XLVII: The Capitol - Eastern Train Station.

Pandora Quinn, 31
President of Panem

After all this time she couldn't believe the day was finally here.

Pandora knew it hadn't been that long—several months of preparation later and one rather quick, turbulent Games and here they were such a short time after they had ended, ready to send home their survivors.

It was easier to call them that than the ugly, brutal truth. No one would take kinder to an explanation anymore convoluted either. When she could just look at them and take them in, calm with the knowledge that they were all alive regardless of what it had taken to get to that point, it was enough. Pandora only hoped it could be for everyone else.

In the car on the way to the station it was easy enough. She had few people to look at, even less to maintain any expectations for. Crynn was at her side, his hand curled around her leg—having his warm, reassuring presence by her side was more than enough, but having her daughter tucked into her own little seat did wonders to calm her nerves even more. When she stared at Persephone for a heartbeat too long she earned a bright, cheery smile in response.

All of this was for her daughter, she reminds herself. So that she could grow up in a world without recent memories of the Hunger Games, so that she didn't have to see children slaughtered every year like clockwork. This was the last, the one to end them all. She likes to believe that the job has been accomplished.

Knowing that not everyone believed it stung some, but it was inevitable. The driver had looked hesitant at the thought of driving through the crowds that had thickened through the streets around the station, average citizens alongside newfound visitors from the District and bright-eyed camera-people, all eager to get the best angle. It didn't matter how much Evander, positioned beside him in the front seats, instructed him on where to go.

As long as she continued to be calm, she could do this. These kids were going to arrive home and live good lives from this day forward, well taken care of and looked after the way they should have been all along. They were the first step in ensuring that Panem never returned to any form of their darkest days—no more bloodshed, nor war, or even rebellion.

Peace and freedom still didn't seem quite real, sometimes. Believing it in reduced her to a child-like state, one that her mother would surely make fun of. Then again, her mother was attending today's send-off, or so she had said. Maybe even she was willing to believe it for the sake of the country; the more people they could rope into such a belief, the stronger it was.

That was what Pandora was choosing to believe herself, anyway.

"Mama," Persephone says suddenly, jabbing a finger towards the window as they begin to weave through the worst of the traffic closest to the station. Cameras are going off at their approach, too close to avoid, and her daughter stares as the bulbs flash back in her face, so eager to get the perfect photo. Normally Pandora would pull the shade down to hide her some, but there's no use now. Once they're out there none of them can hide.

In the very least Persephone seems to be eating it up, smiling and giggling just like a little girl should be. No one can deny her that in the very least.

"Are you ready for this?" Evander asks, swiveling from the front-seat to pin her with a look. It's the type only a brother could convey, their closeness from all those years where they were essentially alone come forth once again. A dead father, careless mother, an unknown brother lost to the world long before Crynn had ever come into the picture… she was lucky to have had Evander the way they did.

She was even luckier to have so much more now, even if it had to come about in the oddest of ways. Selfish as it was, Pandora wouldn't trade it for the world.

"I'm not sure any of us are," she admits, giving him a tight smile. "But today will be good. It has to be."

Still nagging at her, though he's not here, is Soran. Evander has been by her side since they were children, always the understanding brother, but Soran is different. Of course he is. Despite the blood they share they haven't been given the same amount of time to understand each other, nor has he quite forgiven her for allowing all of this to happen in the first place. Some traumas just weigh too deep to be easily forgiven, even if they don't seem that way.

All of this is for him, too. Not just for her daughter but the rest of her family, to keep them safe from the horrors that have continuously plagued them. This is only the first day, but it has to be the first of many. Sure they're sending so many of their kids home, but not all. While there won't be nearly as grand of an affair henceforth, they're setting an example.

Crynn squeezes her knee. It'll be okay, he mouths, and coming from him she just knows it has to be true.

Today can be something beautiful. Of course it can, if that's the way they've all been envisioning it for the longest time. It can be the final piece that heals not just their country once and for all, but the rapidly re-appearing world. They're all at risk of crumbling, but they don't have to be. Not anymore.

She can see it all before her now—the reporters lining the tracks, the cameras still going off, the mentors and stylists and escorts all waiting ever so patiently. She can see the children that will get to live as they are meant to.

And she believes it can be real.

Penelope Priestly, 17
District Eight Female

Even if she's not leaving, she's here to do her part.

It feels a bit too much like falling into old habits for Penny's liking, participating in such a show that is, but she knows it's for the best. No one's manipulating her into being here or saying goodbye—she wants to do these things. It's feasibly one of the only things left to do in this journey.

