Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.

AN: As always, thanks to Nursekelly for all the help.

And the stars burn out, pt 8

Madge retreats into herself, focusing on her music and refusing to talk about the Tour after Alameda's visit.

She'd single handedly almost completely undone all the work Gale had done in one short meeting. As if he needed another reason to hate the witch.

"I told you everything she told me," she tells him each time he questions her about it.

He doesn't doubt that she has, but that isn't what he's wondering after. Madge is smart. She'll have worked out more of the mysteries that wait for her, read between Alameda's words, and it eats at him that she's refusing to tell him just what she's figured out.

All he can do is hold her and hope she opens up, trusts him, sooner than later.

In the meantime, her nightmares renew, as violent as ever.

She screams and fights, flails in the bed, kicking and punching a scratching at the ghosts of the Arena still haunting her.

Gale's had to hold her tightly through the night to keep her from hurting herself or falling from the bed, even going so far as to push one edge of the frame against the wall to make sure she couldn't accidentally fling herself out the opposite side.

She's apologized more in the days building to the Tour too, for hurting him during her panic.

"You're going to have a black eye or a broken arm-"

"You're smart, Madge, but you aren't that strong," he quickly tries to settle her when she wakes from a nightmare and realizes she's been clawing at his back while clinging to him, leaving bloody fingerprints down his shoulders and skin under fingernails.

She sits, shaking and stammering, cutting her nails to the quick after that. Gale is just barely able to keep her from clipping into her own skin as she sobs apologies to him from the floor of the bathroom, tears and blood smeared across her face.

For a moment he can see the broken creature the Capitol created all those months ago, and it adds to his hate for them.

They won't care that Madge can't make it through a night without waking, without a nightmare. They won't care if she's too anxious to hold down a meal. They won't give a damn about her.

She's nothing more than a toy to them. A doll.

Crouching down, he takes her bloodied hands and cleans them with a cool rag before rinsing it out and wiping her face.

Her brittle voice echoes off the tile. "It's not enough to be smart."

Tossing the rag away, Gale cups her cheeks, tries to make her look at him, but even she finally raises her eyes to his, they're empty. She's retreating back into herself, leaving only the haunted shell to occupy space.

Leaning forward, Gale pulls her to her feet before scooping her up.

"You'll make it enough," he whispers against her temple as he presses a kiss to it.

He can't offer her protection, in any way, shape, or form. All he has is his faith in her mind, which had saved her once already, and he can only hope that's enough.

#######

The days stretched, cold and empty, right up until the day before Madge's tour begins.

She practices the pieces Miss Alameda gave her, right up until the time Gale turns up on her back porch, which makes Mr. Abernathy happy.

"Glad you finally put away the funeral dirges."

Madge almost tells him about her visitor, but holds it back. He has enough on his plate, learning what to do now that he's no longer just her Mentor but is still having to guide her through the new game she's gotten herself thrown into, and he doesn't' need to worry about her receiving strange and dangerous visitors.

With each passing day she feels her anxiety creep up, wrapping around her and trying to squeeze the life and what little fight is left in her out.

Her only relief is Gale, and that only makes her feel sicker.

He deserves so much better. A better life, better nights, better everything. He doesn't deserve to be her punching bag, her comfort, her tether in the storm that's become her life.

She can't keep him.

From the moment she saw him standing across from Miss Alameda, his expression set in deep disdain, she'd known whatever strange thing had sprung up between them was coming to a quick and probably painful end.

Even though she hadn't given Madge any particulars of what their job will entail, Madge can read between the lines. If what she's going to bring down on others is hanging over her own head, she has to make sure as few people as possible are trapped under the pendulum with her.

Her parents and Mr. Abernathy are hopeless cases. There's nothing she can do to convince the Capitol to spare them, that hurting them wouldn't cause her any pain.

Gale and Peeta are the only people she has any hope of saving.

Katniss, she thinks ruefully, saved herself twice over by running that day from Madge's porch and not coming back.

Still, she can't bring herself to push either of them away.

Peeta is sunshine and warm treats and a little bit of normalcy in her strange new life. Even Mr. Abernathy likes him, which is no small miracle, and she half convinces herself he needs Peeta and his pastries almost as much as she does.

It's a silly, self serving thought though, and the day before her Victory Tour, when he trudges up to her house with a plate of cherry turnovers, she warns him off of coming again.

"Why not?" He asks, smile still lighting up his face.

