Hunger Games 1. Your Children's Children

It begins, exactly the same as it always has.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the Capitol, people of the Districts of Panem, welcome to the reaping for the Seventy-Sixth – and final – Hunger Games!"

But from then on, everything is different. Effie's voice is full of grit. Where she looked bright and vacant on the small stage of District Twelve, she is miniscule here in front of the Presidential Palace. There's none of the glamour that surrounded Caesar Flickerman's famous interviews here, none of the gaudy show that was the President's execution. There are only two pens facing Effie in the City Circle, boys and girls, each holding around fifty people of which twelve will be reaped. If the atmosphere is close to anything that's happened here before, it's the day the parachutes fell.

Annie sways on Effie's left, then stumbles as Peeta reaches to steady her. Katniss knows how she feels. But she's on the balcony facing the stage with the other victors, far above the action, the four of them who chose to kill. Who voted for this to happen. And now more Capitol children are penned in, waiting in the Circle, and this time it's Annie and Effie and Peeta who are the rescuers, just as powerless as Prim to save anyone.

It was agreed, somehow, that anyone who voted for these Games was unfit to mentor, that you couldn't send them to their deaths and then try and pull them back. So at last, now, she and Peeta are separated by nature. At last, everyone sees that she doesn't deserve him to steady her, even when everything she sees is alight.

Instead, she's got Johanna Mason, whose fear is water where Katniss' is fire, who is watching Annie with fierce concern where Katniss watches Peeta with quiet longing. They watch Peeta take Annie's hand and a second later, their own hands find each other. On stage before the Quarter Quell, their joined hands didn't last. They're all victors. It's their nature. But Katniss holds on.

"Names will be drawn alternately, one girl, then one boy, from the children of some of the Capitol's most powerful citizens, gathered in the Circle before us..."

Effie seems to have lost control of her speech. Was she powerful enough, once? If she'd had a child, would they be stood in the Circle now?

"If your name is called, you will escorted up this flight of stairs" she gestures in front of her, where an elaborate marble staircase leads to the stage "to me, and I will ask you some short questions, about your name, background, and how you feel about these games." She doesn't look at anyone as she says it, not Paylor or Plutarch, doesn't even glance up. But her voice lifts on the last word. There's steel in Effie, somewhere.

"When our talk is complete, girls, please walk to your left to meet your mentor, Leanne Odair." It takes Katniss a second to recognise the name as Annie Cresta's. As soon as Effie says Odair, Annie seems to straighten and releases Peeta to move across the stage. Johanna's fingers slide from Katniss' the same instant, still looking ahead, muscles jumping in her jaw.

"And boys, to your right, where Peeta Mellark will be waiting to meet you."

Peeta holds up a hand, an almost-wave. No words. Even he doesn't try to smile.

"So." Effie stays still and silent until the waiting Avox has to bring the spheres to her, one balanced in each hand. They're glass, one tinted pink, the other blue, each with a map of Panem frosted on. They're not much bigger than some of the exotic fruit they have in the Capitol. With only fifty names in each, the hand-selected children of the most fortunate, they don't need to be. One hundred lucky names for twenty-four unlucky tributes. Everyone in Panem must be able to hear the words Effie's not saying.

_May the odds be ever in your favour._


	2. You Reap What You Sow

Effie's golden fingernails seize on a scrap of paper.

"_Scar_" Enobaria whispers from somewhere behind Johanna. Neither she nor Katniss turn, used to the older woman hissing blood or knives, cutting her teeth on them. But Effie's mouth sets as she unfolds the paper and Haymitch grunts in agreement. "Scar. Always was."

"The Capitol's first female tribute will be Scarlett Rae Snow. Scarlett, please join us on stage!"

There already seem to be Peacekeepers around the girl, maybe fifteen, who steps up. She's quite beautiful, with long dark hair and black eyes, the opposite of her infamous grandfather. But as she lifts her hand to brush that dark hair aside, the camera focuses on the white rose, inked in contrast against her olive skin. And those black eyes glitter in the stage light.

She stops courteously beside Effie, toes together in gleaming patent shoes.

"Now, Scarlett..." Effie veers away from confirming her name or heritage, moves towards what the audience are waiting to hear. "Did you expect to be chosen for the Games?"

Scarlett contemplates Effie, as if she's deciding whether to bite, and then her eyes wander without landing over Annie, the remaining girls in the pen, up towards the balcony.

She's the consummate innocent. "Honestly, Effie? I didn't expect there to be Games at all."

"Just let her go, Effie." Katniss whispers, but Haymitch leans forward, like he's waiting for something.

"What a pity, then" Effie drawls "that you haven't been able to prepare for your big, big, _big_ day. Why, in some of the districts, they've been preparing for years."

Johanna barks a laugh; Haymitch leans back, satisfied. Even Enobaria bares her teeth in glee.

Effie turns back towards the front, effectively dismissing Scarlett Snow. The young girl's eyes finally settle on Annie, who reaches a guiding arm around her back, but doesn't touch her, and she settles into the first of twelve dining chairs lined up along the stage's edge, patent toes still perfectly pointed.

