On the evening of the twelfth day of the Ninety-Seventh Hunger Games, four tributes were driven together for one last confrontation.
Around them, the arena burned. Dry wood and dust caught flame quickly, and the breeze ushered the fire further. From where it began in the saloon, it advanced, closing around the four remaining. The setting sun painted the sky a vicious red-orange, as though it, too, was aflame.
From this crucible, a Victor would be forged.
From District Two, Bastet Avarne searched the smoke.
(This was wrong, all wrong. It was never supposed to turn out like this. As much as Bastet had wanted it, ached and bled and clawed and craved for it, there was part of her that never thought they'd make it here. This was a glory always meant for someone else- for her. But of course Bastet was never enough to make her stay.)
District Four's Tisiphone Fotis limped forward, her eyes dull.
(Tisiphone watched herself stride forward from beside the ghosts on her trail. It all felt faint and faraway. She couldn't hear her heart beating or feel the blood trickling down her thigh. She didn't know why she hadn't done this sooner.)
Chase Holloway of Five felt the fire as though it was in her blood.
(After days of pursuit, she was closer than ever to her target. Her anger was hot and familiar and comforting. Fury gave Chase fuel to keep moving forward. Rage lent her something to occupy her thoughts, to keep her from collapsing from the weight of her losses. She was tired of the world's cruelty, and ready to be cruel back.)
Seven's Valentina Gammon couldn't flee any further.
(It wasn't her fault, nothing that happened was her fault, but her mouth tasted of ash and her stomach wouldn't stop turning. She'd always been able to handle the heat- always been in control of the kitchen- and she'd be damned if she faltered now. She'd come too far to lose again. Valentina was sick of second-place medals.)
They'd suffered twelve days of the Games. For three, their suffering would end today.
The fourth would not be so fortunate.
In an alley between two decrepit buildings, Valentina was hacking her lungs out.
(She couldn't get the taste out of her mouth. The smoke was determined to stick, and it was succeeding.)
Valentina spat a wad of phlegm into the dirt, and something about the undignified gesture made her shoulders straighten. What the fuck was she doing, cowering in an alley right now? This was the end. She was close. Six tributes minus two cannons meant only three more deaths until Valentina was out of this hellhole. And while she didn't know who was dead, she did know- thanks to being knocked to the ground back there- that Chase was alive.
Where had that girl gone?
Despite the dry heat, a shiver went up Valentina's spine. She immediately hated herself for it. The Five girl wasn't- wasn't some boogeyman. She wasn't some monster in the woods, and she sure as hell wasn't anything like Valentina's absolute nightmare of a district partner.
Crack-!
Valentina whirled around, her heart pounding. Deeper in town, where the fire was spreading from, a building was collapsing. She flinched as blackened wood splintered into pieces, taking a step back.
She almost laughed. She needed to get her shit together. But every time she closed her eyes, tried to take deep breaths, every noise and breeze crept into her thoughts, and she would crack her eye open but there would be nothing but ghosts, always fucking ghosts, and she could see smoke rising even as the sky shifted from blue to red-
-and now she was laughing, hysterical giggles bubbling up her throat as she spun around and around, searching for a Five girl that refused to make herself known for some goddamn reason. She could feel Aescelin's ghost behind her, his stupid beady eyes on her skull, thinking he knew everything- but she had beaten him, she'd won.
And she would win again.
Chase had overshot the landing a bit.
In her desperation to escape the smoke, she'd ended up deep in the ghost town. She hadn't been here since the first few days of the Games, and between the time away and low visibility, she'd gotten herself straight-up lost.
She wasn't alone, though. There were plenty of ghosts to keep her company.
She'd never seen so many in one place. Brought together like this, they gave the town a hazy feeling. It was like a ripple in a pond, glassy and smooth and never-ending. The effect nearly made Chase dizzy.
She focused her eyes on the nearest one, trying to regain her balance. It was a curly-haired girl with a green bandana and a 5 stitched into her overalls. Something about her face was familiar, but after so many days fighting for her life, Chase didn't have it in her to put the pieces together. Like all the ghosts, this one wasn't quite meeting her eyes; instead, the girl looked off into the distance, at a point somewhere over Chase's shoulder.
"Come here often?" Chase murmured.
