THERE WAS A SAYING, a phrase in some long-dead language of the old world lost to time and war and the dust that settled on top of it to form Panem, that the trainers back home in the Academy used to use. E tan é epi tas. With your shield or on it. Roughly, that translated to: come back alive and victorious or don't come back at all.

When she was younger and only just coming to terms with the fact that the Games were her only ticket out of her miserable life, desperate to score herself into the shape of a winner, of a Career tribute, Iko didn't quite understand the platitude. Victory meant coming home. In her head, being alive at the end of it all meant coming home a victor. She didn't grasp the concept until later, when she was much older, much wiser, much more versed in the language of violence and its unforgiving and unforgiven nature. That was the problem with the gilded word "glory", coated in teflon and sun-bright, attractive to everybody who ever craved livelihood in District 2.

If she wanted to come home, Iko had to give them all a show. She was the smallest of the Career pack, the dullest in appearance. Alex—he was naturally attractive, a beacon guiding attention to him even when he didn't intend to, which was most of the time. Titus was the same, though his entitlement displaced his charm. Opal, she was tall, a strong swordsman. Sage's red hair made her noticeable, and she was loud, a burning bonfire of a presence nobody could ignore. And Elias was build like a brick wall. Even if his performance was lacking, and his morality was holding him back, they'd always watch out for him in periphery, just to see what he could do.

Iko didn't have those luxuries. Even though Alex couldn't bear to look at her now, he'd understand. In time, he would. But Iko feared that time wasn't going to be on their side. Although there was always an expiration date on the silence wedged between them, this no-man's land of words snagged in the barbed wire, nothing going across, nothing to be said that knew how to be said, the end was coming. Quicker than they'd realise.

They were an exhausted line-up, nine tributes at the end of their proverbial ropes, strung out on the fumes of sleep and the promise of an end. Not quite in sight yet, but close.

As they trudged through the foliage, Iko avoided touching as many plants as she could. Titus' blisters had dulled overnight into an angry rash that spread up his wrist, and even with a solution, Iko didn't want to risk anything. That, and the inviolable fact that Titus wouldn't be willing to share. Especially with her. Despite the ointment, he'd been scratching all night, and they'd found blood under his fingernails come morning. The more she thought about the state of his hand, the more potently Iko felt her breakfast coming back up. So she fixed her gaze ahead. They made the right call to leave Titus behind at camp, and the pack was a whole lot quieter now that their loudest member was absent. Silence meant focus, and focus was precisely what they needed now that they were venturing into uncharted territory. Who knew what the arena could do?

Ahead, Alex slashed through the underbrush with his bow, clearing the way through the thickest part of the forest. Sage was right behind him, and Iko was bringing up the rear, keeping an eye trained on her surroundings while a small fraction of her vigilance was putting Elias on a leash. After they'd forced him to execute his district partner, he'd retreated into himself, and Iko had a feeling he was plotting something. She couldn't let the fresh wound of his rage be their downfall. If he was planning to cut and run, she would gun him down in a second.

They were heading towards the mutts the map in the Control Centre had labelled as Triceratops. Iko didn't know what they looked like, but the name was familiar. Earlier, they'd found a section of the arena containing old paddocks that looked as though they'd been breached. There were claw marks everywhere, but no fresh tracks. Whatever had broken out of containment seemed to have vacated the vicinity a long time ago, unless those markings had been designed by the Gamemakers to spook the tributes. Iko didn't want to admit it, but it was working. Humans were easy to get rid of, but whatever monsters were roaming the arena weren't afraid of her.

Plus, they had more teeth.

Sweat beaded her forehead. It'd been five days in the heart of the jungle, and the humidity was thick enough to swim through, bleeding them of sweat, the salt crusting in their shirts, bleaching the material in the sun set to bake their skin during the day. Presently, there were no tributes in sight, and Iko felt the opposite of anaemic. Stuffed with so much blood she thought she'd burst. Some of it might not even be hers. Some of it might be trapped in the bell jar of her conscience.

