Date: Year 10, February. Six months after Mags' victory.
"I have to admit I am relieved," Lucian said, a pensive cast to his face as he sat across from her on the table.
Mags put down the Capitol newspaper he had consented to lend her, curious he would spontaneously start a conversation. She had been making a list of who's who among their overlords for personal reference.
"I was expecting you to be a greater nuisance," the escort pursued, his mismatched eyes narrowing in suspicion, as if she'd behaved to better annoy him later.
Even when he was pleased he managed to sound unpleasant.
"I volunteered," Mags said with a tight smile, the hand resting on her lap clenching on its own.
Yet she was proud of having survived the week without incident. District One, the Capitol, and she would be finally home.
The days had both flown by and felt like they would never end. The train had zoomed through the countryside bringing the victor from city to city, square to square, stage to stage, where she had stood without saying a word, a testament of the Capitol's power. Mags had tried to look strong but not arrogant, tried to convey a sense of independence, but she knew it had been pointless. From a distance people would only see the uniform she wore and hear the Capitol's words. Still, she had concentrated on her posture in the hope it would distract her from her surroundings and hasten the end of her ordeal.
Thousands of faces had gazed up at her in ten different districts, and while she had learned nothing of strategic importance, she had seen the first hand the effects of those devastating 'victory' speeches. She had seen necks bow, faces pale and fists clench. She had heard sobs and seen the tears glistening in people's eyes when they heard how much the tributes' families had depended on them, about those murdered children's passions and dreams.
Mags knew her knees would have given away had she killed even a single one of them.
She had also seen indifference, people hiding themselves behind a wall of apathy rather than let themselves be hurt. Those had chilled Mags to the bone, because apathy was the first step towards accepting the Hunger Games or even enjoying them. After all, didn't all prefer to enjoy themselves rather than weep about things they could not control?
Her escort's behavior on stage was the only small mercy. The silver-haired man told the truth as he saw it and kept the speeches short and respectful, devoid of embellishments or overdone pathos. Vicuña's escort had delighted in long passionate eulogies, and had a gift for making the audience feel for the dead as they would have for their own child or sibling. It had been torture.
Lucian talked instead like a historian narrating the merits of soldiers fallen a century before. It was painful enough as such. Mags had known these people and even with her back turned to the giant screens, she saw their faces and heard their voices in her mind, brought back to another time.
Fife Chican was seventeen. She was a consummate manipulator but also very much a child. Unlike her younger brother Tabor who was reported to be quite the ladies' man, she died without having ever kissed a boy. She proclaimed before the Capitol that, like her mother, she was clairvoyant, but even that didn't save her. She loved to run the streets of the city with her friend Cat, and was fundamentally a happy, optimistic child. She killed quickly and without remorse, and yet kept no grudges and was loyal to her allies even with a gun in hand. She hid whenever the violence became too much but never fled or lost her wits," Lucian had said, his voice solemn. He didn't pretend to be affected, but neither did he sound dismissive. "In the end, she thought she could escape on a stolen hovercraft. She jumped to her death, finished by the very rebels she had begged to save her. There is only one victor. It was not Fife Chican."
Mags had silently cried, standing stiffly as tears chilled by the biting cold ran down her face. She had been surprised Lucian hadn't insisted so much on the girl's family like he had on Keane's widowed mother, or the now unprovided for siblings of the beautiful Maverick from Ten, who hadn't survived the train wreck. Perhaps it was a form of respect the Capitolite granted the late Game survivors... Mags had been astounded by Lucian's objectivity when speaking for Lila, having expected new anti-rebel accusations. Maybe this was the true quality of scholars: they respected facts.
It would also explain Lucian's characteristic bitterness.
The victor crossed her arms before her and met her dour escort's gaze. "Do you hate interacting with District people that much, or is it the lies that bother you?"
Lucian's eyes narrowed at the personal question. He then sighed and his lips quirked up.
Mags stared, stunned. She'd never seen anything remotely resembling a smile on the Capitolite's face. It was almost disturbing.
