Pandora Mink, 31
National Broadcasting Studio, Capitol
Master of Ceremonies
June 30, 329 AEDD
Pandora Mink had never bled this much before, and she hoped that she would never bleed this much again. When the gunman had barreled into the room to shoot her and her assistants dead, Pandora had been exceptionally brave if she did say so herself. And she truly had been. Pandora had run right through the spray of bullets, shoved aside the muzzle of the gun, and charged directly at the gunman, intending to tackle him. The gunman had then apparently decided that whatever he was getting paid to fend off this mother bear of a drag queen wasn't enough, and had subsequently fled down the hall after slamming the door on her. Pandora, already mid-tackle, managed to avoid hitting the door, but she was far from alright.
The gunman had poor aim, but you didn't need to have good aim to fire blindly into a cluster of people like he had. Pandora had taken more than a few shots, which had miraculously only grazed her sides instead of lodging in her stomach, but one had nicked the fleshy part of her right thigh, which was spurting blood. She had used her scarf as a bandage, and was medically stable for the time being, but her thoughts were racing. Despite the blood loss, her mind was still sharp, so she tried to mentally pick apart the incident piece by piece.
The setting? The broadcast had just finished. Pandora had been live. The President and the First Lady had ordered her to make an announcement about the need to root out a few rebel spies in high places, and the cameras had stopped rolling not a minute before the gunman had arrived. The broadcasting room was totally soundproof, so she didn't know if he had shot up the entire studio or only that room in particular.
The motive? Pandora wasn't sure, but it might have had something to do with her announcement. Did he know? Was he trying to stop her from making it but then arrived too late? Or was it for another reason entirely?
The perpetrator? He was in full Peacekeeper uniform. Well, Pandora though, he might not have been a he at all. The visor of the Peacekeeper helmet was down, and it had covered the gunman's entire face. And all Peacekeepers, male, female, or otherwise, looked identical in their boxy chestplates and armored shoulderpads. The gunman (gunwoman?) had been perhaps 5'8", a little short for a man or a little tall for a woman, which got Pandora nowhere. The tiny triangle of exposed skin where the gunman's helmet and high-necked vest didn't quite meet was a creamy white, and Pandora had noticed that they had the normal athletic Peacekeeper build that was relatively unremarkable, save for a fairly rounded bottom. Useless, Pandora thought despondently. She couldn't very well ask Nikolai Fassnacht to do a butt lineup of all the average sized, pale-skinned Peacekeepers in the Capitol.
Pandora was contemplating more effective ways to handle the situation when she was interrupted for the second time in a day by a person bolting through the doorway. She sprang up despite her injured leg, thinking that it might be another gunman, but was relieved to see an Avox there instead. This particular one was sucking in heaving breaths of air, as though he had been running fast, and he held up an expensive silk necktie for her to take.
Pandora saw nothing special about it at first, but then she checked the reverse side. Embroidered on the label in spidery cursive script were the words Property of Mr. Nikolai Kazimir Fassnacht. And suddenly it all came flooding back to her.
Kazimir...The Coquettes...that one velvet-bordered portrait of the Madonna that hung in the cathedral-turned-dance club...Senator Johannes Mink...Hope, Meg, and Tiz...the boy they called Boxie...when justice took human form in Alecto...the shop with boxes and boxes of vintage platform heels...leather skirts with shiny silver buckles and corsets with comically large satin bows that were always worn over ripped fishnets...not-so-chaste cheek kisses on a train platform...the dirt-poor bartender who had tipped something into Hope's drink...a young Ivan Cardozo...an untold hero...Boxie trading his felt derby for Alecto's flat cap...a white lace glove with a perfectly intact impression of red lipstick...Meg's bloated body floating in the koi pond...the talent scout...telephones ringing...a red lace glove with a perfectly straight row of white pills...the Fassnacht family crest inlaid in red wax on an otherwise white envelope proclaiming that it contained a gift for her...a liquor bottle with the label soaked off…thick syrupy wine, but also not wine, wine wasn't this texture. Or was it? She couldn't seem to remember. Was she always this forgetful? No, just tired. The wine had made her tired. More tired than usual, it seemed. Yes, she had yawned, that sounded right. Wine made her so very tired.…..
Blinking, Pandora shook herself out of the flashback. She couldn't afford to relive the past. It was still so sharp, so painful, and she had tried so hard to forget it. Nikolai was smart. He was smart as a sixteen-year-old and he was smart now. He knew that sending her the tie, and thus reminding her of the double life he led in his younger days, would dredge up all those accompanying memories that Pandora usually kept safely stuffed down. What had Nikolai been trying to truly convey?
