Mike Quail | District 5 | 16

It was five o' clock in the morning, and everyone in the Hydroelectric District had gathered by the water's edge to wait on the upstream ferry. This particular ferry ride was mandatory, so when I say everyone, I mean the whole Dam District.

We adopted the nickname for obvious reasons.

Dan craned his neck to see above the heads of the crowd, squinting upriver. The air was thick with nervous chatter and the roar of the river in motion beneath us, so he had to speak significantly above his usual volume to be heard. "Nothing yet."

Alfred glanced at his watch and scoffed. "Late again, looks like. Typical."

"One of these days we'll get wise and set a later alarm," Dan agreed, smirking.

"Well, since we have the time…" Maurice began, and all three pairs of eyes, gleaming with the excitement I had tried to suppress, turned toward me. I looked down in response. A grin, however, slowly made its way across my face.

"I don't know…" I mumbled, "…I was going to wait until after. You know, as self-congratulations for not dying another year."

Dan groaned. "You've never eaten dessert first in your life, have you? It's called instant gratification, ya nerd. Don't deprive yourself."

"It probably won't even be that much, guys."

"At the very least you could buy something nice from the Centre Square," Alfred pointed out. "Not like you're putting it towards college or anything," he added off-handedly.

"Look, he's smiling; we got him!" Dan grabbed my shoulders and marched me away from the crowd, towards the dam. Alfred followed suit, and Maurice followed sheepishly behind. "To the Dam Post Office!"

The centerpiece of our subdistrict is a towering dam. To take advantage of this middle ground, all our local public offices had been built up around it through the years. This included ferry transportation upriver, this subsector's Peacekeeper hub, and of course, the post office. Upstream of the dam dwelled the sector's wealthy. Downstream, shadowed by sheer cliffs and down crumbling stone steps hewn into the earth, lived the—shall we say—less well off. Folks like me and the guys. So, guess who drowns first if the dam ever breaks!

District Five covers enough ground to have its own subsections. You've got the Turbine District—wind power. The Geothermal District—self-explanatory. The district centre handles the bulk of the processing. There are others, each with their claim to fame. We've got the dam. And I'll be honest—I'll only go up there if I have to. It's a trek up at least a hundred worn-away stairs with unsteady railings, and I don't much care for dealing with the hoard of dam Peacekeepers who parade the public buildings. But when I do have to, there's always this moment after I make it to the top when I lean against the rail, when I listen to the dam magnify the smallest of sounds and gaze past my small and familiar neighborhood. I see light where the river meets the sky, and it all becomes worth it for that short minute.

The view is inspiring, I've come to find. It's where I came up with the idea for my first invention.

See, looking down at the dam, you're struck by its stillness. But it's precisely the principle of motion that makes it so effective. Beneath your feet, huge turbines are kicked into gear by the blunt, continuous force of the river. We just don't see it behind the colossal façade. It's the movement—not the dam itself—that produces the power. I think sometimes that's taken for granted, just like how the world around us is constantly in motion and we don't notice. From motion comes energy. And so many opportunities to store that energy go to waste. It's the little, everyday motions that, when taken advantage of, add up.

In the end, it was the turbines that kicked my mind into gear. I just had to make them easier to work with. I devoted nearly a half a year to this construction. During class, I drew plans. While others took on part-time jobs, I tinkered with scrap metal in the basement. My final prototype was barely an inch in diameter, but it was dense and had a solid moment of inertia for its size. Wiring it up to a battery was simple. Designing the fixture proved trickier, but in the end, I produced an attachment that would screw onto a common tap.

Now, imagine that every time you turned on a faucet, you added a little bit of charge to a battery. I'll be the first to admit that it's not much individually. The size constraints don't offer much to work with. But the big picture? The energy from every single little kinetic motion being stored for later use? It would be the dawn of a new system for District Five, and even Panem itself.

