Chapter 1

Level 11 of the Training Center Tower, three years later…

"The introductory process of the Final Hunger Games is to be quick and undecorative. There are no reapings; the tributes have already been selected individually and the districts they have been individually chosen to represent are completely irrelevant. There are no fancy trains to escort them to the Capitol; all of the tributes are already in the Capitol or have been shuttled in individually by way of trains that have no lavish accessories or decorations aboard. There are to be no parades, interviews, or fancy outfits. Contrary to previous years, the viewers do not want these frivolous preludes to the battle royale that is coming. Frankly, they cannot wait for the killing to begin, and even more frankly, the Gamemakers can't either. But there are to be a few training sessions, so that the tributes have a chance to sharpen up their skills, for many of them are already proficient in different kinds of weapons, and these last tributes are no ordinary tributes. They are the last tributes, selected and sent for the vengeful symbolism of the rebels' new government. They are the Capitol children, getting back what they had cried out for since birth. The blood of children."

"Well, that's just not right," Artemis Hecate Gossamer mumbled sardonically in her lilting voice as she read the leaflet. Her mentor leaned against the door frame that led into Artemis's temporary bedroom as he watched the young, yet extremely judgmental and intelligent, girl flip through the seditious, self-published leaflets that were often found tacked up on buildings throughout the Capitol. He wondered if she was just scanning lightly, or if she really could read at such an expeditious rate. The entire leaflet, which was actually quite short in comparison to some of the other raving publications, took her approximately five seconds to read.

"What's not right?" Haymitch asked. He was, in fact, quite sober. Katniss had made sure of it.

Artemis looked up. "Just this leaflet." With a flourish, she gripped the page at the top and tore it exactly in half down the middle. Haymitch watched in amusement as she placed these two halves on top of each other, then tore these into half. And so on, until all Artemis was holding was a stack of exactly thirty-two pieces of confetti. She tossed these scraps into the air and watched the little white squares flutter down to the ground and join the many other pieces of ripped-up leaflets. "Very poorly written. Grammar mistakes as far as the eye can see. A poor attempt at poetic, flowing speech. I lost count of how many times they used the word 'individually'. Too many run-on sentences, and many misplaced and rather corny fragments. Some good points, such as the one about the rebels not being able to wait for the killing to begin, but even more bad points. Overall, an amateur, unedited piece of work that wrapped the entire package up in an insult. An insult to my conscience and my pride. The idiotic author of this piece will be sorry if I ever get out of this mess."

Haymitch did not understand half of what she had just said. But then again, Artemis was an eloquent speaker. He generally did not understand eloquent speakers. Shrugging, he decided that yes, the girl could in fact read that fast, or so he assumed if she could give such a lengthy and detailed speech on the item of reading itself. Incredible.

Artemis leaned over to the bedside table and took another leaflet. This one was about the justice that the Capitol children would be receiving, and gave out many rather gory suggestions of the different ways they should die. She sighed again and ripped this one up in the same fashion, without even bothering to read the entire thing through.

"Has anyone told you that you have anger issues, Artemis?" Haymitch inquired.

"And antisocial tendencies, habits for advanced formalistic acerbity, and an insatiable penchant for going places I'm not supposed to," she added with a jaded sigh. "I like to sum it up in the words 'evil genius'."

Haymitch's brow furrowed. "What's advanced formalistic acerbity?"

"It's a term I made up. It's acerbity or sarcasm through complicated, formal sentence structures and unnecessarily long and obscure adjectives. Really, it has a more dramatic impact than you might think."

Her mentor looked only more confused and opened his mouth to ask, but then he seemed to think better of it and closed his mouth. She kept her eyes trained on him the entire time. "Was there something you were going to ask, Mr. Abernathy?"

Normally, if any other tribute had called him Mr. Abernathy in the mocking way she did, he would have done or said something that the tribute would not quickly forget. But Artemis was different. For one, she was female, and for two, she was way more intelligent than most fourteen-year-olds. She acted as if she was the smartest person in the room, and Haymitch had to admit that sometimes she was probably right. He pressed his lips tighter together to prevent him from saying something unwise, then he shook his head. When he had first met Artemis, he had liked the look of her. She was smart, fast, arrogant, and acerbic, not to mention good with sharp blades. He had been reminded of himself when he was younger. Now he was left wondering if his own mentor had ever felt this frustrated with him. Probably.

