"Come on, move it!" shouted a young peacekeeper. "Let's go!" he said as he herded the citizens of District 4 into the square where most of the shops were. He had blond hair and looked no older than 20. I didn't recognize him. I guess most of the old ones had either sided with the rebellion or been killed during it. If they sided with it, most likely they were still pretty dead. I hadn't been to the square in over 6 years. It made me feel kind of good, especially when I saw Dinghy's Bait Shop was still in one piece. We had gone there almost every weekend to get more bait for my father's fishing business back before the rebellion. I smiled at the gray-haired owner of the Bait Shop and he waved back.

They had set up the square so there were 7 roped off areas with signs from 12 to 18. There was a rope around all of them. A stage had been set up on the side closer to the ocean and opposite the Bait Shop. I noticed that mostly adults were outside the roped off areas and the older kids were in the places marked 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, and 18.

"Do you know what's going on?" I asked my old friend Jamie. I hadn't seen her since I was 14 because our rebellion groups got split up.

"No idea," she said with a shrug.

Apparently we had to stand with our age group. Jamie and I headed over to the 17s. I saw Urso in the 16s and waved. He didn't look very happy. Even though we were different ages, we were really only a month apart, so he hadn't turned yet. He had pretty much been my best friend during the rebellion, especially after we lost Jamie's group.

"Excuse me, please be quiet!" said a familiar voice, and not in a good way.

I looked up to see President Cartwheeler himself. He looked pretty worn out, but he also wore a nice big smirk. He was accompanied by about 26 members of Panem's army, who all wielded very big, very shiny machine guns. One guy shot randomly into the audience on the president's cue. I heard a shriek and saw an old man who was none other than the owner of the bait shop fall forward dripping in blood. I watched bewildered as he was lifted onto a stretcher and carted away to a hospital. President Cartwheeler smirked. I glared.

"So," he said, with his wonderful Capitol accent, as if nothing had happened, "I am sure you are well aware that you have lost the rebellion." He smiled pleasantly. "I am also sure that you know that there will be a consequence." Worse than District 13 blowing up? "Before I tell you what this consequence is I would like you all to know that all of the survivors of District 13 have been killed." Well we all expected that. "Now onto that consequence," he continued as he licked his lips. "All of the districts will be having a little competition. All of your children ages 12 to 18 have been entered once into a lottery to decide which boy and which girl will be going from your district. Next year, tesserae will be available. This will put you in again as many times as you want to receive a years worth of grain and oil for one person. Now onto the choosing, or reaping." He licked his lips.

A peacekeeper brought a glass bowl full of slips of paper. The president dipped his hand in and pulled out one of the slips.

"The girl tribute is Magali O'Finn. Please come forward."

It took a moment to register that I was the "tribute" and would be in this competition. I walked up to the stage hesitantly. I was still unsure what the competition would be, but I had a feeling it wouldn't be pretty. The president smiled at me, but I didn't smile back. Instead I played with the end of one of my dirty blond braids. Another peacekeeper brought him another glass bowl full of slips, and again the president dipped his hand in and pulled one out.

"The boy tribute is Urso Covendro." Urso walked up and stood next to me with an affixed stare. Everyone in the crowd looked at Cartwheeler expectantly. He waited for about a minute.

"I'm sure you are all wondering what this competition is," he said, his smirk was gone. He licked his lips before continuing. "The tributes from all of the districts will be placed in an outdoor arena that could be a tropical island to a frozen wasteland to a scorching desert-," he licked his lips,"where they will be kill- or be killed."

The audience let out a collective gasp.