One - The First Execution
Victor: Jack Tyler (D3)

I don't remember many details about life before I was five. Everything flows together in a manner that makes distinguishing dates nearly impossible. I guess it's a good thing... They say there was a lot of suffering.

I do remember the day that the war ended; when connections with Canada were cut off, and Mexico's borders destroyed. I remember this day specifically because it was the day they declared peace.

A new nation, Panem, rose from the ashes of North America and became a shining beacon of hope for all survivors. We entered a period of bliss, working together to rebuild our home, and remember those that we lost. We were harmonious for a single year... Until the District borders went up, and we were cut off from one another. My mother, who was on the other side, never came home.

I realized pretty quickly that no matter how hard my father and I tried, food would be scarce for a long time to come. But we continued, taking each day as they came. Until I was fifteen, and the world crashed around me for the second time. I lost my father and went into hiding with my professor. I was fifteen, hiding in an underground bunker and eating from a can, when an entire District was destroyed, and the nation fell silent. The war was over.

I am sixteen now, and nothing seems real anymore.

One month ago, the Treaty of Treason was signed, without anyone quite knowing what it meant. Life continued in a sense of normality, obscured only by the swarms of peacekeepers patrolling the streets, and the hollow grief that followed your every step. I was sure nothing more would come of it, until a few days ago- I can't be sure how many- when a program was scheduled for mandatory viewing at six o'clock. It was then that the nation learnt the consequences of one month prior.

"As punishment for the rebellion," The Capitol's head peacekeeper read, "and to serve as a reminder that a rebel knows no kin, each year from this day forth, the various Districts of Panem must offer up, in tribute, one young man and woman between the ages of twelve and eighteen, to fight to the death, until a lone survivor remains."

You can't quite imagine how people would react to something like this until it actually happens. I had expected some kind of outrage- more riots, even- but throughout the whole of my District, there was silence. We knew that despite how hard we disapproved, there would be no chance of overcoming the Capitol this time.

So we sat, and waited through the commercial break, for the names to be drawn. Then the anthem played, just like it was any other government broadcast.

District 1 was first; Mack Bryans, 15, and Taylor Finch, 18. Then Paul McAllister, 13, and Sarah Odell, 14. They allowed no time to process the information, allowing only a moment's pause before revealing the next child's name and face. It was such a short moment that I hardly noticed when I saw my own ID photo flash across the screen; Jack Tyler, 16. I only realised what had happened when the blue-eyed Lili Freimeyer, 16, from District 5 appeared on the screen.

I guess everyone around me realised before I did, as when I looked around, I was being watched by everyone, as if they were doctors and I carried a deadly disease. All night I was avoided, not even my best friend spoke to me too much. It's quite sad that the last thing I'll remember of her is the back of her head.

I'm dreaming now, I know it. Images flow before of my eyes in a thick, honey-like fashion. I see my mother, going to visit her brother in the morning and not coming back. I see my father, lying in the street, his back a canvas of red. In between each image is my face, filling one side of the television screen, for all of Panem to see. One of the first twenty four.

And then the images stop.

I wake up.

When my eyes open, I am blinded by the hot sun high above. I feel stone below me- no. Metal. I get onto my knees. The unobscured sun hits my back with such force that I'm already sweating. About twenty meters to my left a girl I don't recognise is standing, looking around frantically, trying to get her bearings. A scar covers the side of her face- presumably from a burn. To my right, the girl from 1 is crying, curled into a ball. I can feel my whole body trembling. Where are we? How did we get here? The last I remember is going to bed in a fit of terror, exactly one hour after hearing the terrible news.

I have to think- this is a puzzle, just like anything. With a clear head and logical thinking, there will be an answer. There has to be. Someone across from me, the boy from 7, I think, has only just woken up and begins to shout wildly. He sees the girl from his District and calls out to her, "What's happening? Where are we?" Even at my distance, I can hear the panic in his voice. I notice that we're all standing on metal platforms, with a two meter diameter- the boy from 7 seems to be arguing with himself about whether or not he should step off of it. "Wait there!" I hear him call, "I'll come to you!" He takes a step, ignoring the shouts of protest that burst from a number of children around him. He is gunned down the moment both his feet are on the pavement.

It is then, with pounding heart and terrible shakes, that I notice the two other children- one boy and one girl- lying, covered in blood, away from their platforms. "Rule one," I tell myself, "Don't step off your platform."

The gunshots came from one of the two hovercrafts suspended in the air above us, hanging neatly above two towering buildings. The platforms, the gunshots, the announcement on television, these things don't seem to connect in my mind. Why we're here, where we are; I don't understand. Until I notice the number 13 emblazoned on the tattered tapestries hanging from the buildings.

We are in the ruins of District 13.

Without warning, a voice begins counting down, starting at sixty. I don't want to realise what it's counting down to, but I do- the televised announcement coming back to me- we will have to kill each other.

Bile rises in my throat; do they really expect us to do it with our hands? Surely not. I would rather step off of the platform. It is then that I see what has been right in front of me the entire time, and what my brain has been trying to ignore: the long rack, in the centre of the ring of tributes, holding twenty-four finely polished guns, of all shapes and sizes. "Forty. Thirty-nine. Thirty-eight."

Okay. Think. I can feel a tear roll its way down my cheek. If you all agree to work together, we can avoid this whole situation. It's only logical. Even I don't believe it.

"Twenty. Nineteen. Eighteen." The girl to my right won't stop weeping. I notice her outfit. Why is she wearing that? Why is she we- Oh.

I look down at my own attire, and I can feel the bile once again. We're wearing the rebel military uniform.

The capitol lady's words fill my mind once more, a rebel knows no kin. How nice of the Capitol to make our execution a symbolic once. To them, we are the rebels of 13.

