Chapter 2

Serena

The waves hit the ship again and again, making it swing and flooding the deck; lightning strikes across the sky, revealing the look of horror on the girl's face. She's screaming, but no one can hear her over the increasing storm. The ship is sinking, and she's completely alone.

"Mom! Dad!" She turns around, but no one answers. "Grandpa!" She runs to the side of the ship and looks over it, contemplating the possibility of simply jumping into the revolving ocean.

Then she sees it. But it can't be… There's someone, a boy, staring back at her from underwater; the boat is now so close to submerge that she could touch him if she reached out her arm. "Help me!" she begs. He smiles broadily and takes her hand.

The girl squeals for a moment before hitting the water; she tries to come back for air, but the grip around her wrist is too strong- he's pulling her to the depths and there's nothing she can do about it; she can't breathe. Then everything goes black.

It's still dark, but I can't sleep anymore. My back is drenched in sweat and I feel like I've been deprived of water for days. I tiptoe my way to the kitchen, trying not to wake anyone up, and pour myself a glass of cold water. Then I analyze what just happened in my head.

I have no idea why I had a nightmare about my parents and my grandfather. I was three when they died, so I barely even remember them, and the few dreams of them I've had since then usually involve scattered memories, like my first teddy bear, or Grandpa's sailor tales. I press the back of my hands against my eyes; there was something more about that dream, something important, but I can't recall it. Maybe if I don't think about it, it will somehow come back.

I go to the living room and turn on the TV; they're showing the ruins of District 13 again. We get the idea, it's gone. You're more powerful than us. I turn it off and sit on the couch, wondering what I'll do until dawn. After less than five minutes, I'm asleep.

Marvel

I wake up with the sunlight on my face; apparently I forgot to close the curtains when I came in last night. I sit down, absorbing the moment: it's the day of the reaping- my time to shine. To prove I'm not worthless. Dad will be so proud.

My new clothes are ready: a black suit with golden buttons, recently polished black dress shoes, a white shirt and a deep green tie that really brings out the colour of your eyes and the boogars in your nose, Marv, according to Crystal.

I realize I'm the last one up when I get to the kitchen. Crystal is already stuffing her mouth with peanut butter toasts, risking to stain her white dress. Jem is eating cereal while gaping at the back of the box- why do people do that? - and Mom and Dad are drinking coffee. I have never seen Dad look happier, nor have I seen Mom look more desperate.

"There he is! Our future champion!" My father gets up and opens his arms, giving me a bear hug. He takes a step back so he can enjoy my appearance.

"Look at you, all fancy! Now listen to your old man: give those Capitol people your best smile and in no time all those powedered pink ladies will talk about is how marvelous you are!" He bursts out laughing at his own cleverness, and I join him, because of course he's right. The cameras are going to love me. "Lacey! Lacey, look at your son." Dad is now behaving like a little kid in a candy shop- I wouldn't be surprised if he started jumping with excitement. Not that I blame him; I'm restraining myself from running around the house, screaming how awesome I am from the top of my lungs. I'm going to be a tribute, and I'm going to win.

My mother looks up from her coffee and cracks up a half-smile. "You look amazing, Marvy." My heart drops; she hasn't called me that since I was ten. I feel an urge to hug her, to assure her everything will be okay. Instead, I kiss her on the cheek.

"Thanks, Mom. See you later."

My mother looks concerned, like she has something she wants to tell me. "Aren't you going to eat anything?" she asks.

"I'll eat on my way, we're already late." I pick up a piece of toast, to emphasize what I said. "Come on, Crystal."

Crystal grabs a cookie from the jar before following me out of the house. The streets are already crowded- seeing as District 1 is one of the biggest, the town square is one of the largest too. However, it can only carry all the children between the ages of 12 and 18 (it's not that large, and there's an awful lot of us). The rest of the population has to resort to watch the reaping on the screen, whether it's at home- an exclusive benefit, since we're the Capitol's favourite district- or on the streets; most people prefer to watch it outside. I think it makes them feel connected to their neighbours, like they are silently giving support to each other.

"Excuse me… Excuse me…" I say as I make my way through the crowd.

"Make way, make way, suicidal big-headed brother coming through!" Crystal seems to be more efficient in pushing away the bodies blocking our path. We're almost there; I can already see the 12-year-olds line-up, on the farthest side from the stage. I feel a heavy hand land on my shoulder.

"Hey, man." My best friend, Flint, looks like he just got out of bed, and that's probably true; he doesn't care much about the reaping, as long as his name isn't drawn. Besides, he turned 18 last week, so this is his last time lining up, and he knows I'm volunteering; therefore he didn't even bother about dressing up for the cameras, judging from his black T-shirt and ripped jeans. A girl is watching him disapprovingly- she must be thinking she just spent her entire morning choosing that pink dress and fixing her hair, only to arrive here and be forced to stand next to a guy whose spiked hair hasn't seen a comb in days.

