finale: into the fire
I'm not too sure what I'm supposed to do with this - these hands, this mind, this instability.
From a cage I created, to a hell that heaven made; can't let go of the hatred 'cause I love the way it tastes.
This was not the ending anyone had expected.
Two broken outlier boys and a displaced Career girl, each of them at their wits' end and driven mad by desperation. Insecure Isabelle. Miserable Merrick. Sycophantic Sephtis. Of the twenty-four tributes cast away in the storm of the Twenty-Fourth Hunger Games - so many of them children with pure hearts, solid motivations, unfulfilled desires and unrealized dreams - only three remain: the Blood Queen, the delinquent and the circus freak.
Strange how fate's strings will sway when they're left to dangle over an abyss. Strange, that the three tributes left to face the Games' ultimate tempest were the same three who had no business being alive. The whole of Panem had seen Isabelle's near-drowning in the bloodbath, had watched Merrick endure two days of unspeakable torture, had looked on as Sephtis nearly bled out from injuries not once, but twice, seemingly unaware of the grave peril that his body was facing. The whole of Panem had experienced the brutality that plagued their three finalists, and the whole of Panem had thought them dead; bodies, after all, can only take so much abuse before they wear out.
Merrick, of course, proved otherwise: his continued survival was a lesson in the trials of human anatomy and personal endurance. Padma took away his tongue, his eye, his autonomy and his control, and in return for her abuses, Merrick chopped off her head. For as mangled as his body may be, his will remains insurmountable; it's a rare gift, to be resolute enough to withstand death itself.
(Some might say it's sheer stubbornness that's kept him together since the end of that first night, and Merrick would probably be inclined to agree. Stubborn's a word that's long been associated with his character back in Six, just like standoffish, caustic, uncouth, pigheaded and impossible. While he'd never had a particularly favorable reputation at home, his tenaciousness remained present in everything he did - for better or for worse.)
(It's a quality that's served him well.)
Isabelle, too, is a bastion of resolve - a fact easily proven by her persistence in trekking back and forth through floodwaters not just once, but twice since the sun dawned that morning. Drowning, even unsuccessfully, is a traumatic experience - one that should have instilled in Isabelle a very potent fear of returning to the water. And certainly she is fearful - there's a telltale gleam of panic on her face as she makes her way toward the lighthouse, wading through water that's passed the height of her hips. She simply refuses to give in to her circumstances.
(Refusal to give in. That's Isabelle in a nutshell: since she was a child, her life has been defined by scorn. She was mocked for being different, ridiculed for her appearance, her dress, her mannerisms and her temperament, shoved aside by practically the whole of Two's youth because she was an easy target for abuse, an easy victim for mockery.)
(Perhaps that's why she still fights; because she doesn't know how to do anything else.)
Of course, Sephtis Adeyemi's circumstances may be the oddest of the lot; there aren't exactly many children who can claim being raised both in a circus and amongst the ranks of a rebel cell. There are even less who can claim murder as their most definitive accomplishment - even though Sephtis hardly sees the string of bodies he and his compatriots left behind in Ten as an accomplishment. His life has been marred by cruelty and marked by sedition since his formative years, but he's adapted to every curveball thrown his way, every change, every shift, every slight, consequence and punishment.
(Adaptability isn't as easy as it seems. Not by a long shot. But Sephtis is a master at adapting to survive. It's what he had to do to keep himself afloat, what he had to do to get himself ahead in a world that's reviled him since before he understood enough to realize it. He slept with devils and performed with snakes, he humored harpies and danced with wolves and let himself play dead for tigers that might have bitten his head off otherwise. And he's adapted again to fit the expectations set for the Games - he's killed, he's tortured, he's played pseudo-Career and pseudo-medic and everything else that Padma asked him to in order to escape death.)
(He won't escape it forever; but he may just be slippery enough to wriggle from the Grim Reaper's grasp this time. He's made it this far.)
None of them should be here. None of them want to be here.
