Archive of Our Own

The first thing Ted notices about Floor 6 and its inhabitants, is that none of them know how to cook.

You’d think there would be more pressing things on his mind. More important observations to be made. But once Ted’s victory tour is finally over, he arrives at the victor’s tower. The lift doors open invitingly and Ted steps in without hesitation, honestly just relived there’s an end in sight after days of being chased from district to district by his own voice, waxing lyrical about the bloodshed he caused with a grin, haunted by his own performance.

The lift doors clunk shut behind him and he finds that he’s not as anxious as he really supposes he should be. Ted knows all three inhabitants of Floor 6, he was already fifteen when CallMeCarson won his games, and he can remember it vividly still. Even though his family didn’t necessarily always have the money to watch the streams — nor the inclination to, for that matter — at that age the games were the main talking point in Ted’s school. He can even remember Moses discussing that year’s line up, the strengths and flaws of each tribute, assessing how much of a threat they were; it was a sort of exercise they did every year, analysing the competition. Just in case— well, just in case that skill came in handy one day.

(Ted supposes he should be grateful in retrospect, but he certainly is not. Because why the hell would he give them that?)

He and Moses would often try and predict who they believed was going to win. Even bet on it between themselves some years, if they were really sure.

In hind sight, betting on which child would survive the slaughter of the Games, like it was a simple round of blackjack, strikes Ted as absolutely morbid, and shockingly callous. But hey, he’d been fifteen, and in District 10, while it was slightly taboo to speak so bluntly about the games without social judgement, whispering and discussing them between friends and family was the accepted norm. Even if most people had the sense not to go so far as to place bets, whispers about the Games were about as quiet as anyone got in 10.

And one of those fateful years he and Moses had made a bet was year 60.

Moses took one long look at Carson King and called it, and despite Ted’s bewilderment and mocking of his friend for picking a scrawny looking twelve year old, who couldn’t even smile without strain, over much older, much more capable tributes, Moses remained steadfast in his choice. And he had been right.

Moses was just kind of like that, Ted had learned long ago. Somehow, some way, he sometimes just knew things, random things, sometimes niche or pointless things, but things nonetheless. And this skill of his often applied to where a tribute would place overall. Sometimes, with some tributes, Moses just knew.

Ted knows logically that the predictions must just have been a combination of good analysis and a whole heaping of luck. It wasn’t just some magical ability his friend possessed.

And yet, he can’t help but wonder if Moses had always known where Ted would place in the end.

If that’s why he couldn’t meet Ted’s eyes as they said their final words.

If that’s why Moses rambled on, smothering the unfamiliar tension — the strange sensation of silence between them, of not knowing how to speak to one another — with advice and reprimands and “I hate you’s”, instead of allowing any sort of finality to form between them. Any sort of goodbye to take place.

If that’s why he was nowhere to be seen in District 10 when Ted had gone looking for him.

If that’s why Moses couldn’t bear to see him anymore.

Fuck he had to think about something else, anything else— what had he been thinking about? Oh, oh yeah.

Ted knows he should be more afraid to meet Carson King, CallMeCarson himself, than he currently is. Noah ‘hugbox’ and Cooper ‘cscoop’, too. He knows all about what they’ve done; he’s been hearing the same horror stories about them since he was fifteen.

But with everything Ted’s just left behind those elevator doors, stepping forward onto Floor 6 seems like the easiest thing in the world.

He just has to try his best not to imagine the horror stories about himself he’s left in his wake.

—

The lift finally slows to a stop, and despite his prior confidence, a notable feeling of trepidation does wash over him, as it fully hits him, who he’s about to meet.

Carson King is not what Ted expected at all.

To be fair, Ted doesn’t know what he expected exactly. Maybe that scrawny looking twelve year old, a terrified child with tears in his eyes and a strained smile stretched across his lips. Maybe he was expecting a monster, someone that matches his horror stories and buys into his own hype. Maybe a man who had grown into his sins with a crown upon his head and superiority in his stance, eyes flashing alive with threat.

What Ted definitely hadn’t expected was to find a slightly apprehensive but weary looking teenager, in sweat pants and a plain blue t-shirt. It’s anticlimactic, in an unsettling sort of way. He doesn’t quite trust it.

Carson has to look up to meet his eyes, but Ted finds that it’s him who feels intimidated by the eye contact. There is something of an abyss in the fifteen year old’s pupils.

“You must be Ted Nivison,” The 60th Victor of the hunger games says, his voice breaking in the tale-tell sound of adolescence. He isn’t bothering to look at the golden card held out before him.

Ted smiles widely, spreads his arms out in a self aggrandising gesture, rolling backwards on the balls of his feet, “The one and only.”

Carson exhales in an almost-snort, but something in his posture gets firmer. Stiffer, maybe.

“I’m Carson King,” he says and Ted waits for him to finish the sentence, but apparently that’s the whole statement. As if he needs an introduction, as if the whole of Panem doesn’t know who he is, as if they haven’t all been watching his life through their screens since he was twelve years old. Ted really wants to say ‘No shit,’ but looks at the gold card in Carson King’s hand and reminds himself he is in no less danger here than outside those elevator doors. Than in the arena, even. He is not safe here, and he should mind his words.

So instead, he raises his eyebrows in a mocking gesture and says in a sarky voice, “No shit.” And fuck. Well. At least it’s on brand. Isn’t it so convenient that he based his brand around himself?

Carson continues, clearly repressing a burst of laughter, sensibly ignoring him, “What district are you from, Ted?”

The question makes him blink at its fatuousness, it’s knowing ignorance. But he supposes it’s what’s on the card, what’s been scripted. He’s seen enough of them by now to understand.

Well, Ted thinks. If there’s a script, I better stay in character.

“The best one,” he replies with a knowing gleam in his eye, and tries to ignore the fact that would’ve been his answer anyway. What an incredible character he is.

The younger Victor actually does snort this time and chuckles, “Okay, well, welcome to Floor 6, your home away from home.” Then he crumples the card in his fist and shoves it in his pocket.

Internally, Ted winces at the mention of home. As if this place could even compare. Home is fresh air. Home is cloudy blue skies. Home is loud. Home is dirty. Home is calloused hands and noisy animals. Home smells of cow shit. Home smells of pollen and blooming flowers. Home is where green fields stretch as far as the eye can see. Home is where Ted grew up. Home is where Ted expected to spend his whole life. Home is where his life is. Home is where his family is.

Home, he thinks with grief, is where Moses and Madi are.

Home is where he is not just loved (because the Capitol love him too, now); but where he is known, truly.

At least, he was. Before.

This place? With its pristine marble floor and spotless mahogany walls. Windowless-- the lack of natural light a deprivation that physically drains him. It smells of nothing but sanitisation, so toxically alkaline he can feel himself choke on it. It is scrubbed and synthetic air. Dead air. There is no life here, Carson’s eyes and the fake furniture only confirm it. And there is certainly no home for Ted Nivison.

It makes him angry, how completely opposite to Ted’s home this glorified prison is. How it’s the antithesis of the free fields of 10; of its fresh, natural air. How big of a goddamn lie they’re making him spin this time. As if this wretched place ever could be his home. It all makes him so angry.

He’s fucking furious, and he wishes he could take out the frustration by grabbing a carving knife and skinning a cow, slicing and preparing the meat like he’d been taught in school. At something productive and beneficial for everyone; translate the negative energy into tangible goodness. But he can’t. He can’t and he never can again and just the thought of a weapon, of a knife in particular, makes his pace pick up and his hands itch. And it all makes him that much angrier.

His home has been ripped away from him at the last possible second. And he’d survived. And now his home wouldn’t want him back even if he could return. They’d made that perfectly clear, and his empty bag feels heavier on his shoulder just thinking about it.

His family couldn’t bear him. Madi couldn’t meet his eyes. Moses couldn’t even fucking meet him at all.

Ted couldn’t express the depths of his fury if he tried.

So, he doesn’t.

Instead, Ted rightens his worn leather bag, filled with nothing but toxic smoke and useless pride, and reaches out to grab Carson’s shoulder, unsurprised to feel the muscles under his fingers tense up.

“Carson, my friend,” he begins, sounding as if he is in grave need and as if he and Carson have known each other for many long years.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a glass of milk?”

—

“Nice place you’ve got here.”

Carson has led him through the many halls of the floor, a common room, and finally into a kitchen. Ted is very, very tired, but not so exhausted that he can’t marvel at the intricacies of his new place of residence. Or simply marvel over just how expensive and luxurious every single object in his field of view is. Or even privately mourn the lack of windows.

“Now that’s a good one,” a voice that is decidedly not Carson’s says with a laugh. “Guess you’re not the only blind one in the house now Carson. How does that feel?”

“Literally shut up, Noah,” Carson responds, voice tilted with mirth, his posture relaxing. “Ted, this is Noah. He’s a complete dick and I recommend you stay as far away from him and his dirty traitorous hands as possible.”

Ted turns towards the kid, and wow, he really is still a kid. He looks younger than Carson somehow, but his eyes seem much wiser, and much less empty. Reaching out his hand, Ted says, “A pleasure to finally meet you Mr. Hugbox.”

Accepting the handshake, Noah’s eyes shutter a bit at the reference to his nickname. Shit, Ted didn’t think. He never does, bullshit just falls out of his mouth. After all, his screen name is literally just his real full name. Internally, he notes not to mention it again.

Despite this poorly hidden discomfort, Noah smirks, “A pleasure, huh? Surely.”

Carson laughs, “Never mind, you were right, he’s blind.”

Ted glances back towards the kid, and feels Noah’s hand tighten its grip painfully around his own in response.

—

As Carson opens the fridge and pours Ted some of his promised milk, Noah places a pot of something into the microwave, and with the press of a few annoying beeps, sends it spinning. District 10 did not have many microwaves, and Ted finds himself a little entranced by the way the pot spins around and around inside.

He weirdly relates to it.

“I’m sorry Cooper couldn’t come out to meet you,” Carson says, passing him his milk, “We’re not really meant to see you before the Welcome Gala tomorrow, and well, he says he’s busy with a stream.”

But even as he says it Carson can’t quite meet Ted’s eyes, and if they really cared about upholding that Gala’s tradition Noah would not be lazing about the kitchen messing with the microwave. Ted reckons that if he checked Twitch right now, he wouldn’t see ‘cscoop is live’.

Then he scolds himself, and pushes down the suspicion. It’s really the last thing he needs to be worrying about.

So Ted just shrugs, “It’s fine, it’s his loss,” and finally takes a swig of the milk. Then almost immediately spits it back out.

“What the fuck is this!?” He yells, gagging.

Both Carson and Noah flinch at his voice, but he’s too worked up to care.