No, she corrected herself. Kazimir. What had Kazimir been trying to truly convey? She had to think about her first friend, the boy who was one of the girls, who rocked stilettos six nights a week and wore the same blend of slutty and steampunk as the other Coquettes, not the monogrammed-necktie-having neat freak of a Head Peacekeeper that he had become.
She tried to put the pieces together. The Avox kept anxiously twisting a strand of his hair, which wasn't exactly helping her think, but Pandora understood his fears. Having to tell the man second in power only to the President that you had failed him was probably any slave's worst nightmare, and this Avox was no exception. Pandora knew that he had nothing to fear: Nikolai had never been the sort of person who would lash out in anger. But Pandora also knew that Avoxes were often passed around from official to official. Even the ones that served the tributes during the Hunger Games were only loaned out for that purpose by their owners. They were specially trained to accept abuse and take their beatings quietly, and even if this particular Avox had never been subject to that, he undoubtedly knew others that had, and thus wanted to avoid displeasing authority figures at all costs.
Pandora couldn't exactly explain that to him, though, so she did her best to maintain a calm demeanor and make it seem like she knew what she was doing. That seemed to comfort him at least a little, so she kept it up, mindlessly chattering on about how, ah, yes, of course, and oh, that makes sense, and uh huh, I understand now. To her surprise, it seemed to help her focus as well, and she reached a conclusion after what felt like years but was probably less than two minutes. "Nikolai Fassnacht sent you to me, right?" she asked the Avox. He nodded. "The tie tipped me off. You did a great job fetching it for me! I'm sure he'll be so pleased with you." The Avox seemed very relieved to hear her say so, and visibly untensed a little bit. "Did he send for someone else too? Maybe Konstance DuMouchel or Jacqueline Muriel? I bet I was one of the first people he wanted, so you didn't get the chance to hear what he said to most of the other Avoxes, but I have a pretty good guess as to what he needs if it was one of those two." The Avox nodded again, and Pandora smiled at him.
"That's perfect, honeybun. You're doing really well! I'm going to find him right now. You know where I think he is?" The Avox shook his head, not recognizing that it was a rhetorical question. "I think he's at the Center of Peacekeeping. Why don't you come with me, hmm? You're so smart. I'm very proud of you, and Nikolai will be too once we meet with him. I'm going to tell him all about how brave you were today! I know giving me that tie was hard and scary, but it was really important, and you did it! You've been incredibly helpful. Do you think you can be helpful for just a little while longer?" The Avox nodded, looking significantly more relaxed than he had been just a few moments earlier. The praise was working, Pandora noted. That was good. She wanted to assure the Avox that he wasn't in any trouble. She had used simple, almost childish speech, since most owners (and overseers and masters and bosses, it didn't matter what titles they used) played a cruel game where they deliberately toyed with their Avoxes by giving them confusing, complicated or contradictory orders as an excuse to punish them. The worst part was that they saw it as natural, as a show of loyalty to the Capitol, as though they were doing important work by inflicting pain on former rebels.
Pandora, like Nikolai and Eurydice Shakira, understood that the Avox system was flawed, but it couldn't be fixed overnight. Eurydice had recently begun adopting Avoxes whose owners were arrested on abuse charges into her own private ranks, and Pandora planned on doing the same, although she had to wait until her work slowed down after the Hunger Games were finished. As Pandora led the Avox towards the Center of Peacekeeping, she wondered what his life was like. Had he been treated very badly? She hoped not, but the way his expression had transformed when she said she was pleased indicated otherwise. When the Center of Peacekeeping finally stood before her, Pandora walked right in.
The Peacekeepers were all lined up, and a senior officer seemed to be instructing them to fan out and assess what other damage had been done across the rest of the Capitol. Pandora wondered what damage they could possibly be talking about. The building seemed perfectly fine to her.
She learned the answer to that question the moment she had made her way to Nikolai Fassnacht's office: there was shrapnel coating the carpet and scorch marks over his locked desk drawers and his safe. The safe had been blown open, the papers inside reduced to ash. The same was true for the drawers. Someone had clearly set off small explosives in key spots. But surely the whole Capitol Peacekeeping Force hadn't been mobilized just because of that. What more had happened? A gleaming object in a corner caught her eye, she looked down at the floor, and there was her answer. Bullet casings! Dozens of them! Someone had shot up this room as well, and Pandora realized that she had been so concerned with the scorch marks that the walls were pocked with newly made holes!
