The arena.
The final two.
Byron limps through the rubble; limps, because as the city fell in a stray brick struck him and now his ankle doesn't feel right. He doesn't think it's broken, because it's taking his weight, but it hurts. A lot. Though all of him hurts. His stomach growls, empty. His thighs are screaming. There's cuts on his arms that sting and his head is just one big ache and his heart is pounding, pounding, pounding, because this is it. This is the end, one way or another. Everything that has happened in this hot and sticky wreck of a place has brought him to this.
Benji or Carmen. He already knows. Call it instinct, call it dramatic intuition, call it telepathy if it makes any difference. The girl from Five is not dead. Somehow, he thinks he would know.
He hunkers down against a large chunk of fallen masonry and tries to catch his breath. It's like trying to breathe water. The axe in his hand keeps slipping, so he checks around, sees nothing but lumps of building and cracked up trees, and wipes his hand on the tattered remains of his shirt. Not that it makes much of a difference. His palm is damp with sweat before he's even had chance to grab the handle again. It runs along his eyebrows and over his lips and drips from his hair. Even back in Ten he's never known heat like this.
He should stand up, but he can't convince his legs to do it. He's got a good position here; he can see most of the bowl carved out by the earthquake, he's got something that equates to cover and he's armed. He can sit here, wait it out, let her come to him. Let her wear herself down coming up the hill. He knows Carmen well, he thinks, compared to how well he knew the other tributes. Cold and callous, it seems, but that's an act. A show. Look past the overcast eyes and you'll see someone aching inside. He'd seen it in the reaping recaps. He'd made a note of it. Ally. But the time for allies is done. There must be no hesitation, no recognition. It must be like the others, exactly the same if he can manage it. Quick and brutal, it'll have to be, not ideal but it's the only way. And then...goodbye. He presses his back up to the twisted lump of metal and finds no relief there.
Wait. If he can see most of the bowl, Carmen must be in the bit he can't.
Which is behind him.
He almost hits his head in his hurry to escape his hiding place, the axe whipping into a more threatening place by his side. His ankle protests and a groan hisses out between his lips but the less sound he makes the better, so he bites his tongue as his feet fight for balance on the churned-up ground. Nobody ahead of him, but he knew that. So. Slowly, ready, he turns.
She's here. Sitting on top of the metal, her arms clinging around her knees like he remembers from her nights on guard. The sword lies by her side, in easy reach. Strands of hair cling around her ears. She's not moving. Just watching. His heart gives a few great thumps, just in case he'd forgotten what has to come next.
But he needs to talk himself some courage first.
"How long have you been there?"
"Byron." He almost laughs and makes some sort of comment, just in case the sponsors can still help him, but the tone stops that. It's flat. Not flat emotionless, but flat restrained. "I knew it'd come to this."
He shifts a few steps backwards, seeking more solid footing and finding it. "So did I," he admits.
"You're going to kill me."
"I'm going to try."
"Like you tried with the others?"
What? He blinks up at her. This is...unexpected. It isn't half-brained chatter while they try to move into the strongest position - which she has, he realises, up high, looking down at him - but a real, heartfelt question. It's as if she has been watching him this whole time, which she can't have been, because...
Why can't she? It is the sort of thing she would do. She took alliances so seriously and forgot that they were only ever a shadow, not even close to real. Maybe she even followed him around, thinking she would protect him. Yes. Except now this is the last two and she looks -
She looks as if she'd gladly kill him a thousand times over. If glares were poisonous, he'd be being ferried out of here on a hovercraft by now.
He wipes a hand over his forehead, more for the look of the thing than because it has any notable effect. What remains of his clothes is sticking to him. His heart is so loud he can hear it in his ears and feel it in his legs. He is weak. But he tries not to show it.
"What do you mean?"
Grabbing the sword, she drops down to the jungle floor and snaps to her feet, not taking her eyes away from his. His feet itch to move, even his injured ankle seems to scream for him to run. But he's not. He's come too far to run now.
Carmen points the sword at him. "You danced with Ellie, now she's dead."
"This is the Hunger Games." His voice comes out as a dry croak, so he licks his lips and tries again. There's dust in the air. He can taste it. "People die."
"You were in the house with Tyrion when the mutts came in, now he's dead."
"There were mutts!"
She makes a dismissive huffing noise and advances a few paces. "Mutts don't kill people. They aren't supposed to. Tributes are supposed to kill tributes. Mutts just make it easier. Don't they, Byron?"
She's getting close enough to strike, and he thinks if it comes to speed she'll have the advantage. Which he can't allow. So he reaches back with his foot, finds a secure patch, and moves onto it. Then another. There's a tree, so he goes around that. And all the while she's following, sneering.
She's spoken, but it's not a question. She already knows the answer. Otherwise she'd have struck quickly, mercifully; he guesses this is intended to be torture. It feels like it. The heat. His heart. His body.
She looks weak. If he keeps moving, she might tire...
They dance around another tree and dodge a lump that could have been a coach. "The victor writes the story," she says. "What story would you write?" She takes another step closer and he falters and suddenly she's closer than she has been for a long time. He raises the axe, but she doesn't seem to see it; there's a look in her eyes that scares him. He's seen terrified eyes, he's seen dead eyes, but he's never seen any like this. It looks like he could hack her guts out and she'd keep going. "What story, Byron? How a gentle boy from Ten, a rebel at heart - they can hear me, maybe they'll strike you down right now - came to win the Hunger Games? How he did it because he had no choice? How he never hurt anybody, not really? Never killed anybody?"
"Carmen!"
"Don't." It's a snarl now, hardly a voice at all, let alone hers. She's prowling towards him and he's backing away, using a hand to check for obstacles, but the Gamemakers won't watch this forever. He would swing, but any opening could be fatal. "Don't do that," she spits. "Don't use my name. I'm the girl from Five, that'll make it easier for you. I'm nobody. I'm no-one. I don't matter. Come on then!" She jabs forwards with the sword, not close enough to cause any concern.
"I-"
"Fight! Fight me, you cowardly son of a bitch. Or do you not like it when your victims might fight back? Because they weren't fighting you, were they? They trusted you. They thought you'd keep them safe, or as safe as they could be. The young. The vulnerable. They trusted you!"
Enough of this. "Then they were stupid!" he shouts.
The advance stops. The stillness it is replaced with is worse. And those eyes. Pure, undiluted fury, purpose, and hurt.
"I trusted you,, too" she says. "When was it my time to die, Byron?" She seems bigger now, she seems to take up the whole in front of him, almost six feet of barely contained anger. "When would that fit into your story? Last? You knew it'd just be us two, same as I did. It was always going to come down to us two. So I'd be last. Because it'd be the most difficult, or because it'd be the easiest?"
"Because. Because." Come on! There must be things he can say. There must be some fight in him. He's not a coward! "Because I couldn't bring myself to do it? I was hoping...I was hoping..."
He's scraping the last vestiges of reasonable thought from his mind here, and both of them know it. It's too hot. It's too much. This is not a situation where you think. This is a situation where you say whatever will give you another few seconds. He is used to saying whatever he needs to. But he can't make this sound convincing. And then he notices...
He's been too busy watching her eyes to notice the rest of her.
The words have pinned him to the spot. While he's been trying to fight them off, she's got too close.
And she's faster than he is.
"You should have killed me first," she whispers, and swings.
And then it's over.