Chapter Text
Statistically, it made sense that it was his name on the paper that had been pulled. He was eighteen, after all, so that was already seven entries. Add on the tesserae for himself, his mother, his father, and his two younger brothers, and that added an extra twenty-eight entries. Thirty-five slips of paper with George Davidson written on them. It was simple math.
George hated statistics.
The escort—what was her name again? Zora? Zebra?—leaned forward, her purple lips smacking together as she speaks. “For our boys… George Davidson!” She said his name as though it were something to celebrate, tossing her head with glee. Her bow, the same color as her makeup, her hair, and the rest of her outfit, bounced about, coming dangerously close to falling off her hair. George pictured it flying off, carried away by the wind. Ridiculous. Everything about this situation was ridiculous.
There were about five seconds of total silence after the words left her mouth. Even the wind fell silent for those moments. He was thankful. It allowed him to breathe in deeply for what was probably the last time ever. Savor the moment before he was carted off like cattle to the slaughterhouse. He opened his mouth. The choking smog from the factories flooded his senses. Would the air taste different in the Capitol? In the arena?
Nobody clapped. He tried to pick out his family from the crowd, but he couldn’t make out any distinct features of anyone. Only blank faces peering back at him, hundreds of clones of ashen-faced kids. All thinking the same thing: Better him than me.
“Come on, George! Step up here!” The kids his age had all stepped away from him like he had been tainted the moment his name passed the escort’s lips. He moved forward jerkily, his limbs falling into place without input from his brain. Almost like his body was being tugged along by a conveyor belt. George stumbled as he climbed the stairs to the stage.
He stared blankly ahead as Zora—he was certain that was her name now, it sounded just goofy enough to be a Capitol name—picked the female tribute.
“Emily O’Sullivan!” She was skinnier than a twig, her hair long and thin. She looked to be no older than thirteen. Her body was entirely composed of sharp angles and lines. He could probably lift her with only one hand and barely break a sweat. She stood no chance. Then again, neither did he.
Zora grabbed his hand and raised it high above her head. She had lipstick on her teeth. “Your District Three tributes for the Sixty-Eighth Hunger Games!”
George mustered a smile. There were cameras on him. There were going to be cameras on him for the rest of his life, whether he wanted them or not, whether he lived or not. Maybe there would be a camera in his grave. Making sure he wouldn’t come back up.
Zora kissed the two of them on the cheeks in what seemed to be some bizarre Capitol ritual. “You two are adorable. I could eat you right up.” Judging from how plump she was, George didn’t doubt this in the slightest. He shook his head, trying to dispel the urge to crack a joke.
The mentor for District Three tributes was off to the side, sitting on the edge of the stage. He’d hardly acknowledged any of the proceedings. He was whistling to himself, messing with his pink hair that refused to stay flat. His name was Techno. He'd achieved celebrity status for his performance in the Games and had maintained it by keeping a steady flow of Capitol girlfriends. He had the whole aloof, tough-guy look going on. George didn’t see it—he’d always preferred people with softer features, both on the inside and the outside—but maybe Capitol women found it enticing. Who knew.
George was only a toddler when Techno had won his Games at sixteen years old, but when he was older, he’d heard kids discussing how he had the record for most tributes killed. He’d seen clips of his deeds. Watched limbs and debris fly into the air, covering the cameras with dust and innards.
He closed his eyes and pressed down on his eyelids with his thumbs, forcing the images out of his mind. It had worked when he was a kid, seated in front of the television for the first time, watching kids not much older than him pummel each other to death. It continued to work like a charm.
Peacekeepers swooped in, grabbed them both by the shoulders, and frog-marched them in the direction of the train station. Zora followed, chattering inanely the whole way. It was easy to tune her out; he didn’t understand half of what she was saying.
George stole a final glance of the District as the Peacekeeper opened the door. The smog hovering above the factory that made the clouds permanently tinged gray. The factory itself, looming in the distance. The crowds, starting to disperse. Most of them didn’t dare look in his direction, as though sneaking a glance of the tributes would seal their later fate. Some stared openly with wonder. They were the ones too young to understand. They would learn soon enough.
“Move it, kid.” He did as the Peacekeeper said. Eventually, you had to lose your awe. It was either choked out of you by yourself or by someone else. And it was always best to do it yourself. Less painful that way. You can almost convince yourself that it was your idea all along. Better to have no hope, George thought. It keeps his expectations well-managed.
He was ushered into a private room with no windows. It was all-white. It made his pale skin glow in a sickly way. A single Peacekeeper stood guard by the door, his hands relaxed at his sides. George looked at his hands, stretching out each digit individually and looking at the folds, the cracks, the hairs.
Were these hands capable of killing to survive? He wasn’t sure. He could picture them building tools, bringing water to his mouth, tinkering with electronics, tearing apart meat cooked over the fire. He couldn’t see them wielding a knife and burying it in someone else’s chest. Or firing a slingshot into someone’s eye. Or bashing someone’s skull in with a brick.
He pressed down on his eyes, hard, but it didn’t work as well as it had in the past. Great.
There was a beep. The door opened. His mother entered first, a hand covering her mouth to try to contain a gasp that George had already heard. He stood up and she threw her arms around him, her face buried in his shoulder. She silently wept. George patted her head and watched as his father and two younger brothers stepped into the room. He wished he could cry. It would be freeing.
Once everyone was inside, the Peacekeeper gruffly informed them, “You’ve got three minutes.” His father put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. When George turned to look at him, his father had his eyes trained on a point on the wall. A tear formed in the corner of his eye and slowly dripped down his cheek. George watched its journey surreptitiously. He had never seen his father cry before.
