A/N: Another quick update, scream at me if you must, but I hope it's a happy scream! :D We have District Seven here, and we're revisiting Ivy Cross and Baron Arbor! I hope you enjoy reading! :D

Trigger Warnings: Profanity and sexism (because, you know, Ivy Cross xD)

P.S. I think this is the longest one yet!

I can see you're disappointed

By the way you look at me

And I'm sorry that I'm not

The woman you thought I'd be

Yes, I've made my mistakes

But listen and understand

My mistakes are no worse than yours

Just because I'm a woman

Ivy Cross, 16

District Seven Female

The smile on my face is a grimace now. I can't stand it. I want to shiver and quake and run, run until I can't. Harlow's arm is wrapped around my waist, and his hungry finger seem as if they're just waiting to paw up my ass and my...other parts. I hate my father for buying this too-short, pastel pink dress for me to wear. If I were to bend over he'd see my vagina if I wasn't wearing underwear. I keep tugging down the skirt, and I know Harlow doesn't want it down. I know he's just trying to be romantic or something, to swoon me with his oh-so-intoxicating masculinity and dominance, but really it's just uncomfortable. When we reach the square, and Harlow has to wait at the edge since he's nineteen, I feel so free. I tug my skirt down as far as it will go, and it stays there. Was Harlow tugging it up? Oh damn that man. I clench my hands into fists and I bite my tongue as I wait to get my finger pricked.

My brother Pine proposed to Marla, Harlow's sister, two nights ago. They've probably already had sex. My brother's the type of man that would do that, and Marla thinks she's in love with him. She's in love with the thought of him, but a thought can last a million lifetimes. At least she's happy with how her life is turning out. But, anyway, now that those two are a happy couple, I know Harlow's going to pop the question. It's not going to be alone; he's knows I'm "skittish" and "meek" and whatever shitty adjectives his family uses to describe women who don't want to be baby machines domineered by men like we're sailboats or cattle. He has the ring I bet. I need to run, somehow. I just need to. There's no other way.

When I got Reaped at the Preliminary Reaping back in Nuesville along with 14 year old Trunk Cathsby, I didn't really think much of it. Nuesville is a decently sized town, but most of our population is older; there's only twelve other girls who are sixteen in the town, and Marla is one of them. My neighbor Eddy went two years ago when he was eighteen, and he said it was fun, a good meal and a good hotel to share with your family.

My dad gave all of those privileges to Harlow. We slept in the same room last night, although I got out of bed and slept on the floor the moment he drifted off. We shared a supposedly romantic dinner; he fawned over how pretty I was and I just ate my salad and steak quietly and stared at the tablecloth. There were fifty two blue stripes, and fifty three black ones, on the tablecloth. It was sort of cool, minus Harlow. There was kids from all over the District along with a chaperone like their parent or grandmother or, in my case, my groom-to-be. It's sort of sad; if a kid's Reaped in an Outer District, they only get one person who comes to their goodbyes if they don't live in the main city. If I got Reaped, I'd get a half hour alone with Harlow. Ha. He'd probably try to have sex with me or something.

I stand in the pen. I do not know anyone around me of course, but there's clumps of nervous girls forming, complete strangers who maybe met at the dinner or in the hotel and now are clinging to each other like their lives depend on it, because they're scared out of their wits. In some towns, being Reaped for the Prelims makes you like the Prom Queen and King or something like that. In others, its a terrible omen and everyone treats the day like a funeral. And in other towns like my own, no one gives a fuck about who goes to the capital of our District; they always come back, and our cliched existence continues and the drawn out, boring cycle of life continues to rotate as it "should". You're born, and if you're a boy you marry when you're eighteen or nineteen, and if you're a girl you marry when you're sixteen or seventeen. You make lots of babies, and then you watch them grow up and marry and have babies, and if you're lucky, you get to see their babies make babies of their own! Just the thought of sitting on a porch with a gray haired Harlow and bearing the surname Teuscher and watching our many offspring play and grow up and procreate themselves just makes me want to throw up, not even kidding. I don't know, if I was marrying for love, if I'd ever want kids.

"IVY CROSS!" Razzle Junehop screams and I don't even know what's happening, but I force myself to walk out of the pen as relieved girls part around me. My hands shake, and I steady them by gnawing off my fingernails. My left pinky finger's nail has gotten too long anyway. Not really, but I need an excuse to give into my bad habit of biting my nails. As I reach the stage, I force myself to put my hands down at my sides. As I stand next to Razzle, I've gained a shred of confidence and I keep my back straight and I manage to get a tiny, shaky smile on my face. It only grows as I realize something. I won't have to marry Harlow.

