"You know," Francine said as they got out of the car, "you're nowhere near as stupid as you think. Not everyone can get a GED so fast."
"I had nothing to do this entire time but study." Diana fidgeted with the strap of her brand-new backpack. She was nervous about going back to school, and insecure about going to university. Before, she hadn't known anyone who went to university. "You sure we'll have time to sign up for everything?"
"Given the time of morning it is, yes."
Today was registration day. Diana and Francine made their way to the rows and rows of tables in the poorly paved lot between several shabby buildings. Where had the tuition money gone? Probably the university president's cottage.
"First-year courses there," Francine pointed out.
There was already quite a crowd even though it wasn't even six yet. Diana took out the schedule she had drawn up (she had backups in case she couldn't get her desired courses) and went to queue up. Immediately, she was recognized.
Maybe she shouldn't have worried. She signed up for everything she wanted without issue, the only problem being people taking pictures with her at every turn.
"I knew I made the right choice to take calc," someone said. "I can't believe I'll have class with a Victor!"
Diana beat a retreat to her car and waited for Francine. "How was it?"
"Alright."
The plan from here on had been to drop off Francine at her place, but her parents were there and insisted Diana join them for breakfast. Diana agreed with some hesitation. Francine had met her family, and everyone liked her (except Sooty, who had nothing but disdain for two-legged creatures trying to grab her with their dirty paws), but she couldn't shake the feeling that this meant it was serious, which meant it would be a real catastrophe when it ended.
Diana took a deep breath and sat down at the table. Francine's father was a middle-manager of some sort with a large agricultural estate and her mother didn't work. Before, Diana would have considered their apartment the height of luxury. Now, it was just an apartment.
"It is such an honour to be sitting at the same table as you," Mr. O'Neill said.
Diana shrugged. "Thank you."
"You know, we sponsored you."
"Thank you," Diana said, sincerely this time.
"So, how did you and Fran meet?"
Diana had forgotten what it was like to meet the parents. She opened her mouth, inserted a forkful of eggs, swallowed, and began to explain.
University itself turned out to be like nothing she had ever experienced. It had nothing in common with school, for starters, even if she was scurrying to class and doing homework like when she had been little. Sitting still was still a nightmare, but actually having to take notes made her far less fidgety. In ideology class, she knitted as a Peacekeeper officer monologued about something. She had quickly gotten used to being surrounded by students, most of whom had grown up knowing they would attend university one day.
"I wish he could speak more clearly," Diana complained to her neighbour, who was doodling.
The young man with multiple facial piercings shrugged. He wore an expensive-looking blue shirt and his hair was artfully styled and dyed. "It's better than at my highschool. There, we just had a drunk Peacekeeper rant about something until we gave her money to go buy a half-litre. Even combat-prep was better, and we had to crawl through mud while being beaten with sticks. How was it at your school?"
He hadn't recognized her, then. "Basically like that," Diana recalled what Leonella said about her Life and Defense Preparation class. There, they were supposed to be taught first aid, orienteering, and how to service and fire a gun, but in practice, it was like a second gym class where they ran obstacle courses and had to fight each other while the teacher drank beer with the principal's secretary. "Once, everyone had to run around the yard in just their underwear in December. Someone actually got frostbite." Thankfully, Leonella had been okay, if cold.
"You never know when the Dark Days might happen again and we have to run naked through a snowy field, I guess," the man said in a flat voice that made it impossible to tell if he was being sarcastic.
"We'll be ready for everything," Diana replied in the same tone.
Fortunately, most of her classes were actually interesting, but the homework messed with her head. As a child, Mom and Dad had needed the help of the broom to get her to at least half-do her homework, so the concept of coming home and sitting down to do more thinking was foreign to her. At least when you came home and did chores, it used a different part of your brain. But Francine knew exactly how to motivate her, and the intense work on her GED had given her some discipline, at least. All in all, being a student was better than being an apprentice, if only because the odds of back pain and joint problems in twenty years were far lower. Mina had always been the only welder at her workplace to wear kneepads, and they teased her for being 'delicate'. Knees were delicate things - Mina was smart to be careful.
The Victory Tour crept up somehow. "I can't believe the year is almost over," Grandpa muttered, adjusting his magnifying glass to see his sewing better. The family was gathered around the television, everyone working on their own thing. Grandpa had always said that you had to be productive when watching TV or listening to the radio. Diana didn't mind, because she couldn't sit still without having something in her hands, like a pair of two-at-a-time socks.
"That's how it goes," Aunt Nelly sighed.
"Meow," Sooty said. Michael petted her back.
"I can't believe what that Seemu's wearing," Aunt Sarah said disapprovingly.
