kingdom come .| { jacinta, for violet }

Death has been a companion of hers since the moment she slit Atlas Shim's throat. Not a friend, never a friend. Just a follower. A great, broad shadow stretches over her, like an endless night sky, just like the one in the Arena. Every moment in that place, every breath she stole from the frigid air — she thought they'd be her last. She thought, again and again, that death would take her. But instead it has stolen everyone else.

Jacinta never thought she would be a bearer of survivor's guilt. Her victory was a new beginning, that much was true, but a bright beginning? She had her doubts about that.

"You're wrong," Justice had told her. She hadn't truly believed him, then. Who knew that a drunkard could be wiser than her?

She and Justice aren't very different anymore. Right after he won, Pillar Fray was reaped — and then the same thing happened to Violet.

Winning the Games was not freedom. She was wrong—living was not freedom. Jacinta will never be free of what happened in the Arena, what she did, the price she must continue to pay with her family's blood. She lived through hell, she's alive, she's breathing, but now she just has a new prison.

Jacinta is confined to her room for now, forced to watch her sister fight the vicious boy from Six. (Oh, how memory serves, doesn't it?) The sun is still rising over the skyscrapers, slowly chasing away the darkness of the night from the sky. Pale light floods in through the vast windows that cover almost all of the walls on the right side of the living room; her eyes burn slightly in the light, still not having fully adjusted from waking up.

She lounges on the sofa, her brow furrowed, and sips a glass of dark red wine. Coffee isn't her preferred morning beverage, not when she has to watch her sister bleed on a silver screen. She's sworn to herself that she will not end up like Justice, that she will not drown her sorrows in a glass or a bottle. Jacinta will settle for wine, for now.

The District Seven escort is eating breakfast at the dining table, which is just in the other room. She is oblivious to the events unfolding on screen, Violet's blood on the concrete floor, Aeson's blood on the blades of her blunt. She is oblivious to how deeply Jacinta is suffering; oblivious to the agony that twists inside her chest, rips her apart from the inside.

Despite Jacinta's blank, stoic stare, she is anything but calm. She is anything but unfeeling—if she had a choice in the matter, she would be. She would put walls up and never allow them to be broken down. Jacinta is so overwhelmed with a maelstrom of emotions that she can hardly process all of them. Self-hate, guilt, shame, worry, desperation, despair—she doesn't even have names for all of them. And she doesn't care to find the words to describe them, because if she dwells on the storm swirling inside of her for too long, she'll just shut down completely.

Sometimes she screams and sobs into a pillow at night, but she would never admit that aloud. She would never allow anyone to see her like that, not even Justice. Not even someone who understands.

She hasn't found a coping mechanism yet, either. She's ruled out alcohol and other drugs; Jacinta won't succumb to a pathetic fate like that. She likes to believe that she was raised to be more resilient than that—but she’s sure Marina Salazar would be ashamed if she could see what is transpiring within her right now. She likes to believe that although she and Justice are not so different, she is stronger and more capable than he is.

Jacinta didn't kill three people and watch her friends die just to live an empty existence and become addicted to drugs. She'd be putting all twenty-three tributes that she outlived to shame if she threw away her life like that.

(She respects Justice, but she does not condone his habits.)

Her eyes and ears are still trained on the television. Jacinta sees herself reflected in her sister; disheveled, tired, bloodied, but pushing onward nevertheless. She remembers peering into her reflection in the Arena and seeing herself like that.

"You're not going to hell when you die. You're going to disappear. I'd love to be the girl who made you disappear," Violet tells the boy from Six. The boy who reminds her so much of Ansel; the boy with that haunting, murderous look in his eye. She despises the parallels this fight draws to her own experience in the Arena; a Salazar, rivals with a pasty, barbarous boy from District Six.

Her mind is full of chaos, full of fear like she's never felt before. It isn't the kind of terror she felt in the Games, the kind of terror that gripped you down to your very soul with claws of ice, the kind of terror that holds you to the ground so intensely that it's as if your muscles no longer respond to your mind.

This fear is not for herself. It's the darkest thing she's ever felt in her life. It tears her down, rips her open until all her insides and thoughts and feelings are spilling out. Nothing can stop it; no amount of comfort or bandages or whiskey can save someone from a fear like that.

At least when she was in the Arena, for the most part, she was in control. It was Jacinta who took a stand for her own life and stabbed Cynthia through the skull; it was Jacinta who made the decision that she would do what it takes to live, even if it meant destroying the image of who she wanted to be. Her freedom was never taken away from her in the Games; after all, she had volunteered.

But that's all gone now. Her wings have been clipped and now she's lying on the ground. It was so easy to hurt her — she hates that, hates that she is so vulnerable, hates that Snow can order the death of anyone he wants. All he has to do is say the word, and another one of her family members is gone. It's that simple.

Violet doesn't seem finished quite yet, however. She isn't going to go down so easy, and she proves that by slamming her spiked blunt into Aeson's back. Pride swells in Jacinta's chest; Get him, Violet, get him, come on.

Aeson Kight is a boy of steel, although Jacinta hates to admit it. He doesn't scream when Violet tears into his flesh. He only endures, swallows any cry that may have threatened to break free.

The battle rages on and Jacinta is on the edge of her seat, quite literally. She is leaned forward on the sofa, hand gripping the base of her wine glass so that her fingers have grown pale under the pressure. For some time, as the sound of Aeson’s bones snapping beneath Violet’s blunt fills Jacinta’s ears, she truly begins to believe that her sister will win. But Aeson hits back just as hard and Violet begins to falter.

And then there it is — the final blow. Jacinta doesn’t believe it when she sees it, but then Violet finally falls to the ground. Aeson crumples to his knees and Jacinta internally cheers, hoping that it will be his cannon that fires next. He breathes heavily, the rise and fall of his chest noticeably stronger than Violet’s.