Lisse has a tight hold on her arm, fingers looped around the crook of Penny's elbow. If you had told her this was how the two of them would be she would have called you crazy, but she wouldn't change it for the world now. They'll always be different, but the understanding they share seems to outweigh all of that. It helps that it means she'll have some company in the Capitol for the foreseeable future, too.

Everyone else is leaving. Beside her, she's tempted to drop her elbow onto Micah's shoulders purely just to annoy him one last time, though Penny knows he wouldn't act as such. He would smile and perhaps shrug her off, allowing her to place it there again a second time without interference. The two of them aren't going to get much more sappy than that, and considering she still has to deal with the Nine's that's likely for the best.

She's going to miss them, alright? Compartmentalizing her emotions has never been something lying in Penny's strong suits—she always reacted on her old, wild terms. If she yelled, so be it. If she could get in someone's face she had no qualms about it.

Beyond this odd attachment, though, she's grateful that they get to go home. This won't be the last time they see each-other. They're connected now, all of them, whether they like it or not.

"Are you sure there's nothing you want me to do back home?" Micah asks, eyes fixed on the train as it slots neatly up against the platform. "Anyone you want me to check on?"

Penny isn't sure where they're all going to fit with the mentors and stylists and camera-people assigned to be headed away with them; suddenly she's even more pleased that she doesn't have to get on that train, packed away like a sardine. Running free, as much as she can, has always been the more preferable of the two options.

Penny smiles wryly and elbows him lightly, careful not to dislodge Lisse. "I think you're got enough people to deal with."

"Not that many."

"To you," she fires back. More power to him if he can keep track of his seventy or so odd family members—some days Penny can barely remember to tie her shoes properly. "Seriously, there's no one. Just worry about everything on your side."

"Can do," he agrees softly, looking up at her with some amount of gratefulness in his eyes. Of course he was always going to ask, but in the end he knows it's better for him to keep control and track over everything on his own plate.

Penny straightens, unsure if she's really ready for this. Being so alone all of a sudden will be surreal, really. Yes, she'll always have Lisse, but there will still be unfillable voids. She didn't really think she would miss them this much considering they're not even gone yet. Watching them get on that train will be something else entirely.

"Uh-oh," Lisse mutters behind her, craning her neck to see through the people. Penny gets a much easier look at who seems to slowly easing their way through the crowd in this general direction.

She gives Micah yet another sharp nudge. "We're going to find our Nines. Don't you dare get on that train without hugging me."

"Where are you—"

She nods towards the person approaching. "You can deal with that on your own, thank-you very much."

And, well, she definitely could Two, but frankly Penny's not in the mood. Micah has enough experience dealing with him, anyway—he doesn't need her. It helps that Lisse almost looks relieved when she begins to drag the other girl off across the platform, stretching herself as tall as she can get to pick them out of the crowd in something that could be called an efficient manner. While Penny would love nothing more than to smack away the cameras rapidly encroaching towards her face and the microphones that occasionally dip down into her path, she simply lets herself move through them. They won't matter for much longer.

There are so many people here—for her. She knows that she's nothing more than a small, inconsequential piece in the grand scheme of things. She's not a finalist, didn't even crack the top half, but they don't look at her like that. Penny knows that, just like the rest of them, that she's something of a miracle. Being alive to tell the story of death is something not many people have had the chance to experience before.

"They're that way, I think," Lisse says suddenly, jabbing her finger through the crowd. She seems just as eager as Penny does to get to their friends for one last hug. Last for now, anyway. Like she said, she doesn't plan on this being the final time she ever sees them.

Penny follows her directions, easing through the crowd with Lisse close to her back. She doesn't even have to push through. Most of the reporters step out of her way, still too-close and too-eager, but something respectful to their movements. It's a nice change.

They must know where she's going, too. The closer they get to the Nines the more willing they seem, like they can't wait to capture the moment themselves. Someone out there will get the best picture, the best clip of sound. The thought of it doesn't trouble Penny as much as she thinks it should; she's been in the spotlight for so long that it hardly even fazes her.

When she sees them, she smiles. It's all she can do. It's them and all of the people around them—even the unfamiliar ones, random faces lingering around the train's edge that have no real purpose being there. Those types of people are everywhere, watching on. So many of them all collected just to watch this one little thing.

That's all they are. A blip in the radar. A moment in history.

She wraps her arms tight around Marigold without words, because there aren't any that need to be said. Every flicker around them is reduced to nothing—every noise, every face, every oddity, as if they don't matter at all.