Yet all of them are. Still fighting. Still killing. Still clinging to life with every shred of sanity they've got.
This isn't the ending Panem expected.
It is the ending they deserve.
Death is not the opposite of life - merely a part of it.
And so on the third night of the Twenty-Fourth, three lives intersect - and three tributes meet at a crossroads, each one of them wishing for death while they fight for their own survival.
(Humans are odd that way. So self-destructive. So fragile.)
She knows where she has to go.
The tide is up to her ribcage now, waves rippling and churning as Isabelle pushes her way through them, Cel's spear once more in her hand. It's getting difficult to move; more than once she's had to stop and lean against one of the waterlogged buildings in town, in desperate need of oxygen to stave off her ever-present anxiety.
She's always hated the water. Always hated storms, too, as far as that goes; the thunder and lightning are practically damaging to her ears, and the rain… hells, the rain… she abhors it beyond words, every droplet so loud it shatters her concentration, so wet it threatens to make her burst into a fit of screeching tears. Being caught out here - right smack in the middle of the bloody thing - is unbearable. Every time she breathes she feels like she's back in the ocean, choking on saltwater as it washes over her from every possible direction, and this time there's no Maxim, no friends, no allies to save her… she's entirely on her own with the flood-beast trying to consume her and it's beyond terrifying, beyond horrifying, it's - she's -
Lighttower, Isabelle reminds herself. It's the highest point in the arena, the safest place to be when the storm picks up again. I have to reach it, have to get there, I need - I can't - I can't do this, oh shit, shit, shit, shit -
Isabelle wails, the spear half slipping from her wet hand as her knees nearly buckle. Blood fills her mouth as she sinks her teeth into her lower lip, and she refixes her hold around her weapon, using it as an anchor to try and carry her through. All of this, all the fighting, the surviving, and for what? For what, she's just going to die here, die in the water like she should have in the bloodbath, the storm'll get worse and she's going to drown, and she can't - she can't think, it's too much, too much, I'm not ready, please, I can't do this -
Lightning cracks overhead and Isabelle starts to move again, faster than before. If she doesn't get to the lighthouse soon, she won't stand a chance of making it out of this place. She has to hurry. She needs to get there, needs to get out of the water, anything's better than this, anything is better than here -
She thrashes as she tries to run, shoving water aside with her hands, kicking through it with her feet, knowing she's exhausting her own energy, but fuck it, she doesn't have a choice, she needs to get out of the storm and she needs to do it now -!
The rain stings this time when it hits her face. Stings her cheeks and her eyelids and even her head, and when Isabelle reaches up she realizes with horror that her scalp is bleeding, bits of the hair singed away and dying in her fingers.
What -? She thinks, looking at the thick black strands clutched in her palm, her vision blurring as her movements halt. What's…?
"Aagh!"
A pained noise emits from her own mouth before she even realizes it, and Isabelle flinches as pink rain begins to fall in greater force, landing on her face, her shoulders, her unguarded back and everything else. Her wetsuit seems to disintegrate wherever the rain hits, and the rivulets leave rough pockmarks where they hit her skin, burning and corroding at her exposed flesh.
Isabelle doesn't question it any further. She simply tries to run.
The spear washes away from her hand, and one of her shoes comes right off her feet as she stumbles, unable to see, unable to process any of what's happening. She forces her way through wave after wave of black water, needing to escape the rain, needing to escape death even when it's hounding her. The lighttower's only a short distance away, short enough to power through, she's so close she could grab the doors - no, not that close, but close, she has to be, she has to be…!
Just a bit further, you can do it, Isabelle, just a little more, a little further, you can do this, come on, almost there, almost…!
(The rapids behind her are churning pink.)
(All she can feel is fire.)
Merrick's just finished stocking up the barricade when the screaming starts.
"Let me in!" A girl's voice cries out from beyond the lighthouse door, terror laced through her tone. "Let me in, please, let me in, let me in, I won't hurt you, just open the door, open the door now, please - please, please, please, I can't do this, I can't -!"
