"When I grow up, I'm gonna be the Volunteer, just like you!"
Devon crouches down, bending one knee right to the floor, because if there's one thing kids hate, it's looming, and Devon never wants to make any of the kids he talks to feel inadequate or patronized. "You think so?"
"Yeah! I got my first black this year!" he holds up his wrist, skinny and tanned, to show off the single leather cord tied around his arm. "See?"
"I see it, tiger." Devon grins and claps the boy on the shoulder, adult-like, instead of ruffling his hair, and the kid stands up straight and tall and raises his chin. "It's not easy, you know, you'll have to work hard and listen to what grownups tell you. Do you eat your vegetables?"
The boy's eyes go shifty. "I eat ... some vegetables?"
Devon grins and leans in close. "I don't like all vegetables either, but I'll tell you a secret. The more you eat, the stronger you get. That's why they taste bad. If they tasted good like candy, everyone would eat them, and then everyone would grow up big and strong and win the Hunger Games and how would we know who's best?"
Now his eyes go wide. "Really?"
"Really." Devon squeezes his shoulder. "I mean it, now. Listen to the trainers and eat the food they tell you and that'll give you a real good start. Save the candy for when you earn it."
"Okay!" He's got a tooth missing, just off to the side of the main four, and Devon checks his bone structure out of habit. Good jaw, strong cheekbones; he'll grow up good looking for sure, barring something really weird in puberty. "When I win, can I get the house next to you?"
Devon practiced smiling for years so that now, when his mind skitters sideways and pictures this kid, ten years down the line and bleeding on the rocks, his face doesn't crack. "I'll see what I can do."
Brutus, by the door and swamped by at least seven kids under the age of ten - two hanging off his biceps like a giant tire swing - gives Devon the 'wrap it up' gesture and tells the kids it's time for them to go. Devon turns back to the boy and says, "What's your name, so I can remember when you win?"
The boy's face goes proud, chin up and eyes set. "It's Felix. Felix Hunter."
"That's a good name," Devon says with a nod. "Okay, Felix Hunter, I'll remember you."
"How'd it go?" Brutus asks as they walk back to the truck, and Devon spins around one last time to wave before they turn the corner.
"Tricked another kid into eating his vegetables," Devon says with a grin, and Brutus snorts. "Another day, another victory for the health bureau."
"We take 'em where we can get 'em," Brutus agrees, and slides into the driver's seat.
On the way back, Devon pull out the paperwork for his encounter reports and writes in the names of the kids who pinged his radar. Tracy Hickman, whose mother will be getting surgery next week, will receive a 'get well' card in the mail after; Felix will get an autographed picture on his next birthday. Not all the Victors bother with this sort of thing, either because they hate kids and could never pull it off or because that's not their persona or they think it's creepy or what, but Devon loves it. He loves connecting with people, seeing their smiles and listening to them talk about their lives.
Devon volunteered because he loves his district, and that didn't end the day he walked out of the Arena. The people of Two are the reason he trained, why he suffered starvation and exposure and freezing and nerve gas and hallucinations and all those dark nights alone wondering if the blood would ever wash out, and they love him for it. They deserve to know he loves them back.
Devon's memory is a library. He takes names and faces and tiny details and writes them on cards in his head, then he places those cards in a filing cabinet and stores it on the shelves. The shelves are all divided into years and seasons, and each row by the age of the person and type of encounter. He doesn't remember when he learned to do it, but it's always been a part of him. He writes the official reports so the Victor Affairs Bureau can handle the actual records - each week he gets a pile of cards to sign or photos to autograph, and returns them to the office to mail them out - but the faces, those stay with Devon forever.
It means that if he sees someone at a party or a fundraiser one, two, five years later, Devon only has to check his library to pull up where he saw them and why they were memorable. People love it; they laugh and clap their hands and call over their friends when Devon tells them he remembers that Scott Forrest was worried about his upcoming math test, or Melissa Hardy couldn't get to the top of the ropes course, and each time the link between the Victors and the people they sacrifice themselves for gets stronger.