Except they do.

Micah Rossier, 18
District Eight Male

This all happening doesn't necessarily surprise him.

He's still somewhat… well, not wounded or even hurt, of course, because that would be silly, but there's something inside him that stings at the fact that Milo never tried before this. Not that he had to. Not that Milo owed him anything, least of all that.

His hands are still bandaged, clean and new and fresh. Micah looks away from them now because he knows he'll never stop if he lingers any longer.

"Have you had fun avoiding me?" Micah asks, internally cringing at the prospect of even bringing it up. It's not in his nature to air such grievances, especially when there's hardly any time to really discuss them. Ideally they would have talked about something before this—anything, really, would have been better than the completely empty days that followed what happened.

Milo huffs. "Is this avoiding you?" he questions, looking between them both.

And it's not, of course, but that's clearly not what the question was about in the first place. Truth be told he doesn't know if Milo even was avoiding him, nor why he would if that was the case. Micah is the last person who has ever judged him in a world where seemingly everyone else has. He can't help but wonder if Milo even knows the answers to any of these questions, if he was holed up down in Two willfully or dreading the moment the elevator would open instead.

"How many siblings do you have, again?" Milo wonders, seemingly out of the blue. He doesn't recall ever talking to him about such things, but everyone seems to know his business before Micah himself has ever figured it out.

"Nine."

"Fuck," Milo says under his breath. "And I thought two was bad."

"Brothers? Sisters?"

"Sisters. Twins."

It's such a small piece of information that anyone else would think nothing of it, but Micah has to treasure it. Coming from someone who has distanced himself from so much of the world, it means more than it normally would. It's one more thing he knows about him that, perhaps, not everyone else does. Is that in itself not a victory, albeit a little one?

"For your information, I've been locked down again," Milo says sometime later. Despite the quiet between them, it hasn't felt anywhere near awkward. "Heavily supervised. I don't think everyone believes my claims about not being suicidal."

"I do."

"You do what?"

"Believe you," he replies. "So you know."

He does, he realizes. Milo has never wanted to die in any sense of the world—he just wanted to shut down. There was still a state of existence where you could live and breathe without feeling; if that was the one they could all enter, life would be a whole lot simpler. Micah knows it can never happen for him, but he can't smash the gavel down on anyone that wishes it for themselves.

"Good," Milo says. "I need all the people in my corner that I can get."

"Donatella?"

"She's the first. I guess you're the second, unless it's the other way around."

"What a formidable duo we make."

Milo laughs—actually, quietly, but just enough to make Micah feel as if he didn't say something completely stupid. That state of him is certainly better than the one Micah discovered on the bathroom floor, even if that entire night didn't end as terribly as it could have.

He doesn't blame Milo for avoiding him, if that's the case. Had their positions been reversed Micah isn't sure what he could have done after the fact to rectify it either.

Like he said—no judgement.

Up ahead of him, it's her hair first that he catches sight of, curls ruffling in the breeze despite how shielded she seems to be by the people clamoring around her. Oksana smiles in his direction and he raises a hand back to acknowledge her, so close to the edge of the platform it's as if she's already about to disappear into the train. Of all the goodbyes, hers will be the toughest. Micah has already resigned himself to shedding a few tears around the end of their theoretical road, at least for now.

"I'll be right back," he tells Milo, unwilling to leave him so abruptly. There's no point to it, either, not until the train takes off for good.

The crowd doesn't give way for him, at least not easily. When he finally makes it there he's practically teetering at the edge of the platform and wraps his arms around Oksana anyway. They'll be on the train together, he knows—there's no use for this yet, but it feels right to do regardless.

"Is it wrong that I'm scared?" she asks, muffled into his shoulder. Micah squeezes her tighter whilst shaking his head. He's a bit worried about all of this, too. About the tears shed and how he'll react when he sees his family again. About what the future looks like, above all else.

Oksana being scared is perhaps the least foolish thing he could think to be of right now.

Arms still wrapped around him, Oksana takes a step back, suddenly, small but just enough to jostle him. Someone brushes against his back regardless, the packed crowd too close together to allow much else. When Micah lifts his head he's surprised to find Milo of all people suddenly behind him, having followed the weaving path Micah created through the crowd.

He's not looking at them, though. Not looking at anyone really. His eyes are on only the train, roving down from the front all the way to the back almost curiously. All the while his brows remain knitted together, confusion heavy in his eyes.

