75 Years: Different Perspectives
The Fourth Hunger Games: Lachlan Hennessey (16)
Oh no. My voice echoed as the official revealed the name of the male Tribute. My twin brother is going into the Games, I thought as the Reaping ended and heading to Faith Dolman. "Faith" I said, looking at the teary-eyed girl. Faith looked up at me, her blue eyes full of tears. "I don't know what to do" she muttered as I sat down next to her. Lachie, this is her boyfriend going into the Arena, a voice echoed. "Faith, I know Harold well and I know he can win this" I told her, but secretly, I knew that he may not survive.
Six days into the Games, and the Alliance of the Districts 10-11-12 Tributes has, so far with the exception of Claire McNarama, is still standing. Poor Claire was killed on the first day when Jack Heyer, the District 1 male, speared her as she was trying to flee with a dagger. On Day Five my brother spotted the District 9 Tributes while on the lookout, and seeing as they were weaponless, decided not to attack them. The following day, the District 1 and 2 Tributes decided to torture the District 9 Tributes in order to lure my brother out. My brother, Flora Demaine and Horsa Georges were clever not to fall for the Districts 1 and 2's Traps, but unfortunately, Swift from District 11 and Barbara from District 10 were killed when they were ambushed. It was on Day 7 Harold set up his own ambush. He, Horsa and Flora hid in the dugouts and when Jack and Oliver looked around the boys attacked. Horsa had decided to fight Jack while Harold wrestled the knife off Oliver. As Oliver placed his hands around my brother's neck I saw that he had Oliver's knife in his right hand and swiftly, plunged the knife into Oliver's chest. Oliver fell to the ground dead, his biggest mistake was underestimating Harold.
Day 8 was the day I'll never forget. I was at Faith's house, watching the Games when I saw that Amethyst Rickards, the District 1 girl, had hacked Flora Demaine to death. Harold, angry at the death of his ally, hurled his knife into Amethyst's neck, killing her. I saw Ursula pull out of her quiver, an arrow, and she pointed the tip towards Harold. "I can't look" I heard Faith whimper as she buried her head into my shoulder as the arrow struck my brother. "No" I yelled, shaking at what I had just witnessed. On the screen, Horsa was comforting my dying brother. "Horsa, just win" Harold whispered as Faith started crying before my brother passed away. Harold Hennessey. My brother, my friend. Dead, just like that. Ursula glared at Horsa. "So how does it feel, District 10. Why, it feels like an arrow to the heart, doesn't it" she sneered. That is quite low, even for District 2. Mocking a Tribute's death like that, and even worse, my own brother too. Horsa won the Fourth Hunger Games, but Ursula's cruel taunt about my brother echoed in my mind.
A few days later and the coffins contained the bodies of Claire McNarama and Harold Hennessey arrived in District 12, and as the District gathered for their funerals I looked at the headstones that will mark where they will remain for eternity. After the funerals, one of the Capitol doctors that accompanied the two coffins revealed something to me, that my brother wasn't returned in one piece. "Gaul desecreated your brother's corpse to send a message to District 12. She ordered for your brother's heart to be removed. She hid it in the Capitol, near the Arena. A form of torture to District 12, to scare them a lot". I was sickened by the revelation that a piece of my brother was still in the place where he lost his life. Faith overheard the conversation, and she was disgusted at what the Capitol had done to her lover. "HOW DARE THE CAPITOL TAKE SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T BELONG TO THEM. THAT IS DESCREATION" Faith had ranted that evening, and I don't blame her.
Months pass by and my home is quiet without Harold. His bubbly nature, his kindness, his bravery. Even my sister Martha misses him. Faith was furious by the disrespect shown to him after his death, and she has even talked about being Reaped into the Hunger Games "So I can show the Capitol that they have no right taking something that doesn't belong to them. At least Harold had a heart, something the Capitol lacks" she told me one day. "Good point" I replied back, smiling at the thought.
The Fifth Hunger Games
"Lachlan Hennessey" I heard my name being called out as I walked towards the stage. A sense of Deja vu, I thought, remembering that a year earlier, Harold was standing on the stage as a Tribute. I hope to win, I hope to bring back a piece of my brother back, I vowed as I turned to Faith. "Faith, I promise I will try and win" I told her, but deep down I know I will lose my life.