The man pulled out a weird-looking black tube and put it to his mouth. "Electronic cigar, I'm trying to quit," he explained, waving the device around. "People can't be trusted, so they're told what they need to know, even when it's a stretch," he said, looking jaded.
A stretch?
Mags cleared her throat. "Complete fabrication," she amiably corrected, deciding to test Lucian once and for all.
The escort granted her point, his disillusioned smile broadening. "I appreciate the use of that, but it's unacceptable to restrict data so much that the truth ends up lost. There is nothing more arrogant than fabricating reality to suit one's purposes."
Mags stared at him pointedly, trying not to roll her eyes. The truth ends up lost? Did he think she suffered from amnesia? She waited for him to catch on.
It didn't take him long. "You know the facts," he said, pointing a thin finger at her face. His curled mustache and silver goatee were almost vibrating from sudden interest.
"I will tell you the story, but only if you tell me one first," Mags said, a sense of triumph filling her chest.
This was it. She finally had a bargaining chip with the Capitolite.
"How about I simply not have you executed, Scheherazade?" Lucian said with a smirk, blowing smoke out of his lips.
Mags raised her eyebrows, a little uncomfortable with the threat. She couldn't determine how serious he was. And what had he called her?
"Illiterate peasants," Lucian mumbled, upset the reference was lost on the victor. He set his elbows on the table, turning his piercing mismatched gaze on her. Both eyes, red and blue, seemed to glitter with fierce hunger. "What kind of tale does a fishing district girl want to know about?"
"What you're taught of the districts, and how power works in the Capitol," Mags replied. "I will then tell you of my Games, as factually as possible."
Lucian shrugged. "Fine. Do not interrupt me until the end. I'll allow for a few questions. You may want to take notes," he added with a thin knowing smile, "it's complicated."
Mags kept her eyes down to avoid glaring. He was so patronizing. Still, the suggestion was a good one. She couldn't afford to have him change his mind now.
"You didn't say the dynamite also destroyed the Citadel," Lucian said, frustration evident in his posture.
"No," Mags admitted, her shoulders tight with tension.
She should have predicted that even a factual retelling of the Games would have been stressful. Luckily Lucian was interested in raw data, numbers and the link between events much more than her state of mind and feelings at the time.
Lucian brought his fist down on the table and leaned forward. "Then what destroyed it?" He exclaimed impatiently. "And why did you omit what you did during your last night in the sewers?"
Mags' lips twitched humorlessly. She wasn't mad enough to mention Cresyl or give the escort reason to suspect she was still a rebel. Lucian now had most of the facts, but not all of them, not nearly, and as long as Mags wanted to live, he never would.
"That information is classified. The President insisted."
Lucian nodded, a gloomy cast to his features. "She's a molder of minds, that one," he said, shaking his head.
Mags couldn't help a flash of satisfaction from crossing her face. Lucian's annoyance at Achlys and her methods was a wonderful surprise.
"Why isn't the train bugged?" She bluntly asked. She was beginning to see that the man loved to impart his knowledge, even if it was just to be recognized as an expert.
Lucian lifted a gloved hand and rubbed his fingers together. "Money," he said with a cynical smile, "and the need for trustworthy skilled craftsmen. Sending hordes of mutts into Three was imbecilic. We've lost a generation in terms of research. Everyone who isn't critical in industry has been ordered to teach part time before we lose even more," his lips expanded into a patronizing smirk. "Don't worry, all the trains will be bugged within ten more years. The phones already are."
Mags swallowed as she struggled not to rise to the bait. The casual mention of Three's elite, a pillar during the Rebellion, slaughtered by the Capitol's engineered monstrosities and mourned like a simple loss of added value made her blood boil.
She took a slow breath. "Why did President Achlys appoint you as an escort? You seem rather… independent."
Lucian snorted. "I don't like her and Madam President doesn't like me," he said, "but she's doing better than anyone else could in her position considering the sad state of affairs. Since my intellect surpasses that of amoebas, I do not partake in activities that would endanger my country. Achlys despises corruption and negligence, not the two of us trading facts. I am neither corrupt nor negligent."