I almost feel ashamed of my neat appearance when I look at him; but Flint's family is different- they want him to follow his dreams, and they couldn't care less about not having a victor among them. As for Flint, his ultimate goal in life is to "form a rock band and make an impact on people with my music". Whatever that is. Most likely, he read about it in some History book and thought it would bring him tons of girls or something; I still try to be as supportive as he is being now, with my decision of volunteering.

"The others are waiting for you," he tells me. "They want to see if you would be as prepped up as everyone said you would." Flint looks at me from head to toe and laughs."Seems they were right. Come on, princess."

I'm starting to regret my decision of wearing a tie until we reach our friends Jett, Eric and Jasper- with the exception of Flint, they're all wearing their best clothes. Jasper is wearing a bow-tie. And I'm the one who's all prepped up?

I turn to Flint, feeling annoyed. "You said they had been making fun of me."

Bow-tie. Bow-tie. Bow-tie.

He shrugs. "I lied; you're all a bunch of princesses. Happy now, Marvy-Boy?"

I'm beginning to think Flint is the reason I'm able to put up with Crystal, since he can be even more unpleasant than her if he wants to, when a Peacekeeper appears and tells us we have to head for our respective areas; Flint heads to the front, along with Jett, to the 18-year-olds area, while Eric, Jasper and I join the other 17-year olds behind them. I look at the stage- as in any other district, there are two glass balls, one for the boys and one for the girls, and four chairs. One for the Mayor, one for our escort, Marcus Whitman- whose bald head is even more tattooed than last year – and two for this year's mentors, Gloss and Cashmere. Of course they aren't the only victors from District 1, but it would be a mess if there were seven mentors for only two tributes; so each year they assign a female and a male victor to teach the tributes how to survive in the arena.

The Mayor gets up and reads about the history of Panem (this is the only part Flint ever listens to; he's also the only one who does) and the list of past victors- Cashmere and Gloss try not to smile too much when their names are mentioned.

Marcus steps up to the podium and takes the Mayor's place. "Welcome citizens of District 1!" I can always tell how glad he is about being assigned to our district. "It is my pleasure today to select two of you to compete in the 74th annual Hunger Games. Now, ladies firs.t" He dives his hand in the thousands of slips inside the ball on his left.

"Glimmer Adams!" The girl in the pink dress I had seen earlier walks graciously towards the stage and joins Marcus. She shakes his hand and when the crowd starts applauding she just stands there and smiles beautifully, as if she was just announced Miss Panem. I must say I'm impressed.

"Now it's time to select District 1's male tribute! Ready, gentlemen?" Marcus takes a slip out of the ball by his right and reads Flint's name. There's a loud cheer; everyone knows Flint, and everyone loves him; and thanks to my bragging for the past weeks, not a single person here is worried that he might not come back from the Games. He hops onstage and asks a very surprised Marcus for his microphone.

Flint raises his free arm and shouts to the crowd "What's up, District 1?" I hope he doesn't start singing (I bet the Capitol would love that; they must be spilling their cocktails all over their expensive furniture by now); Glimmer's face has turned the same shade of pink as her dress, but her smile doesn't fade for a moment. I'm shaking with impatience; I have to wait for Marcus to ask if there are any volunteers before I can step in Flint's place. I don't have to wait long, though.

"I want to thank you, Mr. Whitman," Flint proceeds,"for this excelent opportunity. I'm going to spare you the effort of asking if there are any volunteers. Without any more delays, I give you… the sassiest princess to ever walk upon the earth! Ladies and gentlemen, Marvel Gould!"

This is not what I planned at all, but it will do. It's show time.

"I volunteer!"

Serena

"Serena, wake up! You're late!"

I open my eyes abruptly. I'm still lying on the couch, one of my arms hanging on the border. Muriel, or Athena- I can't tell; I just woke up- is staring at me with her blue eyes.

"Oh, crap." I'm usually a morning person, just not when I'm late. "What time is it?" I ask her.

"The reaping starts in half an hour" I feel my stomach turn when she says this. I run up the stairs, towards my room, where I keep my reaping clothes: a strapless navy blue dress, with a cream-coloured belt above the waist and white wedge sandals; I decide to let my almost waist-long brown hair loose; I don't have time to think of a hairdo. However, I put on some eyeliner.

"Reena!" Now it's Kailani's turn to call me. "Sally's here!"

"I'll be right down!" I shout back.

For twelve years, I've followed Grandma's advice of not getting too attached to people strictly; that's why I don't have many friends. But Sally's different- we connected the first time we laid eyes on each other, back when we were six; I was coloring- I still love to draw, but now I spend most of my time fishing or training- and she asked me if she could join. And since I haven't talked to either Finnick or Annie in months, I'm glad I met her.