“Milk...?” Tries Carson, rather cautiously.

“This is not milk! This tastes nothing like milk!” Ted continues to exclaim in a ringing voice that bounces off the walls. “I think I would know what milk tastes like!”

And he’s right. This tastes nothing like the milk he’s used to, fresh and foamy and rich. This substance is far too sweet and far too smooth, and he can feel the sensation of the sugar in it rotting his teeth.

“They’ve probably added a bunch of chemicals to it before they package it up for sale,” Noah says like it’s obvious, but he sounds a little shaken. “I doubt they sell it in the natural form you’re used to.”

That makes sense... but then what is the point of his whole district slaving away to send hundreds of thousands of litres worth of milk to the Capitol, if they’re just going to change its taste, texture and properties entirely anyway? What is the fucking point? They could probably artificially manufacture it themselves.

“Well that’s fucking stupid,” Ted seethes instead of his true, far more traitorous thoughts, “this milk is inferior, I’m not invested at all in what this fucking milk has to say!” He proceeds to chuck the milk, glass and all, into a bin next to him.

The sound of the glass smashing at the force is audible and resounding throughout the kitchen.

Carson bursts into a strange wheezing laughter at his antics, while Noah stares with wide eyes. “At least it wasn’t the floor,” he sighs in a voice that sounds well versed in exasperation. This just makes Carson laugh harder.

Ted is secretly shattered that this little part of home has been taken from him too.

The microwave starts beeping distantly in his ears, drowned out by a strange white noise in his head and Carson’s continued laughter. It really hadn’t been that funny, he thinks, Moses wouldn’t have even cracked a smile. Madi would have just shouted at him, in a lovingly loud way. But the laughter continues and so does the piercing beep that signifies the nauseating spinning in the mechanical box has finally come to an end. An end he can never see for himself.

Ted feels envy towards a fucking microwave. He decides it’s definitely time for bed.

—

He wakes up the next day in his new bedroom after a dreamless sleep. Ted supposes he should be grateful at the lack of nightmares he’d honestly been expecting, but if anything he‘s a little disturbed. Shouldn’t he be having bad dreams about everything he’s seen and done? Wasn’t that normal?

It makes him feel strangely empty. Like he’s not really human. It makes him feel a little bit more broken.

The fact he’s still wearing the same clothes as yesterday doesn’t help with his inhuman feeling either. But he has nothing to change into, and he refuses to bring it up; his pride won’t let him, and neither will his shame.

The time he’s woken up is 4:30, and it’s pitch black with no sound of life but his own deep breathing. A little late for him actually, he’s used to being risen from bed at around ten to four as was conditioned in him by his parents. There was always so much work to do on the farm, his parents had owned some chickens as well as cows because chickens were comparatively easier and cheaper to look after, and by the age of fourteen the little feathered bastards were pretty much entirely his job. His sole responsibility, on top of all his previous farm work with the cows. He never complained though, because he knew all that labour was still nothing compared to what his parents managed. So his morning routine often went: chickens to feed, eggs to collect, fences to mend, cows to milk, cows to feed, cows to breed, cows heading towards the slaughter house. Most of which he could get done before school started at 8:30am.

They had to be up early each day to get it all done in time, ready for the next. The whole district was awake and working by 4:30 on an average morning.

It was a long standing tradition that Ted loved because it meant he always got to witness the sun rise, even in those winter months. The cosmic transition from darkness to light in a stunning array of splotchy yellows, oranges and reds, overpowering and fighting off the looming and consuming blackness of the night, the dangerous shadow it casted over the land. Well, call him an optimist, but he felt the power of the sunrise, and its strength to bring about a new day and push back the darkness, was an inspiring metaphor of freedom, and of fighting.

It’s why sunrises are so sacred back in 10, and why sunsets are such a symbol of defeat that most would rather be asleep, or at least inside, by the time they occur. A sunrise is hope and the power of light intertwined with they very fabric of the universe, and sunrises are how people regulate the passing of time. Time passes as the sun does. How many sunrises you’ve been a part of shows your age. Celebrating the sunrise of a birthday is to celebrate just how many nights of darkness you have fought off, how many defeats you have survived. And it is the hope of morning, on that anniversary, that the light will continue to shine away the shadows for the year to come.

There is nothing but shadows in this room. There are no windows in it to possibly let in any light. There is no sunlight on practically the entire floor. And well, call Ted a pessimist, but if that’s not the most fucking on the nose metaphor for the obstruction of hope in this prison — that he’s rightfully been incarcerated in — he’s ever seen.

Ted briefly considers going to that balcony he saw on his way in, but he knows the sun won’t be up anyway for a few hours. That it is still fittingly dark outside. But he resolves to go out later anyway, that even if so much of his home has been stripped of him, he still has the same sun as his family do. Even if he doesn’t have that family anymore. Even if the smell of burning and bright sun-like flames taint his memory. Even if he doesn’t have the hope the sun is meant to represent anymore. He can still pretend. He can still lie. It’s one of the only things he can still do.

Ted continues staring up into the darkness and tries to think about what to do next. He’s not used to lying stagnant, he is not used to suffocating silence. Everything was always moving and shouting and so very alive back home, even at night. Ted has never really had the luxury of just, lying in bed with nothing to do. And it doesn’t much feel like a luxury, if he’s being honest.

A sad sort of comprehension washes over him, as he is once again hit in the face by the foreignness of this place. How un-homelike it is. That no one else here will be awake this early. That he has nothing to do and nowhere to shout. That he’s alone on the floor for now. At least until the light returns.

“That’s fine,” he rationalises out loud, having a long-standing habit of talking to himself. There was so much noise in 10, unless you shouted anything you whispered under your breath would be lost. Words were such a cheap currency, so seemingly inexpensive, why wouldn’t he use them freely and unfiltered?

(Fuck, if only he’d known then what a dangerous habit that is now).

He holds his head in his hands, nails digging into his face— they leave red crescent suns, setting or rising depending on his state of mind, imprinted into his skin.

“This is fine,” he repeats with a rasp. He can live with being alone with his thoughts for a few hours. He can survive the unfamiliar silence surrounding him for a few hours.

He can. He’s not that desperate for stimulation. Not that in need of the company of others.

“Fuck,” he chuckles to himself in the darkness at these thoughts. At these lost and empty and so very expensive words. “I’m so fucking stupid.”

Because that’s the biggest lie he’s told himself yet.

—

Fortunately or unfortunately depending on what second you catch him at, Ted only has to survive an hour and a half before, without warning, his room is invaded by stylists and peacekeepers. Somehow he’d spaced out so hard he hadn’t even heard them coming.

The Gala. How had he forgotten about the Victor’s Welcome?

Ted huffs as he pulls himself out of the covers and sits on the edge of his weirdly sink-y bed, only to be immediately pounced on by his stylist.

The stylist herself is a woman somewhere in her late thirties with neon orange hair that bounces out of her head in frantic curls; her lips are painted black and her eyeshadow and eyeliner are coloured in the same shade of inviting abyss.

He doesn’t like her, but he supposes he probably should. She seems a kind woman, not at all snobby in the way most Capitol citizens inherently are; she has never once spoken down to him or treated him like an object the way his escort often does. Never said anything to him that’s made Ted want to punch her in the face or snap his own neck like the elite have. She smiles at him, nods and hums. She never says anything bad to Ted. In fact, she never says anything to Ted at all, no matter how many times he’s tried to wrangle a response out of her, a conversation, any sort of back and forth.

It infuriates him.

He had desperately hoped this might’ve changed after he’d won, no risk of mourning any lost attachment and all that, but during his tour the most she‘d ever said to him was a soundless, “Congratulations.” Then it had been back to work as usual.

At this point Ted must have spent at least twenty hours in her presence and he doesn’t even know her fucking name. And he hates her for it. It’s not fair, he knows, he shouldn’t blame the woman for not trying to connect with a teenager she was about to send off to a likely death, or a six foot four Victor whose done things he doesn’t even want to begin to describe. But talking is his main coping mechanism and silence makes him want to scream and he despises her for not giving him that distraction when it would be so easy for her to do.

Logically, he knows he should truly be thankful to her for his outfits, for the easy brand she has helped cultivated. The general brand of ‘Livestock’ is not a straightforward one to pull off, or be in any way creative with.

It’s for this reason that most District 10 tributes try to lean away from the livestock branding. Ted can understand the thought process, farmers and animals do not seem that threatening or that likeable. And a brand that meant you wouldn’t stand out to sponsors was a brand that meant you were as good as dead. Simple as.

But what he believes both him and his mentor Minx have proved in the last decade or so, is that leaning into your district’s brand and committing one hundred percent to it is always the way to go.

The Capitol just eat it up, commodifying the districts in that way. Making each one so clearly distinct and nicely categorised and therefore easy to sell. Sponsors see a tribute with strong district branding and a gimmick that they can make into a figurine to put on shelves and they jump to invest.

That’s all tributes are to them, he seethes internally, bitter and unwilling to let go of it. A business investment.

Ted is aware however, that he did get the good end of that deal, being a funny milk man, chaotic in brand and personality, charismatic enough to get away with murder. Ha. He meant brand wise; it’s a brand most without his confidence would fail to make interesting enough.

But he’d pulled it off; the chaotic milkman, with his steak knife and his words and his volume and his sheer mass. He’d sold it well, and all the little gimmicks came in clutch in the arena just as Minx said they would. The sponsors tripping over themselves to secure both his marketable brand and his victory in one fell swoop of their stones. Two birds down in one.

All things considered, being a cool murderous milkman is a strange, but easy enough in practice, persona for him to pull off. And he really should thank his stylist for it, when he thinks about the comparative fate of Minx.

Minx got the shortest end of the livestock branding stick Ted could ever possibly imagine. Instead of being a farmer, or any quirky spin off of that, Minx was the animals. She was the feral beast to be contained behind thick planks of wood and long electric springs of barbed wire. The Capitol in the nauseating analogy were her faux farmers. Shadowy shepherds, keeping her in line. Keeping everyone safe from her animalistic rampage.

From a branding perspective, it was ingenious. And oh boy, did Minx play it well. Ted can’t even begin to imagine the amount of profit the sponsors made with that cash cow.

Looking at it from a human cost, however? Ted can’t imagine how deep a debt Minx is in.

He automatically stands when his stylist wordlessly gestures for him to get up, completely clocked out. She’s still fussing about with his face but now clothing is being draped on top of him— a white uniform, of course. No huge brand change for him then, they’d hit gold since the naming ceremony with his get up, and at this point were simply milking it for all it was worth.

Not bothering to contain his snort at his accidental pun, the stylist doesn’t even react with more than a subtle flinch, and he mindlessly pulls on the outfit. An act that’s beginning to become muscle memory to him.