In these Games, though, there was no room for that. Empathy was the enemy. Her conscience was mute, a muzzled thing that she'd excised like a tumour. Indifference was her armour, assembled when she was a child, strapped tighter and tigher until she grew muscles to fill the spaces where her girl-shoulders didn't fit. Ambition was her artillery, pushing her to rise and rise and rise until she was the only one ahead and everyone else was left in the dark.

At the edge of the forest, Alex stalled. Iko peered round. They were at the mouth of a clearing, where a herd of animals—Mutts—were grazing in the lush grass. Triceratops, Iko thought, recalling the map, finally placing a picture to the name. They were bigger than the average cattle, probably twice as large, covered in leathery hide, lumbering as they moved, their thick tails swishing listlessly from side to side. Iko didn't see what was so dangerous about them until one of the Triceratops turned, and Iko spotted the three ivory horns protruding from its face, sharp and pointed like a spear. If they charged at them, there was no telling how much damage they would do. And Iko had a feeling that there was a slim chance of survival.

"We're getting across," Alex said, the finality in his tone drawing their attention.

Sage shot him an incredulous scowl. When she glanced to Iko for confirmation, the District 2 girl pressed her with a challenging look, eyes sharp, daring her to oppose Alex.

"We'll lose too much daylight if we try to go around. If we don't get to that sector of the arena, we'll never know where the other tributes are hiding." Alex pursed his lips, his mouth set into a hard line. "There's three of them left, and even if they haven't found alliances with each other, we're all too spread-out."

"How're we going to do that without getting gored to death?" Sage asked, her dried lips pulling into a frown.

Iko's mouth twisted. Sage had a point. None of them knew anything about these Mutts. They were at least thirty feet away from them, and the field stretched out for at least a good mile. Iko could clock a solid six minutes on a mile. Fuelled by desperation and the sheer will to live, she could probably get across without a problem. The issue lay with their speed. Iko hadn't witnessed how fast the Mutts were, and if they were anything like the Pterodactyls back in the aviary, Iko didn't want to take her chances. Beside her Elias went rigid, seemingly realising the same thing. There was a hardset determination to his eyes, the muscle in his strong jaw feathering. Whether that was his attempt to stave off the fear from his expression or a plan brewing in his head, Iko couldn't tell, but she wasn't going to take any chances.

"We could draw the herd away," Opal said, a slender finger outstretched, drawing a line running perpendicular to the direction they were facing. "Fire a shot at them, and when we're in the clear, we move."

"They might come after us," Alex said. "They're not going to be spooked. The Gamemakers wouldn't place them here otherwise. I say our best options are to just cross the field, and hope we don't draw their attention."

"That's incredibly dumb," Sage drawled, and Iko agreed, but she wasn't going to show it. No matter how broken their relationship, district partners were stronger in solidarity. And Iko trusted that Alex knew what he was doing. He wouldn't lead them into a suicide mission.

"What happens if they start running at us?" Elias asked, his voice husky from misuse. There was no challenge detected in his tone, but the troubled furrow of his brow told of an underlying concern for Alex's plan.

"Then we run." Alex slung his bow around his shoulders. He'd left his rifle back at camp, claiming he was a better shot with his bow. It was a pragmatic call, too, considering they needed to travel light today. He swept them with a level glance, and Iko could've sworn his gaze lingered on her for a split second longer. "Everyone ready?"

"Wait," Iko said. Alex halted, spine stiffening. "What if we keeping going down the tree line until they can't see us? This field slopes downhill. If we head down a little further, we'll practically be invisible."

"That makes way more sense," Sage agreed, flicking a bug off the tip of her sword.

"Fine," Alex said, jaw ticking, lambent eyes brass-tack sharp and blazing as he pinned Iko with his searing stare, though he did well to kept his frustration out of his tone. "Sage, you go ahead and clear a path."

