Althea Khamuel
Twenty-four / District Two Victor

Althea sits on the front steps to the Academy, working a cigarette between her index and middle fingers. Snow flutters slowly around her, the stone stairway chilling her through her pants, and the ends of her limbs beginning to sting from the nipping air. Still, this is infinitely better than staying inside.

She blows out the smoke, coughing as it leaves her lungs. She should really stop doing this. Conri says she has a problem, and she knows that. She just doesn't care to quit. It's too easy of a solution to her other much more important problems.

Reaching the end of her cigarette, she flicks it onto the step and crushes it beneath her boot. It leaves a gray imprint in the light layer of snow.

Inside the Academy, Conri is giving one of his yearly prep speeches to precede the Chosen Volunteer brackets. Later this afternoon, everybody will gather in the stadiums to watch the first lineup of kids spar. It's supposed to be the biggest event of the year, just behind the Hunger Games themselves, and she's supposed to be one of four great faces behind it… but the thought of showing up makes her want to vomit. There's a reason she didn't eat anything for breakfast.

There's a level of guilt that comes with training and herding kids into the arena, one that her two fellow Victors don't seem to share with her. Poor scraps genuinely believe they're doing something good for their District, huh? For their country, if they can dare to dream that big. Do they think that this made them any different? Special? More deserving of the Capitol's love? Reality is a bitch, but she isn't going to be the one to break it to them. They'll figure it out in their own time, they always do.

You can always tell the moment when the realization sinks in.

Althea is fine with playing along. She wouldn't dare say she enjoys indulging in the lie, but it's not like it's against her morals to lie to a bunch of overzealous kids. Every single one of the trainees that go through her are all the same; they all remind her agonizingly of herself at their age. It's humiliating how wrapped up in the lie she was. And yet, it's all anybody ever wants to talk about; how many people she has saved and will continue to save because of her Victory. How closer to the heavens and the Capitol she has put them, by proving one thing: they are better.

The outlier Districts are venomous, rabid, unclean. But here in Two, they aren't so vulnerable to such sins. Their strengths give them self control and in turn, value. They aren't to flinch, they aren't to weep and certainly not for those animals that claw and tear down their walls and strike for where it hurts— not where it would kill. Their mercy-kills for those dogs make them human.

Althea has to admit she has never felt more like a dog herself, with teeth too overgrown for her lips, than she did at this time of year. She's brought it up to Conri more than once, the weight on her shoulders and the heaviness of her eyelids, and he scolds her for such foolish thinking everytime. She did everything perfectly, the way she was supposed to and the way she was taught— why does she feel as if she failed?

But yet she stands in front of her trainees, holding that longsword that not even she can pry out of her own hands, and knows she's a beacon of hope. Her light is infectious. Every single soul in that room can pull themselves out of their holes left behind in the war, and she can show them how. She can smile with her pretty, intact teeth and twist her eyes to look menacing and watch as they mimick every single motion in desperation to follow her lead. Her perfect, flawless victory.

That, right there, is her failure.

Holding the truth is where she's failing. There's nothing on the other side that is worth your mortality. She's aware that those kids are slipping through her fingers; if not dead in the arena they would die on the gymnasium floor while everybody pretends their failure makes them scum— or, worse, they would go home, alive, but a failure. They don't know any better. When she had that sparkle in her eyes, she didn't know either.

All Althea can think about is the dozens of students in there, taking in Conri's words and, to a degree, letting it resonate with them. Stretching the truth so thin he can wrap it around their faces and smother them with it, while she sits here and does nothing.

But why do anything? She can't shatter the hope of an entire District. And he tells her that frequently, with his voice low and dangerous, the way he only does in serious situations when real stakes are in the matter. He tells her she's the one keeping them from splintering apart again, in a way neither him nor Pyrite are capable of doing.

Being Panem's darling kind of fucking sucks.

Her pure existence, every step and every move, pushes hundreds of lives closer or further from the heavenly heart that is the Capitol. Ideally, the District could get on the President's good graces and receive freedom and riches and become a little mini-Capitol— this is Conri's ultimate goal— but Althea's coming to the realization that that will never happen.

More than likely, they're laughing at Two's efforts.

(And, like a fool, she's playing straight into it.)

Jules leans closer to Althea, pretending to stretch to only to drape their left arm over the back of the chair and onto her shoulder, like they're stealthy or charming.

Althea gives them an amused look out of the corner of her eye. They squint, trying to read her expression, then use their free prosthetic arm to adjust their collar nervously, like their bowtie suddenly started choking them.