Then Ted begins thinking about outfits as a concept, about Minx and himself. About human debts. Because he and Minx are polar opposites in that way.

What that means is... Ted and his outfit, his persona, often feel like they blend and mix and wobble between the lines of other and separate and the same; and sometimes he honestly believes that there never was a persona and there never was a simple Ted, and that it’s always just been him and the stage and the clawing need to be heard.

Ted is in character just by breathing.

Minx, on the other hand, could not be on the further end of the spectrum. Firstly and most tellingly, her name isn’t even Minx, it’s Rebecca. Becky when Ted feels like mocking her, which frankly he does a lot. And Rebecca can be angry, fuck yeah she can be, just as much as the next Victor can be. But she has never been Minx, and Minx has never been Rebecca, and it’s blindingly obvious to Ted that that’s the way it should be.

Sometimes he really truly thinks that Rebecca is the best child actor in the whole of Panem. It’s a role she’s been forced to perform for eight years now, and she’s not once yet broken character in front of the cameras. Ted seriously can’t imagine how she does it.

He imagines she’s probably envious of his own, far easier, brand. A self-centric thought, but in his ironically humble opinion, one he believes to be valid.

At least, he’d definitely take blindingly white suits and sharp knives over having his own teeth literally sharpened down to a fine point, or having nails so long and jagged that you could gouge your own eyes out if you weren’t careful.

He’d take being cocky and confident over having to act like a fucking lunatic, and then worse, having to deal with being treated like one. Yeah, he fully understands he got the good end of the livestock brand and he can fully understand why Minx might glare at him with envy from the corner of her eyes from time to time. He fully understands.

But privately, deep deep down in a dusty and crumpled and compressed cardboard box called ‘Facts he lies to himself about’ he finds himself envying the distance, the gaping ravine, between herself and the Victor she must pretend to be. In the end, these cruel and unspeakable thoughts think, she will be lucky to have this separation. In the end, it will be so much healthier in the long run, easier to switch off, to take off the costume, when it’s so obviously make believe. A child actor. A simple kid playing dress up.

Ted thinks he might be wearing a costume. Beneath this milkman suit that is. A second skin lays around his whole circumference, and it is rubber and stretchy and pliable. That is how he knows it is a second skin, that it is unnatural. Inhuman.

When he tries to pull at it, it only snaps back. And when he stretches the flesh far enough to see underneath, to see what originally resided before, he finds only void. Then he allows the rubbery skin to snap back into place before he gets sucked into his own abyss.

He tries resolutely not to think about the nothing underneath his outfit. That the self under the persona, if it ever did exist, is completely crumbled. No home to cling on to, no friends or family to cry out for help to, no self left under the costume.

All that he is, is the performance he puts on.

Needless to say, Ted’s sense of identity is doing great, and he has a full grip on the current reality around him. That’s for sure. That’s for certain. And he repeats those thoughts so confidently in his mind again and again and again that by the time his stylist finally pulls back Ted almost believes it. He’s sure that he almost does.

The stylist doesn’t immediately make her way to the exit like she usually does however, and her new case of what can only be described as anxious of hovering is starting to get more under his skin than the silence usually manages to.

He’s this close to just snapping, ‘What?’ when in an unusual twist of events his stylist actually looks him in the eye and says, “There’s a final addition to your outfit.” Her words are whispery and fleeting, but for once, they do feel like they were truly aimed at him.

She reaches into her pocket and brings out a little case the size and shape of two small coins stuck together. Ted squints his eyes at it, uncomprehending, but finds its him that’s silent for once in their dynamic as her next words wash over him.

She starts by saying, “I’m sorry,” and there is an ever so slight pause between it and the next line, and even if it means nothing to the peacekeepers flanking the doors it’s means something jarring and cutting and binding to Ted, “this might be uncomfortable, lay back.”

He doesn’t even huff over the bossing around he’s so taken aback, which she undoubtedly notices. How she interprets that response he does not know. This was an apology Ted had never been expecting, and receiving it felt both like vindication and a stinging backhand to his face.

Ted doesn’t forgive her for the silence. It’s taken too much from him. And for whatever new horror she is about to lay upon him, he cannot promise to forgive her for her participation in that, too. He doesn’t think he has that much forgiveness in him to give, to be perfectly honest. But he doesn’t condemn her, now. He may not forgive her, but he doesn’t condemn her either. And well, if that helps her sleep a little better at night, he supposes one of them may as well be getting enough rest.

He leans back over the bed and does his best not to hiss or blink as his stylist removes his glasses and puts the contacts into his eyes. They produce a foreign sensation of pressure and plastic, unrelenting and hard against the surface layer of his eye lenses, but every second he blinks the more they feel natural, until it’s like he wouldn’t even know they were there.

Holy shit, he can see so much clearer. It’s as if everything before was like trying to look through a steamy mirror, and only now has he actually cleaned the glass. His glasses were awful! The first thing on his agenda after the Gala is to get good functioning contacts. Fuck glasses. Useless pieces of burnt sand.

This is a tangent he’d have loved to have said out loud, but the stylist was now very quickly retreating from him, even faster than normal. Not even a smile or a nod in acknowledgment, and Ted is getting real sick of people not being able to look at him. She and the peacekeepers were gone before he even stood back up from the bed.

Ted suddenly feels so inextricably dirty and broken all at once that he wonders if there’s a word for starvation of sight. A starvation for being seen. Really seen. A word for the deep need for someone to just be able to goddamn look at you without a film of apprehension in their eyes or greed in their gaze. To be looked at and be seen. To be known. To be looked at with love.

Why could no one look at him anymore. Why did everyone stare and no one ever look?

“Never new common fucking courtesy was going out of fashion, a goodbye might’ve been nice!” He says to nothing but stagnant air. Then he sighs and makes the mistake he knows he shouldn’t, and goes to his bathroom to go look at himself in the mirror.

Ted looks as he enters the bathroom, sees his reflection, and immediately freezes in place. There’s a moment of teeming silence. And then he bursts out laughing, and laughing- and laughing—

The suit itself is nothing too different, he’s got a new fancy black bowtie and some flashy looking golden buttons down his white shirt, a gold belt buckle to match, though the belt itself is still black. His hat is also now embroidered with red letters in all caps that spell ‘Milk’, and that would be enough to make him laugh alone. At the crass bluntness of it. Perfect for his character. But his eyes. It’s his eyes that have him reaching for the sink in support as he bends over cackling like a maniac.

They’re pure white. Or should he say, milky. His eyes are the fucking colour of milk. He is losing his mind, this is the funniest shit he’s ever seen, they’ve made his eyes pure milk. He hasn’t even got any pupils. Just milk. Why on earth would they think this is a good idea, oh god, it is all just so impossibly dumb. All of it. Everything.

Reality feels like it’s crumbling at his fingertips, slipping away from his reach like whenever he’d try to grab one of his chickens, “Slippery scoundrels!” He’d shout at them. Reality feels like it’s slipping now. Suddenly nothing feels real, everything around him from the building containing him, to the clothes he’s wearing, to the milk in his eyes, to the blood on his hands falls away like a setting sun, a broken fence. Splintering. Snapping. Reality is snapping. It’s not a fence he reckons he can mend.

The world is too surreal to be true and there is milk in his eyes and he is still laughing. It’s painful now. But most things are at the moment, and none of it is real anyway so fuck it. Why can’t he have a laugh at the ridiculousness of it all? A laugh at this absurd goddam situation, and a laugh at his own expense.

He thinks of telling Moses about the stupidity of it all, the hilarity of it. Of laughing along with him. They always made fun of dumb things together. It was always somehow twice as funny, together. And then, suddenly, finally, it’s no longer funny. Because reality pierces back through in one blinding moment, and Ted rememberers that he’ll never be able to laugh till it hurts with Moses again.

Great, now he feels more like crying. Thanks a lot brain.

“It’s okay,” he says out loud, for some idiotic reason, panting and gripping the sink even harder. “Yeah it’s all fucking a-okay.”

Guess he really does like lying to himself, huh? He’s so on brand.

Just to torture himself some more, he wonders if Moses will watch his Victor’s Welcome. If Madi will, too. If his family will be grief stricken enough to suffer the shame of it.

He deeply deeply hopes they won’t. His milk eyes won’t be so funny if he’s not there to let them in on the joke. They’ll just be... real.

Ted is starting to despise reality.

—

After maybe another thirty minutes, maybe forty or fifty or eighty— who gives a shit, Ted thinks he might hear Carson’s voice calling for him. A knock on the door.

“It’s showtime,” Ted says out loud, and doesn’t let the cringe show on his face. It’s a stupid thing to say.

Instead, he thinks about what his mentor used to tell him before he went out onto any stage, before any interview or speech. Minx had said it was a phrase Technoblade himself had told her, one that is meant to be passed from mentor to tribute, from trapped teenager to doomed child.

She’d said, “Chin up, smile like a lunatic, your audience is watching.” And she’d said it proudly. It decidedly did not sound like something the infamous Technoblade would say, and Ted has a sneaking suspicion that Minx had taken some liberties and added her own spin to it. But whatever works, he thinks. Whatever works. “Go on Ted! They’re waiting for a performance.”

They’re waiting for a performance.

“They’ll let you get away with anything as long as it’s entertainin’.” Another piece of advise from Minx, given at a different time. Ted can’t remember when. “They’ll let you get away with murder as long as you make it fun to watch— especially murder in fact, ‘swhy we’re all here ain’t it?”

It wasn’t a real question, and Ted hadn’t bothered to answer it.

“So that’s what you’ve gotta be, yeah? Entertaining. Give ‘em your best performance. Maybe they’ll keep you around.”

Minx was only two years senior to Ted, and in a lot of ways, he felt decades older than her. But when it came to the games, he knew he was nought but a toddler, scrambling to find his footing, figuring out how to walk. So he took her advice by her word.

Chin up, smile like a lunatic, your audience is watching.

(It came so naturally to him, sometimes he almost feels guilty).

He goes to leave the bathroom, ready to put on another performance the Capitol won’t forget.

Whatever works. Whatever works.

Whatever works.

—

Floor 0 is apparently a ballroom built for the very purpose of these events.

The moment Ted steps out of the elevator and into the spotlight his senses are overwhelmed with the sound of cheering applause, the smell of sizzling alcohol and the sight of all his worst memories covering the walls on gigantic screens. He can taste blood in his mouth.

“The man you know and love everybody, Ted Nivison!”

Already on the stage and welcoming him to the party is of course Pyrocynical, appearance as dazzling and captivating as ever.

