Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

     “Are you sure you don’t want to say your goodbyes?”

     The silver-haired man slowly turned his head towards him, a masked indifference practiced routinely over the years present once more on his gaze. He stood from where he was crouching by the exit, hoisting the backpack over his shoulders along the way. It had been packed light for the sake of his speciality in speed and stealth, but now that Homare was seeing him like this… In what might as well be their last moment together, he wished he could have snuck in more marshmallow packages in there. Just to spoil him one last time.

     “We’ve talked about this.”

     “Yes, but…” Homare held back a grimace by pressing his teeth down against his bottom lip. “You know I’d hate to be the bearer of bad news if…”

     “…Sorry.”

     “No, no, don’t apologize,” he forced a chuckle to lighten the atmosphere. “I’m not the one making a trip to that place, after all. I’m just being fussy.”

     Hisoka Mikage stared long and hard at him.

     More than a decade of knowing each other — of following his lead, smiling through lies; of trusting his intuition in the face of rising red flags; of finding themselves on the same page in the book of warships; of speaking secret tongues known by no one else; of crying about his pain for him without ever learning the full scope of it — and yet still, at the end of all those years, Homare could do nothing but merely guess what his husband was thinking.

     More than a decade of knowing each other could only prepare them so much for this day, for his spouse to willingly walk into a certain death trap, the promise of his long lost memories and the safety of their mutual friend — District 2’s prized head trainer Izumi Tachibana — currently under hostage, waiting on the other side.

     Sending him off just like that… It was a bit nostalgic, for all the wrong reasons.

     Wiser men than him would call off the mission, perhaps. To discourage Hisoka from acting on his own, into the unknown. To insist for a team operation with their close fellow victors, fighting right by his side, so that at the very least, they could share their final moments together. To never compromise the privilege of safety at their home in Victor's Village.

     ...Better safety than most, anyways.

     Hisoka approached in his soundless footsteps, steadily got on his tippy-toes, and placed a chaste kiss on his lips.

     And then Homare remembered why he had chosen to let him go.

     “You won’t have to tell them,” The younger man said. “I’ll be back soon.”

     “…You’re right.”

     His arms made their way around Hisoka’s waist, pulling him into an embrace. He’s perfectly willing to let him go, but by God; he needed this moment. To feel his beloved pressed close to him like this. To feel the poking scabbards of many hidden knives under his dark layers, the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest that is so alive, the hint of sweet confectionary in the air, the figure that slot perfectly to his own. To feel his real, silent presence with his everything.

     He had written the three words he couldn’t bear to say on his back with the gentlest touch of his fingers.

     Homare only backed off when Hisoka patted his shoulder softly, pointing to the old pocket watch he had snuck out of his lover’s inner coat pocket somehow.

     He wished the watch had been broken then, and spare them more time, however false.

     “…Just like we rehearsed,” Hisoka prompted, handing the watch back.

     “Yes, yes,” Homare swallowed down a tinge of upcoming regret for his dear’s sake. “Hide. Don’t come out until you return. Tell others we’re on a private secret camping trip. Be ready to run anytime. Ah, really though… Leaving yours truly in a bunker like that… You sure know how to treat a man, Hisoka. When you return, I will have to make sure we are truly taking on that romantic escapade!”

     “I’m going.”

     “Ignoring your husband again!”

     Homare didn’t miss the faint smile on Hisoka’s face when he pulled his hood up.

     “See you. Alice.”

     “…May the odds be ever in your favor, my love.”

     And may District 13 be kind.

End of Prologue.

Chapter Text

My Beloved’s Glass Hands

A Memoir by Homare Arisugawa.

One.

     Panem is not kind.

     Panem is the calloused hands of a heartless caregiver. 

     It birthed you when you never asked to be. It rips you from the earth and pushes you to your trembling feet, so you can run for your life before you even learn of what death is. It will cradle you just as it will choke you so. It tears you with the same hand it feeds you.

     I do not think it is very far-fetched to dub it a living, self-devouring monument to humanity’s damnation. 

     Panem is a mere handful of individuals walking through Eden, while below the crust, a cluster of writhing bodies claws and climbs their way onto each other towards the top of the pile, reaching for a single trail of peering light spared from above.

