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Chapter Text

Rose’s alarm clock was one of the few things that worked consistently in the Tylers’ apartment, but, at the moment, she couldn’t properly appreciate it. She rolled over and smacked it into silence with long-practiced accuracy.

“Why’s that thing on?” mumbled her mother from the other bed. “You don’t have to work today, you know.”

“Though I’d see if the old man needed any help restocking,” said Rose, sitting up in bed and running a hand through her tousled hair.

Jackie seemed to accept that and settled back into bed. Rose grabbed some clothes and went to wash up in the bathroom. The water was ice-cold, as usual. She sighed. The building’s water heater worked only sporadically, and no one seemed interested in fixing it. A hot shower was a rare luxury. She scrubbed up as best she could, dressed, and headed for the kitchen.

To her surprise, Jackie was there ahead of her, heating water for tea over their gas range. “It’s no use trying to sleep in today,” she said with a shrug. “I never do on reaping days.”

Rose moved in close, laying a hand on her mother’s shoulder. “It’ll be all right, Mom. There are kids with their names in there way more times than I do. I’ll be fine.”

It was true that Rose wouldn’t be in there as many times as her friends Shireen or Keisha. Both of them had taken out tesserae for years to help feed their large families. Jackie had never let Rose do the same, no matter how often they’d gotten down to subsisting on tea. Rose’s dad had died in a factory accident when she was a baby, and Jackie wasn’t about to risk her daughter’s safety.

In one respect, they’d been lucky. When Rose was thirteen, Old Man Henrick, who ran the general store, broke his hip. Jackie had immediately volunteered that Rose could help out in his store, and, between her wages and the small haircutting and styling business that Jackie ran out of their home, they’d fed themselves. Old Man Henrick had been kind, too, sending Rose home occasionally with a small bag of dried beans, or perhaps some canned milk or a jar of pickled vegetables.

Now, Jackie made them tea and heated the remains of the previous night’s dinner of rice and beans, and they sat down to eat breakfast. Neither spoke.

***

Rose actually liked being out early in the day. Here in the Factory sector of District 9, if you didn’t get up early, other people got all the fresh air. As soon as the factories started up for the day, the air would be full of smoke. Not that they would be operating today; after all, it was a holiday. She shook her head in silent disgust as she ran down the stairs of their apartment block.

At the bottom, she nearly ran over Mickey. “What are you doing up so early?” he asked.

She laughed. “Same to you.”

“Couldn’t sleep.” He shrugged. “I figured I’d go down to the workshop, see if I could distract myself for a few hours.”

Rose nodded. It would be Mickey’s last reaping, and she dearly hoped he wouldn’t be chosen. He’d taken out tesserae for a few years, while his grandmother was still alive. Once she died, he’d managed to support himself by repairing clocks and electronics. He was good at it, too; Rose joked that his mom had obviously sneaked him in from District 3. But, just because you stopped taking tesserae, it didn’t mean the ones you’d taken disappeared. His name would be in the reaping fifteen times.

He was practically a family member by now. Most days, he’d come over for dinner, pooling his resources with the Tylers’. Rose knew everyone expected that she and Mickey would end up married. She didn’t know what she thought of the idea, even though she liked Mickey and even found him attractive. It was just that she wasn’t sure about marriage in general. Who, after all, wanted to bring children into a world like this?

She continued on down the street past the next apartment block to Old Man Henrick’s store and entered through the back. “Henrick? You here?”

“Up front, Rosie.”

Henrick was the only person allowed to call her Rosie. He’d earned the right. She trotted to the front of the store, where he was tinkering with the cash register.

“What’re you doing in today?” he asked. “Store’s not opening. Damned reaping.”

Rose shrugged. “I could use something to do. I thought I’d finish up that restocking we started yesterday.”

Henrick nodded, eyes sad. “Good idea. Yeah, why don’t you pull some of those boxes.”

Henrick’s store sold practically everything except for fresh produce. It was one of the approved “Capitol Resale” stores, which meant he retailed goods sent to the district from the Capitol. To his credit, he kept his profit margins on those goods as small as he realistically could. Grain, dried beans and fruit, and canned milk, meat and vegetables were what most people in the Factory side lived on.

Aside from food, Henrick sold cloth and clothing, kerosene, flatware, tools, some electronics, shoes and, most importantly, he retailed locally-made goods. Mickey’s repaired and cobbled-together electronics and the clocks he worked on often ended up on the shelf at Henrick’s. The apothecary – an old woman who hated dealing with people – sold her medicines to Henrick and let him haggle over the prices with customers. Fishermen from lake country sold dried and smoked fish. Tailors bought cloth, turned it into clothing, and sold it back to Henrick, who sold it for them. Even Beekeeper Aggie sold her honey and beeswax candles through the store.

Overall, it was, Rose reflected, one of the best places she could’ve ended up. The Factory side was rough. Their standard of living was a little better than those on the Field side, but it came with much more crime. At least the Peacekeepers in the Field paid attention when someone started screaming. On the Factory side, they just couldn’t be bothered. Gangs prowled the streets and the concrete-block apartment buildings, looking for trouble.

Rose’d had her share of scraps. The ugliest came about because the boy she’d been going with joined a gang, and he hadn’t liked it when she’d rejected his company for it. She’d toughed it out, though, and Jimmy had eventually annoyed the wrong people and ended up in the pen.

Old Man Henrick wouldn’t have it, though, and the community liked his store. Anyone trying to start something with him or his store would find their lives getting very hard, very quickly. Even here, community disapproval meant something. Occasionally, they had to remind the gangs of who was really in charge.

Even so, in his younger days, Henrick had kept a cudgel close at hand in case trouble came calling. Nowadays, Rose was the keeper of the cudgel, and she knew how to use it. Mostly, it wasn’t necessary. Everyone knew she was Jackie Tyler’s daughter; that meant she was, by definition, ready and willing to break heads.

She spent a few hours opening boxes, stocking shelves and heaving grain bags into place. The physical labor kept her from getting too wrapped up in thoughts of the reaping. Old Man Henrick shared some fish jerky with her, and, as she was getting ready to return home, handed her a small packet. She looked inside.

“Cookies!” She looked from the rare treat to Henrick’s face. “Where did these come from?”

“Baker dropped them off this morning,” he said. “I cut him a deal on some flour, so he gave me the broken cookies out of his latest batch. I don’t have much of a taste for sweets. You and your mom enjoy ‘em, okay?”

Rose blinked back tears. He could’ve sold these, she knew. Even broken cookies would fly right out of the shop, and they’d be pure profit for him. She inhaled the scent of sugar and vanilla, anticipating sharing these with her mom and Mickey over tea after dinner.

“Thank you,” she said, and dropped a kiss on his grizzled cheek. “I’ll-I’ll see you tomorrow, ‘kay?”

“You do that, Rosie.” He glanced at the shop clock. “Best get home and changed, or you won’t catch the tram in time.”

She nodded and tucked the precious cookies into her pocket before she left. The gift had given her a lovely picture of what she hoped the evening would be like. The rooftop garden plot was ready to yield potatoes, and Mickey mentioned buying a fish at the market. Fish and fried potatoes, with cookies to follow.

If the odds truly were in their favor.

***

At 2:30, clad in a worn pink dress that was just a little too small, Rose, Mickey and Jackie boarded the tram that would take them to the district square. It was situated right on the border between the Factory side and the Field side.

That was how everyone in District 9 identified themselves – Field or Factory. Only the Field was on the district’s official seal, and for a very good reason: The grain they grew in the fields wasn’t wheat, barley or oats, but the hybrid tessera grain. It had been genetically engineered as a high-protein, high-nutrition alternative to traditional grains. Officially, that was District 9’s industry. A whole district, just for growing the grain so many families depend on, the Capitol seemed to be saying. See what we do for you?

In reality, it was barely half of the district’s job. Most districts had a second industry, and District 9’s was metal. The Factory side, where Rose grew up, mostly consisted of foundries. The metal mines of Panem sent raw ore to Nine, where they were refined and alloyed. Iron and steel were then shipped to Two and Five, and copper was sent mostly off to Three and Six. Precious metals went to District 1. Tin and aluminum went to food-processing plants in Ten and Eleven, and so forth.

Same district or no, though, the two sides couldn’t have been more different. Field looked down on Factory as violent gangsters. Factory disdained Field as a bunch of unwashed yokels.

On the day of the reaping, though, Factory and Field mixed. Rose took her place beside a Field 17-year-old with sun-bleached hair and suntanned skin. She craned her head, catching a glimpse of Mickey settling in with the 18-year-old boys.

Nervously, she fingered the gold pin on her dress. It had belonged to her dad, long ago, and Jackie had refused to sell it, even in the face of starvation. Rose understood. Some things mattered more than money or even food, and her father’s wolf’s-head pin was one of them. Jackie always insisted Rose wear it to the reaping.

“It means your dad’s looking out for you,” she’d said while pinning it on Rose’s dress.

As soon as the district’s eligible young people were assembled, the mayor took the stage and read the Treaty of Treason. Rose hated this part of the proceedings and wished they would just get on with the Reaping and get it over with. Then he introduced the past winners of the Hunger Games.

There had only been five in District 9’s past, and just three were still living. The oldest, at sixty, was Sarah Jane Smith. How she’d won, Rose had no idea; she was tiny and delicate-looking. She apparently had a will of iron, though. Instead of settling down to a life of leisure after she’d returned, Sarah Jane had taken over the local community home for orphans. From everything Rose had heard, the home had been a nightmare before Sarah Jane got to it. Afterward, though, District 9 parents all started sleeping a little more easy, knowing that, should something happen to them, Sarah Jane would personally see to it that their children were raised with love.

The other female winner was Donna Noble, who was in her early forties. Some joked that she’d just shouted at the other tributes until they’d gone away. Nobody wanted to cross her. Still, she was Sarah Jane’s heir apparent, so Rose supposed she must be kind under the hot temper and brass lungs.

Then there was the only male winner still living: The Doctor. If he had a real name, no one remembered it anymore. Even the mayor just called him the Doctor. The Doctor had won just a few years before Donna had, and she and Sarah Jane were about the only two people he suffered gladly. Mostly, he was known for being caustic, acerbic, rude, confrontational, and, furthermore, your only hope if you were ill or injured and couldn’t afford the hospital. He would treat you for free, and most of the people who went to him for healing came out on the other side whole and well and singing his praises.

Still, it took a lot of nerve just to talk to him. His general manner was exemplified by his posture on the platform: Arms crossed, glaring down his nose with cold blue eyes as if disapproving of the whole world. Instead of dressing nicely for this occasion, he wore what he always did – a lightweight sweater or t-shirt under a worn black leather jacket, black denim jeans and clumpy shoes. Rose got the feeling that the reaping was not his favorite event, though she couldn’t imagine him actually enjoying anything.

After the mayor, the Capitol Escort, Reina, took the stage. She’d only been assigned to their district the previous year and was young for an Escort. Rose thought she must be fairly ambitious. Today, Reina wore a suit of shimmering gold fabric. Rose looked at her face on the screen and idly thought she might be pretty without the stylized makeup and huge pompadour wig.

And then it was time for the reaping. Reina made a production out of drawing a slip of paper from the huge glass bowl holding the girls’ names, and Rose could feel District 9 holding its collective breath.

“Rose Tyler.”

The first though that flitted through Rose’s mind was that she hadn’t heard right, that it was just her paranoid imagination. Then she heard her mother’s voice crying her name in terror and denial.

The thing that reached her next was that she was looking down at the pin on her dress. Gold against pink. And then her feet were moving without her permission, taking her silently to the end of the row to the waiting Peacekeepers. Her mother continued to cry out, and Rose risked looking for her. She was fighting to get to the ropes that held the families back from the potential tributes, with Shireen’s and Keisha’s mothers holding her back. Rose wanted to go to her, but her feet kept carrying her to the platform.

She nearly stumbled on the stairs, but a strange thing happened. She looked up and caught the Doctor’s eyes. They were focused on her, and, for the first time, she saw something in them that wasn’t cold disdain. It wasn’t pity, which she’d have expected, either. Instead, it seemed he was looking for something in her. And, suddenly, she didn’t want him to be disappointed. Her back straightened, and she mounted the platform with her head held high.

The next few minutes were a blur. She vaguely heard Reina call the name of the male tribute, Adam Mitchell. She knew him. She’d met him in school. He was in her year and had the reputation of being smart, and he was good-looking enough that she’d nursed a quiet crush on him for a while. Then she’d discovered he was dull and got over her crush. Still, she wished he hadn’t been called. It would’ve been easier if she hadn’t known the boy tribute.

Another blur, and she was being ushered into the mayor’s house, where her mother and Mickey were waiting. Jackie clung to her, sobbing, and Rose found her courage again.

“Mom. It’s all right. I’m all right,” she said, rubbing her mother’s back.

“No, it’s not,” Jackie sobbed. “I can’t lose you, too!”

Rose looked helplessly at Mickey. There were tears on his face, but he nodded at her. The nod conveyed that he would take care of Jackie, no matter what. It made Rose feel better.

She pushed Jackie back enough that she could look into her eyes. “Mom, listen. Whatever happens, I need to know you’ll be all right. I need to know that. Mickey will be here for you, okay? I’ll fight as hard as I can, but I need you to tell me you’ll fight, too.”

Jackie drew a deep breath, and the fire came back to her eyes. “I will. But you have to come back to me, Rose Marion Tyler. Promise me.”

And Rose had no idea how she’d do it, but she knew she had to win. “I promise, Mom. I’ll win, and we’ll move into Victor’s Village and never have to worry about anything ever again.”

The door opened, admitting two more people. One, she should’ve expected. Old Man Henrick limped in, leaning on his cane. To her surprise, he had tears in his eyes.

The other was Sarah Jane Smith.

“Hey, Rosie,” said Henrick, voice hoarse. “Wanted to tell you I’ll make sure your mom has enough to eat. You don’t have to worry.”

She went to him and hugged him. “Thank you. I don’t suppose I’ll be working in your shop again, whatever happens. Take on Wilson. He’s a good kid.” Wilson was a twelve-year-old boy from the community home who was always looking for odd jobs for extra money. He’d helped out in the shop occasionally.

Then she turned to look at Sarah Jane. Up close, the quiet dignity she always exuded was an almost physical force. There was deep, deep compassion in her eyes, and she drew Rose into a hug.

It was strange. Rose had been dry-eyed talking to her mother and Henrick, but now, tears sprang to her eyes and a lump grew in her throat.

“What do I do?” Rose whispered.

“Fight,” whispered Sarah Jane. “You’ll fight. And, if you return, come and find me. Remember, what you do, you do to survive.”

She released Rose and backed away. Mickey was next, hugging her hard. “I’ll take care of your mom,” he said, voice breaking. “But she’s right. You have to come back. You’re the toughest person I know. No one in the arena can be as bad as Jimmy’s gang, right?”

She pulled back and forced herself to smile at him. “Right. I’ll give ‘em hell.”

The door opened one last time, admitting the mayor and a Peacekeeper. “Sorry, Rose,” said the mayor, and he looked genuinely sorry. “Time’s up.”

Rose hugged her mom one last time. “I’ll be back before you know it. Just count to ten. I’ll be back.” She made to take the pin off her dress. But her mother stopped her.

“No. You wear that in the arena. Your dad would never have stopped fighting, and you’re just like him. Remember that, Rose.”

Rose nodded. “I will. I love you, Mom.”

“I love you too, Rose.” Jackie choked back another sob. “Just come back.”

And she knew she had to.

***

As soon as she got on the train, Reina took charge of her, leading her to her drawing room. “Supper’s in an hour,” she said. “There are clothes and toiletries in the room, so feel free to make use of them. I’ll come and fetch you when it’s time to eat.”

She whooshed away in a cloud of perfume, and Rose entered the drawing room, annoyed. Something about Reina bothered her. It wasn’t just the Capitol accent, affected as it was, or the clothes and wigs. Reina always seemed to be laughing behind her face. It was like she knew something no one else did.

At least the room was nice. More than nice, actually. It was almost the size of the apartment she shared with her mom. She tried on some of the clothing she found in the closet and settled on a pair of blue jeans and a pink top. Then she let her hair down from the updo Jackie had put it in before the reaping and brushed it out.

The hour went by quickly, and Reina came to fetch her, as promised. Reina had also re-dressed herself and was in a loose, draped gown of pale green silk with gold and silver embroidery. She’d removed her wig, and her hair, much to Rose’s annoyance, was golden and silky, tumbling in soft waves over one shoulder. She’d also redone her makeup to be less stylized. She wasn’t just pretty; she was beautiful. Rose tried hard not to resent her as Reina led her to the dining room, but it wasn’t easy.

Adam, Donna and the Doctor were already at the table when Rose and Reina arrived. Each place had a bowl of yellow-orange soup on it, and, after greeting her fellow diners, Rose tucked in. The soup was delicious, sweet and savory and creamy all at once.

After the soup came a salad with greens and fruit and goat cheese crumbles. The main dish was some kind of bird, smaller than a chicken, that Reina called a game hen. It was stuffed with rice, almond slivers and mushrooms. All the food was delicious, like nothing Rose had ever tasted before.

As they ate, Donna started asking Adam and Rose questions about their lives. At first, they were casual, about family and friends and where they lived. Both were Factory, of course, but Adam lived in a more upscale area. He had parents and a younger sister. Planned to take over the family business someday. Got the highest grades in school.

“What about you, Rose?” Donna asked. “How are your grades?”

Rose shifted uncomfortably. “I . . . don’t really go to school. Haven’t for a while. I’ve been working since I was twelve.”

It wasn’t uncommon for Factory kids to drop out of school. Technically, they were required to be in school until age eighteen, but as long as you put in an occasional appearance for the look of the thing, no one cared. A lot of kids had to work to help out their families, like Rose, and school just wasn’t as important.

Donna nodded, expression neutral. “What do you do for work? No, wait – you work for Old Man Henrick, don’t you? Wilson’s talked about you.”

Something in her tone of voice caught Rose’s attention, but she wasn’t about to ask about it. “Yeah. Wilson’s a good kid when he’s not trying to get in trouble.”

They talked for a little while longer, Donna and Reina keeping the conversation going. The Doctor didn’t eat much or talk. Finally, as they finished their dessert, he asked one question: “Why do you want to win?”

Both Rose and Adam were taken aback by the question. Adam seemed to recover first. “Uh, I don’t want to die,” he said.

Neither did Rose, but that wasn’t all of it. “My dad died when I was just a baby,” she said. “I’m all my mom’s got. I can’t stand the thought of her having to lose me, too.”

That seemed to satisfy the Doctor, who nodded. Reina then piped up, suggesting they watch the recap of the day’s reapings. Rose felt a little nauseous at the idea, but decided it would be a good idea to size up the other tributes.

A few of them stuck out. Both tributes from Two volunteered. The boy from Four had fiery red hair and practically skipped up to the platform. The girl from Six was crying as she mounted the platform.

And then something new happened. In Seven, a twelve-year-old was chosen, but, before she could get to the platform, one of the fifteen-year-olds burst out of her place, screaming that she volunteered. Both of them were tiny, dark-skinned and delicately beautiful, and, a few moments later, it was confirmed they were sisters. Another of the potential tributes, an eighteen-year-old boy who resembled both girls, had to pick up and carry the twelve-year-old away, she was clinging to her sister so hard.

Rose made note of the volunteer’s name: Martha Jones. Brave little Martha Jones, who volunteered in order to keep her sister alive.

Martha haunted her thoughts while the rest of the reapings played out on the television. Her own seemed surreal, like a dream in which she was watching herself do something. Finally, they ended, and the Doctor told them to go get some sleep. They’d arrive in the Capitol early, and tomorrow would be a very full day.

***

After Rose and Adam left, Reina fetched the wine carafe and filled her glass again. Donna also accepted a refill.

“The boy will be dead within ten minutes,” Reina said as she sat back down. “The girl, though – she has potential. A spark.”

“Adam and Rose. Use their names,” snapped the Doctor.

“She’s right, though.” Donna sipped her wine. “Adam thinks he’s too smart for us.”

The Doctor’s scowl deepened. “Don’t talk to me about smart.”

“Rose is another story. Do you know what Wilson told me once?” Donna asked. “He told me a couple of gang members tried to recruit him. It’s not unusual, but the kids know they can’t come back to the community home if they join gangs.”

Reina blinked in surprise. “Isn’t that a bit harsh?”

Donna rolled her eyes. Capitol people! They really had no clue. “It’s necessary. You get one kid joining the Slag Iron Stags and another getting involved with the Alley Dogs, and, sooner or later, you’ve got war in the halls. They’re always welcome to come back if they leave the gangs. But that’s not the point. Point is, these gang-bangers tried to get Wilson to join up. He refused, and things started to get ugly. Next thing he knew, someone clobbered the bigger of the two over the head with a length of wood. It was Rose.”

She paused for a moment, letting that sink in, before she continued. “Rose then got right in the other one’s face. Called him a few choice names and told him she’d bust his balls if she caught him trying to recruit community home kids again. And he backed down.” She tapped the table for emphasis. “He. Backed. Down. She’s not a big girl, but she somehow has enough street cred to be able to get a gang member to take her seriously.” Donna shrugged. “Might be genetic. From all I’ve heard, Jackie Tyler could take on my mom in a cage match.”

The Doctor actually cracked a smile at that. “That’s saying something. You mom scares me.” He sobered. “But it sounds as if our Rose is used to fighting for her place in the world. That could serve her well.”

“You’ll concentrate on her, then?” asked Reina.

