PLEASE READ THIS A/N FOR REAL. I don't even know what content warnings to put on this chapter. Noncon at a minimum, it's not graphic and the sexual aspect is almost incidental, but it's pretty clear what's going down. Female-on-male, if that's a factor. I feel just as weird publishing it this time as last time, but here we are. PM me if you want a more specific heads-up on what's in here. This is it for the Really Bad Stuff for a while, but it does get about this bad again for a while in… 120k words or so. So, uh, stay tuned for that I guess.

Luther Constantine, District Five, 18

Peacekeepers do not all come from District Two.

Moving the brightest minds in Panem disproportionately to District Five has had an interesting effect over the years: we are, collectively, very smart. The upper class, anyway. There's a lower class of people who have been in Five since the very beginning, but they're mostly the ones who work at grocery stores and mop up chemical spills. The class that defines District Five—the one that runs the power plants and does the experiments too dangerous to be conducted at the Capitol—is, on average, point eight standard deviations more intelligent than the Panem mean.

Of those people, plus high-testing kids shipped in from other Districts, the best of the best go to the Trade Institute at age twelve, where they're tracked into whatever path will lead them to the vocation they score best for. The Solars. The Nukes. The Meds. Drilled and formed into the Capitol's fresh batch of eggheads.

There's another round of selection at age fourteen, but you don't know about it unless you're chosen. Tactics. I was chosen.

It's the most cutthroat, ruthless, high-stress experience out there, except maybe the Hunger Games. Everything is a competition. Everything counts. More money is being poured into you than the entire population of District Twelve and you will be worth it or else. You make the cut, or you die, because you're not going home. Can't have anyone spilling anything. As far as anyone outside Tactics knows, we all tragically vanished when we were fourteen, and that's all they'll ever know.

I'm near the top of the class. Not at the top. That's how you make yourself a target. I also happen to be the personal favorite of the officer in charge of testing and admissions, and I learn some interesting things that way. For example: Ariel Sevasti was seriously considered for admission, but rejected when closer observation revealed him to be a flouncing, self-absorbed prima donna who couldn't keep it in his pants for more than a day at a time. Yes, at age fourteen. Clearly a persona, but persuading him to drop it was deemed not worth the trouble, whatever that "persuasion" may have entailed.

And he is indeed vain, and melodramatic, and the single raunchiest human being I've ever had to deal with. But I know, quantitatively, just how intelligent and ruthless he is. It will be interesting to watch everyone else underestimate him, and to watch him underestimate me. He has his peculiar, ethereal kind of cleverness. You could exhaust yourself chasing phantoms, trying to figure out what's real. But he's in there somewhere. If you struck out behind that mask of his and kept going, no matter what, cornering him bit by bit, I think you could get him by the throat.

Metaphorically. Doing so literally is far less contentious; the boy is obsessed and insatiable.

I have the upper hand when he inevitably ends up in my bed. He's used to instant gratification from people who think he's out of their league. They fall under the spell of his charisma, or do exactly what he says for fear he'll change his mind. But I care very little what his agenda is. If he objects to something, I listen, but I ignore his orders and complaints until they fade away into increasingly polite requests, which I also ignore. He's got no patience. No discipline, no control. I doubt this will be the last time I exploit that. No wonder Tactics didn't want him.

It helps that both of us managed to bring backpacks aboard the train despite rules to the contrary. I achieved it by simply asking one of the Peacekeepers who's primarily loyal to Tactics, not the Capitol. Ariel, I am led to believe from the way he winked when I asked, resorted to… more questionable methods of getting his way, as he apparently often does. My backpack is full of electronics, strategic drugs, and deadly weapons. His contains far worse things. Everything I find, I turn on him. This, I think, was precisely his intention, although I intend to make it more than he bargained for.

