Train Journey, Day Two
June 22nd 2427
10:00 hours
Genevieve Ardelean, 17
Rain soaks Geneve's hair as she pushes and wades through the crowds huddled around the scene of a violent triple homicide. The child's vision is completely drowned out by the sea of onlookers until finally, she pushes her way to the front past the yellow, and black tape. A flash of lightning reveals the bodies of her family. She falls down on her knees, a cry bursts from her lungs as the rain drenches her face, and not even the Peacekeepers can hold her back.
That's enough. Geneve returns to this memory occasionally in her lucid dreaming to remember what it feels like to be mournful. She never let herself truly grieve her family, instead, she shelved her feelings away along with the memory and kept it locked deep down in a vault in the depths of her mind, only returning to it on the rarest of occasions. She always found it more useful to put her feelings to the side and think objectively. It's what allowed her to bring her family's killers to justice.
The scene fades away, and suddenly she is walking down the train that's heading to the Capitol - where she is now in the present in the real world, only in the real world, she's asleep on her bed. She raises her arms up and floats out of the train. The wind takes her upwards, and she soars out in front of the train - straight to the Capitol.
An endless, gloomy library looms up above her. The books are stacked up in winding, zig-zagging spirals, and everything seems to have a sickly, green tint to it. She has been returning here almost every night in her dreams to try to get clues on what is to come. But she still can't make sense of what it means.
A sensation grabs her attention from behind. A sensation that she feels is entirely out of her control. There is a shadow of a person in between the rows of books. Who is this mysterious figure? She didn't put them there. How is this happening? Everything that happens in her dreams should be in her control.
"Who are you?" She mutters.
The shadow doesn't respond. Instead, it begins to steadily creep forward.
In turn, Geneve slowly inches backward. Fear strikes her heart; she hasn't felt fear in her dreams for a long time.
"What do you want?"
Still no response but the figure is getting faster and faster, and the rows of books are closing in around Geneve - again out of her control. Is someone hijacking her dream? Impossible.
The shadow abruptly zigzags in a stiff, in-human motion then darts directly at Geneve! She closes her eyes, and everything fades to blackness.
Geneve's eyes shoot open to the sight of the train ceiling. She's back in her room in the real world. The career's heart is pounding in her chest. What the hell was that?
She hastily hops out of bed and yanks open the draw in her bedside table. Inside is her mother's old spell book. She frantically starts flicking through it in search of the section on lucid dreaming.
Knock, knock.
Geneve sighs. "Who's there?"
"It's erm me… Landon. Breakfast is served."
"Gimme a minute," Geneve calls back.
The young detective rips out the page about lucid dreaming before stuffing it in her pocket. She can't bring the whole spell book with her as it has been taboo in her district for some time.
After getting dressed in her smart clothes, she pulls the door open to find her district partner standing there. The freckled boy's chestnut-red hair is sloppily tied in a bun. His eyes are alive with excitement and the energy of a newborn calf taking its first walk.
"I know we haven't talked much in the past, but I just wanted you to know that I always thought you were super badass," he greets, sticking out his hand for a fist-bump rather than a handshake.
"Urm… thanks. You seem pretty cool too," Geneve awkwardly bumps his fist, unsure of what to make of this boy.
He's not at all what she had imagined, she has to admit that. His parents always looked down on families like Geneve's - families that often struggled to make ends meet. However, Landon doesn't seem to share his parent's snobbery.
Landon sends her an amiable smile then they begin strolling together through the carriage.
"You gotta admit, it's kinda strange," Landon begins.
"What is?"
"What we're doing, volunteering to kill other kids in other districts."
His bluntness catches Geneve off guard, but before she can give a response, her district partner has already lept up onto the railings on the train ceiling and began crawling across it like a spider.
Just then, the escort enters the carriage with the pair's mentor at her side. Their mentor's name is Titania. She is a tall, well-built woman and in her late fifties as District One has not had a victor for some time now. She has trained Geneve a few times before but was never one of her primary trainers. But she has the same permanent frown that she always had when Geneve saw her at the academy.
"Hi Gene," she greets. "Sleep well?"
"It was okay," Geneve lies.
"Mhm… where's Landon?"
Geneve points toward the ceiling.
"Wah!"
Landon loses his grip on the railings and crashes onto the train floor.
"I'm ok!" He calls.
Titania shakes her head and squeezes the top of her nose.
Landon leaps back up onto his feet and then dusts himself off. "It's ok, I meant to do that."
