resurgence. jacinta & mackenzie.

[я𝑜𝓈𝑒]

Her heart convulsed as she watched Mackenzie strike the final blow upon his opponent. Watching him fight the boy from Three had given her flashbacks from her own finale—he, just like her, had been teetering along the brink of death. And then, suddenly, resurgence.

Two years had passed by since that heavy crown had been placed upon her head. Two years since her hands had been stained with the blood of her adversaries. She had never been able to forget them—especially Cynthia Delgado. The girl she should have killed; the girl who should have lived.

Back then, Jacinta Salazar was the girl who would have done anything to live. And now? She had no idea.

She knew that Mackenzie did not share the ruthless mindset she had in the Games, but they had other things in common. They were both survivors, and they were both from District Seven. He was from home—she was his mentor. She was supposed to be there for him, as she had tried to be for Violet.

Jacinta failed to save her sister, but somehow, she had helped Mackenzie live. She could only have given him pieces—armor, sponsors, advice—and the rest had been up to him. She didn't take credit for his survival, but the fact that she had contributed to his victory gave her some solace.

The moment Akira Sokatoa's cannon fired, marking Mackenzie Pryce's victory, Jacinta had rushed to the medical center. Her heart had leaped into her throat with anticipation and disbelief as she headed into the hallway and towards the elevator. She had been rooting for Mackenzie for the entire Games, but she couldn't believe that he was actually coming home. She had almost stopped believing that he would live when he faced down Akira—he had been so close to death.

Despite Jacinta's racing heartbeat, anything that she felt was masked beneath her composure. As her escort followed her, asking where she was going, she turned to her, straight-faced, and retorted, "Nowhere. Now get out of my way."

It was the same escort who had called Violet's death entertaining. It was no secret that Jacinta hated her.

She arrived to the medical center shortly after Mackenzie did. No one stopped her as she walked through the doors and down the hallway to Mackenzie's room. As she approached the doorway, she felt cold. Jacinta remembered this place all too well; when the hovercraft brought her here, she had been broken and bloodied. While she was asleep, they had replaced her ear—if she didn't remember the searing pain of Cynthia's blade slashing it off, she would have believed that it was real.

Jacinta ignored the ice in her veins and stepped through the doorway. Her eyes darted around the room, taking in every detail all over again, until her gaze finally settled on Mackenzie.

Her once steely features softened; he looked so... so frail. She knew that she must have looked the same when she was brought here. They had at least washed the blood from his body, but the pallor of his skin told her that he was still recovering.

The last time she had seen him, he was a tribute. But now, he is the same as her, her equal: a victor, a survivor.

She was leaning against the doorway now, arms crossed over her chest. Just as she did so, Mackenzie's eyes began to flutter open, perhaps because he sensed Jacinta's presence.

"That was quite the finale," Jacinta told him. She gave him a small smile, a tiny crack in the calm expression she wore like a mask.

She wanted this moment to be with Violet. But her sister was gone—Jacinta tried not to think about where she was now. If she existed at all, if her soul still lingered, or if it had been sucked deep into a void of oblivion.

"I hope I'm not disturbing you, but I thought that as your mentor, I should be here when you woke up," Jacinta continued. She kept her tone light, in spite of the heaviness she felt in her heart. "I can leave if you'd like to rest, though." She understood better than most what it was like to be in his situation; she wouldn't be offended if Mackenzie wanted to be alone.

Nostalgia warmed her heart as her mind was brought back two years ago, to this very room, where Justice Fray had greeted her. There were no living District Seven victors at the time, and so he had decided to substitute. Although he was a ridiculous drunk and a flirt, his gesture was overall kind. It had been comforting to know that someone cared after everything she had been through.

Jacinta hoped that Mackenzie felt the same.

[dars]

[я𝑜𝓈𝑒]

He did not sound like she remembered, but then again, no one ever game out of the Arena the same. Mackenzie's voice was so ragged and worn as he asked her a question that at first struck her as strange.

"You're real. True or false?"

But then she reminded herself of what it was like when she first exited the Arena. There had been fatigue so intense that sometimes she saw things that weren't there, and she had lucid dreams that mirrored reality so perfectly that she confused them with her memories.

"True," she confirmed. "I'm not a vision, promise."

Upon the suggestion that she may leave if he wished, something seemed to snap within him and the ghost of loneliness filled his eyes.

"No! No. Please, just... Don't leave me alone," Mackenzie pleaded.

She couldn't help herself as she wondered if this is what it would have been like if Violet had come home, too. Would Violet have begged her to stay, too?

She was silent for a moment, her dark eyes scanning the scars and bruises on his skin.

"I won't," she assured him. "Not until you want me to, or until you fall asleep."

Jacinta studied his hands, which she knew had been used to kill before, the same as her own. And yet, although she would not admit it to herself at the time, she knew that Mackenzie was better than her.

Jacinta was not a monster without guilt, but she was not sorry to be alive. She would not take back the choices she made in the Arena, despite the fact that her actions left a permanent black mark on her soul.

She still meant those infamous words she said to Cynthia on their last night in the Arena, beneath the luminous eclipse:

"I would rather suffer forever than die."

Jacinta figured that Mackenzie was too noble to feel the same. But still, she did wonder—after all, he had chosen to take lives to save his own. Maybe they were not so different.

"Are you afraid to be alone?" she inquired. "I was when I first woke up after it ended."

[dars]