A NOTE:

Margot Arany is not the first of many, nor will she be the last. Be warned. The games will take more lives as the years tick by. Only so many have the strength to keep going. Only so many have the strength to see the golden day. Only so many will get to see Panem's ashes.

We need you.


Day 12 ar, 5:17 am


The chiffon twists before my vision, creating translucent swirls decorated with my own blood. Through it, I can barely make out the snarling form of my ally grasping for my exposed throat. A cough echoes in my paper lungs, rattling my bones. Death is so tempting; the silhouettes waiting for me, strewn among the rainbow fabrics and the concrete, all floating in their own crimson pool. Darkness itself coils around me like a boa constrictor suffocating its prey. Within reach, it's tangible and furious and so, so tempting. But I have too many reasons to live. For my future. For Marriott. There have to be some things not worth giving up.

One of them is hope.


Day 0 br, 10:38 am


That one morning, the stalks had swayed about in the golden gardens near our apartment. Light breezes had fluttered through the book pages on my windowsill. The sun's caresses had flooded the kitchen, reminding me of how the floorboards desperately needed sanding and how the beige wallpaper begged for a replacement. If only we could decorate our dwellings with dreams.

Marriott and I had dressed in a drab mix of grey and white and even though I had found a third hole in my mother's moth-ridden cardigan, there wasn't exactly any other option. The sun may have been cheerful that morning, but I certainly wasn't going to risk almost freezing to death again. There wasn't a door to our apartment as it had fallen to splinters the week before. Marriott had been too busy to buy a new one, so we hadn't been able to hear the warnings the trusty planks would have screamed at us as we made our way to the square.

Sometimes I wished I could've had the chance, but part of me always wanted to be ignorant about the games. That the probability that I was reaped was too low for me to worry about and I could continue trying not to starve or something. Sometimes I wished I wasn't so stupid as to burst into sobs the second Cicero Foster mispronounced my name. I didn't think I'd ever get rid of those hot tears running down my face. God knows I craved to.

I had no care for the boy crouching in his apathy beside me while the train carriage rocked frantically. I had never actually learned his name because I'd been sinking into my own chasm of emotion, urgently trying not to let myself slip into his displayed carelessness. If I still cried, I still cared. If I never learned his name, I didn't have to feel guilty when he inevitably came across a blade in his chest. All night, my tears had pummeled the golden gardens as I waved them goodbye. I had been glad to see the last of those mocking blue skies.


My brother's face painted my dreams all week. He was on the billboards, the televisions, the shop fronts. Each time I turned to see another glaring indulgence, Marriott would stare back at me, eyes ablaze with tears. And it ripped me to shreds. We'd stepped out of the train just to be greeted with aliens pretending not to be baying for our blood and stylists who happily stripped us of our humanities and even when the shadows from the tunnel dissipated into the bloody glisten of the cameras, I had sworn I could hear Marriott whispering in my ear.

"Don't let them reach you"

I'd stood with my arms crossed and my lips scrunched up like I was licking a lemon. Who cared if the sticks punctured my arm and gave me a bunch of splinters? Who cared if my district partner had started ripping the sails off of his headpiece to throw at the crowd? Sponsors weren't people and I wouldn't let them reach me. I'd slipped too deep into my pit for that. Yet, I had still been human enough to scowl at them as they tossed me bloodied roses. One of them pricked me, leaving a small cut on my finger. That had been the beginning. I knew that I would see a lot more blood within the next week. Some of it would be mine.


With a number 9 scrawled across my back, I had joined the ring of tributes flocked around a woman. Silver and plastic glinted from the stations behind us and I even caught a foreboding reflection in a career's icy blue eyes. She'd let us go and reign havoc upon the instructors, but all I could do was focus on the others. On how the girl from 4 could wield a trident like it was a pair of fists, how the boy from 6 didn't hesitate to knock the sparring instructor's lights out, on how the girl from 12 could expertly twist knots into a lethal weapon. I couldn't let them reach me, but they were beginning to shine their lanterns in my direction.

On the second day of training, I had plucked up the conviction to race the boy from 3 on the gauntlets. It didn't matter if he was a fourteen-year-old culled from the city's eternal smog; there was one advantage I did have - hiding and avoiding. Perhaps my brother had taught me too well to camouflage in those golden gardens. I could practically turn invisible against the plastic backdrops, but that didn't matter much as the flat colours didn't reflect the real world in the slightest. Were all the capitolites so brain-dead or had they been too sheltered from life to know what a wheat field looked like?

They had ushered us to the lift where the pair from District 8 were fidgeting early the next day. Trying too hard to cram information into my sparking synapses, I had dreaded the wait for the gamemaker sessions. When every minute was a game of hide and seek with my own doubts, how could I handle an hour and a half of it? Purple and pink berries with pointy leaves were deadly; that was the last thing I wedged in as the announcement system grated on my eardrums. The girl from 1 had already left by the time I let the cold metal of the chair seep into my bones.


16 tributes had disappeared by the time they called my name, pronounced correctly this time. The black eyes of my district partner burned a spot into my back as I shuffled out into the echoing chamber. Being too busy hiding from my own insecurities, I hadn't left myself any time to plan what I would do in the session. The feeling of the concrete thudding under my feet as the gamemakers sauntered around the buffet up top made me want to throw up. If only that was a skill.

Perhaps the paint could have spoken for itself? Taking the ochre and the burnt sienna and the white, I swirled the pastes across my bronze skin that would soon be scarred with lacerations. And I made them look at the golden gardens they had never bothered to see. Was it poetry dripping down my arms, or karma? I could hear it: Marriott's soothing lullabies among the whistles of the stalks in the evening draughts.

When the condensation dripped from the thin ceiling onto my forehead in the gloom, he'd gently wipe it off and assure me that he'd fix it soon. He did, eventually. Then they took the sofa, so we had to sit on upturned wicker baskets. And the next week, I came home to a missing stove, so we bought a tranja one from the young lady at the market that Marriott definitely wasn't hiding a crush on. When the door broke and those evening draughts became frost in the air, he bought another blanket and promised me he would fabricate an ornately patterned one with a stained glass window and I totally didn't believe him. Marriott made overly dumb promises so that I wouldn't cry when he broke them.

The capitol made life-hinging promises and shot us when we got mad at them for breaking those promises.

"Don't let them reach you"

I didn't. I had walked out before I was dismissed and they didn't even seem to notice. The topaz was still married among the golden stalks that I had painted on my arms. And I didn't care for stares tossed my way as I bounded to the lift.


My mentor yelled when I had strolled into the room. Apparently, I had too much talent on the gauntlets to waste my time fiddling with colours. I had never been a huge fan of Erlo Ivans, but there was a point at which I could say I generally disliked the man. He had scoffed when I ignored him and then promptly began to berate me when I continued not to care.

I was slipping again.

