A/N- Thank you so much for your continued support, guys. I'm sorry for all the angst, but if you came into a Hunger Games fanfiction expecting good times, somebody told you a very cruel lie.

The next chapter will be the final one.

"Camera forty-eight!" somebody barked out desperately. Azaiah suppressed a groan, and tapped at the keyboard. She hated camera work. She was supposed to be Design, not Broadcast, but it seemed like lately everybody was being reassigned. She hadn't seen some of her fellow Gamemakers for days (though admittedly there was little love lost there).

Her grumbling stopped when the camera switched and she saw what everybody was getting so excited about. Azaiah swore and threw herself back into things, tapping at screens and altering sliders and getting the footage out just in time. She breathed a sigh of relief as the 'Panem feed' screen filled with woman from One, calmly placing the barrel of a gun against the pale skin of her throat.

"You cut that close," somebody said, in a tone neither congratulatory or condemning. She scowled.

"What are you doing here?" she asked the man standing at her elbow. It always freaked her out how quietly he could appear. She never seemed to notice his approach.

"Watching," he said. "Waiting."

"Don't you have work?"

"I was with the President. He has a message for you, by the way."

"Which is?" she said, biting back jealousy. She never got summoned to talk to the President, and she'd been a Gamemaker for at least twice as long.

"Don't miss out anything that happens next," he said, noting her finger hovering over the 'CUT' button. "They'll still be switching between cameras as they see fit, but don't stop anything from going out."

"Anything?" she said, alarmed. "Is that wise? I mean, suicide is all well and good-" Her words were punctuated by an appropriately timed gunshot, and the woman's body crumpled to the ground. "- but what if they start talking? Do you really want to risk exposing Panem to their rebel nonsense?"

"You can't cut off a story before it reaches its end. This is the final chapter, and you want to just stop reading?"

"Of course not," she said, annoyed. "I'm sick of this damn thing. I want it over. But equally, there's a good reason I've been working my ass off not to show any of their stupid, childish melancholy. I don't see why we should start airing grieving now."

"I think they'll have more important things on their mind than grieving," he deadpanned.

"Eight and Twelve approaching," somebody called out.

"But everything? What happens if they refuse?"

"Then good for them. We can wait and see which one dies of poisoning first. Their message, their mission- none of it matters at this point. The outcome is going to be the same." He paused. "Besides, if they don't want to get their knives bloodied, there'll be… alternative ways of sorting things out."

"They're here," somebody called, as Holmes and Watson stumbled into the shot. Azaiah snapped her eyes to look at her fellow Gamemaker. His cold blue eyes glistened with something she couldn't quite read. "Do you know something I don't?"

"Many things, I'd imagine. Now, if you could just shut up for five seconds, we're about to see history in the making."

"Announcement in ten!" someone shouted. People began frantically flipping switches, altering variables, preparing the sound systems for broadcast. Azaiah looked over at the frenzy and idly swivelled her chair from side to side. Censorship might be boring, but at least it wasn't much work as of late.

"What are they waiting for?" Twelve was asking.

"Three…" someone in the room began to count down.

"I don't know," Eight replied.

"Two…" They mouthed the 'one', and then the announcement began. Azaiah leaned back and watched the children's faces as the man recited his lines down the microphone. Everybody had been falling over themselves to praise Lucan when he announced his plan- change the rules and then change them back. Personally, Azaiah found it ridiculous. This whole 'number' business was ridiculous. Azaiah longed for the days when you could just put twenty-four tributes in an arena with twenty-four hatchets and wait. People were so fussy about entertainment these days.

Azaiah snorted a little when they finished with 'and may the odds be ever in your favour'; she'd always found the line cheesy. When she glanced over at the Gamemaker by her side, he was smiling, but she didn't think it was for the same reason. Turning back to her screen, she shuddered. She didn't know what it was about him that always set her on edge. Very few people could intimidate Azaiah, but Sebastian Moran managed it every time.

In District Twelve, two Peacekeepers were stood awkwardly, hands in pockets. The other two were focusing on bashing the front door in.

"It's so unnecessary," a nearby, tired-looking woman fussed anxiously. "Couldn't they at least knock?"

"She didn't answer the door," her friend replied without turning her head, careful not to draw any attention.

The door splintered and broke, and the four Peacekeepers flooded in. "Watson?" one shouted as they swarmed. "Harriet Watson?" She caught eye of the pile of bottles in the sink and grimaced. "Fucking alcos," she muttered. Outside, there was a sudden burst of static as the huge screen leapt into life.