There's also something I'm not expecting: notes. Several notebooks of scribbled equations. I'm not specifically familiar with it, but it's Nuke stuff. High-level. Maybe not even part of the curriculum. His handwriting is as beautiful as he is, sharp, slanted cursive, with an odd twist to the Zs. It's hard to believe such dignified equations came from someone… less dignified.

I've never had the opportunity to do this before, although the idea has always intrigued me. Tactics is a bit stingy when it comes to handing out live human beings as training tools; the disappearance rate in District Five is suspect enough as it is, and the Capitol has first dibs on prisoners. But the circumstances are perfect: a room to myself, my own bag of tricks, plus Ariel's as a bonus, and of course Ariel himself. So agreeable when I tied him to the bed. Not the slightest hint of hesitation, or any notion that maybe, just maybe, I am not a person who should be trusted like that.

Too late.

Step one is to play along. Go through more or less his standard procedure. It requires getting a bit more up close and personal than I prefer, but everything has a cost.

Step two is to escalate, but not enough to scare him. Refuse his indignant requests that I at least take my shirt off. Tighten the ropes from something that playfully restricts his movements into something much more serious. I'm not sure if he has the situational awareness to notice he's defenseless. He will.

Step three, I hurt him. He yelps as my fingernails dig into a pressure point on his neck.

"Ow, ease off a little," he complains, tugging at the ropes as he tries to pull away. "Where'd you even get that fr-?"

I cut him off with a much sharper jab, clapping a hand over his mouth when he breathes in sharply and I know he's about to yell.

"Ow," he says again weakly once I let him go. "Yeah, no more of that. Not a fan."

I raise an eyebrow, look him dead in the eye, and do it again.

He bites back the yell himself this time, spitting a few curses instead. "Luther," he says incredulously, the first hint of fear crossing his face. "I said no."

"Hmm. I assumed there was nothing you didn't like."

"You assumed wrong. Let me go, you're freaking me out."

"No."

"What the fuck do you mean, no?" he snarls, fighting the ropes again, but now I think he wants to attack me. Note to self: Ariel can get very angry, very quickly. Fun.

I ignore him, feeling along his ribs for a different pressure point, holding a knuckle against the easier-to-locate one on his sternum to keep the thrashing to a minimum. This is lovely; I've never gotten to practice like this before. The only problem is Ariel. I'm getting increasingly impatient with him; I'd like him to stay still and be a good practice dummy, but I suspect he'll bite me if I give him half a chance.

"Luther," he spits, right on cue. "I said let me go."

"Stop asking me that."

"I'm not fucking asking!" he screams, achieving surprising volume for someone so slim. That's going to be a problem for both of us. "I'm telling you to let me go or I swear to the Capitol I will get a vial of polonium and ram it up your motherfucking–"

"Language," I mutter, pinching the place on his ribs I was looking for and getting a piercing screech for it. "Wow. You need to shut up. Hang on."

He watches in disbelief, breathing hard, as I pull a bottle of pills from my bag. "No," he mutters. "You have got to be kidding me. We're not even in the Games yet, what the fuck are you-?"

I stuff four pills in his mouth and gag him. I might be overdoing it by a tiny bit, but he'll be fine, if a little dizzier than usual tomorrow. I don't think he needs to remember this. The Games will pit us against each other, of course, but there's no call to have anyone out for my blood specifically.

I ignore the icy, glittering rage in his eyes. It doesn't last long. Soon there's just pain, and then fear, and then the drugs kick in and it's a hazy mix of the two. That can't be fun, but it's not my problem.

I throw in a bit of what he came here for, even though I'd really rather not, because it works. He's just lucid enough to pull away and squeeze his eyes shut like I'm breaking his heart. Funny, he didn't seem very shy before.

At last it's time to see if I've succeeded. I take the gag off, bracing for a torrent of profanity and possibly an attempt at a headbutt, but he doesn't move a muscle. I clutch my shock stick in one hand and carefully untie his wrists with the other. He just lies there, his breathing shaky but regular, seemingly half-asleep.

