Preschool: Before the beginning (AKA Prologue)

Author's note: Okay, I'm sort of obsessed with the Hunger Games right now. Literally obsessed. I got caught in the fanbase and right now, it's my main fanbase. As a result, the rest of my stories are getting ignored… :(. Sorry, other stories.

Anyways, I've been looking on DeviantArt, and found a few pictures of the HG characters as school-age kids, and came up with this idea. It'll start in preschool, but will continue on for their whole school career. I have one warning, and that is that some of the characters (or all of them) are counted as OOC. Well, what do you expect? 1-it's an AU in which the Hunger Games do not exist and they're all in school in America. 2-They are freaking preschoolers. They are going to act their age. Well, with one notable exception…hee hee hee.

It was only the first day at Laurel Pre-K, and already, Coriolanus Snow was in a bad mood.

Of course he had had to have the brilliant idea that becoming a teacher would help him in his quest for world domination (indoctrinating young people and all that factored into it), and look where it had gotten him: babysitting a bunch of kids just out of diapers who knew how to do literally nothing other than nap (well, as it turned out later, it would've been easier if that was all they could do). Saying that Snow wasn't the sort of person for that type of job was a major understatement. He hated babies. He hated toddlers. He hated giggling children. In general, he just hated children. He hated the whole class already, though he'd never met any of them. And he hated the parents, too. I mean, only someone on drugs would name their kid Katniss, he thought. I mean, seriously, who named their kid after food? Well, apparently a lot of people did. There was a Peeta on the role as well. Almost as bad as if they'd spelled it right and named whoever it was Pita Mellark instead of Peeta Mellark. And who named their kid Foxface? Yes, there was a Foxface Adams on the list as well. Snow hated that kid, but he pitied whoever it was as well. And not even people on drugs would name their kid Beetee. Or Wiress. Only Martians would name their kids that. Stupid, drug-taking, alien parents. Then again, his name was Coriolanus. He shouldn't have been talking, really.

Besides that, he hated his classroom. It was too friendly and infantile. Their were bright-colored numbers and letters adorning the wall. There were bright-colored pictures on the wall as well, depicting days of the week or colors. There were too many cute animals on the wall as well. Smiling animals. Baby animals. Badly-colored animals. Seriously, for god's sake, bears weren't BLUE! Whoever was running the school system had no clue how to teach the kids to live in the real world. Ugh.

Finally, he hated his scowling teaching assistant. She was almost as ugly as he was. And almost as old. She had already watched him trip on the door mat and laughed, put her books on his desk, told him that his lunch was almost as hideous as his face, and had laughed at him. A lot. In other words, kids, school never ends. Snow, however, was now frightened. What if the children turned out to be as mean as Alma Coin, his teaching assistant, had?

"You know that you're the ugliest person I ever met?" Coin asked him casually as she began to write on the board.

"You know you're the stupidest person I ever met?" Snow shot back at her. "You misspelled 'Good Morning!' again."
"It's not as though any can read," she said carelessly and flung the marker away. Snow, sighing, picked it up and replaced it on his desk in an unlabelled drawer with nothing else in it. Finally, he could label that drawer. And label he did. He labeled it 'For killing Alma Coin'. Underneath that, he labeled 'To be used ASAP.'

Suddenly, he heard a car stop in the parking lot. It appeared that the first kid was here. Dang it.

Scowling, Coin walked over to the door, coolly holding it open as the child toddled in, looking up at Coin with a smile on her small face. Snow secretly hoped that Coin would find it in herself to gain some decency and behead the child then and there, effectively decreasing their class size and saving the world from another little brat, but all Coin did was look down at the child in the most imposing way possible and scowl. As soon as the little girl had made it in, Coin, calling her a word that won't be repeated here, slammed the door shut. A shout of outrage from outside plainly said that the parents were there.

"My mommy is always telling me not to slam doors," the girl prattled in her four-year-old excuse of proper English. If one has ever heard a small child talk, they'll know what this one sounded like. High-voiced, bad consonants, the whole shebang. Snow immediately hated her more than he hated the rest of the class, as she had come in first. Stupid child. He wished he could kill her and eat her for lunch. Or maybe hang her as an example to the other children.

