There were literally days left until the Hunger Games.

She couldn't be more excited.

Astraia had never been a host before- but she had watched them all her life. They would come up on stage, shining pinnacles of fashion, and personally oversee the Reaping- personally take the tributes to the Capitol. It was a glitzy, famous job, and now her dreams were days away from realisation.

It was going to be so much fun! She wasn't too happy with the District she had been assigned(urgh, 5, the power people), but she was determined to make the best of it. After all, if she did a good job, she would be promoted; and her favourites, 1, 3, and 4, might even be a possibility for promotion!

Astraia was sat in front of a huge, wall-sized mirror, which incidentally covered her whole wall. It let her have room to try out her multitudes of wardrobe ideas, as well as room to try new makeup techniques.

Hosts always had to be well turned-out, after all, and she wouldn't recieve a personal stylist until after she got back to the Capitol- she had to make herself look as good as possible for the Reaping without a stylist's help. Tomorrow she was to pack and head for the Training Centre to recieve her full briefing on what to do at the District- leaving her just today to finalise wardrobe choice.

She carefully placed a lipstick vertically against her lips, and slowly dragged down, leaving a bright, waxy stripe of teal next to the existing shades of green on her lips. She lowered the stick onto her expansive cosmetics table, smacked her striped lips appreciatively, then stepped back to admire her appearance across the wall-covering
mirror.

Green and blue themed her outfit- Astraia had seen District 5 on TV and knew how dull their colours were, and had decided she would impress them by being a beacon of everything their dull lives wasn't. And she would pick them up from their dull grey lives and bring them to the Capitol and turn them from just another district citizen into a
beautiful Capitolian.
Well. In looks. You can't change a District citizen's personality, there was a reason they had rebelled, and there was a reason they fought readily to the death each year.

When it came to her involvement to the tributes, Astraia really didn't want to spend any more time with them than necessary. The undisciplined districts might be incredibly uncivilised; they might even attack her. She just wanted the fame, not to associate with other districts. They were all dangerous and she was hoping that the benefits of fame would outweigh the drawbacks of having to deal with tributes.

And a benefit of fame was already showing itself; one of the reasons Astraia was getting her wardrobe finished off today was because of an exclusive interview and photoshoot- conducted by Cherry Haven herself.

It wasn't every day you got to be in the famous CHEW magazine.

The doorbell resonated across the room- her Avox answered the door as she quickly smoothed out her long, flowing aquamarine dress. She turned to see Cherry Haven and a young cameraman enter the room, and she smiled excitedly.

"Hi, Cherry!" She trilled, bouncing forward as quickly as her heels allowed her. Cherry Haven, the editor of CHEW magazine, the "sweet as a cherry" Cherry, gave a smile that showed off her perfectly applied paler and deep red lipstick and greeted Astraia in turn."

"Astraia Ryder! It's so nice to finally meet you, the newest District host, what a lovely apartment you have, do sit down, over here-"

Cherry led her through her own room to the large, luxuriant sofas- Astraia didn't really register Cherry leading her through her own home, or indeed the quick, vicious looks she kept sending her flustered cameraman, she was just overwhelmed by being in front of the most famous journalist in Panem- and she was about to interview her.

Cherry sat down carefully to avoid crumpling her beautiful long red dress, and adjusted her hat before starting the interview. The cameraman had already set up a little recording device in front of the two, and was now busying himself setting up his camera on a tripod, while Astraia's Avox dutifully set up the white photography background.

"So, Astraia, what's it like being a host for the very first time? Are you looking forward to it?"

Astraia smiled sweetly, almost unable to keep from bouncing in herseat. She was actually speaking to Cherry Haven.

"Oh, it's a dream come true- and on the Quarter Quell, no less! I've been spending days on my wardrobe, and I can't wait to get out there and show my district their new host!"

Cherry smiled encouragingly, throat sparkling with a thousand tiny gemstones studded on a neckpiece. Astraia found her eyes drawn to it as the journalist spoke, sending new shards of light in new directions as the gems moved.

"And what about the district you've been assigned- can you tell us which one you have?" Cherry said, tilting her head slightly. Her huge tiara-like red hat shifted slightly and she quickly righted it as she waited for Astraia's response.

"Oh, I have District 5 this year, Cherry- not really the one I wanted but oh well, I'll only be there a couple hours, right? Besides, it's what happens after the Reaping that's the exciting bit!" Astraia said, trying to keep her tone upbeat. She was really quite disappointed- she only hoped she could make a good enough impression that she would get District 1 or something more- civilised, perhaps?

