III.
mutatio — change, alter, transformation
Catriona Rey, 39
President of Panem
The door opens without hardly a sound.
"Madam President," the speaker in question begins. "Vice President Edris, as you requested."
A newer hire, she imagines, for Catriona does not recognize him. If the shaking of his well-polished boots is to suggest anything, he has come woefully unprepared to be escorting anyone anywhere, let alone someone of such importance. She'll have to look into that.
"That will be all," Catriona says. "Thank-you."
They nod, scurrying from the room with impressive speed. Sevaine stays fixed in place until the door closes once again, only crossing to her side once they've been left alone. Instead of sitting he folds his arms overtop the plush armchair to her left, avoiding her eyes.
"So what's on your mind, Cat?" he asks.
"Why do you presume something is on my mind?"
He shoots her a bemused look. "You don't truly believe I know so little of you, even now. After so many years?"
The idea of being known is still such a foreign concept, an uncomfortable one. Even from someone she does trust, Catriona does not welcome it. As unfailing as Severin has been, she still does not want him looking. Not like this.
Catriona leans back in her chair, taking a sip of her spirits to calm the roiling in her stomach before she speaks. "I was thinking about the Quell cards."
"Again?"
"You say that as if it's a trivial matter."
"As far as I'm concerned, it is," he insists. "There is no rule against creating more, the creation of which is up to us."
But they both know what it means. Severin is right, of course. Nothing is stopping them—any of them—from slapping two more dozen Quell cards into a locked box and defining the future of Panem. Their predecessors, however, the ones who began this all in the first place, hadn't seen a reason to. Severin may deny it all he wants, but Catriona doesn't have such privilege.
She can't claim to know what their ancestors intended, but she can imagine it. A hundred years was enough. A finale to finish it all.
And here they are, continuing on.
"How long do you think it reasonable to carry out a treacherous punishment? Against kids so far removed from the Dark Days, even?" she questions.
"As long as it takes."
"Until what?" she fires back. "Until what, Severin?"
He shakes his head, fingers flexing uselessly against the chair's back. "You're being soft."
Catriona rises to her feet—a part of her wants to take her glass and crack it over his skull. She could have him in chains for the comment alone. "I'm being realistic," she hisses. "How much longer do you think we can continue this before both of our heads end up on spikes?"
"If the Districts rise up, we will subdue them."
"I'm not talking about the Districts."
Because how long, in truth, will it be before the very people around her are calling for her head? The citizens that roam the streets, that build the arenas, who clean up the children the Capitol kills before they pack them up into wooden boxes to be sent to their families.
It is all coming to a head. The barely-there crowds, the plummeting ratings, the whispers and the agonized tears. It is all pointing to one thing.
Catriona sees it; she'll have to put much more work in to make everyone else do so in a way that means something.
She sees Severin swallow. "I can only imagine what you're suggesting," he says quietly. "But you can't possibly—"
"I can't?" she interrupts. "I can do exactly that."
"If you end them—"
"When."
He blinks. The silence between them stretches so taut it could be shattered with the smallest of movements. "If you've already made your decision," he says slowly. "Then why am I here?"
Catriona once again forces herself to sit down, to take another steadying sip of her drink. Beyond Severin's head, the holoscreen projects a birds-eye view of the arena's unnerving colors and the tributes that continue to spread throughout it.
She has been unable to shake the feeling that the 101st should not be happening at all. It was never intended to go this far.
"I want your support," she says firmly. "Tomorrow I have a meeting scheduled with the rest of my advisors. Afterwards I will be paying a visit to the Control Room. Having your support would mean a great deal."
Sometime in the midst of her speaking, Severin as well turns his attention to the holoscreen. In the night, Seven and his ragtag band of allies cut down the one from Six, but not before he too falls. Somewhere out there in the distant lands of Panem, more than one heartbroken family is sobbing.
Is it wrong to admit that she, too, is tired of it?
"You don't have it," Severin says finally. "I can't."