Victory. I told Levin she should've signed me off for that interrogation class. I think she refused because she knew I'd be better at it than her.

Only I haven't gotten to that part yet. The pills are delicate to use. They're not a truth serum, exactly; just a curious mix of fatigue-inducing, focus-breaking, and of course fear-heightening. They can't make him answer me. But they can make him lose the motivation not to, combined with sufficient incentives to cooperate, and with any luck I've gotten it into his hindbrain that when I'm unhappy, he's unhappy. The other sedative that would blur his memory was to minimize the fallout, although the worst-case scenario is just having him upset with me. Who's going to do something about it, the Capitol? The thought of him crying to them about this of all things almost makes me laugh out loud.

"Ariel?" I say gently, a little singsong.

He flinches at the sound of my voice despite its softness. How very Pavlovian. A good sign.

"You're a Nuke, right?"

"Yeah."

"Who's in charge of the facility you work at?"

"Sullivan."

"Does anything happen there that's against the rules?"

"I dunno," he mumbles.

"Yes, you do," I say firmly, brushing my fingers along the bottom of his ribs. He makes a dismayed little noise and flinches again, but doesn't even try to pull away. I don't think he realizes he's not tied up anymore.

"I-I operate the reactor sometimes." His voice is still barely audible, words more than a little slurred, but they come out in a rush. "Because we're understaffed."

Well, that's boring, but it's proof of concept; that's obviously not something he'd usually tell me. I win. Good for me.

"Anything else?"

"There are some Peacekeepers in black uniforms sometimes, but I-I don't know what they do."

Black uniforms? That's Tactics. And I do happen to know about some experiments being done at a Nuke facility.

"They're scary," he adds unprompted, and I almost laugh again. What a gift this all is.

"Do you work at H-12, by any chance?" I ask.

No answer. His eyes are closed.

I jab his neck lightly. "Don't fall asleep on me yet. H-12, yes or no?"

"Yeah."

"Fancy that. Small world." I pack up my things, feeling very pleased with myself and resenting that I can't show Levin my handiwork. She'll pretend to think I'm exaggerating how well it worked. But she'll know I'm not.

I throw the room's spare blanket over Ariel and drag him onto my back like I'm about to judo-throw him. He's close enough to my size that it's not so hard to haul him down the hallway to the empty common car and sling him down on the sofa. There's another blanket in there. Upon reflection, I take mine back and give him that one instead. Evidence and all. No need to jog his memory about the blur that will be tonight.

I tuck him in neatly. He already seems to be out cold. "There you go. Sweet dreams."

xxx

Ariel is gone when I come out for breakfast the next morning. But a few minutes after I return to my room, the door opens. He flounces in and flops onto my sofa even though I'm already there, stretching out full-length, his back on my lap. "Morning. Did we fuck?"

I blink. "Excuse me?"

"Well, I don't know," he yawns, holding his wrist up to display purple bruises. "Something happened."

"Maybe you slept with the escort?" I suggest. "She seems like the type who'd share drugs with you."

"Huh. Yeah, maybe," he agrees. "How was your night?"

My attention snaps to his face too quickly, but he's not trained to notice things like that. "Quiet," I say.

"You're in a good mood."

Hmm.

His expression is perfectly agreeable, his tone casual. If anything, I overdid it with the drugs. There's no way. Studying him as closely as I can get away with doesn't give me a clear answer, and I find myself almost… not scared. Of course not. But more concerned than he has any business making me.

I shrug. "I've got the Games to look forward to, don't I? Very exciting."

He smiles up at me through drowsily half-closed eyes, stretching luxuriously and letting his head loll back, the gesture almost exaggeratedly relaxed. "I'm sure they will be."

Well! Got that over with. For now. Hopefully I gave fair warning for that, both at the beginning of the chapter and earlier when I said this whole fic was going straight to hell.