Mink Ultramarine, District 1

"She was a shark smile in a yellow van.

She came around and I stole her glance in my youth."

Big Thief, Shark Smile


Caesar Flickerman could not quite believe his new job.

Last year, he'd been a bit of a mess. He'd been an inexperienced, nervous drama student barely older than the victor he'd been interviewing and the victor he'd been interviewing - Sotope Baymark - had been one of the most beautiful and terrifying girls he'd ever spoken to. Luckily for him, Sotope Baymark had deemed him "a total disaster but not a nuclear one" and that was enough for him to keep his job for another year and get into the swing of things.

All the interviews he'd done this year had been pretty successful so far - even the one with Aubergine, the blind girl from District 11. Now he just needed to get the new victor, Mink Ultramarine, through the games recap and his final interview and he'd be solid in the knowledge that he was the Master of Ceremonies.

It was a good thing that Mink Ultramarine seemed absolutely fine.

The new victor strode onto the stage, beaming and waving at the crowd. They cheer right back at him. Already, he was looking to be a popular victor. He currently been ranked Panem's third most attractive male victor and, when he was wearing a sea-grey suit that matched his eyes, Caesar could see why.

He felt a little shallow as he greeted Mink with a smile. The boy had betrayed two alliances. If he'd been an ugly, scrawny outlier, there was no way he'd have been popular at all. Caesar had actually liked some of the tributes that Mink had betrayed.

Some of them, Caesar had wanted to be friends with. Some of them, Caesar would've rather seen win than Mink.

Mink sat down and began watching the recap. He smiled all the way through the pre-games events - volunteering at the reaping, looking handsome during the parade, being charming and elusive during the interviews. Caesar could tell from the look in Mink's eyes that he was the kind of man who liked watching himself on a screen.

He wondered if Mink's smile would fade when he had to watch himself do terrible things.

The recaps were a fairly new invention. Mink was only the third victor to watch their own games on live television. Vitellia Tonioli, a volunteer with seven kills, had sat, silent and haunted. Sotope Baymark, with the blood of four volunteers on her hands, had been triumphant, but not over who she'd killed, simply over who she'd beaten.

"I don't feel guilty at all," Caesar remembered her saying. "Everyone I'd killed had volunteered for the games. They'd known what they were getting into. It's a competition. I shouldn't feel guilty for competing."

The bloodbath began with a bang, as Nucleus, the volunteer from District 5, who'd claimed to be the next Luka Starkwain, despite only scoring a two in training, had completely lost it on his podium and fallen onto the mines. Caesar's friends had been joking about the 'Nuclear Meltdown' for weeks.

Kier, the boy from District 9, whose parents had bet on him being reaped, earned himself some screen time by killing Mink's district partner, Locket. Caesar felt a pang of sadness over the girl's death. She'd talked about her four pet dogs - Jet, Emerald, Rarity and Amber - in her interview. Caesar wondered who'd look after the dogs now that Locket was dead. Maybe he could adopt them.

If Mink felt anything about his district partner's early death, he didn't show it. Instead he just kept grinning. As the camera cut to Mink stabbing his ally, Fidelius, the boy from Two, in the back with a spear, the boy actually laughed.

The rest of the games were particularly chaotic. The arena, a long, beach road covered with abandoned cars, had allowed for a lot of interesting deaths. A bit of screen time was given to every death, especially when Sprout, the tiny fourteen-year-old from Eleven, had managed to hot-wire a car and started running over other tributes. The tributes from four were attacked by sharks and both were killed. The girl, Mariana, had a boyfriend in a coma, who'd wake up to find out that she'd died.

As for Mink, he'd formed an alliance with Evelyn, the tough, pretty mechanic from Six. As they spent time together in the arena, with Mink's only kill outside the bloodbath being Canary, the girl from Twelve who'd never learned to read, viewers had noticed romance beginning to blossom between the pair.

