Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Fuck this.

Reaping day hung like a fog over my parents' heads. A really evil fog that liked to commit murder, I guess.

Mom and Dad had already lost one kid to the Hunger Games - to the Capitol, may trees fall on all those bastards' heads - and they lived in fear that I'd be Reaped as well. I probably should've, too, but I couldn't bring myself to feel much of anything except anger - not since Jasper was taken. Not since I watched my brave, invincible older brother die through a screen. I let my fingers brush the rough wooden hilt of the hand axe at my belt; the weapon's presence calmed me, gave me a brief sense of safety.

Maybe I'd throw it at the stage and watch Colwort Sickle's head cleave in two.

I was sitting on the oaken steps of our small porch, watching the sun move through the too-blue sky. It was raining when Jasper was Reaped; maybe in some perverse way, that was a good omen. Did I still believe in good omens? Maybe not, but I needed all the damn help I could get.

I looked up as the ancient, rotting door behind me creaked open. Mom and Dad wordlessly stepped out, and I stood, realizing the sun had passed its summit. I did my best not to look at my parents most of the time, but especially today; the grief on their faces mirrored what I felt, what I didn't want to display to the Capitol when they broadcasted their favorite pastime - murder - to the entirety of Panem. The Fairtide family, Aspen, Ciara, and their little boy Ronan, joined us as we walked silently toward the Justice Building; they had lost their daughter Rowan the same year we lost Jasper, in the 65th Games. Returning Ronan's nervous smile, I reached into a poorly sewn pocket of my ragged tunic, curling my hand around a tiny vial of pine needles.

The needles were from Jasper's token, the necklace of pine branches that he chose to take into his Games. The one he died wearing. Clenching my jaw, I let myself remember him for just a moment. I remembered how the pine necklace that the Victor of that year's Games, Finnick Odair, brought me after that awful Games crumbled slowly. Remembered going hungry for a week to buy the vial, wanting something special to put the needles I'd salvaged in, somewhere expensive and safe to keep the last piece of my brother I'd ever have.

I felt the backs of my eyes prickle and drew my hand back from my pocket, taking a deep breath of smoky, earth-scented air. I wouldn't cry. Not today, not any day.

And certainly not on camera.

Mom's hand brushed my back; I met her dark eyes for a second before we entered the courtyard before the Justice Building. Dad nodded gruffly at me before taking her hand and leading her toward the crowd of people too old to be Reaped.

Neither of them had spoken more than a word since Jasper died.

Digging my nails into my palms, I banished the tears that threatened to weaken me once more and joined the line of possible Tributes. I barely noticed it when they pricked my finger for blood, focusing only on the ground in front of my worn leather boots. A squat, matronly woman waved me past the front of the line; she didn't look like someone to assist in murder, and I wanted to scream at her, scream at the white-clad, masked Peackeepers lining the courtyard, scream at them all. I wanted to ask them why the fuck they would do this, ask if they could even see what they were doing. I wanted to hurt every single person who had to do with my brother's death.

But then they'd have shot me, and wherever I went after that, it wouldn't be good. So I reluctantly dropped my hand axe in the offered bin and found a place among the anxiously buzzing crowd. As soon as I stopped moving, thirteen-year-old Ronan Fairtide ran up to stand beside me.

"Johanna?" he said quietly.

I looked down to meet his wide caramel eyes. "Hey, kid. You okay?"

He shook his head silently; I sighed. "Yeah, I know. But it'll be over soon, your name's only in there twice. You're safe."

Not much of a reassurance, not for a compassionate kid like Ronan. I remembered he used to cry when I brought animals back from the market; I'd always have to skin them and cut them up in the yard we Masons shared with the Fairtides so he didn't have to watch, or he wouldn't eat them. I'd always admired how he had stayed that way even forced to watch the Games every year.

If the world was fair, he'd be free and happy and vegetarian, like the stuck-ups in the Capitol who reviled the Districts and smiled as we starved to death.

"Johanna, if it's me you have to take care of Momma and Papa, okay?" Ronan murmured suddenly.

I nodded and took his hand. "I will. But it won't be you. You'll be fine, I promise."

In my experience, promises have a tendency to grow claws and come back to shred one's heart to pieces, but I knew the odds of my young friend being Reaped were practically nonexistent, especially compared to mine.

My heart still got shredded to pieces, but I was at least right about that.

Suddenly a microphone boomed. "Testing, testing," trilled a voice, echoing through the courtyard. I squeezed Ronan's small hand reassuringly as Colwort Sickle, District Seven's resident herald of death, set up to address the crowd from the makeshift stage.

I'd have laughed if it were a different setting; Colwort wore a blinding hot-pink suit with a neon green tie and matching cuffs, as well as a sickeningly gleeful, wide grin. He looked even more stupid than most Capitol citizens, and that was saying something. He cleared his throat and tapped the microphone with a finger. "Testing, testing! Is this on?" his voice was reedy, breathy, and all too familiar. He'd been 'escorting' District Seven's Tributes for years, including Jasper.

Little did I know, he was about to continue the family tradition.

Chapter Text

I hated silence. I hated the tension that welled up like anticipation before a cut tree topples, hated that everyone in the courtyard took a collective breath and held it as Colwort reached his right hand into one of the hollow glass globes full of name slips - the blue one. Boys first.

Reapings were the only time I ever saw us districts united, and that was only in our shared hopelessness. What would it be like, I wondered, if we made a decision to unite in something else, more than once a year - shared poverty, for example?

I supposed that unity would have to exclude those suck-ups in Districts One to Four.

"And the male tribute for District Seven is..." Colwort paused for dramatic - read, terrifying - effect. Ronan shuffled closer to my side.

"Foster Trekker!"

Ronan relaxed ever so slightly as a tall, lean but muscled boy with a narrow face slowly made his way toward the stage. I swallowed. I didn't know Foster personally, but I thought I'd seen him in school once or twice.

My heart raced tenfold as Colwort reached toward the other glass globe, the pink one on his left. Now the female Tribute would be chosen, and forty of the paper slips in there had my name on them. But Jasper had already been in a Games - surely we didn't have luck that bad.

Maybe it was that thought that jinxed me.

That awful silence rose once more as the pink-suited man lifted a name from the pink globe. He unfolded it slowly, grinning wider by the second. No one should have a right to look that happy on the Reaping, I thought as he spoke. "District Seven's female Tribute..."

"Johanna Mason!" Colwort called.

Time froze. Or at least, I froze; those around me swiveled to look at me as I stared at the stage. Surely I'd heard wrong. It wasn't me. I couldn't go.

I couldn't die like Jasper did, forced to kill for Capitol entertainment.

But everyone was still staring, so it must have been me.

I felt like I was moving in a dream as I raised my chin and strode forwards, trying to look confident. I was aware of Ronan's terrified cry as someone held him back, but only vaguely. Aware of my parents' tearful eyes, my mother's sobs, even less. In fact, I'd had dreams about this very moment; I'm sure every district kid has had at least one nightmare about the Reaping or the Games. At least.

The gentle thud of my boots on the wooden steps as I got onto the stage seemed to resound through the courtyard. When I reached my place on Colwort's left, I braced myself, staring straight ahead, over the crowd.

I imagined myself as a tree; tall, unmoveable, unfeeling. Imagined bark closing over my skin and leaves sprouting from my head. Imagined rooting myself to this spot and never, ever leaving.

My jaw was clenched hard enough that I was worried I'd break teeth when Colwort finished droning and led me and Foster through the doors to the Justice Building. I waited in a small but unthinkably expensive room, full of velvet upholstery and marble, for five minutes before two Peacekeepers declared that no one was coming to say goodbye to me and took me by the arms. I wriggled, glancing behind me as they tugged me down a hallway. "Hey - wait!" I was sure Ronan would come, if Mom and Dad couldn't bear it. We'd grown close after Jasper and Rowan's Games. "Wait! I'm supposed to say goodbye - wait - " I broke free from the Peacekeepers only to have one grab me again, the other unsling a rifle from his back and point it at my head.

"You wanna see how that ends?" he asked. His voice was weird and robotic, filtered through the helmet they all wore.

Slowly, I raised my hands. "No."

"S'what I thought." the Peacekeeper lowered the rifle and takes my other arm; together the two led me down the hallway, toward my first and last train ride.
Toward my rapidly approaching death.

Chapter Text

I never wanted to hear anyone sing ever again.

Colwort sounded like a dying jabberjay as he warbled the anthem; "Geeeeem of Paneeemmmm, miiiiighty cityyyy, through the aaaages you shiiine anew..."

I clenched my jaw glancing at Foster, who looked like he had a splitting headache - whether from Colwort's singing or the Reaping was anyone's guess.

We were led through train car after train car; apparently we were supposed to meet our mentor, though I wasn't sure how they were meant to help. Had anyone considered that maybe I didn't want to win this? I was ninety-five percent sure I'd rather take as many Careers - Tributes from Districts One, Two, and Four - with me as possible and then kick it.

I didn't want to kill twenty-three people and live with it.

"Weee huuuumblyyy kneeel-"

Fed up, I interrupted Colwort. "Who's our mentor again?" I asked to distract him.

Our escort giggled reedily. "Annie Cresta, dear!" he answered.

I narrowed my eyes. Annie Cresta... wasn't she from District Four? She had won last year's Games.

And then gone insane enough for her Victor's Tour to be canceled.

"I thought she couldn't mentor," said Foster, voicing my thoughts. "Isn't she, uh..."

"She's crazy!" chirped Colwort delightedly.

I shook my head. "What, so the other districts get an advantage?"

Colwort cackled and said nothing more. I exchanged a look with Foster and opened my mouth to press the issue, but just then we walked into a compartment with slightly more opulence than the rest of the train, making it so rich it was hard to look at.

Gleaming gold chandeliers swung gently from the roof, illuminating a thick, patterned, pale yellow rug that stretched over half the floor. There was a sky-blue, outrageously fuzzy couch pushed up against a wall, with matching armchairs nearby and a birchwood coffee table in front of it. On the couch sat Annie Cresta.

She had long, brown hair with just a hint of a russet tint; it was the first thing I noticed because her head was bowed ever so slightly so it fell over her face. Her fingers twitched and fidgeted in her lap; she was wearing a dress just a little lighter blue than the couch, with pink, yellow, and orange flowers embroidered on it. She looked up as Colowort stepped out, leaving me and Foster alone in the compartment with her. Annie's hair still drooped over her gaze as she stared at us, but she made no move to brush it out of her darting sea-green eyes.

I saw Foster take a deep breath before he spoke. "Hi. You're Annie, right?" he asked politely.

The woman's eyes flickered to him for only a second before continuing to dart between us. "I... yes," she said softly.

There was a minute or so of unbearable silence before I strode forward and dropped into an armchair. More slowly, Foster followed, sitting next to me in another chair. Across from us, Annie swallowed several times.

"They said I'm supposed to mentor you," she mumbled finally. She sounded younger than she was, like for a second she'd receded to a scared little girl, though she was a year or two older than me and would have been eighteen when she was Reaped.

"That's right. You're supposed to keep us alive," I said, maybe more sharply than was necessary. "But between you and me, I'd rather die for Capitol entertainment than live in the Victors' Village." I knew my sardonic tone probably wasn't helping with Annie's supposed insanity, but I was so tired of everything. And so angry - I'd thought my anger was all-encompassing after Jasper's Games, but now I felt like I must've been burning alive with sheer hatred and grief. First Jasper, now I had been Reaped as well, and just as a nice little cherry on top our mentor was a traumatized loony.

If my brother of all people couldn't survive the Hunger Games, I was absolutely fucked.

"I'm supposed to keep you alive," Annie repeated.

Traumatized. Loony. "Yeah, I just said that," I snapped.

"No," she stammered a little. "Y-you said I was supposed to keep both of you alive. You can't think that way. The moment you step foot in that arena, there is no 'us' and no 'we'. Even a-alliances can only be trusted for so long. Everyone's out for themselves when it comes down to it."

Foster looked anxious. "Wait. So you're only gonna mentor one of us?"

"I'll try my best to give both of you a good chance," said Annie. "But you need to start thinking selfishly."

Well, that sounded more competent than I had expected.

Maybe I would be able to kill some Career dickheads before I died - and I would die.

Because winning would be worse than death.

Chapter Text

I had sworn when I was eleven years old that they would never break me. Sworn when Jasper was killed that I would stay strong for him. Sworn when Finnick Odair brought my brother's token back and looked at me with awful pitying eyes that the Capitol would never, ever bring me to my knees.

But when the door to my private compartment on the train slid automatically, silently shut behind me, I crumbled. Quiet sobs shuddered through me, muffled as I tried to keep them in, lock them behind my throat so they couldn't display my pain to the world, so I could add this particular fury and sorrow to the ever-growing pile behind my ribcage and never tell anyone that it was there. Including myself.

I was still kneeling, head lowered, on the plush mint-green carpet an hour later when Colwort knocked on my door to cheerily, loudly announce that it was time for dinner. I ignored him, swiping angrily at the tracks of salt on my face.

Fuck the Reaping, fuck the Games, fuck the Capitol. Maybe I'd stab myself in training and never make it to the arena. Maybe I'd throw an axe at the Head Gamemaker during evaluation, or attack the Peacekeepers, or do something else to get myself killed without the sadistic denizens of the Capitol cheering about it.

Or maybe I'd win, stare President son-of-a-bitch Snow in his evil eyes, and then take my own life. Win their Games, but show them I didn't want their reward for murder. I didn't want to kill anyone. But I would, if it meant winning more than the Hunger Games - if it meant winning against the Capitol.

I shifted on the carpet to hug my knees to my chest, and sat that way, awake, until light began to stream through the windows, revealing the blurring landscape beyond as the train sped toward the heart of Panem. I knew it would only take about a day to get to the Capitol, since District One was the only region between the seat of power and District Seven. I had a day before me and Foster would face the idiots who were to watch us die.

As sunrise blushed across the heavens, painting the light in subtle hues of pink and orange, I rose from my carpet vigil to stand next to the glass, crossing my arms and leaning forward to rest my head against the window. I felt like the sky was laughing up there, taunting us with its morning beauty, waving down at the ugly world beneath it. If any kind of justice existed in the universe, it would give way to a storm; lightning bolts would kill Snow and the Gamemakers. The districts would win this time, really win, and we'd eat until we were sick with food instead of grief.
These were the kind of fantasies that kept me going through most of my life in District Seven.

As I glared out the window, I realized we must already have been in District One; the houses we sped by were larger, less run-down than in the non-Career districts. The blurs of faces I caught seemed happy, or well-fed at the least. I wondered if their Tributes volunteered like the ones from Career districts often did.

I wondered if the Career Tributes were as scared, as angry, as the rest of us, deep down - even if they had volunteered.

I wondered if their families had said goodbye to them.

Chapter Text

Annie ate like a district child; almost never. When I finally emerged from my compartment for breakfast, she was nibbling on her first piece of toast; a plate in the center of the table held a stack, and a thick slab of butter sat in a dish beside it. I flopped into the chair across from her and snagged a piece of toast for myself, surveying the available toppings before choosing a viscous chocolate spread to pile onto the toast.

"Morning, Johanna," said Foster, who was leaning against the windowsill behind Annie's chair. There were dark circles beneath his brown eyes, which were the same color as the chocolate.

"Morning," I responded mechanically. How was I supposed to talk to the last person from home I'd ever see - who I would also eventually have to watch die if I was going to win these Games?

Annie ate another crumb of her breakfast. "We'll be in the Capitol by sunset," she said in that quiet, shaking voice of hers.

"Then what?" I asked. It was the wrong question; she began to tremble, picking at the embroidered flowers on her dress - the same one she'd been wearing yesterday.

I looked beseechingly at Foster as Annie squeezed her eyes shut, rocking slightly in her chair. I didn't know what to do. My district partner shook his head, watching Annie with sorrow in his eyes.

What had happened to our mentor to make her like this?

And if one of us got through this, how changed would we end up?

The questions brought fear to the forefront of my mind and tears to their threatening positions behind my eyes. I took a deep breath. I was a tree, I reminded myself. I was rooted in place. I was unbreakable. I was towering. I was bark and leaves and heartwood.

"I'm sorry," Annie said, so softly it was almost a whisper. I realized I was staring at my toast and looked up to meet her wide, watery sea-green eyes.

I shook my head. "I, um... it's okay."

I knew she wasn't just apologizing for breaking down. In that moment, we - me, Annie, and Foster - were connected in our shared grief, shared anger at the Capitol. Even our shared fear of what the future held.

Of course, Colwort ruined everything again. The webbed silence snapped as soon as he threw the sliding door to the food compartment open, that sickening grin in place on his rodent-like features as he sauntered over. I was glad I'd already taken some when he stuck one stubby finger into the jar of chocolate spread and then into his mouth. "Morning lumberjacks, mermaid," he chirped, pointing at me and Foster, then Annie. Annie's gaze dropped to her hands; she started to fidget again. I glared at Colwort while Foster turned to look out the window.

"What are you looking at, dear?" Colwort leered at me.

I rolled my eyes. "Your awful suit. It's practically glowing with ugliness." That last part was true; today's outfit was deep purple with yellow embroidery. Honestly, did Capitol fashion designers have any self-respect? Well, maybe it was just Colwort who had no self-respect, which sort of made sense. After all, what self-respecting person would gleefully guide children to their deaths?

Actually, that applied to the entire Capitol. Never mind.

Our escort shook his head and looked over at Annie. "Hey, cray-cray, this one needs some work, eh?"

The mentor shuddered and continued to stare at her swiftly moving fingers. She was waving - weaving - them through the air above her lap, as if she were holding something only she could see.

Maybe she was crazier than I'd thought.

Colwort went on to regale us all with tales of the past Tributes of District Seven, several of whom he had escorted. There'd been only three Victors from Seven - not very reassuring - and most of Colwort's gloating had to do with the fact that most of his escorted Tributes hadn't been the first to die. After completing his underwhelming lecture, he lifted a sleek black mirror-like thing from his pocket and poked the surface; I jumped a little when a screen flickered to life above the table.

"A replay of the Reaping ceremonies," Colwort said by way of explanation, before settling in a chair. Foster turned back toward us from the window to watch the screen as well; I couldn't read his dark brown eyes.

Annie froze as the anthem of the Capitol - of Panem - began to play. To my relief, Colwort didn't sing along; soon the screen panned to the stage outside District One's Justice Building. As each of the Reaping ceremonies played, I made careful mental notes on each of the Tributes.

From One, the male Tribute was Damask, the female Peridot. Both were volunteers; I couldn't help but make a small, disgusted noise as we watched them step forward. Damask was well-muscled but lacking in height, though his arrogant scowl displayed a nasty disposition. Peridot seemed stoic; she barely moved except to breathe or blink for the whole recording.

District Two had Terracotta - who volunteered and looked like she could start ripping people's heads off at any moment with her bare hands - and Mace, who was Reaped. He must have been only twelve or so; despite his name, he was tiny, and shuffled nervously toward the stage only to stand there looking petrified. He wasn't a threat - but I clenched my jaw. How was I supposed to kill a kid like that? He reminded me so much of Ronan.

Three's Tributes were both around my age - Dottie, the girl, was lean but confident; she held her head high as she was Reaped. Her district partner, Electron, followed her with less grace; he was huge. I decided to keep an eye on both of them.

Four's male Tribute, Pontus, tried to resist the Peacekeepers when his name was called; I blinked as the footage cut to him standing onstage. Annie noticed my confusion; "Capitol cuts out what they don't like," she mumbled, earning an unreadable look from Colwort. Pontus' partner was Cascade, who went quietly, head lowered - though I could see her fuming through the screen. I wondered whether that anger was toward the Capitol or Pontus.

Volt from District Five took the female Tribute's hand when she followed him onstage. Her name was Ray. Watching them stand there, silently displaying their unity despite the Games they were about to enter, brought an unexpected lump to my throat - which I swallowed back. I hoped those two died early; they didn't deserve to suffer, and I knew I'd never be able to kill them myself.

District Six had Gage and Cairo. Gage was medium through and through - fifteen, average height, not giant like Pontus or Electron, but not tiny either. Meanwhile, Cairo was twelve but vicious. When she heard her name, she elbowed everyone out of her way - even if they'd already moved. The expression on her face was one I'd see in my nightmares for the rest of my life; pure, unadulterated bloodlust. This kid was a fucking psycho.

My hands curled into fists as the screen panned to Seven's Justice Building; I glanced down at the red-and-orange patterned rug of the dining compartment as it replayed Foster's Reaping, then my own. I was proud, though; my face in the recording showed none of my inner turmoil, only determination.

From District Eight, Hem and Linen both kept their eyes downcast, looking devastated - what you'd think would be the norm after one was Reaped. Hem was tiny, though she must have been at least twelve, and Linen was also small for fourteen. Another pair I couldn't kill.

Maida and Rye from District Nine were more well fed than Eight, Five, and us in Seven - as could be expected, since their district produced food and crops for the Capitol. Maida gave off Career energy even though she was from Nine - she moved swiftly, surely, like she was used to fighting, and arrogance was all I could see on her face. Rye was gangly and seemed clumsy, half-tripping over his own feet; I had a feeling Maida would have no problem killing him, from the annoyed look she shot him when he joined her on the stage.

Ten's Tributes, Skinner and Pamela, were both well-muscled - presumably from handling the district's livestock. Skinner worried me a little; the gleam in his eyes was similar to Cairo's.

