TW/CW: Xanthe's POV contains non-graphic mentions of parental neglect and frequent references to religious brainwashing and conditioning. Aran's POV contains frequent references to stalking, harassment, creepy but mostly nonsexual practices and fantasies, generally uncomfortable views about women and romance, and brief depictions of a non-consensual kiss. Amy's POV is just gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss, with more gaslighting and extra bonus gaslighting. Kenny's POV contains brief, non-graphic depictions of whipping. Orion's POV has a brief sex joke.
Xanthe Sparacello, 13
The Church of Luiza, Eleven
D11F
July 1, 329 AEDD
The congregation was even bigger than usual on Reaping Day. The Church of Luiza was packed to the brim with people. People in their Reaping outfits, people in their work clothes, very old people with canes and creaky voices, very young people with sticky hands who never stopped talking, even as the service began. People of all kinds were gathered here on this particular day, including one rather short person in the first pew.
Xanthe Sparacello wasn't like the other children her age. She didn't fidget on the hard, uncomfortable seat. She didn't kick her legs, tap her feet, or scratch her neck where the starched collar itched terribly against her skin. She barely dared breathe. Her hands were clasped neatly on her lap, the parallel tips of her toes rested just behind the groove separating two of the wooden floorboards, and her back was straight. She was a well-behaved churchgoer, with perfect posture and immaculate poise. She was going to be a very good girl and make the High King proud (for He was surely watching His most faithful disciple as she prepared to be educated about His grace and wisdom) because she wasn't a filthy degenerate like the people surrounding her. No, she was His anointed. She was far better than that.
She would have continued to think about the High King, but the vicar began speaking before she could. Jeb Sparacello, Xanthe's father, the vicar who ran the church, was about to give a sermon, and even if he would forgive misplaced thoughts, the High King wouldn't. Jeb, like Xanthe, had a direct line with the High King. Jeb was to disseminate His knowledge among the rest of the population. Xanthe was to bring Him new souls for the Elation. She would not fail. She knew the reason she had been chosen, too: she wasn't a degenerate. Degenerates were false worshippers. Degenerates did drugs and drank alcohol. Degenerates valued human morals above divine requirements.
Degenerates were horrible, disgraceful, and blasphemous, but they deserved mercy. Xanthe didn't understand it, but the High King thought so, so she knew it must be true. The easiest way, He had thought, to absolve them of their misdeeds was to wait for them to die, when they would go to the Elation and be forgiven. The High King was great and good and wanted to rescue everyone from the perils of Degeneracy, Xanthe knew, so the more that died, the better. And he had commanded Xanthe to help him in this effort.
Xanthe despised Degenerates. They seemed to be everywhere these days. Awful, foul creatures that didn't deserve the blessings of the High King like she did. Everyone in the whole church was a Degenerate but for her and her father. They had been selected. They were special. They deserved more than this.
Jeb had originally opened the doors of the church when Xanthe was a toddler, and he had named it after his late wife. It had quickly attracted the local population of drug addicts, and he had welcomed them. He cultivated a community in which people felt comfortable addressing their problems out loud. Xanthe thought that he was far too soft on the addicts. When their skin sallowed and their bodies shrunk in on themselves and they collapsed and never got up, she knew that it was the High King's will. He was punishing them for their Degeneracy, absolving them of their crimes, forgiving them, and raising them to the Elation.
As the churchyard grew thick with graves, Xanthe began to catch Jeb slipping. He didn't pray over the corpses of the addicts. He should have, Xanthe knew. The High King had told her it must be done. So she did it herself. She sat alone in the cemetery, completing the ritual for each and every body that passed through her hands. They had been redeemed in the eyes of the High King, and thus in hers as well. They deserved to be honored.
Yes, Xanthe dug up the bodies. The ritual was called the Encore. It was a second funeral, a better funeral, where Xanthe would contemplate the recently unearthed corpse and compose a eulogy for it before praying over it one last time and returning it to its burial plot. She was doing the High King's work, she knew, and she performed the Encore for every cadaver that had been subject to Jeb's inadequate, no, nonexistent ceremony.
Xanthe thought that Jeb didn't go nearly far enough. He had more faith than most, yes, but not as much as he ought to have. Still, she listened to his sermon. He was speaking about mercy today, and the importance of being merciful to others. Xanthe thought about how merciful the High King was, tasking her with bringing Him more Degenerates for the Elation. He was being so kind to the Degenerates, freeing them from their mortal confines and raising them up in His image. It was a very merciful thing to do. Xanthe took a moment to contemplate how she would be merciful when she Volunteered in a few years' time. She would do her righteous duty and save everybody on the High King's behalf.
After all, Xanthe had been granted mercy once, and she planned to pay it forward. Her mother, Luiza, had died of infection after giving birth to Xanthe, but the High King had given Xanthe a second chance even after her accidental murder. Xanthe knew the High King had chosen her mother (a Degenerate) for the Elation, but Xanthe was selfishly upset about her absence from time to time.
Xanthe had great respect for the High King. She knew that He truly was giving Degenerates a second chance, even if it came at the cost of the pious. But she didn't always love the High King the way she ought to. She disliked His odd methods. She didn't understand why Luiza had to die. It was a necessary sacrifice, yes, but how come He had to take such a true, loving woman away from her devoted husband and newborn baby? It was just so unfair.
She buried the thoughts immediately. Even if the High King was hard to understand, or even deliberately cruel, He was the High King for a reason: He knew best. Humans were too foolish and emptyheaded to make sense of Him, maybe. Xanthe was determined to find out by becoming His right hand man, and in doing so, bringing salvation to many more Degenerates.
Plus, she'd get to see the Capitol, when she offered herself up as tribute at age eighteen. The Capitol, Xanthe knew, was a land of great wealth. The Capitol seemed to be related somehow to the High King, because of the Hunger Games, which raised Degenerates to the Elation, and the Capitolites always appeared to be happy and all-knowing. Xanthe longed to visit it and uncover the secrets it held.
She knew that if only she could attain true spirituality, she would finally be happy. Maybe Jeb would pay attention to her a little more, and actually speak to her and interact with her outside of his church services. Maybe people her age would start to see her as a friend instead of the strange junior preacher who lectured them about divine punishment. Maybe she wouldn't feel so lonely all the time.
Some days it seemed like Degenerates were more attentive parents than Jeb. Xanthe had seen them walk their children to school in the mornings, or go shopping with them in the district square, or hug them, or kiss them, or say they loved them. Xanthe had never experienced anything like that. When she was very young, Jeb had homeschooled her, droning on in monotone while lecturing her about the High King, not even bothering to use the rousing voice full of wit and rhetoric that he did for his sermons, or else forcing her to memorize long passages of scripture. He did all the shopping alone, forcing her to stay at home by herself so that she wouldn't be exposed to potentially bad influences. And even though he gave her food and water and an education and a bed to sleep in, he wasn't someone that Xanthe would describe as affectionate.
She was so tired of feeling emotionally neglected. Being the High King's devoted was an important job, and Xanthe knew her mind couldn't be polluted by all the Degeneracy that was found in public if she was to maintain her status, but the result was that she ended up feeling perpetually isolated and alone. She had always been taught that her emotions were irrelevant and that only the High King's thoughts mattered. It had much more of an impact than she liked to think about.
She didn't like to think about it at all, actually. It was so much easier to just go on pretending that she was totally content training for her future as an apostle of the High King. She had been selected to be His Messiah, and if she wasn't, if she had been living this way for nothing at all, if the atheistic Degenerates who told her that she deserved fun and joy were right? Well, she would have been suffering for nothing and her life's work would be in vain.
It was better to push down such intrusive thoughts. It was better to refrain from questioning why such a merciful High King would deliberately kill the mother of His own Messiah, His glorious Chosen One, the girl to whom he would owe his congregation. It was better to cover up all feelings of doubt or despondency, because Xanthe needed to be strong for Him. As she pondered all of this, against her will, because Reaping Day tended to make her consider her future whether she felt like it or not, she saw Jeb gesturing wildly from behind the pulpit.
