Greg hadn't done badly; he just hadn't done well. He had opted to use a handgun and shoot targets in his training session. He had managed to hit most. Well, some. Well, he had gotten one smack-bang in the middle, but that had been the only one and they hadn't been looking. Soon he'd find out his score, and he wasn't expecting any miracles.

He hadn't really gotten to know anybody during the training either. Everybody had seemed to split off into groups before Greg had even caught their names. For those three days, he had either stayed alone or stuck with Sherry. Once or twice, he trailed after a trio that looked around his age- the District 12 kids and the boy from Eight- but they didn't seem to notice.

"Are you okay?" Sherry asked, and Greg realised he'd been staring into space.

"Fine, thanks," he smiled weakly, and resumed spooning soup into his mouth. Not long now.

Meanwhile, on Floor Twelve, John and Molly were worrying over their own sessions.

"What's the highest you can score and still get sponsors?" Molly asked nervously.

"Maybe a five? Most people get about that. Anything lower and it's probably a little dodgy, though," John guessed.

"Oh," Molly whimpered.

"But you'll get that! You'll definitely get at least a five. Not many people do survival skills stuff, Moll. You'll stand out."

"As an idiot."

"No! You'll have done better than me, anyway. I bet nearly every tribute that went in there went straight for the guns. I should have been more original," he said bitterly. "They'll never remember that."

"As long as you get a high score, it doesn't matter. The sponsors won't know what you did, just that you were good at it. And you are good at shooting, I saw you during training," she said confidently. He smiled gratefully. He supposed there had to be a certain degree of truth in it. He'd hit nine targets out of ten, and been pretty close on the last one. The Gamemakers hadn't paid all that much attention, though. They seemed distracted- but tense, like they were just waiting for him to slip up. When he turned around and caught the full force of their glare, he nearly dropped his gun.

One of the only people in the building not panicking over scores was a lone male tribute on Floor Eight, sat at the end of the table and refusing to speak a word to anybody. His immediate reaction had been elation- he had wanted to find John and tell him what he'd done, to get conformation that he'd been as brilliant as he had felt in that moment. But rules were rules, and he'd slunk off to Floor Eight alone to replay it in his head. Now he just felt muted, almost dulled. He didn't know what would happen and he didn't really care either way.

They had nearly finished dinner when Karyn finally gave up hinting, and flat out asked.

"Sherlock, what did you do in your private session?"

"I… talked to them," he said vaguely.

"You talked to them?" she frowned. "About what?"

"II told them things that I'd noticed about them. That was all."

"Did you compliment them on their hair?" she asked in disbelief. "Sherlock, this was your chance to show them what you can do. If all you can do is ramble, then you have no chance of getting out alive."

"What kind of things did you tell them?" Rook asked. Sherlock weighed things up. He didn't particularly want to reveal what he had done, but the chance to smack down Karyn's patronising words was too delicious to pass up.

"What some of the other tributes did, and their scores… that the Head Gamemaker was sexually attracted to the girl from One … that one was sleeping with one of the others. Oh, and what some of them had for breakfast."

There was silence. Serra looked at him, wide eyed. Karyn seemed completely lost for words. Rook just shook his head, and turned his attention back to his food.

"What on earth would possess you to do something like that?" Karyn hissed, leaning across the table. "What on earth were you thinking?"

"I don't tolerate fools, and I make no exception for those sending me to my death," Sherlock said flatly. Karyn turned an interesting shade of scarlet.

"This is the most irresponsible, disrespectful thing I have ever heard of in eleven years of work," she said, nearly shaking with anger. "I hope you realise that this will have serious consequences for you."

"Like what? They'll kill me? Oh, no, I can't imagine that ever happening," Sherlock replied, raising his voice. Was he the only sane person in this room? Could nobody else see things as they were? And was he really the first tribute ever to strike back at the Gamemakers? There was no way that, in seventy-four years, he was the first one to ever just go mad at them. Well, I suppose there's a difference between anger and publically announcing a gay love affair.

"Sherlock, stop it!" Karyn cried, clearly horrified. "You can't talk like that!"

"Why not?" he demanded. "Give me one good reason not to."

"One good reason not to is stood in the corner of this room," Rook said, voice low. Sherlock glanced over to the Avox that had served them. The woman was looking at him with a mixture of pity, horror and disdain. He was suddenly very conscious of the weight of the tongue in his mouth.

"So, is that what will happen? They'll arrest me?"

"Doubt it," Rook said. "They'd have to go to the trouble of finding a replacement. They'll probably just make your life hell in the arena."

"As opposed to the gentle and enjoyable time I was looking forward to," Sherlock said. Nobody commented. They all focused on their meals in silence.

