The Reaping
VIKTOR ● DISTRICT 12
Viktor awoke with a gasp, his ears ringing. His head turned towards his right, where loud horns were blaring cheerful tunes through the closed windows of his bedroom, indicating the beginning of Reaping Day.
He slumped back and gulped air through his mouth, wiping the sweat off of his brow and rubbing his chest, where an ever present drum seemed to beat. The sun was shining through the threadbare curtains and on the bedroom floor, painting the room in a beautiful golden hue, almost mocking him. It was not the kind of day for beauty. He looked around his room for a long time as the horns continued blaring, then took his cane that was mounted on the wall and stood, staring blankly ahead for a few seconds.
It was Reaping Day.
That thought sent him into motion, as he began his ritual that he followed down to the bone every year on Reaping Day.
Viktor limped to his desk, his leg always feeling more stiff during the morning. He ran a hand through the screws and bolts scattered across his desk, along with some incomplete projects he was working on to improve the air and water quality in District 12.
Swallowing a lump in his throat at the thought of those projects remaining incomplete forever, he turned his attention to the old blanket placed over his chair that his mother had woven for him when he was a child, running a hand through the familiar texture that was coarse after years of using and washing. He continued on to feel everything in the place, from the curtains that never seemed to block any light, to the walls that never blocked any sound.
It could have been his last time ever seeing his home, and he always made it a habit to look around and truly appreciate everything in his small, rundown abode with the leaky roof and crammed room every year on Reaping Day.
You never knew what the odds were of your name coming up during the Reaping and as the Capitol liked to keep reminding everyone-
“May the odds be ever in your favour.” Viktor sarcastically whispered as he rummaged around his drawers for something to wear after finishing his shower. Even choosing which kind of clothing was allowed had restrictions, along with almost everything else. That was the Capitol's way of dehumanizing everyone in the districts.
They needed to look clean and proper, but not more proper than the people in the Capitol. They needed to seem satisfied and content, but not so content that they seemed happier than the Capitol dwellers. They were supposed to see the Reaping as a celebratory occasion, though it signified the death of almost 2 dozen people, none of whom were from the Capitol. They could mourn the loss of friends, family and lovers during the Reaping, but only internally or in private, as they couldn't say anything or even hold protests to make the Capitol actually see them as human beings. Because they weren't. At least not to the ones in the Capitol, in Piltover.
He picked the only white shirt he owned, and a pair of fraying brown pants (his best pair), and walked up to his front door. Just as he was about to go outside though, he found himself stopping. Looking down at his hand on the doorknob, he saw the tremble going through his whole body. Viktor held his cane tighter in one hand and held his chest in the other, willing his heart to settle down. He took a deep breath on the threshold of his little house as he laid his forehead against the front door for a few minutes to prepare himself.
Reaping Day. The most soul crushing day of the year. The few weeks leading up to Reaping Day were the most unproductive weeks of Viktor's life. The fear would sometimes consume him so deeply that he could do nothing but lay in his bed all day, wondering if these would be the last few weeks of his life. As a 25 year old, Viktor only had to deal with it for 5 more years after this, when he would turn 30 and forever say goodbye to this deep rooted fear and instead start focusing on better things. Such as his cane, which required a much needed adjustment. Or the air filters he was working on that weren't quite up to the standard yet.
At the end of the day; Viktor tried reasoning with himself; it was no use worrying since he was one person among thousands of others in his district, all of whose names were lying on individual chits of paper in a bowl. The probability of his name being called had to be one in tens of thousands.
Though Viktor wasn't alright (and probably wouldn't be until the whole fucking day was over), he had to make his way out. The horns were slowly increasing in volume, which meant that the Reaping was about to begin. He took one last rattling breath as he walked out, swinging his door shut and not bothering to lock it.
JAYCE ● DISTRICT 1
Jayce Talis swung his door shut, checking one last time that it was properly locked, before taking a deep breath to prepare himself for the upcoming day.