A few minutes later when my district partner trudged in, sobbing, Erlo had rolled his eyes and curtly asked for an explanation. It was like us two had switched bodies somehow and now I was the one being slowly paralysed to the shock - exactly what I was trying to evade. I could hide from many things, my own demons included, but finally it had begun to catch up to me.

I didn't get much sleep that night. No tribute other than a career would expect to, but after nearly a week of frothing insomnia, the capitol had worn me down. Today and tomorrow rang through my mind, then the day after that. They'd already stripped me naked to their frivolity, now they were planning to mould me into their mannequin that could dance and sing for their pleasure.

"Don't let them reach you"

I held on tight to his sentiment while they waxed me bare and coated me in idealised perfection. My skin wasn't bronze enough, my hair too limp, my fingernails ragged and disarrayed. I wasn't me anymore, I was what the capitol wanted me to be - another number in their kill count. 45 girls stood in my place only to be added to their filing cabinet of District 9 tributes. 45 never made it to the front of the drawer. If I was going to be in a drawer, I'd want to be at the front. And if I was going to be subject to some stupid metaphor, it might as well turn out in my favour.


The boy from District 8 had stumbled offstage, much to the crowd's relief. After 3 full minutes of seldom coherent sobs and distracting foot tapping, the buzzer had finally shown them mercy. He had trembled as he sprinted offstage, his skin turning an unusual shade of green. Gathering up my large skirt, I clomped towards the chair. The only bit of solace I had remaining was in Erlo's inevitable frustration at my awful manners. I had supposed that he'd given up on me after my score of 3. I'd made sure not to trip on the step as I plonked myself on the chair.

Lights all around me dazzled in my starlight, refracting off the golden strands woven into my ballgown. It hadn't exactly been what I had in mind, but what could I expect from the capitol anyway? They didn't get to see the field every day when they woke up. Beside me, Julius coughed weakly. It hadn't taken much to steal his limelight. I, scum of the golden gardens, had the attention of the whole country whilst they held their breaths.

It had been a Thursday, and a brisk one at that. Snow drifted in the air like pale dancers and gathered at my windowsill. It had just been me and Marriott because Dad was at work and Mum was at the market. Hours we waited, playing hide and seek in the warmth of the house. We hadn;t noticed that the darkness forming outside would never go away. Marriott and I had fallen asleep by the hearth, a woollen blanket wrapped around our tiny frames. When we woke up, the snow lay thick in sheets on the road as did the worry in our hearts. They never returned, Mum and Dad. I figured out why when the gunshots rang in the town square a couple miles away, only to dissipate into the frost, never to be heard again.

A familiar warmth had bloomed on my right cheek and dripped down onto the delicate tulle. I still cared. Despite all of their attempts to make me a husk that wouldn't care if I died, I'd prevailed. I'd won. There were people who cared about me. Not the gamemakers, not the sponsors, not Julius. Me. I cared and so did Marriott. That was worth more than diamonds in a place where the pavements were engraved with gold. Julius shook my shoulder as I had lifted my head and let the memories cascade from my bronze cheeks. I'd won.

The cameras had caught the last of my golden gown as I slipped behind the velvet curtain back to the real world. I hadn't let them reach me, not yet. I was encased in a brilliant shield; no longer skulking around in the pitch black. Erlo had snarkily congratulated me on my reappearance as my district partner's stammerings droned in the background and gradually, the dots of yellow on the other side of the window snapped to darkness as the moon peeked up at the night full of stars.


My room was surprisingly cool when my eyelids thudded open the next morning. Of all the nights I expected to catch up on some sleep, the night before the games hadn't been the top contender. All the week I had lived here, I hadn't bothered to change the backdrop on the window, even though I knew I could. Forests and streets and skies full of nebulas were just pixels upon pixels, so clever, yet so guilt-inducing. That, and there was no setting for wheat fields.

Cicero had been surprised to see me awake when he flounced into my room. I couldn't pretend I was an early riser, but this was perhaps the last time that my eyes would grace the splendour of the slaughterhouse. I'd been practically forced to make polite conversation, but before too long, Cicero grew bored and left me behind a white jumpsuit to slip into while I waited to be called to the chopping block.

After breakfast, I scurried to my room one last time. Was there anybody waiting to murder me the second the gong sounded? Were there any sponsors willing to stray from the chiselled district 2 boy to give me a chance? The capitol was compelling me to create a slew of possibilities where I found a trident in my stomach, a knife at my throat, hunger coating my shrivelling arteries. Only a few minutes had passed before Erlo's rude knocking interrupted my turbulent daydreams. Avidly dodging eye contact, I slunk past the team of avoxes carrying dirty plates and met my trembling wreck of a district partner at the lift.

What would Mariott say?

"Don't let them reach you"

Well, that had seemed a little fruitless, considering that in a few hours time, everyone would be vying for a share of my flesh and bones. I had a chance, a slim one, but I still had time to return. To do something that my parents tried to do that Friday morning. To weave my way through the path of blood, between the corpses and past the platinum tinted buildings. To take a breath that 23 others would lose. To come back home.

Erlo had proven no help at all in the holding room as I sat and scoffed ginger snaps and glasses of lemonade. My stomach may have been screaming at me that it was going to empty any second now, but I needed every morsel I could get. My mentor had reluctantly decided that he was going to watch me enter the tube instead of my district partner, but that hadn't been much of a compliment. A few backhanded snippets of advice later, the tannoy sounded. It was time to meet whatever hell was lurking above my head.


Ominous rumbles sounded beneath my feet from the darkness below. I couldn't see anything, not even my hand in front of my face. Then the tube began to slide gradually upwards, creating a horrific silent screech that filled the black with sickening dread. I had, at most, two minutes until the gong went off. Then, some sort of grey light poured in through the top of the tunnel. I looked around, desperate for a head start, but all I could see was Marriott's smiling face shining back at me. Marriott's stupid, smiling face plastered everywhere. Maybe I forgot how to breathe, or maybe each inhale was conscious of how final it could be.

I could die in one and half minutes.

The platform under me swayed a little as my eyes met my surroundings for the first time. Harsh light cast a shadow on the grey concrete as my head darted around, urgently absorbing everything before death could swoop in and take it all away. I was facing inwards to the cornucopia, which was a white tent stuffed to the gunnels with backpacks and other resources. Something told me that the white wouldn't stay that way for long. This was real. I could die in just over a minute.

Just in front of me, perched on a crate, was a small rucksack packed with mysterious supplies. It almost blended in with the wall behind it, which was crumbling to pieces as the lichen and moss swallowed the ancient stone bricks. Daylight pierced in through the cracks, casting soft beams in the shape of knives on the floor in front. How fitting. Something creaked in the ceiling above, followed by a tumble of debris. When I looked up, rusty corrugated metal veiled the sky, partly hidden itself under dilapidated wooden beams. Where was I?

Then the countdown started.

60...

I could die in a minute.

