Chapter 1

Sicily's Heels clicked as she scrambled through the glass over pass, her gaze focused on the ornate gold door at the end of the hallway. Her breathing was ragged and small blue curls were falling into her face. Reaching the door she quickly pushed it open holding her breath until she saw Claude.

"Where have you been? She will be here any minute." Sicily released her breath and flopped down into a chair.

"I'm sorry I was almost here when I realized that I had left the plans at home on my desk." She reached into her purse and pulled out a small computer disk. Claude reached into his jacket and pulled out an identical disk.

"It's a good thing I made an extra copy." She let out a frustrated sigh and quickly tried her best to push the stray hairs back into the glittering clips atop her head. Claude came close to her helping to adjust the clips back into their proper position. "Relax we have done this five times already and each one has been better than the last."

"But this needs to be perfect-" Claude griped Sicily's hands and pulled her to her feet.

"And it will be." he leaned in and placed a kiss on her forehead. "You are brilliant, there has never been an arena remotely close to this she will love it just you wait and see."

"She will love what?" The sickeningly sweet voice cause Sicily to jump slightly.

"Why the arena Sicily has created." Claude turned to face President Mandella Snow. She was a tall woman with stunning features her lips were a full and rosy, cheek bones were pronounced, and her violet eyes large and striking against her pin straight mane of snow white hair.

"Is that so Sicily?"

"Yes madame President." Sicily had regained her composure and took the small disk placing it into a slot by the wall. Mandella Snow took a seat in one of the large chairs that filled the marble conference room and claude took a seat next to her his burgundy suit a startling contrast to the white leather. A hologram with rough sketches and blueprints covered the white wall, all of the pictures rotating so that Mandella Snow could see the full design. "I have dove more into research about pre Panem since last year's wild west ghost town arena was such a huge success and I found something extremely interesting and much more modern. In the 20th century this had become Main attraction in the world and heavily influenced pop culture during that time." Sicily flicked her hand pulling up a slew of vintage photographs. "It holds so much potential the space itself is vast and the variety within the attraction itself has so many resources for the game makers between mutts, resources, flammability, secret passages, electricity, and machines this is the arena you have been waiting for." Mandella Snow leaned back in her chair, not particularly impressed.

"You are suggesting we recreate this as arena?" Sicily took a deep breath plastering a smile to her face.

"On the contrary Madame President I suggest we use the original as the arena with a few touch ups of course." Sicily slid her hand across the screen once more and a photo of the current state of the proposed arena was on one side whereas another photo represented the proposed renovations. President snow sat forward in her seat now intrigued, after a thoughtful silence she turned to Claude.

"Are you sure you can create this?"

"It will take a lot of work no doubt but I should be able to engineer it without any problems." Claude had a smirk of confidence plastered to his face they had won her over and he knew it.

"It's too big of an arena the tributes would never find each other you need to condense the space."

"On the contrary Madame President I have proposed a design that can easily reduce the size of the arena when necessary." Mandella Snow sat back in her chair contemplating the blueprints before her. Sicily stood confidently by her presentation Claude was right it was an amazing idea she just hoped president Snow thought so as well.

"Do you think this design will be affected by the Quarter Quell?"

"Not at all." Claude stood up and proudly walked over to the wall flicking his hand so that more vintage photos came to the screen. "As you can see from our research this place was created with a very specific target market in mind." Photos continued to scroll onto the screen in an endless parade. "By our calculations these games will cause a surge in pre Panem pop cultural interests unleashing unlimited opportunities for the fashion and entertainment industries within the capitol and wealthier districts." He flicked his hand and a series of charts appeared onto the screen. "In past years, The Hunger games have cost the Capitol money to put on most of which was made back between, tickets to the live pre-games events, betting, and sponsorship but as you can see nothing had been profitable, until last year." He pulled a chart to the front of the presentation and enlarged the chart his finger following the line of the graph as it made its way above a green line. "Last year's games were the first games we have seen any profit." He pulled up another chart detailing the profits from the previous year's games. "As you can see we saw an increase in sponsorships last year partly due to the unpredictable and exciting new arena, many sponsors provided extra assistance to help their favorite tribute since they could not predict how they would act with the different elements in the arena. The other huge profit point was the sales in western themed fashion that sparked from the arena." Mandella Snow nodded thoughtfully.

