And we are here!

NGL I am a little nervous about what the reaction will be to the ending, but it's what everything has been leading to from the beginning so I stand by it.

(Lyrics below are from the same song as in the last chapter)


And I am the one who you let see you weeping.
I know the soul that you struggle to save.
Too bad I'm the bet that you lost in the reaping.
Now what will you do when I go to my grave?

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victor of the 89th Hunger Games, Veronica Sawyer!"

It takes her a while to hear the cheering of the audience through the arena's loudspeakers, and she barely registers the announcement of her hollow victory. She just pulls his body to hers tighter, terrified they'll take him away from her.

Finally, she sees the flames are gone and there's a hovercraft above her. She uses all her strength to untangle herself from him. Feels physical loss when she can no longer touch his cooling flesh. Following instinct alone, she grabs onto the ladder and clings on as it slowly pulls her up, the hollering screams of the excited audience vibrating in her eardrums.

How dare they? There are 23 children dead, and all they can do is clap and cheer the sole survivor. And in 6 months they'll take day trips to the arena, laugh as they watch their own children excitedly act out their favourite deaths, as if it is a scene in a movie, safe in the knowledge that it will never happen to them.

She wants them to know. She wants them to suffer like she has, she wants them to see everyone they care about die, to know that their own execution is moments away too, wants them to feel the helplessness, of not being able to do anything to stop it.

She clambers through the trap door and collapses immediately onto the glass floor. Below her, she can see the arena that has been her home for the last two weeks, get smaller and smaller. A second hovercraft, with JD's still bleeding body in its grip, takes off in the opposite direction, taking him away from her forever. He'll be buried somewhere near the arena, they all will, the tributes who were alive not two weeks before. She's not entirely sure where. She hopes they put them close to each other.

She wants to join them. She'd rather face all her enemies in the arena again than the ones she's about to face right now.

As if on cue, the doors burst open and Pauline runs out followed by the rest of her prep team (Cecelia and Garfunkel remain timidly in the doorway), a greedy smile on her face, Pauline pulls Veronica onto her feet and into a hug, only flinching slightly at having to touch the dirt and blood that covers her body, "Oh Veronica, I always knew it would be you! What a wonder – for District 8 to have a champion!"

Yeah, that's why you were cosying up to Brad the whole time, was it?

She can't deal with the natter of the uncondemned, so she pushes her off and turns away. Only to reel back at what she comes face to face with; some fool has made a door reflective enough for her to catch a glimpse of herself, and her bloodshot eyes cannot look away.

The last time she can remember seeing her reflection was on the day of her interview, when she couldn't recognise the beautiful girl in front of her, smiling, waving and twirling in the mirror.

But that girl was the girl who was reaped's twin compared to the thing that stares back at her now, wounded, thin, sunburnt, dirty, ragged and snarling. She's covered in blood, hers, his, Heather's, Brad's, maybe others, who even knows anymore? There are gaps in her teeth, her nose looks like it will never regain its shape and around her throat bruises are starting to form like a grim necklace.

She looks nearly as wretched, broken and disgusting as her soul does.

She's tired. So tired.

"Veronica dear, come along now, we've got to fix you up for…"

"No!" she shrieks, watching, without satisfaction, as Pauline's jaw drops, "Not now! I will do everything you say once we get to the Capitol, for now, can you just leave me alone?"

It doesn't sound particularly fierce to her ears but they back away fast and she wonders how terrifying she seems after all she's done.

Is this how everyone will feel about me for the rest of my life?

Once they are gone she slumps against the hovercraft wall, takes deep breaths for several minutes until she's calm enough to think straight. It's quiet in the room now, this will be the last time she's alone for God knows how long. She glances around and works out quickly where the cameras are and casually shuffles to where she's not in their sightline.

Finally, she gets a chance to reach for the item he left her with.

It's a mine. She looks at it blankly, because it's not what she expected. True, she didn't know what to expect, but why this? He'd told her they'd used them up days ago, if he'd known there was one spare why hadn't he used it against Heather? Hell, why hadn't he used it against her?

She flips the item over in her hand, glancing at the door occasionally to make sure she's not being watched, he's not sentimental enough to leave her a memento so it's a message, it has to be, but what? That he let her win? That he could have gotten the better of her if he'd wanted to? Surely that's part of it, the bastard, but it can't be all of it.

