With thanks to MsAir, Glassgift, and akuhilangditelanbumi for their reviews of the previous chapter.
The hum of machinery under his feet was a pattern he knew well, and it faded from his mind with the ease of having made the journey a thousand times before.
But this time, four gold coins weighed down his pocket.
The Capitolian called them "ten credit coins" each. As if that was a minimal amount. As if it was an insignificant thing to give.
In scrap value alone, a single coin could get him enough food for a month. Four coins was an excess of wealth he never saw in his hands, and it had been just the change in that Capitolian's pockets.
The disparity made him want to throw the arrangement in the Capitolian's face. Twenty soma bottles? He knew what soma was, he had seen it delivered to the Capitol so many times. It was a product of District 1, a luxury good for the Capitol only. It was a pale pink liquid, designed to make the drinker throw up so they could eat more food.
He feels the golden coins in his pocket. He has been paid to help encourage the sale of a drink that just throws food up so the Capitol can have more.
He wasn't stupid enough to throw the coins from the train's window, but he certainly wanted to.
And he wasn't stupid enough to break the arrangement with the Capitolian, but he certainly wanted to do that as well.
As much as he despised the concept, with a safe delivery more money might enter his hands. And while he wasn't typically one for handouts, especially from the hands of a Capitolian, he could recognise an easy means of money when he saw one. And he wasn't one to give up easy money.
So, rationalising it to himself as a transaction rather than a handout, Quint found a crate of soma in the train's storage hold, transferred twenty bottles to another container, and labelled it for delivery. Hopefully nobody would notice. He didn't have time to get back to District 1 for more stores, as the train was heading back to District 6 in preparation for Reaping day.
He shuddered despite himself, despite knowing the odds of being chosen. In a District as big as his, the odds were minimal. His District was almost six hundred thousand strong, and those of Reaping age were twenty thousand strong. While he had taken a great number of tesserae in the past, so had many others of his age- his was a few slips in a draw that numbered tens of thousands. He had no chance of being picked. He was safe.
As safe as anybody else was. He shuddered again.
"Hey! Barkwater!"
Quint turned around. A large man with close-cropped hair stood at the doorway to the carriage.
"Problem in the driver's carriage. Deal with it."
Quint nodded and picked up his toolbox, leaving past the man. The conductor on his assigned delivery team was a man of few words and short temper, and commanded an odd amount of respect from him. It could be the imposing figure he cut, or the fact that in any crisis he was level-headed.
It could be that he saw a vast amount of himself in the largely emotionless man's countenance.
The train was short, and the driver's carriage was only a five minute walk away. Quint knocked on the door, waited the requisite amount of time, then upon no response entered.
The driver was on the iron floor. Her pupils, despite the relative darkness of the cabin, were contracted to little more than a pinhead.
Quint put down his toolbox, expression passive as he crouched down beside the driver. A check of her pulse revealed her life still going; a hand on her mouth revealed her lungs still working.
Quint pursed his lips, just slightly. When he had been told of a problem in the driver's carriage he did not want the problem to be the driver. He was a mechanic.
But regrettably, a mechanic with experience in dealing with drug-addicted individuals.
He stood; rolled his shoulders, tried to cast thoughts of his sole surviving family member from his mind. This is a job he had been sent to deal with, like any other, and people are merely machinery of a more complex creation. Quint began work.
A quick sweep found a used needle and a small collection of others; they were each stamped with the seal of District 1. Quint threw them all from the train's window without a second thought to their use. The driver moaned weakly from her place on the floor, reaching out limply to the control panel. At first Quint considered that this might be a wish to regain control of the train, but he realised soon after that her true intention; the control panel of the train was alive with lights, and to a Morphling addict it must seem beautiful.
Sometimes, Quint wondered if it was a nicer life to stay under. So many of his district did it.
He was in the midst of ensuring she had no head injuries when he heard a soft, wet sound from the driver. He looked at her and realised she was choking. Setting his jaw, he plunged two fingers down her throat, clearing it of what he discovered to be vomit. He grimaced, the action grotesque and reminiscent of many other actions like it.
Finally, when she was breathing easily again, he rolled her on her side, checked the course of the train to ensure they were on autopilot to District 6, then wiped off his fingers on her jacket and walked away.
He had little interest in ensuring the driver's wellbeing beyond what he had been instructed to do. She was nobody he knew.
Arrival in District 6 was welcome after several days of watching the driver detox painfully from Morphling. Quint stepped off the train without further comment to his colleagues, going through the security checks as he always did; a Peacekeeper patted him down, two more with guns held towards him waited for a command, or evidence of theft or smuggling.
Four gold coins were held securely underneath his tongue.
He passed the checks without any alarm raised, recieved his food quotas, and Quint walked on through the streets of District 6.
Given the nomadic nature of great numbers of its inhabitants, District 6, despite its population, always seemed empty. The streets were quiet, thickly so. One or two were always lying in the streets blankly, eyes pinpricked, needles hanging loosely from their arm.
Quint cared little for those that lay in the streets, but always checked them in hopes not to see a familiar face amongst them.
An apartment building stood, one amongst many, hunched in the streets as if waiting to die. Quint pushed open the door; no keys required in a place wracked with drug addiction and nomadic lifestyle. He climbed the creaking staircase, walked the corridor caked in filth, knocked and then opened a door on the left.
"Grandfather?"
At an old table, an older man looked up, eyes lined with age and weariness. His yellowed and sallow skin gave him a frail countenance- but the smile he gave upon seeing Quint overshadowed that.
"Quint." He stood, weak figure shaking as he pushed himself up with the table. He started to falter, and Quint rushed forward to support him, helping him back into his chair.
A pause in stagnant air that smelt of oil. The two embrace.
Quint does not know if he can keep abandoning him for so long.
If he was reaped, he is not sure how long his grandfather could remain, even with the four golden coins.
If he was reaped, he is not sure how long he would remain, and golden coins would not help him against the ones that had given them.
Quint Barkwater was submitted by Glassgift- with thanks to them.
All tributes and Capitolians have now been taken, and no more are required; however, if you feel you have a character that deserves attention, I am not above adding more.
Thank you for reading thus far, and I hope to see you all soon.