For the first time in a decade of mentoring, Brutus' girl doesn't make the Final Six.
He warned her. He fucking warned her not to take the kid from Four lightly, but Athena made it to the top of her class across a two-year spread, and they'd nominated Brutus to be her mentor to take her down a peg when she won. He told her that Four is a Career district, that any fourteen-year-old who volunteered would have a pride streak bigger than half the Twos in the Program and a hidden skill-set that let him get away with it. She just laughed and tossed her head and told him the boy's blood would be no more red than any other's.
Well, now it's Athena's blood splashed across the camera lens, her ribs cracked open and peeled apart like a tangerine, and Brutus waits for the wave of grief but all that hits him is anger.
He'd warned her. Why didn't she listen?
The rational part of him says it's because she's eighteen and queen of her whole world, and that when you raise children to be the best of the best you shouldn't be surprised when they believe you. That Brutus was eighteen and cocky and eager for blood once, too, and if any one of a hundred little things had gone differently it would be his corpse fertilizing the wildflowers in the field of sacrifice.
It doesn't matter now, does it. Back home in Two the trainers will be grilling the kids in Residential on what they would've done differently (she could have spotted the trap; she could have thrown her weight back against the net to pull Odair off-balance and give herself a chance to strike; she could have done what Brutus suggested and knife the kid in the bloodbath, committing sponsor-suicide but at least being alive to see it) but it's over. Odair pulls his trident from the ruins of her chest and stalks away, not even glancing back as the hovercraft descends to pick up her body.
It's only three days in. None of this should be happening. The Games used to have traditions, have rules, but for the past few years everything has gone straight to hell. Bigger spectacle, crazier tributes, more blood more sex more glamour and absolutely no respect.
Or maybe Brutus is getting old.
Across the room, Gloss whistles. It's his first year in, and if Brutus had his say the boy would be far away from here - he can scent the mad bloodlust on the kid a mile away - but he doesn't make the rules. "That'll make the top kills for the next five years at least," Gloss says. "Mags, your boy is crazy! What do you guys feed your kids out there?"
Brutus has made his mentoring career out of being gracious in both defeat and victory, but the shocked 'o' of Athena's mouth as Odair ripped her heart out sticks in his eyes and he has to get away. "Well, guess I'm out," he says, tossing down his headset and standing up. The other mentors glance at him, but the action is too wild this year and nobody pays attention to a Two finally learning what it feels like to be on the other side.
He stops behind Misha and taps the back of her chair. "Lemme know if you need anything," he says, and she nods but doesn't look away from the screen, her lips pressed together, thin and white.
Brutus starts for the Two floor, but halfway to the door he veers away, unable to stand the thought of sitting alone in those wide, opulent rooms, sprawled on a sofa where just four days ago Athena speared a plum with her knife and mimed plucking out another tribute's kidneys. He can't sit there under the silent, eerie gaze of the Avoxes while the anger ripples under his skin or he's going to pick something up and smash it against the wall.
There's a communal victor lounge at the top of the Games Complex, and Brutus heads that way instead. He takes the stairs instead of the elevator, welcoming the burn in his thighs and the pressure in his chest after the sixteenth floor that reminds him he's alive. By the time he makes it to the top, Brutus has resolved to up his cardio by another hour each day - aging, that's a problem he never thought he'd have when he was young and stupid like Athena, and lucky for her, now she never will - but his head is a little clearer.
He hears the cheering coming from the lounge as he rounds the corner of the hallway, and for a second Brutus tenses, the fury creeping up again, before he registers what kind it is. Some of the outlying mentors get bloodbath-drunk and take bets, but even they don't laugh and whoop at the actual deaths. Brutus can't imagine that Odair and the remaining tributes just launched into a collaborative dance number.
Nope, this means only one thing: shitty, shitty Capitol movies. Normally Brutus stays the hell away from them, but today, filling his mind with brain-rotting 'entertainment' that only murders good taste and not children sounds like as good a plan as any.