Catriona nods. "Then you are more than welcome to hand in your resignation."
"Cat—"
"Or I can release you from your position. The decision is yours, Severin. Either way I will find someone who will support my decision, who sees the sense in this matter."
He seems resigned, heavy, as if the weight of the world has crashed down upon his shoulders. What he doesn't realize is that Catriona is freeing him of this, affording an easy out.
She is the one with the hard work ahead of her.
"You truly want this to be your legacy, Cat?" he wonders. "The woman who ended the Games?"
"Better than the woman who ended up dead because she refused to."
Better a legacy at all than to be ruined and murdered, her corpse tossed aside before it has even had time to cool. Some sacrifices have to be made for the good of them all. She was raised watching the Games, her grandfather made rich in the betting rings, her mother photographing tributes during the parade and creating multi-page spreads in Capitol Living. Catriona was meant to be here. Perhaps even meant to do this.
"Go home, Severin," she instructs. "Go home to your wife, and your son, and be grateful that he was born here rather than a place he would have been ripped from simply for having the audacity of marking his twelfth birthday."
He does not ask for further dismissal, turning to the door and stalking towards it with heavy footfalls, the kind of which echo around the room. Severin has been a good ally these past years, an even better partner in managing the country by her side.
Everything has to come to an end, however. That Catriona knows well.
Kosta Rosalia, 25
Gamemaker; Head of Engineering
There's always a unique sort of buzz around the halfway mark.
It's a rare thing, Kosta is certain, to have already noticed such a pattern after only two years. Granted those two years have been unusual, to say the least. They've already seen more dead children than perhaps any Gamemaker in history.
He's grateful, of course, but only to be alive. The money is plentiful, the notoriety growing in waves, but none of that would matter if he wasn't so fortunate to be breathing. The President had every right to drag them all to the same square she did the previous team and employ the same firing squad as well.
Frankly, he can't be all the way certain that's not her intention today. Since they were informed of her impending arrival, the air in the room has become too-thick, the kind that you could slice open with the tip of a blade. Still, it is not enough to dampen the buzz, but there is less conversation. More worry.
He misses the arrival of the security team, hovered over Leda's shoulder as he is, but Torryn slaps him hard in the back and Kosta straightens without thinking, missing the President's entrance by merely half a second. A man at her side, some decrepit straightjacket political type, hands a tablet first to Mykari, the unfortunate closest of them all.
"What is this?" Elide cuts in, taking measured steps around the center table until she can face the President fully.
"A non-disclosure agreement," the man says in turn. "You will all sign it."
It is not a question. Mykari signs their name with a flourish, without even reading the contents, and shoves the tablet into Theora's waiting hands. He watches her eyebrows furrow deeply, the blood drain from Andraste's face as they take the tablet in turn, and then it's being passed to him.
Andy's hands shake vaguely as they brush against his own. Before he has even managed the first handful of sentences Leda lets out a soft gasp at his side, cheek pressed to his shoulder as she fights for a better look at the words. "End the Games?" she murmurs. Something opens up in his stomach, drops out and lands at his feet.
Before he can even find the words himself, the tablet is torn unceremoniously from his hands. Elide has crossed the room once again and holds it now, close to her chest, as if concealing the words will somehow make them untrue.
"End the Games?" Elide says at least, tone heavy with disbelief. "You can't be serious, I don't… what does that…"
"I will not assume you so simple as to not understand the words, Miss Ozkann," Catriona says. "Though the agreement is not as detailed as it will come to be, it will provide the necessary information for you to continue your operations."
Elide's cheeks have gone a blistering shade of red, a state of fluster in its truest form. Kosta allows himself to inch towards her, though he doesn't too close. It's just enough so that he can read the words, allowing himself to scan over them once, quickly, and then a second time. If he's thorough, maybe he can properly believe it.
"You want us to continue our work," he says slowly, testing out the words. "Is that correct?"
