I try the bloodbath again.

Three times.

Each time it happens differently.

A knife to the chest from Clove. Marvel wrapping an arm around my neck; a cold blade to my stomach. Then the last time, a blow to the head. So fast that I hardly even remember it or know who did it to me.

The deaths seem to blur together. The mistakes are hard to keep straight or even identify.

Each time, I wake in the Tribute Center.

Each time, I defiantly try to take control. And I keep failing.

Each night on the roof with Peeta gets harder and harder. The stars seem to be getting dimmer. The world around me feels blearier with each restart. The details jumble together. Like there are only random pinpoints of consciousness in me.

It is my fifth restart since the reaping. Peeta and I stand on that roof, again. I look out at the city. The Capitol streets are so loud with celebration, such insolent jubilation, it feels like poison to me. I can see the blind faith in his eyes. I can feel the warm touch of his hands. And I can feel the echo of pain throughout my body; each puncture wound, each memory of suffering, filling me with dread and – I wonder… I fear…

What if I can't save him?

We have the same conversation we always have… until…

"I don't care what Haymitch says. I'm going into the bloodbath," I tell him.

"Alright, I won't stop you, but you can't stop me either," he says.

I turn to him, surprised.

"What do you mean?"

"If you're going into the bloodbath, so will I. We're a team, remember?"

There is something in his voice. So different from all those other times. There is no sag in his shoulder, no quiet defeat. There is a taste of fire in him. A quiet echo of candle flame. Just when I felt mine might sputter out.

"You'll die," I say, with no real authority.

"And?"

And he does.

Clove barely has time to pull back, before my arrow finds her. Yet, it's still too late.

Peeta falls to his knees, his life and the blood draining from him. I watch, unable to move.

And then I die. Again. And for the first time, I welcome it.

I fold around Cato's sword, unable to look away from where Peeta lays bleeding.

I wake up, and I walk to his room, like someone blind or drunk, and I trace the shape of him with my hands, and he is real – and none of it feels possible. And I'm sobbing. And he has no idea why – no way to understand, the true depths of this hole inside of me, the pain and the grief that is consuming me, with each death that passes and with each moment that seals our fates, again and again.

I lay with him, wondering what this all means. Maybe it cannot happen differently. Maybe there is nothing I can do to manipulate the Games. They have never been mine to control. I will be a performer in their game, regardless of my drive, regardless of my memories, regardless of my anger. But unlike Peeta, while we are both pawns – I'm letting it change me. I think of how trivial it had felt to kill Cato that first try. How non-consequential it felt to kill Clove, how righteous I felt, when it was in revenge for Peeta. How the tributes, at first, had felt so real and alive – and now they are just obstacles for my multiple attempts to get through this bloodbath.

When Effie comes to us, she scolds us for not being ready for our last day of training.

We go through another evaluation with the Gamemakers. I channel all of my anger into shooting for them. I'm half-tempted to shoot one of them for real. Especially the strange man.

I have seen him many times, but I have never seen any recognition in his face; no acknowledgement that this is the sixth time we have been in this room together with the dead pig and the other Gamemakers

This time is different. When we catch eyes, he pulls up his coat sleeve, revealing a wrist watch. I think, at first, of Plutarch. The secret Mockingjay symbol. A hint about the Quarter Quell escape plan.

This cannot be what he means.

The man taps the watch meaningfully.

I don't know what it means. Am I running out of time? Is there a limit to how many chances I get?

The strange man has only succeeded in hurrying me.

It feels like I have already been sloppy, but when Peeta turns to me on that roof, for the sixth time, I prepare to make this truly messy.

"The arena is a forest," I tell him. "We will be four plates away from each other. On your right will be Marvel. Clove will reach the Cornucopia before anyone else. She'll arm herself with throwing knives and she is deadly with them. She'll kill the male tribute from District 9. I'll reach the Cornucopia, but Cato and Clove will notice me as I get a bow. If you try to come to me right away, Clove will kill you. If you wait, and intervene, Cato and Marvel will fatally wound me, even if we get away." I pause for breath and Peeta is looking at me like I've lost my mind. And maybe I have. "I've tried and tried to overcome the bloodbath, but I keep dying – and then you died, and I lost you again…"

Peeta seems to be trying to come up with some excuse for this, but I beat him to it.

"It wasn't a nightmare," I tell him. "It was real. All of it. Each time. The pain… is so real. Sometimes it feels like it is the only real thing I know."

"You know me," he says, half-hearted, lost.

"Tomorrow, I think we run. Like Haymitch wants. Into the trees. There's a backpack not far from my plate, where District 9 will die. Clove will try to throw a knife, but I'll get away. Then we'll find some water source and wait out the bloodbath." I sigh. "What do you think?"

There is so much relief in having said all of that; to reach out, to not carry this burden all myself.

Even if it is only tiny increments of this burden, it is enough, to feel like I can breathe.

"Well, I think…" Peeta turns to look out at the city. He tips his head. "I think…"

"You can say it."

"Say what?"

"That I'm talking nonsense."

"It does sound strange," he admits. "But I don't think I'm in a position to turn down a free fortune telling."

I crack a half-smile; his humor almost touching me, but not quite.

"It's hardly fortunate," I mumble. "It only gets worse."

"Oh?" Peeta shows genuine interest. And maybe he thinks it is a game. Like all those others that we have played. A fun way to put off the reality of what we are about to do. A coping mechanism.

I indulge him.

"Well, many times ago, you joined the Career pack, and pretended to help them hunt me down, but really you were just covering for me. When Cato found out, he cut your leg, and when I went looking for you, I found you laying in the mud, half-dead, and the entire time I looked after you, you did nothing but crack jokes and annoy me."

"I bet they were good jokes," he says.

"Yes, dying seemed to improve your charisma considerably."

"And then we both died?" he guessed.

"No, not that time. That time we both won."

"Well then why are we here?"

So many answers come to me.

Because I couldn't love you enough.

Because the trick with the berries.

Because we are destined for things – things larger than we could ever imagine – and it is not to each other.

"The Games don't end once you're out of the arena," I say. "They never end."

"We must not have been very good at playing then," he says.

"You were," I say. "I wasn't."

I am looking down at my feet. Peeta reaches over and brushes fingertips against my cheek.

"At least we aren't alone."

I nod, gathering my courage, then look up.

"We run this time, and we hide," I say, and even if this feels like defeat, I take being together as our consolation prize.