Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games. They belong to Suzanne Collins.
Note: At long last we reach the next victor from District Four. Sure has been a while huh? Honestly I feel like I made the gap between Librae and Anchor a bit too long, but live and learn I suppose. Anyways, Anchor! D4 careers are interesting, as I always feel like canon kinda gives us the least idea as to how they work overall which kinda leads to my whole 'sometimes they are, sometimes they aren't' way of doing things. Well, rest assured, Anchor truly is one. Read on and see what the hell this shark of a boy did in his arena!
Katniss and Peeta were silent as they gazed down at the fierce looking victor imprinted upon the ground.
"I'll be honest, this is one I don't know anything about aside his name," Peeta said, lightly frowning. "Did Finnick ever say anything else about him?"
"Hardly a thing, we had a rebellion to be talking about instead," Katniss said, casually. "Still, beside that stuff about the bloodbath he said… the 'normal narrative was overthrown' and that he was pretty divisive within Four. What do you reckon that means?"
"Like I said I know nothing about him. I'm not the one to ask," Peeta replied. "Well, if Anchor made it out we can ask him. If he didn't then I guess we can ask Annie."
"Sounds like a plan," Katniss agreed.
The pair went silent, holding a respectful silence for Anchor.
52nd Annual Hunger Games
Name: Anchor Paddock
Gender: Male
District: 4
Age: 18
Kills: 11
People always called me the impatient sort when I was growing up. I suppose they were right in the end as I've been unable to wait for the past week.
Unable to wait for the Hunger Games to get started.
The reaping, the train ride, the parade, the training… everything. As far as I'm concerned it was all just pointless filler leading up to the main event. I'd call it a waste of time aside from dragging out the fear in the other tributes. If they are afraid then I guess the time wasting did achieve something after all. It made it easier for me.
I sit on a chair at the side of my launch room, unable to quite find it in me to sit still. No matter how much I try I'm left bouncing my knee and having to suppress a slight shudder. One of thrill of course. This is what I've spent over half of my life getting ready for.
All the training, all the manipulation, all the nights feeling hungry, all the… well, everything really? It's all going to be worth it. It's just like my uncle Sharky Huxley once told me, the Games can fix anything.
Perhaps I should start all the way from the beginning?
I was born to a family of what the poor might call loan sharks. We'd just call it fulfilling a role Panem needs in order to function. Loans are lent and paid, but somebody has to enforce the latter part of the deal. That's what my uncle spent the better part of his life doing.
He got Tide Luther so cornered in debt that she outright volunteered for the Hunger Games to get the money she needed. Sure enough the Games fixed her problems in short order. After that it seemed like any desperate sod was willing to at least consider using the Games to grant their wildest dreams. All it would cost is a few lives of people they'd never met.
That was then.
This is now.
My family could've been rich, but over time the Peacekeepers took over debt collecting and drove us almost to ruin; they stole from us and called it their 'right'!. Since then my family and several others had to resort to the most menial and terrible sorts of jobs to get by, working alongside those we used to collect debts from to further the disgrace of it. Engine room work on ships, fishcake factory staff, cleaning barnacles off of galleons… it's no way to live.
Unlike others who were content to just whine their hearts out about it all and keep working those same shitty jobs regardless I actually took action. I must have been about seven at the time, forced to watch as that monster from One went psycho in the bloodbath and took down all those tributes at once with a grin on her face.
I don't care to recall what the monster was called. I just remember realising that she ended up winning and suddenly she was called one of the top five richest women in all of One, an already rich district.
Volunteering and winning the Hunger Games became the only possibility from that point on. I was far from the only boy in Four who thought he could handle the arena. Plenty of others beside myself trianed hard for their chance at glory.
Before me literally every single boy aside one has ended up killed. I knew I had to play it hard and smart as well.
I needed an ally.
Luckily for me I was in the company of Dolphin, a daughter from one of the other previous debt collector families. She's fine as far as girls her age go – so, my age I suppose – and I have nothing against her. I just knew that she was always a bit 'simple' and tended to just follow whatever the loudest voice in the room would say.
She was perfect for what I needed. Ever since we were little I talked to her about the idea of us becoming tributes in the Games, telling her stories of all the riches, honour and even fans that we'd get from it. I might have lied and said some shit about how we could both end up as victors if we tried to eat nightlock together if we were the final two.
Absolute madness of course, but it merely took a year or two of whispering such ideas into her ears while I trained before she agreed to join me in my quest for all the riches I could ever want. As I said, the Games can fix anything at all.
It was a process. A long, exhausting process at that. We had no academy like what the careers in One and Two have. We only had the bare minimum of supplies and our wits… ok, fine, I had my wits. I led Dolphin through everything; sword fighting, trident throwing, wrestling, hitting the few books we had… I left no stone unturned., Anything that could help I made sure to do.