Reaping Day came; like clockwork; every year to District 1 with a sense of cheer. “It was an honour to be chosen.”--Was what everyone in his district said. Perhaps it was because Jayce socialized with nobody apart from his Academy professors and Caitlyn, that the 24 year old never understood the people who considered being chosen an honour.
Jayce shook his head to clear his mind and then started his descent downstairs. As he walked, he touched the crystal on his wristband. It always seemed to bring him comfort in the most adverse situations. It had saved his mother's and Jayce's life, and though sometimes he felt like a child for his thoughts, he genuinely believed that the crystal somehow kept him safe.
Jayce wanted to provide everyone with that safety, harness magic and give it to ones who desperately required it. He had even managed to stabilize one of the crystals yesterday, and transported a cog from directly in front of him to the other end of his workshop.
Just as Jayce's mind started whirring with ideas and risks and the potential of it all, he ran into his 15 year old friend. His only friend. Who currently looked as white as a ghost and was shivering in obvious fear. He rushed to hug her, rubbing her hands and arms to bring some heat back into them as they were so cold to touch, they felt frozen.
“Jayce.” She barely managed to whisper through her chattering teeth as her eyes moved around frantically, as if her thoughts were too quick to pin down. Jayce's heart ached at the sight. He couldn't understand how people could see Reaping Day as celebratory when this was what it was doing to their youth.
“It's okay, it's okay. I've got you Cait.” He tried comforting her, but it was like she did not even process the words as she continued babbling in fear.
“Ja-Jayce what if…. what if my name-” Caitlyn choked as a sob tore through her throat.
“Hey.” Jayce bent down to look the girl straight in the eyes and spoke firmly, with a confidence he wasn't sure he possessed. “You won't be picked.”
That turned out to be the wrong thing to say as another round of tears spilled through Caitlyn's eyes. “You don't know that! Maya Hart got picked last year and she was only twelve! Jayce I can't go, I can't go. Please don't make me go, please please please-”
“Cait. Caitlyn, listen to me. Your name is in there only four times, there are 30 year olds with their names in there 19 times.” He tried reasoning with her. “Others probably have more! The odds of your name being called is probably one in thousands. Maybe even millions.”
This time, that turned out to be a better thing to say as Caitlyn got some of her composure back and managed to halt her tears.
“One in a million?” She murmured, with a hopeful tint to her voice that Jayce immediately held onto. Though, he wasn't sure if he was doing that for her sake or his own.
“Yes, yes. One in a million.” Jayce continued to assure her as the girl slowly lost the wetness in her eyes, then lost the harsh breathing, then the tremors, and finally when her freezing limbs seemed to be getting some warmth back, she replied.
“Those do seem like pretty bad odds.”
“Exactly.”
“But that kid last year Jayce…. I can't shake my mind off of her.” Caitlyn seemed to lose all the composure she had just gained as she started to slowly fall apart again, and Jayce started to panic as the girl got a slightly maniacal and determined glint in her eye out of nowhere and grabbed Jayce's arms in a strong grip. “Jayce let's leave. Let's just go away. Why do I live here anyway when my mother's in the fucking council?! I don't wanna be here, Jayce.”
“Cait, listen.” He grabbed hold of her again before she could spiral down that thought, and then contemplated for a split second whether he could reveal his very confidential future plans to Caitlyn. His professors had told him to keep it all hush-hush for the time being, but he had to tell Caitlyn. If only to bring some hope back to her eyes. “Let me tell you something. I'm not supposed to share this, but I'm telling you, okay?”
Cait nodded her affirmation. Jayce took a deep breath and continued. “I'm leaving for Piltover soon. My academic years here are almost over and I'm on the verge of a scientific breakthrough. This is going to land me straight in Piltover, most likely by next year, and I'm not leaving you behind, okay?”
Caitlyn's eyes had gone larger and larger as Jayce continued to talk, and on his last line, a raw noise slipped out of her throat.