He throws himself onto the seat to the right with the escort while Geneve and Titania take a seat together on the other side.
The stoic mentor leans in and smiles at Geneve for the first time. "Cesar and Ophelia always spoke highly of you, yer know."
Geneve's eyes widen. "You know the head peacekeeper?"
"Of course," Titania nods. "He told me all about how you brought your family's killers to justice. If you were capable of that at the age of nine, then who knows what else you'll be capable of."
Geneve turns red, beginning to shift uncomfortably in her seat.
Titania gives her a once-over. "Sorry… Cesar mentioned you never enjoyed talking about yourself much. Maybe we can continue this conversation more privately."
"Yeah, I'd much prefer that-"
"We can talk about me if you like, I don't mind," Landon cuts in, leaning against the window with his head resting on his hand and looking decidedly bored.
Geneve and Titania shoot a glance at him simultaneously.
"What? I'm just sayin'," he shrugs.
"Why don't we all move to the dining table? The chefs have worked very hard this morning," the escort says.
Landon springs up first with the escort not far behind. Titania stands up in front of Geneve in the centre of the train. "Cesar also told me about the dreams," she mentions, raising an eyebrow.
Geneve pauses to reply but Titania has already turned away from her. What does she know about the dreams? Is she trained in the art of lucid dreaming as well? If so, maybe she can help Geneve get to the bottom of who that mysterious figure was in her dream.
Or am I treading further and further into dangerous water? Maybe I'm meddling with things I'm not supposed to - the thought fleetingly crosses Geneve's mind.
Briar Bacardi, 17
"Well… look on the bright side - we got out of the suburbs," Chaney's goofy smile extends across his face as he leans forward on the table between him and his girlfriend. "We always wanted to get out of the suburbs…"
Briar lets out the deepest, most disgruntled groan she ever has in her entire life. She's confused, half of her wants to jump across the table and smack him over his dumb head for doing something so stupid. The other half wants to jump across the table, pull him into her embrace, and kiss him; he did just volunteer for the Hunger Games to be with her, after all.
"Did you have to do that? I mean, did you have to? What were you thinking?" She cries.
Chaney removes his arms from the table and begins fiddling with his hands. "I dunno… I wasn't, I guess… I just can't lo-"
"That's your problem, isn't it?! You never think!"
The train carriage falls silent for a moment - an unusual feat with any room containing Chaney.
Chaney rubs his face, his eyes going inwards for a second, trying to figure out a way to calm Briar's anxieties; he always had a knack for that when nobody else did. "Remember when we robbed that bank a few months back? And the bookies before that? That was fun aha…"
"I'm waiting for your point…" Briar says.
"The point is… we were livin' in the... I think I've lost my train of thought." He chuckles. "Get it because we're on a train?"
Briar rolls her eyes. Staring at his smile and bright smile - she wishes she'd never met him in that street corner on that fateful day. She wishes with all her heart that she had rejected his offer of a partnership. This was destined to happen to her, she's always been destined to crash and burn. But this time it's worse. This time she's brought Chaney down with her. He never had anyone; he was just as lost as she was when they first met, and now the only thing she's done for him is to get him killed, along with her.
(Was her father right this entire time? Is she nothing more than a disappointment?)
Briar glances out of the window at the moving trees zooming past, taking in a deep breath to cleanse her anger. Then she glances back at Chaney. "I just don't understand what you expected to happen? I mean now instead of just one of us, most likely both of us will die…"
Chaney shrugs. "I guess I was thinkin' that we'd figure it out, just like we always do… remember a few years back when those three tributes broke out of the arena or whatever? We could do that?" He tilts his head with a smirk. "The boy was even tall and handsome, just like me."
Briar rolls her eyes once more. "And how many times has that happened? Once? In like a hundred years?"
Silence again, until Chaney gulps. "We'll figure it out… we always do," he repeats. "We create our own luck, together, remember?" He smiles.
Briar's mind flashes back to that day in the car, before the heist where he tossed the ring to her, and she almost smiles back, almost.
There is silence again, save for the sounds of the train bumping against the tracks. The silence is broken by the arrival of their mentor - Lance, a victor from District Eleven.
(Since the events of the coup six years ago, there has been a distinct shortage of mentors. So, The Capitol has had to resort to other districts in order to fill in all the gaps.)
Other than his prosthetic leg, the only other thing noticeable about Lance is he appears to develop more wrinkles as each year passes.