Ted would like to think Pyro is threatened by him — at least that’s how he operates around the older Victor on stage. But then, there are many things Ted would like to think. He’d like to think that he’s a good cook. He’d like to think that he’s a good person. He’d like to think that Moses or Madi or even his family aren’t watching when he jaunts up towards his designated seat, smile as white and as wide as the milkman hat atop his head. He’d sure like to think that, but he cannot find it within himself to turn to the cameras and look into them with his empty white eyes anyway.

(Fuck contact lenses, fuck this. He wants his glasses back).

He makes it to the stage and the crowd once again loses their minds as he pulls a few robotic dance moves, spins around, and despite all natural impulses, smiles directly into the nearest camera.

He feels flayed. He’d seen it happen before back in 10, and he feels just as raw and exposed and vulnerable before millions of eyes as the skin feels against the slash of a whip. The best thing he knows he can do, is not turn his back to them. Never give them more skin to strike on.

So he keeps his eyes locked with the camera, keeps his body language open and welcoming and towering towards the audience. Pyro is still rambling off some nonsense, but now his tone is changing and now he’s passing the mic to Ted, and making space for him behind the podium.

Here we go then.

The gold cards he’s been given to read are scripted word for word. It drives Ted insane. “I am so proud to have come so far, and achieve so much,” he says, smile stretching up to reveal his canines. He doesn’t need these cards, he doesn’t need some useless Captiol citizen telling him how to captivate an audience, like they have any actual idea. And this is when he always takes Minx’s advice to heart.

They’ll let you get away with anything as long as it’s entertainin’.

“It is such an honour the Capitol has bestowed upon me, that I was able to prove my strength and rise to the top. I am so endlessly grateful for my victory.”

Words like that might have got caught in his throat a mere three weeks ago, might have become stuck, lodged. He might have once choked on them, getting them out, finding it hard to breathe around the vitriol of it.

Here, today, they slip out without friction. They slip out of his mouth the same way one slips out of their shoes after working the farm all day; unthinking and with enthusiasm.

Looking away from the cards and up at the audience he smirks, “Not that it should come as a surprise though, with bones this strong.” Reaching for his hat, he grabs the brim and tips it towards the writhing mass of people and the blank screens of cameras before him. Cheers break out. Someone whistles.

Well, he thinks and his knuckles are as white as his outfit, if he strays off script a little bit, the peacekeepers will be none the wiser.

(What are they going to do anyway? Lock him up? Take away his family? Isolate him from everything he’s ever known and tell him to smile as he suffers through it? That’s funny. That’s real funny).

A single chuckle of hysteria slips out of his mouth and is promptly swallowed by the sound of the audience’s whooping.

—

Sitting down in his designated seat is somehow far more uncomfortable for him than casually spewing out propaganda is. See, Ted’s very much used to standing behind a podium, projecting his voice so his twisting tongues can be heard even in the furthest of seats of any stadium. He’s used to standing tall and proud and victorious in the spotlight, even before he won, especially before he’d won, in fact. Ted’s used to those hungry eyes that will watch but never see.

What he’s damn well not used to is having to sit down and then stay still on stage. Still on show, but now also there to watch others give their own yet identical spins on the same exact Capitol speech. Sitting down on stage makes him feel smaller, a sensation he despises on the spot, and the lack of movability makes him feel powerless. Even more trapped than usual.

It’s hard to dominate the spectacle when he’s so restricted. And that small control he has on stage is one of the very few mercies he’s got left in the Capitol.

So he tries anyway, stretches his legs out far as he can, crosses his arms together loosely and leans his body back into his chair. Taking up as much space as possible. Looking, at least, like he has control in himself, lounging, even if in reality he couldn’t be held in a more crushing grip.

The victor to his right seems to catch his movements, and Ted can definitely identify a scowl coming from the corner of the boy’s eyes. Ah. This must be Cooper, they have yet to actually interact at all. Ted can’t help but think that’s probably by Cooper’s own design. Though he doesn’t quite understand why yet.

Whatever it is, however, will have to be stowed away for later, because Pyro has stopped babbling and Carson is standing up, Noah not far behind him and Cooper languidly following suit afterwards. Despite Cooper’s clear disdain just seconds ago, Ted sees far more fear in his eyes than anger as he traipses along the stage and takes in the audience.

Ted hardly knows Cooper yet, but he feels bad for the kid already. The stage just isn’t his scene.

The crowd is deafening once again as the three Victors finish walking to the podium, forming an organised queue. For a second, the noise of the crowd continues, but Carson brings up his hand and taps the microphone once gently, and the silence that overtakes the ballroom is soundless enough to contest with the silence of Ted’s own reaping.

Carson is of course dressed as a King, with the same signature crown and cape Ted vividly remembers from the posters that covered his home for months after the 60th games. Your new king, it read, and Carson had certainly looked kingly with his golden crown and purple suit, the regal colours. But clearly, Carson has grown a lot since then, and while he still has a long way still to grow, Ted thinks that Carson has grown into his role as King immensely.

“Ted Nivison,” Carson begins with the exact same robotic voice he used to welcome Ted to the floor last night. “As your fellow Victors, we congratulate you.” Right, because Cooper looks so pleased to see Ted’s victory.

Carson once again doesn’t even bother to look at his cards. “Together, we are a part of something much bigger than ourselves, and you have the honour of joining us,” he says in a voice so echoingly monotonous it makes the performer in Ted cringe. There is no life in those words, and Ted wonders if Carson has to repeat the exact same speech every year. Surely even people as set in their ways as Capitol citizens would find that dreadfully repetitive?

“We welcome you to our family, Ted.” The decade Victor finishes, finally turning his head in Ted’s direction. And oh, how Ted despises the use of the word ‘family’ within this hellish context. The irony of it; it’s salt poured and rubbed right into the fresh and bloody wound. But he knows it’s simply what Carson has to say, so despite his own fantasy of standing up, stomping right over to Carson, and smashing the podium to smithereens, he instead offers the kid a large smile. Nodding in return, Carson turn back towards the cameras and moves to the second part of his speech.

“Ted,” he says with notably more enthusiasm, maybe even a real smile, “I can’t wait to have so much more noise on the floor.”

Unable and uncaring to contain his shock, Ted let’s out a genuine burst of laughter at that opening, and it seems the audience follows suit. Is Carson joking? That is not what Ted expected the great Carson King to begin with.

“You’ve been the stand out tribute since the start,” he continues once the laughter quietens down, “and I think it’s clear to everyone that your victory was well-earned.”

Ted forces his muscles not to drop his smile. ‘Well-earned’. His victory was well-earned. Wow, he doesn’t think he could come up with a more damning statement if he tried. He guesses if he’s earned this victory, he’s earned all the consequences that come with it. He’s earned this punishment.

(That’s bullshit, he thinks. No one could earn such a punishment).

“I’m looking forward to having a conversation with you,” Carson says and he’s finished. He sends one last nod in Ted’s direction, strained smile in tow, and moves back over towards the seats.

Ted doesn’t think he can look at him anymore, so he keeps his attention on the podium instead.

Noah steps up next, and wow Ted almost feels the need to cover his eyes with the way light is flashing off him. The kid is is dressed up in a classic black suit, nothing notable about it apart from the blinding and flashing LEDs sown into its very fabric. Ted’s eyes strain in sympathy for Noah’s.

“I respect your ingenuity, Ted.” Noah begins, sounding sure of himself. “Nothing on me of course, but you’ve shown yourself to have a real skill in strategy. I can definitely respect that.”

Ted is surprised to actually find himself flattered by the fifteen year old’s words; and also a little shocked Noah had picked up on that. Most people just assumed everything he said and did was spur of the moment rather than calculated and considered. He makes a note of his own to be especially cautious about revealing anything around Noah.

The teenager looks towards him and smiles, “I’d love to pick your brain sometime.”

The smile Ted gives back might be fake, but the nod of affirmation actually isn’t.

Lastly, Cooper takes his place behind the podium. Gills have been painted on either side of his neck, so realistic looking that Ted has to stop himself from reaching up and touching his own human skin. Cooper is wearing a beautiful ocean blue suit, with a fishing net draped over the top of him.

His outfit looks serene, like the calm lullaby of an ocean on a windless night. A tranquil blue. A docile wave.

Ted can’t quite read his expression, but Cooper’s face is anything but docile.

“Ted Nivison, you’re a real breath of fresh air,” Cooper says, ignoring the cameras entirely, his eyes never leaving Ted. Ted tries not to gulp and wonders where all the fear in Cooper’s eyes went. “It’s an honour to meet someone so honest and genuine on stage, something I think we could all learn from.”

A round of nodding assent fills the ballroom and Ted feels his blood run cold. He can even see Carson freeze up and hear Noah take an intake of breath. Cooper is pushing it right now, and Ted has no choice but to keep smiling sincerely at him as he looks Ted directly in his milky eyes and essentially spits in his face.

How fucking dare he? Does he think Ted had a choice?

(Did he have a choice?)

Somehow Cooper’s eyes become even more enigmatic as he says, “I can’t wait to help you with your transition into Floor 6. I look forward to it.”

And with that lingering threat, he swiftly turns away from the mic and heads back to his seat. Not even looking in Ted’s direction as he sits down next to him.

Ted isn’t sure he’s ever heard such a passive aggressive speech in his life. The citizens may be too blind to see it, but even the peacekeepers have picked up that Cooper was doing something he shouldn’t be, and are shifting uneasily around them.

Ted thinks about peacekeepers and poorly chosen words and bare backs and wants to strangle Cooper a whole lot more.

Pyrocynical, of all people, can read a room, and even he stumbles slightly attempting to steer the atmosphere back to safety. “Well, uh,” he says before slipping right back to normal, “well thank all of you for those lovely words! I’m sure Ted will feel right at home with you all.”

Home. Home home home. Why does it always have to come back to home?

Ted can see distant smoke again, he can hear the crackle of fire and the popping of burning wood. He can smell the choking fumes; bitter, toxic, nauseating, as his place, his whole life, everything he ever had or was, goes up in a blaze of yellow and orange and red.

Home.

Ted decides to tune Pyro out again.

—

The moment Ted stands up from his seat he is overrun.

“Ted! Congratulations! It’s so good to finally—“

“Congratulations on your victory! Your games were so very—“

“I was one of your first sponsors you know, I saw the potential in you from the—“

“Ted Nivison, what a pleasure! Have you tried the balsamic-glazed steak rolls they’re giving out this evening? I hear they were made especially for you—“

“Congratulations on your victory! I have to say that your games have been my favourite since—“

“—the way you escaped that District 2 girl! She really was quite vicious wasn’t she? Fit right in with that rainforest I suppose, didn’t the Gamemakers do such a stellar job this year?”