Sometimes it means Devon stands in the Victors' Box at the Reaping and sees an eighteen-year-old with proud eyes and a dazzling smile and remembers thirteen-year-old Dale Carver asking him in a low, abashed whisper whether the Program would judge him if he brought his teddy bear with him in the box of allowed items when he goes to Residential next week. Sometimes it means remembering that Alyssa Weathers was scared of spiders, that he told her they were more afraid of her than she was of them, when the giant insect mutts descend from the trees and tear her to pieces in her sleep.
He always asks for the files on the kids who wash out of the Program with every round of cuts, and Devon sends an encouraging note to every single one. The Centre will have recommended a track for them, and he doesn't try to shape their careers or push them in a certain direction, but he thanks them for their service and reminds them that there's no wrong way to serve the Capitol and their district. Not all of them write him back, but he saves the responses from the ones who do.
Each mentor has a type, some more clearly defined than others. Lyme likes the boys, the needier and crazier the better, but she'll take a girl if she's proud and angry enough. Emory chooses the quarry kids who made good, boy or girl, the proud ones who want to show Panem the people that Two's foundations are built on. Misha gravitates toward the ones with the gleam in their eyes, the ones who score a little too high on gleeful violence and get top marks in acting just so they can learn to look sorry.
Devon, for his part, goes for the dreamers. They're rarer - one every three years or so, maybe - but he twigs as soon as he sees their files; knows for sure if he gets footage of any of their yearly consultations. They're the ones who score low on aggression and high on idealism, who join not for the sport or the blood or the chance to blaze short and fast rather than sputter out and fade, but because they're saving children's lives and feeding families and bringing pride to their district. The ones who repeat the words they're taught from birth and mean it.
He's never brought one home - they fall hard and fast, his dreamers, often before they know they're dead - but it's all right, because Devon is a dreamer, too.
The spring before the 73 rd , Lyme chooses a girl for the first time in over a decade, and so Devon sits at his desk with the boys, flipping through folders and glancing at photos and school reports on "If I Won the Hunger Games". He skims the transcripts of their entrance interviews, where they told the recruiters why they decided to join the Program (at seven or eight, most of them either don't know or say their parents want them to, but some have a glimmer of an idea of what lies on the other side).
One boy stands out: in his photos he holds his head high, but without the curl of his lip that denotes arrogance. It's pride but as a positive, pride like Brutus has, the pride in a wall well built or a dam well dug or a table crafted to be strong and beautiful at once. In his interview he says he wants to show the world that District Two is great and remind everyone that the Hunger Games are here to protect them.
It's not surprising that he says it at eight; what's impressive is that at eighteen his answer hasn't changed. Devon hums and flips back through the years of photos, most recent to least, and the boy's face triggers in his memory even before he reaches the beginning of the file and reminds himself of the name: FELIX H.
Devon lets out a long breath and fans out the applications in front of him. The other two are a big bruiser with blood ground into his knuckles and a smaller boy with eyes like knives and the highest kill scores over two years; the big one has top rankings in every physical test there is. Felix has lower individual scores but the highest average overall, fewer distinctions but nothing below a high pass across the board.
Two won last year, but back-to-back victories aren't unheard of, even if no one's managed to pull it off since Cashmere and Gloss soon after Devon's win. The 72 nd was meant to favour the Career boys or the big outsiders used to hard work and little food, and Petra's victory at least shook things up. The exit survey from last year's audience and the monthly polls show that while they're not bored of Two and were pleased with the brutality, Petra's disappearance after her Victory Tour and her lingering injury have left people disillusioned, disappointed.
They need someone to restore the sheen, not just to the district but to the Games themselves. They need hope, charisma, and earnestness, someone to remind people that it's not just about picking up a weapon and bludgeoning everyone else until they're a mess of blood and bone and brains on the ground.
The 73 rd needs a dreamer.