Caesar studied Mink's face for some sign of guilt as the screen showed night after night of Mink and Evelyn huddled together, one of them lying to the other and the other one believing the lies. There was no change in his eyes, only something that looked a little bit like pride. He looked gorgeous, like an ancient statue of a hero, but, in Caesar's mind, it twisted and distorted into something evil and terrifying.

When there had only been five tributes remaining, the alliance had been attacked by Marten, the boy from Seven. He'd gone mad after watching his only ally, Geneviève, the bubbly, friendly girl from Eight, die in his arms from an infection. The quiet, sensitive boy who'd wanted to be a filmmaker was gone, replaced by a vicious killer who drowned other tributes with his bare hands. Marten managed to overpower Mink and hold his head under the water. Evelyn, who had only killed one person so far - Invidia, the girl from Two who'd had a grudge against District 8 ever since losing her aunt and her brother to their tributes - managed to burn Marten to death with a can of gasoline to rescue her ally. It was so different to the quick stab in the back she'd given Invidia.

Caesar noticed that the only time that Mink's smile dropped was when Marten was drowning him on the screen. Maybe he was embarrassed about needing someone to save him, especially since Evelyn had started sobbing in Mink's arms as they watched Marten's charred body twitch and writhe in agony. Maybe he'd thought that she was weak.

Caesar wondered if Mink had known about Evelyn's younger brother, Rodney. Caesar knew, of course. He'd been on the train to District 6 when Evelyn had reached the top eight so he could interview the poor boy. He'd been such a nice boy, so good at keeping a brave face. As Caesar had watched Evelyn kill Marten, the first time, he'd thought about Rodney and whether that had traumatised him. Maybe Evelyn had cried because she'd thought the same thing.

Mink's final direct kill was Kier, who'd been one of the favourites to win since he'd killed Locket. Caesar had learned, after traveling to District 9 for the top eight interview, that his parents had bet all their money on him out of remorse. Now Kier had died believing that his parents had never loved him. Then it came to the finale - Mink and Evelyn, still in an alliance versus Sprout, zooming around the arena in a stolen car.

The only way Mink and Evelyn could kill Sprout was get him out of his car. Their plan was to drive another car straight at his and jump out before they collided. But just as their car had been careening towards Sprout's, Mink had stabbed Evelyn through the chest with a spear, pinning her to the driver's seat. Mink was the only tribute who'd leaped away from the collision. He'd landed softly in the arena's sand and watched his final two opponents die in a fiery explosion.

Technically, neither Sprout nor Evelyn had counted as Mink's direct kills, since they'd both been killed by the crash. Caesar knew that Evelyn probably would've made it out of the crash if Mink hadn't stabbed her. Whether she'd be able to beat him in a fight was another matter, one that Mink clearly hadn't been willing to consider.

Neither the Master of Ceremonies nor the victor of the Twenty-Eighth Hunger Games lost their smiles as they watched Evelyn's eyes fill with fear and anger and sadness over Mink's betrayal. Caesar's smile was as false as Mink's love for Evelyn. He finally understood what being Master of Ceremonies meant. You got to know twenty-four kids, to like them, to root for them, and then you had to watch all but one die.

Caesar certainly didn't feel like smiling anymore. He hoped that Mink didn't either.


It's only as I was writing these few chapters that I realised that I'd written five female victors in a row. Mink is the first male victor since Kraken. He's definitely one of the less likeable Careers I've written. He won just by being a massive sneak. Not many victors managed to form and betray two alliances and the only other one I can think of off the top of my head (we'll cover her in a later chapter) at least managed to show some kindness to her dying ally.

We also finally have the Master of Ceremonies we all know and love. Caesar felt a lot of sympathy for the tributes when he started out and really connected with a few of them. He comes to care for the tributes a little less over time as he becomes desensitised to their deaths. Some of the chapters I've written containing Caesar when he's older and more cynical portray him a lot less sympathetically.

I have something pretty elaborate planned for next chapter, something that'll tie up a few of the storylines I've been setting up over the last couple of decades. It might take me a bit longer to update than usual.