The television was showing Enobaria's appearance in Seven. Despite being underage, she was wearing a little leather dress that showed more leg and cleavage than anything Diana had ever worn to go dancing, and she had once modified an old shirt to leave her stomach completely bare (her ex had approved, Uncle Busybody at the park - not so much).
"I should wear that for a date," Diana said and immediately regretted it.
Grandpa raised his eyebrow. "You're a grown adult, you can wear whatever you want on a date." Now that was a drastic transformation. "This is a solemn occasion, you can't dress like you're going to a nightclub!"
Diana clenched her teeth and made several stitches way too tight. "Grandpa, she has no choice. Her stylists are the ones who decide. Had Warner wanted, she'd have dressed me like that, too."
Grandpa moved his ire to Enobaria's stylist and muttered about that for the rest of the evening. "No respect for the fallen," he said to the television the next morning, which was announcing Enobaria's arrival to Six. Diana ignored him and got ready. Warner had sent in instructions, which she followed carefully. Due to the cold weather (which would hopefully force Enobaria's stylist to dress her in a way that even Grandpa would find acceptable), she didn't have to put in that much effort. Diana combed her hair, put on her favourite simple makeup, and pulled on her outer clothes as a taxi came to take her to the ceremony. The television was by now tuned to 'Unveiled Secrets', with some ex-civil servant blaming District Thirteen (what?), reptilians, and mesmeric forces for her involuntary retirement, so Diana was glad to get out of the house.
Much to Diana's extreme shock, the organizers had somehow managed to find John's family and bring them in. A man who looked at least fifty but was probably in his thirties stood with a child of ten or so and a woman who had to be barely of age and had a baby in her arms. For a second, Diana thought that was John's widow - underage marriages were very common in rural regions, and even in the cities you couldn't shock anyone with married seventeen- or eighteen-year-olds - but then she remembered he had volunteered. Probably his sister, then. Though who knew, plenty of people killed themselves even though they had kids, and volunteering was just a very public way to do that.
Diana hoped they'd get to keep the nice clothes they were wearing.
For Portia, she had her entire immediate family - parents, siblings, grandparents - all in mourning black. Diana felt a stab of sadness looking at them.
The delegation from Two finally arrived. Enobaria was, thankfully, wearing a coat long enough for her to not freeze in. The crowd, who had been there for hours because places in the square were first-come first-served, mostly looked cold as they listened to the newest Victor.
"I would like to start by commending the courage and honour of the Tributes of District Six," she read off a card. "John Keenan heroically took the place of Christian Freeman, a married man with three children and a fourth on the way." Who the hell had a fourth child on the way aged eighteen? Diana did the mental calculation - even had he started at fifteen, his wife would have needed to produce babies at a staggering rate and then kept them all alive somehow. Or maybe there were multiple baby mommies? "Mr. Keenan - know your son died to save another. Elizabeth - remember your brother was a hero few can compare with in bravery and integrity. Mrs. Ross - raise your child knowing that their uncle gave the ultimate sacrifice, and the nation will always thank him for it."
Of course, the unfortunate death was not mentioned. The speechwriter knew what they were doing. Portia got a somewhat less overblown oration, though her bravery was still praised, everyone clapped, and the public part of the ceremony was over. It was hard to believe that a year had passed, and now it was Diana welcoming Enobaria to being a Victor.
"How are you holding up?" They sat in a small lounge on a couch. Enobaria had taken off her coat, revealing an unbelievably sexy getup Diana really wanted to wear for Francine.
"Awful." Enobaria took a tube out of a coat pocket and squeezed out some gel on a finger. With her other hand, she took out her mouthguards and applied the gel to her gums.
"Does the gel work?"
"For a few hours. I have a stronger one which lasts the night, but it numbs my entire mouth." She sighed. "I can't do this."
Diana had no idea what to say. This was worse than when the veterans began predicting their deaths. "It's not for long, you'll get them removed eventually."
Enobaria put her mouthguards back in. "I can't do the Tour. Brutus told me about what they do to you in the Capitol. I can't."
"Have you ever had sex before?"
"Yes."
"Well, it's more of the same, it's just that they decide what to do to you."
Enobaria dropped her face in her hands. "I can't," she sobbed. "I can't do it again."
Again? "Were you raped?"
"He said the only way to be free of him was to die." She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her coat. "But I'm alive. And now I'll never- never-"
"What?"
"Be happy," she choked out.
"Of course you'll be happy," Diana said. "All this is only a small fraction of the year. You can do whatever you want the rest of the time. You can do stuff you like, go to therapy, have relationships."
"There's nothing I like," she whispered. "I was supposed to die. I never had any plans for life."
"You can make them now."
