Whoof, been a while since I've been able to write. I'll jump straight to business though, since this is my first time doing a HG SYOT! Hello, I'm Luxus, and this is a collaboration between me and a friend of mine, Little Knight Mik - Mik came up with the premise and outline for HWFM, as well as handled the technical side of things like a blog and the form (and this opening chapter coughcough). I'll be handling chapters, though I can't say for sure how frequent updates will be due to health reasons. But that's never stopped me before!

HWFM is a non-standard SYOT that only has 18 tributes, and you can find the relevent information on my profile for the fic as well as a link to the gdocs form. Thanks again to Mik for trusting me with his idea and lending a hand with any crossroads I get to.

01 - Aftermath

EVENT COMPLETE

WINNER: JAEHYUN CHA, 16, SOUTH KOREA

user976281: man…
user106674: Pay up bub
user693845: kinda wanted the hot chick to win
user976281: same
user590042: same
user484910: Same.
user106674: You guys just wanted to sleep with her
user523953: well if i have to choose between a hot russian girl and the dumbass who got sepsis in his hand
PoliteBot: Profanity detected! [user523953] , you are now at two strikes. One more strike will lead to being banned.
user832780: kek
user976281: kek
user602382: KEK
user299245: Kek
Gamemaker (Admin): I'm adding kek to the profanity bot.
user259312: boo! no fun allowed
user101459: So how's the sepsis gonna be handled?
Gamemaker (Admin): Hold a sec. Gotta wrap this up properly.

WINNER ELECTED TO: REMEMBER GAMES

KILLS: 3
MOLLY PENDLETON, 15, MIDWEST
SAM GREY, 18, SOUTH
EKATERINA YOLKINA, 17, UKRAINE

TOTAL BACKERS: 372 USERS

user507140: jesus
user523953: I THOUGHT SHE WAS RUSSIAN
Gamemaker (Admin): Lol lowest backer amount yet.
Gamemaker (Admin): Jaehyun confirmed for underdog.
user101459: so…
Gamemaker (Admin): Sepsis, yeah. Probably just gonna pump him full of antibiotics when I drop them off at a highway.
user101459: So he just kicks it. Gotcha
user507140: big ol oof
Gamemaker (Admin): Nahhh he'll be fine.
Gamemaker (Admin): With this I end our annual game.
Gamemaker (Admin): Save up your money for next year's, ya filthy animals.

CHATROOM OFFLINE

Nia Hayes, 33, Member of the Gamemaker Investigation Team

November 17th, 2018

Was it so wrong to walk into her work in a dressing gown and giant cow slippers? To not bother with taking off the hairband she slept in to keep from accidentally chewing her own hair? There were more important things to worry about in the office than whatever she was wearing or how frazzled she looked after being woken up by sixteen calls at three in the morning. Things like just how difficult this next batch of bodies was going to be to process.

Besides, there was a change of clothes for situations like this in the trunk of her car. This wasn't the first time in the last seven years she'd been called in at God knew what time.

At her desk a coffee was already waiting for her, probably just brewed and placed once a coworker got a hold of her. Considering how quickly she'd gotten there from her apartment, even if it was across town, the coffee was still pleasantly hot and warmed her rigid fingers as she whisked it into her hands. She gave it a sip—cinnamon? It had to have been made by Parker—and wasted no time entering the briefing room closest to her desk.

The meeting had already started. Eighteen children's faces, aged from fourteen to eighteen, were displayed on the screen behind her boss. It was the pictures they'd received from their schools and families once they were reported missing, all around the same time this year. Nia sucked in a deep breath as she slid into the nearest chair.

Huerta, the man heading the ongoing investigations into the yearly disappearances, and sudden reappearances, of eighteen children at a time, nodded to her in greeting. "Thanks for coming in, Hayes," he said. Nia raised her coffee mug in a mock salute.

The screen behind Huerta changed ever so subtly, the names of each missing teen displayed underneath their pictures. They were ranked youngest to eldest, only one victim this year being fourteen. Nia wasn't sure if she should release a sigh of relief. The younger ones were harder to stomach, but it still didn't lessen the number of victims overall.

"At 1:33AM we received a call from one Miranda Ryan regarding a suspicious amount of large garbage bags dumped on the side of Route 46," Huerta explained. "There were seventeen bags in total, with an eighteenth, unbagged individual wrapped in blankets a few feet away from them."

Just like all the others, Nia noted. This was how all the bodies and even survivor would turn up after going missing for upwards of two weeks.

One of her coworkers raised their hands—Ward? That had to be Ward sitting right up the front. "Can we confirm that this is the same group involved in previous disappearances?"

Huerta nodded. "We were uncertain at first, since the gender ratio of the victims didn't line up initially," he said. "But the survivor, who we previously assumed to be female based on the original missing person report, is very vehement that he is male."

Ward lowered his hand and nodded, satisfied with the answer. Nia still found it odd that the sick people forcing kids to kill each other had enough respect to refer to those kids correctly.

"The survivor has also been admitted to surgery as of half an hour ago, so I advise you all don't hold your breaths for the time being."

Right, the kids who survived only to wind up passing away from their injuries, or even due to plain shock. Nia leaned forward in her seat and sipped at her coffee. She wasn't going to pray for Jaehyun Cha to recover quickly, having been let down too many times prior, but she was going to hope the victims had enough to say post-mortem about the trauma they'd suffered alongside him.

It was the same as every other case—each victim had dirt in their shoes from multiple states, and some had seeds or leaves from trees found almost anywhere in America. There was nothing to give them a solid lead on where the events—the forced killings—were taking place, but at least they knew it was within their own country.

How kids like Jaehyun Cha would get dragged into it, Nia shuddered to ponder.

One by one the kids and their causes of death were presented on the screen. A girl from Ukraine, whose bag had been labelled with a mock silver medal, had been stabbed over and over in the throat and face. A boy from New Jersey, whose bag had been labelled with the number sixteen and a sad face, had taken his own life—the rope burns around his neck and the lack of evidence suggesting resistance said as such.

Some were still being worked out, Huerta told them. Some were a little tougher to note than the others.

The moment Nia was dismissed she went back to her car and grabbed her bag of spare clothes. This had been going on long enough for her to pack a bag, after all, and it wasn't like this was the first time she'd been called in during the dead of night in her pyjamas. Everyone just liked to act like it was.

She sat at her desk once she was dressed and sipped at her coffee some more. Already there were files for her to sort through, and already a coworker was approaching her.

"How're you feeling?" Janssen asked. She had one of the carafes in her hand, half-filled with freshly brewed coffee. Nia held up her mug to be topped up.

"As good as you can feel once a new batch emerges," Nia sighed. "Is it just me, or do the deaths seem to be more brutal each time?"

Janssen grimaced. "I can't believe they get put through all this…"

"Seven years is way too long for this to be going on." Nia blew at her coffee once Janssen was done. "Seven assumed years, at that."

"Maybe this time," Janssen said, lowering her voice. "Maybe… Maybe Jaehyun Cha will pull through and give us some new information."

Nia scoffed. "Don't hold your breath."

Just shy of 4AM, Nia Hayes began preparations for another year of abductions and investigations.