Chapter 1

In the past…

It is the year of Haymitch Abernathy's victory at the fiftieth Hunger Games.

Haymitch crawled through his house. He hadn't eaten for days, and had no strength or any will to live. Every time he thought of his loss; his mother, brother and girlfriend gone, he stopped moving. The pain was unbearable.

He managed his way to the kitchen and found something to eat. Being 16 years old, and living by himself, the Capitol had assigned people from 12 to look after him. Haymitch knew it was just to check up on him. For their benefit, not his. He nibbled on fresh muffin and sipped water. The sun blinded him and he closed his eyes, staring at his eyelids until he could move away from the sun.

He had woken up from a particularly awful nightmare, screaming. His head was pounding and he felt more exhausted than ever before. He thought this was the day to end it all. He managed to drink an insane amount of alcohol and used the only bit of morphling he could get his hands on. The headache went away, but the walls started moving. The floor was no longer stable and he felt like he was falling from the floor.

He made his way up to the roof and climbed out his attic window. He sat on the roof, staring at the purple sky, the swarm of green moving ants covering the world and the blue smoke that was puffed out of the giant cake (All a morphling hallucination).

Eventually the world darkened and the pretty picture he saw turned back into the village. He stared down at the ground, daring it to come closer to him. His head began to hurt again and his feet felt like lead.

"That's not a good idea." A voice said to him.

"I'll do it if I want to. And trust me, I want to." Haymitch replied, not sure if he was talking to himself. The direction the voice had come from made no sense, so he resolved to have this argument with himself.

"Do you know what's going to happen to you?"

"I'm going to die."

"Oh no. It's not nearly far enough. Plus, you're drunk, so your body is more flexible. You'll just be in pain. But you won't die."

"If I stay there on the ground, I'll bleed to death."

"The President has people checking up on you. They'll find you. Even if you die, the Capital will likely scrape you off the ground and find a way to bring you back."

Haymitch frowned. This was probably true.

"How do I get out of this?" Haymitch asked. His head started spinning.

"You don't."

Haymitch sighed.

"You get off the roof. Through the window you came from. Painlessly. Save yourself a couple weeks of extra pain, because you know they won't issue morphling. He wants you to suffer." The voice was female, he suddenly realized. And he's never heard it before.

Haymitch reached into his pocket to retrieve the knife he hid there at all times.

"He?" Haymitched tried to provoke his fellow speaker to find her general direction.

"The president." She said matter-of-factly. Haymitch wasn't sure if he should throw the knife or just show it to warn her.

He turned to the direction of the speaker, which still made no sense to him, and found her on the roof of the neighboring house.

Ruby Rain stood on the roof of the house next to his. He scanned the village and realized her house was nowhere near his, and that she had found a way to that roof. How long had she been there? And what was she doing there anyway?

"Here, let me help you." Ruby said and took a step back before she jumped and leaped onto his roof.

"How did you do that?" Haymitch frowned and mimicked her move. But he had no strength, so instead of reaching the other roof, he ended up falling…