For Caesar's Palace. Prompt: Gold.
(hope you enjoy)
Thanks to Purple Embers for looking this over.
She was always the nice one.
Ever since she was little, she'd gone out of the way to help those in her District. Her family was quite wealthy; they owned one of the stone quarries, so, even by Capitol standards, they were well off. You wouldn't know it, to look at her though.
Her clothes were always cheap, but she could've worn dishrags and still pulled it off. She was quite beautiful, almost perfect: she inherited golden blonde hair from her mother, and her father's emerald green eyes. She had a pale complexion, and many of the men in the District found her desirable.
It wasn't just her clothes and facial features, though: it was also her personality. She was warm like the sun, caring and giving, and had a heart of gold. All the people in District 1 loved her, and all looked on in horror as she was chosen for the Hunger Games.
The entire District studied her as the lovely sixteen year old's name was called out over the crowd. They stared in stunned unison as she mounted the stairs, walking towards her almost certain death. How, the District wondered as one, Will someone so beautiful survive in the Hunger Games?
She next won over the hearts of all the other Districts, and the Capitol. She was easily the stand out of that year's long list of Tributes, the rest of them virtually obscured in her wake. She blazed brighter than the sun, and as the Tributes were brought to the Arena, every person in Panem held their breath as the gong sounded and the Tributes leapt off the plates.
Nearly all of the audience favored her, and it showed; ninety percent of the camera time was devoted on her as she raced to the Cornucopia, the metal blazing like liquid gold in the sunlight. The crowd ooohed as one when she tripped, hitting the ground with a solid thump as the small boy from 4 jumped neatly over her, making sure to stamp on her fingers and smiling as she cried out.
Pulling herself to her feet, she again ran for the Cornucopia, where fights had already broken out. Ducking underneath the sword of 2's boy, she snagged one of the backpacks, before grabbing a sharpened metal spear from the rack of weapons.
She jumped from the Cornucopia and ran, ducking and avoiding those who fought around her.
The small boy from 4 who had stood on her fingers had his back to her, standing over the body of a thirteen year old girl whose throat he'd just slit. He held the knife in the air again, the blade slick with red blood, and was just bending over to finish the job when she took her last step forward and drove the spear into the back of his skull.
The boy died instantly, slumping down beside his last victim as she pulled the spear from him.
She knelt down and hit him in the back of the head with the shaft of the spear, his skull giving way with the crack. Not content, she pulled a knife from the backpack, knelt down and began stabbing his head, caving in his skull, as blood and brain matter pooled on the dusty ground.
The entirety of Panem looked on as the girl, the sweet, beautiful, girl whose heart of gold they'd all fallen in love with liquified the head of the twelve-year-old from four who had stepped on her fingers.
Finally, she stood up, giving his body one final kick as she whirled around, holding the knife high.
"How do you like me now, Panem?" she muttered to herself as she brought the blunt edge of the knife to her mouth and licked it, delight and madness on her face. Blood matted her hair, turning the blonde to crimson, and it splattered across her left cheek, underneath her wide, staring eyes.
"How do you like me now? !"
You know, eventually I'm going to write a Hunger Games fanfic that doesn't end in blood. Maybe.
Yes, I know she is a Mary-Sue. That's the entire point: the bigger they are, the harder they fall.
INTEMPERIAE (In-tem-peer-ee-i) is Latin for 'Madness'.