District Ten

She sat on the leather couch in fidgety silence. Twisting, twisting. The hem of her Reaping shirt became crumpled in an instant and continued to create disappointing lines as her fingers tried to find something, anything, that wouldn’t change under her touch. Her palms were a mixture of sweat and rust being the product of her ongoing part time job and the fear that embedded itself within her very being. She was caught in a web of legal murders and erse minors that would never stop spearing and slicing and tackling and crunching until they were the only ones left. Bomi began to shiver.

A simple knock broke through her thoughts as she straightened up and patted down the end of her shirt to appear somewhat presentable. The man appeared before her eyes as a slab of pure white with lines of black on his shoulders and golden spheres completing his uniform. A peacekeeper.

“It’s time to go.” The words meant absolutely nothing to her. They were cold, harsh, and most of all, blunt.

She complied without having to be asked twice. Her body dragged itself out of its self-created puddle of despair. Roughly grabbing her arm, he pulled her through the Justice building’s winding halls and assortment of antiquities until she was no longer concerned about the amount of turns she was taking. When they had finally stopped all that was left for her to see was an empty train and a boy.

“Wait here you two,” the peacekeeper said. “And don’t get any ideas of escape because you see those doors?” He motioned at the far end of the station where two automatic rectangles stood patiently. “If you go through them …” He then proceeded to slice his throat with his index finger. The boy made no reaction despite the red circles beneath his eyes. Bomi gulped.

As the sound of the peacekeepers footsteps receded, Bomi allowed herself a silent exhale and shifted her eyes to the ground. The deathly noiselessness that they were surrounded by seemed almost impenetratable.

“Yoon Bomi.”

At the mere flow of the words escaping his mouth her head whipped up in attentiveness.

“You don’t want to fight do you?” The boy questioned.

She shook her head vigorously. Not as much out of fear as it was out of agreement.

“Well, I don’t either,” he responded.

“What’re you suggesting then? We don’t fight and let ourselves be killed by the masses?” Her brow furrowed at the thought. Bomi had never imagined her life to be so fragile and malleable in the hands of others until that very moment. It was simply fight or flight. If she wouldn’t throw a dagger at someone’s heart the conclusive result would be a clear conscience but a completely hollowed out body. Was that what she really wanted?

“Something along the lines of that …” the boy trails off. “I’ve lost too many things I care about already. So I might as well die while keeping my integrity intact right?”

She couldn’t help the instinctive nodding of her head followed by the rush of awe. For a boy who was known for practically nothing in a district that had never once bestowed a second glance upon him until the Reaping, he was by far, wiser than what they believed. But she was still wary of the noose that hung limply around her neck, ready to be tightened whenever she made the wrong decision, or trusted the wrong person.

“Junho,” he called, softly, timidly. The noiseless plea was a strange sound to his ears, almost too good to be true coming from a man who never spoke quieter than a shout. It was pure soundlessness.

“Yes?” he replied melancholically.

The man’s mouth dipped into a low hanging frown as he came closer to the boy with neatly chopped hair and sparkling eyes. Still the same boy, but only taken away from his context. The man’s mind drifted away from the despairing scene to memories of fresh milk and a little boy’s legs shifting shape as he ran at the speed of light. The better days were all he had ever wanted. A boy who could live a pleasant life was all he ever wanted.

“How do you feel?” the man’s voice echoed.

“Like I just drank spoilt milk.”

“Well, it can’t be that bad if you’ve already tried it more than once,” the man’s voice moulded into a chuckle that ebbed away too quickly. Humour was not the best antidote for the poor atmosphere.

“Do you think I’ll … y’know, make it? At least past day one?” the boy hesitantly inquired. Junho didn’t need a resounding yes as a response, nor did he need the reassuring lies that the man would give. The only thing he knew he needed was a response to determine the kind of figure the man was.

“Honestly?”

“Honestly. I don’t need you to lie to my face before I get murdered. All I need is the truth and then maybe I’ll be able to survive this, this thing,” he responded.

The man coughs into the back of his palm and prepares his answer. It is not something he wishes to say to lift the boy’s spirits, but to give him a taste of reality that only he can choose to accept.