For an endless moment, even after Opal and Sage began to lead the way, hacking at the underbrush and staying well within the treeline, with Elias trailing after them, his rifle clutched in his hands, Iko felt like she was staring into the sun as she held Alex's gaze. A beat passed and they stood still, waiting for the others to move a few paces ahead before Iko got tired of the stagnant air between them and followed. She didn't care if he followed or not.

His calloused hand caught her elbow.

If he were anyone else, she might've slammed it into his throat and snapped his neck just for putting his hands on her, but she stopped in her tracks, allowed him to get in her space.

Irritation crossed his expression as he hissed, "what the fuck was that?"

Iko flicked her gaze towards the others, who were still ahead, seemingly unaware of the conversation happening behind them.

Slanting Alex a cool glower, Iko clamped her fingers around his wrist and wrenched his hand off her elbow with a clean jerk. "I'm trying not to get us all killed. The real question is, what the fuck were you thinking?"

Alex scrubbed a hand over his face in exasperation. Jaw locked in express annoyance, he told her, "I'm thinking that we could use those Mutts to wipe out the competition. If i can lead them into a stampede, we'll have three less to deal with. We both clock a decent time for a mile, and that's exactly what I was banking on. We'd be able to make it across the field in time. We can take care of Titus back at camp, and then hunt down the remaining three tributes on our own."

That plan made sense. But the fact that he hadn't drawn her consensus earlier didn't sit well with her. They were meant to be a team. Iko could understand if he wanted to put some distance between them for now, but when it came down to the Games, nothing was more important than their mutually assured survival above the rest of the tributes. A flash of indignance lashed at her core. Iko pinned him with an accusatory stare, snarling, "If you'd shared that plan with me earlier—"

"Forget it," Alex grunted. And then, he stormed ahead, his footsteps muffled in the damp soil, somehow effortlessly noiseless.

Staring after him as she trailed behind the group at a safe distance, Iko bit down on the inside of her cheek to keep the frown off her face. As they edged towards the close, something had unstitched itself from within Alex—that perfect, efficacious buoyancy keeping him warm at his core, a welcoming presence shining like a light guiding them back to the beaten road time and time again seemed to have unravelled. Maybe it was the nerves. Nine tributes left, seven to cull, then it would be just the two of them, gladiating to the death, and only one could come out alive. Before the Games began, Iko had decluttered her priorities, suppressed all glimmer of emotion that might impede progress. Now, though, with the cliff's edge looming ever-closer, as they ran a head-first collision course with the inevitable, the foundations of her built composure were beginning to pull apart, too.

It was supposed to be them. Iko and Alex. Together for the rest of their lives, living in their victor's houses side-by-side, watching each other's families grow as the years went by. But now...

Time wasn't even on their side.

"Everybody ready?" Alex asked as they stalled a good stretch downhill, his features set in an indecipherable expression, that stony mask of granite focus loosening the invisible barbed wire constricting around his throat.

They were well out of sight from the Triceratops now. Their issue was crossing without making their presence detectable. From the way Opal clutched at the cross around her neck like it might grant her a reinvigorated strength, and the way Sage's grip tightened blanch-knuckled on her sword, the girls felt the same flutter of nerves in Iko's gut. Steeling herself, Iko readied herself, slinking out of the tree line under Alex's lead.

With their pulses between their teeth, they set out at a steady jog.

Halfway across the field, the ground beneath her feet began to rumble, and Iko cast a sharp glance uphill. Horror drenched her gut as she spotted the entire herd thundering towards them, kicking up dust. The sound of the stampede charging at break-neck speed towards them seemed to catch the others off-guard too. Sage opened her mouth and screamed, "run!" But her voice was lost to the loud rumbling. Instinct kicking into overdrive, Iko took off like a shot, heart pounding, fear spurring her on, muscles burning. She cut a path diagonally downslope instead, knowing if she kept going straight, the herd would catch up to them quicker.

One glance over her shoulder to search for Alex found him right beside her, just barely matching her pace. Elias and Sage were bringing up the rear, and Opal bounded over a pile of rocks, graceful as a gazelle.