"Is this okay?" They ask.

Althea smiles. "Yeah, that's okay." She isn't sure why they're so doubtful, they've been official for two days now.

The pair is sitting in the District Three suite, on the loveseat in the corner of the room, watching the Ninety-Third Games unfold in front of their eyes. They both have a tribute in top eight— in Althea's case, both of hers were still kicking it— and tomorrow, interviews will be sent out, including the mentors. That means a hell of commotion. But for tonight, it's just the two of them.

A Career and an Outlier. It's funny, almost. Getting so close to somebody so lowly should be sending alarm signals all throughout Althea's body— she should be flinching away, curling her lip in disgust at the mere idea of building a deeper relationship with somebody like them. But Althea's tired of pretending she ever believed that in the first place. As far as she's concerned, when she leans over and plants a kiss on Jules's cheek, it's the same skin that she has. The same muscles, veins, nerves, arteries, organs. They are equal, her and Jules, they're one.

Flustered, they pull away from her. "Woah. So soon?"

"Hey," Althea says, her voice soft but firm. She talks to her trainees the same way, when they need the leader to knock some sense into them. "I love you. It's not too soon."

Sure, maybe they have only known each other for two weeks, got close just because their tributes' paths keep crossing, but for some reason Althea has never been more sure of herself. She grabs Jules's hands, metal and flesh alike, and stares into their blue eyes. They blink back, like they don't know what's happening, leaning in curiously.

"Oh, okay. I love you too," they murmur, a tentative smile spreading across their face.

Althea doesn't really know what's happening either. She's deviating from her role, feeling things she hasn't felt towards people she shouldn't, daring to form her own opinion. But she's been doing this for the past year, hasn't she? The second she emerged from the arena with her hands stained with the blood of innocents, the same warm sticky blood she had bled out, she started changing, becoming somebody new.

She's more than ready to shed her skin now.

Beside Althea, Pyrite cheers out, her voice lost to the crowds gathered beneath them, sitting in the stands overlooking the colosseum, just as equally thrilled and boisterous as she is.

Everybody involved with the Academy, from students themselves to secondary trainers to family and friends, are gathered to watch the great tournament for this year's tributes. They're down to the final bracket. Typically, competitors fight until one backs down and surrenders, but Althea knows how they train their kids; their only surrender is in death.

Her fellow Victor's voice grates her brain, already overwhelmed and on-edge. She has the same moral issue every year— how can anybody be so enthusiastic about this? There's this stabbing pain in her gut, like she just had a sword taken through her abdomen, fiery hot and all-too fake.

"I— I've got to go..," she spits out, temporarily reaching out and using Pyrite's shoulder to keep herself upright as she turns and stumbles back into the hallways of the colosseum. She doesn't bother to stick around to see how Harley kills off that poor kid, as impalement wasn't enough to end his life the first time. It'd be the last kill to earn themselves a slot in the Hunger Games.

Althea can see Pyrite turning and watching her go, concern flashing across her face for a moment.

She has to get out of here.

Numbly, she makes her way down the stairs, descending each level further and further until she sees light spilling into the stone structure. It leads her outside, where the cold air greets her, wrapping around her entire body like a lifeline.

She doesn't realize how much she was overheating until she stumbles into the frost-covered grass, her legs too shaky to keep herself upright. She clutches her churning stomach, and a part of her brain is surprised when her hands turn up clean, not soaked in her own blood. But that wasn't her in that colosseum, not anymore.

Althea remembers the two girls she killed in her tournament— not by name; but by face, by identity. Back then, she believed her cause was good and the deaths necessary, it hadn't crossed her mind what a loss it was. It was the same case with the five tributes she killed in her arena, surrounded by tall pine trees and the rushing of that creek— all faces, no names. That made seven.

She slumps down into the grass, pressing the side of her face against the cold soil, and begins to count on her fingers. An entire ten kids from the Academy were sent into the arena, not one made it home— she extends her fingers, one for each of them, then clenches her fists. Seventeen.

Seventeen lives taken needlessly because of her.

It's not even in her capacity to cry anymore. She can't, not here, not now, not when so many people are inside that building. So many people who look up to her. She picks herself up from the dirt and rubs it off her cheek, standing up despite her shakiness. She needs something to calm her nerves— she instinctively pats her pockets, only to find them empty. She releases a trembling breath, the vapor from her lips visible in the air.

She has to get out of here.

Jules Aition
Twenty-three / District Three Victor

"Kyrell," Jules warns, "Be careful with that now."

