When Chevy Anderson is reaped for the Twenty-Eighth Annual Hunger Games, he knows his life is over.

District 6 is cursed. Everyone knows it. Twenty-seven arenas, fifty-four dead kids, a quarter century of loss and almost getting hopes up before seeing them dashed again. One bitter and useless mentor who still spends eleven months of the year in a prison cell before being released to mentor the next two dead kids walking. Nine years of making the top eight, three in the top four, one in the top two, and twelve empty houses in the Victor's Village.

The last district with no Victors. The laughingstock of Panem. Even 12 has a Victor, long dead but at least they have a name to read at the damn reaping.

Chevy is doomed.

Twice doomed, in fact. It's not just the district that's cursed, it's his own name. Five other boys named Chevy have already gone into the Games, including the monster voted into the Quell. He got his throat slashed open by Cora Shutter. The Twenty-First Chevy was bathing in a sparkling pool when it turned to acid, stripping the bones from his flesh. The Chevy in the Seventeenth tried to run from Boudicca. She caught him. The Thirteenth froze to death and the Fifth was torn to pieces by aquatic mutts in the live arena.

Five Chevys. All dead. Chevy Anderson knows them all. He kept hope before today that maybe the curse would pass him over. It was his last reaping. He only had twenty-one slips in the overflowing bowl. There are hundreds and hundreds of kids in the district with more slips than he has.

And then Ambrosia Butterfield sticks her hand into the reaping bowl and pulls out his name and Chevy walks up to the stage with the slow, shuffling trudge of the walking dead.

It just…it isn't fair, he tells himself in the Justice Building while he waits for his family to arrive. His district partner, a sallow fourteen year old named Jaina Smithers, is clearly already morphling dependent. She probably had dozens if not hundreds of tesserae because her parents spend all their money on hits. It's a common enough story. But he's not like that. He's never touched drugs in his life. He gets good marks in school. He has a girlfriend, and three little brothers, and parents who love him and each other, even a pet rat. They've never exactly been well off, but his dad works hard and he's passed his work ethic on to his sons. Chevy even has his first job lined up for after graduation. He's supposed to go to the depots, to get experience working maintenance for the trains. He's taken classes for it already. It's not as good as working on the hovercrafts, but it's a damn good job for someone just out of school. He was going to rescue his girlfriend from the drug ghettos. He was going to start a family.

It's not fair. But nothing in Panem is fair. It's just cursed. 6 is cursed. Chevy is cursed.

He locks himself in his room during the train ride to the Capitol. How he would have loved to get up close to one of these beauties yesterday, examine the mag-lev technology, pick over the thrusters, go up to the control cab and pester the engineer with questions. Ambrosia tells him to do it. The engineer is from 6 and very friendly.

But Chevy just locks himself in his cabin and refuses to come out. He doesn't want to eat the fancy Capitol feast laid out just to remind him that he should enjoy his last days. He doesn't want to have to listen to Jaina howl as the cravings shake her emaciated body. He doesn't want to get within grabbing distance of his mentor, a sour grey-haired woman who looked him over with a nasty leer and said the week might be more fun than she thought. And he doesn't want to watch the beautiful Careers step up to the stage and wonder which of them is going to be his murderer. All Chevy wants is to curl up and sob into his pillow and whisper his girl's name and cry for his mother and his dad and wonder if any of his friends from school will remember him beyond 'the sixth Chevy.'

It's the worst night of his life.

And then the sun breaks over the mountains and the train glides into the Capitol and things inexplicably start to get better.

Better, because unlike the other outlying districts, even more than some of the Careers, Chevy has a rabid, frothing, fanatical fan base.

Living in District 6, Chevy knows about gangs. But he's never seen anything like the mob that awaits him at the train station. The real heavy betters, the casinos, and the serious sponsors will avoid loyalty to any one district, watching the reapings with careful eyes and picking out the most likely prospects. But like any sport, the Hunger Games produces immense bases from the common rabble who are dedicated to their favored district.