Another confirmed that the source of the stampede had everything to do with the girl from District 3 currently spearheading the herd, trying to outrun them. Terror bleached her features of colour, desperation lending her an extra speed.

They were almost to the other side of the field when Alex turned to yell something at Iko.

"What?" Iko shouted back, confusion knotting her features.

Determination blazing in his eyes, Alex shook his head. Suddenly, he slowed.

"Are you fucking nuts?" Iko shrieked, her heart lurching out of her chest. Without heaitation, she tugged on Alex's sleeve, urging him to keep going. Panic slashed viciously at her chest when he shook her off. Even though the two of them pulled way ahead of the other three, they weren't even close to being clear of the stampede thundering towards like an avalanche. If they didn't move fast, they were going to get trampled. Already, they were catching up with the girl from District 3, horns almost hooking onto the tail end of her dark braid.

"Trust me," Alex said, as he nocked an arrow, drew his bow, and took aim.

"What are you—"

He fired.

As the arrow soared past Opal's head, Alex grabbed Iko by the arm and tugged her along. She didn't have to look to know that Alex's arrow landed true. Didn't have to look over her shoulder to see it strike the District 3 girl tribute through the eye. Didn't have to look over her shoulder to see the girl fall, her body dropping to the ground like a sack of stones for the herd to trample beneath their feet.

She wasn't going to make it anyway.

What Alex had done was a small mercy.

A shout from Sage caught Iko's attention as both District 2 tributes finally broke into the tree line, horrified to see that the herd had gained more ground on them than expected. A sharp intake of breath hissed between Alex's teeth at the same time Iko spotted Sage gesturing wildly at Elias, who'd stopped within range of the stampeding herd. He cast one look at the tree line, where the others were already safe behind, and then flicked his gaze back to the herd. Opal pivoted as she leapt clear of the field and back into the umbrage of the tree line. Her mouth parted in shock. Out there, Sage was still shouting, waving her arms to catch Elias' attention, but it was too late. Alex's fingers tightened around Iko's fractionally.

Slowly, Elias turned. The herd thundered closer, their blind fury growing more and more palpable each second. One of the Mutts let loose a bellowing cry.

The decision only took a second.

Arms outstretched, Elias flashed them all a look over his shoulder, lips curling into a horrible thing of a smile, one that screamed he knew he had nothing left to lose—a dying man's smile. Still in the open, Sage cursed viciously, caught between saving him and survival instinct. Jaw clenched, Sage picked the smarter option.

"He's fucking mental," Sage panted, as she dove into the protection of the tree line. "Why would he—?"

Brows furrowing, Opal started forward, but Iko knotted a hand in the back of her shirt.

"Don't," Iko said, solemnly, the frost in her tone biting "It's not worth risking your life for. Let the arena take care of him."

Heaving a heavy-hearted sigh that could've been mistaken for irritation at the inconvenience rather than what it was, Alex nocked another arrow and drew his bow.

And then he fired the second shot of the day.

When the arrow sank into Elias's heart, he was dead before the stampede caught up to him, three horns skewering his torso, the crunch of his broken spine silenced by the thunderous stampede.

Ducked behind the undergrowth, they let the herd pass. Despite how shaken they were, they couldn'r afford to let it show to the cameras. As Careers, they knew this. Still, Sage bent over and began to retch, the smell of vomit cloying in the humid air. Sure, they'd killed and they'd done unspeakable things just to give the Capitol viewers what they wanted, but a suicide? Voluntarily dying seemed too unfathomable to Iko, who had spent all her life fighting to survive. So this was what had been stewing in Elias' head, a storm clouding his judgement.

And then there was the lingering knowledge that if one more tribute went down, the pack would split. Already, there were so few of them left.

All the way to the other end of the arena, Iko couldn't get the phrase out of her head, a pulsing mantra like a metronome in her head.

E tan é epi tas.

Come back alive and victorious, or don't come back at all.

* * *

SEVEN TRIBUTES LEFT.