Enobaria shook her head. "I don't want to. I don't want relationships. Not after that."
"That means nothing," Diana insisted. "Between ninety-five and ninety-nine percent of people, depending on the definition, want a relationship of some sort. If you're one of those who don't, that's perfectly fine, but that's an inborn thing, not caused by what happened to you before."
"You sound like a computer," Enobaria sniffled. "Are you really sure it's just like how people say?"
"Sort of, I guess?"
"Can you-can you show me?"
What? Diana thought for a second she was hallucinating. Having such an attractive girl proposition her had been the stuff of daydreams (and night dreams) once. "I'm in a relationship."
"You don't want me?"
"I don't know what kind of people you lived surrounded by, but I'm faithful to my partner."
"My stylist said nobody would be able to resist my looks."
"Honestly, the only thing I'm thinking is that I really want to have my girlfriend see me in this outfit. Or see her in it. Doesn't matter."
Thankfully, Enobaria laughed weakly at that. "You're a strange person. But nice."
Diana was 'asked' to participate in an advertisement for a company that made hygiene products. Thankfully, she only had to travel a few blocks to get to there, and all she had to do was pose for the camera dressed for a long trip in the forest with a gun slung over one shoulder, a basket of mushrooms and two fake rabbits in one hand, and holding a box of disposable pads in another. She had to smile widely, presumably glad that no bodily functions could hold you back from hunting and foraging when you had this company's products. Diana really hoped the pads were actually good.
Looking at the photographs, it was impossible to tell if she had female sex characteristics at all - a far cry from the advertisements Enobaria appeared in, which could be found in the sort of catalogues Diana had used to hide under her mattress. Diana's camouflage clothes were loose enough to conceal her figure and she wore only basic makeup that covered up minor blemishes but was not enough to transform her facial structure.
Diana wasn't sure why they were being treated so differently. They had basically the same bodies, but while Enobaria had to pose mostly naked, Diana's capacity for sexuality was only relevant because of the tendency of uteri to haemorrhage blood every so often when you were at a certain age. It didn't seem very fair, but what could you do?
Watching reports about how the potato harvest was perfectly fine and there was nothing to worry about, Diana felt glad for the first time that her name had been drawn out of that ball. She wasn't the one who had to panic. Grandpa didn't spend his time standing in queues and Mom didn't stare miserably at the contents of her wallet. Heck, Diana didn't even know how much a kilo of potatoes cost! This, she decided, was what it meant to be rich.
The rumblings of a new purge were more worrisome, but as a Victor and her family, as long as she said the right things, everything would be just fine.
"Have you heard they're slaughtering the cattle because the oilseeds and turnips are going to the markets?" Francine asked on the night before Reaping Day. They were having a romantic date in a restaurant. Her girlfriend always knew how to take her mind off things.
"Oh, they are? It's not going to be like 31-32, is it?" That was the famine everyone still spoke of in whispers so as to not scare the children - unless they were the sort of people who yelled at their kids for not clearing the plate because 'back in the day we would have killed for this'. According to Rudolf Wang, that famine, worse than even the one during the Dark Days, had been the reason why people in Nine still joked about dismemberment, even if that professor in Centre who had killed his secretary hadn't tried to eat her.
The professor had tried to throw out the body into the Missouri but fell in and had to be rescued, only to be arrested for having a severed head and a pair of hands in his backpack. As Rudolf joked, classic Oh-my-hand.
"I don't think so. My cousin says we'll be eating turnips and corn for a while. I wonder what this will do to the price of plant proteins."
Probably nothing good. "The cousin who's in the Ministry of Agriculture?"
"Yeah."
"And are they, with the situation-"
"They're a loyal person with integrity, they're not worried."
Well, the Peacekeepers and the NCIA weren't exactly the best at sorting out real crime reports from denunciations caused by business rivalries and personal drama, so maybe they should have been worrying, even if they were fairly low-ranking. "Well, Grandpa was told by his doctor to cut down on his meat consumption, so we'll all be eating vegetarian 'for health' soon enough and not care about the price of meat."
"Is there another reason to eat vegetarian?"
"Being middle-class and not being able to afford meat because of your mortgage."
"But lots of people can't afford meat at all."
"That's why middle-class people say they're vegetarian - so they can pretend they're choosing to live off beans and rice and lentil stew, not being forced to do it by their bank accounts."
Francine laughed out loud. "Good one." Turning serious, she added, "Lots of people will be doing that soon enough. There will be a drop in price during slaughtering, and I'm sure farmers will try to preserve as much as possible to mitigate the crisis, but it'll be a long time yet until the prices of fresh meat come back down."
