"It's gonna get harder before it gets easier. But it will get better, you just gotta make it through the hard stuff first." -Anonymous
District Eleven's Aerin Sevani's POV
"Okay, now, lift up your arms." The green skinned male of my prep team instructed me.
I lifted my arms up a bit so that he could do whatever him and the rest of my prep team wanted to do to me. "Lift them higher." He instructed me again. Nervousness started to ripple through my body as I complied, and lifted my arms up to my shoulders. "Higher." He sighed, like I didn't understand him at all.
I started to wonder just how high he wanted me to go. Did he want me to lift them just a little bit higher, or did he want me to lift them a lot higher? I then decided that I'll just go all out and see how much was too much. I lifted my arms up until my hands were high above my head, and felt both a feeling of fear and incomfort as I did it.
I didn't like raising my arms above my head on command, even if his voice was significantly more hospitable than the vast majority of people that commanded me to raise my arms in such a position. It made me think of how people in my hands up position were surrendering themselves to the peacekeepers. I myself had been in this sort of position before, and it wasn't pleasant either. "Perfect." He said, pleased that I had finally got it right.
If this was the case, why didn't he just say raise your hands above your head? Ah well. Nothing I could do about it.
"So what do you plan to do with me?" I asked as my prep team was examining me from head to toe. I didn't like people looking at me like this, not when I hardly had any clothes on. It was a little embarrassing.
"We're checking to see if there are anymore imperfections before we hand you to your stylist." A silver haired woman that looked around my older brother's age. She was by far, the youngest of the group, everyone else looked around thirty, which was the oldest anybody in the capitol tried to look it seemed. I hadn't seen anyone look older then that in the Capitol other than their servants. Avoxes they liked to call them, traitors of the Capitol.
I looked at them, and while they had the same Capitol fashion on the outside, I could see that their eyes were just like those back home in the district. Empty, or close to it. Though they would still be closer to Capitol than district.
Our escort, Veronica, ordered them around casually, and they obeyed without a word.
But while they didn't look happy, they were much better off than just about everyone in District Eleven. So really, they didn't have that bad a life, as far as I could see. Still, they were stripped of identity, dignity, and whatever self worth they had previously had. They were empty, like their eyes. Dead, but not on the outside, they were dead where it really mattered.
No. They might be better feed and live without the worries that we district folks have, but they were not better off than we were. If anything, I think they're worse off than we are. At least we have an identity and what little of a future we could see.
"Well, I do want to look my best for the Capitol." I told them with a smile.
"Of course you do." She said before her and the others nodded with satisfaction. "You know, I think now's the time you meet your stylist, Melissa."
"What's she like?" I asked, wondering if she'd put me into some kind of insane consume. I wanted to know what she was like, I didn't think she was going to be bad, but, who knows, maybe she'd be a crazy person. But I doubt it. But this was someone who only graduated from District Twelve, so who knows what she's thinking. Though, she had been our district's stylist for a couple years, and her costumes weren't that bad, but people tended to get comfortable after a couple years. So was I going to be her experiment? Someone that she could try something dangerous or new on?
"Oh she wonderful." The green skinned male told me smiling. "A little strange, but, she's wonderful. She's really good for someone with only four years of experience."
"Strange?" I asked, wondering what they considered strange. "Strange how?" My prep team just smiled reassuring smiles to me and just said.
"You'll see." That didn't assure me much, but whatever she was planning, I bet it wasn't going to be too bad. They didn't want to injure or kill us. On purpose that is.
I then thought back to a chariot ride a few years back, and saw how a new District Twelve stylist tried to imitate Katniss and Peeta's costumes, with disastrous results. What calmed me down was that I knew that I was from District Eleven, and that my stylist wasn't a first year amateur. Melissa should know what she's doing, the prep team had confidence in her, so I guess I should as well.
I then looked at myself in the mirror and thought of how good of a job they did on me. I almost didn't recognize myself. My skin looked cleaner than it ever did in my life as far as I could remember, my hair was styled neatly, and they even covered up the scar above my left eye.