"You're in a bubble now, Victor," Lucian continued, standing up to straighten his ermine coif-fur, "winning the Hunger Games enabled you to see through the propaganda, but that doesn't make you a weak link. Victors are few enough to be handled individually," he took a long drag from his electronic cigar and peered down at her. "You're allowed some freedom because Achlys knows she can snap her fingers and take it from you if she ever suspects you to be a threat to Panem."
Mags crossed her arms protectively around her chest. "It's a lot to take in," she said in low tones, "especially when you have to keep the illusion perfect."
Lucian smiled nastily at her. "You hadn't thought of that before you volunteered?"
Mags bristled, suddenly remembering who she was talking to. The week had been long, but she'd need more to start confiding in Lucian Gemini.
"I liked your speeches. They served their purpose but weren't overdone," she said politely, deciding to end their conversation on a pleasant note.
"They're dead children," Lucian said, his patronizing expression back on, "there's no need to overdo anything."
But Mags could see he was pleased.
She picked up the paper where she had stopped reading and focused on the bold headlines.
Security: peacekeeper numbers alarm specialists
Mags arched her eyebrows in appraisal. That sounded good.
Extra tax on Luxury Goods to fund security expenses. Attractive bonuses for Homeguard accepting a district assignment.
Recruitment was declared this week a government priority. The number of peaceekeepers remains inferior by a quarter to the country's requirements. District Two can boast of 10 300 trained men and women, One 6 800 and the other districts 2 700. Twenty percent of these men and women are under twenty-two years of age. 14 000 new recruits are been trained at this very moment, including 9000 in District Two alone, but we are far from the ideal 30 000 we need to keep the peace.
District Two's training schools are reporting much lower enrollment and success rates than before the Dark Days. The amount of men needed in the quarries for the reconstruction effort, the poor learning conditions due to the shortage of teachers, the danger and the comparatively low reward are all factors contributing to the need for drastic measures.
Panem requires urgently three thousand peacekeepers to ensure efficient repression of unrest and crime. The Homeguard is 12 000 men strong and until a new generation of peacekeepers is ready to take assignments, we need Capitol citizen to stand up and serve their country.
The article went on describing the harshness of a peacekeeper's job, how hated they were in the 'barbarous' Districts and how their working conditions would be improved by the Capitol. It was clearly implied that peacekeepers were the only thing that was keeping Panem from sinking into bloodshed. The progressive tax on luxury goods, that would reach 200% for the wealthiest, was presented as a pittance in exchange for a peaceful life. Status and riches were promised to Capitol peacekeepers who agreed to relocate. The list of measures taken to ensure their safety was half a page long.
Mags knew with sinking certainty that the lower class of the Capitol would soon be very visible in the districts' main towns.
Next came a controversial discussion over recruiting a special kind of peaceekepers in Eleven, as the district's population was so large that surely adequate people could be found to keep order without needing to import from the already overtaxed districts One and Two.
A pit formed at the base of Mags' stomach when one of the interviewed specialists voiced the necessity of building infrastructure for training peacekeepers in a third district and suggested District Four.
Could the peacekeepers be infiltrated, secret rebels ready to revolt? Mags shivered at the immensity of the task. She loathed the idea of peacekeeper training grounds in her district.
She didn't want to imagine what would happen to a child in Creneis wanting to become a law enforcer. There would be murder.
The victor continued reading and bile rose in her throat as the reported discussion turned to the problem of low population. She couldn't believe her eyes.
Tisias Elysium - Our family laws are too lax and poorly enforced. The population is rising too slowly to reach satisfactory production rates within twenty-five years. We have been giving one free tesserae equivalent per child for families with three or more children, but it didn't have the desired effects. Adults over thirty five with no children should be severely penalized. We should ban birth control for single or childless adults over thirty. Families with a single child over ten years of age should suffer a penalty as well. I would suggest multiplying the amount of reaping slips by twenty and forbidding those families to take tesserae.
