like gold dust | dars

Ex knew before she did because of course she did. The watchful eye of the Capitol, the mouthpiece of those in power (although some would argue that Turing Ayres and Astrid Demander were giving her a run for her money), Ex was lazily scrolling through her Twitter feed one night when the email came through. Stella was perched in bed, a book in her lap as her right hand ran up and down Ex’s left arm. A present reminder of her presence as they shared the same space. Stella lived] for these moments, and they were stolen moments. Fleeting times when the cameras moved away from them and they could just be.

”Darling, you should see this,” Ex’s voice broke Stella’s revery, the words on the page of her novel lost in the rising and falling of the timbres of Ex’s tone. Stella sat up straighter, the blanket falling around her waist. A blank tank and matching black panties clung to the blonde’s frame and the heat in the room spiked up by twenty degrees. Stella pulled down her glasses - another gift from the Capitol and her stylist thanks to Aeson Kight. She threw them on the cream bedspread wordlessly. The boy had left her scarred, her cheeks blackened burned with his wrath, his anger damaging her vision and nearly breaking her spirit. Taking the phone from Ex, Stella read the email, her eyes dancing across the screen.

”That little piece of shit!” Stella was up in a flash, grabbing the black silk robe from behind the Penthouse door and moving silently through the room. She pulled it on, the exquisite fabric wrapping around her body like armor. Ex was powerless to stop her and Stella knew that the woman wouldn’t dare try.

”Babe! There’s nothing you can - “ rang after her as the door slammed and Stella angrily punched the down elevator. She was fuming. The words stuck in her throat, burning to ash, and she exhaled it like smoke. Punching the number Seven with disgust, she rehearsed what she would say to him, the words failing her as the floors dropped below her.

They never told you about the pain after you won. They never told you that the Capitol would stitch you back together with parts that no longer belonged to you. A body made of flesh, muscle, bones, and ivory that was not yours any longer. Property of the Capitol stamped on your smile. Chaos covered in roses and the gods could not save you now. They were suffering in their own right. A tyrant with a rusted crown. A derelict body of a beating heart turned dark.

They never told you how to play the game. How to act gracious and maneuver yourself through the crowds, but respect was inherently built into any interactions. Or so the young blonde had thought as the Seventh Floor bell dinged and the elevator opened. She whirled through the doors and approached the door, her fist a ball as she slammed it against his apartment.

“What the fuck, Mackenzie?!” she yelled, not even waiting for him to open the door. The Avoxes who stood on every floor watched her in silence, obviously. They saw all but said nothing, and Stella sometimes envied them their place. To see without the bias of words. To observe without the pain of interacting. To watch quietly, knowing all but having no hand in the game.

What the fuck Mack really think he was pulling with poaching sponsors out from under her like that? She had groomed them. Hours spent plying them with alcohol, touches on their arm, promises of a return on their investment (blood for blood, wrath for wrath, the thrill of the kill). Ex had come in as her closer, the older blonde wrapping herself around Stella, promises dripping from her silver lips.

She pounded the door again, her anger smoldering as she shivered in the hallway, her warm bed abandoned for a fight with another Victor that would bring nothing but ill will and burnt bridges.

“Mack, seriously!”