MAY THE ODDS BE NEVER IN YOUR FAVOR

I do not own the Hunger Games. FYI: The Quarter Quell did not involve the rescue of Katniss and start of the rebellion. Just so you all know.

Chapter 1

Prim

I stroke Buttercup's soft fur. I sit by the fire, realizing—I've lost everyone. First, it was Dad. When he'd died in the coal mine, I felt like I had died too. But I found the strength within myself for Katniss and Mom, but Mom was too distant, too far to be reached. She looked at us as if we weren't even there.

Even now, she has those scary moments when she's gone. And when Katniss left for the Games, it was like Dad all over again. But now I am losing Katniss. She screams and lashes out at night, haunted with the scarring memories of her past. I try so hard to comfort her, but it's no use. She's as good as dead to me now, when she gets that wild look in her eyes, and you know there's no cure for her insanity.

Am I going crazy too? I must be. Gale helped me during the Games, but now he is locked away, underground, just out of reach. I'm all alone. It wasn't this way when Dad died. I had Katniss then, and that was all that mattered. But now, the only person I had was a big, fat cat named Buttercup. Hurrah.

The reaping was rapidly approaching. In three days, I was to stand and watch a death lottery. I was still scared out of my mind. All of my nightmares replayed Effie Trinket, her lips pursed, reading the piece of paper that changed my life, that drove my sister to insanity. Thousands of names, and only one of them was mine. What if I was called? No one could save me this time. There was no Katniss, no Gale, no loving family to support me. I had to suck it up and do it myself. It's not going to happen. The odds of them picking you again are so slim…

Then I think of how undependable my odds have been lately.

3 DAYS LATER

THE REAPING

I wear a pink dress that reaches my ankles and matching shoes. I can feel the blood rising to my cheeks, heat flowing through my body. I try to remember how to breathe. In, out. I stand with a bunch of kids my age. They all mutter to themselves. In, out. I wonder, suddenly, if this is how animals feel in a slaughterhouse when one of them, they know, is about to be killed. In, out.

Effie Trinket walks onstage with a huge, purple wig that is way too big for her head. She wears a completely purple outfit-a purple dress, purple gloves, the whole package. Her lips are pursed, as if she just ate mold. Her heels' clicking resounded throughout the square.

A tall, wooden podium lay in front of her. She taps the microphone twice, and an awful screeching sound explodes into the crowd. She clears her throat. "Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the 76th annual Hunger Games! We had quite the show two years ago, didn't we?" She looks around, listening, as if she had expected someone to laugh. "Well, then! Ladies first, as always."

A glass ball, like a fishbowl for piranhas, lay in front of her. She reaches in, spinning around and hesitating at certain moments, and I feel so nervous, it seems she is playing around with my stomach. Did I swallow a swarm of monarch butterflies, or is it just my nerves?

Finally, she pulls a slip of paper from the bowl, and reads the name, her eyes widening at the sight. Who is it? Who? Effie Trinket gestures to a nearby Peacekeeper, and they whisper an incomprehensible conversation, from which I catch the words "mistake" and "how did this happen". If curiosity killed the cat, I'd be long dead. Effie straightens her distressed expression.

"This year's female tribute is..." she takes another glance at the Peacekeeper, "Primrose Everdeen."

My mouth hangs open. What? This is wrong-all wrong. This isn't possible. Is it another one of my crazy nightmares? No. I'm not that lucky. Peacekeepers move towards me, grabbing my arms, pulling me away from the crowd...

Gale stands in front of them. "Don't touch her," he hisses, with a glare so angry it could boil a pot of water. They drop me, and Gale wraps me in his arms. "It's going to be okay," he keeps muttering. "It'll be all right, Prim."

I look straight into his eyes. They look like Katniss's eyes. Gray, startling, and wild. I say, as firmly as I can, "I'll make you proud."

"I know you will," Gale says.

I step up on the stage, renewed with a sense of purpose. I can win these Games. And I will.

The next tribute called up to the stage is someone named Jamie Thorn. He is two years older than me, and I don't know him, but I recognize his expression: suppressed fear. The kind of fear you can only conceal in your posture and your smile. Not in your eyes.

We shake hands. His are cold, ice cold. Mine are hot and clammy. Everything seems eerily normal.

I have now calmed down enough to observe my fellow tribute. His hair is brown-no, not brown. Very, very dirty blond is a better way to describe it. His eyes are steely, blue, and cold. My spine tickles in a not-so-pleasant way when he looks at me, as if he is sucking out my soul. I straighten my posture. I refuse to be intimidated by this puny little kid. Katniss might think I'm a sweet little girl, but something changed. When she left. When I was alone. When I was forced to watch her suffer. I suffered too. I got tough. I learned the hard way what it meant to be weak, and the consequences of it.

And I wouldn't let it happen again.

I countered Jamie's glance with one that Gale had taught me one summer day. "Use your powers for good, not evil," he had said. We laughed.

"But how?" I asked, truly mystified. "How can you scare someone?"

He paused, as if trying to pick his words wisely. "Take the things in life you hate the most-no, not hate. The things that frustrate you, the things that-no matter how hard you try, you just can't achieve." He saw my look of concentration, then laughed and said, "Look, you've already got it down. C'mon, lets gather those herbs you were talking about earlier."

Soon, Jamie's confidence wavered, and I pushed him down. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Katniss. The look of horror on her face confirmed my deepest fears. The fears that lay in the arena.

What dangers lay ahead? What dangers could make my sister into the mess she is now? My sister, who was strong so I never had to be? My sister, who held me when I cried. My sister, who, until the Games, I thought could stand anything. What could have torn her to shreds?

I don't care about the Treaty of Treason. In fact no one does, not even the Mayor. The Mayor's voice is like a buzz, droning on and on. I have little time to think, but I do. I think of what awaits me. It is foolish, but I feel inclined to imagine them worse than they are and I will feel spoiled. But I will be ready for it when it comes.

A man in a dark gray suit leads me to the room where I will say goodbye. I notice he has a gun in his holster. "Five minutes," he says. His voice is stern, but I know he sympathizes for me. They all do.

"PRIM!" Gale and Mom burst into the room and smuggle me. Mom rubs her finger in a circular motion around my scalp as Gale talks furiously, fast, and softly. "It will be all right, Prim. You're going to be okay." But it sounds like he is reassuring himself more than me. They sit right next to me as people file in to pay their respects: the baker, the teacher, a handful of people I don't even know. But Gale and Mom stay right next to me, holding my hands and steadying me.

Suddenly, I feel the urge to say something. "If I die..." I swallow. "If I die, you have to promise me you'll take care of Lady and Buttercup, and keep up your work in the apothecary shop, and..." The two of them hush me.

"You're not going to die. Gale and I will make sure of that." A few reassuring smiles come my way, but I can't smile. Not now. I can't cry, either. I am a stone soldier, devoid of all emotion, forgiver of none.

My friends and family are herded out. "Your ride is here," says a man with a sleek suit and a cold voice. I take his hand and board my passage to doom.

Please review! I just started this, so it might take me a while to write the second chapter...sorry for any hooked readers!