“Oh congratulations on your victory, Mr. Nivison—“

“My favourite moment had to be during day three once you finally got your hands on that knife—“

“Congratulations Ted—“

“Mr. Nivison congratulations—“

“Congratulations—“

“Congratulations Ted! I’m sure your family must be very proud of you.”

Needless to say, after three hours of being the life and soul of a very large party, Ted was exhausted.

Carson, to his credit, had come to save Ted from a couple of especially awful conversations. Most notably one woman who had grabbed onto his arm and refused to let go for a whole excruciating ten minutes, while Ted tried his best to smooth talk and smile and not freak out at her clawing grip.

Carson, god love him, eventually caught on to this, and offered to escort the lady over to the buffet in the corner. She’d looked reluctant, but nobody says no to the King himself, and so Ted had been mercifully freed.

Noah, on the other hand, Ted had not seen once. Which seemed quite fitting all things considered. But still, it was impressive, Ted wonders how you could possibly disappear in a crowd so effectively with lights so bright embedded into your clothing.

As for Cooper, well Ted didn’t so much as see him more than felt him glaring at his back as Ted enraptured another group of elite citizens in some absolutely bogus story about District 10. Something about all the sheep escaping or a cow managing to get into the house, he can’t even remember now. But he certainly can still remember the intensity of Cooper’s glower.

Finally, long after Ted had lost track of the time, the last party goer is escorted into the elevator by Carson, and all the camera workers hastily follow suit— clearly uncomfortable being left in a room with no one but Victors and peacekeepers.

Then the elevator opens up once again, this time for them. Cooper is the first in, Noah corporealizes seemingly from nowhere, Ted struts in with his head held as high as he can still manage and Carson enters last, looking back as if to check they hadn’t left someone behind.

The elevator door shuts. The quiet is like whiplash after the ruckus of the last several hours. Despite how novel it is, despite how loud everything just was, Ted still finds himself pained by the silence.

“Well that,” he says to fill it up, and Cooper stiffens next to him, “that fucking sucked.”

Noah is watching as the floor number on the screen increases. Cooper is facing away from him. Carson is the one that throws him a bone, “Yeah, it always does.”

“That Welcome was way longer than my one though,” Cooper mutters, and Ted doesn’t need to guess who he blames for that.

“Yeah,” Noah says, sounding rather wrecked, “yeah it was a lot longer than the last two.”

Finally the door opens, and Ted could not be more thankful to escape that stifling atmosphere. He’s the first out.

The others come out from behind him, also exhaling similar breaths of relief.

They all suddenly begin to rip off their costumes.

“To be fair,” Carson says neutrally, as he takes the crown off his head and hurls it towards the wall. Neither the wall or the crown seem to even scratch. “My Welcome Gala was almost that long.”

“That’s because it was a new decade Welcome, you had like all of Floor 5 with you right? That’s the last Welcome Gala they’re ever going to attend, of course it was so long,” Cooper points out, dragging off his fish nets and looking at them in disgust. “The only reason this one lasted even longer was him, he kept that party going for way longer than—“

“Cooper,” Noah groans, switching off his lights and loosening his tie, “can you not do this for like, five minutes? We just got back.”

“What?” Cooper scrubs at his gills in a way that looks painful. “I’m literally just saying the obvious tr—“

“Cooper.” This time it’s Carson sighing as he chucks his cape into the pile with Cooper’s nets.

“Whatever,” Cooper says, “I don’t even care, clearly it’s not worth it.” Then he pauses. “Did you hear that there was a Gamekeeper there?”

This actually gets Noah’s interest, “Oh?”

“Yeah,” Ted says, feeling extremely foreign in the conversation but refusing to allow it to effect him. “I met him, Daniel right? Though I think he mostly goes by RT.” He chooses his next words exceedingly carefully, “He was an... interesting guy.”

Whirling around Cooper sneers, “Oh what are you on first names basis with a fucking Gamekeeper now?” Cooper looks like he’s smelled blood, “You guys buddy buddy?”

Ted grinds his teeth together and says, “No. I just had a conversation with the man, what the hell is up your ass?”

Cooper just shrugs, “It doesn’t matter.” A pause. “Aren’t you going to change or do you actually like looking that ridiculous?”

Ted is this close to snapping the teenager in half, but then he catches both Carson and Noah looking at him, analysing, expectant. But for what?

Whatever the case, Ted knows one thing. He wants these cursed contacts out if his eyes and his trusty glasses back on his face.

“Yeah, okay,” Ted says with as much certainty as he can muster, he doesn’t want this to look like a retreat. “I want to get these fucking things out my eyes as soon as possible.”

Nodding at him, Cooper looks like he’s about to storm off but Carson calls out to him first.

“Cooper wait, we need to have a word.”

Cooper freezes in place, doesn’t even turn around, “About what?”

“What do you think? Your speech.” Noah says exasperatedly, “What were you thinking?”

Ted can feel the tension in the entrance hall skyrocket, and decides to get out of there while he still can.

—

It takes him an hour to figure out how to take out the awful contacts, and never has he been so relieved to see his own sharp brown eyes looking back at him in the mirror. Oh, the things you unknowingly take for granted until they’re taken from you.

He sits on the bed and ignores how uncomfortably giving it is, how it shifts around his weight. Cooper asked him whether he wanted to change out of this suit, and Ted does, he so does, but looking at his bag in the corner he knows he has nothing he can change in to. Apart from the clothes he arrived in maybe.

Fuck it, he decides. He might as well utilise these clean clothes while he’s still wearing them. Who cares.

He reaches to at least remove the hat, and then stops himself. Well. If he’s going to commit to wearing this outfit, he’s going to commit to wearing all of this outfit. And the hat is kind of a funny addition, he has to admit.

A part of him also points out that he doesn’t have to leave his room. Ted could just rip off these garish clothes and hide in his awful bed forever. Undisturbed. There’s a lock on his door, so there’s nothing stopping him.

Except... inside this room it is so quiet. There is nothing here apart from the sound of his own heavy breathing, and if he listens really hard, his own steadily beating heart. It’s a kind of steady silence that drives Ted absolutely insane. And it’s a type of silence that could be so easily cured by walking out his door and into the common room.

And also, hiding away in here would be admitting defeat. It would be surrendering. Finally giving up after all the hell he survived through. Ted is far too proud and far too stubborn to submit now after all this time.

What’s the worst that could happen anyway?

And with that thought in mind, Ted steps out of his room and towards a source of chatting down the halls.

—

Ted finds himself in the common room and remains there in a kind of stasis all day. It’s much better than in his room. He can hear Carson and Noah as they play on the shared computer, Noah’s increasing groaning and Carson’s increasing wheezes. He can hear Cooper yelp as he drops a bowl in the kitchen. He can hear the background noise of the screen next to him, showing the news.

It’s not enough noise. But it’s so much better than his room.

A part of him wants to join in already, go up behind Noah and Carson and ask what game they’re playing, if he can join. He’s guessing the only reason they’re even still in the common room is to keep him company anyway, just as he guesses the lack of Cooper is related to his presence here too.

But things still feel too raw, too precarious, to try and reach out. Carson and Noah are kids after all, and Cooper might as well be with how he’s been acting. Either way, Ted feels far too unsteady to try and reach for any of them now; less he pulls down the teenagers with him.

He can’t know that when he opens his mouth he won’t let out a roar. That he won’t let out a scream. That he won’t let out all the breath he has left.

So instead, he lounges on the sofa, which is substantially more comfortable than his own bed, tries to ignore the funny looks Carson and Noah occasionally send his way when they think he’s watching the screen (presumably due to his outfit); and he observes his surroundings.

And well, the first thing he notices about his new living arrangements merely a day into living there, is that none of these kids know how to cook.

Carson seems satisfied on just snacking on random fruits or bits of junk food through out the day. Showing no sign that he knows how to live any different or that he is particularly aware how much this lifestyle choice deeply pains Ted.

Noah seems to be just about capable of working the microwave and appears to have peaked with warming up soup or other canned foods with it. Ted’s also sure that he knows how to use the toaster, but he appears to avoid the appliance — which has noticeably been pushed into an unused corner of the counter — for a reason that Ted reckons it’s not worth his life to bring up; unless he fancies Noah taking the thing apart, making some elaborate trap out of it, and using it to kill Ted in his sleep.

Cooper is able to work the stove and grill confidently enough. Well, at least that’s according to Carson, who when Ted asked about if Cooper was the head chef of the house, merely looked at him with a puzzled expression, before shrugging and saying Cooper has been known to fry some really good fish with enough prodding and nagging from Noah. If it’s a special occasion.

But still, Ted has never seen any of these boys so much as look at the oven, let alone use it. It makes sense of course, Carson and Noah have been here since they were twelve and thirteen, they wouldn’t have a clue about how to make a recipe or use a stove, and even Cooper who arrived at sixteen is unlikely to have much experience.

So, in retrospect, it’s out of a desire to help these kids, his new roommates, his fellow victors, that he begins making meatloaf.

—

It’s the next day, and Ted has woken up horrifically late. 7:30am. He actually feels a jolt of panic before he remembers where he is now. That the time he wakes up no longer matters. Wow, he must’ve been more exhausted yesterday then he even realised.

Once again he doesn’t recall any dreams, and it’s really beginning to unnerve him. When he was younger he’d witnessed his first cow skinning, and it had upset him so much that he’d had nightmares about it for weeks afterwards. Nightmares were the natural human response to witnessing something that terrifies you, that shakes you down to your bones and then makes itself at home in your mind. That’s how the brain deals with trauma.

So what does it say about Ted that he’s dreaming about nothing?

“It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter,” Ted says under his breath. Then he rubs his eyes, reaches for his glasses, and pulls himself out of the bed.

Ted considers his options; which quite frankly, are extremely limited. He can either wear the same clothes he arrived in and hope they don’t notice, wear the fucking milkman suit again and hope they — Cooper — don’t stone him, or just never leave his room ever again.

Sighing, Ted picks his only real option and grabs his old clothes from where they still lay discarded on the floor.

He’s beginning to get real sick of choosing between fake options. How long has it been since he made a real choice?

—

Without really thinking about it, Ted heads straight for the kitchen.

To his surprise both Noah and Carson are already seated at the breakfast bar. That’s weird, Ted wouldn’t have expected either of them to be awake yet. Maybe they were having trouble sleeping?

“Morning boys,” Ted chirps as he rolls into the room, naturally taking his place behind the counter as if he’d always belonged there.

“Morning Ted,” Carson yawns.

“Morning,” Noah says, narrowing his eyes slightly at Ted, analysing and invasive. Ted tries to act like he doesn’t notice, and goes about exploring the behemoth of a kitchen once more.