Her eye caught a shadow in the window glass and she whirled around to see— "Nikolai!" she exclaimed. "Thank goodness you're alright! I got your message!" She could have leapt into his arms, but she noticed they were occupied by an Avox that was even more twitchy than hers had been. He was glancing at her Avox like they knew each other, and Nikolai was clued in enough to set him down.
"Yes, boys, that's right. You're free to hang out together while Box—sorry, while Pandora and I talk," he called after them. Then, turning to Pandora, he added, "They're some of Eurydice's newbies. I hated ordering them around like that, and I wouldn't have unless it was absolutely necessary, but, well, see for yourself."
"I have. My room got shot up too. You know, bad as it is, I miss seeing you this sloppy-looking." Her eyes shifted to his dangling suspenders and ruined shirt. "Remember when we used to go out with the other Coquettes and have the grandest time?" Nikolai took on a wistful look.
"Yes, I remember. Kaz and Boxie and all the rest, tearing up the Boulevard every night. Back before Father died and I had to start stuffing myself into these wretched things." He gestured broadly at the necktie. "Not that there's anything wrong with my life. I mean, I'm pretty happy. My job suits me, and I really do enjoy formal clothes and waking up early and all the rest of it. I miss the club life too. More than anything. But it wouldn't do for the Head Peacekeeper of Panem to go out like that. The things I used to wear! I would go back if I could, but I can't. I have a responsibility to improve the lives of Panem's people. Like them!" Speaking with a frantic intonations, he looked at the Avoxes, who seemed glad to have reunited. "I can make it illegal to hurt them, but I need time to do it! To debate, get the senate on my side, plant the seed in people's minds. If I give up my position, someone else will come in, someone useless or sadistic, there's no practical difference! They won't do anything, and those poor things won't be getting rescued! I can't do both. And I'll choose the greater good over nostalgia every time."
Pandora leaned in to brush some of his gel-matted hair back from his face, then gave the top of his head a light kiss. "That's very selfless of you, but you're a good man no matter what you choose. I'll never shame you for picking the Head Peacekeeper route, but there's also no shame in prioritizing your own desires and going back if you'd rather do that. I'm right here, and I'll always support you. Even if you are a tie-wearing lame-o." She said the last bit in a teasing tone, and it finally coaxed a laugh from him.
"Thanks. The same to you."
"Right-o. Now that we've got all the sappy feelings rubbish out of the way…" she said with a wink, "...let's get down to business. Other people are coming, yes?"
"Yes."
"Who?"
"Konstance, Ivan, Jackie, Linus, Flossie, and Orion. Possibly the Shakiras. It should only be a few minutes till they get here, your office is the closest by far." Eventually, the aforementioned individuals all arrived. There were seven officials in attendance, each with an Avox trailing behind, save for Orion, who had come with Petra Floy at his side instead. Both carried stout swords and looked ready to defend themselves if necessary. The eighth, Konstance DuMouchel, had been shot in the chest and was thus in the hospital and unable to attend.
Then Nikolai informed everyone of the terrible news: the shooter had managed to do quite a lot of damage, and no, they had not been caught. Pandora thought back to the platoon of Peacekeepers outside the building. "Chances are, they're in that group," she said.
"Exactly," Nikolai had agreed, "And that's really not papers in the safe were very important, and I only had one backup. I gave that backup to Eurydice when I first interrupted her meeting with the Victors. Speaking of, where are the other Victors?"
"I ordered them to barricade themselves in their tribute suites," Orion said. "For safety purposes. But I wanted someone to go with me, and Petra volunteered." Petra grinned at that. She was tough and kind and intelligent, all the characteristics of a great mentor, and Orion had chosen her because he knew that.
"Were the suites damaged? The tributes arrive tomorrow! The suites mustn't be damaged!"
"They're not damaged," said Flossie Merveilleuse. Flossie was the Chief Tribute Coordinator, and it was her job to manage the tributes' every movement from the minute their trains arrived to the minute they rose into the Arena.
"Good. I don't think it's a coincidence that this is happening just as the Hunger Games preparation is ramping up. We'll have twenty-four new guests to care for, and that's sure to distract us from the attacks at least a little. Speaking of which, are the trains all ready? The Victors need to leave this afternoon. And the escorts and the cooks and attendants and everyone else."
"Yes, they're all fine. Right on track, you could say." Nikolai hadn't missed Flossie's pun, but he wasn't in the mood to acknowledge it.