He doesn't expect them to cheer when he walks in the door, and Brutus stops halfway through his stride, immediately searching for a bucket over the door or some other idiot kid prank. "There's the man of the hour," says Haymitch, grinning sharp but not nasty for once, both his kids dead five minutes in and plenty of fizzy Capitol drinks in his system. "C'mon in, sit down and enjoy your time in the spotlight."
The others snicker, and Brutus narrows his eyes but this isn't the mean kind, for once. It's not about slipping a dagger between his ribs at the first opportunity; they're actually laughing, though they are all victors and that means someone's about to feel pain.
Cecelia smiles at him, dark and pretty, and she brought her baby with her, nursing him under a blanket. "They did a good job," she says, and now Brutus is really worried. "I think you should be flattered."
Slowly, slowly, Brutus turns to the screen, where a big, bald man stands on the top of a cliff, the wind whipping at his clothes, as behind him a woman clutches her breast and sniffs dramatically. "But I love you!" she cries. The music swells in a rise of mournful strings.
"And I'm sorry," the man says, the words twanging in the worst approximation of a Two quarry accent that Brutus has heard in his life. "But I'm married to the job, and I can't cheat on my duty."
If Brutus were holding anything, he'd be dropping it. "Fuck me," he bursts out, setting the whole room to cackling.
"She's trying!" Haymitch says, gleeful. "She's been flinging herself at you for the last forty minutes. Why won't you just return her love?"
It's wrong to laugh when kids are still dying, but it would be even worse to march outside, start a fight and rip some unfortunate civilian's head off. Brutus will take what he gets.
"He doesn't even look like me," Brutus grumbles, thus acknowledging his entry into the game, and he knocks Caleb's legs out of the way and plops down on the couch. Caleb is already out and snoring, and doesn't protest the treatment. Diaphora passes him a glass, and Brutus wrinkles his nose at the lavender liquid and its bubbles but he knocks it back. It burns his throat for a split second before leaving a tingly, super-sweet aftertaste that makes him gag. "And this booze is shit."
"Sorry we couldn't fly back to Two and get a local farmer to personally grind the hops for you," says Chantilly, and Brutus snorts but doesn't glare at her because she's from One but she's still his senior, and Brutus - unlike some people - knows the meaning of respect.
The woman on the screen turns and runs away, sobbing, and the wind catches her tears and floats them backwards, glistening in the sunlight. Brutus makes a noise of disgust. "She looks half my age!"
"Half your age plus seven," says Wiress in a sing-song voice from her seat on the floor, and Brutus shoots the back of her head a betrayed look.
"I expected better from you," Brutus complains, nudging her shoulder with his foot. She reaches back and pats his ankle without looking away from the film.
"You're out early," Haymitch remarks after Brutus hunkers down, snatching a bottle of something that looks the least offensive from the pile on the table. "This year's a hell of a thing, huh."
"Yup." Brutus takes a long drink, and at least this time it doesn't taste like fake fruit. "Tore her heart out. Never seen a thing like that."
Even Chaff whistles, and he and Brutus have made the stink-eye at each other since the first day Brutus walked into Mentor Central and left with his girl still standing. Apparently the Odair upset has made him a little more forgiving. "Well, it'll be over soon," he says, raising his glass toward the ceiling. "Three days and we're down to seven, that's one for the books."
"Hush," scolds Cecelia. "Watch the movie."
Brutus sighs and pinches his nose. Somewhere out there kids are choking and drowning and stabbing each other, somewhere a hovercraft is waiting with Athena's body cooling on a slab. Soon Brutus will have to write his concession speech and prepare for an inquest that will grill him on how his girl didn't make the minimum standings.
Today, though, there's a terrible actor-impersonator of him onscreen staring mournfully out over the cliffs, and a sofa full of people who might not understand each other but at least know the pain of shared loss. "Okay," Brutus says, heaving a sigh, and he stretches one leg out on either side of Wiress, propping his feet on the table. She hums and spiders her fingers over his kneecap, searching for a ticklish spot, and Brutus grunts but leaves her to it. "Tell me what the plot of this stupid thing is."