The Timetrade

Authors Notes: SYOT is still open! I need more tributes! Especially Careers. This is the reason why I haven't been able to write much about them.

Special Announcement: A new story is in the works and I am taking submissions. I won't post an official chapter for a while, so the readers of this story get first dibs...see the end of the chapter (and my profile) for details.

There is also a new poll on my profile. Go vote if you are so inclined.

Chapter Four: Echoes

The dense fog over the arena dispersed when Capitol's anthem and that day's death count were announced. The sky, for just five or six minutes, shone a perfectly dark indigo hue spotted with tiny white specks of stars. The holographic image of the day's three meager victims hovered above their heads - an older boy from Five, and two young girls from Eleven and Twelve. Their young faces, impeccably groomed and styled modestly, were a far cry from the biannual casualty announcements that peppered their future.

Jeanne remembered when she heard her parents' names called out in the roughly constructed town square of her hometown, the place once called District 4. She had been considered one of the lucky ones - they had been able to give her the slightly warped remains of her father's dog tags. Most never even had that small comfort. The incendiary bombs usually wiped all traces of those caught in the blast into oblivion.

Other times, soldiers made it off the battlefield only to die of blood loss, festering wounds and infections, or disease in the emptied remains of a building used as a hospital. Jeanne had seen the twisted, bleeding faces of children as young as these tributes and lied to their faces, telling them that they weren't going to die. She didn't remember every single one she had seen, even if she had promised them on their deathbed that she would never forget them.

Even though those three tributes had died, she felt oddly distant like the day her older sister tried to explain to her that their parents had passed on and were now resting in Heaven. For Jeanne, not seeing those bodies meant something substantial. She spared a moment to clutch at the half rusted dog tags in an inner pocket of her coat before returning to her duty of distributing their limited water supply to everyone present.

The anthem's tune rang clearly through their ears, dying away after the stream of images faded. The fog began to roll back into the air just minutes later with droplets of moisture clinging to their skin, teasing their parched mouths.

"Uwah, it's so pretty!" Azure cried out softly, pointing to the stars and the blistering white moon that hung in the sky.

"I don't remember the last time I saw it like this!" Fianna gaped.

Jeanne turned her head to the sky. Now that the holograms were gone, all of the navigators present had stopped to gaze at the perfectly whole ceiling of blue above their heads. They continued staring at that sight until it faded before their eyes, as if they half believed that it would disappear in an instant and such a thing was too good to be true.

When she returned to the reality set in front of them, she handed the two tributes from District 7 the canteen of water that they were passing around. The boy accepted it, gratefulness clear in his low voice, but he handed it to the girl, Charlotte, before he took a drink for himself.

"Ladies first," he said half-jokingly. Jeanne took a seat on the ground in front of them, tucking her legs close to her chest as everyone around them began to settle down. The two district partners turned to her, seemingly looking at her as if she would bite them if they asked her a question.

"What," she muttered with a sharp yawn that she tried to muffle behind her hand. She jolted upon feeling a sharp jab at her side, only to discover that it was Danix trying to get comfortable behind her. With a playful shove, she shifted around until she was sitting closer to Charlotte, the girl with light brown hair tied into a ponytail.

The girl's quiet breath fluttered as she asked, "Is your sky really so different from ours?"

"About your...world's...sky, you said it was 'fracturing'. What does it look like?" Dominick followed up, leaning forward, genuine curiosity in his tone.

Jeanne blinked slowly at their questions, shifting her gaze to watch her comrades try to find decent spots to sleep. Leah was at the far end of their tiny alcove, since she had the first watch with Danix. Fianna was trying to clean Amara's wounded arm with the limited amount of water that they had access to at the moment. All Jeanne could hear from them were the occasional quiet hisses of pain.

"It's odd, even for us," she said in a voice that could pass for a whisper. "I remember when the sky was whole; it looked just like the one you have here. But now, it looks like a sheet of broken glass - there's nothing but black behind it. They call it the Void."

Azure and Fionn were sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, Fionn's pure white hair obscured by the shadow of the blanket tossed over his head. As far as Jeanne could tell, Azure was already fast asleep, his head resting on Fionn's shoulder.

Jeanne shifted her weight on the bumpy floor. "What about you two?" she asked quietly. "What does your home look like?"