“You're gonna take me with you?” She asked, and Jayce saw her try and suppress the hope that was starting to build inside of her. “But I can't just leave. We need an actual reason to leave the districts. You know what happened with my father.”
“I'll…. I'll figure something out. This is the last Reaping Day you'll ever have to be a part of, okay?” He hugged her tight, trying to convey his sincerity through the action.
“You promise?” Caitlyn asked as they broke away.
“Yes! Yes, yes I promise you.” Jayce replied. He lifted his head towards the open windows decorating the stairwell as he heard the horns blaring louder and louder. The Reaping was about to begin. He turned back to his friend. “But we really need to get going now, Cait.”
Jayce reluctantly let go of her and turned the other way; his instincts telling him to protect her and hold her close like a sibling he never had; but he knew she had to take a second to pull herself together. When she was done, she turned to him with the corners of her lips tugged up just a tiny bit, into a small smile.
“Okay. I'm okay. I'm ready now.”
VI ● DISTRICT 12
“Okay, you ready Powder?” Vi turned to her sister, who was holding onto her hand with a grip so tight that Vi was starting to lose feeling in her fingers. She didn't voice those thoughts out though, she could suffer way more than that for her little sister.
Powder had refused to let go of Vi the whole way to the Hall Of Justice as they, along with Vander, Benzo, Mylo, Claggor and Ekko went there for the annual Reaping for the Hunger Games.
“Powder?” Vi asked, turning her sister towards her with a hand on her shoulder as the girl continued to stay mute and say nothing. The only action she showed was the way she kept fiddling with her monkey charm bracelet.
Powder loved that bracelet. She had made it herself a few years back, and she wore it so often that it had snapped dozens of times. But if Vi even attempted to fix it for her, Powder would throw a fit and insist on fixing it herself. Vi never told her sister this, but she was incredibly proud of her for that, though her hands always itched and ached to help Powder out, who would get this burning determination in her eyes and set off to work on her desk, trying to fix her most prized possession.
But now, though her eyes were turned towards Vi, there was nothing behind them. None of that determination of the past. None of the happiness. None of the glimmer. They were like vacant pools of black water. Seeing, but unseeing at the same time. Vi furrowed her brows in concern and turned to Vander. “Vander, she's not speaking.”
Vander sighed loudly, his face scrunched up with sadness and pain that Vi could feel radiating off of him as he had to let his kids go for the Reaping. It just wasn't fair, for anyone involved. The only ones who benefited from this were Piltovians, getting their yearly obsession of watching people kill each other back. Those people could eat shit for all Vi cared.
Just as Vander was about to pull the freshly turned 12 year old Powder aside to say a few things to console her fears before the girl's first Reaping, a loud clang echoed. Their group turned to see an Enforcer with his metal baton against the ground.
“You two,” The Enforcer commanded, pointing towards Vander and Benzo with his index finger. “Spectators' side.”
Vi’s muscles tensed in anger at the command. She wanted to break that wagging finger. She hated that the Enforcer didn't seem to have even a shred of empathy in his eyes as he tore a father away from his daughter.
However, Vander didn't back down. He turned towards the Enforcer with his face and limbs open, not showing a threat of any kind. Some Enforcers tended to be quite trigger-happy, just waiting for a District dweller to fuck up so that they could put a bullet through their head.
“I was just speaking to my daughter for a few seconds, if you don't mind-”
The Enforcer pulled his gun towards Vi's father and she saw red. Her feelings of animosity towards Enforcers weren't new, but this feeling, this pure fire burning in her chest and threatening to spill out as she watched the man press the gun against Vander's forehead, was new. It was fear. It was anger. It was hatred and frustration and revulsion and everything rolled into one.
She couldn't sit back. She had to do something.
Just as she was about to jump forward, strong arms held her back. She tried dislodging herself, and when her attempts turned out to be futile, she turned behind her in frustration. It was Benzo, with a knowing look in his eyes, that spoke a thousand words without speaking. He shook his head minutely and leaned down.
