Chapter Three
I have to blink frantically as the cool dark of the chariot chamber gives way to unforgiving brightness. The sky is star-strewn already but the tall lights stood behind the stands and the synthetic fire crackling on the sides of the chariot illuminate us. I cannot hide from the eyes of the onlookers and can barely see them as the chariot rumbles along.
I can hear them, however—they shriek, jeer, gibber at as we pass and it takes all of my willpower not to look up at them. I fix my eyes determinedly ahead, where the sleek silver of the Training Centre reflects orange. I want this to be over more than anything.
"Rogers," comes a whisper. Romanoff leans towards me and gently squeezes my wrist, "The screens, check out the screens."
My eyes flit up of their own accord to the huge screens erected on our route and find my own steely face. I can't help but feel startled as I take us in: Romanoff and I, Victors from the poorest district, stripped right down and stained black, as if we staggered into our chariots from the mud. It's an almost feral effect; we could be animals.
But the coldness of our expressions, our strict postures, and the gleaming black horse that pulls us along— these are not base at all. We may be bared for all to see, but we maintain dignity, even superiority, over our viewers. We may be from District 12 but, like phoenixes, we rise from the ashes strong and beautiful and unlike anything else on Earth. We are attractive. We are sophisticated.
We are dangerous.
In the final stretch of the parade, we both allow ourselves a smile. The crows of the audience arise into a collective scream, which I allow to breeze over me and be swept away into the night. For the first time, I feel an inkling of hope.
The chariot turns into formation at the very base of the Training Centre, aligning itself perfectly alongside the District 11 Tributes. The male one, the morphling, bends over the side, his bloodless lips lifting into a smile as he offers a hand toward our horse. Above us is the balcony from which the opening address will be made; I can hear the excited crowd shushing and quieting. For a few restless moments, nothing happens.
When President Thanos steps up to the microphone, he doesn't smile. He doesn't wave or greet his audience in any way. He spares not a glance for the twenty-four Tributes lined up for slaughter beneath him. When I first found myself here, his demeanour frightened me. Now, I've rather become used to it.
Which is a really scary thought.
"Today," the President begins and the words drop like stones on my shoulders, "we welcome our Tributes and the esteemed citizens of the Capitol to the opening of the third Quarter Quell; the seventy-fifth annual Hunger Games.
"The Hunger Games may be a time, in many ways, for celebration. We now mark the seventy-fifth anniversary of the success of the Capitol. However, these Games also serve as a reminder and a tale of caution. In the Dark Days, in the name of a terrible struggle between the Capitol and the rebellious District Thirteen, good men, women and children lost their lives…needlessly," Thanos rasps with the tiniest quirk of the lips.
"However, as violently and ruthlessly as the rebels of the Districts fought, they had no real—conviction in their cause and were thus ultimately crushed. As a doctor would remove an infected limb, so the Capitol destroyed what was left of District Thirteen. And now, every year, twenty-four brave Tributes are gathered to represent their Districts and the final lingering message of that bleak time."
Here, his white hands curl ominously around the stem of his microphone, "And this year, twenty-four Victors are gathered to further hammer home this message, to the Districts, to the people, to our children: the fruit borne of war will taste bitter on the tongue and churn the stomach. The will of the Capitol, however," and his thin arms outstretch, as he makes his final proclamation, "promises prosperity. To turn against it is to deny oneself the tree of life."
The audience goes wild. Proud, Thanos now turns his pale eyes down to the row of chariots below.
"Brave Tributes—our Victors—the children of Panem will one day thank you for your sacrifices in the coming weeks," his mouth, plump and purple in the harsh light, is grinning now, "Remember this. And may the odds be ever in your favour."
Above the whoops around us comes the order to bring the chariots into the Training Centre. I'm jerked as the horse trots eagerly behind District 11's chariot and can hardly gather my bearings again before the heavy metal door is clunking shut behind us and the outside world locked away.