He can’t imagine he’ll ever know quite where everything is stored in a space this large.

“Good to see you actually using the breakfast bar,” Ted says, continuing to open random cupboards and grab random appliances; a kid in a candy store, he believes the old saying goes. He doesn’t think he’s ever had candy.

“Well, after you’d made such a big deal about it yesterday, we figured we might as well.” Noah says, a smug smile playing on his lips.

Yesterday, Ted had walked into the kitchen to find a breakfast bar completely untouched and un-utilised. He couldn’t wrap his head around it, breakfast bars were so useful, they gave you so much space for both cooking and eating in a kitchen. It hurt him to see one covered in dust when his mum would’ve probably given her next born son away to have one.

“There wasn’t even any stools behind it!” Ted laments, throwing his arms wide, a spatula he’d found in hand. “You’re absolute barbarians! Especially you!” He points at Carson, who’s got his dirty dirty hands in some poor box of cereal, “You’re not even adding milk! God’s most gracious gift to mortals such as yourselves!”

Carson just shrugs, deigning to look ever so slightly amused, “It’s better without.”

“Absolute sacrilege! Heresy, I say!”

“I’m not sure you know what that word even means,” Noah drawls, but he’s smirking too.

“You dare doubt my—!”

“Hey- hey Noah-“ Carson interrupts, ignoring Ted’s theatrics and turning towards Noah, smile widening. “Cereal wh-“

“Nope,” Cooper appears out of nowhere, swiftly sweeps past Carson and yanks the box out of his hand, before promptly dropping the whole thing into the bin. Ted privately cringes at the waste.

Carson let’s out a mournful cry, “My cereal!”

“Your cereal privileges are revoked.” Cooper states, sounding very tired. “I refuse to deal with this stupid joke again. It was bad enough the fiftieth time.”

“Oh thank god,” says Noah, at the same time Carson rebuttals “And what power do you have to revoke these privileges?”

Cooper narrows his eyes, and something noticeably shifts in his tone, “Dude I’m a whole two years older than you.”

Carson merely raises his eyebrows, “And?”

“And—“ Cooper’s eyes briefly dart towards Noah, as if he’s expecting his support on the matter.

But Noah, despite his previous relief at the cereal’s destruction — for some reason that is still lost on Ted — jumps to back Carson up. “Yeah no offence Cooper, but you can’t exactly claim the maturity card. The drywall is still quaking from your first week here.”

Snorting, Carson turns back towards the now bare counter. “Oh sweet cereal, I’ll never forget you,” he grieves, obviously done with Cooper. It’s a clear dismissal, and Noah mimics the action of turning away. Ted just blinks.

“Anyone want to explain what the fuck just happened to me?” His voice booms, it sounds much louder in the sudden vacuum of the kitchen than he’d intended. He internally winces, but Ted Nivison has never been a man to stop. “Why did Cooper just pour a whole box of innocent cereal into the fucking bin?”

“Oh god, please don’t ask,” Noah groans, his head is in his hands. “There is only so much a man can take, and I am at my limit.”

Ted thought he was the dramatic one. He chuckles, confused but enjoying whatever kind of recurring bit this is, looking to Carson for answers, but Carson looks shocked to even see Ted standing there. Like he’d forgotten his presence for a moment. Ted tries to continue the joke anyway, “What is he—?”

“No seriously, if you do this Carson I will leave and you will not see me for a week. I have to stream later and I need some semblance of energy left for it. I beg of you Carson, please spare us for today.”

But fortunately for Noah, Carson just stares at Ted, unrecognisingly and... empty, until Ted finds he has to look somewhere else. He shivers, it feels like someone has just walked over his grave.

Meanwhile, Cooper, who has still been standing by the bin, looks at Ted from the corner of his eyes in a way that Ted would describe as distinctly hostile. Though whether that’s actually anger towards Ted or just anger towards how he’d just been snuffed, Ted did not know. Cooper then glances towards Noah and Carson — Noah who is sending worrying glances towards Carson, and Carson who is still blankly staring in Ted’s direction — before shaking his blond head and muttering something under his breath that sounds an awful lot like, “What else did I expect?”

Ted decides that now is the time to do what he does best: fill the silence.

“So,” he begins, after an awkward beat, voice grave and serious. “Which one of you is the head chef around here?”

Everyone’s attention snaps back to him, and standing here behind this breakfast bar, watched by an audience of three, he is overwhelmed by an uncomfortable sort of deja vu. This whole situation feels achingly familiar.

In one way, it feels reminiscent of all those presentations he’d so enjoyed doing at school with Moses; cracking jokes and threats and shouting across the room as Moses actually delivered detailed and factual information to the class. The teacher always scolded him, but they always got an A, and their presentations were always the one’s most looked forward to.

But at the same time, it feels familiar to the many many interviews and speeches he’s done for the Games at this point. He doesn’t know why, the atmosphere, the amount of people, the whole context is so unbelievably different. Ted can’t quite place where this deja vu stems from.

Then it hits him. There’s one common denominator that links all these experiences together: He’s performing.

It’s like the jigsaw pieces connect in his mind. Ted has always loved performing for others, from those school presentations with Moses to even those first few interviews for the Games, when everything seemed to be going right, and he wasn’t aware of how he was burying himself with every lie he spun, every story he embellished, and every joke he told. With each one he had made himself a tomb of his own words.

He had always loved performing. But the performance of Ted Nivison had trapped Ted. And now, performance isn’t just something he enjoys, it’s a reflex, and he realises right at that second, standing behind the breakfast bar to an audience of traumatised kids, that he’s performing again. He realises, breath catching, that he hasn’t stopped performing since he finished his tour, since he emerged alive from the games, since his first interview in front of millions of eyes. Maybe even since he stood before his entire district at the reaping, shocked and shaking and horrified but aware enough to find Moses and Madi in the crowd, to shake his head, to beg them using his eyes alone — so unused to having his speech stripped from him — not to say anything, not to do anything stupid. Then standing there on stage, in front of his whole home, stony and resilient. A pillar of confidence. Unbreakable and unchiselable. While he internally fought to not break out in rage or sobs.

He was performing then, and he is performing now. And the reality of it drowns him. Ted is still performing. He doesn’t know how to stop. He doesn’t even know if he wants to. He doesn’t know if he even can.

“Huh?” Carson asks, oblivious to the revelation that is raining down acidic in Ted’s mind. “Head chef?”

“Yeah!” Ted picks up again, revoltingly relieved for a reminder and way back into the bit. “The meal maker, the cooking connoisseur, the best baker you’ve got in this- on this good for nothing floor.”

Cooper turns away again with a scoff of disgust, which Ted pretends not to notice.

“Uh, I don’t know man—“ Noah begins, but Ted quickly interrupts, still trying to escape the screaming in the back of his mind.

“Oh so it like a joint deal? Co-chefs, co-cooks?”

“Um, not really Ted,” Carson sounds vaguely uncomfortable, but Ted reckons it’s just for show. “We just sort of eat whatever, whenever.”

“Yeah, and it’s worked for us so far,” Cooper says defensively, and oh boy, he can tell what Noah meant about maturity. Cooper’s seventeen now, he should be all over this.

“This is completely unacceptable!” Ted slams his hand onto the counter loudly and doesn’t show how much it fucking stings to do. Carson flinches back at the bang, and then promptly bursts into bemused laughter. “I’m making you all breakfast. Right now. You have no choice.”

Carson raises his eyebrows, still wheezing a little, “Sorry buddy, I’ve just had that cereal, I’m good.”

Cooper just chokes a laugh and says, “Yeah, no thanks.” Then he walks away from the bin, grabs a banana from the fruit bowl, and leaves the kitchen. Ted elects to ignore this reaction once again, even as he catches Carson narrow his eyes and track Cooper’s exit.

He instead turns to Noah, voice dripping in drama. “Surely, Noah, you would like an omelet, even some coffee cake?”

Much to Ted’s disbelief, Noah shakes his head, “As good as that sounds Ted, and it does sound tempting, I’ve got ramen to microwave.” He holds up a pot of what Ted recognises as a form of instant noodles. Not even fresh.

“Noodles, for breakfast?” Ted yells, throwing the spatula aside entirely. It clangs noisily as it hits the wall. “Over coffee cake!?”

“Breakfast, lunch and dinner,” Noah smirks, aware of the pain he’s inflicting on the newest Victor. Ted simply pulls at his hair in despair.

“Heathens, fools, barbarians the whole lot of you.”

Carson, no longer watching Cooper’s sudden exit, is wheezing with laughter again. Ted decides that he really likes the kid’s laugh. It’s contagious. It’s like he’s been starved of comedy or something and now any little joke of quip sent him spiralling— and, huh, that might be exactly what happened, come to think of it.

“You’ve got to let me make you all lunch,” Ted argues, looking back and forth between the two of them rapidly, grabbing a nearby saucepan and waving it at them threateningly. “Show you all what you’ve been missing.”

Noah glances towards Carson, and Carson slowly nods. “Yeah sure, why not,” he says casually, but there’s a light in his eyes, a certain excitement in his voice. It makes him sound his age. It makes him sound like a kid. “What are you going to make?”

Ted doesn’t even have to think. It’s his first time cooking for them all, it has to be his best dish. His favourite dish, ever since he was a kid.

“Meatloaf,” he smiles, wide and chalky, “my mum’s own recipe.” He prays he remembers it clearly. Hates that he can’t ask her for the instructions anymore, that he can’t get her guidance. All he can hope is that he’s committed it enough to memory.

“Meatloaf?” Carson laughs, loud and bewildered, as Noah leans over to him and fake whispers, “What the hell is a meatloaf?”

Ted holds his head high, puffs out his chest and confirms, “Meatloaf. It’s a goddam staple, is what it is.” Carson snorts for the hundredth time. “And it will be a damn sight better than fucking ramen.”

If he wanted to do this right, he decides he has nothing better to do than start right away. So he does.

—

In hindsight, maybe he should’ve looked up a recipe. Just in case.

But he was so sure in his capabilities, and he didn’t want just any recipe, he wanted to make his mum’s recipe. He’s made it enough times before, albeit with some help. Surely, he can manage.

The first meatloaf comes out... okay. But he knows it should be better. There’s something wrong with it. He’s just not sure what.

And well, he looks at the clock, sees it’s only just 8:50. Thinks about returning back to that cold, sterile, windowless bedroom. Thinks about Cooper’s hostile eyes and Carson’s dead ones. Thinks about all that his dreams aren’t showing him. Thinks about home, and his family and his friends. All of which he no longer has. All of which are no longer his.

He thinks about the mediocre meatloaf in front of him instead.