“I believe, that any son of mine will not only make it through the bloodbath on day one, but also survive until the last week,” he stated, with a sense of pride. “But that’s not important. The important thing is that when the Games begin, my son will be a man. And being a man doesn’t depend on whether he survives throughout the whole tournament. It depends on whether his heart is in the right place.” The man’s tears stream down his cheeks that have puffed out with endearment towards the crushed young soul standing before him.

Without a second thought, Junho jumped into the man’s arms and joined the crying. “I promise, I won’t let you down. I’ll make you proud … father.”

The two men clung to one another other in a display of unmanly actions as they bawled within each other’s embraces until the peacekeepers detached them with brute force. The man called for his little boy with a red face and trembling voice while all the young man could utter was thank you.

District Eleven

The glimmer in her eyes and the joyful smile were plucked from her face in an instant at the mention of the words she had feared most; tribute and congratulations. Her usual vigour had dissipated and was immediately replaced with a scowl. Soyu was not happy; not at all.

 As her legs and the daunting force of the peacekeepers dragged her to the stage her head spun with numerous questions and profanities. She didn’t plan for her life to turn in the opposite direction. She had been riding on a high – everybody had loved her.

Or so they had said between gritted teeth and with clenched fists.

“Now, would you like to say anything to your district?” the man’s voice echoed through the microphone. His nasally tone and faux delight was suffocating to Soyu. It was obvious that after he had a taste of the Capitol, coming back to a dump like this seemed a lot like charity work.

“I’d just like to say,” she enunciated cleanly, effortlessly. With her pride wounded and her life seeming emptier than earlier, she reached for her revenge. “If I die, my blood is on your hands district eleven.”

The crowd had frozen. All eyes pierced her unusually complaisant expression as she received the reaction she had been aiming for. The blood that had begun to boil within her veins had left her with a feeling of empowerment. And for some odd reason, she experienced a surge of superiority.

“Lovely,” the man said with a hint of disgust trailing in his tone. Soyu responded to his snide comment with an eye smile.

It was strange, this new side of her. The strength within her posture and the angle that she held her head at were completely different to the girl she had been a couple of moments ago. The energy radiated off of her skin and for the oddest of reasons, she had never felt more alive.

The man held up the next envelope. It was inanimate, yet buzzing in his fingertips. A greater hush of silence fell upon the district as they held their breaths in hopeful prayer. Soyu scoffed as she thought about all of the children who wished it wouldn’t be them and all of the parents who begged that their family stay intact. The desperation within the thousands of eyes that stared at the stage was enough to drown her. She chastised herself. She had been one of them, and this simple fact was what she despised of the most.

“And district eleven’s male tribute is … Kevin Woo.”

At the very announcement of the boy’s name, a disappointed swell of female cries erupted from the crowd. The boy with unusually perfect hair stepped out from the male section and glided his way onto stage. Soyu frowned.

She knew him all too well. To every girl in the district, he was known as the tease. He toyed with them when he was bored but when he had set his sights on a target, he was frightfully scary. Kevin was the product of one too many shots of alcohol and over-confidence.

Upon reaching the stage he began to blabber casually on the microphone, describing the various ways he would attain true respect for his district and all of the other lies in the book that were a tribute’s duty. He was so well prepared that she was slightly shocked when he didn’t even let off a negative vibe. He was good at public image that was for sure. 

Stepping away from the microphone he joined Soyu to the right of the man, sidling up a little bit too close for her liking. And as the man began to make his concluding speech about the importance of the Games and the gratefulness that should be given towards the Capitol, he leaned in closer so that his breath tickled her neck.

“What a surprise meeting you here Kang Soyu. I’m sure we’ll have some fun together.”

Even though her face was turned towards the throng of crying girls and somewhat satisfied civilians, she could feel the enjoyment purely from his playful tone. If he were to combine his compelling aura with a dagger she knew she would be dead before the beginning of any of the action.