All new inventions have to go through the Capitol, so I'd applied for the patent as soon as I'd perfected the prototype and gathered the necessary documentation. That was a year and a half ago. I haven't been given any official word on the matter. But every so often, a check will come in the mail, nondescript except for a Capitol seal. It's always been a pitiful sum—mere pennies, the first time. But it's something. I can only assume the patent is mine, and that the invention is being used sparsely in a niche field.

Is it too much to hope for? To one day make it big? Well, anything's possible. My friends maintain the same. They're my support team. I can always count on them for an extra set of hands, unique perspectives, and a steady stream of optimism.

They all cheered loudly when we found a new envelope in my family's lockbox, and I couldn't help but be encouraged. Maybe today was the day…

And then I examined the contents.

"Half as much as last time," I said quietly. One by one, the others fell silent.

"But…that's not right," Maurice said desperately. "You've had exponential growth in income since the first day. I plotted it and everything…" He looked away, muttering something about the pattern being broken.

"Better luck next time, man." Dan clasped my shoulder. "Just keep at it though, eh? We're breaking ground as it is, this early on."

I nodded, even though I didn't entirely agree. "Alfred was right. There's enough here to buy all of us something from the Square. How about we all celebrate not dying today?"

As the mood brightened around me, I looked up over the dam where the river met the sky. The distant shape of a ferry could now be seen, approaching swiftly.

Leigh Davison | District 5 | 17

Not for the first time, Ma had set the table for three.

Her back is to me as I wrench open the cabinet for a fourth plate. She's unraveling a ball of twine to package the day's deliveries, and she appears not to notice.

I manage to scrape half of the contents from my own plate onto the fourth before pa lumbers up from the cellar. Between two large hands he balances three fresh, glistening cuts of beef. These have been carefully separated from a small pile of last week's scraps.

"Four pickups today," he announces. "Hurry and wrap 'em up now, so we can open right after the ceremony."

Pa insists on keeping Davison Family Butcher open on Reaping Day. He maintains it's the best day for sales. From what I've seen, he's not wrong. We've always managed to serve a hoard of relief-stricken mothers and fathers before the day's end.

"So!" Pa roars. He leaves Ma to wrap and settles heavily in his chair. "Any chance you'll be volunteering this year?"

"No," I say flatly. He starts eating. I don't.

"Could've fooled me," he chuckles. "You'll tear right through that punching bag of yours before long." He suddenly raps my knuckles with the back of his fork. "Haven't I always said? These are fightin' hands, sweetheart."

Pa says you can read a man by his hands. We've all three got ruddy hands—Ma, Pa, and I. Something about my scabbed-over knuckles and power plant burns causes Pa to swell with pride and reminisce on his own boyhood fistfights. He, like me, grew up fighting. Neither is Ma above dishing out a reprimand with an open palm instead of a lecture. It's kind of fitting that the long hours of handling meat always stain our hands red.

A thump and a cry echoed from the stairwell. I stood so fast my chair nearly toppled backwards. Neither Ma nor Pa spared a glance.

I leapt from the kitchen to find my younger brother, limp on the floor and struggling to pull himself up on the banister.

"Here, let me—" I reach for his hands to pull him into a standing position. The gesture is a familiar one. I've done this rescue several times before.

Stairs, bullies, our own parents—Artie has too many enemies he shouldn't. And they wouldn't dare lift a finger against him if I had anything to say about it.

I give him a chance to smooth over his wrinkles before my hands clumsily form the words, Are you okay? How many stairs?

He signs back far more elegantly. His hands are small, pale, and tense. They're prone to shake, but it doesn't show when he signs. Just four. I'm fine.

Glasses? I ask.

They're fine too. I sigh with relief. I had saved up at the power plant for over a year to afford those.

Breakfast is ready, I sign. He nods, but his hands are already trembling again.

Ma and Pa are engaged in conversation when we return. She leans her hip against the counter and pointedly avoid Artie's gaze when we enter. They never bothered to learn how to communicate with him. They weren't the ones who spent hours at the district library pouring over tutorials or practicing signs by lamplight after hours. They don't see how Artie's proficiency has surpassed even mine or how confident he is when he communicates.