After dinner, Sherlock agreed to watch the scores from the private sessions. District One and Two did well as always, with the woman from One pulling a ten. From then on, it was mostly fives and sixes- though the twelve year old from Four only got a two. When Sherlock's own picture rose up on screen, he waited patiently for the verdict. Did they ever give out negative scores? He quite liked the idea of pulling 'minus four'.

"A score of… eleven!" the announcer cried, and Sherlock laughed out loud in surprise- even more so when Karyn and Rook looked at him like he'd grown a second head.

"Eleven!" Karyn squeaked. "For… for… why?"

"I guess they admired his spirit," Rook said slowly.

"Did you actually work all of those things out just by watching them?" Serra asked. He nodded and grinned, pleased with himself. The look on her face physically hurt him, deep in his stomach.

"That's weird," she frowned, looking repulsed. "Don't ever do that to me." It wasn't quite 'piss off', but it had the same effect. Sherlock's face fell for a second, but then set back into its usual stoniness.

"Look, Serra, you got a five!" Karyn said, pointing at the screen. "We can work with that!" Sherlock didn't bother to stick around and watch the rest. He swept out of the room, out of Floor Eight, into the elevator. He'd seen the roof from outside the building and worked out that there must be a way to access it from Floor Twelve. He wondered if anybody would question a lone male tribute on a floor that wasn't his, only to realise an instant later that he just didn't care.

The late evening breeze was cool against his skin, and it felt good after hours of stuffy, artificial air. Sherlock walked right up to the edge, and stood looking down. There was a force field there, he noted. No chance of escape- not that he'd planned to try. He had only wanted to get out of the building for a while. He remained still, looking out over the Capitol and thinking. That had been a major annoyance of all this upheaval; there had been so little time to just sit back and think.

He heard the footsteps behind him before the familiar voice spoke.

"You okay?" John asked. Sherlock turned to see him stood in the open doorway, watching Sherlock with an expression that he couldn't quite place. Sherlock nodded once, and took a few steps away from the edge. "I thought I saw you from the window. You cast a pretty distinctive shadow." Sherlock made no attempts to break the silence.

"I got an eight," John blurted out. He coloured a little. "In, um, my private session. All I did was shoot, but they still gave me an eight."

A genuine smile came over Sherlock's face. "Really? Well done."

"Thanks," John said. Sherlock looked back out to the city as a piece of particularly loud music started blaring from one tower block. When he looked back, John was grinning at Sherlock in a strangely knowing way.

"What?" Sherlock frowned.

"What do you think?"

Sherlock didn't like saying 'I don't know', so he didn't. He just left another pause.

"Eleven," John filled in.

"Oh," Sherlock said. To Sherlock's confusion, John started to laugh. "What?"

"The careers got eights and nines. Most tributes get five," John eventually said, "and some didn't even get that. Only Sherlock bloody Holmes could get an eleven." And Sherlock finally placed the look on John's face as 'pride', and before he could really react he found himself being pulled into a hug.

"Well done, mate, seriously," John spoke into Sherlock's neck before letting him go. Sherlock couldn't quite bring himself to say the 'thank you' on the tip of his tongue.

"What did you do?" John asked, leaning back against the wall. Sherlock copied him.

"Surely you know that."

"I can't imagine you shooting, somehow."

"Why not? I'm good at shooting."

"I didn't say you weren't. But would you really do something that ordinary?" Sherlock thought he had probably smiled more in the last ten minutes than he had in the last year.

"I just spoke to them. That was all."

"Oh, God, you deduced them."

"I deduced things about them," Sherlock corrected.

"Christ. Is that even allowed?"

"I doubt many people have tried it before."

"Fair point. They must have thought it'd be useful in the arena. Being able to tell if people are skilled or not, what weapons they have, whether or not they're lying…."

"That wouldn't make much of a difference to a two-hundred pound giant with a machete."

"Yeah, but fictional machete-men won't get anywhere near you, because you're too smart for that." John said. After a brief hesitation, he added "You could win this, Sherlock".

Sherlock considered this. "There's no denying that I'm an unbelievably intelligent man and most of the others are very stupid children," he replied. "If it was a battle of wits, there'd be no question. But the fact is that there's not always time for wits in this kind of thing. Something much more primal can be of greater use," he said, looking at John. He could see the boy's mind flashing back to their first meeting-

-quite correctly, I suspect-

and trying to evaluate and re-evaluate the situation. Sherlock knew that John couldn't predict what was going to happen- but wondered if he, himself, could. He'd always been able to in the past- to say which tributes would die first, who stood the best chances, what the best strategies would be. But they hadn't seen the arena yet, he hadn't watched the interviews, and to be completely honest he wasn't trying. He didn't want to try.

