Chapter TW: Sexual assault


Roxanne Teff, 15
District 9

Roxanne was just nine years old when her father died.

She and her parents were living in a small cement apartment in the small urban area of District 9 where most people worked at a mill that turned wheat into flour. That's what her mom's job was back in the day, and her dad always said that living further away from the field where he worked was worth his wife not having to walk so far to get to her job.

Their lives were picture-perfect. Well, as picture perfect as a life could be in District 9. Roxanne always considered herself lucky that from a young age, she had parents who taught her what it was like to be in love. In places as poor as District 9, marrying for love was pretty rare. Sure, people usually chose people that they knew they could tolerate, and some even ended up falling in love after the fact. But her parents were different. They got married because they loved each other and they genuinely wanted to spend the rest of their lives together.

But no good things could last forever.

Roxanne and her mother didn't even learn that her father had died until hours after the fact. The fields were about a two hour walk from their house, so when he wasn't home by 10:00 that night, they weren't too surprised. During the summer months, field workers had to work from sun up to sun down six days a week. But when a pair of Peacekeepers in their shining white armor showed up at their door around midnight, it was as if all of the positive energy had been sucked from the house. Roxanne remembered running to hide behind the door frame, peeking out just far enough to see what was going on. She thought at the time that no one would be able to see her. Now she knows that the nine year old girl in the bright yellow nightgown was probably hard to miss.

The three adults talked to each other in hushed tones, so Roxanne could only hear tiny snippets of the conversation. As young as she was, she was intuitive, and she had a feeling she wasn't supposed to hear it. She wished she was a bat like they had learned about in school. Mrs. Greengrass told her and the rest of the class that bats could hear sounds happening 40 feet away.

"…fell right in…"

"…couldn't salvage…"

"…everything we could…"

Roxanne had heard of people being sucked into threshers, but she never imagined it would happen to her father. It was supposed to be the most common way to die in the fields, but it usually happened more to women than men. If someone had long hair and didn't put it up, they were practically begging to get sucked in.

Roxanne still missed her dad a lot, but after six years, she was okay most of the time. She couldn't even remember what his voice sounded like, and if it wasn't for the framed photo on her mother's bedside table, she might also struggle to remember his specific facial features. It was hard to miss what she couldn't remember. Her mother took the death really hard, though, so the two moved in with Roxanne's aunts Marigold and Autumn (Marigold was Roxanne's mother's sister, and Autumn was her wife) in the more rural side of the District. They ended up moving far away from her mother's work anyway. Her aunts had an adopted daughter, Amber, who was around Roxanne's age, and the two became fast friends as soon as they started living together. Somewhere along the way, her mother started dating a man from the mill named Bran. He was nice enough, but Roxanne thought he tried too hard to replace her actual father. She didn't like that.

"Do you want to play something?" Amber asked frequently. Roxanne loved the girl, but sometimes her relentless optimism was infuriating- immature, even. For God's sake, they were 15 and 16. Amber shouldn't be wanting to "play."

"I don't know…" Roxanne said, deliberately trying not to sound mean. "We had school all day today, and we work all day tomorrow. I could use some time to relax, if that's okay."

"You're such an old lady," Amber teased, flashing a bright smile. "Next thing I know, you'll be telling me your joints ache and you'll need reading glasses."

"Please," Roxanne said, giving Amber a gentle, good-natured punch on the arm. "First of all, I'd look hot in reading glasses."

"Debatable."

"And secondly!" she continued. "You're one to talk about being an old lady when you're an entire year and a half older than me!"

"Whatever. I think you're just jealous that I get to be done with school a year before you."

"Well I think you're just jealous that I have less slips in the Reaping bowl than you!"

Amber's jaw dropped to the floor. "You better knock on some wood!" she said, stifling a laugh. Roxanne ignored her and continued to blabber on.

"Amber Marquette!" Roxanne called, mocking the high-pitched voice used by those from the Capitol. District 9 seemed to have a new escort for the Games each year, so it was difficult to choose just one to impersonate. Roxanne thought they all sounded the same, anyway. "Amber Marquette, please come up! It's your turn to die this year!"

