DAY 1
Conscience doth make cowards of us all.

Hamlet III.i

The launch room was bare-bones. It hadn't been designed for looks. A fluorescently lit underground chamber, it would be used exactly once. Ria milled around in it while her stylist investigated a rack of prepared garment bags. The Gamemakers had chosen the arena uniform for a reason. There was nothing to do but undress and put it on and hope that the stylist could parse some meaning from it. It would only provide a slight edge, if it helped at all. She would have an idea of the arena as soon as she rose into it from below.

First came the undergarments, in loose cotton. There were tall wool socks. Then came the pants: a set of knee length beige cargo shorts. The stylist passed her the hiking boots and belt next, and then gave her a tangerine-colored shirt. TAWNY BROOK, it read, in all caps. The outfit was completed by a soft zip-up hoodie in cool forest green, a tan Stetson hat that went on over her braided hair, and an analog watch on a leather band. Her stylist strapped it on over her left wrist next to her bracelet. "Strange," he commented. "They don't usually like giving the tributes a sense of time. They must want you to schedule your movements or something."

"What does this mean?"

"Isn't it obvious? You're going to summer camp." Ria had heard of summer camp. She'd never been, but she knew that such places existed. Rich families paid exorbitant amounts of money to send their children to a patch of undistricted land, where under the watchful eye of Capitolite counselors, they could participate in various forms of outdoor fun. It was considered a gold standard companion to Career training, since it often included the teaching of valuable survival skills. She didn't know what the arena would entail, but she guessed it would be interesting, given the watches. "May the odds be ever in your favor, Ria." Her stylist nudged her towards the glass tube.

"Thank you." She'd never gotten to know him, and it was probably too late now, but he'd done one hell of a job making her look good for the Capitol. If he was right about the summer camp thing, he'd given her a huge advantage. She stepped into the glass tube and flinched as it shut around her with a snap. The pistons came to life and the floor shuddered as she traveled upwards. After several uncomfortable seconds, the ceiling opened to reveal a blue sky peppered with fluffy clouds. The tube filled with warm air and a hint of a breeze, a still summer's day pouring in from above. The arena entered Ria's field of vision. Cabins were strewn across a shaggy lawn in an L shape, six going one way, six going perpendicular. There was a longer building past the corner of the L, and another one opposite it across the lawn. More buildings lay in the distance on all sides. The Cornucopia was woven from strips of white wood in a semblance of the picket fences littering the far reaches of the arena. It seemed to primarily contain weapons, sleeping gear, and backpacks. There was minimal water, which both reassured and frightened her. It indicated that the arena would have an abundance of water, but also that if the Careers failed to find it, they might not have reserve supplies.

The countdown began. Iris Whottenberg's voice blared numbers. Forty-three. Forty-two. Ria tried to find her allies. Caligula was three pedestals to her left. Iolite was five to her right. Hyperion was in view, but Sycorax and Bellona weren't. There was a relatively even spread. Ria visually scouted the Cornucopia, searching for a weapon. It took her some time, but she found a mace just in the shadow of the mouth. She measured the distance in her mind. Twenty yards, maybe? Not very far away. The other tributes around her wouldn't be serious threats. The few high scorers among the pool of outliers were closer to the other Careers.

The klaxon sounded and Ria leapt into motion. In an instant, she had her right hand locked around the shaft of the mace and was poised in front of the Cornucopia, ready to prevent entry by other tributes. Iolite had already reached his machete and was driving it into the chest of a gangly outlier girl. Caligula's fist was rapidly traveling towards someone who had opted to go for the khopesh he needed. A tribute tried to duck past Ria on his way out of the Cornucopia, a rucksack dangling over his shoulder. She wasn't in the Bloodbath for kills, but it was her responsibility to preserve the supplies for the Careers, so she struck. The heavy flange only had to connect with his head once, and then he was laying on the ground, dead.

Around her, carnage raged. The Twelve boy had managed to amass a whole pile of bags and containers and was making a rapid exit, with Hyperion in furious pursuit. He pulled back his bowstring, fired one, two, three, four arrows in quick succession. All four collided with various parts of the boy's body, but none incapacitated him. Ria watched as Bellona careened into vision, fast and low to the ground, thundering after him. She crossed the distance quickly, closing the gap, and was in the process of flinging an axe at her prey when something tackled her from the side. It was the small Seven girl, Ria realized, that had bowled over her ally. The girl scrambled to find her feet and ran after the Twelve boy. It wasn't an alliance Ria had anticipated, but she had to acknowledge that the little girl had guts. Another tribute whisked by Ria and she threw out a foot, tripping her. She sprawled to the ground. Iolite rounded the corner, glancing at Ria for permission and nodding in silent receipt as he sank into a crouch to claim his second kill.

Tributes started disappearing. For such a wide, flat area, she was surprised by the amount of tributes that had managed to remove themselves completely from plain view. The noise began to subside. Fruitless attempts at self preservation were terminated methodically, and the screams started to die out along with their owners. Ria knew it was over when her allies started trickling into view at a walk, panting from the exertion of their coordinated assault. Had any become casualties of the action? No, she surveyed the scene and counted all five: Iolite wiping his machete on his cargo shorts, Hyperion fiddling with his quiver, Bellona with more axes, Caligula removing a chunk of human flesh from the hook of his khopesh, Sycorax sopping with blood. Ria drew back, but at second glance, the blood saturating her entire body didn't seem to be her own. Sycorax caught her concern. "It's not mine," she assured her.

"Is anyone hurt?"

"We're all fine."

"Good, good."

"When do you reckon cannons are happening?"

"Probably soon."

"Should we just sit tight until we learn how many are dead?"

"Sure. That sounds alright."

"How are we all feeling?" This was Sycorax, unexpectedly tender for someone so ruthless.

"A little shaken up, I suppose. About District Twelve. I didn't know that four arrows and an axe were like. Survivable."

"Aw, Hyperion, it's new for all of us. I was right there. You got him in the neck and he still didn't go down. None of us could have expected that." Iolite seemed like he was using it as an in for flirting, not that Ria could exactly blame him. If he and Hyperion were into one another, well, good for them. "You got him, right Bel?"

"You bet I got him. But did you see how that girl tackled me?"

"Gutsy."

"What was her name again?"

"You think I paid attention to the Bloodbaths' names? Just watching the Recaps like 'yeah, I'm so gonna need this information?'"

"Um…yes? Did you not do that?"

"Caligula. Please say sike."

"Nope. Her name is Molly."

"You're telling me you actually pay attention to this?"

"That's correct."

"Why?"

"It's because they're a loser," explained Sycorax, snickering.

"This is true," agreed Caligula. They slipped their arm into hers.

"So Molly is allied with Twelve."

"Presumably."

"But why would he want to team up with her? What's in it for him?"

"Meat shield, maybe? I mean, tackling a Career so he has a better chance of getting away, that's—"

"Strange."

"So Twelve—um, what's his name? Caligula?"

"Ballad."

"So Ballad and Molly are a team. And they got a lot of supplies. They won't have to do anything to survive for at least a week, so it'll be really hard for us to—"

KABOOM! A cannon shook the earth.

"Is that the—"

"Shh!"

KABOOM! KABOOM! KABOOM! KABOOM KABOOM! KABOOM! KABOOM!

"Eight?" Ria had to make sure her ears were still working.

"Yeah, I counted eight."

"Me too."

"Guess we'll have to wait until tonight to see who it is." Ria was already looking forward to the descent of night, when darkness draped the arena like a blanket over a birdcage, snuffing out the tributes' fears. It was so much easier to feel safe when one was out of view, especially in such a flat, treeless environment, but more importantly, the faces of the fallen would be projected on the domed arena ceiling while the nation's anthem played, saluting its sacrifices. Until then, the Careers could only guess who remained.

"We should account for our kills," began Sycorax. "If there are deaths we didn't cause, that's a problem. I got two."

"Same," Iolite said.

"One," said Ria.

"One," said Caligula.

"One," said Bellona.

"One," finished Hyperion.

"Good. That's very comforting. Shall we examine the bodies? I know it sounds morbid, but I need to know if we got the Eight girl or the Threes."

"Margaux, Danar, and Joliet," Caligula supplied.

"Thank you. Right. Let's take a lap."

"Victory lap, ha."

"Sure. Gloat all you want, Hyperion, but some of us have work to do." Iolite fidgeted, uncomfortable.

"Sycorax, you can't just snap at people like that."

"Not my problem if you're counting your trophies before they're won; also not my problem if you want to bed each other, you won't get any judgement from me, heaven knows what I've got going on. Just say it outright instead of derailing important procedures." She waited for a few moments, waiting for her rebuke to impress itself on her two allies.

"It was a little harsh," Caligula put in. Sycorax softened, an indulgent smile forming on her lips.

