PSST! Illuin's doing a SYOT. Submit. Go on. It'll be great.

Apologies for a technical inaccuracy: Capillo's eyes aren't actually greenish brown, they are reddish-purple. I think I must have confused them with someone else. Sorry.

District Seven

Virginia opened her mouth to greet her mother but was arrested by a stinging slap across the face. Shocked and hurt, she felt tears welling up in her eyes.

"Why?" Her mother yelled. "Why?!"

That was it. Emma must have told on her.

"Doesn't make any difference now," she muttered.

"What on earth made you take tesserae for that girl? After everything we told you about being safe and not getting yourself Reaped! You've betrayed us Virginia, you've broken our trust and faith in you. We expected you to be sensible and keep safe!"

Virginia, slighted at the affront, became indignant.

"I can't just go on living in a little bubble and ignoring everything! Besides, it was just tessera for one person, big deal! Tessera was the sensible thing, it barely made a difference to the risk. It was worth it, ok? So stop yelling at me- and don't call me Virginia!"

Her mother sighed, as if exhausted. "Was it worth my daughter- my daughter being Reaped?"

Virginia looked down at the floor and played with her sleeves, pulling them over her hands. "It might have happened anyway," she said, though she couldn't keep the doubt from it.

Ethan and Bryan slipped in, holding glasses of water from the dispenser in the corridor. Virginia's father followed them, as if they had needed escorting. But in this day and age, walking- or worse, wandering around the Justice Building was a suspicious activity.

They stood against the wall, sipping tiny gulps at a time, eyes never leaving their gaze off the floor.

Eventually, they broke the pretence and ran up to Virginia and hugged her, ignoring the plastic cups spilling where they had been dropped on the floor.

"Hey Squirt," Ethan said gently. "Think of us if there are any trees in the arena, k?"

Virginia laughed shakily. "I'll be thinking of you guys anyway."

"Do us proud, Squirt." Ethan gulped. "Seven Pride, right?"

"Yeah, go Team Lumber! Woo!" Her brothers smiled at her sarcasm, so reminiscent of her old self.

Virginia felt the smooth weight of her birthday present as her father pressed it into her palm. (Birthday present? Oh my god she's Gollum! No, just kidding.)

She looked down at the small, blue glass marble. Who could guess how long her family had saved to get it for her all those years ago.

She looked at the V scratched into its surface.

V for Virginia.

Virginia: Blue glass marble, carved with initial


Savan had not stopped crying since the woman had pulled his name at the Reaping. Nonna sighed and hugged him, rocking him gently.

"Why did it have to be me?"

"It'll be OK, kid," Savan's father wiped his damp forehead with a handkerchief. "We'll sponsor you."

"Really?"

"Sure. We'll get you what you need and then in the Games you just have to stay out of the way until you come home." He did not want to add that even if he sold their house he would not be able to afford more than a stale sandwich for Savan. And not even a BLT sandwich at that.

"Here. Your mother gave this to me when we married. Now it is yours. Don't forget that she died so that you could be born. Now you can live to remember her."

Savan wiped his eyes and cursed his luck. At least his father promising to sponsor him made him feel slightly better.

Savan: a silver locket with a picture of his mother inside


District Six

"OhmygodOhmygod you are actually going into the Hunger Games!" His mother went into fangirl meltdown, jumping up and down and flapping her hands.

"Write to us!" His father said excitedly. "Tell us all about it! The Capitol, the train, training, the parade- omg, the parade! You must tell us everything!"

Capillo sighed. They were happy, at least. He wished he could say the same for himself.

"We'll totally sponsor you!"

"Yes! Sweetykins, you must mention us in your interview! Then, we'd be like, famous!" She fangirl squealed.

"Anything else?"

"Not that we can think of. We'll let you know if there's anything more."

Inside, Capillo was hurt. Anything else meant do you love me, would you miss me, would you cry if I died? But, as usual, his parents though only of the Games. He may as well have been dead already.

Maybe he had never even really been alive, to them.

Capillo: his inhaler


District Five

Iresse's mother, Anaire Nolofinwean, fought back tears as she knew they would irritate her daughter.

"I love you, Iresse. And we'll all miss you very much."

"I should bloody well hope so. I've been living with you the last fourteen years. I'd be quite miffed if I died and you didn't care."

"Come back to us."

"Sure I will, technically. But in one piece or two? Maybe I'll come back as little crumbs in a bag. Maybe I'll just be a little pile of ashes and you'll scatter me over a lawn and then the wind will blow and I'll go everywhere, in your eyes and up your noses."

"As in life, so in death."

"You said it Finde."

"You'll win, I'm sure."

"Yeah, right. You're just saying that to make me feel better. Whatever. I'm probably going to die." She shrugged it off, nibbling her nails.

Her brother Turu, although used to his little sister's unusual outlook on life, was surprised. "You seem cool with it."

She pulled a face. "I live in a world filled with idiots. I will be going to the Capitol, which has even more idiots, only slightly richer ones. Then I will enter a teenage death match, with 23 teenage idiots. Someone will be such an idiot they'll kill me. If there is life after death, I hope it will be more slightly more intelligent than the idiocy of the living. Seriously, if brains were gunpowder the Rebellion would have lasted approximately sixteen minutes and the Dark Days would be better known as the Slightly Dim Lunchtime."