Charis Sesterce – I believe a global family quota to allow for some celibates would be more efficient. There should be a special regime for peacekeepers to recruit the adults who desire no children. Enforcing a 2.8 average on normal citizen seems reasonable, as long as the incomes guarantee that the children are fed and clothed. We should also include adopted orphans in the count and deliver more medicine to limit infant death and severe childbirth complications. On average, a sixth of children do not reach their tenth birthday in the districts, and it skyrockets to one in three in some regions. I agree with the single child penalties.
Mags' breath slowly exited her lungs when her burning body screamed for air. Was this Charis woman truly their greatest defender in the Capitol? A calculating mind with a modicum of common sense?
Mags had never heard of the free tesserae bonus for numerous families and suspected the news had never reached Creneis. Poorly implemented indeed... but it looked like things would change, and for the worse.
2.8 average.
Six children between her and Esperanza. Circe.
The wait for dinner became excruciating as the letters jumbled on the page. Mags' brain had come to a standstill, shocked to see written in print how the Capitol was planning to regulate every aspect of their lives, mindless of their wishes and opinions.
More medicine for young children, she told herself, trying to cheer up, but dread numbed her body.
There was nothing they could do to stop the Capitol. Any rebellion was doomed for now, and Achlys was consolidating her power with every passing year.
Mags shifted and wiped her clammy palms on her blue sash. Stress clawed at her insides, stealing away her ability to think.
The train had stopped. She was to be led to the main square of Parsa, District's One stunning capital, named after Persepolis, the richest city under the sun.
The city Mags had been born in.
It was not the thought of walking the streets of her childhood that paralyzed her so, but the wait for the man who would escort her to the ceremony.
Demanding of Valerian Fletcher, someone close to Constantine who had allowed him to die and kept her alive despite any feelings he may have harbored, to see her again, to guard her...
It had been maybe the most presumptuous demand she had ever made.
Her breath hitched when she saw the Sergeant and his squad of elite peacekeepers appear. Valerian was as eerily intense as she remembered. He walked with a grace that made every male in Four seem uncoordinated and heavy. The clean-shaven man's set expression and piercing blue eyes seemed to burn through her and down to her soul. She'd only met one person who surpassed Valerian's tangible aura, and that was Evadne Achlys.
"Mags Abalone," Valerian said, holding her gaze as he granted her a curt nod, "follow me. Lieutenant Goldstein will insure Mr. Gemini's safety," he added gesturing to another squad.
They left before the escort could wonder about this breach in protocol, as he and Mags had never been separated in the other districts, but Lucian didn't seem inclined to protest.
As they walked away from the train station and into streets made empty to facilitate her trip to the main square, Mags' heartbeat slowly decreased to normal levels, relaxed by the squad's rhythmic step.
She stopped dead and her breath when she saw the sign marking the entrance in a small but wealthy looking square.
Imperial Square.
"Peregrine? Imperial Square Inferno Peregrine?" Constantine was staring at her as if he'd never seen her before. "You were born in District One? You...your father murdered General Alloy."
She had no memory of this place and yet her eyes misted over as she forced herself to keep walking. Faint scorch marks still marred some of the stone slabs.
"My aunt bought a tapestry from Jasper Peregrine, a long time ago. It hasn't lost its luster," Valerian said, steering her away from a cluster of refuse collectors behind which a hostile person could have potentially been lurking. His eyes seemed to look everywhere at once, missing nothing.
Mags stood frozen, barely daring to breathe. How did he know? How much information had powerful peacekeepers access to? What had Constantine's mother found out?
Valerian's hand hadn't left Mags' side and he reached for something in his uniform jacket. She noticed there were a few yards between the two of them and the nearest peacekeeper. Her heart began to race, her senses heightened by fear. She knew nothing of this man, and he had potentially motive to kill her.
There was nothing she could do to protect herself.
"Cereus Sphene, Constantine's friend, wanted you to have this record," Valerian said, his blue eyes hooded as he passed her a small wrapped package. "It contains the last hour of Fife's and Constantine's camera tracks and the hovercraft's records. Their scarves interfered with the lips reading software, but the hovercraft was equipped with listening devices."
