shown in the way that i was or the way that i am

left to the people that care or the people that can

dead in my bed and you hear me starting to scream

her on the side of my room oh what does it mean?

i, i will live in my head

and she, she will sleep in my bed

because i, i will walk to the park

because i, i'm afraid of the dark

Oxen Bamby, 20

Resident of District 10

Victor of the 20th Annual Hunger Games

The metal beneath me slowly rises. My Capitol Mentor, a woman with lime green hair named Erlita, waves at me, her bejeweled incisors glinting in the florescent lights of the launch room. Her body swirls, distorted by the warped glass of the tube, as I ascend and she disappears beneath me.

I think that I am still heading up the tube when the plate beneath me comes to a stop. It's pitch black, not a thing to be seen. I keep calm, taking deep breaths. Is the tube stuck? Things don't malfunction like this in the Hunger Games.

A girl wails, and then there's an explosion right next to me. Hot, sticky gore smashes into the right side of my body, drenching me in a thin layer of blood, chunks of flesh tangled in my hair. I manage to not throw up, but I hear the boy who had been on the other side of this girl regurgitate his breakfast. Moments later he's blown sky high as well, his bile setting off the explosives at the base of the platform.

Everything falls silent after those two explosions, and the only light source is the full moon overhead and the silvery, holographic countdown that makes the silvery Cornucopia shine with an ethereal light. The seconds are whittled away, and when the last one's gone. The gong rings, and I sprint forward.

I crash into someone, a younger boy. The light of the moon glints off of his glasses. The 13 year old from Five. I toss him to the ground and keep running forward as a girl screams nearby as the crunch of bone and a manic cackle is heard. I run into the Cornucopia, lock my hands around a flashlight, and shine it on the Horn's contents. What will there be to help me survive here?

The only things inside the Cornucopia are blunt maces. We'll have to bash each other's brains out. Swell.

I wake up groaning, the sheets tangled and soiled yet again. This happens every night. Sometimes its the finale, me bashing in the head of the little girl from Six who had just hid the entire time. Sometimes its me massacring the Career pack at midnight, killing the pair from One and the boy from Two while they slept, leaving only the boy from Four left alive (the girls from Two and Four had died earlier.) But usually it is the Bloodbath, disappearing up the tube into the pitch black arena, being rained on by the guts of the girl from Seven and the boy from Twelve. My nightmares are all the same. They're of me killing, of feeling blood running between my fingers and down my throat. I never ate anyone, but I sure as hell probably ate some dried blood, for I was always drenched in it.

It's only four A.M.; I went to bed at midnight. It's more sleep than I usually get, so I'm fine with it. I step into the bathroom. The lights are on, just like the lights are on in every room of the house. The dark scares me. The dark is a monster. The dark kills. The dark made me murder ten tributes in my Games. The dark made me do everything. The dark is evil. No one understands that.

I step into the shower, turning on a light over the shower to chase away the shadows caused by the shower curtain. It's not a fancy shower from the Capitol, just a normal one, but I have a good supply of hot water since I'm a Victor. I turn on the shower and drown myself in the smoldering hot water for a half hour until I'm falling asleep. Then, wet and drowsy once again, I stagger back to bed, falling asleep on the sweaty sheets.

The boy from Four is playing guard, marching around the Cornucopia clearing, mace in hand. He's sixteen, his arms not strong enough to use the mace to great effect like I can. He follows the pedestals in his march, walking around their outside. The simple act of screaming in a high pitched voice sends the boy from Four reeling towards the dark, horror filled forest that surrounds the Cornucopia clearing. He's high on adrenaline, and the last time the Careers went hunting was two and a half days ago, if my estimations of time are correct.

It's all too easy to traipse over to the unguarded Horn. I find myself standing over Chanel, over Rubio, over Marcus. All three of them scored 9s, and all three of them are threats. That boy from 4, Turc, scored a 7. The only reason they let him stay in the alliance is so they had an expendable scout. Turc won't be a problem to hunt down. Now these three, I need to take them out. For example, I need to take them out now.

