Hey guys! I am there are not enough so's to put in front of sorry to tell you how sorry I am for this long wait. Because of a full time job writing has been quite low on my list of things to get done at the end of the night when I am ready to fall into bed. But finally here is a new chapter for you guys. I hope you enjoy it!

Here we go!

"Katniss? You're going to get Katniss Everdeen?" I repeated what he had just told me but it still wasn't sinking it. "But Gale, I thought you said she wasn't talking to you. After what happened with—"

"Well, I'm going to make her listen!" Gale stomped away, taking deep breaths as he paced the living room. "She'll have to listen. After everything…she'll still listen."

Rory and I exchanged a glance, knowing that though this was crazy, almost impossible, there was no changing Gale's mind. He had decided and so it will be done whether we think it's right or not. I push myself off the counter, the one I had been sitting frozen on since we had arrived back at the penthouse, before going to stand in front of him. Gale towered over me, by a foot at least, and I reached both hands up and put them on either side of his face. He placed his hands on my hips and pulled me closer.

"Alright," I said. "You will make her listen and then make the rest of them listen too."

Gale nodded sternly before pulling me into his arms and holding me tightly. He kissed the top of my head and whispered to me that everything would be okay. Sure, Gale said these things but I didn't believe him. Between him stirring up the pot with Katniss and me going into the arena something was bound to go wrong. The question now is simply what that would be?

I gripped him tighter, willing myself not to think on it for a moment more.

It had been hours since Rory left for the night and I was laying alone in my bed, staring up at the ceiling and trying to find sleep that I knew would never come. I wanted to be with Gale but we thought it would be too risky to sleep in the same bed now that they suspected that something was happening between us.

I thought about the games and what I would do once I got into the arena. I wondered if I would survive, if Lawson and Neva would survive, long enough for Gale to get us all out of there alive. Truth be told, I didn't think he would make it back in time. I didn't really want him to. He should stay in the districts where it was safe for him now that they might consider him a traitor. And me? Well, as I always said, I would try but it probably wouldn't get me far. I would try to get my friends to the end and then be done with it because I wouldn't live either way. I wouldn't be permitted to.

Unless Katniss makes them.

I didn't think she would do it. Rory didn't either. She had been hurt too badly by what the Capitol had done to her to even blink when we died; there was no way she would lift a finger to save us.

I was on my own in whatever kind of arena it may be. I was praying for so kind of tropical paradise like the places I have been on vacation but I doubted that it would be anything that pleasant and cozy. Perhaps it will be a water arena like the last games or the desert one several years before where the heat would blaze during the day and the tributes would freeze during the night.

I pulled my pillow over my head, feeling like I was going crazy wondering.

I couldn't stay here, fearful and anxiety-ridden like this. I couldn't be alone, not tonight.

Quickly, I rose from my bed, like I had to sneak out and walked across the hall to Gale's room. I opened the door slowly, not knowing if he would be asleep or awake, and peeked in to see that he was laying in his bed with his back to me. He looked so vulnerable with his bear back exposed and only a sheet covering him. The only time he looked truly peaceful, truly relaxed was when he was sleeping; I had noticed it the first night we had slept together in my room.

Gale Hawthorne could always put on a brave and strong face but his true, loving nature shown through when he thought no one would be looking…but I saw it.

I closed the door and it 'clicked' behind me. I walked over and sat on the side of his bed, leaning against the headboard, staring down at the man and running a hand through his hair. Gale took a deep breath as he rolled over and laid his head on my stomach, wrapping his arm around my torso and pulling me closer in the process.

"I thought we weren't going to do this tonight." He said, completely alert in his words. I can tell he hadn't been asleep at all.

I continued to run my hand through his hair while his eyes stayed closed and content. "I couldn't sleep."

Gale sighed before sitting up. "Don't worry about tomorrow anymore, okay? Don't worry about any of it." He kissed me before pulling me down so I was lying against his chest. He wrapped both of his arms around my shoulders so tightly that I never thought he was going to let go. I never wanted him to.

It was silent; nothing was to be heard except for our breaths and the sound of Gale's heartbeat against my ear. Finally, I felt the need to tell him what had been on my mind all night. It was something that needed to be said, for his safety and my peace of mind.

"Gale, when you go to District Twelve…don't bother coming back." I whispered into the darkness.

He looks down at me. "What are you talking about?"

I propped my chin up and gazed back at him, at those gray eyes that I won't see for much longer. "Go back to Twelve and be with your family…take Rory away from here if it won't be safe for him anymore."

"But Katniss—"

"She won't help us…why should she? Bringing her here…talking to her about this will only bring both of you pain. It'll dig up old wounds that you are just starting to heal from."

"She'll do this for me, Serena. After a lifetime of friendship, she owes me that." Gale's voice was pleading, like he was trying to convince me that this was going to work.

"She's not allowed back in the Capitol…I just…I don't see—"

"No, stop. Don't do that." He paused, shaking his head. "Don't you dare do that."

I tilted my head. "Do what?"

"Give up. You can't do this, not after everything we've done, everything we've been through. You're going to fight, Serena Snow. You're going to fight like hell until I can get you out and then we'll be free, do you understand me?"

I didn't want to give up. Believe me, I didn't. For both of us I wanted to stay strong and positive but it was so hard. Every breath I took seemed harder and harder, deprived of more and more oxygen. But I couldn't let Gale know that. It would kill him to know I was so close to being paralyzed in fear. Instead I smiled at him and placed a kiss on his shoulder.

"I understand." I managed to whisper.

He pursues his lips before kissing me back on the top of my head.

