Chapter 6: Shrimp Pescal
Dr. Volumia Gaul was nervous, to say the least, when the envelope bearing the presidential seal arrived expressly hand-delivered by courier at her own personal offices.
She was currently working on a big genetic design project on behalf of the University, which also had the potential to revolutionize the hospital Victor's Mercy, which was actively searching for new, approved treatments to build their reputation. Only a meeting requested by the President would be enough to tear her away from her work – an honor, of course, to be offered an audience with him. Still, Gaul was nervous. President Ravinstill had built up a reputation of never summoning a person to his office unless he was displeased with them. The man rarely distributed praise. Perhaps he had gotten wind of her genetic design project and wanted to call a halt?
Dr. Gaul went through the metal detectors at the Presidential Mansion, was cleared by security and directed up in the elevator to the private residence. She met Ravinstill's personal secretary just outside his office and was asked to have a seat. Ten minutes passed in silence, each second making Dr. Gaul all the more panicked.
Yup. Ravinstill definitely wasn't happy with her. What would the punishment be? Her patents revoked? Or worse… a hand flew up to hover at her throat, and she grimaced horribly.
It took Gaul a moment to register that the secretary had spoken. "The President will see you now!" Standing on legs that she was trying not to let shake, Dr. Gaul strode into the presidential office as confidently as she could, though she certainly didn't look or feel it.
President Commodus Ravinstill was standing just off the corner of his immaculate mahogany desk, his back to her as he gazed out the majestic curved windows. Turning, his lips flat in a serious, all-business line, he greeted his guest.
"Ah. Volumnia. Excellent. Please, do have a seat."
Dr. Gaul took a seat on one of the plush yellow couches, both flanking a fabric replica of the presidential seal inlaid into the floor. Ravinstill strode over to her purposefully, and took a perch on the couch directly opposite her. He was cradling a mug of tea, the cup and its accompanying saucer made of the finest china – either imported from Two, or already in the presidential collection, Dr. Gaul had to guess.
"Mr. President, you asked to see me?"
"Indeed, my dear, though I am sure you are wondering why."
"The suspense is thrilling me, Mr. President."
Ravinstill let out a brief chuckle at this. "How droll," and he set his teacup and saucer on the edge of a side table. He kept a grip on the spoon, stirring his drink carefully and deliberately: clockwise, counterclockwise, then clockwise again.
"Is this about my patents, sir? Because let me be the first to assure you, I am extremely careful in my work, and the Department of Science and Technology has given me every confidence…"
Ravinstill raised a hand to silence her, and Gaul's jaw snapped closed.
"I have no concern regarding your contributions to the genetic sciences, Doctor. I have been briefed on your work and you are the best in your field. No, my child, this is not where you are lacking." Gaul glowed fuchsia at the praise, until she relayed in her mind what the President had said: This is not where you are lacking.
Her scientific reputation was safe, at least. So what wasn't?
"What am I concerned with…" Ravinstill drawled. "Is the apparent lack of progress in the rather ingenious invention you proposed to me. The Hunger Games."
Dr. Gaul gulped, trying not to let her voice quiver. "Mr. President, if I may gently remind you, Casca Highbottom and Coriolanus Snow envisioned the Hunger Games…"
"… which you submitted to me as a suggestion for how to best resolve the lingering rebel issues at the end of the war," Ravinstill finished for her. "Your humility is a virtue, my dear, but in this case, misplaced. A politician may draft a piece of legislation and yet not propose it, clearing the way for someone else to do so instead. Who do you think the intellectuals will remember more in history: the writer of a program or its implementer?"
Dr. Gaul's silence was telling.
"Young Masters Highbottom and Snow's vision has been most welcome, but you stood with me in the Rose Garden and laid out the Treaty of Treason, did you not, Volumnia? At the end of the day, you are just as much the creator of the Hunger Games as your pet students."
"…. And therefore I am as equally eligible to take the fall," Dr. Gaul guessed. It was a statement, not a question. "You are displeased with our great country's pageant of renewal, sir."
