Chapter Title: 01. Papers

Chapter Subtitle: 01. The Victors Do Paperwork While the President Schemes

Description: Cashmere (she's sure she's not the only one) just hates papers—no offense, District 7.

Summary: "Good, very good. Just let me ask you one thing. Will this plan anyhow affect the victors psychologically?"/ "FUUUUUUUCCCCCK!"

Rating: T for The Tremendously pissed victors

Main Characters/Pairings: Coriolanus S., Plutarch H., Cinna X., The (enormously pissed) Victors

Genre: Adventure (of the envelope), Horror (of the paperwork), Hurt/Comfort (every time when a victor screams in frustration), Angst (when a victor skipped a paper and has to find it in the mess—oh, the angst!), Comedy (the whole situation to Snow)

Disclaimer: If I owned The Hunger Games, Finnick would've been handing out sugar cubes every Saturday morning.

Thank you for being such a wonderful beta, Amber1015!

"So, Plutarch, my friend, what have you prepared for our very special tributes this year? I mean, this is the year of the third Quarter Quell." Caesar Flickerman comically wiggles his eyebrows up and down a few times, then grins into the camera. The crowd cheers and hoots in anticipation.

After all the commotion has died down, Plutarch, with a small smile on his lips, says in a rather calm voice, "I'm not allowed to spoil anything, but just so you know, this year's game is going to be a series of firsts and lasts."

Of course, Caesar pouts at the vague answer. He whirls toward the audience in his turnable chair, and exclaims, his arms extended to his sides, "Come on, Plutarch, we want details!"

Another agreeing roar from the audience.

"Well," Plutarch says in the same placid tone, "I guess I can tell you that this year, the tributes aren't going to be mixed up."

There is silence, for everyone is racking their brains to figure out what the hell Plutarch could possibly mean. Caesar, eyes bulging out of their sockets, looks like he's one second away from falling out of his chair. He frowns and leans towards his guest, waiting for the audience to catch on before he begins.

"Can you perhaps, elaborate? I'm pretty sure my puny brain isn't comprehending a word you said," he whispers to the Head Gamemaker as if telling a secret, and the whole audience hushes to catch Caesar's words.

"Ah, that was kind of my point—" Plutarch jokes, and there is some laughter from the audience, "—but since you ask so nicely, well then. Originally, twenty-four tributes are supposed to randomly stand in a circle around the Cornucopia when the game starts. However, this year, the tributes won't be mixed up—they will be placed in order around the Cornucopia, from District One to District Twelve; organized, in a perfect circle."

"Ah…" Caesar sighs dramatically as the audience begins to chatter excitedly. Never had the games performed any sort of organization. It was always random horrors for random tributes. Now, things seem to be looking a little bit different.

"Anything else? Besides what was written on the envelope this morning?" Caesar asks with a mischievous grin on his face. The audience falls silent, all catching their breaths to see if Plutarch will drop any more exciting new hints for them.

"Well, that," Plutarch says, and suddenly starts to cough into his hands, causing Caesar to groan good-naturedly. After the little fit, Plutarch smiles at the cameras, his eyes twinkling. "I have to say, that there will actually be rules in this particular Quarter Quell."

~.~.~

"Now I wonder," Cinna slowly says in a calm tone, "How that's going to turn out for us."

Haymitch grimly stares at the television screen, where Plutarch is taking a bow with Caesar calling out aside him, "Plutarch Heavensbee!" The audience goes wild.

"Rules," Cinna says when Haymitch doesn't reply. "Rules," he repeats quietly, putting his forefingers on his lips, leaning forward, and getting lost in thought.

"Yeah, yeah, rules," Haymitch says abruptly, shooting up from his armchair across from the man who was now observing him silently. "Rubbish. Think those'll keep you safe, huh? They're just another word for loopholes and fake heaven. To hell with them. I need a fucking beer."

As soon as he says that, a beer rises out of the middle of the table.

Cinna watches Haymitch calmly as he empties the whole bottle in less than six seconds.