“I’ll give Adam a chance. If he rejects my help, it’s on his head.” He frowned. “Pity of being a Factory kid is that neither of them has a clue about surviving in the wild. At least Rose won’t have any compunctions about asking for help. I’m afraid she will have compunctions about the killing, though.”

Donna looked at him, understanding in her eyes. “The will to survive is strong. In the end, we do what we have to do.”

The Doctor looked away from her. “What we’re forced to do.”

Chapter Text

The next morning, Rose was surprised to find that she’d slept all night. She had been wrung out after dinner, too tired to even cry.

A knock on her door startled her. She opened it to find Reina outside.

“Breakfast is on,” she said. “Wash up and get ready, because we’ll be arriving at the station in less than an hour.”

Rose took as long and hot a shower as she felt she could and put on a pair of soft pants and a hooded sweatshirt. Before she left the room, memory sparked, and she took the wolf’s-head pin off her reaping dress and put it on her sweatshirt.

Breakfast was laid out on a long table in the dining car. Rose’s stomach rumbled, and she happily piled her plate with fruit, eggs, sausage and bread. Adam was already there, munching on a plate of pancakes. They ate in silence for a few minutes, and then, to Rose’s surprise, the Doctor spoke.

“The opening ceremony is tonight, of course,” he said. “You’ll be going to the Remake Center as soon as we arrive. I’d advise you not to fight your stylists, even if you think they deserve it. They’re here to help you make a good impression on the Capitol. You want to do that. Reina and Donna are good at lining up sponsors – Reina makes them want to sponsor you, and Donna makes them scared not to – but it’ll help if they like what they see. Understood?”

“The Hunger Games isn’t exactly a beauty contest,” Adam pointed out.

The Doctor’s customary glare locked on him. “Did you just miss my entire point? Sponsors can be the difference between life and death in the arena. They like pretty. You’ve got a bit of that naturally, not as much as Rose, and the stylists will play that up.”

Adam crossed his arms. “I’m more interested in what’ll happen inside the arena. What about the Cornucopia?”

“Never mind that. You’ve got a week between now and then,” said the Doctor. “My advice is to use it. Neither of you knows how to survive off the land. Most of the other tributes will head for the weapons at the Training Center first thing. You two should go to the wilderness survival trainers first. Weapons are only as useful as the hand that holds them.”

Rose nodded. “Makes sense. All I know about hunting is from watching Dusty the shop cat kill mice and shrews.”

There was more conversation after that, with Donna chipping in some and Reina mostly staying out of it and watching with that almost-amused expression of hers. What Rose began to notice was that Adam seemed determined to have an answer for everything, even the stuff he couldn’t know anything about.

Pride, she thought, and fear. He was so used to knowing more than everyone around him that he wasn’t adjusting well to a situation in which his good grades meant precisely squat. He was clinging to the idea that he could think himself out of this. That he could plan ahead and cover all contingencies.

Rose, raised on the mean streets, knew better. You couldn’t plan your way around chaos. You could prepare, to a certain degree, but once it hit, your plans went out the window. All you could do was respond.

The meal wrapped up as the train slowed, and Adam stalked off. As Rose was leaving, the Doctor called her over.

“What is it?” she asked.

He was fiddling with a pen of some sort. Must have been a Capitol one, as it lit up on one end. “When you go to the Training Center, find a woman named River Song. She’s tall and has curly hair, and she’ll be somewhere around the bows. Tell her I sent you. River Song.”

“River Song,” Rose repeated. “Okay, I will.”

The Doctor nodded. “Good girl. Now, get to the Remake Center. And remember: Be cooperative.”

***

Be cooperative. Rose repeated it to herself as her body hair was ripped out, the hair on her head was exclaimed over in horror, and the three strangest people she’d ever met generally manhandled her. Currently, she was sitting, wrapped up like a mummy over a generous slathering of pink-smelling cream, in a chair while they worked on her head and her feet.

Aurelius, a tall, thin, dark-skinned man with lime-green locks springing from his head, finished rinsing out her hair. “There!” he declared. “You look human now. I don’t know who dyed your hair before, darling, but it was like straw. Like straw!”

Rose gritted her teeth to stop herself from wringing his skinny neck. In fact, her mother dyed her hair. Jackie found it paid to advertise, and her daughter’s head was as good a billboard as any. Some of the wealthier women of District 9 were willing to part with a good deal of money to have their hair colored. So what if the dye was a bit harsh? One dye job could put dinner on the table for a week.

Priscilla, a woman with silver and blue tattoos in intricate patterns all over her face, proclaimed her feet done, and Rose was unwrapped, wiped down, and inspected from head to literal toe. Once the prep team was satisfied, the youngest, a short teenager named Marcus, was dispatched to find the stylist.

When he entered, a few minutes later, Rose was struck dumb by how very good-looking he was. He had no obvious alterations save for a single, stylized-flame tattoo on one temple. He didn’t need any more, not with his striking blue eyes and sensual mouth. He looked her over, smiled, and stuck out his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Rose,” he said. “My name’s Junius, but we all agree that doesn’t suit me, so please call me Jack.”

Rose found her tongue. “Hello, Jack.”

Jack handed her a robe, which she put on gratefully, and took her over to a mirror. She had to admit (grudgingly) that her hair did look a lot better. It was a softer shade of blonde, more like Reina’s, and her eyebrows had been lightened to match. “You are a very pretty girl,” said Jack from behind her, hands on her shoulders. Rose couldn’t help but smile at his words. “And now, you’re beautiful. That smile, Rose, is going to win hearts all over the Capitol.”

“It’s nothing on yours,” said Rose, almost automatically.

“Ooh, and she flirts!” Jack rubbed her shoulders, sending a pleasant zing through Rose’s body. “Rose Tyler, we are going to make the whole world fall in love with you. Let’s get some lunch, and we’ll talk about your costume for the opening ceremonies.”

***

Factory, Jack had said. She and Adam were both Factory kids, so Jack and Adam’s stylist were breaking from the usual grain-themed costumes this year. Instead, they were going with the metal District 9 refined.

Rose had to admit her costume was both beautifully made and a lot of fun to look at. Not quite as much fun to wear, unfortunately; the top was a corset, and she was still getting used to breathing in it. It was made of some stiff, copper-colored material with “rivets” at every seam. The skirt was alternating strips of copper and steel-colored material falling to mid-thigh. Her knee-high boots looked like sections of pipe, as did the fingerless gloves on her hands. Jack had perched a small, coppery top hat on her head that had a pair of goggles attached to it and a bouquet of tiny cogwheels springing from one side. Her earrings and necklace looked like cogwheels, too.

Adam was wearing a suit along the same lines, though his was dominated by steel-colored material rather than copper, and he had a boutonniere of cogwheels that matched Rose’s jewelry. The effect was only marred by his sour expression. “I feel like I’m wearing a train car,” he groused, adjusting his jacket. Admittedly, it made a slightly-metallic shuffling noise as he moved.

“Well, I can’t breathe, so, consider yourself lucky,” said Rose.

“You look amazing, though,” Adam said. “You won’t have any trouble getting sponsors.”

Rose was startled. “Thanks,” she said, a little uncertainly.

“It’s the truth,” Adam insisted. “People like you. Everyone likes you. Even the Doctor, and he doesn’t like anybody.”

She didn’t know what to say to that. Fortunately, their chariot started moving at that moment, and she didn’t have to.

***

It wasn’t until later, when they were watching the recap at the Training Center, that it all began to sink in. All the noise and the lights and the crowds had been overwhelming. She’d clung to Jack’s advice to smile and wave and look confident, but the entire ceremony had been a blur.

On TV, it was different. There she was, in Jack’s stunning costume, giving her biggest smile to the citizens of the Capitol who’d cheer on her murderer. But the announcers loved her.

“Look at that smile!” said one.

“She’s a charmer, isn’t she?” said another.

They didn’t say anything about Adam. They went on and on about the costumes and Rose’s smile, but Adam might as well have not even been there.

Reina had been talking to someone on the telephone. She hung up, looking smug. “That was my couturier,” she said. “Since the ceremonies, he’s had a dozen calls from clients, and it appears that copper is the new gold.”

“Is that good?” Rose asked, having no idea what she was talking about.

Reina sat down, crossing one shapely leg over the other. “It’s excellent. It means you’ve made quite the splash tonight. You’re standing out already, which will make getting sponsors easier.”

“And what about me?” Adam asked quietly. He’d been very quiet indeed since the ceremony.

“What’s good for Rose is good for you right now,” Reina assured him. “As long as District 9 is in people’s minds, you’ll catch a lot of the same goodwill.”

“And what’s important for you right now is to train,” said the Doctor. “Work hard this week. Learn as much as you can. You say you’re smart; prove it.” He sat back in his chair. “Get some sleep, both of you. Tomorrow will be another long day.”

***

Next morning, all the tributes were gathered in the gymnasium for a briefing. While head trainer Atala was talking, Rose took a surreptitious look around.

So many of the tributes were bigger than she was. All of the boys except the thirteen-year-old from 12, and many of the girls as well. The Career tributes were positively hulking, save only from the girl from One, but she had such a nasty gleam in her eye Rose wasn’t any too eager to go up against her. But, at the same time, Rose knew she looked healthier than a lot of them. Most days, she and her mom could have both breakfast and dinner, and Old Man Henrick made sure she had something to eat at the shop. Combined with the physical labor she did every day, it had made her strong and robust.

A flash of golden hair caught her eye. Standing over by a rack of bows was a tall woman with curly hair and an expression that reminded Rose strongly of Reina – as if she knew something no one else did. Maybe they taught Capitol girls that in school. But there was no doubt in Rose’s mind that she’d found River Song.

As soon as the briefing was over, Rose made her way to the bows. River watched her, leaning casually against the wall.

“Are you River Song?” Rose asked when she was close enough to speak quietly.

“My reputation precedes me, I see.” River’s voice was low and husky, making even the affected Capitol accent sound appealing. “You’re the girl from District 9, aren’t you?”

“Yeah. The Doctor told me to talk to you.” Rose paused, then added, “My name’s Rose.”

River smirked. “Well, well, well. This is intriguing. He must like you. All right, Rose, what is it you’d like to know?”

“Everything,” she said. “But you can start by showing me how to use those bows.”

It turned into quite the education. Along with the longbows, there were a couple of crossbows (“You don’t see them much in the arenas, but they do turn up from time to time.”) and small pistol bows.

“They’re good for close quarters and bringing down small game,” River explained, showing Rose how to load one with slim titanium bolts. “They’re a bit more common than crossbows, and, I daresay, a lot more convenient. Let’s see how you aim.”

Rose at least hit the dummy on her first try, and, under River’s tutelage, was soon able to hit the target, if not the bull’s-eye, most of the time. She also tried the crossbow, which she thought was too heavy and cumbersome, before they moved on to the longbows.

By that time, two more tributes had turned up. One was a tribute from Five, a blond girl with pigtails, and one was Martha Jones. River taught all three without any apparent difficulty. Finally, when Rose’s hands and arms felt like they were going to fall off, River spoke quietly in her ear.

“Go and find something else to learn until lunch,” she said. “I’d recommend the foraging station. After lunch, come back here.”

Rose did as she was told. She spent a couple of hours learning about edible plants and how to recognize poisonous ones. At the end, she didn’t do badly on the test, but she decided to make it her business to drop by at least a few more times. Foraging could mean the difference between life and death in the arena, she knew, and, having grown up in an industrial area, she had no practical experience with it.

At lunch, she loaded up her plate with baked chicken, salad, slices of melon and fried potatoes. There were plenty of other dishes, which she decided she’d sample if what she had didn’t fill her up. She looked around for a table. Most of the Careers were sitting around one table, being loud and obnoxious and trying to intimidate the other tributes. Rose picked a seat at a table far away from them and ignored them as best she could.

“Do you mind if I sit here?” asked a breathless voice. Rose looked up. It was the pigtailed girl from Five. “Hi, my name’s Lynda. Lynda with a ‘y’. You were the girl in that beautiful copper costume, weren’t you? From Nine? I’m from Five. Well, it’s on my shirt, so I’m sure you know that, but, um, what’s your name?”

Rose introduced herself, trying to figure out what this girl was up to. It wasn’t unheard-of for a tribute to make herself seem harmless, even cowardly, to put the others off their guard. Or even to attempt to befriend others in order to stab them in the back later. At best, setting up alliances before entering the ring could be prudent.

As Lynda-with-a-y sat and talked, though, Rose rapidly came to the conclusion that she wasn’t playing at anything. She was genuinely as sweet and open as she seemed – and was, furthermore, so badly out of her depth she shouldn’t have been able to breathe.

Movement made Rose glance off to the left. Martha was sitting down at the same table, putting a little distance between herself and Lynda. That was interesting. There were plenty of empty tables away from the Careers, so the fact that Martha was sitting at Rose’s table meant she’d deliberately picked it.

In fact, Adam was sitting at an empty table. He’d brushed off Rose’s invitation to sit together and appeared to be sulking.

Rose nodded politely to Lynda’s nonstop chatter, but paid attention to Martha. The girl, small as she was, had piled her tray with a truly impressive amount of food, which she attacked with gusto.

“Hello, girls,” oozed a voice. The female tribute from Two, an Amazonian blonde, slid into the seat beside Lynda and nabbed a bread roll from her tray. “How are we doing today? I hope you’re having a good time in training. Makes you more fun to play with.” She tore a chunk of bread off with her teeth.

Lynda had gone white. Martha was glaring.

Rose knew this girl. Or, rather, she knew a dozen like her. Gang girls, bullies who got off on intimidating other kids, especially ones they saw as weaker. Rose had fought girls like her, both verbally and physically. She had the scars to prove it. And she had no time for playing games.

District 2 focused on Rose, who casually picked up a fried potato and munched it. They were good, expertly spiced and perfectly crispy on the outside, but Rose suddenly missed her mom’s fried potatoes seasoned simply with salt and just enough cayenne pepper to give them a bite. She wanted to be home, working for Old Man Henrick and living in the drafty old apartment she shared with her mom. Instead, she was living in luxury and eating gourmet food while being forced to deal with fools like this.

District 2 seemed irritated at Rose’s disregard. “How about you, Copper? Your cogwheels turning all right?”

“Save it for the arena, Number Two,” said Rose, letting a little weary exasperation into her tone.

The insult hit the mark. District 2 glared at her. “I’ll make you regret that.”

Rose gave her an incredulous look. “Seriously? You call that trash talk? The Career Farm must be very disappointed if that’s the best you can do. You sound like the villain from some horrid serial.” Martha snickered.

“You want to throw down?” hissed District 2. “You’ve got it, Copper. I’ll gut you at the Cornucopia.”

“Again with the serial villain. Have you got anything better? ‘Cause, if not, would you go away? We’re trying to eat here.” Rose made a brushing-off gesture, and District 2, eyes burning with hate, stalked away.

Martha grinned as Rose went back to her food. Lynda was goggling.

“Are you sure that was smart?” Lynda whispered. “She looks, um, big. And mean.”

Rose chewed thoughtfully. “Yes, but what’s really interesting is how easy it was to get under her skin. It’s like she’s not used to people fighting back. They’re trained in District 2, but I don’t think they’ve ever had to fight anyone who’s trying to kill them. Yeah, that’s interesting, all right.”

Lynda seemed shocked into silence, and they finished their meal quietly. Rose went back for seconds and discovered that the mashed squash was really very good, as was the spice cake. Finally, one of the trainers came roaring through to inform them that lunch break was over and they needed to get back to work.

As she cleared her tray from the table, Rose looked over at Martha, who was wolfing down the last of her meal.

“That was brave, what you did,” Rose told her, giving in to impulse. “Volunteering for your sister. It was really brave.”

Martha looked shocked at being spoken to directly, but she smiled as best she could around a mouthful of food. Rose noticed, for the first time, that she was wearing a necklace made of wooden beads with a little carved wooden bird at the center. Probably a district token, she thought.

The afternoon session was much like the earlier one. River taught her how to draw and shoot quickly, how to shoot while moving, hitting targets from different distances, even having Rose shoot from one of the climbing structures.

Rose liked those. They reminded her of the abandoned factory that had served as the neighborhood kids’ playground when she was younger. She’d been one of the best climbers, scurrying to the top ahead of the other kids. And these didn’t even come with the risk of tetanus.

There were also two actual trees to practice climbing on, and River sent her over to one of them wearing a bow and quiver. Climbing the trees was definitely different than climbing the metal structures, but Rose found the principle was the same. Stick to what looked strongest, mainly. She got about halfway up the taller of the trees before she decided it was too hazardous to go any farther.

There was a sudden shoosh and the tree rocked. Rose looked up to see Martha grinning down at her and realized the younger girl had leaped from the other tree to hers. District 7, she thought. I’ll bet she was climbing trees when she was still in diapers.

When Rose got back to River, the trainer touched a scar on Rose’s arm. “I’ve been meaning to ask where you got that.”

Rose rubbed at it self-consciously. “Knife fight. My ex-boyfriend’s psychotic new girlfriend had it in for me.” She pulled her shirt off one shoulder, revealing another scar. “She also gave me this. But I gave her something to remember me by, too.”

River nodded, expression inscrutable. “Did you call the Peacekeepers?”

Rose barked a laugh. “Why would I? They don’t care if a bunch of Factory kids are killing each other in the streets. You get in a fight, you do whatever you have to do to get out alive, go home, get patched up and don’t whine about it.”

There was silence for a moment. Then River said, “I can see why the Doctor thinks you’re worth my time. I’ll give you as much training as I realistically can, but you’ll have to practice shooting on your own every day, too. And I want you to hit every single wilderness-survival station here, including the knot-tying one. Understood?”

“Understood.” It made Rose feel better to have someone like River Song on her side.

She spent the rest of the afternoon learning to make useful strings from grasses and tie them into knots and snares. The trainer at the station was pleased to have such an attentive student and showed her how to improvise a fishing net, too.

Finally, training was over for the day and they were all more or less chased out of the gymnasium. Rose and Adam took an elevator with the District 10 tributes and a Peacekeeper. No one spoke.

Dinner was another quiet affair, partially because Rose was ravenous and couldn’t be bothered to answer anything Reina said to try to get conversation going. Adam was still sulking.

Then the Doctor asked, “Did anything happen worth noting at training?”

“Aside from Rose pissing off District 2? No,” said Adam.

The Doctor’s gaze immediately switched to Rose, who cursed Adam inwardly before explaining what had happened.

“She was being a bully,” Rose finished up. “I wasn’t going to just sit there and let her.”

“Hm,” grunted the Doctor. “She now knows you’re not a soft target, which means all the Careers will. There are good and bad things about that. What’s the sponsor situation?” He turned to Reina and Donna.

“We’ve a few strong prospects,” said Reina. “Depending on how these two do at the end of the week, I’m optimistic.”

Rose and Adam headed back to their rooms soon after. Rose grabbed him before he turned off toward his suite. “Why did you say that? It’s not your business.”

“You and the Doctor have your strategy, I have mine,” Adam said, and twisted his arm out of her grip.

Rose watched him go, not understanding what he was thinking. She went to her room and had a nice, long soak in her tub, which she thought might be the best thing about the Capitol. Afterward, she went to bed, but found herself unable to sleep. After over an hour, she gave it up and wandered back out to the common room.

Donna was sitting on the couch, reading and drinking a cup of tea. Rose was about to turn and leave when Donna’s voice reached her.

“Couldn’t sleep? I can’t blame you.” She set her book reader down. “Have a seat. Want some tea?”

Rose took a seat on the couch, curling up and hugging her knees. One of the white-clad attendants brought her a steaming cup.

“Thanks,” said Rose. “Hey, what’s your name?”

The girl looked startled and almost frightened. She looked over at Donna, who waved her away. Rose gave the older woman a confused look. “Is there something wrong with being friendly?”

“With them? Yes,” said Donna. “She’s an Avox. A criminal. Her tongue’s been mutilated so she can’t speak.”

Rose was horrified. “That’s-”

“-the way they do things here in the Capitol.” Donna’s look warned her off this line of conversation. “Don’t speak to them unless it’s to give an order.”

Rose heard the underlying message Donna was trying to get across, which was that some things weren’t safe to discuss. Not here. She swallowed what she thought of the Capitol’s criminal justice system and asked something else she’d been wondering about.

“Could you tell me about the Doctor? No one knows much about him. He just seems so . . .” she trailed off.

Donna nodded, though, as if she understood. “You might be able to get his story out of him someday, but it’s not mine to tell.”

“What about you, then?” Rose asked. “How did you win your Games?”

“Aren’t we inquisitive!” Donna chuckled, but there was an edge of disquiet to it. Nonetheless, she humored Rose. “I won because I had some help. She didn’t know she was helping me, and she certainly didn’t intend to help anyone but herself, but I’d have been dead if not for her.

“I didn’t find out until after the Games, watching the recap, what really happened. All I knew was that the Careers were dropping at an unusually fast rate. There was a big pack of them that year, the usual suspects from One, Two and Four, plus this giant from Ten and a ferocious girl from Five, of all places. Eight people running with the Career pack, one third of the field. More than that, really; they killed twelve tributes at the Cornucopia. So there were only four of us still in play who weren’t with them.

“We should’ve been goners. I was Field, did you know that? It gave me a bit of an edge with wilderness survival, and I was just trying to stay out of their way, but a funny thing kept happening. The cannon would blast, and I’d think it was the boy from Seven or the girls from Six and Eight. Then, at night, it would be the face of one of the Careers, and I couldn’t understand what was happening.

“Finally, at the end, with only four of us left, they flooded the arena with this thick mist that cameras could see through, but not the naked eye. There were all these noises, horrible screeches and growls. You couldn’t see what was making them, but they were forcing us all together. I heard the cannon go off twice, and I suddenly realized there was only one tribute left. Just one, and if I could get the drop on him or her, I’d win. I’d live.

