"Survival instincts are one of those things that never die." -Kiersten White
District One's Bastion Barons's POV
It wasn't that I hated mentoring, but I wasn't really fond of it either. I would rather be back in District One with my friends and family, but instead, I normally found myself in the Capitol because of reasons that made me curse that I had won.
Winning had been a dream to me back when I was young, proud, and foolish. Like my newest mentoring partner, Aphrodite Amari, and the tributes we were mentoring.
I couldn't blame Griffin or Lynsa for feeling that way, but Aphrodite, despite being a victor for a year now and being nineteen, was still acting like the tribute she had been last year, but worse. By now, she should of known better, but as she was talking to her friend, Lynsa, about how she was going to do so well in the games and how, when she came out a victor, they were going to have so much fun together. It made me want to laugh and puke at the same time.
Aphrodite was almost as arrogant as she had been a year ago, and that was really saying something for someone that had only won because of her sponsors. Because of her looks. Because her allies did the heavy lifting in the alliance. And in the end, she seemed to get off easily, because she wasn't suffering like the rest of us victors were suffering. She was still living in that childish dream world that tributes dreamed of.
It was pathetic and annoying as hell, but I wasn't going to be the one to burst Aphrodite's bubble, I'd let the Capitol do that, and her time was going to come soon enough. I was sure of it. Just as the Capitol was ruining me they would ruin my mentoring partner. It happened to every one of us, it was just taking longer for her. For some reason that I couldn't explain, the Capitol didn't put her through the things that the rest of us mentors had to go through during our first year of victory. Aphrodite only got showed the good things. I hoped that she would eventually experience the bad things as well. As horrible as it sounded.
She was a pretty District One girl with near perfect smooth and milky skin due to living in a healthy place that didn't starve you, along with being young, along with a head full of bright blond hair and sparkling green eyes that hadn't yet tasted true misery, along with a fit body that had received some extra curves, she was someone that the Capitol liked to see. Her image was helped significantly due to her recent win and the Capitol modifying her into her new, 'better looking' image.
It made me look at Lynsa, who was probably going to win in much the same method Aphrodite had won. Her looks, and nothing else. Sure Lynsa had some skills with a bow and arrow, but honestly didn't look that dangerous. She didn't seem to have that killer initiative that so many other careers, and non-careers, had. Because of that, I focused more on Griffin, and took him way more seriously.
Griffin was a very strong, and very skilled individual, even if he did lose to Lynsa in the scoring. Ah well, what could you do about that? Not like it mattered in the long run. You could shoot arrows into dummies as much as you wanted, but when it came down to humans killing humans, there were people that just couldn't do it. Aphrodite was one of them, and I'm pretty sure Lynsa was one of them as well.
Griffin might be arrogant, but he had more than enough skill to back him up. He might also not talk very much, like the girls did, but that's what I found great about him. After all, a warrior doesn't talk, he does. Sure he had an anger problem that could drive him down a bad path, but as long as he kept his cool, he has a great chance of making it far. Hell, even with his anger he has a better chance than every other tribute this year.
Aphrodite and Lynsa might call him a brute, but better to be a brute than a bitchy girl that can't do things herself. After all, Aphrodite, didn't your allies have to defend you during the attacks? Didn't your allies have to weaken your enemies before you finished them off? The only kill you did on your own was stabbing one of your former allies in the back, and that's when you won.
The Capitol treated you like a princess, and you let it get to your head. Riches, fame, and bragging rights, for doing nothing. And you were clearly enjoying your job of being a mentor.
I on the other hand, had to earn my victory. The slayings in that damn oil factory, the sweltering humidity, the smell of oil and decay everywhere you went. Your arena was nothing like mine. You thought that an old theatre as an arena was hard, try making your way through crude oil raining down you and getting it in your eyes and throat. The smell of decaying wood was overpowering? Try getting sand blasted by nature.
And after that, they used my young looks to their advantage. Because I was eighteen, but had only just began my growth spurt, I looked like I was only thirteen years old. Fourteen if you want to push it. And with that came a bunch of pedophile wannabes that I had to submit to.
Even now, after sixteen years, I hadn't seemed to of aged that much. I still had the same thick blond hair, green eyes, and athletic body, but my body and face remained relatively young. I looked more like Griffin, who looked like he was in his early twenties. Without the large muscles though. I had gained some slight ache that hadn't been as wild as the years before, but it still gave me a youthish appearance. The men and women of the Capitol loved it. Made them feel young, some had told me.
I didn't like the sex, as it felt more like I was being molested than anything else. I wanted to get out of it, but I didn't want to end up like Amber Littlewood, or Druid Ray. So I continued to submit to the Capitol, as much as I hated it.
District Two's Elektra Draconix's POV
Why? Why did you volunteer, Helena?
Couldn't you of just waited until you were at least sixteen? Or better yet, not volunteer at all? That would have been the better decision, not volunteering and living out your life without the shit that your father, your brother, and I, have to deal with. Live your life as peaceful as possible.
No, I guess you couldn't. And honestly, I can see why you would want to volunteer. But you honestly didn't think very far, did you? Otherwise you would have seen how stupid of a decision you made. Volunteering when you're only twelve year old? That's not playing the game, that's signing a death warrant.
Fucking hell. It's mom and dad's fault for making you think that you need to be something more than just a face in the crowd. It's this damn family name that makes you think that you need to be more than just another person walking around in District Two.
Mom and dad expect you to meet the highest standards, and mom even said herself that you won't be a Draconix anymore if you don't meet it. She said that she'd cast you away if you don't become something more.
