Charm Sterlingshire, District One female (18)

An important time in any Career's life was when they met their allies. My District partner was a train wreck, to start with. It was entirely unfair that I had to have that representing One along with me. What were people going to think? If it wasn't so taboo I had half a mind to kill him in the Bloodbath myself just to save face. I could only hope the rest of the alliance would be more cerebral.

"What you got there?" Joseph asked, looking at the notebook Marley was doodling in.

"Dead guy," she said. She moved her arm to show the autopsy diagram she'd drawn.

"Oh. That's nice," Joseph said politely. He didn't seem surprised, which gave me some idea of what Marley was like. The drawing gave me more information- it was very artistic and well thought-out. I guess even a lunatic can have talents.

"Yeah, that's what they look like," Majesty nodded in approval. Joseph glanced at the page again and got a troubled expression. Laken scowled at it.

"Gross," he said.

"That's almost everyone. We just need Beth," Marley said.

"Isabella will probably want to join, too," Joseph said. "She's... half a Career?"

"She hasn't said anything," I said dismissively. If Isabella didn't want to ask to join us it was her loss. We weren't going to go looking for her. Beth, though, was something of a duty. As lackluster as the Fours were, it was smart to as least keep up appearances.

As luck would have it, I was the first to run across Beth. I found them at the fire-starting station, which struck me as a little bit humorous for a Four.

"Why haven't you met up with us?" I asked. "The rest of us have been together all day."

"Huh?" Beth asked, looking up from the fire. She saw who I was and got a cheery expression. "Oh! I forgot to tell you all, didn't I? I thought I'd go with one of the other alliances. You're all not really missing much- I'm not really that good. I was actually the third pick."

"You don't..." I started. "You don't want to join us?" I had half a mind to walk away before Beth could even respond. "I suppose some other, far better alliance came calling?"

"I made some friends," Beth said. They pointed over and my face went sour as I looked at the bug man from Eight.

"You've got to be kidding me."

Majesty Miraval, District One male (18)

The Capitolite doctor sat barricaded behind a desk and stacks of papers. I supposed she thought she was safe. That was what Benovolence's father thought when he brought her to work with him.

"I see your profile results are unusual," the woman said as she brought out a piece of paper. I imagined what she would look like with worms for eyes since it was funny.

"For item seven, 'do you have thoughts of harming yourself or others', you scribbled out 'yourself' and wrote in 'every second ha ha ha'. Would you like to discuss that?"

"I'd like to kill you, too," I said.

"When did these thoughts start?" the woman asked.

Before I was born I was a baby I was a man before that then a baby I tried to kill my mom when I came out I tried to wrap the cord around her I tried to pull it free so she would bleed born in blood isn't that perfect.

"Did you not hear me? I said I want to kill you," I repeated. If there was one thing I couldn't stand, it was people who didn't listen to me.

"Is that why you volunteered for the Games?" the woman asked.

"What, you suicidal or something? I could kill your mother instead. Or your grandmother. Is the old bat still alive? Be a waste if she was already dead," I said.

The woman looked at me with the same placid expression. I wanted to wipe it off her face. Literally. I wanted to pull her lips off her face and turn that smile upside down. Her teeth would still me smiling after that I'd have to knock them out too. I could make a little speech bubble out of them. I'd probably have to break them in pieces though since I'd run out.

"You were the chosen volunteer. Your trainers found you stable enough for the Games?" the woman asked. I wanted to jump over the desk and tear her throat out. If there hadn't been two security guards I would have. But I could come back after I'd won the Games. I'd make her laugh before she died.

Flat face flat face skin laying over skull. She was another empty body. It's not bad to kill someone if there's nothing in there just a Russian doll with air inside we all are really, just empty inside and nothing matters how can they say someone is a killer if there's nothing nothing nothing .

nothing in life

nothing in people

nothing in nothing

nothing in everything

nothing in killing but it would make me happy to kill her. There was only me. Only what made me happy.

Marley Astero, District Two female (17)

I'd never had so many supplies at home. My family wasn't poor but paint was expensive. You got one tiny little tube of paint and it cost as much as most people my age earned in a day. But here there was everything I could imagine and I could use as much as I wanted.

Sculpting wasn't all I did. Sometimes painting called to me and I indulged that part of my creativity instead. There was an austere constraint in limiting myself to two dimensions. I had to create the illusion of the third dimension myself. Wasn't that what all art was about- illusions? Making people think a lump of clay was a bird. Putting blobs of color together until the human brain processed it as a sailboat even though it was nothing but pigment. Or those collections of dots that look like nothing until you see a dog and once you see it you can never not see it again. Aesthetics was an art but it was also a science. The beauty of anatomy was such that strings of proteins knitted into cells could make up a biological processing machine that saw the metaphysical in arranged pigment.

My painting had a lot of black in it. People might have thought I was being edgy but actually I just sincerely thought it was beautiful. The dark colors of the night sky seemed to me to be so much more compelling that a plain blue afternoon or a gaudy sunset. I loved how blue and purple and black bled into such singular hues that we really didn't have names for. And it wasn't just black I was painting. It was a lake. A lake at night, much bigger and wilder than the few scattered ponds we had in parks in our cities. A wild lake in the middle of nowhere, unseen by any person but me.

The painting spread out underneath me until it was almost life-size. I loved how there was so much space at the camouflage station. No one else was there with me. The girl from Nine had come by but when she saw I was there she left. No one liked a Career but another Career, and we only liked each other until the breakup.