Second-to-last was District Eleven with Rosigold and Citron. They were surprisingly fit, but both appeared terrified. I couldn't blame them.

Finally, Twelve's Tributes Cole and Alloy were tiny - my and Foster's age, but so malnourished they appeared younger than Mace or Cairo. I had a feeling they were too ill to be any competition in the Games, which perhaps should have made me feel better since it raised my chances of winning, but only touched the deep sadness I'd felt since I was six.

When the screen went black, Foster sighed, dropping his head into his hands. I crossed my arms and stared at nothing. Annie was shaking again, crying silently, knees tucked to her chest. Only Colwort seemed fine, and even then he quietly rose and left us to our grief.

I guessed the Capitol didn't really preach empathy. Or even emotions.

Chapter Text

I met my stylist the morning we arrived in the Capitol, before the Tribute Parade. She wore her green hair - on second thought, it was likely a wig - piled atop her head; she skipped into the styling rooms near the Tribute Center, smiling sharply. "You're Johanna Mason?" she asked me briskly. I nodded.

"Wonderful. I'm Rumina Monty, your stylist."

Without another word to me, Rumina clapped her hands, and three others bounced into the room. It was hard to tell how old they were, since they were all dressed in outrageous Capitol fashion, but they seemed to be her apprentices or something.

One of them, whose body was covered in sequins that may have been a dress or may have actually been attached to her, immediately hugged me. "Oh my goodness hi JoJo! Can I call you JoJo?" she squealed as I blinked, bewildered, at her. "This is our first assignment and I'm so excited! I'm Ariadne and this is Carmenta and Medea and we're your prep team!" she spoke so quickly, it was like she was actually throwing words at me.

I glanced at the other two girls; Carmenta was dressed in a copper jumpsuit that suited her caramel skin tone, and a bright yellow wig that didn't. Medea had green hair a few shades darker than Rumina's, and a scanty pastel-pink outfit that managed to display swathes of pale, glitter-dusted skin - which seemed to have little whorls of gold actually embedded in it.

Capitol people scared me perhaps more than even the Games did.

Rumina whisked out of the styling room; I looked questioningly at Ariadne, Carmenta, and Medea - who didn't seem mean, just clueless. Which were the only two options if you happened to work for the Hunger Games.

"Okay, so we're gonna prep you first and then Rumina will do your outfit!" said Medea. She talked slower than Ariadne, but with the same lilting edge - a way of lifting the ends of her sentences so she sounded perpetually high-strung.

"What does prepping me entail?" I asked.

Carmenta smiled. It wasn't an evil smile, no. Totally not. "Just sit still!"

Hours later - I wasn't sure how many - I had been scrubbed, waxed, and scrubbed again, my hair washed and brushed hard enough for my scalp to be painful. Parts of my eyebrows stung where they'd been plucked. My skin felt raw and tender.

I missed bathing in rivers.

As I sat up, watching Medea, Ariadne, and Carmenta beam like they'd won a prize, Rumina returned. "Good job, girls," she said briefly, earning three screeches of excitement before she shooed them from the room.

I realized Rumina was carrying a bundle; she shook it out to reveal a long, deep brown dress. There were gold-lined grooves throughout the thick fabric in an attempt to pattern it like wood; at the neckline was a collar of fake leaves.

It looked extremely fucking ridiculous.

Rumina grinned like she could read my mind. "Trust the process," was all she said before helping me into the ugly dress.

Foster also had a fake-leaf collar; he pointed at it and rolled his eyes when he caught my gaze as Rumina led me toward our wooden chariot for the Parade. I returned the long-suffering look.

The moments as we got into the chariot and the horses began to pull us forward were a blur; then, suddenly, a bright burst of sunlight streamed from overhead.

The Avenue Of The Tributes was huge. Large drums lined the wide road, attended by musicians who thudded them with a steady, regal beat. In front of my and Foster's chariot, Gage was carefully sticking to one side of the District Six vehicle to avoid Cairo, who was laughing with a maniacal look on her face, while waving at the crowd that booed and cheered from behind the drummers. Foster stared straight ahead as we followed the others toward the end of the Avenue - where President Evil Asshole himself stood behind a lectern just above where the chariots stopped.

Coriolanus Snow's whitening blonde hair was slicked back in an unflattering style. His blood-red suit had a pristine white rose in the buttonhole. His sneer as he beheld the twenty-four human beings he had condemned to death held pure triumph. I felt myself sweat beneath the awful tree dress, but kept my glare on him; when Snow met my eyes, he smiled wider. I forced as much hatred into my face as possible; he only shook his head.

I got the message he was projecting - 'it doesn't matter how you feel, I've already won' was the gist of it. But it did matter.

"Hey, President Dickhead!" I yelled as Snow's gaze slid across the other Tributes. He looked back at me; suddenly silence permeated the air.

Slowly, making sure they'd all see, I lifted my chin and let go of the chariot railing.

Then I flipped the President of Panem off. With both hands.

There was utter, shocked quiet for a moment before he smiled once more. His voice echoed through his microphone, prompting me to lower my hands.

He didn't address me at all, only said; "Welcome, welcome, to the Seventy-First Hunger Games!"

Snow made some speech about Panem's greatness and the awfulness of rebellion, which I tuned out. Hatred rushed in my ears. This man had sent countless people to the Games; this man had gotten Jasper and Rowan killed.

This man deserved every torture ever invented and more; my middle fingers barely scratched the surface of his punishment.

But from his smile, I was suddenly afraid I'd made a terrible mistake.

Chapter Text

The training room was massive. There were black, thick mats to spar on scattered around; an archery range was on the far side of the room, next to stations for trident and axe throwing. The Tributes from Two, Three, and Five were already there. My first steps were toward the axes, but Annie tapped my shoulder first.

"I have to go back up," she said quietly. "But don't show them you're strong."

I stared at her. "What do you mean?"

"Do you want to join the Careers?" Annie asked. She seemed far more sane than she had even when we'd first met her. I though maybe she was holding herself together for my and Fosters' sakes.

I shook my head, confused. She nodded. "That's what I thought. But it's far more dangerous to go solo and be a threat than be unnoticeable."

"So you want me to lay low?" I understood.

"Exactly." just then, more Tributes entered - Peridot and Damask from District One, Pontus and Cascade from Four. Behind them came District Six's Gage and Cairo, as well as Eight's Hem and Linen. When I glanced back, Annie had left.

I kept going toward the axes, exchanging nods with Foster. We'd agreed not to spar, since our fighting styles were so different - and while Annie had apparently decided my approach was appearing weak, Foster's was to be a mystery. He headed for the survival stations - fire building and such.

Sighing, I lifted a hand axe from the rack before the targets, whirling it in my hand to get a feel for the weapon. The handle wasn't wood - some kind of metal or plastic instead - and entirely smooth, the blade sharper than I was used to, made for flesh and bone instead of wood.

This was an axe for cutting down people, not trees.

Stepping into position several meters from the first target, I was about to throw the axe swiftly and easily. I knew it would be a perfect shot - but then I remembered I was supposed to be inconspicuous. With a mental eyeroll, I lobbed the weapon after waiting a few extra seconds. It landed exactly where I was aiming... just at the edge of the third ring on the target. I strode after it, tugging it from the wood with ease. I was turning to make my way back to the throwing point when a trident slammed into the next target over, the other station; I glanced over to see Pontus from District Four grinning threateningly at me. Usually, I would have gone over and bashed his teeth in. But I was Weak Tribute Johanna now, so I let my gaze slide from his and walked back.

I already missed Hot-Headed District Johanna.

Deciding I could only fake inferiority for so long, I tossed the axe back onto the rack and headed after Foster toward the survival stations. I stopped for a moment when I saw Cascade, the female Tribute from Four, weaving nets at the knot station. Her fingers were deft, and the movements were familiar, I realized - this was what Annie was doing earlier, when we watched the replay of the Reaping ceremonies. She wasn't just waving her fingers, she was pretending to tie fishing knots - or hallucinating, or something. But it made sense; our mentor came from District Four, too. Mace, the twelve-year-old from District Two, was fiddling with a length of twine at the trapping station. I passed him and did a double take as he finished the snare.

"Whoa," I ceased walking next to him. "You made that?"

Mace jumped a little, looking up at me. "Uh, yeah," he muttered.

I sighed. Maybe helping some of the younger Tributes wouldn't hurt - it fit in with my Weak Tribute Johanna angle, at least, and I could protect them in the arena when I finally revealed that I did, in fact, possess a backbone.

"Can you show me? I'll teach you how to build a fire," I offered.

He nodded. "Okay."

A few minutes later, I watched as Mace managed to get a spark going, smiling as the fire caught. He grinned back at me.

In that moment, he looked just like Ronan, despite his grey eyes and dirty-blonde tuft of hair. He cocked his head to the side as my smile faded. "Johanna?"

Again, just like Ronan. "Yeah?"

"Are we allies?"

"Absolutely."

Chapter Text

The seventh floor of the Tribute Center was where me and Foster were to spend our last days of relative happiness.

It was slightly hilarious. The lady at the front desk certainly thought she was being witty when she told us where to go; her bright, artificially orange wig drooped over her excessively powdered face as she giggled. "District Seven equals Floor Seven!" she'd chirped, then burst into laughter; Colwort laughed with her while me and Foster looked on, confused, and Annie rocked back on her heels, alternately smiling for no reason and appearing existentially terrified.

I missed home. I missed the trees. I missed my axe. I missed people who were less clinically insane. I missed not thinking of twelve-year-olds and hoping they'd die quickly so I wouldn't have to kill them.

I dug my nails into my palms and imagined myself for a moment as a towering oak, so ancient and unkillable that even the lumberjacks of my home district left me alone. Then I hit Colwort's shoulder, perhaps slightly harder than I needed to. "Let's go, ugly." I said. "Some of us have shit to do." Shit like dying, but I would rather have been dropped in the arena right that second than keep listening to those sociopaths cackle about the least funny sentence in the history of Panem.

The escort turned to me, the awful smile wiped off his face. "What did you call me, lumberjack?"

"Ugly - because you are," I snapped. There weren't many people I could justifiably take my anger out on, but Colwort was one of them, and I intended to put that fact into practice. To my great disappointment, he didn't take the bait, only rolled his eyes and led me, Foster, and Annie towards the elevators.

Our mentor was having a full-on panic attack by the time we stepped onto our floor; she crumpled to the ground, sobbing, and began waving her arms, warding off things that weren't there. Then she started screaming, and I dropped to the ground next to her. "Annie! Annie, can you hear me?"

"Not again!" she cried. "Not again - I can't be here again-"

Fuck. It must have been this place; I knew Annie had been a Tribute once, and it wasn't a stretch to assume that most of the Tribute quarters looked similar, so even the seventh floor could remind her of her time living on the fourth. "Listen, Annie, you're okay. You're not a Tribute. Your Games are over," I tried to soothe her, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder. I realized that at some point over the last day, I'd grown to feel connected to her, if not friendly - she'd already gone through what was about to happen to me, and though the worse for wear, she was still here, wasn't she? Still breathing, still partially functional.

Maybe that was the deal. You won the Hunger Games, you lived the rest of your life in relative peace. You became a Victor, they stopped trying to kill you.

Annie lowered her shaking hands from her eyes. "I'm a mentor. I'm a mentor," she whispered to herself, dragging her fingers through her long, russet hair.

I nodded quickly. "That's right. You're a mentor. You're safe." unlike the rest of us, she was safe. As safe as it was possible to be if you were district. Foster knelt at Annie's other side, and together we helped her to her feet while Colwort watched like the useless Capitol lackey he was.

Fuck him. Fuck them all.

I would win their stupid Games. And then I would show them that being a Victor was nothing worth living for, if Annie was any example. I would show them what even just existing in a district could do to a person.

I would show them defiance.

Chapter Text

The next morning, we walked into the training center to a few new additions. First, a rope climbing net had been set up above the weight-lifting area; second, they'd added Gauntlets, or so they called them.

The Gauntlets were obstacle courses, parkour combined with brute strength. Each one consisted of several raised platforms, ropes, swinging weights. The Careers immediately ran for the courses; the Tributes from Districts One and Four, as well as Terracotta from District Two, had also recruited Maida from Nine, Electron from Three, and - surprisingly - Cairo, the little psychopath from District Six. The nine of them lined up in front of the hardest Gauntlet and took turns doing it; I wished I could go and attempt to kick their asses, but Weak Tribute Johanna would never even try the first jumps.

Damask from One fell halfway through, amid laughter and jeers from the others in the Career pack. Peridot completed the Gauntlet perfectly, pretty face inscrutable the entire time. Terracotta was flashy, adding flips and whirls to her jumps just to show off. Pontus and Cascade moved like water - crashing waves and fluid grace respectively - while Maida leapt nimble as a stag. Electron barreled through, and finally, Cairo was like a very venomous lizard, skittering across each platform and climbing like a small monkey. When she finished the course, Cairo smiled widely, eyes bright and fevered; I shuddered.

What had happened to this twelve-year-old girl - Mace's age, hell, Ronan's age - to make her like... that? She looked crazier than Annie, and acted with such sadistic tendencies she may as well have been Capitol. I remembered how yesterday she'd run straight for the knives, then proceeded to stab several targets over and over again instead of throwing the blades. Everyone but the Careers gave her a wide berth.
After Cairo finished her run-through of the course, Damask waved his arms at those of us other Tributes who'd stopped our training to watch. "I know we're pretty, but don't let us distract you!" he jeered. Clenching my jaw, I turned back to where me and Mace were cataloguing which plants were edible and which poisonous. I was doing better than I thought I would, from long days spent munching on roots and hacking at tree trunks, but I wasn't stellar or anything. Mace knew even less.

Eventually Volt and Ray from District Five wandered over to us; Hem from Eight followed them soon after. I forced myself to talk to them; these kids deserved to have at least one civil conversation in the weeks before their deaths. Hem was, in fact, a kid - she didn't say, but I thought she was about a year or two older than Mace. Volt and Ray were closer to my age, fourteen and fifteen, but somehow, I felt older than them by more than just a few years. The first thing Volt said to me was 'Do you think we can escape?'.

I didn't, and I told him so. His and Rays' deaths had a better chance of being quick if they died the way the Capitol wanted them to, instead of shot by Peacekeepers.
This was so fucking unfair, even more so than the way the districts were treated outside of the Games. I was sure none of my small allies had ever seen as much food as they were likely getting here in the Capitol - but the food, the luxurious quarters, the riches, it was all superficial, either a way to allow people like Colwort to sleep at night or a safety mechanism to make sure no one immediately starved to death before we could start killing each other.

"Daydreaming, are we, Jo?"

I looked up to see that Peridot - the female District One Tribute - had sauntered over to our table of possibly poisonous flora. "My name is Johanna," I snapped at her, forgetting my Weak Tribute facade for a moment. I automatically hated the Tributes from One - how could anyone volunteer for this? How could the Career districts sit in the Capitol's lap while their fellows were murdered around them?

"What, nicknames aren't allowed?" Peridot smiled at me. It was an annoyingly normal smile, not a crazy one like Cairo's or even Skinner's.

No, Peridot's smile was... actually quite beautiful.

Nonetheless, I rolled my eyes. "What do you want?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize you and your little pack of kittens had claimed the poisonous-plant station. Did you mark your territory as well?"

Mace looked anxious, glancing between me and the Career girl. Hem shifted closer to him, Volt and Ray moving to stand at my sides.

Kittens indeed.

I didn't answer Peridot; instead, I silently returned to examining a spiky-leafed plant, trying to figure out if it was poison hemlock or a harmless fern. After a minute, Ray moved from my side to tug on Peridot's sleeve - before I could stop the young District Five Tribute, Peridot looked down at her.

"By the way, um -" Ray spoke softly. "It's 'litter' of kittens. Not pack."

I tensed as Volt shuffled around the table to stand protectively next to his district partner. Little Ray stood no chance if Peridot decided to be true to Career tradition and accept absolutely zero criticism. My eyes darted toward the nearest rack of weapons. I wasn't handy with a sword, but a knife was easy to maneuver. Could I reach the rack quickly enough...?

But Peridot only smiled. "I know," she said to Ray. "But thank you for correcting me." she patted Ray's shoulder, and the young Tribute beamed back at her. I let out a pent-up breath of relief; maybe the District One girl was slightly less awful than the other Careers, though she'd still volunteered for the Games.

Peridot's eyes flicked to mine, and I very nearly flinched. Those eyes were the green of sunlight through leaves, the green of the forest - the green of home.

She offered a slight smile, and I realized I'd practically frozen, bombarded with memories of afternoons spent in the company of only my axe and the woods. Memories of the comforting thud of blade on wood, memories of my broken family - everything I had shoved deep beneath my consciousness the moment my name had been called at the Reaping.

I let a corner of my mouth twitch upward in return and swiftly lowered my gaze back to the maybe-poison-hemlock on the table.

Weak Tribute Johanna, I reminded myself. Be a sapling. Be bendable. Be insignificant.

Be breakable.

Chapter Text

Annie was always crying when me and Foster got back from training. She tried to pretend she wasn't, but there were tear tracks beneath her sea-colored eyes each day, and Colwort was consistently nasty to her. His nickname for me was now 'weakling'; Foster was still 'lumberjack', but Annie had gone from 'mermaid' to 'crazy' to 'crybaby'.

I wondered if the nicknames were a Capitol thing, or just our escort's way of continuing to let himself think of district people as barbaric animals - or both. Either way, he showed no empathy whatsoever to us or any of the Tributes, opting instead to disappear into the city for most of his days and nights.

Leaving Annie to soak in the trauma that seemed to permeate the Tribute Center for her, and to do her best despite it to mentor Foster and I.

"Since your angle is unnoticeable," she told me one afternoon, a few training days away from the interviews we'd soon have to suffer through in order to 'introduce' ourselves to the Capitol. "Your strategy shouldn't focus on getting a whole lot of sponsors - you'll gain some, because they'll love a long shot, and Capitol viewers of the Games enjoy it when you make them pity you. But you should concentrate on appearing as such a tiny threat the Careers will ignore you; then, further into the Games, you can kind of unveil yourself and start swinging."

Start swinging sounded pretty good to me. I wasn't exactly sure how or who had decided that my so-called angle was to be insignificant, but I didn't see how suddenly changing the way I acted in the middle of training would help either. So Weak Tribute Johanna was here to stay, I supposed.

The night before we were to present ourselves to the Gamemakers for scoring, Foster was still sitting in the living room of our floor in the Tribute Center when insomnia drove me out of my quarters. I dropped into a chair across from him, fixing my stare on the stars that mirrored the lights of the Capitol through the window.

"It's so stupid," he whispered after a few minutes of silence.

I scoffed. "Which part of it?"

Foster shook his head. "Don't you miss it? Home?"

I swallowed. Nodded.

"And yet here we're better fed, cleaner, probably sleep better. Back in Seven, we're starving, and poor, and always exhausted."

"Here we're also about to go to our deaths," I pointed out. "I don't think it's unusual to miss being safe. Or... safer."

He didn't answer, only followed my gaze to the stars. Like with the sunrise that first morning on the train, I wondered if they were watching and laughing at our misfortune.

Or if they were weeping for us, if they wished they could reach down and save us the way I wished I could save Mace, Hem, Ray, and Volt. The way I wished I could save Ronan, take him far away so he didn't have to live in fear, didn't have to submit to those who had caused his sister's death.

Who would be the last Tributes standing, I wondered? If I was one of them, which I was determined to be, who would I have to kill? I hoped one of the Careers - Damask, Terracotta, Pontus, Cascade, Maida, Electron. To my surprise, I realized I wasn't sure I could hurt Peridot; she'd formed an unexpected friendship with Ray this past week, and had been civil to me as long as I returned the favor. And Cairo... well, maybe she deserved to be put out of her misery - maybe she needed it. But she was still a child.

A terrifying, insane, bloodthirsty child.

Who liked to stab things.

I closed my eyes to block the pinpricks of light that shone above. Yes, now I was sure the stars were mocking us, humiliating us. It's what the Capitol did; I had seen with my own eyes that, when placed above everyone else, anyone would cheer for the underdogs' misfortune.

I had learned how the world worked, as anyone from the districts had. We were the machine, the thing that worked and cranked and slowly broke down to keep the Capitol going. I had learned that we fell so they could rise, even though they didn't deserve to. No one got what they deserved, actually. Good people were few and far between.

It was a dream - a hope, though unattainable - that we could ever rise for a change.

Chapter Text

That morning, Rumina brought me another bundle - this one a kind of padded tunic and matching pants. "Your outfit for the Gamemakers' presentation," she explained before helping me into them. The fabric was soft but thick; I thought parts of the tunic might stop an arrow if I maneuvered right, which would be helpful if I got to wear something like this in the arena as well. Several of the other Tributes had been displaying their considerable archery skills since day one, including Dottie from District Three and, surprisingly, Foster.

I hoped to avoid confronting my district partner once the Games started, but a little protection couldn't hurt.

"Damask Gewelir, District One." a mechanical female voice monotoned from the speakers in the Tribute Center hours later. Swiftly, Damask rose from his seat in the front of the room and disappeared through a plain doorway.

The chamber we Tributes were in was unadorned save for the metal chairs that sat in rows. Next to me, Foster was staring nervously at his feet. The Careers were laughing and shouting at one another at the front of the room; I felt sorry for Mace, who looked distinctly uncomfortable beside Terracotta. She was hollering in unison with Maida, Electron, and Cascade.