They put you through training, telling you that being a Draconix is a privilege that you had to earn the right to be called one. And if it weren't enough for our parents to slide us towards that path, the other kids in the District expected a lot out of us as well. The instructors, classmates, everyday people, they expected the Draconix family to be larger than life.
That's why your brother and I volunteered, and found out very quickly that the arena wasn't all that it was cut out to be.
Azael found out that his allies were just using him to gain sponsors, using our name so that they could get attention. Azael almost got killed because of that, because all the careers that year expected him to be larger than life because of his name. So they tried to kill him late in the game, tried to drown him in human sewage when they lost their weapons.
Azael only won because he didn't fall into one of the many traps placed in that network of sewer pipes. He shouldn't have been able to escape the wrath of the career pack, but he did. Why? Because he didn't get lost. He knew the map, knew where the traps were, and stayed away from them.
I was in the same situation as you before, Helena. Before you, I was the runt of the family because I was only five foot five. The same expectations were put on me. A Draconix I was, and I had to earn my place among the family. I volunteered.
I then beat people to death with artifacts from the past. Bashed one poor girl's brains out with a stone slab. She was the one tribute that haunted me the most. It wasn't that I knew her well, or that her death was the most brutal, it was because she refused to die.
I bashed her face until her skull turned into a bowl, and even then, with half her head gone, she refused to die. She couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't do anything but look at me with those eyes of hers. Those eyes that told me that she was still alive and wanting to kill me.
That was four years ago. Now at age twenty, I still couldn't get over it. I'm not a tribal like Perseus Maddox or Druid Ray. I am also not a psychopath, like Amber Littlewood.
Perseus Maddox won his game eleven years ago at the age of eighteen by brutally stabbing the other tributes to death. Though it wasn't what many would call a strategy, it was simple and effective. It was all that needed to be done.
Perseus was big, strong, and a good fighter. It worked for him, and that was all that mattered. He didn't need sponsors, and even though he was a career and would of gotten some sponsors because of that, he wouldn't of gotten as many sponsors as the other careers. It wasn't that he wasn't handsome, he was quite normal. Short brown hair, hazel eyes, and a muscular build. It was just his so called strategy that people didn't like.
The Capitol wanted something original, something to captivate them. All Perseus did was kill. Too much was expected of him.
And while I had the same almond shaped emerald eyes and raven black hair as my sister, my body had matured. Sponsors took notice of that.
I was older than Helena. Stronger, smarter, more skilled than her. And even than, I barley won. I only won because I managed to 'ally' with some non-careers, and while still in the career pack, destroy both those groups from the inside. Get the non-careers and the careers to fight each other in suicidal attacks. Get them to kill their own allies. If I hadn't manipulated them, I don't think I would have won.
I may have supported her on her stupid crusade, but it was only because that was what she wanted to hear. I was too nice to her. I should of spoke up, said that if mom, and dad, and everyone else in the family was going to cast her out of the family because she wasn't high above all the normal people of the district, let it be. But I didn't.
Because of our family name. Because of the district's expectations. Because of mom and dad. Because of me. My little sister, was going to die.
District Three's Ampf Tressel's POV
If there was one thing that you should never have, it's a superiority complex. And for that reason alone, I was deeming Zap Philistone a dead man. Sure he'd make it far in the games, but that was all he was going to do, make it far.
His claim to be a god was almost as stupid as it was the careers thinking that they were invincible. Neither one of those were true. That would be the downfall of Zap Philistone, because while the careers were arrogant, they weren't so arrogant that they thought that they were a living god.
I don't know how Zap got that score of eleven, but it I knew that it didn't make him more godlike than he already was. He was human, like the rest of us. And just because you believed something, or thought that you were stronger, faster, smarter, or more skilled than other people, didn't mean that you were the best.
The careers, back when I played my game nine years ago, the careers thought that they were invincible. They thought that they could overcome anything that the world threw at them. And for a while, they were that invincible pack of tributes.
Stalking their prey around the tram yard, they picked off their victims one my one until nearly nobody stood in their way. But their arrogance caught up with them, as I showed that they weren't as invincible as they thought they were.
While the careers were busy hunting the other tributes, not even forming any semblance of a plan, I used by days in the arena to turn their camp into a death trap.
Using what I knew of electronics, I managed to get a barley functioning tram back online. Then by using the scattered glass bottles that littered the arena, filling them with gasoline and oil, I set them ablaze by the crate full. Then by using the controls, I got the train to ride forward, towards the cornucopia, and jump out of the moving train before it crashed into the golden horn, creating an inferno.
The careers burned to death, finally aware that they were as much flesh and bone as the rest of us were. All their training, sponsors, and warrior mentality couldn't save them from their stupidity. Couldn't save them from that kid that could hardly swing a sword properly, that stupid, thin, blonde kid that had been a nobody. One that you had forgotten about until you were condemned to hell.
I thought things would chance. But I'm now that I'm twenty seven years old, I'm disappointed that nothing has changed through out the years. Careers still thought that they were the greatest warriors ever, they had their pack, and most of the times, they won, only adding to their ego. Its not until after their victory that they discover just how weak they are.
Bastion, Elektra, Perseus, Cress, and Nemo, could vouch for me if they felt like it. Though some were worse than others, and while they had their own reasons for volunteering, there was that core element among the careers. The feeling that they could fight and win the games. That they could defeat anyone in their way. That career feeling towards the so called lesser tributes. Then feeling that powerlessness after victory.
