The Victory Tour was nothing but hell.

Every district was the same story. Poor people, poor place, poor dead tributes faces and their families who seemed too shocked to be angry in their grief. And each time I was forced to stare at their pitiful, hardened eyes as I rattled off line after line about the greatness of the Capitol and the weakness of the districts.

I used to be one of you! I always wanted to scream. My ancestors fought to free your district! I was never meant to stand here.

But at least those districts had fight. Worse still were the ones with people who seemed uncaring whether they lived or died, whether their children had been killed by me or not.

Nightmares were abundant.

"How did you do it?" I asked Mags at one point. "This is worse than the Games ever were."

She shook her head. "I didn't really, I don't think any victor really does. I've seen others break down into tears, stand there unable to say a word. You're handling it rather well I would say."

"Oh," was all I could say in reply. I was an idiot if it had taken me this long to understand. Of course this Tour was made to denigrate rather than build, to remind everyone how helpless they really were against the Capitol, including the victors themselves.

I went through my morphling far quicker than I anticipated and by this point, it showed.

"Jay, I say your face is taking on a very peculiar color," Georgia said to me halfway through the Tour. "And your eyes are huge. Maybe we should take you to a doctor in the next district. It could be a fever of some sort."

"No," I replied quickly. "I'm fine."

But I saw Yondrie's face out of the corner of my eye and I knew she thought I was anything but fine.

Getting Yondrie on this trip was a piece of work in of itself. Georgia explained such things had never been done, could not ever be done, however much I pushed on the matter. But I saw my opening once she explained that every victor was supposed to develop a talent after the Games. I failed horribly at every endeavor she placed me in and when I quietly said that Yondrie knew how to garden, Georgia threw up her hands and agreed.

I wasn't lying, either. Yondrie was good with anything to do with plants, be it herbs or weeds or flowers. It was her idea to grow a different plant for each district as a way to remember their fallen, one of the few things I was actually pleased about on the trip.

Whenever I wasn't giving speeches or making appearances, I was with her gentle hands that taught me how to plant and trim and wake up from this world that chained me in hell.

And it was better than any morphling hit I had ever taken.

But then we came to District 3.

I knew it was going to be rough, even before we set a foot in there, I knew.

The previous district, District 4, had been rough. They had all hated me there, I saw it in their silence, not even a sound when I spoke and I understood why.

I wasn't able to save him. I had wanted to say to Danila's parents. I'm so sorry.

But when I came to District 3, it was rough for a completely different reason.

They smiled at me when I went out into their square which was rough and torn unlike the technology that surrounded them on all sides, their forcible donation to the Capitol. They looked at me and smiled with pain on their faces and they clapped, every single one, as their mayor announced my name.

This was the first time anyone, much less a district had welcomed me with such open arms during the Tour. I was flustered and unsure of what to say next. Unsure of what they wanted from me and what I could do to make it happen.

"Uh, thank you," I began and I did what I always did to get through it – look straight ahead, don't ever look at the pictures of the tributes or their families – "for welcoming me to your district. I am honored to be here. In a show of comradeship and to remember the fallen tributes of this district, I would like to give you these dahlias."

I handed them to the mayor, like with all the districts, and then turned back to the crowd.

They were silent, not the silence of District 4, but an eager silence, a waiting silence. They were still smiling at me and I still had no idea what they wanted.

And when I tried to look away, that's when I caught a glimpse of Killian, his face with that perpetual smirk he seemed to have in life, arm's folded across his chest, knowing he was going to win. Beneath, his mother and two younger brothers who all stared at me in silence.

And who smiled.

"It's alright." Someone whispered behind me and I jerked around to see who it was. The mayor. Still holding those flowers in his hands. "Say what you must. We understand."

There was nothing to say to that. Nothing. These people, these kind, kind people who welcomed me like one of their own and expected nothing. I didn't deserve to be here. And I certainly didn't deserve Killian's kindness.

