Paradise: The 72nd Hunger Games
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Victor's Dinner
A/N: This chapter focuses a bit more on our Victors from previous years and… well, you'll see.
Kayne Lytch –14- -D10V- POV
"How do I look?" I ask Kylie, through the Capitol-provided tablet.
"You look very handsome," Kylie says. "Now stop worrying and just go to dinner. I'm sure you'll be fine."
"You think so?" I ask, adjusting the tie one more time.
"I know so," she says. "Now go."
"Okay," I say. "Love you."
"Love you too bye!" She says quickly, hanging up before I can respond.
When I arrive at the ballroom a few minutes later, I find Athena Feere also waiting outside.
"Hi, Athena," I say. We had gotten to know each other during training, and she seems nice enough. She also seems to recognize that even though I may be many years younger than her, we're about the same level of maturity. The Hunger Games is the great equalizer.
"Hi, Kayne," Athena says. "Ready to head in?"
"Yeah," I say. "I think so. I hope."
Athena turns to smile at me. "Nervous?"
"Maybe a little," I say. "Should I be?"
"Not really," she says. "They're like us, just a bit older. Well, most of them."
"Gotcha," I say. "Thanks."
"No problem," she says. She pushes open the ballroom doors and we walk inside. I take in the dining room. The doors were already ornate, and so is the dining room. It has a long table in the center with six chairs on one side, five on the other, and one at the head of the table. Each chair has a District number, although the ones for Six and Eight are empty, as are, of course, the ones for Ten and Eleven, although Haymitch is here, looking surprisingly sober. I look around for my seat.
"That can't be my seat," I object when I see where my chair is, right at the head of the table.
Athena smiles. "Oh, but it is. New guy gets the head of the table."
"Really?" I ask.
"Yes, really," Jennifer says. "Hey, Athena! How are you?" She comes up to Athena and hugs her.
"I'm good," Athena says as I sigh and take my seat. "How about you?"
"Oh, I'm good," she says. "A bit nervous for my Tributes though. All you guys have banded together this year. I'm afraid I'll be keeping this job for at least another year."
"Now, I thought you liked this job?" Athena teases. "It's how you met guys."
Jennifer scoffs. "Met? Sure, let's go with that. But I don't need that… perk anymore. I'm getting married!" She holds up her hand, showing a silver band with a large diamond.
"Really?" Athena asks. "Oh, that's so exciting! Who…"
The conversation carries on throughout the night. It's amazing how many Victors are married or in long-term relationships. I would have thought more of them would have been like Haymitch, but I guess not. I eventually join in the conversation, everyone being more hospitable than I thought. At the end of the night, Athena and I are walking together towards the elevator when someone – wait, I know her! Katelynn O'Neill! The one who taught me how to use the bow!
"Kayne! Athena!" Katelynn whispers. "Follow me. There's something I need to tell you."
"What?" I ask.
"No time, just follow me," she says.
Athena looks at me. "You know her?"
"Yeah," I say. "Let's follow her. I think we can trust her."
"Okay," Athena says, looking wary. We follow Katelynn into a nearby nook off the hallway.
"What did you need to tell us, Katelynn?" I ask.
"It's a bit of a long story, but I need someone besides Valencia to know," she says, "before I leave. Now listen and don't speak until I'm done. Understood?" Both Athena and I nod. "Good. It all started when I was a Victor…"
Over the next few minutes, Katelynn tells us about Lucy Snow, who I didn't even know existed.
"Why are you telling us this?" I ask.
"Because," she says. "something is cooking in the Districts and Lucy is planning a counter-offensive. And I'm sure that if I'm here I'm going to get caught in the crossfire. So I'm getting out, but I need somebody who I can count on surviving the next day to know about who Lucy really is."
"I see," I say, "but what has Lucy really done that's so bad?"
Katelynn stares at me as if I've grown a second head. "Right. I guess I didn't tell you. Well, she's killed several people. At one point, she wanted a little brother and suggested that her father do the same thing with her brother that she did with me to get her. Luckily, Snow couldn't find some other poor woman quickly enough and she decided that she actually didn't want the competition. And one last thing – if those weren't horrible enough for you. When she got old enough to have… needs, she didn't decide to go find a boyfriend or whatever like a normal girl. No. She decided to use Avoxs to fulfill those needs. And then she kills them. Oh yeah, and when she gets too angry about something that didn't go her way, she'll torture or kill an Avox. There are always more of them."
"How do you know that?" Athena asks.
"Oh, she makes sure to tell me," Katelynn says. "She talks to me every Sunday, tells me all of the evil things she's done over the week. She knows I hate it and she loves that."