And it wasn't just the careers. There were us non-careers. We thought that when we exited the arena that our nightmares were over. That we would have a better life than the one that we had had before. We were wrong.
Honestly, I don't think I would have made it this far without the help of my mentor, Techa Byte. At sixty one years old and having won her games at the age of fifteen, she had more experience with what it meant to be a victor than many of the mentors still alive today.
She explained to me that victory was like the water she had poisoned in her arena. At first, you didn't realize that the fountains of water in that park were deadly until it was too late. You taste the sweet nectar of life, and then it turns against you without warning.
Being a victor wasn't all that it was cracked up to be.
District Four's Nemo Rainer's POV
Of all the career districts, District Four was the least liked among them. This year was not different, our tributes were the least liked among the pack, and that was because Evaline was reaped. A reaped career. It was stupid for the other careers to poke fun at her because she was reaped, she was a career, just like them. But they didn't see it that way. They saw her as weak and unfitting for the pack. It was stupid.
Shoney was a welcome sight for the pack, but they didn't think of him much either. He was a kid that they didn't take all too seriously, and it didn't help that him and Evaline scored the lowest of the entire pack. But scores mean nothing, they're just ways for fools to think that they're better than others.
Both Evaline and Shoney were careers, just like Cress and I.
It's funny, because Cress and I were both outcasts in our pack as well. We volunteered, but it was what was seen of us that made everyone in our pack question us. For Cress, it was that she loved the Capitol. She loved the people and the culture. She wanted to be like them, somewhat.
She would try to mimic their accent, dress up ridiculously, and dye her hair. She got called a lot of things, and some of those things turned out to be true. Capitol whore, traitor, stupid ass bitch. Those were some of the names that she was called back in District Four. Now they're more creative.
Cress won fifteen years ago at the age of eighteen, but seemed to of stopped aging at twenty five. That's probably because she kind of had. Capitol surgeries had done a wonder on her, and because of that, she was going to be forever young. Both physically and mentally, because she was still partying hard.
Capitol parties, sex filled nights, heavy drinking, Cress was loved by the Capitol. Pink hair on a tanned and toned body with blue eyes didn't hurt either. Cress belonged more in the Capitol than a district.
I on the other hand, was hated because I was more of a girl than a man. Dresses, skirts, and long blonde hair, it wasn't something that a thirty eight year old man should be running around in, and yet, I made it work.
Feminine face and a tanned body that was slim and not overly muscular with light green eyes, and I looked almost like a girl. The only problem is my voice, deep, rough, and masculine. I'm working on it though. I can keep a girly voice for about a minute, but that's about it. Hurts my throat trying to be girly.
I was looking for a better life, so I volunteered when I was seventeen and won the one hundred and eighteenth Hunger Games.
Used to the assaults that would be targeted towards me, I was strong enough to endure the blows that were inflected upon me. And because I worked on ships, my hands were strong like vices. It worked in my favour in the arena, a series of mini tropical islands surrounded by the ocean.
In that arena, I was like a shark. I'd grab people, pull them under the water, and drown them. They fought, but the years of working on ships and the years of swimming in District Four payed off. They couldn't escape me.
Even when I came home a victor, I was still and outcast, simply because of the way I dressed. The way I presented myself.
Cress was the same. There was a reason why she hardly ever went back to District Four, and I couldn't blame her. But District Four's my home, and I wasn't about to let that slip through my fingers. Even though I sometimes wish that the people of District Four would all drop dead.
Being a woman had its perks though. It was fun to trick people. That's how I first meet Bastion Barons. Bastion was on his first year of mentoring, and when he went out for a night of drinking, he saw me and started to hit on me. It wasn't until I spoke that he discovered that I was a guy. He nearly fainted, I nearly died laughing. We've been friends ever since.
I wish that more careers were as accepting as my District One friend. It would make Evaline's life way better. Probably make Shoney's life easier too. I know it would have made Cress's life easier.
Like our tributes this year, Cress was a skilled, but neglected career. So Cress left the career pack, scored a four, and let the career pack think that she was a helpless little girl.
But she was anything but helpless. She turned the arena into a slaughter house. Fitting, considering that her arena was a slaughter farm that killed and gutted pigs. She killed every opposing career the second day in the arena. Hung some on hooks while disembowelling them, threw a couple into an industrial meat grinder, dropped a frozen pig or two on another.
I bet the career pack this year would underestimate our tributes, and pay the price.
District Five's Nina Bednarek's POV
The Capitol has no love for tributes that hide during their games. Sure they liked the kids that were shy and didn't want to make themselves known, but what they didn't like was the kids that stayed away from the other tributes in the arena.
The Capitol wanted blood to spill in the arena. They wanted kids that were willing to get down and dirty in order to survive, not kids that out starved, or out hydrated, or hid from throughout the game. No. What they wanted was a tribute that would either kill another tribute, or die with dignity, in a fight.
They expected all of us to either be brave or like the careers, something that some tributes were nothing like.
When I won my game forty nine years ago at the age of eighteen, I had only killed two people, but in my opinion, it was two too many. I tried to stay away from the other tributes, tried to hide from them, but they always somehow found me. That is, until late in the game, when the numbers died down and the number of tributes looking for me decreased. That's when I was finally able to embrace the full element of hiding.
And when I say hiding, I didn't mean that I was someone like Copper Venezia, who stayed hidden in the shadows until it was her time to strike. I was someone that hid and stayed hidden. I was one with the shadows.
