Two children lost in worlds of their own,

The daughter in heart; the son in mind.

The tributes of District 3, forced to confront demons not of their making.

District 3 | The Reaping of Bellatrix Craine

I gasp and jerk upright in my bed, letting my eyes focus as I sigh. It's okay, I tell myself. There's a one in a million chance you'll be a tribute. I untangle myself from the sheets on my bed and wipe the sweat from my forehead, looking over at the pretty faded yellow dress resting on a chair by my window.

The reaping...

I walk over and stare at it until I hear my mother's voice rising into my thoughts: "Bellatrix," she calls from outside my bedroom door. "You slept in. The reaping will begin soon."

"Alright," I answer just loud enough for her to hear.

I'm only twelve; this is the first Reaping I've ever had to worry about. Fortunately, I probably won't ever have to worry too much about it again. I'm the daughter of the richest people in District 3, not counting the mayor's own family. Though we still have trouble sometimes and I've had to learn the understanding of being hungry and dehydrated, I won't have to put more than one of my name, Bellatrix Craine, in the reaping bowl to get food to keep me alive. I don't want to have to watch others be chosen for the Hunger Games; I was never a good person for depression. Others may scream their heads off or cry themselves to death, but I'm worse, and I don't want to have to explain it...especially to myself.

I pull on the yellow dress that makes my dark hair and eyes stand out even more. I look in my old, cracked mirror and slowly braid my hair in two, hoping that I can ward off the reaping just a little bit longer. Afterwards, I look at myself – and see deep brown eyes, black hair, olive skin, small rounded nose, and flushed cheeks. Usually they're filled with a slight rosy color; I guess not today.

Opening my door, I see my mother standing there waiting for me. She gives me a worried expression and puts her arms around me. "Mom," I mutter into her shoulder.

"Look at this," she whispers in my ear. "My only child going off to her first Reaping- or at least her first important one." The sudden memory of my twelfth birthday only a month or so ago rushes back to me. There were no smiles that day. None. Every single one before had been filled with happiness, but the invisible twelve resting over my head brought on the realization of my fate.

"Come on, Mom," I tell her. I back away from her and try to smile. I just barely succeed. "We'll be late."

On our way to the town square where everyone meets up for the reaping, I try to convince myself that everything will be okay. Bellatrix, I think. Stop your worrying. Like you said earlier, there's a one in a million chance you will be chosen as a tribute. Of course, it is a random pull...but that isn't the point. You will only have one copy of your name in there while many others will have more. You don't have to worry.

"Alright, Bellatrix," I hear my mother say. I snap out of my thoughts and listen to her. "This is it, sweetheart." She turns to me, a scared expression obvious on her face. "There's only the smallest chance, right? Only a tiny chance that you'll even be close to-" I interrupt her with a hug. She wraps her arms tightly around me.

"Breathe, Mom," I tell her in as calm a voice I can muster at this moment. "Everything will be alright. Okay?" I back away to see her reply. She turns to my father who's been standing silently by us the entire time – he never approved of me. He didn't like the idea of me learning about nature and the human body rather than how to use a weapon and gaining physical strength. He still cared for me though; I am his daughter, after all.

"It will only be a few minutes," he says in his deep voice. "Then you will be back with us and we will all go home."

"Daddy, take care of Mom until then." His face shows surprise - maybe the smile was a bit too much to add at this point. He simply nods. I turn away and start walking toward the group of twelve –year-olds at the back of the large crowd of twelve to eighteen-year-old kids waiting to know if they'll be a tribute in Panem's nasty Hunger Games.

"I'm scared," I hear a kid my age whimper. It's a small girl, way smaller than I am. Her arms and legs are as thin as a branch from a scrawny tree, her small hands covering her face. She didn't seem to be talking to anyone specifically, but I walk up to her anyway.

"Don't be," I tell her. She looks up in the shock that someone actually heard her.

"What?" she whispers. I look her straight in the eye. She's shorter than me so I have to look down. "What did you say?"

"Don't be," I repeat. "Don't be so scared."