He spoke from somewhere deep inside, drawing the words up from within himself. Xanthe had seen him do it so many times, but it was no less incredible than the first time she'd seen it. She could do the same thing, she knew. She would get to do it when she was older. She too had true passion and zeal for sharing the word of the High King. She longed for her chance to follow in her father's footsteps, but do more, reach new heights, become a paragon of virtue in His name.
Jeb wrapped up his sermon. As people streamed out of the church, Xanthe found herself confronted by kids her age who weren't like her at all. There was a girl her age who had gotten her starched white shirt all rumpled, and Xanthe watched as the girl's father gently smoothed away the wrinkles and gave the end of one of her pigtails a light tug before leading her towards the door. What's more, the girl was beaming up at her father like he was the greatest man in the world, and the father was saying something about how lucky he was to have a daughter like her, and Xanthe suddenly felt a little sick to her stomach.
Then Jeb brushed past her, paying her no notice as he went to stand by the door and shake people's hands on their way out. "Come along now, Xanthe," he ordered. "Don't be rude. We need to bid all of these fine people goodbye, and bless them as they leave, especially considering what day it is." Xanthe stood up from the chair, lingering just a second as the other girl and her father left her line of sight. "Xanthe, what are you, deaf? Don't dawdle, girl. We mustn't keep the High King's worshippers waiting." Xanthe obeyed him. It wasn't like Jeb was mean. He was unnecessarily brusque, though. Would it have killed him to, just once, say that he was lucky to have a daughter like her?
Xanthe was already dressed in formal clothes, so getting ready for the Reaping was a simple matter of walking to the square. Jeb told her that she would be going to the Reaping alone, and that she should follow the people from the church and she'd find her destination alright. This had happened the previous year too, and Xanthe was glad for the brief freedom from the small radius of woodland upon which the church and cemetery rested. She went quickly until she caught up to the girl and father she had seen, and tagged along after them, since they seemed to know where they were going.
The whole way there, Xanthe saw nothing but Degenerates. Degenerates that joked and swore (the High King did not allow joking or swearing). Degenerates that had bags under their eyes (a clear indicator of drug usage, which the High King also did not allow). Degenerates that Xanthe had never even seen in the church, meaning that they either obeyed false preachers or didn't worship the High King at all (the two most flagrant examples of Degeneracy in the High King's eyes). She arrived at the check-in booth at the end of her walk, where a Peacekeeper confirmed her identity and directed her to the correct section.
The escort arrived shortly thereafter. Xanthe tuned out the entire ceremony, instead picturing the Reaping that would come when she was eighteen. The High King had bidden her to do His work, to bring Him more souls for the elation, and she knew that He had called her to win the Hunger Games. It would probably take years to be truly ready, though, so she prepared every day by listening to His word and praying fervently.
She only began paying attention when it was time for the tributes to be chosen. The escort said that the girl would be picked first. Then she stuck her hand into the bowl and pulled out a slip. Xanthe heard the escort say her name, and then the realization hit her.
She had been selected for this by the High King Himself. Planning to volunteer at an older age, the High King had been by her side the whole time, and had made it so that her name was drawn years ahead of schedule. Because she was ready years ahead of schedule. Because Xanthe had been His best and brightest follower since she had first been inducted into the religion. She had never picked up a weapon in her life, unless you counted the shovel she used to bury the corpses of Degenerates in the cemetery, but the High King had seen to everything thus far and He would obviously continue to do so.
All Xanthe had to do was be His public face. Even more exciting, His selection of her could only mean one thing. There was a word for people the High King selected to share His gospel. He had selected her for this very duty, she knew, and his selection made her a Prophet. Her name would show up in future scripture, once she spread His glory across Panem. And when the Prophet Xanthe rose to fame through her Victory in the pageant known as the Hunger Games, the High King shone down on her and painted her in the image of His craft… She had to admit that Prophet Xanthe did have a nice ring to it, but she was there for more than that.
And so as she ascended the stage and recognized that she was destined to ascend to Victory, she began planning how to ascend the other twenty-three tributes to the Elation.
For their own good, of course.
Aran Casteel, 18
Piesterzak Residence, Five
D5M
July 1, 329 AEDD
Nobody much liked Aran Casteel. The feeling was mutual. His own parents had turned him out at sixteen, which some might have thought was a little harsh. The truth was, they had a very good reason for doing it. Aran was a creep, a stalker, and a self-proclaimed incel who only looked out for himself and believed that he was entitled to treat other people like disposable playthings.
Nobody knew where he lived anymore. It was considered a mystery, and nobody particularly wanted to solve it. Technically, Aran was homeless. He didn't have a place of his own to stay. Instead, he slept in a variety of different spots, some more troubling than others. He woke up in the morning on Reaping Day in Aisling Piesterzak's bed. She wasn't his girlfriend, or even just a lover who had taken him in for the night. She was the object of his affection. Aran would describe her as the love of his life, but he didn't really see her as a person. She wasn't even aware that he slept in her bed.
They had dated, briefly, at sixteen. Aran was possessive and destructive, so Aisling broke it off. But Aran began to follow her and harass her. He threatened to kidnap her and kill her family and keep her for himself. He even smashed in the windows of her house because he thought it would freak her out.
Then the Peacekeepers took him to the work camp. It wasn't jail, because the Capitol wasn't going to waste resources keeping people in individual cells and feeding them three meals a day if they didn't get anything out of it. Instead they worked at the trash compacting plant. Aran was shipped up to the camp, where shared a small room with eleven other young men and was given a bowl of slop and a slice of rough tessera-grain bread each day.
The hard labor wasn't something Aran took kindly to, but it was something he learned to deal with. He worked on a sort of disassembly line with the other boys. He hated them; they hated him. Aran was, in truth, an easy person to hate. Being possessive and entitled meant that he assumed ownership over everyone around him in addition to their belongings, something that endured through his sentence. His job was lifting and holding heavy pieces of broken machinery while other workers broke them down. It was an unpleasant duty, but it resulted in Aran's strength improving in the one and a half years that he performed it before he was released and sent back home for good behavior (pinning his misdeeds on weaker-willed people who were too scared to call him on his lies).
Next to him, Aisling shifted, and Aran froze. If she caught him next to her, well...it wouldn't be good. She'd yell for her brother. He'd beat Aran up, then toss him over his shoulder and drop him off at the Justice Building for a tribunal. When he inevitably got found guilty, he'd probably get hauled off to the work camp again, and while he knew he could survive it, he wasn't a big fan of the whole 'ward of the state' thing. He only started breathing again when Aisling had settled back into a peaceful slumber, nestling deeper into the thick mattress. Aran liked it here. He couldn't exactly enjoy it thanks to the perpetual fear of discovery, but it was the one place in District Five that he didn't totally hate. He almost wished that there was someone to capture an image of the scene, just like he would someday capture Aisling–he wanted to preserve the memory, so he could look at him and her in bed together and imagine his future.
He loved the way she looked in her thin summer nightgown, all sheer and silver-white in the weak rays of sun just beginning to peek through the parted curtains. He looked at the swell of her bust, the gradual rise and fall of her chest, the blankets kicked mostly to waist-level. Since she was laying on her side, he could see where the fabric lay flush against her thighs. Aisling was stunning, he thought. She was angelic like this. The effect would only be ruined when she eventually woke up and opened her mouth. No, Aran preferred her like this, quiet and docile and feminine.
It was pushing his luck, but he knew Aisling was a heavy sleeper. And it was Reaping Day. She could use a little extra love, right? He swiped the crusty remnants of last night's dinner from his face, ignoring the grease that got on his hand, and leaned in to press his lips to her temple. Then, moving slowly to prevent the bed from creaking, he ran his fingers through the end of her chestnut-colored ponytail and told her goodbye.
He lifted the window sash and slunk outside, returning the drapes to their proper position and closing it back up after him.
The sun was coming up. Aran stopped to watch the pinks and oranges bleed together. Sunrises and sunsets were among the rare phenomena that could actually make him smile, and he was okay with sticking around for a few extra minutes to enjoy them, but then he heard Cian Piesterzak's voice through the window and knew it was time to leave. Aisling's older brother had come to wake her up, since the Reaping was early to avoid the worst of the heat, and if he swept aside the curtains to let in the daylight, Aran would be in full view.