And then something inside me snapped. Whatever I was going to say, whatever I had planned, it was gone in an instant.

I turned back to the crowd. "I don't know you." I heard my voice reverberate through the square, expecting at any moment for someone to pull me away, to stop me, but still no one said a word. "Any of you, really. Not even your tributes. Not even Killian." I paused but only for a moment, I had to keep going, I had to do this. "And yet here you are, welcoming me with open arms. This district has been so kind to me, I'm sorry that I will not ever be able to repay it."

I took a deep breath. "Killian was my ally. I'm sure in a different world we would have even become friends. But more important than that, he saved my life, more than once. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't be standing here today. He should be here instead of me, he deserved it far more than I do."

Now that I'd caught a glimpse of his face, I couldn't stop looking at it. At that image that was him and yet not. I wanted so desperately to press my three middle fingers together in salute, the greatest thank you I knew how to make to Killian. But this wasn't District 12, these people wouldn't understand. My voice caught and I realized that there were tears in my eyes, tears that I couldn't get rid of.

"I'm sorry," I said, not even sure if it was for the tears or my speech or Killian's death. "I'm so sorry."

I turned away, wanting nothing more than to finally leave this place when I heard the first strains of a song.

My song.

Are you, Are you

Coming to the tree

Where they strung up a man they say murdered three

First one then two then all were singing it, even the mayor. I stopped where I was and turned around, walking slowly back. There they stood and they were all still smiling.

Strange things did happen here

No. No. They couldn't sing this. It was a death sentence. I heard the echo and realized I had said the words out loud.

No stranger would it be

"No!" I was practically screaming now, pleading, tears now falling freely down my face. "Stop! Not like this!"

If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree

And then everything exploded into chaos. It took me a moment to realize that this wasn't some random violence but a pre-planned rebellion. People in the crowds were pulling out guns and shooting at the Peacekeepers who shot right back, blood and violence and death. It was exciting. I was shaking.

I couldn't turn away. I couldn't speak. I was barely even there. I was back in the Games, fighting for my life and I hardly noticed when people clambered onto the stage and pulled me down into the fray.

One of them I could see was the mayor. The other had a strange familiarity and it took me a moment to place him as Killian's brother.

The crush of the crowd was immense now, all of us packed in so tightly that it paralyzed me in fear. The Peacekeepers were multiplying in numbers, surrounding us like wolves about to go in for the kill.

"Don't you understand?" I yelled to be heard over the roar of everyone else. "This isn't going to work, they're going to destroy you all!"

"We know," Killian's brother said and he took out a dagger from his pocket, small but deadly sharp. "This isn't a rebellion, it's the spark. And you are the sacrifice."

Instantly, everything fell into place. Their happiness at seeing me, the song, the carefully planned uprising.

They were going to kill me and make it look like the Peacekeepers did it.

They were going to make me a martyr for the next rebellion.

"No! I don't want this!" But I don't think they even heard me, the mayor was pushing me to the ground, Killian's brother was on top of me, the dagger poised in his hand and this was too much like the Games, too much like my nightmares.

"Your death won't be in vain," he said to me, so quiet, almost like a secret, like Killian's secrets. "We'll make sure of it." And then his knife went down.

In some twisted sense of irony, though, what saved me in the end was that they were so bent on killing me. The Peacekeepers opened fire and not a bullet touched me from so low on the ground.

I couldn't see anything except Killian's brother with his wretched knife but I could hear the screams. He jerked his head up, stopping the knife just inches before my face, and received a bullet in the shoulder as a result. He dropped to the ground, along with other people all around me, pinning me down. I could feel the knife slicing into my arm but I couldn't reach it with him overtop of me. I felt the stickiness of blood, whether him or me I did not know. He was moaning in pain, like many others around me, a sickening, horrible sound. But worse still was when the moans died off, leaving an immovable silence.