"Okay, I get it. She's evil," I say. "Where are you going? How are you getting out?"
"I'm going to leave with my sister, Pamela, and her daughter, Lisa, my niece. I'll take my husband with me," she says. "We have a few Peacekeepers who will get us out safe. Somewhere nice. Where exactly, you don't need to know. But far away from all this. Now, can I trust you guys to keep this information safe? Only tell people you think need to know and can be trusted."
"Of course," I and Athena say simultaneously.
"Good," she says. "I have to go."
I and Athena watch her leave. Then I turn to Athena. "Well," I say. "That's crazy."
"Yeah," she says. "But undoubtedly true. You've seen the blonde hanging around, right?"
I nod. "Yeah. Do you think what she says about some Rebellion or whatever is true?"
"I don't know," Athena says. "But if it were… what would you do?" She looks at me, straight in the eye.
"Would you report me if I told you the truth?" I ask.
She gives a small, harsh, laugh. "No. I'm no fan of the Capitol."
"Well then, I… I would probably help," I say.
"Me too," she says. "Me too. I think that unless the Victor is a career, we should tell them too. They can talk to people in multiple Districts."
"I agree," I say. We walk back to our rooms in silence.
By the time the Victor's Dinner ended, the high speed, high-security train carrying Emily Connors had arrived in the Capitol, and, with the abysmal traffic leaving the interview location in the Capitol, Lucy Snow had just arrived at a site that technically did not exist. And if that site did exist, they certainly did not do the things that people said they did. And if they did, they certainly did not do them to Capitol citizens. Yeah, right. That site did exist, it did do the things the rumors said it did, and it did do them to Capitol citizens as well as District scum. That particular night, the District scum in question was Emily Connors, and the 'interrogator', to put it nicely, was Lucy Snow, the President's daughter herself, still in her dress for the interviews. When she walked in, the Peacekeepers saluted her and moved to the side of the door. She possessed no identification, her face and name were enough. When she asked where Emily Connors was being held, she was told immediately, as the Peacekeepers who brought her in had warned the Peacekeeper at the desk that Lucy Snow would be looking for her. With her guards, she walked to the cell Emily was being held in.
"Has the prisoner been touched?" She asked the guards.
"No," one of them responded. "Just as you requested, Ma'am."
"Good," she said. She strode forward to the girl tied in the chair, removing the gag that was in her mouth. "Do you know who I am?" She asked.
"No idea," Emily said, spitting in the face of the other girl.
"I am Lucy Snow," Lucy said. "Daughter of President Snow. You will tell me what I want to know or you will face the consequences. Do you understand?"
Emily said nothing.
"Where did you get that gun?" Lucy asked. "It came from a stolen shipment. Where did you find it?"
"Laying by the side of the road," Emily said.
"I know that's not true," Lucy said. "Let's try again. Where did you find the gun?"
"Laying by the side of the road," Emily said. Lucy sighed.
"Very well, Miss Connors. Get the bag," she ordered. A Peacekeeper returned with a bag, throwing it roughly over Emily's head. They leaned her onto her back and dumped a bucket of water over her face.
It had reached midnight by the time Lucy got angry enough – not from the torture, she enjoyed that, rather, she was annoyed at the lack of useful information being produced from the torture – that she decided that she wasn't going to get anything out of the Rebel girl. Emily's hair was wet and soaked onto her back. She was bloodied and cut all over and could barely speak. She was on the verge of death if she didn't get proper medical care.
"One more time," Lucy, her dress still immaculate, growled. "Tell me where you got the gun. Tell me who you're working with."
"I'm… not…" Emily coughed up blood. "Telling you –," she spit blood at Lucy, who was shocked by the dirtying of her dress for the first time that night. She quickly used the towel she had been using as a gag to wipe the blood off her dress before it stained. "Anything!" She finished.
Lucy stepped back, her anger boiling over. Many people like her might take out their anger on their own people, perhaps shooting a henchman or two to relieve their stress. Lucy understood that that would not be productive, as fewer Peacekeepers meant fewer soldiers for her. Lucy would kill an Avox or two when she got home, probably. "Very well then," Lucy said. She quickly drew her gun from underneath her dress and pointed it at Emily's head, taking a step back. After all, blood splatter on her new dress would be horrendous. She pulled the trigger, sending a bullet flying through the air to meet with the soft skin of Emily Connors' head, which broke away at the impact site from the sheer energy being delivered, and shortly after that, the bones of her skull, through which the bullet carved a hole like a woodpecker's beak through the soft siding of a house, entering the soft tissue of her brain and destroying it like so much paper in a fire. In less than a second after Lucy pulled the trigger, Emily Connors was dead. The blood from her wound burst out, luckily not staining Lucy's designer dress.