"It's not funny, Roxy," Amber said, though the sparkle in her eye suggested otherwise. She liked her cousin's dark sense of humor, but usually lacked the courage to make jokes like that herself. "I'm gonna laugh if it's you, you know. You totally set yourself up."

"It won't, don't worry," Roxanne said, rolling her eyes and leaning back in her seat. "District 9 is huge. It's so not gonna be me."

"Whatever, girl. It's your funeral."


Arius Finley, 17
District 9

"You can do it, Arius. I know you can."

Amber's voice echoed in Arius's ears as he sat in the Justice Building, his face blank. From the outside, one might think Arius was nervous for what would happen to him over the next few weeks. Amber certainly seemed to think so, the way she was giving encouraging words with a troubled look on her face. It was unusual. Arius was used to being the one comforting his older sister, and now it was the other way around. Though it wasn't as if he needed the comfort.

Because strangely, Arius wasn't all that bothered. Maybe it was the universe giving him some payback for all the bad things he'd done in the past. Maybe the universe chose him because it knew he stood a chance. Maybe the idea that "the universe" was a conscious being that could make decisions and tell right from wrong was stupid. Regardless, Arius was chosen to compete in the 100th Hunger Games.

"Listen to me," Amber said. She had requested to have a private goodbye with him, separate from their parents and other three siblings. She looked over her shoulder, checking to make sure the door was closed, then met Arius's eye with earnest. "You saved my life."

Arius shook his head. "You don't have to-"

"Stop. I know you'll be able to do it. You've done it before."

The memories of that night came flooding back. He was walking home from a long day at the fields with Amber when he was almost 16 and she was 19. Their parents were happy that Arius was working in the fields because it meant that Amber wouldn't have to walk home alone in the dark anymore. They were happy that she would be safe.

The sun had retreated under the horizon hours ago, leaving the District pitch black, save for a few candles lit in people's front windows to guide the night workers like Arius and Amber home. Sometimes they had a lantern. Not usually. Not that day.

Arius had crouched down to relace his work boot and told his sister to keep going without him. It would only take a couple of minutes for him to lace up and he knew he'd be able to catch up with her. He was only on the ground for what felt like a couple of seconds before he heard his sister scream. He unceremoniously stuffed the laces into his boot and broke out into a sprint, following the sound of his sister's voice.

He found her quickly being pulled by her hair into a narrow alley by some creep who looked about 50 holding a knife to her throat. He was bigger than Arius but definitely not faster. The sight of the nearly six foot tall and heavily muscled teenager at the end of an alley must have surprised him just enough to loosen his grip on Amber's hair, because she dropped to the ground and scrambled away.

While he was distracted, Arius charged at the man, using the sheer force of his body to push him to the ground. The two grappled for control on the ground for a while before Arius found himself on top of the man, a knee at his throat and one hand holding his wrists above his head. He was vaguely aware of a sharp pain in his left arm and looked down to see a long line of blood dripping down his forearm.

That's gonna leave a scar.

Something primal took over. He had never really been in a fight before, aside from a few petty schoolyard brawls with his classmates. But this was different. Who was this man to threaten his sister's life? Before he knew it, Arius was punching this man harder than he'd ever punched anyone in his life. The man's nose broke with a powerful crack, and blood began to gush out of it.

That's probably enough.

It wasn't enough. This man needed to pay for what he did (or was going to do) to Amber. He grabbed his hair and slammed his head into the ground until the man weakly spit out a tooth covered in blood and spit.

Arius, that's enough.

He kept going. He punched, hit, scratched, and slammed until bruises blossomed all over the man's face and neck. There was so much blood on the ground, Arius couldn't tell what was his and what was the man's.

"Arius!"

He looked over at his sister, her normally tan face as white as a sheet and tears in her eyes. She was shaking, and with heaving breaths, Arius got up off the ground and walked over to her. He went to touch her, but she flinched, still staring at the man on the ground. Even though it was dark, it didn't take Arius long to realize that the man was no longer breathing. Without another word to Amber, Arius walked to the water pump at the end of the alley and washed the dead man's blood from his hands.

"It's not going to help," Arius said, snapping back to reality. "I don't even remember what I did."