And unlike Copper, I didn't mean to kill those kids, it was an accident.
I won by hiding, and because of that, I was probably the least liked mentor of the Capitol, because in their eyes, I had been a coward and an unentertaining tribute. I also wasn't up to beauty standards either, which didn't help when I needed some sponsor gifts. But better to be an unattractive, unentertaining, coward of a tribute than a dead tribute.
My mentoring partner, Atom Lugger, was better liked in the Capitol than I was. His method for winning the games six years ago was simple and crude. Because of the nature reservoir, it was a simple matter of hiding in trees, waiting for you enemy to get below you, jump down, and kill them. Wither it was by knife, or rocks, or fists, he was determined to not let them escape.
He was better favoured by the Capitol. Tall and handsome with wavy brown hair and light blue eyes, along with being someone that was willing to fight and kill, he was the opposite of me. Sure he hid, but it was seen as a strategic manoeuvre.
I'm sure that Alexander could have learned from him, if he even cared about what he was trying to offer him. They might have gotten along with the whole hide and strike strategy, but Alex didn't care what anyone of us had to say, and neither did Valerie, unless it had something to do with her going back home because the Capitol wanted to correct their mistake of reaping her.
Neither of my district's tributes were going to make it out alive. Mostly because they don't listen. They were fixated on their ideas.
Alex was fixated on doing things his way, and Valerie thought that she didn't belong. She thought that her father was going to get her out of the games. But even with all that power as mayor, he couldn't do anything to change the reapings.
Just like how I couldn't change that I was a victor and a forced mentor, my punishment for being a boring tribute, I couldn't change the Capitol, only change the direction that some of the future events that were to come. Like help my district, if I could even do that.
District Six's Turbo Danhauer's POV
Anything can be used as a weapon. Anything. The human mind is an amazing thing, as it can think of things that others might have never thought of before. Creative things that are scary to even think of. Like how I won my game using a whistle.
Back when I was still in the arena, many thought that I was crazy, suicidal even. Maybe I was, maybe I wasn't, I can't remember. Either way, I made it out of the arena alive by doing something so crazy, so stupid, that it was crazy and stupid enough to work.
What I did was use a whistle that I had found in that toy shop, and used it to attract the mutts to my location, and have them devour my enemies.
Some would call it cowardly, some would call it smart, but I didn't care what they thought of my method, I was alive, even though at times I wish I was dead.
I'm only twenty eight years old, and have dedicated half my life to mentoring ever since I won at the age of sixteen, and I couldn't see how some of the other mentors could stand doing this, especially Rune, who volunteered for this shit. Year after year, kids could be sent in, and most of the time, they couldn't come out alive, and we were forced to teach this kids to survive? Even though the odds weren't in their favour? I'm surprised that Copper hasn't killed herself yet. I'm surprised that more of us aren't dead. But I guess survival is a powerful motivator for staying alive. Just like in the arena.
Copper, forty nine years old, won the ninety ninth Hunger Games by strangling tributes to death with wire. Just like me, some called her creative, and some called her a coward, I didn't see the difference as long as you're alive.
They called us the same, but I don't know wither we're the same or not. Copper looked like she was deliberately trying to kill the other tributes while I looked like I was trying to figure out wither I wanted to kill myself or not. Probably the later, since I was still here.
Copper, blonde hair with wrinkled and sagging skin along with faded green eyes, had seen a lot more action than I had. Her body told that much, compared to my relatively young looking body with black hair and brown eyes.
Did I want to live as long as her? Did I want to see more kids die in front of me? Because I wasn't as good as a mentor as I could have been? Because the odds weren't in their favour?
Only the future could tell.
District Seven's Barker Fabian's POV
Amber Littlewood was sweating, in her underwear, screaming at the top of her lungs, while punching holes in the walls. In short, Amber was on another rampage fuelled by drugs, alcohol, and rage.
"Come out you little fucker!" Amber shouted as she punched another hole in the door leading to Bo Heatherfeild's room. "Fight me!"
BAM! Another hole in the door. "Fight me!" BAM! "FIGHT ME!"
Avoxes were trying to hold her back, as was I, but Amber was too strong because of the drugs and rage. It was surprising, because when most saw her, she looked nothing more than a five foot two girl. But if you look past the size, you'll see that she's a war machine made of tanned skin, muscle, and an ugly face that's been aged by anger. Pre-mature grey hair with wrinkles on her face, or scars, violent brown eyes, and more Testosterone flowing through her body than some of the guys back home, Amber Littlewood was a force to be reckoned with.
Before she won the fifth quarter quell, in which she won at the age of eighteen, had been a victim of chronic whipping. Back in District Seven, she had been known as Amber 'Whipping post' Littlewood because of all the times that she had been whipped. By the time she got in the arena, any attack to her back she didn't even feel. None of us were sure why she got whipped so often, but more than a few people thought that she liked the kiss of the whip.
Amber was violent, unstable, and let her opinions be known to everyone. She said what she wanted to say, and nothing had changed.
To say that Amber was a natural in the arena was like saying the ocean is full of water, everyone knew it. That year, there were no sponsors, not that Amber needed sponsors. All she needed was a weapon, and from there, everything else fell into place.
She loved fighting, lived for it. Those kids, not even the careers, stood a chance against her. Hit her, slash her, stab her, she'd keep on going. She was unstoppable in the arena. Hell, some would argue that she injured herself more in that mirror filled arena than her enemies, as she destroyed those mirrors with her body, by either punching, kicking, or body slamming it.