And when it comes to 6, the last district without a Victor, 'dedicated' is a bit of an understatement. They call themselves the 'Sixatrons.' Mostly young and uneducated, they believed that District 6 has been discriminated against since the beginning of the Games. Any criticism, any perceived slight of their tributes is met with protests, riots, vandalism, and criminal mischief. There was an incident during the final interview of Virtus Manchetti that didn't quite get covered up, and everyone knows that several Sixatrons actually died. But it was at the end of the Twenty-Sixth, when the boy from 6 perished of thirst even as the arena burned around him and Emrys crawled out a Victor, that the Sixatrons burned down the official souvenier stands and trashed City Centre and attacked an official convoy. The junior Gamemaker involved barely escaped with his life. The Fighting-Fives, at first so ecstatic at their first victory, were chased into their homes and, followed by mobs who smashed their store-front windows and trashed any restaurant, store, or park that flew a Fighting-Five flag.

Undersecretary Coriolanus Snow had looked down from the balcony of President Lucius's mansion at the fires flickering through the city. Spartacus Brandybane stood behind him.

"You need to do something about this," he had said through gritted teeth as a cheer rang out in the distance. "You need to distract them. Give them what they want."

Spartacus had given him a horrified look. "You want me to fix the Games? Fix a Victor?"

"This is a matter of national stability," Cory Snow had growled. "I'm not suggesting you rig the Games to make it a sure thing. Just…give one of them a chance. A clear chance. A clear advantage. And soon. We need to distract them from-" He swept his arm across the city skyline. "This."

Spartacus had pursed his lips, looking as if Snow had suggested he sacrifice his first-born son to a District 7 forest god. "Well, if it's a matter of Capitol security, I'll see what I can do. I've got an arena planned in a couple of years that would be simple enough to alter."

"See that you do," Snow had said before he turned back to the chaos below him.

Chevy didn't know any of this. All he knows is that the crowd nearly tears him to pieces before he even makes it to the Remake Center. All of them are trying to touch him, see him, tell him that they know he's going to make it. The sight of hundreds, thousands of people all desperately hoping to see him live and promising to do whatever they could to help bolster Chevy's spirits like a hit of purest morphling.

Once they make it to remake alive, Chevy finds out that the District 6 stylist has been removed for this year and replaced by the rising fashion star known only as Madame Lucia. Lucia rejects the gaudy faux-uniforms the Sixes have worn for years past and dresses Chevy in a dark bodysuit shimmering with stars that 'transports' the audience to the edge of the galaxy. By the next morning, every fashion house in the district is hurrying to churn out space-themed party-wear.

There's not much Chevy can do in training so he focuses on the survival and knife-fighting stations. He earns a six, which the Sixatrons claim is a good omen. They're all over CGN and the other stations, claiming that they'll do whatever it takes to make sure 6 finally has a Victor. Chevy's mentor sneers at them. She claims none of them have more to offer than pocket change and instructs Chevy to play up the 'experienced, worldly ladies' man' angle to try to pull in a few 'mature' sponsors.

Chevy ignores her advice and during his interview he just talks about Jumper.

Jumper is one of those mass-produced teen flicks with a message approved by the Ministry of Information. The studios released it a couple of years ago. It features a young teenage boy who runs away to the districts to escape his rebel-sympathizing parents. He makes it to Six, where he's taken in by a loyal, upstanding district family. The kids in the district teach him to jump the trains. They cling to the sides of the boxcars and leap from train to train as they pass by each other. It's a dangerous sport that requires athleticism and a keen eye. Chevy is one of the best jumpers in his class. He and a few others were recruited as extras for the jumping scenes and in one scene Chevy can be seen behind the Capitol stars, gripping the boxcar with a wild grin on his face. The money he made bought his mother her first new dress in twenty years.

Jumper is still popular in the Capitol and its star is still a top celebrity. Before the interviews are even over, the scene Chevy appears in is played over and over again on the broadcasts. The fans of the lead actor double the sponsor money Chevy has brought in. The leading lady personally makes a pledge of support. Her co-star insists that Chevy will join him in an interview if he makes it back.