Who was beside me? A tall girl with lanky chestnut hair in braids, I thought, from 5 and on the other side, a smaller boy with black cornrows and a terrified expression from 7. The closest career was a few pedestals away, his shoulders raised and a haughty disposition smeared across his face. I could tell he was eyeing up the spears at the centre of the cornucopia, admiring how the sharpened end could quite literally end someone in a matter of seconds.

50…

All I could do was breathe. Inhale, exhale. This could be my last.

40…

Focus on the bag in front of me. It could save my life.

30…

Get ready to sprint and don't slip on the blood.

20…

Don't pay attention to the boy crying next to you.

10…

I could die in 10 seconds. I wouldn't see Marriott ever again.

5…

I want to breathe.

4…

I want to shine.

3…

I won't hide.

2…

I do care. I do.

1…

I won't let them reach me.

Then the gong sounded.

It took less than a second for the scarlet to ooze to the concrete below.


My heartbeat ran synchronously to my footsteps, muscle pounding in my eardrums. I could feel it - burning, asphyxiating in my chest, daring not to look back as the blood seeped into my boot prints in the rubble. I hadn't noticed how bitter the air was as it scraped against my cheek and made my eyes blurrier still. Almost there. With my hand wildly outstretched, I grabbed the bag right in front of me, the thin textile rough against my fingers, and stopped. I was at the centre of the bloodbath, clutching a prized resource. Now all I had to do was get out alive.

My blood was venom in my veins and it burned with a red-hot flame. My legs were calling for ice, but I couldn't stop, not even for a second. I darted by the girl who had been cowering on the pedestal next to me less than a minute ago, who now lay staring up into the metal abyss, unlike the boy on the other side who was long lost in the arena by now. Crimson puddles glinted all around me as my eye caught the boy from 4 growling and jabbing his trident into the throat of the boy from 8. Red glittered as it poured from his neck, ensnared by the pale sunlight.

I couldn't let them reach me.

The saliva in my mouth was turning sour as my surroundings convulsed. I had to stop soon or I would drown in my own mucus. Yet whether me stopping would be due to an arrow in my skull or the relief of temporary safety, I didn't know. Among all the chaos, I couldn't hide. I'd just have to hope that yesterday's gleaming shield would be enough to protect me for now. I had been heading for an opening in the expanse of decayed stone, where hopefully I would be allowed some peace to strategise. That was, until an arrow had missed me so narrowly that it tore a hole in my waterproof, grazing my abdomen as it sailed past.

If there wasn't enough fire in my system already, there was even more blossoming on my side. Hot blood trickled onto my ripped sleeve as I stumbled, and it continued down to my palms, coating them in sticky crimson. I didn't want to look, but this was the Hunger Games. It was made for looking at. Marriott would be watching this, hoping that his little sister wouldn't be devoured by the arena. But it wasn't the arena, this old factory, that I was worried about. It was the one who shot the arrow I was worried about. The one who could catch me and kill me right now. The tributes themselves.

The arrow was in front of me where it had landed on the concrete with a clatter. Everything hurt like hell, but it was too good an opportunity to pass up. So, I bent down for just a second to scoop up the scarlet-tipped arrow, leaving a small smear of my own blood where it used to be; my knuckles skinned to the pink flesh underneath. At least I now had something useful in my grasp.

I had a weapon.


Even though the blood was making the arrow slip, my hands had grown white in my frantic grip. Another one whistled above my head before long, eager to join its cousin in making me bleed. I swallowed the bloodied saliva prickling at my throat as my legs buckled slightly under me. I hoped the next shot wouldn't be the third try charm. When I heard the twang of the bow, frenzied in its bloodlust, I couldn't help but falter in my unease.

Maybe that's what would finally kill me.

I'd staggered for just a second, but by the time the hand had jerked my shoulder back, there was nothing I could do about it. The concrete was ice under my back as the cracks shattered my eardrums. Tears streamed freely down my face and now the red and grey and brown were all mixing together in blocky hazes. My muscles had stopped their pleas, glad for the respite from running. Not that being on the floor was any better. If you were on the floor, you were indistinguishable from a corpse. And that's exactly what I was attempting to avoid.

The first blow came in the form of a poorly-thrown punch. Though my reflexes had been slowed by the fall, I still mustered up the strength to dodge and their fist made a crunching sound on the dappled concrete. Expecting some sort of pained reaction from them, I had missed the second hook aimed at the side of my head. Clouds clogged up my ear canal with a dull ache and a sharp pain triggering through my skull. Were my lungs filled with fog?

Apparently the attacker had dried up their supply of arrows as I stole a glance at their quiver in my hurry to return to my feet. The one thing they were lacking, I would use as my weapon. I felt a little light-headed as I aimed a kick at their kneecap. It connected. Scrambling to my sore, screaming feet, I tightened my grasp on the arrow, which had numbed my hand a little in the ambush. Then I finally, really looked at the person in front of me.

It was the girl from 8. The one who had been fidgeting in the lift before the gamemaker sessions. The one who had been inseparable from her district partner all throughout training and now lay festering by the tent with punctures in his throat. She was the same age as me, but smaller, slighter and much more desperate. The only things she carried were an empty quiver and a useless bow that was trembling in her hands. And one more thing - an arrow lodged deep in her side, surrounded by a patch of scarlet. I looked down at my bloody hands. One of them was shivering and the other balled up into a numb fist with an arrow missing from its clutch. Before I had a chance to gulp, the girl was on the floor, counting the seconds she had left. I hadn't killed her yet.

I hadn't let her reach me.


Three days had passed since I'd stabbed her. The cannon had been lost to the cacophony of the bloodbath's end and her picture had joined the gallery wall of forgotten faces when the clock had struck midnight. District 8 wouldn't be getting a victor this year. Nor would 3, 5, 10 and 11, the last of those eight dying on the night of the second day, presumably to the careers. I'd heard her screams. I'd heard the silence right after. I'd heard the boom of a cannon signalling her final breaths.

I'd heard her die.

That wasn't anything new, though I wished it was.

I was tucked up in a little corner, shielded by my backpack and my clammy fists. They'd gotten me this far, even though the cold still trickled into my sleeping bag and I was practically defenceless. Not to mention that I was living off a rapidly depleting supply of beef jerky, cheese and dry crackers. Nobody had passed me, I only heard when others found each other and only saw the nighttime silhouettes cast by torches. They were looking for me, all 8 of them. And so far, somehow, I had evaded the soft glow of their thirsty lanterns.

The scab on my side didn't help either.

Ink spilled across the sky, splattered with twinkling white stars. Even though I knew it was an illusion, the night looked so real, like I could touch it. Through the shattered window above, Panem's anthem blared, followed by a silver portrait of the boy from 1. A career. If I felt any relief, it was quickly overshadowed by the fact that there were still 4 others out there, including the pair from 2. And they would be mad at the death of their ally and so desired to take out their rage on outlying tributes and-

I was overthinking. The frost from the window was spiderwebbing across my neurons, crackling and tracing the squiggles filled with thoughts of death and blood and flesh. I had to get out of here. I was trapped in a factory that no longer made products; it made nightmares. I couldn't scream or they'd reach me. I couldn't pound on the wall because the plaster would fall. Dust swirled up into torrents of haze that percolated through the moonlight. I'd been silenced, practically awaiting my death. Forever couldn't pass while I sat and watched the dust dance in the night.