Devon pauses with his fingers on the files, then slowly pushes Grant (the big boy) and Nathan (the mean one) out of the way and pulls Felix's file toward him. He picks up his pen and fills in the form and writes the boy's name and candidate number in block letters, then scrawls his signature across the bottom. Felix's giant, open smile beams at him from the oldest photo at the top of the pile.
The cameras love Felix from the moment he calls out and the boy he stands in for collapses to his knees, shaking with relief. Felix winks at him as he passes - technically a violation, but Devon won't scold him because the escort coos and the audiences will swoon - and bounds up the stairs like an oversized puppy. Lyme's girl gives him a cool, neutral, sideways stare (and yeah, Devon saw her file too, saw the police report when she was eleven, the one that made Lyme throw a bottle right through her window and demand to take her) but Felix just smiles, smiles and keeps his distance and all but bounces on his toes.
On the train he sits forward in his seat with his hands between his knees, expression wide and open as he listens to Devon and Lyme go over the details of the Reapings in every district. He soaks in every word and nods and answers every question, and at the end of the briefing Lyme's girl leans over and mutters, "You make me sick" but Felix only shrugs. Lyme gives Sloane a quelling look, and the girl sits back and Felix asks to see the Fours again, his brows furrowed and mouth set in thought.
They love him in the Capitol, too, and Devon's console pings with sponsor offers before they've even gotten settled. Felix's charisma carries him through the chariot parade, even with the ridiculous costumes, and he charms the Pack during training, weaving them into a tight net of temporary camaraderie that makes the outliers shiver and turn away. His interview has Caesar roaring with laughter one minute and wiping away tears the next, and every night before bed Devon grips him by the back of his neck and tells him he did well.
The final night, Devon sits in his room surrounded by sponsorship agreements, separating them into batches based on which ones will demand more in exchange for their money, when Felix knocks on his door. "Can I come in?" he asks.
Devon looks at the pile of papers, covered in numbers that say in black and white exactly how much Felix's life is worth - or isn't. "I'll come to you," he says easily, standing up and closing the door behind them. Lyme and Sloane have gone out to the balcony, and so Devon follows Felix back to his suite. "Everyone gets nervous," Devon says, sitting in the chair. "You'll be fine."
"Oh, I'm not worried about dying," Felix says, waving a hand, and of course he isn't or he wouldn't be there, but neither are the five other Careers, and Devon swallows hard. Felix glances at him and laughs, a little sheepish, running a hand through his hair. He bathed after his interview but glitter still showers down onto his shoulders. "I mean, it's okay if I do die. I know why I'm here, and even if I'm dead, that kid back home isn't. That's not what I mean."
Devon frowns. "Then what?" he asks, curious in spite of himself. The night before is when even the dreamers usually start to get their jitters, but Felix is calm. Not oblivious, not deluded - it's not a layer of ice over a murky pool of quicksand - just, well, calm.
"I don't want to be forgotten." Felix's eyes flicker, and for the first time he looks troubled. "I - we have to memorize the death lists for our Centre Exam, right, but outside of the Program, I'll just be gone. I'll be District Two, Male, and that's all anyone will ever remember. I don't want that." He looks at Devon, his eyes pinning him against the seat. "Is that wrong? I mean - is that selfish?"
"It's not selfish," Devon says, and now his stomach clenches because he made the wrong choice, he should have sent this boy home with a letter of congratulations for making it this far and asked to be invited to his wedding when he met a nice girl or boy and settled down, but it's too late now. Far too late. "Of course you won't be forgotten," he adds, a little too sharp, but Felix just smiles at him, startled and pleased. "Mentors never forget. And it doesn't matter, because you're going to win. You've got great odds. Your skills are solid. I have more sponsors than I know what to do with. You're going to win, you're going to come back, and I've been beating away the new Victors for ten years because the house next to me is saved for you."
Felix sucks in a breath. "You remember that?"
"I told you," Devon says, and something in his chest shatters. "Mentors don't forget."
"You really think I can do it?" Felix asks, but his eyes have gone steely now, faraway and focused on the prize, not the room around him. Devon reminds himself that Felix didn't smile his way to the top slot out of a hundred possible candidates.
