Note: please keep in mind that characters' views do NOT necessarily echo my own. I write them the way they are for the purpose of storytelling and character development, not to convey an agenda or put down certain groups. I hope the content of this chapter isn't too offensive.

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Challenge: Journey's challenge

Prompt: blood

Fic(s) involved: Brutal

Main character (and Hetalia counterpart): an unnamed girl from District 10 (OC)

Other characters (and Hetalia counterparts): Eudocia Conc, District 10 (OC), OC family members

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I'm not a bad person.

I've just always adhered to a certain philosophy. Call it survival of the fittest, if you'd like. It's a necessary belief to get ahead in District Ten. Strength merits success. Weakness does not. Weakness hinders strength, snatching at it like claws, draining it of its life and vigour. I've seen healthy people wither away after spending too long at a loved one's deathbed, surrendering themselves to the disease that lingers in the blood. A stain that they won't let be washed away.

When I was a girl, still of reaping age, I loved a boy whose younger sister suffered from asthma. They were the descendants of a Victor from the early years, before the Games changed from punishment to celebration and their survivors were showered with riches. Whatever the man had won could not blot out his granddaughter's iniquity. I'd seen the extremes to which the family went to keep her alive. Don't think I can't recall the hours at which they'd woken to herd the cattle, the threadbare touch of the boy's clothes, the questions I'd dared ask under cover of night.

"Don't you ever wonder what it would be like if you didn't have to work two shifts? I mean, if it wasn't for…" How to phrase it without offending? "…Eudocia's – condition?"

"Well, I don't know." It was there, that resentment, restrained by a barrier of brotherly love. "Sure it would be easier, yeah, but-"

"But what?" An indignant rise in my voice. "You wouldn't have to work 'til one in the morning? You'd be able to afford a decent pair of shoes? We'd have time, real time, to spend together?"

"But she's my sister."

She was his weakness; his bloodstain; she infected the entire family. It wasn't fair.

"Name, miss?"

"Eudocia Conc, sir."

The official's brows furrowed, eyes darting over a list. He gave a harsh laugh.

"Sure, and I'm our esteemed President. I've been in this position long enough to know that girl never comes outside of the house."

"Well, that's it, sir. I'm taking these out for her, as a favor. Since she can't come here herself."

A sigh. "All right, then. How many will it be?"

My mind reeled. How many would help; how many would hinder; how many would cleanse the tainted blood?

"Ten tesserae, sir."

It never guaranteed anything. As far as I knew, the next victim could have been the usual eighteen-year-old field hand; the sturdy, weathered type who I'd want to survive solely because she deserved it. But it was Eudocia Conc's name that the escort read out that year, and her face that lit up the sky one week later.

My time with the boy didn't last long after that. I never told him what I'd done, but could not escape the thought that he knew. It was at his request, after all, that I'd gone to sign him up for more tesserae while he watched the cattle. He only had to recall our moonlit conversations to guess I'd offered his sister's name in his place.

In the end, though, I'd done the right thing. Wash out the stain, and everything returns to how it should be. Everybody gets what they deserve. The last time he spoke to me, his family was faring better. They'd purchased another five cattle. The hole in the roof was fixed. The boy was wearing new shoes.

She didn't suffer long in the arena. The tribute who ended her life walked away with unbloodied hands. Not a drop spilt.

Again, a fair result. That stain is mine to bear.