“All I had as a weapon was this heavy mallet I’d picked up at the Cornucopia. Didn’t know how much good it would do me, but, suddenly, I could see something through the mist. It was the boy from Four, the only tribute left. He was short, but built like a brick. And he had his back turned to me.

“It took just one blow from my mallet to put him down. Just one. He had a knife, so I – I cut his throat, just to be sure. It was my only kill in the Games. Everyone else, I’d been able to avoid or chase off, but to win, I had to kill him.”

Donna fingered her teacup. “And it was only after that I found out how I’d won. It was the girl from One. She was a schemer. Manipulated the hell out of the other Careers. Killed one and blamed it on another tribute, played the two biggest boys against each other until they fought and one killed the other, poisoned the girl from Five by slipping nightlock berries into her food – you almost had to admire the way she went about it. Finally, the girl from Two got suspicious of her and slit her throat, but, by then, the Career alliance was shattered. They turned on each other like wild animals until there were only two of them left. The last four standing were me, the boys from Two and Four, and the girl from Eight. Four killed Two and Eight, and I killed him.

“And that was it,” she said. “If the girl from One hadn’t pulled all of her shenanigans, the Careers probably would’ve eventually slaughtered all of us. I held out as best I could, had a bit of luck and won. Remember that: The biggest, strongest and best-prepared aren’t always the winners. All it takes is for one thing to go wrong for them, and all their training won’t be able to help them.”

She patted Rose’s shoulder. “Go back to bed. Sleep deprivation does no one any good.”

“Thanks, Donna.” Rose set her empty teacup down and rose to leave. Just as she got to the hallway, Donna’s voice stopped her.

“Good for you, by the way.” Donna flipped her red hair. “Those bullies needed a bit of a takedown.”

Heart a bit lighter than before, Rose went off to bed.

Chapter Text

The next day, Rose hit the archery stand as soon as she could. River had her fire while moving again, moved targets while Rose wasn’t looking and gave her progressively less time to turn around and get off a shot, had her fire at closer targets alternating with ones farther away, and finally had her fire from behind cover.

“You’re still making yourself too much of a target,” she said. “Leave that much of your body hanging out, and someone could put a knife or spear in it.”

As Rose’s arms ached, she went off to the wild game station, where she learned to field dress small game and also learned why one shouldn’t eat raw rabbit. Not that she was tempted.

And then, at lunch, a funny thing happened. Instead of spreading themselves out, one after another, kids from other districts started sitting at Rose’s table. It started with Lynda and Martha, but soon, Sunshine from Eleven, Georgette from Eight and Nokia from Three joined them.

“Nokia is a pretty name,” said Rose.

Nokia, a small, quiet, dark-haired girl, said, “My parents named me after a piece of antique electronica at the district museum. Same with my brothers Sony and Kodak.”

Sunshine was tall and strikingly beautiful, with skin a few shades lighter than Martha’s, huge dark eyes and enviably thick, shiny black hair. She, too, seemed very quiet. Georgette, a pale redhead, was a bit more talkative. Conversation was sparse, but astonishingly normal, if shallow.

And that was how it went for the rest of the training days. The Careers took up one corner of the cafeteria, while other tributes either scattered themselves around the room or gravitated to Rose’s table. Rose learned their names: Chip from Three, Toby from Eight, Feather from Ten, Furrow from Eleven, and Benj and Scooti from Twelve. Chip was sarcastic. Toby was nearly sick with anxiety and didn’t eat much, even though he was already far too thin. Feather always looked like she’d been crying. Furrow was subdued and sad, thinking about his family. Benj was resigned, Scooti determined.

Every district had its own stereotype. District 1 was vain and silly. District 2 grew brutes. People from Three were weird. District 4 was sex-obsessed. Five’s people made Three’s look normal. Six was for druggies, District 7’s people were rugged and a bit thick, Eight’s were bad-tempered, Nine’s were dumb thugs, Ten’s smelled of manure (and had sex with their livestock), Eleven’s talked funny, and Twelve’s were hopelessly inbred.

The stereotypes certainly didn’t seem true of this group. Okay, Furrow and Sunshine did have accents that sometimes made them hard to understand, and, yes, Nokia and Lynda were both a little off-center, but Chip was quick-witted, Martha was obviously sharp as a tack, Georgette was nice, Feather was as well-groomed as any of them, and Benj and Scooti seemed perfectly normal. And Toby – he was just scared. All Rose could think was that she’d have probably made friends with all these kids, if only they weren’t all supposed to go into an arena and kill each other. And for what?

Lynda sniffed, throwing a disdainful look at her fellow District 5 tribute. “Rodrick’s trying to make nice with the Careers over there. Looks like the guy you came with is, too.”

Rose looked over, and, sure enough, Adam was hanging around the Career table, talking to the girl from District 2. It was . . . odd. Was he trying to ally himself with the Careers?

District 2 caught her looking, threw her a poisonous glare, and then sidled closer to Adam.

“Unbelievable,” Rose muttered. She had no idea what kind of game he was playing, but, from where she sat, it looked like he was going to get himself stabbed in the back if he didn’t watch out.

Then lunch was over. She spent the afternoon learning to throw knives and studying up on how to treat your own wounds. Which came in handy, since she cut her hand with one of the throwing knives.

***

Finally, the last day of training arrived, and, with it, her individual session with the Gamemakers. The Doctor advised her to show them everything she could do, so, as she went in, she was laying out, in her mind, what she’d do. She very nearly tripped over a huge weight, left in the middle of the floor by another tribute, as she crossed the floor. Absently, she picked it up and heaved it back onto its rack. It wasn’t any heavier than the larger grain or flour sacks she’d had to stock at Henrick’s.

She picked up a pistol bow first and shot every bolt in its quiver as fast as she could. She managed to hit the targets on all the dummies, and the bull’s-eye on three. Then she used a longbow to put arrows in three more targets. She climbed up onto one of the climbing structures, and, holding onto it with her legs, shot a heavy bag all the way across the gym. Figuring she’d done enough to be judged on, she used a chain dangling from the climbing structure to swing to the floor, landing on both feet without a bounce, and stood in front of the Gamemakers.

The head one wrote on a pad he was holding for a moment, and then nodded at her. “Thank you. You may go.”

She left, hoping River’s tutelage would be enough to get her a good score.

***

That evening, she, Adam, both of their stylists, the Doctor, Donna and Reina gathered to watch the training scores. Reina had been absent at dinner, and now, coming back to the common room, she made jaws drop. She looked like she’d been dipped in liquid copper up to her armpits. Rose had absolutely no idea how you could even get into a bodysuit and gloves like that; they seemed to have no seams or fastenings. Her hair had been replaced by a wig made up of long curls of what looked like various metals hanging to her waist, and she had bits of copper foil stuck to her face and lips. Adam gawked. Donna reached over and shut his mouth.

Reina looked pleased by the reaction. “Like I said, copper is the new gold. Donna, Doctor, you’ll need to get changed.”

The Doctor scowled. Donna sighed. “After the scores, Reina,” she said.

“Where are you guys going?” Rose asked.

“To an unparalleled networking opportunity,” said Reina.

Rose blinked at her, nonplused, and looked to the Doctor for help.

“A party,” he growled in tones he might’ve used to announce his own execution.

“What Bubbles and Giggles here are trying to say,” said Donna, “is that tonight is the customary pre-Games party. Everyone except the Gamemakers will be there – mentors, former victors, current and potential sponsors, escorts, trainers, stylists and prep teams – and it’s a good opportunity for us to scare up more sponsors for you.”

“You scare,” said Reina, sitting down with a catlike air. “I tempt.”

Donna snorted, but didn’t say anything else, as the scores were starting to be announced.

The Careers reliably scored between eight and ten, with the District 2 girl getting a nine. Most other tributes were around the five or six region. Tiny Martha managed an eight, which impressed Rose. Adam got a six, and Rose drew her breath, not sure she wanted to see her own score.

Nine!

Rose blinked at the score, wondering if there’d been a mixup with another tribute. She couldn’t have scored the same as District 2, right? But no correction was aired, and they went on to the rest of the districts. Once Benj and Scooti from Twelve were awarded a seven and eight, respectively, Rose looked around.

The Doctor was obviously pleased. “I knew you could do it.”

“Yeah. Congratulations,” said Adam. “I’m going to bed.” He stood up and left.

After he was gone, Rose turned to the Doctor. “I’m worried that Adam has the idea he’s going to get in with the Careers. They’ll slaughter him.”

The Doctor sighed. “I’d guess that’s his strategy, too. It happens every year. There’s always some idiot who thinks he can talk his way into the Careers and then stab them in the back, and it never works. They’ll toy with him here, just for amusement value, and then cut him down at the Cornucopia.” He looked at her expression. “He’s not your responsibility, Rose. You need to think about your own strategy. We’ll talk more about that tomorrow.”

She nodded, feeling uneasy. Two more days, that was all. Two more days, and then she’d find out just how good she was at surviving.

Then Jack’s big, warm hands were on her shoulders, easing the tension in them. “Don’t you worry, sweetheart,” he murmured in her ear. “You’re going to have people lining up to sponsor you. And after your interview, there’s not going to be one person in the whole Capitol who won’t be on your side. I promise.”

The Doctor reverted to his customary scowl. “Hadn’t you better get changed, too, Jack?”

“Can’t improve on perfection, Doc.”

“Don’t call me Doc.”

“Boys,” called Donna, “if you don’t mind putting them away for a moment, it’s time for all good girls to go to bed, and for me to get changed for the party. Say goodnight, Rose.”

“Goodnight, Rose,” said Rose. She gave the Doctor and Jack her cheekiest grin and got up to leave. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Jack caught her hand and kissed it. “Oh, my lovely Rose, I intend to do things you can’t pronounce.”

“Goodnight, Rose,” said the Doctor firmly, giving Jack a disapproving look.

“Night, everyone. See you tomorrow.” Rose took herself off to bed. It was strange, but, even though she missed home terribly and was trying not to think about the upcoming Games, she was truly enjoying her time with the Doctor, Donna and Jack. If only we’d met a different way . . .

***

The Baths was the Capitol’s biggest, most exclusive club, and tonight, it was the place to be seen. There was a dance floor, catwalks crisscrossing over huge tanks of water that occasionally had people in them, alcoves with tables where people could talk or . . . not talk, and an ever-present Avox waitstaff to keep everyone’s plate or glass full.

On the dance floor, all the action centered around Amy Pond, former victor and mentor for District 4. Most of her clothing was long gone, leaving her in skimpy black lingerie, impossibly high heels, and iridescent tattoos. She was tall and lean and red-haired and unbelievably sexy, and everyone wanted a piece of her. She gave just enough to keep them interested, but seemed almost wrapped up in her own world, dancing to the thumping beat of the music.

Over on a couch, her colleague, former District 4 victor Finnick Odair, who wasn’t wearing much more than Amy was, sat with Jack. The two of them were kissing and caressing, murmuring to each other in between.

Then Jack stood up, announcing he was “going in,” and made for Amy. They danced together, and Jack leaned in to whisper in her ear. Amy drew back in mock outrage and smacked him lightly across the face. Jack protested the treatment and made for stylist Cinna, whose ear he also whispered in. Cinna chuckled, then slapped him, too.

Meanwhile, Amy sashayed off the dance floor straight for the Doctor, who was brooding at a table. When she reached him, she straddled his lap and leaned in to nibble on one ear. The Doctor didn’t respond, and, after a moment, Amy got up, pouting, announced he was no fun, and moved to a booth. There, she sat down in the lap of Ace McShane, victor and mentor to District 3, and started making out with her.

If you knew what to look for, there was a pattern to it. Jack caught Donna on a catwalk and gave her a drunken twirl, leaning in to kiss her neck. River Song came in and sat down to chat with the Doctor. One of the Avoxes took a drink and an innocuous note to sponsor Plutarch Heavensbee, who was sitting at a table where Reina was holding court.

If you knew what to look for, you could see a fire spreading.

***

Next day, Rose had a lengthy session with Reina on presenting herself. Reina taught her how to walk attractively in heels in a long gown, how to sit attractively, how to answer questions attractively, and, in general, how to be attractive. Rose was fairly certain she’d never get quite the same shimmy to her hips Reina walked with. She managed well enough not to trip herself, though, and Reina sent her off to the Doctor.

He seemed to consider her a moment as she sat down, and said, “I’m not going to coach you on what to say or do during the interview. You have the right instincts for that already. You’re charming, and charm goes a very long way in the Capitol.”

“Some of the other girls are prettier than I am,” Rose said, shifting a little uncomfortably under his regard.

The Doctor shook his head. “Doesn’t matter what they look like in pictures. It matters what the audience sees behind their faces. You have a kind of appeal – you’re tough, but still vulnerable – that will win hearts. All you have to do is be yourself, and the sponsors will follow.”

Rose wasn’t so sure of this, but she nodded anyway. “So, what are we going to talk about?”

“What will happen in the arena,” the Doctor answered. “Rose . . .” He stopped, looking hesitant, but determined. “I need to know that you’ll fight in the arena.”

“Of course I will,” said Rose, feeling he was getting at something else, but not understanding.

“Not just to survive.” The Doctor looked straight at her. “To kill.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You mean, hunt other tributes down?”

“Yes, if you have to.”

Rose shook her head. “No, I don’t think I could do that. I’ll kill to protect myself, but I can’t imagine . . . no. I’m not going to hunt people down like animals.”

The Doctor clearly wasn’t satisfied. “Do you want to go home? Because, if you do, you’re going to have to compromise some of those high principles.”

“And do what, Doctor? Go home and know the only reason I can see my mom is because I killed a bunch of other kids who just wanted to see theirs again? How would I even live with that?”

“The way we do.” The Doctor’s tone was clipped, harsh. “Me, Sarah Jane, Donna – we did what we had to do to survive. It’s a different morality in there, Rose, and the sooner you get used to that, the more likely you are to come out again.”

“Donna only killed one other tribute in her Games,” Rose said.

“Donna got lucky. You may not.” The Doctor fiddled with his blue-tipped pen again and lowered his voice. “River told me you befriended some of the other tributes. Don’t think for a moment they won’t turn on you. And you have a minute, tops, to say whatever you want to say without anyone listening in, so let’s hear it now.”

Listening in. Rose realized, belatedly, that she probably hadn’t been truly alone since the reaping. She gathered that the Doctor had somehow temporarily disrupted any bugs.

She took advantage of it. “Doctor, what am I supposed to do? Become what they’re trying to make me? Prove the Capitol right when they act like we’re all animals out in the Districts? I want to get home, I want it more than I can say, but I still want to be me. They don’t own me.”

“Then survive!” the Doctor hissed. “Panem is rotten. From the inside out, from the head down. It doesn’t have another ten years in it, as things are, and Snow knows it. He’s clinging to power. They’ve specialized the Districts too much, and the Capitol has become too greedy and complacent. You have the chance to fight for a new world. Don’t miss it.” He glanced at his pen, which blinked. “Damn.”

He sat back again, his face closing off, and Rose knew they were being observed again. “Of course, I can’t tell you what the arena will look like, but I can give you an educated guess. Every few years, they try something different. Last year was one of those times.”

Rose nodded, shaking off her frustration about not being able to continue with their previous conversation. She remembered the previous year’s Games. The setting had been an open pasture land, almost completely flat and covered with tall grasses. It had made seeing other tributes’ cooking fires far too easy for the hunting Careers. And then one of those cooking fires had gotten out of control . . .

It had been a short Games.

“This year, more likely than not, they’ll go with the usual varied landscape. Be prepared for woodlands. You hit all the survival stations at training?”

“Yeah. I just hope I remember the edible plants.” She shivered; the reality that the Games were bearing down on her was just setting in.

Unexpectedly, the Doctor’s hand curled around hers. “Rose,” he said, voice gentle, “I want you to know that I believe in you. It’s been a long time since I coached a tribute I truly thought had a chance of winning. I see a spark in you that I haven’t seen in . . .” He trailed off and pulled his hand back, retreating into himself again. “Just remember all we’ve talked about, and don’t worry about your interview tomorrow. You’ll do fine. Better than fine.” He smiled, easing the creases at the corners of his eyes. “You’ll be fantastic.”

***

The next day, Rose belonged to Jack and the stylists. Aurelius worked on her hair, wrapping it up and pinning it around a little rubber form on her head. When he finished with that, he started pinning in little copper cogwheels to decorate one side. Meanwhile, Marcus did her fingernails and toenails. They were red, but with a coating that, under the lights, shimmered yellow and orange, like flames. Priscilla did her makeup, using copper and bronze on her eyes and a warm red on her lips.

After hours of prep, Jack came in with her dress. The inside was soft satin, luxurious against her skin. And the outside . . .

It looked like it was made of molten metal. Yellow, but with every ripple tinged reddish orange. As she moved, the dress even seemed to throw off sparks.

“The fabric’s been treated so it’ll constantly be changing under the lights,” Jack explained. “You’ll look like you’re on fire out there.”

“It’s . . . it’s gorgeous, Jack,” Rose said through a curiously tight throat.

Jack brought over a pair of earrings and a bangle for her wrist. “These aren’t your best accessories, though, Rose. That smile of yours is. That and these huge brown eyes. You’re going to have the audience eating out of your hand.”

Rose took a shaky breath. “So, hopefully, I’ll be eating out of theirs soon?”

Jack’s eyes caught hers in the mirror, and, somehow, Rose knew his playboy-stylist façade was just that. His eyes had gone cold and hard, but his anger wasn’t aimed at her. There was something much deeper going on with him, and she wanted to know what it was.

“You’re beautiful,” he told her, voice soft with conviction. “And you are worth fighting for.”

Then the moment was over, and she was ready to go. Jack escorted her to the elevator, where the other District 9 people were waiting.

“You look beautiful!” the Doctor blurted. Donna blinked at him, and Reina smirked. The Doctor backtracked quickly. “I mean, you’ll do fine for the cameras. Could make a difference as far as sponsors are concerned.”

Donna gave him a pained look. “May I offer an unqualified ‘You look beautiful’?”

“Thanks, Donna,” said Rose, and she accepted compliments from Reina and Adam as well. She still wasn’t sure what kind of game Adam was playing, but decided it didn’t matter.

The tributes were gathered backstage, lining up in preparation for going on. Rose almost laughed. It looked like they were kids dressed up for some kind of bizarre dance. Like the graduation formal for the Factory-side high school, when the families of graduates often spent money they didn’t have for fancy clothes they didn’t need, because it was the one time in their lives they could.

Someone ushered them up to the stage, where they took their seats, and the interviews began. Rose found herself listening to the others with great interest. The girl from One, whose name appeared to be Lace, was bubbly in a dress that looked like it was spun from sugar. The boy, Gem, was a constant stream of innuendo. Both of the Twos, Livia and Sulla, presented themselves as aggressive killers. They matched in black leather.

On and on they went. Chip was funny, Nokia eccentric. The Fours, Shella (in a dark blue-green gown with a neckline that bared her sternum) and Reed, played sexy and boisterous in turn. Rodrick was arrogant, Lynda sweet.

When they got to Martha, the audience was extra attentive. Her volunteering for her sister seemed to have piqued the Capitol’s curiosity. And she did look lovely, in a green gown with silvery butterflies decorating the skirt, even if her hair reminded Rose of the pineapple atop the fruit tureen at breakfast.

“My family means everything to me,” Martha told Caesar Flickerman. “Tish is my sister. I’d do anything for her. And . . . since she told me to win, I guess I’ll have to.”

That got a lot of applause. Rose had to admire her spirit.

A few minutes later, after poor Toby fumbled his way through his interview, Rose was called. She stood, hoping her knees wouldn’t knock together too loudly, and, remembering Reina’s lessons, crossed the stage to Caesar.

“Rose Tyler,” he said, “did you know you’ve kicked off a fashion revolution?”

Rose smiled and put her head on one side, the way she did when trying to get customers to stop haggling. “Well, Reina – our escort – says copper is the new gold. But that’s thanks to Jack. Just look at the clothes he makes!” She gave a quick twirl, drawing applause and cheers. “I think this is my second-favorite thing about the Capitol.”

Caesar gladly played along. “What’s your favorite thing, then?”

“My bath.” She made a sound of sheer pleasure. “I could soak in it forever.”

“Oh, I know what you mean. I soak in mine for hours – now, wait a moment, Rose.” He leaned in confidentially. “I was told that, if you have stage fright, you should imagine the audience naked. But now, I think they’re imagining me naked.”

Rose leaned in and stage-whispered, “Uh-oh – so am I!”

The audience roared, as did Caesar. “Oh, Rose, I may have to keep you. Tell me: Who’s your fella back home?” He raised his eyebrows.

She shook her head. “I don’t really have one.”

Caesar leaned in, putting an arm around her shoulders. “Now, sweetheart, don’t be shy. There has got to be a guy back home who’s pining for you.”

“I’m serious!” Rose insisted. “I mean, there’s Mickey, who’s sort of my boyfriend, but I’m a little gun-shy. My last boyfriend turned out to be . . . well, kind of a nightmare.”

“Say no more,” said Caesar. “We’ve all been there. Some of us, more than once.” He cleared his throat and tapped his chest, and the audience obediently laughed.

Rose took his arm. “Aww, who could be mean to you, Caesar?”

“Okay, now I simply must keep you.” Caesar looked up at the box with the Gamemakers. “Can I keep her?”

“No!” yelled one, drawing more laughter from the audience.

Caesar sighed. “Too bad. I know I’ll be pulling for you, Rose. Who do you have back home who’ll be pulling for you, too?”

