*deep breath*
Hello everyone; if we haven't met, my name is Paradigm of Writing and I am an SYOT writer here in the fandom. What you are looking at is the very first chapter to my next SYOT - yes, I know I'm in the middle of one right now, I'm 3/4 of the way finished with that one - called Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Death. This, ladies and gentlemen, will be my take on the 1st Hunger Games. I have a companion story called The Ash Wars for the Dark Days but that'll be after this piece is completed far into the future. The submission form will be down at the bottom, but it'll be greatly appreciated you all read through the chapter; it'll mean a ton. Please enjoy Chapter #1: When the Dust Settles.
Vengeance is a monster of appetite, forever bloodthirsty and never filled. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich
Friedrich Calvary: Mayor of District 1 P.O.V
This is it.
The end of days.
Or, at least, it feels like the end of days.
Friedrich Calvary tugs on the ends of the bowtie a bit, tightening the pressure around his throat. One hand falls lax to the side, resting atop the windowsill, leaning his head back against the chilled pane. The pane is oddly cool, despite the rays of sun beating down onto his neck, it being a hot and sweltering August day, like all the others in the past have so far been. The pressure remains on his throat, pressing back into his Adam's apple so hard he thinks it might expel from his throat. Friedrich has no idea what he'd do if part of his body were to be suddenly thrown up onto the carpet in front of him. He frowns, at that thought... in less than a week's time twenty-four teenagers will be experiencing that same exact scenario... but it'll involve limbs of all shapes and sizes, jaggedly cut off at the bits, pillars of blood spilling into the sand.
He shudders, moving away from the class, rubbing at his arms.
"Their blood is not on my hands," he whispers to himself, squeezing his eyes shut. He swallows heavily, his throat churning, Friedrich taking a deep breath, stumbling over towards the chair in the corner. The mayor of District 1 sits down, ever so slowly sliding his body onto the cushion, a jar of molasses moving at the speed of an insect drowning in amber. "Their blood is not on my hands," Friedrich repeats again, his hands shaking, he smoothing out a crease in his pant leg. It isn't his fault the war ended swiftly after they turned coats... it isn't his fault that President Israel pressed the barrel of the gun up against the underside of his jaw, and told him to tell the forces to stand down. District 2 had already succumbed, licking Emrick's boots clean, and then all of the attention is turned towards him.
Friedrich is shivering during the commencement, the announcement broadcast to all of the districts, and the Capitol, that District 1 will be joining sides with the Capitol, switching away from the rebellion, a decent hit to District 13's army and morale... but they'd be able to last, wouldn't they? That is, until, just half an hour later, Two goes public with their announcement of switching sides, and the rest of it crumbles like a sandcastle in Panem's hands. Friedrich has seen the glares that the mayors of all the other districts have given him since then, but it is that or bite the silver bullet. All the remaining mayors that didn't announce their official surrender that same night are lined up in front of the steps to the presidential mansion in the Capitol, a silver machete separating their heads from their bodies, and Friedrich holds onto his seat of power.
He's a hero, in One, as his poll numbers have gone up exponentially, and people are cheering for him in the streets, fan mail almost so overwhelming it is a rising mess of papers to the top of the mail room, a mountain of pallid white, with some still having fresh ink drip down the envelopes, into a puddle at the bottom of the mound, an inky midnight pool. Friedrich is unable to look at the puddle, his heart welling in his throat, before swallowing it back down. Not my blood on the ground. I- I didn't do anything to them. This is their own fault, they've done this to themselves.
District 13 fell much quicker than anyone had been expecting, even Friedrich, living out the last few weeks of the war in the Capitol, in a holding cell, furnished and open, but he is no free man until his trust is fully confirmed. Living so close to the Capitol, as has Two, no one understands what it feels like to have the breath of the viper breathing down their necks, until the fangs have already inserted the skin in its venomous bite. Districts 7, 9, 10, 11, and 12 have lost 40% of their working male population, men between the ages of 30-55... orphans, families without fathers and mothers, widows left to collect paper scraps in the streets as the iron yoke of the Capitol comes down swinging even harder. Friedrich doesn't wipe away the tears as the executions are aired live. He will never shed another tear again, for he's cried too many times over the lost sons and daughters from the jewel in Panem.
It is the end of days, at least, in his head, for Panem to ever be 'normal' again. President Emrick Israel and the committee underneath him call it the Hunger Games, and the first day of the first year is happening today. The arduous process of having it signed into law took four months, nearly five, before Emrick threatens to turn the nation under lockdown until the quells of unrest that threaten to reappear are silenced. From what Friedrich can recall from one of the last video conferences held from the mansion, that this is the replacement for what would be mass executions across all the districts. Thank the heavens for Cain Passionia, Friedrich blesses his lucky stars. Without him, Emrick's right man, potentially the population of Panem would be culled.
However, he's not so sure if Cain's intervention has helped in the long run, for it is his brain child to think of the Hunger Games. With District 13 successfully eradicated, a smoldering landscape farther out east with smoke billowing from the volcanic devil's mouths bore into the ground, an entire community, an entire kingdom wiped out... it has been left to just Districts 1-12, and the Capitol. Each district will offer up one young man and woman between the ages of twelve to eighteen to fight in the Capitol, sanctioned over a two-week period max to be quartered off into an arena, isolated from the rest of the country, to fight to the death. The victor of said Games will be held onto a pedestal for all of Panem to see, an example of what the generations should be from now on... and if anyone is to stray just but a little...