"In a number of ways, yes. It has taken some observation, but after five years, I have come to see this contest as it was originally proposed to me as being flawed in many respects. Let me commend you, however, for the brilliance of its purpose – as a tool of power, it is quite useful. BUT," and here the President held up a finger. "It is clear to me that the virtue of this glorious conquest of skill can be corrupted, particularly if these weaknesses are left unaddressed. That they have not been, or if they have, have been so gradually, leads us to the result before us today."
Gaul tilted her head. "Which is?"
"A continued and disturbing lack of clarity on the rules. A Reaped crop that is uninspiring. Lackluster Victors, some of whom do not buy into the point of the Games: to be a killer. To be a conqueror, for only in this will the districts now ever know the taste of being a conqueror. Also, I fear that the Games in their present form have become rather stale. You cannot put fear into the hearts of men if the tool which wields that fear is…. well, to put it plainly, boring."
"The scientific, analytical process is in constant motion perfecting itself, Mr. President," Dr. Gaul tried to explain patiently. "But I am sure, with time, we can perfect…"
"Volumnia: do you know who my favorite Victor has been thus far?"
Dr. Gaul attempted to keep a poker face, even as her heart hammered in her ribcage, for fear that she had forgotten her place. "I am sure I do not know, Mr. President." Though she would imagine it was Maximus, the very first.
So Ravinstill's answer surprised her. "Dell Fonio in the 3rd, District 9. Do you know why?"
Dr. Gaul shook her head. The President was back to stirring his tea.
"The lad has grit. He rose to the moment, and killed when he had to, even when it didn't come easy. True, the boy may be a cripple, but he didn't let that stop him. He played the game, and he played it hard – not easy as Maximus did, and he didn't win by default in some freak accident like Acacia Ivy or the coward or that simple-minded boy from last year. Thus far, Dell Fonio is the only one who has willed himself to be a player. For this game to be a success in the future, Doctor, we need to recruit better players. Which brings me to the first aspect of the process we can perfect, as you put it: the Reaping."
Dr. Gaul blinked. "The Reaping, sir?"
"Contact all the mayors in every district and ask them to scout for potential talent. Have them ensure that only the very best of their children are selected – by that I mean, those who are ready and willing to fight." He arched a lofty eyebrow at her pointedly.
Volumnia Gaul deciphered his meaning instantly. "You want me to order that the Reapings be fixed."
If it were possible, the President's eyebrow went up further still. "And?"
Gaul smiled tightly. "No problem."
"Very good. Dismissed."
Dr. Gaul tried to not get up too quickly as she prepared to take her leave.
"Oh, and Volumnia?"
She turned.
"I've arranged for the contractors at Capitol Landscaping LLC to continue to make naturalistic modifications to the arena. Just to keep things interesting. My advisers tell me we're on our way to making technological advances that could raise the potential for the Games in the future, but it is still some time off. Since you are of such a scientific mind, I may appoint you to assist them."
"It would be an honor, Mr. President."
Ravinstill smiled. "Excellent."
The mayors in each district did scout for natural talent, and only the names of those kids with the most potential, those who stand to fight, were entered into the Reaping bowls that week following Dr. Gaul's meeting with the President. In District 5, for example, a rough-and-tumble boy by the name of Shrimp Pescal was selected to take part in the 6th Annual Hunger Games.
Shrimp Pescal was not at all a common name from the Power District, and a quick survey of census records quickly determined why: the Pescals were originally natives of District 4, who had then moved southeast to bordering Five for Mr. Pescal's work as a hydroelectric engineer. Shrimp had only been a baby then, so District 5 was the only home he had ever known. By the time he was a small boy, around eight or nine years old, his family was considering emigrating back to their roots, when the fighting broke out that culminated in the Dark Days. The Pescals dared not make the trip then, with Ravinstill starting to regulate the travel industry and the amphibious combat campaigns of Four and Thirteen against the Capitol being particularly violent.