“I’ve got my friends, especially Mickey, who’s practically family,” said Rose, “but mainly? My mom. My dad died when I was just a baby, and I’m all she has.” She could feel tears pricking her eyes. “I’ve got to get back to her, no matter what. I’ll fight as hard as I can, and I’ll get back to her. I promised.”

“I believe you.” He kissed her hand. “Our hearts go with you, Rose Tyler.”

The buzzer signaled that time was up, and Rose was dimly aware of applause as she made her way back to her seat. She breathed out a sigh of relief and relaxed, glad to have her interview over.

Adam was up next, and he put in a decent showing, making some quips about his opening ceremonies outfit and Factory life. Rose felt her mind wandering a bit through the Tens – she was suddenly exhausted – but was drawn back by how gorgeous Sunshine looked in her white-and-gold gown, with all that glossy hair falling in waves down her back. At last, when Benj was done with his interview, they were released.

By the time Rose got back to the Training Center, all she wanted was dinner and her bed. Dinner was easy enough; there was a spread laid out, and, not even bothering to shed her gown, Rose loaded up a plate and sat down to eat. The whole team was there: The Doctor, Donna, Reina, Jack, and Adam’s stylist, Ophelia. Reina was seemingly chattering with the air, but Rose could pick out the glimmer of an earbud when she turned her head.

“You both did well tonight,” said Donna. “We’ve had a couple more calls about sponsorships, and Reina expects more after the interviews air.” She gestured at them with her fork. “Tomorrow morning, you’ll have to be up early for the transport. We’ll have to leave early for the Games Center, too, so you won’t be seeing any of us.”

Rose’s stomach suddenly felt like lead. “Any last-minute advice?”

“Don’t stick around at the Cornucopia,” she said. “It’s a good place to get killed. Grab something if you can and then book it out of there. Find cover, and find water. Remember, it’s a game of attrition. The longer you can hold on, the better your odds will be. We’ll do what we can, but don’t make the mistake of relying on us. And try not to kill each other. That sort of thing never goes over well back home.”

The whole group watched the interviews as they aired. It was strange, Rose thought, to watch yourself on the television. Had she really looked like that?

Jack gave her a squeeze from the side. “That little tongue-in-teeth smile of yours? Money in the bank, baby doll, money in the bank.”

“It’s just the right amount of innocent sex appeal,” agreed Reina. “Four oversold herself, in my opinion.”

Considering what Reina had worn the previous night, Rose thought she could talk, but Reina seemed to be able to get away with a lot just by virtue of being Reina.

Adam yawned and stretched. “I’m going to bed. Night, everyone.”

His leaving apparently signaled that the gathering was over. Ophelia left next, followed by Jack.

“I’ll see you early tomorrow, sweetheart,” he said to Rose.

“You will?” she asked.

He nodded. “Last person you’ll see before the Arena is me, honey. I’ll be with you in the launch room.”

Rose felt herself relax just a little. It was comforting to know she’d have a friend there, right before . . .

Reina let an Avox help her into her coat and went to catch the same elevator as Jack. Just before she left, though, she turned and said, “Rose? I’m not allowed to bet, but if I could, my money would be on you. Good luck, dear.” With that, she was gone.

Donna looked surprised. “Well, that’s a first. Reina doesn’t just say things like that, Rose. Take heart.”

“Thanks, Donna,” said Rose. “For everything. I’m glad you’re on my side.”

“You bet I am.” Donna wrapped her in a hug. “Let’s just get you home, okay?”

“Yeah.” She turned to the Doctor. “Any last words of wisdom?”

He shook his head. “No. You’ve got everything you need to come out of this alive, Rose. I believe that.” He shuffled his feet, looking awkward.

Rose took the initiative and moved in for a hug. He smelled good, like clean skin and his worn leather jacket. A little of the smoke of District 9 clung to him, too, and she felt safe, just for a moment.

Finally, she drew back and looked in his eyes. They startled her. His blue gaze wasn’t cold and distant anymore; it was full of a longing she couldn’t begin to name. Whatever he needed, she wanted to give it to him.

He stepped back, breaking their gaze. “Best get some sleep,” he said gruffly.

“Not sure I can,” said Rose.

The Doctor reached out and poured wine from a carafe into an empty glass. He picked it up from the top rather than the stem and handed it to her. As he did so, Rose saw something drop from his fingers into the wine, making a little plip. It fizzed briefly before disappearing altogether. She looked at him, a question in her eyes.

“Drink a glass of wine before you get into bed,” he said pointedly. “It’ll help you relax.”

She nodded and took the glass. “All right. I’ll – I’ll see you, then.”

To her surprise, the Doctor drew her near and kissed her forehead. “You will. I know you will.”

Rose forced herself to walk away, turning just as she left the room to wave at the Doctor and Donna. They smiled and waved back, and she continued on to her room.

Inside, she set down the wine beside her bed. Whatever the Doctor had put in her wine would help her sleep, she knew. Best save it for after she’d bathed.

The Avox girl she’d tried to speak to the other night was in her room, tidying up. “Um, excuse me?” Rose said. The girl looked up at her. “Would you help me take my hair down? I’m not exactly sure what Aurelius did with it.”

The girl nodded, and Rose sat down and let her take the pins out. It took several minutes to get them all. The girl then helped Rose out of her dress. Rose found herself surprisingly unselfconscious about being naked in front of the girl. Who knew what else she’d seen in her life?

Rose handed the dress to her, taking the opportunity to slip her hand into the folds of fabric enough to take the girl’s hand. “Just make sure Jack gets this, okay? Thanks.”

The girl squeezed her hand, and Rose caught the shimmer of tears in her eyes as she gave Rose a slight smile. How long had it been since anyone had touched this girl with kindness?

She left, and Rose took a long, hot shower, washing away all the makeup and beauty treatments Jack’s team had used on her. She pulled on a silky nightgown, drank the wine, and slipped into bed.

Within seconds, she was asleep.

***

Morning moved fast. Rose was awakened at what her mother would have called “the ass-crack of dawn” by Jack, who hurried her through dressing before they went up to the roof to catch the hovercraft that would take them to the arena. She made herself eat breakfast on the way, even though she didn’t feel like eating at all. The thick porridge and sausages nearly stuck in her throat, but she forced them down.

The trip to the arena took about an hour, and then she and Jack were ushered into her launch room. There, she was allowed to bathe, and Jack finished her grooming, pulling her hair back into a ponytail at the nape of her neck and securing it with an elastic. Then he helped her dress in her arena outfit. The pants were dark green with multiple pockets, all of which were empty, and she had a sturdy brown belt to hold them up. Her shirt was black, and the jacket she was given was dark gray.

“It’s a good color,” said Jack. “Actually less noticeable than black in low light. The material holds in body heat, so it’s a good bet there’ll be some cold weather, and it’s waterproof, too.”

Last were the boots, which fit perfectly. “Good treads on these,” Jack commented. “How do you feel?”

The question broke something in her, and Rose, to her horror, began to sob softly as the reality of being in the Games hit her. She'd been holding terror at bay with activity until now, trying to keep the fact that she might be about to die, possibly horribly, from her mind. And she just couldn't do it anymore. Jack gathered her to his chest, making soothing noises and running his hands over her back. In a few minutes, she pulled herself back together with the determination of a Tyler woman.

“Thanks, Jack,” she sniffled, and then said, desperate for anything to say that wasn’t connected to the Games, “You smell amazing, by the way.”

He gave her one of his I-would-do-anything grins. “That’s because I’ve got cologne tattooed into my skin.”

It was such a weird thing for him to say at the moment that Rose started laughing helplessly, almost hysterically. Jack laughed with her, and they sat down to wait. He gave her a glass of water, which she sipped as the minutes ticked away.

“It’s been good to know you, Jack,” she finally said. “Tell the Doctor and Donna – even Reina – that for me if I don’t make it out, okay?”

“I will,” he promised, squeezing her hand.

She looked away. “Tell me the truth, Jack: Do you think I have any chance of winning? Please, just tell me the truth, even if it’s not what you think I want to hear.”

He used his fingers to turn her head toward him and looked her in the eyes. “Yes, Rose Tyler. I absolutely think you have a chance. You’re smart and you’re tough and you’re better than the Careers. They don’t know what it’s like to fight, really fight, the way you have all your life.”

His voice steadied her, and, as the announcement came that it was time to launch, she stood, feeling oddly removed from it all. This was just another fight, and all she had to do was tough it out.

Jack took her face in her hands. “You really are worth fighting for, Rose.” Then he kissed her gently, like a brother might. “Go get ‘em.”

She stepped onto the plate, and it began to rise.

Chapter Text

The voice of Claudius Templesmith announcing the beginning of the Games was a mere buzzing in Rose’s ears as she looked around her. Ahead of her was the Cornucopia. It was situated against a high bluff, and the tributes were arranged in a semicircle around it. The bluff rose about fifty feet, and there were some woods at the top.

Rose looked around. Behind her and to the right was a woodsy area. To her left, though, was what looked like the remains of an old industrial town. Rose blinked, almost not comprehending it. It was crumbled and overgrown, but a tall steel tower rose out of the midst of it, and there were unmistakable factory buildings jutting out of the trees.

She turned back to the Cornucopia and the bounty that littered the landscape. It was a bad idea, she knew, to run for it, but . . .

There, winking at her less than ten feet away from the Cornucopia, was a pistol bow and quiver. It was almost perfectly aligned with her launch pad. If she could get that, her odds of survival would increase dramatically. There were other supplies closer to her pad, but she had her eye on the pistol bow – and she knew she could run fast when she had to.

The gong rang out, and Rose’s feet were moving before her brain could tell them to. She bolted straight for the pistol bow, blocking out everything else, and grabbed it and reversed course as the first fighting began. As she ran back toward the woods, she stooped and grabbed a green backpack and a small cooking pot, slinging the bow and quiver onto her left arm. Then she sprinted for the woods.

And someone grabbed her ponytail.

Street-fighting instinct took over. Rose dropped the backpack and planted her feet, swinging her right arm around in an arc behind her. Since she was holding the cooking pot, it carried more force than it would have otherwise. It caught the incoming, knife-holding arm of her assailant, knocking it in toward his body. Rose had turned halfway and now bowled, shoulder-first, into him. They went down, her assailant making a horrible choking noise.

It was Toby. Rose gaped at his face for just a fraction of a second before dropping her eyes to his side. Her impact had forced the knife he was holding into his own side, stabbing deep. Into his lung, from the sounds he was making.

Then she looked at his eyes again. They were glazed, vacant with despair. Poor Toby had been dead before he’d even entered the arena. Her only choice now was to finish him off herself, or leave him for someone else.

So Rose pulled the knife from his side and, without letting herself think about what she was doing, cut him below the ear, opening up his carotid.

“Toby,” she whispered as he bled out. She couldn’t tell him she was sorry, because that carried so little weight, but at least she could say his name. Because he was a person.

The she stood, taking the knife and a small, black pack he had with him, and ran for the woods.

***

About fifteen minutes later, the cannons started. Rose had been trotting through the woods at as fast a clip as she thought she could maintain, but now, she stopped, crouching by the roots of a fallen tree, and listened.

Seven shots. She wondered if Adam had been one of them.

Not wanting to follow that line of thought, she laid out her supplies. She’d shrugged into the green backpack as she’d run, but was carrying everything else. As the adrenaline faded, she realized her arms hurt.

Inside the backpack was a lightweight sleeping bag, a mess kit, a box of waterproof matches, a liter-sized canteen – empty, unfortunately – and a bottle of iodine, along with a length of nylon rope. The canteen had a lanyard on it, so she clipped it to her belt, freeing up space in the backpack. She tucked the cooking pot inside and opened Toby’s pack. It contained some food – a fruit-and-nut mix and some dried beef strips – and a medical kit, as well as a spare pair of socks. She was able to tuck the entire thing into her larger backpack.

Then she looked at the knife. It was a good knife, what she’d heard called a Bowie knife. And it was covered with Toby’s blood. So was her hand. It was shaking.

Her head still hurt where Toby had pulled her hair, and she knew having long hair was a liability in the arena. With trembling hands, she pulled her hair tight and used the knife to cut off her ponytail. She looked at it for a moment, thinking about Jack brushing out her hair just an hour or so ago, and then dropped the hair on the ground. Then she wiped the blade clean on some moss.

That done, she strapped the pistol bow and quiver on and shoved the knife into her belt as well. There. She was as prepared as she’d get. Now, to find water. The forest was lush, and she’d seen a few small animals around, so she knew water had to be somewhere close.

Rose continued on, going downhill and hoping she was doing the right thing. Fortunately, luck was on her side. After about an hour or so, she heard the chattering of water and followed it to a shallow, noisy creek, where she gladly washed the blood from her hands. She was thirsty enough that she wanted to just cup the water in her hands and drink it, but knew one attack of what the trainer had called “beaver fever” would cripple her. She filled the canteen and used the iodine to purify the water, then hooked it back to her belt and moved on.

She’d completely lost her bearings as she’d followed game trails through the woods and had no idea where the Cornucopia was or what direction the town was in. It would have been more her speed than the woods, but, she reflected, the houses and buildings would be the first places the hunting Careers would look for victims. For no particular reason, she decided to follow the river downstream.

The woods were quiet, though she heard the occasional rustle of a small animal moving through the underbrush or the song of a bird. Once, when she stopped to refill her canteen, she caught sight of another tribute across the creek. She thought it might be Feather, from the auburn hair, but whoever it was spotted her and bolted before Rose could get a better look.

She also heard one more cannon as she walked, probably someone dying of wounds taken at the Cornucopia. Eight, then. One-third of the field was down.

The creek was eventually joined by a smaller brook, and together, they made, if not a quite a river, then a nice, wide stream. Rose thought she saw fish in it, which reminded her that she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Judging by the sun, it was going on afternoon. Strangely, she didn’t even feel that hungry. But it would, she knew, be a good idea to start foraging.

She pulled the cooking pot out of her bag. It was fairly lightweight, so it wasn’t hard to carry, and she knew from her run-in with Toby that it made a decent weapon in a pinch. As she walked along, she occasionally spotted something she remembered from training. Fiddlehead ferns, a dandelion-like flower whose name she couldn’t remember, watercress along the edge of the stream, groundcone roots, mountain lettuce – she was surprised at how much she was able to gather in a few hours. Now if she could just find some protein . . .

The stream began to widen, and, just as the woods opened into a grassy clearing, turned into a pond. Rose spotted cattails and was in the process of harvesting a few stems when she disturbed a nesting bird. It was a duck of some sort. Rose had no time to go for her pistol bow before it first rushed her, then turned tail and flapped off.

“Damn!” she muttered. Then she saw its nest and changed her tune. There were three big eggs in it, which she lost no time in adding to her pot.

She took a look around the pond. Halfway around it, an old cabin stood, crumbling. Rose wondered if it had been a family’s home or just a getaway for someone in town when they got sick of the factories. Some of the wealthier merchants from the Factory side had cabins in the lake country, and Rose had always envied them. She and her mom were lucky to get a day on the beach once a summer.

The open clearing was making Rose nervous, so she retreated back to the woods. There, she spent some time gathering fallen branches and cleared a patch of ground for a fire pit. She laid the greens out on a piece of bark and went down to the water to fill her pot. Then she lit a fire and set the eggs to boil while she ate the wild-greens salad she’d harvested. It was . . . different, but not bad. She decided she liked the cattails best.

Once the eggs were done (and she’d figured how to move a hot pot off a dying fire without burning her hands too badly; the extra socks turned out to be handy hot pads), she peeled and ate two of them. She badly wanted to eat the third, but decided it would be her breakfast in the morning.

Speaking of morning, the shadows were lengthening as the day waned. Rose made sure her campfire was good and doused, gathered her supplies, and set out to find a good place to spend the night. A tree would be best, she decided. A nice, thick, tall one with big branches.

The sun was just starting to set when she found her tree. She couldn’t have named what kind it was for love or money, but she liked the look of the branches, and it was easily taller than either of the practice trees in the gym. It took a bit more effort to climb with her backpack on, but she was able to find a nice resting spot about twenty feet off the ground. She hung her backpack on a limb just above her and pulled out her sleeping bag. It didn’t offer much in the way of padding, but it was warm. The nylon rope made a good harness to anchor her to the tree in case she got restless in her sleep.

By the time night fell, she was as comfortable as she’d get, she decided. She lay back and watched as the sky lit up and the anthem of Panem played. Then they began showing the faces of the fallen tributes.

Chip was the first. Rose felt a pang for him, but knew she’d be seeing more of her would-be friends in the sky long before this was over. Like Lynda, whose face filled the sky after Chip. The girl from Six was next, and, after her, the boy from Seven. Not Martha, though; she’d come through the first day alive, it appeared. Then there was Toby. Rose closed her eyes, silently begging him to forgive her, and opened them again just in time to see Adam’s face.

So. He hadn’t made it. Whatever his plan had been, it either hadn’t worked, or it had backfired. She let herself feel sorrow for him, but knew she couldn’t afford to dwell on it.

The boy from Ten came after Adam, and Benj was last. That meant that both from One, both from Two, Nokia, both from Four, Rodrick from Five, the boy from Six, Martha, Georgette, Rose, Feather, both from Eleven, and Scooti were still in play. The Careers would probably hunt at night, so Rose knew that number could go down before dawn. Exhausted as she was, that thought kept her awake.

She thought about her mom. Jackie wouldn’t be alone, she knew. Factory life was rough, but neighbors supported each other. The other families in the Estates (as they jokingly called their apartment block) would take turns staying with her while she watched and would make sure she ate. Mickey had probably moved in for the duration. That thought brought comfort. Jackie’s friend Bev, another Factory widow, might just stay with her, too.

Rose closed her eyes and thought about home. It seemed so far away, though, for all she knew, she could be just miles from District 9 right now. The thought only brought sadness, and no comfort.

As the moon rose, though, a little flash of white flickered through the branches of her tree. A mockingjay began to sing. Its song was soft and sweet, nothing Rose recognized, but it felt like a lullaby. It felt like a bit of home.

She closed her eyes, and, finally, she fell into exhausted sleep.

***

At the Game Center, in District 9’s control room, the Doctor and Donna watched the screen as they replayed District 9’s day. Adam’s death came quickly. The boy from Four hit him dead-center in the forehead with a crossbow bolt, and Adam went down with a look of blank surprise on his face.

Then they watched Rose. Her dash to the Cornucopia, getting the pistol bow and a few supplies, the race for the woods, her fight with Toby and his death . . . they fast-forwarded through most of her walking through the woods, but watched when she stopped to examine her backpack. The Doctor paused it as she discarded her cut-off hair.

Reina chose that moment to walk in. “Good news,” she said. “There’s been more betting on Rose. I need one of you to close with another sponsor.”

“She did well today,” said Donna, her voice sounding uncharacteristically distant.

“Quite well,” Reina agreed, apparently oblivious to Donna’s tone. “She got a weapon and supplies, she fed herself, and she made her first kill. Not bad at all for a Factory girl.”

The Doctor stared at the screen, at Rose’s hair dropping from her hand, at the expression on her face. He knew he should be glad she’d finished the day so strong, but . . .

Donna’s hand covered his. He looked over at her and squeezed her fingers, glad there was someone else here who understood what he wasn’t allowed to say.

***

Bang!

The cannon woke Rose while the sky was still dark. For a moment, she was completely disoriented but recovered before doing something stupid, like moving. She stayed perfectly still, ears straining for any sound. There was nothing, save for the distant chattering of the creek and an occasional bird call.

And yet, somewhere out there, someone had just died. It could have been a Career ambush, or perhaps someone finally succumbing to a wound they’d taken at the Cornucopia. She shivered, even though she was quite warm inside her sleeping bag.

Rose decided to stay where she was until there was more light and attempted to shift into a more comfortable position in the branches. She wasn’t sure there was one. Her whole body was sore.

In spite of that, though, there was something pleasant about being in these woods, with the clean air and soft night noises. She could just see the stars through the forest canopy. They were a rare sight at home. Too much soot and smoke in the air.

She fell into a sort of reverie, letting her mind wander away from the difficulties the day ahead would no doubt bring. She wondered if the Doctor or Donna was awake and watching her. Somehow, the thought of the Doctor ever sleeping didn’t seem quite right.

Just as the lightening of the sky became noticeable, movement caught Rose’s eye. She froze, heart racing, but it wasn’t a tribute.

It was a wolf.

Rose turned her head and shifted to get a better look at it. It was huge, bigger than any of the dogs that haunted the Factory side, fighting for scraps or trying to make friends with the humans. Its fur was silver-gray, and its eyes, as it looked straight at Rose, were golden, even in the half-light before dawn.

Captivated, Rose stared down at the beautiful creature. Its gaze was disturbingly intelligent, reminding Rose of the way the Doctor had looked at her during the reaping. What are you going to do? it seemed to be asking.

“Wroo,” it said, as if imparting the secrets of the universe.

“Wroo,” said something near Rose’s head.

Her head whipped around. The mockingjay that had sung to her last night had apparently roosted in the tree, and it now shook its tail feathers and rustled its wings as if just waking up.

Rose looked back down at the ground. The wolf was gone. She wondered if it had been a dream after all.

The forest was coming alive with the sound of birds, and Rose figured it was less than an hour until sunrise. Time to get a start on the day.

She peeled and ate her last egg and drank her remaining water before breaking camp and climbing down from the tree. Her next order of business was to go down to the stream and refill her canteen and purify the water. While she was there, she discovered a clutch of berries and examined them. They had powdery blue skins, and she remembered the trainer at the foraging station saying most berries that color were good to eat. She tried one. It tasted good, and she gathered the rest. After a half hour and no ill symptoms from the first, she ate them.