Cheap meat had always been an oxymoron. Diana had heard somewhere that back before the Cataclysm everyone had eaten meat, but a) that might have been someone making stuff up and b) the Great Swine Flu (which also affected most mammals including humans) had certainly not existed before the Cataclysm. It was just too hard to keep lots of animals in one place, because they would just get sick and die, and keeping lots of animals in one place was the only way to lower costs. Thus, Diana's family having had meat once a week even though they had been in the upper ranges of the working class, and those had always been the cheapest cuts to boot.
The food arrived. Meat was present on the plate. Diana ate her chicken and wondered at what point Grandpa would try to convince the family that chickpeas were the superior form of protein.
"I wonder why you can't just give medicine to animals so they get better," Diana mused.
Francine nearly spat out her wine. "Honey, there aren't enough antibiotics and antivirals for humans to go around, let alone animals. Medications are very hard to make."
"Oh. That makes sense. I remember when I was little I was taken to the hospital for pneumonia, and we had to bring our own bedsheets." She leaned in closer. "And I was once at a hospital in the Capitol to give a speech, and there was mold and cockroaches everywhere and the elevator wasn't working even though the X-ray cabinet was on the fourth floor."
"No way. Chief doctors steal in the Capitol, too?"
"Of course they do - why wouldn't they?"
"And nobody cares?"
Diana shrugged. "I guess it was even worse before they fixed it for my visit."
"Awful." Francine ate an elegant bite of baked vegetables. "Let's change the topic. It's Reaping eve, you need to relax. I shouldn't have brought up such a heavy topic.
"Sure," Diana said. "My Chem TA was arrested for synthesizing and selling alpha-PVP and 'springs'. They found bags of the stuff in her room."
Francine snorted. "Typical. My first-year professor made mephedrone and desomorphine right in the lab under some general's protection."
"Desomorphine?" Diana asked, remembering the morphlings in her home city with their flesh rotting off their bones. From talking to the other Victors, she knew that the situation was basically the same all over the country.
"Yeah. I bet she's still doing it. Unless she fell out of favour. I love your dress, by the way."
Diana had thought her parents would veto the dress, but they had just giggled about her wanting to look good for her girlfriend and approved it enthusiastically. What a difference being an adult made. Before, they had acted like the world was ending when she went on a date in something that showed her collarbones, and now, they thought it was perfectly fine for her to go on a date in a dress that showed most of her boobs and had a slit up to her hip. And when before, Diana asking to buy some lace for a bra had resulted in uncompromising refusals to make her anything made for taking off, now, she bought sexy underwear and Grandpa winked and told her to not wear out poor Francine too much!
Even when Diana quipped that it was her being worn out, her relatives laughed uproariously instead of scolding her for rushing into things.
"Glad you think so." Diana adjusted her six-pointed star pennant that, when worn with something so revealing, glued everyone's eyes to her boobs. It always worked on Francine, like now.
"It'll look even better on my bedroom floor."
"I'll hold you to that." Diana reached out and took her girlfriend by the hand. Francine was stocky and had big extremities, so when she covered Diana's hand with her other hand, it enveloped the palm fully. Diana loved the sensation. It was like a cocoon of warmth for her hand, a promise for what would happen to her entire body soon enough in Francine's arms.
Adam said that the reason Diana's anxiety had reached the clinical threshold was her having been Reaped. Having such an unlikely event happen had unlocked something in her mind and made her constantly think that other, equally unlikely, things could happen. Like Leonella being Reaped. Diana mentally slapped herself when seventeen-year-old Mary Everett was Reaped and told herself to stop being irrational. Some time later, the unimposing girl mounted the stage to stand next to Albert Lee, who was eighteen. Both were crying.
The two fed off each other. When one calmed down, they would look to the other and start crying again. When Diana said she would be their only Mentor, Mary burst into tears all over again.
"Oh, for fuck's sake," Diana snapped. "They told me there was no point in helping me because I'd die anyway. And here I am. You're better off without them. So stop crying if you want to live." That had the opposite effect. Diana sighed. "Don't die before death. Don't give up now."
"What's the point?" Albert asked morosely. "We're going to die."
Even John's defiance had been easier to deal with. "Look, Albert, I'm not going to lie - I also thought I was going to die, and my being here is thanks to luck. Just as it is for everyone else who makes it out. But luck alone is not enough, you have to seize on the opportunities you have, and you can't do that if you've given up already." Mary shook her head. Diana had no idea what that was supposed to mean. "Please just try to calm down. You're not dead yet. For-for as long as in the heart, a soul yearns, hope is not yet lost." Diana was impressed by her own quick thinking, she had never spoken these words in English before.
Albert shrugged and wiped his eyes.
