District 9 female – Bulga Conroy, 14

Get her. Scare her. Take her money so you can feed yourself. Don't be so weak. You're being weak, Bulga. Don't be a pussy, get the damn money!

I jumped out from the bridge that I'd been hiding under at the little girl who was walking past the bridge I'd been hiding under. She was probably too young even to be reaped into the Hunger Games, so small and weak that it was easy to pry the Panemian dollars that she'd been so foolish to carry out of her hands and leave her crying.

I left her there crying and sprinted back into the town, looking down at the money I'd taken and counting it as I ran. It was enough to get something other than grainy food for once, maybe even one of the more expensive food items sent from another district, like meat from District 10.

I walked into the butchery and bought myself an already-cooked beef sausage, then wolfed it down. I was starving. It was eight o'clock at night and that sausage was the first thing I'd eaten since seven o'clock the previous night at the orphanage. I'd run away the next morning before breakfast.

It wasn't the first time I'd run away from the orphanage. It was a common occurrence, actually. I'd get so sick of the owner there, how she'd neglect and abuse me, how the older kids at the orphanage would bully me, that I would just run away. But always, no more than two days later, the peacekeepers would find me and take me back to that torture cage.

That's why I stayed under the bridge a lot of the time. Not only did it give me shelter and keep me hidden from anyone who might want to kidnap me, but it also a lot of little kids would walk past the bridge and I'd have the chance to jump out at them and take their food, or their money so I could go and buy food.

So, that night, after I finished eating my sausage, I made my way back to underneath the bridge and found a comfortable position, and fell asleep.

The mandatory viewing that was projected in the middle of town the next morning was so loud that I could hear it from under the bridge. I groaned and lay down as I listened. It was about the first Quarter Quell, and how tomorrow morning we'd be able to vote for the tributes who would go into the Hunger Games.

That was different, as usually the tributes were chosen randomly. This was a good twist, though, because it meant I could vote for someone I thought could win the games, but also wouldn't mind if they died.

I clambered out from under the bridge so I could find a kid to steal breakfast from, but then an older girl saw me coming out from under the bridge and approached me. I felt my stomach flip at how much taller than me she was.

"Well, if it isn't Bulga Conroy," she said. "Or should I say the little troll under the bridge?"

I felt a pang in my heart. So many people called me a troll because I would hide under the bridge. It made me self-conscious, but I wasn't going to let this girl know that.

"Yeah?" I said.

"Did you hear about the Quarter Quell?" she said. "My little sister, whose money you stole yesterday, and I are going to vote for you."

"OK," I said. I didn't care. Two votes weren't going to get me into the games. Everyone would vote for criminals, for example, a boy who'd set the entire wheat fields on fire and was going to be executed anyway.

The girl didn't move. "Can I help you?"

"Yeah, actually," the girl said. "Piss off. Don't go near my little sister again. Or I'll snap your neck."

I felt myself shiver. I hated when older kids did the exact thing to me that I did to younger kids. But that was just the way the world worked. The bigger and older you were, the more power you had.

"OK," I said, trying to pass her, but she gripped my shoulder.

"OK, what?"

"O-OK, I won't go near your sister," I said.

"You better not," the girl said, finally letting go of my shoulder, and I walked away from her as fast as I could.

I headed into town and approached a girl who was in the year below me in school.

"Hey," I said to her. She jumped and spun around slowly to face me. "You got any money for me to buy myself some breakfast?"

"I – no..." the girl said, but her hand moved to her pocket. I sneered.

"Give it to me," I said. "Now. Or I'll choke you."

The girl's large brown eyes widened, and she pulled a few coins from her pocket and held her hand out to me. I grinned and snatched them out of her hands, then walked towards the bakery.

The bakery in District 9 was the second-best bakery in Panem, the best one obviously being in the Capitol. But since our district was the district that provided the grain and wheat to make bread and other bakery foods, we got a good share of pastries.

I stood in the long queue now to get one of those pastries, and heard people talking about the Quarter Quell.

"I think it's unfair," said one old woman to her husband. "It's bad enough seeing these kids get chosen randomly, but to have to pick one out? I don't want to do that..."

I got to the front of the line after five minutes of standing in it, and when I asked for a sweet pastry, the man behind the counter narrowed his eyes at me.

"You're one of the orphanage kids, aren't you?" he asked me. "Shouldn't you still be at the orphanage?"

"No, I'm not," I said quickly. "My parents are waiting just outside for me."

"No, they're not," he said. "You're from the orphanage!"

I shook my head, then left the bakery, but the man was already calling for peacekeepers. I sighed, then began to run from them.

