~ NIGHTINGALE ~

By SincerelyAlice

Chapter 1: SOMETHING HAD SPARKED

A/N: My very first Hunger Games fanfiction! My very first fanfiction in general! :) This will be told almost entirely from Katniss Everdeen's point of view. Katniss X Gale.

Enjoy! :)

I do not own Hunger Games! Belongs to Suzanne Collins!

Prelude: Gale and I had talked about the Hunger Games... year after year it seemed. Who could have guessed that now, me sixteen and Gale at eighteen, we'd both become a part of it.

My name is Katniss Everdeen. Do let me begin with the two words that set my story in motion... and to follow two more words that began our story...

"I volunteer!"

The shrill voice that had been conjured didn't seem to have come from my mouth. It sliced through the sky. The crowd, no longer rowdy.

Today was Reaping Day. And my younger sister, Prim, had been reaped. Now I couldn't seem to meet her eyes. She stood before me, not believing what I was saying. No one could.

Then, in a much more composed voice, I affirmed to them and then again to all of Panem, "I volunteer as tribute."

Effie Trinket, the Capitol woman, was pleased; that much was evident. She was saying something to the mayor, who was also seated onstage. When the mayor looked at me, he could have only seemed sad. Could it have only been this morning that I'd come to him with Gale to sell him strawberries? Also sitting next to Effie and the mayor was Haymitch Abernathy. He was the only surviving victor of District 12 from the Hunger Games who was still alive. The other victor was long dead; Haymitch was middle-aged. In all seventy-three years of the Hunger Games, District 12 has only had two victors. Perhaps that puts things a little more into perspective.

I'd just volunteered to die.

"…Let her come forward," said Mayor Undersee, and these were the only words I'd been able to comprehend. I walked past Prim, making my way towards him and my fate. Everyone let me walk past. I was nearly to the scaffold when I felt something come at me from behind. It was Prim again, in her little reaping blouse and skirt with her blonde braids swinging around her face. She looks up at me, her eyes round as blue saucers. She's low to the ground, and cannot physically stop me. In her teary desperation, she tugs at the folds of my dress.

"No, Katniss! No, you can't go!"

What I really had to do right now was maintain a stoic image, for I felt all too much that I was being broadcast all throughout Panem.

"Prim, let go. Let go!"

Someone is pulling my twelve year old sister away from me. That someone... I turn around to see that it's Gale. Gale's my best friend. He has her in his arms, but Prim is still kicking at him, trying to break free but in vain. In her savage terror, she accidentally rips at the collar of Gale's shirt. He ignores her... Prim is still crying, but Gale has concealed all his emotion in those dark eyes of his, the eyes that are so like mine.

"Up you go, Catnip," he whispers, with a small motion of his head towards where I was being expected. I nod to him as I take a step forward in that direction.

But before I turn back around, I give him one last look, and I see that in those same dark eyes something had sparked, like a fire.

After I climb up the steps of the village square, I join Effie Trinket onstage, who is beside herself in joy.

"Well bravo! That's the spirit of the games!" she cried, clapping her hands together. Finally, after years of reaping in District 12, something had happened considered "exciting". "What's your name?"

"Katniss Everdeen," I said, trying all too hard to swallow the lump that was forming in my throat. I could hear my heart thumping in my chest loudly, and my hand stayed to my chest absently. Could it be possible for all of Panem to hear?

"I bet my buttons that was your sister. Don't want her to steal all the glory, do we? Come on, everybody! Let's give a big round of applause to our newest tribute!"

But applause never came. I stood before the people that had now become my people. I was now representing them. The silence only meant that no one was agreeing with this, this horribly wrong thing that was the Hunger Games.

Instead, the thousands of District 12 performed this… sort of gesture. It's real old-fashioned, but it's used to say a good-bye to a loved one who has deceased. In the gesture, you bring your middle three fingers to your lips and then you hold them outwards. In this case, to me. The thousands that I've known and grown up among, saluting to me.