"Why are you so confident?" She drops her hands.

"I'm not. I'm equally as scared as everyone else."

"I know you," she hisses, surprising me by the dangerous aura she suddenly projects. "You're that girl. You're a Craine." She spits it out like venom. "Well, I got news for you. Just because you're name is only in there once doesn't mean anything. My name is in more than once. So go away and stop teasing the rest of us."

"I-I didn't mean-" I stutter. She pushes me away from her and my mind explodes. "Hey! You don't have a right to treat me this way!" I yell exactly what I think. "I'm not trying to be mean or anything!" She glares at me for one last second before changing her expression. She starts to cry and others of our age group come over to see what the matter is. They must see me red in the face with anger and her crying - they will probably get the wrong idea. Great, I tell myself. Now look what you've done.

"Get away!" a boy shouts at me.

"Don't be so mean, Craine!" another person starts. Then, suddenly, every twelve-year-old is against me.

"Hello, District 3!" a loud voice says. "Welcome to the thirty-fourth Hunger Games!" I back away from the others that seem to hate me now. Then again, none of them ever met me; I don't work in the factories like they have to. I do work though, if you count the occasional piece of machinery that my neighbors can't seem to fix; other than that, I've always been caught up in some book. I don't go to school either. My parents, though they work long hours in the factories, taught me themselves.

I hear people speaking on the stage set up for the reaping - am I even paying attention? How can I pay attention to whoever is talking when I have as good a chance as anyone else to be chosen as a tribute for the Games? I don't want to die. No, I tell myself. Stop. Everyone else has a chance. You don't.

"We shall do the ladies first!" I know this woman. She's Elena Bonita. Capitol people are always loud and obnoxious. She isn't any different dressed in her fancy clothes. I look her up and down. She looks well fed, maybe a bit too well fed. She's still a slim woman though.

Wait, I think. Did she just say 'ladies first'? Good. This way I won't have to be pulled by suspension like the boys because they're second-

"Bellatrix Craine!" I blink and turn to look around me. I could have sworn I heard my name. It was probably my mother being worried about me. But, wait. That wasn't my mother's voice. Oh! Perhaps it was one of the others that were mad at me. But... Our voices are still a little squeaky from our age. This voice was older. "Where are you, Bellatrix Craine?" I slowly move my head up to Elena. No, my mind screams. No, no, no, and no! This- This isn't-"There you are!" I feel peacekeepers' hands pushing me forward. "Traitor twelve-year-olds," I think as they back away from me to show where I was.

"What?" a peacekeeper by me asks.

"I said that out loud didn't I?" I mutter. I'm pushed onto the stage. Looking up, I see my face plastered to the television screen hanging above my head at the top of the stage. My eyes are wild and my hair is losing in a fight against the breeze.

"Come," Elena says. "Come, dearie. Stand right here." She drags me by my arm to the center by the glass ball full of the names of the girls. The names, my thoughts whisper. The hundreds- if not thousands- of names on slips of paper...and only one was mine. One. Yet, that was the one slip her manicured hand happened to reach for. Did she see the name and reach for it on purpose? Maybe she knows my parents? Grandparents? Heard of them before and wanted to see me?" Our male tribute is...Tophani Salasata!"

I see a boy start his way from the group of fourteen-year-olds. He's small. He's shorter than me and thinner too, which seems a little odd showing he's older than me. We could very clearly be mistaken for family members, though, with our black hair and brown eyes. I thank him with my mind for momentarily taking the cameras away from me. I search for my parents, remembering them. I spot them behind everyone else. My father is holding my mother. I cannot see her face because it is buried in his shirt. I know he is pale though. The dark eyes we share wide and looking right at me seem to be speaking to me.

Why? they seem to whisper. Why you? Why us? You only had one name. One…why?

"Now, shake hands, you two," the mayor, who I didn't even notice before, says. I turn slowly to Tophani and have to slightly bend my head down to look at him. He seems calm enough in our situation. How? I want to ask him. How are you so calm when we just had our death warrants signed for us? His hand is stretched out. I hesitatingly take it, my heart pounding against my ribs. Panem's anthem plays.