Maybe fifteen minutes later, the speaker voice sounded once more; "Peridot Shire, District One."

Peridot had been sitting silently, and went to the doorway silently as well. She glanced back once before heading to where the Gamemakers undoubtedly waited; for some reason, I caught her gaze for a split second, then watched her turn away and keep walking. Another fifteen minutes, and Mace's name was called - he also looked back at me with wide, scared eyes. I nodded at him and he shuffled away.

Terracotta shot to her feet with an exasperated "Finally!" when her name was called.

Dottie skipped her way through.

Pontus rolled his eyes.

Volt squeezed Ray's hand.

Cairo giggled just a little too loudly to sound innocent.

"Foster Trekker, District Seven." said the speakers fifteen minutes after Cairo went in, and I watched my district partner rise from his seat.

"You've got this," I said quietly to him. Foster nodded mutely and made his way through the door.

On my other side, Hem leaned forward to talk to me across her own district partner, Linen. "Are you scared?" she asked softly.

I nodded. "Yeah, I am. But sometimes being scared helps," I told her.

Hem tucked some of her short brown hair behind an ear. "What are you gonna show them?"

I forced my face into a reassuring smile. "I'll show them what it means to be district," I said truthfully.

The little District Eight Tribute tilted her head as if considering, then nodded. "That sounds fun."

"Oh, I hope it will be."

The mechanical voice resounded through the room a few moments later. "Johanna Mason, District Seven."

I took a deep breath and stood up, meeting Hem's eyes once more before following the first thirteen Tributes through the doorway. The hall beyond was luxurious marble, and my shoes clacked on it as I stepped over to open the door at the opposite end from the one I'd just come in through.

The Gamemakers ate and laughed and talked on a balcony at the back of the large presentation room, presiding over a huge, mostly empty space with weapons and targets lining the walls. There was yet another door on the other side, presumably the one I was mean to leave through. As I walked in, I could feel the Gamemakers' eyes swoop over me.

"Johanna Mason?" said one of them, stepping to the front. He looked oddly normal for a Capitol citizen - though I wasn't sure why his short beard was shaved in wavelike patterns. This must have been Seneca Crane, the Head Gamemaker.

"Yes, I'm Johanna," I responded awkwardly to his question.

"Then you may begin when ready."

I took a deep breath and walked over to the nearest wall for a throwing axe. I tossed it in my hand once or twice, thinking over my approach. I was Weak Tribute Johanna, I reminded myself. Be a sapling. I was aiming for a score around six or seven; right in the middle. If it was too low I'd have absolutely zero sponsors, but if it was too high, the Careers may begin to feel threatened.

Choosing a target, I strode backwards away from it after taking two more axes from the wall. I stopped maybe four and a half meters from the circle of marked wood, looking up once at the Gamemakers before whipping my first axe at the target.

The blade thunked satisfyingly loud as it slammed into the target, right in the center. If that had been a human head, the throw would have cleaved through the skull. There were a couple of appreciative murmurs from the balcony; that was my cue to start being mediocre. My next throw landed just outside the second ring of the target, the last in the middle of the fourth ring. After dropping the axes back onto the rack, I returned to the center of the room, staring up at the Gamemakers' balcony.

Seneca Crane nodded at me. "You may go."

I began to turn away, but suddenly I was frozen with realization. These Gamemakers were the ones who controlled the arenas. The ones who put mutts and disasters in to mess with the Tributes. The ones who decided on any given day who would live or die in the Games.

They were directly responsible for Jasper's death.

The Head Gamemaker cocked his head. "Did you hear me, Ms. Mason? You may go," he said.

Now shaking with anger, I left the room behind and entered another marble hallway, which led back to the lobby of the Tribute Center.

There was nothing I could do, and somehow that made it a hundred times worse.

Annie was curled on the couch beside me, Foster and Colwort in chairs nearby. We were all staring at a screen, waiting for the Tribute scores from the Gamemakers to be announced.

"What was your score last year, crybaby?" asked Colwort obnoxiously, grinning at Annie.

Our mentor curled her fingers into fists, but she didn't break down. "An eight."

"Not bad," I said.

"Everything about the Games is bad," countered Annie, to an eyeroll from Colwort.

I fell silent, because she was right.

Annie flinched when the anthem started blaring from the television; the other three of us turned to watch it with rapt attention. My score had to be exactly right; otherwise my Weak Tribute facade wouldn't work as well.

The anthem faded and scores began showing up; of the Careers, Cascade and Pontus both had tens. Peridot and Terracotta both managed nines, Damask an eight. I raised an eyebrow when Electron appeared with a five; the Career Tributes usually all had high scores. And then Cairo came up.

With an eleven.

"What the fuck?" I muttered.

Foster shook his head. "What could Cairo have done?"

Annie shivered. "Something awful."

We all quieted when Foster's face popped up on the screen; I cheered for his score of eight and reached over to high-five him. He looked surprised, both at his score and apparently at the high-five. Then my own face replaced his on the TV; I held back a wince. I looked so... expressionless.
"

Perfect!" Annie said when I was scored at a six.

I kept watching for my young allies' scores. Mace had ended up with a seven, and I made a mental note to congratulate him. Hem got a five; I sighed. She was too young to be here, and I wasn't sure she'd ever touched a weapon; she spent most of her training time at the survival stations with Volt and Ray - who got an eight and a six respectively.

Tucking my knees to my chest, I glanced at Annie.

I could keep my mind intact, I thought, if only I didn't let myself remember that most, if not all, of my now-friends would be dead soon.

Chapter Text

"Welllcome... to the Seventy-First... Hunnnger Gaaames!"

The crowd roared their excitement for our impending demise as Caesar Flickerman whipped around to face them onstage. Me and the other twenty-three Tributes were lined up to the side in order of district, waiting for the show host to call our names.

It was time for our interviews.

Caesar's wig, eyelids, and lips were all dyed a painfully bright orange this year; his wide smile was nauseating, similar to Colwort's. "Citizens of Panem... are you ready... to meet our Tributes?!" he shouted. I wondered what the point of wearing a microphone was if he was going to yell as the crowed called out once more in response.

"Then... please welcome... Peridot Shire of District One!"

Another cheer from the elaborately dressed Capitol crowd threatened to break my eardrums as Peridot made her way toward Caesar; she sat gracefully across from him.

"Now, Peri - can I call you Peri?" said Caesar.

Peridot nodded. "Most of the people close to me do," she told him.

That was an overly calculated line. I decided Peridot's angle was gaining sympathy and being overly friendly when she continued, turning to the crowd. "In fact, you all can," she said with that damn charming smile.

As Caesar asked the District One Tribute about her life back home, her family, how she'd felt at the Reaping - the usual shit - I shifted uncomfortably on my feet. My dress was, in my opinion, extremely ugly - it comprised of several different stiff panels in different shades of brown, all patterned to look, or so I was told, like wood.

Rumina had dressed me as a fucking tree. Again.

I mean, the Tributes of District Seven usually ended up as trees for everything, but did it have to look so stupid? And why had I ended up with the stylist who couldn't be original - or even any good?

I knew I often imagined myself as a tree, but that didn't mean I actually wanted to look like one.

As Caesar dismissed Peridot, pressing a kiss to her hand, I examined the crowd more closely. It seemed like the current Capitol fashion was embedding sparkly shit into their skin, like Ariadne and Medea. Some had sequins like the chattery girl from my prep team, while others had elaborate glitter tattoos of plants, animals, and even names all over their bodies - which were covered just barely enough for basic decency.

"Here's Mace Bellator from District Two!" called Caesar from the stage as Damask stepped back into the dark space beside it.

Mace stumbled forwards into the harsh lights; I felt worry rise in my heart as he perched on the very edge of the seat next to Caesar.

"Okay, Mace, how do you feel about not being a Career?" the show host asked, leaning forward so his orange eyeshadow sparkled.

The young Tribute shook his head, shaggy yellow hair falling over his forehead. "I never wanted to. I don't want to be like them."

"Oh? What does 'like them' mean?"

Mace raised his chin, staring at Caesar defiantly. "Evil."

Caesar dramatically looked from Mace to the crowd. "Do you guys think the Careers are... evil?" he stage-whispered, to a mixture of booed 'no's, gasps, and cheered 'yes's.

I didn't know what Mace's angle was, but I had a feeling he wasn't following it.

Later, Ray spoke softly about her family back in Five, then about how she and Volt were close friends. I dug my nails into my palms, wishing the two could have a chance to continue that friendship - for it to maybe grow into something more, or remain for the rest of their long, happy lives. But they would die in the Games, I had no doubt - no one with a good heart would survive.
In her interview, Cairo made absolutely no sense. When Caesar asked, "Do you miss District Six?" she only mumbled to herself for a minute.

When he repeated the question, she said; "District miss Six. Six District miss. Do you miss District Zero?" her grin was terrifying; the bloodlust in her eyes was even more apparent than I'd seen in the recording of her Reaping, and at one point she shook her head from side to side like a dog, so her short, dark hair stuck up in all directions.
"District..." Caesar looked unsettled. The crowd was hushed.

Cairo curled into a ball in her chair, staring unblinkingly - still with that awful smile in place - at him over her knees. "District Zero, do you miss District Six? Zero safe, never safe," she giggled.

Caesar glanced at his watch. "Oh - time's up! That's Cairo Streblo from District Six!" he waved the scary little Tribute offstage, looking relieved.

I picked at one of the panels on my stupid dress as Gage's interview passed quickly. Then Caesar was saying "Let's meet Johanna Mason of District Seven!" and I was stepping onto the blindingly lit stage and-

But my heels - made of faux wood, ugly and difficult to walk - clicked on the steps to the platform, and I froze. Suddenly I was back in Seven at the Reaping; suddenly Mom was sobbing and Ronan was looking up at me with wide eyes - looking up because I was standing on a stage next to Colwort. Because I had just been Reaped.

"Johanna?" Caesar's too-kind voice sliced through the memory, slamming me back to the present. I shook my head.

"Sorry," I mumbled probably too quietly to hear, successfully balancing on my heels and making my way over. I folded myself into the seat, hunching my shoulders slightly and meeting Caesar's eyes for only a moment before fixing my gaze on the ground. At least the moment of feebleness on the steps corresponded with my Weak Tribute Johanna routine.

Caesar dramatically flipped some of his orange hair back from his face - that bastard did everything dramatically - before asking his first question. "How've you been this past week, hm?"

I crossed my legs and clasped my hands in my lap, which I'd practiced with Annie. She knew exactly how to turn me into the picture of demure, nonthreatening innocence. "Absolutely terrified," I told the show host, deliberately swallowing. I let my eyes dart up to his hideously painted face swiftly, then to the crowd, then back to the floor. I hoped I was convincing.

I hoped no one could see how much I wanted to punch Caesar in his smiling, murdering face. How the fuck could he sit there and talk to us Tributes - talk to us as if we were human, which was more than most managed - just to watch us sent off to be either killed or inevitably messed up in the head? How could he do this to children?

How could he look at Cairo and not see that it was his fault - the Capitol's fault - that she was so insane?

Caesar nodded, face melting into a look of sympathy that was just a tad too sincere. "I'm sure you are."

I kept the glare from my face, looking at the crowd once more. Most of them were beaming. So they were just going to watch while Caesar displayed us for slaughter like prime livestock, chant as we tried to gain sponsors, tried to heighten our chances of survival as much as possible, knowing only one of us would live in the end

They were just going to watch, while children died. While people, humans, died. Really, every single one of them was only trying to kill us; Snow and the Gamemakers would make sure the whole Capitol was screaming for our blood.

Well, I thought, fuck that - and fuck anyone who had anything to do with it.

Caesar kept asking the standard questions, and I kept answering like a sniveling, weak coward. I didn't look at the crowd when Caesar dismissed me, but shuffled offstage with my head down. As I watched Foster step toward Caesar with a mysterious half smile, I felt a hand on my wrist and wrenched it away, spinning to face the person beside me.

Then I froze again.

Finnick Odair stood there, his face half-shadowed. He'd grown since the last time I had seen him - when he'd given me Jasper's token six years ago. I realized he must have only been fourteen back then, when he won the sixty-fifth Games. When Jasper was eighteen - though he'd turned nineteen in the arena.

"What did he say your name was?" Finnick asked, gesturing at Caesar.

I stared at him. "Johanna. Johanna Mason."

The District Four ex-Tribute closed his eyes; all the color drained from his symmetrical face. "You had an older brother."

It hadn't exactly been a question, but I nodded and answered anyway. "Jasper."

"Do you still have his token?" Finnick asked. His lids lifted, showing the tears that swam in his green eyes.

Slowly, I reached toward the little strip of leather around my neck - Carmenta had given it to me earlier. Attached to it, like a charm on a necklace, was the tiny vial with Jasper's pine needles inside. First my brother's token, now mine.

Finnick glanced at the floor. "He talked about you," he told me. "Jasper. Always used to mention his little sister back in Seven."

A lump rose in my throat; I swallowed it down.

I would. Not. Cry. Not here. Maybe more tears would fall when people started dying in the arena, but Capitol soil would never soak up my sorrow.

This apparently wasn't a principle Finnick held; a single tear tracked its way down his cheek. "You have to win," he whispered.

"I'm planning to." to my frustration, my voice was slightly thick with sadness.

He nodded. "But don't only win to live - win for Jasper. Win for all of us," he choked the words out, quietly.

I narrowed my eyes; I knew he'd promised Jasper to keep me alive when my brother had died.

I agreed, though. "I will."

I had made a lot of heart-shredding vows over the last week - ones to Volt and Ray and Mace and Hem, promising eventual peace, promising swift deaths - that I was ninety percent sure I couldn't keep.

But this one I meant. I would win.

I would win for all of us.

Chapter Text

The ceiling of my room in the Tribute Center was extremely interesting.

Or, it must have been, because I couldn't stop staring at it.

It was like I really had turned into a tree, even after ripping that horrid dress off of me. I may perhaps have thrown it out a window, and it may perhaps have landed on some Capitol businessman's head on his way to work, but that's irrelevant. The point is that I was practically rooted to my bed, my eyes fixed on a random spot above.

All I could think was that come morning, I would finally be sent to the arena.

The Games would start.

The Tributes would die.

My allies would inevitably be the easiest targets.

And I couldn't protect them, because I was supposed to stay Weak Tribute Johanna until the Career pack had been at least partially taken care of.

I couldn't stop any of it.

These thoughts cycled in my head until dawn brushed the sky from navy to grey to pink. Until Annie's gentle knock on my door drew me out of my stupor. Until it was time to go.
Until I had to let the Games begin.

To my surprise, Rumina hugged me after dressing me in the outfit I was to wear through the Games - no arrow-proof tunics, unfortunately, only a black jacket over a soft, formfitting dark green t-shirt and light brown pants.

"I hope you win, for what it's worth," said my stylist, adjusting the clothing around my shoulders. "I'm guessing the arena has some woodlands because of the shirt, and maybe somewhere chillier from the jacket."

I nodded. "Thanks, Rumina."

I glanced down at my left arm, where a tracker had been inserted before the Tributes had been brought to... wherever we were now. Under the arena, I guessed, judging by the pedestal that I now moved to stand on. There was a round tunnel the same shape and size above it; I caught a glimmer of sunlight at the distant end.

All I could do was wait. Rumina gave me a last pitying look, then exited the room. I heard a lock click behind her and managed a small grin; I decided to be flattered that they thought I was confident enough to try and escape.

Finally, the same mechanical female voice that had called us one by one at the Gamemakers' presentations began to count down the seconds to the destruction of my life.

"Sixty seconds."

"Fifty-nine seconds."

"Fifty-eight seconds."

I felt my heart begin to race and tried to slow my breathing. I had a plan. I wasn't going to go for the Cornucopia; Weak Tribute Johanna would be too afraid. I'd go in the other direction instead.

I would win, then I would die.

Simple.

"Forty-nine seconds."

I was a tree. I would appear as a sapling, but I was a tree. I was strong. I was steady.

I was alive.

"Forty-three seconds."

I had to keep it together. Ronan was watching, my parents were watching. Finnick was watching.

I would win for them. Like Finnick had said; I would win for all of us.

I would win for Jasper.

I would win for Mace, for Hem, for Volt and Ray.

I kept myself thinking 'win for all of us' so I didn't have to think about how terrified I was.

"Thirty-five seconds."

I ran my hands through my dark hair.
"

Twenty-nine seconds."

When there were twenty seconds left, the pedestal shot up so quickly I almost fell off, shoving me upwards, through the tunnel. The rest of the countdown was projected over the Cornucopia, which was the first part of the arena I saw when I rose aboveground. Each of the twenty-four Tributes were on similar pedestals in a circle around it; the district pairs were closer together than the rest. I glanced to my right, where Foster was looking back at me.

He gave me a nod, and I returned it, signing a silent agreement. We wouldn't immediately try to murder each other.

The timer reached ten seconds.

I took in more of my surroundings; the golden Cornucopia was situated in a sort of clearing; there was a tree behind each pedestal, making a ring. Beyond that ring was a circular stretch of grass before a real tree line - Rumina had been right about the woodlands.

Two seconds.

One second.

On edge, I nearly flinched as Seneca Crane's voice boomed unexpectedly through the arena.

"Let the Seventy-First annual Hunger Games... begin!"

There was a cannon boom like thunder, and then Tributes began running off their pedestals. Terracotta immediately went after Mace, who began sprinting away to the tree line. The rest of the Careers began the bloodbath; Skinner ran straight for me.

Adrenaline surged through my veins as I leapt off the pedestal and raced toward the tree line, in the opposite direction of Mace. My own breaths were loud in my ears, each thud of my shoes against the grass resonating in my head. As I cleared ring of trees around the Cornucopia, two cannons went off in quick succession. I risked a glance backwards - please don't be one of the kids, don't be one of the kids, I though frantically-

Skinner of District Ten was a couple meters behind me, a sword in his hand and that scary gleam in his eye, the one that was too similar to Cairo's trademark crazy grin for comfort. Thanking whatever higher power existed for the weight lifting station back in the Tribute Center, I shoved a burst of speed to my legs - which would have burned with exertion a week ago.

I just had to make it maybe ten more meters; then I would hit the woods and I could climb a tree or something to escape Skinner.

I knew it was a bad idea, but I couldn't help looking back again - Electron was now gaining on me behind Skinner, and the burly District Three Tribute distracted me enough that I nearly slammed into a trunk as I reached the tree line. I avoided running face-first into the wood, but it cost me my speed; suddenly Skinner had me backed against the tree.

Another cannon sounded.

Fuck, no, I couldn't die here -

Skinner raised his sword, but just as I was silently apologizing to my family, my young allies - apologizing to Finnick - there was an awful kind of squelching noise and the wicked prongs of a trident protruded from Skinner's chest.

I felt bile rise to my throat as the trident's wielder tugged the weapon free and let the Tribute of District Ten's body slump to the ground. Holding the trident was a grinning Pontus; Electron stood next to him. Seconds later,

Skinner’s cannon broadcasted his death.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. I stepped forward, but the two Careers pressed closer, forcing my back against the tree trunk. "How about a nice District Seven kebab?" sneered Electron as the tip of Pontus' trident - still crimson with Skinner's lifeblood - steadied just in front of my throat.

"JOHANNA!" the shrill, terrified scream came from Electron's left; he looked over and snarled. I craned my eyes in that direction to see Mace sprinting toward us with a large dagger in one hand, Hem trailing behind him. Both of the young Tributes' eyes were wide; I was surprised no one followed them as they raced to what they thought was my aid.

No, this couldn't happen - Mace and Hem couldn't die saving me; Electron and Pontus would rip them apart.

But, I realized, Pontus had glanced toward my two allies - which meant he was paying less attention to the trident he was holding to my neck. Fueled by sheer adrenaline and heart-pounding fear, I wrapped my fingers around the trident's shaft and twisted. Pontus yelled as I tore the weapon from his hands; clumsily maneuvering it in the limited space, I jabbed it into his stomach. It was a weak shot, but he stumbled back enough for me to slip away and run full pelt toward Mace and Hem.

"This way!" my voice was raw and cracked as I beckoned my small allies away from the Cornucopia. Hem stumbled; I lifted her into my arms without missing a beat and carried her, speeding through the trees with Mace at my side.

There was a furious shout from behind; Mace shot a glance back.

"It's Pontus and Electron!" he screamed.

"Just keep going!" I called back, but I knew we couldn't run forever. Hugging Hem tighter, I frantically scanned the blurring trees for a place to hide.

There - I ducked toward a thick patch of foliage, grabbing Mace's hand to tug him after me. It wasn't ideal, but now my body ached from so much running despite the adrenaline. "Just be quiet," I panted to Hem and Mace. "Just be quiet."

Mace fixed his hands over his mouth to quiet his breathing; I put my own fingers over Hem's mouth and pressed my face into her shoulder. The little District Eight girl was shaking with fear; I couldn't blame her. The three of us stayed in that thicket - which was really a few bushes and shrubs loosely clumped together - until our breathing slowed. It seemed like hours before heavy footsteps crunched through the leaf litter nearby, and another few before they disappeared.

Some minutes and another cannon shot later, Mace shifted from where he sat awkwardly hunched to the ground. "A-are you okay?" he asked me softly, shakily.