Peeta, she thinks sadly, will be so much easier to push off than Gale. Not just because whatever exists between them isn't so strangely intense, but because Peeta will listen. Peeta will understand. He'll see reason without an argument.

"I can't keep putting you in danger," she tells him softly wondering just how sensitive the listening devices are, hoping the biting gusts of wind will cover their voices enough.

She doubts it, but she has nothing but foolish hope to hold on to.

"You don't scare me," he jokes, but his grin slips off when Madge sets him in a weary gaze.

"I'm not the one we have to be scared of."

His eyes stay on hers, locked and searching, for several seconds, before he glances around.

He doesn't know exactly what she's afraid of, but he's a smart boy. Even if he can't feel the buzz of electronic ears and eyes on them, he's perceptive enough to know that Madge can. That's clearly enough for him.

Nodding, he sets the turnovers on the snow covered railing and opens his arms for what will have to be a farewell hug.

Biting back a sob, Madge falls into him.

"I'm not afraid," he half whispers into her ear, holding her tight.

"I know."

But he should be.

"I understand," he finally mumbles.

Nodding, Madge lets a few tears slip down her cheek, freezing dry in the bitter cold.

He understands that she's doing the kindest thing she possibly can by ending their friendship, and for that she'll be eternally grateful. All her energy and arguments need to be saved up for Gale, because she can already sense the fight he'll put up, and she isn't sure she has enough energy to make the same argument twice.

"Thank you."

#######

Gale glares at his boot.

There's a hole in it. He can feel his sock getting soggier with each step he takes in the slush up to the Village, but he ignores it. The hot shower he'll get on arrival, and Madge's fussing over him, is enough encouragement to keep him going.

Her Victory Tour begins tomorrow.

The prep team will arrive to doll her up, polish and shine her, then she'll be dragged off to entertain people that can't even be bothered to see her as a human being. It makes him so sick he barely eats, even though meals have continued to be less lean than they've ever been in his life.

Such is life in the most recent Victor's District.

Looking up, he squints into the cold and sees the light from her kitchen glowing yellow out into the dark of the night.

He wonders if she's got a plate ready for him, if her mother had made it out or if Madge had been forced to cook something up for herself and Haymitch.

She's not a bad cook…she's not a particularly good one either. Neither is her mother, but Gale happily eats whatever either of them have made. They're trying, and he doesn't want to discourage Madge or embarrass her over her mother by refusing.

Besides, food is food.

Upping his pace, he jogs toward the back porch.

His foot is already on the bottom step when he sees someone sitting on the swing to the side.

Freezing, he immediately thinks it's Alameda again, come back to feed Madge more poison, and he tenses. It isn't until his eyes adjust to the shadows that he realizes it's Madge and relaxes.

"What're you doing out here?"

It's freezing, she hates being cold.

For a moment she doesn't look at him, stays stiff and quiet on the bench, eyes focused on the ground, but just as Gale steps toward her, worried she's sick or hurt, she practically jumps up.

"We-I need to talk," she says, her voice a little too high.

Gale nods. "Okay, let's get out of the cold and-"

"No," she shakes her head, "no, we can't go in."

Worry quickly building in his stomach, Gale reaches out for her hands, but she steps back, just out of his grasp. His eyebrows pull together. "Madge, what's wrong?"

Looking around, he expects to see someone watching from the trees, Peacekeepers or people like Alameda, but there's no one. Only lonely bare trees and night.

"Gale, you can't come here," she finally manages to tell him, her eyes rising to meet his, wide and terrified. "You have to stay away."

Staring, he tries to understand her words, but can't. She isn't making any sense.

"Why-"

"It isn't safe," she half whispers, an anxious edge to her voice. "I've been so, so, so selfish, don't you see? I've been using you and it's dangerous…I knew I couldn't have you in my life, I knew it wasn't safe, but…"

Tears begin rolling down her cheeks as she closes her eyes.

Gale starts to reach out again, to try to comfort her, assure her that she hasn't been using him or selfish or any of the other ridiculous things she's rambling about, but she steps away again and his fingers only catch cold air.

"They'll use you to control me, Gale. They'll know I'll do anything to keep you safe, keep your family safe. It's bad enough worrying about my family, knowing if I say or do the wrong thing my mother could 'accidentally' overdose on morphling or dad could be accused of treason…I can't-I can't put your family in that kind of danger too."