I blink and take a deep breath.

I'm in a beautiful room, but I don't care. "Mom," I whisper standing in its center. "Dad. This wasn't supposed to happen. I wasn't supposed...I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be in this room." The door bursts open. I'm suddenly in my mother's arms and tears are running down both of our faces like rivers. I feel my father's arms come around both of us. I've never seen him cry. We pull away from one another as my mother strokes my hair and wipes hurriedly at my eyes, as if she can push the tears into nonexistence.

"Bellatrix," my dad finally says. "Everything will be alright...right?" He's asking me? My father...he's the bravest man I've ever known. He's asking me...

"Daddy," I whimper and fall into his arms. He clutches my head with one hand and holds me with the other. I feel his warm tears falling onto my shoulder. "I don't know, Daddy." He pulls away to look at me. I give him a small smile. "But...I'm sure everything will be okay." That gives him the strength to smile back and we all hug again.

"Time's up," a peacekeeper says opening the door to the room. I nod to him. He seems to notice my strong father crying and closes the door after adding, "Hurry up." I turn back to my parents.

"Bellatrix," they say. I kiss them each on the cheek and give them one last tight hug.

"It's time, Mommy, Daddy," I say simply with a sad smile. "Wish me luck."

"Only the best for you," my mother cries. My father nods and grips my mother's hand tightly. He opens the door.

"We love you, Bellatrix," he sighs. "After this, you will be back with us and we will all go home together." The door closes behind them and I feel sick. After this, my mind repeats. After this, there might not be a me to go with them.

District 3 | The Reaping of Tophani Salasata

I chuck a rock at the factory in front of me, missing my intended target by several meters. That's not really much of a surprise to be honest, as my aims never really been that good. I could probably sit here chucking rocks for hours, and wouldn't hit that camera until the games had finished.

Thunk!

Another rock slams into the wall and falls down to the ground, where a small pile has been forming over the last hour or two.

Is it weird to say that this is my hobby?

Yes, it is, A quiet, but determined part of my brain tells me. You've been wasting what might be the last day in your home district chucking rocks at a CCTV camera for no real reason.

It won't be my last day

Because that's true - or, almost certainly true. There's probably around 10,000 people here in District 3, and about 2,000 of them are of reap-able age (we don't tend to live that long). The average number of slips should be about 5, but if you factor in tesserae, the number's more like 10 per person. 10 x 2,000 = 20,000 slips in that orb; 10,000 which I could get chosen from.

I have taken 8 slips, plus the 1 I have too, and I'm 14 years old so 9 + 10 + 11 = 30 slips with my name, Tophani Salasata, written on them. That means a 0.3% chance that I'll get chosen to take part in the games. If you factor in my siblings who are eligible, the odds go up to 0.65% chance that someone I know will get chosen. Adding on my best (and only) friend, Mitra, to this tally brings the total odds of someone I care about being chosen to 0.7%.

The odds of dying of natural causes (if it's natural to die crushed under a large piece of machinery is debatable though) is just shy of 1% a year. (Calculated through dividing the number of people in District 3 by the number that die each year and multiplying by 100).

That means that I am statistically more likely to die without the Hunger Games, than for someone I know to get chosen and (inevitably) die in the games.

Math is my favorite subject at school - if you can call that place a school.

I chuck another rock at the camera to release my pent-up aggression about that particular subject. The miss is closer this time, making the camera wobble precariously, like some bird of prey perched on a mountain top.

Our school is basically a place where we learn to take apart and put together mechanical things, something I have done ever since I was born anyway, so it's not even hard. In Math we sit and stare at a wall while a teacher attempts to explain that 2 + 2 = 4 to some sleeping teenagers.

I once asked her about logarithms and trigonometry, and she gave me a blank stare.

You really are psychopathic, aren't you? my brain says scathingly.

I've never bitten anyone ever since, thank you very much! And it's her fault anyway; she got in the way of my teeth…

That made me seem even weirder than before to everyone else in my class, not that they hadn't made their minds up already.