"Lachie". I saw a ghostly figure standing beside me. "Harold" I whispered, turning towards my brother. "I'm sorry. I failed." I muttered as Harold hugged me, strands of dark hair falling over his grey eyes. "You didn't fail, Lachie. You looked out for Faith. I wish I could spend my whole life with her" he whispered. I glanced at my twin. "I knew I was doomed the moment Moora, Fig and Bessie was poisoned" I thought back to my District Partner, Fig Demaine from District 11 and Bessie Georges from District 10, all three poisoned by contaminated water. Being stabbed through the chest was no better than dying a slow, agonizing death from poisoned water, but at least the former was quick. Mr. Dolman had made a name tag in memory of Harold, and I wore it in the Games. The irony isn't lost on Mmseyone Musk, the eventual District 3 victor. Harold, ever the romantic, would think it's meaningful. Harold and Lachlan. Lachlan and Harold. Twin brothers. Two personalities. Looking down at the name tag, I saw it had been cut into two. "You wore the tag on your chest, didn't you?" I heard my twin say. I thought to the reason why I wanted to win the Games. I thought back to Faith's conversation a few months ago, and I suddenly remembered what she meant.
Faith was Reaped into the Sixth Hunger Games, and like Harold and I, didn't survive the Games. She froze to death one night into the Games, when Dr. Gaul locked her out of one of the rooms. At least she was reunited with Harold. District 12 got their first Victor in the 10th Hunger Games, and footage of those Games, plus the nine before, were erased by Dr. Gaul. Faith and I failed to return the piece of Harold Hennessey back to District 12, and Lucy Grey Baird, the Victor, vanished shortly after. Maybe she knew too much about Coriolanus Snow, that he had ordered the execution of Sejanus Plinth alongside a woman named Lil? Maybe Sejanus feels sorry for the District Tributes because he was from a District himself? Maybe not all Capitolites are heartless.
Decades pass, and District 12 failed to gain another Victor. This year is the Second Quarter Quell, and three Seam Kids, Flare Mulholland, Tostig Wilkes and Haymitch Abernathy, and one Merchant girl, Maysilee Donner, were Reaped. Flare, Tostig and Maysilee lost their lives, but Haymitch made it out just hanging onto life himself. Haymitch lost his mother, brother and girlfriend two weeks later, when Snow, now the President, ordered them to be killed. How can someone be so cruel to order the deaths of three innocent people?
It was another twenty-four years before District 12 gained not just one, but two Victors. The idea was that both Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark were a "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" who ended up in the Games, an idea proposed by Peeta himself. "He reminds me of you, Harold" I told him on the night of the Interviews. The District 9 girl, Rosie, was the great-great-niece to Ginger Carmichael from the Fourth Hunger Games; her great-grandmother Chive won the Seventh Games, a fact mentioned during Rosie's Interview. Rosie was killed in the Bloodbath, a spear through her neck.
"NO!" I heard Harold yell as Katniss was Reaped into the Third Quarter Quell. "They're Reaping Victors?" Several of the Victors, such as Cecelia Garland from District 8, had families of their own. It was too cruel to see three very young children being pulled away from their mother, knowing they'll never see her again. In District 4, a young woman, Annie Cresta, was Reaped, however, an elderly woman, Mags Flanagan, offered to volunteer, as if she knew that Annie and the man Reaped alongside her, Finnick Odair, was a couple, and if Annie died in the Arena, Finnick would try and do something drastic that could see him receive the same fate. The 75th Games was halted on the third day with six Tributes left, and it was a sign of things to come.
Harold and I wandered around the ruins of the City Arena, the place both of us died in. Tomorrow, the Arenas where 1,743 people lost their lives will be destroyed. In their place will be memorials to those that died there. The walls are rigged with explosives, and the surrounding roads are closed. It turned out we weren't alone, as Oliver Shields was also there. "Harold". Oliver muttered. "I forgive you. We had no choice of being in the Games, and it was just unfortunate. You must be Lachie. You do look like Harold. You both are brothers?"
"Yes. Twin brothers, in fact" I told him.
"I see. Every Victor from District 1 is dead. Enobaria Golding is the last District 2 survivor. Beetee Latier is the only victor from District 3 left alive. Annie Cresta is also the last surviving victor from District 4. Every Victor from District 5 is dead. District 6 doesn't have any living Hunger Games Victors. District 7 is just down to Johanna Mason. Every Victor from Districts 8, 9, 10 and 11 are now dead, and all three living victors from District 12 are alive" Oliver explained. "Some died of natural causes before the war, eighteen of them died in the Third Quarter Quell, the majority was killed in the Victors' Purge and Lyme Rabe and Finnick Odair were killed in battle. But it showed that the Districts doesn't have to hate each other. Now that travel between Districts is possible, I could see some of the surviving Victors travel to visit each other."
"Johanna does visit District 4 to visit Annie, due to the fact she and Finnick were good friends" I pointed out.