"And our first male tribute" Effie dives a hand into the blue bowl "will be Kilo Rungold."

Kilo is a hulk of a boy, a man really, who towers over the Peacekeepers walking him up, dwarfs the other figures on stage. He answers Effie's questions with grunts, yeses and no's, but when Peeta smiles broadly at him as he takes his seat, the corners of his lips twitch back.

"One to watch" Haymitch notes.  
"Built like Thresh. Or Cato." Katniss agrees.  
"Or Brutus." adds Enobaria. "District Two builds them right."

The reaping takes on a rapid rhythm, like watching a real-life version of the usual television recaps. There's little Cupcake, trembling when she's called, running straight to Annie and clinging to her side. Some good looking boys – none to compare to Finnick, but one that's slender with striking pale hair and eyes, another whose tiny dog tries to follow him on stage. These children are so used to their pets and possessions that it's a weakness; the next boy is so weighed down with gold jewellery that it dazzles the cameras, making it impossible to see him.

The girl who comes after, though, takes Katniss' breath away. Tallish, thinnish, with longish golden hair. Just a flick of gold eyeliner around greenish eyes. A black lace dress that could only have been sewn by one hand. She seems to take eternity to reach the stage. A young Peacekeeper shoves her forward and Katniss lurches forward, only to find her arms gripped at her sides, Haymitch on his feet behind her. "Easy, sweetheart."

Enobaria scowls over. "The Mockingjay's grown a heart? Over _Alice Cartesan's_ daughter?"

"And _Cinna_ Cartesan's favourite niece, brainless" Johanna snaps, pressing down on Katniss' shoulders to get her back in her seat. "Everyone seeing you freak out isn't going to help her, Katniss. Sit _down_."

Katniss' calm only lasts until Cinna's niece steps up besides Effie, and the older woman begins. "So, Cindy...". It takes Haymitch behind her and Johanna almost in her lap to keep her in her seat. "your mother was Alice Cartesan, head of President Snow's Supreme Court."

Cindy smiles. "Yes, she is."

"And your Uncle Cinna was Katniss Everdeen's stylist! Isn't that a miraculous coincidence!"

It's hard to tell with Effie sometimes whether she's being sarcastic or not.

Cindy's smile wavers. "Yes."

Annie looks across at Peeta and follows his eyes up to Katniss on the balcony. Right away, she's beside Cindy, leading her by the hand. The last chair on the girls' front row is beside Scarlett Snow.

Slowly, Johanna moves back into her seat, but Haymitch's hands hover by Katniss' shoulders. It takes her a minute to focus again, but she hasn't missed anything. Effie's staring at the next name she's drawn, turning it over in her hands. She frowns. Looks at the Avox holding the bowls, who gives a tiny shrug. Just as Plutarch rises from his front-row seat, she lifts her head, hesitates, and calls out "Ilian? Just Ilian?"

Annie's stood right beside Scarlett Snow after depositing Cindy, so she sees the girl flinch. But the other tributes are too distraught, everyone else too far away.

A small, dark-skinned boy separates himself from the crowd. He wears simple clothes, boots, leather gloves. Almost like a hunter. He moves like one, too, light and steady. Somehow he emerges from the pen away from the waiting Peacekeepers, but he heads for the stage by himself.

Effie tilts her head in intrigue, but he starts speaking as he approaches. "Just Il. People just call me Il. I did expect to be chosen. I do expect to win. I don't think there's anything else to know."

He's barely stopped walking, still making for the chairs by Peeta. The seat opposite Scarlett is empty, the one place no one wanted to take. Instead of sitting, he stands in front of it, hands clasped.

Even though they're from the Capitol, the rest of the tributes suffer the curse of the Outer Districts. It's impossible to remember them all, and the emotional impact of the day has already taken its toll. It's possible most people even have favourites picked already. The mood is more like District Twelve as well. Seeing their classmates actually reaped has shattered the children's bewilderment, made them truly afraid for the first time. The whimpers grow, the pens quake as their occupants shuffle. The potential tributes no longer all look the same; it's possible to spot the ones that lift their chins or stare straight ahead amongst the tearful and the terrified.

The last girl called is of the former kind. The elaborate patterns on her face and hands, thin, intricate wisps of black and blue, seem to mean something to Effie, who leads with a strange question.

"Do you think the Gods are on your side?"

The girl merely spreads her hands, expression serene. Effie's hand dives into the bowl again, for the final tribute's name.

"Carlis Floss!" Effie can't help smiling even before she's finished reading the name, and Carlis, so delicate and pretty that several people look around them to check a girl hasn't been called by mistake, is sacrificed to everyone's relief that this final reaping is over. That the names of the dead are fixed, now, maybe forever.

"Anyone see a Victor?" Haymitch asks, but it's almost rhetorical. Enobaria will choose Kilo the brute. Katniss would give her life for Cindy Cartesan. He won't be able to ask Peeta or Annie later, knowing that's too cruel a question for a mentor.

"No." Johanna says, already standing to leave. "I don't see a Victor at all."


End file.

Hunger Games