Diana may have already mentally buried her Tributes, but she still had to give her all for them. She encouraged them, advised them, had sex with sponsors for them. Mary got a four and Albert - a five. Diana advised them to appear calm and reserved in their interviews and then it was time.
The girl from One seemed to not know a word of English (though she had a score of ten), so everyone sighed in relief when she was replaced with her male counterpart, an exotically handsome boy with blond hair and green eyes and the palest skin she had ever seen. Not a colouring you'd expect on anyone naturally, let alone someone from the scorching One. He was friendly and charming and mentioned that he had a sister who wanted to volunteer next year.
"Does she also look like you?" Flickerman asked.
"Yeah," the boy said. "All three of us take after our father."
"Oh, there's another one of you?"
"Yes. I have an identical twin sister." Their poor mother.
"Did she also want to volunteer?"
"No. We all know stories from the Dark Days about siblings facing each other in battle. That never ended in a way compatible with honour."
A pause. "I presume you were not always known as brother and sister?"
The boy nodded. "Yes. We were once believed to be twin boys. I've known my sister to be my sister since we were three, but we barely managed to afford puberty blockers, let alone hormones. So if you want to sponsor me, please give the money to my sister instead."
Diana flapped her hand. There it was. The second Tribute up, and he had already done something to make himself the most noteworthy. Nobody had ever asked for money for their family before. Nothing anyone else did now could compare. And indeed, it was Gloss Delacruz who survived in the lush forest, much to the delight of Clio Delacruz, who was finally able to get the treatment she needed. Mary and Albert perished at the Cornucopia, Mary - at the end of Gloss' javelin.
The funeral was a massive occasion, Mary and Albert's relatives drowned out by the sea of functionaries muttering about the ultimate sacrifice. When the caskets were lowered into the graves, everyone applauded, as if the two had been artists. Watching the televised funerals before, Diana had always been confused by that - what had they performed? The role of a Tribute? Were the gathered mourners subtly nodding to the frequent complaints that the way the Games were edited made them look like a really weird television show? Or did they actually think of it as a kind of television show?
Diana still had no idea why they were clapping, but she put her hands together nevertheless. That was how you learned how to behave in society. You mimicked the others, whether you understood what was happening or not. You clapped for Uncle Noah the harmonica player, who had died ten years ago from food poisoning, and you clapped for the Tributes, simple as that.
The boy Tribute for the Sixty-Third was George Pittman, ID number 092492406. The first boy to come up, a thirteen-year-old who must have run all the way from the back, thankfully wasn't the one.
"And now, for the ladies!" Elly reached his hand into the bowl and drew the slip, Diana's heart hammering with irrational fear. "Edie Wu!" Seventeen years old.
The correct George, an eighteen-year-old, turned out to be scrawny and seemingly in control of himself. Edie was visibly pregnant. It hit Diana that she had never heard of pregnant Tributes, just like she had never heard of kids going in missing limbs or unable to see.
"Any volunteers?"
Nothing.
"Girls, where is your honour?" Elly raged. Diana had never seen him that emotional. "When my grandmother was drafted, half the eligible youths in her village stepped forward for her! Would you let your District be represented on the national stage by someone who cannot fight? Are you willing to live knowing a mother-to-be died for you?"
That explained why visibly pregnant girls never went in. Which made sense - they were neither capable of honest combat nor were they the innocent martyrs dying for the nation people sometimes spoke of (Grandpa complained about the Christian overtones usually present in the latter rhetoric). Half a minute of ranting later, a mass of voices began to shout that there was a volunteer, and they could all sigh in relief. Diana was convinced this would be edited down for television. The volunteer turned out to be a very well-dressed sixteen-year-old named Patricia Armstrong.
"Thank you for your sacrifice," Elly said, bowing so low, his head was at the same level as his knees.
"Thank you for your sacrifice." Edie had tears in her eyes as she shook Patricia's hand.
"Thank you for your sacrifice," Diana said sincerely.
George turned out to be the child of farmers who owned too little land to live off of, and Patricia was the daughter of a lawyer. She had volunteered simply because it was the right thing to do. George ate a lot but remained in control, and Patricia was obviously forcing herself to eat.
"Thanks for volunteering," George told Patricia. "I thought we were going to have to stand there forever."
Patricia shrugged. "I didn't want to," she said quietly. "But someone had to." She looked at Diana. "Where are the other Victors?"
"They stay at home." The Tributes looked scared. "Don't worry, Elly and I are on top of things." Diana took a chocolate bar and ate a piece. Elly was on his phone.
"So what do we do in the Arena?" George asked.
"You're getting ahead of things, but it depends on what the climate is and what supplies there are. How good are you at foraging?"