"What?" Micah asks, but stops himself when Milo holds up a hand. To him, it's a universal signal for being quiet. He clamps his jaw shut, trying to search out what Milo is looking for but coming up with nothing. Of course he can't. He never looks for anything wrong—has never known how to.

But something is wrong. He can tell just by the look on Milo's face, the strain to his eyes and the clench of the jaw. Perhaps that says more about how he already knows Milo better than the unpredictable outside world rather than anything else.

He almost doesn't want to know. Not knowing is always better, right?

"Do you hear that?" Milo questions, almost cautiously. Until this moment, it's not a word he ever would have associated with him before. There's no choice in debating it now, how slowly the words come out, a nervous trickle. And Micah does hear it, he thinks.

But only for a second, a steady beep, before the world explodes around him.

Everything is reduced not to white, but to gray. Like the sky has thrown a downpour on all the unfortunate souls below, the water in his eyes rendering him blind. If only it was water, if only it was rain. No thunder, no lightning—only a searing, blinding light and a ringing in his ears that doesn't quite eclipse the hysterical screaming.

He's thrown back against the concrete without ever feeling his feet leave the ground. His hand is torn out of Oksana's, body screaming in pain as he slams down, lungs screaming for air that has suddenly been robbed from him. It feels as if he can hardly move but he forces himself to, anyway, the memories of the arena coming screeching back in all too deadly fast. Even the arena made more sense than this, though. This… he has no idea what's happening.

The second he rises to his knees some of the noise filters back in, so dim that it feels somehow far-away. Still that screaming, a panicked wail interspersed with it that's somehow worse. Ahead of him the platform has been nearly obliterated, the train door smoking and hanging loose, the entire body of the car nearly knocked loose on the tracks. The ruin. The beeping. Something went off. A bomb, perhaps, or something much worse.

There are so many bodies around him, moving and writhing as one as they struggle to free themselves. So much blood, too, sticky rivulets of it moving too-fast through the breaks in the cobblestone. Ahead of him someone rises to their feet, unsteady and shaking—not Milo, not Oksana, though he thinks he can see her not far away, struggling in her own right. They have to get out of here. If the Games have given him anything, it's some newfound sense of self-preservation.

Micah nearly keels over the second he rises, not unlike the woman before him. She's teetering on one heel, blood-splattered and sobbing. Her finger jabs shakily towards the tracks once again and all he can do is blink, trying to rid the fog from his eyes…

The sudden force that slams into his back is nearly as bad as the first explosion. It was only the first, as he discovers. Micah is driven down into the pavement with the weight of another body on top of him—he doesn't even hear the beeping, this time. There's only a moment where he can lift his head before whoever's got him shoves him back down, but it's enough.

It's more than enough.

When the second explosion ricochets outwards, it's not just the structures that suffer the consequences. The woman, knocked off-balance, nearly plummets into the train-tracks. Instead the force nearly tears her in two, and all Micah can do is squeeze his eyes shut as blood and shrapnel showers over them, her ungodly weeping brought instantly to a silent halt.

Micah can't move, and it's not just because he's being held down. It was nearly in jest when he said it about Milo previously, but now he's felt his body shut down. The fear has overtaken his urge for flight. If he moves, he's going to end up just like that woman—what's left of her, anyway.

When the weight on top of him shifts, panic spikes through his body before an arm wiggles beneath him. It's Milo's arm, he realizes. Even half-blind he knows it is, and shit if that doesn't somehow make him feel a tad better. Maybe it's wrong of him, and he's the last person who is ever going to believe it, but if everyone is saying Milo is one of the worst things out there in the universe then surely nothing else can get to him.

Somehow, even though he isn't, Micah is safe right now.

He knows he's not supposed to move even before Milo forces him still again, but Micah can't help stretching an arm out to Oksana, close as she is now. She hardly looks like anything, curled up as small as she can get, streaks from fresh tears cutting through the grime on her face. She removes a hand from one of her ears to reach back, just enough for their fingers to overlap, their pulses beating together.

Beneath them all the earth shakes again and refuses to stop. It's not just here that it's happening, but all around them. Further down the tracks and back into the station, trying to take everyone here out with them.

One is an accident. Two is awful, but not unavoidable.

Anymore than that, and it's deliberate.

Someone is trying to kill them.

It's at that moment, of course, that Micah is finally relieved of some of the weight holding him down. The alarm that overtakes him overshadows everything else as he scrabbles for Milo's arm, trying to do anything other than simply shut-down. His alarm is short-lived as Milo uses the arm hooked around his chest to yank him up, too, leaning back down before Micah can even comprehend it to bring Oksana to her feet, shoving her into Micah's arms.