Her main problem, she knew, was that she had never lived in a wooded area and could lose her bearings all too quickly. The Careers would likely hunt along the waterways regularly, knowing the other tributes had to get water to survive. But Rose didn’t dare wander too far away from the stream because she might not be able to find it again.

Sooner or later, she knew, she’d have to face them. At the moment, coming off a week of training and eating better than she ever had in her life, she knew she was at her strongest. The trouble was, so were they. If she could hide out from them for a little while longer, someone else might take one or two of them out, or at least injure them. Then she might get lucky.

She knew, too, that the Gamemakers would likely drive them all together at some point. Not today; the bloodbath at the Cornucopia would be enough to hold the audience for now.

The best thing she could do, she decided, was to keep herself fed as best she could, stay strong, and face the Careers on her own terms, if at all possible. With that thought in mind, she dug Toby’s bag out of her backpack, emptied its contents into her pockets and back into the backpack, and used it as a foraging bag. It was the same waterproof material as her coat and lighter and easier to carry than the cooking pot.

By mid-morning, she’d gathered more groundcone roots, a couple of dandelions, some oyster mushrooms and more of the berries she’d eaten earlier. She was just thinking she ought to try finding game when clouds poured into the sky with unnatural haste.

They opened up, and a blinding, bruising rain began pounding through the forest canopy. Rose yanked her hood over her head as fast as she could and pulled the strings of her foraging bag shut. It was like having buckets of water poured over her head. Rose had been in bad storms before – the ones that rolled into District 9 over lake country could be downright dangerous – but she’d never seen rain like this.

And then the lightning started. The first flashes were several miles away, judging by the thunder, but they were coming closer. Rose had always been told to stay away from power poles and the abandoned factory during storms, since they could attract lightning. But what about trees?

She got her answer quickly enough. A blinding flash took out a tree just across the river. Deafened by thunder, Rose raced in the direction she thought would take her to the clearing by the pond. She had to keep retreating from the swelling creek as she did so, but, fortunately, she was right about her direction. She ran out into the clearing and crouched down the way she’d been taught as a child.

The rain continued to pound on her, and she covered her ears against the thunder as lightning struck again and again. She could see the flashes even through her screwed-shut eyelids.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. The clouds rushed away as fast as they’d come in, and Rose stood to find the world steaming in the sun. She pushed back her hood. Under it, her hair was soaked just from the very brief exposure it’d had before she’d pulled her hood up. Her jacket had done a good job of keeping her upper body dry, fortunately. Unfortunately, her pants had not. She squeezed as much water as she could out of them, thankful that at least her boots had kept her feet dry and she wouldn’t be squelching around in wet socks.

There was nothing to do for her wet legs other than letting time and sunlight dry them, so she allowed herself a bit of grumbling before going back to the woods.

Hunting did not go well. She spotted a rabbit and put an arrow where it was before it sprang away and was lost in the underbrush. It was the only one she saw. It seemed like her footsteps were only getting louder, crunching dead leaves and twigs with every move she made. Hours later, she had nothing to show for her efforts, and she was hungry.

She ate her foraged plants and decided to head back to the clearing to see if she could make a fishing net from the grasses and reeds around the pond. Then, twitching movement caught her eye.

A fine, fat squirrel was perched on a nearby branch. Rose lifted her pistol bow, and, in one movement, sighted down the barrel and pulled the trigger.

The dead squirrel hit the ground with a thump, and Rose, delighted, fetched her kill. It was . . . really terribly cute. She felt bad for a moment, but the thought of meat set her stomach to rumbling, and she got over it. She dressed the carcass as she’d been taught, constructed a spit with some difficulty, and made a fire.

Not bad, she thought, taking her first bite of roasted squirrel. If she could get even slightly less incompetent with her woodcraft, she might just have a chance. She decided to eat half of the meat now and save the rest for evening.

As she was wrapping up the remains in leaves and stuffing it in her foraging bag, she began to hear sounds from the other side of the stream. She froze, listening hard. Shuffling, then definite footsteps – and a truncated scream.

The cannon went off, and it shook Rose out of her inaction. She realized very quickly that her cooking fire could easily give her away, and dousing it could give her away even more easily. Just the smell of wood smoke and roasted meat could alert the hunters – Careers, probably – that someone else was close by.

She packed up as quickly and quietly as she could, loaded her pistol bow, and crept away as fast as she dared. The stream was still swollen, which could give them problems, and Rose hoped to be well away before they crossed it.

It was no good, though. She just couldn’t move fast enough through the woods, and every sound she made might as well have been a cannon shot. Time to find a hiding place.

One of the fallen trees from the lightning storm gave her what she was looking for. She crouched by the stump, just under the fallen trunk, hoping the bushes would be thick enough to hide her. Pistol bow in one hand and her knife in the other, she waited. If they found her, she was determined to take at least one of them down with her.

About five minutes later, she heard them coming. They were, she thought, quieter in the woods than she had been, but not much.

“. . . couldn’t have gotten too far,” said a female voice. It sounded like Lace. “That fire was still burning.”

“I’ve got squirrel guts on my boots,” a male voice complained. It was definitely Gem.

“Stop whining!” Lace snapped. “You’re worse than that idiot from Four. And you’re telling the meat exactly where we are.”

There was only movement for a few moments, coming closer. Then Gem spoke again.

“What are we going to do about the Terrible Twos? I swear those maniacs’re gonna gut us both in our sleep.”

Lace sighed impatiently. “We cooperate for now. There’s still plenty of meat to hunt. They’ll help thin it out. We’ll do them in when I say, understood?”

“Yes, Mommy.”

“I don’t know why I even put up with you, Gem.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Shut up!”

They moved on. Rose stayed put for another ten minutes before cautiously poking her head up. There was no one in sight, and she didn’t hear anything alarming, so she dared to leave her hiding place.

At the very least, it was good to know that the Careers weren’t all getting along perfectly. With something to disturb the balance, who knew . . .

She set the thought aside for later and concentrated on foraging for a while. She knew she needed to move away from the area she’d been in, because the Careers might just come back. Where, though?

Then it struck her: The other side of the stream. They’d just made a kill there and would likely assume no one else was around. Rose shouldered her pack, pistol bow in hand, and made her way to the stream. It was still fairly swollen, but, as she followed it upstream past where the brook joined it, the water level dropped. She found a place where it was no more than ankle-deep all the way across and very carefully picked her way to the other bank.

After that, she refilled her canteen and purified the water, and she set out to find a camp for the night. The trees here were a little sparser, but she was able to find one that had enough foliage to offer good cover.

She ate most of the remaining squirrel, leaving a little for morning, and settled in as the sun set. Then she watched the sky to see who had died.

Georgette and Feather. Rose had liked them. The cruelty of the Games hit her yet again. Those girls should all have been home with their families, having friends, going to school and looking forward to the future. Instead, they’d been hunted down and killed.

And the worst was that she couldn’t even really blame the Careers. They were as much a product of the culture as any of their victims. Someone had taken them and molded them into killers who cared less about human lives than about squirrel guts on their boots.

She clenched her fist. The Doctor had been right: Panem was rotten, through and through. And if she survived, Rose vowed that she would do everything she could to bring the Capitol down.

***

The next day, Rose was in mid-forage when the woods around her began to explode. When a black sphere about the size of a small apple landed near her, her instincts had her up and running before it could blow.

She zigzagged through the woods, watching for the bombs. They weren’t big enough to kill, perhaps, but they could certainly maim. She skirted a boggy area and narrowly avoided a falling tree, all the time trying to keep her bearings.

It was only a few minutes before the attack ended, but it had done terrible damage to the woods – and Rose’s nerves. She took a moment to catch her breath.

Something smelled bad. She looked down and discovered that the bombs had given her a gift. A dead rabbit lay at her feet, its head gone and its belly torn open by debris. It was small, no larger than a squirrel, but it was meat. She’d take it.

The day passed slowly, with no sign of any other tributes. Rose’s earlier run had taken her around to the far side of the pond, and she crossed the outgoing stream via a fallen log after roasting the rabbit. The woods there were thicker, but without as many tall, strong trees. The foraging was good, though.

Just before sunset, there was another cannon shot.

As evening fell, Rose realized none of the nearby trees were big enough to climb. She decided to camp in a hollow in the ground surrounded by thick foliage, keeping her knife and bow handy in case she was disturbed. The anthem played, and beautiful Sunshine’s face was in the sky.

Loneliness gripped her. Rose had always surrounded herself with friends. Here in the arena, though, she’d been completely alone from the first day. She’d had no communication with her team on the outside, which she understood – she wasn’t desperately in need of anything, and it was better for them to save help for when she really needed it – but it added to her feeling of being isolated from the world.

She slept very badly.

***

At the Games Center, Donna rubbed her tired eyes and looked over at her partner. As usual, he gave no indication of being tired or bored or anything except vaguely disgruntled at the world. He was watching the monitor, frowning, as Rose tried to get comfortable yet again.

“She’s still alive. That’s something,” offered Donna.

“But she’s not being proactive,” said the Doctor. “She’s not standing out. The sponsors won’t like that.”

Donna waved a hand. “Reina’s got it in hand. She’s been telling them Rose is biding her time and that it’s all part of our strategy. You know how persuasive she can be.” That was as close as Donna ever got to complimenting Reina.

The Doctor didn’t seem satisfied. “That’ll buy her another few days, at the most. After that, the money won’t be coming in anymore.” He sighed. “I’m concerned about more than that. She’s completely out of her element, and it’s wearing on her psychologically. She can’t afford as many mistakes as she’s been making. It’ll catch up with her.”

“But she’s still strong,” Donna countered. “She’s got survivor’s instincts. She’s learning.”

“I know,” he said. “I still believe in her. I’m just worried about how she’s dealing with being in the arena.”

Donna patted his hand. “Keep worrying, then. I’m going to get some sleep, or I’ll be of no use to you or her tomorrow.”

“Night, Donna.”

“Night, Doctor.”

Chapter Text

Rose woke, cold and cramped, from a terrible dream in which Toby was coming after her with evil red eyes. It figured that what little sleep she’d been able to get had been plagued with nightmares. Her head ached and her legs were stiff from the cold; she hadn’t slept in her sleeping bag because she’d been too afraid she’d have to get up and run in the middle of the night.

The best she could say was that the night was finally over. The sun was up, so she decided it was time to get up.

There was still just a little bit of rabbit meat left over from last night’s dinner. She ate it before packing up and moving from her resting spot. Nearby was a small blackberry bush with a handful of ripe berries, which Rose picked and ate. She hoped there were more to be found; they were delicious, and she was still hungry.

Time to hunt, then. She decided to go back to the woods near the pond, where she’d spotted rabbits and squirrels, and she set off to find her way out of the thicket. No matter how hard she tried, though, she couldn’t seem to get her bearings back. Somehow, she’d gotten completely turned around, and she couldn’t see anything through the thick bushes and trees.

And then, mid-morning, a spine-chilling screech split the sky. Her feet rooted themselves to the spot, the sound drilling into her brain and finding her most primal fears.

Another screech, and Rose knew what today’s Gamemaker-sponsored fun was: Terror birds, a Capitol muttation used during the Dark Days. They could kill grown men with one strike. A few had nested in the wild near District 9, and very, very occasionally, you could hear them. Any that came close were shot down by the Peacekeepers, who had just as vested an interest in keeping them away as anyone.

There wasn’t much that could be done about terror birds. Their skin was so thick it could shrug off even small-arms fire, and they had eyes sharper than any hawk’s. Rose remembered her grandfather telling her, when she was very small, that if she ever heard a terror bird, she should get under something and then stay very still. They went after movement.

She hit the ground, rolling under some bushes. The hideous screams echoed back and forth across the arena. One swept low, its huge wings blotting out the sun, but it didn’t seem to notice Rose.

Endless minutes ticked by, and, finally, the sounds faded as the terror birds left the arena. Rose breathed out for what seemed like the first time since she’d heard the first scream, and she dared to come out from under the bush, dislodging a spider from her hair as she stood.

Too late, she heard the sounds coming toward her. Running feet, bodies crashing through the bushes –

They were on her before she could even draw her pistol bow. Martha sprang out of the thicket, twisted to avoid crashing into Rose, and tripped, falling to the ground. Shella from District 4 was hot on her heels, knife in hand.

Rose instinctively placed herself between Shella and Martha, drawing her own knife. She blocked Shella’s knife-wielding arm and stabbed toward the other girl’s body, but Shella was too quick, leaping back. The two squared off.

Knife fight. Yeah, Rose knew this.

“I was hunting her, but you’ll do just fine, Copper,” Shella snarled.

“Think you’ll find I’m better than fine,” said Rose.

Shella feinted left, but Rose didn’t fall for it. Instead, as Shella slashed downward and to Rose’s right, Rose stepped aside and caught her shoulder, throwing her off-balance. Shella flailed backward – but Rose already had a knife in her.

Shella looked surprised as she fell.

Rose stepped away from her. Unexpectedly, her right leg gave out, and she sat down hard. Something wasn’t right.

And then she realized that Shella’s knife had cut deeply into her right leg a couple of inches above the knee. It was bleeding heavily.

Shella’s cannon sounded as she died, and there was movement beside Rose. Martha was up on her feet again. She stared at Rose for a moment, then turned her attention to Shella. She knelt down, stripping a longbow and quiver of arrows, a canteen and a backpack from the dead girl. She also took Shella’s knife and used it to cut a strip of her jacket off.

Rose watched her with detached fascination, thinking that any second, the younger girl would run off with her purloined supplies. Instead, Martha dumped them next to Rose, said, “Hold on a minute,” and disappeared into the thicket.

She was back moments later, kneeling down next to Rose’s wounded leg. She examined the knife cut and then opened up the tear in Rose’s pants a little wider. Rose saw Martha was holding a handful of thick moss, which she pressed against the wound and tied in place with the fabric she’d cut from Shella’s jacket.

“There,” she said. “You won’t be leaving a blood trail now. Let’s get this stuff and go somewhere safe.”

Rose was still feeling stunned from the fight and her injury and the odd twist the game had suddenly taken. Martha gathered up what she’d taken off of Shella, and then she pulled Rose to her feet. For someone so tiny, she was strong.

“Lean on me,” she said, and Rose had no choice but to comply. Martha looked around at what, to Rose, had seemed an almost impassible wood, and she confidently picked a trail, helping Rose limp along. In minutes, they were out of the woods and heading across the clearing near the pond toward the dilapidated cabin.

Martha sat her down in the open doorway of the cabin. It was a good place, only visible from one direction and still partially hidden by the tall grass. She knelt by Rose’s leg and untied the makeshift bandage so she could examine the wound.

“Not good,” she muttered. She spotted Rose’s canteen and unhooked it. “Is this water purified?” Rose stared at her. “Rose. Did you purify this water?”

“Um, yes,” said Rose, wondering why a cut that was bleeding so much didn’t hurt.

“Good. Did you boil it, or do you have iodine in your pack?” Martha began to unscrew the top of the canteen.

“I, uh, I have a medical kit,” Rose said, feeling it ought to be mentioned.

Martha’s head whipped up. “You do? Let’s have it!” Rose continued to stare at her, feeling like she hadn’t quite caught up on what was happening. Martha looked her steadily in the eyes. “You can trust me, Rose. Just like I know I can trust you. I can help you if you’ll let me.”

Caught up or no, Rose knew she needed help. She took off her backpack and handed it to Martha, who dug out the medical kit and the iodine.

“We need to get you out of your pants,” said Martha. “I’ll help.”

It took a bit of doing, as Rose’s leg still wasn’t fully cooperating with her, but she got them off. So much blood . . .

Martha scrubbed her hands with disinfectant and then started cleaning the wound with water and iodine. That hurt. Rose gasped.

“Sorry, but it’s necessary,” said Martha. “I’m going to have to stitch this, and we can’t take the risk of sealing infection inside.”

“H-how do you know you can trust me?” Rose asked. It was, perhaps, not the best thing to say to the person who was doctoring you, but it was the only thing that came to mind.

“Your pin,” Martha said decisively. “You’ve got a wolf pin. I’ve got a mockingjay necklace. It’s like the stories.”

Rose focused on Martha’s wooden necklace. The bird was, indeed, a mockingjay. “What stories?”

“You don’t know about the Wolf and the Mockingjay? Well, maybe they’re just District 7 stories.” Martha pulled out a small, curved needle and thread. “You ready?”

Ready? When Rose’d had stitches after her first knife fight, the apothecary had at least given her a good slug of sleep syrup first. That wasn’t an option here.

“Why don’t you tell me one of those stories,” she suggested, feeling queasy.

Martha nodded, and, as she began to stitch up the wound, started talking.

“In the Time Before Time, when the Lady still walked the forests, the Wise Woman sought her out.

“ ‘Lady of the Forest,’ said the Wise Woman, ‘the People ask your help. A lone Wolf howls at night, and it fills them with fear. Why is the Wolf alone? Why does it sing of such pain? Will it attack people in its agony? We do not know.’

“The Lady considered this. She called for her good friend, the Mockingjay. ‘Find this Wolf,’ she said. ‘Bring its song back to me.’

“So the brave little Mockingjay sought after the Wolf and listened to its song. When it had learned it, it flew back to the Lady and sang the Wolf’s song to her.

“Then the Lady understood. The Wolf had lost its pack, its mate and its cubs. It called for them night after night, but they were all dead and gone. The Wolf’s loneliness consumed it, and it longed only for death.

“So the Lady sang her own song to the Mockingjay, and she sent it back to the Wolf. The Mockingjay sang the Lady’s song to the Wolf. It sang of peace, of home, of friendship and warmth. It sang until the Wolf’s grief and pain were soothed, and the Wolf followed the Mockingjay back to the Lady.

“The Lady greeted the Wolf as she would a friend, and she said, ‘You, Wolf, will never be alone again. I grieve your pack with you, but you must live on with their memory inside you. The Mockingjay will be your friend and companion, and you, Wolf, will now be a protector of the forest and the creatures within it.’

“The Wolf bowed its head and said, ‘Lady, it will be so. I thank you for your gift of a friend, the greatest gift I have ever been given, and I will forever protect the forest from all evil.’

“And from that day on, the Wolf and the Mockingjay were the greatest of friends, and the People learned to honor and respect the Wolf.”

Martha tied off the thread. The wound was now closed with small, neat stitches. Rose swallowed hard, hoping she wouldn’t throw up or faint. She’d felt every one of those stitches, but there was no doubt Martha was a talented healer.

The younger girl smeared the wounded area with antibiotic cream and applied a sterile pad to it, which she sealed over with a clear adhesive. “Done,” she said with some satisfaction. “I’ll have to keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t get infected, but I think it should be fine.” She looked at Rose’s face. “Are you okay?”

In fact, Rose wasn’t feeling remotely okay, but she said, “Yeah. Thank you, Martha. I-I wouldn’t have known what to do.”

Martha smiled her very pretty smile and said, “One good turn deserves another. You saved my life back there. I was a sitting duck; you could’ve run, and she would’ve killed me.” She handed Rose Shella’s canteen. “Here. Drink what’s left in here; you lost a lot of blood.”

Rose did what she was told. “So, you’re a healer?” she asked.

“Yep. I’m apprenticed to Mr. Stoker, who’s been the healer for our camp since before I was born. You get some nasty injuries when something goes wrong with felling trees.” She stuffed the medical kit back in Rose’s pack. “You need somewhere safe to rest for at least a day or two, and I think I know just the place. Come on.”

“Without my pants?” Rose asked.

“It’s close, don’t worry.” Martha helped Rose, who felt quite exposed, up, and took her around to the side of the cabin facing the pond. The ground was a little sunken, and some of the boards had rotted and fallen away.

That was when Rose realized Martha meant to take her under the cabin. It . . . was not a bad idea at all, she realized. The tall reeds hid the opening the two girls ducked through, and it was actually quite roomy underneath in the light of the small flashlight Martha had pulled out.

“I think it used to be a root cellar,” she said, indicating a trapdoor in the middle of the cabin floor, or perhaps the cellar ceiling.

It was low enough that Rose had to scoot in backward on her rear, but it was dry and cool. Rose flopped down, exhausted in ways she hadn’t known were possible. Martha disappeared for a few more minutes. When she came back, she had the rest of their supplies with her. Rose fingered the longbow. It was an impressive weapon, much more powerful than her pistol bow.

“You’re good with those. That’s why I took it,” said Martha. “Have you eaten at all today?”

Morning seemed like days ago. “Some rabbit and berries.”

Martha nodded. “Can I take the pistol bow with me? I’ll get us some fish or game. I’ll make you something for the pain, too.”

At the moment, Rose was feeling extremely agreeable to whatever Martha had in mind. She handed over the pistol bow and quiver. Martha took them, but gave Rose a dissatisfied look.

“You might get shocky,” she said. “You need to stay warm, if possible.” She dug Rose’s sleeping bag out and manhandled her into it. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Just rest.”

Rose didn’t need to be told twice. She was asleep as soon as Martha left.

***

She awoke to the smell of fish cooking. For a moment, it was like she was back home. Opening her eyes, unfortunately, ruined that illusion.

Rose looked around and spotted Martha crouching over a cooking fire she’d situated just outside the root cellar. Something was boiling in Rose’s cooking pot, and Martha appeared to be roasting a fish in some coals she’d raked out.

“Martha?” she called, just to let the girl know she’d awakened.

Martha looked up and gave her a smile. “How are you feeling?”

Rose took an inventory. Her leg was throbbing, and, as she sat up, she felt a little dizzy. Other than that, though, she was surprisingly okay. Sleep had restored at least a little of her equilibrium.