"—and when are we going to stop paying that private tutor?" Ma was asking. "I've been saying for years now it's an unnecessary expense."

"When our son can be of some use," Pa replies with his mouth full. He swallows thickly. "I don't care for it either, but you know Artur's dead weight. He should learn to earn his keep."

"A world of good those lessons are doing him then. More than five years we've had this tutor and he doesn't speak, can't understand a damned word we say, brings home awful grades every week…if you ask me, he's too slow to be of any use, and nothing we do will change that."

Bull. Artie was a genius. Apparently, I was the only one who had put any effort into understanding him.

Artie's hands are raised, but hesitant, like a sentence best left unsaid about to die on your tongue. After some thought, they're set in motion. I'm not hungry today.

I nod and don't bother to hide my anger toward our parents. He understands.

It was recently that he discovered that our parents had seriously considered disowning him. I've known for longer. I've fought tooth and nail against the notion ever since, often with furious shouting matches that he'd never been able to hear. I always talk them down in the end, but it's moments like these that remind me how fixed in their minds the notion remains. They talk about Artie like this all the time, right in his face, like he's not even in the room. They assume they can talk freely without him being the wiser. But what they don't know is that, not long after I got him his glasses, Artie developed a keen proficiency for reading lips.

The thing is, they probably wouldn't care either way.

The mid-morning sun is hot on our backs as we make our way through the marketplace. All of the shopfront windows are dark, but the street is bustling. The chatter in the air is uncertain, dreading. Fists everywhere are clenched. Knuckles turn white in the sunlight. I walk just a step behind Artie, casting a shadow over his small frame.

Like a slow-moving current, the crowd approaches the district university. The quad is spacious and fenced in, perfect for holding all of District Five's children against their will while their parents struggle against the iron gates. Artie's hands start to tremble again. Two years ago was his first reaping, and the years to follow haven't been any easier on him.

The marketplace opens up into the public square. We pass by our school, and my eyes narrow suspiciously down its back alleyway. That was where Artie had been ambushed last year. Seeing him pinned against the wall by three boys three years older and nearly twice his size—it was the most anger I've ever known at once. I don't remember much what had happened beyond the intensity of my emotions, but I do know I took on all three. One I knocked unconscious and left in the alleyway for the rest of the evening. Their ringleader's nose was never quite the same.

No one jumped out at us. It was a laughable notion anyway, though part of me had hoped for an excuse to hit something. I settle for glaring at everyone who dared look our way.

My glare softens for one person: a twelve-year-old named Jule. Artie's only friend, she's seen her own share of bullies because of her family's economic status. Usually, she'll wave and sign a rudimentary greeting. Today, it's clear her mind is somewhere distant.

It's Jule's first reaping, Artie informs me. Her whole family's nervous.

I know, I reply. Her mother came by yesterday. With more money than I knew she could usually afford. Enough to buy one of our nicer cuts, out of hope that her children would survive another year.

I also knew for certain that Pa intended that pile of old scraps he brought up from the basement for her. That's his philosophy when it comes to poverty: "They'd better be grateful for anything they get." The idea made sense when I was younger—leave expensive tastes to expensive people. But years of seeing Artie go through the same treatment at Pa's hands showed me how ugly a sentiment it is.

A steady stream of children surrounds us, but we're not even half of those in attendance. Not yet. In the distance I hear the horn of the ferry boat and the distant squeal of a braking train. I steer Artie in front of me to file into one of the many lines forming at the gate.

In the line beside us is an unwelcome, familiar face—my classmate Josep Petro. He turns away a beat too quickly. His nose is still horribly misshapen from our encounter in the alleyway, and I smile despite myself.

Serves him right.

For a second, I picture him getting reaped. Could I wish that on a person? What if Artie got reaped? I wonder. And I know my contingency plan: threaten to make Josep Petro's life a living hell unless he volunteered in his place. That I could accept.

And there stands the main building of the university: stone-cold and casting all beneath it in shadow.

Mike Quail | District 5 | 16

We approach the university. It's as dull and archaic as I remember.