"Well," I said turning towards my prep team. "Thanks for cleaning me up."
"Our pleasure." The women with thick red tattoos all over her body answered cheerfully. "Well, we better get Melissa here so you two can finally meet."
As they left, I thought of how grateful I felt towards them because they left me in my boxer shorts. I heard from my mentor, Rune Shaith, that his prep team left him naked for what felt like hours on end. I made a joke to him about that, but he didn't find it as funny as my district partner, Angel, or our escort, Veronica, did. Guess he had bad memories of it. My prep team was nice, but what was this stylist of theirs like? They said she was strange, strange how? What could be considered strange in the Capitol?
Maybe she was like Angel and I. We were strange to the Capitol. If that was the case, maybe I could get along with her better than Rune had with his stylist.
"Hello there!" I heard a female's voice shout. I turned around to see a young looking woman with turquoise hair and deep green, vine like tattoos on her face. I looked lower to see that she was holding a bottle of wine in her right hand. Oh, this is what they mean by strange. Not as bad as I thought. "You must be Aerin!" She shouted happily walking up to me.
"Yes," I told her with a smile. "Yes I am."
"Hello Aerin, I'm Melissa, your stylist for the games, how are you this fine day?"
"Great," I told her. "Everyone's been really nice to me here." Which was true. Veronica had been nice to Angel and I during the reaping and the train ride. When we got to the Capitol everyone cheered for us and wanted to meet us. And then there was the prep team, who weren't as scary as I first thought they'd be. Thanks for scaring me Rune.
"Great to hear." Melissa said taking a swig of her wine before talking to me again. "Okay, so my partner and I have an idea for you and your tribute partner, Angel. Want to guess what it is?"
"Yeah, sure." I smiled. I wonder what they had in mind for us. Okay, we're from District Eleven, so it has to be something farm related or something along those lines. "We're farmers." I guessed.
"Not even close." Melissa told me. What!? Okay.
"We're farming tools." I guessed again. If we weren't farmers, we'd be the tools we use in the fields.
"Closer, but still far." Oh, this was going to be good.
"Some sort of plant?" I guessed. We farmed plants, so, this had to be it.
"In a way." Melissa said before taking another drink of wine. If she wasn't drunk yet, she'd soon be.
I opened my mouth to gave a guess to what kind of plant we were going to be dressed up as, only for the stylist to start talking. "Okay, Aerin, me and my partner decided to cover you and your partner in vines." Oh I see, farming, plants, vines, it could work.
"Sounds like fun." I told her, glad to find out that it wasn't going to be a complete disaster. I wondered what I'd look like covered in vines.
"Okay," Melissa said. "Take off those shorts." That took my by surprise, and I couldn't help but shout.
"What!?"
"We're covering your whole body in vines so we need you to take off those shorts of yours." She explained, not bothered in the least by what was going to be happening.
Was it really necessary? I wondered. "If your worried about it don't be," Melissa said in a way that indicated that she might be trying to calm me down. "Angel's going to be doing the same thing, and don't worry, just be calm." I don't know, this might be a little too strange for me. But, they were helping me get noticed by the Capitol and hopefully that would get me sponsors. So I'll continue to do what Rune told me to do, don't fight and do what they say, even if I did feel a little heat start to build up in my face as well as a sense of embarrassment.
But I trusted that Rune wanted what was best for us, so I did as she asked.
District Four's Shoney Germoal's POV
Well, this wasn't the best thing they could have came up with, but it wasn't the worst I had ever seen either.
When me and my district partner, Eva, came from our stylists, I saw that we were both dressed up as navy soldiers. Both of us had white button up shirts, white dress pants with black dress shoes and a black belt with a golden buckle on it, with white gloves for our hands. And last but not least, those white hats with the District Four crest above the brim. We were also given one rifle each. We were a complete set of naval soldiers, just like those in the history book pictures.
It was really cheesy, but at least it was original. I'm kind of surprised that nobody had thought of this before, instead, sticking to mystical creatures and water gods. Or on occasion, fishermen. I was glad that we weren't simple fish though, that would have been half humiliating and half stupid.
