Stander Kray (21) District 7

I frantically force my way through the crowd forming around the small square. People minding shops come to their doorways to see what all the commotion is about, peering from their doorstep to witness the events. Frustrated, I put more effort into my push, and suddenly burst out into the open. I find myself on the cobble floor on the square and glance around. I blush red when I realise a few people are looking at me with raised eyebrows, but I follow the other residents' stare to a young girl being confronted by a peacekeeper.

"Jania!" I scream, leaping to my feet. As I approach the two figures, the peacekeeper dressed all in white armour, flicks out his baton. My younger sister cowers backwards slightly, unsure of whether she should risk running. She seems locked in the peacekeeper's gaze, and doesn't even hear me calling for her. A loaf of bread is on the floor, and I quickly make the connection. Jania tried to get us food. Usually she's small and sneaky enough, but today obviously not. As I get closer I see her cheeks and eyes are red from crying.

I see the peacekeeper raise his baton as I continue the never ending run towards them. He brings it down in a swooping strike. Jania shuffles backwards, barely able to move out of fear.

The baton gets closer to her body, and I approach further toward them. I leap, arms outstretching, hoping, praying I can get there before the baton strikes her skin.

I do, and the peacekeeper and I go flying several feet before landing with a heavy bump on the cold, cobble ground. The impact knocks the air from my lungs but I soon jump to my feet when I feel the angry eyes of the peacekeeper on me.

"Leave now." He commands, raising the baton. "Or would you like to take the beating for her?"

"I'll take it for her. No one hurts my family." I say stepping into firing range, and plant my feet next to Jania.

In a second the peacekeeper pushes Jania back and strikes a hard blow to my ribs. I collapse instantly, smashing my head on the ground.

"Jania, go." I murmur, seeing her face swimming before my eyes. She flees the square, and I assume she heads home. As long as she's safe, that's all that matters. I hear the next impact before I'm struck, and this time have a few milliseconds to brace myself. The baton crashes against my other side, surely cracking ribs. I groan as the impact shoots through my chest and overwhelms my whole body.

I wake up back at home. I am paralysed with mild pain as I lay in my bed. I must have blacked out after the next few baton strikes. Groaning as I fully emerge from my slumber, the pain hits me like a ton of bricks. Someone slips their hand into mine, trying to calm me down. My eyes dart about, before resting on Jania, her eyes full of tears.

"I'm so sorry." She says quietly, sniffing to hold back the wave of tears.

"It's fine." I try to say, but it comes out as a few interrupted groans and mumbles. Jania sits me up against the headboard of the bed, and I glance down at my body. I flinch at what I see. My chest is purple, covered fully by the blanket or bruises given to me by the peacekeeper. A leg is in bandage, the reason for that I cannot remember. Promptly my head begins throbbing as I lean it back against the wall.

Oh well. I sigh and suck it up. If I hadn't stepped in, Jania would be in my place right now, and that would break my heart. I take another look at her crestfallen face and reach out tentatively with my hand and cup her cheek. "I'm okay. What matters is that you're safe." I smile weakly, and she nods slightly.

Eve Ferris (14) District 9

My brothers push past me in frantic glee to reach the food first. Dawn hangs back and grasps at my hand. My little sister is very sweet, and looks up at me with her gleaming brown eyes. She's very innocent, and unknowing of what future could await her in form of the Hunger Games. I give her hand a squeeze, emitting a cute laugh from her, and she promptly returns the squeeze.

We head to the small kitchen and dining room. It's difficult to fit us all round the table, however we manage. I take a stall and prop it next to my heavily pregnant mother, who smiles at me, and Flick, my eldest brother. Dawn pulls herself up on my lap. I look at the small table and the amount of us squashing around it. My mother, Flick, Dawn, and my three younger brothers and I, all sit on make-shift chairs and stalls, eating from wooden bowls around the tiny table.

"Where's father tonight?" Carter, one of my younger brothers asks.

"He's working late, dear." My mother replies tiredly. "He's sorry he can't be here, but when he is offered extra work, he must accept. He works very hard to give us food, you know. And keep us in the house."

"I know." Carter nods, looking meekly at his mush in the bowl. "I was just wondering." He shrugs.

I hunch slightly on my stall as my breathing becomes shallow. There are a lot of people in this very small room, which doesn't bode well for me. I take a nervous glance to my mother, who's already looking at me, a shadow of worry on her face. "You can leave if you want." She says quietly, the others at the table ignoring us. "Take Dawn and go for a walk. I'll put your dinner back under the stove to keep it warm." She smiles at me brightly, though her eyes are tired. I nod my thanks, grab Dawn by the hand, and then leave.

