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    THE VICTORY TOUR of the star-crossed lovers from 12 came and went. Jupiter had not attended and only watched the news of it because her mother had asked her to and Mars had been hovering over her shoulder waiting for a reason to yell at her. She had hugged her knees to her chest and watched with lifeless eyes, listening to the falsified speeches and Katniss' cracked voice and dark eyes.

    Cassia gasped and softened her gaze at all the right moments, clutching at the blanket she strung over herself at night when she stayed glued there and Juptier and Mars would retire as it got dark and tiredness wearied them. Jupiter worried for her mother sometimes, but a bigger part of her wished she had done more for them over the years.

    It was when the Victory Tour came to an end that Jupiter grew tense, waiting for her invitation to come in the mail. It was the first time she had read her letters since Mars had berated her for it– shuffling through the same cursive-typed pages that thanked her for her participation and donation, asking her to get in contact about returning, everything Jupiter dreaded.

    She wondered who had asked for her. The Council did not like her or her methods, why would they want her in a position of teaching future tributes or able to make decisions and suggest courses of action? Had someone finally just figured it was worth inviting Saturnus Marrow's daughter for appearances?

    Finally, on the final day of the tour, Jupiter found the Capitol-originating letter and almost kissed it. Her entourage of stylists and her escort were to arrive early the next day before spending the entirety of their day on the train to the Capitol, all expenses covered by a lavish hotel and decor.

    It was the one time Mars could not touch her.

    When her District's escort, Aurelia, and her stylist Lux arrived the day of the Capitol's Victory party, they flourished into her house and greeted her so affectionately she almost welcomed it. Mars would try and talk them up, as he always did, but they were completely uninterested and devoted their attention and praise to her.

    Aurelia was older than when Jupiter had first met her during her games, but it had been so long she almost considered them friends despite their obvious differences. Lux, meanwhile, was a pointed woman with her hair dyed dark blue for the winter, wearing striking white lashes and lipstick.

    And then Jupiter was packing her bags, going over the outfits and itinerary for her journey, letting herself be styled simply for the trip, and then she was out the door and leaving the cold of her house behind.

    It was not unusual in the Victor's Village to see someone leaving with their escort, bags packed. But it was unusual for the Victor to look lighter at the prospect of heading into the heart of Panem.

    The Capitol loved her. They celebrated her at the parties she attended and bathed her in praise and recognition. She presented herself graciously and kindly, because she liked the attention. As she checked into the hotel, she was welcomed back warmly. As she watched the news in her hotel room as Lux pulled at her hair, Caesar Flickerman included her in the list of esteemed guests and people looked lovingly up at the announcement.

    The Capitol was not her family and not her District, but they were some of the few people who celebrated her survival and did not care how she had won. In fact, they liked the plot twist, and Jupiter had spent years after her Victory having to swallow back the blood in her mouth to respond positively to the praise.

    She knew she was taking whatever warmth available to make up for the ice at home, and that the people who cheered her on and applauded her being covered in blood as a moment for TV and not horror did not care for her. But she had long decided she did not care. Something needed to be nice in the life she had made for herself after she had walked out of the arena.

    "Oh, what a darling!" Lux exclaimed intermittently at the TV, Jupiter only occasionally tuning in. She blinked at the screen, the guest list again being highlighted as a reminder for the occasion. Someone she liked from 10 was attending, as well as the subject of Lux's endearment, the golden boy from 4.

    Jupiter's expression softened. Finnick attended many of the same events she did, and she always tuned in to see who else from outside of 2 she would be mingling with.

    "Do you think it will be double the grandeur tonight?" Jupiter asked, lightly, to make conversation more than anything. The silence, something she was so used to at home, was suffocating.

    "It better be," Lux tsked. "Those two deserve it after everything they've been through."

    Jupiter bit her tongue to keep from saying everything they had been through was because of the Capitol. Hostility was not something she wanted to raise.

    "Will you be attending?" Jupiter continued.