"Does she now? Well, news flash, I'm not your mommy," Coin replied in a patronizing tone, pulling the door open for the child's parents. Snow instantly could tell that the child had taken after her father. Both had the same gray eyes, the same olive skin, the same straight, black hair. Snow didn't like people with black hair. The mother, however, with her blond hair, blue eyes, and pale skin, didn't fare much better in Snow's book. He didn't like blondes either. As a matter of fact, he considered telling blonde jokes so she would leave. The fact that she was pregnant wouldn't help her. Another brat on the way for Snow to babysit. Ugh.

"Hello. You must be Mr. Snow," the man said with a pleasant smile. Snow smiled in response, hoping that a show of pleasantness would get him out the door really fast. However, he looked like an evil snake. In other words, smiling was a failure for Snow.

"I am. The teacher," Snow replied. "And that is my, ah, lovely assistant, Mrs. Coin." Coin scowled at him. She'd heard the sarcasm in his voice all too well. However, the small toddler smiled at her and held out her hand. Coin scowled more, waiting for the child to withdraw her hand. However, the child just kept holding her hand out until Coin realized that touching the scumbag's hand was inevitable and disdainfully shook it.

"And that's Katniss," the man continued pleasantly, either oblivious to Snow and Coin's coldness or ignoring it. "She's daddy's little girl, isn't she?" he continued, tickling her. The girl giggled and walked over to the carpet, where she sat down right in the front row. Well, the parents didn't seem too addled. Why, then, had they named their child after food?

"Let's hope that the next one is mommy's little girl," the woman behind him smiled, patting her stomach affectionately. Snow and Coin were at a loss at how to deal with these revolting and altogether too-nice parents. Perhaps the best way to get them out was to prove that Katniss would be well taken care of. Coin walked over to her, bent down on one knee, and smiled. In other words, she made Snow look downright pleasant when he smiled.

"Is that your lunchbox?" she asked in a pathetic attempt at friendliness. "Here. Let me take it from you and put it in your cubby." With that, Coin wrenched the lunchbox out of the girl's hand (causing her to giggle more) and tossed it into one of the cubbies with disgust.

"Wrong cubby!" the girl squealed, thinking it was all a game. Snow and Coin had never hated anyone so much as they hate this little girl. "That's not my name!" With that, she grabbed the lunchbox, began hunting through each of the cubbies, and finally found her name. Grinning once again, she stuffed her lunchbox in the cubby, kissed her mommy and daddy goodbye, and toddled to the carpet.

"Oh, pardon me," her dad's voice was as clear as a bell outside.

"More brats," snapped Coin. Katniss acted like she hadn't just heard her. Chances were that she hadn't.

"Door duty," Snow snapped at her. She just sighed and nodded, pulling open the door-

And not jumping out of the way fast enough. She was trampled by a plethora of little kids. The rest of the class had just arrived, in one huge mob. Parents followed behind them, a few apologizing to Coin and trying to help her up after the herd of shrieking children had passed, though most were busy kissing their children goodbye. Snow watched the entire scene with disgust. There were so many little children! What was the government thinking, shoving so many into one class like that? And if he hated them all as much as he already hated little Katniss, this was going to be a very long day.

Screw that. It was going to be a very long year.

Author's note: A few things in here. First of all, all of the known tributes and victors will be in one class, as well as a few friends and assistants (Ex: Madge, Gale, Cinna, Portia, Effie, Boggs, Cressida, etc.). They're all the same age in this, (Even Mags and Rue are four as well as Katniss, Peeta, Madge, and the like). However, Prim and the other known younger siblings will be in another class. Don't ask me why I did that. I just felt like it.

Also, I thought it would be funny if Foxface wasn't just her nickname, but her actual name.

Regarding the Everdeens: I believe that Prim is about four years younger than her sister. As Katniss is four at this point in the story, it makes sense that Prim will be born sometime this year in the story.

And about why Snow and Coin hate Katniss in this more than anyone else: though this is an AU and there will be no 'Mockingjay' or anything like that, I figured I'd stick to canon in that Snow and Coin despise her. Though in this, it's for being the first child in classroom on their first day ever of teaching… lol.

Finally, I named the school 'Laurel' because laurel wreaths were bestowed upon victors in ancient Greece. Not all of the kids are victors, but a significant portion are. And I know classes aren't usually as large as theirs will be, but this is called 'fan fiction'. I'll try to be both as canonically and otherwise accurate, but I make no promises.

Any suggestions fro some of the characters' personalities? I have it mostly figured out, but I'd appreciate suggestions.

Did you know that reviews make me happy, and when I'm happy, I write faster? Please take a moment and review.