"It is, Mr. Rosalia. The rest of this year's games are to go on unchanged, and as far as my advisors are concerned, the plans for any future arenas are only more pertinent now. Further details will be made available to you as they are solidified, which is precisely why this information is to stay with whom it is spoken to. Is that understood?"
There is an assent of murmurs from around the room—the interns are downright cowering. Naevys looks as if she is only moments away from being sick. The thundering in his chest is nearly bringing him to that very same point. One of the security guards steps forward, hand extended in waiting—half of him expects Elide to refuse, but she eventually hands it over with a sour look painted on her face.
"If there are any further questions, you may request an appointment and come to me directly," Catriona explains. "Otherwise that is all I need for you. As you've been made aware, there is a great deal of work to be done on my side of things."
Just as she turns to go, Elide begins to splutter. Kosta isn't quick enough to reach forward and grab her, reel her back in. "That's it?" Elide asks wildly. "That's all we get?"
Kosta can't deny that he feels much the same way—the difference is he wouldn't dare voice it. But fury has edged into Elide's voice, fury at having things so suddenly ripped from beneath her feet, and it has blinded her.
"Elide," the President says. It's just her name, that one simple thing, and his skin crawls for it. "Should it be necessary, I can always find another person to lead this team. One of your fellow Gamemakers, perhaps."
"But—"
"Elide," he hisses. This time he does allow himself to grab her arm, to dig his nails in so firmly that they leave a nasty impression.
He does not have to say anything else. She falls silent, though the trembling of her skin beneath his palm suggests she is far from done.
"As always, I am sorry for the interruption," Catriona apologizes. The unnerving click-clack of her heels continues to echo across the room long after her departure. Outside of their breathing, the room is otherwise silent until someone steps forward—a petrified intern, who sends him a sideways glance.
"The Nine girl, sir," she manages, gesturing to the holoscreen where the Nine girl's body lies splayed out, the boy from Two already departing. "Shall I…"
He sighs. "Please."
He fears he can't do it himself—letting the intern fire the cannon is the least he can do right now. That would mean letting go of Elide, and he truly doesn't have a clue of what she would do if he released her. She remains staring at the door where the President exited, unaware of the room around her as it slowly trickles back to life.
"Elide," he tries again, more gently. "It's not something you can argue. We're all shocked, believe me, but—"
"But nothing, Kosta," Elide snaps. "Not even two years, two fucking years, and she pulls the plug on us? On everything? It can't be that trivial, amounting to nothing. It can't be."
"Think of it this way. If she's serious, if this really happens, you'll be the last Head Gamemaker in Panem. You'll go down in history."
"It's not good enough—"
"It doesn't have to be," Theora says flatly behind them. "Or have you forgotten that you nearly died last year? How many more opportunities do you want to give her to kill you?"
His relationship with Theora is… complicated, to say the least. They butt heads. She's crass, and he rarely has the patience for it. But in this he can't help but deniably agree with her. Elide is like a sister to him, some of the only blood he has, and nearly losing her was bad enough. Another mistake and she'll be dead, no questions asked.
In the President's eyes, they have already buried more than enough people.
"You really think I need that reminder?" Elide asks.
"I do."
That should be the end of it. Elide finally tugs her arm from her grip, though he's held on long enough that her initial rage has faded into something more tolerable. She mutters a few choice words under her breath, squeezing her hands together until the skin at her knuckles turns white. He knows it's not the end when Elide shakes her head, the shock in her eyes morphing into something he can't quite put his finger on. How many times can he tell her to let it go? How many more times will the rest of them wait here with bated breath just to see if she's still alive?
"This is going to end badly," Theora says matter-of-factly. It's the second time in as many minutes that he's agreed with her without hesitation.
Kosta gets the feeling it won't be the last time.
So... that's a development!
I would explain further but frankly that will become available in-fic whenever I decide to write more, so I'll save those ramblings for the actual writing. I did say at some point during very early VAM discussions to not get attached to any one tribute idea before you really knew what was going on, is all I'll say.
Until next time.