"What does it matter? It's not like we're ever going to be able to go back," Charlotte said, though not in the most caustic manner. Her voice was bitter, sure, but Jeanne heard the uncertainty hidden behind the biting words. She smiled despite herself.

"Where you come from matters," she replied, thinking of how just a few hours ago Etaín had told them the same thing. "Even if it's not paradise, you must have some good memories of it. It's good to think about sometimes even if it makes you sad."

The other two were quiet for a moment. By this time, Fianna had done all she could for Amara's arm. Leaving the silent girl to her own musings, Fianna retreated to her brother's side, curling up so that he was stuck between her and Azure.

"You guys can't go back to your own time, can you," Dominick stated. Though it was hard for Jeanne to make out his features in the dark, she could hear the realization dawn upon him as he spoke. There was something else in his voice, too, something darker and sympathetic. "Even though you say that your home is so terrible, you speak of it fondly."

Jeanne sighed, leaning against the tree at her back. She opened her eyes and could almost see the lively fish market where she once lived and roamed as a child. The sea, a deep blue that was almost black in color, had still produced fish until just a few years ago. She still remembered the salty tang of the seawater and the pungent smell of fish in the air.

"What did District 7 specialize in?" Jeanne asked at last. "I don't quite remember."

"Wood," Charlotte provided, "nothing but wood and carpentry. Seven is pretty big because of the forest."

"What do you do for jobs?" Jeanne wondered aloud. There were still trees in the future, of course, but the need for an entire District dedicated to lumber had fallen away after a few decades of deforestation. Even District 4, which had long since been populated by fishermen, had been forced to find other work after the seas became leeched in black.

"Many of us just help cut the trees down or process them for shipment. My old job was to help chop them down," Dominick said. His voice, though, was strained. Maybe the hardship of their lives was simply too close in the past for them to look back on those years fondly, Jeanne considered. "It's hard work. But I had to do it because I have a lot of siblings."

"And I made flutes and little trinkets out of spare wood," Charlotte said. "They don't sell for much, but it's just me back home so it's not like I had a choice when I was younger and couldn't do any other work."

"You can make such a thing out of wood?" Jeanne said curiously. The only instruments she had ever seen were metal whistles and the silver stringed device that a friend of Kleitos and Kallias always carried around.

Charlotte nodded her head. "It takes practice, of course."

"I always liked the ones you made," Dominick said wistfully. Jeanne could imagine him smiling to himself in the dark. He seemed to be the type who naturally smiled at any time like Fionn and Azure, except his fair smiles were more convincing than her friends'. What secrets were hiding beneath that facade were unknown to her, but Jeanne was never one to pry, and so she left the matter alone and let him talk. "I know someone who bought one. She plays it often during lunch break at school. It's a little..."

"Rough of a tune," Charlotte filled in. "I know. But without better wood I can't get rid of that sound..."

"But I like it," Dominick persisted. "It gives it a little life. I wouldn't like it as much if it didn't have that whistle. If not, it'd just sound like something from the Capitol."

Jeanne listened to them chatter softly to each other until she was drifting off to sleep. It reminded her of the nights she spent with her siblings, all four of them crammed into the small bedroom of their rickety home. Her older and brother would always mutter to each other in the dark like Dominick and Charlotte were, talking about meaningless things and teasing each other gently.

That night, she dreamed of the ocean.

Rowan knew that their tentative alliance wouldn't last for long. It was comprised mostly of Careers and the tributes from the other Districts who they saw fit to threaten into compliance. With the fog this thick and the very likely chance that the Careers would turn on them the second those strangers calling themselves time travelers were out of the picture, most of the tributes from the outer Districts had already fled or died trying.

Rowan felt the pull of sleep tugging at his body, but forced himself to stay awake as he and the District 3 boy crept away from the clearing where the Careers had set up camp. The last embers of the fire they had started crackled weakly in the fog, wisps of dark smoke disappearing into the night.

Behind them, Kalypso had grabbed one of the backpacks they took from the Cornucopia and shoved it in their direction without meeting Rowan's eyes. He nodded gratefully at her, ignoring how Braylon, the fifteen-year-old District 3 boy, skittishly inched away from her. Rowan's hands brushed hers for just a moment as he took the backpack and he could just barely see the coldness of her blue eyes by the dying light of the fire.