There was a reason that nobody in the Capitol wanted to be close to her.
Honestly, I was kind of jealous, because she hadn't been forced to have sex with anyone. Guess there are some things too crazy for the Capitol.
I was forty years old, my blonde hair was fading, and I was beginning to look old, but I was still getting calls from the Capitol to come on over so that I could please somebody. I couldn't say no. Nobody says no to the Capitol and doesn't regret it.
I made the mistake of saying no once. They got my parents to kill each other. They used my Hunger Games survival strategy on them. Psychological warfare.
When I won my game twenty two years ago, I wasn't strong, or fast, but I was smart. I used my words, and the arena, an abandoned village of straw huts, to my advantage. Getting other kids to kill themselves, or getting them to kill others.
Tricking them, messing with their minds, playing tricks on them, using the right words, sending them on guilt trips, that's how I won.
How I regret saying no. How I regret winning.
I wanted these kids to win, but at the same time, I didn't.
I wanted these kids to live, but at the same time, maybe it was better for them to die.
Amber kept on making craters in Bo's door as I thought of those two tributes. Sami, shy and reserved, was opening up a little thanks to her District Eleven allies. She got a score of six, and was in a good position to be in. Decent score, allies, but I didn't have much hope for her. She was a kind soul, not a killer. And even if she were, she wasn't strong, like Amber and I. She'd need Aerin to help her out on that.
Bo was also not a killer, as Amber wanted to be proved wrong on. Amber wanted Bo to fight her because of his score and interview. She wanted Bo to be a fighter, not a hider. She wanted to see him stand up for himself. Like she thinks he should have done back when confronted by the District Two pair.
I didn't have much hope for him. Because if he gets found, he's practically dead.
Alone, afraid, and anti-violent. I don't think he's victor material.
As we continued to hold back Amber, five syringes suddenly appeared in the back of her neck as five more avoxes pushed down on the plungers. Amber suddenly became weakened, but not out. There was still fight in her, but the drugs that we have up here that was meant for situations like this, for Amber's violent phases, gave us a chance to get Amber out of that phase.
"Let's get her to her room." I told the avoxes before we dragged her to her room.
District Eight's Penny Azuma's POV
From one hell to another. That's the sum up of my life. I lived my life going from one life of horror to the next.
First was the poverty of District Eight. Living in the poorest part of the district, I had to start working at the tender age of six, fixing live, industrial sewing machines that threatened to rip my flesh off, spear me, or kill me. Why was a little girl like me given that job? Because our little arms could fit in better than an adult's. I lost a couple of my friends to those machines. Vivid images of those deaths and injuries still fresh in my mind.
I hated machines.
Then came the rebellion of District Eight. A frenzy of violent protesters attacking the district peacekeepers because they believed in the freedom that Katniss Everdeen was going to bring. Katniss Everdeen, the girl on fire, the one that betrayed the boy that loved her. Why should anyone of followed her into battle?
It started with our mayor. He spread videos of Katniss standing up to her head peacekeeper, defending a boy that was being whipped. Whatever the reason he was being whipped, Katniss stood between the head peacekeeper, took a hit with the whip, and won. She got the peacekeeper to back down by talking to him, threatening him. To some, it was that action that showed that the Capitol could be brought down. If some girl from District Twelve could stand up to the might of the peacekeepers, why couldn't we?
But it didn't rally enough people, so the assault was on a standstill. At least, until the tributes of the third quarter quell held hands, creating a chain that many thought was a symbol of unity. I didn't care what it was, a showing of friendship, a symbol of togetherness, or because they needed to say goodbye to each other, that event triggered the rebellion of District Eight.
The rebels wanted every man, woman, and child that they could get their dirty hands on, so when my parents signed up for the rebellion, my two older brothers and older sister, along with myself and my two younger sisters, were drafted into their cause.
They thought they could fight the Capitol. Free District Eight from their rule. They were wrong.
Sure we had taken control of some of the factories and a good part of the district, but I would never have said we were winning. We took too many losses, my older siblings were among them. Killed by getting bullets in their brains.
The rebel army was nearly defeated, but what really severed the heart of the rebel army was the fire bombing of the district. They destroyed our bases of operations, our holdouts, the buildings that we had captured, anything that was holding a rebel got bombed.
I got separated from my family during the air raids, got separated from all friendly faces. If you could even call my allies friendly. We may have been on the same side, but the adults that were making us fight were not the good guys in the eyes of us kids.
They gave us a weapon and told us to fight for their cause, or else we'd be considered allies of the Capitol, and killed. Our own people treated us no better than the enemy did. So we fought the Capitol out of the fear that we'd be killed by our allies.
Because of that stupid fight, I had lost my home, my friends, my parents and older siblings, and was covered with hideous burns that covered nearly half my body.
Then I got reaped at the age of eighteen and entered that arena. A large factory that reminded me of my childhood. It felt as if the Capitol was rubbing all the death and destruction of my district in my face. It sickened me.
I won my game because I had been forced to fight a war that I wanted no part in. The arena was no different. I had killed before, so killing didn't bother me. I won by being the toughest little bitch in the arena.
After I won, the Capitol fixed my body up, healed me of my physical scars, like they were trying to redeem themselves. They didn't heal my mental scars, so I remembered the hurt that they had caused me by destroying my home.
I was then forced to mentor kids that kept on dying year, after year, after year.
