Pawn
I do not own the Hunger Games, or any characters except my own. The plot is mine. Steal my characters, plot, and actual story… I will hunt you down and cut you. This was posted before and I didn't like how it was written and so, I took it down and edited it.
Chapter 1
I am safe and warm in Graham's arms. For now, nothing can hurt me. I snuggle closer to him feeling his scent and rest my head on his shoulder. I know that this must come to an end, as it does every night and then I am thrust into a world of unknowns. My name is Carmen Hyde. I am twenty-two years old, and I am a Capitol pawn.
There is a light shake on my shoulder and I open my eyes. Iris, an Avox and my only trusted friend, stands over me gesturing to the clock. Seven-thirty. We've overslept again. I shake Graham hurriedly and he groans. "We overslept. You know what will happen if my mother finds you here."
He chuckles. "I doubt my presence will bother her. Your mother was quite the whore back in the day."
"She still is," I mutter. We have this exchange everyday. Iris covers her mouth, but I know she's smiling. I pulled my nightgown over my head. Iris starts to help Graham collect his clothes, averting her eyes as he dresses. I make a note to give her something nice for her trouble, for warning me. She could easily turned Graham in. A nice handkerchief, a small vial of perfume, extra food. Avoxes aren't supposed to have these nice things. After all, they are criminals and enemies of the Capitol. Despite that, Iris is the closet thing I have to a friend here in the Capitol. I can't even trust my own mother.
Graham and I embrace. "Love you sweetheart," he whispers. "See you soon."
He closes the door behind him as he leaves. It's still semi-early. The only people out and about are the Avoxes, and who can they tell? Still, it's closer than I like. Graham has to get to work. He works for Central Defense.
"Thank you," I say to Iris as she begins her morning duties. She starts making my bed. I slip into the bathroom to take a shower. I am reluctant to shower, to wash Graham's scent off of me. I put my forearm to my nose and smell a trace of his spicy cologne and sex. I hate showering off his smell. I press a variety of buttons to start the shower and my transformation into a high profile member of Capitol. Gamemaker's Daughter.
When I get out is a warm towel waiting for me, possibly put there by Iris or my style team. The mirror is steamed up so I can not look at my unmade up self. I stand there for a moment savoring the heat before going back out into my air conditioned room. It is late June, and the heat was beginning to creep. Soon, we would be frying eggs on the sidewalk. I wrap my hair in a towel and pulled a robe around my slim body. As I open the door, the sound of the television came through the room.
That's odd. I think. Then it dawns on me. My stylist and prep team must have turned it on, but surely they would have knocked first. I walk around through the door that separates my actual bedroom to a small entertaining area. Graham was there, sitting on the couch holding a cup of coffee. Iris had left already. Breakfast waited on a tray, under a silver lid.
"What are you doing here?" I ask.
"I don't have to work today. Isn't that great?" He pats the cushion for me to come sit next to him. I sit and tuck my legs under me. My damp legs stick to the velvet cushions. He squeezes my knee.
"What's the occasion?" I worry he's been fired.
"Today's reaping day," He says simply. "The worst day of any kid's life, but then again you wouldn't know."
This hits me like a ton of bricks. He's right, I don't. I was born and raised with the silver spoon of the Capitol in my mouth. Graham was not.
"What was it like? The Reapings?" I ask cautiously.
He shrugs, his eyes glued to the screen, where they broadcast the highlights from previous Games. "It was terrifying because if you were selected, your life was basically over and you were sent to die." He hesitated. "But what's more is when you see those you know killed. I don't know which is more terrifying: being sent to die or seeing your loved ones killed."
I rest my hand on his shoulder. "Both would be hard."
"It's hard when you people you went to school and played with to the Capitol's source of entertainment. Do you want coffee?" Graham says abruptly.
"No thanks." I am rather shaken by Graham's words. I get up and go back to the bathroom and take the towel off my head. My dark hair hangs damply down my back. Everyone says I look like my mother, but I cannot see the resemblance.
Graham comes into the bathroom and wraps his arm around my torso. There's a terror in his blue eyes that I have never seen. "The worst part of reaping day is every time District 3 is shown; my mind goes back to those who were sent to die. Their families. Their empty seat at school. The fact that you have more food because they aren't there." His eyes well up with tears. "I hate the reaping. I hate the Hunger Games. If I could be a part of getting rid of it, I would."
A sharp knock at my door stops his tirade. I know that it is not my mother. Now, that I know it is the reaping day, my mother is with Seneca Crane, the head Gamemaker. The Hunger Games is one of her passions. Graham is safe for another day. It's my prep team and stylist. They come in talking excitedly as they carry the tools they make me to a proper Capitol citizen.
