The Hunger Games: Staying True. (Completed)

Chapter Twelve; Dreams and Monsters. [Edited]

This is unbelievably dangerous and every single one of us knows it. Others are shifting, anxious eyes darting this way and that. Abraham is sweating more than usual. Cressida is having trouble breathing normally.

"We'll be fine."

Stream sits beside me, and her hand is resting on my knee. I'm glad of the weight, the strength of her fingers when she squeezes.

Her dark skin is hard to discern in the black of the truck. The scar lashing down her face is easy to find though, paler than the rest of her skin. Her hair is pulled back tight, her face devoid of make-up, wearing clothes mostly made of black.

We're all in similar ensembles. Anything that can identify us is covered. Anything we're known for or unique to us we've done our best to cover.

I've got eye contacts in to hide the green I'm famous for. But there's not much to be done about Stream's scar.

"I know." I squeeze her wrist, then thread my fingers through hers. "I'm not a rookie anymore."

"I'm aware." She scoffs. "I remember when you were puking out the back of this truck. When you struggled to keep the tears back. Seems like yesterday."

"Wasn't too long before that." I chuckle.

"Seems longer, what with all the shit going on."

There's not much to say to that. In the Capitol, nothing really happens. A new movie is a big event here, or perhaps a new Noble scandal, but nothing real happens here. No, the real stuff is left to the Districts. Stuff like starvation, Peacekeeper brutality, outbreaks of illnesses and disease that no one can afford to treat.

We try our best to help, but there's only so much we can do with the tiny loopholes we're left with.

This is the inbetween period of the year, the couple of months of silence that isn't occupied by the looming threat of the Hunger Games. This always seems to cause a small stirring of activity in the Districts, more arrests, more punishments, a few quiet whispers of rebellion.

Often the solution is to hold back food, send smaller amounts of it to Districts that are already struggling. So we do our best to help, but eventually the Games will be upon us again, and the whole country is too occupied and too scared of those to raise their voices.

Tavy kicks my boot and gives me a smile through his thick bushy beard. He's a hulking man, probably twice my height and three times my width, with pale skin and ginger hair. He's older than a lot of us, with piercings in his face and tattoos on his hands.

"All right, Princess?" He asks, he's protective of me more than anyone else, but I think that might be because I look like a child to him.

"Just fine." I nod.

"Did you bring the clothes and blankets?"

"Of course."

That's my job, spending my fortune on the sly for provisions. It works out fine really, no one would ever question me buying clothes in bulk, and my family rarely pay attention to me anyway, so deliveries go unnoticed, and if they are they are rarely questioned.

Stream and Tavy are charged with the food, or some of it anyway. They work for a restaurant, so them hauling around boxes of food would not look suspicious.