After running for a block, Aran turned his attention to food. Food wasn't something he had enough of these days, and he'd had to dig in the trash for his dinner the previous night. He certainly couldn't afford anything in the rich neighborhood where the Piesterzaks lived, and he didn't have time to get to the vendors in the poorer areas while still making it to the Reaping on time, so he hunted around for a family that had a dog, then hopped the backyard fence and looted its bone. He gnawed on it as he made his way. It was a raw bone, and he eventually managed to split it open enough to suck out the marrow. A pre-chewed bone with labrador slobber on it wasn't really a good meal, but Aran had eaten worse in his time on the streets.
Sometimes he was lucky when it came to food. Other times, not so much. He sometimes wished that he could go to the Capitol, where he knew he really belonged. Everyone in the Capitol was rich. He could eat whatever he wanted there. If he wanted a decent meal in District Five, he had to beg, borrow, or steal, none of which were a safe choice. Begging was beneath his dignity. If he borrowed something, he'd have to give it back. Theft was punishable by death. Would he take the risk? Absolutely, when times were bad, but if he had enough money to get a little street food or a few groceries at the market, he just found his normal tactics humiliating. He flushed in embarrassment when he passed a group of boys his age that were pulling warm rolls from a brown paper bag for their breakfast, hyperaware that one of them was whispering something about the bone Aran was clinging to. He felt stupid, and broke, and like it would be a very good time to develop the power of invisibility.
Aran didn't get paid very much for his occasional odd jobs work, so he didn't have nice clothes for the Reaping. Instead he wore his usual clothes, which he'd had on for several days and nights in a row. They weren't classy, not by far. They were trashy: a sleeveless white shirt that Aran for some reason always referred to as a wifebeater, ripped jeans that were made up of more rip than jean, and a pair of shabby work boots.
He walked, because he didn't have any other way of getting to the Reaping. People shied away from him in the streets, but he paid them no mind. He was almost grateful for the Peacekeeper's derision when she demanded his hand at the check-in booth, since it gave him an excuse to be pissed at something tangible (as opposed to just general pissiness at vague concepts like girls or the government).
Aran didn't like the escort, Ravya. He had gotten plenty used to her theatrics, since she had been escorting for District Five since he was twelve, but he didn't find her any less tacky. She had such an off-putting accent, he thought.
He ignored the ceremonial rigamarole, only looking up when it was time for the tributes to be chosen. As Ravya's painted fingernails hovered above the rim of the glass sphere, Aran started to feel an ugly sense of dread take root deep inside him. It seemed to start in the lowest part of its stomach and spread outwards with a prickling sensation, encroaching further, expanding itself until it engulfed his entire body.
He listened to Ravya's stupid, awful voice: "Which lovely young person will come on up today? Hmm...it seems we have an Aran Casteel! Aran, doll, would you please join me up here? I have some lovely surprises in store for you on the train once I choose your new friend, alright?" Aran, in truth, suddenly found himself excited. This counted as an opportunity! It was a way to get rich, earn immunity from the law, and besides, everybody knew that Victors had lots of power in their home districts. He could force Aisling to love him!
Still, he couldn't let the world know that just yet. He was too scrawny to pull off the strong approach, despite his muscular body, and too obviously poor to play at confidence, but Aran knew how to evoke sympathy in people that didn't know his background. Unfortunately, the crowd around him threatened to ruin his plans, because a cheer was going up. It started in the eighteen-year-old girls' section, rippling out from Aisling herself, earning a huff from Aran. Soon enough, the entire crowd was whooping with joy. If he didn't do something soon, the audience in the Capitol would put two and two together and figure out he had done something disgusting. But hey, maybe he could use his appearance to his advantage. If he could frame the situation as evil, mean bullies cheering at the plight of a harmless, down-on-his-luck street kid, well, that might be a different story.
Aran slouched his shoulders deeply, hugging himself and pretending to be frightened and pitiable. He tucked his chin down too, trying to force a tremble into his stride. Using one of his last-ditch (and more painful) tricks, he dug a ragged fingernail into his septum to force his eyes to water and give off the impression that he'd been crying. He walked to the stage slowly, ignoring the jeers around him. Ravya's overprotective attitude ended up working in his favor, because she bought his story on the spot, immediately smothering him in a hug and evicting Sturgis Zeta, the male mentor, from his chair because "...sit down, sit down! Tsk, poor darling, why are you crying? What's wrong? Hang in there, I'll get you a little privacy from the crowd in just a minute, alright?"
Aran might not have liked Ravya, but her reaction locked in his first impression for good. He decided right then and there that he was going to win the Hunger Games. He'd have wealth, and freedom from District Five, and Aisling. Sturgis Zeta had won just a few years ago, and everyone had rejoiced. His Victory meant the district was provided with prizes all year long. Money was thrown into the streets for children to collect and bring home. Fine foods were provided for the citizens to feast on. There were fans transported by train to keep the power plant workers more comfortable in the hot southwestern summer, and in the winter, there was a surplus of fine wool coats brought to market. Aran would be the people's savior, and then they would forget about his earlier transgressions.
And then he would have Aisling all to himself.
Ash Maris, 13
Factory DX-214, Eight
D8F
July 1, 329 AEDD
Ash was on decoration duty. Again. She had the kind of quick, dainty fingers that were good for handling fiddly little pieces, at least according to her supervisor. Today, it was fancy underwear: miniature bows of ribbon, sequins, tiny pearls, and of course the itty-bitty snaps and buttons for the closures. She worked steadily, eager for her paycheck, but secretly wished that the sun would never rise.
The Reaping always came early in District Eight. In summer, the air was hot and humid, and the ceremony was supposed to finish before the biting insects came out to swarm. Children would be packed together too tightly to swat at bugs and had to stay there for as long as an hour, which was practically mosquito heaven. As a result, the Reaping was scheduled in the morning, at a bright and early eight thirty.
Ash worked the night shift. She worked part-time, to help keep her family afloat, and the rest of the time she helped take care of the home and keep the household running. The night shift just happened to need workers badly enough to offer raises to the first few employees that joined up, and since she didn't go to school or have any set appointments, she was fine with the schedule. Plus, it meant that she wasn't slaving away in a massive sweatshop in the stuffy heat of day. She got the cooler hours, and she was fine with it. It's not like there was even a difference in visibility, thanks to the massive fluorescent lights, which was good, considering her fear of the dark.
Ash's father couldn't work as much as he should have been able to. He was an ordinary factory worker, spending his days bent over a sewing machine, save for the times when he had his debilitating migraines. Ash, as a rule, liked the factory machinery. She was intelligent and bookish and knew how the rotors and gears moved and what made the motor run and what made the whirring noises. She could do so much, but she didn't get the opportunity to, because her steadiness and patience were wasted on hand-sewing the ornamentation onto clothing so that it would be extra pretty for the Capitolites who would wear it.
She wasn't a big fan of the Capitol. She could tolerate it most of the time, but she'd seen the way it exploited the people whose work allowed for its wealth. Ash actually liked clothes, to some extent. They could be nice. But in a world where she had seven dresses, one for each day of the week, plus one Reaping Day outfit, and hadn't gotten a new everyday garment since she was ten years old, it seemed unfair that someone in the Capitol could buy a new set of clothes twice a day. The pair of bedazzled thigh highs in her hand would sell for more than she could believe. If she smuggled them out and sold them independently, she'd make enough money to buy herself a whole new wardrobe.
The luxury was repulsive. These people had money to burn. They could quite literally set fire to nine out of every ten of their dollars and stay richer than her. It made her angry. She would have liked to learn more about mechanical engineering, for instance, but she couldn't. Instead she had to earn money for food because her father had a medical condition that made work in the bright, noisy factories agonizing. When he got a migraine, the best way to deal with it was to lay down in a dark, quiet space to wait it out. Ash didn't resent him for it, although she did wish she had more free time.
Even if she was angry, she wouldn't speak up about it. She wasn't very good at being assertive. She had always been kind of socially anxious, despite being so extroverted. She had friends, yes, but she wanted to curl up and die if she was put in a situation where she had to challenge an authority figure, or ask for something, or proactively tell of a problem. She had a hard time talking to strangers. She'd keep pushing her feelings down forever. She was conflict-averse to the point of self-sacrifice.