“My leg hurts, but I’m okay,” was what she distilled it down to for Martha’s benefit.

Martha grabbed the tin cup from Rose’s mess kit, which had been sitting by the fire, and carried it over. “This should be cool enough to drink now. It’s willow bark tea. It’ll help with the pain.”

The smell was not promising, but Rose trusted Martha. Possibly, she thought, more than she should. But Rose had always had good instincts for people, and she followed them now. She drank the tea, which didn’t taste any better than it smelled.

“Bleah,” she said.

Martha chuckled. “Yeah, I know. But it’ll help, I promise. Ready for some dinner?”

She didn’t wait for an answer, but went back to the fire. When she returned, she was carrying two big pieces of bark loaded with fish and bluish tubers. She gave one to Rose, along with a canteen of water and the fork from Rose’s mess kit, and sat down with her own, pulling out a multi-tool utility knife to eat with.

Rose looked down at the meal, and she looked over at her dining partner. “Let’s be allies.”

Martha gaped at her. “You want me as an ally? But I’m not much of a fighter.”

“I am,” said Rose. “I can fight, but don’t ask me to find my way through the woods without getting completely lost, or light a fire without matches, or hunt – the only reason I had that rabbit was because the Gamemakers blew it up – or remember half the plants from the foraging station. And I’d never have been able to treat my leg the way you did. I grew up in an industrial town. We don’t even have trees!” Martha giggled, and Rose went on. “You’ve got a lot of strengths I don’t have, Martha. I think we’d be stronger together. If you’ll be the brains, I’ll be the muscle.” She stuck out her hand. “Deal?”

Martha took it, grinning. “Deal.” She took a deep breath. “When should we separate?”

It was a sobering thought, but Rose appreciated Martha’s directness in bringing it up. “When we’re down to, say, six?”

The other girl nodded. “Yeah, that sounds good. Until six.”

Deal struck, the girls turned to their food. Rose found she liked the tubers. “What are these?”

“Katniss. Arrowhead,” said Martha. “They grow in the pond.”

They ate the fish and katniss roots, along with the contents of Rose’s foraging bag. Martha also made Rose drink an entire canteen of water. After dinner, they laid out their supplies.

While Martha had fewer supplies than Rose, they weren’t inconsequential. She had a hand axe, which she said she could throw accurately, and Shella’s knife for weapons. She also had a canteen that was a little smaller than Rose’s, the multi-tool, the flashlight, a packet of crackers and one of peanuts, a pair of gloves, two loops of wire, and a strange-looking pair of binoculars. It all came out of a small, black backpack. Shella’s pack yielded another bottle of iodine, dried fruit, dried beef, crackers, a compact tarp and a compass.

“How do you purify your water?” Rose asked.

“I boil it. It’s always cold by morning if I do it at night, and I can always cool it in the river if I refill it during the day.” She got up. The ceiling was just high enough that she could stand on her feet as long as she bent over. “I’m going to set a few snares and put my fish trap back in the water. I’ll also check your pants; I washed the blood out of them and laid them out to dry earlier.”

While she was gone, Rose got curious about the binoculars. She discovered that you could break them into two components, regular binoculars and night-vision goggles. Together, they made night-vision binoculars. An asset, indeed.

In spite of the throbbing in her leg (which wasn’t nearly so bad now, thanks to Martha’s medicine) and the lingering weakness from her blood loss, Rose felt much better. Lighter. She wasn’t alone, and she had someone to teach her the basics of surviving off the land. Martha was, she decided, an incredibly capable person, especially for someone so young.

Martha returned, bringing Rose’s pants with her. “They’re still a little clammy around the waist, but I didn’t want to leave them out there all night.”

Rose took them. “Thanks. They were starting to smell, weren’t they?”

“I’m pretty sure we all stink by now,” laughed Martha.

The light was going fast, and Martha stood her flashlight on its end so they could see each other. “I saw that the boy you came with died,” she said. “Did you know each other?”

“A little,” Rose said. “We were in school together for a while. What about you and the boy from your district?”

“Tom.” Martha looked sober and sad. “He was a really nice guy. I knew him – our lumber camps were together for a few years – because he wanted to be a healer, too. He’s the only reason I have supplies now.” She hugged her knees. “I just ran from the Cornucopia. He found me later, like he knew what I’d do and where I’d be. He was badly wounded, and he told me he wanted me to have what he’d gotten. I – there wasn’t really anything I could do for him. He had a belly wound. He knew he was going to die slowly, so he asked me if I could – if I could help.” She swallowed. “I brought him some nightlock berries.”

There wasn’t anything Rose could say to that, so she reached out and hugged Martha close. Martha shuddered, but didn’t cry. It was something Rose could understand.

“Come on,” Rose finally said. “You can share my sleeping bag. It’s big enough for both of us.”

Martha accepted the invitation readily. Rose thought she must have had some cold nights. They snuggled together as the sun set and the anthem played. Martha had switched off her flashlight, and, very soon, the darkness was absolute.

“Why do you think Shella wasn’t with the other Careers?” Martha asked after the anthem.

“Dunno. Maybe she got separated from them because of the terror birds.” Rose thought about it. “Or, maybe it’s because there’s trouble in paradise in the Career camp. I overheard the Ones bitching about the others yesterday. I don’t think they’re getting along.”

Martha snorted. “That’s putting it mildly. I spied on their camp a little while ago, and the Twos were having a screaming argument with the Fours. I’m surprised you didn’t hear it way over on this side.”

Rose considered it. “We might be able to use that. I was thinking about how Donna, one of my mentors, won her Games. She said the Career pack got divided by the girl from One that year, and they started killing each other. What if we did something to upset the balance?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. But it’s worth thinking about.”

They lay quietly for a few minutes, and then Martha’s voice broke the silence. “Rose? Have you . . . killed anyone else?”

Rose swallowed. “Yeah. Toby. He jumped me at the Cornucopia. I had no choice.”

“Toby?” Martha sounded incredulous. “He was so afraid, though.”

“He was,” Rose agreed. “I think it broke him. I looked into his eyes, and it was like he wasn’t even there. That’s what the Games did to him.”

Martha shivered and cuddled closer to Rose. “I want to go home.”

“Yeah.” Rose hugged her, stroking her back. “So do I.”

They fell asleep holding onto each other.

***

The Games Center cameras hadn’t been able to find a good angle to see under the cabin, and the director had finally given up. Instead, a heat-image camera had been positioned above it, and it showed the sleeping girls as the evening’s guest commentator made uneducated guesses at how genuine the burgeoning friendship between Rose and Martha might be.

Donna, in the District 9 control room, looked over at her partner. “So. Think she’s standing out yet?”

“I’m not sure what to think,” the Doctor said.

“That’s a first.”

The Doctor hit a few buttons, bringing up Martha’s footage from the beginning of the Games. “Right now, I think it would be a good idea to have a look at this.”

They watched for an hour, skimming over the more boring parts. As soon as they caught up to where Martha met Rose, the Doctor turned back to the live footage. Donna caught a glint of satisfaction in his eyes, and hers narrowed.

“You’re plotting,” she said.

He gave her one of his rare, madman grins. “I might just be. Hold down the fort.” He stood and made for the door.

“Where are you off to?” Donna demanded.

“I know Jabe Cheem, one of the District 7 mentors,” said the Doctor. “I think now would be a very good time to have a little chat with her.”

Chapter Text

Under the cabin, Rose and Martha had the rare luxury of sleeping in. Rose’s leg finally woke her. It ached terribly, and Martha ducked out to get more willow bark. She also brought back a nice, big rabbit from one of her snares.

She seemed edgy, and Rose asked, “What is it?”

“It’s just about time for the Gamemakers’ deadly twist of the day,” Martha said. “It’s always coordinated with the time of the start of the Games.”

Of course it was. “I don’t know how I missed that,” said Rose.

Martha grinned at her. “I’m the brains of the outfit, remember?”

Rose was set to say something sassy back when a distant buzzing reached her ears. “What the hell is that?”

Martha’s eyes had gone wide. “Tracker jackers!”

“What? Get in the pond, then!” Martha made to help her, but Rose waved her off. “It’ll take me too long. Go!”

“No.” In a flash, Martha was outside kindling the fire. She piled on some green reeds to make it smoky, and then she withdrew under the cabin.

It was good thinking, Rose knew. The smoke and fire would, hopefully, block the deadly wasps from getting to them.

The buzzing grew louder and louder. Outside, it looked like a cloud was passing over the sun; that was how big the swarm was. The fire was doing its job, though; score another for Martha’s quick thinking. Not one tracker jacker got past it.

The buzzing faded into the distance, and Martha dared to venture out. “All clear,” she said.

Rose pulled herself out into the open, blinking at the daylight. “What fun they must have at the Games Center, thinking all of this up.”

Martha insisted on examining Rose’s leg before she put her pants back on. There were no obvious signs of infection, according to her, and the soreness would just take time to heal. She brewed up more willow bark tea, and Rose watched closely as she set up a spit for the rabbit. There was also a fish in Martha’s fish trap, and it cooked in the coals once the rabbit was done.

They ate, and Rose helped Martha repair her fish trap, an elegant little creation of reeds and grasses. Martha said they made them a lot in District 7 if there was a river or lake in the camp.

It was an education, hearing about life in Martha’s district. Because of the industry – lumber – there were few permanent towns. Instead, families were assigned to camps, nomadic settlements that periodically packed up and moved to a new location. Martha’s camp moved, on average, every three to four years. Her mother was the camp’s schoolteacher, and her father was a mechanic, helping to maintain the equipment for cutting down trees and the trucks that transported the lumber. He’d been a lumberjack, but losing a leg had put an end to that.

“Before the reaping, I promised Tish that she wouldn’t be chosen,” said Martha. “Leo had to take out tesserae for a while when Dad was injured, so we were all afraid for him. I couldn’t believe it when they called Tish’s name. I just . . . I couldn’t let this happen to her, you know?”

Rose nodded. “Yeah. I don’t have any siblings, but I can’t imagine letting my little sister be chosen if I could volunteer for her. What’s your brother like?”

“Leo? He’s great. His girl’s about to have a baby. Her parents won’t let her get married until she’s eighteen, but that’s just a month after the baby’s due. I can’t wait to find out if it’s a boy or a girl.” A shadow passed over Martha’s face. “I hope I find out.”

Rose didn’t know what to say to that, so she told Martha about life on the Factory side, about her mom and Mickey and friends and Old Man Henrick, about her dad’s death, about growing up never seeing the stars, and about the gangs she’d had to dodge or fight all her life. It was as foreign to Martha as the forests of District 7 were to Rose.

As the two of them constructed a fishing net, Martha asked, “What did you mean last night when you talked about upsetting the balance of the Career pack?”

Rose shrugged. “They’ve got a lot of egos in there. If we could make something go wrong for them, really wrong, they might just turn on each other.”

“I’ve spied on them a little,” Martha said. “They took all the stuff from the Cornucopia and put it inside one of the buildings in the industrial area. It’s big, made of concrete, and the doors are rusted shut. The only way in is where part of the wall collapsed. Someone’s always there to guard it.” She made another knot in the net with an ease that was eluding Rose. “It looks pretty impressive, but I watched Elton – that’s the boy from Six – sneak in and steal some things from them.”

Rose watched Martha’s clever fingers and tried to imitate her movements. “Suppose we could do something to their supplies. Ruin them somehow. How long do you think they could survive without all the food and weapons and stuff in there?”

Martha grinned. “It’d be interesting to find out. Have anything in mind?”

“I thought you were the brains of the operation,” Rose teased. Martha giggled. “Once my leg is a little better, we can make our way over there and maybe find a way. It’s better than just sitting around trying not to get killed, anyway.”

“How many of us are left, anyway?” Martha wondered aloud. “Both from One and Two, Nokia, the boy from Four – are there any left from Five?”

“Yeah, Rodrick,” said Rose. “Elton from Six, you said, and then you, me, Furrow and Scooti. That’s twelve, right? Have you seen any of them?”

“Scooti was up on the bluff, last time I saw her. There’s a lake up past the factory, and I think both Elton and Furrow are near it. I haven’t seen Rodrick at all, and I only saw Nokia once, near the Cornucopia.”

Rose wondered how she was getting along, also being from an industrial district. If she’d made it this far, though, she had to be tougher than she looked.

She only hoped this respite would last. The willow bark tea took the edge off the pain in her leg, but it still hurt. Rose wasn’t recovered from her blood loss, either. Martha kept pushing fluid on her, which was all very well and good until she had to pee. That was not easy at all with an injured leg, and Rose sincerely hoped the cameras were following something else.

The day went by peacefully enough, though, and Rose felt she was learning more just watching Martha than she could have in weeks with the wilderness trainers. The younger girl could move so quietly, and she knew how to cover her tracks and practically disappear without half trying to. Rose couldn’t wait to see how she dealt with the forest, if she was this good with mere tall grass.

Dinner was rabbit and more katniss roots, with berries for dessert. Rose decided she could get used to fresh meat and vegetables that hadn’t been pickled or canned. She and Martha snuggled up together for the night, and only then did Rose realize that it was the first day since the Games began that no one had died.

***

The next morning, a tornado ripped through the arena. Not a big one, fortunately, but it tore apart the nearby thicket and peppered the cabin with debris. Rose and Martha were underneath when it hit, Rose pinning Martha against the side of the root cellar and protecting her with her body. It sounded like one of the big trains that brought in ore and took out steel from the Factory side.

Afterward, Rose and Martha surveyed the damage. Much of the tall grass had been flattened by the wind, and Rose felt uncomfortably exposed.

“The good news is, they don’t seem to be deliberately trying to kill us,” Martha said.

“Yeah,” Rose agreed. “This is just to keep us all from getting too comfortable. Speaking of which, did you want to take another look at my leg?”

Martha directed her to sit on a wide, flat rock near the pond. “How does it feel?” she asked as she removed the bandage.

“It’s better. Doesn’t hurt as much.” Martha poked at it. “Ow. That does.”

“But the good news is that the swelling’s going down, and there are no signs of infection.” Martha looked almost smug. “Only problem is, we’re running low on sterile dressings. I hope-“

A silver parachute landed next to them, interrupting whatever Martha was going to say. Rose picked it up and looked inside the small case attached to it. Martha gave a squeal at what she saw.

“Do you know what those are?” She didn’t give Rose time to answer, but snatched the case out of her hands. “These are the kind of wound dressings they use at hospitals. You don’t need padding or even stitches, and they’re impregnated with antibiotics and healing agents.”

It didn’t look like anything except clear tape with a slightly squishy texture. Martha cleaned the area around Rose’s wound and applied the clear sheet, which immediately brought a cooling sensation.

“It’ll bond to your skin. Don’t pick at the edges!” Martha smacked Rose’s fingers away from it. “Completely waterproof and sweatproof, and it’ll seal out dirt and germs. Best of all, you don’t have to worry about popping the stitches now. Not that it’ll feel great if you try to do any tree climbing, of course.”

Rose looked at the wound dressing, and she understood that the Doctor was sending her a message. “In that case, I think we should move on from here.”

They gathered up their few belongings, and Martha said she knew where there was a spring in the woods. It would be a better place to rest than along the stream, so Rose agreed to go there.

First, though, she decided to do a little practice with the longbow. Martha used some charcoal to make a target on the side of the cabin, and Rose found a spot she thought was about the distance between the archery stand and the dummies from the gym. The bow was a little stiffer than the ones she’d used in the gym, and her first shot went astray. She refocused, and she managed to hit the target with each ensuing shot, and the bull’s-eye twice.

“I think you killed it,” said Martha. They collected the arrows and headed into the woods.

It was slow going. Rose watched Martha, how she moved and where she put her feet, and did her best to imitate her. Martha could move almost soundlessly through the woods. She stopped a few times to point things out to Rose, like ways to figure out what direction she was headed, or signs that game was nearby.

As educational as it was, though, Rose was done by mid-afternoon. Her leg ached, and she had no energy left.

“Why don’t you rest a bit?” Martha suggested. “The spring’s not too far from here. We can head there when you’re ready.”

Rose sat down with her back against a fallen log, grateful for the respite. “Thanks. You don’t have any more willow bark, do you?”

“No, but I know where to get some.” Martha pulled out her knife. “I won’t be long.”

She left, and Rose leaned back, closing her eyes. The woods were quiet, and she began to drift into a half-doze, just at the edge of sleep . . .

And a nightmare came crashing through the bushes. It was almost unrecognizable as a human, so covered with blood and dirt that the only clear features that stood out were two bulging eyes. It screamed, and it attacked.

Rose was completely unprepared. She forced herself to her feet, but the maddened tribute was on her before she could find her balance. A hot pain ripped through her injured leg, and she was being forced back and down against the log, trying desperately to keep those hands from her neck-

Thunk!

-her attacker buckled and fell to the ground with an axe in the back of his neck. Rose pushed him away and saw Martha a few feet away, horror in her face.

Rose’s brain caught up with the situation. Her attacker was Rodrick, his once-handsome features twisted with fear and hate and tracker jacker stings. He’d torn at his own flesh in agony and delirium in the day or so that had followed, and it was only Martha’s axe that had ended his torment.

Martha bent over, retching, as the cannon went off. Understanding, Rose went to Rodrick’s body and dislodged the axe. Then she closed his eyes and stepped away so the hovercraft could take him.

Rose cleaned the axe with some moss before going to Martha. She rubbed the younger girl’s back.

“It was the tracker jackers,” she said. “The stings drove him insane. There wasn’t anything you could’ve done for him except what you did.” She put the axe back into Martha’s belt. “There. Now I owe you another one.”

Martha took a few deep breaths. “Thanks, Rose. I don’t think we need to keep score, do we?”

“No. Not us.” Rose hugged her. “Let’s find that spring now, okay?”

The spring was situated in a good place, with enough foliage about it that it wasn’t immediately visible against a small bluff. Rose had left “exhausted” back at the scene of Rodrick’s death, and she took Martha up on her offer to keep watch while Rose napped.

When she awoke, Martha was sitting on a rock, staring into the bubbling spring. “Do you want to talk?” Rose asked.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” Martha said. “I want to be a healer. Why do I have to kill?” She wiped a tear away.

It didn’t make sense, and Rose knew nothing she could say would help. She tried anyway. “Sarah Jane – she’s one of the living victors from Nine, along with the Doctor and Donna – told me, before I left, to remember that what we do, we do to survive. I think I understand what she was trying to get across to me now. I understand why she took over the community home after she got back. And why the Doctor does what he does, and why Donna works at the community home, too.”

Martha looked at Rose with those too-wise-for-her-age eyes. “In other words, find something to keep you from hating yourself?”

“That’s about the size of it, yeah.” Rose squeezed her hand. “Let’s eat something, and then you need to rest.”

They took turns watching during the night. Neither slept well.

***

The next morning, they foraged for food. Martha chided Rose for not having an arrow on string while they walked through the woods. Martha herself always had her pistol bow loaded and ready. Rose obediently drew an arrow from her quiver and kept it on the string. Good thing, too; she managed to nail a rabbit a few minutes later.

It was also good that they were on high alert for the Gamemakers’ mid-morning terror, because the only warning they had was a sharp, high-pitched hiss. Suddenly, the trees were full of lizards with razor-sharp teeth. And they looked way too interested in Martha and Rose.

“This way!” shouted Martha, whipping around and setting off at a run. Rose trusted her sense of direction and followed.

Something landed on her backpack, and Rose knocked it off with her bow. She ignored the pain in her leg, instinctively understanding it would be a bad, bad thing to let these things get their teeth into her. She hit another one off of Martha as they ran.

The lizards kept up with them, leaping through the trees. One would occasionally leap for the girls, only to get batted aside. Rose didn’t want to know what would happen if they started getting more aggressive. The only thing she could do was to follow Martha, racing hard for the edge of the woods. Branches whipped across their faces, and Rose nearly turned her ankle on roots several times, but she kept running as hard as she could.

And then they burst out into the field with the Cornucopia. They both turned to look back at the woods, where the lizards clustered on branches and hissed angrily. One or two jumped to the ground, but they were clumsy there, easy to kick away.

As if there’d been some kind of signal – which Rose supposed there was – the lizards then melted away, retreating back where they’d come from.

Rose was on high alert for any other tributes, knowing that if she and Martha had been chased out of the woods, it was possible others had, too. Movement caught her eye, and she had her bow up and pointing at the small figure stumbling out of the woods before she processed that it was Nokia. The District 3 tribute seemed to be holding something.

Martha gasped, and Rose, knowing Nokia wasn’t a threat, not now, lowered her bow.

“Rose?” came Nokia’s voice, sounding faint and distant.

Martha moved first, but Rose wasn’t far behind as they both ran for the girl. By the time they reached her, she’d crumpled to the ground. Livid bites covered her exposed skin.

It was obvious, even to Rose, that Nokia wasn’t long for the world. Her face had gone gray, and she was having trouble breathing. Some kind of venom, then, perhaps not very strong, but, with the number of bites and Nokia’s emaciated body . . .

“I’ve got you,” said Martha, gathering Nokia up to lean back against her.

“Water,” Nokia wheezed. Martha gave her a drink from her canteen.

Rose touched the strange device she held in her hands. “What’s this?”

“I made,” Nokia began, and had to stop to breathe. “I made a . . . bomb. Thought . . . I’d blow up . . . the Careers. Don’t . . . think I can now.”

“You’re fine,” Martha said, sounding a little hysterical. “You’ll be fine. Just rest.”

“How do you use it?” Rose asked. It looked like two ceramic discs held together with a lot of wires, with a flat button on top and a metal lever sticking out the side. Rose suddenly remembered noticing that the ground near one of the launch pads had been dug up. Nokia had built this thing out of some of the land mines.