Altogether, I must say that I had not expected this. But perhaps they had remembered my father, recognized me from my frequent appearances at the Hob…or they had known Prim. She'd become something of a common sight, bumbling about the town. She made an impression on just about everyone.

Taken so aback, I wanted to cry, although I knew that I could not. I run my fingers over the folds of the dress, where Prim had creased it. But before I'm given the chance to tear up, Haymitch bounds onto stage, and he is very obviously intoxicated out of his good mind. When he speaks you can hear the slur in his voice.

"Look at her. Look at this one!"

Haymitch throws his arm around my shoulders, and I have to hold myself up straighter for he's stronger than he seems. The drunken man continues, and he is shouting although I'm directly next to him. I can just barely distinguish the beer on his breath above the smell of his overall stink.

"I like her! Lots of…" And then Haymitch pauses, almost as if trying to find the right word to finish his thought. I stare at him incredulously, unable to offer one. Was it HEART?

"…Spunk! …More than you!" And then Haymitch releases me from his vice grip and bounds for the front of stage with startling precision considering how drunk he was. Each step he makes is like thunder shaking at the stage.

"More than you!" he yells again, but this time his finger is pointed towards a camera.

Is he speaking towards all of us? Or is he actually projecting his opinion live, all the way back to the Capitol? But before anyone can make a move, he staggers, and as his mouth opens to continue, he falls forward off of the stage. He is knocked out unconscious.

Although publicly disgracing himself and District 12, I was relieved that the cameras had found their new point of focus. I used this precious piece of time to completely compose myself. I would not cry. I fix up my posture and systemically the emotion drains from my face. This is how it should be. I look far off into the distance. From here I can see where Gale and I had been, out in the woods only this morning. We had talked about running away…it was now that I'd known that I'd made the right decision in not agreeing with Gale on this. If I had, it would have been Prim up here with no one to take her place.

Haymitch was being taken away by paramedics. I watched them warily. Would they take me too, if my heart stopped right here? Effie Trinket was trying to regain control of the audience.

"What an…exciting day!" she cried, in that ridiculous accent of hers, and then she tried to straighten her just as ridiculous wig. "But more excitement to come! It's time to choose our boy tribute!"

This seems to be about the only thing that could stun the audience back into silence.

I watch as Effie Trinket makes her way over to the ball that contains all the slips of paper with every boy. It has the name of every boy between twelve and eighteen in the district in it. One hand at her head, keeping the curls in place, her hand reached for the second slip of paper that would determine which one of these boys would join me in the Hunger Games. I eyed this Capitol woman with the utmost disdain, from her bubblegum wig to the long fingernails in the same sickly shade of pink which, she didn't realize, sealed two fates.

"Peeta Mellark!"

I recognized that name from somewhere, and, my eyes meeting his own, I remembered. He was…he was…

"I volunteer!"

I hear my words again. But by the second time, the volume level escalates to as far as the forest. Both the boys and the girls, who had been separated, were melding together in front of the podium. The boy who was called previous, Peeta, had been almost to us. He was eaten away at by the crowds, and just as quickly he was forgotten.

Gale emerged, a blue fire ablaze in his eyes.

"I volunteer as tribute."

Immediately there were cries of outrage from all the girls, it really was no surprise. My face, previously devoid of all emotion, now must have have worn a look like nothing other than shock. Sort of a What the HECK do you think you're doing?

"E-excellent!" said Effie again, taking this as a second of pleasant surprises. Two volunteers in one district, in a district that never had those. If Haymitch had referred to me having "spunk", well than Gale had just that as well.

It's gotten so rowdy, a few Peacekeepers descended upon the people. I'm unable to contain myself. I use the lapse in order to meet Gale halfway at the stairs.

"What do you think you're doing?" I hissed at him, not particularly wanting our exchange to be on television. I kept my voice low, although there was still so much noise around us. "Volunteering for…for Peeta? Why?"

"I'm going with you," said Gale, keeping just as quiet as me, but his voice was steady.