Jules watches as their not-so-little sister operates their drone, flying it around their backyard. Powerlines linger menacingly above the flying metallic bug, threatening to zap their hard work in a second and reduce it to a useless pile of scraps. Does she even know how long it took to get that remote control connected?

Kyrell gives them a glance which they see out of the corner of their eye. "I'm careful."

"Could you just fly a little lower, please?" They beg.

"Yeah, I can." She slowly releases the button that keeps accelerating it upwards until it's on level with the tops of their heads instead. It flies around like a beetle would, its machinery inside whirring like the rapid fluttering of wings— it's kind of cute. It has an antennae and everything, but that's the only way Jules could get it synced with the remote.

Truly, a great feat considering they never graduated secondary school.

Lately, most of their days are spent tinkering with little robots and repairs in the house (it's a big house, always something). They're very happy like this. The other day, they got a chance to tear apart an old car and bring its parts to their shed, which they also built, and that just made their whole month.

Of course, the bigger projects are difficult to do one-armed, so Jules frequently enlists the help of their older brother Connell for more of the heavy-lifting. But he doesn't understand a thing about mechanisms or wires or even coding. That was all Jules's thing. Well, more like it became their thing after their Victory; when the Capitol permanently hard-wired a prosthetic arm to their leftover nerves after they blew off most of their actual arm on a minefield, they figured they should learn about what the hell was attached to them.

And sure, it functions like an arm, they can make a fist just fine, they can even feel objects in their palm, but it just wasn't flesh and in practice that psyched them out too badly, so they don't get a lot of use out of it. It's really fucked up if you think about it, but they don't think about it often. They have better things to think about now.

Their RC-Bug Drone Thing beeps at them from up above, beginning to lower itself down from the sky. Jules rushes out across the yard and grabs it before it can take a tumble into the grass; they've yet to discover how durable it is, they're not going to take any risks. Not after all the effort they put into building it. They turn it over, checking out any wear, then beams at their sister.

"Whaddya think?" They ask, bounding back over to her.

"Mhm, yeah, it's cool." Suddenly, Kyrell looks really stern. "Now when's the last time you ate? Or slept?"

"Um—"

She frowns. "C'mon, man, you've been tinkering with this thing for so long I don't think I've seen you in days."

Well, they've eaten sometime, because they're not very hungry right now. They don't really remember what they had, though. And they've dozed off at their desk once or twice since they've started messing with the Bug, so yes, they have slept. "I'm fine," they say, because they are.

Kyrell squints like she doesn't believe them. "Alright…" she mumbles. They've been through this before. "But if you ever need anything, let me know."

"Yep. I will." They flash her a thumbs-up, and she rolls her eyes and walks back into the house.

Althea tugs the upper layer of Jules's blonde hair back into a ponytail. There were a lot of things in their life that changed with the rediscovery of their identity, but their hair is unchangeable— it will always remain at length with their collarbone.

Althea looks depressed today. Jules can see her expression in the mirror behind theirs— her face perfectly real and authentic and miserable. They don't get to see her like this often. She's always in front of the cameras and playing a character. Their alone time is fleeting, and it always has been.

They understand how much she hates being in the Capitol during the Hunger Games season. They know a lot of things, but they never know how to help with this. What's the point of being so damn smart, then?

They move around to throw their arms over her shoulders (she usually hugged low), giving her a tight squeeze. Because they're a good head taller than Althea, she can bury her head in their chest and just breathe for a moment. They stand in silence in the bathroom, swaying gently to a silent beat. This is what people do to comfort another, right? It seems to be working.

"Alright," Althea sighs after a moment, like she's finally ready to face the day. Her face is now straight and unemotive, conformed to her character again. "We've got to go. I'll see you down at the party, okay?"

Jules nods. "Okay. See ya."

Watching Althea go, a chill descends their body where she was once pressed against them. She's taught them a lot over the past year of their relationship, like romantic love and communication, but with that came a newfound emotion: loneliness. They hadn't known longing and missing somebody so deeply was a thing they're capable of until they had something that touched their heart— fit into their life like a piece they didn't know was missing. Well, they know now.

They're not sure what to do about this newfound array of emotions. How is it possible to feel this? It's weird. It crawls beneath their skin like bugs (ew, don't think like that), or more like butterflies fluttering in their stomach (that's still bad).