It was strange. Usually he was eager to work it out, to see if he could get it right. Maybe this was different because they were living, breathing people who he saw every day. Maybe it was different because he was one of the pawns in the game he was trying to play out in his head. Whatever the reason, it was different this time. This time, he was actively fighting to not know.

"It's the interviews tomorrow, right?" John asked.

"Of course."

"Nervous?"

"I don't get nervous, John."

"Hopeful?"

"For what?"

"I give up. Any feelings at all?"

"Not really. It's just another pointless little round. It's not really relevant."

"It can get you sponsors," John pointed out. "That's pretty damn relevant."

"Oh, yes. Our adoring crowd, all somewhere out there," Sherlock said, looking back out across the city. John followed suit.

"It's almost beautiful, isn't it?" John said. The Capitol was displayed in front of them, so clear and sparkling and just out of reach. On their rooftop, in the darkness, all he could see was John's faintly lit figure and his own cold breath. Sherlock leant back against the rough brick wall and breathed in the night.

"There are so many lights," he mused. The buildings were illuminated with a kind of brightness that he'd never seen light the factories at home. The mayor's brother might have gotten a few luxuries back in District 8, but Sherlock hadn't wanted Mycroft's money and so Mycroft had stopped offering it. Besides, a high end lifestyle in the districts would be beyond hell for any Capitol resident.

"And so many people," John said softly. Sherlock could even make some of them out- only pinpricks in the distance, partying and shouting and swarming in hoards.

"Look at all of them, John. They don't even know, do they?"

"What don't they know?"

"What they have. What we haven't." Sherlock paused. "What we'd give to have so much and to know so little."

Neither of them looked away from the vivid world in front of them, and neither of them spoke. Sherlock didn't move as John's hand found his, and squeezed it gently before letting it go. The brief moment of warmth stayed with him long after he'd retired quietly to his own floor.


The woman from District One wore clothes this time, although they left very little to the imagination. Greg spent equal amounts of time staring and trying not to stare.

"Miss Adler," the host greeted (he definitely had no qualms about staring). "It's so good to see you again. Although, I think we saw more than we'd expected last time," he threw to the audience, who lapped it up. They screeched their approval, hooting and clapping. Irene sat with her back straight and legs crossed, seemingly in total control.

"So what was the motivation behind that choice?" the host asked, leaning forwards. Irene's lips curved upwards, and she tossed her hair over her shoulder.

"Well, they offered me all kinds of beautiful dresses and robes- but at the end of the day, it's difficult to improve on perfection." The crowd went insane again, and Greg looked away. She was eighteen, so presumably old enough for their standards.

He had received a five in training. It was a pretty average score, and he was okay with that. The problem had been the interview. His mentor was at a loss as to how Greg should try and present himself. They attempted awe-struck (he couldn't gush), funny (he wasn't), dangerous (that one was best forgotten). They had completely side-stepped Irene Adler's angle, which brought him endless relief. It was always risky to try 'sexy', but she did it very well; when her three minutes were up, most of the audience's eyes didn't leave her. The poor boy she had come with was almost entirely overlooked.

Both of Two's tributes were quiet but undoubtedly menacing, whereas Three's pair were just plain quiet. Everybody had the good grace to give Carl Powers their full attention, and the young boy coped remarkably well under the stress.

"Do you think a twelve year old could really win these Games?" the host asked, not unkindly. Carl bit his lip.

"I hope so," he said. "I think it depends on what the arena's like." His timer went off, he returned to his seat, and Greg didn't miss the thumbs up the boy from District 10 gave him. Neither did the host. When Niahm, the District 5 girl, sat down, the man was ready with a new line of questioning.

"How are you getting on with the other tributes?" he asked.

"Really well, actually. I didn't think we'd all get on as well as we did, but people just seem to have stuck together for some reason. Maybe we're all just more friendly than usual," she grinned, and he chuckled and patted her on the arm.

"Friends won't help in the arena," he reminded her, voice dropping into seriousness.

"Allies can, though," she argued. And then it was the boy from District 5, and then Shelley, and then Greg was taking his seat in front of Panem.

"Greg," the host greeted warmly, and the audience applauded politely. "How are you today?"

Greg forgot every mildly interesting or amusing thing he could say. His entire mouth went dry, and he responded with a mutter of "… um".

"Tongue tied?" the host asked, and the catcalls from the audience bit into him like insects. "Let's try another question, if that one's too difficult for you." More laughter, more shouting.

"No, it's fine," Greg finally forced out. "I'm fine, thank you. How about you?"

"Well, I was getting a little bored, but it looks like you've decided to talk to us after all," he smirked. "How're you finding the Capitol?"

"I like it," Greg said. "It's different to home, though."