I toured there with my class this year and was since encouraged to apply. My grades were good enough, after all. Alfred certainly took to the idea, pouring over his studies with a fervor that bewildered our entire year. They never understood his ardor, which tended to make him more bristly than usual.

I can't say I understand either. I get his passion—I've devoted sleepless nights to completing my own prototypes. But for university? Sterile classrooms, halfhearted teachers, and mail slots stuffed full of recycled Capitol blueprints? People who went in emerged as project managers and factory overseers. It was a good living. Goodness knows Alfred wanted to get out of the dam shadow before long. But I don't want to spend my life reading someone else's blueprints. I'd rather make my own.

You know, if I make it that far.

It had been easy, prematurely celebrating our survival safe on a boat several miles downstream. We'd joked about the escorts and theorized that they were actually highly realistic animatronics (no real Capitolite would deign to visit the districts, right?—and how else could they look so plastic?) We'd debated whether being considered old enough to kill someone meant that you should be old enough to drink, and wondered, more importantly, if that seemed like a valid case to make to the local bartender. Now all that lighthearted banter seems a far-off memory.

Being here, cast in shadow along with all these people—well, you're that much more aware that two of them will be getting a death sentence. And the most I can do is hope that it's not me, or my family. I have two sisters; one is reaping age. And sure, we have our disagreements. They couldn't care less about robotics or any of my other interests, so we don't spend much time with one another. But seeing one of them up on that stage would still cripple me.

The silence had begun to feel like a hundred-pound weight by the time our escort ascended the stage. She's new this year, and I'm shocked by what I think is her age (the Capitol embellishments make it difficult to tell for sure). If she were born in the districts, she might have just barely escaped the reapings herself.

She's also—glowing? Yes, I realized as she stepped into a darker patch of shadow. Her skin was indeed giving off a faint, yellow radiance.

"Quite the phosphorescent escort we have this year," Maurice remarked. The corners of Dan's mouth twitched.

"I swear, if you're gonna start calling her the phosphorescort…"

"That can't be good for the skin," Alfred said with a frown. "Luminous chemicals are toxic to most organisms."

"Robot confirmed." I whispered.

We doubled over in silent laughter until a peacekeeper glared threateningly in our direction. The brief respite to the tension had ended.

Looking back, I'm grateful there were at least some pleasant memories to hold onto from today. The last was the sigh of relief that escaped me, when the escort selected from the female bowl and announced the name of a tribute that wasn't my sister.

Leigh Davison | District 5 | 17

It's me. It's me and I'm not happy and I make sure everyone knows it.

I don't go quietly. I growl at the crowd of seventeen-year-olds around me. They scatter like flies. One tries to extend a sympathetic hand. I slap it away. A peacekeeper locates me and attempts to grab my shoulder. I barrel right through him, knocking him out of the way with my elbow.

He shouts at me. I turn right back around and scream through clenched teeth. Then I storm up to the platform, each stomp echoing too-loudly across the quad.

From that moment on, I don't pick up any details. I'm vaguely aware of shoving aside the Capitol escort as she approaches. I see my skinny, blank-faced district partner join me onstage. When we shake hands, I squeeze so hard I hear something crack. And that's all I notice. Every other noise is muffled by the roar in my ears. Everything I see is tinted with shades of red.

The walk to the Justice Building seems to take the rest of the morning. The quad may as well be miles long, at the rate that the rest of the crowd shuffles out of our way—even with the peacekeeper duo that towers over us, everything's so sluggish I want to scream. Meanwhile our escort clutches us both by the elbows and keeps making these distressed little noises. It's clear that neither the silent treatment from me, nor the spacey silence of the other kid, are at all to her liking. Each "Really, now—you can't ignore me forever!" and "Say something at least!" is like a mosquito making another pass around my ear. I'd swat her myself if I weren't too concerned with finding Artie in the crowd. As slowly as we moved, I couldn't find him.

I'd get my three minutes, then. It's a lifetime too short.

Who else would come to see me for a last three minutes? My parents, definitely. Apart from them and Artie, I can't picture anyone else coming to cry at my feet. I don't really have friends my own age. No one at school was worth the time.