She'd never be brave enough to do anything about the world she lived in, so instead, she wrapped up her shift and finished up with accessorizing the last batch of garments, then clocked out and headed home. "Home" was a little studio apartment just behind the factory where the pollution was bad and the accommodations were worse. Ash expected her father to be sleeping, but he was up and about, spreading lard on two slices of bread for her breakfast. It was thoughtful of him to think of her.
He wasn't feeling well. Again. He was on day three of a migraine, and he had chosen to put himself in more pain to do a nice thing for her.
He wouldn't be coming to the Reaping. Ash wished sometimes that she could have a more normal life, but her father didn't have that option, and neither did she. She had to provide, because he often couldn't. If he made it through for a few months working, they'd have enough money to afford migraine medication for him, but he couldn't work without any medication, so Ash had to do everything instead. If only they could take out a loan, but no...predatory loan sharks hid in the shadows with exorbitant interest rates and teams of people just waiting to beat up debtors. Her father had rejected that out of hand when she first suggested it as a child.
Ash didn't think of herself as a child, not really. She had to take on the responsibilities of an adult, anyway, and didn't that count for something? It was tough to be the worker of the family, but Ash was grateful that she had a family at all. Even if her mother had died of pneumonia a few years ago, at least her father was still around, unlike Alyssa's. (Alyssa was the pretty girl who lived two apartments over and watered the weeds that grew between cobblestones, who Ash had admired from a distance for an embarrassingly long time but rarely talked to.)
She had friends too. She had more people to support her than some others she knew, and that was lucky. Ash wasn't all alone. There were folks who loved her, like Eddie and Fara. She used to go to school with them, but after her mother's death, she had to start working, and then she just saw them around the apartment complex. When she was home instead of working, they were inseparable. When they were young, they said they would rule the world someday. They played a game called Panem, in which they pretended to be Capitolites. Ash remembered being the president and making awful laws for her friends to follow, because when she was seven or eight, that was funny. If she could play Panem now, sit on the president's throne and make decrees, she'd be gentler, softer. She'd feed the hungry, house the homeless, pay the pauper.
The government should already be doing that, but it wasn't. Ash absently hoped that would change, but she knew it wouldn't. It had always been stagnant or worsening. She hadn't seen any signs of improvement in her life, and she knew they weren't coming any time soon, especially not on Reaping Day.
Reaping Day represented the very worst aspects of Panem, and Ash wished she could stop it, but even though she didn't consider herself one, she was a child, a powerless child who should be worrying about the concerns of children, not problems that were supposed to be dealt with by adults. Of course she still hoped, but the hope had been mostly crushed out of her when her mother died, and besides, she didn't have time to waste, not when the Reaping was approaching.
Ash's Reaping dress was the nicest piece of clothing that she owned. It was an olive-green smock dress, with big black buttons down the front and black and white checkered pockets. She changed into it, brushed and braided her hair, washed her face, and walked to the district square. The check-in booth was oddly positioned right next to the whipping post, a strange feature that scared Ash. It was only her second Reaping ceremony, after all. Once she'd been guided to her section, she started chatting with the people next to her upon failing to locate her friends.
Then the escort arrived. It was a new one, named Opiter. He seemed nice, Ash thought. He didn't come off as preachy or snooty like the last escort had. He introduced himself and explained that he'd been moved from District Eleven, where he'd escorted for several years, since he wanted a change of pace and to explore a new district with a different industry, and wasn't it just so exciting here! Ash reminded herself that an experienced escort would be a good thing if she happened to get picked, but at the moment, she caught herself thinking rather dismally that changing your career because you wanted to travel somewhere new was a privilege that she'd never have the opportunity to experience.
The Hunger Games were tailor made to keep the downtrodden, well, downtrodden, but Ash figured that they had to be expensive. There were all the couture outfits, the extravagant meals, not to mention the arena and all of its contents. The Hunger Games cost Panem money, money that could be used to help people!
Ash tried to refocus her mind. Reaping Day tended to bring out her pessimistic side. The video was playing, and she shut her eyes to block it out, along with the intrusive thoughts that she knew would follow. She waited until the last possible second to open them. The escort was drawing the slips, one from the girls' bowl and then one from the boys'. He announced her name simply, and suddenly, Ash felt like she was going to faint.
She didn't, but she was acutely aware of the way she was being watched. The escort knew that it was her who'd been picked. She had reacted rather obviously, gasping out loud, but she hadn't cried, and that was surely a good thing, right? She'd been watching the Hunger Games for years. She knew that the criers were the first people to go. Being weak-willed got you nowhere. Strength was what mattered.
Ash climbed the steps to the stage. It was only then that she realized she'd been Reaped with her full name, Aster, instead of the one she preferred, so she walked to the microphone and asked the escort if it'd be all right for her to go by Ash instead. It was the boldest thing she'd done in years, but you know what? She was in the Hunger Games, and she was almost certainly going to die. If she did, she wanted to go by her real name. The escort granted her request.
This would be her strategy, she decided. It was an impulsive move, but death was on the horizon. Nothing mattered if she was going to die. Nobody was going to care if a corpse had been socially awkward. She had nothing to lose by asking for more in life, and if she managed to be likeable or convincing enough, maybe she could prolong her death a little bit. Maybe she'd be lucky enough to have a friendly district partner! She liked people, and she could get along with one other person. She was young and on her own. If she could team up with a new friend, maybe she'd have more success!
Unfortunately, she knew the name of the male tribute, and she knew more than a little about the boy behind it. Kenny Michaels wasn't friendly. He was reckless, gutsy, and brash. But he just might save her yet.
J. Pace, 12
Sector 23 Orchard, Eleven
D11T
July 1, 329 AEDD
It was smack-dab in the middle of the harvest season and Pace had just turned twelve. They were both disappointed and relieved by this. Turning twelve meant that school was over, and there wouldn't be any more patronizing teachers to demand they submit to arbitrary rules and suffer punishment for failing to meet random criteria. That was the good part. The bad part was that there was a lot of corn to be harvested and Pace would be harvesting this very same plot of corn for whatever remained of their life before they died.
It wasn't an exciting life. Pace wanted freedom, something that the adults in their life never seemed to stop scolding them for. Their parents were the kind of people too beaten down by the long hours of heavy labor to bother answering most of Pace's questions, who found it frustrating that clearing up a point of confusion was about as easy as squeezing blood from a stone. It didn't help that their questions were usually things like "Why are there Peacekeepers standing guard in my classroom at school?" or "Why do I have to take out tesserae when there are people in the Capitol so rich that they have multiple houses?"
They also had a penchant for playing devil's advocate and debating every single statement that crossed their path, which was a very effective way to make every person in their life (with the possible exception of their grandmother) think that they were nothing but an immature, obnoxious child who should be seen and not heard.
Well, at least they got some more independence, even if their new daily routine was irritating. They had to get up in the middle of the night to get ready and walk the long four miles to the orchard, where they wore itchy clothes and worked until late afternoon. They had been working part-time since they could speak coherently, but now their shift had been extended. Their older siblings worked the same shift as them, which was good, because traveling in groups was always the safest choice when there were Peacekeepers around.
Pace was something of a hero to their younger siblings, but the older ones were a little exhausted by their constant kvetching. They knew that their complaining could get exhausting quickly. The truth was that the world overwhelmed them, and they were simply grappling for as much power as they could. Being a young person in a poor district was hard, and Pace was fed up with having to work like an adult while still being treated like a child. They knew it sometimes made them irrationally angry to be confronted with the reality, which was that life wasn't fair.
Instead they preferred to live in a kind of dreamland, a fantasy world in which everything would suddenly become perfect and just if only they could out-debate their elders. In truth, preference was probably the wrong word, because Pace wasn't aware that they lived in this make-believe space at all. They were still too young, too gullible, too hopeful, too untouched, and too innocent to realize that reality was much harsher. They would be at the bottom of the totem pole for their entire life. Even if they became an adult and had children of their own that they could boss around, they would still in turn have to answer to the Peacekeepers, their boss, and the Capitol in general. Hierarchy kept Panem running, and being born into a poor family in a poor district pretty much guaranteed that they would remain destitute and powerless for their entire life.