I smiled at the rifle in my hands. It looked almost real. I looked at Evaline and saw that she was smiling happily at the uniform she wore. She was checking it out by holding the fabric and looking at it from all angles. Was she really so happy to be dressed up as a sailor? It was her opinion I guess, she was entitled to it, and I was entitled to my own.
"Hey there fellow careers." A young girl's voice called out to my left. I looked over to see the twelve year old girl from District Two. Howl Draconix standing merely four feet away from where I stood. It almost frightened me at how close she had gotten to me and I didn't even notice.
She looked even smaller in person then she did on T.V, and that was saying something as she looked pretty darn tiny then.
I wasn't that big for my age, but at least I was a decent size, she looked like she could easily be trampled to death during the bloodbath if she wasn't careful. Kind of like how she could of been trampled during her reapings if she hadn't leaped from one kid's head to the next before reaching the arena.
She was dressed up in a shiny, silver dress with a split down her left leg. And attached to that, she had wings on her back. It suited her, she almost looked like a fairy, with her small frame and such. Though it looked odd for a District Two costume. What was the stylist thinking this year?
Beside her was her district partner, Lucifer Despar. He wasn't that much taller than me, but he looked stronger. I looked at his face and noticed that all his facial features looked small. His lips, eyes, and even his nose all looked a little strange on him. He wore a simple knight outfit, if it could be called that. It was mostly a sword and shield with steel chest armour. Someone's stylist had been lazy this year.
The little girl looked at Eva and I up and down, examining us like how someone would examine the quality of a fish from the market. "If one of you can be called a career that is."
"Hey, non-volunteer career, get over here!" A strong and rough like voice shouted. I looked over the District Two tributes and saw the District One tributes just over them. Behind Lucifer was Griffin, taller than the rest of us with short black hair and bigger muscles than Lucifer. He wore a jewel encrusted suit that shone and glittered at every angle, just like the one he wore during the reapings, except this time, his pants and tie were also covered in jewels. If his stylist wanted to blind everyone when he got into the open, they were probably going to do a pretty good job.
And beside him was Lynsa. She was also small and thin, but not as small or thin as Howl. Her chariot outfit made her look like a powerful female warrior. She had golden armour chest armour, a leatherish looking gold battle skirt, a golden shield with a sword and sheath of the same colour. At least the sword looked like steel.
Her costume was different from Griffin's, who looked like he was trying to be at the height of fashion. Period.
I looked over to curly red haired Eva who was walking kind of shyly towards us. It wasn't too obvious, I just saw little signs in her movements, though it looked like she was trying to hide it.
"So, here we all are." Lucifer said with his arms held wide, looking at each of us careers when we were all standing together.
"Yes." Eva said both happily and unhappily. "Here we all are, nice to meet you all." I saw the tributes from One and Two look at her and start to examine her. They looked up and down at her. Just like Howl. What were they looking at her for? She couldn't be that interesting.
"You seem okay," Lucifer said smiling. "For someone that was reaped."
"I may have been reaped," Eva told him with a little anger in her voice. All her shyness seemed to be replaced by confidence. "But I'm just as good as the rest of you, so watch it." Lucifer then put up his hands in mock apology and made an 'Ohhh, I'm so scared' expression on his face.
"Nice gun you got there." The little girl from Two commented looking at the rifle I was holding. "Can I hold it for a moment?" I shrugged and handed it to her. She examined the rifle for a moment before pointing it towards Eva. What the-!?
As far as I could see, nobody was trying to stop her. Griffin looked monotonic, Lynsa was caught up in the surprise, Lucifer looked like he wanted to see what was going to happen next, Eva was wondering what was going on, and Howl was smiling.
Then I heard the gun click empty before anyone could even react. "Darn, it's empty." She laughed before tossing it back to me. I caught it in mid air.
"Not funny." Evaline seemingly snarled at her.