I'm just glad that I wasn't alone. I still had my younger siblings, I had Alen Porber, and my mentoring partner who had won the one hundred and fourteenth Hunger Games at the age of sixteen by trapping other tributes in rooms before setting fires in the room next to them. Castles were good that way. Made of stone, and stone couldn't be burned though. But the holes that those murder rooms had had no windows to vent the air out.
Now forty one years old, Alen had aged pretty well. Short blond hair with a thin beard, bright green eyes, and a face that didn't make him look older than he really was. He had aged well. Not like me who had wavy grey hair and sagging skin.
But at least I wasn't alone.
I never wanted to be alone.
District Nine's Mazie Gornick's POV
The more things change the more things stay the same.
These games had changed over the years. Different tributes, different arenas, different ways to die and confront a situation, but in the end, they are always the same. Twenty four little children enter the arena, twenty three of them return in boxes. That is, if the president is kind enough to send them in boxes.
I remember the president that ruled after President Snow died right after the third quarter quell. President Dawn was a brutal man that wanted to show just how helpless the districts were, remind them that they were at the mercy of the Capitol. He didn't destroy us, but he did something almost as bad. He strengthened the hold of our district.
More peacekeepers arrived in our district before rounded up all the rebels that they could find. They took them to the square, and forced the district to execute them. Family, friends, strangers, it made no difference to the peacekeepers, we were forced to attack the rebels until they died. Even I, a seven year old girl, was forced to physically destroy a man until nothing of him remained but meat, bones, and memories.
The peacekeepers then burned the fields and homes and businesses of the former rebels, and forced us to rebuild the district. We managed to scrape by, but it wasn't that much different than it had been before, it was just harder. We were still hungry, we were still at the mercy of the Capitol, and we were still forced into a life of misery.
Our ruler changed, our district changed, our lives changed, but at the same time, nothing had changed. This rebellion that was supposed to change our lives, did nothing.
The games continued as well. And when I was eighteen, I got reaped, and won the eighty sixth Hunger Games. It was because I knew what to expect. People weren't the same, but there was always a certain type of person around, you just had to find out what and who they were.
I knew that there was going to be the cocky careers, the scared tributes, the smart tributes, the tributes that everyone under estimated, over estimated, lairs, pacifies, psychopaths, the whole ordeal. When I found out who they were, it wasn't that hard to figure out how I could use their personalities against them. Sure I didn't know the finer details of them, but I knew enough.
I would like to say that my mentoring partner, Barlic Machinist, is different, but he's the same as well. Winning the one hundred and fourth Hunger Games at age eighteen by pure intimidation, he made himself seem more powerful than he really was. He had a way with words when he was young, but now he was nothing more than a walking shell of himself.
He was alive and well, but then President Dawn threatened that if he ever use his words as a weapon against the Capitol, that he would personally make everyone that he cared about run through a rice field full of landmines. Barlic didn't dare disobey.
The threat still holds today, as there are still people in the world that Barlic cares about.
Now Barlic, with the same dark skin, tired dark eyes, and old wrinkled look, had the same amount of speech availability as an avox. He could still write, so that's how he communicated. He was a good mentor, so that's why he still mentored.
At least he still had teeth though, almost all of mine were gone. As for my hair, it was grey, not that I didn't mind it. I was old, but as I had said many times over, things never really change.
Not even the games and the tributes changed. The only things different about the games were how, when, and where they died. It was predictable. How the Capitol manages to all excited about this year after year is beyond me.
Talliana was a typical party girl, a girl that wanted to make the most of her life without falling into the dread of the district, be with her friends, didn't expect to get reaped. She was a fun and easy going, but was also determined to get home.
Arrowe, while he had volunteered, wasn't anything special either. He was a risk taker, and what do risk takers do? Stupid things, such as volunteer for the games. I bet he didn't even think about what would happen if he lost. I bet he didn't think of the bigger picture beyond himself.
No. These kids might not have been like some of last year's tributes, or the year before that, but they were still the same.
I was only nice to them because it was easier to deal with happy tributes than depressed ones.
District Ten's Druid Ray's POV
Survive by any means necessary. That's what I tell my tributes before entering the arena. A final piece of advice that was probably going to be the best thing that they heard from a District Ten mentor. At least, until District Ten got another mentor that was at least half sane, or was at least in the real world.
Of the three mentors in my district, I was probably the only one that was able to do the job of mentoring. Sable De Balzac, our female mentor, and the one that mentored me ten years ago, was more dead than alive, both inside and out. Our other living mentor, Joesiah Herzig, thought that he was a fucking tree.
I don't know how that bastard's still alive, but he's not fit for a mentor. He isn't even fit to be a human being anymore. Ever since his victory of the ninety eight Hunger Games, he hasn't moved or anything, he just stands sill, like a statue, and stares off into nothingness. Old, wrinkled, and with dark hair that'd be a perfect bird's nest, it was hardly surprising that I was chosen to mentor after my victory.
Sable, my former mentor, wasn't much help either. Because she was addicted to morphine and other powerful drugs, she was more of a walking corpse than anything else. At forty nine years old, she looked even older than the oldest mentor of this year, Penny Azuma, who was seventy nine years old.
With dirty, sagging, awful grey skin, sickly yellow eyes, black teeth, and black hair that was never clean, Sable looked like she was over one hundred years old.
I could see why Sable turned out this way though. Her games were the stuff of nightmares. Near complete darkness with danger lurking everywhere, Sable's mind snapped when she gave in to paranoia, and insanity. Attacking anything that she thought moved, made a sound, or if she thought she saw something in general. Nothing was safe from Sable, not even herself.