"If you say so. I'm sorry, Hyperion. Iolite."

"S'okay."

"Yeah, well, not really, I'm mean. You all can try to get used to it and I'll try to be less of an insufferable bitch."

"Deal," said Ria. Sycorax stared into her eyes as though trying to see right into her.

"I like you," she declared. "Sharp. Very sharp. In another universe, we could have been fast friends. Of course," she added, "that won't be happening because only one of us is leaving this arena alive. But yes, I think very highly of you. So far."

"The feeling isn't mutual." Ria smirked performatively, praying that she was on the right track.

"Oh, you're a smart one. You get me. Once we've got this little body-counting activity out of the way, I need to shove you and Caligula at each other as quickly as possible. See what you come up with together."

"Is this some sort of hazing ritual? I think it's worse for them than me." This produced a genuine belly laugh.

"You can read me like a book, can't you? I must say, I've never been particularly good at lying, so I do make an effort to remain as guarded as possible. Refreshing to see someone knock down the barriers for once."

"Surely I'm not the first."

"Nah. But we do share some similarities. For example, I bet you're just itching to lead the Pack. Not as though it's feasible, what with Four being the runt of the litter, but I'm sure you think you want the job. And think that you could do a better job than me."

"Yes to all of the above."

"Well, see, it's not as fun as you might expect. And speaking of not-fun things, we need to go count the bodies. Move." She pushed past Ria to the entrance of the Cornucopia and pointed at the corpse there. "Whose is this?"

"District Eleven Male."

"Not whose body. Whose kill?"

"Mine," said Ria.

"Excellent work. Very clean. And this one?"

"Iolite's." Sycorax led the Pack straight out from the mouth of the Cornucopia and veered right. She pointed at another dead tribute.

"Also mine," Iolite said. Slowly, the Careers traveled in a circle. Hyperion and Bellona's kills were similarly normal, but Sycorax and Caligula's told a different story. Caligula was responsible for cleaving the Five girl's torso in half, and even they didn't seem to know exactly how it had happened.

"I've never killed anyone before. I may have overreacted a touch."

"You think?"

"You should see mine." Sycorax circled around to two more corpses, one with a gaping divot in his stomach. She gestured with her sword. "He jumped on me once I got him. Got me all bloody."

"So we know who died, how they died, and who killed them."

"Yes."

"So the dangerous tributes made it."

"That too." There was a pause. "I guess we should look around."

"I guess we should. Say, why don't you four go adventuring while Caligula and I mind the camp?"

"Are you sure, Sycorax?"

"Yeah. We're going to have some personal time, if you get my meaning."

"You mean you're—"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence. No, we just need to talk about some things. Go figure out what's going on and be ready to report back to me." That sounded more like the Sycorax Ria was getting to know, so she nodded.

"Sure thing." And thus the expedition began.

• • • • • • •

The cabins, in their L shape, had a vertex. That vertex turned out to be a bathroom block, with lines of communal toilet and shower stalls on the inside and a bulletin board on the outside. The bulletin post had several posters and notices tacked onto it. One flier proclaimed: Camp Aestus Welcomes You! Another was a handwritten message saying: Curfew is strictly enforced! Do NOT let me see you wandering around camp after dark. Thanks! —Head Counselor Jane :) There was a posted schedule acting as a daily timetable of the campers' activities. Ria decided it would be best to confiscate it for the exclusive use of the Career Pack. She didn't want any outlying tributes stumbling across it and getting the upper hand. The last item of note was a glossy illustration of the camp name and logo. Ria looked at it, then at her companions' shirts, then at it again. A picture started to form.

"This isn't our camp, is it?"

"Look at the graffiti." Ria followed Bellona's finger to something scrawled on the bulletin board itself, permanent marker on cork reading: Tawny Brook is going down! She counted the exclamation points. Next to it was a cardstock leaflet detailing a battle to determine the better of Camp Aestus and its rival at some sort of multi-event competition, to commence at twelve noon in one week. Ria looked at Bellona.

"Oh no. We're the rival camp, aren't we?"

"Looks like it."

"Wait," Hyperion said. "If we're not the campers here, who is?" Ria consulted the schedule, then cross-referenced it with her wristwatch.

"They're at 'morning activity' from now until eleven-thirty. I think it's time to find out what's in those cabins." Slowly, Ria carefully folded the schedule and slipped it into her shorts pocket. She held her mace tightly and slowly, slowly, they walked into the grassy expanse between the two lines of cabins. Each had a wooden number nailed to it. The nearest cabin to her right was six. The nearest to her left was seven. Twelve cabins. Twelve districts. She led the group right, down the line, until they hit four, and she pulled the waterproof vinyl flaps away from the entrance, peering inside. No mutts jumped out to assail her, so she ventured inside. What she saw took her breath away.

There were four beds, two laid out end-to-end on each side of the room. They were surrounded by footlockers and rolling sets of plastic drawers and mesh laundry bags hanging on hooks. It seemed that whoever the campers were, they weren't all very neat. Despite the laundry bags, there were clothes on the floor at one of the beds. Ria crept closer and kicked away a pair of knee-length denim shorts. She felt a pang of homesickness as she remembered how much Rio loved shorts like that, which were, as it happened, very similar to the ones he had at home.

Then she saw the bracelet. It was made from red shells strung together on a piece of elastic, and it exactly matched the green one on her own arm. She hurried to the footlocker, threw open the lid, and staring up at her was his favorite book. She picked it up and slid off the book jacket. In her brother's real copy, there was a dent in the back cover. She turned the book over, and the dent sat embedded in it. Ria staggered backward a step, floored by this information. She opened it, and yes, his margin notes were intact. Her mind slid over itself, refusing to catch. How the fuck did they get this?

She registered the telltale spring green quilt on the next bed over and flew to it. On the pillow, there was a worn stuffed animal. Ria picked up the gray plush cat and turned it over. When Coraline had been little, she'd chewed on the tail and it eventually tore off. Mrs. Sounder had mended it with mincing stitches. Ria ran her finger over the repairs, which were exactly where she remembered them being. Her head spun. There was one more test. She heaved up the thin cot mattress and extracted a baby-pink diary. She shook it, and a sepia-saturated photograph of Gia holding the newly adopted Coraline fell out. Already anticipating another perfect replica, she checked the reverse side and saw her mother's perfect looping script. Coraline, age five.

Ria didn't realize her allies had come in behind her until Bellona's fingers touched her back. "Are you okay?"

"They're our families. The rival campers are our families," she gasped.

"Oh god. I need to check, see who's here. It looks like they only have two relatives per tribute, right?"

"The leaflet said one week. If they haven't declared a Victor in six days, we have to fight them, don't we?" Ria's eyes welled with tears.

"Seems that way," said Bellona. Across the cabin, Hyperion sat on one of the beds, crying and holding a wadded up pajama shirt to his chest. Ria floated over to him, Bellona ghosting along beside her.

"Who did you get?" Ria asked.

"June, and, um, Krios."

"Ria, I'm so sorry, I have to see who they have for me," Bellona said, hurrying outside. Ria followed her a few steps over to the 1 tent and slipped inside. Iolite's hands quivered as he pored over the items covering the surface of a makeshift nightstand, picking up trinkets and evaluating them. Bellona blanched as soon as she saw a fluffy blue bedspread, patterned all over with stylized white hearts. There were photos clipped to a string of fairy lights, Bellona and a smiling redheaded girl hugging her, Bellona and a smiling redheaded girl in nightgowns on a bed identical to the one in the cabin, Bellona and a smiling redheaded girl eating pizza. It looks like she has a girlfriend. Please let her not have a girlfriend.

"Who's that?" Ria asked tentatively.

"My best friend." Bellona skirted around to the second bed and took in a few clues that were indiscernible to Ria. "And my little sister."

"They took my little sister too."

"How old is she?" Bellona asked. "Mine's seventeen."

"Mine's eleven."

"So they don't have to be Reaping age, they just have to be close enough?"

"Maybe. Who did Iolite get?"

"I can't tell. I don't think it would be a good time to ask him. Do you know who Hyperion has?"

"I didn't recognize the names, but I'm guessing his brother and his stepmom. We talked about family and stuff on the train."

"His stepmom?"

"She's twenty-one."

"Oh. That's probably close enough to eighteen, right? Especially if she looks young."

"Yeah. We should get the Twos," Ria said.

• • • • • • •

By the time the excursion had ended and all four tributes on the scouting mission were safely back at the Cornucopia, it was too close to the end of the 'morning activity' for Sycorax and Caligula to visit the District Two cabin. Ria had been devastated by the knowledge that her siblings were in the arena with her, but she knew that it would have been even worse to not know which of her loved ones had been chosen. Sycorax and Caligula had seemed to be doing well after their alone time, or whatever Ria was supposed to call it. After she gave them the news, they were more agitated than usual, and Ria couldn't help but feel guilty.