It hardly feels like he's alive. The world around them has transformed into something recognizable, all gray and ash and the heat of a fire much too close. He can barely move without the risk of stepping on someone—hardly anyone has dared to move. When his feet shift backwards he feels them stick, the blood seeping into his soles too present to escape.

There's blood on Milo's face, too, a messy streak of it cutting down across his cheek. The back of his jacket is torn, revealing uneven stripes of blood that paint his back all the way to his shoulders, and of course he's bleeding, even injured, he took Micah to the ground to avoid the second explosion without even thinking. He took the brunt of everything that came flying at them.

Micah still can't breathe. Somehow they reach out at the same time, him forward and Milo back, though for entirely different reasons. He wants to drag him away. Milo, instead, grabs on and forces his feet to stutter-step back, away from the worst of the disaster.

"Go," he says, or at least that's what Micah can only assume he says. His mouth forms the word, but Micah can't really hear it. By the time he lets go, he's already too far away. Moving further in while saying, at the same time, that Micah needs to get the hell out of here. Oksana continues to clutch at him, their shaking matched in rhythm and pace, and Milo's retreating back moving through the carnage only appears bloodier by the second.

They're going to die today, aren't they? They're going to die anyway. Milo will bleed out somewhere on this platform, alone despite the number of bodies he's surrounded by. He'll die because he finally did something good in saving Micah's stupid, sorry life. Penny could be dead out there too, and Hosea and Inara, and he can't move, can't get Oksana out of here either, let alone himself.

He has to move. Has to at least try. His legs quake when he moves, and Oksana hiccups out another sob attached to his side, shuffling along with them. They're moving as one.

He needs to go, even if a part of him doesn't want to. Micah should be going after him. He should be doing something.

A few horrific moments, though, and Micah wonders if he'll ever work right again.

Hale Mavala, 17
District Eleven Male

There are a number of things to do in the immediate aftermath of a critical situation.

That's how Glenna would word such a thing, anyway. Her and all of the fire captains and squads out in the fields of Eleven, they always had their plans. Not having one, or rushing into things too quickly, often meant meeting your maker far earlier than you had initially planned.

When the explosions start going off, he reacts. Far enough back from the platform's edge, he's saved from the blast radius and still grabs onto someone with each hand to bring them to the ground—the reporter at his left goes down easy enough, far too willing to listen to someone's instructions. The other just so happens to be Inara.

Hale wasn't prepared for this. It's a good thing he had nothing more than a split second to grab onto her, or he might have hesitated, thought about the consequences of it. She folds to the ground, and just behind her is Ten, and fuck he was ill-equipped to deal with this situation, hadn't ever wrapped his brain around trying to figure it out. Now that they're here, though, everything that happened in the past fades just as rapidly as the initial dust in the air.

Somewhere behind him, far enough away from this disaster, he knows Tella has Casi. That's one of the only things he does confidently know. With them taken care of, he can focus his attention on other people no matter who they are.

This isn't just a fire, though. When you ran towards a blaze in Eleven there were only a number of scenarios that could run through your mind. Someone had left a candle burning, dropped a match, lit a cigarette in somewhere far too dry to handle it. Hell, even the sun could get so hot during harvest-time that it could light up a field like a tinder-box.

Hale has never had to deal with something of this magnitude. Something this undeniably evil.

As always, too, a deathly fear tries to clamp down on his legs. His head tells him to get up and run, to prioritize himself. In order to get back to Arley, he has to be in one piece. Unburnt. Unbroken.

And, fittingly enough, the decision is made before him before Hale can even consider charging in. Hosea is a blur as he lunges to his feet and continues past them, moving closer towards the smoking remnants of the platforms edge. Inara screams after him and the reporter next to him whimpers into the ground, her lipstick smeared all over the concrete.

He releases both of them at the same time. The reporter curls into herself. Inara, just as he predicts, is on her feet just as fast as he is.

Maybe she hates him. Maybe Hosea does, too. None of that matters right now.

She beats him to the train only because of how nimble she is. Hosea has disappeared through the doors and the whole thing is rocking, wheels knocked askew from the tracks as a result of the explosion. Every few seconds someone will struggle their way their way through the doors and barrel past them both, matted with blood and grime that does nothing to hide the hysteria written all over their face. Some of them are limping. Some of them can barely walk.

They're still alive. Every person that comes out means there's at least someone that was worth saving. He still should run, of course, but he can't.