They have to stop thinking like that. What they have to do now is go down to that party at the base floor of the Tribute Center and pretend like they don't know their girlfriend and bring in sponsorships for their tributes. They know those poor things don't stand a chance, and neither did last year's. They could only outlast for so long, and these guys will do the same, following Jules's example— but unlike them, there is almost a zero chance of those guys going home.

(It's just really, really hard to get attached to people you know are going to die.)

Jules pulls their suit jacket over their shoulders, leaving it unbuttoned to hide the shape of their body. They are always hiding themselves, wearing only long sleeves with gloves in public to hide their abnormal arm and keep the stares away. Crowds are scary. This is scary.

(They aren't a liar, not really, but they have to be one in public. Do you have a lover yet, Jules? Those Capitolites ask all the time, you're quite a beautiful woman, and you're wealthy now (you're welcome!), I'd be surprised if you were still single. And everytime Jules has to laugh and go well, no. I'm perfectly single, and I intend to stay that way.

No they don't. No they aren't. They're none of that. They're not single, they're not beautiful, they're not a—)

They splash some water on their face. Just until tonight. They have to stay at that party and linger at the edge of the crowd and talk to some straying Capitolites and hope their tributes are more charismatic than they are so they get some money— then it'll be done. Then they'll be alone and real again, not fake and metal. Not something the Capitol made of them, but something they've made themselves.

That's only, like, what— eight hours? Christ. But they'll get through it, they always do.

Whenever Jules is between projects, they begin to lose their mind.

They rub the fingers on their left hand across their upper arm on the right, where skin becomes metal. It tingles and aches at the meeting point, and they've become hyper-aware of that sensation now that their brain is cleared. They dig into it, tugging at their arm, trying to get between the two parts— one real, and one fake.

Many parts of them are fake. Their organs aren't theirs— when shrapnel went completely through their abdomen, their expendable insides were removed, and the necessary ones were borrowed from somebody else. Who it was, Jules doesn't know. They don't know who they've become.

Nobody knows that part, though. It happened on the inside, leaving nothing but tiny incisions along their stomach. Nor does anybody know of several of their bones held together by metal. Those went unnoticed, too. But they know. And with no distractions to keep it off their mind, they remember.

Suddenly, their body becomes very heavy.

They sit back down at their desk, turning away from the full-length mirror across their office. They tap their fingers— all five of them— against the wood surface. With their recent scrap metal project being finished, the area was cleared, and now it's empty and desolate. Normally they have a long queue of things to accomplish, but without much else to do in their life they blew through the entire list. Now they're… lost, maybe? Or maybe this is just what boredom feels like.

That's new too. Their life before the Games was a lot of moving around, relocating, trying to outrun the loan sharks that were after their father. That was fun for a while, always having their life on the line, until that line finally snapped and left three children orphaned, shackled with the debt that he left behind.

It should be obvious where the story goes from here— the price of Victory was too tempting for a seventeen year old Jules who didn't really think too hard about the consequences. They'll be honest about that, it was a stupid fucking decision— if not easily justified. At the time, they didn't want Connell to be stressed with running between his three different jobs, or for Kyrell to be sick with anxiety of the loan sharks returning. Honestly, they just wanted their siblings back.

Apparently, that came with the cost of Jules's life.

Now, they have more money than they knew what to do with. It certainly smoothed down their siblings' rough edges, so they guess it was worth it (and they got Althea out of it too, so…). But right now, they're scratching at their stomach until it turns red, clawing at something they'd never be able to reach. Goodness, they want to see their organs with their own eyes. They imagine the replacements are discolored, fakes next to their real intestines; but they only think like that when they're lost… or bored… or whatever this is.

They need something to do. Their hands itch to move.

Can't one of their siblings be gracious enough to damage something so badly they have to crawl through the belly of the house for days to fix it? That happened once with the plumbing. That was fun. If not, they can always go and smash the microwave and try to rebuild it piece by piece…

Overhead, the lights flicker. Rain slams against the window, and it has been for a while now that they think about it, and the next crack of lightning is met by the rumbling of thunder not a second later. Jules jumps up to their feet right as the lights give one last flash and dies, drowning them in a sudden darkness. When the backup generator doesn't power on, they're already at the front door, tugging their raincoat over their shoulders.

"Jules!" Kyrell shouts from the top of the stairs, leaning forward like she was planning to rush down and grab them herself. "You can't go out in that weather!"

"Uh-huh… I'll just be a moment!" They look up at their sister and smile, zipping up their jacket.

Any final complaints she has falls on deaf ears as Jules runs out into the storm and around the side of the house, the thoughts of their mismatched body long gone in favor of a new project.