"Go on." Claude flicked his hand and pulled up another graph.

"These are the projected profits from this year's games, as you can see even with the extra expenses needed since it is a quarter quell profits are still projected to be even higher than last year."

"Let me see the designs again" President Snow rose and strode over to the wall as Sicily brought back her arena sketches. Mandella examined the designs turning the blueprints in every direction. "We have the equipment to do this?" Both Claude and Sicily nodded. "You are positive that this will be completed in time?"

"It is not something anyone has tried before but I have run the numbers and tested it on a small scale we should be able to accomplish it without a problem." Claude stated confidently. President Snow looked over the blueprints once again.

"There is no backup plan if this fails I expect nothing less than perfect."

"We will not disappoint Madame president." Sicily stated matter of fact, standing tall and confident.

"You will begin construction immediately." With a curt nod to both game makers Mandella Snow briskly left the Marble conference room. Once the door closed behind her Sicily let out a large breath folding over in half trying to steady her knees.

"Yes! we did it." Claude ran over to Sicily pulling her back up to a standing position. "The Design was brilliant I told you absolutely brilliant." He Gripped her shoulders and pulled her in for a rough kiss on her powder blue lips. Sicily stared into Claude's Pink eyes, some of his long black hair had freed itself from his slicked back ponytail.

"You had the construction team on standby correct? We have all the materials to assemble a force field of that magnitude?" Sicily started to panic her design was brilliant there was no doubt about that but would they be able to pull it off?

"You bet we do, I will call the team right now we will start tonight. You will need to talk to the stylists and work with them on the designs for the tributes clothing. We're going to make history my dear." He pulled her in for one more quick kiss before rushing out of the conference room. Sicily stood alone in the all marble room panic beginning to set in. She and Claude had been head game makers for the past 5 years and each arena had been more elaborate than the last. This year they were taking a huge risk, and had convinced President Snow that it would be a profitable risk, if anything failed she would be out of more than just a job.

Mandella Snow stared out the large glass doors to the balcony she could hear the roar of the people clearly, and any moment now she would walk onto that balcony and announce this year's Quarter Quell. These games made her nervous 50 years ago it was a Quarter Quell that had sparked a civil war, and 25 years ago rebels had appeared in some of the outer districts. Her father had not been a patient man and he had paid dearly for it his greed and fear had clouded his judgment and because of that he had nearly destroyed an empire. She knew the rule change this year would not be favorable among the districts and because of that she had taken precautions sending extra peacekeepers into the districts in order to quickly remove any dissidence. She took a deep breath and nodded to the guards to open the doors. The crowd cheered as she glided to the podium before her a gold envelope waiting on the marble fixture.

"Citizens of Panem the time is upon us to celebrate Panem's glorious victories. One hundred and twenty five years ago our country was saved from rebels who wished to destroy everything we had created." The crowd grew completely silent. "Fifty years ago one selfish young woman plunged this country yet again into a chaos falsely accusing the Capital of mistreating their citizens when all we have ever wanted was to protect them." She picked up the small gold envelope, opening it she pulled a single gold card from with in. "On this the anniversary of the one hundredth and twenty fifth hunger games we honor the fifth Quarter Quell as a reminder to the rebels that the capitol is your protector and you can trust no one else, as the tributes this year are reaped so shall a loved one be reaped with them." The crowd erupted into thunderous applause and Mandella Snow let a small smile grace her cold face. She turned her back on the sea of people and made her way back inside. She needed to start right away on the preparations for this years games they had a lot to accomplish in a short amount of time.