The second he bridges the gap between the crumbling platform and the train he spots not one but two bodies—the first is sprawled on the ground below, twisted into the gravel below the train's wheels, hardly intact. The second, a man in a once pristine white coat, lays on the ground at his feet. A long chunk of shrapnel sticks out of his chest, gleaming silver still as a ray of sunlight cuts through the drifting ash outside the train.

Hosea is ten feet to his left, reaching over a man wedged between two seats to smash the window open. With much wiggling the man frees himself and scrabbles on all fours towards the gap, practically rolling out of it and to the ground below. At least he's out, though. He has a chance.

"Go with him," Hale says automatically. "But make it quick. Get whoever you can out."

Inara levels him with a long, heavy look before she too enters the train, hands gripping at the metal bar on each side of the door. He knows saying anything to her is a risk after what he did, but there's no avoiding that now. They're stuck in this together—they've made their choice.

He doesn't expect any words back, so when she turns after Hosea it's almost a relief.

That, and it frees up enough space to allow Hale to think about the real task at hand.

There's enough blood on the floor that it's slick, and as he takes a step from the cracked open doors he holds both hands out, clutching tight to the metal supports to keep himself upright. When someone comes tripping towards him, their mangled and bloody hands fluttering about uselessly, he can barely get out of the way in time. It looks like a house of horrors in here—bodies slumped over the seats, the windows shattered if not covered in blood. There are handprints of it everywhere he looks, desperation written in every individual curve and smear of them. No matter where he moves there's sobbing, wailing, shouting and screaming that never seems to let up.

Ever since that lone woman struggled past him he's seen nothing but bodies. Early reporters and their shattered camera lenses, a cleaner trapped in one of the main cars, warped and half underneath the massive dining room table. The chandelier has shattered along with the television screen, a dozen champagne flutes and all of their companions in ruin along the floor as he crunches through them.

Up ahead he can hear the sound of struggle, a grunt interspersed with more glass crackling away like fireworks. With every step the train bows and shifts, groaning in its own way. He doesn't have much longer to be in here.

If no one else is alive, he shouldn't be anyway.

But there's noise, and it's a person, and that's enough for him to struggle on ahead instead of escaping out the nearest window. The door into the next hall barely budges, giving him nothing more than a foot to squeeze through, and it's so close and so tight that when he comes face-to-face with a living, breathing person they both rear back, startled—

And it is, of course, Milo.

The moment in which they stare at one another, silent, is possibly the longest of Hale's life thus far. Worse than any of the fires, than sitting next to his brother's hospital bed, than getting on the train in the first place. Somehow this little one outweighs all of them. And yet the fear pulsating away in him, still, has nothing to do with Milo.

A man lies at his feet—the remnants of one, anyway. A trickle of blood still runs freely from his mouth, recent and fresh.

"Fuck," Milo spits suddenly, but Hale doesn't even flinch. "Fuck, he wasn't dead when I found him."

Except he is now, undeniably so, as if he waited for someone to find him before letting go. Milo stares down at the man for a long moment, his mouth pressed into a thin, white line before he shoves Hale's arm aside where it's braced against the wall and pushes through the recent gap he's created, trying to move past him.

"What the hell are you doing?" Hale asks, though he doesn't stop him.

"Same thing as you. Playing hero when I have no right to."

Alright, that stings a bit, but he forces that down. He slips back through the door after Milo only to finally catch sight of his back, torn and exposed skin still leaking blood, ripping open further as he continues to move so forcefully.

"Hey," he says after him. The train rocks when Hale forces himself faster after Milo's retreating form. "Tell me all of that blood isn't yours."

"Alright. It's not mine."

"Milo—"

"Don't."

"Once the adrenaline wears off you're going to go down like a stack of bricks."

"Been there, done that." Milo shrugs, almost casually. He doesn't stop, either, not that Hale really expected him to. Having Milo do something predictable for once is, though, somehow the most comforting thing that's happened thus far.

He could let him go. Any minute now this whole train could go up in flames and take them with it. Milo's tendency towards self-preservation only extends so far, and judging by the state of him it's not working out so well today. If Hale lets him go, that could be it, and maybe that's what Milo deserves. Their old situation, finally reversed.

Hale strides forward, the floor underneath him shaking, and grabs a hold of Milo's arm before he can get any further. This he expects, when Milo whirls on him with a fire just about blazing to life in his eyes, except he flinches as more blood rolls down his back. Hale's already won this.