"Good one." Lucifer laughed. Laugh as he would, I didn't find anything funny about it. I saw something in that little girl's eyes, I couldn't put a word on it. Aggression? No, that was too violent of a word. It was smaller, but similar. Maybe superiority over my district partner? I hated people like that. Either way, if there really had been bullets in that weapon, she would of gladly disposed of Eva, and probably claim that it was an unfortunate 'accident'.
I started to wonder if I'd get along with them if they were going to be like this all the time. Especially that girl, Howl.
"All tributes to your chariots!" A voice called out from behind me. "I repeat! All tributes to your chariots!"
"Well, we better get back to our places." Lucifer said walking away with Howl. "See ya later reaped career girl."
"Ignore them, Evaline." I heard Lynsa kindly say before she also left with Griffin. Was I going to be all right with people like this around me? After all, I wasn't that much of a career. I just volunteered out of curiosity and boredom, and Eva. Well. Eva was reaped, and that said a massive amount on its own. District Four wasn't the most respected career district, and Eva being reaped would only make it harder for the other careers to take us seriously. I just had to hope that having a twelve year old as a tribute evened things out.
As Eva and I climbed up on our chariot, I noticed that she was smiling, like she was looking forward to going out in our cheesy naval costumes. Maybe the words were spoken towards her by District Two hadn't affected her. Good, she shouldn't let people push her around like that. She shouldn't give them the satisfaction that they wanted to see.
As the District One chariot started to exit the tunnel, I decided to help out Eva a little, show her that not everyone was against her.
"Hey, Eva." I said, holding my gun in both hands. She turned her head towards me, wondering what I wanted. I smiled to her before I said. "Check this out." I then started to spin the weapon in my hands like a stick. "Oh. Yeah. Ugh." I said as she moved her body out of the way of the weapon's ends. "The Capitol's going to love- Opps."
I mistimed the turning, and the fake weapon flew from my hands and clattered on the ground. Our chariot then began to move, making it too late for me to go down and pick it up. "Well damn." I looked back to Eva, smiling anyway. "I guess I'll just wave."
District Eight's December Juliet "Ember" Varen's POV
It couldn't be. It just couldn't be. I thought I'd never see him again, and yet, there he was. So far, yet so close. I wanted to call out to him, to let him know that I was right here in front of him. But it couldn't be him, it just couldn't, how could it be him? I was imagining things. Things like this didn't happen, they only happened in story books for children. A fantasy world plot line that people wish for. So why was I seeing him?
"Ready to go?" My stylist, Maria Velnore, asked me. I tore my eyes away from him before looking at Maria and telling her that I was ready. I got help from Maria getting loaded onto the horse drawn chariot and stood beside my district partner, Dav Anders. He didn't help me up the chariot. In fact, he didn't even look at me as I got on. Maria was the one to help me up the whole way. Why did this guy have to act so superior? It's not like he was better than the rest of us. He didn't have to act like he was the- Oh, the chariots are starting to move.
"Okay," Lola, one of the members of my prep team announced excitedly. "Off goes District One." I watched the chariots in front of me, and noticed that they didn't have any drivers, only the horses were pulling them. How did they manage to go the route from here to the president's mansion? Did they do it so many times that they remembered it? Were they trained to do it?
Deciding that I'd look into it later, I looked forward and examined the other tributes chariot costumes, wondering what their stylists had planned for them.
District One's always made a show, they were usually the Capitol's favourite as they had the best looking clothes and seemed to have the best designers. This year, the boy was covered head to toe in jewels while the girl looked like a powerful warrior in gold armour.
Then came District Two with the little fairy girl and the knight. The girl looked good with her silver dress and shiny wings that seemed to glitter and shine with every turn.
Then went out District Three who were dressed as circuit boards with some parts of them lighting up with red, yellow, or orange lights. The giant in the chariot didn't look too happy with his costume. In fact, nobody on that chariot looked happy. With five peacekeepers on the chariot along with the two tributes, there wasn't much room for them, the giant, or the little girl on it. I had to admit, it was a little funny. But wouldn't it of been better for only one or two peacekeepers to be with them instead of all five?