“They will not hesitate to shoot. You know that.” He whispered. There was a moment where Vi wondered if it was worth the risk to protect Vander, but she knew the consequences would not only fall on her but the rest of her family too. She couldn't do that to them.
Vi physically felt the fire in her chest burn out and dampen to its usual state of animosity. She pulled herself away from Benzo and resolutely stared at the ground, unable to look at the scene in front of her through the rage brewing inside her head.
“Spectators’ side. Right now.” The Enforcer commanded again. There was complete silence for a few seconds, then Vi heard Vander's resigned sigh which was his telltale sign of giving up.
“Alright. We're going.” Vander replied through his teeth, and Vi finally looked up when she heard a sound that indicated the gun was gone. Though, she was sure that image was burned into her brain forever. She turned her eyes towards Vander to see that he too had rage in his eyes, but it was extinguished by his hopelessness.
Then, he turned towards her. His gaze held all the words he couldn't say, and all the resignation of a man too old to be dealing with this kind of torture year after year. “Vi.” He pleaded, and Vi knew what he was asking of her.
Help Powder. Keep her safe.
She nodded decisively at her father. This was something she could definitely do, and she was glad to be of some use after the way she was unable to help him just then. Vi took a hold of her sister, taking her towards the line for the blood samples after one last look at Vander. “Let's go Powder.”
Just before they had to divide based on their ages, Powder tugged insistingly at Vi's hand.
“My name…won't be called, right?” She asked, looking up at her older sister through her glassy eyes, voice so unlike herself but at the same time so much like herself that Vi's heart ached. She bent down to maintain eye contact with Powder, but paused as she wondered how to reply to that. She could tell Powder the truth, that nobody really thought their names would ever be called, until they were. Or Vi could comfort her little sister.
Besides, a niggling voice in the back of her head said, Powder's name getting called didn't mean she had to play the games.
“It won't.” Vi replied firmly. She looked towards everyone else who was getting divided according to their gender and age, giving a nod to Mylo, Claggor and Ekko. “See you on the other side.”
“See you there, Vi.” Claggor replied, taking responsibility for the other two and going to take their blood samples for identification.
Vi turned back towards her sister, who had gone mute again, looking dazed and staring right through her and Vi….she just couldn’t take that.
“Tell you what,” She said with a smile that she hoped looked genuine, as she held Powder's face in her hands. “You meet me back here after the Reaping is over and I'll take you to the roof of that playground I told you about. You can see the whole district from up there, I'll show you everything, I promise. Okay Powder?”
Some of the permanent glimmer that seemed to reside in Powder's eyes came back, and Vi's heart jumped happily at the sight. Powder had wanted to go to that rooftop for a long time, but Vi would always refuse and tell her that getting there was difficult and dangerous and one wrong slip could end in injury. Now though, Vi thought she was ready. And even if she wasn't, Vi would try her best not to let any harm befall her.
“Okay. You promise?” The little girl said, her voice underlined with surging excitement.
“Yes.” Vi replied as she caressed her blue hair and tightened Powder's braid one last time. Then, she directed her sister towards the line for blood samples of the younger kids. “Have I ever broken a promise?” She said before hugging her sister goodbye, and going towards the line for people her own age.
She held her finger out and barely felt the prick as the blood oozed out of her finger. After the process was done they were gathered in the District Square in front of The Hall Of Justice.
Vi looked around for Powder, giving her a small nod and a smile when she saw her, and then looked around for her brothers and Ekko, giving them all nods as well.
Then she settled down, willing her heart to stop jumping around her chest as the Mayor went ahead and spoke about the history of The Hunger Games.
Just fourteen more years of this, she thought, in an attempt to unruffle her feathers. Just fourteen more times.
CAITLYN ● DISTRICT 1
Just one more year of this, Caitlyn reminded herself as she stood in the District Square. Just one last time.