Both of them shook their heads. "My mom always looks over what I forage," George said shamefacedly.
"Don't worry, my grandfather does that for our entire family." George smiled weakly. "Anyway, it's no big deal, odds are the climate won't be familiar enough for that in any case. Don't touch anything you're not a hundred percent certain about. The more barren the Arena, the cheaper food will be, because the Gamemakers don't want everyone to be too weakened to fight, but if it's a lush Arena, you will have problems." Diana knew full well by now that sponsors would be thin on the ground. "Usually, there's some provisions close to the pedestals. If there's twelve identical backpacks, go for one. Grab small backpacks, they have survival kits. Don't dawdle, but try to kill someone."
George turned pale. "I can't."
"You have to. The Gamemakers will make your life hell if you just run away." Diana took a deep breath. "Let's take things in order. First, we need to see what kind of competition you have."
They sat silently for a while until Elly said the recap was about to start. As Diana had expected, Gloss' sister stepped forward, onwards toward her noble death. Beyond that, there was nothing noteworthy. The demographics were about as usual. She ran through the analysis for George and Patricia, who steadily became more and more scared. "Don't worry. Like I said, my Mentors dismissed me after taking one look at me, and here I am."
"So what do we do?" Patricia asked desperately.
"First - do what you're told. When we arrive tomorrow, you'll be prepared for the parade. George, it might be unpleasant, but stay calm. Patricia, it's like a visit to a very expensive bathhouse."
George looked baffled but nodded.
"You might be put in very revealing clothes. Do not protest." Patricia turned red. "Above all, be charming. Can you smile?" They both smiled. How did they do it? "Excellent. Do that. Now, the training. Spend the first morning looking around everything and pay notice to what kind of survival training is being offered, that offers clues to the Arena climate. Once you're done with that, do first aid. Second day, fighting with knives. Morning of your last day, go around the climbing, jumping, and so on stations just so that you know what you can and can't do."
"Only a day to learn to fight?" George asked.
"Three days isn't enough. A day is enough to learn how to stand, hold a knife, and kill an unarmed person, and that's all that's realistically possible in the time we have. I spent the better part of two days there, and had I run into someone who was also armed, I would have died." Even the boy from Five could have very easily inflicted severe injuries on her. "In your individual evaluations, show off both knife skills and first aid. If it does so happen that you collide with someone as untrained as you who has a weapon, you'll be badly injured at best, so best demonstrate that you know what to do in that case. All of my Tributes so far had knives placed close to them, so you'll have that advantage as well. The Gamemakers want excitement, so they hand out small advantages very generously at the Cornucopia."
"But then couldn't everyone do that?"
Diana knew full well nobody else did that because she hadn't brought anyone home. Her strategy had only been a small contributor to her survival. Like yeast making dough rise, it had allowed her to succeed when she had luck. "Each Mentor has their own strategy. This is mine."
"But what about the Careers?" Patricia asked.
"Pretend they're bears. There's nothing you can do if they catch you, so try to stay out of the way."
"But how?"
Get lucky.
"Run as far as you can on the first day. They will start hunting after a couple of hours to go through the Cornucopia and consolidate, but they usually don't go too far because it's difficult to guard the Cornucopia, so you have to stay out of their reach. This is why it is absolutely crucial that you kill someone at the Cornucopia. The Gamemakers will allow you to hide for longer." She looked at them intently. "Your goal is to stay out of reach of the Careers until they get killed off by something or other, and to remain strong enough to fight off everyone else."
"What if we reach the end of the Arena?" George asked.
She had a good pair this year. Maybe they had a chance. "You probably won't be allowed to - in my Games, the Arena was gradually shrunken with barriers. This is an important thing to consider. Sometimes it's hard to tell if there is something on the other side of the cliff, and the forcefield is invisible and will kill you. Usually, it's preceded with something like an unscalable cliff or dropoff, so it'll be obvious you have to turn back. Some Arenas do have difficult landscapes as part of it, so just be careful. If you are not running away from someone or something, don't go somewhere you have to fight the terrain. The one thing you should not do is go up or down very steep cliffs. That never ends well."
"Should we stay together?"
"Absolutely not. You'll kill each other on the first night. From now on, think only about yourselves."
George and Patricia did as instructed. Diana was able to guess that the Arena would be cold and barren, which was not good. "I will prioritize sleeping bags if I have to, but no guarantees." Not that many people wanted her now, and those that did tended to have smaller wallets.
"So should we go deeper into the Cornucopia?"
"If it is truly that cold, they will have something on the outside. Boring if everyone just freezes to death."
George got a four and Patricia - a three. Diana was unable to figure out what it was they had done wrong. She certainly hadn't done anything supernatural in there, and she hadn't been particularly noteworthy in training, either.