The ghost girl didn't respond.
"Fine. Be like that," Chase said, the girl's silence resonating more than Chase wanted it to.
(She was alone. She was so fucking alone that now she was talking to people who weren't even there. That meant she was losing her marbles, right?)
(Tye used to joke that she never had any marbles to start with. He'd give her head a hard tousle, and Chase would protest, because they both knew she was plenty smart. Then he'd pull her in for a noogie, and she'd threaten to bite him until he let her go, which he always did…)
Chase rubbed her head. She needed to focus.
"What'cha looking at, anyway?" Chase muttered. "If you're not gonna talk, could you at least keep lookout for me-"
Chase turned to glance over her shoulder and nearly swore as a dark figure turned the corner, heading down the street toward Chase. Chase threw herself between two buildings, holding a hand over her own mouth to keep quiet.
Her mind raced. Who was that? Who the fuck was left? It wasn't Valentina, that was for sure- Valentina was nowhere near that tall. She remembered Nine was tall, from their short meeting at the river, so maybe him?
A shadow loomed in the street, and Chase pressed herself up against the nearest building, holding her breath. The shadow grew taller, taller-
-not Jem.
It was a girl, she was pretty sure. Not one she really remembered. She had long hair in tangled braids, and leaned heavily on what looked like a stick but Chase feared was a spear. She wasn't moving quickly, but she was so tall. And she wasn't Valentina Gammon.
Chase couldn't get herself into this fight. She had priorities.
She bit down on her tongue as the girl limped down the dusty street. Every instinct screamed at her to squeeze her eyes shut, but she forced them to stay open and watch.
By the time sweat had run rivers down Chase's back, the girl's footsteps had faded from earshot. Chase unclamped her hand from her mouth, letting herself take a few deep breaths. She needed to calm down.
After counting to sixty twice, Chase finally poked her head out into the street again. Only ghosts once more. The girl with the 5 was still lingering.
"Good watch-keeping," Chase admitted.
No response.
Chase huffed and turned away, heading back toward the tunnel entrance.
The ghosts were everywhere.
It had gone from a few on each block to the streets absolutely swarming with them, and it was absolutely suffocating. Bastet wanted them the hell out of her way. Her hand kept twitching toward her knives, wanting to stab their unseeing eyes out.
(If ghosts were going to be shoved down their throat, couldn't Bastet at least see the one ghost she actually wanted to see?)
She slowed as the thought came to her. Nine was still out there, wasn't he? They'd gotten sidetracked by Tisiphone, but this wasn't over. There was still another chance to see her.
They had to take that chance.
"Nine?" she called. "Nine!"
The streets remained eerily silent. They spun around, the red-orange sky whirling above her head, to no avail.
"Nine!" she shouted. "Get the fuck out here! We're not done!"
They started walking again, picking up the pace with newfound direction. The town was burning- there were fewer places for Nine to hide now. He'd be smoked out eventually.
She didn't know how long she searched, walking through ghost after ghost after ghost. It probably wasn't as long as it felt, with their anger and desperation spiking every passing minute. She clutched her knives harder and harder, using the pain of them digging into their palms to keep them focused. They needed this. They needed her.
And then, finally, just when they thought they might break, she turned a corner and found him.
It was Nine, it had to be. Right height, same terrible posture, hat pulled low on his forehead the way he liked. He struggled with the same telltale limp, making his way slowly. He was veiled in smoke, making him difficult to make out, but Bastet didn't give a shit.
What they cared about was that he was facing away from them. That her ghost was within the smoke. Since Nine had already proven he didn't have the balls to kill Bastet, not when it came down to it, Bastet surged forward.
To her.
"I missed you," Bastet breathed.
They couldn't see her yet, but they knew she was there. They wished she'd turn around, she'd look at them instead of that Nine fucker.
(They wanted her warm brown eyes again.)
The words came pouring out faster and faster as they got closer.
"I didn't want you to leave," Bastet told her. "I- I never did. When you were gone and I was training without you- it was the worst time of my life. When you're gone everything is always so… so wrong.
"And I hate that you did that." Their cheeks were hot, and when they rubbed their forearm against her face, her shirt came away damp. "I- I didn't deserve that. You didn't deserve to take any hits for me. They were for me for a reason."