    "Not my place," Lux replied. "But you eat enough for the both of us, alright?" Jupiter gave her a weak grin. "Okay, my love, after the prep team is done with you I'll be back."

    It sounded almost like a warning as Jupiter only nodded and ducked her head before her prep team of three arrived to slather her in moisturiser and maintain the image they had been keeping up for the last few years.

    They took her into the bathroom off the side of the main hotel room as Lux worked with her hangers and fabrics, Jupiter keeping her eyes forward and letting them Capitolites do their thing. She hadn't bothered to learn their names over the years, the way they floundered around her she almost didn't need to and now she was in too deep to ask.

    Jupiter had spent twenty minutes being polished and waxed off when a voice rang out. "Jupiter! Jupiter!" Lux cried, as if the building were on fire.

    "What?" Jupiter asked, furrowing her brows when there was no fire.

    Lux was flustering around the screen in the hotel room, her cheeks flushed. "He proposed! Oh, they're getting married!"

    The prep team gushed along with her as Jupiter's eyes only drifted to the screen above them where Caesar Flickerman was currently standing on stage before a cheering crowd. Peeta and Katniss had their arms around each other, cheeks flushed and smiles so wide they looked unnatural. A replay was in the corner, of Peeta on one knee before everyone. A sick feeling twisted in Jupiter's stomach and she found herself glad when the excitement died down and the prep team refocused on her.

    Lux dressed her charge, Jupiter following whatever she was told, quieter now than she was before. It was only when Lux tried to remove the pearl delicately hanging around her neck did she jerk away in refusal. Lux only clicked her tongue.

    "You're lucky the beads match that thing."

    She also had a pair of pearl earrings tucked away that managed to pull it together, Jupiter looking at herself in the mirror with cold eyes and clenched fists once it was done. The attention was off her for a minute, as the car arrived and her team fretted, from the screen she dreaded so much she could still hear Caesar rambling on about the engagement even as Peeta and Katniss fled for the party Jupiter was headed to at that very moment.

    Jupiter swallowed thickly before pushing herself to her feet and heading down from the hotel and towards the Capitol car picking her up.

    Lux and her team had done their job, adorning Jupiter in a silver slip dress that teased the imagination and made her look sleek but relaxed at the same time. It was dripping with beads around her shoulders and upper arms, and dipped low in the back, exposing the planets she had tattooed down her spine.

    Chunky silver jewellery glinted against her skin under the many lamps of the President's mansion, with matching makeup on her face, small silver lines around her eyes on an otherwise untouched face. Lux, who was the most overdone person Jupiter knew, worked with the 'less is more' theory. Jupiter liked her for a reason.

    Jupiter entered the building with ease and was escorted through to the banquet room, a path she knew well from a few times over the years. She wasn't always invited to the Victory dinners, but they were always over the top, even for Capitol standards.

    Tonight was no different, the ceiling transformed into a night sky with musicians floating around on clouds, an open courtyard area with a pond and a garden, fireplaces (plural) and a tiled area that served as anything from a dance floor to a place to stand and chat. Capitol citizens were everywhere, some Jupiter knew from her attendances at events over the years and others complete strangers who approached her as if they were friends.

    But she took it in stride, greeting everyone with a smile and a kiss on the cheek or a hug, letting herself be the subject of photos or discussion. She was asked her opinion on Katniss and Peeta's engagement at every turn, and every time would gracefully repeat the same thing.

    "I'm happy for them. It's so nice to see people find their one person, especially when they're so young."

    It was half-lie, half-truth.

    Once most of her greetings were over and Jupiter had stolen a moment away, she was stuffing her face from one of the many banquet tables, rich, savoury pastries crumbling in her mouth and a creamy pasta dish she had walked around with for longer than necessary.

    She had made it to the bar after she had eaten when someone pushed in beside her, in a way she had learnt to ignore in the crowded parties. "Who has time to think about marriage?" they scoffed from beside her.

    Jupiter frowned, before seeing it was one of District 10's few Victors, Fawn Silverman. The pair shared a one-armed embrace as Jupiter's drink was set down in front of her. Fawn glanced down at it before asking the bartender for her own.