Phil, Maria and Chester Phillips are all waiting for us, ready to express pleasure at our performances. Romanoff doesn't immediately vanish this time; instead she stands to my right and attempts to scrub the filth off of her breast with the heel of her hand. She comments on how stubborn the stuff is before smirking when she notices how red I've become.
"God, Rogers, you're such an innocent," she chuckles. I open my mouth to retort but my chance is robbed by another amused voice, "Can you blame the guy, Nat?"
The District 10 Tribute—Barton?—is behind us, looking fairly smug for a man with a cowbell around his neck. He looks to be around thirty years old, a head shorter than me with sandy hair and a handsome face. He's clearly on good terms with Romanoff, whose smile warms at the sight of him.
Uncertain, I stick out a hand, "Um, hi, I'm Steve—"
"Rogers, I know," he says, shaking my hand firmly, "Clint Barton. You've already got the rest of us talking."
"I do?"
"Mmm-hmm. Everyone's wondering about—"
A Capitol attendant abruptly bursts into our circle, clearly flustered, "Right—all of you—have to get to the elevators NOW, and no arguing, I've got enough of that from him—"
"I thought we were getting along," Stark, behind her, is grumbling before leaping back as the attendant aims a smack at him, "Fine, fine, but I get the elevator with Captain Hotpants and No-Pants."
It takes a guffaw from Phillips and a subtle push from Maria before I realize that I'm Captain Hotpants.
I wind up crammed at the back of the elevator with Stark, Romanoff, Clint Barton and the sullen-faced District 6 Tributes. Every pair of Tributes gets their own floor in the Training Centre in which to live during their time in the Capitol; this means that Romanoff and I have Floor 12, the penthouse. Stark spends much of the ride up to Floor 3 lamenting his stylist's choices (in much more colourful language) and admiring the effects that ours had ("Your chariot was on fire. By which I mean literally. By which I mean that you guys were hot."). Once he's gone, Romanoff and Barton take up a quiet conversation and I'm left in awkward silence with the District 6 Tributes.
The female is a tall, unwelcoming sort of woman with a pointed chin, a long sheet of black hair and eyes like trees in winter. Her white arms are folded over her chest and she acknowledges no-one, not even her partner, who looks so like her that I do a double take: the same pale skin, the same black hair, the same cruel twist of the mouth. His eyes, when I catch them, are green, however; a forest, like his partner's, but one in the thick of summer.
"Hello," I greet him. He doesn't reply. The only reaction that my speaking garners is from Romanoff and Barton, who stare at me.
Unnerved, I opt to try again, "My name's—"
A shrill bleeping swallows my words and the doors slide open on Floor 6. The District 6 Tributes, without so much as a glance, step out and the doors pull shut again.
"Don't bother," Romanoff tells me, "I get that you're nice and all, but Loki and Laufey aren't the friend-making type."
"Oh," is all I can think of saying. Feeling distinctly chastised, I lean back against the wall. After a moment of silence, I add, "They sure look alike. Does everyone in District Six look like that?"
It's an innocent question but, when Romanoff rolls her eyes and Barton laughs, I'm glad I didn't think to ask it in the presence of the Tributes.
"Don't generalize," Barton advises me, still smiling, "You'll get a punch off anyone from District Six if you suggest they're the norm there. Laufey is Loki's mother."
This stuns me into a horrified silence for long enough that we reach Floor 10 and Barton leaves us with a lazy wave. Nearer our floor, I finally splutter, "But—b-but how?"
"They both were Victors," Romanoff says easily and without looking at me, "and both got Reaped."
"No-one else Volunteered?"
Romanoff scoffs, "Who in their right mind—except the goat-brained Careers—would want to do this twice?"
That night, curled up on slippery soft sheets, I dream of the Hunger Games and of my mother. She stands in a snow drift with frightened eyes and a spear clutched in cold gnarled hands. I run to her—am I attacking or rescuing?—I run to her with her name peeling the insides of my mouth but she blows away like a snowflake before I can reach her.