Harvesting was rough work. It required heavy, dangerous tools. It took lots of time. It was designed for people much taller and stronger than the average twelve year old. Pace's new supervisor was a man in his late thirties who was on a constant power trip, and Pace had already decided that they had zero respect for him. He had condescendingly called Pace "little man" and aside from the misgendering, they didn't enjoy being infantilized. Pace could handle being sore and tired, but they despised that their supervisor, in addition to being demanding, didn't take younger people seriously and constantly set them up for failure.
He had already decided that Pace was going to receive the worst workload every day. They knew that there were difficult patches in the fields. Normally, supervisors rotated the workers so that a different person worked the patches each day and nobody was always stuck with the hardest, most annoying task. This supervisor rotated all the other workers, but Pace was always in the same spot. The worst one.
They saved their complaints for the dinner table, mostly. They were angry about things, sure, but they could feign acceptance of the situation while they were on the job. They needed to hold it down, of course, to help support their family, but they didn't want to. They wanted to have fun! They were a kid, but in District Eleven, kids had to behave like adults.
Pace was kind of a sad, soggy puddle of gender dysphoria and pent up indignation. It was aggravating to deal with the crushing pressure of responsibility day in and day out. They wanted to scream, or run away and start a new life in, they didn't know, District Seven? Or maybe just hit someone. Yeah, their supervisor could do with a nice fat bruise or two to decorate his ugly, sneering mug. But as Pace looked at that face, and the six feet of angry grown-up that it sat atop, they knew that realistically they had no chance.
They sulked as they worked, enduring being referred to as a "stupid boy" by the supervisor, then collected their meager paycheck and walked home, kicking open the stuck front door, the chipped paint sticky and swollen from the humidity, and went to their room to prepare for the terrible Reaping that was to come.
Pace had already taken a bath before work, and they certainly weren't going to suffer through an ordeal involving cold water and foul-smelling soap twice in one morning. They dressed in their Reaping clothes slowly, trying to prolong the inevitable, but their mother pounded on the door and informed them that she was going to have them and their siblings out of the house in less than five minutes, so help her, and they had better be ready by the time everyone else was, or they would be in Deep Trouble after the Reaping, and then they would be in Deep Trouble all over again, because just wait until their father gets home!
Pace didn't much mind her threats. They wouldn't be late because they didn't want to provoke the Peacekeepers, not because they didn't want to provoke their parents. Even if they were late, their mother would give them an earful and a whole bunch of extra chores, and their father, when he got home, would take them outside and scold them for doing something that could get them hurt, especially considering the increase in the severity of Peacekeeper-given punishments. But that would be it. Their mother's bark was much bigger than her bite. Still, they got outside with the rest of the family on time.
Their mother walked Pace, plus their older brother Malachi and their older sister Sierra, who were fourteen and seventeen respectively, to the square, then dropped them off at the check-in booth. Pace obeyed the Peacekeeper's commands–even they knew that Reaping Day wasn't the time to get sassy–and went to their section. They were a little confused about the process since it was their first Reaping, but they were in a pen full of other twelve-year-olds who were all a little bit confused, and Pace took comfort in that as they waited.
They didn't have to wait long. They had never seen the escort before since their parents had always kept them at home with their younger siblings and grandmother during Reaping Day, but judging by the whispers of the older kids, they figured out that this was a different person than the man who'd guided District Eleven's tributes in past years. First, the escort introduced herself as Cake. In Pace's opinion, Cake was just about the stupidest name that a person could have. They hadn't decided on what name to give themself (currently, they went by their surname, but since the name change form required a full name, they had chosen to use their first initial in lieu of their given name and were thus J. Pace in the eyes of the government) but they made a mental note to avoid that particular one at all costs.
Cake read off a list of the Victors that the district had produced in the last three hundred and twenty-eight years, of which there were only twenty-one, and then played a propaganda film on a massive screen that showed just how deadly the Peacekeepers could be. Pace shuddered involuntarily.
Then Cake announced that it was time for the actual Reaping and that she would be selecting the female-classified tribute first, then the male-classified. Pace considered the Capitol to be despicable, but they decided that the escort was sort of okay. Her telltale accent and extravagant dress set her apart from the District Eleven folks, as did her overly patriotic speech, but Pace could see the kindness in her eyes and hear the warmth in her voice. Plus, they felt included when she had stressed that the bowl on her right side was for the tributes classified by the government as female for Reaping purposes and the bowl on her left side was for the tributes classified by the government as male for Reaping purposes. Even if they were only being included in a death lottery, it felt good to not be treated as an afterthought, or worse, forgotten altogether. They weren't male, but the government had classified them as such, temporarily, for this one event.
Cake kept it up, too. Her exact words were "Your first tribute will be Xanthe Sparacello! Xanthe, would you please come up here?" No assumptions of pronouns, no use of the word female. And then she said "Your second tribute will be J. Pace. Would you please come up too?" and Pace could have sworn their heart stopped. They had been twelve for less than a week. They shouldn't have had to worry about this. This wasn't supposed to happen to them, this was supposed to happen to somebody older who had taken out loads of tesserae that accumulated in loads of slips, what might have happened to Pace in a few years' time. But it was happening right then, and they had no control over it.
They were upset, and rightfully so. It was all the Capitol's fault for doing this to them, and they even let a few rather vulgar words slip out that their mother surely would have scolded them for, and then they remembered that she was there, and they looked over their shoulder and picked her out among the crowd, face twisted in agony over their fate, and they had to turn around and look straight ahead and clench their jaw to avoid saying something they would regret. They made it up to the stage and stood next to Cake, and saw Malachi and Sierra, and they wished harder than they had ever wished before that Malachi would run up and take their spot, because that's what he always told them, right? That he'd be there to rescue them? That he'd fight and die if it meant keeping them and their other siblings safe? But their ever-valiant brother showed no signs of living up to his promises of heroism.
They felt a hand on their shoulder and realized it was Cake, adjusting their posture (they had a bad habit of slouching) and steering them towards Xanthe, their seemingly unremarkable district partner. Cake prompted them with an "And now for the traditional handshake!" and once it was over, Pace found themself turning around next to Xanthe and following Cake through the double doors of the Justice Building.
Amy Kawasaki, 16
Kawasaki Residence, Five
D5F
July 1, 329 AEDD
Amy Kawasaki's ideal place of residence was not District Five. It was the Capitol, where people were equal parts gossipy and gullible. A world where everyone was talking about her, the most controversial high-class lady in town? That was the dream. Sadly, the lack of Capitolites in District Five meant that Amy had to resort to her more local inferiors to glean an appropriate amount of groupies to provide her with attention, entertainment, and material goods.
It began when her parents separated. They had both remarried to people Amy disliked as much as she did them, but her new half-siblings posed an interesting moral question. See, Amy actually found herself getting attached to them, which was unfortunate. How was she supposed to uphold her good name while also maintaining a somewhat fond opinion of three rather pleasant, lively, and inoffensive-looking under-tens?
Amy didn't like the Capitol by virtue of it being the Capitol. Her parents, wealthy government workers, taught her to believe that it was worthy of worship and praise. In truth, Amy knew that it was she who was worthy of worship and praise, and that moving to the Capitol was a means to an end, that end being attaining as much power and status as possible whilst accruing obscene amounts of money to lord over the poor suckers shining her shoes. Now, it is important to note that Amy was not classist. She hated the rich as much as she did the poor; the poor were just more malleable due to the influence money had over them. In fact, Amy thought that the rich were more fun to toy with, since it was all a game of stoking jealousy and breeding malcontent.
Her parents had failed her from the beginning. Workaholic slaves to achievement with too many more important things to do than raise their children, they had tossed Amy into the most rigorous, prestigious, ultra-competitive ballet academy they could find, fed her nothing but harsh criticisms for the next decade, demanded that she start striving for the next achievement every time she finally succeeded in reaching the coveted first place, tried to drill it into her head that the Capitol they lawyered for was absolutely flawless, and, like idiots, expected her to fall for it hook, line, and sinker. Parents like that screw kids up ninety-nine times out of a hundred, and Amy was no exception. What Amy learned from them was this: power was the best thing to have, then attention, then money, then whatever was left. Amy had money. She knew she could get attention. And maybe, if she played her cards just right, she'd be able to sink her teeth into the power she so desired.