His mother finally relaxed her iron grip, if barely. “You have a good head on your shoulders, George,” she said. Her hand trembled as she brushed back some of his hair behind his ear. She didn’t tell him to win. It wasn’t painful that she didn’t believe in his capabilities. What capabilities did he even have that were relevant? Even if he had any chance of survival, his odds were nothing compared to the Careers. Telling him to win would give him hope. And he has no time, no space, no energy for that. It does not belong here.
His father grabbed him by the shoulders and tapped his chin. “Keep your head high in there. Don’t…” He cast a furtive glance over his shoulder at the bored-looking Peacekeeper, who was stifling a yawn. George narrowed his eyes. How could he be so indifferent at a time like this? Did he have no compassion? Was he simply numb, as George was now? Had he seen this same scene play out year after year after year? Each time, a child saying goodbye for the final time? Was it background music to him? “Don’t let them get to you. Keep your dignity.”
“I will.” That was something he could afford to promise.
He kneeled to embrace his younger brothers. Both were too small to be reaped. Both were too naive to understand. They knew that he wouldn’t come back if he lost. But they didn’t know that the events that played out on the screen were real. That if he died in the Games, he really had been killed in that gruesome way. They thought the Games were an elaborate movie production put on for everyone in the Districts. That the deaths were faked and the tributes lived in the Capitol happily ever after. They thought it was the Capitol’s way of giving back. Selfishly, George was glad that he wouldn’t have to witness his parents shatter their innocence. “Win for us, George!” Jack pleaded, clapping his hands.
George smiled. “I’ll try.”
“We have a present for you,” Ben added, rummaging around in his pockets.
Eventually, he retrieved a thin, metal circle. He proudly brandished it. It was perfectly smooth. George turned it over. A threaded wire was bunched at the back. “It’s a necklace!”
“A battery necklace,” George said, his throat tightening. “Thank you.” He turned it over and over again in his hands, relishing the way the cool metal feels on his skin. It was the standard battery that they used for most electronics in District Three, for everything from computers to bombs to whatever fancy whirring thing the citizens of the Capitol wanted on a certain day. They had the most eccentric wants. Most of the time, George didn’t even understand the purpose of some of the devices that were exported. They seemed pointless. Easily broken. Easily replaced.
Each member of his family gave him one final hug before leaving him alone with the Peacekeeper. They didn’t say ‘I love you.’ George wasn’t sure if it would have made a difference if they had. He knew he was loved. He knew it was too hard to say. He knew too much.
The door clicked shut. Would it have felt more climatic if it had slammed? A cathartic release? A finality?
He untangled the wire and put the necklace on, tucking the battery underneath his shirt. It settled right over his heart.
*
The train ride was… awkward.
Emily spent the entire time staring out the window, refusing to do much of anything. Instead, she chewed on the skin next to her fingernails. For a second, she had looked in George’s direction, and he had seen her bloodshot eyes.
He picked at some of the bread. It was thick and fluffy, so different from the flat squares made with the dense, ration flour he’d grown up with. If only he were hungry.
“You two are my third set of tributes,” Techno informed them, leaning back in his seat. “So. What am I working with?” In his mentor’s eyes, they were objects to be tinkered with, not people who were pawns in a cruel game meant to humiliate the Districts. It’s hard to escape from the engineering mentality, George knew this very well, but his mentor’s words made his blood boil.
“I’m pretty good with electronics. Y’know, wiring and stuff,” George offered. Techno snorted derisively and rolled his eyes.
“Obviously. Give me something unexpected.” George narrowed his eyes. He was starting to dislike Techno.
Zora made a disapproving clucking sound with her tongue. Today, her theme was all-pink. Her outfit was pretty similar to the one she sported yesterday except for the shade difference. Even her afro was colored pink. Capitol fashion made no sense. “Techno, play nice.”
“I’m a decent runner,” Emily said in a small voice. “I can get away.”
Techno nodded. “Okay. That can be useful. George? Anything else?”
“I can handle an ax pretty well.” Every year, their family scraped together enough savings to buy a turkey. They’d kill it and make a stew from all of its parts. Once George turned eleven, his father taught him how to handle the ax properly. It wasn’t a fond memory. But it was a useful one. “Probably not better than a Career, but it’s a start.”
“A start,” Techno echoed. He stared down George before nodding once to himself. “Okay. Yeah. We can try to figure something out. Won’t be the easiest thing, but hey, I’m a miracle worker.” And then he had the audacity to smirk. The string of anger that had been coalescing in George's chest tightened and then snapped.
“What do you even do?” George spat out. “I mean, I get you’re important, whatever, but does your entitlement come from somewhere? Or are you just an asshole?”
Techno let out a low whistle. Zora covered her mouth with a manicured hand. Emily cringed away from him after his outburst, her eyes wide. George wished he had swallowed back the words when he had the chance. “I’m sorry. I’m a bit overwhelmed—”
“No, please, keep telling me what you really think.” Techno quirked an eyebrow. When George didn’t respond, his cheeks burning, his mentor continued. “Let’s see. I help you form alliances. I make sure you get sponsorships and I send you gifts when you’re in the arena—that is, if I think you deserve them. I’m your lifeline. I wouldn’t go around trying to sever it so early on.”
Bile rose in George’s throat. He’d gotten frustrated and blew his chances at survival. “No, I mean it, I am sorry, it’s—”
“But I respect you for having the balls to yell at me. That’s some nerve, kid.” Wait, what? He was so distracted by Techno that being called ‘kid’ didn’t even register for him. His mentor wasn’t going to give up on him? “I think our chances of a win for District Three aren’t as bad as I’d thought.”
Well.
Nothing about that conversation went as expected.