Shaking, she crosses her arms over her middle and lets her tear streaked face turn down again.

"If I make a mistake, if I slip up just one time-onetime-they'll do something terrible to you, your brothers or Posy, even your mom." She lets out a strangled sob. "Gale, I can't be responsible for that. Please don't make me responsible for that."

The wind cuts through his clothes, whipping his coat as he tries to think of some way to comfort her, some simple half-truth that might calm her nerves, but none comes. He can't argue any of it isn't true. This is her reality, they both know that, and she's trying to save him from it.

"That's what happened to Haymitch…isn't it?" He finally asks, when the weight of her words finally settles over him.

She doesn't say anything, just sniffles and nods.

He wonders, a bit morbidly, just what Haymitch had done to upset the Capitol, other than being himself that is.

Madge isn't Haymitch though; she isn't harsh words and cruel comments. She's smart, too smart for them, and that's why she's still alive. If anyone can play this game, it's her.

"Don't I get a say?" He asks, a little more sharply than he intends.

She winces at his tone, her red-rimmed eyes glancing up for a moment to meet his stormy glare before dropping back to her feet.

Finally, after a shuddering breath, she shakes her head, tears dripping onto her nightgown and leaving awkward little splatters down the front.

"Not this time."

Gale feels his heart stop and a strange, sharp pain stings his lungs. He can't have heard her right.

After a frozen eternity of bitter wind blowing around them, whipping her too thin nightgown around her legs, she steps toward the door.

"You have to go, Gale." She finally looks up with her bloodshot eyes, almost too swollen to open, wiping her nose along her sleeve. "I want you to be happy and alive, and neither you or your family will be able to have that if you keep coming around."

Before she can get to the door, Gale stops her, catching her wrist and pulling her into his chest and holding her there. She's freezing.

"I'm not going anywhere," he whispers.

There's no fight in her, just more sobs as she buries her face in his chest. He slowly feels his shirt soak through, but he doesn't care, this isn't how things are going to end.

She needs him, he knows she does. He isn't letting the Capitol dictate their lives anymore than it already does.

They tell him when to wake up, where he's going to spend his days, if and when he and his family get to eat, everything. He isn't letting them take the brightest part of his life from him.

Pulling back Gale reaches out to wipe tears from her cheeks with his pitifully thin gloves before cupping her face in his hands.

"Madge, I'm not leaving you."

Tears dangle on her eyelashes as she blinks, another little sob bubbling out of her chest as she shakes her head.

"Gal-"

He silences all her protests with his lips. Every stricture she could have against herself dies against his mouth.

The moment is all wrong, he knows that, but he's never been much good with words, and she's just not listening to reason. It's too sloppy, too cold, and he hates the idea of her associating their first kiss with the misery that's swirling around them, hates her not being the one to make the first move, but it's the best he can do.

There's chocolate on her breath, he can taste it on her tongue. He can smell her shampoo, the soap on her skin, feel her heart beating against his chest.

Pulling back for half a breath, she hesitates, her wet eyelashes flicking tears onto Gale's cheeks, and he thinks she might push him away. It's what he deserves.

But then she's on her toes, kissing back, her eyes fluttering shut and her body melding to his, hands fisted in his shirt, keeping him pulled flush against her.

Taking her sudden enthusiasm to mean all the madness about him going away is at an end, Gale tightens his arms around her, lifting her off her feet.

Stumbling, Madge ends up pinned between Gale and the small space between the door and the window.

Tiny splinters dig into his hands as he shifts her, trying to keep from ruining the delicate material of her nightgown. He kisses a line down her neck, nosing the soft trim at the collar away and nipping at the skin underneath.

She's every bit as soft, every bit as perfect as his filthy mind had made her out to be, and he almost curses himself for not kissing her before. Now she's going to be leaving and he'll only have the ghost of her lips this one time to haunt his nights.

Then, just as suddenly as he'd kissed her, she pushes him away, almost knocking him to the snow slick wood of the porch.

Her eyes widen, dark and wild, and he knows he hasn't won this battle.

Frantically, she shakes her head.

"You have to go-"

"Madg-"

"I said go!" She snaps, her body shaking.

Before Gale can get his bearings, she's to the door, pulling it open and rushing in.

Turning, her face is even more tear stained, more pained.

"Please, Gale, just stay away."

Then she shuts the door softly, the lock clicking, hollow and final, leaving Gale standing on the porch, uncertain just what happened.