She started off as a young child. She started off small, playing little harmless games with the people around her. She'd make people's heads turn over in circles when she did things like the hiding game, where she'd take the item someone had just touched and tuck it away for a few minutes, then put it back in the spot it'd originally been. She'd play it for hours, until the people were certain they were going crazy. Then she'd work herself up to changing their perceptions of their surroundings entirely, coaxing them into believing that their clothes were once different colors, or that their kitchen used to have a different layout, or that they'd met their spouse in an entirely different place. She eventually reached the point where she could completely warp their memory, turning a yes into a no and back again. She was a master puppeteer, and they were her darling little marionettes, with their darling little heads that she'd fill with whatever she pleased. It was such terrific fun that once she did it the first time, Amy knew she was addicted. Just one hit and she was hooked for life.
She had no idea how much her innocent habit would grow, but she welcomed it. Her first trick of such subtle gaslighting eventually grew to be one of a few core staples in her repertoire of manipulation tactics. Amy knew how to make people adore her, but more often than not, it was even better to make them hate her and then force them into attending to her all the same. She deserved to have it! She was superior. She had figured out the cheat code to the game of life, and so she would win, and she would win through her own carefully curated skills.
Amy had just enough love for Kain Becker and Riley and Colin Kawasaki. That was it. She could hold a little affection for her three stepsiblings, even though they saw her as more of a person than an idol, but for the rest of the world, she held nothing but an observer's view: amusement, displeasure, or indifference. She was a level above other people, so she could never truly go through life the same way as them.
The dance company was fun, though. She didn't get any special privileges there, which made the game all the more enjoyable. She really had to work for her status there, and, well, she succeeded. She had all of the other girls eating out of her palm. Even if their bad dancing aggravated her, she could use their support to her advantage, so she did. The boys, though? Reeling them in was easy. All she had to do was simper a little and wear a low cut shirt to get them interested, and then she'd let them think that they were just one heroic act away from making her theirs.
It was so easy. Amy was used to the sweet life. She was in the middle of a tougher project, though. She was getting sick of having her mother and father and stepmother and stepmother bossing her around and interfering with her plans, so she'd been brainstorming ways to get rid of them. Not kill them of course, that would be cruel. No, just frame them. They were Capitol lawyers who put rebels in jail and worse, so if she could make them look like they'd been working to gather Capitol intel and were secretly working with the rebels themselves, well, that'd be damning.
And then Amy would be free. The overcrowded orphanage didn't take in sixteen-year-olds, so she'd have total authority over her own life. If she could time it during the Hunger Games, when the government was most concerned with rebellion, it would probably have an even greater chance of success. She was eagerly anticipating the Hunger Games themselves, though.
It was a peek into what life would be like in the Capitol. Amy loved the extravagance of the costumes, and the intrigue of the drama between the tributes. It was always perilous, of course, but Amy had idly considered volunteering, just once or twice. You know, to spice things up and show Panem how masterfully you could really manipulate someone. It might be a good method of moving to the Capitol. The Hunger Games would probably be unpleasant, though, so she'd look into other ways of doing things.
Reaping Day was going well for Amy so far. She'd had the family chef prepare cupcakes for her breakfast, and she'd had a relaxing morning, first taking her time getting ready, then starting a rumor that ballooned into a massive argument between three of the maids, eventually culminating into Amy firing one on the spot, just for funsies. Then it was time to mentally prepare herself to be worshipped by the unwashed masses the second she stepped outside the double doors of the Kawasaki home.
It was bound to be a thrilling day, of course. Busy days meant lots of commotion, which meant there was room to foment distrust between family and friends, and then to air out people's dirty laundry with as much fanfare was socially acceptable. Once the Reaping was over, she figured she'd mosey on down to the dance studio and see how many people she could stir up. But first, the ceremony.
Amy's family was wealthy enough to afford a new set of Reaping clothes, and they were absolutely stunning on her. The cocktail dress was a rich shade of scarlet and spun of the finest District Eight satin. A pair of equally red platform pumps crafted in District One from imported District Ten patent leather had been chosen to accompany it. The hue coordinated nicely with the tone of her skin, which was fresh and dewy from her recent candlelit bath.
On her way out of the door, she kissed each small stepsibling on the top of the head. She actually struggled to keep the smile off of her face, but she had to force the corners of her mouth down into the appropriately haughty expression that the situation called for. Her entourage joined up with her, walking about three paces behind, signifying her high status. She generously allowed the Peacekeeper to draw her blood, then settled in the aisle between the boys' and girls' sections, fanning out her skirts on the walkway and scowling delicately at anyone who got too close to stepping on it as they scooted by to get to their pen.
The escort, Ravya, took the stage. She picked the boy first. Amy recognized the name, Aran Casteel. She wasn't quite sure why the crowd was cheering for his selection, but he started to cry over it. Hm. Must be a stupid person thing, she decided. Then Ravya called Amy's name, and her perfect poise threatened to crumble. The Hunger Games were amusing, sure, but when other people were the tributes! However, she composed herself in the blink of an eye, ensuring that nothing would seem amiss with her, that she still emanated perfect strength, as she climbed the stairs to the stage.
"Shake hands!" Ravya chirped, and she prodded Aran to stand up and greet Amy. Amy grasped his hand gently and tried to gauge his state of mind. Despite his chewed-up lip and teary, bloodshot eyes, his private delight wasn't going unnoticed to someone so practiced at manipulation. Amy knew that he wasn't actually sad, just faking at being pathetic. She pretended to buy in the way Ravya had, patting the back of his hand softly.
"Hush," she soothed, whispering. "It'll be alright, I promise." She saw the side of his face twitch, and that's how she knew it was the right moment to clamp down and twist, crushing his hand and grinding the bones against one another, mildly enjoying the way his mouth contorted in silent pain. "Faker." She let the word fall from her lips harshly, and quietly too, leaning in, lips just barely resting on the shell of his ear. She needed to pull this off, she wasn't going to waste her moment, not this early in the game, even if it meant braving some ugly street kid's gross, overgrown sideburns. She listened for the hitch in his breath that meant he realized he'd been caught, then let her voice go treacle-sweet. "Oh, I'm sorry that hurt, but I was just helping you be a little more convincing, you know? That little crying trick wasn't fooling anyone. What do we say when people save our sorry asses and don't let our little schemes come to light in front of all of Panem?" She dug a sharpened nail between the webbing of his fingers.
"Thank you," he grumbled.
"Good job," she said brightly as Ravya steered them toward the Justice Building. "That's exactly right." Amy smiled a little to herself. This was Phase One. Of course Aran would be upset with her at first, but she was playing the long game. She would fake him out not just once, but twice. She was Amy Kawasaki, and she always got her way. She could guarantee that Aran was going to love her by the end, but more importantly, he would need her. And he would protect her to the end.
Kenny Michaels, 15
District Square, Eight
D8M
July 1, 329 AEDD
Kenny hadn't intended to piss off the Peacekeepers enough to get whipped. It had just kind of happened. Kenny had a natural knack for ruffling feathers, and well, the Peacekeepers were just being overly sensitive.
This wasn't Kenny's first rodeo. He'd gotten whipped plenty of times before, just never on Reaping Day. What angered him was that this time, he hadn't even done anything wrong! One little word about how rigged the Games were, and the vultures had swooped in and dragged him to the whipping post in the district square. Normally when Kenny said something to provoke the Peacekeepers, he did it on purpose. He hadn't, this time, but he believed in getting his money's worth. If he was going to be flogged no matter what he did, he might as well do something to earn it, right?
Apparently scooping up the apple core from his pocket and flinging it in the face of District Eight's Head Peacekeeper was the wrong move. Now, fat rivulets of blood were starting to trickle down his back. "You should be ashamed, young man!" One of the Peacekeepers was shouting at him. Ick. "Throwing garbage at an officer preparing to gently correct you was a positively dastardly thing to do. This should teach you a lesson!"