Cressida Ballade
Twenty-five / District One Victor

CW: drug use

Nowadays, Cressida lives her life by letter.

When the Capitol sends her one, somehow always finding her no matter where she was, it's sealed with a wax stamp and written with pen and quill. It makes her chuckle every time; do they really need to be doing all of that?

She's sitting on a train departing from District Six and heading towards Eight, tucked in the corner of a car full of hefty boxes, with her sniper rifle across her lap and the letter clutched between her fingers, and she reads it thoroughly. They apologize for the delays on her payments with what she'd imagine to be a shrug and wave of their hands, then goes on to assign her the next victim like she wasn't left without this week's pick-me-up. That pissed her off. She wanted to find those stupid Capitolites on the backend and give them a piece of her mind… if she knew who they were.

Cressida doesn't know much. She only knows that a few times a month she receives an assignment, a victim she has to put a bullet through, and they aren't always a District One citizen. Frequently, she makes secret trips across all of Panem, just to shoot some guy and be gone with the wind again; and in return, the Capitol sends her that stupid drug she's dependent on.

If she didn't know better, she'd assume that the people addressing her were the creators of the stuff, but since she knows those mad scientists are long dead— her victory ensured that— she knows that couldn't be right. Either way, the Big Guys have a hold on production and have her bound like a dog to a chain. They aren't even honest either, they're beginning to miss their deliveries and leave her without for a few days. Not good.

Cressida leans back against the boxes, holding onto her shotgun like she's afraid it would float away if she let it go. Of course, she's going to go through with all of her assignments, because she's not the best gunslinger North of the Capitol for nothin'.

But once she finds those responsible… it's on sight.

She gives her letter another quick read through. She's heading towards Eight, which is her least favorite place with its Peacekeeper scene. Actually, she hates all the urban Districts for that reason. They make her job harder, but really, over the years, she's come across every scenario there is to experience when you're an international assassin. Dare she say… it's become easy. She doesn't have an ego, that's a fact; she hasn't spent her entire life with a crossbow in hand just to be shit at aiming.

Anyways, there's this man in Eight. He's getting a little too big for his shoes, apparently, and thinks he can ascend to Capitol status if he accumulates enough money… money launderer, of course. Those kinds of people scare the Capitol the most— they have all economies under strict control to keep everyone in line; what would be considered "rich" and "upper-class" in the Districts are middle-class at best in the Capitol. It's why Victors are put on salary, rather than accumulating all their money at once.

So, in short, this guy is raising eyebrows. He has to go.

Alright, Cressida thinks with a shrug. Get him in the night from the outside-in and somebody will end up stumbling onto his body in his wannabe mansion, but by then she'll be long gone. No trace, no evidence but a broken window and a corpse and a breeze in the air. She smiles to herself as a plan unfolds in the back of her head; damn, she's clever.

The lines between her own skills and what the drug gives her are blurred, to put it simply. Her skill with guns and long-ranged weapons are all hers, accumulated from years of harsh training both in the academy and not, but her reaction time and foresight is... well, sharp. It can't possibly be natural.

They say the extra skills are why they were given the drug to begin with - "they" being her and the other child soldiers she was raised with. To create the perfect tribute, to hone man's natural abilities and instincts about as close as they could get to superpowers. It was a dangerous and controversial project; Cressida's the only one to have lived this far.

The rest of them were either taken by withdrawals, or their hearts just simply stopped when it was injected into their bloodstream for the first time. Lucky her for being the strongest, now she gets to play puppet!

You know, as a treat, when she blows this guy's brains out, she's going to imagine it's the head of the Big Man instead.

The night is quiet. Mr. LaPointe's two-story house went from a shape on the horizon to looming above her menacingly, like a giant thick tree. She walks through the garden, her shotgun locked and loaded, her steps making no sound.

Cressida huffs. There isn't any way to get to the second floor from outside, not one that wouldn't botch her aim; she sighs and reluctantly admits sneaking inside is the only way to get to him. Why is she so hesitant? Not like he has any sort of family living with him for her to disturb. He's a lonely, greedy man and he'll die that way.

She pushes open the front doors and steps into the entrance -

Her boots dig into the loose soil beneath her feet, and it takes her a second to gain her footing. To her left, water rushes in a stream, and to her right, it's a wide expansive jungle. Actually, it's all jungle, everywhere as far as her eye can see (and she can see far); branches and shrubs tangle at her feet and low-hanging leaves brush at the top of her head, like the forest is reaching out to grab her.

