District Two had always been the oddball District when it came to the Reaping. The Training Center preselected their tributes so that only the best of the best available would go into the Games, giving District Two the upper hand against the rivals they would encounter. There were always two males and two females chosen to volunteer each year. The tributes this year were certainly going to be nearly invincible against their competitors, or so the Training Center always claimed. But, with only 8 Victors in the existing pool, that strategy wasn't necessarily accurate. Regardless, they still held their statement as true and gloated about it to everyone they'd encounter from outside of Two.

Maybe it's a curse that was placed on Auden Stucco. What had he done in his life to deserve his fate? He had pulled through and gone to the Training Center despite being part of the fraction of people in District Two who were "poor". He was always friendly to his peers, treated his siblings fairly, and protected his family. Perhaps it was the fate of him becoming a drunkard like his jailed father starting to play with him. But would his greatest fear really start becoming reality and be the death of him?

Apparently it could be, why else would he have been selected to be a volunteer this year? Sure he has strength and a strategic mind, but was that really enough to be thrust into the Hunger Games at age eighteen? According to whoever chose the volunteers, he was a "shining star in the Training Center who would most definitely win!" Yep, this was fate playing with him. No doubts whatsoever.

His siblings, Marcus and Marina, had been so proud of him. Their incredible older brother was going into the Games, what could be more honorable and brag-worthy than that? And his mother, his poor mother, didn't even have a clue that he had been selected. With three jobs, he didn't want to stress her even more. He knew that when he said his final goodbyes, she'd be furious with him, but telling her beforehand would only worsen his situation. Besides, he didn't want to risk it, he'd rather deal with the aftershocks.

He was sitting on the couch fiddling with the sleeves of his shirt. He felt Marcus' eyes staring at him, but that was the last thing on his mind. His naive little sister had been stupid enough to go to the District Two Jailhouse and visit their poor excuse of a father before the Reaping. Auden hated that man with all of his heart. What was going through that man's mind when he decided to kill seven innocent people and to go as far and rape one of them? Did he seriously think that drinking would make the problem go away and then by taking out his drunken anger on his family he would be compensated for the lives he took? It was either he was really dumb or...well really, his father was pretty much the dumbest man in District Two. He was impulsive, acted on whatever he thought was good at the time, regretted it, drank his problems away, abused his family, then repeated the cycle. Why hadn't he learned that that never worked? Auden would probably never know and would rather never find out because that meant he would have to face the beast himself.

As the door opened behind him, Auden's trustworthy, welcoming facade escaped. Marina came into his view and in an instant he jumped up and strode over to her. The true Auden was about to be revealed.

"Where the heck were you?" He already knew the answer.

"Visiting father." He was right.

"Why on earth would you visit that drunkard?" He knew the answer to this too, but he couldn't tame his anger.

"Because he's my father and I love him! Why don't you?"

"Because that man-" he caught himself before revealing what his father really did to poor, innocent Marina.

"Because that man what?" she pushed. Auden subconsciously realized he would have to safely twist the truth to prevent her from knowing the reality of it all, so he, for once, allowed himself to stretch the truth and omit the gore as best as possible on the spot. Too bad his temper was going. Feelings always seemed to override his thoughts when his anger was present.

"Because that man betrayed us all and wound up in jail. He doesn't deserve our forgiveness or our pity. He doesn't even deserve life! He better be damn grateful he wasn't killed for everything he did," Auden spat, not even comprehending what he was saying. Whenever he yelled, it all became a blur to him. He just completely let go from everything and let his mouth take control over his mind.

"He does deserve our forgiveness! He'll be out one day, I know it! And then we can be a family again," Marina retorted.

"That includes you implying that Auden would be winning these Games," Marcus intruded.

That put a silence on the argument at hand. Marina looked up at her older brother with glassy eyes. She had completely forgotten he was volunteering against his will today. She immediately regretted even going to visit her father.

"Auden, I-"

"Shut up and get dressed. We're leaving soon." Auden walked out of the house, not wanting to even look at his siblings.

Celeste Brooklyn Eversong couldn't wipe the grin off of her face all day. Today was going to change her life forever. After the Reaping today, she would be free for the rest of her life to do whatever she pleased with it. She would no longer have the stress of being Reaped and she could die her natural death when the time came. She would live her life caring for everyone around her with her knowledge on healing and never worry about a single thing in her way. Oh how she anticipated her dream to come true!