The war took a toll on young Shrimp, forcing him to grow up quickly. It helped that he was well built and tall for his age. By the time he was a teenager, no one outside family could tell why he was called Shrimp; never before had a name been such a mismatch to its owner's physique. He was sixth months beyond his fifteenth birthday, but looked like someone who should have already aged out of the Reaping. What also cut Shrimp apart from the rest of the crop culled that year was his anger. He was known to lash out and get in trouble in school; many people in positions of authority in Five considered him a juvenile delinquent. Perhaps sending him to the arena would be a good outlet for him; the distinct possibility to dispose of him cleanly, all the better. This was a win-win rationale that would gain widespread implementation during a certain special edition of the Games nearly twenty years later.
When Shrimp's name was called, he nearly hurled the district mayor off the stage in his rage. Much as Maximus had before him, Shrimp lashed out at anyone and anything at every opportunity along his journey to the Capitol and eventually the Capitol Arena.
When the tributes were launched on Games morning, most of the tributes blanched. Only Shrimp and two others grinned wickedly.
The contractors of Capitol Landscaping LLC had completely flooded the arena. The weapons were still in the center, only this time on a wooden disc floating on the surface of the water. Planked wooden walkways were interspersed between the pedestals.
When the gong sounded, Shrimp and the two kids from the place of his birth, District 4, dove into the waves. The rest simply stayed on their plates. After a moment or two, however, a few brave souls judging the distance between the walkways and their pedestals made a jump for it. Several made it onto the planks dry; a couple hit the waves and, unless they learned how to tread water ridiculously quickly, drowned.
Shrimp personally took down ten on the center wooden circle, armed with a harpoon in one hand and a scalpel chain in the other, the latter of which he used to lasso his enemies' necks and then yank till they turned as blue as the water at their feet. The kids from District 4 joined him, marking truly the first instance of tributes working together.
It didn't take long before the contractors had had enough of the handful of kids who still clung to their pedestals as a safety net, so they manipulated the pedestals to sink back down into the depths, setting these stragglers adrift.
Unfortunately, this sensation sucked everything else down – the wooden walkways, the center circle, the weapons. All of it sank, tributes dragged under in the deadly whirlpool created.
Those who still lived and couldn't swim drowned quickly – bloodless deaths that had the Capitol audience in the stands booing. By the end of the first thirty-five minutes, only Shrimp and his allies from District 4 remained.
The Top Three had lost all of their weapons in the sinking, so there was nothing to do but tread water and determine who was the best swimmer.
They treaded and treaded. And treaded. After nearly ten hours of this, the summer sun was starting to sink into the sky, heralding dusk. The Capitol audience was growing tired and impatient. Were these tributes seriously going to bob there like buoys and see which one would drown first?
The spectators couldn't abide by this. As had happened at the conclusion to the Games four years ago, when onlookers rushed the arena's field, several large groups of rabid fans now invaded the giant swimming pool that was the arena. An all-out stadium brawl ensued as audience members competed to see who could drown two of the remaining tributes first. Shrimp was too strong for these fools, though, and held down at least two men under the water until they also drowned, adding (unofficially) to his kill count.
The tributes from District 4 weren't so lucky. They were held and dragged under by the crazed fans until water filled their lungs, denying Shrimp Pescal his final kills and making him the Victor of the 6th Annual Hunger Games. He was the youngest person up to that point to win – a distinction he would hold for almost thirty years.
President Ravinstill was apoplectic in the aftermath of this disastrous finale, one of the most egregious ever recorded. At least until… well, you know the tale. The one about the berries? Not long after Shrimp was sent home, the President called Dr. Gaul into his office.
"I would like for you to prepare a statement that decrees the opportunity to watch the Games in Capitol Arena live will be discontinued hereafter. I can never allow the travesty of drunken fans to again impose on this sacred pageant. Do I make myself clear, Doctor?"
"Yes, sir."
"And one more thing: explore the possibilities of introducing… genetic mutations into the arena, with all deliberate speed. At best, I would like for the potentials of your research and advances to see the inside of the arena before the decade is out."
Now, this was an order that Dr. Gaul could get behind. She grinned, immensely pleased. "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."
"'Tis my pleasure and duty, Volumnia. Dismissed."
The President and the esteemed doctor announced the banning of fans from the Capitol Arena the very next morning. The decision angered season-ticket holders who had bought ten-year passes to the Games at great expense. But like most other things when it came to his constituents, President Ravinstill didn't care a whit about that.