Sure enough, after we're paraded across the square, marched up the marble steps of the Justice Building, and shoved into waiting rooms across the hall from one another, Ma and Pa are already there. They sit comfortably on plush furniture, chatting casually. It looks like they've been here a while.

Ma rises when she sees me, coming up to only my chin at her full height. "We came as soon as we heard."

"We wouldn't miss this for anything," Pa booms. His smile's as wide as I've ever seen it as he comes in for a hug. "Our girl's gonna do us proud."

"I thought you'd be more…upset," I mumble into his shoulder. A confusing jumble of emotions overshadows my anger. It'd be dangerous to unpack here and now.

"I would be," Pa replies, pulling away, "if you didn't stand a fighting chance out there. But you're a winner, Leigh. You'll win or fight 'til your last breath. I'm betting right now I'll see you home before the month is out."

"And imagine if you did come back!" Ma's eyes are sparkling. "We'd live like kings in the Victor's Village! An official endorsement from a victor would do wonders for our business," she added with a wink.

I don't know what to think. It's like a betrayal and an encouragement mixed together into one package. I don't know if it's from them or somewhere else entirely that I pull together the strength to say stoically, "I will come back."

"That's my girl!" Pa punches into his palm. "Give 'em hell, Leigh."

"Well," said Ma, "I'm just glad it was you up there and not Artur I mean…" She laughs—actually laughs. "…can you imagine the embarrassment?"

"And see, here's the thing." My temper climbs again, and my voice rises to match. "I'm coming back, and if I hear that you've ever mistreated Artie while I'm gone, even once, the last thing you'll be getting from me is an endorsement."

Ma sputters, and Pa turns red as he speaks. "Now Leigh, your mother was just—"

"Get out!" I yell. "Now!"

Ma is fuming. Pa's brows are furrowed, his fists tight. But without another word, thankfully, they shuffle out. When I hear the last of their footsteps in the hallway, I turn around, punch the wall, and scream out the loudest, foulest expletive I can manage.

The catharsis lasts less than a second, but it's the best damn second I've had all day.

The minutes pass; worry seizes me. What if he didn't make it in time? What if Ma and Pa had seen him on the way out and dragged him home already, or some lowlife like Josep Petro had taken advantage of my absence? I'm about to kick down the door and find him myself when it inches open. Artie enters to find me sitting on the arm of the couch, massaging my bruised knuckles. His eyes are glassy. Under his arm is a small, stuffed duck we played with together as children.

I brought it just in case, he signs. It isn't as smooth or controlled as usual.

I retrieve the duck and stuff it into my front pocket. It's a tight fit, and its head sticks out, but I didn't care. It's perfect. I tell him. And then, I'm coming back. Don't worry.

I am worried.

I'm more worried about you, I sign, letting him read the genuine fear on my face.

But you could die. I'll be fine.

I don't believe him. I've always been there to block the target on his back, but now? Listen to me. Stay out of trouble. Don't trust anyone who can't understand you. Find a safe place. Wait for me.

Artie looks down. I believe in you, Leigh. But…I can't wait for you forever. My breath catches.

And maybe, he adds, I'll finally be able to teach Ma and Pa sign language.

I pull him into a fierce hug. He finally breaks and sobs against me, but I hold on. Oh, Artie. Too brave for his own good, and too kind for the world around him.

He wouldn't last without me. I had to return, for his sake.

Mike Quail | District 5 | 16

You know what I'd never realized before? How many different ways there are to kill someone.

Sure, there's the conventional. Stabbing. Bludgeoning. Strangulation. But when murder is turned into a game, conventional doesn't always cut it. You could find a source of salt water—highly conductive—and rig up an electrocution device. You could disguise something poisonous to look edible and be on your merry way before the cannon sounds. With the right lens, you could remotely start a brush fire that could quickly spiral out of control…

There was a crack that I felt that brought me back down to earth. And I looked up to see that my hand was locked in the death grip of a girl who stood as tall as I was. She had some serious muscle on her and was wearing the fiercest glare I had seen directed at anyone, let alone me.