"But somehow, Plutarch thinks that it's a one-way ticket to our Mockingjay," Haymitch splutters angrily, and Cinna's face darkens a bit as his eyes trail the bottle in Haymitch's hand as he slams it onto the table.

"We need a new name for our rebel leader," he mutters quietly, but sadness and rage can be heard just behind his calm façade. "The Mockingjay is dead," he says even more quietly, and Haymitch can see stylist's fury at the Capitol shimmering just beneath the surface.

Haymitch's eyes soften a bit, and he lets out a deep sigh. "You were quite fond of her, right?"

"That's an understatement," Cinna answers, closing his eyes and breathing deeply.

Haymitch pauses for a moment as he observes the pained man. His first tribute, his first hope, his first bet, and his first death. Katniss Everdeen had been a lot of Cinna's firsts, and the Capitol had killed her without mercy.

"I was too," Haymitch manages to say, his voice catching a little bit on the end, and when Cinna opens his eyes in surprise, he's already gone.

~.~.~

The envelope.

It was a small thing, a soft yellow shimmering around it like a halo.

Really, a small thing, carefully designed to fit perfectly in the pearly white box that contained thirty-eight of those things.

It was the thing the entire country had its focus on.

The envelope sat elegantly in the box a Capitol child brought in. He was about eight and was wearing a white dress suit and with a matching white rose pinned on it. With a cheeky smile, he walked toward the center of the stage, where a much, much older man stood, also dressed in blinding white.

The envelope sat still while the old man thanked the boy who held up the box for him.

The envelope was picked up and opened in the old man's careful, gloved hands.

Then it was read out loud, and there was a chorus of gasps and squeals in the audience.

"In this special year of the Quarter Quell, for the worthiest of the Capitolians who had died during the rebellion, only the worthiest of the citizens of Panem will be reaped. Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor."

~.~.~

Snow frowned at the enormous amount of paperwork in front of him. The papers filled at least a quarter of the enormous ballroom, floor to ceiling. "I always knew that there will be a price for me to pay if the rebellion happens," Plutarch coughed then, which suspiciously sounded like a "when." Snow promptly ignored him, and continued, "But this is too much."

Plutarch smiled to himself. "Yes, it is, sir."

A look of annoyance flashed across Snow's face. "Then why—"

"Sir," Plutarch cut in, and Snow scowled; he hated when someone interrupted him, but because of his esteem for his favored advisor, he bit his tongue. "Have you ever questioned why I've asked you to call all the victors to the victory party at your mansion two days ago? Perhaps why Haymitch Abernathy has plans to head to the District 12 stylist's house a few hours later? Or why Finnick Odair and Johanna Mason were throwing sugar cubes at each other this morning, rather than being in their respective districts?"

"Yes, I thought that that was because you didn't want the victors to have any connection with their districts, in fear of uprisings." Snow said, pondering. He took a gulp of water in the elegant crystal goblet beside him as he suddenly felt thirsty.

Plutarch nodded. "Yes, that's also true, but the main reason is to make them work for us here."

Snow knitted his brows. He knew that he would've been happy to hear that when just four years ago, but after Johanna Mason? Well, he could already hear her sarcastic voice in his head, spitting out, "WORK FOR YOU? WORK FOR YOU? Well, hell yeah, I'd be glad to. YOU CAN KISS MY—"

"I know what you're thinking, sir, but this 'work,' isn't that drastic. I'm sure even the most, ah—tricky—victors would be pushed into doing it." Plutarch said, and Snow couldn't help but marvel at his smile. How could he be smiling after saying something a parallel to Katniss Everdeen is alive and well, sir?

"How...?" Snow inquires, and as if he'd entirely planned out the whole conversation beforehand, Plutarch nods lightly and begins to explain.

"Do you know, sir, that the victors constantly have nightmares, not only because of their time in the arena but also because of the children they'd mentored that died in the arena?"

Snow frowned at the sudden question. However, he answered with a curt, "Yes, go on."