For interview prep, she and Elly did their usual thing. In the morning, she took George, who by now was resigned to death and spent hours in prayer every day. His token would be his cross necklace.
"Let's try some typical questions first." George slouched, but Elly would fix that. "So, George, what do you think of the Capitol so far?" She had a list in her notebook of most popular questions by average amount of times asked, complete with trends courtesy of Leonella.
"Well, it's nice. I like the food."
"So do I! What's your favourite?"
"Chocolate," he said after a pause.
"Excellent choice. Now, you don't have a very high score. Anything up your sleeve?"
"I guess?"
"What will you do when you're in the Arena?"
"Try to survive, I guess."
"What do you have at home waiting for you?"
"My family."
Diana sighed. "Alright, we can work with this. We'll do quiet and confident. No 'I guess' or anything of the sort. You're in good shape, so that speaks for itself. Stick to brief answers, but speak more confidently. And pretend to be confident about the Arena. You can admit you know your odds are low, but if you sound like you've given up, you'll be forgettable. Don't say 'I'll try to survive', say 'Do everything I can to return home'. If he asks about your score, say some things are hard to demonstrate."
George nodded. "Uh-huh. Act confident, like I know what I'm doing."
"Exactly. Let's try again. Do you think that score of yours reflects your capabilities?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Some things are hard to demonstrate."
"But they're the key to success?"
"Yes."
"How will they help you?"
"How do I answer that?"
"Say something like 'you'll see'."
"Uh-huh. You'll see."
"Excellent. Monosyllabic is fine, Flickerman will do the talking, and as long as you have a few interesting remarks, it won't be dull."
Over lunch, Elly said that Patricia did great. The middle-class girl was more practiced in speaking, too. "So, what do you think of your competition?" Diana asked.
"I prefer to keep that to myself."
"How are you liking the Capitol?"
"Oh, I love it. My room is so nice, it's so big and comfortable, and I have so many clothes to choose from. I wish I could live here."
"Do not go into that level of detail, the average Capitolian doesn't want to think about your room being the size of their apartment."
"Alright. Um, my room is lovely and very comfortable. Everyone I've met is so nice, I can't believe such a nice place exists." Diana imagined the faces of working-class Capitolians listening to Tributes singing the praises of luxuries they only saw on television. "And I love my clothes. This outfit is so nice. My stylist is great."
"Do you think we'll see each other again?"
Patricia kept her face even. "I know I will do everything to come back."
"Do you trust your Mentor?"
Patricia looked weirdly at her.
"He asked variants of that question multiple times each year in the past few years. I'm not the most popular, but I'm fairly young, so it's possible he'll decide to talk about me instead of you."
"I trust her with all my heart and know she will do everything to help me. She is an example and an inspiration."
"Good. This is generally good. Make sure to smile even when he asks about disturbing things. You're naturally fairly upbeat, stay that way, it's a good look. Now, is your training score deceptive?"
"It is. I might have tried something flashy but impractical there, but you'll see that when it comes to it, I have no equals." She smiled.
Everything Patricia and George said at the interview rapidly became irrelevant when the girl from Seven confessed that the baby daddy of her ten-month-old was actually someone else ("I just don't want her to grow up not knowing the truth!") and the boy from Ten admitted that he didn't actually love his wife (who was pregnant with their second child) and wanted her to marry someone else instead of mourning. The well-bred Capitolians in the audience clearly struggled to wrap their heads around the small-town drama. Diana was just glad Patricia had volunteered.
Unlike the Tributes, the audience had several minutes to scrutinize the Arena before the gong. It was a cold, rocky, and barren place pitted with holes and canyons. The Gamemakers had gotten creative this year. Not only were the Tributes far further from the Cornucopia than usual, but there was a four metre wide, metre fifty-deep moat between them and any supplies bare metres from the pedestals. Diana rechecked the catalogue, but she remembered right - survival gear and even water was extremely expensive. There was absolutely no way she could send two sleeping bags. One would drain her resources.
Someone was getting fired for this.
The gong sounded and, understandably, sixteen Tributes ran away from the Cornucopia with nothing. There weren't even any loose rocks that could be used as weapons. The Careers waded across, too far away from the others to attack, as did two others. The Cornucopia itself was unimpressive. There were six identical bags with sleeping bags, enough MREs to last the pack a week if eaten at the expected pace, so enough once they stretched it and added in sponsor gifts, and enough water. There were spare socks, but no other articles of clothing, which would be a nightmare, and a first-aid kit. Weapons-wise, there were ten knives, and that was it.