District 9 male – Calvus Logg, 15

I felt myself yawning and staring at someone other than the teacher. There was less than a minute left of class, and it was a Friday. Why would I still want to concentrate?

We were dismissed finally, and when everyone got up, I found myself face to face with my friend, Maize. He grinned, showing off the gap between his teeth, and pushed his long dark hair behind his ears.

"What you doing this afternoon?" he asked.

"Working," I said, stepping back slightly from him and then leaning down to pick up my bag.

"You're working an awful lot recently," said Maize.

"Yeah, maybe," I said. "I want to prove to my aunt that I can be the new owner of the brewery when she retires. Yet no matter how hard I work she still seems to prefer Carter."

"Are you working tomorrow?"

"Not until eleven," I said.

"Should we hang out before eleven, then?" asked Maize. "We could just go to my place and watch the announcement of the Quarter Quell, eat a few snacks as we do so?"

"Yeah, alright," I said, feeling my cheeks heat. "See you then."

"See you," said Maize, then we left the school together and went our separate ways.

I got to the brewery and my Aunt Nessa and my cousin, Carter were both already there, working hard. I quickly got myself ready and got straight to work. I worked as hard as I could, as I'd been waiting all day to come here.

Competing with Carter for the top spot in being the heir to owning this brewery wasn't entirely fair. First of all, it was his mother who was choosing, and who ran it, not mine, and he also had the advantage of not being at school anymore, giving him all day every day to work hard and impress Aunt Nessa. As much as I looked up to him, I was incredibly jealous of him and would love to swap lives with him.

But.

If I was to swap lives with Carter, that would mean that I wouldn't have met Maize. Or, if I had, I would be twelve years older than Maize, and it would be even more unacceptable than it already was for me to admire him as I did.

If I was to tell anyone else about the way I looked at Maize, the way I secretly looked at him, I don't think anyone would like me. Not that anyone in the district knew about me. I'd rather remain known as the youngest member of a wealthy family who gets forgotten about than the youngest member of a wealthy family who was gay.

"Cal, would you mind giving the kegs a clean?" said my aunt Nessa, interrupting my thoughts. I nodded, then picked up a cloth and made my way to the first keg.

I got off at ten o'clock that night, and I felt exhausted. However exhausted I felt, though, I felt good about myself. Aunt Nessa had complimented my work, about halfway through the shift.

The next morning, however, I bought some candy on my way to Maize's house, and when I was there plopped myself next to him on his couch in front of the hologram that was about to show President Snow announcing the twist of the first Quarter Quell. But I made an effort not to sit too close to him, because I didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable.

Not that he knew that I had feelings for him, of course. But could maybe have a feeling. It wasn't like I was good at hiding it.

Anyway, we were both silent as President Snow's face filled the screen, listening intently. What if the Quarter Quell was that all tributes had to have the initials 'C.L'? Then I would be screwed.

Maize looked worried, too, and part of me wanted to take his hand, but of course, I couldn't do that. The twist was announced before I could overthink it, however. The twist would be that the tributes would be voted in by their own district.

"OK, that's fine, then," said Maize. "It will be bullies and criminals who get voted. We can both live another year!"

"Thank god," I said.

"Who are you going to vote for?" Maize asked me.

"I don't know," I said. "Probably just random criminals or whatever."

"Alright." Maize paused for a second. "What do you want to do now, then?"

I shrugged. "We could get through this candy, perhaps?"

Maize just smiled his beautiful smile and opened the packet of candy I'd brought.

The voting for the tributes was the next morning, and Aunt Nessa was going on about some rude kid she had hired to work at the brewery with us, and how she thought we should all vote for him.

"That kid needs to be put in his place," said my Uncle Rooten, his voice stern. "A spank or two should do it for him, it works for Cal well enough."

I went pink and looked around, embarrassed. I didn't want others to know that my uncle still spanked me when I was fifteen years old. That was something for toddlers. Because of this, I split away from my family and found Maize in the voting area.

"Who are you voting for?" I asked him, grabbing a piece of paper to write down my own votes.

"Just some random people," said Maize, shrugging. "First names that came to my mind."

"Alright, I'll do that too," I said, writing down some random kids from school, then handing in my paper.

Maize and I walked back to where my cousins, aunt, and uncle were, and on my way, I saw a few people staring at them and whispering.

"Only high in society because they are always loyal to the Capitol..." I heard one of them saying. I shrugged it off, because wasn't everyone in the Districts loyal to the Capitol? We all did work for them, after all. Whatever.

Thank you to Very New To This for Bulga, and Dante Alighieri1308 for Calvus. What do you guys think of these two? See you in the next district!