"Where are we going?" Dawn asks after a few minutes walking from the house.

"The fields." I say, feeling much more relaxed already. My shoulders begin to drop now I am free from the small room.

"Why?" Dawn asks, tugging on my hand.

"Because," I say, kneeling down so I can be on her level. I hate belittling people, even when they're only five. "Some people find it very difficult to stay in closed spaces. Sometimes it even scares them." Dawn nods. "Sometimes it even feels like the walls are closing in, and like it's trapping them. This is scary for them, do you understand?" I ask softly. She nods again.

"And I get that. It's called claustrophobia." I conclude, pushing back off my knees.

"Oh. It sounds horrible." Dawn says, following me to the field.

I open the gate and make sure to hold Dawn's hand tight as we weave through the waist height strands of wheat. If I let her go, she would be lost in here. We pick a spot and sit ourselves down amongst the tall wheat, flattening some so we can lie on our backs and watch the sun go down. I breathe out heavily as my body finally feels as if I'm fully relaxing again.

The sight of the sun setting is beautiful in our District. The orange sphere sinks behind the rolling hills, emitting one final ray of bright light, which shrouds the fields in a gentle haze and warmth. The strands are highlighted in the rays, glittering gold and amber hues. In a second, the light fades as the sphere slips fully behind the hills, and the rays vanish. "Mind if I join you?" Flick's voice enters my thoughts.

"Sure." I say, and shuffle up to make room for him between Dawn and I, but find Dawn is gone. In a moment of wild panic I leap to my feet and begin screaming her name.

"Calm down." Flick says gently, placing a soothing hand on my shoulder. I jump at his touch; his fingers are like ice. "I took her back home when you were watching the sun go down. I figured you wanted some alone time, as you looked like you were daydreaming."

I sigh in relief and sink to the floor. "Thank you."

"It's fine. Sorry for worrying you like that."

I shake my head, dismissing it, and lie back on the ground. The air may be a lot cooler now, but the light wind is wonderful, and caresses my skin softly as I lie in the fields.

"So," Flick begins "it's the reapings soon."

"Oh great." I roll my eyes. "Thanks a bunch for reminding me." I laugh slightly as I sit back up. "You're lucky; you've only got this reaping and next year to go and you're safe."

"Thanks for jinxing it, Eve." He glares jokingly at me.

"Oh shut up." I grin, ripping some wheat from the ground and pawing at it until it becomes a ball, which I then throw at him. It hits him square in the face, which is a picture of shock. I look into his deep brown eyes that I truly trust. He's one of the few people I feel I can really be myself around. Most people just see me as the silent mouse. No one really ever gets to know me very well.

Interrupting my thoughts, the ball returns to me, hitting me on the arm.

"Oi!" I say, laughing. "Your aim is bad anyway." I stick my tongue out at him.

He makes a sound of annoyance. "You started it."

I turn to collect the ball, but stop as I hear a voice.

"We should go." I say quietly to Flick. "I think it's a farmer. If they find us in here, father could lose his job."

Flick nods in agreement. He scoops up the ball of wheat and we gradually make our way through the strands, picking our way towards the gate. We arrive, without having an encounter with the farmer, and run home as fast as we can, hoping no one saw us in the fields.

Aria Opal (16) District 12

"Work harder, Aria." He commands. "If you want to be a victor like me you must put the effort in."

"I know!" I snap, gritting my teeth and continue slashing at the dummy with the short-sword. "Get off my back okay. I've been working for this for a long time." I am determined not to let him get under my skin like he always does.

"Yes, but I've won the games and you haven't, so maybe you should listen to me." He says with eerie calmness. I spin on my heels to face him, and lower my sword from my stance. I glare into his sky blue eyes, which look back at me without a flicker of emotion. I never believed that the Hunger Games could change you, but with the evidence that greets my eyes of my boyfriend, who used to be one of the most loving, caring, sympathetic people I ever knew, now just stares and is obsessive.

"That was luck, Tobias." I state. "Don't act like you trained for it, because you were reaped, and you were crying when I went to say goodbye. You said you wish you'd done some recreational training with me. You thought you were dead from the start." My voice begins to rise with frustration as I remember the boy he was before he won the games. "If it weren't for those mutts and that District 6 girl shooting the boy from 2, you would have been dead. You killed her after the mutts had done damage whilst you cowered in a tree."

