A/N: Trigger warning for nudity, emotional abuse, and mentions of rape.

The servant bows towards the door. "You may go in, sir." Not an Avox, then. Never a good sign, but Finnick has no choice but to follow orders. This door leads to a long, narrow hallway whose stark white walls are decorated only by the blue-tinged shine of the fluorescent lights above. His palms begin to sweat, so he wipes them off on the front of his pants and hopes they won't leave a stain behind. He knows the rooms that the Capitol's elite lock away where no one else can see.

When the door opens with only the gentlest of pushes, the room he finds worries him more than the chains and paddles he had been expecting. The room shares its sharp angles, cement floor, and too-bright white paint with the hallway, but the desk in the center is all its own. At least twelve feet long and as wide as he is tall, it dwarfs the chair that sits before it. As he steps inside and the door swings shut behind him, Finnick's stomach clenches. He can handle appointments when he knows what is going to occur, but he is less sure about this.

"I'm not paying you to look around." Her high-necked black gown and dark hair are the closest thing that this room has to color.

"I'm sorry, ma'am." He smiles at her and walks to the desk. Finnick pauses with one hand resting on the chair's back. He knows better than to sit down without permission.

She studies him from her seat on the other side. "Off." He dropped his hand. "No, off with those. If you're going to be nothing more than a pretty piece of décor, I might as well get my money's worth." Her skin is stretched tight over her face, creating cheekbones as jagged as mountain peaks and wide, reptilian eyes, evidence of decades of anti-aging procedures.

The last time his hands shook as he undressed for a client, he was fourteen, but this is different. Instead of ooh-ing and ah-ing over each new inch of exposed skin, she takes a cold, clinical interest in his nakedness. The woman allows him to stand there, shaking before her, for several minutes. Again, he can feel sweat building on his palms, but now he has nothing but himself to rub away the moisture. "Turn." She has no need for pleasantries, and Finnick can appreciate her honesty. There's no reason to ask when you can take.

He follows her orders, and when he has come full circle, she has moved closer. "Such a handsome boy, and you're already ready for me too. Tell me, Finnick, do you think I'm beautiful?"

Just as he cannot risk remaining flaccid, he cannot risk the truth. "You're gorgeous." The huskiness in his voice is almost always enough to speed up his appointments.

"Beautiful and a good liar. You must be very good at your job." Her fingers run along his bottom lip, and even when he shudders, her eyes never leave his. He wonders what she would do if he tried to pull away. Her thumb tugs down on his bottom lip and sneaks between his teeth, and Finnick has been taught too well to not sigh and suck. His eyes flutter closed without a conscious thought. "I stand corrected. You're too good at what you do." His eyes fly open. She still stands before him, brown eyes alight and lips tugged up in a cold smile. "You're too good at what you do, and it's going to kill you." Her fingers run down his chest and continue down his stomach. Finnick's abs give an involuntary flex, and his toes curl as she moves even lower. "But maybe you like it. Who am I to judge?"

"No. No, I don't like it."

"Then why are you here?"

His throat clenches, but these words need to be said. "I have to. He makes me."

"There's always a choice."

"Not for me." He blinks away a tear. "I don't get to choose anything."

She perches herself on the desk, allowing her leg to swing beneath her and her high heel to dangle one foot. Her chest is pushed out towards him, and were he fourteen and pure and innocent and good again, he might have wanted her. Now, he just wants to run. The hand that tilts his chin up is warm. "We're very alike, Finnick Odair." He searches her eyes for any clues, but they are as unreadable as stone. Her thumb strokes back and forth along his jawline as she speaks. "I remember being young and beautiful like you, broken by the Games." She must have seen his surprise. "Yes, I was just like you, but I found my way out."

"And then you bought me." He can't hide his anger, his disgust at the other Victor.

She nods. "I suppose Mags won't be proud of my methods, but then again, she never has been."

The door seems miles away, and Finnick struggles to breathe as his heart beats rapidly against the walls of his chest. He panics and pushes her hand away. "D-don't touch me." He stumbles a step away from her and runs for the door. Foolish. Foolish and stupid, but he can't think well enough to breathe, and -

Her voice stops him. "Leaving this room without my permission is the same as signing Annie Cresta's death certificate." He pauses, his hand an inch away from the handle. "But, as we were just discussing, there's always a choice."