In Kenny's opinion, the Peacekeeper was being a wee bit dramatic. And also lying. Gently correct me, my ass, he thought. As for teaching him a lesson? Oh, please. Sure, on one hand, the whipping hurt. Badly. But Kenny had above-average pain tolerance, and besides, it hurt more to know that the Capitol was punishing him for talking about his brother's death. Travis had gotten Reaped when Kenny was thirteen. Kenny was softer then, less jaded by the world of crime and punishment. After seeing Travis earn a respectable score of seven and perform well at interviews, Kenny had assumed that Travis would make it home.
He died twenty seconds into the Bloodbath, when the boy from Two sent a spear flying through his throat. Kenny felt a little avenged when an outlier, Harrietta from Ten, had won, snaring the murderer with a bullwhip (awfully similar to the one slashing down on Kenny's back right now) but he knew that the Capitol's blatant favoritism was to blame. Not to mention that the Capitol operated the Hunger Games in the first place, and kept the Peacekeepers in the districts.
Kenny didn't cry. He wouldn't give the Peacekeepers the satisfaction. The Head Peacekeeper, the one he'd thrown the apple core at, just looked frustrated. She'd never gotten one single tear out of him, but she'd put him back on the post again and again to try. He made her look bad. What else was she supposed to do? Kenny had a passion for making her job more difficult. He'd set fires, shut down businesses, stolen from the barracks, organized riots, physically and verbally assaulted Peacekeepers, and spoken badly about the Capitol.
Time dragged on. Eventually, the whipping ended, and Kenny's father arrived to collect him. Clark Michaels was the stay-at-home parent. His wife Shannon, Kenny's mother, owned and operated a factory that made hats, which meant that the Michaels family was one of the richer ones in town. If Kenny's mother had been anyone else, Kenny would probably have been executed long ago, but her name meant something to the Capitol, and that meant that the Peacekeepers had to at least somewhat stay on her good side.
Kenny liked his father better than his mother. Shannon was too busy to be around very much, and when she was around, she did nothing but fret over his rebellious attitude towards the Capitol. Clark didn't much try to tell Kenny what to do. He supported most of Kenny's "hobbies", but he wasn't happy to learn that Kenny had been whipped again. He wasn't upset at him, but he was considering giving one of the Peacekeepers an earful, at least before he realized that the Reaping would be occurring and Kenny needed to prepare.
They walked home, not bothering to talk about it. The Michaels family could afford an indoor bathtub, which Kenny used. He went through the uncomfortable process of rubbing soap into the fresh wounds to prevent infection before bandaging them, and then dried off with a towel. Clothes had been laid out on the bureau in his bedroom: a striped tie, crisp blue button-down shirt, and stiff khaki shorts. Kenny didn't actually mind formal clothing, but he didn't think the event that kicked off a child murder pageant was something worth celebrating.
He wore them anyway, to avoid additional wrath from the Peacekeepers. He wouldn't push them any further than he already had, especially not on Reaping Day. Even he knew better than that. Kenny was pretty much a ball of fury and bitterness with poor judgement and even poorer risk assessment. He was fine with provoking people and facing the consequences if it meant he got the satisfaction of yelling at them. It wasn't a trait that would serve him well in the future, but at this point, Kenny wasn't very concerned about the future. He had no concerns beyond the Reaping, which he anticipated to be the usual condescending, bootlicking, overly patriotic affair.
He just wanted to have breakfast first. He had gone to visit his friend Kate, but then the argument with the Peacekeeper had happened, and the ensuing whipping had screwed up his entire Reaping Day schedule. He had some kind of sweet, filled pastry from the larder, then said good morning to his mother, who was rushing around with one shoe on, trying to find her clipboard with the factory timetables before she had to leave. She actually stopped in her tracks to give him a telling-off for the morning's misdeeds before pinching his cheek and making him promise to be good for the rest of the day, then wished him luck at the Reaping before hustling off again.
He got to the district square, where the splotches of blood he'd left behind on the pavement had been covered up by the strategically placed check-in booth and its floor length tablecloth. The Peacekeeper glared at him. Kenny glared back. He was directed to the section for fifteen-year-old boys. The other boys shifted away, not wanting to be associated with such a prominent troublemaker.
The video was played. It was a propaganda film talking about how great the Capitol was and how evil the people who disliked it were, and Kenny felt the eyes of the populus on him. Then the escort walked onstage. He was new. District Eight was one of the least desirable districts to escort for, a gloomy hub of industry, always overcast and smoggy, with citizens that were bland in terms of appearance, lifestyle, and personality. Rebellious without the redeeming rural charm of Eleven or Twelve. As such, it tended to get a new escort every one or two years.
This one introduced himself as Opiter and seemed much less perturbed by the city than his predecessors. He, unfortunately, was a good deal more sycophantic than them as well. Kenny wasn't a fan of this oddly clad man who waltzed into his life and started yapping about the Capitol's grace and generosity with those hideously overinflated lips. How could Kenny take him seriously? He had been born into the ruling class, and any attempt to empathize with the worker ants was nothing short of patronizing. How could someone with so much gold jewelry compliment the fruits of his peers' labor without it being in extremely poor taste? It was just so unfair!
It was eventually time to choose the tributes, which Kenny was grateful for. He'd have done anything to make the speech end. Opiter wasn't overly dramatic about it, pulling both slips from their respective bowls in quick succession. "Your first tribute," he said, "Is Aster Maris. Aster, please come up here. Is that you, in the two braids and green pinafore? Thirteen year-old section? Yes, these stairs here." The petite person who climbed the stone steps looked frightened, but seemed to hold herself together as she stepped up to the microphone, rising onto the tips of her toes to speak into it.
"If it's alright with you, I'd prefer Ash, Mister Opiter," she said. She seemed like a timid thing, or maybe she was just extra polite to adults? Kenny wasn't sure.
"Ash Maris?"
"Yes. Is that okay?"
"Yes, Ash, that's fine. Now for our second tribute. Kenny Michaels, you come up here too."
Kenny didn't even realize he'd been chosen at first. When he finally did, his reaction was harsh and immediate: "What the hell?" he bellowed. Breaking rank and fleeing his pen, he ran to the line of Peacekeepers flanking the section. "Which one of you pigs did this?" he screeched. "Which one? Which one of you Capitol-loving fucks did this to me?!" He turned on Opiter, leaping onstage and getting in his face. "Who paid you to do this?" He turned to the crowd. "Who paid this bastard Capitol aristocrat to pick me?"
He was agitated. He wasn't thinking clearly. He hadn't considered the possible repercussions. All that was going through his mind was in regards to the fact that he'd been unjustly set up by somebody working for the Capitol and no sir, he wasn't going to stand for it.
Somebody snatched his tie as he dashed past, and he tripped, stopping in his tracks, yanked tight. Caught!
It was the Peacekeeper that had lied about the "gentle correction" or whatever earlier, and he was determined to catch him. Kenny strained against the necktie, trying to break free without choking himself, before realizing it was impossible. The Peacekeeper, suddenly so tall and strong, towered over him and wrenched his wrists behind his back.
He felt fragile. This had happened before, and he had felt fragile then too. Kenny wasn't a big guy, and whenever he was subdued by a Peacekeeper, he always felt uncomfortably tiny. He instantly became so quiet and respectful that he might've been confused with Ash, who he'd entirely forgotten about and who was now clutching Opiter's hand and hiding behind him.
The Peacekeeper cuffed Kenny upside the head. "You stop this nonsense right now."
"Yessir." The Peacekeeper marched him onto the stage and stood him on Opiter's other side.
"Shake hands, please," Opiter said. Ash stepped out into the open and shyly extended her arm. The Peacekeeper released one of Kenny's.
"Behave," he growled, just loud enough for Kenny to hear. He didn't dare disobey. He shook hands with Ash and stood there while the Peacekeeper and Opiter conferred in hushed tones, and then the Peacekeeper let go of him with a final warning hissed into his ear. "Or I'll make sure the Head Peacekeeper of all of Panem gets mutts sicced on you the moment you step into that goddamn arena. Got that, boy?"