Thunk.

Another rock hits the wall, and rolls into the small pile beneath it.

I'm running low on rocks.

I sigh slightly and sit up, staring moodily at the pile of rocks, trying to estimate their weight, and from that, deducing how much energy I have wasted, and how that equates to food, and money.

"Tophi?"

A voice calls out from behind, and I turn round, hoping to see Mitra, or maybe a peacekeeper coming to arrest me. But to be honest, what peacekeeper is going to call me 'Tophi'? The voice turns out to belong to my oldest sister, Garami, who's already dressed up for the games.

That's the worst bit; they make us treat today like a celebration.

Actually, the worst bit is probably the murdering bit… The logical part of me begins to reason, but is cut off shortly by a ruder side of me that only appears on reaping day.

Shut it.

"What?" I say, turning back to the rocks, now I know I'm not going to be arrested.

"Mum says to come back and get ready, or you're going to be late for the reaping." She tells me. There's a pause before she continues, this time in the incredulous voice people who talk to me often use.

"What are you doing here?" She follows my line of sight, and sees the large pile of rocks under the camera, on the other side of the fence. "Are you trying to get arrested?" She asks, looking disdainful now.

"Yes"

"What?!" she stops talking after this outburst, though she splutters slightly, apparently dumbstruck by the honest answer. (Really, people ask you a question, you actually answer it, and they go all spluttery and angry on you)

She looks at me, hoping for an explanation. I don't give her one, and she writes it off as another part of my odd personality. Odd's one word for it, the people at school have a wide variety, ranging from 'Weirdo' to 'Psycho' to the only-once-used 'Boy with too much brain, and too little of anything else'

It's actually a pretty good description of me.

I avoid talking as much as possible, and have very little in the way of voice. According to the only person who I talk to on a regular basis, Mitra, I could pass for mute if I really wanted to. I've always been short too, with my lack of height. I can barely reach the tables in the factories and I'm just glad that some younger children work at the plant so I can steal their chairs, which are designed to be higher. I blame it on bad nutrition, but my mum swears I've got some dwarf blood in me somewhere.

My face looks is completely round, like a circle, and my nose is short, thin and pointy. You could probably use it as a knife if you wanted to, not that my family has any food to cut anymore, we barely scrape by, and if it wasn't for me working, we'd all be starving even more than we are already. I'm skinny, like most in my District, and I'd probably be 70 pounds on a good day, but it's never normally a good day where I live. The emaciated look I have is shared with most inhabitants of District 3, though I seem to have got it worse than other people, or maybe my round face just exaggerates the gaunt look.

The only part of me with any color at all is my hair, but it's not exactly pretty. I haven't had my hair cut since I was 13, and I don't think it's ever been washed. It hangs limply around my ears and shoulders, thin and straggly, like the rest of me. It's completely black, and keeps flopping into my eyes at irritating times.

The only part of my appearance that I actually like is my eyes, and that's only because (as far as I know) malnutrition can't make them look worse, like it's done to the rest of my body. They're a yellow-ish brown, but much too big for my face, rounding off the whole 'Startled Owl' look I've got going on.

"Are you mad?"

My sister seems to have regained the use of her vocal chords. I shrug as way as an answer, but this doesn't seem to satisfy her.

"What would mum and dad do if you got caught breaking a CCTV camera; you know they'd execute you without a second glance!" She says, beginning to shout now.

I realize that shrugging will just provoke her further, so I give my first full-sentence response for weeks.

"Cry for a few months, then gets on with life?"

She starts to splutter again, and I push myself upright, and start to walk towards the dull grey apartment block that's supposed to be my home, though I refuse to call it that. It's just the small hovel where I'm forced to reside at this moment in time.

My sister follows, silently, muttering words like 'selfish' and 'no idea!' occasionally, but wary about continuing conversation with me.

I have that sort of effect on people.

"You are not going looking like that!" My mum shouts as I walk out the doorway with a small 'bye' by way of an explanation.