He decides he has time to kill.

—

The second meatloaf comes out much the same, however. And he’s not sure what he’s doing wrong. He must be missing something. There must be something he’s forgetting to do.

Ted’s in the middle of punching the shit out of the third meatloaf to flatten it onto the baking tray, when Cooper walks back in to the kitchen.

“Oh.” Cooper stops when he notices Ted, Ted keeps taking his anger out on the meat, both comedically and as a genuine outlet. “You’re still here.”

“Yeah,” Ted huffs as he starts making holes in the meat for the sauce, getting a little tired at this point. “Haven’t left yet, been making lunch.” He nods his head over towards the two abandoned meatloaves on the counter.

Cooper flinches as Ted loudly beats the meat again, unsatisfied by its prior thickness. “Is this... meatloaf?” He asks, almost sounding amused, mostly sounding fed up. “Why the hell have you made so much of it?”

“They weren’t right,” Ted answers, pausing for a second to rest his hands. He clenches and unclenches them rhythmically. “I must’ve got the recipe wrong.”

“They look fine to me,” Cooper retorts. Ted thinks he’s being purposefully difficult.

“Well they’re not!” He shouts, unsure where all this genuine aggression is coming from. “Who’s the beef expert here? The cow expert? The one who knows how to use an oven?”

The other victor just narrows his eyes at him.

“That’s what I thought.”

“Whatever man,” Cooper grumbles. “I just came in here to grab some chips anyway.”

He moves over to the cupboards, opens one, and Ted says, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You’ll ruin your appetite.”

Cooper takes the chips anyway, and once again leaves the kitchen in a fashion that makes Ted wonder what the hell he did to upset the teen. He resolves to worry about it another time. He needs to focus.

But the third turns out just the same as the first two did. And so does the fourth. Once he gets to making the fifth he finds he can no longer justify the frenzy in his head, he thinks of all the food he’s wasting, how many families in 10 these supplies alone could feed. How much beef this is. How much that amount could sell for. How he’s already betrayed his home with the gluttonous way he keeps pouring ingredients into this mixing bowl. But he can’t seem to stop. And his home already hate him. And there’s so much food in this cursed fridge. He has no reason to not place the 5th fucking meatloaf into the oven, just as Carson and Noah walk into the kitchen, Carson laughing at a joke Ted didn’t hear.

“Hey Ted,” Carson greets as they enter, that childish excitement back in his voice once again, “is the meatloaf ready yet?”

“Almost,” Ted replies, still looking at the cooking meatloaf through the oven door, watching. He hears the two walk further towards the counter, and then suddenly stop.

“Dude.” Noah says, sounding shocked, and it’s the first time Ted’s heard his blasé attitude fall away. “Is this, all meatloaf?”

“What the fuck...” Carson breathes, voice sounding torn between bursting out laughing and genuine concern.

“Yeah, but all of them are failures,” Ted explains, still not looking up from the oven.

“Failures...?” Carson repeats, voice high. Then there’s a sound of a scuffle of some sort above him.

“It doesn’t taste like a failure to me,” Noah says around a mouthful of— oh no. “Sure this one is a little cold, but it actually tastes rea—“

Ted jumps up abruptly and forcefully, and both teens jump backwards, Noah falling off his stool. Ted does not feel any remorse. “No! Don’t eat those!” He pulls the plates away from them and their greedy little fingers, “They’re too terrible for human consumption! They deserve to rot!”

“Woah man,” Carson says, raising his hands placatingly, “they seem fine. What’s wrong with them?”

“They poisoned or somethin’?” Noah chokes, pausing his chewing, eyes widening.

“They’re just not right! Something must be missing in them, I must’ve forgotten a step in the recipe. They don’t look like how I made them last time.” He couldn’t lose this bit of home as well, he couldn’t. He refused to; and Ted Nivison always got his way. One way or another. “I’ve just got to figure out what I’m doing incorrectly.”

Noah just gapes at him like he’s a crazy person. And he guesses he is. “Ted, man, no offence, but you’ve made four of these already. Don’t you think you should maybe call it a day? Try again another time?”

“I’ve made five,” he says, jabbing his thumb towards the oven, “and I take full offence, thank you very much. Wait another day and let my memory fade even further? That has to be the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. You are a dumbass. You are lord of the dumbasses, Noah.”

Noah rolls his eyes but Carson gawks, “Five!? Ted have you been in here this whole time?”

Ted knits his eyebrows together, anger dissipating somewhat, “Well, yeah. Since this morning.”

“Oh my god,” Noah groans as Carson clutches the counter before him and cries, “We thought you’d just snuck back to your room when we weren’t looking! That’s how the others acted when they first arrived here. I thought that maybe you wanted to be left alone! We were just trying to give you some privacy!”

“Oh it’s fine guys, don’t even worry,” Ted grins at them before leaning back down to watch his meatloaf. He continues, somewhat absentmindedly, “I’m fine, it’s all fine, this is just a good distraction, if anything.”

He does not see the worried look the two younger boys exchange between themselves.

“Anyway, this meatloaf is gonna be the one. I can feel it. Feel it in my very soul.”

—

As it turns out, meatloaf number five was not the one. And to the great horror of both Noah and Carson, he cleans his utensils, and begins grabbing the ingredients needed for a sixth.

They tell him not to, half laughing, half serious. They tell him to stop. But well, Ted Nivison has never been a man to stop.

Also, the cretins eat one of his failed meatloaves despite his protests.

“Look man, I’ve eaten nothing but cereal yet today, and this shit smells good. What do you expect me to do?” Is what Carson had argued around a mouthful of the forbidden food.

“Perish.” Was Ted’s easy response. But they ate the meatloaf anyway. So Ted will call them even.

The two teens sit and watch him as he cooks. They call for him to relent in his culinary rampage, as he dramatically squishes the ground beef in his hands, and as he finely dices the onions with a huge knife and sadistic smile on his face. They wheeze as he smashes his fist into the meat again and again in the mixing bowl, and then cradles his creation like a baby. They cry out when Ted gets sauce everywhere and when he licks the sharp knife clean (then he does a cool flip with it in his hand, and Carson shouts “Pog!” — whatever that means, and Ted cringes at how comfortable the weight feels in his worn palm). They chat between themselves, they eat meatloaf, they enjoy the performance Ted is putting on in their own kitchen.

The vibe is good, the kids seem happy and Ted is kind of enjoying himself.

It’s when the sixth is also a failure that the boys begin to start frowning.

All the humour is gone from Carson’s voice when he says, “Wait- Ted seriously, stop now, that’s enough dude.”

Noah nods along with him, “Yeah Ted, this isn’t funny anymore, this is stupid. This meatloaf is fine. Stop.”

But it isn’t fine. Ted knows it’s not right. And Ted Nivison has never been a man to stop, and Ted is Ted Nivison. That’s his fucking name. And so he does not stop.

The making of the seventh meatloaf is decidedly more sombre. As Carson and Noah watch him still, but silently this time, with twisted features and frustrated eyes. Occasionally leaning to each other and whispering, while Ted repeats all of the same actions, but in a way that is noticeably more angry, more forceful and vulgar. Less fun. The atmosphere has grown as cold as his first meatloaf.

It’s not like he isn’t aware that this is crazy. And stupid and wasteful and borderline manic. But the meatloaf isn’t right and something about that burns within him a fire so bright that he just has to keep trying. He has to keep trying. He has to.

Ted is just pulling the seventh out of the oven, ready to be assessed, when Cooper returns to the kitchen for the third time that day.

He glances at the six meatloaves lining the counter, and the seventh one in Ted’s oven-mitt cladded hands. Ted doesn’t look up from his latest attempt, and so does not catch the way Cooper turns towards Noah and Carson, blustering exasperation on his face. He doesn’t notice the way Noah shrugs back at Cooper, helplessly. The way Carson is too busy staring at Ted in concern to catch Cooper’s nonverbal question.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Cooper says after a solid thirty seconds of shock. “You’ve got to be. You’re still pulling this bullshit? It’s been over nine hours!”

Ted still doesn’t glance up, instead he slams down the tray and yells “Fuck! It’s still not right.”

Cooper rubs his forehead and lets out a guttural sigh, “Stop being so dramatic man, it’s clearly fine. They’re all clearly fine!”

From over at the counter Carson waves his arms about in agreement. “That’s what we’ve been trying to tell him!” He says loudly, sounding rankled. “These are all really good! He’s just not- not listening to us or something!”

Scoffing, Ted turns fully towards Cooper, cooking rage temporarily projected onto something other than the meatloaf in front of him or his own failure.

He pretends very hard not to hear Noah very softly tell Carson, “I think he’s having a breakdown dude.”

“How would you know what’s fine, huh? Fish boy?” Ted booms, voice as expansive and large as the mucky fields he grew up on. That he can never return to. Shit. “You don’t even know how to preheat an oven, you- you salty piece of mangled seaweed.”

Cooper’s eyes flare, bright with un-contained rage. He hears Carson wince somewhere behind him, but he doesn’t care, he has bigger problems to worry about right now. Mostly whether there is enough ketchup left in the fridge for an eighth meatloaf. Turning away from the nonsense, he goes to check.

Carson’s voice is stressed as he attempts to deescalate the situation, “L-look guys, I think that we should all just take a step back, maybe give Ted some sp—“

“ARE YOU STARTING ANOTHER MEATLOAF!?” Cooper yells, incensed. Ted doesn’t even look back round.

“What’s it to you, bitch?”

“No this is- this is ridiculous! I refuse to deal with your stupid melodrama!” Cooper splutters, and Ted freezes. “You were bad enough on stage but Jesus do you have no off switch? Can’t bring it down from one hundred even in the slightest?”

Suddenly Noah bursts through Cooper’s ranting. “That’s enough Cooper! You’re not helping!”

Cooper just ignores him. “Seriously, just who do you think you’re impressing? Who the hell are you showing off for? Can’t you act like a real fucking person for five minutes? Or are you just stuck like this?”

Ted clenches the empty ketchup bottle in his hand, hears the sound of it cracking distantly, still not turning around. For once in his life, he says absolutely nothing. His ears are ringing.

“Cooper chill the fuck out!” Noah tries again, but this time the other victor just snaps towards the fifteen year old. “Can’t you see your making this worse?”

“Oh whatever Noah, it’s so typical that you w—“

“Cooper.” Carson says in a voice so heavy Ted can feel the centre of gravity shift in the room, and silence swallows the kitchen. “Take a walk.”

Another beat of silence, and then, “You- you can’t just tell me—“

“Take. A walk, Cooper.” Carson sighs, “Please.”