I had to do something about it.


The last of the water dribbled down my throat, but it hadn't been nearly enough to quench my thirst, just like the last strip of jerky had still left my tummy aching. My district partner, that little boy, died yesterday. He had been grinning in his photo and even if it was black and white, I could still visualise his rosy cheeks and shock of light brown hair that constantly jostled as he bobbed his head. Was he entombed in a coffin? Was he six feet under? Was he on a folding table while capitol surgeons tried to stitch his dismembered limbs back together?

I wasn't hungry anymore.

I couldn't be certain of how many days had passed, but there were now only 7 other tributes left searching for me. Fewer lanterns, but they were now blinding in their intensity. How much longer could I stay in the shadows? Two days ago, I'd been forced to relocate due to a small earthquake that caved the roof in. Now there was just a mound of debris where I had slept only the night before. That window was boarded up with plaster and rocks.

I wandered through empty corridors with empty rooms branching off them. I'd been lost for days in this place. This was the first time that I didn't want to be found. Of course, I was never alone. Occasional glimmers of the greedy cameras reminded me that Panem was watching as I starved in a maze of stone and shadows. The buzzing wasn't because of the silence - it was because of the lens darting around as it captured my skeletal figure in HD. It was sick; I was sick. My tummy had stopped rumbling yesterday, like it knew it wasn't going to fill again.

At least I could feel my hands.

I could feel as they searched for a blade to hold, to caress. Maybe it was better being numb to the overpowering desire to kill. If those bony fingers turned black with necrosis, at least I could stay the way I used to be. Before I had to kill. Before I had to hide. Before I had to starve. But I couldn't. The capitol, with their twisted puppet theatre, had me on a string. There was no way out without killing. They had me begging for a weapon.

I stopped walking. In the room I had just passed, I'd heard the faint rustling of a tribute. My backpack now weighed me down like its contents had petrified. They'd given me a chance too soon. Last time I took a chance, it ended with the 8 girl's cannon. This time, it could end in mine. Or I could end with a weapon in my grip and food in my stomach. I had no choice. I'd die to their hand or to starvation, and I knew which option I'd rather take. It was time to come out of the shadows.

It was time to turn on my lantern.


The rucksack slouched against the wall as I gingerly creaked open the door, or at least, tried to. They'd either wedged themself against it or made a barricade. So I pooled my strength and rammed my whole arm into it. Sparks of flame flew down my shoulder to my wrist, but after a couple of attempts, the barricade gave way and smashed into the wall on the other side, piecing the air with a metallic screech. I was about to enter when smashing of glass interrupted my footsteps. The tribute was scared, just like me. Yet I was the one attacking, literally willing to kill for a piece of bread.

Peeking around the door, I saw her delicate frame dangling from the shards of glass. I could already see the blood welling under her belly. My stomach went cold. She was willing to rip herself to shreds to escape from me. As I approached, I realised her groans were punctuated with soft sobbing. We weren't hunter and prey, we were both trapped here with limited supplies, both trying to find a way out. She cared if she died. Slowly, the light ebbed from my lantern.

I couldn't kill again.

Somehow, I found a way to swallow down the sour vomit coating my mouth and I inched towards the girl desperately struggling to free herself. Sunlight poured into the room and glanced off of the glass fragments, making the whole room sparkle with a dappled effect. It could've been beautiful if it weren't for the chill of death standing by the window. As I circled around to her side, she stopped struggling. Did she know I was weaponless? Or did she just want the agony to stagnate?

If I didn't help, she would die; I would be her second-hand killer.

So, I hooked my hands either side of the window frame and heaved her limp body off the broken glass. She didn't contest. The breaths were jagged in her throat and she looked around without really seeing, just taking in the red-tinted glitter. A large gash pulsated on her abdomen, littered with tiny shards. Skin flapped aimlessly around the tear; dark blue strands of fabric strewn about the puddle on her shirt. I wasn't a medic. I was starving. I was sleep-deprived.

But my pale hands found their way into the wound, picking out the loose bits of blue and powdered glass. I'd spotted a mostly empty bottle of water nearby, so I used the remaining precious liquid to disinfect it. Ripping her coat into strips, I wrapped material around her waist, holding it closed like some sort of makeshift bandage. She probably wouldn't live long enough to let it heal, but I was selfishly glad that I could walk away knowing that I hadn't directly killed her. She was the one who tried to jump out of a window.

Did I want to win that badly?

What was on the other side of the arena if I did claw my way out? Maybe she had more of a reason to live than I did, yet I'd be the one who got to watch as her heart stopped beating. Marriott could easily live without my burden. I was the only one standing between him and his ultimate freedom. Was death even so bad? It seemed like a losing game - an empty void, or the pain of life? Was it better living while knowing that someone couldn't make that choice because of you?

Was it because I was a killer?

Or was it because, deep down, I knew that the gamemakers had made the decision for me?


As I slung my bag over my right shoulder, I felt ironically relieved at the extra weight. She'd had food in her pack, but no more water. I'd been so tempted to just slurp the water up from her wound, but my tongue already tasted metallic enough. There were no weapons either, unless she was hiding them in her pockets, so I'd carefully placed a large shard of glass in the empty bottle holder on the side of the rucksack. If I was fighting at this stage in the game, I probably didn't need my pack. It was getting too close to doomsday for my liking.

Then I heard her voice. It was soft, but too full of suffering. It was quiet, but too loud. She was pleading for me to stay and help her. Because if I left her, she'd be like a carcass to a flock of vultures. On the verge of death, she wouldn't be able to move in her paralysed body as she drowned in her own blood. The careers would love it. I couldn't leave.

I had to go back.

And I did. I sat in that room until the moon was watching over our heads in that little closet. Shelves full of spools of thread coloured my thoughts while I sat there with the girl. She was hanging on by a thread in a room full of sewing equipment. Maybe that was the point, an insensitive attempt at humour. The gamemakers were apt at inventing contorted jokes to fool their audience into thinking we were all just characters in some soppy television drama. We were real. We were dying. We were in the darkness, awaiting our call to the other side.

I'd gotten up and closed the door because the silhouettes being cast on the wall outside had been too reality inducing. Clouds floated around aimlessly in the dark sky, mixing with the glass and turning the walls all mottled. The girl's blood seemed black in this light. About right for a place like this. As my eyes flitted about for danger, my blood felt like treacle in my veins. Tugging the sleeping bag round us both didn't do anything to stop the smothering dread and guilt and fear. She could die during the night and I'd wake up with a withering body laying next to me. She could kill me in my sleep. The careers could burst in on us any second now and end the games right then and there.