Violet doesn’t get up, and Aeson doesn’t move. He just stares at her, waiting.

Jacinta shakes her head. The seconds tick by, and as they do, her hope vanishes, drains completely into a dark void of despair. Violet’s face comes into focus, and then Jacinta really sees it. She knows that look, that slack in her muscles, the fading light in her eyes – she’s seen it too many times on the faces of her own victims and friends to mistake it.

Clementa looked like that as she laid dying; Jacinta remembers because the image is still burned into her mind, fresh and agonizing as if it happened yesterday.

Violet is dying – her sister is dying.

Tears begin to well up in Jacinta’s eyes and she uses her last bit of self-control to tide them in. ”No,” Jacinta says between gritted teeth. But she cannot stop the inevitable, and she knows this. As she watches Violet’s breathing grow shallower and shallower, a new wound is opened within her and a flood of emotions – among them, rage, misery, blame – comes rushing out.

When Clementa died, it was like someone had punched her right through the heart with a fist of steel. This wound is deeper; it penetrates down to her very soul.

The camera is trained right on Violet’s solemn face, and Jacinta reluctantly watches as a bitter taste pools in her mouth.

"I tried, Jacinta," Violet whispers.

It's those words, not the sound of Violet's cannon, that finally force the tears from Jacinta's eyes.

And that’s it – that is all there is. Violet’s story abruptly comes to a close – BOOM.

Jacinta doesn’t flinch, doesn’t scream – she would have if she had the strength, but her body is shaking too intensely, like a bomb is about to go off within her. All of her control has slipped right through her fingers, and she allows her emotions to take reign over her. There is nothing to stop her tears from streaming down her face, nothing to prevent her from throwing her wine glass at the television as the camera pans to Aeson.

She folds and collapses on the inside. Something inside her spontaneously combusts; her entire universe bursts into flames and melts to nothing.

To her dismay, the television screen doesn’t crack and the wine doesn’t damage it enough for it to stop working. She will fix that she decides; Jacinta can’t watch anymore. Illegal or not, she can’t.

"Jacquelyn!" Jacinta calls for the District Seven escort. She comes running as quickly as she can in her ridiculous heels.

"Yes, Jacinta?" she chirps with a smile, but it disappears as soon as she sees the tears glistening on Jacinta's cheeks.

Jacinta scowls at the escort. "Turn the television off," she commands.

"I can't actually... do that," Jacquelyn replies, her voice full of uncertainty and caution. "Did something happen?" Jacinta’s hands curl into fists at her side, and she shoots a harsh glare at the escort.

"Use your fucking brain," snaps Jacinta. "What do you think happened, Jacquelyn? Didn't you hear the cannon fire?"

Jacquelyn shuffles closer to peer at the television. The camera is panning from Violet's broken body to Aeson's emotionless face. Those empty, dark eyes. For a moment, Jacinta doesn't see Aeson, but Ansel instead. The boy she villanized for so long, only to discover that she and him were not as different as she liked to believe. Ansel was not evil, not truly callous – he was ruthless in his bid for survival, and so was Jacinta. But Aeson... Aeson is rotten to the core. As Jacinta stares at him, rage and agony ablaze in her eyes, she can see right into his soul and his heart and only sees darkness and decay.

She hopes his body rots, too, just like his heart and his soul.

"Oh!" exclaims Jacquelyn. "I was wondering if Aeson and Violetta would ever fight. That must have been quite the exciting sight to see all that tension finally boil over!" The enthusiasm in her eyes, the cheerful smile on her face — Jacinta wants wipe the joy right off her face with a swift punch.

Jacinta only blinks at first and stares blankly at the escort, trying to come to terms with the fact that she really just said that.

Jacquelyn has just unintentionally triggered Jacinta's wrath, but she doesn't realize Jacinta's displeasure at her words until the Victor speaks.

"Shut the fuck up," she snarls. "You think my sister's death is entertaining? Fuck you—FUCK. YOU. Get out of my sight." It takes all of her self-control not to raise her voice, not to yell thunderously at her idiot escort, but such an outburst may warrant for security to investigate, and she doesn't want her emotional state relayed back to President Snow.

But when Jacquelyn hesitates, staring at her with wide, incredulous eyes, Jacinta loses her grip on her temper. "I said get OUT of my sight! GET OUT!"

Jacquelyn flinches, but she doesn’t walk away. ”B-but, I have to make sure you’re ready for the party tonight,” she stammers. ”The most important Capitolites will be there, and… and you still need to encourage them to sponsor R-Raven.”

”I’ll be there,” Jacinta snarls. And I’ll make sure Aeson Kight never receives another sponsor again. She wants him to burn, to suffer and die for what he’s done. All Victors kill and Jacinta is not innocent, but it’s personal for her. It would be a small revenge, but revenge nevertheless – and perhaps it would do something to heal the ever-expanding hole in her chest. Revenge is no panacea, but it certainly soothes pain.

”Now leave, and summon my stylists within the next few hours,” she tells the District Seven escort. ”And if the press hears anything about my outburst this morning, I will personally see to it that you get fired.” Jacinta isn’t entirely certain she has the power to do that, but she could slander Jacquelyn to the tabloids. It doesn’t matter, really; whatever makes Jacquelyn listen to her.

”O-okay,” Jacquelyn stutters. She quickly leaves District Seven’s apartment, leaving Jacinta alone.

She grabs a blanket from the other side of the couch and wraps it around herself. Jacinta wipes tears from her eyes, but as soon she does, more fall down her cheeks. So she just buries her head in her hands and allows them to downpour, succumbing to the grief that slowly rips her apart.