Mags almost dropped the bag.
Questions she had resigned herself never to find the answers to, wounds she had painstakingly tried to patch, memories she had pushed away to spare herself the pain of reminiscing…
Mags clutched the records harder, rendered mute by a surge of desperate hope. Had Fife made Constantine reveal why he had committed suicide in the end? Had he truly died for her or had it been a freak accident? Why had he volunteered? Had Fife truly died hating her?
She hastily tucked the records inside her coat, blessing the designer for having include pockets.
Mags let her arms fall limp by her side and stared at her feet. A new terror seared the young woman's veins and cramped her limbs for she knew how double-edged such a gift could be. Resignation was healthier than vicious disappointment or grief made raw by exposure to the harsh truth.
She tensed when she felt a firm hand between her shoulder blades.
They had reached Byzantium Plaza, where the ceremony would be held. Keeping her half-hidden from the cameras, Valerian steadied her, and for the first time, Mags saw peacekeepers as what they should have been. Protectors of the people. She forced a small smile, aware no sound would exit her lips. She hoped her expression conveyed how much the records meant to her. Her doubts fled. She was happy to have him there.
"There have been whispers of unrest in District Four among our ranks," Valerian had, his tone unnervingly bland. "Has your victory made a difference?"
Mags' thoughts floated back to the Pier of Spirits where Rio and Douglas had been put to rest. She thought of the houses that were almost finished, of the cleaned out desalinizing factory and the first new beams of the academy. She thought of the clean barracks walls, and the lack of incidents with Peacekeepers in the last weeks.
She found her voice. "Yes, it has," Mags whispered, her eyes falling on the crowd behind the low barricade. "Four shouldn't need reinforcements."
"Good," he said with an inscrutable expression.
Mags repressed a shiver, feeling as if Valerian could access her private thoughts with a mere glance. She had been a fool to think Lucian's ghastly stare was uncomfortable. Never had she felt both so protected and so very vulnerable at once.
They finally reached the platform. Thousands of men and women, tens of thousands, were still arriving in the immense square.
"Thank you," Mags said, her voice thick with emotion, "for keeping me safe."
Valerian's lips fleetingly twisted into a grimace, but he soon recovered his solemn demeanor. "We lost many good men and women that day."
"Yes. We'll lose more," Mags said, weariness and distress darkening her features.
They were speaking side by side in soft curt tones, their stiff postures mirroring each other, but Mags wondered if there wasn't more sincerity in this stilted conversation than in any she'd had since she'd left Four.
"We must serve Panem," Valerian said, his piercing eyes embracing the majestic Byzantium Plaza where people were still gathering, "or what is there left?"
Mags nodded absently. "What is Panem?" She mused.
She served her country as fiercely as Achlys did, and yet they could not both triumph.
Valerian gave her a soft smile and Mags could now easily see the man Constantine had seemed to respect so much and not just the Sergeant in uniform.
"Thank you for demanding that I guard you," he said, his expression still warm, "it made things much easier. Constantine always craved to be a hero. I am glad he didn't make a heroic mistake regarding you."
Delivered in such a soft voice tinged with sarcasm and sorrow, Mags feared the compliment would cause her to burst into sobs.
"Which one is Cereus?" Mags whispered, seeking a distraction, her eyes on the assembled people.
Valerian scanned the crowd, his face darkening in concentration.
A rueful smile crossed his thin lips after a long pause. "Cereus is a six-foot-high, blonde, fit young man with short hair, wearing a white shirt, thick black trousers, and a long winter coat. Unless he takes a flag and waves it, I'm afraid we'll never find him."
Mags allowed herself to smile. Hundreds of men fit that description.
"I will thank him for you," Valerian promised, serious once more.
Mags wondered why there could be no such peacekeepers in Creneis. The man was courteous, competent, intelligent and even kind, although she suspected that was out of affection for Constantine and Cereus.