But for now, she would stay at home and practically be a stay-at-home mother. That was her life for about two days now. The mayor of District Two had given Celeste, his trustworthy maid, his newborn daughter. It hadn't been his idea but rather his wife's. She was a paranoid woman who was afraid that a Peacekeeper would come and screw up her family. So far, nothing bad had happened to either one of them, but she still didn't want to risk it.

Celeste didn't mind though. Two days in and she already loved little Nissa Rose with all of her heart. She was such a sweet child who would follow in Celeste's footsteps when she too grew up. Nissa may have been pronounced deaf, but she couldn't have been any less perfect to Celeste.

Currently, Nissa was sleeping and Celeste was reading one of her new books that her parents gave her. It was all about healing methods with plants. She recognized a few of the ways it mentioned but most of the methods were brand new and very intriguing. She'd have to bookmark them in her mind, maybe they would come in handy in the future.

"Celeste, are you ready?" she heard her father call. Damn it, she forgot it was Reaping day.

"Uh, yeah! Just give me a minute!" She hurriedly got up and stripped her night clothes off. She slipped on the first dress she grabbed and shoved shoes onto her feet. Sprinting down the stairs, she began combing her fingers through waist-long, raven black hair. She noticed her father and mother in the living room talking. When they saw her, they both shook their heads.

"Celeste? Were you reading your books again?" her mother, Andrea, asked.

"No, why would you ask that?" Celeste tried to lie.

"Because your dress in on backwards, sweetie," her mother replied. It was then that her daughter looked down and noticed that she had indeed dressed backwards, but hey her shoes were on the right feet. Did she get credit for that at least?

"Okay fine, you caught me, I was reading. That new book you got me is so amazing though!" she enthused. A smile grew on her face when she remembered her precious new book.

"We ought to take them away from her," her father, Casper, jokingly suggested.

"You can't do that, you love me too much," she replied.

"You are right, we do, but you need to learn time management," her father replied.

"Yeah, yeah maybe I'll work on that when I come back later."

"You better young lady." Whether he was talking about not volunteering, not getting reaped, or working on time management, she didn't know, but she just assumed all of them. Her mother got up and wrapped a warm arm around her daughter who was slightly taller than her. She said,"Now you best get changed. Wouldn't want you going outside like a fool."

"Maybe we should Andrea, I think it suits her," her father joked.

"Shut up, Casper!" Celeste pointed at her father with mock anger,"I'm going to fix this dress now."

How Auden made it to the Reaping without stabbing someone or punching a wall to release his anger was a surprise. He wasn't ruthless and bloodthirsty like everyone around him, but he did have his fair share of tantrums and anger meltdowns. He was going to call Marina out again but then he noticed that people were coming into view and he didn't want them to see him as rude towards his family, so he kept his mouth shut and wore a small grin on his face to help keep his cool.

"Auden-" Marcus started.

"Don't talk to him Marcus, he won't respond." Marina said, crossing her arms. Auden could feel the glare she was giving him behind his back.

"Alright. We'll see you soon Auden." And with that his siblings went to their respective areas: fifteen year-old boys and fifteen year-old girls.

Auden stepped in line with his fellow eighteen year-old boys. Dread filled his heart as it became heavy. He hates how he had to end his last moments with Marina on bad terms, but he couldn't blame himself. She was the one who visited their father against his rules. You might have no other option but to forgive her before the inevitable happens and you're shipped off on that train to the Capital, he thought to himself. He huffed. Mental Auden was right. He had no other option.

"Welcome, welcome!" A peppy woman in an outfit that reminded Auden of a peacock stepped up to the microphone on the stage. Auden contained his laughter at her looks. It was rather ridiculous...and amusing.

After the usual video, Celeste was more antsy to finish the Reaping then to discover who would be sent to their death. She just wanted to go back home, spend time with her precious Nissa, read more of her new book, and live like that until she could actually apply for a real job, her dream job.

"As tradition goes, ladies shall go first!"

Peacock Lady wasn't slow and meaningful in digging through the bowl but rather quick and careless. She pulled out a slip with such speed that it flew out of her hand and off the stage. A Peacekeeper grabbed it from the ground, handed it back to Peacock Lady, and returned to his place. Red soon filled the blues, greens, and purples of her dress as she blushed in embarrassment.

"Ah, uh, yes yes. The female tribute for this year shall be..." she opened the slip slowly in fear of dropping it again,"Celeste Eversong!"