She clawed and hit and bit herself in order to stay awake for the thirteen days she was in the arena for. She feared that falling asleep would get her killed, and she was mostly right. Some of the tributes that did fall asleep meet their end as they napped. Killed by tributes that stumbled upon them, or by mutts.
By the time that Sable got out of that arena, she didn't even look human anymore. She was that badly damaged.
Joesiah on the other hand, became so convinced that he was a god damn tree that he forget that he was human. I couldn't see how anyone could forget that they were human, but Joesiah somehow did. In his arena, a jungle, he covered himself with bark, vines, and mud, hid from the other tributes, and the rest is history.
And then there was me. The one that betrayed the one that he loved. The Capitol loved the tragic love story, and some even tried to comfort me with sex, saying that I should pretend that they were Saddy. I felt like bashing their brains in. They were not Saddy, and they should never say that I should pretend that they were.
After a couple years of this sexual and mental abuse, I finally gave in to my feelings. I killed a Capitol woman that was pretending to be Saddy by using drugs, alcohol, bondage, and violence. Tried to make it look like a night gone wrong. I didn't try hard enough.
The Capitol killed my grandparents using drugs, alcohol, bondage, and violence.
I knew nothing but rage at that time. Rage and sorrow. And even though I knew that my grandparents were old and about to die, I wanted them to live out their lives and die naturally, not by the Capitol.
But because of their deaths, the Capitol could no longer control me. Just like they had no control over Sable or Joesiah.
It was because of that that we became the most hated mentors by both the Capitol and our fellow victors. The Capitol because they couldn't control us as much as they wanted. Our fellow victors because we were more free than them.
I felt like laughing. We might have more freedom than them, but that didn't mean that we were free. I was still stuck in a shithole called Panem, Sable was trapped in a morphine riddled body, and Joesiah was practally brain dead. We were still alive, but dead on the inside because of our choices.
I didn't think that Max was going to win. Max was a thirteen year old kid that talked too much and was over confident in his ability to go for a long time without food. His ally wasn't much help either. What could a twelve year old girl from Three, and a thirteen year old boy from Ten do? Nobody was lining up to sponsor those two. Nessa was doomed to be a bloodbath, and Max was too annoying for anyone to really care for.
Life, I also didn't see her winning, but she still had a better chance than Max, despite her scrawny body. She was willing to fight, and sometimes, I guess that was enough.
I didn't particularly like Life, but I gave her the best god damn advice that I could think of. I even told her that love was a weakness in the arena. I didn't want her to make the same mistake as me.
But why did I care so much? She was going to die in the arena.
Sable answered for me. Sable almost never talks, but when she does, you better god damn listen to her. Sable told me that I cared about Life, because I could see a part of me in Life. The poor farmer kid that was deemed just another victim of the games and would be forgotten. Defending someone when we shouldn't of.
Forget about it Druid. We both know that she's dead.
But then again, Druid, didn't you say the same thing about yourself?
District Eleven's Rune Shaith's POV
My fellow mentors would rather be back home in their district rather than mentoring another batch of kids. They didn't want to start to get close to their tributes, only to see them die in the arena. They didn't want to be reminded of themselves back in their younger days. And frankly, neither did I.
I hated mentoring, but I volunteered for it. I didn't need to, and many wondered why I could possibly want to be in the position that I am in right now. One such person that wondered that was my mentoring partner, Pepper Ridgeway, who was the first tribute that I had successfully mentored. That was eighteen years ago, and so far, we haven't gotten any of our tributes return back home.
I'd like to think that this year's different. Pepper wants to think that as well. Aerin seems like the best choice for us this year. He's strong, skilled, and has a likeable personality that sponsors might like. That being said, he was young, fourteen years old despite his looks.
His district partner and ally, Angel, was also a somewhat decent tribute as well, but we didn't think that she'd be able to win. Not unless Aerin makes it far with her before laying down his life for her, and then she somehow makes it to the end. Angel wasn't as strong or skilled as Aerin, and she was young as well.
And as much as we didn't like it, but we remembered the last tribute that won at the age of fourteen. That District Nine girl who won the one hundred and twenty sixth Hunger Games, Zea, had killed herself not long after her victory. Assaulted a peacekeeper so badly that he was forced to put her down. I don't know what she had been thinking, nor did I know what exactly happened to her to make her act that way, but I had a theory that the stress of being a victor was too much for her to handle as such a young age.
When I looked to Aerin and Angel, I have to wonder that, if they somehow do win, will they end up like her? Will I of helped the district gain a victor, only for them to kill themselves soon after? Knowing that their post victory suffering was my fault? Could I live with that?
I looked over to Pepper, and thought of how she was still alive and well. If I could mentor her into the figure that she is now, I could probably do the same with Aerin or Angel, if they did win, it would just take a little bit of extra work. And really, if I could prevent even just one death a year, I would call that a good year.
Honest to god, Pepper and I try to help the district, but it seems that whatever money we use to try and help the district, it seems to do nothing to the overall suffering. Like all the good we try and do gets swallowed up in the black void of violence and suffering. Not unlike the arena, where we both won by fighting tooth and nail, literally, for our lives.
My arena was a hospital, which I found rather ironic, as it was supposed to be a place to reduce pain, not inflect it. But even so, I used those surgical tools and syringes to deliver death to anyone that stood in my way. Pepper's arena was a fancy cook house, one that acted like a giant kitchen. Throwing boiling water in their faces, using cutting boards as armour, shoving tributes faces onto the burning stove tops, Pepper fought as ruthlessly as humanly possible.