Friedrich shudders at the implications of that thought, for Emrick's stare through the camera lens hundreds of miles away is enough to cause the mayor to scuttle away from his desk like a dog on all fours.
The outline of how the morning is supposed to go, where the event is darkly noted as The Reaping is to start at noon, at the zenith where the sun is in the sky, but Friedrich believes it is just so he will be forced to sweat more, as he's standing on the stage in front of every teenager in District 1 for the entire duration of the reaping - the term has slipped into his own vernacular flawlessly, only where he notices it over dinner with his wife and daughter, asking to pass the buttered corn, and if his sweet Emily is ready for the upcoming week, for she's not exempt from the call either - and won't leave the stage until it is over. The boys separated one side of the courtyard in oldest to youngest, and the girls on the other side... and one lucky - unlucky, if certain circles are asked, but their positions are removed by the end of the hour, loyalists put into place - young man and young woman are to be selected.
Cain Passionia - "Bless him, bless him, bless him!" Friedrich yells at the ceiling, with a curved palm sliding over slicked over flesh, a jar of olive oil spilling down his skin as his cries echo into the night - suggests something a bit more pacifistic, at which Emrick nearly chokes him out right there at the meeting, on something called a volunteer. Someone who can potentially save said reaped tribute's life if they are feeling lucky or stupid enough to do so. Friedrich is never going to recommend anyone do that, in his district, for enough people have bled in the Ash Wars as it is... his people have suffered enough.
He checks his watch, the lump in his throat returning, he rubbing his fingers over the slight nub, shaking his head, frizzed blue strands of hair parting over his eyes. Emrick keeps him alive, he's told by the man himself, on not just his loyalty, but his eye color. "It is not very often I find someone with pink eyes, you know. Never change them, Mr. Calvary."
He'll never change them, if it is an order from the top.
It's 11:30... and with that, the citizens of District 1 will be arriving in due time to the town square, the reapings held in front of the Justice Building, just a hop and a skip away from his home. He has to buy a new home to live in, as his old bed is covered in memories from the old Panem, from the Panem that no longer exists once the dust has finally settled.
Friedrich gets to his feet, tugging at the sleeves of his jacket, hiding his translucent flesh behind a sheath of midnight, and for a split second, his eyes catch the curved scar that will never fully heal, the sinew cut ending just where the wrist meets his palm.
"Just another price I've had to pay," he tells himself, lifting his head high. "No matter. The other districts will pay their due too, eventually."
He is simply wasting time, the longer he waits, the longer he stays standing still instead of heading to the stage, to make sure the slips are all accounted for, or that the sound equipment will work... preparedness, or rather a lack thereof, has left the wool over his eyes too many a time in the past.
Such as the bullet underneath your jaw? Or Cain's hand in yours? A voice unlike his own whispers throughout the room, Friedrich turning around with a frown. No one there, just a fine settlement of dust on the other windowsill overlooking the town square.
"Just the wind," Friedrich tells himself, with a skittish laugh. "It's nothing."
The hour draws ever near on the beginning of the 1st Hunger Games, and when the dust settles, no one will ever be the same.
Tribute Submission Form
Name:
District with two backups:
Age:
Gender:
Appearance:
Personality (be descriptive please: likes, dislikes, sexuality preference if any, traits, etc...)
Backstory:
Family/Friends: (no need to be overtly descriptive)
Reaped/Volunteered?:
Reaction/Reason:? [volunteering reason needs to be a knock out of the park]
Weaknesses (minimum of three, be specific)
Strengths (maximum of five, be specific)
Weapon(s) of choice:
Token:
Reaction to seeing the Capitol for the first time?:
Any allies or alliances?:
What would they do during training?:
Private Gamemaker Session?:
Preferred Range of Score: (1-4, 5-8, 9-12) and why?:
Potential interview strategy?:
Preferable Placement and why?: ([Bloodbath: 24th-18th] - [Early Game: 13th-17th] - [Mid Game: 7th-12th] - [Finale: 1st/Victor-6th]):
Cause of Death?
There we have it folks, the very first chapter of my next SYOT, Chapter #1: When the Dust Settles, for Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Death, an SYOT detailing the very 1st Hunger Games. Above is the criteria for the tribute submission form, and if you have any questions about anything on there, please let me know. Submissions will be through PM only, no review submissions please, and I do not do reservations, nor first-come, first-serve. The submissions will stand on their own, regardless of my own personal relationships, so make those tributes the best they can be! Submissions are open starting today, and I have yet to decide a day when I'll end them, but it won't be for at least a good while. If you submit a tribute that is currently alive or in a story that has not been discontinued, that tribute/submission will not be counted or used. If they are from a discontinued SYOT and were introduced but not killed or the SYOT did not make it into the arena, feel free.
Although I feel it doesn't need to be said, might as well cover my bases, that if you submit someone from a typical Career district 1, 2, or 4, obviously in the 1st Hunger Games, the actual Careers don't exist.
On my profile, eventually, as I always do this, there'll be a statistic breakdown per district / gender for the total number of submissions, for my benefit and for yours. A max of just three tribute submissions, but I imagine most might just send one for right now, please and thank you. If you do send three, know that I most likely will accept just two of the three, but right now I am aiming for one tribute per submitter. This chapter started one of my OC's from a Capitol perspective, Mr. Friedrich Calvary, the mayor of District 1, as well as some cameos for other characters that'll be included alongside the tribute cast. Please do review and let me know what you thought; it'll be greatly appreciated, and by all means, please submit! I'd be honored. I love you all so much! Have an amazing day! Bye!
~ Paradigm