"I'll say I fell asleep and you slipped away," she said in a near silent whisper.

Rowan had to ask, "Why?"

She was quiet for a moment, but unlike most girls Rowan had ever known, she didn't give off a sense of vulnerability standing alone with her back to the other Careers. Even though she was letting them leave, her eyes were still the same cold blue as when he first met her in the training center. Her strong back was still and straight. She was just the type of person Rowan had always hated - even he had been fooled by her innocent act until she snapped at one of the younger District 12 tributes who got in her way on the second day of training.

He had been prepared to stay far away from her, silently hating her like all the other Careers who relished in the thought of murder, if not for that night he found her crying by herself.

They were all just the Capitol's pawns, he realized that night. Even Kalypso, who cried because she felt as if she had to win the Games but was just realizing how hard that would be, was just another one of their pawns.

And then the Gamemakers threw this extra element into the Games - kill all of the time travelers or else all of them would perish and there wouldn't be a Victor this year - and suddenly Rowan found himself following Kalypso and her Career pack.

"The other Careers wanted to kill you guys in your sleep when the shifts changed. But that's no fun at all," Kalypso replied at last, a cruel smile alighting on her lips. Rowan didn't flinch, even though Braylon was mumbling about leaving before she pulled out a dagger and stabbed them in the throat. "It'll be a pretty boring Game if we just bashed your heads in while you were sleeping. So go, before the others wake up."

"Thanks," Rowan said with a nod, maintaining eye contact with her for as long as he was able to before the darkness of the night concealed her from his sight. Soon he and Braylon were running at an even pace, careful not to make too much of a ruckus. There were still two other tributes from the outer Districts with the Career pack, but there wasn't much they could do for them now.

They were running for a little bit when Braylon finally spoke. "You seem like a smart guy. You can't tell me that you really trust her though, right? I mean, did you even see that smile? It looked like she wanted to rip us open and eat our innards. She's pretty, but I don't think that's exactly worth it."

Rowan shook his head and shifted the backpack from one shoulder to the other. "She's not the most pleasant person," he agreed, "but Careers are human, too. Just like us. In any other world do you think they would all be psychopathic murders? In the end..."

In the end it's all the Capitol's fault, was what he wanted to say but knew he could not, for fear of the Gamemakers bombarding them with mutts or natural disasters in retribution for speaking out against them. Braylon looked unconvinced, but said nothing in return.

He never thought that he'd be saying something to defend the Careers. Maybe the Games really were making him go insane. He wondered what everyone back home thought of him now - were they confused? Angry?

He knew that he would never know the answer. And strangely, he was alright with it.

Kallias had once gone a week straight with most of his body coated in the blood of his comrades who had been blown to bits beside him or died of blood loss while writhing in his arms. Past experience told him that if he didn't get this giant cat blood off his arms before the night was over, he would be practically dyed in the stuff for the rest of the Games. It smelled terrible no matter how many times he was exposed to it and to top it all off, it made him look like a psychopath.

He was crouched over a shallow pool of half-stagnant water with Kleitos standing next to him with his arms crossed impatiently. He was completely opposed to the idea, as being near any water source put them at risk for being spotted by the Capitol's cameras, but Kallias had been adamant about cleaning himself. He was not about to be stuck smelling like a rotting chunk of meat for the rest of the mission.

The water smelled of plants and mold, but Kallias just held his breath and tried to clean as much of the blood, fur, and bones away as possible. Neither of them spoke, not willing to risk causing extra noise in case the Gamemakers altered the effects of the silencing fog.

The horde of gigantic cat mutts that had been chasing them either fell to their deaths in the deep bog they left behind about two miles to the west or were killed by Kleitos and Kallias. The battle had been long and hard; Kleitos had received a shallow cut on his thigh that wouldn't stop bleeding and Kallias could practically hear his muscles scream as he repeatedly blocked the big cats' powerful blows.

Kallias looked upwards, but the sky was dark and grey with clouds and fog. He could barely make out Kleitos's form against the darkness. They had tried to dress the wound, but it had been getting dark by the time they managed to find a safe zone, away from the Gamemaker's cameras.

"How's your leg?" Kallias asked quietly. "I can try to..."

"No," Kleitos said shortly. He shifted his weight onto his injured leg and hissed quietly. "The water's not clean. It'll only make it worse."