"Only one of us can make it back home," I reinstated, not leaving his eyes. I clasped his hand tight. Gale just shook his head. I couldn't convince him otherwise, and really, what was the use even if I could? He'd volunteered, and one thing I knew for sure was that he couldn't just change his mind now. He was the fellow tribute, whether I liked it or not.

And I did not like it.

"But…who's going to take care of Prim and…and the others?" I asked. I found Prim, who was clinging to my mother tightly. I also thought of Gale and his family of five. We'd sworn to each other that if one of us had been reaped, the other would help to take care of that person's family. What had happened to make Gale go back on his word?

"I have a feeling they'll be fine," said Gale, and I followed his gaze towards where Peeta was still standing. Peeta nodded curtly, almost as if there was now some sort of mutual understanding between them. And then Peeta returned back into the crowd, back to where his family was. His mother, who was crying, but moving about fretfully as there was a confusion in the crowd. And then there was Mr. Mellark, the baker, who was also in tears. Peeta's other older brothers were surrounding him. At least one of them could have taken Peeta's place, but it had been Gale to do so instead.

I knew that as long as the Mellarks could help it, Gale's and I's families would be taken care of. They were now somehow indebted to us. I didn't particularly like this, but what could I do? This was the current predicament. And at least Prim would still be fed...

A few gunshots were finally heard, and the crowd gathered was finally hushed, and into a stony silence. I don't know if anyone lay dead, but if someone did I could not see over everything that was still happening... As Gale and I made our way back onto the stage, my mind was in jumbles and my vision was so short-sighted. The Hunger Games was to the death. It didn't seem as if there was an favorable outcome. May the odds ever be in your favor? It didn't seem as if I had any odds...

"And your name is...?" asked Effie Trinket, but into the microphone. She ate up Gale with her hungry eyes.

"Gale Hawthorne," he replied evenly. More screams from those below us, but they were quickly quieted by the Peacekeepers around them. If people knew me, they knew him. And what we were most known for were being the providers, we brought meat into this district.

The three-finger motion was given once more. Gale held no expression, just looked out into the faces of our people.

The mayor went on with a speech, about the Treaty of Treason. When all the districts had tried to rebel against the Capitol, the attempt had failed. The thirteenth district had been annihilated completely. Now, as a yearly reminder, the Capitol hosts the country-wide Hunger Games. "Peace comes with a price." Really, it is that yearly reminder the absolute and utter control the Capitol holds over the twelve remaining districts. Of course the mayor doesn't say this, but we all know it.

When Mayor Undersee had finished, he motioned that Gale and I were to shake hands. To accept him as my adversary. I went forward to hold out my hand for him, but Gale didn't move from where he stood. There was an unmistakable silence in the air in that second when he just refused to move, and no one dared utter a word. With a very subtle pleading look from me, he finally stepped forward to take my hand in his. His grip was so strong. The Panem anthem began to play, as that second was becoming forgotten, and Effie Trinket's voice rang out above the noise, "Let the 74th Hunger Games begin!"

But I paid no more attention to all that. I had mine on Gale, trying to figure out what were in his motives. He noticed me watching him, but he turned away to scowl in the distance. He was still surly from before, having to shake my hand.

Gale hated being controlled, as he would surely hate being in these Games and playing the part of a piece. I suppose that when he said, "I volunteer as tribute", he must not have been in the right mind. Why had he done it really?

Because he wouldn't let me go at it alone?

Gale is looking back out over to the forest, where we'd spent the morning. The two of us, we would never again return to the clearing in the forest.

Gale and I had talked about this year after year it seemed. Who could have guessed that now, me sixteen and Gale at eighteen, we'd both become a part of it.

[A/N] Direct similarities between this and Suzanne Collin's Hunger Games will end right about here.

So what do you think? :) Please remember to review! I will update with Chapter 2 soon! ^-^

"The names will vary, the names they may change,
But the game, the game it stays the same."