"Great. We have quite a lot to do, but we need to get everything situated for the tributes as soon as possible. These fine young people must be taken care of while they're in our care, and protecting them from events like those that happened today is absolutely essential. Pandora, why don't you take the Avoxes and Petra and go round up the other mentors? I expect that the younger ones will be feeling very apprehensive, and I trust you to assuage those jitters. And as for the Avoxes, they've been through an ordeal just like the rest of us, and what's more, I thrust them right in the middle of it. If you could get them a cozy blanket or two, it'd be a massive improvement. We'll meet up again later."
Departing the Center of Peacekeeping, Pandora and Petra led the Avoxes to the upper floors of the Tribute Center, where they found the other Victors in the Mentor Common Room. She got the Avoxes situated, and then, when they were all resting comfortably on various pieces of furniture, she began calling up the Victors one by one to provide some much needed moral support. She decided to go in reverse order, beginning with Aileen Bartonhill of District Twelve. Aileen passed, and then she was on to Yew, and then Elodie and Aubrey. Eventually she hit the Career districts, first with Kaylee and Lura, then Petra and Fabian, then Admira, and then it was time for her to meet the newest Victor. "Griffin Cadbury? It's your turn, honeybun."
Pandora had met Griffin before. She had interviewed him before his Games, and then after he had won. He was a nice boy, she thought. Polite, and careful with his words, yet somehow always tripping over them. But even though he acted remarkably adult, he still had a delightful innocence to him. A presumption that everything would work out in the end and the grownups were there and would whisk him away at the first sight of danger, and then they would take care of the problem and all would be right in the world once more. That innocence was so rare in Victors, considering what they had been through, but that made sense. Children could afford to be idealistic. Adults could not. Even though Pandora knew Griffin would one day learn good didn't always triumph and that things weren't always fixable, she decided that today would not be that day.
"Hello, Missus Mink!"
"Hello, Griffin! And you don't have to call me that. Just Pandora is fine."
"Okay, Pandora. I'm here to talk about my mentoring, right?"
"Yep! It's been a tough day for all of us, and just think, it's not even time for lunch yet! Nikolai thought it would be a good idea for me to have a chat with everyone and review the mentoring guidelines."
"Oh, dear. I hadn't heard about any guidelines. Should I have prepared for this?"
"Nope, you don't need to prepare. There are just a few basic rules. The first is that you have to propel your tribute or tributes to Victory to the best of your ability. You have to teach them how sponsorship and training work, but your escort can help with that. You have to answer any questions they have. Oh, and you have to try to make them as safe and content as you can. If you need any help, Admira is happy to assist, or you could ask any of the other mentors—except for Mae and Penn, because they're not exactly what I'd call knowledgeable—or any of the escorts or stylists, or you could find Orion Zenobia, Flossie Merveilleuse, or me, and we'll be happy to get you all squared away."
"Thank you so much, Missus, I mean Pandora. Is it alright that I'm still afraid?"
"Afraid of what?"
"Afraid that I won't be able to provide enough guidance for my tribute, or that my shortcomings will cause his failure."
"Griffin, the fact that you're afraid of that is a good thing. It means you're a compassionate and thoughtful young man, and it means you're going to be an incredible mentor. You're as ready as you'll ever be, and I have faith in you. You're going to do very well, and you'll improve with every decision you make. You'll repeat the choices that lead to your successes, and you'll avoid the choices that lead to your mistakes. You'll learn with time."
"I will?"
"Yes, Griffin. You will." After he had returned to his fellow Career mentors, Pandora felt a tiny nudge, and she realized that the Avox who brought her the necktie had somehow wriggled under her arm and was cuddled up on her lap. How little affection did he get that he sought it from an almost-stranger? She gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze and he relaxed into her touch, pressing his face against her non-injured thigh. "How long has it been since you've had a proper hug, honeybun?" she murmured, not expecting an answer. All she got was a despondent look. "A year?" she guessed. The Avox stretched his hands apart, in the universal signal for more. "Two?" More. "Three?" More. "Four?" He nodded. "And how old are you? Count on your fingers for me, okay?" He flashed her all ten, then held up his open left hand and his right thumb. "Sixteen?" He nodded. "You're sixteen and you haven't been hugged since you were twelve?" Another nod. "Do you want a hug now?" More nodding, fast and emphatic. Pandora sat the Avox up in her lap, then enveloped him in an embrace so tight that it squeezed the breath out of him. "There, is that better?" He nodded.