"I'll bet. It must be so much better out here. He's lucky to get to see this gorgeous city, isn't he folks?" And the audience roared their appreciation, as if this was all just a scheme to take unfortunate children out of the districts and make them into stars.

"I'm lucky, yeah," Greg replied, not daring to consider if he believed it or not.

"You got a five in training?" the host asked.

"Yeah, that was good. I just… shot some things," he said limply. The remainder of the interview carried in a similar way. Dull question, dull answer, an offering to the audience to inject some kind of life into things. When Greg waved goodbye and Sherry was called up, he was just glad that he had made it to the end. Of course, nobody would remember him, but what did that really matter?

Sherry did similarly, although she was a bit more amiable than he had been. District Seven weren't much better, although the girl- Kate, Greg thought her name was- had a certain cheekiness to her that made some of the others sit up and pay attention.

The boy from Eight that Greg had seen in training sauntered over to the chair like he couldn't really be bothered. He had been the tribute that got an eleven- Greg's mentor had been muttering about it for hours. Greg had no idea what he might have done. He hadn't seen anything during training to indicate that Sherlock was amazing at either attack or defence, but what did he know?

"Sherlock!" the host beamed, seemingly amazed by the boy's mere presence. "Your score in training was remarkable, young man."

"I know," he replied. There was a strange kind of dissonance when he didn't gush as the room had expected him to. A few mutters began within the crowds gathered.

"Were you surprised when you heard the score?"

"I hadn't put that much thought into it, to be honest," the man replied, and the audience seemed to decide he was aiming for droll. They accepted this quickly, and were soon tittering gleefully. But Greg couldn't shake the feeling - something about his tone, or his posture- that Sherlock wasn't joking.

"Do you want to know what he did to get that eleven?" the host asked the audience, who demonstrated their agreement in a solid wall of noise.

"Tough," Sherlock said flatly, cutting the host off before he even asked the question. No, Sherlock definitely wasn't just trying to be funny. Greg watched him with a strange mix of dread and awe. He'd only seen a few tributes behave like this, and they tended to exit the Games very quickly. And painfully.

"You're from Eight?" the host asked, attempts at banter fading.

"That's correct, yes."

"What's it like there?"

Sherlock seemed to struggle to answer this. "It's large. There are lots of factories. We deal with textiles."

"Yes, but what's it like for you?"

"I don't understand the question." Greg wondered if Sherlock was just socially awkward, but that wasn't it. It was more like he just flat-out didn't care, or he was angry, or he was trying to prove something. For some reason, Greg got the impression that if he wanted, Sherlock could probably be charming as hell. He just… chose not to be.

Greg was a little surprised to realise that he liked him. He liked Sherlock Holmes, in spite of (or perhaps because of) the man being his opposite in nearly every way.


John had drummed his fingers on his leg anxiously through every tribute's turn but this one. He forced himself to stay still as Sherlock took the interview seat, not wanting to distract him. He wondered what angle his friend would try to play. John had been advised to go for 'friendly', and he was hoping he could pull it off. He couldn't imagine Sherlock trying the same, somehow.

His prep team had evidently gone for sexy- he was dressed in a purple shirt that was too tight to be entirely decent- but as the three minutes ticked on, it was clear that his attitude was anything but enticing.

"I don't understand the question," Sherlock stated, not making any attempts to apologise or justify.

"I mean, what are you fighting to get back to? Do you have a girlfriend waiting for you?"

Sherlock screwed his face up. "Girlfriend? No, not really my area."

"A boyfriend, then?"

"No."

"Anybody here who's caught your eye? They did say that you're all getting friendlier next year, am I right?" There was the obligatory pause for clapping and screaming from the Capitol residents, but Sherlock did not visibly react.

"No, not really."

"Okay, so no romance. What about friends, then?"

"Friends? No, I don't have friends. I certainly don't intend to start making them here."

"Ouch," the host winced to the background of laughter. "Nobody that you care about even a little bit?"

Sherlock replied with a casual "No, not really".

"You're sure?"

"Of course," Sherlock said before a shrill burst of noise declared his interview over.

"Well, you can't say he isn't feisty. Give it up for Sherlock Holmes from District Eight!"

John let out a breath he had forgotten about. That was that, then.

It would be point blank ludicrous, he thought, to care at all what a man he had met four days ago thought about him. Even more so when he considered all of the very real threats he would be up against so very soon. What did friendship matter? What did loyalties matter? In the arena, all that mattered was staying alive. He would die and Sherlock would probably die, and what went on between them in the interim made absolutely no difference.

Sherlock happened to look down as John looked up, and their eyes met. For a split second, John felt like his pulse had stopped of its own accord. Then Sherlock looked away, uninterested, and John's heart went slamming back into his chest at twice the normal strength. It hurt, no matter how much he tried to pretend that it didn't.