I wake up again as I have done every night for months now: the mountain looms out of my subconscious and I fall. When I jerk upright with a yelp, an Avox appears at the door within a minute.
Avoxes have never made me particularly comfortable—the idea of a person, tongue removed and forced into servitude, having to wait on you hand and foot would probably make anyone squirm. This one is unfamiliar, a pretty one, with brown curls and big eyes, and she hands me a glass of water without my having asked.
"How did—um," I hesitate. I'm not really supposed to speak to Avoxes but this one has an unusually understanding expression. "I had a nightmare."
The Avox nods twice and then presses gently at my wrist to guide the glass to my lips. She must have seen and felt things unlike anything I can imagine. I guess it's ridiculous to expect that an Avox wouldn't recognize a nightmare when they see one.
Training starts the next day. At breakfast, Phillips instructs us to scope out possible allies—"Everyone knows what everyone else can do; pick right and they'll give you an edge,"—and, in private, orders me not to do anything involving strength in front of the other Tributes.
"In your last Games, you were a weakling," he deadpans, "who couldn't even handle a weapon. Now you're…" he gestures at my chest, "more than that. You're stronger, but they don't know how strong. Save all the showing-off for your session with the Gamemakers."
"Then how do I find an ally?" I protest. Phillips arches an eyebrow at me.
"These people are smart, Rogers, and understand the Games as well as you. They won't just be looking for muscle."
That's how, on my first day of training, I find myself loitering around the plant-identification stand learning about berries rather than swinging hammers like Thor or twirling knives like the beefy District 2 girl, Niko. I'm surprised to find that I'm not alone; Bruce Banner, a soft-spoken older man, peers at the leaves of the nightlock plant alongside me.
"I'm not too worried about weapons and things like that," he admits when I probe, "Most tributes die because they can't reach food or water; this is the important stuff."
He's so shy and sweet that it takes me a long time to place him. Bruce Banner won the Hunger Games twenty years ago, when the arena was kept in perfect darkness for the entirety and the Tributes were observed through sickly night vision. Only three days in, Bruce seemed to go berserk and tore apart anything that he found in his path. When he was lifted out, he thought he'd been gone for years.
"I didn't recognize you without all the, you know, green," I tell him and he snickers.
We spend some time there before moving as one to the camouflage station, where the instructor and the woman from District 11 are showing the morphling and Bruce's dark-haired partner, Betty, how to paint oneself to blend in with tree bark. From the corner of my eyes, I watch Romanoff climbing the black netting on the side of the training room with a blade clenched between her teeth; Barton is examining the bow and arrows, which are metallic and lethal; Allegra, from District 3, runs her sword through a dummy's head while Tony ambles around the different stations; Sif and the District 2 boy, Kallikrates, look at the weapons rack together; the District 8 teenagers, whose names I've learnt are Peter and Gwen, remain inseparable; Laufey is nowhere to be seen but Loki is now at the plant-identification station, standing with—of all people—Thor, who appears to be having as much luck drawing him into conversation as I did.
I heave a sigh and turn back to Bruce, who has his head craned up.
"Look," he says, "The overlords are watching."
The overlords are the Gamemakers, who will rate each Tribute on their skillset and then control what happens in the arena. Only two of the smartly dressed Capitol men have their gazes on us; the rest are bickering over a banquet table, laden with enough meat and bread to keep District 12 alive for months.
Heimdall is the Head Gamemaker and observes the room before him with a carefully blank expression. He has been Head Gamemaker for as long as I can remember and it is said that his golden eyes can see everything; that he has had some secret procedure that keeps him from ageing and he will always see what is happening. He is a stoic but fair man and probably the ideal man to have controlling the deaths of twenty-three people.
The other, Johann Schmidt, an especially grave and intimidating man, has his eyes fastened on me. When he finds me looking, his eyes flash with something dark and primal, something like that which haunts the eyes of every person in District 12: hunger. With that sight fixed on me, I suddenly feel like the stuffed pig Schmidt's colleagues argue over; and Johann Schmidt would like nothing more than to devour me.