On that chariot was the one that I was looking at. The one that I wanted to be with. The one that I cared for most in this place away from home. My eyes must be playing tricks on me. I had wanted it so bad for so long, that my mind must be playing with me. This couldn't be real.
District Four came after them. They were sailors with rifles. Even if only one of them had their gun with them. Did the guy not get a gun? Why?
District Five then came out as light bulbs. The male tribute also didn't look too happy. He waved, but only just. I wasn't sure if it was because the albino couldn't, since his arms had little reach outside his costume, or because he wasn't enthused in general. He looked angry, just like the District Three male, but to a lesser extent. His district partner as well. She looked miserable as well. Wasn't she the one that cried out for someone to volunteer for her? What had driven her to do that? Fear? Denial?
District Six came out soon after, and they were dressed up as trains, if trains were supposed to stand up like buildings and were lit up like ones.
Then came Seven, they were dressed up as lumberjacks with red and black plaid shirts, blue pants, and black suspenders, all finished off with black work boots.
Then came Dav and I. I was dressed up with a knee length dark blue dress with glowing white strips and dark blue shoes. Dav had a dark blue dress shirt with glowing white strips with green pants and dark blue shoes. What I had that he didn't have were ribbons that wove down my curly dark hair. I waved to the Capitol citizens, like they told me to do, as they cheered at us. But why did we have to do this? Why did we have to dress up in costumes for them? It didn't make any sense.
To get attention, I told myself. The Capitol doesn't want to see us as people, just as objects that can be manipulated, molded, into whatever they wanted us to become. Some more than others. We weren't all equal, they had the same mentality as Dav. It was obvious. They didn't like the lesser districts, such as Ten, Eleven, and Twelve, which is why they got new stylists, those that were inexperienced. Those that worked for the tributes of One, Two, and Four however, got the best stylists, and they got the best costumes.
We were unequal, because the attention would automatically go to those from One, Two, and Four, because they had the best costumes. They were winners, and winners should look as such. Those below them were struggling to at least be seen.
Maria liked to say that she might not be as good as a career stylist, but she could still get her tributes noticed if she played her cards right. That everyone had a chance of getting noticed. To which I think, when was the last time that District Twelve was noticed? When was the last time that Districts Ten and Eleven were really noticed?
District Twelve did get noticed recently, for the reasons that their tributes nearly burned to death.
Maria was right to say that everyone had a chance, but not everyone's chances were the same. Still, she did her best, and I was grateful that she was at least trying.
I took a look behind me and saw that District Nine was dressed up as wheat grains. The male's seemed to be slowly crumbling as bits of grains fell in front of his face. Was that intentional, or just a badly made costume?
District Ten was dressed up as different things, just like the District One and Two tributes. The little boy was a satyr while the older girl was wearing a dress made of blue and green feathers, with dots of the same colours on them, with the same feathered, high collar. She was going for a peacock look. I got the peacock for the District Ten costume, but why the satyr?
Then came District Eleven. Their bodies were entangled with vines, and only vines that wrapped thickly every which way on their bodies.
And last but not least came District Twelve. The tributes were dressed up as coal miners, and their uniforms were white, like the District Four pair. They had a black chalk like substance all over their costume and their faces. Dirty and degraded, like all of Panem liked to look at them as.
But even with all those people out there, and all the things that caught my attention, I just couldn't help but look again. I looked back and saw him again. He'd be almost fifty now, but he it seemed he hadn't aged in the years he was gone. I thought I'd never see him again. But I didn't want to see him, not like this, not as a tribute for the games. Why did fate have to be so mean to me? The man turned around and looked at me, just as he did when he was escorting the giant from District Three past me. And just as I knew it was him, he knew it was me. I felt like crying now, why did it have to be this way? Did my ancestors want to punish him more? Or did they want to punish me for something? Or both?
"Why did it have to be this way?" I whispered to not only myself, but to him, even though he couldn't hear me. He turned away from me so that he could slam the back of his gun into the giant's back. "Why did I have to meet you like this, dad?"
Please. Let this be real.
A/N: Some changes were made in this chapter.