Author's Note

I do not own the Hunger Games.

Thank you to everyone who has submitted a character! There are still four open slots: the District One Female, District Two Male, District Six Male, and District Eight Female. Submissions close on the thirtieth, but if you do have an interest in any of the remaining slots and aren't sure about meeting the deadline, let me know and I will hold the slot reserved for you.


Since he was underage – only fifteen – he was to return to a type of 'school' in prison and learn some skills the Capitol deemed 'useful.'

"And if you're lucky, maybe you can earn parole," grunted one of the peacekeepers.

He snarled at them, which earned him a baton to the head.

Prison was nothing but routine. Get up, wash, breakfast, class, lunch, skills lessons, free time, tea, bed. He took up running in his free time, and butchery in his skills class. The prison had their own little slaughterhouse for sheep and horses, and he spent four hours an afternoon working amongst the meat.


Her mother took one look at her and wrapped her up in her arms.

"Oh, sweetheart," was all she said.

She pushed her away.

She had given her new husband a hoard of new children, she learnt quickly, ranging from only slightly younger than her to barely walking.

Some part of her still alive and attached enough to care seethed.

She had them, she cared for them, so why leave the two of them behind?

Was it their wildness, there even from a young age?

Was it their being their father's children?

Their violent, angry nature?

Hadn't she loved them?

Perhaps they were simply unloveable.

She was given a tiny, narrow room in the attic, barely even a room, barely high enough for her to stand without hitting her head – and what if she grew taller, huh? – but it was a space of her own, which her mother said 'was important at this difficult time.'

Whatever.


The only one of their mother's new children that was tolerable was the seven year old girl, Ariel. She was a waif of a girl, with a mop of dark hair and the same big pale eyes she had who knew more than she should and had a touch of the wildness about her that had been tamed and beaten into submission.

"You're like me, aren't you?" she asked one day.

She smiled.

And they were friends.