I felt like screaming. I wanted to scream. But pinned underneath everyone dead and gunned down, I could barely breathe, much less let out a single sound.

It might have been minutes or hours or days but eventually I could hear people moving somewhere above me and then light burst out as Peacekeepers dragged bodies away. I gasped with the rush of new air but I was too far gone to scream.

"There he is."

"Is he even alive?"

"He'd better be. Pull him out."

I was yanked out of the mess of bodies and set onto my feet. All around there were people, most dead, but some still breathing, some still crying out in agony, and then quickly being silenced. The few that weren't injured were being dragged away, most likely to never be seen again.

They kept asking me if I was alright. Nicely. The Peacekeepers. Over and over. But I couldn't speak. I tried but my voice wouldn't appear. So I just stood there and didn't stop shaking.

The others came for me. Ran over to me and hugged me tightly. Mags and Georgia and the prep team. They kept talking about my arm and how it needed medical attention and someone must have bandaged it because next I saw it was covered in gauze.

But I didn't speak, not until we got on that train. Because I knew he was watching. The President.

District 3 never recovered. It was beaten down into submission year after year and never did well in the Games from that point onwards, only surpassing District 12 in its number of victors.

I got into a lot of trouble for what happened.

I think I'm still paying the price.

I went straight for my luggage once we were back on board the train. I knew where it was, the pocket where I kept my morphling.

But there was nothing there.

No, that couldn't be right. I might not have had a lot left but I knew I had one or two still. One more to get me through this. One more.

I tore the luggage apart, seam to seam, and then the room, end to end.

But there was nothing there.

No. NO.

"Jay," someone said behind me, so softly I almost missed it.

I turned.

Yondrie. Holding the last vial of morphling.

"Yondrie," I said, my voice low and dangerous. "Give that to me now."

"Jay," she said, her eyes filling with tears, "what happened to you?"

I felt like laughing. "What happened to me? The Games fucking happened. District 3 happened. They were going to kill me!" I saw her eyes widen with that, but I pressed on. "For their cause. But I was a coward. Always have been, always will be."

"You're not a coward-" she began quietly but I cut her off.

"I am! You don't know how much I am, how much I hide from you every single day!" I was dizzy with pain, the world seemingly spinning around faster and faster. "I can't do this anymore! So don't you dare judge me." I walked towards her. "Give me the vial."

She clutched it all the more. "Jay. No."

"Give. It. To. Me." I was pulling at her arm, trying to pry the thing out of her hands. I knew she couldn't hold on forever and she didn't. At the last moment, she threw it to the opposite wall, shattering it into a million pieces.

"No!" I scrambled to the ground, my hands looking to salvage any amount, but it was no use. It was gone. I collapsed.

"Yondrie!" I yelled in desperation, in pain that I could never really express.

She didn't say anything for a moment. Then she knelt down to my level.

"Jay," she said, clasping my hands in hers. "Your hands are bleeding."

They were, from the broken glass. I leaned against the wall, putting my head in my hands, before realizing a moment later that I was smearing myself in blood and in fact probably was covered in blood from what happened earlier today.

How perfect.

"I'm sorry," I said finally, utterly broken. "For everything. I'm sorry you have to put up with me like this. You deserve so much better."

She didn't say anything to that, just leaned forward and tried to wipe some of the blood from my face.

"The fact that you were taking morphling is not what was bothering me," she said. "What bothered me was that you never told me. Ever. You don't think I didn't notice every time you took a hit and got strung out? Every time you looked at me but couldn't actually see me through the haze of drugs? I saw, Jay, I saw and it tore me apart more than you will ever know that you would rather go to your demons and your drugs than to talk to me!"

She was crying again and it made me feel even worse. "No, Yondrie, it was never like that. I didn't mean it like that."

She ignored me. "All I want, all I have ever wanted, is for you to tell me what you're thinking. Ever since we first met, you've been secretive and I know you are keeping things from me. Just tell me and I'll tell you everything and then we can finally stop being so alone."