Pandora was worried about the gunman, sure, but it was no longer her top priority. Her leg would be fine. She could meet Nikolai at a later time. The Avox welfare situation was even worse than she had first realized. She slid the Avox's shirt up slowly so as not to alarm him, and then she saw what she was so fervently hoping to not see: fading pinkish weals that had been made by some sort of strap, open cuts that shone crimson and could only have come from a whip, and both new and fresh bruises in varying shades of blue, green, and purple. "Did Eurydice do this to you?" she asked the Avox. He shook his head. And then it all made sense. "I know who it was. The person she's having take care of you, that's it, isn't it? Whoever feeds you and gives you water?" He nodded, sagging. "Oh, goodness. She must not have known. We're going to find her and fix this right away. Are you up for another walk?" He nodded.
Pandora was livid, but if she showed it, there was no chance that he would recognize that her rage was directed at the person who had beaten him. Instead he was sure to assume that he had done something to provoke her, and then he would start fretting over the possibility of punishment. Pandora tugged him closer to her chest for an extra second, then pulled back and stooped to look directly at him. She held his hand as she spoke. "Honeybun, I need you to pay attention to what I'm saying very closely, okay? I will never hit you. Hitting is very wrong and very bad, and it won't be happening any longer. All the hitting is in the past. As long as you're under my care—because I'm not letting you, nor any of the other Avoxes, go back with Eurydice until I'm sure you're safe and the person hitting you has been fired—you will never be hurt in any way. I'll protect you. And you can have as many hugs as you want, I promise."
She would be at work for a good chunk of the next month or so, and would be spending most of it on standby at the studio, but Alecto would happily take care of the Avoxes until she got back. And so Pandora, with six little ducklings marching behind her, led the way to the mansion.
I'll tell you that Pandora was the most generous and welcoming individual that I've ever had the pleasure of encountering. She welcomed me into the world of mentoring so long ago, just as she welcomed those Avoxes into her home. She was on a mission to improve Panem, just like her friends Eurydice and Nikolai, and she led with love. Ever since the tragedy of her youth she had despised violence, yet strangely enough, she was the only official at that seven-person meeting who never felt guilty about the death that had followed it.
Hey y'all!
I'm so pleased to say that I received thirty-six incredible tributes in total! Unfortunately, that means that twelve of those incredible tributes had to be rejected. You all made those decisions incredibly hard (I think that the D10M slot was my toughest call overall!) and the final cast reveal has been posted on the blog. I've also listed it below this note.
I ended up having to turn away a few truly exceptional tributes that just didn't fit with the rest of the cast, so please don't feel too dejected if you didn't make it in. If you're interested in hearing the specific reasons your tribute didn't get in, feel free to tell me and I'm happy to send you a PM! Please note that you can expect an extra ten sponsor points for each tribute of yours that was accepted.
Thank you to everyone who sent in tributes! I hope that you'll continue to read the story as it progresses (and maybe leave a review or two,) and I'm very grateful to you for spending time to contribute. I'm planning on updating next week with the first six tribute intros, plus a POV from a featured Capitol character!
Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor!
–LC :)
District One
Female: Nascha Eirena Czarin by contemporarydancer2
Male: Orpheus Adello by TheRaichuinRavenclaw
District Two
Female: Haylia Boaz by Pacecca
Male: Tybalt Alistair Martell by contemporarydancer2
District Three
Female: Twyla Behring by Elim9
Male: Beemo Hudson by Very New To This
District Four
Female: Odicci Harbore by 30777
Male: Nathaniel Lewis by wiifan2002
District Five
Female: Amy Kawasaki DrRedneck
Male: Aran Casteel by Moonlight Salsa
District Six
Female: Vica Madsen by Treble-Notes
Male: Danny Maddox by Very New To This
District Seven
Female: Brielle Rawlings by Treble-Notes
Male: Tom Leary by Very New To This
District Eight
Female: Ash Maris by hufflepuff8
Male: Kenny Michaels by wiifan2002
District Nine
Female: Maize Bono by illuminating-spirit
Male: Jeremiah King by wiifan2002
District Ten
Female: Mare Duster by TheRaichuinRavenclaw
Male: Fahad Azerola by Josephm611
District Eleven
Female: Xanthe Sparacello by ladyqueerfoot
Tribute: J. Pace by Elim9
District Twelve
Female: Aspen Silvius by Gildedarcher
Male: Nikita Valeta by ladyqueerfoot