Nokia’s lips were turning blue, but she answered. “Button . . . ten seconds. Lever . . . disarms.” She drew in a painful-sounding breath. “Take it.”

Rose took it, very gingerly. “We’ll put it to good use. I promise.”

Nokia looked at Rose and then at Martha, who was starting to cry. “Strange. We . . . should have . . . been . . . friends . . .”

She died. A cannon fired.

Martha started sobbing. Rose laid the bomb aside and, as gently as she could, pulled Martha away from Nokia’s corpse. Once they were clear, she let Martha collapse, and Rose just held her, murmuring comfort. A hovercraft appeared and took the body away.

“Not fair,” gasped Martha. “We should’ve been friends! It’s not fair!”

“No,” Rose agreed. “It’s not fair.”

She let Martha cry, letting the strain of the arena, of having to kill Rodrick, of witnessing Nokia’s death, work itself out. The younger girl finally cried herself to sleep, and Rose decided to let her rest. They were in a relatively sheltered area at the edge of the woods, and Rose could see the whole clearing without them being immediately noticeable themselves.

It was a few hours later when Martha awoke, and, without a word, she led Rose back to the spring, where they roasted the rabbit Rose had shot earlier and ate.

“What now?” she finally asked as they finished their meal.

Rose lifted Nokia’s bomb. “Well, Nokia made a present for the Careers,” she said. “I think we ought to deliver it.”

Chapter Text

It was a long, cautious journey to the industrial town, where the Careers had holed up. Martha led, of course, but Rose was beginning to see the woods with her eyes. She saw the differences in terrain and understood what they meant, and was able to figure out where to put her feet and why. Martha quizzed her a little, and Rose was able to point roughly toward the Cornucopia and the pond.

There was a little hill overlooking the abandoned factory, which they decided to spend the night on. They ate cold rabbit and foraged some plants and slept in a big willow tree.

When morning came, they sat in the branches of the willow and discussed plans. Rose could see quite clearly which building they were in, and she didn’t like the look of it. For herself, at least. For the Careers . . .

“We need to somehow get the bomb in there,” she said, peering at the entrance through the binoculars. “It’ll bring the whole thing down.”

“But how?” Martha asked. “We’ve got one shot at this. That means we need to be absolutely sure it does its job.”

Rose sighed, glaring down at the concrete building. “Well, unless you can build a catapult, the only way I can see is if one of us personally delivers it, and I’m afraid that would be a suicide mission.”

Martha was silent for a moment, and Rose could almost see the wheels turning in her head. “Not necessarily.”

The ground suddenly began to shake, and both girls descended as quickly as they could. Martha tugged Rose uphill. They rode out the earthquake from the top of the hill, watching the trees thrash back and forth. Finally, it ended, but Rose didn’t stop shaking.

“I hate earthquakes,” said Martha.

“That was my first,” Rose said, voice unsteady. “I don’t like them, either.”

They picked their way back to the willow tree, which appeared undamaged, and looked out over the Career camp again. To Rose’s disappointment, the Careers’ building was still standing, although a smaller one nearby had fallen down.

“Okay, Brains,” Rose said. “What is it you were saying before the earthquake?”

“We don’t need to blow the Careers up themselves for this to be effective. This could be the opportunity we were looking for to destroy their supplies.” Martha looked at Rose, who nodded. Encouraged, she went on. “I was thinking that the Careers mostly hunt at night. They leave one on watch duty. If we waited for them to get far enough away, we could maybe distract the one on watch, and one of us could run in and set the bomb, then run out.”

Rose thought it was as good a plan as they’d be able to come up with. “All right. I’ll set the bomb, then.”

“No, you won’t.” Martha held up a hand to Rose’s protest. “Number one, you’re better with the longbow than I am, so you can take out the watcher if needed. Number two, I’m faster and quieter than you are. I have a much better chance of getting into position without alerting anyone I’m there than you do.”

Rose opened and shut her mouth. Martha was, unfortunately, right on all counts. Rose’s leg still ached, and it slowed her down.

They spent the rest of the day laying out their plans. Martha pointed out a tree within shooting distance of the factory, one that was sheltered enough that anyone in it wouldn’t be immediately obvious, and open enough that Rose would have a clear sight line. Rose would take the binoculars and signal Martha with the flashlight when the coast was clear, then cover her when she made her move.

Then they made a rendezvous spot. It would be the tree they were currently sitting in, they decided. They took out Martha’s fishing net and camouflaged it with leaves, and they constructed a blind in the tree.

“If they head out this direction, we’ll have to have a backup plan,” Rose pointed out.

Martha agreed, and she pointed out a copse of trees on the far side of the factory, near the lake. “Do you think you could find that in the dark?”

“Let’s hope so. If I can’t, though, I’ll hole up somewhere until morning and then find you, okay?”

As night fell, Rose watched the Career camp with the binoculars until they took off hunting for the night, leaving Gem on watch. Fortunately, they headed in the direction of the high bluff beyond the Cornucopia, and Rose and Martha left their tree, each girl heading toward her station.

The night-vision goggles and Martha’s patient teaching paid off for Rose. She was able to find the tree Martha had pointed out from the hill after an hour of cautious hiking, and, as the moon rose, she climbed high enough to get a good view of the Career camp.

Gem, to her irritation, was loitering about the front of the building, just where Martha needed to go. He had a crossbow, which he held in a lazy fashion, and he seemed disinclined to move.

A cannon went off. Rose was pretty sure it meant no good for Scooti. It also meant the Careers might be heading back after making a kill. She focused on Gem again.

Rose was thinking she’d just have to shoot him – though the angle was bad and she wasn’t sure she could get a clean kill – when she spotted a metal staircase leading up the side of the building and had a better idea. She let fly with an arrow straight at the staircase. When it hit, it rattled loudly enough for even Rose to hear it. Gem startled and walked around the side of the building to investigate, and Rose signaled Martha.

A bit of shadow detached itself from a silo. Swift and silent, Martha ran into the building. Seconds later, she ran out again. When she was clear, Rose descended from the tree.

As she hit the ground, she heard the explosion. And then she heard the building begin to collapse. Here, it was almost deafening, and she knew it was echoing through the whole arena. It was only a matter of time until the Careers came back to investigate. So she ran.

She ran until her leg was burning, and then she slowed to a walk. Every second brought danger nearer, she knew. Finally, she found the tree, and climbed until Martha’s small hand pulled her into the blind they’d made.

***

The Doctor and Donna watched the live coverage, which switched between the girls huddled in their tree and the raging Careers at their collapsed building. Something – probably cooking oil – had ignited in the wreckage, and fire was consuming everything that hadn’t already been ruined. The commentators were having a field day.

Gem had been killed by falling debris. Lace spotted the arrow lodged in the twisted metal of the staircase, which had been in Shella’s quiver last time she’d seen it, and it swiftly led to a screaming debate over just who had done this.

Reina entered the control room. “I’ve got to say, people are loving this.”

“It’s good television,” said the Doctor. Donna knew him well enough to hear the pride in his voice through his casual tone.

“It’s excellent television, and it’s having an effect. The feedback coming in is that no one wants Rose and Martha to split up.” Reina looked pointedly at the Doctor. “They’re magic together. That’s what I’m hearing. It’s something new in the Games, their bond. Those two girls have become, dare I say, the little sisters of the Capitol.”

“Imagine that,” the Doctor murmured.

She leaned down to the Doctor’s ear. “And I understand someone has been encouraging this. What I wouldn’t give, Doctor, to have a look inside your head.”

Donna huffed a laugh. “I’m not sure there’s a person alive who could survive that.”

The Doctor smiled mysteriously and hit a button. A silver parachute floated down and practically landed in Rose’s lap. A second one swiftly followed.

The girls opened the attached containers. The one with the District 9 seal contained fried potatoes seasoned only with salt and a little cayenne pepper, the way they would be back home. The one with the District 11 seal contained six pieces of maple-sugar candy.

As Rose and Martha shared the bounty, the Doctor sat back with a satisfied look in his eyes.

***

The next day, Rose and Martha watched the Careers picking over the collapsed building from their tree.

“We should probably move on,” Martha said.

Rose agreed with her. “What do you think of going into the town?”

They could see it from their perch, a crumbling and overgrown small town wrapping halfway around the lake. Part of it looked like it had been burned down. Rose wondered what, exactly, had happened to it.

Martha shrugged. “It’s as good a direction as any.”

They spent an hour or so hiking through the woods, heading away from the old factory and toward the town. They were both alert for whatever the Gamemaker challenge of the day was, but, when it came, it didn’t affect them. Not directly. Martha pointed across the lake, where a forest fire was burning.

“They might be trying to literally smoke Furrow out,” she said.

They continued on, and the fire burned itself out with unnatural haste. Just as they reached the town, trumpets blew.

“Congratulations to our final eight tributes!” boomed the voice of Claudius Templesmith. “It has been decided that this year, there will be a small change in the rules. Until now, only one victor has been crowned. This year, however, we will crown a pair of allied victors. Choose your ally within the next hour, and signal your choice by joining hands and raising them. May the odds be ever in your favor!”

Rose and Martha stared at each other, eyes wide. Rose was the first to speak “Did you – did you just hear that? Did it mean . . ?”

“I – I think so.” Martha’s smile was blinding. “We can both win, Rose. We can both win!”

It was all Rose could do to keep herself from shouting and screaming with happiness as she grabbed Martha in a crushing hug. Until now, she’d been afraid of how attached she was getting to the other girl, knowing they’d have to separate and that one would die. But now, to have someone by her side, someone who could be a true friend and share the burden . . . it was almost too much to believe. Martha was making incoherent sounds of happiness, hugging her back just as hard.

They broke apart to raise their joined hands, beaming up at the sky.

***

Reina opened the door to the District 9 control room. “Caesar Flickerman is angling for an interview with one of you. He wants to know what you think of these latest developments.”

Donna, knowing how the Doctor hated Flickerman and all his ilk, started to get up. To her surprise, however, the Doctor waved her back into her chair.

“I’ll take this one,” he said.

Reina looked at Donna, who shrugged. She had no idea what the man was thinking. As usual.

They got their answer a little while later. The Doctor, in an uncharacteristically gregarious mood, sat down to chat with Caesar Flickerman in the color-commentary booth.

“I think it’s a fantastic idea,” he said. “Just what the Hunger Games needs to keep it fresh and relevant. Here’s something the audience can really cheer for – not just a lone kid, trying not to get killed, but a relationship. Friends and allies.”

“Of course, your girl’s in there,” said Caesar. “The allied pairs are: Lace from One and Reed from Four; Livia and Sulla from Two; Elton from Six and Furrow from Eleven; and, of course, Martha from Seven and Rose from Nine. Now, Doctor, there’s no denying Rose and Martha have captured hearts.”

The Doctor nodded. “I could see from the beginning that it was a genuine friendship forming there. Rose wears her heart on her sleeve, precious girl, and I was afraid of how she’d deal with it if she and Martha had to face each other as enemies. Thanks to the generosity of the Gamemakers, they won’t have to.” He spread his hands. “Besides, they’re better together. They have strengths that complement each other. It’s better not to be alone. Better with two.”

As Caesar fell all over himself to agree, Reina laughed softly. “It never fails to amaze me how that man can be such a curmudgeon, yet such a clever politician at the same time.”

The same thought had occurred to Donna.

***

Rose and Martha refilled their canteens at the stream and treated the water before moving deeper into the town. Martha didn’t like the area down by the lake, and Rose agreed with her. It was too open. Nonetheless, they thought they might make a trip in around sundown to see if they could nab some fish or waterfowl.

“This allies thing is good in more ways than one,” said Martha.

“Really? I was just thinking I don’t want to face the Terrible Twos.”

“Well . . . yeah, but, look at it this way: Who do you think they’ll decide are the biggest threats?”

Rose didn’t even have to think about that one. “The other Careers.”

“Which means Lace and Reed. And we know they don’t get along.”

“Ah.” Rose got what she was saying. “So, they’ll go after Lace and Reed, who, as you said, don’t like each other and won’t make a good team, figuring the rest of us are soft targets. Or softer, at least.”

“Exactly. Two fewer Careers to worry about.”

As if on cue, a cannon shot echoed through the arena. A second one swiftly followed.

“Martha, keep using that big brain of yours,” Rose said. “It has good ideas.”

In some ways, the town was harder to navigate than the woods. Some old fences were still standing. They had to be cautious of the houses for fear of being ambushed from within. Game was not evident, and they resorted to snacking on their non-perishables by afternoon. They didn’t like using the streets, either, for fear of being seen.

But then, as the shadows started to lengthen –

“Martha, is that a – a cabbage?” Rose asked, looking at the thing Martha had just stumbled over.

Martha stared at it. “I think it is.”

Rose suddenly realized the vines clinging to the fence didn’t have berries on them, but tiny red and orange tomatoes. Other vines were bearing string beans. Martha stooped down and pulled on what Rose had taken for a weed and produced a small, bright-orange carrot.

Somewhere in the past, someone had planted a vegetable garden there. Over the years, some of the crops had been choked out by weeds, but many remained. Rose and Martha looked at each other in incredulous joy, and then they attacked the bounty. They feasted on the fresh vegetables, stripping the vines and uprooting carrots and turnips. They cut zucchini from one plant and summer squash from another.

Martha held one up to the sky and said, “Remember, children of the Capitol: Eat your vegetables!”

Rose nearly inhaled the tomatoes she was eating at that. Martha giggled and picked an onion.

“I’m not eating that raw,” said Rose.

“Yeah, but it could add something to rabbit or grouse. No reason not to eat well just because it’s the Hunger Games!”

They both collapsed laughing. Rose realized they weren’t behaving rationally, but then, they weren’t living in a rational world.

Evening was falling, along with a light rain, so they decided to take refuge in a nearby house. Rose didn’t like the one with the garden; it had a root cellar, which meant the floor could be dangerous. They loaded up their packs with as many vegetables as they could carry, and Martha also took a big, hard-shelled squash with them.

They found a house with an intact floor that sat among concealing bushes and trees. Martha cut the squash open with her axe to roast it on the fire. She also took the seeds out and roasted them in the pot.

“We have similar squash back home. The seeds are my favorite part,” she said.

The squash was delicious. Rose thought the soup she’d had for her first meal on the train must have been made from something like it. After they ate it, she and Martha snacked on the seeds and looked around at the house.

“I wonder who they were.” At Martha’s look, Rose clarified, “The people who lived here. How did they live? What happened to them? Did they see disaster coming? What did they do when it hit?”

Martha seemed to consider it. “Sometimes, a camp runs across a town like this. If they do, they have to alert the Capitol so it can be stripped of metals and anything else of value, and then everything’s razed and planted with young trees.

“When I was eight, our camp found a town. A few of us kids wandered in. My brother dared me to go into one of the houses, so I did. Inside, I found a picture in a frame that was still intact. I think it must have been a wedding picture. The woman was wearing a beautiful white dress, and the man was in a black suit, and they were smiling at each other. They looked so happy.

“I left the picture there. It didn’t seem right to take it out. But it’s haunted me. I always wondered who they were and how they lived their lives, and if they stayed that happy. If they had children. For all I know, I’m related to them.”

They sat quietly for a moment, listening to the symphony of crickets, night birds and frogs outside. Then Rose asked, “What are weddings like in your district?”

Martha popped another seed in her mouth. “Well, the bride and groom always wear blue in honor of the Lady of the Forest.”

“Blue?”

“Yeah, the Lady wears robes of blue. Don’t ask me why. Anyway, the bride and groom wear blue, and their families and the Wise Woman – usually the oldest woman in camp – lay out branches in a circle on the ground. The bride and groom stand inside with their hands joined, and the Wise Woman leads them through the Seven Promises to each other.”

Rose had her eyes closed, picturing it in her mind. “What are those?”

Martha counted them off on her fingers. “First, to support each other in word and deed. Second, to be faithful and give of yourself only to your husband or wife. Third, to care for each other in illness, injury and sorrow. Fourth, to celebrate life’s joys together. Fifth, to raise any children of the union with love. Sixth, to honor the land, which gives us life. Seventh, to share their love with all around them.”

“Mmm. That’s beautiful,” said Rose. “Anything else?”

“Well, then the Wise Woman calls blessings from the land, the trees, the waters and the sky above. After that, the husband and wife leave the circle by jumping over the largest branch, which has usually been decorated with ribbons and flowers, and then everyone eats maple cakes, and there’s always dancing and storytelling. Weddings are fun.” She nudged Rose. “Why? What are District 9 weddings like?”

“They’re nice, too, but not much like yours,” said Rose. “There’s no wedding color. If you can afford new clothes, you buy them. If not, you just wear your best clothes – girls often wear their graduation dresses if they still fit – and the families gather at someone’s home or at a place like the Justice Building. There’s a wedding ceremony, and it’s usually led by the bride’s father or mother. It ends with the bride and groom sharing a small loaf of bread.

“After that, there’s the wedding feast. Each guest is supposed to bring some kind of food to share, and they eat it together, and usually get a little drunk. The bride and groom leave to have their wedding night, everyone else gets even drunker, and that’s about it.”

Martha yawned hugely, and Rose hugged her. “Get some sleep. I’ll take first watch.”

***

They indulged in a lazy morning, munching on vegetables and talking about plans for the day. Neither thought the Games would last much longer; the Gamemakers would bring things to a head soon.

They decided to go back to the garden and gather as much as they could. When they got there, a rabbit was snacking on the cabbage Martha had tripped over. Rose shot it.

“I don’t think we should cook it just yet,” Martha said. She was scanning the sky, on high alert.

Rose knew Martha had a better sense of what time of day it was than she did, so she picked up the rabbit and joined Martha in watching for any signs of what the Gamemakers had in store for them.

It wasn’t long before an ominous, almost black, bank of clouds came flooding into the sky over the lake. At first, Rose thought they were just dumping down another heavy rain, but the sound was all wrong. It was like thunder, like an avalanche . . .

Martha gripped her arm. “Hail.”

“Hell.” Rose looked around and decided the house’s cellar would be the best place to ride out the storm. The cellar doors were closed, with a rusty lock holding them shut, but the wood was rotten and fragile. Rose took it out with one kick. Underneath was an ancient wooden staircase which Rose trusted not at all. She jumped down, breaking through the rotten wood. Fortunately, the floor wasn’t far below.

Martha swung down after her. As the first fist-sized hailstone smashed on the cellar floor, she and Rose huddled in the corner. Overhead, things smashed and crashed under the onslaught. Part of the cellar ceiling gave way. More hail came through the cellar door, ripping away whatever remained of the stairs.

It was over in minutes, moving on through the arena. Rose hoped it gave the Careers some nice bruises.

She gave Martha a heave up and out of the cellar, and Martha helped her climb out as well. Outside, it looked like a bomb had gone off. Several of the elderly, fragile houses had fallen down, and most of the others had lost sizable chunks. Trees had fallen, and the garden had been utterly flattened.

“What a waste,” muttered Martha. She and Rose salvaged some of the root vegetables; everything above ground was a loss.

Motion caught the corner of Rose’s eye and had her moving before she could even think, tackling Martha to the ground as a spear flew through where she’d just been. Rose looked up to see a dark head ducking out of sight two houses away.

“Come on,” she hissed, and she and Martha scrambled to where a corner of fencing had survived.

Martha took a quick peek. “It’s Furrow and Elton!”

Rose cursed quietly, putting an arrow to string. She peered around the corner, sighted the boys, and let an arrow fly. They ducked out of the way. Another spear, a heavy one with a flint head, flew at them, but missed their blind by inches. Rose shot another arrow, as did Martha.

This time, someone yelled an agonized curse. Rose got a quick glimpse of Elton with a pistol bow bolt in his shoulder before he and Furrow retreated into the brush.

She and Martha waited for them to be gone before daring to retrieve their lost arrows.

“I liked Furrow,” Martha said. She looked and sounded forlorn.

“Yeah, so did I,” said Rose. “But if we live, he can’t get back to his family. If he lives, we can’t get back to ours.”

Martha nodded sadly. “I know. I just wish it could be different.”

They decided to go further into the town in hopes Furrow and Elton would head the other way. They hiked until they found an ancient bridge over a small stream flowing into the lake, and they refilled their canteens and cooked the rabbit there.

Martha had the idea of butchering it and then spitting the meat and pieces of onion to roast over the fire. It turned out to be remarkably delicious.

In spite of the good food, though, Rose was tired, bone-tired. She wanted all of this to be over.

“If anyone else dies today, I think we should start heading back to the factory,” she said.

Martha looked at her quizzically. “Why?”

“Because the Gamemakers will just force us together anyway. I’d sooner start from a position of strength than just get chased toward the Twos and maybe injured along the way.”

“Yeah.” Martha looked away. “Yeah, I guess that makes sense.”

They spent the day resting and refreshing themselves. Martha shot a grouse of some sort and roasted it along with the turnips. Both of them washed in the stream. Martha also examined Rose’s leg, which felt much better and only hurt when Martha probed the wounded area.

There was a single cannon shot in the afternoon.

“That was probably Elton,” Rose said. Martha just nodded, looking too old for her years.

True to their plans, they started wending their way back toward the factory. Evening fell before they were more than halfway there, so they made camp and ate until they were full. There was still a little meat left for the next day when they were done. No point, Rose thought, in trying to make it last.

Just before the anthem, another cannon rang out. The sky said both Elton and Furrow were dead.

“Just us and the Terrible Twos, then,” said Rose. “It’ll all end tomorrow.”

Martha shivered and cuddled into her side.