I turn to her, and utter the word that everyone I know hates most.

"Why?"

She splutters a bit (is that where Garami gets it from?) and then actually responds with a satisfactory answer. It's times like these when I fully appreciate the fact that she's my mother.

"Because you look like a tramp who's been rolling around in the dirt, and what would the Capitol think if you went there dressed like… like that!" she gives my dirty clothes a look of trepidation, like they might leap off me and begin attacking her.

I have actually been rolling about in the dirt, looking for rocks. Attacking that camera is a hobby of mine, or maybe a tradition. I've worked out the odds, and my chances of death are more likely painful than not painful, and being shot falls under 'not painful', so it's actually a rational decision, if you think about it.

Nobody thinks about it.

I suppress the urge to shrug and say my second, full-sentence answer of the day. Must be some kind of personal record.

"That I'm a weakling who's going to die." I say.

I ponder silently about telling her about how unlikely it is for me to be chosen and how I'm more likely to die this year, but I don't think she'll fully appreciate the impressiveness of my mental calculation - mental being the key word.

I take a second to admire the shade of deep plum my mum's face has turned, before turning towards the door again.

"No!" she says firmly, grabbing me by the shoulders and forcing me into the chair. If we could afford rope, I'm sure she'd have tied me down too, as she reaches over for the scissors. "I am giving you a haircut"

I squirm slightly, but her grip is too strong.

"Sit still" she commands, and I can feel the cool metal touching the back of my neck "I haven't done this in a long time, and the more you move, the worse it's going to look"

I wriggle more strongly in response, as she sighs, and starts to cut off my hair.

"Why didn't you just sit still?" Sanni laments, looking at my greasy, limp (now uneven) hair. Sanni's another one of my sisters - I have three in total. Sanni's oldest, at 16, then Garami, 15 and finally Thandaka, 10. I've also got two little brothers, Pani and Rakta (10 and 9). Of all my siblings, Rakta's the only one who can think rationally. I've been considering training him as my apprentice.

I shrug at Sanni as she looks at my hair in horror again. Her reaction's better than Garami, who laughed so hard she almost stopped breathing, and any reaction at all is better than my mum's reaction when she stood back and saw my hair properly. She gave it a look of horror she normally withholds for my detention slips.

"And why did you feel the need to explain to Pida the odds of getting your arm stuck in a valve, and it ripping all his skin off?"

I wince slightly at the memory, my mum's voice bouncing around my head a bit more. I still feel justified for doing that, the last two people with Pida's job did lose some skin, and so the odds were pretty high. I work with radiation, or more precisely, controlling it, and stopping it leaking out and giving everyone cancer.

I never knew people could vomit if you told them what it looked like if you had your skin ripped off, the logical bit of my brain repeats, remembering the fountain of sick he managed to eject in one go.

That's because you're a psychopath, a small voice whispers.

We manage to arrive at the square on time, which is positively late for District 3, as everyone's so early all the time. I say goodbye to my family, as I think mum would blow up if I tried to sidle off without doing so. I make my way forward, pushing my way to the front of the 14 year old section.

"Hey, dwarf, the 12 year olds go at the front!" a boy behind me yells, I recognise him from school. 4 foot 5 is not a good height to be, and I'm shorter than most of the 12 year olds.

I stand on my tip-toes, glancing around for Mitra, whose red hair positively glows in the confines of the dull and dusty District 3. I spot her in the female's section, and give her a small wave, though my arm barely reaches over the heads. I consider yelling to her, but decide against it. My voice box might die of shock at actually being used.

Anyway, the logical part of me reasons I can always talk to her later.

Not if she's reaped, the other part whispers.

0.5% odds; that's tiny, less than me, anyway. She'll be fine.

'But what if-

-Shut up!

I shake my head physically, and the boys snigger, like they do at school all the time. It's a pretty weird noise, like when you shake a sugar shaker when it has too much sugar in it.