"Shut up, Aria!" Tobias shouts, slamming his knife he had been cradling into the dummy. The impact echoes and I have the sense to fall silent. "It is called being tactical. I must have done something right, or I wouldn't have won." He spits on the floor and walks away.

I drop my sword completely and let it fall to the ground with a clatter. He turns back round on reaction to the noise, but I am already walking away. My head is held high. I will not sink to his level.

"Get back here right now, Aria." He commands, and I can picture his face clearly; I've seen it enough times. He's flushing red with anger, with his lips pricking up into his devilish snarl. "I mean it." He shouts. "Look at everything I've done for you. You do not have the right to walk away from me you conceited brat!"

I slam the door on my way out, hoping it'll be enough to shock him back to reality. Anger bubbles up inside of me and I begin to shout every curse under the sun, directing them to him.

"He's changed so much." I frown, sinking down into the sofa beside my older brother, Zarak, who is busy running his fingers through his messy bronze hair. He stops as he realises I'm talking about Tobias. Zarak knows he's the only one I ever open up to about anything.

"That's the Hunger Games." He says sadly before shrugging and pulling me into a hug. "He probably can't help it."

"I know." I say slowly. "But he's horrible. He never stops going on about how he won the games and about how great I could be if I tried." I sniff, my anger from earlier fading fast and being replaced with sadness. "I just want back the Tobias I fell in love with." I say quietly, burying my head in Zarak's shirt.

"Hey." He coos, stroking my hair. "It's okay. Everything will be okay." Zarak's bad-boy exterior melts away, and exposes his softer side.

"He scares me sometimes." I say hesitantly. "But I have to remember it's him underneath it all, and that hopefully he'll come back one day."

"It doesn't always work like that. But if he touches you, you must tell me, so I can rip him to shreds." Zarak says darkly, resting a protective arm on my shoulder.

"No," I say, shaking my head aggressively, "you can't hurt him." I turn to my brother. I admire his intense sea-green eyes and the way they shimmer with anger. He's actually beautiful. He trains with me most of the time, but doesn't ever listen to Tobias's advice. Zarak is strong; anyone could see that by looking at the way he's built; tall, muscled, and broad shouldered.

"I barely see him outside of training, and when I do, all he talks about is the Capitol, the Games, and weapons. He's not the Tobias I love." I feel tears welling up in my eyes but blink them away furiously. I am not weak. He will not break me.

"I just want to run away and leave District 12. Leave behind all these bad memories of losing father, having to live with our vile step-father who treats us like scum. And now I've lost my Tobias. My love. I told him things Zarak, like the kind of things I tell you." A sigh of anguish escapes my lips. "We were so close. How could he let the games change us?!" slowly through my speech my voice begins to rise. By the end, I am shouting, jumping around on my feet, trying to emit my anger and frustration.

Zarak leaps up and envelopes me in his arms, holding me crushingly tight. I can actually feel him draining the anger from me. He holds me until I stop resisting, and the embrace become comfortable. "You don't need him."

"If I leave him he'll kill me. He's mad enough as it is. He thinks he owns me." I shake my head. How could I have let it get like this. I couldn't bare standing up to him when he returned all cocky and angry from the games. I let him walk all over me like our mat at the door. How uncharacteristic of me. How foolish of me.

"I'm meant to be strong. I train, I am grounded. How did it turn out like this?"

"You can't blame yourself."

"I know." I frown. "I can't help but hope he'll change. You and he mean everything to me. You're the only two people I trust in this world." Zarak knows this is true. After father died in the mine when part of it collapsed, he was there for me. When our mother remarried to the District mayor, and moved into his fancy house, the beating begun. Our step-father will never like us. Never has, never will. We are just scum to him, getting nothing but scrap whilst he graces our mother with riches. He takes her from us. I barely know her anymore.

"I hate this." I state coldly. Our unstable lives have gone nothing but downhill in the last few years. The one thing I look forward to is volunteering for next year's games. I'll skip the Quarter Quell, but volunteer for the next, when I will be at my peak from all the training. Then I can bring money to Zarak and I, and we will never have to see our step-father again.

"Me too." Zarak nods and we sink simultaneously onto the sofa.

A/N- Hello everyone, thanks for reading. If you could drop a review I'd be very grateful thank you :)

Who was your favourite character in this chapter?

Did you particularly dislike any character?

What did you particularly like in this chapter?

Big thanks to GeorgeMellark6 for beta reading for me. Thank you also to Eneyla Arcamenal for offering to help me :)

Once again, thank you all for reading. I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Next chapter is District 1 and 2 reapings.