Chapter Text

Morning came after a restless night. Neither of them had gotten much sleep. They ate a good breakfast and filled their canteens at the lake, and then they set out for the factory again.

Before they reached the edge of town, the Gamemakers pulled their last stunt. Martha and Rose could hear it, though not see it. Something was coming, something horrible making clicking sounds, rustling through the underbrush . . .

Martha grabbed Rose’s arm and pointed. An insect, something like a locust, only a foot long with terrible jaws, hopped out into the open.

“Run!” Rose pushed Martha ahead of her, and both girls ran with all their might. The insects followed, gaining, and there was nothing to do but keep running until Rose’s leg ached and her lungs burned, and the things were still at their heels.

Martha wriggled out of her pack and discarded it, and Rose followed suit. The pack got caught on her bow, but Rose couldn’t afford to stop; the bow and quiver went, too. It gave them just enough extra speed that they reached the factory ahead of the hideous insects. Rose caught sight of the Twos bursting out of the forest on the other side, running the way she and Martha were, but there was no time to worry about them.

Rose and Martha turned toward the huge metal tower at the edge of the factory complex, and, within seconds, both were swinging up onto and into it, climbing for their lives. The Careers followed suit, reaching it just ahead of the ground-obscuring wave of locusts.

The good news was, the locusts couldn’t seem to get any purchase on the metal. The bad news was, the Careers could. They climbed, eyes trained on Rose and Martha.

“Stay above them!” Rose barked. Martha, smart Martha, was already there, swarming upward like a squirrel.

Rose followed, keeping an eye on the Careers. Sulla had a sword, but he couldn’t hold it while climbing. Livia had knives, though, and drew one to throw. Rose kept moving, climbing around to the other side of the tower, not offering her any obvious target.

Something was making the metal slippery under her hands. Rose looked, and it was blood. Adrenaline was running so high in her system she didn’t even feel pain as the corroded metal bit into her skin.

“Rose!” Martha shouted, and Rose ducked just in time to keep Livia’s thrown knife from killing her. It slashed across her shoulder, but, even in her super-adrenalized state, Rose could tell it was only a superficial wound.

“Come on, Copper,” Livia taunted. “I thought you wanted to mix it up!”

Rose distractedly realized they didn’t look good. Sulla was pale and had bags under his eyes, and Livia looked downright gaunt. Sulla also had a big bruise on one temple. Apparently, they’d had a rough few days.

And they were in her world now. Here, in this broken-down industrial tower, Rose felt at home in a way she never had in the woods.

She kept climbing. Her fighting instincts were telling her to keep wearing them down, because they’d wear down faster than she and Martha would.

Livia threw another knife. It clattered against the metal struts, not coming anywhere close to Rose.

Martha shrieked, bringing Rose’s attention to her. A corroded strut had broken even under her slight weight, and she barely caught herself before she could fall from the tower, her pistol bow tumbling from her grip. It brought her within reach of Sulla, who grabbed her ankle.

They were right across from Rose. She ducked inside the tower, grabbed a bar overhead –

- swung forward on it, thrusting her feet out –

- and caught Sulla in the chest. Air whooshed out of his lungs. The hand that was holding onto the tower slipped. Martha shook his other hand off her ankle.

He fell.

“Sulla!” screamed Livia. “Sulla, no!”

They were a good eighty feet up. Even without the locusts crowding around the base of the tower, there was no way for Sulla to survive. The cannon sounded.

Livia turned furious eyes on Rose and Martha. “You little bitches are dead!”

She went after Rose, pulling herself upward and inward. Rose ducked out to the exterior. She had no time to worry about what Martha was doing, trusting the younger girl to have her back.

For as worn down as she was, Livia was still strong and fast. She had no more knives, but pulled a bent, broken bar from one of the struts. Rose knew better than to underestimate the damage it could do.

Rose scrambled upward, trying to maintain her advantage. Livia swung the bar, just grazing Rose’s side.

And then Martha was there, kicking at Livia’s head. Livia pulled herself to the tower exterior, trying to go after Rose while keeping her distance from Martha. She swung the bar again, but this time, Rose caught it. There was a brief scuffle for possession which ended when blood-slick hands on both sides slipped off it, and the bar fell away.

Livia made her move. She surged forward, grabbing hold of Rose’s coat, and bashed Rose’s forehead with her own.

White lights flashed in Rose’s vision, but she kept hold of the tower with her right arm. Livia drew back for another blow –

- and screamed as Martha’s axe bit into her other arm, the one holding onto the tower. Rose took advantage of the moment, giving Livia a good left right in the face. She drew back her fist for another –

And Livia, dazed and bloodied, looked right into Rose’s eyes. She still had hold of Rose, fist knotted in her jacket. Her eyes, though, looked like Toby’s had at the Cornucopia, seemingly a lifetime ago.

“Livia,” said Rose, not even knowing why she was saying it.

“I could pull you down with me,” Livia said, her voice rough with exhaustion and pain. “It’s all we’re good for. Death. Killing or dying. Doesn’t matter. Could take you down with me.” She swallowed. “What’s the point?”

Then she let go of Rose’s jacket.

She fell. A cannon sounded.

“Rose,” called Martha’s voice from above.

Rose looked up. There was a platform at the top of the tower, just a few feet above her. Rose forced her weary, battered body upward, and Martha pulled her onto the platform, where they clung to each other.

Martha was in no better shape than Rose. Something had torn through her jacket and left a long, shallow cut in her side, and she had a bloody scrape on her forehead. Her hands looked like raw meat.

They both watched as a hovercraft flew in below their feet to pick up Livia’s corpse. Sometime during the battle, the locusts had retreated, and the arena could now be taken for a pleasant, peaceful valley.

Rose was shaking. So was Martha.

“Why – why don’t they announce the end?” Martha asked. “We won, right?”

“We won,” said Rose, voice dull.

And then the announcement came, but it wasn’t the one they were expecting.

“Congratulations to our final two tributes!” boomed Claudius Templesmith. “Upon an examination of the rules, it has been decided that the previous revision of allowing two allied winners is not legal. Therefore, only one winner may be crowned. May the odds be ever in your favor!”

Of course, thought Rose. Of course they weren’t really going to be so kind. Of course they were taking away the only good thing she’d found in the Games.

“What?” gasped Martha. “They can’t do that! They can’t!”

Rose shook her head. “Of course they can. That’s the whole point of the Games, isn’t it? To show us that they can.”

“Well – well, screw that!” Martha tossed the last few bolts in her quiver and Shella’s knife off the tower. Then she fished her utility knife, her last weapon, out of her belt, and threw it away as well.

Rose laughed, full-throated and full of humor and, perhaps, a little madness. “You’re right. Screw that.” She pulled her own knife out of her belt, and it followed Martha’s.

“Let me see your hands,” said Martha. Rose let her. Martha pulled out her canteen and rinsed them with water, and then she tore strips of cloth from Rose’s jacket and shirt and wrapped them.

When she was done, Rose returned the favor. They both drank a little water as well, and then they sat together, holding hands and looking out over the lake.

“What happens now?” Martha asked.

Rose shrugged. “Dunno. They’ll probably kill us both.” She sighed. Every bit of her hurt, but she felt oddly peaceful all the same. “Tell me another of your stories, Martha. Something about the Wolf and the Mockingjay.”

“In the Time Before Time,” Martha began, “there came to the People word of mechanized, metal soldiers advancing through the wild, killing everything in their path and burning the forest. Though the People were brave and had withstood many troubles, they feared this foe would be beyond them.

“The Wise Woman, therefore, sought the Lady of the Forest. ‘Lady,’ she said, ‘the People are frightened by these metal soldiers. We have never fought so fearsome an army, and we fear that they will destroy us so that the world will forget we ever lived.’

“ ‘The world forgets nothing, Wise Woman,’ said the Lady. ‘But yes, this foe is beyond you. Go back to the People and tell them to be strong, for the Wolf will protect you.’

“So the Wise Woman returned to the People and told them what the Lady had said.

“ ‘Can even the Wolf overcome such a foe?’ asked the War Chief.

“ ‘We must trust the Lady,’ said the Wise Woman. ‘Trust her, and be strong.’

“Meanwhile, the Lady sent for her Mockingjay. When it came to her, she sang to it. She sang the song of the Earth, the Sky, the Trees and the Water. She sang of the People and of the animals of the forest. She sang the power of life itself into the little bird, and she sent it away to find the Wolf.

“When the Mockingjay found the Wolf, it sang the Lady’s song to it until the Wolf’s eyes blazed with golden light. The Wolf, filled with the power of the song, ran to meet the ravening horde.

“ ‘You will come no further,’ it snarled at them.

“ ‘We are eternal,’ said the soldiers. ‘We have no life for you to take. We will exterminate all life from these forests and make the land bow to our will. We will never stop.’

“ ‘Then I will fight you under the Sun and under the Moon,’ said the Wolf. ‘I will rend you to dust, and you will blow away with the wind and be washed away by the rain. And I will not stop until I have defeated every last one of you.’

“So the Wolf fought the mechanical soldiers. It fought them under the Sun and the Moon. With each swipe of its claws and bite of its teeth, the soldiers fell to dust, and the wind carried them away and the rain washed the land clean. Only when the last one had been defeated did the Wolf stop to rest.

“The Mockingjay flew to its friend, for the Wolf was terribly injured and dying. ‘We come to the end, my dearest friend,’ said the Wolf. ‘I am happy to die with you by my side.’

“But the Mockingjay began to sing again the song of the Lady. It sang life and healing into the Wolf. The Wolf’s injuries faded, its wounded body healed, and it leaped to its feet, happy as a cub. The friends disappeared into the forest, and they protected it together.

“This is how the Wolf and the Mockingjay saved the forest and the People from the metal soldiers.”

Rose looked out over the valley one more time, breathing deeply of the clean air. “Never stop telling your stories, Martha.”

Something in her voice tipped the younger girl off. “Rose, what are you thinking of doing?”

“I’m not just going to sit here and wait for the Gamemakers to get bored and zap us,” Rose said. “One of us can still go home.”

“So you’re going to jump?” Martha caught on far too quickly. “No! If one of us is going to, I will. You’re all your mom has, remember?”

Rose shook her head. “My mom wouldn’t want me to survive if it meant just sitting here and watching you die. That’s not worth it, not to her or me.”

“And it is to me?” Martha asked. She held their joined hands, with their blood-soaked bandages, up to Rose’s face. “You and I share blood now. You’re my sister. I can’t let you die, not any more than I could let Tish die. Not while I can help it.”

“Martha, you volunteered for Tish. This is me, volunteering for you.” She held up her other hand to stop Martha’s objection. “I should’ve known from the beginning that they weren’t going to let us both live, but I wanted to believe it. So let me do the right thing. You’ll be their victor.”

“Screw. That.” Martha gripped Rose’s hand so hard it hurt both of them. “If that’s the way they’re going to play, they won’t have a victor. They wouldn’t, anyway; if I let you do this, I’ve lost.” She took a deep breath. “We’ll both jump.”

“Martha, please.”

“We’ll both jump. We’ll both do the right thing.” Martha brought Rose’s hand to her mouth and kissed it. “My sister.”

Rose knew it was useless to try to talk Martha out of it. And, somehow, it would be wrong to. Because Martha was right. There could be no victor this way.

She kissed Martha’s hand. “My sister.”

Martha nodded, lips pressed together. “On three.”

“One.”

“Two.”

“Th-”

“Stop!” shouted Claudius Templesmith’s voice. “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you your victors – Rose Tyler and Martha Jones!”

***

In the District 9 control room, seven people started breathing again. Jabe and her partner Dave had joined the Doctor and Donna, and Reina and her counterpart from Seven, Cathica, were present as well. Ace McShane from Three had also joined them after they’d used Nokia’s bomb.

“Of all the brainless moves,” fumed the Doctor.

“What? I thought they were brilliant!” Donna protested.

The Doctor waved his hand. “Not the girls. The Gamemakers. I don’t know that they could’ve come up with a worse idea than offering to allow two victors, then withdrawing the offer at the end. I predict someone’s head will roll over this. Literally.” He looked at the screen, where Martha and Rose were being plucked off the tower by a hovercraft. “It’s them I’m worried about now.”

“I’m going to go back to the Three control room,” Ace announced suddenly. “I just remembered something I needed to tell Beetee.” As she got up from her chair, her hand folded briefly, flashing three fingers.

It was a signal. Reina looked at Cathica, who gave her a terse nod and followed Ace out of the room.

“Doctor,” said Reina after they were gone, “there are rumblings coming out of Four. Some of the higher-ups are convinced they’re about to rebel. It’s the same with Eight.”

“And we can add Seven and Nine to that number soon enough, I’ll wager,” Jabe said. “Good thing they don’t seem to know about Three.”

“We’ll have Snow’s eyes on us,” Donna pointed out.

“That could be useful,” said the Doctor. “I predict it’ll make things difficult in our districts, but it could be worth it to occupy the Capitol’s attention. What’s most important is that we protect them. The girls. We’ve got the spark we’ve been looking for. We can’t let the Capitol snuff it out.”

Jabe nodded. “Understood. I can get Martha out with very little lead time. We should be able to get her family as well.”

“Good. Be prepared for it, then.” He looked over at Donna. “We can take care of Rose.”

“Hell, yes.” She glanced at the clock. “I just need a word with our flirty friends. And we need champagne.”

She pressed a button on the console, and a port opened in the wall. Inside was a bottle of champagne and five glasses.

By the time the bugs were working again, all anyone watching could see was a happy, united team toasting the Wolf and the Mockingjay.

***

Rose stared into the mirror, unable to get used to her eyes.

When she’d finally emerged from her drug-induced, post-Games slumber, her skin was polished to perfection. All the injuries from the Games and even her old scars were gone. Her fingernails, torn to shreds by the tower, were now perfect half-moons, and all the body hair that had started to grow back was gone.

But it was her eyes that had changed the most. They were no longer brown. Instead, they were amber, like a wolf’s.

Jack had explained it to her. “Basically, your eyes already had that tone in them. All we did was to bring it out by removing or lightening the other colors. The effect isn’t permanent; over the next few years, they’ll slowly revert to brown if you don’t get the color touched up. For now, though, you’re the Wolf.”

It had seemed to her at the time that he wasn’t telling her everything, that there was a deeper reason for the alteration. It was beautiful, no question about that, but it also made her look somehow . . . feral.

Her hair was still short, much to Aurelius’s evident disgust as he flounced off with his rejected cart of hair extensions, though Jack had shaped it to look less ragged.

“I want people to remember how you cut it off in the arena,” Jack said.

The reunion with Martha and the Games recap had been last night. Tonight was the interview with Caesar Flickerman. And it was, according to the Doctor, very important that she play it carefully.

“You and Martha forced their hand,” he’d told her. “You went off script. They’re not happy with you. You must make them believe you never intended to be rebellious.”

“I didn’t, I was just trying to live, or at least save Martha!” Rose protested.

“I know. But some in the districts have been, shall we say, inspired by the idea of the two of you saying ‘Screw that!’ to the Capitol. What you must do now is go out there and make it look like rebellion is the farthest thing from your mind. Play up the sisterhood. Gush about how kind the Capitol and Gamemakers are for giving you your new best friend.” The Doctor held his hand up. “You can vomit later. Just remember: You’re protecting Martha as well as yourself. And those around you back home.”

That brought Rose up short. “They’d – they’d hurt Mom?”

“In a second.” The Doctor looked away, the lines in his face deepening. “We’ll protect you as much as we can, but you have to be careful, Rose. Very careful.”

Now, Rose stood backstage, wearing a steel-colored gown with a silvery wolf-fur ruff around her shoulders. Her face was painted in cool tones and her eyes rimmed with charcoal gray, contrasting sharply with her golden eyes. When she caught her reflection in the mirror, they practically leaped out of it.

“You’re on, Rose,” said Reina.

Rose walked out into bright lights and thundering applause, and Martha joined her from the other side of the stage. She looked beautiful in a black gown whose huge sleeves had patches of white on them, mimicking a mockingjay. They embraced at mid-stage and went to sit opposite Caesar.

He began with innocuous questions about their respective journeys in the arena and how it felt to have someone to team up with. They were both careful with their answers, talking each other up and emphasizing how their strengths complemented each other. Caesar happily played into it, and he replayed some footage alternating between Sulla and Livia eating something that violently disagreed with them and Rose and Martha chowing down on fresh vegetables in the garden. The audience found it hilarious.

Then he came to the dangerous part. “What were you thinking, there at the end, when the allied-winners rule was revoked and you faced one of you having to die?”

Martha, smart girl that she was, burst into tears. Rose hugged her as the audience made sympathetic noises. It made Rose wonder how many of them had cheered on Livia and Sulla as the Careers had mounted the tower and closed in for the kill.

“I think this really says it all,” Rose said, indicating the tearful Martha. “I don’t think anyone who hasn’t been through something like that can understand how close you can get to another person. We were all we had in the arena. We had to rely on each other, trust each other completely. When the announcement came that we could both win, we were so happy, because we already felt like sisters. And when they revoked that rule . . .” Rose shook her head. “You can’t just turn off that feeling. Neither of us could’ve watched the other die. That’s why we decided to jump together.”

Martha sniffled, adding, “She’d have done it, you know. Jumped to save my life. But I could never have gone home, knowing I allowed someone I loved the way I love Rose to kill herself for me.”

Rose remembered the Doctor’s words. “I’m just so glad the Gamemakers decided to spare us. They didn’t have to, but they did, and I’ll always be grateful for their mercy.” Surprisingly, she got the words out without choking on them.

“I think we’re all glad that you’re both here,” said Caesar. The audience applauded, and Rose hoped she’d done the trick. “What are you both looking forward to the most when you get home?”

Martha spoke first. “I just got word today from Cathica that I have a niece!” The audience cheered. “My brother’s fiancée, Laura, gave birth to a girl. Her name’s Martha Rose, and I can’t wait to see her.”

After the cheering died down, Rose spoke. “I’m mostly looking forward to seeing my mom and my friends again. Once everything settles down, though, I’m going to find some sort of work. We have a tradition among winners in District 9 that you don’t just move to Victor’s Village and eat bonbons after the Games; you find something worthwhile to do. You work for a better Panem, and that’s exactly what I want to do.”

The applause was deafening. Rose didn’t think it would be quite so loud if they understood her definition of “a better Panem.”

When President Snow placed the crown on her head and she met his eyes, though, she had the feeling that he did.

***

Her last night in the Capitol, Rose had an unexpected visitor as she was getting ready for bed. There was a knock at the door, which Rose opened to reveal Martha, dressed in yellow pajamas.

“Cathica and Jabe said it’d be okay if I came up here. May I come in?” she asked.

In answer, Rose pulled her into a hug. “Of course.”

They sat on Rose’s bed, and Rose ordered two cups of hot chocolate, which took mere minutes to arrive. For a little while, they sipped in silence.

“I – I had a hard time sleeping last night,” Martha finally said. “I was afraid of the dreams.”

Rose nodded. “Yeah, same with me.”

“It just seems so strange now. Everything that happened.” Martha ran a hand through her hair, which had been ironed stick-straight by her stylist. “So surreal. I almost feel like it happened to someone else. I couldn’t have – couldn’t have really killed Rodrick.”

In fact, Martha’s official kill tally stood at three: Tom, Rodrick and Gem. She’d gotten credit for Tom because she brought him the nightlock berries, and Gem because she delivered the bomb that indirectly killed him. Rose had Toby, Shella and Sulla to her credit. As for Livia, she’d ultimately been declared a suicide. District 2 probably hated that.

But Rose knew what Martha meant. While she’d gotten in fights back home, she’d never gone in with the object of killing anyone. In fact, she’d never picked fights; they’d always come to her. She’d killed in the arena, though; killed with an ease that scared her. No, she hadn’t had a choice, not a real one, but that didn’t make her feel much better.

“What will you do when you get home?” Rose asked.

“I’ll keep learning to be a healer, I guess,” said Martha with a shrug. “I think I’ll miss camp life.”

“I’m pretty sure I won’t miss Factory life,” Rose said, and laughed. “Victor’s Village is up by lake country. It’s as pretty a place as you’ll find in Nine. It’ll be nice not to always be breathing smoke.” She set her empty cup aside and slid between the sheets. “C’mon.”

As she had under the old cabin, Martha readily accepted the invitation. She snuggled down under the covers, humming idly to herself.

The tune was one Rose felt she knew, and, within seconds, she placed it.

“Martha, did you ever sing that song in the arena?” Rose asked.

Martha seemed startled at the question. “Well . . . yes. I was so scared the first night that I hummed it to myself as quietly as I could. It’s an old lullaby my mom used to sing to me. How did you know?”

“A mockingjay. When I was trying to sleep, one of them sang that tune to me. I could tell it was a lullaby, and . . . it was comforting.” She took Martha’s hand. “It’s almost like we were meant to find each other in there.”

Martha smiled. “Of course we were. The Mockingjay found you for me.”

Rose hesitated for a moment before telling Martha about the strange incident with the wolf. Martha was very interested.

“It was a gray wolf? With eyes like yours are now?” Rose nodded. “That’s always been the description of the Wolf in the stories.”

“Do you think it was real?” Rose asked. “I never saw or heard another wolf in the arena.”

“I think it was real. Even if it wasn’t there physically, it was real. Sometimes, hunters or a Wise Woman will report seeing the Wolf and the Mockingjay. It always means something important, really important, is about to happen.”

“Good or bad important?”

Martha shrugged. “Either. Sometimes both. But I think you must be very important, Rose, if they came to you.”

Rose hugged her tight. “Not more important than you.”

Nestled into each other’s warmth, the Wolf and the Mockingjay slept without nightmares.