I nodded; I didn't trust my voice. Hem moved slowly away from my arms, tucking her knees to her chest. "Are we s-safe?" she asked, even quieter than Mace.

I nodded again, even though I knew there would never be a safe moment in this arena. Swallowing, I whispered raspily; "You guys should rest. I'll take watch."

The two nodded silently and curled up next to one another; I could tell from their breathing that they weren't asleep, but who the hell would be able to sleep after that? I glanced up at the sky, which was darkening too quickly to be natural.

Bastard Gamemakers.

I closed my eyes. Suddenly my heart quickened once more; my hands were shaking, reliving that awful, tearing impact that had resonated through the trident staff as I'd stabbed Pontus. Skinner flashed behind my eyelids, that squelching noise replaying in my ears. Shuddering, I dug my fingernails into my palms. As quietly as I could, I crawled to a corner of the thicket.

There I emptied my stomach of the bland piece of toast that was the only thing I'd managed to eat this morning.

Maybe I should have let Pontus kill me, instead of damning myself to another day in this fucking hellhole.

Chapter Text

I'd missed the stars.

I hadn't even noticed during my time in the Capitol how the harsh, glaring lights blotted out so many of those stars - ones that we could see out in Seven. But now, in the arena, swathes of them painted the sky.

I felt like I was welcoming back old friends. Yet as Mace and Hem finally drifted into fitful sleep and I remained looking up, those friends were replaced by faces.

Panem's anthem blared suddenly in the otherwise quiet night; I started, my two young allies jumping awake.

"Just the memorials," I whispered, patting Hem's shoulder as she quivered.

Indeed, the sky now displayed the Tributes that had died today.

Cole from District Twelve was first; I wasn't surprised. Despite the Capitol feeding us like animals being fattened up for slaughter, both Tributes from Twelve had remained scrawny and ill-looking. Then was Dottie from Three and - more surprisingly - Cascade, a Career from District Four. Next was Rye - Maida's district partner; I wondered if she really had killed him. Then Rosigold from Eleven.

The last to appear among the stars was Skinner. I dug my nails into my palms as the anthem faded along with the sky-screen; the night was still once more.

Six Tributes gone - six people dead, and the only thing to commemorate their lives were cannon shots and their pictures, shown for seconds. Soon everyone in the Capitol would forget their names, and most of the districts as well. Only their families - and their fellow Tributes, most of whom would die as well - would remember.

Mace seemed to have the same thoughts. "Is... is that it?"

"I... yeah." I murmured back. "Yeah. Um..." What now? "Lie back down - I know it's hard, but do your best to sleep, kid."

Mace shook his head but obeyed, tucking himself next to Hem again.

I didn't take my own advice.

I must have eventually drifted off, though, because footsteps just outside the thicket woke me. I sucked in a quick breath as the world rushed back to me; whoever was outside must have heard it, because they stopped walking.

Fuck.

I reached toward Hem and Mace, ready to wake them and run; but I froze when Peridot brushed some of the foliage aside to find us and held up her empty hands "Wait, wait, I'm not gonna hurt you," she said swiftly.

Warily, I rose to my feet and shifted to stand in front of my young allies. I scanned the District One girl's pretty features; there was a smudge of blood on her cheekbone, and more of the stuff splotched her clothes. I couldn't tell if it was hers or not - though I didn't see how she could have killed anyone without a weapon, unless she'd had one and dropped it or something. Her green - fucking beautiful green - eyes shone fiercely. "What do you want?" I asked. Peridot seemed to have come in peace, but I sure as hell wasn't about to trust a Career anywhere near Mace and Hem, no matter how civil she'd been to us the last week.

Peridot sighed. "An alliance." there was an edge to her tone, a worried, tired kind of tint that hadn't been there before.

"Why? Aren't you with the Career pack?" it occurred to me that she may not be alone; I looked around for a sign of Damask or the other Careers, but Peridot shook her head.

"I left the Careers. I couldn't - couldn't stay," she told me. A haunted look that mirrored how I felt about the events at the start of the Games flashed in those eyes.

And just like that, I knew she was telling the truth. Though if yesterday had taught me anything, it was to constantly be on edge - so I made sure to keep myself between Peridot and the two younger Tributes, who were still asleep. I sat down, Peridot settling beside me as the grey light of what may have been dawn or just the Gamemakers' simulation of it washed over our thicket.

Mace and Hem finally awoke when that grey light turned a warm golden that seemed far too benign to exist in this arena. Hem sat up first; she looked confused for a minute before appearing to remember where she was. The expression in the young District Eight Tribute's eyes scared me - a bleakness, like she was already dead inside and just waiting for a Career to come and stab the life out of her shell. She didn't even react to Peridot.
Mace, on the other hand, raised his dagger - I'd forgotten he had that - in one shaking hand and looked over at me. "Why is she here?" he asked.

His scared, desperate voice was as heartbreaking as Hem's cold gaze. "She's our ally now, too," I said, looking over at Peridot, who nodded.

"There's some cliffs a couple hours west of here," said the District One girl. "We should keep moving, but if we reach those by nightfall we can sleep one of the caves."

"Okay," was all I responded with. Suddenly, I was way too fucking tired to distrust Peridot - as far as I could tell she was being helpful, which gave her a point up compared to anyone else here, even me.

That mostly sleepless night was already catching up with me.

Chapter Text

Could Gamemakers mess with our eyes, too?

The sky was bright and clear as we walked west. Mace stuck close to my side.

And I couldn't stop looking at Peridot.

In the sunlight, she was stunning. Her long, dark hair seemed close to navy; her eyes glittered like the gems she was named for. Somehow, she managed to smile despite where she was - where that light that brought her alive was coming from.

Hem was the polar opposite of Peridot. I grew increasingly worried about the little girl from District Eight; she seemed half-asleep, and it took me five tries at the least to get her attention at any point. When we tried to get her to eat - Peridot had brought a few bland granola bars from the Cornucopia - Hem just shook her head and shuffled away. Mace kept trying to talk to her, but she was silent.

As the sun approached its summit, two cannons went off; Hem flinched and tucked herself half behind me, Mace stepped closer and raised his dagger, and Peridot froze. I looked around, not daring to take another step.

"Do you think they were close?" I murmured.

Peridot shook her head. "They could've been on the other side of the arena, for all we know."

"But they could have been right next to us, too," said Mace.

I was realizing that the District Two boy was one of the most intelligent people I'd ever met, and one of the most stable. He'd managed to see that initial bloodbath at the Cornucopia and stay sane - saner than Hem, at least.

Honestly, he was calmer than I was.

I let out a long breath. "Let's keep going. There's no point in waiting around."

It was just past noon when we passed the Cornucopia. We stayed relatively far, but I spotted something that made me feel sick and edged closer, stopping at the tree line. Damask, Terracotta, Pontus, Maida, Electron, and Cairo were sitting a few meters from the ring of trees that surrounded the giant golden horn. Cairo seemed to be singing softly to herself; Terracotta and Pontus were shooting her creeped-out looks, and Damask was whittling a sort of spike from a long branch.

In the mouth of the Cornucopia hung a human being.

I thought it was Rosigold from District Eleven; her lustrous blonde hair was recognizable even through the blood that coated it. Mace made a small, pained sound, and I heard him step back. Hem was, impossibly, quieter than she'd been all day.

I couldn't tear my eyes from the grisly sight; the noose around Rosigold's neck was made of thick, black rope. I narrowed my eyes and realized that the small fingers of one hand were trapped beneath the noose as well, like she'd been trying to get it off her.

The Careers had killed - no, executed - a child. Rosigold was fourteen, same as Ray and Volt. Looking at her, I suddenly felt weightless in my terror, like whatever had anchored me to the ground before had been snapped like Rosigold's neck.

I wondered if it had been Cairo's idea. This was one thing that wasn't the Capitol's fault; Tributes so bloodthirsty, so evil, that they made enemies of their fellows instead of our mutual oppressors. I'd have thrown up again if there had been anything in my stomach.

It was vile, and ugly, and so, so awful - and I think it was then that my reality really hit me. My only way through this was to win, and kill twenty-three - now fifteen, because of the two cannon shots from earlier - other humans in order to keep my own life.

My only way out was death.

I had known it before, but Rosigold's gruesome fate brought it into focus.

"I couldn't stay with them," whispered Peridot. Her voice shook.

I nodded, speechless for the second time in two days. I wasn't used to that; there were always words waiting on my tongue for whoever would listen - usually less than polite ones. But seeing this - hell, not seeing it, being in it - made those words seem empty. Meaningless.

If I did win, I doubted I'd have second thoughts about killing myself to defy the Capitol.

I felt a tug on the sleeve of my jacket; Hem was holding on to it. "Keep moving," she rasped. "Not safe."

I glanced back at the Careers, then at Peridot - whose green eyes were now lined with silver tears. "We're just an hour or so away from the cliffs now," she murmured.

For some reason, her sadness tugged painfully at my heart. "Okay."

We kept walking; the sun kept beaming like nothing terrible had ever existed. No one in Panem deserved this kind of weather, this kind of beauty - except perhaps the girl made of green and sunlight who strode beside me.

Chapter Text

We came across another dead body as the too-fucking-bright sun began to set.

Citron, Rosigold's district partner, was lying sprawled out in front of us when we left the woods. The boy from District Eleven was still bleeding, though he was long dead from an arrow to the heart. There was a patch of scarlet staining the long grass around him; the cliffs were beyond a small grassland area that sat between them and the forest.

It was too much for Hem; the small Tribute began to cry, wrapping her arms around my legs. Awkwardly, I patted her hair.

I was starting to wonder if my experiences in the last two days had messed up the way I interacted with other humans. I never seemed to know what to do anymore; when Mace or Peridot spoke to me, it took a few extra seconds for my brain to process how I was supposed to respond. The only impulses that came naturally now were those of a terrified animal. Run. Hide. Check for danger. Make sure my allies were unharmed.

We had run the last few minutes through the woods; at some point, Pamela from District Ten and Gage from Five had found us; it appeared the two had allied, and that Pamela wanted revenge for Skinner's death. Since no one was stupid enough to attack the Career pack, Pamela had come after us instead. I knew the heart-wrenching fear I'd felt every time another Tribute had come after me with a sharp object would never fully fade. My ribs almost ached from being pounded against.

The entire day had been a weird sort of alternation between walking, running, and stopping until one of us voiced the need to keep moving. By the time we found Citron, I was so hollow that all I could do was look. And I think that's all any of us could truly do; look. Imprint the horror on our memories, and never forget the sight.

Peridot reached for my hand; I would have pulled away if I wasn't so exhausted, was what I told myself. But she was the only person I could count on to help me - Mace was clever and Hem was close to my heart, but both of the younger Tributes were more for me to protect than to strengthen me. Peridot, on the other hand, was my age - and extremely strong, since she hadn't yet gone out of her mind.

And so I twined my fingers with hers and we stood there until Mace began to step toward the cliffs. The boy of District Two looked slightly green, but he was holding up well; he'd even gotten Hem to talk about her home in District Eight to him a little earlier. Now he led the young girl as well as me and Peridot toward what was hopefully shelter; Peridot didn't let go of my hand.

I would have pulled away if I'd gotten enough sleep. I would have.

But I hadn't, so I didn't.

We settled in the biggest cave we could find at the bottom of the sheer cliffs; in fact, they were less cliffs and more a pockmarked wall of stone. Nevertheless, I was grateful for our egg-shaped shelter.

I sat against the back of the cave, on the sand-strewn ground; Hem was tucked against my right side, Mace beside her. Both the youngsters had immediately passed out after collapsing to the sand; it seemed their tiredness outweighed their trauma. For now. Despite the deepness of their slumbers, both kids twitched and muttered every once in a while in a way that suggested endless nightmares.

Which were exactly the reason I couldn't sleep.

I'd managed to hold it together during the day, but every time I closed my eyes, I felt that damn trident stab Pontus again, saw Rosigold swinging from the Cornucopia, watched blood bubble from Citron's already-stopped heart.

I couldn't fucking breathe with them closed, and so my eyes remained open to see Citron's face appear in the sky through the cave entrance as that awful anthem played. One of the cannons from this morning must have been for him.

Apparently, the other was for Volt. Tears stung my eyes as the boy from District Five's youthful face gazed down at me from amongst the stars. I wondered where Ray was; surely the two would have left the Cornucopia together - and I wondered who had murdered Volt. I knew he was the first of my four young allies who would inevitably die here, but somehow that made it worse, made everything worse. I wished I hadn't promised Finnick I would win, wished I could walk up to the Careers and just leave. But I couldn't die yet, and I hated it; I didn't own my life, and I didn't own the end of it. It was all the Capitol's, all the property of that dickheaded fuck Snow.

I knew I was tired, because the curses I had learned from Jasper were far more prominent in my thoughts than anything else.

"Jo?" Peridot was sitting on my left; I rolled my gaze toward her.

"Hm?"

The District One girl was also watching Volt's picture fade from the dark sky. "I didn't help them do it. What - what they did to Rosigold. I ran as soon as - as they started. I - I couldn't stop them," she said, shakily and kind of suddenly. Like I was judging her, like I gave a fuck that she had run when we'd been running all damn day.

"I know," I whispered, voice gentler and quieter than my thoughts. "It's not your fault."

She sighed.

Maybe she was really just trying to convince herself of her own innocence, which was why I reached over, why I took her hand again. To comfort her. That was why I didn't move away when she scooched closer.

Why warmth spread through me when she laid her head on my shoulder.

Why the first real sleep I got in the arena was because Peridot Shire of District One was almost holding me. Or I was almost holding her.

Chapter Text

It was still dark when the Gamemakers decided we had it too easy.

Peridot woke me; I had one arm wrapped around her, and she brushed against my side as she shifted to sit on her knees, gazing out the cave entrance.

"You okay?" I rasped, blinking sleep from my eyes and tracking her line of sight.

"Um... I am for now," she whispered back and pointed.

I peered into the darkness; as my eyes adjusted, I realized there was movement out on the patch of grassland where we'd found Citron. His body was gone, likely taken by a hovercraft while we slept, and in its place were several wooly, trotting animals.

I heard a 'baa' and shook my head. "The Gamemakers made fucking sheep mutts? Of all the crazy shit to do..." I was still talking like Jasper; apparently once my foul-mouthed brother's dialect took hold, it was there to stay.

"Yeah. I guess you could say," Peridot grinned. "That this is really... baaaad."

I couldn't help but smile. "Super baaad. Just terrible. I'm sure if we went out there we'd get... rammed."

"I'm feeling really... sheepish right now."

That was it. I burst out laughing; so did Peridot, and we muffled our giggles by pressing our hands to each others' mouths.

Which did not at all make my face warm. No. I was flushed from... laughter. Not blushing.

I wasn't blushing.

Okay? I wasn't.

Mace stirred as our chuckling petered out; he crawled over to sit beside Peridot. "What's going on?" he muttered sleepily.

I tilted my head toward the cave entrance. "Sheep mutts."

Mace wrinkled his nose. "Sheep? Really? What do you think they do?" then he frowned. "Other than whatever normal sheep do," he added.

Hem came and sat next to me without a word, having woken up silently. She was shivering; I put a hand on her small shoulder.

"Maybe they're carnivorous - Capitol seems to love making cute things eat Tributes," said Peridot.

I looked over at her. "Are sheep cute?"

"Cuter than... ewe," Mace said with a straight face. It took me and Peridot a couple seconds to catch on; then we were laughing again along with him. What was it about sheep that prompted endless puns? Even Hem smiled wanly.

When I could talk again without giggling, I said; "I guess we just stay here until they leave?"

"We'll have go soon. Water's run out," Peridot gestured to the bottle she'd brought from the Cornucopia along with those granola bars; sure enough, Hem had drunk the last few sips that evening.

Mace sighed. "Let's stay for as long as we can, then. If they do eat people, none of us will get away alive."

Hem muttered something under her breath; I turned to the District Eight Tribute and asked what she'd said.
B

ut Hem only rose to her feet and moved toward the entrance. Peridot and I reached for her, realizing where she was going - but Hem dashed away suddenly.

As soon as she stepped out of the cave, the sheep bore down on her.

Mace screamed and tried to run after Hem, but I yanked him back. "There's no point!" I yelled over the frenzied baa-ing of the sheep - the fucking carnivorous sheep; Peridot had been right.

The girl from District one was sobbing; I felt tears slide down my own cheeks as blood stained the grass again.

It was worse than seeing Rosigold hanging from the Cornucopia, worse than stabbing Pontus - Hem was quite literally being torn to pieces alive.

It would have been better if she had been shrieking as well, but Hem was silent as the sheep ripped chunks off her; now Mace was limp in my arms, doubled over as he vomited. I let go of him and sank to my knees, dropping my gaze from the scene outside the cave and fixing my hands futilely over my ears, wishing I could do something, anything, to drown out the sounds of the Capitol's horrifying creations. I only realized I was screaming along with Peridot, who was crumpled to the ground beside me, when my voice broke.

I hoped Snow died thousands of times in every single fucking way he'd killed a Tribute. I hoped the Gamemakers' whole families got ripped apart as well, and I hoped every single psychopathic, shit-brained Capitol fuck who was watching this and not launching a rebellion right then and there dropped dead in their homes.

I didn't want to win anymore. I wanted to follow Hem out there. I couldn't watch another fourteen people die like this - couldn't even watch one more.

But I'd promised Finnick. My parents couldn't lose both kids. Ronan couldn't lose me as well as his sister. Hem couldn't have died in vain.

So I didn't throw myself to the sheep, but curled up on that sandy cave floor and cried. I had succeeded in not sobbing my eyes out in the Capitol; now I was justified in letting tears soak through me until all I had left was grief and anger, the two things that had fueled me since Jasper's Games. A cannon went off; when I looked up, still crying, it was over; pieces of Hem were strewn around the grass; Mace had his face turned away and was staring blankly at his hands. Peridot was shuddering against the wall. The sheep were gone, like they'd never appeared and ruined everything, as every single fucking monster from the Capitol always did - including the people who lived there.

The hum of a hovercraft reached my ears. Seconds after the sound, a kind of cross between a claw and a cage dropped down and scooped up what was left of Hem. The claw retracted into the hovercraft, and all that was left was blood and torn grass.

And horrible, horrible memories.

Chapter Text

I couldn't stop crying. Mace had now vomited at least three times, and Peridot was shaking uncontrollably next to me.

I almost hoped the Careers would stumble upon us now. It'd be a welcome distraction from the sudden, bottomless hollow feeling in my chest.

If my heart hadn't broken when my name was called at the Reaping, now it was split clean in two.

Hem was a child, was all I could think. An innocent child, who had died because she was fucking traumatized enough to calmly walk to her own death. Had her family back in Eight been watching? Hell, I didn't even know if she had siblings.

I barely knew anything about her; our time together in training had been spent in terror and those heart-shredding, clawed promises.

But I knew she was kind enough, in her quiet way, to help the others at the training stations. Knew she was clever enough to have won if she'd been older.

Knew she was pure and sweet and gentle enough that watching Skinner die, seeing the bloodbath that first day, had destroyed her inside.

I was spiraling into a rabbit hole of grief for the umpteenth time when Cairo dropped into the cave.

I had no idea where she'd come from; only that suddenly the young, crazy District Five Tribute was standing in the center of the sandy ground - was lifting two long knives - was leaping at Peridot.

"No!" Mace cried; I leapt to my feet as the District One girl wrestled with Cairo, pushing back while Cairo did her best to stab Peridot in the face.

I reached toward Cairo, but without sparing me a backward glance, the younger Tribute tossed one of her knives. To my surprise and horror, it caught the sleeve of my jacket and was thrown hard enough that I stumbled back.

Cairo was way too fucking strong for a twelve-year-old.

"Jo!" screamed Peridot, beautiful eyes darting to me, wide with fear.

Her distraction gave Cairo an opportunity to plunge the second knife into her side.

No, not her - not again - I took the knife from my sleeve and lunged for the District Six Tribute atop Peridot , plunging the blade into Cairo's back.

The screech that tore from her mouth was unearthly as I pulled her off the girl from One. Cairo didn't struggle when I tugged the knife free and laid her on the sandy floor.

In fact, the young girl from Five was smiling as blood began to redden her lips. "Won't... miss... District... Zero..." she rasped, so softly I barely heard.

But I wasn't paying attention to Cairo anymore; I ran to Peridot, shrugging my jacket off and pressing it to her bleeding side. "Can you hear me? Peridot!"

She blinked up at me. "I - Jo -" her gaze wavered; her blood was pooling on the ground beside her, so I pressed the jacket down harder. The knife hadn't punctured any vital organs - it couldn't have.

I think it was then that I accepted how much the ex-Career meant to me.

"Don't die, Peridot. Please, I need you, I-" I was rambling, but I needed her to stay awake, needed her to stay alive.

Peridot wrapped one hand around my left wrist as I kept the jacket against her wound. "I'm not going anywhere, Jo," she whispered. Too calmly. "I promise. I promise."

I wasn't crying, but my terror was somehow more primal than tears - fear of losing someone, instead of the emptiness after you did.

She closed her eyes for a long moment, corresponding with three wrenching cannon shots that seemed to shake the arena, and I had a few seconds of breathless, plummeting panic before they opened again. The fingers wrapped around my wrist moved toward the wound Cairo had inflicted, and that all-consuming dread softened enough for me to think straight. "Mace?" I said.