The boy from Three reconsidered halfway across the moat and went back. He would freeze to death. The girl from Eight got across, realized she was in trouble, and tried to go back, but the boy from Four easily caught up to her and slit her throat. A cannon rang out.
"So," the girl from Two said. "Anyone has any ideas how we're supposed to not freeze to death?"
The camera cut to the others walking around. The phone rang. It was Leonella. "This sucks," she said. "They should have had twelve sleeping bags and have them be the only things outside the moat, alongside with a knife next to each one, and made the moat not so wide. Or not had it be so cold. It is really interesting to have running away or towards the Cornucopia be more clearly delineated choices, but there is no good option here unless you have loads of sponsor money, and going by how nobody has more than a bit of water, you don't."
"I'll pass on your application to Seneca Crane." If he wasn't being fired for this, that was. Leonella giggled. "I have to work now. I'll call you back."
"Alright." She hung up. Diana sent George and Patricia some food and water and called up her usual sponsors, but they said they wanted them to survive the night first.
Diana wished one of them had died so she could send in a sleeping bag, but they had about equal chances, so it was hard to choose one over the other. Two Tributes died from accidents over the course of the afternoon and two were badly injured, though they would linger for days if not put out of their misery. Diana stayed up all night, knowing that if she fell asleep, the cannons would give her flashbacks. She sat in her armchair, read books, crocheted, and kept an eye on the screen. As the temperature dropped, the Tributes began to freeze. The soaked boy from Three went first. Then another. Then another. And another. Diana struggled to keep her eyes open as the hours ticked by until the clock hit midnight and her 'second wind' set in. Another quiet death. And another.
Diana was so infinitely grateful to be the way she was. Rabbi Simon had always said that God made people in certain ways on purpose, and maybe he had a point. She would have taken a thousand more accusations from exes of being 'cold' or 'unfeeling' or even 'sociopathic' if it meant being able to sit here and watch Patricia fade away in her sleep without feeling any emotion.
George and a few others had the good sense to stay awake, but he was obviously struggling to not pass out. The price of everything had jumped, but thanks to nocturnal sponsors she was able to send him a decent blanket, which he wrapped around himself as he sat on the ground. She then finally turned off the audio and slept, only to discover the next morning that ten Tributes remained. Forget firing, someone was going up against the wall for this.
The temperature did not increase. It was below freezing and remained so. Was some sort of equipment broken? The Careers only had heat-reflecting blankets and socks to wear, so even though the moat was gone, they opted to stay where they were. This had to be bad planning. That moat should have been gone immediately after the Bloodbath and there should have been spare clothes.
A spear was delivered. The boy from Two wrapped his blanket around himself and set off, but just minutes later, he was attacked by wolves and had to beat a retreat, masterfully swinging his spear this way and that to prevent them from pouncing. When Diana had been little, she had seen someone survive being attacked by a pack of stray dogs by using her satchel in a similar way. It was impressive, but what were the Gamemakers thinking? The Careers now sure as hell weren't going anywhere.
That night, the temperature fell so low, the Careers only survived thanks to huddling in a pile under their blankets. George did not make it, and neither did the others. Once the last cannon sounded, the pack stepped outside, looking rather absurd in their blankets and socks and armed with one or two knives each. They took off their blankets - thankfully, they were wearing underwear - bowed to each other, and the final fight, the first pack collapse in over a decade, began. Wounds were instantly apparent on mostly naked bodies. Since the fight was so big, there was no time to finish off an adversary. The boy from Two, down with a gut wound, managed to slash the boy from Four's ankle and make him fall down.
Several minutes later, it was over. The Fours and the girl from One were still breathing, but they were too injured to do more than lie there, nearly naked in negative twenty, their blood steaming in the air. The girl from One made it the longest, becoming, technically speaking, the first-ever Victor with no kills to her name, not even a partial - Templesmith cheerfully announced that none of the wounds she had inflicted had been major. Despite everything he had said about his sister being willing to sacrifice herself and him being fine with it, Gloss Delacruz wept from joy and relief. Diana couldn't fault him. Sometimes luck was on one person's side, sometimes - another.
A/N: The title (יִתְגַּדַּל in the original) is the first word in the Mourners' Kaddish, a prayer recited during the bereavement period and on the anniversary of someone's death.
Alpha-PVP, mephedrone, and desomorphine are real drugs, 'springs' are a term I made up - there's constantly new synthetics popping up that have different names.
Applauding at the funeral of someone who was a performer is a thing I've vaguely heard about happening in Russia. When Vladlen Tatarsky got killed, people clapped at his funeral, resulting in people on Twitter speculating - 'what did he perform? the role of a Z-blogger?' or 'is everyone just happy to send him off to the next world?'