By the time we were eighteen and the reaping came by we looked like Gods of some kind. Muscular, ready to fight and not remotely afraid. The fact we ended up sparing a pair of little kids when we volunteered was just icing on the fish cake. Four was cheering for us, calling us heroes.
I won't say no to that kind of support if they feel like giving it to me.
"Three minutes Anchor," my stylist says from his spot leaning against the opposite wall.
"Thanks for the heads up," I reply.
Where was I? Ah yes, the reaping. I told my family I was as ready as I could be and that I was more than willing to risk my life to make us rich, to grant back the wealth we'd once had. I wasn't about to let Uncle Sharky's debt collecting days just be forgotten and all the rewards he earned stay out of our deserved reach.
They gave me their blessing and then it was off to the Capitol. Making the crowd at the parade love me was the easy part. The hard part was putting up with that horrendous seahorse outfit. I played my part like a good little tribute, but for a moment it wasn't just tributes I was ready to kill. Even now my stylist has no idea just how much resentment I've got inside directed right at him.
Being accepted into the careers was a formality. With me in the pack Dolphin's spot was also secured. I buddied up with them and played ever so nice, making sure to learn their names and show some interest in who they are.
Feigned interest I assure you, but it did the job just fine. Tulip, Rich, Eris and Sextus all see me as a solid kind of guy. Somebody who has their backs for at least until the top eight. Somebody they know will be able to help them in their quest to kill all the outliers.
I'm alright with them thinking that, but I've got bigger plans for this arena than what they've thinking about. I think my score of eleven speaks for itself. Dolphin got a nine and the other careers only managed eights.
"Want anything before you go?" my stylist says. "A glass of water? A cookie?"
"Nah, I'm good. I'm as ready for the arena as I possibly could be," I stand, stretching myself out and flexing my biceps for a moment. Never hurts to look good. "What do you reckon awaits me up there? I mean, aside a bloodbath of course."
"I don't know anything about the arena," he says, almost sounding apologetic. "But based on the fabric of your outfit and the waterproof nature of it… expect to see water. Probably either grand lakes or an ocean."
"Got it, thanks for the heads up," I say. I move over to the admittedly eerier launch tube. "Hey so, can I just stand in this now and save us a moment?"
"By all means go ahead," he says.
I lean against the side of the tube's interior, wondering to myself how the other tributes might be feeling. The rest of the pack are probably excited or, in Dolphin's case, hardly aware of how to feel. As for the rest, probably terrified. I don't care to think over it any further when it doesn't matter.
The tube soon closes and the platform below my feet slowly rises me to the arena above. I smile, knowing plenty of things the others do not know. They won't know even when it's too late.
The dead aren't known for having much on their minds.
I told Caesar that I was aiming to impress people in the bloodbath and show what I am made of. I'm not in the habit of breaking a promise when I make one.
Formidable muscles. Check.
Killer instinct and calm state of mind. Check.
An armada of sponsors ready to send me anything the horn of plenty lacks. Check.
A fool proof plan. Check.
A victor's crown. Not mine yet, but for all intents and purposes… check.
It's a minute or rising through darkness before I finally rise into the arena, the strong smell of sea salt hitting my nostrils. At this point I can't help but laugh a bit.
It's all too perfect.
The cornucopia is about two hundred yards away and filled to the brim with choice supplies, a silver trident leaning against the interior. Mine of course. But that's not what has me feeling so pleased.
It's the fact the arena is just a flat sandy beach that spreads out for miles and miles. Most of the sand is waterlogged and I can see some parts of it are submerged under the seawater, but other than that it's pretty open. If there are any secrets to be found out there I can't spot them from my own pedestal.
The pair from Eight stand either side of me, both shivering under the pink sky. A shame they're not able to appreciate the beautiful dawn like I am. A shame they're about to die.
Again I find myself feeling terribly impatient as the countdown ticks closer to zero. Fame and fortune are so close that I can almost taste them; they'd be closer still if the Capitol would start the countdown from thirty seconds, not sixty.
By the time the gong finally goes off I'm so impatient that I could just about kill somebody. I guess that's just another reason atop of many others why I lunge for the boy from Eight and smash his skull against his launch platform. A lethal wound for sure; he won't be getting back up from that one.
The charge towards the cornucopia reminds me of how those who owe a lot of money would helplessly run for their lives from debt collectors. It's sickening to think that I have anything in common with such people, but I've got no choice. Not when I need to be the first to reach the trident.
My powerful legs make it easy to reach the cornucopia a moment before Rich and Dolphin do. I greet them with nods, passing a sword to both of them. Rich nods and runs off while Dolphin joins me as we stand guard at the front of the silver horn.