The District Two boy was sitting next to where Cairo lay still. "Yeah?"

"Can you hold this for a sec?"

Mace nodded and quietly moved over to take the jacket from me, holding it over Peridot's side. "I'll be right back," I murmured to both of them, then slipped out of the cave.

How did I treat a stab wound? I knew enough to try and stop the bleeding, but didn't it need something else? Peridot would need food soon, and water - now that I thought of it, I was parched, probably from crying.

Suddenly, I felt extremely stupid. What the fuck was I doing out here? I couldn't go off alone, and a lake wasn't just going to appear.

A sharp beeping noise suddenly sounded from above; I l saw a small metal canister falling from the sky, attached to a bright white parachute. When it landed in my outstretched hands, I looked up and smiled. The expression felt foreign on my face, even though I'd been laughing with Mace and Peridot just hours ago.

"Thanks, Annie," I said to the late afternoon sky nonetheless. This was my first sponsor gift; I was surprised I'd been donated enough money for even one, but I was grateful for it all the same.

My heart again threatened to tear out of my chest with fear when I stepped back into the cave and Peridot was asleep; but her breathing was steady, and Mace gave me a reassuring nod as I twisted the sponsor gift open. Inside the canister was a small bottle of water and a large roll of clean bandages; the water smelled faintly of salt.

"Why saltwater?" asked Mace, frowning as I took his place holding the jacket to Peridot's side.

I shrugged. "I think it's for cleaning the wound," I said. Axe accidents were common in Seven, and I remembered that Jasper had known how to stitch Dad's arm up when he nearly cut it off - I was maybe eight years old. My brother had rubbed salt into the torn skin first, saying something about infections.

Apparently this made sense, because Mace nodded.

Peridot muttered in her sleep, and I had to put a hand on her shoulder so she didn't toss and turn.

Chapter Text

I was bandaging Peridot's side, wrapping the gauze that Annie had sent us around her torso.

I kept that thought foremost in my mind because her shirt was off to make the bandaging possible, and she was so damn beautiful that I could barely breathe.

Also, her gorgeous eyes would not waver from my face.

This fact was more likely to kill me than the Gamemakers were.

She had woken up with the birds that morning, and Mace had helped me clean her injury with the salt water. She seemed fine now, if pale.

A hovercraft had come for Cairo earlier. I hadn't been able to look at the young Tribute's body; she seemed so tiny in death, so incapable of the savagery she'd displayed.

I had killed a twelve-year old. A child.

Yes, Cairo had been trying to hurt Peridot - had even succeeded - but she was still as old as Hem had been. And who knew what kind of shit she'd been through that had made her the way she was? The little girl from District Six was a victim - of the Capitol, of Snow - just like the rest of us. And yet I had stabbed her in the spine without thinking. Her family in Six, if she had one, had almost certainly been watching. Hell, my parents were watching,

Ronan was watching, Finnick was watching. They had all seen the monster I'd suddenly turned into.

By now, I'd lost track of how many times I had wondered if the cost of winning was too high.

From the sky display last night, I knew Cairo's district partner Gage was dead too - as well as Alloy from Twelve. They had been the other two cannons from after Peridot had been stabbed.

That meant there were twelve Tributes left; Damask and Terracotta from One and Two, Electron from Three, Maida from Nine, and Pontus from Four made up the Careers. There was me, Mace, Peridot, and then Foster, Ray, Linen from Eight, and both Tributes from Ten. Half of us were gone.

Me and my allies might die soon as well if we couldn't find any drinkable water.

As I finished the last bandage and sat back, Peridot tilted her head.

"What's District Seven like?" she asked quietly. Still watching my face.

I shrugged, the corners of my mouth tugging upwards despite everything. "Lots of trees. And axes," I said dryly; mostly I was trying to get her to smile.

I succeeded. "Yeah, I kind of guessed that, lumberjack girl," she told me, eyes sparkling.

That particular nickname hit me like a punch to the throat, but I smiled back at her anyways.
J

asper's friends had called him lumberjack once. And by friends, I mean allies.

In the arena.

Shoving the memories down as usual, I shifted to sit next to her, back against the cave wall. Mace had insisted on sitting watch just outside.

"The trees are really what I remember most. I've always thought of them as the strongest things in Panem - we cut them down over, and over, and over again, but the saplings always replace them. The trees always come back. And when you walk through the district... it's like you're surrounded by life, even though there's so much death around. If that makes any sense." I murmured.

Peridot nodded slowly. "One is the opposite. Everyone's always either making stuff to feed and clothe and ornament the Capitol or training for these Games. It's like we don't have our own lives - we're raised to exist just to help the Capitol run."

I loosed a soft breath. "Why would you volunteer, then? If you didn't like the way One is."

She shook her head. "I didn't want to volunteer. I... my sister was the one who got Reaped first, but she had a job and everything. A life. So my parents made me..." she sighed.

"I'm so sorry, Peridot. That's..."

The District One girl smiled a little, though her green eyes were fixed on the ground. "I'm glad I ended up here, though, in a weird way. Glad I met you," she looked up at me.

"I'm glad I met you, too," I said, because I wasn't sure what the fuck else I was supposed to say to that.

Mace stuck his head into the cave. "Can we go get water?" he asked, voice quiet and unlike him enough that I worried Hem's death had destroyed him the way the bloodbath had the little District Eight Tribute.

I nodded and stood slowly, Peridot following. As we packed up and left our cave, she took my hand.

"Jo?"

"Yeah?"

"People close to me really do call me Peri."

I smiled. "Okay, Peri."

And because I was an idiot, I felt hopeful.

Chapter Text

No one decent ever wins these Games.

And I'm not sure when I stopped being decent, but no good human would murder a child like Cairo.

Nor would any good human manage to keep her mind off it so well.

All I had to do was focus on Mace and Peridot, and Cairo leaves my head for hours at a time. What had I turned into, that it's that easy to forget? I certainly couldn't get rid of Hem's face in my mind's eye that easily, and I didn't kill her.

Well, not technically. Just by inaction. I probably could have saved her if I'd reacted sooner, stopped her from leaving that cave. Okay, so that was two kids' deaths on my hands; I wondered if Ronan was watching with disgust, wondering, like me, how I was managing to walk so calmly through the woods alongside my last two allies. We were in search of water; Peridot had insisted she was well enough to move, so we had set off as the sunrise finished and followed the cliffs until the grassland gave way to more trees. Nevertheless, I watched the District One girl carefully to make sure she really was okay.

I used one of Cairo's knives to slowly break a large stone as we walked, then to roughly whittle a sturdy fallen branch.

All I needed was some kind of twine, and I'd have a stone axe. Finally, a weapon.

And then the next time Pontus came for me with that trident, I'd cut his ugly head off.

Fucking Gamemakers. They'd really messed me up.

I should cut their heads off instead, but I'd have to get out of this damn arena first.

"Johanna?" for a stupid second I thought it was Ronan tugging on my sleeve; but I looked down and there Mace was, now walking on my right side while Peridot was on my left. He was gazing up at me with solemn grey eyes.

"Yeah?" I thought about trying to smile, but was worried it would come out weird and twisted and sad, like every other good thing did here.

Mace sighed. "Where did Hem go? I mean - after."

I missed a step and met Peridot's eyes; this was not a conversation I felt I'd be good at handling, especially not after there was so much blood on my hands.

Even when I washed it off, it would still be there. Red and endless and damning, evidence of my crimes.

Reminding me that I was as bad as President Evil Bastard Snow.

Peridot shrugged, so I turned back to Mace.

"Well, back in Seven we say that the earth takes us when we die," I said, remembering what Ronan's parents had once told me about Jasper.

"Takes you where?"

"Somewhere peaceful. A forest, or a garden, or... or a beach." more memories from Jasper's Games hit me, but I was practiced in ignoring them. "We have this tradition where we each get a seed from a specific kind of tree at birth - and then another on each of our birthdays after. Then, once we die, our loved ones plant the seeds all in the same place, somewhere special to us, and our tree grows from them."

Peridot's hand brushed mine. "What kind of tree are your seeds from?"

"An ash tree." there were seventeen flat green seeds in a carved box that Jasper had made me, in my bedroom back home.

I wondered if there would be an eighteenth.

Peridot entwined our fingers, and I felt warmth spread up my arm to cover my whole body.

"I hope I end up in a forest," said Mace. "We never had enough trees in District Two. Everything felt empty."

That doused me in cold sorrow. "I'm sure you will, kid," I murmured around the lump in my throat, ruffling his hair.

We continued in silence for a few minutes before I felt something hit the top of my head and looked up; the next raindrop hit my hand, and my allies stopped as well.

"Take out the canister," said Peridot. "We can catch the water."

Nodding, I dug the canister that had carried Annie's sponsor gift from my jacket and twisted it open as the sky opened in earnest; apparently, the Gamemakers didn't believe in spring showers, because within seconds, we were soaked and thunder was rumbling across the suddenly dark clouds like a thousand cannons. Mace smiled at the sky; Peridot swept her wet hair off her face and grinned at me.

The smile knocked me breathless as easily as if she'd actually stabbed me. In the dim light that the clouds had left for us, everything was in shades of deep green, like our shirts, or coal-grey. Except Peridot's eyes still managed to gleam emerald when she moved her head; they were bright with that spark of joy she could find in everything - the joy she managed to find in me, though I had thought it was long buried.

All three of us were laughing as we linked hands and raced for the cover of a tree with long, far-reaching branches. I positioned the canister on the quickly muddying ground just at the edge of the partial shelter to catch us freshwater, and we sat nearby it. Mace swiftly fell asleep upright with his knees tucked to his chest; Peridot dozed against my shoulder, and I watched the rain because I felt like an image of Hem's and Cairo's faces had been burned on to the backs of my eyelids.

"I love the rain," Peridot whispered softly. "It reminds me that things can be beautiful, even though so many ugly things exist."

"You remind me that things can be beautiful," I said, and was rewarded with a smile.

Then she sighed. "I keep wondering where my parents are. If they're okay - even though I'm here because of them."

"I think I'd wonder where my family was even if they had physically dropped me in this arena themselves." I whispered back, and realized it was true.

Peridot nodded slightly. "I keep imagining my little sister watching. I... I killed Cole in the bloodbath. The boy from Twelve. And I can't help but wonder if she even recognizes me."

I swallowed. "My brother, Jasper... he was in the sixty-fifth Games." already, these were words I hadn't spoken to anyone. "He killed a Tribute or two, as well, but I never stopped loving him. Never stopped hoping he would be the one to come home, before..."

She hugged me sideways and said, into my shoulder;

"Love is weird."

Chapter Text

I woke up with a hazy sense of unease.

It took a few minutes of carefully watching the trees to realize this was because there'd been no anthem last night, no faces in the sky.

No deaths.

Maybe this should have made me glad of the spared bloodshed, or disappointed that none of the competition had been eliminated for me, but all I felt was anxiety. Less death meant the Games were less fun to watch - and the Gamemakers hated it when Tributes were boring, because it meant they had to get off their evil asses and send things to kill us.

Or they loved it for the same reason.

Bastards.

Peridot's warmth shifted beside me as she lifted her head from where she'd fallen asleep on my shoulder. I felt the corners of my mouth curl in a small smile when she looked up at me.

"Morning, Peri," I murmured, rising to my feet next to her.

"Morning," she yawned, looking around.

I knew that look. It was the same one I'd had moments before - the one of checking what horrors had unfolded while you were unconscious.

I would see it another thousand times after that. Too many times.

The world blurred for a second at Peridot's next words.

"Where's Mace?"

The young District Two Tribute was no longer anywhere near the huge tree we'd camped out under; I lifted the now-full canister of rainwater from the mud, twisting it shut as Peridot paced toward the thicker foliage to the East.

"Jo, look at this," she called; I jogged over and nearly laughed in relief; a line of rain-ravaged footprints - small, but big enough to be Mace's - was visible from his place by our tree all the way through that Eastern foliage, winding between small, tangled trees and ferns until they disappeared from sight.

I thanked whatever sadistic, angry God was presiding over this shithole.

But it was too soon for thanks.

We followed the footprints East, and I quickly began to wonder whether we were, in fact, tracking Mace; I had barely any experience with tracking, but I was pretty sure footprints weren't supposed to stay this pristine, or this recognizable. But it was the only clue we had as to where the twelve-year old had gone, so I stayed silent and led the way along the too-perfect trail.

Bad decision. I made so many bad decisions.

Two.

Cannon.

Shots were all it took to send me and Peridot running down the trail of footprints.

Don't be Mace, don't be Mace - and there he was. Lying in a tiny clearing where the trees drew back just enough to see the sky. There was blood all over him - so much blood, I couldn't tell where it was coming from.

I stopped as soon as I saw the prone District Two boy, suddenly immobilized, my stare fixed on him.

No. No, no, no. I knew he'd die, knew they'd all die, but somehow... somehow I'd stopped thinking about it. Stopped distancing myself to protect my heart, like I'd been doing since Jasper's death. Stopped reminding myself that anyone could kill anyone. And now Mace was... was... there, and it hit me harder than Hem, harder than Cairo, because I hadn't looked at Mace and seen a Tribute. I had looked at Mace and seen Ronan. I'd seen a brother, a younger me.

I'd seen hope.

It felt like time had paused, the world had stopped to hold me here, shackled by horror. Everything was still - until Peridot ran past where I'd frozen, dropping to her knees beside Mace. "He's alive," she rasped after frantically checking his heartbeat. And then the universe was moving again and I was stumbling toward them, falling like a stone in water to sit next to the girl from District One.
Mace's grey eyes were open; they flicked over my face as I scanned him for injuries, trying to figure out where he was hurt, why the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed was too shallow.

"St- sto- stomach," he wheezed softly; I searched his torso as Peridot took the canister of rainwater from me and held it to Mace's chapped lips.

My heart thudded in my ears, reminding me that it was somehow still beating, when I saw blood bubble up to stain his teeth. His dark green Tribute shirt was too stained with crimson to tell where he was wounded, so I peeled it up, hands shaking; my mind went blank when I saw the gaping, bleeding knife hole in Mace's abdomen.

Crunch. Something - someone - landed in the leaf litter off to our left.

Another behind.

Two - heavier - on our right.

Slowly, Peridot moved one hand, stained with Mace's blood, to take mine; she gripped the hilt of the knife from Cairo with the other hand, where it hung at her belt. I lifted the other knife from my own-

And Terracotta, Mace's district partner, landed right in front of us - only his body and quickly shortening breaths between us and the Career.

"Look what we've caught. A squirrel and a gemstone," hissed Terracotta, a cruel smile tilting her mouth upwards.

I tilted my head, carefully shifting into a fighting stance with Cairo's knife held in front of me. "I'm a squirrel? Then you must be a Peacekeeper, Two. What'd you do to end up in here?"

The Career's dark eyes narrowed. "Bitch."

"Your insults are getting less and less creative, Capitol pet." I forced a cocky grin onto my face. Talking - mocking - made it easier to pretend I wasn't scared out of my fucking mind. Maybe I should have kept the Weak Tribute Johanna facade up and running, but I didn't know how that would help me now.

Luckily, that decision was out of my hands. I wouldn't have to fake being a weak coward - there was nothing pretend about the fear that slammed into my lungs as another, deeper voice - Pontus - sounded from the left.

"You're a chatterbox," he jeered.

Another voice from behind. "That's what makes squirrels so easy to kill. They lead you right to them, with all that noise," drawled Maida from District Nine, grinning as I whirled to face her. Peridot and I were now back to back.

Electron chuckled, emerging from the trees next to Pontus; Damask strolled over to stand opposite them.

We were surrounded.

Damask tsked. "Peri, Peri, why would you join the weaklings? We've been searching for you - and look, you've come back. What d'you guys say we give dear Peri a proper welcome home?" Peridot's district partner leered around at the rest of the Careers, who laughed. I pressed closer to Peridot, feeling her muscles tense as she anticipated an attack.

"'Nother thing about squirrels. They're quite stupid, and easy to trap," Maida pitched in; my gaze flicked back to her and I felt the blood drain from my face.

Trap. It was a trap.

Mace was a trap - those footprints, the ones that were too perfect, had been planted to lead us - to -

Fuck.

The Careers had led us here to kill us; my Weak Tribute Johanna routine hadn't convinced them I wasn't a threat - no, it had marked me as an easy target. Marked Peridot as one by association. Watching Damask's eyes dance, hearing Pontus laugh lowly, meanly, I realized.

They were just as bad as the Capitol, as vile as Snow, as sadistic as the Gamemakers. Our deaths would be sport to them, something to laugh about later, something to boast about. Our lives were nothing to them.

Maybe it wasn't their fault. Maybe they'd been conditioned to think like that by Snow's fucked-up speeches and whatever other shit he used to convince everyone the Games were a good thing. But blame didn't matter in the arena - blame didn't matter at all, when the Careers' thirst for blood would kill us regardless of who had made them this way.

"Aw, are you a little scaredy-squirrel? You scared?" I could hear the smirk in Terracotta's voice.

"Are you?" Peridot threw the words at her. "Looks to me like you're too terrified of us to take another step."

I felt my nails scrape against the smooth black handle of the knife in my hand, then dig into my palm. My heart pounded hard enough in my ears to make me a little dizzy - or maybe that was just terror.

It was only when Electron charged at me that I spied the axe in his hand. The muscled Tribute from Three raised the weapon over his head, poised to slice me in two - but he obviously wasn't used to using an axe.

The first lesson I'd teach if I happened to feel like giving axe-swinging lessons; do not ever leave your torso fully exposed. It is the most idiotic fucking move you could make.

As the burly Career began to bring the axe down, I ducked, holding the knife like a spear as I dove for Electron's stomach.

He howled as I jammed my knife between his ribs - and then I was sidestepping as he fell to the ground, grabbing the handle of his axe as he flailed, and slamming the butt of it into his nose.

Now I had an axe.

Now I was a menace.

It was so easy - too easy - to swing the weapon sideways at Pontus when he leapt over Electron's writhing body, trident in hand. Too easy to revel in the rush as the prongs of the trident clanged against the head of the axe, too easy to shove the male District Four Tribute's weapon aside and swing for his neck.

He blocked again, snarling. "Trees can be felled, bitch-squirrel."

I grinned as our weapons clashed over and over, the axe an extension of my arm - of my soul. "I've heard fish are quite delicious. Easy-" another swing straight at his head, another block - "easy to catch, as well."

I faltered at a scream - Peridot's scream - from behind me, earning a painful slash down one arm.

Shit - shit, the District One girl's side wasn't fully healed -

I gritted my teeth against the pain as warm blood began to trickle down my arm, swinging my axe again and again and again, meeting the prongs of the trident again and again and again. Pontus's grin blurred as sweat dripped into my eyes; finally, I grabbed the shaft of his trident on the next swing and tugged him toward me, bringing my knee up -

I hoped Finnick was watching as I kneed Pontus in the balls; he screeched and stumbled back. The hem of his shirt rode up, and I caught a glimpse of a dark scar where I'd stabbed him during the bloodbath for half a second before my axe came down.

And his head.

Thumped.

To the leaves coating the the forest floor.

Too easy. I wasn't horrified enough, wasn't frozen as I whirled away from the Tribute's headless, falling body and ran to where Peridot was miraculously holding her own, the knife in her hand coated with blood as she battled Maida.

But Peridot was leaning on her left leg, wincing whenever a movement tugged the wound that was barely healing to begin with on her right side. I swung at Maida, but the District Nine girl was fast - and a better fighter than Electron or Pontus. She wove out of the way; only when she spotted the two male Tributes' bodies did she shoot a glare at me and step backward - I flung myself into the next swing, my axe making contact with one of her legs for a moment before she tore away and disappeared into the trees.

I turned - and saw Terracotta grabbing Damask's arm. The two ran in the opposite direction from Maida as Peridot leaned on me; I wrapped an arm around her waist and swore softly as I felt new blood soaking her shirt.

There were a few seconds of silence; even the birds, the wind, had shut up and watched us fight the Careers.

Then; "Not bad, squirrel." breathed Peridot.

A broken, shaky laugh escaped me. "Not bad yourself, gemstone."

Three cannons sounded then.

Three.

Pontus, Electron...

And...

Holding each other up, me and Peridot stumbled toward Mace.

Mace's body.

Those shallow breaths had stilled.

The axe slipped from my fingers as we stared at him.

The stars were laughing.

They didn't care.

They were like Snow.

Smiling as Panem was smothered in pain.

As my heart slowly divided into even more pieces.

Both Peridot and I flinched when the anthem blared, barely waiting for the sun to fully yield before the Gamemakers displayed the victims of that day.

First were Pamela from Ten and Linen from Eight - Skinner and Hem's district partners respectively. I couldn't bring myself to feel anything for them - couldn't muster the energy to feel sorrow. It was like after Jasper had died; all I knew was anger - except for the green-eyed girl sitting beside me. She closed those eyes when Mace's face appeared in the sky; silently, I twined my fingers with hers as his face gave way to Electron's, then Pontus's.

As that horrible anthem faded, the tree in front of us yawned.

We were just a few meters away from the tiny clearing where a hovercraft had left only bloodstained leaf litter where Mace, Pontus, and Electron had died; at the soft yawn - barely loud enough to be heard over the chirping of nighttime insects - I wrapped one hand around the handle of the axe which rested beside me and rose to my feet.