I liked to draw myself in my paintings. The me I drew often didn't resemble what I looked like in real life. It wasn't a matter of wanting to draw a self-portrait as much as it was that I wished I could live in a painting. I could paint myself a whole world and make myself anything I wanted and jump right in. So I painted myself over the lake. I painted myself a few feet above the lake's surface, casting a reflection in the calm water. I drew a glow around myself with lighter paint. I was a ghost in the painting. I sometimes thought about how much I'd like to be a ghost. I could go anywhere I wanted and people wouldn't see me unless I wanted them to. I could fly, which I thought everyone dreamed about. I wouldn't be tied down to a body anymore. Bodies were really cool from a scientific standpoint but wouldn't it be grand to just be a mind untethered from an earthly shell? To be a floating, wandering soul would be a dream for me.

I left my painting on the floor when I left. An Avox would probably come clean it up eventually but I wanted it to stay as long as possible. It was a little bit of prettiness in the world. I made a painting. I imagined a world and I drew it. That was how miraculous a human brain was. We not only ran the world but we created our own.

Joseph Carpenter, District Two male (18)

My allies were a strange bunch. Marley seemed to actually be excited about the killing and Majesty was just plain nuts.

"Hey, watch it!" Charm snapped when Amaranth brushed against her accidentally in the cafeteria. Amaranth made a face at her and kept walking.

"I can't wait to start taking out these undesirables," Charm said as we took our trays to a table.

Did you really just say 'undesirables'? What are you, a soap opera villain? "I don't think it's a good idea to celebrate killing people," I said. "It's kind of just what needs to be done."

"Needs to be done? What, no businesses are hiring? Gotta put food on the table so you signed up to kill kids? You chose to do this. Don't get all high-and-mighty at me," Charm said, glaring at me.

"Yeah, I guess that's true," I said. Charm did have a point, but also I didn't want to split the alliance before the Games even started and make myself a bunch of enemies. Better to let this one go and learn from it.

"If you ask me, it's a matter of getting someone else before they get you first. No one's in this life for anyone but themselves," Laken said.

"Sounds like you had a hard life," I ruminated.

"I got problems like anyone else," Laken shrugged, clearly not wanting to discuss it with someone he just met.

Marley scooted closer to me, since she was sitting next to Majesty. She gave me a glance as she did and I made room. I may have just met her but I didn't want anyone to have to deal with Majesty.

"Anyone called dibs on anyone yet? Wouldn't want to step on any toes," Majesty said.

"I suppose I should say the Nine girl, but I'm trying to be the bigger person," Charm sniffed.

"Honestly I just want them after they're dead," Marley said. Everyone but Majesty looked at her with horror. "Oh my gosh that sounds so bad. No, I just like embalming people. Not that. Ew."

"Yes, embalming murdered kids is way less weird," Laken said.

"Well it's less wrong, isn't it?" Marley said.

Laken tried to think of an argument and finally just huffed. "Okay, I guess that's true." Laken was just about my only normal ally. He didn't seem like the type to make friends but I had a feeling we'd be default acquaintances throughout this. I mean, his alternatives were the bigot from One, the absolute maniac from One, or the girl who wanted to stuff dead people. To be honest, I was starting to think maybe we weren't the good guys.

Laken Dervissey, District Four male (18)

Shane's Games were from before I was born. I started watching them to learn a little about my mentor and was immediately engrossed. I'd thought all Career Victors loved to kill but clearly that wasn't true. Shane went into the Bloodbath full of zeal but I saw it die inside him when he watched his partner kill a crying little girl. He spent the rest of the Games trying to take something back. Just like me.

When I turned around after the finale, Shane was standing behind the couch. I jumped and tried to think of an excuse to stutter out.

"Ugly, isn't it?" he said. "There are things you can't take back."

"You didn't want to kill people, either," I said.

Shane took a seat on the other end of the couch. "I didn't take you for a reluctant Career. What is it? You have something to prove?"

"I don't like killing," I admitted. I guess my mentor was the safest person to admit that to. My allies would kill me but Shane's job was to keep me alive. "I just like the fighting."

"I used to, too. I guess I saw what fighting did to the other guy and didn't feel so great about myself anymore," Shane said. It was uncanny seeing Shane look so regretful. We thought of our Victors as larger-than-life heroes. I'd heard people talk trash about Shane but I could never imagine why. He killed Rhoda Hamilton. Everyone said she was one of Panem's greatest achievements.

"It's not that I like hurting people." I felt the need to defend my motives, lest Shane think I was a bloodthirsty thug. "I wanted to..." it was too private to say. "Protect someone," I finished halfway.

"That I can understand," Shane said. His voice went faraway as I knew he was talking about Rain, the girl I'd seen him bond so closely with in the Games. His hand went to his shoulder. I'd seen the dolphin tattoo in publicity photos but I'd never known what it meant.

"It was my mom," I blurted, surprising myself. "They killed her. And every time I fight someone I think of them."

"You really are a peaceful guy," Shane said with strange admiration.

"What? I just said I constantly think about what I want to do to them," I said.

"Right," Shane said. "You said you don't like killing but you like fighting. Someone took your mother and when you think about it, you don't think about killing them. You just think about fighting them. You want to stop them from doing what they did and that's all. You don't want death for even someone who did that to you."

I didn't know what to say. I hadn't thought about it that way but it was true. Losing my mother gave me a hunger I could never feed but it didn't make me a killer. The rush I got from fighting covered up a pain I always felt but I kept going back because there was something it could never give me.

"No, I don't want them dead. I want my mother back," I said. I wanted the have that hole in my life filled back up. I had maybe sixty years left in this world and I didn't want to spend every single day of them without her.

"It's not the same, what I lost," Shane said. "But it does get easier." I knew he wasn't going to say what I wished he would say. He wasn't going to say that it would go away.

Luckily for us, Majesty had a lucid period long enough for a POV. Also Marley's POV was her form's private session suggestion but it was so cool I thought it deserved a whole POV instead of a little paragraph. She IS doing that again in the session but that will be shorter.