Does he want her to use it? To throw at the Capitol crowds as they cheer their victor? Or even at President Gowan as he comes up to shake her hand. After all, he used his last words to encourage her to use her power… but that wouldn't work, and he must know it! They spend ages, days, preparing a victor before they're presented to the crowds, someone is bound to find this on her person! He'll get her executed! Maybe that's the point, to have her lose too, at her moment of victory. But that's not his style either, she might not really understand him but she understands that, after all they've been through together, to have her killed by the Capitol he hates for something so petty when he doesn't even get to watch…

She's distracted by the sight of the Capitol coming into view. When she arrived two? three? weeks ago (God, it feels like a lifetime) it was by train and that was impressive enough; buildings so tall they appeared to brush the sky, grandiose roads so wide they could fit 6 cars all at once, white, glistening statues 10 or 20 times as large as her, gardens with perfectly arranged flowers surrounding elaborately sculpted hedges. Even on her journey to death row, the sights had been breathtaking.

But the views from the train are nothing on the views from the air.

She remembers Pauline telling her how few have flown over the Capitol by hovercraft and she pities their loss. Even in her traumatised state she is unable to pull her eyes away. Through the glass floor she can see the buildings of the Capitol, fancy houses and flats with rooftop gardens and swimming pools, shops that are bigger than District 8's Town Hall, in the distance she can see President Gowan's palace, the Capitol's own Town Hall which looks grand enough to be a palace itself, the weapons store with its shining purple roof, where (at least according to JD) on the top floor, right up to the roof, they store the nuclear bombs…

Oh.

Oh.

She fingers the mine in her hand… the mine that goes off on impact… the mine they use to set off bigger explosions… and slowly it all makes sense.

How high in the air would a nuclear explosion reach? Higher than this, she guesses, it doesn't really matter in any case, even if she did survive none of the Capitol staff on this flight would let her leave alive.

Understand them, learn what they want, learn what they fear, learn what motivates them, say the right words and you won't have to kill them. They'll do it themselves.

No. She won't survive. She was never meant to. She's his magnum opus, his final victory. Of course, of course, his greatest competitor would have the most impressive death.

At least, as promised, it will be quick and painless.

He's planned this from the beginning, it's why he volunteered. He's planned her role in this too – he made sure she won for this moment; so she could be here, alone, with all the power and none of the monitoring and suspicion his victory would have caused.

Perhaps he's known what he wanted from her from the moment he looked into her eyes and saw intelligence, saw competition. Or maybe he didn't see that, maybe he just saw a challenge, a bit of entertainment to toy with during his final days, to see how far he could push her, to see if he could reach his endgame – to kill tens of thousands – without ever lighting the fuse…

Why does it feel like a betrayal when she knew what he was from the start?

But he's succeeded, she's not going to stop, even now she's realised his plan. There are only two choices ahead of her and she knows the life of being loathed by her district and used by the Capitol, haunted by nightmares, forever asking 'what if?' is not for her.

He's given her an opportunity, whether he cares about her motives for the deed himself, here is a chance to get what she wants.

I don't want them to win.

The Capitol will be gone in one brief explosion, tens of thousands will die, the guilty and innocent alike; the crowds who cheer, the children who will never be reaped, the Gamemakers who have spent the last two weeks making them suffer.

They'll be a revolution, they'll be chaos, the world will burn. But maybe it will rebuild itself from there. Maybe a new world, without the Capitol's control, will be better than the one she was born into.

Well, it's not like it could be much worse.

The hatch where she entered the hovercraft has an emergency exit lever, she walks towards it. From here she has a clear view of what they are flying over, of the purple roof heading closer. It's now or never.

She waits for the feeling she always gets, where she realises she doesn't want to die. It doesn't come. Instead, there's a different feeling, one of power, one of finally being able to take control, to exact revenge on the ones who have wronged her and who have caused the suffering of everyone she has ever known.

I feel… I feel like a God.

When she closes her eyes to gather herself together, it's Betty's face she sees, shining with determination, desperate to make a difference in this world, no matter what the cost.

She needs to get her timing right.

She puts the mine between her thumb and forefinger. It's too late to worry about the cameras now, too late to worry about whether her decision is right, too late to change her mind.

She gives the cameras one last smile, waits until they're just about to be overhead, pulls the lever and lets the mine slip out of her fingers.


I want to thank everyone who has read this fic. You guys are all amazing and I love you all.

As this is the last chapter, if you've made it here, may I ask for a comment just to let me know what you thought? Even if you're reading this 5 or 10 years from now, I always appreciate comments, it means a lot to me and I promise I'm not very scary!