It was very Kevin-esque of him to play with his prey before feeding. And it was even more like him to ensure that they wouldn’t forget who he was and what he did. Some had speculated that it was genetic, this nature that defined him. He just laughed in response. He had created himself uniquely, every action was meticulously chosen by him and contributed to his playboy persona. No one else could take credit for what he had become.

Sitting grumpily opposite him, his next target chewed on a handful of grapes. Despite the bountiful luxuries that tempted his senses, he did not pick up more than a piece of seeded bread, taking careful bites as he watched her chomping away obliviously. It had been almost twenty minutes and his routine had proved to be ineffective at attracting her attention. It was a remarkable feat for any girl to resist his charms for such a long period of time, especially when it was only the two of them and the occasional Avox within the carriage.

The bread clumped within his throat as he swallowed it dry. The fresh poultry in front of him became increasingly appetising but he held his ground and opted to gain her attention through a cough. The choked sound that came out of his mouth was strangled but still effective. Her eyes darted towards him with faux disdain.

“What?” she grumbled, making it more than obvious that he was the last thing she wished to be speaking to.

“Oh, nothing. I was just thinking to myself that you’re far too pretty to be subjected to this kind of punishment,” he answered nonchalantly.

“Damn straight.”

Laughing at her comment he leaned back into the leather couch giving her an intrigued look. The evident smirk on his face made her shiver. Her fiery eyes faltered.

“Stop doing that,” she commanded bluntly. 

“Doing what?” he had begun to grin.

“This. That. All of these mind games. They’re stupid and they don’t work on me okay?” He flashed a toothy grin at her risen figure that is now dauntingly tall and hovering above him. Her body, stretched above the table was only a minor attempt to intimidate him. He could feel the energy pulse through him as he met her height so they would be face to face.

“How can you be so sure they’re not working?” His fingers trailed over her cheekbones, ingraining miniature circles into her flesh with pointed precision. And then she had become stuck. As his fingers toyed with her free-will her eyes were glued to his as the caress captured every last piece of her self-restraint.

His fingers moved to tuck strands behind her ears and lingered longer than they should have to be considered a friendly advance. Breathing hot air into her ear he chuckled clandestinely to himself.

“You’re mine now.” Her head nodded into his embrace as a whimper escaped her lips. He pressed a chaste kiss onto her temple in response. Now, he only needed to own eleven more and then survival would become second nature.

District Twelve

They peered at her with owl-like eyes as she strode through the crowd to take her place near the back where most of the older children were situated. Staring through her bangs she felt the girls on either side of her shuffle away with fear. Jieun didn’t bother with them.

It was finally the year. It was her final Hunger Games and she was anticipating the future. Escape from such a horrid tradition was all she had ever dreamt of since she was twelve years old. Every year, just watching countless murders made her shudder. She remembered every single tragic death and every matching heartbreak felt by their loved ones. A thirteen year old boy would throw a spear into a seventeen year old girl’s skull. A seventeen year old girl would choke a thirteen year old boy in a deadly headlock. The endless continuing pattern of kill or be killed was far more terrifying than District Twelve’s endless starvation problems. 

She chanted words of self-encouragement within her mind, promising herself that all of her hardships would come to an end by the conclusion of the Reaping. But it was the Quarter Quell. And the results were not left to chance but to pure fact. Jieun knew, deep down, below the surface of her skin, that she wouldn’t be able to return to her distasteful life of scouring for food scraps. There would be no more pleading to her neighbours for pieces of stale bread or sleeping endless nights on an empty stomach. And at that instant, she felt revolted at the idea of her world. Repulsed by the fact that she would wholeheartedly return to life in poverty rather than have an abundance of food but a limited lifetime. She sighed under her breath.

Her notion proved true when she heard her name echoing across the tiny square. “Song Jieun.” It was enough to wrack her whole body with a shiver that went from head to toe. Her blue head bowed down in compliance as she shuffled forward onto the stage and stood next to their district ; a man who couldn’t care less about her wellbeing.

Peering at all the faces in the crowd she felt like screaming. Screaming so loud that all the birds would flee from the safety of their trees, that all would have to cover their ears from her attack. All she wanted was to scream loud enough so that everyone would hear her pain. So that they could relish in the fact that she was about to die and that perhaps her screams would send tremors through their world and stop the one thing that had continued for 25 years.