Something thuds against the heavy wood, and Merrick practically stumbles over his own feet in his haste to pull away from the entryway. It's not as if he doesn't know exactly who it is that's standing on the other side, exactly who it is that's trying to break in. The last surviving tribute is the girl from District Two - the same girl who spared his life, freed him, and offered to help him take his revenge with absolutely no judgment or qualms.
She showed him mercy, just a few short hours ago. But Merrick's too canny to believe she'll do it a second time, especially once she realizes he's betrayed her trust with Ten.
From the corner of his eye, Merrick can see Sephtis rising to his feet (well, as much as he can with his gored leg). Before the Ten boy has a chance to move, Merrick raises a hand, gesturing for him to stand down - not to concern himself with the door yet, not to worry unless they really have to. They need to conserve their energy; neither of them are in a good enough state to fight if Two takes down the door, but they'll be forced to regardless.
And neither of them stand a chance against a Career. Not in a genuine fight - she'd blow right through them.
Wearing her out's the best bet. Maybe it's underhanded, maybe it's dirty, Merrick doesn't know and he doesn't care. He isn't even sure what he's still doing here. He just knows that against all reason and all odds, he's alive - and he doesn't want to die yet. He's ready for things to end, but he can't bring himself to just lie down and let the Games chew him up. Not while he's still got two fists that can punch and two legs that can kick and a head stuffed full of bad memories and rage he's needing to vent.
He should be dead, but he refuses to die like this. Merrick Aldaine will go when he bloody fuckin' well wants to, and not a moment sooner.
There's another hit against the door. The barricade rattles, the table moves to the side. The wooden barrier separating both him and Sephtis from the fury of the storm opens, no more than a crack, and a dim grey light starts to filter into the room. Merrick tenses. There's a hand reaching around the door, dark skin covered in pockmarks and lesions where Two's flesh seems to have burned away. Blood seeps from her fingers as she continues to screech - "let me in! Let me in, please! PLEASE!"
Merrick doesn't move. Neither does Sephtis.
There's another hit at the door… and then silence.
An overwhelming sense of dread settles into Sephtis' gut.
The world beyond the lighthouse is quiet - so quiet he can hardly stand it, reminiscent of too many dead nights from his childhood, running around between tents in the Cirque du Noir as the rain poured down from overhead, dousing their torchlights. For a few moments, it's as if the world has narrowed, and time has halted in anticipation of a single moment - the moment when Sephtis Adeyemi dies.
He isn't dead yet, but he's close enough. His vision's going double. He can taste bile in his throat. There's blood leaking out of him, has been since he left the clinic with Six an hour or two back. Sephtis knows he can't do anything about it. He's too grievously wounded to last for very long against Two… or against Six, either.
He can't even be sure whose injuries are worse right now. Six is missing all sorts of pieces from his upper body, but nothing so bad as to prove fatal. Infection might be a different story, though; the lighttower reeks of decay just by proxy of their residing in it. Sephtis doesn't think he's quite so bad on that front, but both of his wounds - the one through his knee, the one through his arm - are probably significant enough to need stitching, and he doesn't even have simple bandages.
(Padma's the one who was good with keeping track of injuries, figuring out how to mend them. Sephtis' strategy has always been to shrug them off and power through, but he'll be the first to admit that in these circumstances, he's not sure how long he can make that work.)
Two's shouts die as the pounding stops, and Sephtis turns to look at Six. If she's dead, he knows what comes next; both of them do. They can't put it off for long.
"Looks like it's time," he says, voice more stoic than it has any right to be. "Shall we -"
"DAMN YOU!" Two screams, and the barricade topples over, fragments of glass from a couple of carelessly added lanterns spraying everywhere as the lights shatter against the floor. The door bursts open and there she is, a seething juggernaut of a Career, struggling to keep on her feet. A quick glance is enough to tell Sephtis why; the flesh of her legs has practically corroded, skin stripped clean from the muscle and the underlying meat of her body singed and tinted a sickly orange color. Her upper body's better, though not by much, covered in peeling layers of multicolored flesh, half-melted along her jaw and cheek, much of her hair burned away from her scalp.