So, with 31 sleepless hours under my belt, what was 6 more?


When I lifted my head in the morning, there was drool everywhere. If the sleeping bag wasn't already ruined from the blood and the glass, it was now. The girl was still conked out next to me, but her gentle snores reassured me of her determination to clutch onto life. It was invigorating. Or, perhaps it was the sleep. The same ghostly room I'd beaten my insomnia in was now pale gold, vivid and bright. I could see my breath in the frosty air as I exhaled slowly and yanked my jacket around my shivering frame. Nobody had died yesterday. That meant only one thing - with kills slackening and only 6 of us left, the finale wasn't far down the road.

Then a cannon sounded, somewhere in the distance. We had to make a strategy, and quickly.

I shook the girl awake and I saw her eyes narrow as she emerged from her state of slumber. With no idea what her name was and where she was even from, I had to be prepared to leave her. If I wanted to get home, I couldn't tag along with her forever. Yesterday's train of thought chugged through my mind. She had at least some smarts to make it this far, so it wouldn't hurt to use that as an advantage.

What would Marriott think of me?

I had no friends, and I wasn't about to make that change. It had always just been me and him alone in the world. We'd never risked our comfortable lives for anyone, but now that the capitol had forced our hands, what would I do now? I couldn't ask Marriott, he was too deep in his own puddle of grief back in 9. For once, I was the only one who could make this decision. To live or to die, to shine my lantern or to turn it off, to make peace with my situation or try to stick it out until the stubborn tendrils shrouded around my skeleton? I had to make a choice. I had to rely on myself.

I could only try.


We crept around the edge of the door, but the only thing staring back at us was the utter silence. She limped along with her arm around my shoulder and a hand on her belly, but we made a decent pace and by the time the next cannon sounded, a wide opening had appeared at the end of the hallway. Figures darted around inside like fireflies in some swampy air. There were only 6 of us left. Me, the girl and them.

It was the end.

That was when she noticed. The girl perked up and crashed over me into the nearby room, which was practically identical to the one we took refuge in last night. Swathes of fabric tumbled over the wonky shelves and little chunks of plaster rained from the feeble ceiling. As I flailed, my hand got caught on a bundle of lilac silk and it crashed to the ground with me. So this was an old textiles factory like they had in 8. How ironic it had been that the ones the arena was homage to had also been the first pair to get killed off. Like I'd said, it was all some unfunny comedy to the capitol.

While gathering the motivation to haul myself to my feet, the silk felt flimsy between the concrete and my hands. Lilac streaked with ivory and vermillion lay torn and twisted under me. Something so filled with potential beauty was gone, wrecked, scattered with broken futures where it cascaded over shiny acrylic, paired with petals and the flashes of a camera shutter. That would never be. Why would they put so much fabric in the Hunger Games if they weren't expecting a pile of threads at the finale? There had to be a reason, no matter how stupid. As lecherous as the capitol was, it wasn't stupid. How else would the districts be so easily contorted under its ruthless thumb?

No, something in the universe told me that we'd need the colour.

The girl was fretfully cowering behind the door as I inspected the individual rolls of fabric. Some kind of orange nylon, a white chiffon and navy cotton blend blurred in vibrant waves before my eyes. It was like the ocean and fire mixed into one, melding, marrying, merging. Something about the muted yellow satin stuffed to the back stirred my memory. In the corner, she was deliriously peeping through the door hinges, her dark brown waves falling chaotically around her bloodshot eyes. Then I saw her nails. The same colour as the satin was painted on her chipped, bashed nails. A flood of forgotten details rushed through my neurons, making my head spin a little as I figured out the gamemakers' little mystery.

Each spool of fabric was something worn by a tribute.

She was the trap girl from 12, or Chryssie, as she'd called herself. The one who'd pranced out onto the stage with sunlight draped around her shoulders and moonlight pooled at her ankles, a tiara sparkling on top of her head. And she had to go home too. So if I knew who she was, there was no chance I could use her like a mannequin. I knew her goal and her plight and her background. How could I pretend she was hollow when 16 years of human life stared me back in the face? I couldn't.

We had to be a team, or nothing.


Clutching at a jumbled bundle of sunlight satin and with Chryssie shielding behind the door frame, I glimpsed through the pinprick at the end of the hallway. There was certainly a lot of blood, but there had been no more cannons since we'd noticed the battle. Frost hung in the air, but somehow, it remained noticeably stuffy. Dawn kissed the sky outside, swirling pinks and peaches among the brilliant golden clouds and spattering fuschia in their crevices. It matched the colours on those shelves, stitches upon stitches of fabric laced with dawn and that would soon be laced with blood too. Poetry. As they used to say, red sky in the morning, shepherd's warning.

And we couldn't wait to see blood dripping down from the skies.

The pinprick grew larger as we trudged along. So did the roars and the clanging of metal against metal and thudding, furious bootsteps looking for an escape route. We were walking towards a battlefield, or more accurately, our graves. Well, for at least one of us. Satin wasn't exactly revered for its protective strength in combat, nor were glass shards often wielded in the face of danger. We were underdogs, Chryssie and I, but there was still a slim chance that one of us would get to watch the dawn fade into the blue sea of day. I'd make sure of it.

Neither of us had realised who was even in the room at the end, it'd always seemed out of reach, impossible to get to. When the light brown wood of the door frame materialised in our heads, it all came rushing back to us. This was real, I could die. For all the lyrical waxing and consolation, it was real. My fingertips went cold. My stomach was lined with lead. My heart frenziedly beat in my ribcage and I was afraid it would shatter it. My head filled with butterflies and dizzying heights that slipped and slid under my hazy boots.

I looked into the room from a while away, yet the battle was still too close. It was near-identical to the cornucopia place, except heaps of colour choked the walls and the tent in the middle was missing, instead replaced with the bodies of a girl and a boy. I flung myself back against the bricks on the other side, like they'd protect me if the remaining 4 tributes spotted us watching them. Chryssie rubbed her stomach and winced a little, but I could sense that she was trying to ignore the pain. The pain I caused.

At least she was alive.

Composure was quite difficult when the people on the other side of the room would happily slit your throat open and throw you on the kill pile. So, naturally, I tried to stop my shaking hands and my ragged breaths before I charged in. Closing my eyes, I tried to visualise what I would do if I did emerge as victor. I'd throw myself into Marriott's loving arms. I'd eat artisan pastries all day long under the sun. I'd sit by a crackling fire reading a book, wrapped up in a large woollen blanket as night sheathed the warm sky. That was waiting for me, if I could just win. But winning the Hunger Games was easier said than done.

I opened my eyes and the trembling was gone and my grip was steady around the glass shard.

It was time.