"What's my other choice?"

"As far as I can see, you can either leave and watch Miss Cresta die or sit down and listen to what I have to say."

Shaking his head, Finnick steps away from the door, a small, sad smile twitching at his lips. "I hoped there would be a better option than that in there."

"I don't see one, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist."

She watches him walk back towards her, the woman's eyes fondling every inch of him. Finnick shivers against the cold, but he does not stop to grab his discarded clothing before sitting down in the seat before her. "Then I suppose I should let you speak."

"A smart boy as well, then. Very good." The woman moves a lock of his hair back into place, and he shudders, but she pretends not to notice. "You're never going to be ugly, did you know that?" He waits for her to continue, unsure of where she is trying to lead their conversation. "Do you usually not answer when your clients ask you direct questions?"

"I suppose I've never thought about it."

"Don't lie. We both know you have. When you're underneath some disgusting Gamemaker and you can feel him moving inside of you, I'm certain you cling onto that foolish idea that someday, he won't want you anymore. When you're forty, or fifty, maybe even sixty, they'll find someone younger and prettier to fuck, and you can go back to District Four a free man. Don't you?" Unshed tears sting in his eyes. It's the only thing he has to hold onto, and she can't steal it from underneath him like this. His pathetic dreams do not stop her. "I bet that each morning you wake up with that little glimmer of hope that some magical switch has been flipped during the night and you'll see a monster or a cripple looking back at you. And every morning, you're disappointed, because you're always back to your two choices of a dead love or that filthy Gamemaker."

Finnick forces himself to stay still. He won't cry in front of this woman or give her the satisfaction of lashing out at her.

Her posture has been rigid through their entire conversation, but for the first time she leans in towards him, and her voice drops to little more than a conspiratorial whisper. "The key, love, is to make your own third option."

"I don't have a third option. I can't take that risk." The other Victors have told him horror stories of coming home to find loved ones' corpses neatly arranged at the kitchen table or lined up in the backyard with small, efficient bullet holes put through the center of their foreheads. It is all too easy to picture a similar fate for Annie Cresta, the mad Victor who can be easily forgotten.

She shrugs. "Then you hope you die young. That's the only way Snow will let you go."

His eyes meet hers. "What can I do? What did you do?" He would happily pay any price to escape the Capitol's perfectly manicured clutches – any price except the one they ask.

"I married in. Found someone with ambition and just enough brains to know he couldn't get where he wanted to go by himself." Her eyes go out of focus as she speaks, as though she can see her life playing out before her in a world invisible to Finnick. "I rather liked him."

Realization finally hit him. "Mags told me about you. Aida, right? You won a year or two after she did."

"Did she tell you about how much she hates me? It would be a shame to leave out that part." He flushes and chooses to stay silent, and she smiles at him, catlike and predatory once again. "I'm glad that we already have such a good understanding of each other."

He tries to shrink back in his seat, but there is nowhere for him to go. "What is my third option? I can't marry out without leaving Annie."

"He won't allow you to marry out anyway. That girl has nothing to do with it."

"Then why did you bring me here? To taunt me?"

She appraises his body once again. "You are a lovely specimen. I'm sure there are other avenues open to such a handsome boy."

He wants to snap her like he broke that other boy in the Arena. Instead, he keeps his voice calm. "Such as?"

"There are… others… who feel the same way that you and I do about our beloved president, and many of them are in a position to do something big should the opportunity present itself." For the first time, there is worry in her brown eyes. "You, though, are in a unique position to help us. Your access to the Capitol elite is unrivaled. The ability to get inside, in more ways than one, the leaders who keep this government together could make you invaluable to our cause."

"My third option, then, is to spy and wait."

"And hope that the right opportunity comes. Perhaps get dressed in the meantime."

He nods, his nakedness no longer a concern. "And do you think that day will come?"

"I can hope."

A/N: Written for the April monthly oneshot challenge at Caesar's Palace and using the prompts benevolent and darkness.