"But don't you care? At all?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You kidding me? If you fed tributes on the number of f***s I give, it really would be the Hunger Games."

Sigh. There's sad goodbyes... and then there is Iresse. While other tributes wept and lamented their misfortune, clinging to lost hopes, she flopped around in the Justice Building, counting windows, swearing at secretaries and wondering what was for dinner.

Iresse: a watch (functional, not pretty. 'Cause, you know, when you're in the Hunger Games and have less than a week to live, you'll want to know the time.)


"Good luck kid" His father patted him awkwardly on the shoulder.

"Thanks," Xavier said, unsmiling. His father sighed, then sat down beside him.

"I know we've never really been close and I really should have spent more time with you, but you are the best son I could have asked for."

Xavier tried to think of something to say. Almost as if the words had been put there, he said: "And you're the best dad I could have asked for."

His mother began to weep, wrapping her arms around him. Xavier found himself growing suddenly, very sad that he would never see them again combined with relief that at at last he had been able to say exactly the right thing.

At least in the arena there wouldn't be much time for socialising.

Xavier: n/a


"I can't believe it!" Charlotte made herself squeal with excitement. "I am actually going into the Hunger Games!"

Her brothers looked at her in a mixture of awe and incredulity.

"What made you volunteer?"

"I don't know." She blushed. "I guess- well, you only live once, you know?"

"And you're going to win, right?"

"Of course!"

"Charlotte Stillwater- our little victor!" Her parents looked on her with pride, a faint tinge of worry in their faces.

"'Bout time. District Four hasn't had a victor for like, ages."

Charlotte shrugged. "Hey, never mind the past. Whatever we did, we're still a Career District. Can't be all that bad, can it?"

"I'm sure you'll do great!" Her brothers' smiles, looked a bit more forced now. "Don't forget your token!"

Charlotte smiled, reaching for the silver trident made of tin foil. "Thanks for making it, Steve."

"It's ok. Just remember what it means, ok?"

Her smile grew wider. "It means I must always play to my strengths."

Charlotte: tin foil trident


"So you're really going into the Hunger Games?" His little brother looked up at him, eyes wide and shocked.

" 'fraid so, Nep." Nep's eyes rapidly filled with tears.

"That's horrible!"

He shrugged. "That's the way the cookie crumbles" he said broodingly. He'd been brooding ever since his name had been called.

His father came into the room, swigging from a nearly empty bottle of scotch. He grunted at Damian who returned the greeting with a scowl.

"You're to look after him, you hear?"

"Huh?"

Still holding onto his little brother's hand, Damian drew himself up to his full height. "You have to take care of Nep, understand? He's your son, not that bloody bottle!"

His father clenched his fists aggressively. "Don't you tell me what to do."

"Mom would agree with me. She died when Nep was born, when you neglect him you spit on her grave!"

His father leapt at him, bottle in hand.

"Stop it!" They turned. Nep pushed himself between them. "Stop fighting!"

Damian nodded. "Ok, Nep. For you."

Scoffing at them, his father smashed his bottle into a wastepaper bin.

Nep's eyes didn't leave Damian's face. "You will win, won't you."

Damian swallowed. "I'll try."

His father snorted. "Yeah, he'll try."

"Shut it!" Damian shouted at him.

Nep ignored his father and fumbled in his pocket for something.

"I found this on the beach."

It was an aqua blue ring, a little worn from the waves but quite pretty. It was quite a feminine piece of jewellery and a little tight around Damian's finger, but he was past caring.

"Thanks, Nep."

Damian: aqua blue ring


"I need to tell you." Leigh took a big breath. Shayen almost forgot her fear and anxiety in her curiosity. "What?"

"I love you" she said in a rush. Then she breathed out, not quite able to look Shayen in the eye.

"I was going to tell you before the Reaping" she said. "But- I didn't make it. But I had to telll you now- just in case- you know-"

Shayen did know. She had already gone through about fifty worse case scenarios in her head.

"Thanks for telling me," she said, pushing her glasses nervously up her nose. "You know my answer already but- thanks."

Leigh beamed at her. "Come back, ok?"

"I'll do my best."

Leigh winked at her, careful not to disturb her welling tears. "Oh and tell your District partner that if he even thinks about hurting you, I shall castrate him with a blunt pair of tweezers."

Shayen laughed nervously. "Thanks, Swid. I feel safer already."

Her friend looked at the clock. "Your parents will be here in a minute."

"Right. Don't worry, I won't tell them."

"Thanks." Looking a little relieved, even in her grief, Leigh made for the door but was stopped by Shayen who wrapped her in a hug. Unable to contain her sorrow any more, Leigh let her tears flow freely in Shayen's hair.

Shayen thought of what Leigh had said to her as she stepped onto the train but stopped when she realised something.

"Bum" she said to herself. "Forgot my token. Dammit. Today has been such an illogical day, it's been really quite awful."

Shayen: n/a