Or, it would've been time if the ceiling behind us hadn't started to dust our hair with ivory. I could taste the musty plaster filling up my mouth as the roof above us shook vigorously. My stomach churned with it, trying to absorb the dry chalkiness. Then a brick crumbled down onto the concrete with a rumble. The hallway was collapsing in on us like it did to my hideout all those days ago. My eyes clung to Chryssie's frail form as she finally doubled over and sunk to her knees. If she was too incapacitated to even reach the room, how could she fight to the end?

Another brick fell, this time narrowly missing her foot. We had to run. There was no other choice. Taking her trembling hand, I heaved her into my arms and stumbled to my feet as another couple of bricks tumbled into dust. Chryssie felt like a thousand rocks in my grip, even though she was so fragile and small. Staggering, I inched towards the doorway, towards the fighting, but there was no point. I wasn't strong enough to save her and even if we could escape the ceiling crushing us, we'd immediately be slashed down by the battle-hungry tributes there. Death or death? That wasn't a question.

I had to leave her, for my own sake.

But my mind was screaming one thing and my muscles were screaming the contrary and no matter how many times my arms cried out to leave her and sprint to my grave, I just couldn't. I tried once before and that was already one too many. The concrete beneath my unsteady gait was beginning to crack under the pressure and the rain of bricks thundered even more heavily. The corridor was falling to pieces just behind me. In some twisted way, I was glad that the gamemakers hadn't forgotten about us, hadn't written me and Chryssie off as inevitable deaths, just leaving us to waste away in that sewing closet. And if the capitol thought we could still win this, we still had something.

My ankle faltered slightly as it had in the bloodbath, but I lurched forwards, the yellow satin slithering over the girl in my arms like a funeral shroud. Violent echoing in the avalanche promised a bloody, slow death and I didn't want that to catch up with me. Was the whole building falling to shrapnel? It pounded in my eardrums until I couldn't think anymore and maybe that was just my heartbeat struggling on, trying to keep me alive as I was trying to keep Chryssie alive. I ran. I ran until the blood in my mouth poured over my throbbing tongue. I ran until my chest fractured with every breath I took. I ran until my sides ached with the all too familiar stabbing pains and I felt the scab fissure open, revealing the scarlet underneath.

I ran until there was no corridor to run through anymore.


Eyes darted towards us as my final stride resounded against the concrete. They were bloodshot - thirsty, but exhausted. I had but a split second. Lowering Chryssie to the ground, I reclaimed the glass shard that had thankfully remained in the unfurling satin, though both were tinged with red. As I twisted back to face my murderers, I pictured my brother's face in the weathered stone blocks. Marriott would be watching, right? I hoped he hadn't lost faith in me. I still had too much life for a dead girl. Absently, I wondered what he thought of our alliance. Surprised? Relieved? Disgusted? Well, it wouldn't last much longer, whatever he thought.

And then a blade glided past my ear from the far left corner.

The fight had begun. Mild pain shot through my hand as the sharp glass lacerated my palm. I ducked to the side and sprinted to the right corner where there was a huge pile of assorted materials. If I could just disarm a tribute with my shard and separate them from the group, I could use the fabric to strangle them. Grim, but it was practically my only option. Shouts erupted between the careers as another knife missed my shoulder and fights broke out. As I whistled past them, I kept stealing glimpses of the main event - the 2 girl against the pair from 4. Yet, as the rainbow heap grew under my feet, I realised that there was another tribute in here other than Chryssie's crumpled body.

Not just that, he was staring me down from across the warehouse.

It was the quiet boy, the one from 6 who had talked of street smarts and of stealth and of crippling poverty while the capitol sat idly and cheered in their velvet and cashmere. His tawny hair was ruffled by days of anxiety, tipped with the familiar ivory colour of the corridor's ceiling. I couldn't kill him, either. His little sister needed him back, or she'd be sent to the community home where riots shattered sleep and killed ambition. I couldn't do that to a defenceless child, one who wasn't even participating in the games, but still unequivocally racked my brains with guilt for something I hadn't done yet.

Look, Marriott, I still had morals.

Look, Chryssie, I won't stumble anymore.

Look, Panem, you won't coat my hands in their blood again.

I'd take the glass shard to my neck sooner than I'd take another life.


Jagged breaths crushed my ribcage as I tried to stay calm. The girl from 2, intricately painted with scars, looked around during the fight, her sword swinging wildly in her loose grip. Ocean boy, as Julius had called every boy from 4, was dappled black and blue with bruises as his district partner flung her brass knuckles at his throat. Then the ringing started. Like a siren was going off, reverbing around the warehouse, crashing into anything with ears, so we could feel the blood oozing from them. It was hard to think, to formulate words and opinions, but I had to keep watching.

The girl from 2 prowled around to Chryssie's body, tracing her blade along the girl's delicate frame, finding the hole I tore in her belly, finding her collarbones jutting out from under her shirt, finding the nails the capitol painted with sunlight. Punctuating the ringing, Chryssie's groans morphed into whimpers of mercy. The inhales got caught in my throat, pricking it with thorns and brambles. Did Chryssie even have roses and blackberries back in 12?

Pink chiffon and navy-purple organza struck my eyelids as they bled with tears. Roses and blackberries. Chryssie and her fate. The girl from 2 and her scarlet sword. Then, a cannon.

I'd been too busy crying over my ally's predicament to watch the girl from 4 receive a throwing knife to the back of the skull, her brass knuckles hanging limply between her raw fingers. Tawny sprinted across the room, skidding across the concrete a single knife in his hand, and tackled her district partner to the floor. It all happened in a moment. The only career girl left, Chryssie's almost-killer, whipped around and bolted towards her 'ally'. Chryssie heaved silently, then lay still. Too still.

A cannon. Tawny's head slid with a splat to the ground.

Was it especially loud, or was I imagining? Had they died at the exact same time? Was there a double funeral waiting in the wings? Whatever happened, I needed to act. I was their only other competitor. I had to do something. The boy from 4 was heavily injured, after all, and the girl seemed to have an affinity for the boy. Narrowing her eyes, she scanned the room to see if any of us were left. Did some careers have feelings, after all? Or did she just want to save the best fight till last?

Pink chiffon found its way into my grip. A quiet pain reignited on my palm. Tramping quietly down the pile, I avoided the girl's gaze. Finally, something I was good at. Her lantern's luminescence spilled across the grey room, setting the fabrics alight with gold, crumbling the lichen to ash, scattering embers in the air that I could barely see. Yet, I was wrapped in shade that no light could stab. So long hiding in the shadows could only help when you had to stand in the light.

And yes, Panem, I would stand in the light.


Chiffon twirled at my fingertips and the glass caught each refraction of the dawn's light as I darted towards the career. I'd used the same technique as Tawny, but this time, I'd win. Somehow. There was no breeze in the air, but cool tendrils of visible gasps weaved past me as I grabbed and wrenched the girl's arm. The sword clattered to the floor in time with cannon as I caught a glance at her expression, contorted with confusion and fury. So ocean boy was dead, huh?