"Clean this up," Lucy said to her Peacekeepers, holstering her gun again and leaving the cell. She would return home that night, use some Avoxs to fulfill her various desires, before killing all of them and going to sleep. She would return in the morning, well-rested and fulfilled, with another plan to find out what she needed to know. It would be well-thought-out and she would execute it quickly. But for now, she needed to live a little and let loose. She strode quickly out of the black site and to her waiting Presidential limousine.
At the same time the train arrived at the Capitol, the Rebels had located a suitable target. A lone, young, Peacekeeper, walking back to his small house from the station, unarmed and unarmored. A boy, one of Emma's close friends and now lieutenants, by the name of Marcus, stepped out into the alley in front of the Peacekeeper, holding a silenced pistol, at the same time as two of the girls, Kaitlyn and Erica, grabbed the Peacekeeper's arms, tying them behind his back and stuffing a gag in his mouth. Emma directed the operation, and soon, the Peacekeeper was sitting in their warehouse, gagged, tied, and struggling.
"Hey," Emma said, standing in front of the Peacekeeper. "Hey, you." The Peacekeeper looked at her. "I'm going to remove your gag so we can talk. Don't bother calling for help. We're in a warehouse, late at night, and no one's around. No one will hear you. Understand?" The Peacekeeper nodded, his eyes betraying his true fear. "Good," Emma said. She pulled up the Peacekeeper's gag.
"I'm not going to call for help because I don't need any to take on you kids," the Peacekeeper said with false bravado. His eyes betrayed his true feelings and Emma was an expert, just like her sister, at reading people.
"Uh-huh," Emma said. "We have multiple people, all armed, and you're tied to a chair. Good luck. So, I'm going to ask you some questions and you're going to answer. If you don't answer me, or you obviously lie, I'm going to use this," Emma held up her gun. "Now, I don't want to use this, but I will if I have to. Okay?"
"I am Peacekeeper Austin Jane, Capitol ID Number Three-Five-Five-Six-Eight-One-Niner," Peacekeeper Jane said. (Yes, a different Jane than District Nine's Jane.)
"That's nice," Emma said. "Okay, I'm going to ask you a question now and I want you to answer with more than your name or we'll have a problem. Do you know anything about what happened to Emily Connors?"
"I am Peacekeeper Austin Jane –,"
"Do you know what happened to Emily Connors?" Emma repeated her question.
"I am Peacekeeper Austin Jane –,"
"Last chance, then I use this," Emma held up her gun. "Do you know anything about Emily Connors?"
"I am Peacekeeper –," Emma steeled herself, took a deep breath, and remembered the falling bodies of Lake and the other girl. She swung the gun at the Peacekeeper's face, leaving a deep gash along his cheek from the butt of the gun. "Ah!" Peacekeeper Jane shouted.
"Tell me the truth," Emma said forcefully. "Or I'll use it again. Do you know anything about Emily Connors?"
"I am Peacekeeper – ah!" The man was struck again.
"Tell me what you know," Emma said. "Do you know anything about Emily Connors?"
"I… I… wait!" The Peacekeeper shouted, seeing Emma's arm wavering. In truth, Emma would never have hit the man unless he repeated the Capitol line again. "You're a scary little b—h, you know that?"
"I guess I do now," Emma said. "Tell me about Emily."
"Fine," Peacekeeper Jane said. "Emily Connors was taken to the Capitol on the orders of Lucy Snow. That's all I know."
"Who's Lucy Snow?" Emma asked.
"I can't tell you that."
"You don't know or you won't?" Emma asked.
"I won't," the Peacekeeper clarified. Emma struck him again, and again he cried out.
"We've been over this," Emma said with real remorse. She, unlike her older sister, enjoyed nothing about this. But it had to be done. "Tell me what I want to know. Who is Lucy Snow?"
"She's the President's daughter," Jane broke yet again. "She almost has more power than he does. She does a lot of stuff like that. She thought, I overheard my commander saying that she thought that Connors would lead us to some people who stole a shipment of guns. I guess," he said, looking at the armed people all around the room, "that she was right."
"I see," Emma said. "If Emily's with Lucy, what happened to her?"
"From the rumors I've heard?" Jane replied. "She's probably dead by now, if she didn't crack. Even if she did, actually. Either way, your friend's dead."
"S—t!" Emma cursed, for real this time. "Okay, can anyone else think of a useful question to ask?" Everyone shook their heads.
"So," Kaitlyn asked, "what do we do with him now?"
"We can't let him go," Emma answered. "He knows too much, he's seen all of us, he's been here."