I run down the stairs, holding my dress by the chestline to stop it from sliding off- very lady-like, I must say- to find Sally waiting for me at the door. She's wearing a grass-coloured sleeveless dress that goes perfectly with her hazel eyes.

"Sorry I'm late," I say. "Wow, you look amazing!"

"Thanks." She smiles. "You look amazing too, I love your dress."

"Yeah, but if I'm not careful I'll end up half-naked by the end of the day. Ugh, I can barely breathe."

I'm fooling around in an attempt to cover up up my discomfort; I can't shake off the feeling that this day will go terribly wrong. I hug Kailani. "See you at the reaping, sis," she says, while Sally and I step off to the street.

In District 4, unlike the other districts, the reaping is held on the beach; although the spirit of the reaping does not match the sparkly blue sea, the Capitol insists it's the ideal place for it to be held, so we have no choice but to follow their orders. At least it helps to fill our pockets- every year thousands of oddly-looking tourists visit our district because they "saw it on television and found it to be extremely beautiful".

"I shouldn't have brought these shoes." I complain as we move with difficulty across the sand. At least, I think bitterly, if I get reaped they won't make me look so small. I know what it's like in the Games- it's mostly a matter of size. Brains and skill take you nowhere in physical confrontation, and if you're on the tiny side like me, and you're from the wrong district, they will go after you first.

"Okay, here we are," Sally says cheerfully, when we finally manage to get to our designated area. "Hey, are you okay?"

"Oh, yes," I lie, "It's just the dress, it's too tight and I'm not used to it." I feel like I'm about to throw up.

I look to the stage, trying to focus on something else; the three chairs assigned to this year's mentors are already filled by Finnick, Brenna- a dark-haired woman in her 30s-, and Mags. Being the oldest victor alive in all of Panem, Mags acts as a mentor every year; she should be retired by now, but I think the Capitol felt District 4 wasn't cooperating with them when Annie was declared unable to guide tributes. So they invented this "old, wise mentor" thing to punish us, by forcing an elderly, practically mute woman to teach children and then watch them die year after year.

District 4's escort, Alida Cox, is hopping back and forth, alternately talking to the Mayor- already set by the podium- and Finnick; she's not much older than I am, maybe around nineteen or twenty (she must have friends in high places, because people this young are never assigned the best districts), and she has her turquoise blue hair in a braid that goes down to her ankles, revealing two angel wings tattooed on her back; apart from that, she doesn't look like she's from the Capitol.

The Mayor makes his usual speech- I've watched the reapings on television enough times to discover it's like that in every district- and finishes by saying he hopes this year's tributes will bring honor and prestige to District 4. He takes a step back from the podium and bows slightly as Alida flicks across the stage to take his place.

"Greetings to the good people of District 4! It's a wonderful day, don't you think? Oh, how I love the sea, the sun, the-" One of the men in the camera crew clears his throat and she seems to return to reality. "Oh, sorry. Shall we select our female tribute?"

Alida dives her hand in one of the balls placed on the stage, but before she takes out a slip, Finnick signals her and mouths "That's the boys' one!" She blushes, mumbles an apology and takes a slip out of the other ball.

"Serena Brooke!"

She just said my name. She just said my name! I stumble, feeling dizzy for a moment; Sally grabs my arm to stop me from falling. "I'm okay" I assure her. I take a deep breath and walk up to the stage- I swear even the seagulls are silent. Alida gives me a a clumsy hug; "There she is! Aren't you lovely?" Yes, I must look extremely lovely right now; I feel like all of my blood has drained from my face. I cast a glance at Finnick, my childhood friend- his face shows a mix of shock and grief.

"Now, now… Our male tribute…" Alida takes a slip out of the other ball. "David Rivers!"

"NO!" The blood-curdling scream comes from a woman standing next to the 13-year-olds area, as a boy not older than that age shakily walks to the stage to join me; he has curly red hair, blue eyes and his face is covered in freckles. He's adorable. The woman, who I presume is his mother, is now crying silently while the Peacekeepers push her away.

"Before I can officially anounce the tributes for this year's Hunger Games… is there anyone who would like to volunteer?" Alida asks.

Nothing. Not a single person. I understand that no one is volunteering for me; I'm seventeen, I'm a big girl now. But there are eighteen-year-old boys here twice my size that have trained all their lives. Then why aren't they volunteering for poor David, who hasn't even reached puberty yet?

"No one? Well then… representing District 4 in the 74th annual Hunger Games, Serena Brooke and David Rivers!"

I see my own fear reflected in David's eyes as I shake his hand; whether we like it or not, we're district partners and we're going into the arena.