And I couldn't help it. I did weep then, releasing everything from since the Reaping and even before. Every fearful moment, every bloodlust, everything that had gone through my mind, that had been eating me whole.

I was sure she would look at me different, that she would tell me how horrible and strange and awful I was. But she just looked at me with pity, not like the permanent kind people gave me back in 12, but the temporary kind that was sorry I had suffered, and then she hugged me tightly, so tightly I thought I wouldn't even be able to breathe but somehow I managed.

And we just sat there in silence for a very long time, even as the train began to move and night began to fall and it seemed that all the dark things I had been through finally began to fade away and in all my memories of all my days, I cannot say that I felt happier or more peaceful than at that very moment.

It became cruel irony what followed.

Instead of being the martyr for the rebellion, I became the martyr for the Capitol. I was plastered on every screen in every paper in every place. Poor Jay Tipper, in District 3 when he tried to give his thanks, the people mobbed him and almost killed him. Poor Jay Tipper, they horribly injured him in the process – as if I hadn't been injured even worse in the Games. Poor, poor Jay Tipper.

The only good that came out of any of it was that I was given a few days off the Tour to rest – probably just so that they could push the story that I had been more injured than I actually was – but I was still grateful nonetheless.

For District 1 and 2, security was ramped up to the highest level, all these Peacekeepers surrounding me at all times, even when I was just on the train which, though a nuisance, was perhaps for the best. I can't imagine that either was grateful to see me.

I had the sneaking suspicion, though, that this was just for the media too. Or, even more likely, to reassert the power of the Capitol after such a defiance.

I can never forget that.

Then came the Capitol and all the Peacekeepers became nonexistent because they were simply everywhere. It was so strange, after a lifetime of hunger, a Games of fear, and a Tour of the highest tension, to be placed into the finest clothes and dropped into parties where I was the center of everyone's attention. Where nothing happened except for eating and dancing and talking of the most mundane things. I felt like I was going insane. I probably was.

Then came the moment I had been fearing since the beginning. The Presidential Party. The moment when I would finally see what President Snow would do with me.

I clutched onto Yondrie until her arm must have gone numb. At least Yondrie could now be seen in public with me. Ever since the District 3 incident Mags had told reporters and other media sources that once Yondrie had heard what had happened she had travelled all the way from 12 to be with me and had since been seen at my side at all times.

"Jay," she said, looking at me sideways, "I'm pretty sure the President is not going to assassinate you at his own party."

"Stop mocking me, this isn't funny!"

"Mocking Jay? Who would ever do anything like that?"

I rolled my eyes. "Ha ha ha. You are hilarious."

"Jay," she said seriously. "Calm down. I'll be right beside you the whole time and I'm not going to let anything happen to you."

I smiled and gave her a quick kiss. "Me either."

If I am going to be honest, the party didn't really leave much of an impression on me. It was like all the rest. Music. Dancing. Ignorance. I spent most of it thanking people who told me I was the luckiest man in the world and trying to avoid being seen.

About halfway through the party is when President Snow made his entrance, along with his wife, smiling and waving at the crowds. I tried to disappear into the mess of people as much as possible but somehow Georgia found me and dragged towards them.

"Come on, dear, the President has specifically requested to meet you. You can imagine the honor!"

Oh, I could imagine. "Uh, I just, it's just, I'm just not feeling so well right now, maybe later or-"

"Jay!" she said, sharply. "Nobody denies the President. Get yourself under control and for heaven's sake be polite!"

They were standing at the foot of the stairs and smiled as we both came near. At the last moment, Yondrie, who must have been following close behind, slipped her arm around mine and squeezed it reassuringly.

"President Snow," Georgia said with as much overwrought reverence as she could, which happened to be quite a lot, "what an honor it is to be in your presence. Allow me to formally introduce the victor of the previous Hunger Games, Jay Tipper, and his wife, Yondrie."