"I thought you were off today," I say as they bustle into my living room.
"Silly girl," My stylist Regan says, "Beauty never takes a day off."
"But it is the reaping day."
"Yes, but the first doesn't start until nine. Surely you want to go shopping and you can't go out looking like that." Regan held up a lock of my damp hair.
Graham snorts. "Carmen? Shopping? That will happen when President Snow dies."
The chatter falls silent. Graham has committed a serious crime by showing dissent to our president. He could have his tongue cut out.
To relieve the tension I ask, maybe too brightly as I shoot Graham a dark look. "Are you excited for the Hunger Games?"
"Oh don't you know!" Cordele, one of the prep team exclaimed. "I heard one of the up and coming stylists, Cinna, is coming into the Games. He's so visionary!
The Games might be a way of the Capitol for keeping the rest of us in line, but it's a time for the stylists to show off their skill. My stylist and prep team start talking at once.
Graham snorts in disgust. "My brother died for your entertainment, and all you can worry about what you look like when you go shopping, or what you're wearing. Try starving to death and entering your name multiple times to make sure you have food for your family for the year."
Regan is the first to speak. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize the Games hit so close to you, Graham."
He blinks back tears and I move to comfort him. I do not know how to, as a member of Capitol's society, I am directed by strict protocol. Emotions do not have a place here. My team is thrown as well. They start digging through the various items, chattering to change the subject.
Graham sighs and sits back on the couch watching the highlights of previous Games. His hands are clenched around his cup of coffee.
Regan gives me an apologetic look as she combs my limp brown hair. "Which Game?"
"Seventieth." He takes a sip of coffee. "He was fifteen, I was seventeen."
I have become numb to the idea of the Hunger Games and the cruelty of the Capitol to the numerous districts, but Graham has not. It is not so much human nature we fear here. Everyone stabs everyone else in the back. We fear emotions. Anything that breaks social protocol makes us shatter.
I only let my prep team do minimal amount of work on me, and by the time of the first reaping they are done. Nine has finally come. Twenty-three tributes face a certain death. Graham and I sit on the couch. His arm rest on my shoulders and he is toying with a piece of my curly hair. There will be two reapings this hour. A half an hour devoted to each District.
I am wearing a simple black dress that has a scoop neck and black flats. Graham is wearing clothes that he had previously stashed in my closet and somehow missed my stylist and prep team's eyes. Or they had chosen to ignore it.
"Are you excited to see what your mother has helped come up with these Games?"
"No," I say flatly.
"Are you at least curious?" Graham asks.
I hesitate. "She loves them more me."
"It's good to see that someone else has a chip on their shoulder about the Games," Graham says wryly.
I sigh and lean my head on his shoulder. I can think of better things Graham and I could be doing than watching the reaping, but as citizens of Pandem, it is our duty. Since we live in the Capitol, we watch them on television complete with commentary by Ceaser Flickman who turns a different color every year.
They are all the same. Frighten children held in roped off areas by age. When their names are called, they walk to the stage terrified.
When it is District 3's turn, I clutch Graham's hand that is around my shoulder. He gives me a small smile. Then we both watch. Calypso Mulder is that district's representative. She has pink skin and gold tattoos around her eyes. She has a green wig. "And the young lady representing District 3 is…" She fishes around in the ball with slips of paper. "Rosemary Montoro."
The camera pans to the pen to where the fourteen year olds are standing. They always move out of the tributes path. Rosemary's hair is pulled back in a severe braid. Green eyes stand out from her peaked face. Graham groans quietly and I squeeze his hand. "My mother used to watch her when I was younger. She used to like to make mud pies."
"That's not going to do her much good in the Arena," I say. I kiss the back of his hand.
"Unless you're from 1 or 2, you're shit out of luck," Graham chuckles. "That's why they have so many victors. They train the hell out their kids."
Now it's the boy's turn. Roswell Murkus's name is called. Fourrteen. He is a small boy. He is skinny and dark circles are branded underneath his eyes. There is a smear of dirt on his white shirt. Graham emits another sigh. "I used to play with his older brother. They were worse off than us. They'd come to school dirty and hungry." He shakes his head. "Every year I get a reminder of where I come from and what I left behind."
"It can't be all bad," I say.
He shrugs. "No, I guess not."
"You have me."
"A Gamemaker's daughter who has a mother that hates me for no apparent reason." He tickles me.
