Ava leans forward to listen attentively to what the prisoner has to say. She feels excitement flowing through her veins, and slight nervousness too. She has no idea what kind of story she is about to hear. The biggest secret of Panem in seventy-five years. She looks around her to see what Zephyra is doing. The older woman has a blank, tight look on her plain face. She is showing absolutely no emotion and instead sits there, waiting for the story to get onward. She has the pen and binder in front of her, ready to take notes as the prisoner gives out information. Ava notices her foot tick impatiently. She did not want to hear the entire story of the Games, just the type of technology that was used, but to get that information she knew she was going to sit through the entire story.
Ava, on the other hand, was actually quite interested. She wanted to know the story of the Games. Who and what was involved and how the story played out. She heard the static as the prisoner took a shaky breath. "First let's start with the setting of the Games. There are a few things you have to understand about this time in our country's history.
We had just entered our second decade as a new country. As the president liked to put it, we rose bravely from the ashes and took control back. The Capitol was rapidly growing and improving. District 13 had been taken care of and they no longer feared the threat of nuclear war. In fact, life was just fabulous as far as the Capitol citizens were concerned. They lived in a thriving city, full of hope and the promise of new, bigger and better things. They partied, ate, and drank too much. But it was fine. Because they could. They had recently discovered that you could now eat everything without getting too full. All you had to do was take a few minutes to throw it all up and you were set to go. The night could never end.
Meanwhile, the districts, especially the outer ones, were weaker than ever. They took a much longer time to grow back and took a large beating. Livestock had been killed, lands blown up, forests completely flattened. Their shops, homes, and public buildings had been incinerated. They had to rebuild all alone, with no help from the Capitol that took their children away relentlessly every year. The Capitol had actually formed an alliance and began to help the districts closest to it. These were the ones that you know now as the Career Districts- One, Two, and Four. At that time, there were careers, but they were a newer idea. Those districts were loaded with Capitol propaganda to volunteer and become a winner, showered in gifts from the adoring Capitol. They trained these kids to believe that going into the Games was an honor to your family.
Of course, the Capitol was not stupid and knew that the outer districts needed to have some hope of winning the Games. It was how they kept them in line. All the districts were important to the Capitol-and still are even if it's hard to see. The Capitol needs each of the goods that they produce and cannot afford to lose another. Without the districts, there is no Capitol.
Leading this country was an intelligent young lady, the first-and only- female president. She was striking and so bold, she was all people talked about. This woman's name was Corinna Cetus. A well-educated woman born and raised in the Capitol with the kind face of a woman, but the stern harsh personality of a man. She could appear so warm when she came on the screens and flashed her large blue eyes at us, but off screen-the things she did."
There is a pause and what sounds like a sigh, "Incredible cruelty. Her cabinet alone changed every few years or so as she executed those she was done with as to not let her secrets get out, but also to keep young blood on her panel. People often believed that she sent them off on vacation, as she called it when they were done serving their time and she wanted to reward them for all their hard work. I assume that maybe death was a vacation to them after working years under Cetus' iron rule. The way she ran the country was through both pleasing the citizens yet making them fear her to death. The uneducated peasants and the thick-headed rich of the Career districts loved her. And since there were so many poor and such powerful rich, she was able to carry on with her greedy, inhumane rule. It was those with an intelligent mind but in a place with so little power to make a difference that suffered the most. They could see right through everything, but feared for their lives dare they say anything. It was the best, yet the worst time to be living in Panem. There was so much to celebrate and people had so much, yet there was also so little and people lived in such terrible conditions.
When the Thirteenth Hunger Games rolled around, she had been in control for two years. This was her second Hunger games she was in charge of. The Twelfth Hunger Games ended in an upset with the final two being two boys- an eighteen-year-old from One and a fifteen-year-old from Seven. The boy from Seven allowed himself to be chased into the forests of the arena where there he used his skills growing up in the lumber district to climb a tree. Although the boy from One had incredible strength, he was not used to climbing sun primitive things as trees and struggled as the two went farther and farther up. Refusing to back down and blinded by his own hubris, the blonde young man was not as fast or adept as the scrawny one who could climb all day if need be. All it took was one misstep and the snap of a branch under his muscular build for him to go crashing down onto the rocky surface below. He was dead the second his head hit the ground. We all watched in shock as blood oozed down his porcelain face. The other boy looked even more surprised as he paused when he heard the crash. He then broke down, weeping, every emotion possible flashing across his young dirty face.
Well, Ms. Cetus did not like the way that one ended and her entire panel of game makers, trainers, technicians, everyone was wiped clean. For the Thirteenth Games, she brought in a whole new batch of people, it took months to build up, each chosen specifically and carefully to achieve the kind of ground-breaking Games that nobody had ever seen-and that nobody has seen since. She kept everything so top secret, nobody but the chosen few knew anything about what the Games had in store and on Reaping Day that year, children and families shook and cried all morning awaiting those twenty-four dreaded pieces of paper that would condemn twenty-three to their deaths and leave one a whole different person than the child whose name was called but weeks before.
So here we are. Now listen because I'm only going to say this once and everything I say is crucial to the story, whether you think it is or not. Everything affects everything-that's the beauty of these Games. Let's begin with Reaping day, the beginning of the Thirteen Hunger Games. As always, it all starts in District One…
So here's the second chapter and more intro. The next chapter will be the start of the reapings! I need tributes for every spot right now and will update as I get more! Thank you, I hope you like it so far and PLEASE SUBMIT!