We both smiled and nodded our heads toward him. "An honor to meet you, sir," I said.

He turned to look at me carefully and I got the creeping feeling that I was already dead in his mind, just another person gone who meant nothing. His eyes, a sharp clear blue, reminded me much of Killian's but without any of the warmth, only the gears clicking forward in logical reason.

"An honor to meet you too, the first victor ever from District 12."

I didn't know what to say to that so I just said, "Thank you, sir."

Georgia, perhaps realizing she was not needed anymore, promptly left. President Snow's wife, a woman with a kind smile who I could not reconcile being married to such a cold man, went up to Yondrie and whispered in her ear, "I say, why don't we let the men have some time alone?"

Yondrie looked at me sympathetically but she couldn't refuse. She squeezed my arm once more before melting into the crowd and leaving me alone with what I suspected was my worst enemy.

We stared out into the crowd in silence. I desperately wanted to get this over with but wasn't so brash as to speak out of turn or inadvertently reveal something that might be of some use to him so I waited.

"Tipper, Tipper, Tipper," he said slowly. "Why does that sound familiar?"

I didn't offer a reply.

"Oh," he said, as if it had suddenly come to him, "I seem to recall that that was the name of one of the rebels we executed during the Dark Days."

I didn't say anything to that at first. I didn't know what to say. But I knew silence meant guilt and I wasn't about to give in to that. I wasn't so foolish to think that denying completely my family had ever been part of the rebellion was such a good plan either.

"Is it?" I finally said, nonchalantly. "News to me. My father never talked about our family. And it just so happens that I don't talk to my father anymore either."

At least that was more or less the truth.

"Really?" he said and I knew it was false the moment it sounded. "And what makes you unable to talk to him?"

Even without starting the conversation, I had given away too much.

Stupid. Stupid.

"We have different views on everything," I replied. "I don't associate myself with people I know serve only to aggravate me."

He clucked his tongue. "That's a shame. I rather think people with different views can be quite interesting, if a touch misguided. I highly doubt that you and I share the same views, for example. And yet, here we are."

I shifted on my feet. There was no way for me to win. Why didn't he just kill me now and get it over with?

"Excuse me for my impertinence," I said, realizing I might as well say whatever I wanted, "but why does an important man such as yourself concern himself with me, a lowly boy from a lowly district?"

He started to laugh, long and loud, which was the last reaction I was expecting. "Oh Jay," he said, placing his arm around my neck as if we were old friends, "but you are important. Why else would we spend so much lavishing you with a house and money and nice clothes or guarding you after that rather unfortunate incident in District 3 where they sang that little song of yours."

He moved his hand to the nape of my neck and I froze, not able to move a muscle. I knew what he was doing. I knew what he could do. He could snap my neck with a stroke of his arm and I wouldn't even let out a scream much less be able to defend myself. For some awful reason it reminded me of holding that rabbit, trying and failing to kill it on the day of my first Reaping. Except this time I was the rabbit. And he wouldn't flinch to kill as I had. He knelt to my ear.

"If any other district had also decided to rebel," he whispered, so softly that even I could barely hear the words, "you would not be hear right now. The one reason, the only reason, you are still here is because you serve my purposes at the moment. Don't think you can fool me, I know you and your kind. If you think that you can start a rebellion in any capacity under my eye then you won't be the one to suffer," ever so slightly, he shifted my neck to where Yondrie and his wife sat beside a rose garden, laughing, "your wife will. And you are sorely mistaken if you think you can sway me to mercy by that point."

He straightened himself, removing his arm from my neck in the process. I looked at him. He was so young, about ten years older than me give or take, but even so he seemed to behave as if he had ruled this world for an eternity and would continue to do so for as long as time existed.