Speaking of the douche. "Ivy, my dear!" he wails from the crowd. What happens next is just instinct. My middle finger shoots up and it feels so damn good, I can't even explain it. My smile grows even more and I want to start laughing, taunting him, but I can't seem crazy. Razzle pulls out a male slip, but some random sixteen year old guy volunteers and looks half crazed as he splutters his name. I'd hoped I'd get some nice guy like the one who was Reaped, Malachi. He looked like a hard worker and a possible ally. I've always wanted to meet another Seven guy outside of Nuesville and see if they're any different from those back home. Looks like that's not going to happen. Baron's head is probably going to explode or something weird. He seems like the type whose sanity would break in the Games, if they haven't already. But he does look cunning and willing to kill, and rather strong. He might be a threat. It's such an old saying, but keep you friends close, and your enemies closer. As Razzle announces our names, I shake his hand and smile prettily. He just rolls his eyes and walks away.

I walk into the goodbye room, two paces ahead of the Peacekeepers. I don't need them to spur me forward, and the room is marked in big bold black letters declaring FEMALE TRIBUTE GOODBYE ROOM. Classic Seven style, bold and out in the open. Some of our citizens aren't...the most smart citizens, so everything around here, especially in the Justice Building, is labeled clearly and concisely.

I sit on the bench in the room, expecting Harlow to come in at any second. But he doesn't. I get a whole thirty minutes to myself to chuckle quietly and think about my future being torn away and tossed in the trash. Pretty much every other tribute would be weeping right now, thinking about how their future hubby and kiddies are gone for good now, but it just makes me grin. No Harlow. No baby machine Ivy! I will never, ever bear the surname Teuscher!

It feels wrong to be happy, but I am. I wonder how the Games could be something so good when they're really something so bad, but I guess everyone sees things differently. I'm an expert on that type of thing. I've always been the different one.

The Victor's Village of Seven's here in the capital of Seven, Ashburgh. I never have to go back to Nuesville again, no matter if I'm alive or if I'm dead in a coffin. The tribute graveyard is here, in Ashburgh, too. I'll get to see the world, and I'll finally be free, even though it's all just a simple illusion. I don't really care, however. If I get out of marrying Harlow, even if it means I'm going to die, so be it. I'd rather die than marry him and be his baby maker.

I'd rather die in the Games than die a conventional death in Nuesville. That's just the way I'd like it, and now, thanks to Razzle Junehop, I'll have it that way.

I sat alone, in bed till the morning

I'm crying, "They're coming for me"

And I tried to hold these secrets inside me

My mind's like a deadly disease

I'm bigger than my body

I'm colder than this home

I'm meaner than my demons

I'm bigger than these bones

And all the kids cried out, "Please stop, you're scaring me"

I can't help this awful energy

God damn right, you should be scared of me

Who is in control?

Baron Arbor, 16

District Seven Male

I stand on the train platform, grinning viciously. The two Peacekeepers seem sort of bothered with me, but I don't really care. I just stared death in the face and now here I am, alive, with a chance of living to the end of my days. Thoughts of what I could do now fill my head. If I win, no, when I win, I can harbor all of my friends in the Coven and protect them from the law in the Victor's Village. I can give Grandma Circe the life she deserves, with a real wooden floor and heat and cooling in a real house in a real village with real food and real tools inside it. I can do so much when I win. Now it's just a task of deciding how.

Ivy Cross joins me on the train platform, and she's smiling, too. It's not a fake smile like I'd expect it to be, it's a real one like mine, filled with hope and a dash of exhilaration. She doesn't look at me, seemingly ignoring me, and I can understand why. I did get a little out of hand when I got onto the stage and volunteered. But who wouldn't be just a little excited when they're escaping the gallows and certain death?

My Grandma Circe was the one who came with me to Ashburgh for the true Reaping. She knew what I was going to do; I volunteered back at home in Ainslee's (our home town's) Preliminary Reaping. She said she didn't condone what I was doing, but she understood my reasons. She said death was death, and I countered with one of her favorite sayings: Hope is eternal. She couldn't fire back to that. Rowan was sad the entire time the couple of days before I left, knowing I was going off to the Games and probably wouldn't come back, but I comforted her and got her to laugh and smile. She is my best friend, after all. I can't leave her glum and depressed while I'm gone. The other members of the Coven daring enough to come visit me in the stocks where I was being held wished me good luck, and no one else came to visit me except a drunkard who went on a rant about how disgusting I was before the Peacekeepers dragged him away. I didn't mine listening to him prattle, however. It just gave me more fuel to keeping going, more fuel to show the world what I was and to break the mold that had been built around what I was. I wasn't practicing witchcraft and magic. No matter how much I wanted to believe it, we were just a group of jokers, medicine men and women who knew how to produce potions to heal the sick and comedians who could make others laugh and complete feats of mystery that were just the cause of sleight of hand and distraction. We made the mistake of calling it magic, and then people thought we were crazy and everything spiraled out of control.

