Just like the Games, early-years Victory Tours are different from what we see in canon. Victors are less exposed and there is nothing is improvised. I won't spend very long on the victory tour (I wrote a very detailed one in Showdown) because it isn't essential.
I have posted a new story: Checkmate: behind the scenes. It contains outtakes (well, one outtake for the moment, and two on the waiting list). So don't hesitate to give me ideas of scenes you want written that haven't fit in the main story.
I have begun a 3 month internship. I work from 9am to 7pm every day of the week. It will impact my posting speed. Please be indulgent^^.
Date: Year 10, February. Six months after Mags' victory.
"Play by the rules, Preciosa," Angelites said as she fastened Mags' golden brown hair back with a wooden clasp. "Now more than ever, do not give the President any reason to suspect you. Please, do not stand out. Please," the woman repeated, her eyes glistening at the prospect of letting her daughter leave, with no way to contact her for over a week.
Mags grasped her mother's hands, wishing she could soothe her anguish. "I promise, Mama. I won't try anything."
Heavy with the remains of the last meal she had shared with her mother and sister, Mags' stomach churned as she stepped on the first wagon of the hooting train.
The winter sun had already descended below the horizon line and tomorrow, she would be in District Twelve.
She knew what was expected of her.
The Victory Tour was not broadcasted, but when the seven previous victors had come to Four – Whit from Nine had killed himself before reaching District Seven - , they never had had to say a word. They had all been clad in similar clothes, a brown jacket and trousers adorning the Capitol crest, with a sash representing the color of their district.
Mags hadn't even known districts had symbolic colors before. Seven was green, Nine dark yellow, Ten brown, Three silver, Six gray, One golden and Four blue. She guessed she'd have to wait for more victors to see what the others colors were.
Mags had seen all the ceremonies behind the large screens of Creneis' square. People were not obliged to go to the main town like they did for the Reapings, but peacekeepers made sure all attended, young and old. Unlike the Games and evening news, all had to watch. Not even toddlers could be completely kept in the dark about the horror of the Hunger Games.
The victors had all been accompanied by their escort, who read the same ritual words year after year.
"Children grow up in the world their parents saw fit to offer them. Children pay for their parents' mistakes. You saw fit to ignore the consequences and willingly plunged Panem in chaos to satiate your greed," the accented voice, a gravelly bass or a chiming soprano would say, always with the same damning finality. "No crime goes unpunished and now two more of your children have died. As a nation, you failed to obey the laws of our legitimate Government, and obstruct the peace our enlightened leaders enforce for the prosperity of all Panem. You still have not learned from your mistakes. Therefore the Hunger Games will go on for one more year. Your children will pay for your crimes."
Mags was surprised people still had children after listening to that. She was certain nine months after the Victory Tour has to be the time of the year with the fewest births. It certainly put a damper on her wish to become a mother.
But it was not the ritual words she dreaded.
What the victor dreaded would happen after there had been a silence long enough to let the escort's speech sink in. The giant projections screens would replay the deaths of the two tributes from the visited district, but not before a short text on each tribute had been read. It wouldn't do to have the dead be simple anonymous figures to the watchers. No, the Games had to wound. To strike deep.
Mags waved at her mother through the glass of the train's door, forcing a smile on her face. She spared a nod to Marquise and Legend and wished she had been able to give Kyle and Esperanza one last goodbye.
Her escort did not bother to lift his eyes from the book he was reading as she slipped into the compartment.
Lucian Gemini was a very thin man in his thirties. Ivory horned glasses rested on the tip of his long nose, just above a spring-like silver mustache. A long goatee of the same shiny silver curled forward under his chin. His eyes were both striking and terrifying, one was brilliant dark blue and the other vivid red, giving the escort's gaze an air of madness that made one want to flee.
Mags couldn't help a slight wince. His thick silver hair were hidden beneath what looked to be the pelt of a dead animal, white silky fur, with two small paws hugging his ears and a dark-tipped tail falling down his neck.
"Ermine?" Mags guessed weakly, finding the word amidst fuzzy memories from her early childhood.
"Kwafewrs are all the newest rage," Lucian drawled, barely acknowledging her presence.
Mags blinked at the meaningless word. "Pardon my ignorance…?"