    "I was hoping to catch you," Fawn told Jupiter as they waited, her elbows leaning on the counter. "This place is so massive."

    Jupiter scoffed in response. The first real reaction she'd had in a conversation all night. "I'd be surprised if I actually saw the starring couple tonight."

    A different look came over Fawn's face and she was quiet for a moment, only breaking when her drink was set down and the pair left the bar. "What do you make of it?" she asked abruptly, leaning forward so Jupiter could hear.

    Fawn was around the same height as her, and suited her name aptly, small, brown-haired and doe-eyed. Jupiter remembered her games, the 69th Hunger Games just the year after her own, her first time being a mentor and watching them live in the Capitol. Fawn had been smaller then, but a butcher's daughter, as it turned out, knew the most effective places to stab people for a quick death.

    Due to their close games and equally-as-bloody winning techniques, the pair had got along over the years and Jupiter would never turn down a conversation and catch-up with the girl. She was a friend.

    "Make of what?" Jupiter replied lightly.

    Fawn's expression didn't match her friend's tone. "A handful of berries undermined the Hunger Games."

    Jupiter paused, confusion evident on her face. Fawn was still watching her closely. The Victor from 2 only shrugged. "I undermined my games by winning."

    "You undermined your District's honour, not the Capitol," Fawn replied immediately. Jupiter was growing more confused with each word, wondering if there was a response her friend was expecting or searching for. "What's your drink like?" she asked abruptly, face softening back to the way Jupiter was used to.

    Stunned, Jupiter only offered her the glass and they exchanged beverages.

    "Yeah, this is mine now," Fawn said after she had taken a sip. "I have to go," she added, gesturing to where a Capitol man was lounging with his legs open. "But we'll catch up." She kissed Jupiter on the cheek and left, the Victor of 2 left standing with the brilliant gold drink in her hand.

    The oddness of the interaction faded as Jupiter downed the much sweeter drink, and then another, and another. She had been ambushed by a group of Capitolites at one of the tables as she tried to grab seconds, and was engaged in a dull conversation about fabrics that would suit her skin tone better. Fawn's words could not be further from her mind.

    A hand brushed against her bare back, and Jupiter tensed as she turned, but just as quickly her face lit up when she saw who it was. "Hi," she breathed, resisting the urge to hug him, and instead placing a hand on his bicep, squeezing.

    "My lady," Finnick greeted teasingly. He turned his attention to her company. "May I steal her?" he asked, smoothly.

    The Capitol citizens she had been entertaining only blushed and said something along the lines of "anything you want". Jupiter couldn't even roll her eyes through the smile on her face as Finnick escorted her away.

    He was a sight for sore eyes amongst the crowds, bronze outfit for the night making his hair shine and the dim lights darkened his eyes in a way she didn't like, but he was all the man she had come to be friends with over the years.

    Jupiter hadn't seen him since the 74th Hunger Games when he had left early on after Katniss had bombarded the remaining tribute from 4 with tracker jackers. She hadn't had much time to exchange goodbyes, as usual, but events had been more sparse since the victory.

    "I thought I might save you," Finnick told her as they walked together.

    "My hero," she deadpanned but couldn't keep the fondness from her voice.

    "Always a pleasure," he chuckled. "Drink?"

    "Please," she sighed.

    Jupiter looked for the golden drink Fawn had swapped with her, but couldn't find it on a menu, and opted for an elaborate fruit martini as they split from the bar. The pair ended up in the garden on a lounge chair, catching up and laughing in a way Jupiter had been waiting for all night.

    It was considered good sportsmanship when Victors were seen together and friendly, especially at events such as these when the Games were being celebrated. Jupiter didn't see it that way.

    She had made better friends with other Victors than anyone from 2 over the years, people who did not care for how she had won and simply understood the desperation and made her feel a little less monstrous for it. People like Fawn, many of the Victors from 11 and even a fondness for 8. Some were wary because she was a Career district and considered in good standing with the Capitol, others understood they were in the same boat.