Liar.

Of course he remembered. How could he forget the first night that really made him feel alive? For fifteen years Arius was made to feel inferior, and for what? Because he lived in District 9? Because his family was big and poor and they worked in the fields? Whatever the reason, there were no two ways about it: killing that man made Arius feel good. He tried to tell himself that it made him feel good because the man was bad, and he stopped him from doing bad things. But deep down, he knew he couldn't kid himself. Killing that man made him feel powerful and alive. He loved knowing what he was capable of.

"It'll come back to you," Amber said. "I know it will. I know you've been practicing."

Arius's blood went cold. How did she know about that? The surprise must have registered on his face, because his sister scoffed.

"Arius, we work together. It didn't take long for me to figure out you weren't always in the fields when you said you were."

She was right, of course. Killing that man woke something deep inside of him. Within weeks, he joined an underground fight club of sorts at District 9's black market that allowed him to not only fight other people, but even to get paid if he won. It was a win-win; he got to get his aggression out and make money at the same time. Eventually, he was making enough consistent money at the club that he cut his hours in the field in half. But he hadn't considered how that would look to Amber, who he used to work the same hours as.

"The odds are in your favor," Amber continued. "But this time, you're not fighting for me anymore. You're fighting for yourself. So win."


Amaranth Lavash, 22
Victor of the 96th Hunger Games: District 9

Life as a Victor was more luxurious than Amaranth could have ever imagined. She had heard from some of the older Victors like Cashmere and Kingsley that some of the more attractive kids who make it out of the Games used to be forced into prositiution against their wills. Luckily for the younger crowd, that practice was almost completely done away with by the time Amaranth took home the crown, thanks to her good looks, charming personality, and some seriously generous sponsors. The rumor was that the newer administrations understood the importance of keeping their Victors happy.

Ironically enough, now that Amaranth didn't have to worry about cutting down wheat stalks day in and day out, she made her living in sex by choice. Back before she was a tribute, no one gave her the time of day. Beauty standards in District 9 were pretty much everything that Amaranth wasn't. The men at home liked their women tall and muscular so that they could work hard and make a lot of money, while she was barely five feet tall and could be knocked over by a gust of wind. Her mother taught her that men appreciated women who were outspoken and had big opinions, but Amaranth struggled on that front. She never knew how to articulate what she wanted to say, and she had trouble raising her voice.

But when she got on the train, everything changed. Men (and even some women) in the Capitol found Amaranth's petite stature and soft-spoken nature charming, even alluring. She was showered with gifts in the arena; food, water, medicine, and blankets so it hardly felt like she was in a fight to the death at all. She had a blowgun at her side and killed just two people, more or less standing back and letting the other tributes do all the heavy lifting.

On her Victory Tour, Amaranth was approached by a few executives in the Capitol who asked her if she wanted to do some film work, and before she knew it, she was starring in some of the classiest adult films in Panem. She loved what she did, and if it allowed her to spend most of her time in the Capitol and more or less lease her house in Victors' Village to her parents and younger brother. She didn't come back to her District often, but the Reaping was an exception, especially the Reaping for a Quarter Quell.

While Arius and Roxanne were saying goodbye to their loved ones, Amaranth and Kepheus sat quietly on the stage, waiting to be taken to the train station. She was conflicted about which tribute she would end up with, since they usually let the tribute choose the mentor rather than the other way around, and she didn't know who she wanted to choose her. On one hand, Arius looked like the more capable of the two. But on the other hand, he also looked absolutely insane as he mounted the stage with a grin spread across his face. She was leaning more towards hoping for Roxanne, but only time would tell.

After just 20 minutes, the tributes came back out. Arius's grin was replaced by a completely neutral expression, and Roxanne's scowl had come tear stained. If their changes in demeanor were any indication, these next few weeks were sure to be exciting.


Thanks to the garden for Roxanne and Mykindleisawesome for Arius!

If you saw that the first time, no you didn't.

1. Who did you like better, Roxanne or Arius?

2. What did you like about them?

3. What didn't you like about them?

4. Thoughts on Amaranth?

5. Any predictions?