...Was she supposed to tell Cherry her district?

Cherry made no indication whether she had been right or wrong in stating her knowledge of district assignments, but simply made another encouraging smile and led her to the photoshoot, making an irritated gesture at the cameraman to start. Astraia pointed for her Avox to leave the room and then started positioning herself for the photoshoot.

Flash

Astraia smiled beguilingly behind the layers of makeup as another bright light assailed her.

Oh yes.

This was the good bit.

Astraia wasn't a talker, or a writer, like Cherry; she was a poser, a model, there to be seen. She was doing something that would get her into the limelight- her days of being just another Capitolian were over.

Time to shine.


Thick sheafs of blue paper, lined with white, were piled neatly on the plyboard desk. Curling corners of the few loose sheets had been weighted down with a few misshapen lumps of glass, pencils laid very precisely next to the sheet closest to the front of the desk. In the bottom corner of the desk, a single corner was permitted to be messy- strange, bulbous guns, wires coated in colourful plastics, and piles of silicon-coated motherboards covered the single area of the office that was even close to messy.
And sitting in front of this desk, soldering a tiny wire to a tiny connection point, sat Crucis Wishart, the owner of the office.

He was a genius when it came to the design and development of weaponry. District 2 handled weaponry and thus had its own modest facilities; and in these facilities Crucis was undoubtedly (in his opinion anyway) the most accomplished. He had designed the pulse gun that was now standard issue to all Peacekeeper forces- he hadn't been acknowledged or paid for it, but he didn't need to be. He just enjoyed doing his job.

And he was only just 18, so the manager figured he could get away with not paying him.
He was weird enough that nobody wanted to encourage him to stay in the weaponry facility anyway.

Crucis had just finished soldering when he heard the yell from outside his small office.

"Why are there eyes in the goddamn microwave?!" Someone screamed. Crucis checked the clock on his wall boredly. Lunchtime. 1:23 to be precise.

"Put them back!" Crucis yelled in a far more measured, calm voice, before turning unconcernedly back to his work, expecting that the conversation would end at that.

It didn't, as the screaming man in question then burst into his office, waving a jar in the air furiously. Some circular objects could be seen rolling about through the glass.

"Wishart." He said in a show of controlled fury, staring daggers at the boy. "Why. Are there eyes. In the microwave."

Crucis looked up boredly, but not after carefully placing his work to one side and slowly raising his green-tinted goggles into his mop of sticky-up dark hair. Through this intense show of boredom, the man's eyes goggled from his skull and his face's shade deepened from crimson to purple.
Eventually, Crucis spoke.

"They are an experiment."

The man gave Crucis one long angry look, opened and shut his mouth like a fish, then slammed the jar of eyes onto his desk and left the room without a word.
Angry as he was, he wasn't going to mess with a Wishart.

The Wishart family was renowned for many things. Most of them were violent. A family run by the head of Distict 2 security, Venus Wishart, the children were known by name across the district and each by different monikers. 14-year-old Ivory was the Womaniser. 16-year-old Feral was the Sadist. So on and so on.

But Crucis, despite being the oldest child in a family of six other children, wasn't known for savagery, or strength, or any of the similar qualities bestowed among the children of the dictator-like figure heading the Wishart family.

He was generally known as "that odd one".

He wasn't a fighter, as proven by many, many unsuccessful training hours in the Wishart household. He held no interest in the Hunger Games, unlike his sister Feral- he was the weakest of his family despite being the oldest. Even his youngest sister, 6 year old Saffra, carried a machete to school and threatened to "shank" her school bullies.

But again, nobody was going to mess with a Wishart. Even the young one.s After all, everyone knew what had happened to their father when he had refused to raise his children as a pseudo-army.
The Wisharts didn't really talk about the circumstances of his death much. Suffice it to say that it was a horrible accident, that nobody would dare call anything else but a horrible accident.

But Crucis was that weak link in the Wishart army, and although Venus Wishart wanted obedience from her children at all times, there was a blind eye turned to Crucis' activities that didn't clash with family activities. He would escape to his sanctuary in the weapons manufacturing and design facilities, and after he had proven to be a genius with technology he had been given his own office- his liking of this small, private space could be seen by how oddly immaculate it was- for a disorganised person like he was, it was kept impossibly neat.

Crucis tired of soldering, placed the half-completed gun on top of an ever-increasing pile of electronics, and stood up to retrieve the jar of eyes.
He wouldn't say where he had gotten them from, but they weren't from an animal.