The train appears on the horizon like a gleaming angel sent from heaven, whizzing down the tracks near soundlessly. The brakes screech as it comes to a stop, and Ivy cringes a little bit at the loud sound but I don't mind it. The Peacekeepers step back and the train comes fully to a stop. I open the door and gesture for Ivy to go in first. She looks at me strangely, as if I have some vendetta against her already. I just opened the door for you, girl. She steps inside the train, and I follow her, pulling the door closed behind me. The train starts moving soon after Ivy and I have sat down at the table.

Our Mentors, Oakes and Paula, sit at the table. Both won with a mixture of cunning, strength, survival skills, tree climbing, and skills with axes and hatchets. We're one of the only five Districts to have two Victors, and since Eight got two Victors pretty much from luck it seems, we're pegged as the fourth strongest District and the strongest non-Career Districts. Our tributes almost always do well, and we have the best Outlying track record in terms of how long our tributes survive on average. Razzle isn't at the table; Oakes informs us she's changing into more comfortable clothing. Oakes is smiling and seems all nice and warm and fuzzy, almost like the uncle you don't really know that's already half drunk when you get to the party. Paula's icy and cold and stares at her nails, which are long, glossy, and cared for impeccably. She and Ivy start chatting quietly, and Ivy's words manage to coax a smile onto Paula's pale-as-snow face. I pick up a bonbon from the table and munch on it thoughtfully, enjoying the burst of flavors inside my mouth. Razzle totters into the train car, out of her flashing leaf dress and in a simpler cocktail dress made of a autumn leave print. She smiles at Ivy and I and shakes our hands. Everything is so amiable here, and even if Paula is a little cold, Ivy's relaxed her somehow. The five of us chatter about nonsense about things in Seven. Turns out Razzle vacations to Seven all the time and one of the houses in the Victor's Village is practically her own. After talking for a while, Ivy and Paula stand up from the table and push in their chairs.

"We're going to go discuss strategy on our own," Paula grunts, her smile gone, her cold, no-frills demeanor back. She and Ivy trot out of the car, and once they're gone the mood is even more relaxed. Razzle and Oakes sit on one side of the table and I sit on the other.

"Such a courageous young man, volunteering!" Razzle chuckles. "What made you do that?"

"I'm on death row because I dabble with medicine and card tricks and the Peacekeepers think I'm an evil sorcerer." Razzle laughs uproariously, but Oakes's face darkens a bit as he stares at me, a little concerned and a little disturbed.

"Are you the boy from the Coven in Ainslee?" Oakes inquires.

"Yeah, how did you know?" I shoot back, surprised he's heard of my plight. The Victor's Village and Ashburgh are a good, long drive from Ainslee.

"My sister and her family live in Elmboro," Oakes mutters. "It's-"

"Right next door, I know, I've gone there before with my grandma to the spice shop, they don't have one of those over in Ainslee. I guess I'm the talk of the county, then? I wouldn't be surprised, people out there always want something to talk about."

"Well, yeah, your story's circulating, but my sister told me about you after you volunteered during the Preliminary Reaping. She heard you were on death row, accused with one count of witchcraft, and thought that you might be volunteering at the big Reaping and that I should look into you, that you might be my charge this year. Seq was right, as she usually is. So yeah, I've got some background on you. Sorry, not trying to be creepy, but I like to be prepared."

"That's fine," I murmur. "So, can we talk strategy? Should I focus on skills I don't know well yet in training? If the Careers ask me to be in their alliance, should I accept? Should I make an alliance or go it solo in the Games?"

"Whoa, slow down!" Oakes chuckles. He pauses for a moment, and then says, "Yes, no, maybe so."

"Alright, then," I reply, grinning. "So, I have a lot more questions. I need to have this all down, and I need to be prepared. So, let's say I come across a water source and I'm really thirsty, but I don't have a filter or iodine, but it looks clean enough to drink, but then again-"

"Don't drink it. Play it safe," Oakes says, cutting me off.

"Play it safe," I mutter. "I'm not the best at that."

"Well, you'll have to study up on that if you want to survive, Baron."

"I will. I really will."

"Then there's hope for you yet."

A/N: District Seven! Yay! I had to make myself stop with Ivy. I love all of these tributes, but damn, when I get in that girl's head and start writing, I just could go forever, on and on and on. I hope it was fun to get another look at these two!

I'm going to go back and fix the sponsor system if you didn't see that already. I need to up the points for the items, especially weapons, now that I see how many chapters we are going to have in this story.

Who did you like better here, Ivy or Baron? Have your opinions of them changed?

Ivy (1 pt.): What is the name of the boy who was Reaped alongside Ivy at the Nuesville Preliminary Reaping?

Baron (1 pt.): What is one of Grandma Circe's favorite sayings that Baron uses against her when he volunteers the first time for the Preliminary Reaping? (Hint, it's three words!)

Until Next Time,

Tracee