He perches down silently on the seats parallel to the two lovers from Nine.
"Well… don't everyone talk at once," Chaney pipes up.
Lance closes his tired eyes and then squeezes the top of his nose. "Tacita tells me that you two are a erm…thing?"
"Wasn't it obvious?" Chaney blurts back.
Lance pauses for a moment and strokes his chin. "No… not yet at least. In fact, that's what I wanted to talk to you about."
The pair both perk up in interest.
"Since the failed second rebellion, The Capitol hasn't exactly been a fan of love stories in the arena-"
"You gotta be shitting me," Chaney interrupts. "You're not saying-"
"You can still be a couple in private, but we're pretty damn sure that if it goes public then you'll be targeted by The Capitol… not to mention the other tributes."
"No way," Chaney shoots back immediately, shaking his head and folding his arms. "Never gonna happen."
Briar finds that her eyes are fixed on Chaney for a brief moment, caught in a kind of trance at his silly face. All these years, if anyone ever asked her what she saw in him she'd say something like "I needed a good get-away driver." The truth is she always felt sorry for him, in a way. He was abandoned by everybody he'd ever known… everybody until she came along. She understood him like no one else could and he understood her. So, if there is some chance… some way of getting him out of this, to prove that she won't abandon him like everyone else, then she'll take it.
What difference does it make if we act like a couple or not? There's no way we're returning a couple.
"Chaney," she mutters, and his eyes meet hers. "Let's think about this rationally, I know that's hard for you but if there's any option to increase our chances then shouldn't we take it?"
"I don't believe this," he sighs. "Fine, we can give it a shot, I guess," he concedes, although half-heartedly.
"Good," Lance responds, pushing himself up. "Because I wasn't askin', I was telling. My job is to get one of you outta here alive, but I can't help you if you won't help me."
With that, the one-legged mentor hobbles off, leaving the couple together.
Chaney leans back on his chair, smirking to himself ironically. "This just keeps getting better by the minute," he says.
"Chaney…" Briar murmurs. "You know we wouldn't be doing this if we had any other choice-"
"But what about living in the moment? What about not giving a shit what anyone thinks? What about our life together?"
"That life… that future is gone," Briar replies, coldly.
Chaney shakes his head. "I don't believe you," he swallows.
He breathes in. "So what's it gonna be? In public, we're just acquaintances but in private we're boyfriend and girlfriend?"
"Looks that way," Briar shrugs.
Morton "Ren" Moreno, 18
Screams have been ringing through Ren's mind for the last five months. But strangely, he never realized that he'd enjoy the sound of it so much. There's something about a last plea, a beg for help, despite how fruitless it is, that's fascinating to him. Will everybody react the same in their last moments? What about emotional pain? Is it worse than physical pain? Ren has never loved anyone in their life, but other people seem to be uniquely hurt when they lose someone they love - in a way that physical pain simply can't replicate. It doesn't make any logical sense to Ren, but it seems to happen, nevertheless.
CRASH
To Ren's irritation, their thoughts are cut short by someone wholly irrelevant to them - their District partner. She just hit her shoulder on the stack of plates in the canteen that Ren is feasting in.
(He hasn't been able to gorge himself like this in the months living in Twill's attic.)
Alizka, Ren's District partner, hasn't noticed him yet as he's leaning against the train wall and calmly shoveling a rice meal into his mouth from his plate.
Ren stealthily steps out of the shadows. "Did your parents never teach you not to startle people?"
Alizka jumps back in surprise, gasping and clutching her heart. Her eyes are still glistening and red from where she's been crying. "Sorry! I didn't know you were there," she responds.
She shoots Ren a smile as bright as her dress to try to clear the air that's developed between them in these first few moments of talking, but Ren simply ignores her, tossing their plate down on the rack. Then, the dentist picks up a fork, wishing it was a knife, and heads over to the fruit section. They begin to impale some sliced-up sections of fruit before sticking them in their mouth.
"I'm Alizka but most people call me Liz, and you're Morton, right?"
"It's Ren! I Can't stand that name."
Ren aggressively jabs another piece of fruit before gobbling it up.