"Yessir." Then Kenny was handed off to Opiter, who now seemed comparatively warm and pleasant, despite coming from the Capitol. He had to be a better chaperone than the Peacekeeper, right? As Opiter said his final piece and led Ash and Kenny towards the Justice Building, he sighed heavily.
"Kenny, do me a favor and never pull a stunt like that ever again. Please? It's rude, it's a waste of time, and it's not a very effective publicity strategy." Kenny was prepared to say something insolent and snippy, but Opiter's surprisingly mild tone of voice didn't really warrant that kind of response.
"If you say so."
"I do. I bet it was a shock to be Reaped, right?"
"Yeah."
"I understand. I don't blame you for overreacting, but I'm here to say you can't go around and do things like that. You're not changing anyone's mind, you're just sabotaging your own chances of success."
"Fine." It wasn't fine, actually, Kenny had been picked for something awful and was being sent off to die, but he could make an effort to not blow up quite so badly, especially considering the Peacekeeper's threat.
"Good. We'll talk more on the train, but this isn't the end of our chat. Not by a long shot, kid."
Orion Zenobia, 41
Tribute Training Center, Capitol
Head Trainer
July 1, 329 AEDD
Orion was cheerful as he polished the sword's hilt. He was in the Training Center, making last-minute adjustments to the weaponry displays. If he wanted it to get done more expeditiously, he could have called over just about any Avox in the building, but Orion liked doing it himself. He wanted to put his own personal spin on the room. He had been Head Trainer for many years, and he experimented with a new layout each Hunger Games. He was polishing this particular sword because he had left his fingerprints on it when he moved it to a new rack and he wanted it to be absolutely pristine for whoever handled it. The natural oils from his skin had left noticeable little marks, and he wanted the tributes to enjoy the feeling of picking up something seemingly untouched.
He couldn't wait to learn who the tributes were. Orion's three favorite moments of the Games were when he saw the twenty-four tributes get Reaped on live television, when he received a complete dossier on each one, and when they walked, starry-eyed, into the Training Center for the first time. Orion had a true love for the tributes and a genuine desire to prepare each one as best he could. He would dutifully read their files from beginning to end. He didn't have to. Before him, not many Head Trainers had wanted the dossiers, but Orion knew that he could help the tributes most if he understood their backgrounds. He could have his subordinate trainers teach them certain skills and recommend specific weapons if he had an idea of everyone's level of experience.
Orion was cheerful because he was talking with Anadyr Pike-Jones, who was accompanying him. Anadyr, a District One Victor and the spouse of Kaylee Pike-Jones, one of the current District Four mentors, had exactly three personality traits: sassy, flirty, and right. Their speech was peppered with expletives and innuendos, but they knew what they were doing. Always! They had mentored Griffin Cadbury the previous year, in fact, and managed to turn the Career Pack's shy, anxious weak link into an icon. Despite how much their personality clashed with his own, Orion was actually very good friends with them. He loved his job and preferred to take it seriously, but it was even better when he got to do it alongside someone equally knowledgeable as a fighter who he'd also known for a long time.
Anadyr was talking about the selected Career tributes. Orion couldn't remember a time that Anadyr had ever been wrong, which was useful in a lot of situations, but especially handy when they got involved with conflicting rumors , and that was another thing he liked about them–they knew all the gossip. "Nathaniel Lewis and Odicci Harbore for District Four!" they declared.
"Kaiya told you?"
"No, Kaiya told Kaylee and Kaylee told me, you asshat."
"Fuck you."
"Would you be so kind? Kaylee doesn't get here until tonight and I could use the attention."
Orion laughed. "Yeah, I don't think Kaylee would be too happy about that."
"No kidding. But I bet she would be happy to–"
"Say, what're Odicci and Nathaniel like?"
"They're the Careers from District Four. I might be a Career, but I'm a District One bitch."
"Okay, what's going on with the District One kids?"
"I love the boy. I'm so jealous that Griff gets to mentor him. He reminds me a lot of myself."
"Oh dear."
"Don't be like that. You like me, right?" Anadyr batted their eyelashes at him.
"Of course I do, you moron. What's the boy's name?"
"Orpheus Adello."
"Why'd you pick him? You headed the selection committee this year, right?"
"I did. Let's just say he made a strong first impression."
"And the girl?"
"Nascha Eirena Czarin. She was a more complicated choice, but when it comes down to it, I wanted someone cunning to send in with Orpheus."
"Do you think they'll get along well together? Or is this one of the years when the Pack is more chaotic?"
"They'll tolerate each other fine."
"That's good to hear. Have you heard anything about District Two in the last half hour? The tributes are supposed to be getting selected right about now."
"No. Unfortunately."
"Ugh." Orion hung up the now-very-polished sword. He knew Anadyr wouldn't reveal anything more about their district's tributes until the other Career Victors had an opportunity to do so, because for all their talk, they really did believe in fairness. Orion did too. Even though it would have been fun to find out early, he knew that it would sway his opinion and cause some implicit bias that might affect the course of the Games, which wouldn't be good at all. "In that case, would you mind tagging along if I track down a Gamemaker to ask if they know more yet?"
"You expect me to get off my ass and walk somewhere? Orion, how could you?!"
"You ran for five hours straight during your Games. I think you can handle a quick walk."
"I'm not going!"
"Really? I'll give you a piggyback ride," Orion bribed.
"Fuck yeah I'm going!" They got situated on his back, and they then proceeded together towards the Gamemaker Control Center, where they found Jacqueline, Rosé, Derp, Nigel, and Karen all hunched over a piece of paper.
"It's in some sort of code," Nigel was saying. "I wonder how we're supposed to decrypt it. Is there a key of some kind?"
"Excuse me," Orion interrupted, "But what's going on here?" Nigel turned to face him.
"We all went to meet with Flossie for a minute or two and this was lying on my desk when we came back. I think it has something to do with the attacks. Nikolai got a message dropped off the same exact way pretty recently. We ought to bring this to him, but it'd be nice if we could decode it first."
"What's it say?" Nigel turned the paper toward him. It read:
WJWZUN, XK W ZKWN WJZ PKHH JEGAHWE BWAAJWYDP PDK BAHHASEJC, RKNXWPEI:
EJRKOPECWPK YAJZQYPAN PSKJPU-PDNKK
LHWYK BWEPD EJ PDK WHXWYARK ZUJWOPU
WJD E RAO PA KJOQNK UAQN HKCWYU
LNKRWEHO SDKNK EP DWO KPKNJWHHU OPAAZ
BAN ERWJ DWO EJBANIKZ IK PDWP EP'O DK
SDA EO XAPD A'KN WJZ 'JKWPD PDK OEHRKN DAAZ
WJZ ALLANPQJEOPEY ZQIAQYDKHO YAQHZ
OKP QL GWVEIEN'O YAILWJEAJ, SDEYD SAQHZ
LAPKJPEWHHU XK UAQJC SEHH'O CWIK YDWJCKN
KJPKN PDK SANHZ AB PNKWYDKNU BAN CAAZ
LNKLWNK PA LQP FADJ ZAK EJ ZKKL ZWJGKN
XKYWQOK LAHEPEYO EO OQYD W YENYQO
WJZ UAQ WNK WXAQP PA XKYAIK PDK BAAH.
OEJYKNKHU,
GWEUW WHXWYANK
"Well that does us a fat lot of good," Orion drawled.
"It looked like it might be a Caesar Cipher," Nigel said, "But the letters aren't equidistant from their original alphabetical positions, so it doesn't work out right." Orion wasn't exactly sure what Nigel meant by that, but Anadyr apparently knew, because they piped up,
"Oh! I bet I know how to figure this out!" They slid down off Orion's back and peered at the paper, steadily getting more worried over the course of perhaps ninety seconds before turning to Orion.
"What's wrong?" he asked. Anadyr stared at him in horror. Voice shuddering, they said in a more severe tone than Orion had ever heard them use,
"You need to get Nikolai over here right now."
Hey y'all!
I'm just going to pretend to ignore my unholy hiatus, but we should be back on track shortly. This isn't discontinued, I was just unproductive as hell for, like, five months. I hope I represented this batch of tributes pretty well, and I'm super excited to get to work on the next chapter!
–LC