Iolite snapped at Hyperion when he asked who he'd gotten, and Ria took that as a sign to back off. Iolite was generally the mellowest of the bunch, as far as she could tell, but she knew that calm people could have the worst reactions when antagonized. He had fumed, demanded to go hunting, and dragged his district partner along with him somewhere into the distant woods. So Ria worried, because she was seriously rattled seeing Bellona so calmly go along with Iolite on his rampage, and she snarked, because Sycorax was in a chatty mood and communicated almost exclusively through snark. Her respect seemed to grow for people who could snark alongside her, and if there was anything Ria needed, it was to stay on the Pack leader's good side.

Ria learned a lot about District Two and its tributes. Sycorax and Caligula had been on-again-off-again for years and were the respective stars of their Academies. (Ria hadn't known that other districts had multiple.) When they learned that one another had risen to the top of the rankings, they'd let their performance slip on purpose, so they wouldn't have to go in together, but the Academy heads seemed to have other plans. They'd decided that sending in a district pair who already trusted one another would give Two an edge against the other Careers, and neglected to tell the Careers themselves who the other Volunteer would be. After Caligula Volunteered, Sycorax had to make a split-second decision. Ria heard how she'd intended to stay in place and let the Reaped tribute or a backup Volunteer enter the Games instead, so her beau could come home, but that some well-meaning Academy friend pushed her into the aisle, thinking that she was helping.

"I Volunteered without Volunteering," she said. Ria noted the sorrow in her voice. And so Sycorax and Caligula played back and forth, recounting their terrible, wonderful history with something that passed for reminiscence. Somehow, to Ria, the whole story was made worse with the knowledge that Sycorax and Caligula shared neither a saccharine courtship nor a bitter breakup, but something else altogether. They were forever separating and getting back together, fighting and going on whirlwind sprees to the edge of the district, living wild in the desert for four days and dozing with their backs against warm slabs of red rock, coming home and punching walls, sleeping around to make one another jealous and taking offense when the other strayed, meeting under the cool glow of a winter moon to extend a thousandth olive branch, kissing hard in the street when training let out, protecting each other with a ferocity that could move mountains.

It wasn't the kind of love Ria aspired to, but some part of her understood their eternal struggle. Sitting with them in the shade of the Cornucopia, Ria met people who were a little mean and a little vulnerable and a lot dangerous. Caligula and Sycorax could lay into each other with exclusive impunity. At first, she'd sort of assumed that Sycorax was the boss, mostly because she was sniping at Caligula constantly, but it turned out that it normally went both ways. They'd drawn lots in advance to decide which one of them would take charge of the Career Pack (who drew lots when strategizing for the Hunger Games?) and get the sponsorship advantage that came with it.

Hyperion ignored them. Ria tried to bring him into the conversation, but he didn't seem to be feeling very social. "What are you thinking about?" she asked.

"The girl I killed this morning."

"Why?" Ria had firmly pushed the whole Bloodbath to the back of her mind, pointedly ignoring any moral objections her mind raised.

"Because I'm a murderer now."

"It's the Games," she offered.

"That doesn't make any material difference. Besides, I have a bad feeling about this whole thing. They put my brother and June in the arena, right? So we're probably going to have to kill them at some point, or someone else will. Or maybe the Gamemakers put like, an explosive chip in them so they die if we do. Or they only pull out the Victor's relatives, and everyone else's are trapped here."

"Are you worried about Iolite?"

"Are you worried about Bellona?"

KABOOM! All of the remaining color seemed to drain from Hyperion's pale face. Caligula stiffened.

"I'm sure it's not them," Sycorax said.

"Right. Careers don't jump ship. They'd never leave each other to die."

"Yeah, probably just a loner, maybe a Bloodbath injury bleeding out. If it's them, it'd have to be two cannons."

KABOOM!

"Don't jinx us," Caligula snapped.

"Should we eat without them?"

"I don't know."

"I could do lunch." Someone opened up a crate of pull tab cans.

"What's that?"

"Looks like baked beans and sausage."

"No more gourmet, huh?"

"Shut up." Having nothing better to do, the four Careers dined on cold franks and beans, waiting to see if their allies came home or not. No news was forthcoming.

• • • • • • •

When the District One tributes staggered back to camp, it was well into the afternoon. Caligula scowled. "Where in the world have you been?"

"Hunting. As you probably heard, we caught ourselves some prey."

"You were gone for an awfully long time," Ria said. "We were worried you had died."

"Careers don't usually die early."

"Well, Careers don't usually storm off on the first day."

"How are you?" Hyperion asked.

"Not good. District Three found us."

"Oh?"

"They have a bigger alliance. Someone was making noise, so we tracked them to this little patch of woods. There were two girls there, but as soon as we killed them, the Three boy showed up and threw a tomahawk at us. He hit Bel in the side."

"Did you get his district partner?"

"No. We didn't see her."

"Are you sure they're still working together?"

"I hope not." Iolite pulled a first aid kit from the heap of supplies and sloshed a bottle of isopropyl alcohol, assessing its contents. He put it back and picked out a bar of soap instead. "How much water is there?"

"A lot. We've got like a dozen filled bottles, plus the two barrels."

"Then we should wash it off before wasting antiseptic." The other Careers formed a sort of anxious semicircle around Bellona, sitting on a box, and Iolite, cutting the bloody, congealed fabric of her shirt away from the wound it had already partially clotted against. Bellona hissed in pain. "I know, I know. But we can't let the fibers dry inside the wound."

"Do we have morphine?"

"I really don't need any," Bellona said.

"If we do, we won't be wasting it on little scratches anyway."

"None of us are going to get injured badly but nonfatally," Hyperion argued. "Don't save it for a perfect occasion that's not going to come."

"Well, when I have to amputate your infected arm, you'll be grateful that I didn't piss all the pain meds away on a nonissue." He started to wash the wound, and soon, red-tinted soap suds were sliding down to the dirt floor. Once Iolite had poured the entire contents of a water bottle over top to rinse it, it became apparent that things weren't as bad as they had first looked. The tomahawk hadn't connected with any major organs, but the corner of its wedge-shaped blade had sliced laterally through some of the subcutaneous fat and grazed a couple rib bones. It wasn't an injury Ria would have enjoyed having, but it could have turned out much worse than it did. This could heal.

The first aid kit was well-stocked, and Iolite made quick work of protecting Bellona's wound from the elements, but Ria was still worried. How long would the Games last? It was hard to ration supplies without an idea of how many days the Careers would have to subsist on their stockpile alone. Hunting animals was difficult, the Academy didn't exactly have courses on edible plant identification, and who's to say they weren't plopped in the middle of a poison arena, where the plants and animals killed on contact? There had been a Games like that once, one of the early Quarter Quells.

The next order of business was moving to a better-concealed location. There had been a stream of figures in the far distance, none of them displaying the arena uniforms, so it was decided that they had to be the rival campers. Sycorax immediately decided that it was too dangerous to be in open proximity to them, so the rest of the afternoon was devoted to dragging all of the supplies a mile or so away to the west. Then it was time for another serving of beans and franks, and as night fell and the anthem played, Ria watched for the face of the boy she murdered. District Eleven came towards the end, so she had plenty of time to anticipate it, feeling more and more perturbed with every passing photograph. The Five girl, gutted by Caligula, had an accusatory stare. You did this, she seemed to say. The Sixes still bore traces of childhood, sparse eyebrows and baby fat clinging to the vestigial remnants of safety. Ria wouldn't be surprised to hear that they were both twelve or thirteen. The boy's Adam's apple hadn't yet protruded. Ria learned that the girl she had tripped and offered up to Iolite for slaughter was from District Nine, and by the time her own victim rolled around, she was almost too afraid to look. His eyes were large and fearful. He knew he wouldn't survive, and the circumstances might not have been her fault, but everything else was. She had cut a life short.

She had killed someone's Rio.

DAY 2

"Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied, and vice sometime's by action dignified."

Romeo and Juliet

"Rise and shine!" Ria awoke to Caligula prodding her in the ribs. Having taken night watch with Hyperion, they were responsible for waking up the rest of the Pack. "We have half an hour before it's safe to go see the cabins." It took her a moment to remember that the Twos still had no idea which of their loved ones had been fated to die with them.

Hyperion was the chef that morning. Ria discovered that tinned pears and brown bread were a poor match for one another, but was grateful to have a change from the previous day's fare. The pears were sort of a nasty textural combination with the crumbly bread, but dipping the bread in the syrup at the bottom of the can wasn't too bad. Bellona attempted to drink her syrup all in one go and immediately gagged; Sycorax rejected her serving and offered it to Caligula instead. It was, overall, a good time.