A fist came flying towards my head, but I'd learned from the 8 girl and snaked underneath it. Her knee jabbed upward, searching for something to connect with, but I jumped back, chiffon swirling before me in soft waves. Glass glittered in my grip, eager for some colour.

We weren't short of that here.

She burst back towards me standing in the rainbow mountain. In her rage, she must've forgotten about a weapon. She was so close, I could feel her cold breath. I felt the heat of her lantern. It was almost too late, but in the red mist of urgency, I frantically whipped out the piece of glass like a hunter would pull out a rifle and I prayed.

To the golden gardens, let me win this fight. It's the only one I have left. The only one standing between me and you. The only one forever and ever. It flashed in my vision - a wheat field, Marriott's stupid face, the lanterns. A girl hell-bent on killing me, before charging right into the shard, drawing a large gash vertically up her throat. I had slit her neck right open, up until the chin bone was exposed to the cold air.

But she wasn't dead. The wound was burbling, babbling, the blood bursting with bubbles that popped and perforated my mind with images of hot, thick blood. She swallowed, but the scarlet spurted up, spattering all over her scarlet shirt. I looked away, but the career wasn't done yet.

A hand gripped onto my leg and even though it was rapidly draining with colour, it was surprisingly strong. I tried to yank it away, but the girl rolled over onto my foot and I slammed onto the concrete. Warmth was growing on my side again. She'd caught me with her sword just before I'd reached her, ripping off the scab, ripping through my flesh. I'd never even felt it in my desperation. I had to win. Both of us would bleed out if this didn't end soon.

And I still had the chiffon.

The girl clutched my jacket and clambered on top of me and I didn't struggle; I twisted the pink fabric into a sort of rope. Then, I took a deep breath and swung the chiffon between my face and hers. The shard had torn a chasm of red through her pretty, dark skin. Strings deep inside her throat throbbed with acrimony and a stubborn will to keep fighting. A drop of her blood splashed against my lips and I could taste the iron, metallic and bitter and hot.

She couldn't keep snarling at me forever.

I twisted the chiffon up and around her neck until it was taut and I couldn't pull any longer. Gargles of rage escaped through the slit, but she was like a fish in a barrel under my grip. I rolled her back around until it was me kneeling on her chest and even though there was magma pooling under my shirt, I tugged at the chiffon until I thought the stitches would start coming out one by one. Her skin, her beautiful dark skin, was losing its colour, turning some shade of grey. The colour of the fabric was taking away the colour of her skin. How the games loved irony. I pulled at it until the veins in my head were aching and my arms were too and the lace and leather and fur under her were shredded by my unrelenting grasp until, finally, a cannon.

A cannon.

I killed her.

Again.

More blood.

My hands.

They're covered in red.

It's not pink anymore.

It's red too.

I'm cold.

I'm freezing.

I'm going to die too.

My hair hangs limply in my face. I can hear my breathing, rough, like sandpaper. I can feel my fingertips are wet. And they're red too. Everything is red. Yes, I'm on a pile of fabric, but they're all muted. Washed out. Grey. Like the walls. And the ringing is still here. A siren. That's red too. It's all grey and red and I can feel it. Touch it. Hear it.

See it.

See her.


Chryssie's still here. The sirens distracted me, back when cannons pinged around the walls freely. Maybe they're distracting me now, too, even though the thoughts swimming through my head are burning ferociously through the dark. I'm drowning in my laboured breaths, trying to keep afloat even though there's flames flickering at the surface. Blood. Water. Fire. Darkness. All trapped in my brain. And I'm all trapped in this room, too. Unless I kill my ally.

Or unless she kills me.

She's picking up the sword and it shines proudly in the harsh light. Hair's draped across her face like a veil. A veil for death. One she'll have to wear at her parade soon enough. Lumps won't stay down in my throat and I can feel the bile rising up. Footsteps vibrate through the concrete and up my spine and they're louder than the sirens that haven't stopped ringing, won't stop ringing. The dead career's lying by me, her lifeless face still spiteful for her death.

I haven't taken my hands from the chiffon yet.

I try stumbling to my feet, but the fabric is twisted around my boot and my breaths heave hollow. Nausea hits me, like Marriott's congealed herb soup stench. Dizziness. I can barely see her looming figure caressing the dirty blade, it all melts into one and even though I should be familiar with this, my heart surges in its iron maiden. Tears don't make a difference. My ally, the one I saved, is out to kill me.

One more fight.

One more fight.

One more fight.

I have to breathe. A cold gulp of air fills my lungs, like after drowning in a lake. Who says I'm not already drowning in decisions? I've never been good with those. But this isn't a wardrobe choice, it's life or death. She's not dead yet. I have to choose. She's going to choose for me otherwise. I don't want to fight. Marriott's waiting for this. He'll be watching. I can't let him down.

Or I could just give up. It's not a decision if it's not for myself. Chryssie has a life too. A family. A reason. A purpose. Why else would she be trying to kill me? I have my golden gardens, she must have something too. And I need to choose, Now. Right this second. Because she's coming towards me and her face is not like the career's. She's warm even though she's half-dead. She doesn't want to live with guilt either, but that's better than death in her eyes. Decision. There's a second left. Her hand's reaching out. The sword swishes inelegantly through the thick air.

And I don't care about the blood on my neck because there's pink around hers.


The chiffon twists before my vision, creating translucent swirls decorated with my own blood.

Flames creeping into my neck.

Through it, I can barely make out the snarling form of my ally grasping for my exposed throat.

Eyes popping out, desperate.

A cough echoes in my paper lungs, rattling my bones.

Silver in the gash.

Death is so tempting; the silhouettes waiting for me, strewn among the rainbow fabrics and the concrete, all floating in their own crimson pool.

I'll have one too.

Darkness itself coils around me like a boa constrictor suffocating its prey.

My shadows.

Within reach, it's tangible and furious and so, so tempting.

Can't resist.

But I have too many reasons to live.

Do I?

For my future.

Golden gardens.

For Marriott.

Through the television.

There have to be some things not worth giving up.

Why else would I still be alive?

One of them is hope.

Hope.

22 have died, 2 of them at my hand. Soon to be 3. Yet we're all standing in the capitol's palm, being tossed around by gamemakers who want their perfect puppets. The pink swirls around with the blood, making a red rope. Black scarves join in, sucking the warmth from the breaking sunlight. Then there's gold. Gold I've not seen in weeks even though they all shine it in my direction. Gold they all find too blinding. Gold that dances with my dark. Red and grey and black and gold. Colours. Pretty. Sunlight nails turning blue. Rosy cheeks withering to ash. Stone creeps in, to her lips first, then to her scared face. Darkness blooms in her throat as she gulps in lungfuls that never go anywhere.

And I have hope.

The 23rd cannon is music to my bleeding ears. The siren's stopped. The warmth returns.

Black eyelids.

Red hands.

Grey cage.

No more.

Away from the red and the black and the grey.