She should be dead. Sephtis has no idea how she isn't.
But then again, he and Six aren't dead either.
The Capitol must be disappointed.
"So it's left to us, then," he cackles. "Three corpses, all ready to keel over."
"You let him go," Two sneers, not at him but at Six, her words a guttural growl. "What happened… to revenge? To… to our retribution?"
Six shrugs one shoulder, his arms crossed over his chest as he stares Two in the face, unwilling to relent. His silence, even if not by choice, seems more mocking than words could ever be.
"Whatever," Two hisses. "I made it this far… I can make it past… a couple of… dying…"
Bloody spittle drips down her chin as she falls to her knees. From above their heads, something begins to crack.
Sephtis doesn't even have a chance to look up before the world falls apart.
In the weeks and months immediately proceeding the Games, nobody can describe exactly what they saw during the final moments. Isabelle Harmony collapsed on her knees. Merrick Aldaine craned his head up to look at the ceiling. And Sephtis Adeyemi…
Sephtis Adeyemi did nothing. Absolutely nothing, as the windows far above their heads cracked and rain began to pour through the open panes, drenching the inside of the lighthouse with a coat of nightmarish acid, intent on forcing the tributes into action as much as it seemed intent on killing them. From the open doorway that Isabelle Harmony fought so hard to push through, pink floodwater began to wash inside the room, overtaking her as she kneeled on the floor, gasping and wheezing and crying for it to stop, all of her pleas lost on deaf ears.
Sephtis and Merrick, both with more presence of mind than Isabelle seemed to retain, made a mad dash for the stairs, the former shoving the latter down as he tried to break away. But, naturally, getting away from Merrick wasn't quite so easy; Sephtis barely made it to the second step before he was thrown off balance, his body slamming sideways into a wall. Disoriented, he half-crumpled on the staircase, winded further by Merrick's elbow jabbing into his gut as the Six boy attempted to push past him. Sephtis kicked his leg out, watching his heel collide with Merrick's head as the Six boy tumbled backwards, his left hand fixed tightly around Sephtis' ankle as he tried to drag the Ten boy into the flood alongside him.
Sephtis kicked again, and Merrick let go, but didn't falter in his pursuit. He lunged back toward the staircase, tackling Sephtis as he restarted his assent, and for all Sephtis' punches, hits and whacks, Merrick refused to let go. He clung to Sephtis with an arm around his chest and one around his neck, their combined weight too much for the Ten boy to carry alone. Sephtis bit at Merrick's hand, at his arm, but still Merrick refused to let go. Sephtis' leg, of course, could only hold out for so long.
He, too, was brought to his knees. The floodwater continued to rise, surpassing the first stair, then the second, then the third. It rose ever higher, with no mind to where the tributes were, nor how gravely Sephtis and Merrick were fighting to hold on longer than the other. And along with it came Isabelle Harmony, still alive, with her skin nearly burned away entirely, her grotesque hands scrabbling on smooth stone as she tried to pull herself from the tide of acid, not wishing to be drowned a second time.
"... puh… puhl… eah…" she begged, but neither Sephtis nor Merrick could hear her as they tumbled back and forth across the stairs, madly trying to grab at the wooden cover separating the lowest level of the Overlook from the ones above. Merrick's fingers reached for the dangling chain, but with his nails ripped off, his palms scraped and his knuckles bent out of shape, he couldn't manage to keep a hold on the handle no matter how hard he tried. Sephtis, half on top of him and with an elbow pressed against his throat, could do no better with the blood oozing down his arms and his hands so shaky he couldn't keep them still.
As the finalists fought, the flood continued to consume everything in its path. It was only a matter of time before it carried Isabelle away, only a matter of time before it reached Merrick and Sephtis. When it finally did, the results were macabre beyond measure.