The Capitol fixed our injuries back then, but age and stress had caught up with us. We were both tall, dark skinned and muscular, which helped our bodies look younger, but our faces were different stories. Wrinkles were beginning to show on Pepper, and the ones already on me were becoming more and more noticeable. Our brown eyes were tired, but not defeated, and Pepper was getting a few strands of pre-mature grey hair on her corn rows. My shaved head however, managed to minimize the among of grey that had settled in years ago.
All this stress, and I was choosing to mentor kids, who were more than likely going to die. Why was that? Well, as I told my family, I couldn't just stand back and let kids die while I sat down and watched year after year. So four years into my victory, I choose to start mentoring at age twenty one, feeling as if it were my duty to give the tributes the best chance that they could get.
The district has enough suffering already, and I didn't want to just do nothing while it all happened, not while I could do something about it. These kids at least deserve a chance, so I'll give them the best one I can.
Little that does, unfortunately.
District Twelve's James Ashfall's POV
As I continued to down the shot glasses of honey flavoured alcohol, I thought of my tributes and how they were going to be sent into the arena soon. This was one of the worse parts of being a mentor, knowing that the kids you had been around for nearly a week were perhaps going to die in a few short hours from now. Drinking took the edge off those thoughts and feelings.
I had a dumb, fat, rich boy, and a dirt poor young girl that looked more like she should belong in the merchant class than in the Seam. I wondered about that, but didn't ask, as she was reserved and probably wouldn't tell me anyway. But there was another reason that I didn't ask. I didn't ask because knowing about her past would have meant that I'd know her a little bit more. And knowing would lead to understanding, to the best of my abilities. And understanding would lead to attachment.
I learned long ago that I shouldn't get attached to my tributes, and that I should expect them to die. After all, this was District Twelve we were talking about. The worst place in Panem and the laughing stock of the Hunger Games due to our tributes dying quickly, and having only four victors in its history.
Almost all our victors had been from the Seam, and had won because of their brutal living. Someone's name who had been long forgotten, Haymitch Abernathy, and Katniss Everdeen had came from the Seam. I was the exception. I had came from the merchant area, and was written off as a dead tribute by everyone, even my home. Even by District Twelve standards, they didn't think I stood a chance.
After all, what chance did a merchant kid like me have in a death game that was called the Hunger Games? Even though the line between merchant and Seam had thinned after the riots that had occurred just over sixty years ago, the merchant class was still less starved and had a somewhat cozier life than the Seam residences.
I was no Haymitch, Katniss, or even a Peeta. I was a guy that washed clothes. I wasn't strong, nor was I fast, or even smart. Nothing like the previous District Twelve victors.
Right now, Evanlyn had a better chance at winning right now than I had when I had been reaped. She was smart and knew how to survive the outdoors. If she could outlast the other tributes and starve them out, then she could come home. She was good that way because of the poor life she had lived. Used to starvation, knew how to survive outdoors, smart. She had a chance, unlike Colin, who didn't stand a chance.
Too dependent on food to survive long. So clumsy it wasn't even funny. Unable to fight back against someone that could actually take him on. And stupid as fuck. And if there was any other doubt that he wouldn't end up as a bloodbath, he was slow. He wouldn't be able to get out of the bloodbath field in time. He also had no stamina, which made running for him impossible anyway. So all in all, he was a bloodbath through and through.
If I could help her, I would help Evanlyn. If she could survive long enough to gain sponsor money, if she showed a chance that she could survive, I'd help her.
In the reflection of my shot glass, I saw a man with an uneven mixture of blond and grey head and facial hair, diluted blue eyes, and a light tan. Wrinkles were lined across his forehead, face, and around his eyes showed that he was just a year shy of fifty, but looked older. He looked like a soldier that had just returned from a long run war. Fitting considering my arena was a battlefield.
Having facing horrific trench conditions of rain, mud, and rats so big they looked like they could fight cats, I found that those weren't the worst things that arena had to offer. They had undead mutts that resembled soldiers of the old, attacking rat mutts, murders of crows, and attack dogs that could track you and rip you to pieces. But what got a lot of tributes was the paranoia of hidden traps. Not powerful enough to kill you, but enough to severely hurt you.
I saw my reflection, then saw myself as I was thirty one years ago. A scared kid that was in no shape for the arena. I wasn't a fighter, like Haymitch or Katniss, and I wasn't a survivor, like Peeta or Eva. But as I found out in the arena, sometimes it wasn't those who were the strongest, the fastest, or the smartest. Sometimes, it was the lucky ones that survived.
I had been lucky when I had gotten attacked by other tributes. I somehow managed to defeat them, even when I logically wasn't supposed to. I had been lucky when I had managed to escape the mutts, even when it seemed impossible. I somehow managed to avoid traps, avoid starvation, avoid becoming consumed with fear.
In the end, I won by luck, because when my final fight came, I was so badly injured that all I could feel was pain and couldn't even see anything. But then luck came in, and allowed me to shove my enemy into a landmine field.
Luck, was the only reason I was still alive today.
A/N: And now my brain hurts. It feels as if I'm mostly repeating the stuff, probably because it's mostly the same stuff. History and all. Couldn't go deeply in depth with everyone.
I'm not completely satisfied with this chapter, but do you know how hard it is to make little histories for twenty four mentors without creating a massive dump of words? Some would argue that I should have done that, but, this is just a teaser, I guess. You'll find out more about the mentors as the story progresses. Hopefully.