New theories had sprung up overnight. Hyperion was convinced that the Gamemakers had probably only set the cabins to appear like they housed people the tributes were associated with, whereas Bellona suspected that the people they saw might have been robots. Each of the Careers looked forward to getting some closure, and hopefully determining exactly what was going on with their relatives.

When the Ones and Fours had initially stumbled upon the scene, it had been every man for himself. Now, they hung back, gathering a respectful distance from the cots as the visceral horror set in amongst their allies. Sycorax, like Ria, had a brother close in age and a much younger sister. Caligula had two friends. Once the discovery was made, Ria turned her attention to the Four cabin. She sincerely hoped that the personal touches had really just been set dressing, but the items had moved.

This was not a positive sign. Sure, maybe another tribute had found the cabins and explored them, but why were clothes missing from Rio's footlocker, and why had unfamiliar ones joined his shorts on the floor by the laundry hamper? It was too uncanny to be a coincidence. Bellona had discovered that her best friend's bed was made up nicely, the hospital corners refreshed, but her sister's had the covers tossed back. "It's too in character to be faked," she said.

"What happens now?"

"We hunt for tributes."

"Do you think the schedule changes daily?"

"If it is, the one we have is out of date."

"We should check the bulletin board." They did. There was a fresh copy of the same schedule. This time, it was decided that they should leave it there, in case the Gamemakers intended it to be publicly visible. There was also a new item. A handwritten note on seashell-bordered letterhead asked the reader if they happened to know the location of a navy blue pajama shirt. Return to Cabin Four if found. Please. The mosquitoes eat me alive when I sleep shirtless.

"That's not good."

"Yeah, mosquitoes suck."

"No, I mean they know if we move stuff." Hyperion removed a tightly balled shirt from a pouch in his cargo shorts. Ria realized that it was the same one he'd been holding at the initial cabin visit. "Either that's my brother's handwriting, letterhead, and tone because he wrote it, or the Capitol somehow fabricated this to imitate him."

"Probability points to it being your brother."

"I know." There was a glum silence.

"What are you going to do?"

"Become the Victor. Murder anyone who gets in the way." There was a hardness in his voice that Ria didn't like.

"You sound determined," she said.

"Aren't you? I'll do whatever I have to."

"Then we should go figure out what's going on."

"What's stopping us from tracking down our relatives?" Bellona asked. "If I talk to Perdita, I know she'll help us make sense of all this."

This was a bold idea. Now that she thought about it, why shouldn't Ria go straight to the source? Surely her siblings would be happy to explain what was going on, if they were really in the arena. If they weren't, the Career pack wouldn't have to live in fear anymore. So why was she so reluctant?

"I don't think the Gamemakers want us to," Sycorax said. "What if they've done something to them? Like making them into mutts that can be controlled, and they might hurt us if we get too close." Ria considered that. Seeing Rio and Coraline as mutts, with none of the free will that had shaped their personalities, would be infinitely worse than not seeing them at all.

"Then let's not," Bellona said.

"We should go. It was stupid to leave the camp unguarded, but we needed all six of us here."

"Some things can't be helped."

"Yeah, let's hurry."

"We ought to do some hunting."

"Yeah, we'll do that too."

"Last year's Careers sucked at hunting. We have a reputation to keep up."

"We do."

"Let's get this bread."

• • • • • • •

The camp had been picked clean through. The supplies were mostly intact, but every weapon had been systematically removed, save for those that the Careers had brought with them to the cabins.

"Shit!" Someone had carved a tomahawk symbol into the muddy grass. With a smiley face. Smirking.

"They're taunting us."

"Oh god. Now they've done it. That girl got so far last year that stealing from us is becoming a legitimate strategy."

"This has to be the Threes, right?"

"Of course it's the Threes. Dipwad."

"Hyperion, shut up."

"So you get to call me a moron but I can't call you a dipwad?"

"Exactly. Rules for thee but not for me. A classic leadership mantra."

"You're joking."

"I am. Congratulations on discovering sarcasm. Shall we applaud?"

"Sycorax."

"Sorry, Caligula. Okay. New plan. We need to find some more weapons. Iolite and Hyperion left their weapons before we went for the cabins, and Bellona only has one axe with her, so she can't throw it."

"How are we gonna get new weapons? Wait here until someone sponsors us?"

"It's a summer camp. There's bound to be sporting equipment storage."

"So let's find it." The Pack split into three pairs: Ria and Caligula, Sycorax and Iolite, and Bellona and Hyperion. They agreed to meet back at their base after four hours of searching. Each one took a direction and then took off.

It took them a while to find the shed. Caligula had been the one to spot the sports fields, and Ria assumed that they were heading in the right direction. Just to the east of the sprawling lawns, there was a series of targets in the distance, located near a squat brown shed.

It was an armory. Archery sets, air guns, crossbows, machetes, and yes, tomahawks and other axes lined the walls. They geared up and headed back, then waited. Caligula was louder without Sycorax, Ria decided, but also not as happy. She wondered what it would be like to have such a strong connection with someone that being in proximity to them made her light up.

She was thinking so much about Bellona that she forgot about her twin.

• • • • • • •

Ria was really starting to hate franks and beans. Yes, it was better than starving. No, she didn't have to like it. Enough said.

Hunting had been moved to the afternoon, with priority given to finding the Threes. After Ria and Caligula had distributed the new weapons and the crisis was averted, it was decided that Iolite and Hyperion ought to stay back and defend the camp while everyone else went adventuring together. Ria had weakly suggested that maybe Hyperion would prefer to hunt, since she had no objections to giving him a kill that would otherwise have been hers, but Sycorax vetoed this, arguing that since Ria would be staying up with Iolite for the night watch anyway, she ought to get some excitement while she could.

She didn't want to go hunting. At the beginning of the Games, it had seemed like such a jaunty proposition, but as soon as she registered the reality of what it meant, it no longer appealed. Sycorax, in contrast, was as peppy as ever. "Don't be so mopey," she suggested. "If you're going to win, you're going to kill. Might as well get over it early." Ria wasn't sure if her relatively bloodless weapon was the source of this problem, but she had to agree that Sycorax had been thrust into the heart of things when her first kill had tried to leap over her and accidentally put himself right within impalement range. She claimed that while the flecks of dried blood stuck to her skin were itchy, the baptism of fire had improved her confidence.

"You'll find a way to overcome it," Caligula assured her.

"I don't want to overcome it," Bellona said. "Killing is supposed to feel bad. As a reminder of what the Dark Days really were. You think civil war is all sunshine and rainbows?"

"It's supposed to feel righteous," Sycorax said.

"Does it? For you?"

"No," she admitted. "It feels pretty neutral. It's my job. I knew what I was signing up for." Ria apparently hadn't. Not even the death of the previous Volunteers, the ones she'd known and trained alongside, had dissuaded her from following in their path. Was she, like them, doomed to die? To be butchered by unnamed outliers like the one that killed Jo two years ago or the Three boy that had nearly taken Bellona out of the game? (Not unnamed, she corrected, just irrelevant. Caligula said his name was Danar.) Or would she, too, fall prey to a mutt? One that shared her brother's face, even?

She could fix all of these wrongs, she told herself. She could make up for her misdeeds once she and Rio and Coraline were safe in District Four, away from the danger the arena contained. It would all be worth it to protect her family.

Except she wasn't really sure about it and it kind of hurt to think about so she chose to look at the blue sky with its puffy white clouds and hoped that she wouldn't have to kill any tributes.

KABOOM!

Every cannon set them on edge. When the alliance was divided, it was hard to not worry. Sycorax had brought Bellona with the hunting party deliberately, so that she would have more protection in the event of an attack. "I hope it was one of the Threes," Bellona said.

"I thought you didn't like the death."

"I'd rather it be the guy who attacked me than any of the others."

"Shhh! I think I heard something." Ria, in her attempt at ignoring the conversation, had long ago tuned into the sound of running water. There was a river nearby, but there was something else. All four Careers froze in place. Sure enough, there was a soft crunch.

Sycorax gripped her falchion tightly. "Fan out," she whispered. The other Careers obeyed. Ria crept forward to where she thought the sound might have originated, and caught a glimpse of an orange shirt from between the trees.

"There!" she called. The tribute ran, but Sycorax had been prepared. The Careers already had him in their crosshairs. Four people converged on him.

"Who wants him?" Sycorax asked. She looked at Ria, who understood what this was: a challenge. Sycorax might've related herself to Ria, but she still didn't want dead weight on the team. Ria knew what was expected of her. If she refused this opportunity, she would die alongside her would-be kill.

"Seems like he should go to Ria," Caligula said. "Her kill yesterday was so clean, and the kid's so small. No reason to drag it out."