But nothing, not the Sixatrons, not celebrities, not Jumper can match the feeling that swells up in Chevy when the tubes lift the tributes up onto their pedestals and he gets his first look at the arena for the Twenty-Eighth Annual Hunger Games.

It's a train yard.

They're launched onto a flat, elevated train platform. Hundreds of cargo trains are sitting on the tracks that loop and weave around in all directions. The ground is flat and barren, with no features beyond the endless trains. No vegetation, no bodies of water, no landforms.

The gong sounds and Chevy doesn't bother with the ample supplies lying scattered around the Cornucopia. He turns and runs for his life.

He's immediately set upon by the boy from District 1. The Careers pegged him out early as a possible threat, if only for his popularity, and whoever was launched closest to him was instructed to take him out. The boy from 1 is only two spots down from Chevy, and now he scoops up a spear and gives chase. Chevy runs between engines, ducks under boxcars, leaps over couplings trying to shake his pursuer. He's finally sprinting down a length of bare track, his breath coming in great heaving gasps, knowing that he didn't even make it ten minutes in, when there's a roar behind him. A train comes barreling down the tracks and Chevy gives a final leap, grabbing a ladder on the side of a boxcar and laughing as the District 1 boy is left gasping in the dust behind him.

That night he jumps off the train on the fair end of the arena. Water, bread, and grapes soar down to him. As he eats, Chevy begins to scratch in the dirt, tracing the turns that the train took as he rode it. A parachute falls with a notebook and pen. Chevy wonders if someone had to tell his mentor what he needed.

Nine die at the bloodbath, including Jaina. The Games settle into the long stretches of inactivity between the deaths. This is usually where the Careers band together and sweep through the arena for the survivors, but they have a massive task on their hands this year. There are two dozen trains weaving their way through the arena, with dozens more sitting motionless on the web of tracks. Each one has dozens of cars that must be searched. There's no way to throw open the massive boxcar doors silently, and the cannon fodder easily evades the Pack. They manage to kill four over the course of two weeks.

Chevy spends his time jumping the trains. It keeps him popular with the Capitol crowds who are still thrilled with his connection to Jumper. Some of the moving trains have food for the tributes who manages to climb aboard. There are pumps scattered around the arena that provide freshwater, but they're few and noisy and using one is a signal for any nearby hunter. Meanwhile, Chevy maps them all. He traces the routes of each train he rides. He notes the junctions where the tracks meet and marks the switches. He's even able to time the cycles and determine where the moving trains are closest together and at what time. He keeps his notebook close at all time.

The price of food rises and the parachutes stop falling. As the Games stretch into their third week, starvation and dehydration become the new killer and the rest of the tributes begin to die. The Careers discover that there's food and water aboard some of the moving trains, but this backfires on them. Not all of them are strong or skilled enough to jump the trains, especially not at the same time. The girl from 4 dies in the attempt. The rest of the Careers are scattered throughout the arena, their alliance broken by their own hunger and weakness.

Chevy begins to feel the effects of starvation as well. He's no longer jumping the trains, simply moving between boxcars hoping to find food. There's none left. His hunger cripples his body and his advantage is negated.

And then, as the Games enter their fourth week, he finds the tribute train.

It's a perfect replica of the train that brought him to the Capitol. It's moving fast, faster than any of the other trains. Even if he were healthy, Chevy would think twice about trying the jump. But now he's weak, desperate, and has nothing to lose.

He loses his grip on the first attempt and has to wait for two hours for the train to come around again. The second time he misjudges the timing and slams himself against the train itself. He falls to the ground, battered and bloody.

The train cycles around twice more, each time past a motionless Chevy. But then, as the sun sets, he stands up, watches the train approach, and begins to run. The train flies by, he jumps, grabs.

And makes it.