"Sir, the victors, as well as mentors, feel guilty of the death of their tributes, even though they know that it's what we wanted them to feel. When a district has a victor, the mentor responsible for the tribute has a brief mirage of relief that they weren't responsible for his/her death also." Plutarch glanced at Snow to see if he was following his explanation. Snow's face was scrunched up, but he waved his hand for the plump man to continue.

"Well, then think about this, sir. If the mentors are to choose their tributes, would they be abhorred? They won't be completely delighted, of course, but think about this; if they were able to escape mentoring the weakest, the most hopeless of the district, therefore having a better chance to make a victor out of their tribute and dodging their guilt, would they really say no?" When Snow didn't answer to his rhetorical question, Plutarch continued, "So what I'm suggesting is, put the victors in one huge room—"

"—when you say victors, does Mellark count?"

Plutarch paused a bit at the interruption. Then he continued as serenely as ever. "Yes, sir. His attendance should be mandatory. It's a plus for you, for you can send out the message; Look, the victor of the 74th Hunger Games. He hasn't even finished his victory tour, and he's already working for the Capitol."

Snow nodded sagely. "Good."

"So, again, what I'm saying is that we put all the victors in one huge room and tell them to sort through those papers—which has a bit of information on each child of reaping age in all 12 districts. Assign a table for the victors of each district and give them the files of their district's children. Tell them they can't go home until they've been through all the papers.

"They'll say yes because they'd never pass up a chance to let their tributes win. But they'll work efficiently because they hate us and will want to get this done fast—but correctly—and go home. And since the districts that have a sizeable reaping population have many victors, and the districts that have a small reaping population have hardly any victors so each district's sorting would end in a similar time. The reaping's in late July this year, sir. Let us keep them in the Capitol until then—or at least until they finished judging which children are to be reaped and which shouldn't be.

"But here's the trap. We tell them that they're free to work whenever they want, as long as it's in the required building. We tell them that they're free to roam the Capitol streets, do whatever they desire unless it's contacting their or other's districts. Tell them that they can do whatever they want if they just finish the paperwork before July. And if they want to, they're free to spend the rest of their time in the Capitol until the Games season starts. We give them a false sense of freedom, so they'd become lax, unguarded, undetermined. And you know what that can mean.

"Of course, the victors of the rebellious districts would still go home right after their job is done, but the other victors would quite like short-lived sensation. We may be able to keep the rebels in persuading other districts to join them and postpone the rebellion for a little while more."

Snow sighed and leaned back in his thron—chair. He went through all the things Plutarch just said to him in his mind. It was a great idea. A fantastic one as usual, and he didn't see any loopholes or faults in it.

"I guess you're going to suggest we plant secret cameras and recording devices in the room, also?"

Plutarch frowned at Snow's abrupt question, and the president was taken aback a bit. Was Plutarch actually going to say no to spying on the enemy?

"With all due respect, sir, I don't think that's a good idea in this circumstance. See, the thing is, if we plant the cameras, it'll be easier for the rebels to plant theirs as well. And as you know, some rebel districts may hold important information, but the districts loyal to the Capitol hold important information as well. And even though we need rebel information, we can't afford to leak any of ours. Even if you say that we're the only ones who planted the cameras, the recorded audios might also leak. So, what I'm proposing is to clean the building – completely. Make sure there aren't any cameras or recording devices hidden."

Snow contemplated this for a moment.

Then, smiling as wide and cruelly as his puffy lips could handle, he said, "Good, very good. Just let me ask you one thing. Will this plan anyhow affect the victors psychologically?"

~.~.~

Cashmere hates the color black. And white.

She feels dizzy from having sorted all these fucking miserable papers, and she's feeling cranky and irritable.

"So, what you're saying is, Plutarch convinced Snow that we're doing his dirty work for him, rather than planning a rebellion?" Gloss quickly shoots Cashmere a look as the disbelief in her voice threatened to carry over to the large table of District Two next to them.

"Yes, that's what Haymitch said," Sphinx replied—a man in his thirties and a District One victor of the 58th Hunger Games. "Now hush, and read the next form."