"Yeah. How old are you?" Sycorax kicked a bit of loose dirt in the direction of the boy, who was huddled behind some scrub brush. This was the show the Capitol expected. The viewers were sure to be on the edge of their seats, wondering whether the Careers would torture the boy for their entertainment or choose to have mercy on him.

"Um, fif, fifteen?" he said. It was an answer, but it sounded more like a question.

"Look me in the eye when I'm talking to you." He drew himself up a little, raising his face. It was the kid from backstage at the Tribute Parade, Ria realized. The Nine boy with the doe eyes.

"Fifteen?"

"Sure, Ria can have you. Right, Ria?"

"I'll even be nice about it," Ria agreed. She loathed what she was about to do, but there was no way she could just go ahead and bludgeon the poor thing in front of her. "Caligula, would you mind trading for a moment?"

"I'd be honored." They passed her their khopesh and she surrendered her mace. She crept closer to the boy.

"This is going to be very quick and painless, but we have a very important question. Have you seen any other tributes recently? The Threes, or maybe the Eight girl or the Twelve boy? Hell, even the Seven girl."

"No?"

"Alright. Any last words, wishes, things to that effect?"

"Um, Dad, Mom, uh, I…" Ria did her best to tune it out as he described how much he loved his family and which of his friends he wanted to get his prized possessions. He asked his parents to bring the barn cat to the television so she heard him say goodbye. Ria waited until he finished, then brought the khopesh up to his neck, angling it the way she was taught. She'd never been very good with bladed weapons, but this was about efficiency.

"Ready?" I'm so sorry, she mouthed. He nodded. "Alright. Count to three for me."

"One, t—"

She severed his carotid artery as neatly as she could. He lost consciousness after just a few seconds, and she stepped back, trying to appear satisfied with the atrocity she'd just committed.

KABOOM!

Sycorax was right. Something about the presence of blood made it both harder and easier. Ria wasn't squeamish, but she found the overtness of the violence a little stomach-roiling. On the other hand, she'd done her best to please the Capitol without doing anything truly terrible. It was for the best. With blood, there was a closure that made it easier to box up the whole experience without it seeping into all her actions thereafter.

"That was good!" Sycorax said encouragingly.

"Thanks. The blood did sort of fix the problem."

"I'll drink to that."

"Good idea, actually. Hunting is dehydrating." Satisfied with the kill, Sycorax decided that they could all head back to camp. A less observant person might've mistaken Sycorax's enthusiastic interrogation of the Nine boy as sadistic glee, but Ria saw the conflict on her face as she let down her ponytail and hid behind long curtain bangs. And it all clicked.

Ria internalized; Sycorax externalized. Sycorax was bound to be arrogant or worse, to project a perfect Career attitude at all times, to cover for the poorly hidden reluctance of her allies. Leadership was the toll she paid. She bore the burden of engineering scenarios likely to captivate the Capitol and entice sponsors, to prevent the Careers from coming off as weak or bloodshy, but she had the conscience to do what she could. The brief terror she'd inflicted, a cat toying with a mouse, had been enough to satiate the audience, but it had truly petrified the Nine boy. It was still preferable to any of the nasty deaths that could have befallen him, but she hadn't liked it one bit more than Ria had.

After an early dinner of franks and beans (roasted over a bonfire this time), a sponsor gift finally arrived: plush marshmallows, squares of chocolate, and graham crackers. It felt like a cruel joke to the Careers, despite it being a treat, but the Capitol would be eating up the delicious irony. Ria chomped a s'more and felt guilty about what she'd done.

"Anyone know any campfire songs?" Hyperion asked.

"This is a repeat after me song!"

"Sycorax, please don't do this to us right now."

"Aw man. I made up, like a whole little ditty."

"I don't want to do audience participation. How about Princess Pat?"

"That's also audience participation."

"Oof."

"How about some pop music?"

"There was this song I heard on the train," Ria said, blushing.

"On the train? Do you not get Capitol radio in District Four?"

"No."

"What?" Hyperion looked surprised. "I get it."

"My family's up north, though."

"Oh yeah. Well, we get it in the south. Radios are expensive, though."

"What was the song?"

"Playgirl, I think?"

"Oh, I love Nero Dapper!" Bellona exclaimed. "Playgirl's really good. Have you ever heard Cabana Fontana? It's about Tiffy's aunt Fontana and like, her finding all these guys to date at the beach, but she's young and works as a lifeguard?" She slumped. "I wish we had a radio right now."

"We should do a singalong."

"Playgirl is literally the only Capitol pop song I know," Ria said.

"Then you should sing that. We can do it together!" Ria had never sung in public before and wasn't crazy about starting now, but she also wasn't about to turn down a chance to sing a lesbian love song with her crush.

"Sure!"

"Oh, but it's acappella, so we gotta make the beat—here, Sycorax, you know enough to follow along, right?"

"No, I can do it," Ria said. "I only heard it once, so it's not even like I know the lyrics well enough."

"That sounds great too! Alright, here we go: Cover of Icon magazine, girlie's got a good thing going…"

Somewhere along the way, Ria found herself thinking about Hyperion's comment on the train. Why not have some fun before the opportunity left her life altogether? All the Careers beside her would be dead soon. What was the worst that Bellona could do, say no?

So after the song, when Ria was setting up shop to take watch, she caught Bellona by the supplies and asked her out. And she said yes. And as they kissed behind the blue plastic drums of water, Ria thought to herself how lucky she was. The Hunger Games hadn't been too terrible to her specifically, at least not yet.

That would change. But before it did, she had a night to spend.

• • • • • • •

Iolite was easy to talk to. They started off light, chatting about Bellona and Hyperion, but at some point, things came back around to the cabins. Iolite maintained that they had to be dupes. "There would be outcry," he said. "If they took four additional tributes from every district, people would be rioting in the streets."

"Why make us think they're here with us if they're not?"

"The drama. When they do Final Eight interviews, they'll set up some cameras and ask them how they feel knowing that we have to fight their pretend selves to make it out of here. They'll see themselves die onscreen. It sends a pretty strong message to anyone trying to screw with the Games, doesn't it?"

"So you think it's a power play?"

"Maybe. Or it might just be Capitolites trying to one-up each other. Someone says 'you'll never make an arena like this' and so they do, just for the hell of it."

"That might be worse."

"Who do you think killed the Five boy?" The anthem had revealed him to be the unknown casualty.

"Maybe the Threes?"

"Who knows."

"Yeah. Did they really think taking our weapons was the way to go?"

"There usually aren't a ton of random weapons lying around the arena if you lose yours. It was a solid strategy. We got lucky, not them."

"The Careers really are fading."

"One of us needs to win this year."

"Tomorrow, we should cross the river. Or go see the other side of the Cornucopia."

"The Threes are so close, though."

"Yeah. Well, if they don't want to be seen, we're probably not gonna see them."

"They'll kill us if we don't kill them."

"Yeah."

"Yeah."

"How are you feeling about your kills?" Ria asked.

"Not good. It's supposed to be a good thing, you know. Killing. But it's just ugly and painful. The Academy lied."

"The Academy does that, yeah."

"Well, we fell for it. So now we're stuck."

"We are."

"And this isn't really an escapable situation."

"We were dumb."

"Yeah. Didn't really think this through."

"How do the Victors do it?"

"I hope I get to find out."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. But I wish there was a third option. Besides living or dying. Like saying a magic word. If you find just the right word, there's like, a secret rule that they airlift you out of the arena and you get to go home."

"That would be nice."

"Bel said you're dating now. As much as you can date in the arena, but, yeah."

"She did?"

"Yeah. Why not have some fun on the way out? Hyperion and I are doing the same thing."

"So you've accepted that one of you is going to die?"

"Yeah. We might be in a tragedy, but we don't have to indulge the despair."

"Are you scared?"

"I'm scared of not being able to have joy anymore. Just vanishing. I want death to feel like an afternoon nap." Ria couldn't say she felt the same, but she could say that she felt better. Maybe it would all be okay.

KABOOM!

DAY 3

"For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak with most miraculous organ."

Hamlet

A long night bled into a highly anticipated sunrise. Ria fixed breakfast. The tinned pears and brown bread were more tolerable now that she had discovered how to eat them. Iolite woke the others. Ria had a long day of nonstop hunting and exploration ahead of her. Bellona and Caligula prepared for several hours of socializing and guarding the camp against intruders while Sycorax counted out four cans of beef ravioli into a backpack. Ria didn't love tomato sauce, but anything was preferable to another can of franks and beans.

The Careers worked the arena over methodically, starting out due west and continuing until they hit a river. Sycorax didn't want to admit defeat, but even she had to admit that wading across a river of unknown depth in the Hunger Games was a dumb move. Instead, the Pack headed up the river bank, traveling north. They were too loud to sneak up on any tributes lurking nearby, but the purpose, even more than finding prey, was assessing the arena layout. The Pack was in high spirits. According to Iolite, Bellona's injury hadn't developed any signs of infection overnight, and the three deaths during the previous day had been enough to tide them over if nothing exciting happened.