Kaitlyn tugged on Emma's arm and pulled her aside. "I can do it for you, Emma. You don't need to –,"
"No," Emma said forcefully. "I will not ask any of you to do anything that I wouldn't do myself." She walked back into the center of the room and addressed the small crowd. "Look, people, if any of you want out now, that's okay. What we've done before this amounts only to weapons theft. Still a capital crime in this country, but that's one of the things we're trying to fix. This amounts to treason. So if anyone wants out now, let me know and hand in your weapon. We'll have to keep you under surveillance to make sure you don't run to the Peacekeepers, but we'll let you go. If you want to leave now, just hand in your weapon and go." Emma looked around the room, waiting for someone to break ranks. But no one did. "Okay then," Emma said. She stepped forward towards the shocked and frightened Peacekeeper and raised her gun."I'm sorry," she said. And she meant it. For she took no pleasure in this task and was indeed absolutely revolted by having to kill this young man. This man who still had so much of his life left in front of him. But if she wanted her and her friends to live, this man had to die. At that moment, she wondered if she had made a mistake in capturing him. But no, she hadn't. She captured a man who had trained his entire life to kill and oppress in hopes of being able to get back a good person, a young girl who was just trying to make the world a better place. Sure, her goal hadn't been accomplished, but she did what she did for the right reasons – a bad life to save a good. She wished, so desperately, that that wasn't the only way, but it was. It was the only way she had a shot at seeing Emily again. And, she realized, if she wanted to free all of Panem, many more bad people would have to die. After all, evil doesn't just stop when asked politely. So she pulled the trigger. The gunshot reverberated around the warehouse, louder than everyone had expected, and the blood stained Emma's shirt. She gasped in disgust and almost dropped the gun, but she didn't. She carefully holstered the gun and then looked at her body, her shirt no covered in blood spray.
Erica walked up to her and so did Kaitlyn. "Here," Erica said, "take my jacket. Use it to cover your shirt."
"And take mine, wrap it around your waist," Kaitlyn said. "Come on, Emma. Let's get you home."
"Someone needs to clean that up," Emma protested, pointing to the dead body of the Peacekeeper.
"We'll leave it for the others," Erica said. "Hey, guys, can two more of you come with us?"
Marcus and Flint ran over to help the girls. "What did you need, Erica?" Marcus asked.
"Let's just give Emma some protection on her walk home," Erica said. "Sound good?"
"Sounds good," Marcus said. The small group formed up into a box, with Emma at the center and one of her lieutenants at each corner. Flint looked back.
"That was a brave move, Ma'am," he said to his young commander.
"Thanks," Emma said. "But don't call me Ma'am. I haven't done anything to deserve a title. And besides, we're not the military."
"Emma," Erica said gently. "You have done something to deserve it. And," she looked at Kaitlyn expectantly.
"We are sort of a military now, Ems," Kaitlyn said. "After all, we have weapons, all that. And you're our commander now, Ma'am."
"Darn right she is," Erica said. Suddenly, the box stopped their walk out of the building, all four young soldiers facing their commander. They did what they had seen the Peacekeepers do so many times, coming to attention and rendering a proper salute of their new commander. Emma was shocked for a second, then she smiled slightly. The images of the dead Peacekeeper were still stuck in her mind, but she forced them down. She returned the salutes.
"Thank you, guys. Thank you. I guess you're right. And it means a lot. But we need something different than what the Peacekeepers use."
"Why?" Erica asked. "It works, doesn't it?"
"Fair point," Emma said.
"I like it," Kaitlyn chimed in.
"I thought you people just said you wanted me to make the decisions around here," Emma teased. "But okay. We'll work with their salute for now. Now let's go. It's late. Unless you guys plan to let me help with the cleanup."
"No, Ma'am," Kaitlyn said quickly. "We're getting you out of here. Rebel One, move out."
"Is that really what we're calling ourselves?" Erica asked.
"Well, we are the first Rebel unit that we know of, so…" Kaitlyn responded.
"Fair point," Erica said.
The small group of Rebel soldiers took their new General back to her house, returning almost an hour before Lucy Snow returned to hers. Emma's adoptive parents did not ask why she was out so late, nor did they care. All they knew was that whatever she was doing, it was good, and they shouldn't ask questions. Emma put her clothes in the wash that night to get the blood off them before re-hiding her weapon and falling asleep.
A/N: So, if you guys said: "Wow, that chapter didn't have much to do with this Hunger Games," then you're right. But, I promise, this all has a point, somewhere down the line. For I promise that the tales of Lucy Snow, Emma O'Neill, Layna Paris, and Cornelius Snow are far, far, from over…
Anyways, the next chapter is the start of the Games, so place your bets for who will survive and who will die in… The Bloodbath!