"Alright Dolphin, just like we planned it," I give her a small smirk. "Ready to get going?"
"Yes boss," she says, saluting. It's rare that she says much else to me these days, not that I mind at all.
We play our parts in the pack for the opening minute or two. Guarding the bounty within the cornucopia is easy as can be. The opening is pretty big, but having a long weapon make sit simple to block anybody who would dare make the charge… or scare off anybody who was merely thinking about it. I don't miss the way the tiny boy from Seven runs the other way after seeing me.
The girl from Twelve, of course, doesn't change her mind. That's why she lays crumpled and bleeding at my feet not ten seconds later. Pick your battles Twelve, pick your battles.
With the arena so vast and no notable areas where supplies might be kept anywhere in sight I should have seen it coming that every tribute would participate in the bloodbath. Clearly a tactical error for plenty of these people; the area around the cornucopia has gone from a sort of waterlogged brownish cream to a gross crimson. Seven corpses have way more blood than I had assumed.
Or should I say eight corpses? I give Dolphin a nod and a certain curl of my hand. She knows exactly what this means.
She better know. I've only gone over it with her hundreds of times over the past three years of our lives.
We grab a pair of axes from inside the cornucopia and let them fly not a moment later. I'm not sure who had the better throw between us both – ego says I did, but I cannot deny Dolphin always has had a bit of extra muscle to her that I still lack, even from our days before training – but the end result is the same. Some awful squishing noises, some terrible crunching sounds and two whimpers as a pair of young adults fall down dead, each with an axe buried into the backs of their skulls.
Seems like District Two won't be getting a back-to-back win this time around. Too bad, too sad I suppose. These two really were promising, but that's exactly why they had to die. Letting them remain alive would have made the entire plan come falling down.
The Ones realise what we've done right away, taking their attention away from the boy from Five. He makes the move to stab Rich in his shoulder and run for his life. Smart boy; if this wasn't a fight to the death I'd owe him for making my job easier.
A quick and painless death will have to be enough.
"C'mon Dolphin, charge!" I roar, if only for theatrics. I have to allow myself to have at least some fun after all.
We run fast, faster than ever before. We don't slow even as I slash the throat of the boy from Three along the way. I think he might still be twitching by the time we reach the Ones. It's rather gross, to be honest.
The Ones are tough, but they're startled and furious. A combination that could only lead to mistakes. The boy from Five's luckily timed stab gives us the easy upper hand over Rich, my boot crushing his neck not long into our battle. With him down and the number advantage on my side it's easy for Dolphin and I to send Tulip down with a broken arm and missing a few fingers.
"Traitor! Traitor!" she screeches. If this is what Uncle Sharky had to put up with when he collected debts I can see why he hated poor people so much. Good thing my family won't be poor for much longer.
"I think you the word you're looking for is victor, something you most certainly am not," I say to her, bringing the trident down right into her ribcage.
She stops twitching before long. By then Dolphin finishes off the only other tribute who had still been in the area. Goldenrod yellow jacket… ah, that'll be the girl from Eight.
I can't help but wonder how the world outside the arena is responding to all of what just happened. Thanks to some fake loyalty, good timing and an admittedly fortunate arena districts One and Two have both been eliminated in the opening frenzy. I don't think such a thing has happened ever since the First Games.
I suppose some things are so nice you've simply got to do them twice.
I smirk, imagining the furious screams from One and Two. Surely there will be rage, complaints and accusations that we somehow cheated. I say let them complain, it's of no concern to me. I'm alive and I've got a Games to win.
Only one thing left to take care of.
"Hey Dolphin?" I say.
"Yes Boss?" she replies, moving towards me.
"Is it just me or is that another tribute over there? Girl from Three, you reckon?" I say.
She turns to glance at where I was pointing out a mile or two yonder to the north.
It's the perfect opening for me to skewer her with the trident. She falls to the ground, dead in an instant. Good help is hard for a debt collector to find so I'd be pretty cruel to draw it out. Good help deserves a painless way out.
I must be standing in an eerie silence for a minute or so before the Gamemakers realise the bloodbath has officially ended and start to sound the cannons. On and on they go, a lot longer than they do in most years of the Hunger Games.
Sixteen cannons fire all in all. Just eight of us left to play. I can't help but find it an amusing thought that the family interviews will be getting started not even an hour into the Games.
Sixteen dead. Just seven left to go. Already seven kills to my name.
"I don't suppose anybody could send me a can of peach soda? Kinda thirsty after all of that," I announce.
A parachute falls with the requested drink. I raise it to the nation and drink heartily over a job well done. After that performance I think I've earned a nice break. Not a long one though, not when there are seven tributes trying to get away from me.
