A/N: Big news. I know, last chapter was up for… like 30 minutes?
This chapter, you're going to be reading the work of PeenissandClato, who has become just as much of an author of this story as I have. Applause, please!
Anyway, this will continue for the remainder of the Reapings- each tribute gets a chapter, and PeenissandClato will stop by often to write tributes in order to get these out faster.
Tell us what you think of Janos Sheenan, who was submitted by The Koala of Doom and is fourteen.
Janos Sheenan
District Seven Academy
May 19th, 11:36 A.M. Two days, twenty-two hours, twenty-four minutes from the Reaping.
"You see, when we chop birches, the wood tends to be more difficult. Work at a diagonal angle in order to do less work and still get the stuff we need to come out," Mrs. Montemayor said, gesturing at a piece of sample wood.
A stifled laugh came from the back of the room. Mrs. Montemayor had a clear idea of which of the snobs it was.
"That's what she said," Janos chuckled, bursting into fits of laughter and pointlessly flailing his arms. The majority of the class groaned; they had no interest with the fool. The exceptions were four girls, all of various sizes. She knew them by name; she'd given each detention numerous times.
But the true nuisance was always the Sheenan boy. He just didn't seem to understand that nobody except his small circle of corrupt schoolgirls thought of him as funny, or even vaguely amusing.
She was about to comment as a boy from the seat behind Janos swatted him with a stick that'd flown loose in the demonstration. Mrs. Montemayor turned a blind eye and continued to saw the wood while noting various wood-cutting techniques.
"I hope you're about done, Mrs. Montemayor. I'm boooooored," he howled with his friends laughing alongside him.
The woman stood erect with keen eyes, responding in the exact tone Janos had used. "Well, Mr. Sheenan. I hope you're about ready for detention. Because that's where you'll be for the next two days."
Seriously, were all of the kids here born without a sense of humor? Was he the only who could take a joke?
Janos had long discovered the kids' disapproval of him, but he doubted that he'd never get them to joke around with him.
Tommy Hilfiger, the boy who'd decided to jab Janos, had gotten a round of laughs by poking him. Poking him! He could do that! Maybe he'd bring a stick and jab Tommy the next day…
The bell escorted an embarrassed Janos out of school, all the way, he muttered in worst insults he could think of at Mrs. Montemayor and the absolutely boring people around him.
Idiots, Janos thought angrily. One of these days, I'll show them Janos Sheenan. While he was lost in his fantasy where all the dull kids around him bowed to his comedy, he almost didn't notice Thekla, a best friend of his, along the way home. Round Two.
"Hey Thek! What do you get when you mix a snowman and a vampire?" he burst, giving her one of his most convincing smiles.
Thekla rolled her eyes- she'd heard this before. "A frostbite, Janos, I know. I'll see you later," the girl muttered as she trudged through the muggy, pre-summer air.
Janos sighed himself. He'd strived to be the best at everything, yet he couldn't even get a laugh out of his friend. He had disappointed himself once again. Janos considered going for Rounds Three and Four with Jagusia and Adelyn, but decided against it. Odds were, he would be denied again.
It was pointless, anyway. His friends had left for Jagusia's for violin practice, but he'd decided not to come. Whenever Jagusia touched the wood instrument, Janos reminded himself of an annoying jester. It annoyed him how Jagusia was better than him at something; the girl was supposed to be a groupie, not a talented sidekick.
Instead, Janos's feet led him on the long trek back to his home, where his brother stood at the door with two tomahawks and a pleading grin on his face.
"Janos? Can we go get some wood? Please?" his younger brother, Reuven, pled with a puppy dog expression. He might've been twelve, but he still acted like a five-year old to get what he wanted. Janos, on the other hand, worked for himself. Kind of.
His forehead beaded with sweat from the walk, but the look in his eyes was undeniable. His brother had his charm, of course.
"Sure," he said lightly, picking up a tomahawk which felt like it weighed a ton and following his younger brother into the sparse forest.
Reuven babbled the entire way about his day, leaving Janos to plan how to get more wood than his brother.
He had always been this way. Competitive. He loved the thrill of victory and the rush that he got whenever he saw the face of the loser. Over the years, he'd become obsessed with victory and the adrenaline it brought.
Even his little brother would be crushed when Janos obliterated more trees.
Once they reached the lumberyard their parents worked at, Janos began to slice tree after tree. Reuven cut as many as he could, but as they both tired, it was clear Janos had taken more trees down. It'd been easy ever since he started picturing the wooden giants as some certain fellows at school. Who went by the name of Tommy Hilfiger.
"Woah…" Reuven murmured off-handedly. Janos stood proudly on a tree stump, glaring at any suspicious-looking trees that might get up and assault him in vengeance.
Reuven scratched his head as he glanced around. Between the two of them, eleven trees were cut it fifteen minutes, seven of which belonged to Janos.
"Nice job, Jay," Reuven said quietly. Janos's heart tinged with guilt, only for a moment, as he looked at his little brother. Reuven would get over it. Janos already had.
"You did alright," Janos replied as he grabbed pieces of wood in his hands, weighing them nonchalantly.
"Janos… you won't get reaped, will you?" his brother murmured with his big brown eyes staring into Janos's darker ones. "I don't know what I would do without my brother."
"Buddy, I'd never leave you. Even if I did get reaped, those tributes wouldn't know what hit them- I mean look at these trees!" he exclaimed gleefully. His brother remained worried behind him as Janos marched triumphantly. "Besides," he said without truly glancing back, "if I left, who would there be to crush you at everything?" he chuckled gaily.
Janos led the way home; his sulking brother followed quietly.
Janos was still too proud of his victory to stop and see his brother in tears.
Janos Sheenan
District Seven Town Square
May 22nd, 10:03 A.M. Three minutes into the Reaping.
Janos snickered as Princeton dug up the girls' slip, and for once, his posse didn't laugh along with him. They were all too tense to hear anything but the name of the soon-to-be-dead girl.
All their worries were for not, as it occurred.
A girl with pale skin and brown hair from the thirteen-year old section parted from the relieved teens; she was shaking like an aspen leaf. Her left hand instinctively moved to cover her right wrist.
It took a while for him to connect her face and wrist to her name, but Janos had seen the girl around town. She was the Fairmount girl, the one he'd heard rumors of. Rumor said they didn't feed her unless she worked obediently and politely. Judging by her frame, Janos could believe that.
The sympathetic cries of injustice rang out, but most were half-hearted, as they always were. It would be okay. This girl wasn't their child.
People were too pleased with their daughter, their wives, and their siblings coming home safely for another year.
Janos remained stoic while the girl scanned the crowd, silently daring somebody towards the front to do something.
Janos rolled his eyes; she was being the typical heroine. Boooooring.
Princeton was escorted… Ha. Princeton. The escort being escorted.
Princeton was led to the boys' bowl, where his slip-picking cane pulled the unlucky boy out. Janos had nothing to fear; he had exactly three slips; Reuven only had one. But at the last moment, where Princeton's cane raised to reveal the name of the dead boy, his mind slipped the thought in the smallest of voices.
What if?
And then, the name was called.
Janos was frozen in place as the Peacekeeper cried the two words that shattered his life into irreparable pieces.
"Janos Sheenan."