"She doesn't like the fact that you weren't born in the Capitol." I try twisting away from him but he only holds on tighter.
"I'm not 'pure' stock. Which bastard is she trying to set you up with now?"
"Some guy name Sven Postimus."
"Sounds like a complete dick," Graham says.
"Have you met him?"
"Nope. I've never heard of him."
"You don't have to worry," I say. I stroke his spiked blond hair. "I won't leave you for him."
He smiles and kisses my forehead. "I'm not worried."
We settle back onto the couch to watch District 4's reaping. One of the victors, Finnick Odair had been a guest of my mother's a few times. He was a handsome and charming man who never missed an opportunity to make me blush. I would probably see him again in the next few weeks as the mentors mingled with the Capitol's high society to try to secure sponsors for their tributes.
"Are you going to any of the parties tonight?" Graham asks, jolting me out of my thoughts.
"The one held for the Gamemakers. You want to go?"
Graham snorts. "Would your mother let me go, is the question."
"She will listen to me," I answer. "She won't let herself be embarrassed by her own daughter. And besides, you work in the Defense. You might be useful to them. I've heard Seneca Crane isn't Capitol born and bred, but he's doing great things."
Even if she does let him accompany me, there will be some sort of string attached. There always is.
"I wouldn't put designing an arena that kills children for sport high on my list of accomplishments," Graham says.
"It keeps the Districts in line," I say.
"We're all starving to death, it's not like we have the energy to revolt. Most of our time is spent working our hands to the bone so people like you can live in luxury."
People like me. I decide not to fight with him about my upbringing. People from the districts were portrayed by the government as stupid individuals who could do nothing more than work. They were useless and criminals. They had no feelings or manners and we in the Capitol were better off.
We sit and watch the remaining reaping in silence. I know Graham is upset. When people are upset in the Capitol, the solution is always a gift. Gifts will not help in this situation. The reapings have become boring. It is the same thing over and over again. Frighten children move to the stage as their names are called. "Do you want to go for a walk?"
"And miss all the action?"
My stomach growls. In all the excitement, I forgot to eat. It seems to be a growing trend. At least today, I'm hungry. Graham checks his watch. "It's past lunchtime. I guess we should go and face the world."
By the world, he means the Avoxes that keep my house running smoothly. The could care less about our comings and goings. As we walk out of my room, I hear the echoing announcement of the tributes' names being called. It doesn't matter where we decide to go, we will see the news any way. Graham takes my hand and leads me to the kitchen. As we get closer, I can smell lamb stew with plums cooking.
We seat ourselves at the bar which faces towards the stove. There, there is out head house chef Tomick chopping an onion hurriedly and bark orders at two Avoxes who are helping him. He must be helping prepare Seneca Crane's chef with the preparations for tonight's dinner. A black haired male Avox sees us and dishes a plate of stew. I mentally thank him since it is against the law for me to acknowledge his presence. After all, he is a traitor to the Capitol and we showed him mercy by not killing him straight out.
Graham digs eagerly into his lamb stew. Finally, District 12, the last district is shown on the screen. Tomick stops what he is doing and wipes the sweat off his brow. The District is looks worn and dirty. A black grime covers everything including the camera. It pans across the children, who look the same from all of the districts, hungry and frightened.
Then it pans to District 12's only still-living victor who teeters unsteadily onto the stage during the last words of the mayor. The bottom of the screen reads Haymich Abermarthy. 56th Hunger Game Victor. His blond hair, which comes to the tops of his collar is greasy and matted. Vomit stains his blue dress shirt. He is screaming obscenities at the camera which is rewarded by applause. He stops his drunken rage confused. The escort, Effie Trinket's smile falters when he wraps his arms around her and squeezes her in a big hug. Caught off guard, she tries to escape in a way that reminds me of a cat that has been caught by a too-lovable child.
Two Peacekeepers manage to pry his arms off of her and help him back to his seat. Graham snickers beside me. "I feel sorry for those kids."
Effie's pink hair looks off center. All most too cheerfully, she says. "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor."
"Someone may have slipped something in her juice for her to be that happy," Graham says.
"I wouldn't want her job." Tomick says as he refills both of our bowls. "It…"
An injured cry pulls all of our attentions to the television screen. "Prim!"
A girl several years older than Prim is rushing towards the stage. "Prim! I volunteer!" She gasps. "I volunteer as tribute!"
Goosebumps crawl up my arms. Graham almost drops his stew in his lap.
The Gamemakers would be shocked and pleased. The stakes have been raised.
A/n: Please review!