"Perhaps, but then again, Victors do get on well with each other due to their similar experiences. I noticed the road used for Tribute Parades is now renamed to Finch O'Callaghan Road in tribute to that District 5 girl from the 74th Hunger Games, you know, the one who chose the method of how she died, and the fact her death, and the deaths of twenty-one others, had not been in vain, for it ended Snow's dictatorship"
Looking at the walls of the City Arena for the last time, Oliver, Harold and I remembered that we had watched, ghostly, for over seventy two years. By tomorrow night, the Arena where I died in, and the Arena where my twin brother lost his life, will be reduced to rubble.
A few weeks later, and archaeologists are now on the site of what used to be the City Arena. They were excavating the grounds for the remains of pre-Panem. One of the archaeologists uncovered a tin box.
"Faith, I love you" I heard Harold mutter to Faith as he said his goodbyes prior to the Fourth Hunger Games. I hugged my twin, knowing it will be the last time I'll see him alive.
"Perhaps Harold made an impact, at least in terms of Alliances between Districts?" I wondered as I sat outside the City Arena's ruins as the Capitol TV Screens was showing Katniss and Rue Thornley working on a plan. My mind flashes back to the conversation I had with Faith
"I know you're upset about what Dr. Gaul had done. I am as well. But jumping into the Hunger Games to make a point isn't the correct answer, Faith." I told the girl as we walked down a path as the autumn sun started to set. "But there is something Harold had that the Capitol hasn't"
"What's that, Lachlan?" Faith asked
"He had a heart, and that is something the Capitol doesn't have" I explained, thinking back to my twin brother.
"I'm scared" I whimpered as I climbed into Harold's bed as the sounds of thunder raged outside. I had a fear of thunder, and every time a thunderstorm raged outside I would rush towards Harold's arms and he would calm me down until the storm went away as I snuggled myself into his chest. Nothing ever fazed him at all, and that is what I wish I could be.
"Oh Faith, I love it" I heard Harold mutter as he opened his present. "You've even engraved our names on it too" Faith laughed as she went to her boyfriend. I looked at the watch I was given before walking over. In Harold's palm was a locket, engraved with his name and Faith's name. Faith placed the locket around Harold's neck, arranging the chain so the actual locket was resting against his heart. "It's cold" he whispered.
"Katniss! I need your help" I asked the young woman, one of the last surviving Victors of the Hunger Games as she stood in front of my grave. Katniss was visiting the graveyard to mourn her sister, Primrose, who was killed in the Rebellion, a young girl, just fourteen, dead as she tended the wounded. The first wave of bombs rained down on the crowd outside the President's Mansion, and Prim and the other medics were sent in to tend those wounded by the bombs. Then, a second wave of bombs rained on the wounded and the medics, killing them. It turned out Alma Coin ordered the bombings to frame Snow. She wanted a Hunger Games for the Capitol children as well, for the 1,743 lives lost in the Games.
"Did she do it?" I heard my twin brother ask me. A fresh pile of earth covered Harold's resting place, the remains of the Tribute having been dug up and reinterred. The missing piece of the District 12 male from the Fourth Hunger Games reunited with its' owner, nearly a century later. Beside me, Harold can only smile. Finally, he can rest in peace, I thought.
"Lachie! Harold!" A voice called both our names. Faith Dolman was standing in front of a shimmering staircase. Then it hit us. We can move on now, and joined Faith as the three of us walked up the staircase, joining her in the afterlife. Now that Harold's body is back together, there is no reason for us to haunt the Capitol and District 12. Looking back at the District, I muttered "Farewell, District 12". Katniss, Peeta and Haymitch can move on now, and so can Panem. Nobody needs to remember a pair of District 12 brothers who lost their lives in the City Arena, except in History books. Harold formed an Alliance, while I highlighted the injustices forced on the Districts. Lil's death hasn't been in vain, neither have the Rebellious Tributes' deaths, nor was those that died overthrowing the old regime. The Victors that was Purged didn't die in vain. My name is Lachlan Hennessey, and this was my story about The Hunger Games.
So this is Lachlan's chapter, and I must say, I would imagine that Dr Gaul would want to punish Harold for his Alliance. The knowledge of what the Capitol did to his twin brother was what fuelled Lachie's actions in the Fifth Hunger Games. This was one of the first Chapters for this side story to 75 Years I wrote, along with Gemma and Keanu's chapters, as well as Chapters 24 and 29. I wanted to post this chapter up as well as Chapters 5 and 6 so I can start work on the chapters through to Mags' Games before resuming on 75 Years. This chapter made me cry while writing it, and it also lead to a Headcanon of mine that the Capitol has an urban legend about a Tribute from the early days of the Games whose ghost roams the site of the City Arena, as if he is searching for something or someone.