One good thing about the national anthem was that they were already on their feet and already ready to run for cover. At night, when Elias' face bloomed like a ghost in the sky, the second and last death of the day, the Career pack were gathered inside the cave, their backs turned to their former ally, not because they weren't able to face him, but because it was time to move on. No point runinating in something they couldn't have seen coming.

Before they'd entered the cave to rest for the night, Opal had said, unprompted, "he killed his district partner. Maybe he decided that he couldn't live with himself if he won. Somehow." Like she couldn't stop thinking about Elias for the entirety of the time they'd spent scouring the arena, hours after he'd walked towards the stampede with his arms spread open as if to embrace his eminent death. Iko wanted to tell her that he had no chance of winning, anyway, because miracles didn't happen in these Games.

To Iko's surprise, Titus didn't make a crass comment or even a joke about their fallen ally. Elias—he'd been useful for awhile, but the potential had been wasted. There was no denying that his refusal to be vicious, his lack of drive to win, depleted his utility. In previous Hunger Games, there was no shortage of tributes who'd gone off the deep end, too trapped in the darkness that'd been carved out of them when their conscience fled their bodies after they'd taken a life. But that space, to Iko, could be filled by other things. Like winning. The end always justifies the means.

As they ate, it was almost as though nothing had changed. Elias never spoke when he was with them, and his silence went unnoticed as they joked and made conversation about home, about the spoils of battle, about what it'd be like to live rich and famous. Sometimes, though, they still felt his large, sulking presence, and there would be moments Titus would turn around to needle Elias about something but would be met by the empty space in the back of the cave instead.

That night Iko slept in the back of the cave, curled up in her sleeping bag, the furthest from the rest of the pack. Alex slept beside her, but his back was turned and before their torchlights flicked off for the night as Opal took first watch, she saw him glance over his shoulder, as though checking to see if she was real or not. Just a look over his shoulder, but he didn't meet her gaze, piercing as it was, sharp as the knives on her belt, cutting clean through his cranium—a virtual vivisection of his thoughts—and his refusal to see her, to acknowledge her burrowed into her gut like shrapnel. When she fell into the abyss of a deep sleep, it was Elias' face she saw in the dark, bloated like a body in the river, the abyss gazing back, pressing the gun to her head, cold metal cutting so surely into her skin it might've been real for a fleeting moment, and there she was, smiling, screaming: do it, I dare you. Do it. Maybe I deserve it. You were too late, too coward.

But you're dead and I'm buried.

In her dream, he pulled the trigger, and the gunshot tore through her head so violently her body jerked backwards, and didn't stop convulsing.

Until she realised it wasn't a dream anymore.

Someone was shaking her awake.

"Get up," a deep voice commanded, wrenching her from the darkness without ceremony. "Iko, get up. Now."

Eyes snapping open, Iko shoved Alex off, and pulled herself up into sitting position. The others stood around her sleeping bag, a council of vultures glowering down at her. Opal's lips were pursed in silent disdain and Sage's eyes were glistering with barely checked anger. Alex's expression was the least decipherable of all. She'd been the last to wake. One glance at the waterfall and the light glittering behind the shadows told her that it was already morning. There was a familiar stench lingering in the air, the smell of blood that Iko assumed to be the lingering smell in their clothes, but that didn't explain why they were all being so hostile towards her.

"What?" Iko furrowed her brows, cutting them a confused look. "What is it?"

"It's Titus," Alex said, something pricking in his tone. A kind of desperation. And the way he was looking at her, that half-accusation in his voice—Iko didn't know what she'd done but she felt like a child who'd just gotten into trouble. "Answer me honestly—"

"What?" She felt like a broken recorder, but the panic surging through her like a rising tide didn't leave her much room to think. A bad feeling pooled in her gut, leaden with dread.

"Titus is dead," Alex said, eyes sharp, slicing through her skin, searching for an answer. He swallowed, a muscle in his jaw ticking. "Iko... what did you do?"

AUTHOR'S NOTE.

👀👀

also im so sorry this took so fucking long lol