This was written for no reason other than I thought it would be fun, and I thought this area of the story could use some exploration
In My Defense
by ryrous
Nobody ever asked Seneca Crane what it was like to be Head Gamemaker. Nobody ever asked him how he was able to come up with new killing machines. It was gruelling, thankless work. Seneca thought the mountain terrain was interesting, and he certainly enjoyed the desert with the endless sinkholes. Of course, most of the tributes died in rather uneventful ways. Scorpions accounted for eight of the deaths that year. Poisonous snakes for another five. There was no end to the criticism from the talk show hosts and commentators that thought the games were a bit dull. Seneca wanted to strangle every last one of them with their own peacock-feather eyelashes or bludgeon them with their stupid music box hats. It wasn't his fault the dimwits couldn't find more entertaining ways to die. If there was one thing Seneca wouldn't stand for, it was undeserved criticism
"I'd like to see her design an arena, then she can nitpick," He fumed one night as he watched a particularly whiny media princess complain about the "unimaginative" lack of rhinestones on the arena's rattlesnakes.
"She's just voicing her opinion, dear, you don't like the steaks at Lionston's, I'd like to see you make one as good,"
"Good quality lion meat should not go plorp when you poke it. Lionston is cheap and lazy, he's not a chef."
"I'm sure he wouldn't like to hear you say it,"
"Of course he wouldn't, that's why I'm not going on television to talk about not liking him."
Mrs. Crane sighed. There was no point once Seneca got behind something.
So he made a few missteps, what about the fabulous moon arena he designed? Nobody talked about the ingenuity of the moon crater with the ants that bore holes in the heads of the unfortunate tributes that happened to take refuge there. No, those bastards just sat around all day like vultures, picking around his mutilated carcass for another piece of insufficiency. If Seneca heard one more ridiculously corpulent old geezer begin saying they thought the games could be a bit more this, or a tad more that, he was dangerously liable to snap.
And then that Everdeen girl pranced into his arena with her eleven rating and some ridiculous story about saving her sister. The vultures loved her, adored her and her annoying knack for avoiding all of Seneca's lovely death traps. She and that stupid Mellark boy distracted the audience with their kissing and soft words while Seneca's giant leeches were almost entirely ignored. Inconsiderate fucks.
Seneca had half a mind to drop that boulder that made the ceiling of their cave on their unsuspecting lovesick teenaged heads. Woops, there go the star-crossed lovers from District 12, just like that. He didn't do that though, because that would be seen as sloppy or lazy, and Seneca was tired of being called sloppy and lazy. There wasn't much Seneca could do about them anyway, they kept dodging everything, no matter how much he sat and pulled levers and twisted knobs and pushed control panel button, they just survived. He would have withheld that medicine that saved the boy's life now, if he could.
But as the games wore on, Seneca began to think that they were absolutely unkillable. They were so close with the nightlock berries. But then the silly redhead took leave of her brain and died. Fine, he thought. If they refused to die at his hand or the other tributes', he would let them die at each other's. He planned an announcement.
After the very interesting demise of the boy from District 2, he gleefully relayed the message to Claudius, whose surprised expression made Seneca want to jump for joy. He had won, he had outsmarted the fools, showed them that nobody would beat him at his game. These two disasters had turned into his greatest success story—no wait, what was the girl doing?
Seneca groaned inwardly, she just couldn't go along with anything, could she. The two from District 2 would've been at each other's throat in a heartbeat, but again this girl was intent on ruining things.
Ruining things!
She couldn't do that! They couldn't both die! If he had stopped and thought, maybe the President would've just told him to let them poison themselves, but Seneca wasn't thinking about the President.
"Claudius! Stop them! Stop them you fool! STOP THEM!"
The President didn't seem angry about it, but then he never seemed angry about anything. Still, Seneca walked as stiff as a board until one of the Presidents guards told him he wasn't going to get a lecture. As the guard left the room, Seneca breathed a not-so-silent sigh of relief. The door went click, but Seneca didn't notice, he was too wrapped up in his joy over not being chastised. Lectures had always been the worst part of his job. If there was one thing he hated, it was definitely unwarranted criticism.