He could almost feel her intense gaze penetrating into him as he turned his back and walked away from her bedroom. "This kid's good," he muttered to himself.

"Thank you," Artemis's clear, lilting voice rang out in the silence.

The last load of tributes came in that night. The next day, they would begin training. Each and every one of the tributes was marked off in attendance before they went to bed, which was just another security procedure to make sure that no one had gone "missing" during the day. Then everyone drifted off to sleep, in preparation for a long and hard day of training tomorrow.

All except for one.

The cameras didn't even see her board the elevator and insert a silver key into a keyhole on the elevator panel. The elevator didn't move for a second, but then it geared up and rocketed down. Down, down, down the elevator raced, until Artemis's ears popped. The elevator eventually slowed. When the doors slid open, she stepped out silently into a spacious, dimly lit room. Her eyes scanned back and forth. Good, no guards. The Control Room would most of the time be empty until the Games officially began. The elevator door closed behind her, leaving her in almost complete darkness except for a few soft glowing lights on the walls.

She waited a few moments as her natural night vision kicked in, then she crept down the stairs on silent feet. She stopped at the balcony and gazed down at the holoboards and consoles, currently in sleep mode. For a moment, she imagined the Gamemakers below her and wondered what it would feel like to be the Head Gamemaker, standing at this very spot while commanding her underlings to kill more tributes. She smiled coldly, for several reasons. The first was that her father had, in fact, wanted her to become a Gamemaker when she grew up (it was either that or a lawyer, and Artemis highly doubted that she had the patience for the latter). The second was for the folly on the Capitol people for placing the Control Room right below the Training Center, accessible to anyone who had a key –– or who had stolen one.

Normally, in a situation like this, she would be worrying about cameras. But there were no cameras. This was the Control Room that manipulated the Games. It was a confidential area, and the only thing between civilians and this top-secret lair was a key. Artemis smiled again. Stupid Gamemakers. This was the seventh time in her life that she had ever been down here. All of them had been illegally.

She strode down the stairs and crouched in front of a Gamemaker's holoboard. She ran her fingers along the edge of the console, feeling around with her quick fingers. Her fingertips pressed against a small, almost invisible latch, and the entire side of the console opened. Cautiously, Artemis lowered the door, revealing an impressive array of wires, inlets, outlets, switches, lights, dials, and tiny screens. Her careful hands hovered over the mechanisms for a moment, then she pulled two specific wires from their sockets and plugged them together in the space of half a second. She froze stock still as she waited. After a full minute had passed with no sign of anything except the gentle hum of sleeping holoboards, she relaxed. If Artemis had not hotwired it in the way she did, the first touch of a wire of switch would have set off an alarm and she'd be dead. Literally and/or figuratively. Even though cameras were banned, there was security down here for reasons. People weren't supposed to be in here unless they were supposed to be.

Once she relaxed, Artemis pulled two objects from the breast pocket of her denim jacket. One was a flat, rectangle-shaped silver disk, about nine centimeters long and four centimeters wide. The other object was a short white cord. She plugged one end into the disk and the other end into a certain outlet of the console. The screen on the silver disk lit up with a small circle symbol, which swirled as it loaded. After a few seconds the circle vanished and was replaced by a message. Download all? Underneath it were two options: Yes and No.

Absolutely, thought Artemis, and selected Yes.

The circle reappeared, above a single word. Downloading… it read, and after a count of exactly ten seconds, it was replaced with a note.

Warning, it read, changes made from the main console to the data downloaded on this device will alert you when relevant changes are made. If you are to be fighting to the death in an arena in which you are not permitted to have this device, you may want to set your device to vibrate.

Artemis pressed the icon for OK. The circle came back, over the words Saving changes… which were quickly replaced by a white check mark and Changes Saved. She unplugged the disk and the cord, slipping them into her jacket pocket. Then her nimble, thin fingers started flying over the complicated mess of cords and switches and tiny screens in an almost incomprehensible pattern until a tiny blue screen in the top right hand corner lit up and inquired, Clear download history? Artemis selected the Yes icon.

She shut down the system, closed the door of the console, and stood up. Artemis Hecate Gossamer now had the entire Hunger Games at her fingertips.

Watch out, Katniss Everdeen, she thought with a sinister smile. These Games are no longer yours.

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