"My mistake… I get that this must be stressful for you too," Liz offers. "Whatever the reason that you were running, whatever led you to volunteer… I'm not judging you-"
Ren abruptly stabs down on the last piece of fruit firmly - quickly growing tired of this meaningless conversation. "You know," he points his fork at his district partner. "You remind me of someone I once knew. Someone that wouldn't keep her mouth shut, someone that kept sticking her nose into other people's business." he gradually steps forward as Liz stumbles back, and her eyes grow wider with fear. "It didn't end well for her either-"
"Sorry to intrude," a voice cuts in, like a bell ending a playground fight.
Their mentor is standing in the doorway, just as Liz's back has reached the wall of the train and the intensity of the room couldn't get any higher.
Ren's district partner recovers her breathing and clenches her fists. "Just don't speak to me again, understand?" She says, doing her best to try to sound intimidating.
She pushes past Ren and their mentor and runs back to her room.
The dentist's son then looks their mentor up and down; he is a monster of a man, about six foot six and broad-chested with a large, bald head. He's known as "Baize the Bone Crusher", and one of the few surviving victors of the new Panem. Ren would rather fight an enraged grizzly bear than this man.
"So, why do they call you the bone crusher?" Ren asks.
Baize frowns. "Because I… crush bones."
The two of them then proceed to take a seat for a more in-depth discussion.
"Let me get straight to the point," Baize begins, his voice coarse and rough. "I know what you did, so does your escort."
"Good," Ren responds. "The other tributes should feel fear when they hear my name."
"Yes and no," Baize states.
Ren raises an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"I like you. Do you wanna know why? You have potential. Potential to win, which is good news for me and more importantly, my records."
Ren snorts. "How noble."
"But if we're gonna make that happen then we don't want to reveal all your cards yet. It may not look like it, but I was able to play the nice, gentle boy before the bone-crushing hobby began."
"What are you suggesting?"
Baize leans back on his chair and strokes his chin, his eyes drifting upwards. "I say… we wait until the interviews - they seem to be effective for grabbing people's attention."
Ren ponders this for a moment. He's never particularly liked being told what to do by anyone but on the other hand, the shock of a reveal like that in the interviews would put them in the spotlight for sure. If this is his way of being remembered, then so be it. It doesn't matter how the world remembers them as long as it remembers them all the same.
"Alright, we'll do it your way," Ren says. A fox-like grin appears on his face, imagining the sight of his parent's jaws dropping open as their son gleefully confesses a murder on live TV.
"But in order for this to work, we're gonna have to pick your allies very carefully. Either someone as messed up as you or someone too afraid of you to dare break an alliance."
(Ren can't decide which he prefers the sound of.)
"But judging by the reaping recap and from what I know of the other tributes-"
"How about the careers?" Ren interrupts.
(Ren has no real interest in working with the careers but the idea of showing the careers up and destroying them from the inside is something he'd relish.)
The huge mentor shakes his head immediately. "Too unpredictable. We gotta think outside the box… I like the sound of the boy from Fourteen."
"The volunteer?" Ren remembers.
Baize nods.
"You think he's good?"
"Maybe better than good… he could be an asset."
Ren nods in agreement. "Fine, let's do it." He pushes himself up from the table, eager to leave but Baize holds his hand out to stop him.
"Just one more thing."
"What?"
"If you wanna make allies then we gonna have to work on your… charisma… or lack thereof," he says.
"What do you mean?"
Baize smirks, ironically. "Exactly that… so I'm gonna give you some lessons in charisma to prepare you for your interview."
"Fine," Ren concedes, rolling their eyes.
Reese Haricot, 15
Sometimes, in the darkest days of winter, when Reese had found his mother coughing and gasping for air under her worn, single sheet, she'd call him naive, she'd tell him that his head is constantly in the clouds. She'd attempt to hug him and apologise afterward, but the boy kept his mother's words in the back of his mind - hoping that they weren't true.
Even now, as he is staring out the window in wonder, on his way to the Capitol to compete in the Hunger Games; the Capitol is a bright, silver castle in the sky before his eyes. It's far above the clouds and shinier and grander than he ever could have imagined. It's dangerous, sure, but what adventure doesn't come with a little danger? If Reese is truly like the sunflowers that saved his mother, then he'll blossom again, no matter what life throws at him. Just like how any flower blossoms again after every winter.
His district partner hadn't said much and has been hiding in her room most of the time - leaving Reese alone with nothing but his imagination, which was nothing new.
(His life back at home was just him wandering the district with only his music to keep him company.)
"Reese!"
His mentor's voice snaps him abruptly back to reality. His feet lose their balance in the process, and he almost topples straight off of the table he is standing on. However, he steadies himself on the train floor, only spilling a cup of tea in the process.