"Hello, District 3!" A voice calls from the stage, and I bend sideways, to look up the aisle, in order to actually see anything. Elena Bonita is shouting from the stage. I sigh quietly, and stand up straight again, determined to spend the rest of the reaping staring at the boy in front's hair…

The way it's swishing is actually pretty hypnotizing…

But there's not such a thing as hypnosis…

"Bellatrix Craine!"

I jump slightly, aware that I must have drifted off to sleep, while still standing upright. I ponder on the use of this in the Arena, before leaning sideways again to sneak a look at the girl.

"Where are you Bellatrix Craine?" she calls again, as no girl appears in the aisle. Everyone's staring around looking for her. I quickly evaluate the workability of hiding in the crowd as a possible tactic, but write it off almost instantaneously.

A peacekeeper calls from the 12 year olds section and shoves a girl forward, where the others have backed away like she was contagious or something.

Maybe she is, the logical bit goes. She could have the flu, or TB, or something.

She looks pretty shocked. She probably is pretty shocked.

She leaves, and I see that she's already taller than me (not really much of a surprise though). She actually looks very similar to me, as she has black hair, brown eyes and olive skin, like mine. But if you look closely, the similarities stop. Her eyes are a deep, dark brown, whilst mine are a slightly off-yellow. Her black hair shines in a way that only the rich people's do, and looks like it was cut professionally, not by her mother with rusty scissors like mine. She's skinny, but not in a malnourished way like me.

Elena starts to babble at her: "Come; come, dearie. Stand right here."

The girl follows (well, dragged by the arm, to be honest) and steps up to the stage, and I feel my heart pound, as it always does, before the boy is chosen.

It won't be me, think of the math. It won't be me, think of the math. It won't be me, think of the math. It won't be me, think of the math.

I repeat this chant in my head, trying to rationalize with myself. I blame my sister's influence.

"And for the boys!" Elena reaches into the other orb and pulls out a small slip of paper.

0.3% chance, remember?

"Our male tribute is… Tophani Salasata!"

I let loose a loud, obscene swear word, which I've only every heard once before in my life, when my mum opened a letter my teacher sent, telling her that I'd been burying other people's books in the vegetable patches again.

Everyone looks at me, and I shrug at them. I turn and walk up to the stage, thinking of all the chances I had not to be chosen, and how in at least 332 alternate universes I was not chosen, and I hadn't just sworn loudly on national television.

Do the best with what you have, though.

I step up to the stage, and am surprised to see that I'm not actually trembling or anything. I must deal with pressure well then. I look at Elena, and give Bellatrix a sideways glance before letting my eyes glaze over somewhat. My brain whirs, thinking of ways to escape – and/or win the games.

A quick bit of math gives me a 0.56% chance of escape verses a 1.838% chance of survival respectively, so I stay still on the stage, ideas for strategies racing through my head. My main problem is not being noticed, as I'm a runt, so I need to do something to stand out (barring swear words as an option after the response I got earlier).

A clunk echoes through my head as an idea forms.

Elena smiles and asks me "And how old are you then?"

I look at her.

She looks at me.

I shrug.

She blinks.

"And…?"

I raise my eyebrows and point to my throat and shake my head.

She looks confused.

I give her the most condescending look imaginable, which makes her flinch as a voice yells out from the crowd. "He's a mute!"

Mitra's voice. Knew she was clever, she always knows exactly what to do, and seems to read my mind half the time. I need something to make me stand out, and don't people always say I could pass as a mute? Elena looks confused and I'm suddenly glad the Capitol's full of idiots that don't realize that I just swore in front of them, so can talk.

I give a nod at her, and turn to face the girl, Bellatrix, who seems to be having an attack of hysteria. I consider breaking my silence and telling her about calm breathing and the dangers of hyperventilation, but I doubt she'd appreciate it much, and I think staying mute makes things easier.

You dangerous, mute lunatic, the other part of my brain sighs, sounding exactly like Garami, except it isn't sputtering. At least you made the interviews more interesting.

Brightening slightly at the prospect of making Caesar feeling very awkward, I reach forwards and shake hands with Bellatrix like asked and revel in the warmth of it. I can actually feel her pulse racing frantically.