I tilted my head up to search the branches; it was a small tree by a lumberjack's standards, and when the leaves above me rustled, I hefted my axe.

The ground was rocky beneath the leaf litter; Peridot carefully rose and moved to my side. "Are you going to cut it down?" the words were soft, and - terrifyingly - hollow, like she didn't care one way or another. Maybe I was imagining that, but it scared me nonetheless when I remembered the look on Hem's face before those fucking sheep...

Deep breath. Lift axe.

Swing. Hit trunk.

Repeat.

The easy motions were almost instinctive, the effect immediate; I was transported back to Seven, to safety, to home. To Jasper showing me how to make sure the tree fell where I wanted it to. To believing this was what my life would be; axe and tree and calm. Not blood, not fear, not anger.

Not that scary, too-understandable hollowness.

I felt rather than heard Peridot step back, quietly watching me as the wood thudded in protest. Back home, I would have said a quiet apology to the tree, thanked it for the wall or furniture or firewood that it would become.

But this wasn't really a tree - this was something the Gamemakers made, something they owned.

And I would make no apologies for destroying it.

My swings were even, measured - yet grew harder and more vicious as Snow's face flashed in my mind's eye, then the Gamemakers on that stupid platform where they sat for the presentations, then Colwort, then back to Snow. No, the tree was no longer a tree; it was everyone I hated. Everyone who represented the Capitol. Everyone who had cheered when I killed Pontus and Electron, everyone who would cheer for my death anyway.
Snow; swing. Gamemakers; swing. Colwort; swing. Peacekeepers; swing. Caesar Flickerman; swing. On and on, until the moon - the fucking Gamemakers' moon - had truly risen and I'd hacked away enough of the wood that the tree had begun to tilt to the left.

As it fell, I could hear Jasper's cheer, see my parents smile in a way that they hadn't for seven years.

I stepped smoothly back, Peridot following, as we watched the tree crash over the little clearing.

A shouted curse, a snap, and silence. Then a cannon shot. I was right; there had been a Tribute hiding in the tree. Peridot cautiously led the way along the fallen trunk until we reached the point - around three-quarters through the clearing where Mace's blood still stained the ground - where branches began to split from the trunk.

A few more steps toward the top of the tree, and the fallen Tribute was visible - his neck snapped on impact and stuck at an odd angle, his dark hair longer than the last time I'd seen him and his frame thinner.

It was Foster. My district partner.

I'd just killed...

Foster.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck - this couldn't be happening-

I swayed on my feet, barely feeling Peridot's hand on my shoulder. She must have recognized the boy lying on the leaf-strewn ground in front of us, dead - dead because of me -

What were they thinking back home? Did Foster's family assume I had known it was him in that damn tree?

Somehow, killing was more real when my victim came from my own district. I almost chuckled at the thought; was that how the Capitol would feel if their children were sent with us into the Games? Is that what they needed to see it, to understand the pain, the sorrow, the hatred - would it be different for them then?

"Jo." Peridot stepped in front of me, now with both her hands on each of my arms. "Johanna, listen to me. You didn't know."

I shook my head, half-delirious with sheer disbelief. I had just killed a boy I knew - someone I'd gone to school with, someone I'd known the name of before these last, awful days. Before the Capitol had - before Snow had turned me into this. This killing machine, this person who had murdered three people today and only cared about one.

This monster.

The word thudded in my ears, in time with my damned heartbeat. Monster, monster, monster.

Monster for not saving Hem, monster for stabbing Cairo, monster for so easily ending Electron and Pontus's lives.

Monster for killing my own district partner.

Peridot's green eyes wavered and blurred in my vision; I realized tears had escaped my eyes only when the female District One Tribute brushed them from my cheeks with her fingertips. "You didn't know, it's not your fault." she whispered. "You didn't know."

But I had known for the others. Hell, I had smiled as I stuck that knife in Electron's gut, had enjoyed beheading Pontus. Had been relieved when that feverish light had faded from Cairo's eyes.

Damned. Murdering. Monster.

Peridot's steady gaze was the only thing that kept me breathing as she led me back into the trees.

When I slept, I dreamed of blood that coated my hands - only it wasn't Hem's, or Mace's, or Cairo's, or the Careers'.

It was hers.

Chapter Text

A grin on Ronan's sister's face that matches his exactly.

A brown-haired girl who looks like Annie but older, hugging my brother.

Jasper throwing an axe.

Yelling as a dagger hits his defenseless chest.

Falling.

A cannon that destroyed my eleven-year-old life.

I jerked awake next to Peridot, who was still dozing against the trunk of yet another tree.

My head dropped into my hands as my reality came into focus. I was still in the arena, despite the flashes of Jasper's face - and Rowan's - that plagued my mind.

Wait. I looked up at the too-perfect blue sky the Gamemakers had graced us with today, thinking. Counting.

This was the sixth day of the Games.

Today was Jasper's birthday.

He would have been twenty-five, if he hadn't gotten stabbed exactly on his nineteenth birthday. He should have been free then, should have been safe from the Reaping, but it was too late; he was already in the arena by then, in the Sixty-Fifth Games - with Finnick and Rowan and... I searched my memory for the name of Finnick's district partner from that year.

Caprice. Caprice Cresta. Annie's older sister.

A humorless smile curled my lips upward. The Crestas, it seemed, were as unlucky as us Masons. Both children Reaped and sent to die.

Fucking wonderful. I was crying again.

Slowly, carefully, I tugged on the small thread of leather that still sat, forgotten until now, around my neck. Lifted the vial attached to it. Stared at the dried, weary pine needles inside.

Needles that Jasper had carried, that had hung at his collarbone for six days until Finnick had taken the pine necklace off my brother's dead body and brought it home to me. Until, back in Seven, we had buried the eighteen pinecone seeds Jasper had collected for each of his years, while Rowan buried the nineteenth - the last one - in that year's arena.

Slowly, I uncorked the vial and took a short, sparing breath of the pine scent that had been Jasper's.

When Peridot woke, I didn't tell her what day it was. I had Foster's death as an excuse to be grieving.

She didn't need to feel worse on my part. She shouldn't have to feel sorry for a monster.

When the sun finally set, I watched the shadows lengthen and wondered if today's lack of cannons - lack of death - had been the universe's attempt at an apology.

Chapter Text

The next day, the universe stopped apologizing.

A cannon rent the air almost as soon as the sun rose; then, as me and Peridot slowly used up our canister of rainwater and steadily grew hungrier, we came across a pond.

There were several small, furry hooved things around it.

"Are those goats?" Peridot murmured from beside me, where we stood maybe twenty meters from the pond.

"I have no idea."

They were, in fact, goats.

If goats grew sharp teeth and attitudes worse than President Child-Murderer Snow's.

I hefted my axe in one hand as the foliage across the pond wavered, revealing a slim, limping form. Her black hair was cut short, her leg wrapped in some kind of brown fabric. Maida; it seemed my axe blow to her leg had done at least some damage. The District Nine girl, however, didn't appear to know what had happened to Hem; she paused warily, but strode toward the pond in a straight line, disregarding the goats.
It took seconds.

So much like the little District Eight girl.

Bile rose to my throat as the animals flickered between those stupidly cute goats and the sheep from those early days, as I saw not Maida but Hem being ripped apart again. Peridot's trembling hand was in mine once it was over, and I felt her flinch in my bones when Maida's cannon went off.

And yet, I was so full of anger, so full of pain... that there was no space left to feel for the fifteen-year old who was now strewn in pieces near the pond. No space for tears to well as a hovercraft hummed in, doing its best to scrape all of her together.

Apparently, the goats were satiated, because they trotted off as a pack - a herd? What do you call a bunch of goats? Never mind, I don't give a fuck - toward where Maida had emerged from the trees.

Peridot, of course, was braver than I was; she took the first step toward the pond, screwing the now-empty canister open once she'd ascertained the goats were gone and dipping it into the pond. I followed after a few seconds like the coward I was. "Think that's safe to drink?"

She shrugged. "We don't have a choice, do we?"

As usual, she was right. I nodded, glancing around - frowning when I spotted a small, grey, furry carcass a little way away. It looked like Maida had managed to stab one of the goats before they'd eaten her; its lidless bovine eyes were glassy and empty.

Looked like the dinner menu was murderous goat and pond water.

Chapter Text

The two days after Maida's death - and that of little Ray from District Five, as we discovered that night - passed without particular event; I got the feeling the Gamemakers didn't bother to be creative, since we kept passing suspicious groups of animals - sharp-horned cows and horses with bloodstained muzzles, for example - but me and Peridot easily avoided them.
Four Tributes were left, including the two of us. Only Terracotta and Damask remained.

And I couldn't help but notice that dodging those cows and horses brought us ever closer to the Cornucopia, and presumably the center of the arena.

As the sun began to set on the ninth day, Peridot paused while we settled our weapons, water, and the last of the food from the dead goat mutt in preparation to sleep. "What if we just go?"

I looked over at her. "What?"

"The Gamemakers obviously want us to go to the Cornucopia. Damask and Terracotta must be there. Why not just end it?"

Something caught in my chest. "Peri..."

She took the few steps between us and reached over to hold both my hands in hers. "We're only postponing the inevitable. At some point, the Capitol will get bored and they'll send something in to kill some of us and leave a Victor - which will probably be one of the Careers." she paused. "We have to win. Either me or you. One of us has to be free."

I closed my eyes, willing the tears away. When I opened them, Peridot's green gaze bored into me.

"Okay." I whispered finally, and stepped away to grab my axe.

Moonlight gleamed off the golden Cornucopia, turning it pale as a ghost; I whirled my axe once or twice in one hand as me and Peridot stepped past the ring of trees, approaching the pedestals where each Tribute had stood on that first day.

It seemed like years ago; most of the people who'd been on those pedestals were gone. There was no trace of their presence here, nothing to remind the world that this was where those twenty peoples' lives had changed forever, and changed for the worse. As if they had never existed.

Peridot was staring at the pedestals that had belonged to Mace and Hem; I put my free hand on her shoulder, nodding slightly when her green eyes met mine. She nodded back; the determination in her face was enough to make me want to cry again.

The moon was at its summit when Damask swaggered from the Cornucopia's mouth - where, to my sudden nausea, Rosigold's half-rotted skeleton still hung by its neck. It seemed the hovercraft hadn't been able to reach her.

I would have no problem ending the last two Careers.

"Peri, darling." Damask's grin was pure evil. "Tired of waiting to die?" there was a sword in his hand, which he tossed up in the air and caught by the hilt as Terracotta followed him, yawning like a cat.

"Oh look, the squirrel's back." Mace's district partner drawled, a long machete dangling from her fingers.

"Do you think Snow will cry when we kill you both?" I snapped back at the two. "Think he'll miss you Capitol pets warming his bed?"

Terracotta smirked. "Well, I'm sure your best friends - the trees, that is - will miss you back in Seven, squirrel. Maybe your parents will visit your dead body, even though they couldn't be bothered to give you a farewell."

Shock rippled through me for a moment. How could the Careers know I hadn't seen my family after the Reaping? But I quickly smoothed over my expression. It didn't matter.

The axe in my hand practically hummed with anticipation, or maybe that was me - maybe I was shaking with exhaustion and need to end this whole fucking nightmare.

"What a shame you won't be alive to find out if they do," I shot back at the female Tribute of District Two with a cocksure smile, before hefting my axe and running straight at her.

Terracotta laughed, a wild, half-hysterical sound, as she brought her machete up to meet the head of my axe. Somewhere to our right, there was a clang and a grunt as Peridot rushed at Damask with the long knife she still had from Cairo.

"I guess Peacekeepers aren't as good fighters as I thought, Two," I jeered at Terracotta as she backed toward the Cornucopia under my blows. Rosigold's corpse swayed sickeningly behind her, like the little golden-haired girl from Eleven could tell these Games - this session of thoughtless slaughter - was coming to an end.

Terracotta's grin was feral. "What do you train against, trees?" she cackled and backed up another step, letting me think I had her - and then, without warning, went on the offensive. I stumbled, quick reflexes the only barrier between me and that machete.

Damask yelled in fury nearby, but I couldn't spare a glance to check if Peridot was all right - I desperately swung for Terracotta's head, relief rushing through me along with adrenaline when she blocked. At least I hadn't totally lost my footing.

But now we were evenly matched, trading blows swiftly. It reminded me of fighting Pontus, though Terracotta fought less with brute strength and more with speed - darting her machete over my defenses, looking for weaknesses.

Another shout from Damask and a thud that suggested he'd fallen, followed by a cannon, and Peridot was at my side, her knife sweeping toward Terracotta's torso; it was a mark of the District Two Tribute's skill that she managed to dodge and continue, now battling both of us.

But with two against one, it didn't take long for her head to roll off her neck and bounce morbidly once on the grass, courtesy of my axe.

Standing about half a meter in front of me, Peridot panted, knife dangling at her side.

We'd done it. We'd killed both remaining Careers.

But... that left just us. Me and Peridot were the last two Tributes.

And there could be only one Victor.

Chapter Text

I saw the realization in Peridot's eyes flicker just after my own.

One of us had to die.
I

loosened my grip on the axe until the head thumped against the grass just as Terracotta's had, my fingers wrapped around the handle the only thing keeping the weapon from fully falling. For once, I couldn't read the District One girl's green eyes as we stared at each other, silence falling over the arena. Not even a breeze disturbed the quiet; the Gamemakers really were going for dramatic effect.

I hoped each and every one died an excruciating death as Peridot let the hilt of her knife slip from her fingers and left it behind, taking a step toward me. "Go on."

"No," I whispered, stepping back as her words hit me. She was... was asking me to... "Peri, I can't-"

Peridot strode forwards again, until there were barely centimeters between us. "Kill me, Jo. Win. Live." she paused, eyes shining, her breath shuddering. "Please."

I felt a sudden, small sob tear from me, shaking my head. "No. I can't - I won't -"

"You have to win. I don't..." she ran a hand through that beautiful dark hair. "I don't want to anyway."

I flinched. "Peridot..."

It was the worst kind of agony. Worse than anything Snow could do to me. Worse than anything I'd ever felt, because I could have saved her. She could have saved herself.

But instead, seeing the inability in my face, she turned. Stepped back to where the knife lay - a knife that had been carried by a broken child, a knife that had killed Peridot's district partner.

She lifted it and looked back at me. Looked back as I followed her, confused.

And then brought the knife up

And

then

it was leveled at her heart.

"NO!" Tears escaped along with the raw scream as I ran the last few steps to her, reaching out to grab her wrist, to take the knife - to stop her from -

Peridot Shire gave a small, sorrowful smile - fucking smiled as she plunged the blade into her chest.

"Peri- Peridot-" I caught her as she fell backwards, dropped to my knees with her head in my lap. "Stop- stop!" I half-sobbed, half-screamed. She raised one weak hand to brush one hand along my cheekbone.

"Find your freedom, Jo."

I caught her hand and twined my fingers with hers. "Please, Peri, you're everything - please-" I bent to press my forehead to hers, my tears dripping down to mingle with the trace of blood that had appeared on her lips.

One of my hands hovered over the knife in her heart, but I didn't have anything to stop the bleeding if I pulled it out. My other hand clenched in her shirt at her waist as I searched her eyes - the green eyes, the eyes that looked like trees and sunlight and home.

Peridot made a tiny movement that might have been a head shake as she swept the hand at my cheek to the back of my neck, wrapping her fingers into my hair. Slowly, too slowly, she didn't have the seconds - she pulled me down to brush her mouth against mine. "Promise me you'll find it," she breathed against my lips.

And then the hand in my hair

went

limp.

"I promise," I muttered through the broken sounds that now escaped me of their own will. "I promise."

My heart was already shredded. I thought the claws of that vow couldn't hurt me.

I was wrong.

Chapter Text

I couldn't let go of her.

I heard a hovercraft buzz overhead, knew they had come for me, but all I was frozen yet again, staring at Peridot's slack face.

Her green eyes were still open, glassy and stuck fixed on mine despite their emptiness.

She was gone. And yet I couldn't force my arms from around her, couldn't look away.

I'd thought I was willing to win and then throw it in Snow's face at any cost. Thought it would be worth it.

But nothing was worth this, worth her life - the life that shone like a star, like the gemstone she'd been named for. The life that had brightened everything, even as Hem and Mace and - and Peridot herself had walked toward their own deaths.

Even as I knew I would walk to mine.

President Snow would pay for this; I wasn't just going to kill myself when I stood the Capitol up.

I would take the evil bastard with me, and I would fucking laugh as I did it.

Of course, I had no idea how - only anger and grief and agony had places in me right now. I only realized I was shaking when it jostled Peridot's body ever so slightly; I shifted my grip on her as new tears re-traced the tracks of salt on my face.

I guess the Gamemakers or Snow or whoever the fuck was in the hovercraft above me got bored with watching the aftermath of their murder, because the same claw-cage thing that had lowered itself from the previous hovercrafts - the ones that had lifted the other dead Tributes, that had brought Hem and Mace and Cairo home. That had moved Pontus, Electron, Terracotta, and Foster from the places where I'd killed them.

Somewhere in my grief-crazed mind, I wondered if they'd secretly sent someone down to search for the severed heads that I'd let roll away.

The claw lowered around where I still clutched Peridot's limp form, clanking when it snapped shut. I watched the ground recede, watched the bloodstains left by the final Careers - the last two grass bloodstains of the year, I thought hysterically - grow smaller and smaller until the hovercraft swallowed us up .

Darkness. Then I was awash in artificial light, painfully harsh after so much time in only the glow of the sun and the radiance that Peridot carried. I only cared about the change because in the light, I could see her face again.

Not that it mattered. That face would never move again, never smile again.

And yet.

"Miss Mason, we need you to let go of Miss Shire, please." A gentle female voice preceded a tall, stiffly moving woman in a form-fitting grey dress; I looked up to find the source of the sound, bringing the room around us into focus. It must have been the hovercraft's hold; the light, though harsh, was dim, and the metallic grey walls were curved inwards. The claw-cage was gone.

“Miss Mason?” The woman stepped closer as I glanced around.

It took me a second to process her, where I was, what she’d said.

That I had to let go.

Mute with adrenaline and wrenching grief, I shook my head. The woman in the grey dress sighed.

“Miss Mason, I understand this is difficult, but we must send her back to her family in District One.”

Peridot’s family - the family that had made her volunteer, the family who had sent her to the Games in the first place.

They had basically killed her. No, I would not be letting go. Those people would not have her.

The woman in the grey dress moved ever closer; I shifted backward on my knees, curling my arms protectively around Peridot’s body. “No,” I rasped finally. “No.”

She sighed. "I will ask you one more time, Miss Mason. Let go of Miss Shire, or I must employ force."

A choked, humorless laugh fell from my throat. Employ force? I'd seen plenty of fucking force. I could employ some force myself if it came to it. This bitch's head would be rolling on the floor if she touched me or Peridot.

That was when gloved hands clamped over my shoulders. I writhed, twisting to spot the masks of two Peacekeepers before they took my arms and began to try and drag me away - away from Peridot. "No-" I flipped, tugging them toward me with their grips on my arms and trying to kick at their shins.

One of them cursed at me. "Little Seven whore."

I bared my teeth, pure instinct and rage the only things keeping me awake as I wriggled in the Peacekeepers' grip.

I heard the grey-dressed woman's heels clack behind me, felt a prick in my arm.

Stopped struggling. Looked down.

Saw the needle.

Then nothing.

Chapter Text

I woke up with a pounding headache.

And, unfortunately, a pounding, still-living heart.

Yet there was a numbness in my chest, where my grief for Peridot and for the other Tributes and for the massive pile of shit that was my life resided. A soothing , like something had put those shredding, all-consuming emotions to sleep.

I was still angry, but not burning with it.

"Johanna?" A soft voice. Almost timid.

A voice I'd known there was a significant chance I'd never hear again.

"Annie," I greeted my mentor in a half-whisper, throat raw from screaming. I couldn't quite remember when I'd screamed exactly, but it must have been around the time Peridot...

I locked that thought up in chains and shoved it to the corner of my brain where I kept my memories of Jasper, propping myself up on one elbow. The cot beneath me was thin but practically buried in white sheets; I spotted a discarded IV and several syringes on a small metal table nearby.

Annie shifted in her chair against the wall. Her sea-green eyes were downcast. "I'm so sorry." she murmured. As if it was her fault.

I focused on that numb feeling, let it shove aside the grief. "Where are we?"

"The Tribute Center; you've been out for a day or so. The recap is in a few hours."

"I wasn't 'out'." I said. "They sedated me."

She shrugged.

The rest of Annie's words sunk in. The recap - I'd have to watch the Games on that damned stage with damned Caesar, watch everyone die again in front of the whole Capitol.

Fuck.

I opened my mouth to ask another question, but the plain grey door across from the cot swung ajar, admitting the tall woman in the grey dress from before. Two people - presumably doctors - in long white coats followed her. At a jerk of the head from one of them, Annie rose from her chair and disappeared through the door.

I glared up at the three, flashes of Peridot lying broken on the floor of the hovercraft hold appearing in my mind's eye. "What do you fucking want?"

The woman smiled. "Miss Mason, I apologize for our lack of hospitality. I'm afraid I did warn you."

Peridot falling from my arms. The Peacekeepers struggling to hold me. The needle.

My eyes darted to the little metal table. I couldn't trust these people. "What. Do. You. Fucking. Want."