I take out Marcus first, one smash of my mace crumpling his head and killing him. Chanel and Rubio begin to awaken. Rubio's wounded in the leg from a run in with some of the crazed, rabid wolf mutts that prowl the horror forest, so I bludgeon Chanel to death. Her cannon rings as Rubio wakes up and manages to grab his mace. But he's on the ground, and I'm above him. He sleepily tries to hit into my shoulder, but I knock the mace from his hands easily, breaking some of his fingers, too. He howls, and three more blows to the chest, two to the neck, and Rubio is also dead.

Turc stands at the edge of the clearing, having come back from his wild goose chase. He has on night vision goggles like I do, and he sees his three slain allies and then me, holding my bloody mace, a wicked grin splitting my face in two. He turns and sprints off without a second thought, and I grin. Now I have the Horn, and the safest area of the arena, its Field, all to myself.

I wake up again, screaming out loud this time. I crawl out of the sweat soaked sheets, creeping through the fully lit bedroom to open the door to the fully lit bathroom. I climb into the shower and turn it up all the way to its hottest setting, and I soak in it until I'm ready to fall asleep. It's a process, you see? Everything has to be a process. The darkness took spontaneity away from my life, along with everything else. The darkness can never be allowed to touch me again.

When you try your best, but you don't succeed

When you get what you want, but not what you need

When you feel so tired, but you can't sleep

Stuck in reverse

And the tears come streaming down your face

When you lose something you can't replace

When you love someone, but it goes to waste

Could it be worse?

Pumpkin Little, 31

Resident of District 11

Victor of the 7th Annual Hunger Games

Things don't always work out in life. Sometimes you have to make things work in your favor. That's what I did in my Games. When life handed my a death sentence penned by our escort at that time, Mina, and President Gaius Snow himself, I took that death sentence and shredded it to scraps. I got a group of two others, Jeremy from Seven and Laura from Ten. Jeremy and I were 16, Laura 18. In the evergreen forest arena, I put my knowledge of plants to use, keeping the three of us alive until the Top 8. Then we split. Jeremy died the next day from eating a poisonous mushroom, Laura two days after at the hands of the boy from Two, Parkios, who was an early Career who trained himself, quite like Brick and "Headmistress" Serephina. At the end, Parkios made the fatal mistake of crossing the boy from Five, who was a wizard with traps. Parkios died in the boy from Five's traps, and I attacked him and his friend, the boy from Three, ending both of their lives with dagger skills Laura taught me while she was still alive and we were still allied. I made the odds in my favor.

My little sister doesn't quite understand the concept of making your own luck and your own odds. Well, I'll be honest. My little sister doesn't quite understand the concept of anything. She doesn't understand anything.

"But Pumpkin, it just doesn't work!" she whines.

"It's called growing things, Gourdia! How the hell did you grow up in Eleven and not learn how to take care of a fucking plant," I howl at her.

Why am I so angry, you might ask? Well, I have a perfectly good reason. Gourdia killed my cactus.

I'm usually a complacent woman. But this is over the line.

"Gourdia, you know this isn't just a random, stupid cactus. This is Berry Hanlowe's cactus! From the 12th Hunger Games!"

I better explain, shouldn't I?

Some Victors, many, really, have things to remember their tributes by. Every District has a Tribute Graveyard. Takami passes out pastries to the families of the dead. Anneliese knits things for those who lose tributes to the Games in Five. Unity lays flowers on every grave every day. Why, even Calla will share some booze or a joint with a family member of a dead tribute, and the Careers take good care of the families whose tributes die. My little tribute to my tributes is the plants. They're from the arenas, the plant that was closest to the tribute when they died.

For example, the 10th Hunger Games. The boy's pot is bigger, filled with sand and lots of beach grasses, since he died in the Bloodbath, near the beach and dunes. The name Theodore Anderson is scrawled around the lip of the pot in my loopy lettering. Next to Theodore's pot is a true beauty. A little purple flower that dies every winter and comes back every summer, created by the Gamemakers, was the plant Hailea Himalayan landed on when she died at the hands of Catherine Spark, the better half of the famous Spark twins, in the Top 8. The little plant, with is plethora of dark purple flowers, is cute and tiny, just like Hailea was.