"Coiffure is a style or manner of arranging the hair," Lucian painstakingly explained, spelling the word out. "As this is fur, the name is Coif-furs," he said, clicking his book shut and standing up to face her.
I see... Mags nodded, trying to look impressed. The pelt was beautiful, but she still shivered at the thought of wearing a dead fancy rat on her own hair.
She opened her mouth to say something but Lucian raised both his gloved hands to stop her.
"Let us keep all our talks informative and civil like during the Games, and the week will go over smoothly."
Mags resigned herself to a long trip. One week alone with her memories of Fife and Constantine, one week wondering where the allegedly freed rebels now lived and trying to glean information on the Districts from the very little she would see. Her face fell at the prospect. Why could at least Marquise have come along? The peacekeeper would have been thrilled to leave Creneis for a time and she'd have made decent company.
Mags gave the escort a curt nod.
The distance Lucian kept between the two of them, the inordinate amount of perfume he wore and the white gloves he changed every day were indication enough of his opinion of district people. He would probably have a stroke were she to sneeze on him.
He had made very clear the first time her and Delphin had traveled with him that he had taken the job only because the President had asked him. Mags still wondered what special talent Lucian hid, or if Achlys had just wanted to get rid of him.
"Is there a schedule I should know of?" Mags said, as politely as she could, "I haven't been prepared."
"You will wear the clothes in the closet and keep clean and groomed like a civilized young woman. You will stand tall, keep your expression pleasant, and will not interrupt the speaker or try to interact with the crowds in any way," Lucian said, as if talking to a small child. He was already walking away from her. "Peacekeepers will be assigned to you in every district."
"I want Valerian Fletcher in District One," Mags found herself saying.
She ground her teeth together after the words had escaped her lips. She had promised her mother mere minutes before.
The silver haired man's jaw clenched, causing his mustache to twitch. He froze but didn't turn around.
"Excuse me?"
So tense she barely dared to breathe, Mags decided that if Achlys had seen no harm in her recent activities, this single demand would not create a stir. There was nothing rebellious about it.
"Valerian Fletcher was the Peacekeeper Sergeant who rescued us on the last days of the Games. He protected us during that horrible battle against the rebels. District One South Sector. I would like to thank him since I did not before," Mags voice hardened before the man could dismiss her and take his leave. "It is my only demand during the trip. I will not be difficult and only ask questions relevant to the tour," she promised, hiding her clenched fist behind her back.
Lucian slowly turning his eyes towards her and finally nodded, his expression still pinched, as if she was the carrier of a dangerous infectious disease.
"Very well. I will make arrangements. Keep yourself occupied. I will give you a list with the schedule of our stops before I retire for the night."
Keep herself occupied? Mags suddenly wished she knew how to draw like Glynn. She had taken nothing with her. The walls of the wagon were so close. She stared at the ceiling. Had it moved closer to her while she looked away?
Her heart accelerated and Mags suddenly was breathless, desperate to exit the cramped room.
The rational part of her struggled to calm her body down. Train walls did not close upon passengers and she had enough air for weeks. If the rest of her heard those arguments, it didn't pay heed.
Her mouth had gone dry and sweat pearled on her brow. She couldn't spend six days like this.
Her cheeks burned with shame as she forced herself to admit defeat.
"Sir, I am afraid my tolerance for closed spaces has disappeared after the Games, is there a way to reduce it?"
Lucian rolled his eyes at her, scorn written all over his face. "I'll get you pills for anxiety." His thin smile fell. "Paid by your account," he warned, his mismatched eyes darkening in suspicion.
Mags forced herself not to glare back. Rarely had she been so docile and polite, and Lucian still found a way to be unpleasant. She pitied the people who lived with him, such behavior couldn't just stem from a distaste of district dwellers.
Comfortably seated in the stuffed armchair, Mags noted with great relief that the pills had completely cleared her mind.
The railways shimmered with an odd substance. Mags had never noticed. She hadn't really paid attention. It glistened in the moonlight. Maybe it was what kept the railways so neat, why the wildgrass and deep roots stopped dead five yards away on each side. Even the snow seemed loath to cross the invisible line between the wilderness and the railway stretching out beyond the horizon.