"Aww, man, they're broadcasting again," one of the men said. "I don't want to miss it."

"Then hurry up," the leader snapped. "Try the bedroom door."

He did so, and found it wouldn't budge. "It's blocked," he said.

"Let me try," the leader grunted, shoving the other man out of the way and slamming into the door as hard as he could. It shuddered slightly, but somebody had pushed something up close on the other side, blocking it off. He tried again and then scowled, drawing back.

"It's blocked," he said, not leaving any space for a retort. "Can we go around the back?"

"Oh, for God's sake," a woman said, and she reached into her belt. The others, understanding what was going to happen, scurried away with their arms over their heads. Pulling out a small, compact ball, the woman crouched down. She set it in motion towards the door and raced from the room.

The explosion was small: localised, but fierce. They heard the muted bang from outside and tore themselves away from the screen to venture back in, masks strapped firmly to their faces. There was little smoke and even less fire, but it paid to be safe. The smallest Peacekeeper was elected to work their way in, squeezing past the destroyed obstacle; a smouldering wreck of what had been a wardrobe. When she entered the room, she led with her gun.

Yet instead of a person, she found nothing. She looked around stupidly, but there was no clear place where anyone could be hiding. She caught a glimpse of something in the corner- a scrap of paper, left trapped under a stone on the very far side of the room. She darted and grabbed the note, grateful that the flames hadn't beaten her to it. She was less grateful when she read what it said.

Sorry, guys, too late! Send John my love.
Harry xoxo

In District Eight, nobody was attempting to track down Mycroft Holmes. Nobody would be that stupid.

In an area of Panem only two people knew the exact coordinates of, in a patch of forest and grass and water hemmed in by invisible forcefields, filled with poisoned water and toxic plants and the stench of death, the sun was beginning to rise. Within a few seconds, it was high in the sky.

"I suppose they want this well-lit," Sherlock muttered. Neither he nor John had moved, the recent words ringing in their heads.

"You knew this was coming," John said, voice hollow.

"I suspected," Sherlock admitted. "Letting two live? They were never going to follow through on that. Too risky, too strange, too different. They don't want change. They can't handle it."

"If you knew- if you bloody well knew it was going to end this way, why- when they announced it, why did you- look, you know what I'm asking," John said, lowering his voice.

Sherlock did know the question, but he wasn't sure about answer. It seemed weak, somehow, to admit that the revelation hadn't been instant. That, at first, he had ignored logic in favour of emotion. It had only been later, after the initial rush had worn off, that the suspicion had flourished from a niggle of doubt into knowledge of the most likely outcome. Sherlock should have changed things then, should have taken it back- but there had still been that stupid seed of hope, that little voice whispering 'maybe…'

"Because for a very intelligent man, I make appalling life decisions," he answered eventually. John snorted, the laughter slightly bitter.

"And I thank God you do," he sighed. "C'mere." He drew Sherlock close and kissed him. Their lips moved gently together, and Sherlock only just remembered to drag the gun towards himself with his foot. They broke apart after a few seconds.

"You do know what has to happen next, don't you?" Sherlock checked, his voice gentle.

"Yeah," John said sadly. "Yeah, I know."

"I am sorry," Sherlock said sincerely.

"Don't be. It's not your fault."

Sherlock probed around for more words to say, but found none. There was no point in putting it off any longer, he supposed. He stepped back and raised the gun to his head, deciding to do it from the side rather than try and aim the thing inside his mouth- could be awkward, chance of missing. But before he could even think about pulling the trigger, the weapon was yanked from his hand.

"What the fuck are you doing?" John shouted.

"What do you think?" Sherlock snapped, confused.

"Are you insane? No way, Sherlock, no way."

"Well, what did you think I meant?" John looked at him disbelievingly. Slowly, as if demonstrating something to a child, he raised the gun to his own chest. It was awkward with his dominant hand still splinted, but the intention was clear.

"Don't you dare," Sherlock said. "I mean it, John, put that thing down."

"Or what? You'll shoot me?" John said, but he lowered the gun anyway. "Sherlock, only one of us is walking out of here, and it should be you."

"Why?"

"Because you're you!" John said it like it was obvious, because to him, it was. "You're Sherlock Holmes!"

"And you're John Watson, and enough good people die in these Games without you joining them."

"Sherlock, please," John said, nearly begging by now. "I don't want… I can't take it, okay? I can't watch you dehydrate or poison yourself with mercury and just sit around hoping you outlast me- because that's what I'll be hoping, trust me." Sherlock heard the whole sentence, but he was stuck on one particular word.

