Mentor Profile
Fernando James
Age: 55
District: 10
Hunger Games: 36th, aged 16
Mentored By: Jon Kerry
Kills in the Arena: 3
Preferred Weapons: Sword
Tributes: Toby Denham and Indiana James
Mentoring Record: 20 Games/1 Victor - Toby Denham (51st Games)
Johanna's victory in the 67th Hunger Games may be well remembered for her victory when she had never been favoured before the Games, but she hasn't got the record for the lowest training score from a victor.
That honour goes to Fernando James of District 10, who won the 36th Games despite only being awarded a score of three by the Gamemakers during his private session. The scenes following the bloodbath at the Cornucopia on the first day of the 36th Games are infamous; the Career tributes, who stood tall as usual at the end of the first round of fighting, were all killed by explosives hidden within the spoils of victory. With weapons and supplies dispersed evenly further into the arena, this Hunger Games had punished the greedy and the arrogant, leaving the unfancied and unconfident tributes to fight it out for the win.
And so, despite barely being given a thought before the Games began, Fernando James claimed District 10's first victory in over thirty years. The rest of his Games are largely unmemorable, but the images from the Cornucopia at the start of his Games will stay with us forever.
In many ways, Fernando is the most unlikely victor in the history of the Hunger Games.
Following victory, Fernando was understandably far more humble than many of his fellow victors, only beginning to embrace his role as an inspiration and a celebrity when he reached his early twenties, around the time that his cousin Indiana won the 42nd Games. At the time, they were the only pair of relatives to both be crowned victors (two years later Brutus would match this feat, mentored out of the arena by his father, Amadeus Cato).
Fernando has always been a man of few words, his expressions and body language often commanding respect on their own, his actions often doing the talking. At times this has gone against him - he will forever be remembered as the 'loser' of the on-stage bust-up in the wake of the James-Bryan scandal - but the ability to communicate through actions is a vital one as a mentor.
Like many other tributes in this year's Hunger Games, Fernando has shown his real skills once out of the arena and calling the shots in the Capitol. Fernando's mentoring style has often been considered aggressive, often lumping funds into expensive items early in the running, keen to give his tributes an advantage from the start at the expense of contingency. Often his gifts can be considered left-field, on several occasions initially bewildering his tributes, but his unconventional picks often give an advantage in the end.
For a district with a traditionally poor record in the Hunger Games and a small number of victors, Fernando's mentoring tactics often get his tributes much further into the Games than they would be expected to, on average. However, once they get to the latter stages of the Games, they're on their own (as every tribute is), and to this day Fernando is yet to mentor another victor.
If there is ever going to be a time for that to change, you can put your house on Fernando wanting it to be this year. Like so many others among the mentors this year, Fernando has to mentor fellow victors and friends through the arena. But for Fernando, there will be family too, when his cousin Indiana takes her place on the pedestal tomorrow morning at the start of the Games.
If the rumours are to be believed, this year's Games are going to be a fast-paced one. If Fernando can get in early with an excellently timed sponsor gift, he might give his district a real advantage.
A/N: If you enjoyed this chapter, please review! Constructive criticism is welcomed :)
The next chapter should have a familiar face... :)