That was the moment I became acutely aware of my own mortality.

I now paced around the waiting room in the Justice building, wondering if the question I should have been asking was not How can one die? but How will I die?

And my district partner…she wasn't even a career but holy crud she was the scariest-looking girl I had ever seen. Good thing she was on my side, right? Right? I mean, people didn't usually kill their own district partners…though after last year's games, I was second guessing even this common decency.

Forget a proper burial; this girl could pound me straight into the earth beneath my feet.

Mom, Dad, Ana, and Gabi were the first to visit me. It's the most somber and silent I've ever seen the four of them at once. At first, mom tried to make me promise her I'll come back. But then she sensed my dejection and realized there's no sense in making a promise that I don't have much chance of keeping.

"I guess I wanted some false hope," she whispered in my ear as we embraced.

I then turned to Dad. "So…any chance of finishing that robotic drain cleaner now?" It had been a project we had been tinkering on together in the garage for some time, but Dad shook his head.

"Don't think I could bring myself to."

Ana and Gabi don't have much to say for their own part. To be fair, we never really did. The two of them mainly confided in each other over the years, never wanting to participate in any of my own interests. But we hardly resented each other for it. And now they had to watch me die.

Who would have the words?

I watched my family leave and wished for more time. Almost immediately afterward, my three friends stumbled into the room to replace them.

"Bro," Dan said as soon as we locked eyes, and I was shocked by how unshakably determined his expression was. "You alright?"

I was about to reply of course not when Maurice added, "Walking up there, it's like you shut down or something. Kinda scary. I don't know if you heard what people were saying…"

I grimaced. I had spaced out as soon as my name was called, and I should have known that would strike some people as odd. I had tried to put the whispers out of my mind at the time, but I remembered more colorful murmurs, "Isn't he one of those nerds?" … "Looks as dead as one of those robots he works with." … "Is he mentally unstable or something?"

"Whatever went down up there…it can't again," Alfred ordered. "You'll need to keep your head on straight, whatever happens…"

"…because you've got this," Dan said firmly.

"N-no, no, I don't!" I protested. "Look at me, I'm not…not athletic, not strong…"

"No," said Dan, "but you're stupid smart."

"Strong wins fights," said Alfred, "but smart wins games."

That struck a chord, more than anything my family could have said to me.

You could find a source of salt water and rig up an electrocution device. You could disguise something poisonous to look edible. With the right lens, you could remotely start a brush fire…

Something clever. I had to plan something clever, something big, that no one would expect. And if that's all it took to turn myself into a contender, well, maybe I stood a chance after all.

Authors Note:

And...we're off to the races!

Or reapings, as it were.

So now we have our District 5 tributes! A bit of an unconventional starting point, I know, but I don't really care about getting the districts in order as long as I can write both tributes into the same chapter. That'll probably dictate the order in which I write these reapings.

I've copied and pasted the list of current tributes on my profile, and I do intend to make some sort of infographic with faceclaims later on (for visual purposes, since working physical descriptions into 1st person writing can be awkward). There are plenty of open spots (*wiggles eyebrows at new readers*), and though I'd love to see the characters y'all come up with, I'm not in too much of a rush. I kinda like being able to tackle this at a leisurely pace. I'm trying for between 200-500 words per day. It'll largely depend on when the busy patches are.

A special thank you to WhymsicalBell for Mike and IciclePower33 for Leigh, two amazing tributes who seemed to write themselves at times. Which may explain why this chapter ended up as long as it did. I don't know if this will be the standard length for my chapters in the future, but in this case it seemed right. So I hope I wrote them right by you as well. :)

Not much left to be said except keep the reviews coming! I believe it's conventional to also ask some sort of question at the end of a chapter. So in case you want something to guide your review-writing process: Were you able to get a pretty good picture of District 5 from the descriptions? What are some of your District 5 Headcanons? And how about the tributes? What did you like about them? Do either stand out?

Cheers,

Grey