Volunteer Games Chapter 2, a hunger games fanfic

"Volunteer Games"

Chapter Two

By Brian Grove

Brian at rescueddoggies dot com

Disclaimer – As I'm British and male, it may come as no surprise that I don't own Hunger Games.

An experienced beta would be welcome.

Previous Chapter:- The volunteer games begin, but aren't popular with viewers. Changes are made, then Stefani, Dorada's sister, unexpectedly volunteers.

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

"But why would Steffi volunteer?" cried Gail.

Gail was nine years old, part of the baby boom which followed the Genocide Games and the signing into law of the Restriction Treaty. The Restriction Treaty, the Act ratified by the Capitol and all the districts, devolving many powers to the districts, whose mayors and governing bodies were from then on to be elected, putting the Peacekeepers under control of the districts and removing forever the threat of a crazy President having the power to take away children.

For the first time, people felt safe to have a family, without fear that they would lose them. Panem had never seen a baby boom like it. Even Peeta and Katniss had succumbed, although Peeta had always wanted children, Katniss had always been afraid. The result was Gail, my baby sister.

It was dad who wanted the name Gail, to honor his rival, Gale Hawthorn, because he had died saving my life when we were rescued from the arena at the end of my second games.

Stefani was enchanted by Gail from the moment she knew about her. Poor Katniss suffered endlessly as Stefani asked to put her head on Katniss' tummy to hear the baby. When Gail was born, Stefani was the first visitor, beating me by a nose and getting us both told off firmly for running in the hospital.

As soon as she was considered old enough, Stefani babysat Gail at every opportunity. It was a strange irony that the best friend of the youngest daughter of a game sponsor was the daughter of a two game victims, sorry, victors.

Gail knew Stefani better than anyone. "She'd never volunteer," she insisted.

But she had.

Being the first volunteer from the Capitol, they made a lot of fun at her expense in the chariot parade. She was dressed like a parody of Capitol fashion. A toga-style dress fell from one shoulder, leaving one breast exposed. It finished halfway down her thighs. Her legs were painted one color, her arms another, her face was left alone except for huge ugly earrings dangling from her ear-lobes. Her hair was in spikes, each spike a different color. We couldn't believe that Steff would volunteer for all this.

Katniss wondered if Stefani could have been training in secret, though that still wouldn't explain why.

When the training scores were announced and Stefani had a three, when the lowest score from any of the others was a five, it was obvious that she hadn't been training.

"So, Stefani, our first volunteer from the Capitol. Some have been saying that they don't believe that you volunteered. To put people's minds at rest, can you confirm that you did actually volunteer of your own free will."

"Yes, I volunteered." Her voice sounded as if she wasn't interested at all.

"Of course we know that your big sister was a tribute in the Genocide Games..."

"So was my brother," she interrupted.

"Ah, yes, your brother, Apax."

"Apraxo."

"Right. Supposedly died in the bloodbath, right? Of course, nobody knew it was all fake. But no fakery with the PortonDeLeones Hunger Games. You must be hoping to make it longer than he did, but your training score? Are Capitol kids these days just not up to the standard of the District kids? What happened?"

For the first time, Stefani showed a bit of fire as she replied, "Maybe I'll surprise you."

"I look forward to it."

Stefani's family and Una's family had joined us in the Presidential mansion, so we could give support to Stefani's family through this whole ordeal. Dorada was as pale as I'd ever seen her and when she was sitting with her arm around her mother, she sat beside me, her head on my shoulder.

Stefani couldn't have volunteered. We all knew that. But she had.

Mom got up and walked out without saying where she was going. She didn't return that night.

Very early the next morning, the was a ring on the front door of the mansion. The Presidential guards had escorted a very embarrassed Peacekeeper.

"P... Peeta M... Mellark?" he asked, nervously, knowing full well who dad was.

"Yes," dad confirmed.

"I have to inform you that your wife has been arrested..."

"WHAT?"

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

It was a televised circus. Even the start of the games were delayed by a day so as to not miss a moment.

Katniss was standing in a dock, facing her were a long row of fourteen judges, the Constitutional Court.

Set up under the same laws as the Restriction Treaty, the Constitutional Court was made up of one senior judge from the Capitol and one from each District. The chair of the court could come from any District or from the Capitol, but would always be a judge from a different District to the person being tried or anyone else involved in the case.

Most of their cases dealt with disputes between districts, but they also had direct responsibility for cases of corruption by the highest officials in each District or in the Capitol.

It was a judge from District Eight who said, "Katniss Mellark, you are charged with abuse of office, in that you ordered the Presidential guard to attempt to falsely arrest the owners of PortonDeLeones, knowing that it was not within your legal powers to do so. How do you plead?"

"Guilty, and I'd do it again. We didn't hold a rebellion to stop the games only to have these murders start all over again."

"I think we are all perfectly aware of your beliefs about the games, Mrs. Mellark, but being President does not give you the right to overthrow the law, a law, I might add, which you personally signed into law."

"It was designed to prevent a future President from bringing back the games, not to allow them to happen," Katniss responded angrily. "I know Stefani. She would never have volunteered."

"But she did, didn't she? We all saw her admitting that on television last night. And you just couldn't accept that. Strange isn't it, that you never tried to stop the games before this, before it was a personal friend involved.?"