"I know you can do it." Devon smiles, broad and encouraging and edged with poison. "Just remember what I told you. You're not there to be flashy, so don't give in to the pressure to make it entertaining or do something stupid because you think the sponsors will like it. Just do your job, make the kills, and you'll do fine."
Felix nods. "I - can I tell you something else?" he says in a low voice, and Devon nods. "I feel like - like I'm meant to be here. I know that sounds stupid, but I really do. All of this feels right."
"That's good," Devon says. "Remember that feeling because you're absolutely right. You're the best of the best and you'll be the best again. All you have to do is fight, and I've got ten years of top results that say you can."
Felix beams at him, and Devon slips sleeping pills into the milkshake he makes for him and stays until he's down.
DISTRICT TWO, MALE
Day: seventeen. Career pack: separated. Tributes remaining: six.
Time: 4:16am.
Cause: muttation attack, primate type.
Duration: twenty-three minutes.
Performance: satisfactory
Mentor commendation: recommended
The train whirrs along the tracks at two hundred-fifty miles per hour, humming instead of rattling like the intra-district passenger lines that chug and shake and sway. You know you're on a train when you travel through Two; this is removed, surreal almost, scenery flashing past too fast to see, less like riding a train and more like a dream you can't wake up from.
Devon and Lyme sit on opposite ends of the car, each next to a plain pine box. Lyme's on the floor with her forehead against the side, and she's talking in a low murmur, too quiet for Devon to hear even if he wasn't deeply invested in giving her privacy. Only once does Lyme's voice rise up loud enough that Devon can't block it out, twisted with rage and tears and dark satisfaction - he can't fucking touch you now, at least - before falling back down.
Devon sits next to the casket on the long bench, trailing his hand back and forth over the lid like he would Felix's back if he were here and needed soothing. A splinter snags in his finger but he keeps going, the tiny prick and ache grounding him.
"Here's what I didn't tell you," Devon says to the air, and he stares out the window and registers nothing. "The night before I mean, here's what I didn't say. Here's what's going to happen. I'll hand you over to the mortuary department to get things ready. While they're doing that, your name will go up on the Wall of Sacrifice in the Centre. They'll give me an electric chisel and I'll carve it into the brass myself. It's not a ceremony, no cameras or speeches. Just me and you one last time. I'll contact your family, ask if they want to see you. Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Most don't, don't feel bad."
He leans back and tips his head until it thunks against the polished wood behind him. "We'll take the car out to the field. The Centre takes care of all that, so they'll have it ready by the time we get there. They'll give me the shovel because the mentor always throws the first bit of dirt over the coffin. After that they'll take over. I'll wait until the ground is packed, and the last thing I'll do before I leave is toss a handful of flower seeds over top. I already called ahead and ordered, so I know they'll be there. Then I'll go home and find my girl and tell her all about you so she'll remember, too."
The sliver jabs hard into the pad of his finger, and Devon winces but doesn't bother picking it out. "The flowers will start to grow pretty fast. They'll lie dormant over the winter, and it'll be cold, sure, but you won't mind. Then next spring when the sun comes back and the birds start singing it'll be blue flowers everywhere. Forget-me-nots, just like I promised." He closes his eyes against the sting. "You'll like it there, don't worry."
"Knew you'd be here, so I held it for you," says Tobias, waving Devon over to the seat. "You got the sample?"
"Yep." Devon hands over the scrap of paper with Felix's signature from the graduation paperwork, sits on the chair and rolls up his pant leg. Three names are inked into the skin of his calf in three different hands: TREVOR, ELECTRA, CONNOR. "The usual, if you don't mind."
"I liked this one, too," Tobias says absently, holding the paper up to the light to study the scrawls and swirls. "I'll give you one thing, Mr. Devon, you know how to pick 'em."
Devon leans back and closes his eyes. "Yeah," he says, probably too low for Tobias to hear, but he's got his pen and is tracing Felix's name on Devon's shin and doesn't respond. "I guess I do."