Kallias nodded to himself and stood, shaking the loose droplets of water from his arms. He tried to concentrate on moving forward through the thick trunks of the swampland trees instead of the images of the past that flickered before his eyes.

The only smell worse than blood and rotting meat was the scent of an infected, festering wound. The smell of rotten flesh on a person who was still alive - Kallias knew that the dead limb would send poisonous blood to the rest of the body if it wasn't severed. He nearly vomited just thinking about it. He could almost taste the scent on his tongue, fresh and pungent.

"Kallias," said Kleitos sharply. His head snapped to attention immediately at the cold alarm in his partner's voice. That wasn't the voice of someone trying to snap him out of a flashback. It delved into a dangerous growl. "Someone's out there."

Kallias drew the dagger at his hip. The gun was there, too, but he knew that he couldn't use it here. He fell into a crouch, ready to kill another ten giant cats even though his body ached for rest if not the bliss of sleep.

"Who's there?" he called out slowly, just in case it wasn't a mutated lion in the bushes. However, he received no answer. Cautiously, making sure Kleitos was located behind and little to the side of him, he parted the bushes half expecting to see giant fangs the size of his forearm.

Instead, he found a girl crouched in the shadows, her eyes wide. She was small, but didn't look like the youngest in the Game, and she leapt to her feet immediately when she realized that her hiding place had been compromised. She had pale skin and her hair was in a bun, but he couldn't discern any other features in this lighting.

"I don't want to kill you," she said quickly, holding her weaponless hands up to show them. "Please believe me."

Kallias did not relax, even when he felt Kleitos lay a hand on his shoulder and try to pull him backwards. He wasn't stupid enough to try and work the blade out of his hand, though. The girl continued to stare at him imploringly. It wasn't that Kallias doubted her words - even if she did want to kill them it would be hard for her to win against the two of them while she was cornered.

"Remember our orders," Kleitos said lightly. "Save who you can."

The girl's face lit up. Kallias couldn't tell if it was a farce or not.

Kallias shook his head. "There's no one to enforce those orders anymore. And if we're to survive this thing..."

"We didn't come here to murder everyone in the arena," Kleitos said in a hard voice. Notably, he made no further move to stop Kallias. Not that he could, even though he was taller, especially with that injured leg.

"We have to get rid of them because they know now. They know what will change the future - if we kill the target and let the others go free, one of them can still make the time pieces! We didn't come here to eliminate one threat only to create another!"

Kallias breathed evenly, the grip on his dagger tight but not painfully so. He didn't stare the girl in the eyes.

"Kallias, stop it!"

"I don't have a choice," he said to himself. I don't have a choice.

Is that why I watched everyone I loved die? Is that why my friends' blood is on my hands?

Once, I would have done anything to kill my enemies. The Capitol - kill all of the Capitolites, those greedy, evil demons who steal all that lives and is dear to us - they told us that the Capitol was our enemy. If we didn't want them to kill us, we had to kill them. It was simple. I wasn't happy living like that, but I was alive and that was all that mattered.

But you gave me a choice. The only person in all the world who told me that there is more than one way to live - I'm sorry -

But I don't have a choice.

"I won't take any chances. We must make sure that future never comes to pass no matter what we have to sacrifice."

Sorry for the long delay! This chapter is a bit disjointed...I'm hoping to improve in the next one. I wrote the first part a while ago and when I went back to it, it was hard to pick up from that spot.

Special Announcement: I am planning a new story. Rest assured, it won't be posted until after The Timetrade is done and after it has been completed and edited. It's in the planning/character submission stage. Like this story, which had a limited amount of spots for the time travelers, this new story will have only seven slots open, so it can get competitive if enough people are interested.

The detailed rules (and they are weird rules...) are located on my profile page, like aways. PM me with questions and submissions (and you'll probably have some questions for me...I'll be surprised if you don't).

Basically, the story is about a group of ten who were raised by a Capitol scientist from childhood to be highly loyal soldiers. They were originally from the Districts, but grew up together and think of each other as siblings. They are loyal to the scientist who raised them, a woman named Astra Morrigan. As the rebels attack the Capitol (the events from the Mockingjay), Morrigan decides not to send them to battle and tells them to live. But the rebels, who have won the rebellion, find out about these ten "experiments" and have to decide what to do with these brainwashed kids.