#######

Madge stays by the door for hours.

Frigid air leaks under the frame, seeping into her skin through her coat and socks, freezing her in place, but she doesn't care.

Gale is gone. He'd left finally, after standing at the door for nearly an hour. He hadn't shouted or pounded on it, just stood quietly and started, as if waiting for Madge to come out and apologize, maybe tell him it had been some kind of test.

The door never opens for him though, because it isn't a joke and she isn't going to apologize for saving his life.

Her lips burn in accusation.

Had she led him on? Probably. She'd been manipulating him, drawing him into her web of misery without even trying. No wonder they'd decided she should be placed among those who inflict the worst kind of pain on people. Clearly she has a gift for it.

The tears on her face finally dry up, her sobs dwindling to hiccups and then painful silence before she finally slumps over.

She sleeps, but there's no peace in it.

Her mind is infected, filled with all the monsters Gale had helped keep at the edge of her consciousness. They sense she's alone, vulnerable, weak, and they invade, clawing their way in and leaving her screaming on the ground.

Faces press in, she thinks they're her fellow Tributes, yelling, accusing, cursing her, blaming her for their deaths, even if she wasn't the cause of most of them….

Gale and his family scream in the dark, all in agonizing pain…it's her fault…she dragged them into this…

Suddenly, President Snow, his thin lips curled up in a cool smile, is staring at her, appraising her, determining just what she's worth, just how she'll repay her debts to the Capitol.

His sickly pale hand reaches out, taking her chin between his cool fingers. "You'll serve your purpose nicely, won't you Miss Undersee?"

"Please," she begs him. "Please, Mr. Abernathy said-"

"Mr. Abernathy isn't in charge my dear," he somberly tells her. "I am."

She shakes her head frantically, her mouth moving, trying to speak, plead, but nothing comes out. He's taken her voice, just like he's taken everything else.

Someone taps her shoulder, and when she turns she finds a little girl smiling sadly at her. Madge thinks she should know her, but just how she can't quite remember.

"Come now, Magdalene, you can't stay like this," she tells Madge, her little voice echoing as she leads her away from the President.

They walk through what Madge recognizes as the Justice Building, passing other children that, like the girl, she should know but doesn't. Each simply stands along the wall, vacantly smiling, hollowed out eyes staring into nothingness as Madge passes by.

"Who-"

Her question dies on her tongue when she looks back in front of her.

The Justice Building is gone, evaporated around them, and replaced by the weapons room at the Training Center.

Before Madge can ask what's going on, she sees her guide has changed as well. No longer small, she's nearly Madge's height, dark green curls and an empty expression on her face as she holds out her hand, offering papers.

Confused, Madge takes them, frowning down at sheet music.

All the notes spill off the paper like water, forming a flaming puddle at her feet.

Then she begins screaming.

"I can't!" She flings the papers away, tries to get away from the flames. She can't though. "I can't!"

Miss Alameda only shrugs, smiling sadly-

"Madge!"

"Madge!"

"Madge!"

Shuddering, Madge feels herself being shaken.

The stupor of her nightmares is slowly blinked away in the harsh florescent light of her kitchen.

Mr. Abernathy is on his knees next to her, his face screwed up in worry.

"What are you doing down here?" He asks, cupping her face in his hands and sweeping something warm and wet from her cheeks with his thumbs.

For a second she can't remember why she's on the floor, why she's alone, why Gale isn't there…

Then her memories flood back, cracking her open again and spilling onto the floor.

She'd hurt Gale, but a wounded heart is better than a dead body, isn't it?

At the moment, she isn't so sure.

Mr. Abernathy pulls her into his lap, combing her hair and shushing her. She's crying again, or maybe she never really stopped, she isn't sure anymore.

"It'll be alright," he tells her. An empty comfort. A lie.

It won't be alright.

#######

As Gale sneaks through the dark, back to his house, a cold drizzle begins to come down.

It seems fitting.

His miserable night needed a fittingly crappy ending after all.

Madge was having some kind of…episode, that's all there is to it. The Victory Tour has messed with her head and she isn't thinking straight.

That's what he tries to convince himself of anyways.

The thing is, she is thinking clearly, a little too clearly.

Gale's heard about Haymitch's family, how they died not long after he won his Games, but he's never really connected the two events before. He feels a little stupid for that.

Of course the Capitol had killed them.