     But that would barely scratch the surface. 

     It is a naive, inadequate metaphor to reality. 

     The state had bred generations of horrors and injustices that I could not, would not attempt to describe, at the chance of minimizing the legitimate sufferings of everyone else; nor would I even begin to pretend that I have the capacity to fathom the full scope of its crimes with my single feeble existence.

     Even living within the confines of false comfort of my own metal fortress, I have learned as much. Stand atop the pile to your heart’s desire — with pride in your chest and blood on your hands — you cannot climb onto the other side. And likewise, no matter how grand, how dignified, how opulent; there was no castle impenetrable to the Capitol. So when the angels of death blare their mighty horn in my direction, I wasn’t permitted a fleeting stage of denial. It was straight to the trials for I, as any other.

     What is a socially constructed title to divine powers? What is a hailed house name to the halls of purgatory? What is another rags-to-riches tale to the three sisters of fate?

     Absolutely nothing, I have gathered.

     My grandfather Sakae was a person whose name used to strike thrill and excitement within the hearts of the people of Capitol.

     My grandmother Miyako, was not.

     Somehow, they finely encapsulated the two opposing spectrums of the kind of battered Victors the Games spat right back out from its underbelly. One made into an idol of worship to project onto he never once even considered signing up for; the other unable to embody the heroism they were wishing out of her with the conditions of victory being “too anticlimactic.” But together, in their unlikely union, they have created quite a house name for a three-generation family of victors, to be recognized for years to come. They were a perfect picture of a pair of survivors who preserved through their own level of hell, finding each other at the end of the storm to heal.

     If I close my eyes and tune out the violent context, I suppose I can somewhat acknowledge the poeticism in it; how they must’ve looked to the awed gazes of Capitol’s hopeless romantics. A pair of tragic lovers who conquered the end of time, now suspended in it. A breathing oil painting, each stroke a meaning unknown to everyone else.

     From them, the family came to be.

     My grandparents wanted to rebuild themselves, to create a sense of normalcy out of the ashen ruins.

     ...Or at least, that is the only justification I can offer in their place. I find that I had given up trying to comprehend a dead person’s psyche ages ago.

     It didn’t change the fact that the blood of victors was the perfect family drama the Capitol wanted.

     Had my dear grandparents known the risk, and went forth anyway? I used to wonder.

     Nevermind their take on the situation, the both of us surviving the Games were among the many conversations my mother and I never had.

     We never had the chance to. 

     Loss far outweighs any resentment I could ever afford to make towards my family, that much is true. And it was not like it had offended me to be brought into the world in the first place. I just hoped that perhaps, they would have considered the long term route I ought to take, to accept the inevitable fall completely, to its full commitment. In their internal conflict, making a choice between preserving the innocence of a child or preparing them for what’s to come, their wishful pursuit towards both had come with its own set of consequences.

     Enrolling in the combat academy was out of the question, as if that was strictly where they drew the line, where they thought too much exposure had been. 

     On the other hand, by the age of 11, I was taught many things; from how to start a fire, to building a compass, to crafting wire traps, and finally — to make poison out of nothing. 

     If they hadn’t wanted the gruesome image of me taking a life like a Career in the first place, maybe they should have looked back at the choices made.

     What was done is done.

     What was sowed will be reaped. 

     So when the headlines came, I couldn’t bat an eye. 

      Is the grandson of the famous Arisugawa Victor couple as relentless of a killing machine as they were?

     But oh, how I still wish the answer would have been a clear-cut no.

Chapter Text

Two.

     I am a fairytale.

     Within a tale as old as time I was born.
     A chosen one without perks, infinitely.
     A champion with no contest, definitely.
     A devotee at gods’ mercy I will be.

     I am Cinderella.

     A dark chariot of black horses and doom.
     Towards the sea of hands that waves back too.
     Towards the smile of a godmother so cruel.
     Towards the death of the stranger next to.

     I am Prince Charming.

     A miraculous night of suit and despair.
     The hearts of millions I will capture.
     The price of living I meant to lure.
     The cost of being loved, can I endure?