"Hope…" he echoed.. Hope. Luck. Chance, odds. 'May the odds be ever in your favour'. The Hunger Games, the games, games, odds, favour, the odds, in your favour...

"They want this over," he said, the ideas unravelling in his head to fall out of his mouth. "They want this over as badly as we do. They predicted this would happen- oh, they may be cruel, but they're not stupid. Somebody worked it out, and that somebody made contingency plans."

"What do you mean?"

"I always did think it was a strange thing to find under a bush." Sherlock pulled the small bottle out of his pocket, a space others might have used for water or weapons.

"You've been keeping that thing with you?"

"It was a puzzle, John. I never could leave a puzzle." He twisted the cap off, finally opening the damn thing, and found it came away with surprising ease. "Its spawning must have been an event, possibly one of the first in the game," he said. He shook the pills out into his hand, twin strawberry capsules. Sherlock held the emptied out bottle up to the light and snorted derisively. "Oh, they get zero credit for originality."

"Can I see?"

He held the bottle out. John took it gingerly and peered inside. Etched onto the base, so shallow that it couldn't be seen from the underneath, was a carving- tiny, delicate. It was identical to those they had seen around the arena, except for one detail: where they had been numbers, this was a word. He handed it back.

"Finis," Sherlock read out loud. "'The end'. It's still scheduling, just a variation."

"So it's poison?"

"No, they'd never have given us two pills if that was the case. They're identical to look at, but only one can be poison- the other has to be safe."

"So if I take one and you take the other, one of us lives and the other dies?"

"Taking the decision out of our hands." He tapped at the bottle with his fingers. "Kind, in a way, I suppose. What do you think?"

John thought about spending the rest of his life alone, every breath he took laced with the ghosts of those Sherlock hadn't. He imagined watching Sherlock die- maybe violent and fast, maybe slow and agonising- while he stood nearby, waiting to be declared a victor and rewarded for his good luck, to be decorated with gold and blood. But then he imagined himself dying- again, maybe painless, maybe excruciating- but with the knowledge that it had saved Sherlock's life. And then he didn't know what to think.

"Would it be quick?" John said, hating how small his voice sounded.

"I can't know, but I'd imagine so. They won't want to drag it out any longer. As this says- 'the end'."

"And what do you say?" John said, looking at Sherlock intently. Sherlock looked down at the pills in his hand, and then back up into John's eyes.

"I say," he began slowly, "that from the day I was picked, I intended to play this game and I intended to win. I still do. But I thought that winning simply meant living- now, I'm not so sure. I don't think it's winning if I swallow a pill and I happen to live. I don't think it's winning if I can go without water for longer than you. I don't think it's winning if me living means you have to die. I don't see anything in that situation but loss." He turned the pills over in his hand, running his long fingers over their shape. "You can't win this- not the way I want to- by playing by their rules. Luckily for me, I've never had a problem with cheating."

John watched as Sherlock turned to the nearby bushes. He could guess at what Sherlock was looking for, but he didn't know what to say about it; much less what to do. He quietly lay the gun on the ground as Sherlock finally found a small cluster of the orange fruit, and plucked a handful off deftly. The cloth around John's fingers was coming undone.

"From what I understand, they're incredibly toxic," Sherlock told him, turning back around. "One or two will cause death within a few minutes."

"Nobody gets to win."

"And so everybody does," Sherlock finished. Again, he asked "what do you think?", and again, John didn't know.

"I…" he began, uselessly. "With the pills, there's a chance you could live."

"It's not a chance I want." John was still unsure, but he held out his bad hand and Sherlock tipped several of the berries into it. John picked one up, rolling it between his fingers. He tried to remember what Greg had said about the effects, but he couldn't. His mind had set up an impenetrable barrier to the memory. Probably for the best.

"John, listen to me," Sherlock said urgently, watching his face. "You don't have to do this."

"Sherlock," he said, dropping the berry back with the others. "For once in your life, shut up."

Sherlock leant down and kissed him once, very gently. "On the count of three?" he asked, tipping the pink pills into the bottle and setting it aside.

"The count of three," John agreed.

"One," Sherlock began. John reached out his spare hand and their fingers entwined silently- an aching reminder of a rooftop a million miles away, a night a million years ago.

"Two." Sherlock took one final look at John's face. He smiled- there was sadness in it, but it was a smile all the same- and then shut his eyes.

"Three," John finished for Sherlock. He raised the berries to his mouth and, next to him, Sherlock did the same.

