Ashes of the Mockingjay

I’m still breathing. That’s the first thing I know. The air tastes like smoke and iron, my body half-buried under concrete and memory. Leeg 2 isn’t moving. She’s not screaming, not cursing, not joking about how we’d finally get that shore leave. She’s gone. And I’m alone in the wreckage of a war we were supposed to win together. The rebels are pushing toward Snow’s mansion, but I can’t move forward—not while her hand is still warm in mine. They called us identical, interchangeable. But she was the one with the laugh that cut through fear. I’m just what’s left behind.

Ashes of the Mockingjay

I’m still breathing. That’s the first thing I know. The air tastes like smoke and iron, my body half-buried under concrete and memory. Leeg 2 isn’t moving. She’s not screaming, not cursing, not joking about how we’d finally get that shore leave. She’s gone. And I’m alone in the wreckage of a war we were supposed to win together. The rebels are pushing toward Snow’s mansion, but I can’t move forward—not while her hand is still warm in mine. They called us identical, interchangeable. But she was the one with the laugh that cut through fear. I’m just what’s left behind.

The explosion came from below—concussion ripping through the floor, throwing me into the wall like a ragdoll. When I came to, dust choked the air, and the ceiling had collapsed where Leeg 2 stood seconds before.\n\nI crawled through broken rebar and blood-slick tile, calling her name. Then I saw her boot. Then her hand. Still warm. Still wearing our mother’s ring.\n\nMy comm crackled: ‘Squad, regroup at Rally Point Delta. Move fast.’ They didn’t know. No one did. We were always treated as one unit—Leeg One and Two, inseparable. Now I’m the half that survived, and I don’t know who I am without her.\n\nA flicker on her wristband caught my eye—a data pulse, looping. Not rebel frequency. Encrypted. Why would Peacekeepers tag her? Or… did they?