But anyway, I have a plant for all 41 tributes to have died from Eleven. The plant that Gourdia killed was the cactus for 14 year old Berry Hanlowe. She placed 3rd, and was a remarkable young woman who derived water out of the abrasive desert landscape. She lost her life fighting the last Career, the boy from One, before that boy was taken out by a startled Anneliese Petrova.

I tasked Gourdia with caring for this cactus when I was gone visiting my friend Unity over in Nine for a week for a little girl time together. The cactus was a little sick, so I asked her to water it once. She didn't water it, but did end up overwatering the little miniature pine tree for my own District partner, Antonio! The bitch!

"Just get out, Gourdia," I say through a veil of tears. She does so.

Gourdia will never understand. Losing these plants is like losing my tributes all over again.

If I look back to the start now

I know, I see everything true

There's still a fire in my heart, my darling

But I'm not burning for you

Eris Glasshine, 24

Resident of the Capitol

Capitol Mentor for District 12

"So, Eris, what do you think of Kerensa's newest dress?!" Napolia drawls, her voice slurred by alcohol.

"It's atrocious," I murmur as we watch the model, in a number from Kerensa Linette's newest collection, Abrasia, prance down the runway in a neon yellow jumpsuit studded with electric blue, flashing gemstones.

"DID YOU SAY ATROCIOUS?! I'M WEARING THAT PIECE!" Napolia screeched. Thankfully no one could hear her over the heavy applause of the final piece in the collection as the girl in the avant garde, flamboyant dress strutted off stage. Napolia was in fact wearing the same outfit.

"I meant, like, atrociously amazing!" I say, feigning I high pitched, giggly voice. That placates Napolia, who stands and walks out of the runway hall with me. She's in ten inch heels and is drunker than Calla Espenson on a Saturday night. I practically carry her to a taxi, which whisks away "my friend" back to her apartment.

I walk home alone. People criticize me for my drab gray and brown clothing, and my lack of physical alterations. I have mousy brown hair, warm tan skin, hazel eyes, and a bit crooked teeth. I've been Mentoring tributes from Twelve since I was 20. People tell me that's why I am so drab, so outdated, so District looking. Napolia says that she's surprised that I haven't been arrested by a Peacekeeper thinking that I'm an escaping District prisoner wandering through the streets of the Capitol. I honestly sort of agree with her statement. I do look abnormally normal for a Capitolite, and the Peacekeepers around here the the stupidest in Panem.

No, I am not a District citizen. I never was. I just took the job from Uriel Fless after he retired. No one wanted to take the job, and I wanted something to catapult my name to fame so I would maybe get a better job down the road as a Gamemaker or an actress or whatever stupid dream I was having at that point.

My first trip to Twelve, for the 19th Annual Hunger Games Reaping, was a wake up call.

I saw the poverty, the illness, the starvation, the horrors of the Outermost District in Panem. I saw the little 12 year old boy and 15 year old girl step onto the stage, tired, coated in grime, their bellies concave and their eyes hollow and dead. Both Parker and Nicole died in the Bloodbath, and it was the most excruciating thing I've ever watched in my life. I cried my eyes out, and the Victor-Mentors realized that I wasn't a plastic Capitol doll, but a real human.

The next year, I got a 13 year old girl and a 16 year old male. The male died, blown up after puking from being splattered with the guts of Oakes's girl. The little girl survived the Bloodbath but didn't last longer than a day before mutts got her.

When the little girl, named Delia, died, I walked over to the Eight station. Their boy was still in it, and Woof was working tirelessly at his station while Uriah called sponsor after sponsor, trying to get enough money to send his boy a can of rice so he wouldn't starve.

"So, you guys dabble in rebellion?" I asked them, nonchalant.

That was the day that this Capitol girl became a whole-hearted rebel.

A/N: The last of our Mentors! Next up are the Reapings for District One! :D

What did you think of Oxen, Pumpkin, and Eris? Thoughts on POVs/writing?

Thanks for reading! :)

Until Next Time,

Tracee