Her trembling limbs had managed to gain some semblance of control after Jayce had revealed that he would leave for Piltover next year, along with her. She knew some people in District 1 would deem it cowardly, and say that she was just running away from honour, from fame, from respect.
But Caitlyn was of the thought that her life mattered more than those things, and if that made her a coward, so be it.
The fifteen year old looked up at the stage where her parents stood. Cassandra and Tobias Kirammen, the symbols of power in her district. Her father was the mayor of District 1, born and raised there, while her mother was part of the Council of Piltover, who was born and raised in the Capitoll.
Someone from Piltover getting married with someone from one of the districts was very uncommon and widely criticized. After their marriage, they both planned on moving to Piltover. But they discovered that her father leaving the districts for Piltover was not such an easy task, and it was not allowed even under a marriage contract. At the same time, Caitlyn's mother didn't want to leave Piltover since she had just been offered a seat in the council. Thus, they both lived in their respective places for the first few years of their marriage, meeting up every couple of days since District 1 was the closest to the Capitol.
Apparently when her mother got pregnant, they had planned on making Caitlyn live in Piltover. Unfortunately, Cassandra Kirammen had gone into labour while on a visit to District 1, and Caitlyn was born there. Due to the (frankly, messed up) citizenship laws upholded by Piltover's leader, Caitlyn was deemed a citizen of District 1.
That was how she ended up in the District Square, with her finger hurting where it had been pricked, listening to her father talk about the history of The Hunger Games as her mother stood behind him, smiling serenely at his words. Caitlyn looked around herself and felt sick when she saw most people nodding along. Everyone there seemed to think that The Hunger Games was a good thing for their world.
Caitlyn sometimes wondered if she had gone insane, with the way her ideas and opinions were so misaligned with the rest of her District. Thankfully, she met Jayce. He was the only person Caitlyn knew who shared her beliefs, that the Hunger Games were nothing more than dehumanizing and oppressive actions taken by Piltover's Council in order to control the Districts.
She partly thought this discrepancy in opinion she had compared to others in her District (apart from Jayce, of course) was due to the fact that she was an extremely sheltered child. Her parents would not speak about the Hunger Games, let her watch the Games or even discuss the tributes. They pretended like the Games never happened, apart from the acknowledgement of Reaping Day each year. They explained the basis of the Games on her 12th birthday before her first Reaping, and since then no word was ever spoken in the Kirammen household about it.
She looked at her parents on the stage and wondered what their end goal was by sheltering her. Did they mean to protect her? Prevent her from seeing death? Keep her innocence? She could never understand them.
As she wondered, the representative from Piltover walked up to the mic and Caitlyn just….she couldn't look any longer. Her hands were sweaty, there wasn't enough blood going to her head, she felt like her arteries were constricting, like her whole body was reacting to her fear. She looked around frantically, searching for a tall stature with kind brown eyes and relaxed minutely when she found him. Jayce.
He too looked like he had seen better days, but perhaps seeing Caitlyn's stricken and pale face, Jayce raised his finger with a weak smile and mouthed, “One last time.”
That calmed Caitlyn down more than anything else could. Jayce knew exactly how to comfort her. She reminded herself again of the fact that she wouldn’t have to do this the next year. Or the year after that, or the year after that. She never had to feel like she was part of a bowl of sacrifices waiting to be killed. Never had to walk in the dark, in fear of her own mortality. Never had to scream or cry or have nightmares about a slip of paper bearing her name getting announced in front of everyone.
I never have to do this again. Caitlyn thought and smiled to herself, finally finding the courage to look up at the stage as the representative of Piltover finally chose a slip of paper from the women's bowl and opened it with great fanfare. Upon seeing the name written there, her eyes widened as big as her smile until she almost looked maniacal, and then proceeded to look behind, towards Caitlyn's parents.
Caitlyn furrowed her brows, confused.
What was going on?
The woman turned back towards the crowd and announced, with a ringing voice and a blinding smile.
“Caitlyn Kirammen!”