He crossed around to the other end of his desk, set down the jar of eyes- positioned a gun at one end. His fingers tapped a small rhythm against the barrel as he lined the sights up with a single milky sphere in the jar.

"With glass, microwave testing with human eye-"

He straightened, dragged his green-tinted goggles back down in front of his eyes, trailed a wire down to an electrical socket. He hadn't bothered with wiring it to a plug; electrical shocks were a little habit he had grown to enjoy, in a way, and he liked to give himself little thrills every so often.

"In three, two-"

He gave up with a countdown as he realised its futility with only himself in the room- he jammed the wire into the electrical socket, watching the propped-up bulbous gun barrel start to heat up, whine, emit an ever-higher pitch as it got ready to-

Bang

Crucis pulled the wire from the socket as glass shards and eyes scattered themselves across his desk, a sizeable scorch mark left where the gun barrel had blown itself apart. He tapped the wire against his knuckles erratically.
He would have to rewire that gun. Change a few components.

He made a few quick calculations in his head, then snatched up one of the now-displaced pens on his desk and scribbled something on his hand.

He would get these guns to stop blowing up eventually, he was sure.

Crucis was fairly trigger-happy. He enjoyed the feeling of holding the gun in his hand, aiming and firing- when he wasn't creating guns, he was shooting them, and when he had perfected a design, reworked it over and over until, like the pulse gun he had created months ago, he held in his hand a piece of work he was certain would work the way he wanted it to work every time-

Well, that was perfection.

He liked to be in control. With guns, with his office, with his own life. He controlled the first two- but his mother controlled that final part.

Maybe he would find a way to perfect that aspect of his life too.

He turned suddenly, train of thought angled onto another thing. He picked another gun up from his huge pile of electronics- this was his personal pulse gun, the original, that all others had been extrapolated from.

He kept it in perfect condition but made it look like it was a piece of unfinished junk. He liked it to be a private piece because then he had control of it.

He turned it over in his hands, admiring the handiwork. It had been his best design yet.

This was his control. This office, this gun, his designs.

It was as close to complete control as he would ever get in District 2.


Smoke and mirrors. That was the phrase, right?

Seneca stared into the smooth, perfect surface of the mirror, and behind the glassy surface Crane stared back.

He knew every year how dangerous his position was.

That was the price of power.

Seneca had once just been a tech guy. He had been where Lexus Valerian was now- head of technological research, working to revolutionise the Capitol and the Hunger Games.

He had done it a little too well, because here he was, Head Gamemaker, the second most prominent member of the political maelstrom that was Panem's ruling government.

Maelstrom in that nobody knew precisely how everything was going to happen but the President himself. Seneca, Demitri, all of the big players in this world- they were either willing puppets or reluctant puppets. The President was the sole puppeteer, and he alone knew what their movements were to be.

Seneca hated politics. He was a tech guy- you wouldn't ask Lexus Valerian to be President any more than you would ask him.

Not that either would ever become President. Seneca kept his suspicions to himself, but he reckoned Snow was going to keep presidency in the family after him; give the position to his granddaughter.
But that was neither here nor there. Another speculation for many years in the future.

Seneca made a soft humming noise, if only to fill the silence in his opulent home with ambient noise. He let the tone resonate around him and fade as he stared into his glassy counterpart's eyes- a clear, natural brown. He had never changed them.

Most of the technicians and governmental workers preferred to keep themselves looking as natural as possible, save a few minor, easily changed details- Seneca had even wondered himself if it was for more shady reasons than occasionally not wanting to be noticed in the streets.
Smoke and mirrors. Deception and intrigue. Keeping focus away from
the true person beneath.
Keeping focus away from the truth.

He was such an idiot. He suddenly swerved from the mirror, façade dropped, the true him showing beneath when nobody was watching.
He was just tired.

Every day started in fear of what was to come- every night he slept restlessly, fears of the correction facility looming in his mind as he turned over each possible error he had made that day.

He wondered if those fears would ever be realised; and if they might be realised sooner than he hoped. Seneca wasn't keeping up with the President. Every mistake he made would build up, and build up, until finally the President would-

No. He couldn't even think about it. He looked into the mirror again, stared at it for a long time. He watched the blood return to his pale cheeks.

He walked away.

Something snapped.

He pivoted wildly, took three quick, enraged paces to the mirror, and-

Crack

He stared at his balled-up fist as blood trickled from the cuts left by the glass shards. He gaped in shock at his hand, then at the mirror.

Shattered to pieces.

He mused in his numb, fear-stricken mind that it was a nice metaphor for himself.