Their legs, like Isabelle's, were the first to be taken, flesh rotting away and muscle atrophying before sliding away from their bones in yellow and orange clumps, chemical burns coating their skin so thickly that it made them unrecognizable. When it reached their torsos, it ate away at their outer layers slowly before corroding their organs, leaving both Merrick and Sephtis coughing up blood and clinging to one another, too disfigured to move. Sephtis, unsurprisingly, was the last to lose consciousness, unbothered by the extremities of the pain that had undone both of his fellows when they were caught in the acid, and remained present enough to observe what was happening even as the breath left his body.
It took hours for them to die. Hours for their cannons to fire. Blessedly enough, the potency of the acid made it seem far shorter for the three finalists, enough that the pain itself faded in a shorter period of time than it by all rights should have. Not all too surprising, in the end; the compound was created by the fingers of a poison expert, well acquainted with rot and decay from his many years serving as a doctor in Panem's very own Capitol. Valentin Verduin knew exactly what he was doing when he acidified the water, and he knew exactly what he was doing when he introduced it into the arena.
There was never going to be a survivor. The Hunger Games had only ever brought forth a cycle of pain, misery and death, unabating and unrelenting. Perhaps without a Victor, Panem would finally open their eyes once more to the cruelty of the Capitol, who stole their children and crushed them into submission with neither concern nor care.
Perhaps without a Victor, reform would finally come.
As the death knell of the anthem finally played, an image of the twenty-four fallen was projected across the arena skies, signifying the loss of all those who had fought and suffered for the sake of survival.
Beneath it gleamed a projection of the Capitol's own insignia, cracked through with lines of red.
"Ladies and gentlemen, the Victor of the Twenty Fourth Hunger Games… is indeterminate."
Finalist, Placement Unknown. Isabelle Harmony, District Two. Killed by Valentin Verduin.
Finalist, Placement Unknown. Merrick Aldaine, District Six. Killed by Valentin Verduin.
Finalist, Placement Unknown. Sephtis Adeyemi, District Ten. Killed by Valentin Verduin.
A/N: Into the Fire by Asking Alexandria.
I think about half of you knew this was coming, and half of you had no idea whatsoever… so it'll be interesting to see the mixed bag of reactions I'm sure will come from it. For those of you who are curious if this was always the projected ending for Centrifuge… yes, it was. I had the plan in place way back in July 2020, before I even opened submissions, to actively write a no-victor Games for the bridging chapter in my verse, particularly as incentive for the Quarter Quell. That it serves as a means for Snow's consolidation of power is simply another plus.
My apologies to Para, Olive and Thorne for putting an end to your tributes this chapter. I'm not sure how much of a comfort it will be to know that they've been my final three from the very beginning (the hows of this finale were always in flux, while the whos and whys never changed) - but I genuinely grew to care very much about Isabelle, Merrick and Sephtis, particularly as I wrote their arcs through the Games. All three of you get to pick up some new placements here, as the canon placings for this final three are all "Finalist, Unknown Placement," but with that said…
Sephtis would have been the last one standing, in this final iteration. So congratulations, Thorne, on your first technical winner of a Hunger Games! I apologize sincerely that he was never intended to survive beyond this final chapter, but perhaps it will be an assurance to know that his story is not over quite yet… I will be posting a oneshot alternate ending entitled 'Syzygy' between now and the time I open submissions for Floccinaucinihilipilification that will detail Sephtis' victory in full (along with some other potential victories from Merrick and Isabelle, who also received a great deal of my thought before heading into this final three). It's the "what if?" story that nobody asked for, but I felt was needed to properly tie off Centrifuge in its entirety.
My acknowledgments will be up with the final chapter, but for now I'll keep it brief: thank you, as always, to everyone reading, submitting, commenting, discussing or supporting me as I continue to write for this verse. I'm ever so grateful, and it means a lot to have so many loyal readers who have stuck with me through this journey.
The epilogue will be up soon.