The berries had barely touched John's lips when trumpets began to blare. It was the same victory music as ever, he knew- but he couldn't shake the sensation that it was different somehow. Slightly off-key, slightly too fast. Before he could give any real thought to it, the announcer was gabbling frantically.

"Stop! he shouted. "Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games: Sherlock Holmes and John Watson! I give you- the tributes of Districts Eight and Twelve!"

John dropped the berries and let himself fall into Sherlock's waiting arms.

"You asshole," he whispered into Sherlock's ear. "You utter, utter asshole. You knew, didn't you?"

"I suspected."

John laughed in wonder. "Fucking Christ."

"It wasn't a trick," Sherlock insisted, voice too low to be picked up over the fanfare of trumpets. "I wasn't lying. I would have done it."

"I don't care. All that matters is that you didn't have to." And then they were kissing, and the roar of exuberant crowds back in the Capitol was flooding the arena, pumped through the speakers. When John pulled away he found that he couldn't stop laughing, even through the tears running down his face.

The fraying piece of fabric around his hand finally gave up and drifted away from his skin. He caught it just before it hit the dirt and gave a cursory glance to his broken finger, before deciding that he really, really couldn't be bothered. He knotted it loosely around Sherlock's wrist instead.

"For safekeeping," he said, but the hovercraft overhead drowned his words out. He didn't much care. Sherlock's hand firmly in his, the two of them stepped onto the ladder together. Frozen in place as his feet hit the first rung, John rose and watched the arena fall away; slipping out of sight until it was nothing but a bad memory, a nightmare burning behind his eyelids.

Thomas Lucan had never known the main control room to be in silence this complete before. He was overly conscious of his own breathing, his quickened heartbeat. One by one, people noticed his presence and turned to look at him- confused, desperate, their eyes searching for answers he didn't have.

He had to get out.

He yanked the door of the small office closed behind him and rested his head in his hands. Lucan sucked in a breath through his teeth, and let it out slowly. He told himself that he could have one minute- sixty seconds exactly- and then he would leave and deal with things, as a Head Gamemaker should.

There was a slight crackle in his ear, and he frowned. He thought he had switched the earpiece off, but admittedly he had other things on his mind. He turned the thing back off, only for it to reactivate less than a second later.

"You knew this was coming," a soft voice murmured, and his eyes widened. His lips began to move, but the bomb in the corner of the room detonated before he could get any further.

As soon as the door closed behind them, one doctor firmly grabbed hold of Sherlock's jacket, the other John's.

"You've gotten so weak," one said caringly. "Here- this should help."

The needle between Sherlock's shoulder blades was sharp and cold and most certainly unneeded, but he wasn't awake for long enough to complain about it.

When he woke up, he kept his eyes closed for a few moments. Smell of antiseptic, sharp- possibly hospital , though lack of noise indicates otherwise. More likely medical location in Training Centre. Naked but some kind of restraint belt around waist, two tubes in right arm- most likely for rehydration, possibly electrolytes or nutrients. Any pain in limbs gone, hair washed and brushed, nobody else in room. Nobody else in room. John not in room. John.

He opened his eyes. There were no obvious doors or windows; nothing other than his bed and the softly glowing ceiling. The tubes extended into the wall behind him and, when he looked down at his skin, it was clean and unblemished. A portion of the wall suddenly slid open, and a woman walked in carrying in a tray.

"Where's John?" he demanded immediately. She stopped in place and looked at him helplessly. Ahh. Avox. "Well, is he safe?" She just looked at him, eyes wide and confused. He was growing impatient. "Come on, did they cut your neck muscles at the same time? You can at least nod."

And nod she did; timidly, but it was there. Presumably she wasn't used to victors being so talkative. It was true that his voice was rusty from lack of use, but he wasn't going to start listening to his body now. They didn't give him much food, but his stomach had shrunk so much that he barely managed to finish it all. He had only just swallowed the last bite when they knocked him out again.

That continued for some time- the waking and sleeping, punctuated by gradually increasing meals. Every time somebody brought food, he would ask them the same questions- is John safe? Is John nearby?- and they would always reply with a slight and anxious nod. Everybody seemed on edge around him; as though even being around him was dangerous. He liked that.

When he finally woke up and found the restraint gone, tubes gone, he was out of bed before his eyes had fully opened. They'd given him a replicate of outfit he wore in the arena, and he chastised himself for his initial revulsion. It's just fabric, he thought crossly as he pulled it on. You've spent your whole life dealing with fabric.

He paced impatiently until the smooth expanse of wall finally slid open. Karyn, Rook and one of the stylists stood at the end of the corridor, waiting for him. They watched him approach quietly.