     I am Peterpan.

     A kingdom of vines and rivers and ruins.
     In a land where kids will never grow old.
     In a land where the red escapes their fold.
     In a land where I stood and watched them unfold.

     You are Snow White.

     A red apple fallen from the sky.
     I wait for the sleep, let the nightmares be.
     I wait for the quiet, the cease of heartbeat.
     I wait for the end, and in the night I scream.

     I am.

     An image of a boy I no longer knew.
     My cloak of shame, I have nothing to show.
     My soiled name, they are satisfied no more.
     My knife in hand, dear gods, please let me go.

     I am a victor.

Chapter Text

Three.

     The first time I laid my eyes on him was through the screen of a projector. 

     Every living soul of District 2 knew the 60th annual Hunger Games reaping should not have gone the way it did. 

     “Technical difficulties,” they had said.

     “Technical difficulties” was apparently the best excuse they could offer to the disturbed, trembling crowd of young and old standing idly in District 2’s town square; home of many unshed tears and public punishments, which mere glimpse of the perimeter was enough to churn the stomachs of our entire population. 

     Fear at the sign of a new, unfamiliar, different kind of trouble brewing when the lights went out was enough to silence the commotion, stilling dead on their tracks not unlike possums waiting for predators overhead to pass. It was the peacekeepers who had herded them back home as if they were a flock of obedient sheep, hushed confusions in tow. While I do not hold it against the people of the district in the slightest, the memory would always make me laugh bitterly. Oh, how we were so conditioned to giving in and waiting patiently for the commencement of the annual child-murdering ritual that a change in the routine had concerned us all the much more.

     But the reaping had carried on nonetheless, tributes announced from the discomfort of our own homes. No chance for anyone amongst the Career candidates communally selected to seize the glory for themselves to volunteer. Deliberately so.

     Of course, if they so wished, the reapers would still have their way with their desired target, even if the inauguration had taken place on site. 

     Hisoka Mikage could not possibly be older than 15 when he was reaped.

     In hindsight, there was nothing extraordinary about him; so much so that it was comical, more than anything. A small, frail, unassuming child whose worn out oversized attire, tired green eyes and matted silver-hair made him look like he was fished right out of the sewers from one of the poorer districts. 

     His details — or the lack thereof — was glaringly unsettling.

     The boy with no memories. No background. No families to claim him. 

     An entire living John Doe, that’s what he was. Such traits, combined with the suspicious nature of his circumstances going into the Games, was bound to raise the eyebrows of everyone within vicinity.

     There were immediate, inevitable conspiracy theories spoken behind closed doors that surrounded him in the district when he was first introduced. Perhaps a child pried from the unfortunate hands of another district as an additional trial for the group’s misbehavior. Perhaps a product of Capitol’s unethical experiments emulating a person going out for a test run. Perhaps a part of a secret rebellious organization under Capitol’s watch being punished, an exhibited threat. Or perhaps just a very unlucky, homeless orphan no one paid attention to, who just happened to hit his head at some point.

     He was so young.

     Too young to even humor any of those speculations, I still think to this day. And it angers me to even play out the possibilities once more today.

     They were as quick to shrug him off as they were to whispers. Majority of the population had called it luck, on their part, that the boy being sent off to the bloodbath didn’t have to be theirs or their neighbor’s.

     I imagine they felt the same way when some victors’ privileged grandson was reaped.

     “So it’s rigged, then,” I had voiced it to my then-mentor turned friend, Azuma Yukishiro, over a cup of tea. Being mostly still bedridden, all while the broadcast was made mandatory for every household, no exceptions, I found an ounce of solace in watching it with a friend beside me. 

     I remember being unable to pry my eyes off the screen, staring into those weary ones, wishing they were never there to begin with.

     Hisoka’s entrance into my life felt as swift and cruel as a knife to the back.

     It was as if my friend was watching the gears in my head weigh the predicament I have made for myself that very moment. Sipping on a glass of wine himself, Azuma had a sad smile when he uttered the agreeing words. 

     “When is it not?”

     I said nothing then, but that had sealed the facts. 

     I didn’t want the boy to die.