Not all stories have a fairytale ending, Celeste had decided at that moment. Earlier, she was living her dream, and now her dream shattered in front of her eyes. No more Nissa, no more books, no more joy for her from her on out, even if she won. She would never escape the Games. She saw the way some Victors acted after they won. Some were horrendous, some were normal, some were better than before. She would be the one to go into recluse and self pity over everything wrong in her life and what she had witnessed in the Games.

Celeste put on a brave face and removed her usual smile as she hesitantly began walking up to the stage to take her place as District Two's female tribute.

"Do I hear any volunteers?"

Silence.

"Very well, onto the boys we go!"

Auden watched Celeste up there. He recognized her. Occasionally he would see her walking to the mayor's house when he was heading to the Training Center. He had heard the rumors of her dropping out from the Training Center and didn't know whether to believe them or not, but now he knew that the rumors were indeed true.

This time, Peacock Lady had been rather gentle and slow in picking the boy tribute, not wanting to make another mistake in front of all these teenagers. She carefully drew out a slip and smiled to herself. She hadn't dropped this one! Auden was half tempted to clap for her, but suppressed the urge knowing it was the wrong time to do so.

"And for the boys we have..." with confidence, she opened the slip with speed and tore it down the middle. She frantically held them together to cover up her second mistake. "It's, uh, um...Re-Remus Korem...Komim? Koram?"

Deciding to stop her from embarrassing herself any more, Auden raised his hand high and called out,"I volunteer!"

She sent him a relived look as he walked up the steps to take his spot not to Celeste. Auden looked out in the audience and found Marina's eyes watching his. She gave him a small smile that he returned. Maybe they would be fine, even if he dies. Maybe fate was letting him have one wish fulfilled.

"And who might you be?" Peacock Lady questioned.

"Auden Stucco."

"And there we have it! Our two lovely tributes for this year's Hunger Games!"

A fairytale is a fairytale for a reason. Fairytales have happy endings. The protagonists don't suffer and have the best fate imaginable. For Celeste Eversong and Auden Stucco, their lives were far from a fairytale. Two protagonists were born into District Two and suffered and couldn't change their fates. Maybe that's why dreams are just for sleep, Celeste concluded, That's why I can't live my dream, I'm not sleeping. I'm wide awake and this is complete reality.

Okay so here's a few things I wanted to clear up after last and this chapter:

1. Just because the parents or sibling(s) aren't involved in any dialogue in the Reaping chapter doesn't mean they are dead. If they are, I will either slide it into the Reaping chapter, a later chapter, or both.
2. Sometimes I dont' use line breaks because they make the chapter look choppy and I'm going for a flow factor.
3. I'm super stressed about writing this story, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy writing it. I'm just nervous that I'll become like every SYOT I myself have submitted to. I'm afraid I'll randomly lose inspiration and never write again, stop the book entirely, or just never finish it.
4. I hope you guys understand that some of these tributes were really sparse in detail and I didn't have the heart to deny them, so I kept them. No offense to the creators, but I get your character wrong in any way please do tell me.
5. Maybe now you're starting to realize why I'm struggling with the Careers? They're all so un-Career-like that it's kind of annoying yet cool if you catch my drift. Once again, no offense to the creators, but I'm trying to not make them all seem so alike by tweaking your descriptions just a hit. If I ever stray too much, please tell me and I'll be sure to get them on the right track.
6. As you can tell, I'm not including the final goodbyes because those would most definitely be repetitive and boring. I know practically everyone has a token, so what I'm going to do is just revealed the tokens throughout the chapters and, if it flows with the plot, have a flashback of sorts to the final goodbyes.
7. Regarding everyone's ages, I'll put them in the chapter but I'm not going to say "Some Tribute's POV, age 89" or whatever. I'll list the ages in my bio if you still don't know them even after every chapter I post.

That's just about everything I think. I'm glad you guys liked the first Reaping and hopefully you will enjoy this one. Yet again, I've edited all of these chapters like 5 times to make them as close to perfection and not garble as possible. I'm determined to make this story as realistic and enjoyable as possible, and your feedback is always a good guideline for that.

I'm going to wrap this little (or really long) Author's Note with, surprise surprise, a Latin phrase because, surprise surprise, I'm a Latin geek.

Respice, adspice, prospice. ("Examine the past, examine the present, examine the future.")