Madge's family and everyone she's connected to are liabilities to her. They're all weapons in the Capitol's arsenal against her, to keep her in line and make her play their game.

For half a second he thinks about running for the fence, he wants to get away from the District, away from the Capitol and its manipulations. They took his dad, his freedom, and now they've taken Madge.

Before he turns and heads toward the woods, he licks his lips.

He can still taste her on them; still feel her hands gripping the front of his shirt and her breath against his skin.

She didn't want him to go, she's just trying to beat them at their own game, take away their pieces.

If he were in her place, he can't say he wouldn't try to do the same thing.

She's smart and she's doing the smart thing, he just needs to think of a smarter way to play this game. He isn't going to let the Capitol have her too.

Picking up his pace, he sneaks back through the Seam, up his front porch, and in the door.

It's pitch black and only a little warmer than outside, but leaving the stove on isn't an option. There isn't enough wood and there's been too many houses burned down that way. Cold and alive is better than dead and warm.

Kicking off his boots and shrugging off his coat, he pops his neck and starts toward the back and the little room he shares with his brothers. His body freezes when he hears the squeak of his mom's bedroom door and his name.

"Gale?"

His mom frowns at him from her room, a thin blanket held around her shoulders, clearly curious as to just what he's doing.

"I, uh, just needed a drink." Dressed in his work clothes in the middle of the night, which is perfectly normal.

One of her eyebrows arches, clearly disbelieving.

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, Gale looks anywhere but at her, letting the soft sound of the sparse rain on the roof fill the silence.

Finally, he starts to edge out of the room. "Uh, night-"

"Sit."

She points to the couch, her expression clearly telling him she isn't going to argue.

Feeling a little put out, he's a grown man he shouldn't have to be lectured about what he may or may not have been doing in the middle of the night, Gale slumps down on the couch, crossing his arms and waiting.

Her eyes focus on him, not angry, but worried, and Gale instantly feels bad for his attitude.

"Mom, I-"

"Did she kick you out?"

Caught off guard, Gale stares.

Smiling softly at his confusion, his mother asks again, "Did she kick you out?"

Gale just frowns, uncertain what he's hearing. "You knew?"

A little chuckle bubble out of her as she walks over and drops down beside him.

"Sweetie, did you really think you could sneak out for months on end without me noticing?"

"Well," Gale shrugs, "yeah."

He'd been careful and figured if she noticed she'd say something. Her silence was his confirmation.

She laughs softly. "You aren't the only person in this family to ever sneak out of the house and not want their parents to know."

Grimacing, he didn't want to know that, Gale nods.

Ruffling his hair, her expression softens. "Now, tell me who she is."

#######

It's nearly daybreak when Gale finishes telling his mom about the past few months of going to the Victors' Village.

He leaves out a few details, showering in Madge's fancy bathroom and sharing her bed mostly, but there's still enough to the story that she understands just how important the time has been. She knows how important Madge is to him.

"She's just spooked," he tells her. "I just have to prove to her that there's a way to beat them. They can't win."

He won't let them.

His mom watches him for a minute, her expression grave, before she finally sighs and takes his calloused hand in her weathered one.

"Baby, I know you don't want to hear this," she begins carefully, "but, Madge is right. You can't win this fight. Not right now. She's keeping you and us alive."

Gale makes a disgusted noise and slumps further into the couch, taking his hand back.

Looking around, he takes in the house.

Battered kitchen table, almost empty cabinets, a threadbare couch, crappy television, other people's laundry waiting to be done…

They're alive, but this isn't living. It's surviving, and barely at that. Hadn't she been the one to warn him against that kind of thing?

A warm hand runs through his hair, smoothing it down, and he feels chapped lips press to his temple.

"It takes a special kind of love to let someone go."

"What about fighting for someone?" He snaps. "That's got to be special too."

She nods. "But sometimes you've got to know when to walk away."

And clearly she thinks this is the time.

"You're a good looking boy, Gale. Smart and strong." She brushes her hand over his cheek. "You'll find someone."

Someone not marked by the Capitol. Someone who doesn't wake screaming and clawing in the night. Someone whole, not broken in a thousand little pieces.

Someone who isn't Madge.

That's not someone he wants.

When his jaw tenses, she sighs. "You aren't going to let this go, are you?"

Gale chews his tongue as he shakes his head.

He loves her, and he's going to fight for her.

Even if he has to fight the Capitol.