They were close enough now that they could see her silhouette.
"But I know why you did." She swallowed hard. "You keep l-leaving, and I'll keep finding you. I don't care how many times I have to. I'd- do anything."
A few feet away, Nine started to turn, bracing himself on his spear.
They reached out to her.
"For you, Ave," they said, her name gold and sweet on their tongue, "I'd do anything."
Their fingers passed through smoke.
Nine turned to look at them- no, not Nine, these were eyes she knew-
(-warm brown eyes-)
-but they were wrong, the warmth leached from them-
(-warm brown eyes went cold-)
-cold brown eyes locked with theirs.
Bastet shrieked, stumbling back. It was wrong, all wrong, they were supposed to be warm bright sugary like lemonade-
-they- they couldn't-
-be dead, not again-
-not again-
A soul-wrenched scream ripped from Bastet's lungs. They couldn't look away from the wrongness, the coldness brownness deadness, and they reached forward again-
(They'd hold her, they'd chase her forever, they'd do anything-)
-only to be met with a sharp burst of heat against her throat.
There was only cold after that.
Boom.
Tisiphone removed her spear from Bastet's neck. Bastet crumpled to the ground and didn't move.
No tears fell down her cheeks this time. None of Bastet's words had registered in her ears.
The cannon confirmed their death, so Tisiphone turned and walked away.
Two tributes left. Time to find them.
Valentina smashed her baseball bat into the nearest building as hard as she could. She didn't care about breaking it so much as she cared about making noise, but seeing chunks of wood go flying was still satisfying.
"Come and get me!" she shouted, bringing the bat down again and again. She paused, breathing, then added "Freak!" for good measure.
(As exhausted as she was, it was exhilarating to do something.)
(She… she was tired of these stupid games. She hated the feeling she was being toyed with. She wanted control back, she wanted victory, she wanted to stop fucking around for one damn minute and get this done.)
"Get over here!" she screeched. "This town ain't big enough for the both of-"
"The fuck are you doing?"
Valentina could suddenly feel the burn in her arms acutely. She stopped and turned to find none other than Chase Holloway, standing bloodied and haggard a few dozen feet away.
Valentina sneered at her. "What does it look like?"
Chase glanced from her to the broken planks of wood, then back at Valentina again, then shrugged.
Since she didn't feel like explaining herself, Valentina instead pointed the bat at Chase. "You've been following me for days, you weirdo," she said.
Chase's expression hardened. "You killed Fleur."
Something ignited in Valentina, something wild and panicky. "That wasn't me," she insisted. "That was Aescelin, that wasn't my fault. Look!" She gestured to Aescelin's useless ghost loitering behind her. "I took care of it! Like I always do!"
Chase didn't budge. "That was fucked up," she argued. "I- I saw them, what you did with the- with the cuts and the fire- and you didn't have to do that."
"That was him, not me-"
"You let him-"
"I killed him for it!" Valentina shrieked.
"Days later!" Chase shouted back. "You're just as insane as he was!"
Valentina stumbled as though struck. "That's not true."
"Why'd you stay with him, then-"
"That's not true," Valentina repeated. "That's not true, it's not-"
"It is!"
(She couldn't be tied to him, to what he'd done- she'd never live that way-)
"What was I supposed to do?" Valentina cried, her voice desperate even to her own ears. "He would've killed me- this is the Games, people freaking die! What were you expecting? You two would go skipping into the sunset together? You're the delusional one here! Not me!"
Silence.
Valentina panted, waiting to keep arguing, but Chase said nothing. Instead, she turned her face toward the sky, washing her face in red and orange and smoke, squeezing her eyes shut so tightly that Valentina thought she might cry.
But then she opened them. She set her jaw, and lowered her chin, and stared at Valentina with more rage than she'd ever seen in her life.
(It sent fear straight to Valentina's bones.)
Chase lunged forward, tearing into a sprint toward Valentina. As she ran, she picked up a broken plank of wood. Chase lifted it, screaming bloody murder as she closed the distance between them.
The fire was at Tisiphone's back. It pushed her deeper into town.
She put one foot in front of the other, leaning on her spear for support as she made her way forward.
As Chase got closer, Valentina swung her bat. Chase was faster, though; Valentina's arms had barely stretched toward her when Chase smashed the jagged wooden plank she'd picked up on Valentina's knuckles.