Ria didn't want to look at the face of her victim. Iolite had paid attention for her and reported that the Five, Nine, and Ten boys had all died. Less than half of the tribute pool remained, and Ria realized with a sickening start that besides the Career Pack, the only remaining tributes were the Threes, the Seven girl working with the Twelve boy, the sneaky-looking Eight girl, and the Twelve boy himself. Ria wasn't ready for her allies to die. As Sycorax poked along the shoreline and insisted upon performing the repeat-after-me song she'd composed the night before, Ria could almost forget for a moment where she was. It was a highly strung, imperfect bunch of friends, but they were hers. They got hungry early, but Sycorax fortunately had the foresight to bring packets of dry jerky to snack on.

The Careers spotted the bridge just before lunch. Beyond it lay a sliver of forest across the wide river, and so they crossed and traipsed into the woods, where they immediately discovered an elaborate obstacle course stretched across the entire tree canopy as far as the eye could see. There were evenly spaced wooden signs every hundred yards or so along the river, informing the readers that this side of it belonged to Camp Tawny Brook. That meant that it was the tributes' home turf, where they didn't have to worry about bumping into their possibly muttation-ified relatives.

The ravioli was serviceable. After scarfing it down, the Careers walked the length of the river south, back to camp, with the treetop obstacle course continuing in parallel. There was a canoe with wet oars moored at the bank, and so they commandeered it, taking two trips to ferry the whole Pack across and hopefully stranding whatever hidden tributes had just been using it. They would have hunted, but it was getting dark, and while prowling the arena at night could prove fruitful, it would worry their allies. It was also easier to get lost at night, and so as streaks of orange crept across the sky, they stumbled back to camp. Was it Ria's imagination, or was sunset happening earlier than it was supposed to? She chose to believe that the afternoon had just felt quick, but then she decided to check her watch. It was four thirty.

"Why are the Gamemakers sending us to bed at half past four?" she asked.

"Maybe just to screw with us." It was well known that the Gamemakers liked messing with the tributes' circadian rhythms. It always did interesting things to their alertness and irritability, and that was an easy way to manufacture drama during the slow moments. The Careers, however, were not planning to go to bed before suppertime. They took advantage of their limited downtime, splitting off into their respective romantic pairings. Ria found herself unexpectedly alone with Bellona.

"Hi."

"Hi." This was new. Ria generally had the social scripts down, but for some reason, things were different with her girlfriend. Was Bellona a girlfriend? Did that word even mean anything in the arena, where there were no date venues or bouquets of flowers? She had never had a girlfriend before. Had Bellona? It was strange, she realized. Most tributes' concerns revolved around acquiring resources and trying not to die. Meanwhile, Ria was sitting pretty with a full belly contemplating her love life.

"Did you have fun hunting today?" Bellona asked.

"Yeah, actually. I think it was good for me."

"Iolite said you all sang."

"We did."

"Say, do you ever think about the immutable reality of death and how happiness seems futile in the face of it?"

"Of course. This is the Hunger Games."

"And you're happy to have a relationship, knowing that you or I are going to die very shortly?"

"Yeah. We're going to die anyway. Why not die happy?"

"Happy is the future, not the present. Love seems so bland and finite when you have to cram so much of it into such a short amount of time. I'm happy to have this, but wouldn't it be happier to have a real relationship, with a natural buildup? Don't you want the trust that comes from getting to know someone over months instead of days?"

"Why date me, then?"

"Because I'd still take an imperfect, truncated romance over the regrets of never taking the leap."

"Do you like the Games?"

"No."

"You seem like you're coping with them so well."

"Well, I'm not. I'm here because the Academy told me to Volunteer and saying no isn't an option. I'm just trying to win and get out of here with as little trauma as possible."

"Good luck."

"It's been okay so far, actually. Last year was so bad. We're actually getting along, which is nice."

"I feel like there's gonna be a group hug by the end of all this."

"Don't bet on it."

"There's just this really good sense of cohesion. Like we've figured this whole Career thing out. I feel safe, you know?"

"Yeah."

"Actually, whatever the Gamemakers did is working great. I feel super tired and achy and stuff. Like I want to go to bed early," said Ria.

"I wonder if they pumped chemicals in the air or something?"

"Maybe."

"But I don't feel drowsy at all, so it could just be about you taking watch last night"

"That's probably it."

"You should take it easy. Sycorax and I are guarding tonight. Tucking in early might be good for all of you, actually."

"You'll make sure to wake me up if anyone stirs up trouble?" Ria fluttered her eyelashes in parody.

"I'll have them dealt with before they have so much as a chance of disturbing your sleep."

"And have all the glory for yourself?"

"I do apologize. No need for you to miss out on the fun." Bellona's smile suddenly dropped off her face. Career flirting might've been all well and cute in the abstract, but they were laughing about murder. "You'll feel better after some rest. We've been doing so much walking, no wonder your legs hurt."

"I'm sure it's nothing a good night's sleep can't fix."

"Have something to eat first. Can't let that yummy ravioli go to waste, can we?"

"I'm not really hungry. But thank you, Bel. It means a lot."

"You called me Bel." Ria froze. Had she? Yeah, she kind of did. Was Bellona okay with that? Was she moving too fast, or was Bel just, like, a platonic thing with Iolite? Maybe—

Bellona kissed her softly on the forehead. "Goodnight, Ria." Ria beamed at her.

"Goodnight."

DAY 4

"It will have blood, they say: blood will have blood." Macbeth

Ria felt considerably worse in the morning. She was dizzy and feverish, and dragging herself up into a sitting position required more effort than it had any right to. Acting in his official capacity as resident medic and dad friend, Iolite was summoned to read her temperature. Ria held the thermometer in her mouth uncomfortably. She wanted breakfast, but at the same time, it seemed like maybe she would throw up if she tried to eat.

"Okay. You're at 104, which is well in the worry zone but not quite in the emergency zone. We're gonna get you an aspirin from the first aid kit. Is anyone else feeling off?"

"I feel a little lightheaded," someone said. It was Sycorax.

"Then we should take your temperature too. If it's serious, you need to stay in camp today and rest."

"I'm not putting that thing in my mouth."

"We can disinfect it."

"I am fine."

"If you're fine, why do you feel sick?"

"Just been awake too long, probably, since watch started at an ungodly hour of afternoon yesterday. I'm not used to missing out on my beauty rest."

"So it's not a big deal?"

"No. I wish I hadn't said anything in the first place. Back off, you're practically sitting on my lap."

"We're standing," Hyperion informed her.

"Sensitivity to physical proximity can be a symptom of illness," Iolite said.

"I'm not ill."

"Then your temperature should be perfect, right? And we'll put Iolite's fears to rest."

"Caligula, you traitor."

"Sorry. You suck at being sick."

"I'm not sick. God, give me some space!" Iolite got the isopropyl alcohol and cleaned the thermometer off with a cotton pad. He handed it to Caligula, sensing that they were probably a better choice for providing Sycorax with unwanted medical care. They patted her cheek.

"Open up, babe." Sycora was too smart to open her mouth to refuse. She gnashed her teeth angrily. Carefully, Caligula laid their hand across her jaw, locating the pinch point. They squeezed gently, and the mandible parted, forcing her lips apart. She swatted at them. "Ow!"

"What is it?" Iolite asked.

"102.3. You are absolutely sick."

"I am not sick!" Sycorax angrily spat out the thermometer, looking cross.

"Oh, yes you are. And you're going to stay right here all day, and because I know that you're going to start working as though you're fine the second I'm out of sight, I'm going to stay with you."

"Kill me now."

As Caligula scooped her up, Iolite was looking on concernedly, musing about the origins of the illness. "What do you think could have caused this? Is it contagious?"

"I sure hope not." Sycorax had apparently surrendered to the fever and was now struggling to peel off her sweatshirt. "Could you…?"

"Yeah. Hang tight." Caligula unzipped her and tried to slide it the rest of the way off. "Lift your arms up." She did, and as the short sleeve of her orange shirt shifted down, Caligula shrieked. "What is that?!"

There was a tick the size of an apricot snuggled in Sycorax's armpit.

"That's not good," Iolite said.

"How do we get rid of it?" Caligula proffered the first aid kit.

"Normally, you're supposed to use tweezers, but I don't think that's going to work here. Maybe some forceps?" He leaned in to inspect it.

"Wait," Ria said. "Does that mean I have a tick too?"

"Yeah. Normally, ticks climb higher the longer they're on you, and you have a worse fever than she does." It took a few minutes of careful searching to discover the parasite at the nape of Ria's neck, hidden under her braids. Iolite figured out how to work the forceps to remove both Careers' ticks without leaving any insect parts beneath the skin, but he was at a loss about what to do beyond that. "Rest," he said. "Take some fever reducers. Get plenty of fluids. Eat if you can. Keep the bite wounds clean and reapply the anti-infection cream every hour or so."