Why isn't mine though? I wonder, as the anthem plays. I should be swearing again

You haven't got a heart, Garami's voice tells me in a nasty voice. You survive on equations and facts alone.

I imagine my logical half shrugging: Fair enough

While my parents come in and sob for a bit, my brain is literally whirring inside my head. Well no, not literally, but more metaphorically. I don't like people using the wrong words for things, not that I can use any words whatsoever from now until my death. Sad, really. Ideas are forming in my head, some stupid, but most of them are good and logical.

Things I work out as I wait for the train (while I pat my mother on the back as she has started to cry again) include my Cornucopia plan. Run away. Over 50% of deaths occur there, and most people who go into the battle there die. The worst plan would be the 'grab something from the edge and then run like the wind plan' as most of the deaths are from that, people thinking that they'll just 'get away' quickly and they don't 'get away' and die. I'll just learn to live off the land and survive like that.

If you can survive, Garami's voice whispers, as the real Garami weeps openly on my mother's arm.

If I can, then I will, if I can't, then I won't and that fact won't be changed by worrying about it, my logical half says, in a tone as if explaining why 1+1=2. Fact: believing that thinking something is equivalent to doing something doesn't make it true.

"You will try hard to survive, won't you Tophi?" My little brother Pani asks, eyes unnaturally round at the moment. I ignore the use of my irritating name and nod, because it wouldn't make sense not to try hard to survive, would it? It's hardwired into our systems through many years of evolution.

"But you're probably going to die, aren't you?" Rakta asks, looking both annoyed and confused at Pani's comment. I nod again, because it's true (1.838% chance, isn't it? Unless something dramatic happens to improve my odds which itself is unlikely). This causes the rest of my family to look upset and angry at Rakta, which seems unfair as all he did was mention the truth for once.

The peacekeeper comes over again, looking thoroughly suspicious. It's probably due to the fact that I have talked in front of him or at him earlier in my life, and now I'm suddenly a 'mute'. I smile again at the prospect of an interview with Caesar, causing the peacekeeper to look even more suspicious. I suppose most people in position look sad or cry. I've never really cried in life, because it doesn't solve any problems. I asked my family and friend why they do it and they gave me the 'you're being weird again Tophani' look. Well, Mitra didn't, but she gets the 'you're being weird again Tophani' look all the time too, except it was more 'you're being weird again Mitra' because her name is Mitra, not Tophani. My name's Tophani.

"Good Luck Tophi" My mother sobs, while my father clutches her arm tightly.

Fact: wishing someone Good Luck will not create Good Luck. There are no such things as wishes, the Hunger Games saw to that years ago. I would have told them about this particular thought if I wasn't pretending to be mute.

I wave to them as they leave the room, leaving behind nothing but salty pools of tears. Probably some dead skin and hair too, but that goes without saying, doesn't it?

"Are you" the peacekeeper jabs a finger at me "ready to go" he begins to mime walking.

I stare at him, wondering why he's acting like I'm deaf or an idiot. I might be mute but I am certainly not unintelligent. I always do well in class, except when I'm biting teachers.

Again, just the one time, my brain protests. Stop bringing that incident up, you make us seem bad. people

It's probably because I act weird, even when I'm not being a mute. I don't talk much normally, and I ignore most because (rule number 1 of life) people are idiots. So he must be assuming things. Well, two people can make gestures.

I stick my middle finger up at him, giving him a universally known symbol in sign language. He glares at me, but this wasn't just an impulsive decision. I think everything through first and he can't do anything to me. He's too low down the totem pole to sabotage the games and make it harder for me, and he can't hurt a tribute. He'll just have to suffer with me until we get to the train. I point to the door, as if to say 'I thought you said we were going…' and he glares at me again, half shoving me towards the door. I stumble slightly but remain upright, and begin to walk towards the train.

And most likely my death.

(98.162% likely to be precise)

Authors for this section: Bellatrix Craine written by PrettyBandGirl XD | Tophani Salasata written by Enzonia