And towards the golden bath of day.


Day 14 ar, 5:43 pm


When I wake up, I'm in a strange room with tubes attached to my chest and stitches sewing my flesh back together. Am I but a jigsaw puzzle to them? Something to rip apart and sew back together? Something to be figured out and made civilised through brutality? Yes. I'm a plaything. But nobody can answer me anyway because I'm all alone. And it occurs to me that before all this, I was too naïve. I hated the capitol just because everyone else did and now that they've given me a reason too, I feel empty. All the biscuits I shove in my face can't make it go away.

And I thought I won. Turns out, I didn't even know what game I was playing.

Days pass before I will myself up onto that stage. Time concertinas back into the regularly scheduled programming of reality tv without me. Nightmares fold back in on themselves, invisible to the naked eye but all too present if you bear my name. Weeks of starvation condense into minutes. Split second kills dilate into hours of replays, static over and over again wobbling before my darting eyes. The fuschia couch I despised so much before the games doesn't even register in my mind. It's velvet. Who makes couches out of velvet?

At least it's not red.

In some ways, I'm the same as before. I still want there to be a door on mum and dad's apartment. I still never want herb soup ever again. I can still see Marriott in my reflection, his grin reversed in my own scowl. But there's something new. Something more subtle than a newly-instilled hatred for the capitol and scorn towards my gaudy escort, or overwhelming homesickness and being camera-shy all of a sudden. It tumbles with my night-and-day heart, mixing into and out of it's rhythm as it so pleases. Sometimes in my dreams, it manifests into a rope, strangling me with dread. I see it in the detail of my pink chiffon dress that I have to wear for every interview; in its every stitch. Snaking around my senses, it froths up my lungs with acid.

What will Marriott say when I get home?


The train carriage rocks me gently from my slumber, though it was far from gentle.

Chryssie's not at the foot of my bed this time.

Tawny's head isn't dangling from the chandelier like usual.

The girl from District 8 hasn't ripped my throat open yet.

Lifeless, stony eyes once belonging to the career aren't staring back at me from outside the window.

So why does poison eddy in my stomach?

I swallow the honey-soaked polenta and pansy pancakes with a little bit of difficulty, but I manage to hold down a coughing fit. I see his blue eyes laugh in the bubbles of my sparkling water. Bronze skin stretches across my bony knuckles, reminding me of when he used to take my hand in the night and swear to protect me. Look how far that got me. But now I have to get over it all. We're nearly back at 9 and I can't decide whether it's been a month or a millennia. Erlo begrudgingly rises to his feet as the train pulls into the station and I follow suit, ready to return to my life. What will Marriott say? Cicero ruffles my hair a little as I try to avoid slipping down onto the train tracks, making a blonde strand flop down over my nose. I don't bother to move it.

Crowds only welcome me back because they have to and because there are peacekeepers around to make sure you do. Nobody pays attention to the games here unless you're a gambler. And if you're a gambler, you're a nobody. At least they care on the surface, that's more than I can say for my mentor. Yet, for all the astonishment I wished in returning to Marriott, he's not anywhere I can see. Their faces grin in purported joy, but I know it's just the hunger itching at their stomachs. Pavements swim before me, each step heavier than it ever was in the arena. This was the price I paid for choosing life. Another arena in 9, but now I have to live with ghosts hanging on my shoulders, pushing me down into the dirt until I'm 6 feet under just like them. Cameras will still want to catch each flutter of my eyelash in restless sleep, each tear I shed in the dark, each drop of blood that I squeeze from the bandages still guarding my throat.

On the bright side, my jail walls are transparent now.


Peacekeepers disperse as I enter the labyrinth of dwellings from the north-west corner of the square. People aren't so creepy as to line the streets all the way back to our apartment. Or, as I should say, mum and dad's apartment. Now that I've won, we can't live there anymore. Perhaps it's best to put that place behind us, we've been through too many tough winters to count in there. Erlo's disappeared too, probably to check over our new house in the Victor's Village. And it all seems so disingenuous. The capitol tried to kill me and now they're giving me a mansion? That's not even scratching the surface, but they're so shallow that even that reveals their hypocrisy.

The streets are empty, yet the white sun is glaring in the sky. Where is everyone? Are they all cheering for my ghost walking through the aisles back in the square? Are they reclaiming the maimed body of the boy whose name I never knew? Probably. They've still received two bodies this year, but one of them's still clutching onto the feeble strands of hope. I've not let them reach me, but now I'm reaching for them. To tell them that I have the hope that almost got me killed.

Is it so lethal, just to live?

Of course it is. There's no death without life, no life without death. And when I look up, the sun is bright and hot and the tarmac is a darker shade of grey than the stone bricks and all the houses are more yellowed with age than those narrow corridors of plaster. Windows are boarded up from the heat, but all I'm thinking is that it's to keep me out. My feet are cumbersome under the beating of my heart, but I can still hear both, perfectly out of time.

I have plenty of time.

Just to walk, to amble, to dance along down the empty streets.

Because all the people are mourning a dead boy.

And I'm singing just because I'm not laying in the next coffin along.

I pass a house with a creeping rose blossoming up its walls and slithering into the gaps between the planks of wood in the window. A white rose. Not a pink one. Not a red one. It's pretty. Then the road turns straight and I gallop down there, near a wooden barn packed with chaff to be churned through working hands. A fence begins, rickety and a little dilapidated, but I've seen it so many times because prominently displayed right behind it are these huge wheat fields. These golden gardens, as Marriott used to say.

My heart soars when I see the dusty panes of glass shielding our beds from the sun. My book is bound in dark green leather, still laying face down where I left it at page 128. I don't see that it's just as empty as every other house because I'm too eager to push the white linen curtain aside and be welcomed back home. Familiar mustiness and specks of dust float through the air as I step inside and the TV's still blaring with my victory. But Marriott's not scooping me up in his arms. Where is he? Where's my brother? I turn the corner into the alcove.

The streets aren't so quiet anymore.

A crumpled note flutters to the planks below.

Because Marriott's hanging from the ceiling.

Dead.

If you're alive to read this,

I'm sorry Margot.


AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Hello there! I'm FloatingFerrets. You may have already guessed that. As you also may have guessed, this is my first victor of my new verse, Margot. She was created on a whim when I was collating names for tribute ideas and I stumbled across a pair of names that went really nicely as siblings. I've had the idea of a fabric warehouse/ abandoned factory arena for a while and as time went on, I incorporated more and more extended metaphors and quotes into the mix which make for quite a wild ride indeed. There'll maybe even be some more where that came from in the coming year, though I'm not sure how long that's going to possibly take. Currently, I'm 1/7th of the way through my next story, detailing the tale of Bunny O'Leary and their sister as they struggle to deal with the injustices of Panem. It will be posted eventually, I'll make sure of it!

Hopefully you enjoyed reading and have an absolutely fantastic day, week, month and year wherever you are :)