Title: You Cannot Lie Still
A/N: I am so freaked out to upload this, I hope it isn't horrible. This is an AU of both things, which I hope is clear. I don't want to make an uber long A/N, but the story title is a song off the Game of Thrones soundtrack and the title for this is from one of my favorite songs "Carnival of Rust" by Poets of the Fall.
Spoilers: I'm all caught up on Supernatural, but I haven't finished the second book of the Hunger Games because of homework and all this other stuff (not to add that the download I got for it is only half the book).
Thanks: To everyone on Tumblr who answered my question, I would have kept saying Teresea in this fic instead of tesserae!
Word Count: 1,896
XXX
Shoving his hands further in his pockets, Dean exited the store behind him, turning around only to nod at his boss waving him goodbye. His smile to his boss was fake, of course, he really didn't like the guy, but the smile was real in different ways. He was smiling as he walked through the heavy rain back to his house because of the night. The last night. The last night he'd stay up with his brother telling him if he was chosen for the Hunger Games he'd be fine, he'd win, he'd be the best and wouldn't even have to try and the week of training before he went off to fight would be a waste since he was already the best he possible could.
But that was also why the smile was wiped right from his face. He was lying to himself, because if Sam was chosen for the Hunger Games, he hadn't trained his whole life. He wasn't that fast of a runner and he'd never lifted very much in his life. Sam most likely wouldn't make it very far, and the only thing that kept Dean's head held up high as he trudged through the dirt streets that were mixing into mud was that he knew that spending all night might at least make Sam confident enough to last longer than one night.
He paused in his footsteps and leaned against the wall of a building and sighed. The fact he'd given up on ever telling Sam that he had a chance of not entering the Hunger Games, that he had a chance of living his whole life without ever being chosen. Why? Because they were poor, even with Dean's two jobs and Sam's own job and that meant that Sam was signed up for so much tesserae that it was mind blowing he hadn't been drawn all these years.
Dean kicked back off the wall, and walked the rest of the way home. He opened the door and shut it behind him, instantly thanking whoever created fireplaces and dropped his jacket off at the table in their small kitchen. Their house was small, probably one of the smallest in District 12. It had one bedroom, a bathroom, and a kitchen that had a small little hallway that led off to the last room, the living room, which also had the fireplace.
"Sammy?" He called out, pushing back the curtain to the bedroom and looking in, it didn't matter that the logical place for his brother was to be the living room, after all it was his brother's turn to sleep on the couch, whether or not the Reaping was tomorrow. He dropped the curtain back to it's place and walked towards the living room, peeking in to see his brother sprawled across the couch, starring up at the ceiling with the same blank face as the last six years.
"I can't do it, Dean." He said, looking away from the ceiling and towards him. "I'll be drawn tomorrow, there's no doubt."
"You'll win if you do." Dean replied, echoing the words his father had told him every night of the Reaping he himself had spent staying up and wishing his name could vanish from the jar. The fact his father had influenced him so much with not getting his hopes up on staying home probably is one of the reasons he said the same things to Sam.
"If I so make it very far you know I can;t kill another person."
"yeah, I know." Dean leaned against the wall inside the room, still watching his brother contemplate. "But you'd do to survive, right? I wouldn't think any-"
"It doesn't matter what you think, does it?" Sam sat up on the bed, brushing his hair out of his eyes. "If I think it's true, then it is to me, right?"
"Do you think Santa exists?" Sam rolled his eyes and Dean followed his movements, equally upset. "You thought he was when you were younger and that didn't make him real, now did it?"
"Not the point, Dean. If I think I'm a monster, I always will be to myself."
"You aren't a monster. You could never be a monster." Sam narrowed his eyes at him and Dean ignored him, tired with this prissy little boy. "If you're picked you'll do what it takes to survive, whether or not it makes you a monster because you will not be murdered by anyone."
"What if I commit suicide, then? Right now?" Dean sighed and Sam sat up, brushing past him and into the kitchen. Dean didn't give it a second to debate whether or not he should follow his brother, he was already behind him, watching him fumble with the drawer and pull out one of the long knives they had. "I won't be picked tomorrow because I'll be dead."
"Then I'll kill you." Dean answered. "And you wouldn't, suicide isn't the answer. You're stronger than that." Before Sam could give his lecture on suicide not being for the weak, Dean continued. "I have faith in you. You will survive. Put the damn knife down, okay? Before you hurt someone."