It takes him an hour to crawl inside. The dinner is laid out for him in the dining. Juice and meats and fruits and bread. This time, Chevy doesn't hesitate. He stuffs himself full, vomits it all up as his body goes into nutritional shock, and then eats more once he recovers. He sleeps that night in a bed with silk comforters and feather pillows, his notebook stuffed under the mattress.

Chevy lives in luxury aboard the tribute train for three days until the last of the cannon fodder succumbs to starvation, leaving just him and the five scattered Careers.

That night, the trumpets sound, and a Feast is announced. Chevy knows the place the announcer mentions. It's by a turntable where six tracks meet. He crosses it several times a day.

That night, the tribute train grinds to a sudden halt, and Chevy knows his reprieve is over.

But thanks to his notebook, filled with times and figures and maps, he knows what he has to do.

It takes him half the night to make it to the first switch. He knows how they work. He's studied them in school. His first job would have had him maintaining them around Panem.

Now, he grits his teeth and pulls the lever and with an almighty groan the tracks move.

He makes it to the second switch two hours later. The third is pulled just before dawn.

The sun rises on the last day of the Games.

A table is set up near the turntable, heaped with food. The five Careers are there by dawn. They ignore each other, stuffing themselves to recover their strength before they decide whether or not to track down the last tribute or just fight it between themselves now.

The girl from 1 is screaming at her district partner to back her up and help her take down the Twos now when a hideous screech fills the air.

The train is burning from two separate collisions, but it's still roaring down the tracks. Another one is speeding from a different angle, heading for the inevitable collision.

The Careers forget their alliance, forget the feast, forget everything as they run. The trains collide in a mushroom cloud of fire and a rain of burning wreckage. Two of the tributes are incinerated instantly, a third crushed by falling debris. A boy is trapped beneath the wreckage, screaming for his mother as he feels the flames brush his cheeks. The girl from 1 claws her way through the carnage, stumbling out across the tracks just in time to see the third train barreling towards her.

She doesn't even have time to scream.

The trumpets sound and Chevy Anderson is pulled from the arena and the curse of District 6 is broken.

The celebration in the Capitol is like nothing that has ever been seen. Even the supporters of other districts celebrate now that the Sixatrons will finally calm down. The Sixatrons themselves hold a two week festival that blocks all other activity in the City Centre. They fill the stands for the Victory Ceremony. Mobs form wherever the faintest rumors suggest that Chevy might appear. He's hailed as a hero from every corner. Even Coriolanus Snow, stepping in for an ailing President Lucius, sets the crown on the new Victor's head with a genuinely-pleased smile and a sigh of profound relief. Spartacus Brandybane tells Chevy that he's invited to spend a week of pampering at his villa after the Victory Tour.

Chevy goes home to his girl, his family, the Victor's Village, and a district profoundly grateful for the bounties of Parcel Day and a taste of district pride. He lives a long life in the district, marries, has children, fades from the public eye as newer, younger, fresher Victors come after him. He still has the nightmares, but he has a wife to hold him when they threaten to overwhelm him. He's the only 6 Victor who never turns to morphling or other drugs and so he goes to the Capitol again and again as one of the mentors. He watches children die every year, but he comes back to laughter and giggles and cartwheels and stick-figures drawn in the mud.

The only sour point, the one thing that is more painful than Chevy will ever admit, are the attitudes of his fellow Victors. The Victors from 1 and 2 flatly despise him, believing the Gamemakers rigged the Games in his favor. The others resent him because even through four weeks in the arena, he arguably had the easiest time. Even Victors like Wren and Emrys treat him with a certain coolness. They survived against all odds like he did, but he never had to look into the faces of those he killed and watch the life be torn from their bodies. He pulled a few levers and let the arena do the rest.

They don't know that his wife finds him up late at night sometimes, watching the fiery crash with glazed eyes five kids die in the space of two minutes. They don't know that he can't hold down food richer than potato soup and flatbread.

And they don't know that he can't ride a train without being plunged into a walking nightmare and trying to throw himself off, convinced that the crash will come if he doesn't. The Capitol medics sedate him on the trip to the Capitol. Every year.


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