How is she supposed to find one boy in this mess? It's like finding a needle in a haystack.

Flies buzz by her ear. She swats them away, then returns her hand to her crossbow, holding it half-out in front of her for quick attacks. It's always good to be prepared from any sneak group attacks— the outliers are mostly divided into three big alliances this year, which isn't good for Cressida nor Khali. As messy and untrained as they are, her odds dwindle when it's five against one.

It's been a while since she split up with Khali. She can only hope he's doing okay— as for her, her skin is beginning to itch and her tongue is bone-dry despite all the water packs she has. Not good. Maybe he's doing better, or maybe he's doing worse, crumpled into a ball somewhere and begging for the visions to end. For both of their sakes, she hopes he's still holding on stron-

He's in front of her.

Cressida snaps her head up, her weapon already aimed at his head. It's not Khali, it's the Big Man. His face is as clear as day, yet as blind as the night; whenever she thinks she can see him, all identifying features dissipate. When she pulls the trigger, the Arrow - Bullet - never launches, and he's still standing in front of her, laughing, a needle perched between his fingers like he's preparing to stab her with it.

The Crossbow - Shotgun - clatters against the Grass - Tiles - her hands too shaky to keep holding it. But then Khali's in front of her, placing it gingerly back into her hands, curling her fingers around its Wooden - Metallic - body.

She doesn't understand; does he want her to go through with this? Khali was always bloodthirsty, a very unfortunate trait for a One volunteer, but a good one to have for their situation— for her to justify this. He would want her to do this.

Kill them. Kill them for what they did to us.

His blood is everywhere. Khali wheezes his final breath, and bleeds out from an arrow (not a bullet) through his chest, his ending merciful and quick. Not like their other victims, with their heads blown straight-through. Cressida's own head spins. How did she get to the top of this hill? It's such a long way down. She's so dizzy, and the flies are growing louder, and her hands are starting to twitch and her vision is growing blurry.

He was doing a lot better than she was, before she took her arrow through his heart. He rationed his supply of the drug, his mind was as clear as day by the time their last sponsorship ran out. The golden liquid sits in his veins still, while hers ran its course days ago.

He's made of the stuff.

Choking back her instinct to pull away and gag, she digs her teeth into his arm until she draws his blood. It settles on her tongue, dripping into the back of her throat.

This is the part of victory Panem would never know about.

The train rumbles beneath her.

Cressida's mind is empty. She's hearing normally again, the car floor sends chills down her spine, and all her pain fades with the memories— including the memory of how she got here.

Carefully, she flexes each of her limbs, testing for injury; when nothing screams back at her, she slowly sits up. Nothing, not even a headache, meets her. She's completely unscatched, which is lucky of her, considering she just… Well, no, she didn't. She won six years ago now, not last night. Last night she killed Mr. Lapointe in his home by beating in his skull with the butt of her shotgun.

She lifts her head, noticing the empty needle sitting on the other side of the car. Her forearm itches from where it was inserted into her, but it was a clean job, much cleaner than she ever does (but of course, she only shoots herself up when she grows shaky and darkness begins to press into the corners of her eyes). Her best guess is somebody was sent to fetch her from the mansion, when they noticed she was deviating from her job. They're always watching.

But what did they expect from her? They left her to go cold turkey for an entire week. Did they not learn from the first time… are they stupid, or something?

First time around, a lot of funds and time were spent painting her image carefully. She became the sneaky sniper in the trees, hiding her beauty behind the shadow of her hood. Her kills were quick and clean and entirely off-screen, and the only time she was seen in full was in the finale, with her blue eyes sparkling with a newfound life, blonde hair neatly pulled back into a ponytail. Her smile was bloody but in an attractive way, a way the Capitolites went wild for.

You would think they knew better than to let her go a week without another hit. Stupid bastards made her both a junkie and an image of beauty, the One standard. If she wasn't running around killing people for a living, she knows for a fact they'd be keeping her in the Capitol and—

God, the tonal difference makes her laugh. Out here, she's withdrawing and hallucinating, bludgeoning people with a weapon she could've killed them with from yards away; but in front of the cameras, she's petite and pretty and she speaks sensually and she knows how to catch people's attention.

Cressida grimaces. They better love their pretty little doll now, because when that anonymous face stands in front of her, it won't be possible to wipe any trace of their encounter from the public.

They'll all know what they've done to her.

Something something Full Confession… shrugs and walks away.

Thx for ama for betaing this again . Final stretch to intros Smiles.