"Everyone that way's dead," Hale says evenly. The truth, as much as he wishes it wasn't. "And we're both going to follow them if we don't get the fuck out of here."

Any second now Milo will tear himself away; he'll keep going, and he'll die. And Hale… God, Hale doesn't want him to die, does he? Not the way Casi wants him to. Not the way he should. It doesn't matter how much he fears it, because as much as he's tried to deny it, saving people is somehow in his blood. He's not the best at it, wasn't made for it, but it's become a part of him regardless.

Milo is already weakening, in danger, and has no Eight to save him. Hale's blood is alive with the pressing anxiety of it all.

But, when he pulls on Milo's arm and doesn't receive a fight back, there's relief there too. Not enough to overtake all of the bad, but a heavy enough dose to make him feel as if surviving today is actually possible. Everyone else wasn't so lucky, but they were already brought back once.

And for them, it appears, death just has to try a little bit harder than it does with most others.

Devan Del Rio, 18
District Four Female

As if all of this shit wasn't bad enough, now she's going to have to deal with her parents fawning and fluttering over her for this too.

Truth be told, Devan isn't sure she's going to mind it as much as she once would.

Would a hug after all of this really be so bad?

She keeps her hand knotted in Varrik's shirt-sleeve, the only job anyone has really been willing to assign her. Leashing him had been difficult enough on its own, but she was more fit for it than anyone else. Practice makes perfect, after all.

They had found Rory not long after the initial blast—he was never far, after all, but Devan had no clue where he had gone. In the throng of security and panicked hordes undulating like an ocean around them, it was near impossible to keep track of everyone. It was the precise reason why she kept such a tight hold on Varrik. The second she released him he'd be gone.

Devan brushes some of the dust off his shoulders with his free hands, pretending not to notice how he starts at her touch. His eyes are far-away in the literal sense, raking over the distant masses of people still trying to move away from the main platform. Devan, of course, knows what he's looking for. She may not be a rocket scientist, but it doesn't take one to figure it out.

She, for one, is not risking her hide to go and look for anyone, let alone someone with a seven attached to their name. She was told to stay put, god dammit, and for once in her stupid life she's going to listen. There's no use in giving Rory an aneurism when they've already tried putting the guy into an early grave more than once.

"Dev," Varrik says, his voice still retaining some sense of distance.

"No," she says quickly.

"No," he says back. "No, I mean… I see her. It's okay."

God, he cares. He cares so damn much that you could see it from a mile away. A part of Devan wishes he would stop, make it so much easier on himself, but that's not the way the world works. Asking Varrik to stop caring about Lex would be like asking the earth to stop spinning—futile, impossible, and ultimately disastrous.

When Devan cranes her neck to see around him Lex is easily visible, being escorted further away from the main blast zone by someone that looks only vaguely familiar—a stylist or a prep team member, perhaps, though it looks more like Lex is escorting them judging by their mismatched levels of hysteria. As if Lex would be perturbed at anything like a bomb going off directly in her face.

Varrik sinks his teeth into his lip, and finally some of his previously quivering form comes to an easy rest. Satisfied that he's not at risk of abandoning her, Devan finally releases her hold.

"What are the chances that all twenty-four of us are still alive?" Varrik wonders, eyes darting about once again.

"None of us were on the train yet," Devan recalls, trying to rationalize the following words in her brain. "Hopefully… hopefully one-hundred-percent."

And, if someone does happen to be dead, let it be Veles or some other waste of oxygen that walks around calling it a parade. Devan knows she's not any better, really, considering she pinned Lex while Ambrose skewered her whole, but that's a problem for another day. It's something she's trying not to think too much about for the sake of her own mental health.

As if that is a thing anyone cares about in this instant. Therapy was all well and good, but it's not going to help any of them with this.

"Should we be doing something?"

Varrik can't just sit still and accept that everyone else around him is moving, trying to sort this out, while he's been told to stay put. He was, after all, quicker to react than her, latching onto Devan and pulling her back to her feet when she had gone sprawling to the ground. His path back here had been wild, nonsensical, but it had gotten them away. For all his faults, Devan knows she'll never trust anyone more to have her back than him.

"There's nothing we can do," she admits, though she's loath to say the words aloud. Being stationary, unable to accomplish anything, is one of the worst if not the worst things Devan can bring to mind. The others being, you know, mass death and destruction in the midst of what was supposed to be a happy day, but for her? That, personally, is bad enough.

Just like Varrik she's itching to run. Even just to walk, to keep up pretenses that they're helping in some way. A part of her wants to disobey Rory like never before, though there's no use.