"Will we get better?"

"I don't know. These seem like mutts. All bets are off." That was disquieting. If Iolite had an optimistic prognosis, like he had for Bellona's side wound, he would say so.

Was this going to be the end?

• • • • • • •

Ria slept for most of the day. Caligula coaxed her and Sycorax into nibbling on some of the stale bread, which was the only thing they could bear to stomach. She lacked the energy to converse, but she did have plenty of time to stress about things. She checked her watch periodically, drifting in and out of consciousness. Sycorax was more agitated than usual, and didn't seem as low energy as Ria. She complained loudly and frequently to Caligula, and Ria ignored it. They encouraged her to eat another slice of bread, but she only made it halfway through before vomiting onto the grass. It was, overall, not a good time.

She snapped awake mid-nap to the voice of Iris Whottenberg coming in through the arena speakers. "Tributes," she said brightly, "You all have noticed that a member of your alliance seems to have come down with the sniffles. Ticks, disease-spreading parasites found all across wooded areas of Panem, can have a fatal bite. Fortunately, we in the Capitol have advanced remedies to halt a slow, painful death in its tracks. At noon tomorrow, twenty-four hours from now, there will be a Feast at the Cornucopia. You're cordially invited to collect the cure, but make sure to arrive on time! Supplies are limited, and latecomers may find that the medicine they require is no longer in stock. We hope to see you there!"

Ria considered this. There were more sick tributes than doses of cure, so someone would have to die. It would be a suspenseful Feast, bur Ria recalled that the previous year's Feast had also been eventful: it had ended the Games. The Career Pack needed to plan, but there was nothing Ria could do to help. She could barely even talk.

So she slept.

DAY 5

"Such men as he be never at heart's ease whiles they behold a greater than themselves."

Julius Caesar

The morning brought stories. Two cannons had gone off the previous night, and Ria had been too far under to even notice. As the Pack gathered to eat creamed corn and update Ria, Sycorax, and Caligula on the news, Iolite fussed over her.

"The aspirin isn't doing anything. We need to go to the Feast." Sycorax had also worsened overnight. It seemed like Ria had been infected a day earlier than her.

"We got Twelve and Seven yesterday," Bellona said.

"How?"

They told her the story. It had gotten dark even earlier, at about three o'clock, and they risked taking a shortcut near the cabins while the rival campers were inside, and Hyperion, being Hyperion, impulsively decided to see what would happen if he returned his brother's shirt to him.

It had been the real Krios and the real June, along with the real Rio and the real Coraline.

It confirmed Ria's worst fears. Hyperion and his brother had talked. They had hugged. It was everything Ria wanted more than anything. Unfortunately, she was still sick.

The Careers hadn't been the only ones at the cabins that night. Krios had warned them to be quiet—the head counselor, a woman named Jane, would make sure the horses had everything they needed for the night, but once she got back from the barn, she would be on the prowl for curfew violations. It was essential to be as silent as possible. Bellona did vaguely recall a note on the bulletin board about a sunset curfew, and so the Careers had known to keep their presence discreet.

Not everybody did. There was noise outside of another cabin across the way. Ballad, the Twelve boy, had carried a feverish Molly to the Seven cabin so she could say her goodbyes in case he couldn't get the medicine at the Feast.

The Careers wanted to attack, but they didn't dare reveal their presence.

Then they heard hoofbeats, and saw a woman astride a tall, handsome stallion, blood pouring from her neck, a riding helmet dangling from her saddle horn. With one hand, she held the reins. With the other, she carried a thin rod with a perpendicular head. She wore a nametag and a blue STAFF shirt.

Then she cantered over and bludgeoned the Twelve boy's face in with her polo mallet, before trotting off eastward.

The Careers were horrified. They'd killed Molly, of course, and it was largely a mercy, since a quick death at the blade of an axe was preferable to the agony of a natural expiration.

On the bright side, there were two fewer competitors. The Gamemakers had flown a red pennant above the Cornucopia, signaling its location to the tributes across the flat arena. The plan was for Bellona, Iolite, and Hyperion to bring back two doses of cure. Whatever happened would happen. They were a team.

The trio set out, and Ria fell asleep almost immediately, just after vomiting up the bottle of water she'd had for breakfast.

She could barely move. Things were getting worse.

• • • • • • •

Someone shook Ria awake. Hyperion stood over her with a syringe that held a thin, clear fluid. "We got your medicine," he said.

"And Sycorax's?"

"Yes, hers too. Ugh." He scrunched up his face. "I've never done this before. How do you give someone a shot?"

"Iolite…" Ria knew what she wanted to ask, but it took too much effort to say. "Where is…?"

"Iolite died," he said gently.

"Who killed him?!"

"We're not sure, but Bellona killed Three. Got some good revenge."

"Where…?"

"Getting the first aid kit. The Three girl threw a tomahawk at her."

"They both…?"

"They both used tomahawks. Look, I have no idea how to do this. What if I just stick it in your arm and hope for the best?"

"Okay," Ria said. She felt a sharp prick, and then her senses suddenly began to clear a little. She didn't feel healthy, exactly, but she felt a little like she did the previous day, when the illness was less intense.

"Better?"

"Yes."

"You can go back to sleep now." Ria did, but first she checked to make sure Bellona really was there. Then she drank half a bottle of water.

She did not throw up.

DAY 6

"Cry 'Havoc!' and let slip the dogs of war."

Julius Caesar III.i

Ria ate breakfast. They were back to franks and beans, but that was okay. She was just happy to eat solid food again. Sycorax didn't seem much better yet, but Bellona theorized that maybe Ria had healed quicker since her fever was closer to breaking. That seemed like a reasonable explanation, so Ria accepted it with little question.

The Careers decided to spend the day at camp, preparing for the showdown the next day, when the rivalss would meet in battle. "How are we going to do this?" Sycorax asked.

"They're going to do something to our families to make them attack us."

"But what?"

"How should I know?"

"Wait, where's Hyperion?"

"Good question, actually." Hyperion had somehow drifted off. Sycorax looked frustrated.

"He's going to be participating in this thing, right?"

"I don't know. He's awfully committed to his brother and June. I don't know if he'd be able to fight them if it came down to it."

"Well, we can't have that. Besides, I was hoping to ask him about the Feast medicine, because I am doing so much worse. It's like he didn't inject the stupid serum at all." There was a pause. "Oh god. He didn't, did he?"

"I don't know."

"Ria, you're better. What did the medicine in the syringe look like?"

"Uh, clear."

"Mine too. He probably just filled it with water."

"Come to think of it, it's weird that Iolite died during the Feast. Who could have killed him? The Eight girl? The sick Three boy? His district partner who was busy fighting Bellona?"

"Holy shit. He's not coming back here, is he?"

"Afraid not."

"Well, we still have a war to fight tomorrow."

"What are we going to do?"

"We have to defend ourselves and hope this is all an elaborate reconstruction."

"Are you sure, Bel?" Ria asked.

"If Perdita tries to kill me tomorrow, I'm gonna rock her shit. These are my Games to win."

"She's your best friend, though."

"If the Capitol melted her brain or put a violence chip in her or something, she's not really my best friend anymore, is she?"

"Does sentience matter?"

"Yes," someone said.

"Not really," said someone else.

"So what are the rules?" As the debate raged on throughout the day, Ria kept looking furtively at the slackened muscles in Sycorax's face and thinking to herself that she had to be in so much anguish. Sycorax could still talk a little, but physically, she was completely helpless. Caligula gave her sips of water, but she had lost her swallow reflex. When they poured some directly down her throat, she vomited so hard and for so long that bloody foam began to dribble down her dry lips. She rested her head in their lap and occasionally contributed to the conversation, but her voice rasped. She spoke softlyand with a great deal of effort, with an absence of her usual conviction. Ria knew the end was near.

Two meals came and went, and still, Sycorax clung to life. She lived past the anthem, with no deaths, and into the black of night, where the remaining Careers, sans Hyperion, held a vigil. Standing united, they stayed with Sycorax until the pain became too great even for her. The thermometer read 108. The end was nigh, and no medicine would be arriving.

Sycorax sweated in Caligula's arms, daring to try and have some more water, but as soon as the vomiting began again, even more violently than before, she turned helplessly to her lover and spoke in a whisper. Slowly, they touched noses, Caligula cupping their girlfriend's damp face. Sycorax closed her eyes. "I'm so glad I met you all. I love you." She gazed into Caligula's eyes. "I love you," she murmured. "You're all I ever wanted."

"It's going to be okay," Caligula said. "We'll meet again soon."