"Fine." Sam tossed the knife back in the drawer and slammed it shut, crossing his arms over his chest. He didn't even have to ask Dean to stay up with him, Dean had already known he wouldn't be able to sleep.
-x-
Sam looked over at the clock on the fireplace and waited until the number flipped and turned to seven before he tossed the pillow off the couch and towards Dean, who somehow had managed to fall asleep on the floor.
"Dude!" Dean said, instantly awake. "What was that for?"
"Many reasons." Sam replied, narrowing his eyes at his older brother. "One of them being you falling asleep on me, the other be that it's almost time to go."
"I need my sleep, Sam." Dean said, returning his eyes narrowed at him. "You didn't make breakfast?"
"I'm not a cook, you make it. I have to get ready." Before Dean could objectify, Sam got up and retreated from the room, showering and changing into the cleanest, most formal outfit he could find. When he returned, his stomach was in so many knots it should have stopped working, and he almost went down to the doctor's to check but he knew that him not able to even nibble on the roll in front of him wasn't because of some physical problem. It was much more mental.
"They won't pick you." Dean said finally, Sam looked up from the roll in his hands and raised an eyebrow. Dean had never said that before. Never. Dean was always afraid it would be some type of bad luck or that it was useless.
"You don't know that," Sam replied, putting the roll back up on the table. "And I don't want to talk about it, okay?"
"Right, right." Dean looked away from his brother and reached across the table, grabbing up Sam's roll and tearing it in half before chewing on it. "Get tired of talking about it last night, then?"
"Dean." He said, warning his brother. "Just shut up for once."
-x-
"You'll win if you do."
Dean's voice echoed through his head as he walked out of the house and down to the center of the District, taking his place in the line and barely having the strength to look behind him to see Dean leaned against a building with the rest of the older siblings or parents. He regretted seeing Dean look at him with so much guilt on his face that Sam could only place as being from telling he that he wouldn't be chosen.
Sam looked away and across the lines of people, catching a few familiar faces. Madge, the mayor's daughter, Katniss, a girl whom he had bought some things from in the Hob, and a few students from his school. But he'd never talked to any of these people besides for a few small words. He'd refused to become friends with people in fear he'd have to deal with their death, his only exception being his neighbor and co-worker, Jessica. He'd crushed on her for a long time, but they weren't...official.
The Reaping went as usual, the mayor welcomed everyone and his eyes lingered on Madge most of the ceremony, and Effie set up the two clear glass bowls on the table, making her speech.
"Ladies first!" She says, and crosses over to the first bowl, doing these strange hand motions she probably finds that keeps the people on edge before reaching in and walking back to the microphone. "Primrose Everdeen!"
The name shocked Sam more than it should have, and not because Prim was only twelve and surely her sister wouldn't have allowed her to sign up for tesserae, but because when he glanced over to look at her, her name was already echoing through the area.
Katniss, it was Katniss who was screaming for her sister.
"I volunteer!" She screamed out, pushing past the guards and the sight of the girl he barely knew made him look away. "I volunteer as tribute."
He heard Effie mumble something about waiting until after Prim got to the stage but even Sam knew that it was stupid to wait that long, it would have been a horrible sight to see the little twelve year old girl up on the stage, watching her sister out in the audience.
It would have been heart wrenching.
And precisely what the Capitol would want to see.
Katniss was better in more ways than one to already volunteer, and she's already up on stage, her sister being hauled away by someone Sam recognizes but can't quite place but knows that he's probably friends with the Everdeen's, or vice versa.
He doesn't even have time to think about because Effie is already talking, trying to cover up the mess and wrong order of things. "What an exciting day!" She warbles as she attempts to straighten her wig, which has listed severely to the right. "But more excitement to come! It's
time to choose our boy tribute!"
She's crossing over to the bowl and pulling out a paper, all the while Sam's stomach is twisting itself into the most intricate knots in the universe and she's walking back to the microphone and Sam can't even breathe anymore, and he thinks he's about to die or at least pass out while she's taking her time in unfolding the paper and flattening it out before she reads those two words. That one name that contradicts Dean's statement during breakfast and giving him every reason to have eyes filled with guilt for telling that lie and everything is a blur as he hears his name through the speakers and he's being pushed up the steps and he has to refrain himself from looking behind him to see that his brother, much like Katniss, is being restrained and he can't even be let free because he's much too old to volunteer now.
"This year's tributes, Katniss Everdeen and Sam Winchester!"