What is Devan going to do out there? She's not a first responder, not a doctor. She can't really help anyone.

The best she can do is stay here, for everyone's sake. If she can keep the two of them out of trouble than that's two less people for everyone else to worry about. Devan figures they've caused enough uproar and grief to last a lifetime, let alone not to cause any on today of all days.

Varrik takes a deep breath, one of his hands finally finding a hold on her arm. "I hope everyone's okay," he says under his breath.

She knows what the proper thing to say is, though it's not what comes out. "Even Veles?"

"Let's not push it."

She squeezes his arm tight. Varrik leans down to press his forehead to her shoulder, just for a second. Normally the both of them would find an abnormal amount of humor in that, so neither of them so much as crack a smile now. Devan just finds comfort in him for a moment, a friend in the midst of so much chaos.

Judging by how things are unfolding in front of her, not everyone is going to get so lucky.

Cambria Mervaine, 51
Former Co-Head Gamemaker

After all this time, you'd think standing in the midst of smoke and ash and ruins would be something familiar to her.

Except it's not. It doesn't get any easier, either.

Even having each of her children tucked under both arms doesn't quell her nerves. nerves that haven't reappeared like this for a very long time. They're violent, for once, making her arms tremble where she's holding onto them. Where Mercia is wide-eyed and searching Atlas is almost expressionless, trying to distance himself from everything that's going on around them.

There are a few specks of blood staining the collar of his pale-blue button down; they're not his, she knows, but that doesn't stop her from looking.

It doesn't stop her from wondering whose they are.

Security has already been back and forth numerous times to check-in on them, scattered about like a flock of startled birds. Someone keeps coming back to ask if they're alright, or if they need anything, or if they can please get a car situated to take them far, far away from here. Cambria refuses to leave while the state of everything remains like this, though she has half a mind to let them take her children.

She doesn't trust anyone, though. Never has, doesn't plan on it anytime soon. For all she knows she'll let her kids get in an unknown vehicle with a random driver and they'll end up dead, too, splattered all over a different pavement but gone nonetheless.

Already she's begun to run through her mind who could have done this—this many bombs spread out across so much distance, artfully placed to do a maximum amount of damage. That kind of work isn't just one person, and certainly not an amateur. Whoever did this knew exactly where to go and how to get out unnoticed. No matter how many bodies she spots, all of them look so innocent. Not vile enough, certainly, to kill children so eager to get back home.

That level of vile stares back at her in the mirror every morning. She knows it well; harbors it close, even. It makes picking out the truly bad people easier.

"Is he okay?" Mercy asks, brushing a piece of hair behind her ear. For once in her life her daughter's voice is nervous, a far cry from the normally brazen and free-spirited girl she deals with on a daily basis. As she gazes forth at her father some ten feet ahead of them, Cambria doesn't blame her. Ferrox hasn't moved, feet rooted to that very spot ever since she had dragged her entire family this far away in the first place. An effort solely spear-headed by Cambria, of course, because Ferrox had seemed oddly out of commission.

It was the shock, she knew. Everything he had worked so hard to fix once and for all was falling apart right in front of him. He had been through so much that nothing like this ever should have happened.

Even she wasn't strong enough to stop it, though.

"Stay here," she murmurs, carefully stepping away from them. Atlas winds an arm tight around Mercy's shoulders, drawing her into his side, and for once she doesn't protest.

They're not just listening for her sake—they're scared.

When Cambria steps up to Ferrox's side she makes just enough noise to be noticed, pressing her hand to his until his fingers loop through hers almost subconsciously. "I feel like I should know what's going on," he says softly. "Or who… who did this."

"We'll find out."

"Will we?"

"We always do," she responds, squeezing his hand tight. Like a promise. "And when we find them, whoever they are… there will be hell to pay."

If only he looked so sure. Cambria believes it, but his stare is the perfection definition of a thousand yards, having entered into a place she's never been privy to. All she can do is remain by his side, as she always has. As she always will be.

They don't have a choice but to figure this out, and they'll do it together. One last battle, and then they can rest.

After everything they've been through, everything they've done, Cambria knows they deserve it.

Yeah, about that whole home time thing... someone say sike.

At least something finally happened though, right? Or maybe not. Enough to at least kickstart something more, though. On a much cooler note, I finished this entire bad boy today instead of editing this chapter whatsoever, so go me!

Also, special shout-out to Nell for being the best reviewer ever. Just so everyone knows I love her lots.

Until next time.