Valentina screeched, reflexively yanking her hands closer to herself to protect them. As she did, Chase went in for another strike, smacking the baseball bat itself. Valentina fumbled for it, but Chase was again faster, dropping her plank and yanking the bat free from Valentina's grip.
Valentina stumbled. And her eyes were wide.
(Chase could see it then, just how afraid this girl was. All the fake sweetness and smirks had vanished and been replaced by fear.
Good.)
It was Chase's turn to swing, and Valentina stepped back, narrowly avoiding the blow. Chase kept up a barrage, forcing Valentina back, back, back, through the alleys and buildings and streets, keeping her too busy to find a replacement weapon.
(It felt good to have this girl flee her. Unlike the days in the tunnels, Chase could see the terror in Valentina's eyes for herself.
But good wasn't enough. Chase wanted more.)
Valentina started coughing as the smoke became thicker. "Stop," she cried out. "We're- we're going the wrong- w-way-"
Chase ignored her, ignored the smoke in her nostrils, and swung again, forcing Valentina back.
She hadn't hit Valentina with it very much. She wanted Valentina to keep running.
(Chase had been running for so long.)
"Stop!" Valentina shrieked, stumbling back. "The- the fire-"
Valentina was right about one thing: it was close. Chase smiled.
Valentina went slack-jawed as the realization hit her.
"No," she said, her voice shaking. She raised her arms, holding her palms out toward Chase. "Wait- please-"
Chase swung, letting her bat connect with Valentina's hands. Valentina screamed, pulling them back, and from the way she was cradling her left hand, Chase could tell something was broken. Chase went low, forcing Valentina to take several steps backward to avoid getting hit again.
Valentina cast a look back at the wall of fire consuming the ghost town. When she turned back, Chase could see tears glistening on her cheeks.
(How fucking dare she cry right now. Chase doubted Valentina had any problem killing Fleur, and she had the nerve to cry and plead as her own end approached? Bullshit.)
Chase's barrage picked up speed. She swung again and again, forcing Valentina further and further back. The Seven girl pleaded and pleaded, but her pleas fell on deaf ears as Chase pushed forward.
Finally, Valentina stood with her back against the flames.
The heat licked at her heels. Valentina gasped for air through the smoke and the pain in her hand. It was hotter than any grill or oven she'd ever used.
(As a cook, she'd burned herself plenty of times, especially when she was younger. It made her better; taught her how not to make mistakes. But she'd never been stupid enough to sear more than her fingertips.
This fire wanted all of her.)
Chase was unrelenting. She hit Valentina's shoulder with the bat, and it hurt so much Valentina forgot to be humiliated by getting hit with her own weapon. She cried out, leaning back-
-right into the fire.
It latched onto her shirt, and Valentina's cry turned into a shriek. She threw herself at Chase, trying to get away, trying to get anywhere, but Chase responded with a grin and another blow to the ribs. Valentina was sent back into the fire- and it was burning now, really burning, and it was too hot-
(Valentina had never been in this much pain in her entire life. Her skin blistered and her hair turned to ash. Her clothes fed the flames. But the worst part was the smoke, the smell of her own burning body coating her nose and mouth and throat. She wanted to vomit, but there was nothing in her stomach to let her.)
"Please," Valentina begged. She pushed herself out of the flames again, back toward Chase, but Chase held firm.
(It wasn't her fault, Fleur wasn't her fault- and she'd already paid for that death- she'd lost her precious barbeque, could never stand over a grill again- she'd lost everything, lost herself- she'd just wanted to live- she didn't want to be burned-!)
It happened again and again. Valentina dragged herself out of the fire, screaming and crying and begging, and Chase sent her back, again and again and again, slowly roasting her. Chase was burning now, too, bits of her clothes and hair alight, but she wasn't panicking. She calmly patted the embers out and knocked Valentina back in.
"Please, please," Valentina wept, her voice reduced to a croak. She nearly gagged on the smell of burning flesh in her throat. She was on the ground now, too weak to stand, and she crawled forward, reaching for Chase's ankles.
(She was too close-)
Stars erupted across her vision as Chase slammed the bat against her head. Chase kicked her back into the fire, and she screamed again as the flames welcomed her back.
