now she can't think of anything else besides doing what she knows she shouldn't. Her mother and Prim are watching. Everyone in her district is watching. More importantly, everyone in the Capitol is watching. She'll give them a show then. She'll take all their games and their bullshit and cram it down their throats by stuffing her mouth full of poison. She'll make them choke on their spectacle and their pageantry and then she'll be free of all of it.
"Together?" he asks her and she puts her brave face on, her eyes flicking to where she knows the cameras are.
"Together," she resolves and she swears to herself that she's going to pull the trigger instead of choke when the pressure is on.
"Okay," he agrees and she can tell he's psyching himself up for it. "One."
"Two," she says and her eyes never leave his.
He touches her braid almost as if to reassure himself of what he's doing. His fingers weave softly through her hair and for a moment she loses her nerve. She . . . she can't do this in front of her mother and Prim. Her mother will fall apart, will break so completely that there will be no hope left for her. So what should Katniss do then? Should she continue grinding herself down to keep her family alive? Should she pretend like it's okay to have to kill the boy she loves? No, this is the only way and she's not going to lose her nerve. This is the only way to be free of games and electrified fences and senseless death. This is the only way to be with who she loves because she doesn't want to live a life of emotional starvation now that she's found him.
"Three," he finishes. "Happy Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen."
"You too, Peeta Mellark," she says and they both down the berries.
She's never tasted anything so sickeningly sweet in her entire life. The poison works fast, fast enough that her muscles start to lock up. She collapses with Peeta and her listless eyes look up to the sky. He takes her hand, fingers stiffly clinching around hers with his last flickers of life. Somewhere that seems so far away, Katniss hears a voice trying to tell her that both of them have been declared the winners of the 74th annual Hunger Games but it's too late for that now. She's won a much bigger prize than anything the Capitol could ever give her. Katniss Everdeen is a girl on fire once more, her body burning with pain. It's a pretty day to die, to catch on fire and just burn out until there's nothing left of you. She congratulates herself on a game played so very well even as the world fades to black. Katniss decides that maybe the odds really were in her favor this time.
Title: Choke
Fandom: The Hunger Games (movie)
Rating: M
Genre: Tragedy/Angst
Pairings: Katniss Everdeen, Peeta Mellark, KatnissxPeeta
Warnings: spoilers for the end of the movie/book even though the fic is an alternate ending, also there is suicide
Summary: Katniss always knew she was going to choke when the pressure was on.
Choke
Her blood turns ice-cold when she hears the announcement. She's already notched another arrow in her bow, the instinct so engrained into her that it's a reflex. She looks at Peeta and feels her heart drop straight into her stomach. It sits there like a rock, like some heavy and indigestible thing. Conversely, the little food in her stomach threatens to come up through her digestive tract as if to replace the loss of her heart. Katniss knew going into this that it would be difficult. She told herself that this was a game and she had to play to win. She had to win for Prim and her mother. It's only now that she realizes how badly she was getting played throughout this entire ordeal. She can't win in a game like this, not when it means doing something she knows she'll never be able to do.
Life is full of unfairness. If the world is just a giant board and life is all a game then it has some extremely unfair rules. It puts you in the most terrible of positions and there's simply nothing you can do about it. Katniss knows she'll never win. Oh sure, she played at being confident and stoic for her family and she tried to play nice for the cameras to get some sympathy but she knew somewhere in the back of her head that she was going to lose. She knew that it would come down to this and the moment she realized she couldn't pull the trigger was the instant she knew she was going to lose. When it mattered most, she knew she was destined to choke.
"Go ahead," urges Peeta and she strains her ears to make sure she heard him correctly. "One of us should go home. One of us has to die. They have to have their victor."
She stands there and looks at him in sheer bewilderment. There's a part of her brain that screams at her to do it. After all, Peeta was the one who was going to sell her out to Cato and his other new best friends. It's not as if she can trust him, not when he's stuck in this nightmare with her and the poisonous nature of the Games has corrupted both of them. At least if she does it, she'll be able to go home. Yet there's another, more forceful part of her brain that reminds her of the truth and she remembers their conversation what seems like forever ago. If she lets go of that bowstring and makes the shot, she will have become something she knows she clearly isn't. The Games will have changed her so irrevocably that she might as well kill herself if she kills him.
She loves this boy. Somehow, some way, she loves him. She thinks maybe her brain is still screwed up from that tracker jacker venom or maybe it's because she hasn't eaten very much ever since she got into the Games. She's starving and has been for a long time though not always in a physical sense. Fine then, if she's already been poisoned by the Games and she's already starving then she might as well just eat something and get it over with.
"No, they don't," she tells him after having already put her bow away since it's plainly obvious she won't be using it. "Why should they?"
Katniss Everdeen has been starving for a long time but it's not a hunger that will be satisfied by anything in this world. She clasps her hands in his and gives him some of the nightlock berries. The world will just keep spinning and the Games will go on and on until the end of time. Ever since she left her district with him, Katniss thought maybe she was just starving for affection but it wasn't just that. She wants freedom. She wants it so bad that she can taste it and she thinks that maybe Peeta wants it too. She's spent so many nights imagining what life could be like without electrified fences, without the Games, without this gnawing ache in her heart. She's salivating for the chance to finally find out.
"No," says Peeta, reading her intentions clearly.
"Trust me," she tells him.
Katniss heard once that love makes people selfish. It's one of the reasons she's tried to avoid it for almost all of her life. Being selfish wouldn't have helped keep her family alive and she's been doing that for such a very long time. Yet now she can't think of anything else besides doing what she knows she shouldn't. Her mother and Prim are watching. Everyone in her district is watching. More importantly, everyone in the Capitol is watching. She'll give them a show then. She'll take all their games and their bullshit and cram it down their throats by stuffing her mouth full of poison. She'll make them choke on their spectacle and their pageantry and then she'll be free of all of it.
"Together?" he asks her and she puts her brave face on, her eyes flicking to where she knows the cameras are.
"Together," she resolves and she swears to herself that she's going to pull the trigger instead of choke when the pressure is on.
"Okay," he agrees and she can tell he's psyching himself up for it. "One."
"Two," she says and her eyes never leave his.
He touches her braid almost as if to reassure himself of what he's doing. His fingers weave softly through her hair and for a moment she loses her nerve. She . . . she can't do this in front of her mother and Prim. Her mother will fall apart, will break so completely that there will be no hope left for her. So what should Katniss do then? Should she continue grinding herself down to keep her family alive? Should she pretend like it's okay to have to kill the boy she loves? No, this is the only way and she's not going to lose her nerve. This is the only way to be free of games and electrified fences and senseless death. This is the only way to be with who she loves because she doesn't want to live a life of emotional starvation now that she's found him.
"Three," he finishes. "Happy Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen."
"You too, Peeta Mellark," she says and they both down the berries.
She's never tasted anything so sickeningly sweet in her entire life. The poison works fast, fast enough that her muscles start to lock up. She collapses with Peeta and her listless eyes look up to the sky. He takes her hand, fingers stiffly clinching around hers with his last flickers of life. Somewhere that seems so far away, Katniss hears a voice trying to tell her that both of them have been declared the winners of the 74th annual Hunger Games but it's too late for that now. She's won a much bigger prize than anything the Capitol could ever give her. Katniss Everdeen is a girl on fire once more, her body burning with pain. It's a pretty day to die, to catch on fire and just burn out until there's nothing left of you. She congratulates herself on a game played so very well even as the world fades to black. Katniss decides that maybe the odds really were in her favor this time.