All the victors of the 74 Hunger Games, minus the deceased, insane, and sick, were huddled around, district by district, in the giant ballroom of the presidential mansion. Peeta Mellark's victory tour had ended a month ago, and oddly, no victors, including him, were to go home back to their districts after the ceremony at the Capitol. Mellark's home district celebration was never even held.

Turns out that they were to read the two-page forms of all of the children eligible for reaping in their entire district. The whole lot had been reading tedious paperwork all day long for a month. Talk about being the Capitol's true puppets.

Cashmere sighs and skims over the page again. She finds herself, two minutes later, reading the same sentence over and over again. She shakes her head to snap out of whatever the trance she was in and concentrate. This is important. She tells herself. This is important.

The victors were required to sit together by district and to actually read through the whole forms and decide if the child was "worthy" of getting reaped. That meant that the child had to excel in their district's industry, and have an additional "worthy" skill. If they were "worthy" enough, the victors were to put them on the middle of the table where a small machine sat (fuck those, why can't they read through the forms? Pointless machines) and calculated how many children were approved. If they weren't "worthy" enough, (and wow, how Cashmere thought them to be lucky) the form was to be thrown away on the floor. Yes, like literally. (At first, there were wastebaskets, but those were soon proven worthless since they started to overflow rather quickly.)

When the victors were done, each district was to have at least 10 kids per age "worthy" of reaping.

Cashmere, getting dizzy by all the white and black, blinked a few times. Haymitch had told them again and again that this was important; they were to choose children that were most fit to be the Mockingjay, so they have a better chance at getting one to become a victor. To Cashmere, seeing all the forms around her, it finally began to register in her mind that the odds were really against them, to begin with.

She felt weird and slightly like a hypocrite for choosing the children who would go inside the horrible arena she had to face, but feeling that was likely a part of Snow's plan, she tried to swallow it down.

She wanted to go outside, bathe in the bright city lights, rest in her comfortable living room in the victor's village back home, drink beer with Johanna, Finnick—even Haymitch, but since nobody was complaining, she swallowed the feeling down. Of course, she could do it, she could leave this place any time she wanted to, and go wherever she wanted to, as long as it's a place in the Capitol, but Haymitch's strict orders required her to stay put from dawn to dusk, sorting through papers as fast as she can. The only time she was to go out in the city was the "annual drink party" the leaders of the rebellion were planned to have every three days, which was more like a secret meeting for planning the rebellion.

Cashmere drops the paper she was reading—the boy had looked too skinny anyway—and stretches, yawning loudly. The ballroom is a little bit over half-full—if you don't count the papers. All the victors of Districts 1, 3, 4, 7, 8, 11 were remaining at their posts. They look fatigued, for they had only been working without respite. Even the four victors of District 7 stopped complaining about how hard they worked to create these papers.

However, District 2 is a different matter. Three victors are languidly shuffling through the papers, sipping coffee and chattering with each other, while the other six were out in the Capitol, having fun doing who-knows-what. Don't get her wrong, Cashmere hates the Capitol, but she couldn't help but think that she wants out of this ballroom, even if it means that she has to roam through the overly-decorated streets.

"FUUUUUUUCCCCCK!" comes a loud shout from the table of District Seven, and everybody whips their heads around to Johanna Mason (of course)—all secretly glad that there was some kind of distraction (entertainment) happening.

"Sorry," Johanna quickly mutters, looking embarrassed and annoyed at the same time. "Paper cut."

~.~.~

"Hm, I'm pretty sure that having nothing else to do than rummaging through enormous amounts of paperwork would make the victors quite cranky. It would only be a matter of time before they quarrel with each other. It may not sound much, but in this stage, we have to do everything we can do to break the rebellion up, which in this case, would be defeating unity."

There was a moment's pause when the older man regarded the Head Gamemaker carefully as he slowly thought everything through.

"Ah, I see that I owe you. Again." Snow finally muttered, his puffy lips stretching to the sides.

Plutarch nodded slightly. "No problem sir. That's what I do."