She reached forward, sinking her nails into the ground, to drag herself out again. Her arms shook, and she couldn't look at them anymore, couldn't take in how much had been burned away. She tried to pull herself, but one hand was broken, and the other had lost any strength it had left.
Above her, just beyond the flames, Chase loomed, Valentina's own bat primed for another round. The figure was getting fainter, and Valentina couldn't hold her head up any longer.
"Please," Valentina whispered, the words dribbling from blistered lips. No one was listening. "Please… please…"
(Valentina Gammon was always so close, but never enough.)
(Some faraway part of her wondered why she'd ever hoped that would change.)
Boom.
Tisiphone was close.
The fire pressed against her back, ushering her forward. The more steps she took, the more she caught glimpses of a tribute through the smoke.
She kept walking.
Chase stared at the flames. Valentina's body sizzled, still burning.
It was getting harder to keep her smile on her face. Her arms ached. Her shoulders drooped.
She reached a tentative hand toward the wall of fire.
(She wanted it to warm her again, to fill her stomach like a full dinner. Chase could feel her anger fading, slipping through her fingers every time she grasped to take hold of it again. She needed it, though. She couldn't take the emptiness. She didn't want the anger to go away.)
The fire warmed her hand, but nothing more.
(Her knuckles twinged, reminding Chase of breaking Spark's nose. How it felt so good to break that fucker's face after what he did- after turning them in to the Peacekeepers, getting Tye killed- but then her eyes stung, too, and she remembered how she'd cried for hours afterward.)
A lump grew in her throat. She wanted warm arms around her. She wanted her rage to blind her to how fucking alone she always was.
(She wanted home. But Chase Holloway knew better than anyone that home wasn't a place - it was people.
She'd never been able to hold on to those.)
She heard the scuff of boots on dust from behind her. Chase turned, baseball bat heavy in her hands, her own back against the fire now.
A tribute emerged from the smoke like a phantom. It was the one Chase had seen earlier. The girl leaned heavily on a spear, one of her legs tightly bandaged. She looked like hell.
She wasn't someone Chase really remembered. Chase didn't know if that helped or not.
The girl didn't say anything. Chase didn't either. She just lifted her bat, arms aching, and prepared to fight. With a wordless cry, she launched herself at the tribute.
Chase swung her bat. The girl met it with her spear. The girl jabbed at Chase's head, and she ducked. Chase managed to hit the girl's shoulder, but didn't elicit much of a reaction. Instead, the girl maneuvered her spear like a staff, cracking it against Chase's ankles. Chase yelped and tripped, sprawling on the ground.
Chase gasped, trying not to panic. She pushed herself onto all fours and scrambled up, reaching for the girl's leg wound. She tore at the dressings, unraveling the tourniquet holding everything in place. The girl quickly shoved Chase off, sending her back to the ground, but the damage had already been done. Blood poured from the wound in her thing, and what Chase could see of it looked terrible.
Chase panted, waiting for the girl to react.
But there was nothing.
Tisiphone didn't feel anything.
(Tiss was somewhere behind herself… floating. Separate.)
(Alone was better.)
Chase's jaw went slack as the girl ignored the blood and looked straight at Chase.
Chase scrambled back to her feet, grabbing her fallen bat as she did. She raised it, disregarding the leg wound and now aiming for the girl's head.
Before she could finish her swing, heat blossomed in the pit of her stomach.
Chase looked down.
The girl's spear was stuck in her gut.
Chase screamed, losing her hold of the bat. The other girl pulled, ready to remove the spear, but Chase held on. She needed the spear to stay in in order to stay alive.
(She needed the warmth. The fullness.)
The other girl pulled again, but Chase grabbed the shaft of the spear and pulled back. She pulled so hard the spear went deeper. Chase cried out, but she still couldn't bring herself to let go. She reached and yanked again, harder and harder, screaming as she pushed herself closer, closer, the spearhead tearing through her insides and out her back.
Finally, she was only a few inches away.
Her mouth was full of blood. It started to overflow as she opened her mouth, and she had to spit a wad of red saliva into the dirt before she could get her words out.
"Hold me," Chase begged. "Please."
(Tiss was still far, far away. She still couldn't hear a thing.)