"Well done, kid," Rook said, after several seconds of silence. "Always thought you had it in you."

"No, you didn't," Sherlock said evenly.

"No, I didn't, but it was a nice surprise."

"Where's John?"

"Alive. You'll get your reunion later, princess. For now, you need to go and get prettied up."

The stylist scowled at Rook, and lay a finely manicured hand on Sherlock's arm.

"One second," Karyn said before he could be dragged away. "I just wanted to congratulate you, Sherlock. I was impressed- you played your part perfectly."

"What?"

"The romance angle. Very clever idea, very easy to work with. Of course, after the cameras went down and the sponsorship was blocked off, it was less beneficial, but I'm pleased to see you kept it going until the end. A true actor never breaks role."

"I- I didn't-" Sherlock was uncomfortable with how often he found himself lost for words as of recent. Before he could add anything else, he was dragged away by his stylist.

He didn't... he couldn't think. It hadn't all been fake, had it? At first it had been, yes- but no, even then, at the Cornucopia… that wasn't a lie, was it? It had been for real. Though, was it really like Sherlock? What was more likely- him using John to manipulate the viewers, or him genuinely wanting a relationship with the man? The question was laughably easy to answer, and yet…

And then he was being engulfed by his prep team, and it was almost a relief to be able to focus on the annoyance of being made over.

"That's new," John said, looking at the platform. Glamor nodded once, tightly.

"They had to rethink the entire design- what with two victors, and all."

The rumbling of the crowd outside was loud, and the noise sent John's stomach flipping over. He imagined their cries, their shouts, the sheer energy of so many people in one place. He didn't want to be here. He wanted to be with Sherlock and he wanted to hide away from the world, just the two of them, until everything made sense. He didn't mind if it took a while.

"How about a hug for luck?" Glamor said, and the general feeling of unease that had been building in John exploded into fullness. The man he had met at the start of all of this would rather bathe in acid than offer him a hug. John stood stiffly as Glamor folded his arms around him, and was not shocked when the escort began to hiss words into his ear.

"There was no rebellion, do you understand? Everything continued as normal- nothing was burned, nobody said or did anything stupid, and it's a shame that the cameras were malfunctioning, but at least nothing important was missed. That's the story Panem are being told, and that's your truth from this moment on."

"Okay, I see," John said.

"No, you don't. The President's letting all of that slide, for reasons I can't even begin to guess- but the crap with the berries? The Capitol aired it, every second, and now they're the laughing stock of Panem. They can't cope with that."

"Really?" John said, laughing himself as though Glamor had just told him something hilarious. He had handled one sided conversations before, after all. "What next?"

"Your excuse is that you were following Sherlock's lead. You were hungry, thirsty, scared, in love, whatever- you weren't thinking straight. You're young and confused, and that's all there was to it."

"Sure thing. Where's Sherlock?" He had asked about Sherlock's location and health more often than he had said 'hello' in the past few days, but all he ever got told was that he was alive, and that John would see him later on. As for Harry, nobody would tell him anything at all.

"He's being given some instruction of his own." Glamor pulled away, and when he spoke again his voice was back to normal. "There's gonna be a short delay before the ceremony. Stay here and stare at the walls or something."

John nodded and sat down in a nearby seat. He stretched his left hand out, curling and uncurling his fingers purely because he could. All of his injuries were healed, his skin spotless. He tried to remember what had happened to the strip of material Harry had lent him, but found that he couldn't. Never mind. By the sounds of it, he had much bigger problems to worry about.

Nobody would tell Sherlock why he had been taken to sit in this private room, but he had his suspicions. He tapped his fingers against the table in a simple melody, watching the strip of rag shift as his wrist moved. Sherlock had no idea where his own token had gone. Presumably a magnifying glass was considered more inflammatory than a strip of fabric.

He stopped tapping when he heard the door open behind him- at least this room had a door- and then resumed when he heard it close lightly. Somebody was in the room with him, he could tell. "Most people knock," Sherlock said. He shrugged. "But then you're not most people, I suppose."

"I should hope not," an alien yet familiar voice said. "It would be so disappointing if the President of Panem was just like all of you ordinary little people, don't you think?"

Sherlock watched, amused, as a cup of tea was set down in front of him. He looked up as somebody dropped into the seat opposite him, cradling his own cup and saucer. The man's smile was wide; his eyes dark, and not so much deep as hollow.

"President Moriarty," Sherlock acknowledged.

"Sherlock," the man grinned. "I think we need to have a little chat."