The two of us were silent then, no longer wishing to talk of fear and what would happen tomorrow. Instead we just laid there in each other's arms. That's all I wanted, all I needed on my last night. Eventually, I fell into a deep dreamless sleep. A sleep that didn't contain Gale or Katniss or the Games. Just empty darkness that kept me wrapped up in a cocoon of safety and bliss for a few hours longer.

But the safety and the bliss didn't last long. Something was happening, ripping me from the darkness before I was ready.

I felt my body torn from Gale's and I fell to the ground hard. Someone's foot thuds against my side and I was pushed into the corner of the room, huddled in a ball. Then the yelling started, and I looked up and saw them; there were at least five guards in the room. Two were by me and three were with Gale, wrestling him from the bed. He was fighting them, trying to get away, but one of the men punching him, hard, in the stomach and he stopped his struggle due to the impact.

"Stop!" I said. "Leave him alone!"

"Get her out of here." One of the guards, who was trying to get ahold of Gale, told the two by me before turning his attention back to my bodyguard. "Gale Hawthorne, you are under arrest for treason against the United Districts of Panem."

"No!" I cried out just as the two guards reached down and grabbed my arms. They started to drag me out of the room but I wasn't going. I wouldn't leave.

Gale kept struggled to get away from the three guards, to get to me. His gray eyes connected with mine and for once Gale Hawthorne looked scared, completely and utterly terrified. Something in him snapped—I saw it in those gray eyes—and he made his move against his captors. Gale elbowed one of them in the nose before punching the other with his free hand; it was just enough for him to close the five feet between us.

"Everything will be fine. Don't worry. I love you. Don't worry."

It's all he could get out before the guards got hold of him again. But still he struggled and again they punched him and beat him with their nightsticks.

"No! Please, stop!" I pleaded as I was hauled out of the room. I fought the two guards but they were so much stronger. "Gale!"

The last image I have of Gale Hawthorne was of him, lying of the ground, bloodied and beaten, with three guards standing over him. Through the chaos though, he looked at me and mouthed three little words. "You'll be okay."

He gave me a half smile.

The next instant he was flipped onto his stomach and handcuffed and I was dragged out of his sight, knowing full well I would never see him again.

The two guards brought me up to the roof where a transport was waiting to take me to the arena. They dragged me up the ramp and threw me in a seat where I sat motionless. I vaguely remember one of them coming up to me and shooting something into my arm…something about the tracking device…but I was so numb to everything happening around me that I didn't even pay attention.

Gale was probably dead by now. I'm sure they shot him on the spot.

He could be dead and I will never know for sure.

I was shaking uncontrollably.

The plane landed and the guards drag me off again. They led me down and through underground passages until they dropped me at a door. One of them look down at me with an un-amused look on his face. "The clothes you'll need to put on are already in your dressing room. Once the timer starts, you'll have fifteen seconds to get into the tube that will take you up to the arena. If you are not in the tube, you will be shot on the spot. And remember to stay on your stand for sixty seconds or else…well, you'll be blown to little bits." He paused as he looked me over once and shook his head. "Have a nice death, Serena Snow."

The guard opened the door for me and then pushed me in before closing it again. Inside the empty room, the silence was deafening. Everything was still, unlike the bedroom I had just been in and I wasn't sure how to handle it. How could someone go from mayhem to quiet so suddenly, knowing that everything they have known was on the verge of change? They couldn't. I couldn't.

There were a couple hangers on the wall opposite me with the clothes that I was supposed to wear in the arena. They consisted of skinny tan cargo pants, a fitted black t-shirt, an olive green cargo jacket, and black combat boots that sat on the floor like the ones we wore to training. With shaking hands, I took the pieces and began to replace them with the pajamas that I wore. These clothes didn't indicate anything about the arena I was going into but I didn't care much about that now.

I sat down on the chair they provided for me but then got up again instantly, unable to sit still for that long. I stood up again and started to pace while I braided my wavy auburn hair back in its double Dutch braided ponytail. Then I was left with nothing to do. Nothing to do but stand and wonder what I should do once I get into the arena and if I would be leaving anyone behind now.

Was Gale all right? No, that was certain. But alive? That was my worry now when it should have been what my fate held for me in the next few moments. I'm sure that was their plan all along, though. The guards came and ripped me out of bed, and beat Gale in front of me because they wanted to rattle the spoiled Capitol princess.

They had done just that. I was rattled.

Gale wouldn't want this to control me. He wouldn't let it.

He'd tell me that I had to focus on the games now, not him. My survival and success was what mattered because I couldn't control what was happening with him.

"Thirty seconds." A voice came over a loud speaker and echoed of the concrete walls of the room, making me jump. Had I really been waiting in here that long?

The guard said once the timer started I would have fifteen seconds to get into the tube in the corner of the room. I'd guess that it would shoot me up into the arena; but the idea of be stuck in there, waiting, terrified me more than I already was.

"Fifteen seconds."

A buzzing noise started and I knew it was time to go…and yet I couldn't move. I was frozen where I stood, unable to make my way to the tube that would take me away from the uncertainty of Gale and bring me to the uncertainty of my own life.

The timer was counting down and I now had five seconds to get into the tube.

It was now or never.

I don't know how but my feet started to move and I made my way over to the tube, stepping inside the cylinder. The timer got louder. "Three, two, one, zero."

A wooshing sound came from behind me and I spun to see that the door had slid closed.

This was it. No turning back now.

I was going into the arena.

I hope you enjoyed it! I rushed through the edits in order to get it out to you guys sooner so hopefully there aren't too many typos! Thank you so much for reading and being so patient! Please tell me what you think if you feel inspired to!