"We'll just take some tests. Check that you're healthy."

Healthy? I hadn't been fucking healthy since I was eleven years old.

One of the doctors lifted a syringe from the table. "I'll have to sedate you again," he said.

Fuck no. I watched him approach, gaze flicking from the suspiciously long needle to his throat.

When the sharp point came too close to my arm for comfort, I wrapped my fingers around the syringe and ripped it from his hand. The doctor yelped, stumbling back as I swung upright from the cot; the grey-dressed woman and the other doctor half-tripped over it as they tried to rush over and stop me.

In seconds, the needle was buried in the first doctor's neck.

And another was buried in my shoulder.

Chapter Text

They hadn't bothered to wake me up in order to dress me.

When my eyes opened, I was in another stupid tree dress - courtesy of Rumina, who stood in front of the hard chair I was slumped into.

"Rise and shine JoJo!" chirped a voice from behind her; Ariadne's smiling, powder-dusted face appeared over the stylist's shoulder.

I winced. The stupid nickname was too close - for a moment I was staring into green, sunlit eyes, before Medea popped up on Rumina's other side with a clack of her tall green heels.

"Is she still on the morphling?" Medea asked, peering at me.

Rumina took a step toward me. "They took the IV drip out, but it might take a while to leave her system."

With a dazed, vague kind of horror, I realized the numbness was slowly retreating from my chest, leaving the raw agony to beat against my ribcage.
I

couldn't bring myself to ask for it back. Couldn't bring myself to care.

Maybe the pain and the memories would kill me.

Maybe I hoped they did; I wasn't sure I could make it through the recap, much less the Victors' tour. Find your freedom, Peridot had told me - well, where in this fucked-up world would I be freer than in death?

I realized the prep team had been chattering on about something; now Rumina flashed me a shiny Capitol smile. "We're going up, hun. You'll get onstage last, after Annie."

Onstage?

Ariadne, Carmenta, and Medea clacked their way to a small, slightly raised platform a few meters from where I sat. As soon as they got on, it rose upwards - the rectangle of wood slotting into the ceiling above.

And then a cheer shook the walls - a Capitol cheer.

Fuck, we must have been under the stage - in the auditorium where Caesar had interviewed the Tributes. This meant I'd been sedated for the whole journey to the recap.

The three-hour recap of the Games. Which I would now have to watch.

As the emptied platform lowered once more and Rumina stepped on to it, rising to ever more cheers, a hand touched my shoulder; I whirled instinctively, almost elbowing Annie in the face.

Her solemn, sea-hued eyes appraised me as she took a calm step back. "Be careful out there. Snow's covered up the doctor you killed, but he'll be watching you."

I knew things were dire if Annie was the calm one. "...Okay."

In silence, I watched as Colwort appeared in the shadows and followed Rumina on to the platform - then as Annie went up after him.

The platform lowered soundlessly again. My turn.

I wondered if I could just not get on, wondered if I could run. How far would I make it back to Seven before the Peacekeepers gunned me down? Maybe it'd be easier than sitting through this.

My legs disagreed; I was walking toward the platform, it was rising -

- then suddenly I was back in the Tribute tubes and my heart was pounding with terror and it was the arena above me, not the stage -

And then Caesar's voice was booming through the auditorium, the barely dressed citizens of the Capitol leaping and howling below.

"Here. Is. Our. VICTOR!!!" he yelled to another round of ear-splitting cheers.

Caesar beckoned me to a throne-like chair a few steps away, rotated enough that I could see the huge, blank screen at the back of the stage from it.

"Now, Johanna." the host began with artificial seriousness. "How do you feel?"

I stared at him. There was no need to avert my eyes now, no reason to pretend I was anything but angry. Weak Tribute Johanna had died with Peridot.

"Like shit," I answered him shortly. Truthfully.

Chuckles rose from the audience; Caesar threw back his head and laughed, bright orange wig flopping. "Ah, are you sure the other Tributes didn't die of laughter? You're certainly armed with your humor!"

I didn't respond for a moment, glaring at him. They thought that was funny? Had they laughed at the Games too? Had they still been giggling over our sheep puns as Hem died?

"Wish I was armed with an axe right now," I said. In that moment, I actually rather wished I had a knife so I could slice him into little shreds.

I'd make fucking Caesar salad.

His smile stayed in place, though I caught a flash of cowardice in Caesar's eyes as he wisely refrained from laughing again. "Let's begin, shall we?"

And so, on the screen behind the stage, the Games began for a second time.

It wouldn't be the last.

Chapter Text

My palms were clammy. I wasn't sure why.

The audience was cheering as the screen flickered on. I wasn't sure why that was, either. Suddenly I was detached from the world, from my body - I was watching through a blurry lens.

Maybe I was dying of desperation to get out of here. That would be an interesting way to go, if not as symbolic as my original plan to take Snow with me.

It started with the Reaping; a seconds-long shot of each Tribute from Districts One to Twelve, showing their faces as the escorts for each District announced who would die this year. I watched the recording of Peridot, but nothing else. I couldn't bear it, not after seeing her parents emotionlessly watch her walk up to that stage in One - so like the stage I was standing on now.

Barely a few minutes in, and already I wondered if it was possible to combust out of sheer hatred.

Then were a few flashes of us in training; I saw me talking to Mace, and Hem befriending Peridot. The other Tributes were showcased at their strongest stations - Pontus and Cascade each got several shots of them throwing tridents.

After that, my picture slid across the screen with my training score below it. They swapped to a minute or so of the Tribute Parade, with the camera focused on my and Foster's carriage - though of course my middle fingers to Snow were nowhere to be found.

Then they flicked between shots of the Tributes rising into the arena.

The countdown.

Seneca Crane's voice.

And the beginning of hell.

Chapter Text

Cascade Clammic of District Four was not a volunteer, but she would have been. If that stupid escort - she hadn't bothered learning her name - had called someone else, Cascade still would have stepped up.
Not because she wanted to be here, but because no one else deserved to die like this.
She did.
She had secrets. She had sorrow. She had blood on her hands already.
So she was here, watching the other Tributes warily as she waited for the countdown to finish. She'd go for the Cornucopia first; she knew she could take the others with her bare hands if they reached her before she could grab a blade. She knew from experience.
She also knew she didn't want to win - but she didn't want to die on the first day, either. She wasn't that weak.
And so when despicable Seneca Crane's voice announced the beginning of the end, Cascade leapt like a deer from her pedestal and raced toward the huge golden horn.
Her sea-blue eyes darted sideways at a pitiful scream from her right; the female District One Tribute had just run one of the tiny Tributes of Twelve through with a machete.
What a coward for going after the weaklings first. Cascade smirked and returned her focus to the Cornucopia -
Only to be tackled to the ground. She bared her teeth in a snarl, looking up to see the girl from District Three - Dottie, that was her name - scrambling to pin Cascade's limbs to the grass. She writhed in the District Three girl's grip.
Cascade shoved Dottie off her with a well-placed kick to the stomach, slipping to her feet smooth as an eel as the other girl stumbled back. It was then that Cascade registered the sword Dottie held, though obviously didn't know how to use; she held the weapon in front of her like it would grow arms and legs to protect her.
The District Four girl's smirk returned.
Cascade charged at the other Tribute, mouth now twisted in a feral grin, fist raised to strike. To her credit, Dottie darted out of the way of the blow and swung her sword.
Either the Tribute of District Three was stupidly lucky, or she'd been faking her ineptitude; the blade caught Cascade's stomach, slicing deeply below her ribs.
Cascade howled in rage and pain as she wrenched herself backwards, tearing the sword from Dottie's hand. Then, gritting her teeth, she ripped the weapon from her own abdomen and lashed out, slitting Dottie's throat.
Her victim dropped almost immediately. Sword now limp at her side, Cascade pressed her free hand to the swiftly bleeding wound in her stomach. Her vision blurred, darkening at the edges as she stumbled away from Dottie's body, towards the tree ring.
She only made it a few steps before collapsing into the gore-stained grass beneath her.
No. No. She wouldn't die here. She couldn't.
She was stronger than that.
She had to be.
But Dottie's cannon was the last thing she ever heard.

Peridot Shire of District One leaned on the sun-warmed side of the Cornucopia. She was shaking with adrenaline, though she managed to hold the machete in her hand steady.
At least, until she spotted One of the other Careers, Cascade from Four, slit the girl from Three's throat. Peridot shuddered, clenched her jaw, and looked north - to the swiftly moving, confident figure she knew was Johanna. Skinner from District Ten was after her - but Peridot was confident Jo could take him.
And then the male District Four Tribute - Pontus - ran after Skinner.
Straight towards Johanna.
Peridot spared a moment to mentally curse every one of Pontus's ancestors before dashing from the safety of the Cornucopia's shade to intercept him. She pretended to run for the tree ring behind him, but instead slammed her shoulder into his. Hard. Then she let herself drop to the grass. "Sorry!" she said, forcing her voice to a higher, fear-driven pitch.
The boy from District Four stumbled, turning long enough to glare down at her. "Watch it, bitch," he snarled, his sea-hued eyes flashing with wrath.
"Sorry," Peridot chirped again. She didn't have to fake the tremble in her hands as she rose back to her feet, but it was more from adrenaline than fear of Pontus - who turned away and continued after Johanna and Skinner.
Hopefully that would buy Jo some time.
Hopefully Peridot wouldn't see her again.
Hopefully the Careers would find someone else to kill.
There was a shout from behind her; she whirled to find Skinner's district partner Pamela holding a thick, short spear to the throat of one of the scrawny District Twelve Tributes - Cole. Peridot acted more on instinct than anything else as she raised her machete, advancing a step to swing at Pamela.
Surprised, the District Ten girl whirled to face her, pivoting the spear to point at Peridot.
Yet Cole remained on the ground, murky grey eyes wide with terror.
Peridot quickly shifted her blade to block the spearpoint as Pamela jabbed for her shoulder, tripping back a step. Her green eyes flicked back to Cole - she willed him to get up and run before more Tributes, or her fellow Careers, noticed the vulnerable boy.
Pamela spun the short spear in her hand, matching Peridot swing for swing. She used the thick shaft like a quarterstaff; Peridot had been trained for the Games to an extent as all District One children were, but this girl from the farming district was keeping up with her.
If Peridot had been her sister Aurelia, she would have been furious - would have killed Pamela in the most painful way possible, just to show the world what it meant to undermine a Career Tribute.
But Peridot had volunteered for Aurelia. Had given her a life. Had gazed out the train window at where Aurelia stood with their younger sister, Cherish, as she sped toward the Games. Maybe it had been the wrong choice. Maybe their parents had been wrong.
Peridot certainly thought Aurelia was better cut out for the Games. She'd always been the strongest one, looking out for Peridot and Cherish.
Until it actually mattered.
There was a shout from behind her and a blur of green fabric as Damask, her district partner, came up behind Pamela. If the District Ten girl had been any less skilled, his sword would have gone straight through her neck -
But she whirled and ducked away from his blow, before sprinting off toward the trees.
Damask, who she barely knew though they were both from One, moved to go after Pamela. But Peridot grabbed his wrist and shook her head.
"She'll have to come back for supplies at some point. We don't want to be spread too thin this early." she said carefully.
Her district partner considered, then nodded.
Pamela was safe for now.
But Cole was still sitting on the ground, looking up at her as Damask stomped off to kill someone else.
"...please," murmured the scrawny boy, his wide eyes flicking from Peridot's face to the machete still in her hand.
Slowly, she raised her hands in a yielding gesture, though not daring to drop her weapon.
Cole shook his head. "Please."
He pointed to his chest.
Peridot felt her breath desert her lungs.
"Get it over with, One!" came a yell from across the clearing. Peridot's gaze flicked to where Terracotta from District Two stood, then back to Cole. The small Tribute's gaze was pleading - but she wasn't sure if it was for mercy or death.
Maybe they were the same thing.
She raised the machete; Cole closed his grey eyes.
They never opened again.
Peridot wondered if Cherish had been watching her older sister's first murder.

Chapter Text

Maida Falx of District Nine had managed to snag a bow from the Cornucopia without killing anyone.
She was very proud of herself for this. But now that the bloodbath was over, the seven Careers sitting in the mouth of the huge golden horn, all bets were off.
If Cairo didn't stop fucking skipping, she would get an arrow to the head. The twelve-year old from Six was scary - terrifying. It was like her brain was absent, and only reappeared when she had the opportunity to stab something.
Like she had her district partner, Gage. Several times.
Even after he was dead.
Maida had watched. Damask had watched. Terracotta had watched. Pontus had watched. Only the dark-haired girl who was Damask's district partner and the bulky male Tribute from Three hadn't.
They'd be the first to go, probably. The least willing to watch death - the least willing to kill.
Though even if she hadn't turned away, Maida had to admit it was more than a little disturbing to watch a child stab a fifteen-year old to death. Said child was now skipping in cheerful circles around Maida and the other Careers, giggling to herself.
Maida fingered the fletching of the arrow in her hand, deliberating the pros and cons of shooting one's psychopathic, so-called ally.
She didn't get a chance to nock the arrow to her bow; Cairo stopped and suddenly skittered to the very edge of the Cornucopia before freezing. The little District Six girl had perked up like a sheepdog spotting a squirrel.
"What is it?" Damask demanded as the rest of the Careers, including Maida, converged to stand behind Cairo.
Cairo giggled softly. "She misses District Eleven." she pointed to the other side of the clearing; sure enough, the fourteen-year-old blonde girl from Eleven was skirting the tree ring.
"Rosigold." Damask's district partner murmured.
Great. Now that Maida knew the girl's name, it would be that much harder to kill her. Cairo, apparently, had no such qualms; bloodlust glittered in the young girl's eyes as she took another small step out of the Cornucopia. The boy from District Three followed, beckoning both Tributes from One - as well as Maida herself.
"Let's go before she runs off," he said.
Cairo's smile only widened. The two long knives in her hands were still covered in Gage's blood; Maida wondered if she even noticed. Rosigold's head whipped toward the Careers as they approached; her warm brown eyes widened and she began to run -
Only to scream and drop to the grass as Maida's arrow, the one she'd been plotting to bury in Cairo's skull, hit her ankle - a major tendon. A maiming shot, not a killing one.
Maida caught nods from Pontus and Damask as the six of them jogged to where Rosigold had fallen. The girl was curled on her side, hands uselessly wrapped around her ankle near the undoubtedly painful arrow. She was crying, pleading, golden hair half in the dirt and half tumbled over her dainty, pretty face.
She looked more like a Career than a child from District Eleven.
"Nice shot," Terracotta said approvingly.
Maida barely managed to contain her shudder. This was what she got for joining the Careers - she only hoped Damask would run Rosigold through with his sword quickly and get it over with. Of course, her luck did not decide to miraculously change; Cairo had a gleeful smile on her face as she peered down at the injured Tribute.
Rosigold's gaze flicked across the Careers; Maida fought not to flinch as it met her own.
"Make it stop," sobbed Rosigold. "It hurts - please -"
Maida didn't move. She forced her face into arrogant indifference, but couldn't tear her eyes away from Rosigold.
"Can we just..." the boy from District Three seemed to feel the same way. "Get it over with?"
Pontus snorted, shooting him a dark look. "Why? A few tears making you uncomfortable, Electron? Are you that much of a wimp?"
Maida clenched her jaw. She really needed to stop learning people's names.
The Reaping was a one-way ticket to hell. Everyone knew that. And Maida had no intention of dying in a cage.
That's what this arena was. A cage.
And Maida would kill the entirety of Panem before she accepted never seeing the golden wheat fields of District Nine again.
She would win, she would get back, and she didn't give a fuck about anything that got in her way.
Even if watching Rosigold lying there made something in her chest twist painfully.
Cairo didn't share this sentiment. She immediately raced to stand next to Rosigold, her brown eyes darting up for mere seconds as she pointed to Pontus and then Electron. "You and you, carry Eleven to the golden horn."
Pontus scrunched his nose. "The what?"
"The Cornucopia, dumbass." Damask crossed his arms, and ire flashed in the District Four boy's blue-green eyes for a moment before Cairo beckoned impatiently.
Maida barely questioned why they were all obeying the twelve-year old. To her, it seemed like basic common sense - after all, who knew what else the girl was capable of if she could kill Gage in such a gruesome way?
To Rosigold's credit, she struggled as the two male Tributes lifted her from the ground, kicking out with her uninjured leg and screeching like all hell was loose.
Which it was.
Rosigold gave a muted scream as Pontus unceremoniously dropped her before the Cornucopia, forcing Electron to do the same. Cairo advanced, and it was then that Maida noticed the length of rope in her hand. The twelve-year old cocked her head, looking up; Maida followed her gaze and, with no small amount of horror, spied the arching beams that were secured just beneath the Cornucopia's entrance.
Cairo giggled and tossed her rope so that one end fell over a beam - despite her lack of height, she got it over on the first try in a concerning display of strength. Then, with terrifying deftness, her small fingers wound and tugged the rope while the other five Careers watched her with apprehension.
Even Rosigold blinked past her tears, eyes dry but wide in horror when she beheld what Cairo had made.
The twelve-year-old girl from District Six had tied a perfect noose. Maida didn't want to know where a child had learned and, apparently, mastered a hangknot, but it couldn't have been anywhere good. What the hell had happened to Cairo? Maida almost pitied her - until she moved toward Rosigold with the noose held open.
"Wait." Electron stepped between the two girls. "You can't- this isn't right."
Cairo only smiled; Maida half expected Damask to scold Electron again, but the boy from One was silent.
"Listen." a soft but firm voice interluded, and Maida turned to where she'd all but forgotten Damask's district partner stood. "There's no point in doing this. It's as senseless as the Reapings."
Damask snorted. "Peri darling, don't be naive. The Reapings are a privilege. An honor."
"Now who's the dumbass?" Pontus grunted.
The District One boy whirled to him, glaring. "I didn't quite hear that, merman. You wanna reiterate for me?"
Pontus took a step toward him, clenching his fists. "I said. You're. A dumbass."
Electron quickly stepped between them, catching Damask's fist as it swung toward Pontus. "We're allies," he snapped. "Start acting like it."
Terracotta rolled her eyes. "What the wimp from Three won't say is that you're both dumbasses, so stop arguing about it."
Damask's district partner gave a warning cry, darting for Cairo, just as the little Tribute from Six slipped the noose over Rosigold's head now that Electron wasn't there to stop her. "Pull," she ordered, glaring at Damask and pointing to the trailing end of the rope where it hung across the beam.
Ripping his arm from Electron's grip, Damask sneered. "If we're allies, stop being a coward and work with us, Three."
He stepped to the rope.
And obeyed Cairo.
Maida didn't watch this time.

Cairo Stre... something of District Six hadn't slept for two days.
She'd gone longer without before, of course. She couldn't remember when. But she thought it may have been in the glittery city she'd nicknamed District Zero - even if where she'd been wasn't particularly glttery. At least, not in her memories.
She had been in glittery parts recently, but before that...
Before that, she hadn't been this confused about everything. She thought.
She couldn't remember.
They said she came from District Six - said she should miss it - but she couldn't remember where that was or what it looked like.
They said her name was Cairo. It could have been. But... it didn't sound like hers.
They had done something. In the not-glittery parts of District Zero.
Something that had hurt.
Hurt even worse than her head did every time she thought about it.
She had screamed then. Screamed so much that eventually, blood had come out instead of pleas.
It still hurt to talk, an echo of the memories that stopped her from sleeping - the pain that had kept her awake as those memories were made.
She couldn't ever really remember, and she didn't want to.
She looked down at the beam on which she was curled; it was within the golden horn, and beneath her, her supposed allies slept. The only sound was their soft breathing - and the slight creaking of the other thing beneath her.
It looked like an ornament, a decoration.
A red and gold one.
It had been a girl once, one like her.
Until she had hung it.
She couldn't help but be fascinated at the way people turned into things when you hurt them enough. She wondered if she was a thing yet. She didn't think so; sometimes she hopped in place or swung her arms about, just to make sure she could still move. She wondered if the red-and-gold ornament beneath her, gently swaying in the night, was watching the stars. If it knew why it was frozen.
Fabric rustled, and the girl who didn't think she was called Cairo looked toward the back of the golden horn - she'd heard the others call it something with a C - where the Tribute with long dark hair was awake.
She didn't like that Tribute. The green eyes unsettled her - they seemed to see everything. See deep.
See into her. The problem was, she didn't know if there was anything for those eyes to look at. If there was really anything in her, or if she was just a depthless pit of confusion and pain. The Tribute the eyes were attached to began moving toward the front of the horn. Toward her beam.
'Cairo' let her gaze move to the stoic Tribute on watch - the one with the bow, as the green-eyed one stopped near the thing beneath the beam and edged her way around it.
The one with the bow was there to stop the others from sneaking off, as well as to protect them.
But the Tribute with scary eyes met no opposition when she crept away from the clearing and disappeared into the trees.
That Tribute didn't look back. If she had, she would have seen the small figure slipping from the beam to follow her.