"Ten. Nine. Eight."

I can't move. Even if I wanted to, I'm sure that my legs wouldn't move. I make eye contact with the girl on my left, the blood is drained from her face.

When the voice reaches zero, a siren sounds throughout the city square, almost deafening.

I'm not sure what I expected to happen- I'm not sure what anyone did. Practically stumbling, the twenty other tributes step down from their platforms, confused as to what our next move should be. One boy, with stick-thin arms and olive skin, doesn't stop like the rest of us- he continues to stumble towards the guns. "Hey- wait! Stop!" It's the boy from 4, trying to regain a sense of order, and unity, "Look we don't have to-" his words are replaced by a spray of blood. The hovercraft has shot him down. The olive-skinned boy only falters for a moment, but then he quickens his pace.

It is his hurry that starts the chaos. Suddenly, no one wants to be left without a gun. We all run forward, the girl on my left faster than she looks. Amidst the commotion I notice the hovercraft's edges blur, disappearing. It has vanished by the time I've reached the rack.

We all push against each other in an effort to get our hands on a weapon; a brute of a male grabs a girl by her hair and flings her aside, like she is nothing more than a doll. Finally, my fingers clasp around a handle, and I retreat as quickly as possible.

With my back turned, I can only hear the sound of the first gunshot, and the cries of pain that follow. Within moments, gunshot after gunshot sounds through the air; but I don't stop running, I can't stop.

I pass a billboard, and am set to continue sprinting, when I see several heads in the near distance, distorted ever so slightly. When I figure out what it is, I stop dead in my tracks. Inching my way forward, as if being called by the grinning faces in front of me. I reach out a hand.

The smooth surface tingles ever so slightly with power. A force field. I peer through, and am disgusted by the array of Capitol officials who sit behind it, watching the bloodbath unfold. One of them points behind me, a drink in the other hand and a smirk on his face. I don't take the time to look, running away as fast as I can.

Throwing a look over my shoulder, I see the girl with the scar aiming her gun at me. Now I'm the one whose blood has drained.

At long last, I arrive around the corner of a building, out of the girls sight, and take a moment to catch my breath. The gun I picked up is a small handgun, hardly enough room for twenty three bullets.

I don't allow myself time to panic- I'm still too close to the bloodbath. So I keep running, along the side of the building and up rubble-covered roads. My heart is pounding in my chest, I can feel blood pulsing through my neck. Dust flies up when my feet hit the ground, and my knees threaten to buckle with every step.

I can't do this, but I have to.

Suddenly, I notice that I'm running without any cover- any buildings that may have stood here once have been burned to the ground. The ring of platforms are in my direct sight, and so are the bodies. Two, four, eight, twelve. How many have we killed already? At least half of those who came in are dead. At least.

There are no further gunshots though, and I can see the remaining few tributes running in different directions. The crying girl is still on her platform, a flower of red blossoming across her grey uniform. She never even got up.

Maybe this will be the only year, I think, maybe people will realise that this is completely barbaric, inhumane, and just plain evil. Maybe, just maybe.

The sound of a cannon has me tumble to the ground. It goes off again, and again; nineteen times.

With the silence that comes after the nineteenth cannon, I finally allow myself to cry. In the shade of a wooden door- miraculously still standing in its frame- I let sobs wrack their way through my body and up my spine. I can hear someone telling me that I'm going to die here, but then I realise that it's my own voice. I am going to die here, alone, and at the hands of another child. No one will lift a finger to stop it. There is nothing I can do.

Before nightfall, there are three more gunshots that echo through the District, and three accompanying cannons. Through simple maths, I know that that means it's just me and someone else left alive. I don't feel hope though- if I haven't pulled my trigger once yet, can I really expect to pull it now?

Sleep doesn't welcome me into its embrace that night, so I watch the stars fade one by one until the sky is awash with pink and blue. Even then, I don't want to move, because if I move then someone will die.

The decision to get up and move isn't up to me, it would seem, because soon I hear movement near me. My heart stops. It's coming from several meters away. It is not the sound of someone moving with a purpose- it's more like they're wandering aimlessly. It is the sound of someone who has been moving for hours without a break, and now wants nothing more than to just sit down. As if they read my mind, I hear the thud of someone dropping to their knees.

Slowly, carefully, I prop myself up on my elbows, the gun gripped tightly in my right hand. It's the large boy who threw aside the girl during the initial scramble. He is crying, softly, to himself. His gun lies at his feet, and he holds his trembling hands in front of his face. I hear him mumbling quietly.

We sit like this for a few minutes, he, completely unaware of my presence. Whatever this boy has done, it was because we were forced to. We didn't choose this.

I'm about to drop my gun when I see the hovercraft appear in the distance, two large guns dispatching slowly from the wings. The message is clear: one of us must die.

The other boy looks up slowly, but he doesn't move towards his gun.

"I know you're there," I jump at the sound of his voice, barely a whisper, "I can't... I can't do it another time... Please just.. Please..." I watch him, sitting there, not moving. I try to think of something to say, anything, but no words come. How can I do it? The hovercraft gets closer, and I can hear the engines rev louder, as they start the motors for the weapons, "Just do it!" He's yelling now, and he turns to face me- his face red, streaked with tears, "Do it now or we'll both die!" I can't believe it, my mouth hangs open. "Do it!"

Time slows down, and I can feel everything; the beating of my heart, the engines whirring above us, the sun heating the rubble below me. I know that if I do it, I survive. He won't put up a fight. I could do it, with only one life on my hands. One life.

It is at this point that I know that this year won't be the last. The proof is in the ground that I run across, the ruined buildings around me, the District that was burnt to the ground.

I squeeze the trigger.