"I've tried to stop them since they were announced," she argued.

"But not like this, using force. Using force for your own personal benefit, to save the child of friend, even though it is obvious that the child didn't want to be saved."

Katniss couldn't respond.

"The Constitutional Court will recess to reach a decision."

The Constitutional Court took less than half an hour to reach its verdict. Without exception, they all looked unhappy.

"Will the accused please stand."

Katniss stood up.

"Katniss Mellark. The case against you was clear, obviously, since you pleaded guilty. This has been the hardest case any of us have had to deal with as judges, both in this court and in our own Districts before we became part of this court. We all respect you personally for what you have achieved for Panem, but it is our sworn duty to uphold the law, to show that nobody, no matter how exalted, is above the law of the land."

He took a drink from the glass of water in front of him.

"It is with the greatest reluctance that we declare that you are removed from the office of President from this moment on. Due to your lack of remorse, you are also banned from holding any public office in the future and will serve six months in prison. I might add that it would normally have been a much longer term, but for the debt we all feel that this country owes you for your actions in the past. Do you understand the sentence?"

Katniss looked at him and said clearly, "Yes."

"Have you any questions?"

"No."

"Take the prisoner down."

Katniss was led away.

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

Peeta, Gail and I were allowed to visit her before she was sent to the prison, in the secure bunker in District Thirteen.

"I'm sorry, Peeta."

"You couldn't stand by and do nothing," he said. "I know."

"It's only six months. It won't be long," she assured us.

"Mom," I said, "it's supposed to be us reassuring you by saying things like that."

Mom began giving us a list of instructions, what we could take with us when we left the presidential mansion and what we couldn't, Gail must behave for dad and try not to annoy me too much. But it was when she told dad to make sure that I got enough sleep and didn't stay up too late, I'd had enough.

"Mom!" I cried. "I'm twenty-seven years old. I'm not a baby any more."

"All three of you will always be my babies," she replied.

The television that night showed footage of the disgraced now ex-President, being led onto the train which would take her to the prison in District Thirteen.

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

The next day, the game began and Stefani proved once again that she hadn't been training by almost being killed in the bloodbath. She escaped with no weapons, no food and no water.

On the third day, she found water, more by chance than anything, a cool stream flowing down from a mountain. Desperate for food, she'd begun eating the leaves of the plants around the stream, but they'd obviously just given her an upset stomach and apparently made her delirious.

"You need to hide!" Gail shouted at the screen. Stefani had gone to sleep beside the stream.

Sadly Stefani couldn't hear Gail's good advice. A group of careers were searching the stream for tributes and found her. "Hello, Capitol girl," one of them said.

Gail was furious with me for taking her back to bed and not allowing her to watch as they tortured Stefani. Call me a coward, but I couldn't watch either.

It was just beginning to get light when dad came into Gail's room, where we were both lying on the bed, and said, "It's over. She's dead."

Stefani's family, including Chiapaska and Salique, were distraught, as you might expect. When Salique said nothing all day, we began to worry about her, but as she focused on trying to comfort her "almost-mother", her speech returned. Two days later they all went with Una to District Eleven.

Gail was almost as bad. Stefani was almost like another big sister to her. Peeta, Gail and I were alone in the mansion now, rattling around in the empty place that no longer felt like home.

I don't even remember who won the games. It wasn't one of those who'd tortured Stefani, at least that was something.

Gail spent most of the time looking at old Hunger Games footage, not the games themselves, which dad wouldn't let her watch, but the reapings, the chariots, and the interviews.

When I asked her what she was doing, she said, "I don't know. Something struck me when we were watching Stefani. Something wasn't right and I can't put my finger on it."

I watched them all with her. We must have watched the "before" and "after" segments for every hunger games for the previous twenty years about a dozen times.

Like Gail, something didn't "feel" right, but what?

Finally dad asked us to stop. "We're moving to Eleven in two days. I don't want you upsetting Steff's family with this. It's not going to bring her back."

By the time Mom was released from prison, we were living in District Eleven. It felt more like home than the Capitol.

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

Two more Hunger games came and went, another two groups of children volunteering to die.

I wasn't convinced and nor was Gail, who once again watched the interviews over and over again, still sure, that somewhere in all that footage was the clue she needed.

If determination was all that was needed to stop the games, Gail would succeed. She made a nuisance of herself in every government office, but to no avail. The games were legal, and while the tributes all admitted to being volunteers, there was no political will to change that.

The fact that quite a few of the families were convinced that their child would never have volunteered, indeed some had openly spoken out against the games, was not enough to change people's minds.

Then Gail disappeared. When dad reported her disappearance, he was told that she was on record as having volunteered for the Hunger Games.

It is the only time I have ever seen dad lose his cool. The only reason he didn't end up in prison was that the officials he hit refused to press charges.

Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games - Volunteer Games

Author's notes...

Please review.

Brian

THE STORY SO FAR

Chapter 1

The volunteer games begin, but aren't popular with viewers. Changes are made, then Stefani, Dorada's sister, unexpectedly volunteers.

Chapter 2

Katniss sent to prison and stripped of the Presidency for trying to take action against the games. Stefani is killed. Gail spends her time trying to find proof that something isn't right about the games. Then she disappears, another volunteer for the games.