"Do the honors?" They fell into a final kiss, fever or adoration or both blooming in Sycorax's rosy cheeks.

"I hope it doesn't hurt anymore." Caligula picked up their khopesh. The sword felt heavy with the weight of what Sycorax wanted, needed them to do. To spare her the worse pain.

"I can't believe this is goodbye."

"I love you to the moon and back, Caligula."

"I love you too."

KABOOM!

DAY 7

"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown."

Henry IV, Part Two III.i

Ria's last morning in the arena was deceptively bucolic. Birds sang. Breeze softened the thick blanket of humidity that amplified the heat of the day. Best of all, Ria seemed to have developed either taste blindness or trauma-induced delusion, because the franks and beans were borderline enjoyable.

Clearly, something big was about to go down. Ria kept a close eye on her watch as it ticked closer to noon. This time, the Gamemakers' red flag had appeared by the river, so the Careers followed it and crossed a floating pontoon to the other side. Six tributes remained in total, and the trio of Caligula, Bellona, and Ria made up half of them. They had a spectacular advantage for so late in the Games, but part of that terrified Ria. What if she and Bel had to face off in the finale? What if they had to kill one another? It was almost too terrible to name, but as such, demanded to be recognized. It had happened before, district partners or childhoods friends or even, yes, lovers, circling one another like vipers, waiting to see who would fall first.

The seconds hand ticked around to the twelve and, across the river, a regiment of ten young people broke through the trees, armed with cap guns. She quickly did the math: six tributes times two relatives equals one dozen enemy combatants, except two were missing. Ria searched for faces she recognized. Yes, there was little Coraline, holding what looked to be a carbine. Guns in the Games? It was unthinkable, but Ria had already seen plenty of unthinkable in six and a half days under Head Gamemaker Lucent Saccharyn. Putting real live non-tribute humans in the Games was also normally unthinkable, but that had gone straight out the window on the first day.

Coraline fired the carbine and it jerked back, its recoil smacking her in the chest. The bullet (was it rubber? It had to be rubber, right?) pocked a hole in a tree ten feet away from Ria.

Oh no. Nothing was as it seemed. Rio had a carbine too, and was already in the ranks making their way across the pontoons. Ria had come prepared for normal combat, but she hadn't expected her twin to shoot her. Ria spotted Perdita and a Bellona clone that had to be her seventeen year old sister. But no June. And no Krios.

"Charge!" shouted Bellona, and she rushed forward into a spray of gunfire. The bullets were definitely rubber, as it turned out, but still packed an enormous punch. Ria watched as one of Bellona's axes tore into Perdita's neck. Ria targeted people she didn't know, like the older blonde boy resembling the Eight girl, someone with space buns, a slim girl with a hard face who glared at Ria with lifeless eyes as she ruptured her lung. There was screaming, so much screaming, but she heard someone familiar.

"Ria!" She ran on instinct and found Rio already dead, torso torn open. His blood dripped glossy like treacle from Caligula's khopesh. She lunged for them. They caught her by the collar and reflexifly wrapped their arms around her torso. Something KABOOM!'ed behind them.

"Ria, calm down, it's fine."

"You killed him!"

"Come look. Come here, see? No organs, just silicone and a lot of fake blood. I don't know how the Capitol made these things, but they aren't our families." Ria looked. Sure enough, there were no organs among the glistening mess, just off white gel coated in red.

"But the exterior? The others met them. How does this work?" To her dismay, she realized she was crying.

"I don't know, but I promise, they are not real people. We've got just about everyone taken care of by now. Let's just get these last few, and then we can regroup and figure things out." They gingerly released her, and Ria searched for Bellona only to realize that she was on the ground with a tomahawk buried in her face. She felt a sudden explosion of rage, longing for what could have been, anger for what she had been robbed of. She and Bel had never even gotten in a proper makeout, and now they never would.

The Three girl was at the periphery, cutting down a plastic stranger. With another tomahawk.

"You!" Ria snarled and lunged forward. The girl turned to face her, but Ria's mace was already coming down hard, and then there was no reply at all because she was gone in a blitz of cannon fire.

Then there was silence. Ria looked at Caligula. Caligula looked back. They counted. "You, me, Hyperion, and Margaux."

"Almost the finale."

"Yeah. Dibs on Hyperion."

"That's so fun. See, back at home, my name was also in everyone's mouths!" Hyperion smiled brightly at them from the tree line, nocking an arrow. "But unfortunately, there's only one way this story ends."

"Do tell," Caligula drawled.

"See, I'm a lot smarter than you people give me credit for. Take the syringes, for example. A stroke of genius!"

"You killed the love of my life in the most horrific way possible," they said flatly.

"Yes, but that took work. That was hard to pull off! I only found one full syringe, but there was an empty one on the ground, so I improvised. Don't you just love recycling?"

"You're a terrible person."

"See, this is one of those interesting ethical snags where it sounds barbaric, but there's not even any quantitative difference in the outcome. I'll kill more, sooner, and better, and it won't be any worse than if I left all the ugly stuff to the rest of you."

"Go ahead and try." Caligula caught Ria's eye and began walking to the left, away from the river.

"Oh, I will. Let me tell you something. I am willing to do whatever it takes to keep my family safe. Now that you've massacred all your relatives on a riverbank instead of doing the right thing, the just, upstanding thing, and you're going to die too."

"I have a question. How, actually, did you keep them away?" Caligula inched another few steps, and Hyperion turned to follow them.

"I figured everything out in advance. Ever read the Odyssey? Krios and June had me tie them up in the cabin, like how Odysseus's men tied him to the mast so he would not succumb to the sirens' calls. They're safe."

"They're pretend," Caligula informed him. "They're mutts and robots, just like everything else in the arena."

"Enough of that," he said dismissively. "The time has come for District Four to claim a Victor and reclaim our glory." He pulled back his bowstring, but Ria had already pulled the carbine trigger. A fusillade of rubber bullets pummeled his stomach, and he sank as Caligula drove their sword into his chest. His bow and arrow fell to the side. He wasn't dead yet, but Ria got the sense that Caligula preferred it this way.

"How should we do this?" they asked.

"Fairly," Ria said. "Hand to hand, on equal ground. Winner takes all."

"Sure." Hesitantly, they both lowered their weapons to the ground, then kicked them towards the trees. Ria raised her fists.

Just then, a small figure in an orange shirt came trudging out of the forest, her wispy white-bonde hair swaying in the breeze as she lugged something behind her. Margaux had arrived.

Ria blinked, and somehow, Hyperion had thrust the khopesh into Margaux's neck, but she grinned. Ria and Caligula exchanged a look, instinctively recognizing that an outlier with a mortal wound smirking at her killer could only mean one thing. Margaux retrieved her cargo: a red jerry can. She upended the contents over Hyperion's prone body, then removed a small object from a pocket in her cargo pants. She flicked it at him just as her KABOOM! rang out.

The lit match collided with Hyperion's gasoline-soaked form and fire burst forth, engulfing him. There was a second cannon, although it took a distressingly long time to fire. And then Ria, knowing exactly what she had to do, loped towards the odor of burning flesh and collected her mace.

"I'm sorry," she said.

"I'll be with Sycorax," Caligula replied. And Ria punched the flange through their throat, holding our her other arm. She caught them as they swooned momentarily, then fell unconscious, and a moment later, the final cannon fired. Ria dropped her mace and became aware of the breeze stirring her braids, her friend's corpse, their blood on her hands, physically dripping down into the indentations of her knuckles and palms. She might be able to scrub the dried rust from them, but she would never be able to wipe them clean of the memories.

Iris Whottenberg's voice came over the speakers, declaring her Victor. Ria heard the rotors of a hovercraft engine, coming to collect her. The hovercraft docked gently on the dirt and woodchips, the door opening with a gusty rush of air. Inside stood Bethany and Kip, tall pillars of grace, flanking Rio, the real Rio, who'd probably been kept in the Capitol since Final Eight family interviews. He looked to a Peacekeeper for permission, who nodded. His sandals hit the ground as he rushed, arms outstretched, for his sister.

Her heart sang with the pain of home.

Hey y'all!

As many of you know, this is my first time participating in the annual SYOT Verses Victor Exchange (pretty much a Hunger Games secret santa). I received Poppy's tribute, and I hope I've managed to provide them with a satisfying arc for Ria. She'll be appearing in future stories post-Prudence and Gumption as a mentor, so stay tuned for those! In the meantime, I'll be updating Reprisal.

This has been a wonderful, chaotic journey. This is the first time I've written an HG fic focusing on only one character, so congrats to Ria on being the first! I had a ton of fun with her and I hope you had a ton of fun reading about her wacky summer camp hijinks. You can find me brainrotting about her in the Verses server and reading the absolute gold Ren has created for my own VE kid.

—LC :)