Chapter Text

Citron Caper of District Eleven had been running for hours, or that's how it felt. He could hear the Careers crashing through the underbrush behind him. The girl from District Nine was gaining on him, an arrow already nocked to her bow.
Citron dodged another tree trunk and gasped for breath, his district partner's young, bloodied face flashing behind his eyes with every step. It was the second day of the Games - the Careers had found him on his knees, gaping at the body that hung from the Cornucopia in horror.
He didn't want to know what they planned to do to him.
His lungs ached, but fresh adrenaline surged through Citron as an arrow thudded into the ground mere centimeters from his left foot. He sped up, willing his legs to move faster, get him away faster-
"Give up, Eleven!" came a jeering voice from behind him, the words half-stolen by the pounding of his pulse in his ears. Citron didn't know which of the Careers was shouting after him, and he didn't care. He only cared that his family was watching, that Rosigold's family was watching, and he didn't want them to watch both their Tributes die to these Capitol lackeys.
They had hung her. Rosigold.
Hung her.
He half wished he hadn't gone to the Cornucopia. Hadn't seen her body.
He didn't want to die, but he didn't want to live with that image for the rest of his life, either.
Citron only realized his thoughts had slowed him down when another arrow landed, this time almost grazing his shoulder before viciously stabbing into the dirt just ahead of him - and another grazed his neck. He stumbled, twisting to look behind him.
He didn't realize the District Nine girl had shot again until he felt the sharp pain blooming in his chest. Barely registered the arrow in his heart as he tripped, falling backward.
Citron tried to keep his eyes open, fixed on the clear, endless blue sky above him. Even when the Careers came and leaned over him and muttered, he didn't look at their sneering faces.
He didn't know how long it took them to leave him there, or how long he lay in the grass, watching the blue like it might save him. Soothe him.
He barely registered that he was dying, even as blood bubbled from his lips.

Volt Litner of District Five watched the sun inch toward the horizon and hoped Ray's face wouldn't appear in its place.
He had planned to stay with her, like they’d always stayed together back in Five. Supporting each other. But he’d been separated from Ray in the bloodbath, and now he was holed up in a small hollow made by the roots of a large tree.
There had been a cannon just minutes ago; Volt had just begun to settle down when another wave of sound crashed over the woods.
Then another.
And another.
Which three were dead? He took a deep breath of quickly cooling air, praying it wasn’t any of his allies. Especially Ray - and Johanna.
Johanna, he hoped, would win. She had the best chance.
Snap. Volt's eyes whipped toward the far side of the clearing; he froze. If another Tribute was coming, his best bet was to stay as still as possible; he couldn't outrun any of them except the children - the two from Eight or Alloy from Twelve.
It wasn't a Tribute.
It was... a deer. A beautiful young deer, without antlers. Volt scrunched his nose; he was pretty sure that meant it was female, but he couldn't quite remember the difference.
The deer scrunched its nose back, daintily stepping toward him. It lowered its snout, gazing at him with bright, dark, gleaming eyes. Entranced, Volt lifted a hand to touch its coarse fur - and flinched back with a cry. The pretty animal had snapped at him, just nipping the tips of his fingers with sharp teeth.
Volt was ninety percent sure deer were not supposed to have sharp teeth; nor were they supposed to snarl like this one was. He shrunk back into the hollow as it advanced, more quickly now, its delicate features twisted as it growled.
An acre or so of forest away, Damask froze at faint screams in the distance. Terracotta continued to sharpen her sword, though her shoulders had tightened; she exchanged glances with him while Maida quietly nocked an arrow to her bow.
Not one of the Careers spoke, even when Volt's screams suddenly cut off.

Chapter Text

JOHANNA:

I was so cold. The anger, the fire I had felt for so long, was washed in a freezing wave of fury. Crystallized. Still.

Volt's terrified face replayed in my mind. Then Cascade's surprise at the sword in her gut, Maida looking away while Rosigold - poor Rosigold, hanging from the Cornucopia. Cairo shivering on her beam above the body.

Citron's labored breathing.

I couldn't watch any more of this.

My eyes darted away from the screen, flicking over the silent crowd. Some of them even looked solemn. Solemn, not angry, not horrified at the deaths of so many children. I glanced over at Caesar-

Caesar, who was smiling.

My fingers curled into fists, nails digging into the stupid tree dress. Caesar Flickerman was smiling as he watched the Johanna of a few days ago stab Cairo, watched Mace ask with a tremor in his young voice where people went when they died.

That fucking psychopath. I wanted to stand, wanted to go and pound him to a bloody pulp until he was so flattened they wouldn't be able to scrape him off the goddamned stage.

"Jo."

My attention whipped back to the screen.

"Johanna, listen to me."

Everything stopped.

It was her voice.

"Peri," I whispered involuntarily.

I saw myself, a lifetime ago, the version of me that had killed Foster. I saw her reach out to put her hands on my shoulders. I saw her green eyes, her face that had led me through the worst of the Games.

Then the screen cut to the Careers, and I realized with a flash of loathing that they hadn't shown Mace's death. It was gone quickly, though - because Peridot had disappeared, and it was like losing her all over again. I was sure she was haunting me, somehow; I couldn't stop hearing flickers of her laughter, or her screams for Hem, or her guiding words; her eyes glimmered in my peripheral vision, never really there.

I couldn't show them - couldn't show Caesar or Snow how much it affected me, but I couldn't help it. I buckled, curled over in my chair, trying to tuck the sharp, shredding pain of loss away. I felt a sob rise in my throat and squeezed my eyes shut.

Come back, I silently pleaded, pulling the blurriness back from my eyes with sheer force of will. My arms were wrapped around my aching chest, as if someone had kicked me there. Come back and tell me what to do.

She didn't. I almost hated her for it, the way I'd hated Jasper, just a little, in the weeks after his death.

But there were other, more deserving targets for that hatred.

Chapter Text

I should have looked.

I should have seen who the fifth-to-last cannon had been, should have born witness to Maida's death, to the brutality of the Capitol, again.

But in the end, was it worth remembering if all it gained me was pain?

Instead, I stared at my leaf-green heels and listened to the screams. I blocked out the voices, made sure they were a blur, but the cries of anger, the soundtrack of bloodshed, were all still there. That was how I knew I was finally approaching the end of one torture and the beginning of another, when Damask's furious dying screams cut through my stupor.

I only looked up when I heard her again.

Peridot's expression, even through the screen, sucked the air from my lungs and the blood from my heart. The bastards had set up the camera view so it faced her head-on, like I was actually sitting in front of her. Like she was, again, pointing a knife at herself.

Right in front of me. I could have reached out and touched her - if she'd been real, but instead I watched her dramatically fall in edited slow motion, saw myself catch her in my arms.

I heard my own shattered scream as if it had come from another mouth, in another time - a century in which things still mattered. Now, I realized, they didn't. Nothing mattered. We were stuck in a yearly cycle of grief; lose, mourn, repeat. There was no way to heal the pain that I carried now, that I had carried since I was eleven. There was no relief, not ever.

All I could do was be angry, and be cold, and stop giving a fuck.

"AAAND THAT - IS THE SEVENTY-FIRST - HUNNNGER GAMES!!!" Caesar's voice boomed, and suddenly the Capitol citizens were jumping and glittering and cheering, and I looked up at the screen that was now showing Panem's crest, but it couldn't be over, it wasn't over because they hadn't shown my promise to her, they hadn't shown what she had said-

I saw someone step onto the stage in the corner of my eye; I turned, and saw none other than President Snow.

Just like that, I was cold again.

He looked the same as at the Tribute Parade; to me it seemed like a thousand years ago. His expression was also identical, icy and smug - though I felt like a different person entirely from the fiery girl who had flipped him off.

Funny how he managed to ruin everyone else's lives, turn district kids into numb monsters, and still remain the same amount of evil jackass himself.

"Miss Mason," he greeted me smoothly, beckoning with one hand.

Slowly, I stood, limbs stiff with frigid hatred. I was a tree, I remembered; a tree whose sap had frozen in the inhospitably cold air around it. A tree who would die soon, when that sap expanded and exploded, ripping through bark like an axe through muscle and bone.

Snow imperiously lifted his chin as I approached him; I observed with an uninterested kind of detachment that he was maybe three inches shorter than me.

"Congratulations," he said graciously. Murderous little fuck.

Emphasis on little. Ha.

I inclined my head ever so slightly, unwilling and unable to force my face into some kind of emotion. I was so sick of everything, so disgusted by the man in front of me, but it was like my feelings were on autopilot - I was just there, controlling my limbs, severed from the heart that had no right to still be shifting and aching and thudding behind my ribs. I wondered whether my brain had decided of its own accord that it was tired of being susceptible to constant pain.

"Ellis?" the president glanced behind him, reaching out a hand; a young girl with his wide, scheming eyes stepped up beside him. In her hands, held carefully like a tray of food, was a small velvet pillow.

On it was the crown. There were six sharp, jagged points around its circular base; it glimmered bronze and gold in the neon lighting of Caesar's stage.

Vaguely, I realized that I'd been planning to kill Snow in this moment. Then, that I didn't have a suitable weapon.

And then that it didn't matter either way.

"Kneel," Snow said.

I was a tree, rooted in place, a monarch of the forest; standing for decades and centuries. No one had been able to truly cut me down for seventeen - almost eighteen, now - years.

On that stage, before President Coriolanus Snow, I bent. I knelt. I felt him place the crown on my head, gently, almost reverently. Felt it dig into my scalp as he released the weight.

"Trees can indeed be felled, Miss Mason," he murmured, the words catching my ears just as I rose.

I knew my dark eyes were shards of ice when I met his gaze. "Or, they can be pruned."

This was an agreement, a contract. I would be submissive. I would comply with the Capitol, I wouldn't make myself a threat - as long as they left me the fuck alone whenever possible.

Find your freedom, Jo.. Maybe this was the closest I could get; I would never have anything resembling peace if I resisted.

Snow's face curled in a grotesque, smug smile. "Quite right."

I had no idea just how wrong I was.

Chapter Text

I wondered how long it would take me to die.

I was sure something horrible would happen to my parents, to Ronan, if I brought about my own demise - it'd cause problems for Snow's display of the triumphant Victors. So, safe in the knowledge that he had leverage in the form of my family, the president was sending me back to District Seven to while away the rest of my - hopefully few - years, reliving everything I'd lost and training a new generation to sacrifice either their lives, their sanity, or both.

Triumphant Victor, indeed.

Across from me in the train's dining car, Annie pushed a small plate with a slice of toast toward me. I listened to the scrape of porcelain against polished wood, remembering its twin - sharp steel against bone.

"You should eat," my mentor said quietly.

I stared at the toast, watching melted butter soak into it.

"Johanna, you know they won't let you starve to death," Annie reminded me. Then her voice lowered. "Believe me. I've tried that, too."

I sighed. Looked up at her sea-colored eyes. Sighed again.

Finally, I lifted the toast from the plate and took a bite.

It tasted like tree bark. I put it down.

"What am I supposed to do now?" I asked; my mouth was almost on autopilot. At this point, my brain wasn't paying enough attention to ask questions.

Annie leaned back in her chair; she fixed her gaze on the small, crystal-dripping chandelier above the table. "You wait. For as long as it takes - because some day, someone will come and bring Snow down. He can't last forever. Some day, there will be someone he can't break." she spoke with a soft kind of surety.

I closed my eyes. Blood and faces and terror immediately flashed behind them, so I opened them again. "So, what? We keep sending innocent kids to die until the fucking messiah arrives?"

"We don't give Snow any reason to kill us, and we stay alive long enough to aid whatever rebellion finally succeeds."

I nodded vaguely. That probably made sense.

Twenty minutes later, me and my mentor were still sitting there in silence; it was only when the train finally screeched to a halt that I looked up from my feet, still tucked into thin heels.

Annie stood, and offered me her hand; I think I ignored it, not out of any contempt for her but because I had again retreated into a pocket of detachment - I wasn't present enough to notice it. My legs followed her through the train and out onto the platform.

And then we were in District Seven.

The breeze that stirred wayward strands of my hair from my forehead carried the scent of sap and green things; it was cool and fresh, air filtered by the leaves that swayed above, leaving barely a patch of blue sky to peek through. The train whipped up the fallen foliage on the platform, and the discarded leaves danced in the air for a moment before tossing themselves back toward the earth. Everything was familiar; everything was how I had known it for seventeen years.

Suddenly, I hated it.

It was too peaceful, too normal - too good, compared to everything else, to be true. I couldn't trust it. How did I exist, how did I move through the world without checking around every corner, every tree, for mutts or Careers or some other awful thing the Gamemakers had played God to create? How did I ever feel relatively safe?

How did I know they would stop trying to kill me?

"JOHANNA!"

It was Mace's voice, and he and Hem were running toward me, and Skinner was right in front of me and I had to protect them-

I glanced around in a panic, and took a shaky step back just as Ronan barreled into me. His shaggy brown hair had grown out a little; he was slightly taller, lankier. But the small, beaming face that he looked up at me with hadn't changed. "You're home!"

I forced a smile, shoving the memories into the dark corners of my mind; I'd always been able to force a smile for Ronan. "Hey, kid. How are you?"

"Awesome!" he answered, still clinging to me with his thin arms around my midsection.

I hugged him back for as long as I could bear, then ruffled his hair and stepped away. "I hope your parents are doing good."

"They are!" he grinned. "Yours too. They missed you though."

"I missed them, too," I told him, and realized in that moment that I had not, in fact, thought about my parents since the Games.

Which had only been two days ago. Three days ago? I couldn't remember; either way, it felt like another lifetime.

Chapter Text

He gave me twenty-four hours. Twenty four-hours for my parents to hug me and cry, twenty-four hours for them to apologize for not coming to see me before the Games, they were so sorry, they had just been so overwhelmed.

Twenty-four hours to finally escape to my new, horrible room in our new, horrible house in the Victors' Village, carefully unstringing the vial of Jasper's pine needles from my neck and placing it on the dresser before sliding to the floor. Twenty-four hours to doze in and out of sleep, terrified to fully close my eyes.

Then my mother knocked on the door, and said quietly, without meeting my gaze; "President Snow is in the study. He's asked for you."

I was so surprised at her rare, full sentence that it took a second for the words to sink in.

What the hell did Snow want now? I was supposed to be safe for six months; they were supposed to fuck off until the Victory Tour. "Why?"

She shook her head apologetically. "He didn't say."

I leaned my head back against the wall; I was sitting with my knees tucked to my chest in a corner of the room, like a jumpy animal - which, at this point, I was.

Running my hands through my hair, I sighed. "Fine. I'm coming."

She left without another word.

Shit.

Snow may have been short, but I had no doubt that once we were alone, he could easily find a way kill me without staining his suit. Or have a Peacekeeper shoot me through the skull. Either way, I was absolutely, entirely fucked if the president decided my promise to be compliant wasn't good enough.

I let out a tense breath and slowly rose to my feet. He wouldn't take my life yet, I reminded myself. First he had to make me tour the Districts - first he had to take my dignity and my status as one of Seven's own. Victors were generally frowned upon outside he Capitol - after all, what kind of person would kill twenty-three others just to live the cushy life while everyone else starved?

Apparently, the kind of person I had become.

My stomach roiled as I shouldered my door open and moved hesitantly down the plushly carpeted hallway. If I hadn't known this was Seven's Victors' Village, I might have guessed I was in the Capitol; it was almost reminiscent of the Tribute Center. The study was at the end of the hall, and my palms began to sweat when I saw the heavy spruce door was partway open.

My brain may hope for death, but apparently my body was still trying for survival.

"Good morning, Miss Mason."

Snow's words galvanized my feet into finally stepping through. Inside the study, the president sat with his elbows on the desk, fingers steepled before his smiling face. Whitening blond hair still slicked back so he looked like a wrinkly egg, suit still scarlet as the blood that he'd spilled oceans of.

"Welcome," he said, as if I was the one who'd shown up in his house with no warning and a history of murdering his family.

I nodded in curt greeting, setting myself on the edge of the chair across from him. "President."

"I hope you're settling in well?" he said - definitely a lie - and gestured vaguely around us. There was a tall vase of fresh white roses on the corner of the desk; I wondered who had put them there, since I doubted my parents had begun to care enough to put out new flowers.

Then, I realized that Snow himself had a colorless rose in the buttonhole of his suit.

"Of course." also a lie.

Snow nodded. "I'm glad to hear it."

Lies, lies, fucking lies on top of lies.

"I'm honored to have you; what brings you here to Seven?" I asked carefully. Respectfully.

He tilted his head, snakelike, to appraise me with knowing eyes. He understood that I just wanted to know whether I was about to die.

He could smell my fear.

"Why, I came only to visit you," Snow said calmly. "I have a business proposal to make."

A business proposal? That didn't sound like imminent death - but it didn't sound good, either. Not coming from the mouth of Panem's vile president. I waited silently for him to drop whatever bombshell he had up his sleeve.

But apparently he wasn't done performing yet. "How old are you now, Miss Mason?"

I blinked. "I - seventeen. Eighteen this November."

"So, you're still young yet." Snow gave me a reptilian smile. "Young and rather pretty."

He paused as I stared at him, bewildered. What the fuck was going on?

"You see, I've often employed other Victors to... entertain the elite of the Capitol, when they happen to be around."

It began to dawn on me then, just slightly, what he may have meant. I clenched my jaw. "Entertain."

"Yes." the smile began to look more and more sinister.

I exhaled through my nose. "You want me to fuck the Capitol elite?"

"If you must put it that way."

"No." I shook my head, immediate disgust rippling through me. How could I do such a thing - how could other Victors do such a thing - after everything we'd been put through? "Absolutely not. There is literally nothing you could pay me to be bedded by corrupt officials who answer to you."

Snow chuckled. "Miss Mason," he said, "What makes you think I plan to pay you?"

I wish I had never been there that day. Never seen what I did. But the moment I stepped into that new, horrible study, it was too late.

The president lifted one hand and snapped his fingers; my gaze whipped toward the door as two Peacekeepers shoved their way in.

Between them, held by the arms, squirming with his eyes wide in fear... was Ronan.

I instinctively shot up from my chair. "Let him go."

"Why, that is entirely up to you," Snow told me.

"No. You can't make me provide entertainment for your circus of dickheads," I snapped.

"Johanna?" Mace s- Ronan said in a panicked voice. "What - what's happening?"

The feet of my chair scraped accusingly against the hardwood floor of the study as I stumbled back from the desk, my calves pushing it along behind me.

"You can save him," Snow reminded me. "He will live, if you agree to comply with what I've laid out."

A short, hysterical bark of laughter escaped me; I ran a hand through my hair, trying to remind my lungs that I had yet to be stabbed.

Ronan's wide caramel eyes searched my face, and all I could remember was Jasper and Rowan and Finnick and Caprice in their Games, dying one by one, me and Ronan sobbing in the Fairtides' living room.

"Fine!" I finally shot the word at Snow. "I'll be your fucking puppet. Let him go."

Still sitting behind the desk, Snow laced his fingers together and leaned back in his chair. "I don't think I can do that. You defied me at first, did you not? I must protect my authority, and as such cannot allow Ronan Fairtide to live."

"What?" desperation cracked my voice. "You have to - you can't-"

"Oh, I think you will find that I can indeed," said the president.

No. No, no- the Games were over, people I cared about were supposed to stop fucking dying-

"I'm deeply sorry for your inconvenience," Snow continued.

Inconvenience. I huffed another painful laugh, doing my best not to let it become a sob.

"Johanna!" Ronan cried out as the Peacekeepers hefted him forward.

And suddenly, I was back in the arena. Suddenly, I was walking through painful, unbearable situations every day, collecting traumatic experiences like Capitol citizens collected... glitter, or whatever they hoarded in their endless spare time.

Suddenly, my brain was once again in wild-animal mode.

I launched myself at the nearest Peacekeeper, fist swinging for her helmet. Snow's lackey ducked and tried to return the favor to my stomach, but I leapt back and returned with a right hook.

"You little-" the Peacekeeper grabbed my wrist.

I struggled in her grip, but either she was terrifyingly strong or that suit gave her superpowers, because her fingers were like iron. I flailed at the desk, something in me wanting to hit Snow, wanting to cause him some fraction of pain, and succeeded in knocking the vase of white roses over before the Peacekeeper got hold of my other hand and tugged both behind my back. The vase shattered deafeningly, roses splaying from its mouth like the highest branches of a fallen tree. One of the glass shards had caught Snow's hand; there was a small cut across the back of it.

My satisfaction was fleeting.

Slowly, the president drew a handkerchief from somewhere in his suit and wrapped it around the injury. Then, he met my eyes and smirked.

And then the second Peacekeeper forced Ronan to his small knees, the mouth of a gun planted between his shoulder blades. "No-" he struggled until the Peacekeeper visibly dug the gun into his back, a warning.

I couldn't breathe. There was no more air left in the study. All I could find was Ronan's terrified face, and the life fading from Mace's grey eyes, and Peridot telling me to find my freedom - freedom, the exact opposite of this situation.

When the gunshot went off, I realized this was the first time someone had died in front of me via firearm.

At least they were getting creative.

As a thud followed the shot, I heard Snow rise through the ringing in my ears. I must have fallen to my knees; his footsteps shuddered along the floorboards as he approached, scooping a white rose from the pool of water and broken glass - which was now beginning to mix in spirals with Ronan's blood.

"I implore you," murmured Snow. "Do not forget, and this need not happen again."

He dropped the rose into my lap; the thorns pricked my fingers as I involuntarily caught it.

Ronan's glassy eyes were still fixed on me. I was still sitting there, staring in turn at him and the rose and the swirling liquid marble of water and blood, when my parents came to check what had happened.

No one asked any questions; maybe they, too, were used to it by now.

Or maybe I just didn't hear them.