More charged silence, followed by copious amounts of grumbling, followed by the sound of what Ted can only assume is Cooper storming out of the room. Leaving the kitchen while giving Ted the distinct feeling Cooper has an issue with him for the third time that day.

Steeling himself by taking a long breath, he finally lessens his death grip on the ketchup, and turns back round to face the two teens once again. A cheeky smile slapped onto his face.

“Well that was quite a commotion,” he deadpans as if he is looking into a camera and sharing a knowing wink with the audience.

Carson and Noah don’t say anything to that, and Ted can’t stomach anymore silence so he continues, “Well, I guess my meatloaf making days are over,” he looks at the useless empty ketchup bottle, “meatloaf without sauce is too hideous to even contemplate.”

Carson has turned towards Noah and is giving him a kind of look that Ted can’t even begin to decipher, Noah doesn’t seem to appear too happy about it though.

Still uncomfortable with the deafening quiet, Ted goes on, “At least you guys have lots of leftovers for tomorrow, you’re welcome, by t—“

“No,” Noah finally responds out loud. “No, Carson I’m not le-“

“C’mon Noah, please.”

Ted has no fucking clue what their talking about. “Uh...?”

Carson is still giving Noah a very strong Look.

“Alright, alright.” Noah grumbles, finally relenting. “I better check on Cooper anyway.”

Carson nods his head in thanks, and then Noah reluctantly gets up and walks out of the kitchen, briefly glancing back at his friend and rolling his eyes as he does so, making his disdain for the situation obvious.

“Right. Well that wasn’t weird at all,” Ted says, as Noah walks out, voice patently mocking.

Carson just turns towards him, and he suddenly looks so much older than fifteen.

Ted feels a little paralysed in that moment.

“I don’t... really know how to do this, but, I think I need to say it.” The first and youngest Victor on Floor 6 begins, and Ted feels his stomach sink in apprehension.

“I know it’s hard moving in here, after- well after everything,” Carson stutters, voice strange, dead eyes piercing. “It’s rough, especially at first, but it does get easier, and if- if you ever need help or advice or anything you can come to me. You can talk to me. I’ve been here the longest, it makes sense.” He sounds as if he’s trying to convince himself as much as Ted.

And Ted would love to point out in that moment how much younger Carson is than him, how much more of a child. That three year age gap chasm-like between them. At their age, three years may as well by three decades developmentally.

So yes, Ted would love to point out how it logically should be Carson looking to him for support, not the other way round. But he knows, gutturally, looking into the eternity held in the young boy’s eyes, that Carson is aged in ways that Ted is yet to understand.

Ted is going to say something, he really is, but Carson seems to be on a roll now.

“And I’m sorry about Cooper, he’s actually a lot better than before. When he first arrived yeesh, it was—“ then he suddenly stops himself, seems to backtrack. “I know this is uh, probably harder for you. It was the same with Cooper, and I- we definitely messed up with welcoming him,” Carson sounds guilty about that, but doesn’t look away. Ted isn’t quite sure exactly what he’s trying to say here, it’s all a little muddled. “But the way you won your games was different to all of us, especially Cooper, I hope you understand it just might take... some time for him, for all of us, to get used to having you around.”

Ted feels his gut plummet as Carson speaks, feels the hair on his arms raise. He shudders at the word ‘different’. He thinks of his age, his height, his muscles after years of cutting up pounds of meat and lifting around hay bales. He thinks of the spotlight, the interviews, all the love he received from the Capitol. He thinks of the rainforest, running for his life while still trying to stay in character, as Minx had advised. He thinks of his many sponsors, the milk, the carving knife.

‘Different’ is a condemnation of a label, even if Carson means it well. ‘Different’ is how he was no underdog, no ingenious electrician, no rebellious survivor; not like the rest of floor 6. ‘Different’ is how Ted Nivison was a shoo-in to win the games from the moment he first opened his mouth on stage. Maybe from the very moment he was reaped. It was so obvious, in hindsight, even he could have predicted it, if he’d seen it from an outsider’s perspective. Moses must have known he was going to win. He was always so good at predicting these things. He must have known.

Ted can only hope that he understood, too.

Carson attempts to pull his lips upwards— and there it is, that strained smile Ted recognised on that scrawny twelve year old Moses bet on all those years ago. “God knows it took us long enough with Cooper, and even now you can see, we don’t- I don’t always get it right. I feel bad that we didn’t try more sooner. But we’ll try harder this time around.”

Then his smile shifts, and sure it is a little strained, but it’s a lot genuine, too, “It’s just been the three of us for a while now, y’know? And you’re so- big. It’ll just take some time for you to find a way to fit.”

How could anyone be genuine here? How could they stand it? How does he do it?

“Right,” Ted eventually manages when Carson finally seems done speaking, and he’s taken a little aback by how hoarse his own voice sounds. He looks at Carson’s earnest face, at how he really does consider this prison home, at how he genuinely hopes Ted can one day feel the same way. How he hopes Ted can feel better. He looks at the empty plastic in his fist, he scans the plates of mania-made meatloaves. Finds that he rather wants to burst into tears, real true sobs, like he hasn’t done in half a decade. Instead, he shakily swallows, “Right.”

Sincerity. It’s not something he ever expected to see anywhere in the Capitol. And that was kind of a relief at this point. He is not sure he can look it in the eye.

Carson’s smile fades slightly, “Are you okay?” Then he stops himself again, says, “I mean obviously your not okay, that’s a stupid question, but—“

“I’m dealing,” Ted saves him, lying through his shiny white teeth. “I’m dealing with it fine.”

The teen doesn’t look completely convinced, “Okay, but know you can talk to me Ted? If you ever need to.”

As if, Ted thinks. As if he was going to dump his baggage on a well meaning fifteen year old. This kid may have taken control over the floor, may be the head, but Ted would be damned if he ever let this child have to deal with any of his own bullshit. Which... he realises with a sort of creeping guilt, is exactly what he’s just done. With fucking meatloaf, of all things.

“Sure, man,” he says, voice achingly soft, small smile so very seemingly sincere. “I am really just tired though, I think all the nonstop cooking has finally caught up with me.” He sounds quiet and far away and alien to his own ears, “Might just get an early night.”

It’s only just passed 5pm and he could not feel more painstakingly awake.

Still, he can’t even find it in himself to feel guilty about his deception when some of the tension bleeds out of Carson’s shoulders.

“That sounds like a good idea,” Carson nods, voice relieved. “I should probably also go check up on Cooper too, before he and Noah get into another argument.”

Ted grins, happy to move the subject away from himself, “Do they do that a lot?”

“Oh you have no idea,” Carson shakes his head in despair, “and it’s always over such stupid things! I swear I’ll probably go out there and find them shouting to each other about weather patterns, or about the goddam Titanic again.”

“What the hell is a Titanic?”

“Not so loud!” Carson hisses in genuine panic. “They might hear you!”

Ted bursts into confused laughter, and privately wonders just how long this kid has been trying to look out for the idiots on this floor.

“Okay, good luck with that,” he chuckles, “I’m just going to store all these meatloaves for later. I suppose they aren’t completely inedible.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Standing up, Carson assesses him one last time, “You sure you’re good? It’s okay to say if you’re not.”

Reaching for the plates and trying to sound as casual and loose as possible, Ted replies, “Of course dude, what have I got to hide?”

—

Hours later he lies in bed, wide awake.

He cannot take the silence of it. That is one lie he is far too tired of convincing himself of. So he allows himself, for tonight, to acknowledge the truth of it. He can go back to pretending tomorrow.

The silence makes him sick.

So, that truth in mind, he slips out of the unbearably comfortable sheets and tiptoes his way to that balcony he remembers seeing but never got the chance to check out. Gingerly as possible, so to not alert the others to his awake-ness. It is for the best that they believe he is still sound asleep.

Somehow, he makes it unseen or unheard. Luck is not a concept he’s been used to this past month, and it’s definitely not something he ever believes he’ll rely on again. But still, as his mum would say: “Never look a gift horse in the mouth.” And never reject small mercies, no matter how much he distrusts them at this point.

When he walks out onto the balcony the sun is setting. “How’s about it?” He laughs with venom on his tongue and the ancient pain of his district buried snug in his heart. Defeat. The death of hope. The light retreating as the dark takes over again. Yeah, that felt fitting. But it felt a little pretentious, too. A little full of himself to think the sun and it’s light was all for him, like the universe existed to bend to his personal whims.

Ted Nivison is the sort of character to force the sun itself to move to his wants and needs. Ted is just tired. And Ted Nivison thinks right now, in this darkening moment, that all the setting sun really means is that he ought to go back to bed.

But Ted Nivison is not a man to stop, so he leans upon the banister. Gazes into the beautiful purple the sky is becoming. Pretends it’s not his favourite colour, and that he doesn’t prefer it to the attention seeking blaze of the sunrise. It would only confuse his mental metaphor. And what’s one more lie.

The light from the sky disappears, and Ted finds it doesn’t make much a difference with the glow of the city underneath. It lights up the city despite the dark trying its best to take its turn in ruling the land. The light perseveres.

Oh, Ted wonders. What must it be like to live in a place that is always light? That always has hope? That never gives in to the defeat of a sunset?

His mind wanders back to the kids behind him. Hopeful and defeated and tired as they all are.

Mentally, he promises himself to never again put his own issues onto the shoulders of the teens around him again. No matter how many lies or jokes or performances he has to make to do so.

Ted never wants them to be worried for him. He certainly never wants them to be worried about him. He can tell they’re afraid of him, a little unnerved at least, and he can’t blame them because he’d be afraid of him too.

He rubs his eyes, so very exhausted.

They’re all just kids, simultaneously under the scrutiny of millions of eyes and yet somehow completely unsupervised.

Ted doesn’t know what is left of himself, he doesn’t know what is real or fake. He doesn’t know what the fuck he’s going to do next. No home, no family, no self. But here it is. Here’s a new purpose. Something he can latch onto with an iron grip, something he can use to centre himself, to hold onto instead of falling into the gaping void he knows lurks under his second skin. The abyss he feels within himself that grows more expansive and empty by the day. That he sees reflected in Carson’s eyes.

He’s going to look after them, even if the only way he knows how to do that is by cooking them meals. He’s going to look out for them. In the way Carson shouldn’t think he has to. In the way Noah so obviously attempts with Carson. In the way Cooper so bitingly rejects. He’s going to try.

What else is there left to do?

He looks into the sunset and decides that if this is what defeat looks like, well then... at least he thinks it’s pretty. At least it looks purple.

Purple was always his favourite.

Eventually, sometime long after the purple fades to black and even the blinding city dims, Ted floats back to bed, already half unconscious. And when he lays back down he finally drifts off, into another disturbingly dreamless sleep.