Snow satisfyingly chuckled. "Yes, thank you. Tell Jacob—the boy," he added, as Plutarch rose an eyebrow. "—to get ready for the envelope reading. It's in half an hour. Dismissed."

With a polite nod, Plutarch Heavensbee started to walk out of the room.

"Wait, Heavensbee," Snow called out, and Plutarch stopped in his tracks. He slowly turned around. "Yes, sir?"

"What," Snow paused, then started wheezing furiously, and Plutarch patiently waited for the old man to finish coughing on his own blood. "Did the envelope originally say? You know, before we altered it."

Plutarch looked the president straight in the eyes. With his eyes somewhat lacking the usual twinkle, he replied in an unintelligible tone, "For this special Quarter Quell, to show that the Capitol is merciful despite the rebellion, a quarter of the tributes going in the arena will be spared instead of one."

As the information sinks in, Snow searched Plutarch's eyes, trying to detect the source of the off feeling from the plump man he'd received. Plutarch hadn't sounded neutral as always, in a voice that suggested that he was merely stating a fact. No, he could swear that there was some emotion mixed in his voice this time. But what kind of emotion was it?

"And," Plutarch suddenly interrupted the president's thoughts, and the old man started a bit in his chair-throne. Before he could raise a questioning eyebrow, the Head Gamemaker continued, "Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor."

It was when Plutarch walked out of the door that Snow realized that it also was a sentence that was written on the original envelope.

A/N: Surprise. Cinna is alive. No shit, since it's before the 75th Hunger Games, and he didn't make a Mockingjay outfit out of a wedding dress and Snow didn't really had an excuse to kill him (—yet). However, District 12 costumes won't be designed by him.

Let me know what you guys think. (That's just another way of saying REVIEW PLEASE less desperately.)

So, from the next chapter (which would be set around July, or August—reaping season), a Capitol Side District would be turned into a Rebel Sided one. I'll be sure to pick it from a hat.

From then on, the story isn't likely to skip days, even though I might write some scenes from the past if I feel like it. (I'll be sure to write them in another tense.)

Okay! I think I conjured up a reasonable sponsoring system! If you have a better idea, or if you think this won't work, please tell me so.

So, each of the tributes you've submitted earns you 10 points, even if it weren't chosen for the SYOT.

A tribute chart will earn you 3 points per each review. However, submitting more than one tribute chart per chapter will be ignored.

Pointing out the mistakes I made and giving me suggestions—any suggestions, through review or PM earns you 2 points each.

A review can earn you 1-3 points based on the length and quality. I may not be able to be entirely fair here—I'm not a robot—but I'll try to be.

And…(drumroll) I'm going to ask two questions after each chapter. (I forgot which SYOT I got this idea from, but NOT MINE.) Really random things that come to my mind after writing a chapter, or even more random things that come to me while writing the chapter lol. And answering them both will earn you 5 points. I'll probably ask questions with no real answers though, like Fried eggs or boiled eggs? Rather than How long is the Great Wall of China? But if I do ask questions with real answers, you have to get it right to earn sponsor points. You can submit your answer through review or PM, but before the next chapter is published. Yeah, I guess you can answer, but no sponsor points for you then. You can't answer the questions in chapter two and ask me to give you sponsor points when we're on chapter fifteen or something.

You can buy your favorite tributes (yes, it can be yours) items in the games, I'll write down the sponsoring item list the chapter before the actual games. Oh, and another important thing, (congratulations, you made it sound completely unimportant) you can't sponsor the Capitol Side Districts unless they've turned into a Rebel Side. But don't worry about submitting a Capitol Side District tribute, they have the plus of being safe in the arena.

I'll write the sponsoring system and the currently earned points on my profile.

Let's start.

Question 1: Fried eggs or boiled eggs? (I'm totally fried...(?))

Question 2: How long is the Great Wall of China? (Hahahahahahahahahahaha—okay, I'll stop.)

Bonus Question (no points but please help me out): (Okay, totally confused here.) Is it a SYOT or an SYOT?

Real creative, I know. *insert actually proud smile* Happy SYOT reading!