But Jieun didn’t scream. She remained silent and regretful as the hundreds of eyes that glanced at her with sympathy never gave her more than unspoken feelings.

It was sometime around late afternoon when they arrived in the Capitol. It was the place with the magnificent lights and the dream-like buildings that seemed so unrealistic before his poor eyes. The buildings rocketed into the sky at unbelievable heights and sparkled a shimmery metallic in the dimming sunlight. Hyungsik couldn’t believe his eyes, he was in the Capitol.

Stepping out of the train in his second hand clothes he was met with brilliant flashes of light and a large crowd of citizens from the Capitol, the people who actually enjoyed the annual festivities. They wore their extravagant clothing in horrifically blinding shades and smiled with their distorted complexions. Hyungsik stared back meagrely and then ran back to join his crew.

It was only the three of them. The less than talkative , Jieun and himself. Through the entire journey to the Capitol he had barely spoken a word to the other two. It seemed that district twelve was too quiet for his liking. Treading silently next to his fellow tribute, the led them to a towering building that would be their home for the next few days. Few was most likely a severely limited number. It was less than a week.

They filed into an elevator and shot up to the twelfth floor. When they reached their level Hyungsik was struck with awe. It was the most modern thing he had ever seen and even more breath-taking than the trains. The cleanliness, the space, the fresh food; it was all some kind of twisted dream where everything he had never experienced came to visit.

“Dinner will be in an hour. For now the two of you can go to your rooms. Down that hall to the right, choose the one you want,” the said slowly. And then he left in a rush, moving back to the elevator and hurriedly pressing the button to close the door. Most likely so he wouldn’t have to see their pallid faces.

Hyungsik proceeded to watch the girl who still kept her lips sealed. “Um, are you going to eat?” he asked, carefully, almost timidly. She shook her head in a dejected manner and then left him in silence as she disappeared to her room.

He scratched the back of his head in frustration. He didn’t hate the games as much as some others he knew, but he still didn’t enjoy them. Hyungsik knew that having allies was key to improving his chances of survival, but how to achieve such allies, that was a question that bugged his mind. After watching the other Reapings of the better-off districts none of them appeared to be welcoming prospects. Their faces were too stern or too weak, too confident or too unwilling.

He walked over to the long banquet table lain out with foods he couldn’t recognise. He pinched a pink squishy ball of what he suspected was food and casually tossed it into his mouth. It was an explosion of sweetness in his mouth as the strawberry goo poured out of the centre. He swallowed it in one go and decided against having another based on the mere fact that he didn’t want to spoil his dinner.

Hyungsik had never experienced such luxury before in his entire life. He had a destiny carved in stone that was unalterable. It was work in the mines, get married, raise a family, live with a little less than what’s required to feel satisfied with yourself. It was his entire life. However the one thing that could change it all in less than a minute was the games. He would probably never have a wife; never have a first love or a first child. He wouldn’t be bringing home food, or scraps, to his family and he certainly would not be breaking a sweat underground.

He would be living the remainder of his life in the Capitol, stuffing himself with the urge to survive and later, the arena, awaiting death at any second. He stood before the ceiling to floor window and glanced down at the ground where citizens or the Capitol bustled about in a flurry of colourful dots. It was an image he would never see at home.

He leaned his head against the cold surface of the glass and finally accepted his reality for the first time.

Twenty four tributes.

Twenty three dead, one alive.

There can only ever be one.

A/N: I am literally bowing down and apologising a million times because I've abandoned this for a while. I just had a lot of stuff going on for a while but good news is I have no more exams and I should be free to update in the next coming weeks. yay. AND ALSO, CATCHING FIRE IS NEARLY OUT YAYAYAY. I've got my ticket for the midnight premiere and I'm super pumped. I hope everyone else is too. And to those few people who actually waited long enough to read this (or just forgot about/wasn't online alot/didn't really care) I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH. 

also; updated with a very amateur looking character chart/poster. I did my best (Y) for future reference, once a tribute dies their image on the chart will be red. It makes everything pretty easy to catch up with.