But if elite peacekeeper squads ever came to her town, it would be because pandemonium had erupted.
Mags stood tall and impassive, draped in a coat adorning the Capitol crest for the eleventh time in six days. She learned more than she had ever wanted to about Mirabelle. She would have rather kept her bad opinion of the bloodthirsty volunteer than learn she had trained stray dogs to be perfect competition animals. Stray dogs didn't truly garner her sympathy, but it was enough to physically remind her that each and every death in the Games was a human life snuffed out prematurely.
"Constantine remained an enigma to most who watched the Games," Lucian began. "Son of a wealthy influential man and the former Colonel of South Sector,"
"Former?" Mags breathed, her head snapping towards Valerian. What had happened?
"Selene Aquila stepped down and is now a Captain in District Ten. Willingly," Valerian said, his eyes far away. "She is happier than she has been in months. Coraline, Constantine's governess, works for me now. Roy Aquila regretfully passed away," the peacekeeper bowed his head, sorrow tightening his features. "He was an elderly man."
Mags' green eyes had widened in horror. She lowered them to the floor, and brought her hand to her trembling mouth. A profound sadness invaded her, her heart weeping for strangers who had suffered so much from the Games. She mourned, devoid of pain or anguish, simply aware that the tributes were never the only victims.
After a moment, she wiped her tearful eyes and realized she had completely missed the rest of Lucian's last speech. Constantine's death had been interpreted as the result of a cowardly escape during the recaps, but Mags knew that while Constantine had been many things, a coward couldn't be farther from the truth.
Leaving things like this didn't feel right, like abandoning a task unfinished.
Mags' surroundings blurred and all she saw when she took the microphone from her startled escort's grasp was Esperanza, smiling at her trustingly when Mags had promised her that she would be able to visit whichever district she wished when she was older; when they would have won Panem back.
"It's all for the children, isn't it?" Mags began, talking as much to herself as she was to the crowd. "That's what makes the Games so terrible. But when you volunteer, kill, win, it's still for family, for the future. The truth is that Panem is a shattered vase struggling to glue itself back together. Can something broken truly repair itself? Constantine volunteered because something was broken, because victors live outside the fabric of society and -within reason and legality- make their own rules. It's a loophole, a shortcut to something you wouldn't attain by living normally. But the odds…"
No one could win on their own. Without Fife and Constantine, she would never have reached the Citadel.
Mags' lips twitched into a crooked smile. "It all comes down to compromises. How much is your life worth? How far would you gamble for your children's lives? Casting blame, dreaming of change…" A sigh escape the young woman's lips. "There's just the truth and how you can affect it. Every major action is a compromise, but the future you offer your children, the world you'll leave behind when you die, will be the sum of it all."
The lightheaded victor turned her eyes back on the crowd, feeling very much like a child and marveling at the fact she was alive, in District One, on this very day. "You can't volunteer without that drive. The Games will swallow you whole if you're not animated by something bigger than you."
Constantine had made two incredible gambles. Volunteering and sacrificing himself. Mags would see his faith pay off, and hopefully, wherever he was, he would approve.
"Did you improvise that?" Valerian asked as she backed away.
Mags felt as if a bucket of cold water had been thrown on her face. As her mind cleared she wondered what had possessed her to do that. Nerves and emotional exhaustion could not excuse such outbursts.
"I had promised Mama I would shut up," she said, her face falling. She turned towards Valerian, a blush creeping up her cheeks. "Did that even make sense?"
"Yes," Valerian said, a hint of mirth crinkling his eyes. "It was good. People are tired of weeping."
AN: I make a point of writing dialog quickly (in one go, so 5 minutes) when the characters have no time to prepare or are out for their comfort zone. Then I edit it of course, but improvised speeches will never sound improvised if I spend days thinking them up and polishing them. If Mags' last speech seemed fragmented, that's why. I dislike writing speeches more and more as time passes xD I find it rather pompous. But here I had to since I had said she'd made a speech at the end of chapter 24 (the one from Cereus' point of view).
Don't hesitate to give constructive criticism.
Please review^^.