    On the other hand, District 1 had learnt to despise her the same way, very close to her own home, but the other Career District, 4, had treated her with a surprising amount of kindness.

    In that, came Finnick. A Career, not trained to the same extremes 1 and 2 were, but prepared for his games and ready to win if that was what it took. The youngest Victor ever, Jupiter had remembered his games at thirteen, watching them in the living room of a different house.

    She remembered it because it was the year her father had died, and she had spent the week of Finnick's games looking at him on the dreaded screen. Not as something to sponsor or to root for or find beautiful, as everyone else did, but something to aspire to. If someone so young could win and bring wealth home, then so could she, she had told herself firmly.

    It was a time in her life where she still belonged to her District and wanted to make them proud.

    Finnick brushed a hand against her shoulder as they talked, the beads on her dress chinking together as he did so. Jupiter paused at the touch, drink slightly raised to her lips.

    "They match," he said affectionately, gesturing to his own throat. Jupiter absentmindedly pressed the pearl between her thumb and index finger before reaching for the fruit on the rim of her drink. Fruit liqueur spread across her tongue and she only hummed in response.

    Her prepteam's makeup was doing a good job of hiding a fresh bruise on her jawline, but she could see Finnick's eyes searching her face for anything as they sat close together. But he failed to notice anything, and his face softened as he sipped at his own drink.

    "Have you congratulated the happy couple?" Jupiter asked him, her tone dry.

    Finnick narrowed his eyes a bit. "We haven't had a chance to catch up."

    Jupiter only nodded, her frown deepening. "Finnick." His name drew his attention back up to her eyes. "Have you ever thought about getting married?"

    "Is this a proposal?" he responded casually.

    "You wish," she fired back.

    Their smiles faded, and Jupiter's question hung in the air. They had had these sorts of conversations before, but behind closed doors and between walls, not at a party surrounded by Capitolites. While most of them were now drunk beyond coherence, Jupiter knew the question was ill-placed and could endanger her friend.

    "I'm not sure I'm the marriage type." He answered in a false tone, the one Jupiter knew to be made for the cameras and the Capitol. It is not his real answer. Jupiter managed a weak smile in return as she finished the rest of her drink. "Are you?" Finnick asked directly.

    "Not to anyone in 2," she chuckled. But she reached out a hand and squeezed his knee, in a comforting way. She knew what he did to survive in the same way he knew her. She had the privilege to think about marriage, however unlikely. Finnick did not.

    Finnick pulled away from her, but swung an arm across the back of the lounge seat, open to her still. "Rather uptight, aren't they?" he jeered.

    Jupiter smirked. "They never change," she confirmed.

    The night was growing old as they continued to waste time together, glasses shifted away by Avox and replaced by fresh drinks, the smell of tobacco in the garden air as people came and went.

    Jupiter got to her feet eventually, swaying slightly. "Would you like to dance?" she asked shamelessly.

    Finnick smiled at her, the sort that lit up his eyes and made him look younger. "I would love to," he replied, softly, getting to his feet as well.

    Jupiter sighed. "But?"

    Finnick tilted his head slightly. "I have to retire soon." Jupiter recognised the tone, looking out the corner of her eye in the direction he gestured.

    "Ah. Been keeping you all to myself," she said lightly, patting his bicep.

    "I'm sure I'll be forgiven," Finnick told her.

    It wasn't as funny as Finnick intended it to be.

    Jupiter didn't want to let him go. She knew what happened but she knew there was nothing she could do to change it. She did what she needed to survive, and so did Finnick.

    "Goodnight, Finnick," she said softly, looking up at him.

    "Enjoy the after party," he told her, and she knew it was because he would be long gone before it started.

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    JUPITER'S own Victory Tour had been a lonely affair. She had been sixteen, close to turning seventeen, returning six months after she had come home covered in blood and her soul three shades darker. The Capitol had sung her praises, thrown her a party in the streets and replayed her games over and over as the tour commenced.