I'm ready to go in under ten minutes. It would have been five, but the girl from Six's corpse had fallen upon a stack of gear I wanted and proved harder to move than I'd expected. Time is money and I won't have any of it until it's just me left.
"Sorry about that," I say to Dolphin's corpse. I stumble for a moment, nearly tripping over the detached head of the boy from Twelve. "You were just too powerful to keep around. Thanks though, I couldn't have taken out the other careers without you."
For the first time in so long I can't stop myself from smiling. My grin persists as I set off at a leisurely pace to the north. They can run, certainly they can, but in an arena like this I don't think they'll be able to hide.
I mean, I can see the distant silhouettes of the others almost a mile away in several directions and getting further by the moment. They can tire themselves out if they'd like, but in the end it's all the same. The loan shark will catch the debt evaders and make them pay with the only currency on offer – their lives.
"At this rate I might be out of here by sunrise tomorrow," I remark, starting to increase my speed to a light jog, leaving the bloody massacre behind me for the hovercraft to clean up.
I hope they pay the clean-up crew well. The bloodbath looks revolting; anybody who so much as touches that mess deserves a quad digit paycheck.
Katniss and Peeta finished their silence. With one last look down at Anchor's fierce gaze they began to move further down the street together. It wasn't long at all before they came to the fifty third face among the dozens that covered the sidewalk.
"I wish…" Peeta trailed off.
"Me too Peeta. I wish I'd made an effort to learn more about him," Katniss agreed.
The face that looked up at them appeared almost cheeky, perhaps even a bit boyish with plenty of attitude. The young man had short hair, a fiery look within his eyes and some particularly killer sideburns.
"What was it that Johanna said about Blight again?" Peeta asked as he gazed at the imprinted face of the fallen victor.
"Something about him 'not being much, but he was from home'," Katniss recalled. "I'll ask her what she meant by that when we get to that party."
There we go, the Shark of Four! Anchor's chapter was perhaps the overall easiest to write, or at least somewhere within the top five easiest. First person POV chapters tend to fly by swifter than most do and the fact his chapter covered not even thirty minutes in-universe may have had something to do with it. Anyway, as for Anchor himself I feel like he's a decent sort of antagonist to see the beginnings of. In a sense the 'other side of the coin' to Tide. One a gambler, one a descendent of vicious loan sharks who longs to regain lost – and ill-gotten – fortune. I feel like betrayals in the bloodbath are something that's surely happened in canon, but the idea of a massive bloodbath where one particularly strong career is able to betray his entire alliance and become a solo agent… once I had that idea I just had to write it out and put it into action. What do you think though, did it make for good reading or just come off as too big of a power move? Either way we have another canon up next, so get hype!
Stats
District 1: Peridot Gaudy (8th Games), Crystal McCree (14th Games), Bronze Marley (19th Games), Crown Martins (24th Games), Dollar Dettwieller (32nd Games), Mascara Court (41st Games), Platinum Twist (44th Games)
District 2: Baron Overwhill (4th Games), Runa Peace (7th Games), Olga Machete (10th Games), Rook Valiant (17th Games), Boulder Atherston (20th Games), Vercingetorix Carnby (25th Games), Dragon Batofel (27th Games), Rhyder Overwhill (39th Games), Mercy Gregor (46th Games), Brutus Gunn (49th Games), Lyme Rabe (51st Games)
District 3: Honorius Perthshire (5th Games), Pi Orbit (22nd Games), Beetee Latier (37th Games), Wiress Plummer (47th Games)
District 4: Museida Selkirk (3rd Games), Mags Flanagan (11th Games), Tide Luther (23rd Games), Librae Ogilvy (35th Games), Anchor Paddock (52nd Games)
District 5: Shunt Gaspar (12th Games), Isobel Sparks (18th Games), Crimson Flanders (29th Games), Porter Tripp (38th Games), Neon Erg (48th Games)
District 6: Chassis Macalister (31st Games)
District 7: Pliny Aransio (2nd Games), Fir Buzz (9th Games), Jack Tylos (21st Games), Snag Nakamura (34th Games)
District 8: Woof Casino (16th Games), Paige Murphy (30th Games), Spool Nylon (42nd Games)
District 9: Mizar Aldjoy (1st Games), Gwenith Rosebud (13th Games), Teff Withers (28th Games), Laurel Flamsteel (36th Games), Tabbock Summers (43rd Games)
District 10: Stallion March (26th Games), Lammy Phyronix (40th Games)
District 11: Bear Redfoot (15th Games), Seeder Howell (33rd Games), Chaff Mitchell (45th Games)
District 12: Duke Saint-Rose (6th Games), Haymitch Abernathy (50th Games)