"Whoops! Sorry!" He blurts.
As quickly as it is spilled, the tea is mopped up by an avox.
His mentor can only fold her arms and chuckle in amusement at the clumsy boy. She told him yesterday that her name is Thia. She is of average height with dark skin and bleached blond hair. Beneath the smiles she is a stern-looking woman - Reese imagines she has likely been worn down by life's hardships like a rock being slowly eroded by the waves.
"As we are arriving at the Capitol today, I thought we could have a little talk to help prepare you," she says.
"Of course! Thank you!"
Reese scampers to take a seat opposite his mentor but hits her with a question before she can even finish sitting down. "Can I ask you something… that might sound kinda dumb?"
Thia smiles. "No question is dumb, not with so much at stake-"
"Yeah so, I read that the Capitol has these beasts that they can create… like monsters. I've seen them on TV. Is this true? That the Capitol has monsters?"
Thia nods, her eyes drifting down. "The Capitol has plenty of monsters… just maybe not the kind you're thinking of."
"It may sound kinda stupid, but I always imagined being the one to slay those monsters… maybe save one of my friends from certain death in the process," Reese interjects. He picks up a butter knife, which to him is a glimmering sword, from the table and jabs it at the air.
Thia chuckles. "You're a strange boy, aren't you?" she says affectionately.
Reese drops the butter knife. "Sorry, I'm gettin' sidetracked again, aren't I?"
"A little…"
Thia then adopts a more serious expression, furrowing her eyebrows. "Listen Reese… there's something I wanted to talk to you about. Well, two things actually. Let's call it good news and bad news."
"Sure," Reese smiles, bright like the sun outside.
"There's something that has caught my eye about you. I'm not supposed to be this blunt, but you do know what's gonna happen to you, right? What you're gonna have to do?"
"I-I…"
"You're going to be forced to kill other kids in front of the entire country," Thia says plainly.
A shadow seems to creep through the entire train around Reese, and all the colour from outside turns grey. He bows his head… reality always hits him hard.
(Maybe it started all that time ago when his mother had told him that his father left and never returned.
Maybe there is no good reason why he disappeared, so the fantasies just make more sense to Reese.)
"I don't mean to scare you… I just want to give you the best chance you can get, and I need your head to be in the game," Thia continues.
A gentle smile returns to Reese's lips. "I understand," he says.
His mentor smiles back, reaching into her pocket. "Now for the good news!"
She produces a shining, new harmonica from her pocket and Reese's eyes light up with excitement.
"After you told me about your harmonica yesterday, I asked around. Turns out Septimus has one that he's never used, you know Capitolite's, they often have a bunch of stuff they don't need."
Reese gratefully reaches forward and takes the little, metal instrument, then examines it in his hands. Shape-wise, it is almost identical to his father's, just a lot shinier and a lot less rusty. But Reese has always been extremely sentimental about small things like this, and he can tell just by the weight that it's not his father's.
Still, it's the thought that counts, and he knows that. So, he smiles up at his mentor. "Thank you, it's perfect!" He hops off his seat and gives her an appreciative hug.
"It's the least I could do."
"Where did an escort get a brand-new harmonica, anyway?" Reese inquires as he begins to blow into the instrument. It creates a slightly uncomfortable high-pitched sound as his lips aren't used to this particular harmonica.
"He told me that he got it from some merchant, dressed in a golden suit."
Reese immediately stops playing his instrument and stares at Thia like she's just sprouted wings.
"A merchant?"
"Yeah… apparently he had a collection of harmonicas," Thia answers. "You ok? You look like you've just seen a ghost."
Reese, realising he has gone pale, returns his smile to his face. "Yeah, I'm fine," he says. He stretches out his arms. "Thanks again for the gift, I think I might go for a nap before dinner if that's ok?"
"Of course."
As Reese is plodding back down the train, a sickly feeling develops in his stomach. It couldn't have been a coincidence. It has to be the same merchant. Who is this mysterious man? Is he playing some kind of twisted trick on Reese? So many questions whirling around in Reese's brain and so little time to find the answers to them.
Is my father involved, somehow? Will I see him again?
That last question is more like wishful thinking to Reese. But he's read many fables before and if his father did come galloping in to save him at the end of it then that would seem about right to him. That's just how every great story ends.
Hi thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed. If you've got time, I'd love to hear your thoughts. I hope you all have a great weekend"