Berlyn is a girl's name. My father knew this and he named me that anyway. I guess having three sets of twins and all of them being boys made him wish he had at least one daughter. I'm not the youngest, though, so I figure my younger brothers weren't planned. At least I'm not the effeminate version of an identical pair. Me and my twin, Gunther, don't look anything alike. Our younger brothers, Hans and Inglebert, are identical. Well, almost. Ingle has no hair. At all. I think it's funny, but I get in trouble whenever I comment on it. Our older brothers are similar, but not identical. Wilhelm and Ottokar look like our mother. I think that makes Wil Dad's favorite. He'd never admit it.

Anyway, I'm technically the third oldest. I'm the most aggressive out of the Hayden boys. Comes from having a girl's name. I get into fights just for the heck of it. I know it drives my father crazy, knowing that my outbursts are offenses that get my name tossed into a glass bowl every time. I've stopped counting how many I must have. That's the point. I want my name in there as many times as I can get it. That reduces my brothers' chances of being picked on Reaping Day. We don't talk about it because we don't have to. I'm the one going if any of us have to. Last year was the most intense for me when Wil and Otto had been in the year before and had taken out tessare since then. I know Wil got into a fight at the docks before the names were tallied in the bowls. Gun and I were 12 that year, and I knew I didn't have more of my name in there than Wil. Someone's name was drawn whom I didn't know.

Now we're 13 and I know I have the most in there. Please let the probability theory be worth coming up with.

"I hate that you're doing this, you know," Gun tells me as we clean our catch of halibut.

I separate the skin from the meat of a filet. No, I don't want to go to the arena. The thought of any of my brothers going there is worse.

"I don't care what you think, you know," I tell him.

He nods and sighs. Normally, he'll throw fish oil at me and call me an idiot. Today, the reaping is less than a week away. Gun doesn't do serious very often. His self defense is humor. He only gets real with me when stuff is mortal danger serious. First time he did it, we were seven. I had accidentally run into a fire urchin while we were diving. Having never even seen one before, both of us thought I was going to die. It hurt like hell, literally, my arm where it stung me was on fire. That pain was worse than when I broke my arm. Gun looked like he was ready to kill somebody.

That's the look he has on his face now. I'm glad he's focused on the halibut. Well, he may be doing that so he can stay angry. Crying follows pretty quickly for him.

"I know, you jerk," he says softly. If he gets any louder, his voice might break and then he'll start crying.

"We know why, Dad knows why," I say. That fat fish is done, move on to the next one, "Don't worry about it until it happens, okay?"

"Okay," Gun flicks oil at me then, "But only because you'd give up on life without some comedic breaks from your favorite person."

"That's true."

We don't talk like this much. I'm going to break my hand on a wooden post on the docs later. Gunther is going to cry until he passes out. We're emotional.

Reaping Day comes around faster than I want it to. Mock me, I'm human. Fear is a thing that happens.

Despite what most of the people in District 4 pretend, we aren't rich like 1 & 2. The media likes to make us look like a beachfront paradise. They don't show devastating high tides that should be predictable at this point. They don't show hurricanes. They don't show the damage. They don't show how much it costs to rebuild everything from the ground up every year. More money goes into restoring the docks than imports. Imports, in case it's not obvious, get us everything that isn't fish or freaking coconuts. I hate coconuts. Flaky and sweet. They're disgusting. So, clothes, building material, metal tools, that all comes from other districts. I have two shirts. One I'm allowed to wear, the other stays in our father's closet until Reaping Day and goes right back in once it's over. that's okay with me, I prefer no shirts. I have one pair of nice pants that have a hole in the left knee. I prefer shorts. Any long pants I've ever worn end up with holes in the knees.

Gun and I brush our hair. His is black and curly, like our Mom's, so all he has to do is make sure there's no sand in it. Mine, unfortunately, is our Dad's hair. It's light blond, straight, and must be parted exactly right, otherwise it's a mess. Gun does it for me because Wil and Otto are hogging the mirror. They both have black hair, but it's straight and looks a worse mess than mine when it's not combed right.

"You look like Dad," Gun frowns at me like he's trying to read words, "Spooky."

"Only 'cuz you keep styling my hair like an old man's," I smirk at him.

Gunther's eyes are green like mine, but they usually have stripes of gold in them. Mine would look like that if I laughed more. Today, I assume our eyes are the same. His have a sad, silver color in them.

"I don't want to go today," he lets his thoughts slip. He covers it up immediately, "It looks like it's going to rain in the middle of the ceremony and Dad will be pissed if our nice clothes get ruined."

"Mhm," I don't respond to that.

District 4 may be considered a Career district, with a large pool of victors and a reputation for excellent battle tactics. I almost blame luck. Our product is wild caught fish, which is all the training we get. I'm not old enough to get on the sea yet. Thirteen-year-olds are confined to the harbor and reefs. That's why our victors are all either 16 or 17. Big, strong, experienced with the adventure of open sea fishing. It's not combat. It's not the same. I have enough experience getting into fist fights to know that much.

It doesn't matter, though. We won't have to worry about it. Probability is a funny thing. In theory, it all makes sense. On paper, it's logical. In real life, it doesn't matter. In real life, numbers don't mean anything because there's always a chance the small odds will win out.

Otto has a book on probability, the sadist. I tried to read it, and I got a headache.

The sky was still overcast by the time the reaping was supposed to start. We all filed in line like we were supposed to, good little sheep off to the slaughter. I think that's right. I don't know because I've never seen a sheep. It's a phrase. Our Opa used it once. He saw sheep.

Gunther and I are in the front row of the thirteen-year-olds. Since our last name is Hayden, we're always in the front. For some reason, the majority of District 4 has M or O last names. I don't like being on the front row. Everyone can see how short I am. This is the only point at which I wish Gunther and I were identical. He's got almost six inches on me. All the other thirteen-year-olds are at least eight inches taller than I am. I'm stunted. I'm a runt. I hate it. Wil spent an entire month making sure I ate twice as much as he did and I never grew. Maybe I've got worms. It's unlikely. Saltwater should kill worms and I'm in the ocean more than I'm out of it.

The 12's in front of me are taller by a few inches, so I can't see the stage. That's good. I have a hard time keeping a straight face when the announcer lady comes out with her hair all huge and weird and make up on her face looking like urchin spines. Dad made it very clear that smiling was not acceptable during the Reaping. Apparently, he did some suspicious stuff and we were all under close scrutiny. No smiling for Berlyn.

There's a girl across the road in the thirteen's row who is crying her eyes out. She was wearing mascara and it's streaming down her face.

Said announcer lady walks on the stage. I know the sound of her high heels. There's the regular speech. There's the regular greeting.

"Ladies first," the lady walks to the right, well, my right. She sticks her hand in the clear fish bowl and picks out a piece of paper. She toddles back to her microphone and with a fabulous grin, she reads off the name, "Layla Rourke."

She must be older. I don't see anybody moving at first. Then a tall girl walks by, her hair is dark and braided. She goes silently up to the stage and no one makes any protests, no goodbyes, no good luck, no one says anything. Maybe she doesn't have any family?

Then announcer lady totters to the other bowl, picks a paper, and teeters back to the center.

"And our male tribute is..." she squints at the paper to make sure she's reading it correctly. She's having a hard time because it's a girl's name, "Berlyn Hayden!"

Well, I got what I wanted, didn't I?