    She wished they hadn't. It had opened all the wounds that had been healing all over again and reminded people at the Academy why they had not welcomed her home with open arms. At the time, she had not understood that her life would not change after she had won.

    She had thought her mother's attention would finally waver as they moved back into the Victor's Village, she had thought Mars would move out once he was over eighteen and that he would look at her with pride rather than malice. She had thought the other Victors would accept her in time and that she would stop waking up with the crushing feeling of guilt in the pit of her stomach and the feeling of blood slick on her skin.

    It didn't.

    The teenager had barely been able to open her mouth at the interview with Caesar, her mouth like sandpaper and her heart in her throat. People had told her she was accomplished and brave and smart, things she would never associate with what she had done. She was supposed to be proud.

    She hated it. She hated them all.

    She wanted to go home and tell her dad she had done it.

    But she couldn't.

    Most of the people who greeted and praised Jupiter were Capitol, dressed in their ridiculous outfits and even thanking her for making the journey to see them. She had only been able to put a smile on her face and move through the crowds as she entered the banquet hall of the mansion, completely alone.

    Jupiter had had a different stylist at the time. He had put her in red and adorned her with gold pieces, including a spiked headpiece that commanded attention whenever she turned her head. He had tried to stick around but ultimately got lost in the crowd with the prep team, and her escort Aurelia had practically abandoned her to the wolves.

    And that was when Finnick, just about the youngest face at the party, had approached her. His collared shirt had been unbuttoned all the way to the navel, leaving her wondering why he even bothered with the last two buttons at all, and he had had the smell of alcohol on his lips, though she would later learn it wasn't from him drinking.

    "You look lost," he said. Jupiter had only looked at him, unsure what to say. She knew him from his games and she knew his reputation of being beautiful, but in person he had been so much more. "I'm–"

    "I know who you are," she had bristled. Finnick paused, lips still parted. "Sorry," she murmured, looking away from his sea green eyes.

    "I can give you a tour," Finnick had offered, unfazed.

    Jupiter blinked at him. "Of... one hall?"

    Finnick shrugged, gesturing around them dramatically. "One hall, she says. This place is huge."

    Jupiter had hesitated, before realising she didn't want him to leave her alone again, wandering the hall like a lamb waiting for slaughter by the Capitol. "Okay," she agreed.

    He had grinned boyishly and hooked his arm in hers and began escorting her around. He used rather colourful language and explained things in gory detail to comedic effect, leaving her laughing for the first time since she had been reaped. She still thought fondly of the first time she had met him, not knowing he would become one of her closest friends in adulthood.

    As the night grew old and the music slowed down, Finnick had released her arm and smiled at her. "A dance?" he asked mockingly, bowing with her hand in his and everything.

    "I can't dance," she had replied, looking at her feet.

    "Just do as I do," Finnick told her softly.

    Maybe it was the need for a companion that night, or simply that he was her age and not Capitol, or even that he had not shred an ounce of judgement to her, but Jupiter had followed his lead. She had let him show her how to dance, even if it was simply swaying and not stepping on his feet.

    Aurelia had found her with the boy and said something along the lines of how nice it was to see two young Victors supporting each other, and gushed lovingly to Finnick. She had then taken her charge away at midnight to get to the train in time, which would take her back to District 2 for the final part of the Victory Tour.

    Jupiter had not wanted to leave– she had not wanted to go home.

    Finnick had bid her farewell and thanked her for the night, which she felt should have been swapped. "I look forward to seeing you as mentor next year," he had said with a wink.

    Jupiter had been so flustered she hadn't really thought about that she hadn't mentioned anything about being a mentor yet. But in the years to come, Finnick would be right. Jupiter was happier when she wasn't home, and from that night it would stay true.

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longer chapter because it's what they deserve

finnick is 24 and jupiter is 23! they're just a year apart so in the flashbacks shown she is 16 and he is 17 and he's been a victor for 3 years at that point

based off a quote from the books, finnick was not touched until he was 16, so at this point he's been doing snow's bidding for about a year :(

okay enough timeline stuff i hope this was a good meet cute bye <33