Mags realized she had fallen asleep while watching the scenery. She jumped to her feet, all too vividly reminded of the previous time she had stirred in the comfortable armchair of a Capitol train.
The train's rumble was deafening. Mags head darted to the sides: every shadow turned to fire at the edge of her vision. Her hands fastened so tightly on the table that the wood creaked.
Mags snapped her eyes back on the landscape, taking slow regular breaths to force her upset senses back under control. She swallowed a couple of the nearby pills, not even bothering to go ask for a glass of water.
So this was Twelve, she thought, embracing the landscape. She couldn't see the mountains yet. The victor would visit two districts a day, one in the morning, either after dawn or closer to midday, depending on the distance, and one later in the day. She would stop for less than two hours in each main town. Her insides clenched from disappointment as she realized she would know barely more about Panem after the Tour than she did now. A part of her had truly hoped this trip would give her insight on how the other districts worked. She should have known that Achlys would never have overlooked such a blatant loophole. She would be kept away from the population, the segregation would be almost complete.
She heard Lucian enter the compartment but did not turn as he offered no greeting. She absently wondered if the second wagon carried avoxes. She hadn't seen any yet.
Mags had never truly realized how huge the districts were and how comparatively tiny the inhabited areas had to be. This was the land she had been born in, and she knew almost nothing of it. Even during the war, they hadn't strayed too far from the ancient roads that still crossed the continent. These were full of pits and crevices, often washed away by landslides, huge shattered paths of asphalt, cracked by centuries of exposure to the elements, but there grass grew thinner and the beasts stayed away.
Those roads had told her what the Capitol had always remained vague on. That towns, cities and villages had once numbered the thousands and people over a hundred times what Panem could boast, that the sea had indeed risen, for many of those roads ended directly in the water. Some signs, bent, battered and half-concealed by rampant growth, still had borne visible inscriptions.
180, Mexico, Tampico.
Mags wasn't sure there were a hundred and eighty working railways in the whole of Panem now.
The dawn sky was pastel blue, no hint of cloud in any direction. The air was pure as could be.
That's when the victor saw it, jagged crumbling spires in the distance. Hidden amidst the climbing plants hungry to reconquer what men had once colonized, so far even the slightest hints of clouds would have hidden it from view.
Ruins. Ruins of a time where people were free to travel and to choose their trade, of a time were languages were many and information widespread.
"Chicago," the escort unexpectedly offered, his eyes locked on the dead city, "it's so easy to forget all this ever existed, so easy to deny that we are a dying people, living off the scraps of a once glorious civilization," he whispered in bitter tones.
"What do they say about it?" Mags said, her voice dry with awe.
"That it was one of the beating hearts of this country before the waters rose. Fifteen million people lived and worked in those skyscrapers and the neighboring suburbs."
Fifteen million? Mags' eyes widened in shock and horror. Surely the histories had been embellished by a nostalgic. How could have so many died when those same people had built railways that withstood centuries of abuse?
"The sea rose abruptly, more violent than anyone had prepared for," Lucian continued, "They washed away chemicals and bacterial agents regardless of the many protections to avoid such a disaster. People drank the contaminated water rather than die of thirst. Millions fled and efforts to quarantine failed. The plagues spread fast and the best laboratories were underwater, empty, with the specialists fleeing with the common citizen. Chicago stood far from the sea, but when thirty million refugees from the west coast crossed the Appalachians, they brought death in their wake. The cities died like a rose withers after a night too chilly. It was utter chaos."
Thirty million? Mags found she couldn't even comprehend the number.
Mags turned to the man. He was slightly taller than her, but for a Capitolite, he was short, and yet as he spoke of history, his mesmerizing eyes shone with hunger that gave him an unnerving aura. Mags found herself staring, intrigued to finally have glimpsed something personal about the escort. Lucian Gemini was a scholar. Mags had to find more ways to make him impart his knowledge.
"They say there is a world beyond the ocean," Lucian murmured, "but communications were lost."
A world beyond the ocean.
Maybe, if she failed, Mags would find the best boat in Four and go there.
Edit: I replaced New York by Chicago (there was really no reason for her to see NYC, Chicago is already a slight detour).
Please review^^.