"Don't tell me where I heard this," he said, normally, naturally, "but rumors say that it is your wife who grows the plants, not you. Such strange notions some people have." He laughed, its tone ringing oddly or maybe it was my ears roaring with blood that distorted its sound. "But do tell that lovely wife of yours that if she ever gets the fancy, she can come work in my garden. I dearly adore roses." He plucked the white rose out from his lapel and held it out. "For you," he said. I knew I had to take it.

But I allowed myself one defiance, one small rebellion though I was terrified, no, perhaps because I was terrified. I stared at him, stared and hated and drove him through with my eyes.

"Thank you," I said in the nicest voice I could muster, "for the insight and the rose."

I found Yondrie still by that wretched rose garden when I went to get her.

"Is something the matter?" she asked me as soon as Snow's wife left.

"No," and I tried to smile when I said it. I held out the rose. "From President Snow. For you."

"Oh," she said. "How lovely."

The next Hunger Games came far too soon for my liking.

Or maybe it was because that's when it finally hit me. When I clambered onto that stage, right next to Mags who was staying this one final year to show me the ropes in being a mentor, it hit me, really hit me that my life was now forever entwined in the one moment I would most like to forget. That all I ever did now was live and breathe and help to serve the Hunger Games.

And that thought terrified me, even more than my own bloodlust or the Games themselves.

It was also quite strange to see the eighteen-year row, all those kids I had once gone to school with, who could conceivably be reaped into this Games. It was a horrifying thought to think of Kit being reaped and me having to coach him, even if he was too terrified to be friends with me anymore. At least Yondrie was a year older than me and finally not eligible for reaping anymore.

In the end, the two tributes were no one I really knew, a boy about sixteen and a girl about fourteen, both from the Seam. That didn't make it any less horrifying.

Afterwards, as I walked off the stage, I swore, just for a moment, I saw a flash of green eyes that fled as soon as I looked for them.

Training our tributes was certainly not a pleasant experience. While I could teach them trapping or survival skills or even how to use weapons, I was absolutely clueless in everything else concerning the Games and I often looked to Mags to answer their questions to the point where they simply cut out the middleman and asked her instead of going to me.

Even when I did know what I was doing, I still felt out of place. My tributes, looking at me with desperate eyes, asking me, begging me for advice. Showing me the snare I had taught them and smiling widely like it could protect them in the Games. They behaved as if I was some ancient sage instead of the eighteen-year-old that could have been reaped if I wasn't last year.

The other tributes didn't see me that way. Whenever I walked into the room they always talked about me. And I could always hear because they were none too quiet about it.

Look over there, that's Jay Tipper. You know, the one who won last year completely out of nowhere, the one almost killed in District 3. He's already mentoring, can you believe it? It's because they don't have any victors in District 12 so now they have to send children to do it instead.

But I never said anything in response.

And that was my biggest problem. I could teach tributes and learn for the most part what Mags had to teach me but no matter what I did, I never felt up to speaking to sponsors, even the ones who had sponsored me during my Games.

"You're going to have to learn, Jay," she said to me. "If you ever want to bring a victor home."

Not that that even mattered that year. Those poor kids, so afraid, hardly trained, were both killed only seconds into the Cornucopia Bloodbath. That tore me apart more than anything.

"Get used to it," Mags said. "Every year is like this. Learn to detach yourself."

That just made me angry. "What? I'm not supposed to have feelings now? Does the Capitol take those away from me too? Did you send me into the Games not caring if I lived or died?"

She softened at that. "Of course not. I wanted you to live and I did whatever I had to do to make that happen."

I put my head in my hands. I knew she was right. I knew that I couldn't become so attached when every year this was going to happen, over and over and over and over. But I had so little humanity to grasp onto. I needed this.

I also knew I was wasting time when she was leaving me so very soon. There was no point in her coming back to 12 after all. I tried to think of all the things I needed to say to her, apologies and thanks and good wishes for the future all rolled into one.

But by the time I had raised my head and thought out a response, she was already gone.

And I was alone.