Chase could feel herself weakening. She didn't know when she'd started crying. Blood gushed down her front, down her back, and dripped from her mouth. The world was spinning, blurring out the girl's face.
No arms embraced her.
Chase Holloway closed her eyes. She let go of the spear, and with the last bit of life in her, she wrapped her arms around herself.
Boom.
The other tribute slumped over Tisiphone's spear. Tisiphone dropped it, letting the girl fall to the ground.
Wind began to whip around her. Tisiphone looked up; a Capitol hovercraft was above her, metal claws descending toward both her and the dead girl.
A wave of dizziness hit her. She looked back down.
Her entire leg was painted red. She'd lost too much blood.
(Far, far away, Tiss closed her eyes, empty and numb and alone.)
The claw enveloped her, and the world went dark.
4th: bastet avarne, d2 (killed by tisiphone fotis)
3rd: valentina gammon, d7 (killed by chase holloway)
2nd: chase holloway, d5 (killed by tisiphone fotis)
VICTOR: tisiphone fotis, d4
final kill count:
aveline: 1 (bryony)
invincible: 3 (jude, jest, jem)
bastet: 3 (zinnia, chevre, tomo)
mercury: 1 (shazia)
tisiphone: 4 (true, brizo, bastet, chase)
brizo: 1 (rumi)
chase: 1 (valentina)
valentina: 1 (aescelin)
aescelin: 2 (mercury, fleur)
jem: 2 (aveline, invincible)
patrek: 1 (wisdom)
mendi: 2 (tiernan, patrek)
featured ghosts:
astrid galilei, d5, the false fate of mallory catelli (killed by rory hutchinson)
thank you so, so much to all four submitters of these tributes: laney, queen of mourning, jay, and nell. bas, tina, chase, and tiss have been with me for two full years now, and i don't take that lightly.
bastet was fascinating to me from the beginning, and as soon as i read their form i knew they'd be a major player in this story. you complicated mess of a cat girl... i could always rely on you for an out of pocket comment or scathing internal monologues, which were often very fun. you had some highlight moments in the fic for me (the pool... faking amnesia... nonsense lesbianism...) and i am glad that while you couldn't have your happy ending here, you and ave are happy together in another universe.
tina was submitted and i knew i needed that girl immediately. i always had a blast when it was time to write tina, from the plots with aescelin to her pranks to her adoration for the art of barbeque. truth be told, she was supposed to go out several chapters ago and i simply could not do that. she girlbossed me. i have no shame about it. i loved her sneakiness and passion and attitude. she was both absurd and deeply sixteen years old, vivid and larger than life, and it made me fall in love with her.
chase stole my heart so fast. she was so smart and big-hearted and goofy and i never ever knew what was going to come out of her mouth (lizards? eggs? licking poles? yolo?). she was just always so incredibly clear to me. in case you can't tell i literally put off killing her until i couldn't put it off anymore. chase my darling i'm so sorry about this. you deserve so, so, so much better than everything you ever got. you grew up too fast and died too young and i will miss you forever. i love u.
and of course...
TISIPHONE! YOU'RE NOT DEAD! i have so many feelings about you it's not even funny. there have been multiple tissays (tiss essays) in people's dms in the last month. i love you dearly. we are going to have so much fun together! there's a lot i um. have planned for you... but rn i am so proud. i knew you could do it. #tisswins REAL. nell i'd say i'm sorry but i'm highkey not. how dare u predict exactly what i was doing in our dms in february. i love ur daughter and have no regrets! ! !
damn. we r really here right now. crazy. ummmm i have two epis planned as of rn: one for victor and one to wrap up the fic and propel us into the future. and then summary chapter of course. maybe that'll change idk. but that's the plan for Rn. ik a lot of you are interested in next fic things but i'm not planning to announce anything until jan 2025 bc. i need a lil break and also epi writing time. we're gonna get an interlude fic tho in case u were worried :)
thank u to vee for the beta :heart: and to all my spoiler buddies for hanging in there w me
thank u again to my finalist submitters, ily to my dead children, and congrats to tiss & nell! very pleased that i no longer need to keep this secret. thanks to everyone who's read this far, particularly those who've been in it all along. i'll get sappy about everyone again at the very end but for now i will end it there.
ily bye