It's lovely. If only you could frost someone to death." "Don't be so superior. You can never tell what you will find in the arena. Say it's a gigantic cake-

But collective thinking is usually short-lived. We're fickle, stupid beings with poor memories and a great gift for self-destruction.

I don't want to cry. Everyone will make note of my tears and I'll be marked as an easy target. A weakling. I will give no one that satisfaction.

I curl up, make myself smaller, try to disappear entirely. Wrapped in silence, I slide my bracelet that reads 'mentally disoriented' around and around my wrist.

I clench his hands to the point of pain. "Stay with me." His pupils contract to pinpoints, dialate again rapidly, and then return to something resembling normalcy. "Always," he murmurs.

While you live, the revolution lives

Right before the explosions begin, I find a star.