The stark white room goes silent as the long thin shadow of Titus Vos slides across the blinking lights of the control panel. All that can be heard in the pause is the faint bleeping from the large 3D map projection showing the current locations of the remaining eight tributes. The heels of his dark red patent leather shoes click across the linoleum tiles as he passes the rows of Gamemakers hunched over their glowing screens. As he stops before the hologram, the blinking lights throw his face into sharp relief, all lines and shadows.
A woman, hair dragged back into a shining knot atop her head, glances up and notices with a small shudder that his face looks vaguely skull-like.
Titus watches the eight lights blink on and off in front of him, each a circle with a gender symbol and district number inside. Not so very long ago, there had been nine, and then one had winked out of existence. Inside the control room, not an eyelid had batted except for the woman with the shining knot of hair. For a moment, as the image of the little girl flashed up on her screen, she’d felt something stir inside – a strange, new sensation.
Pity.
She’d thought of her own little girl; the two must have been of a similar age. Somewhere out in the districts, another family had been hacked at, leaving a gaping wound that could never be repaired. For the first time in her pampered life, the woman had felt, in some tiny way, what the mothers of the tributes must have felt.
Then the moment had passed, and her fingers had once more danced over her keyboard, sending the message to the pilot of the arena hovercraft. As she’d returned to the task of sorting through sponsor messages and pathetic bribery from the citizens, she didn’t even spare a thought as the shining silver machine that had carried Ellie to the arena not so long ago, departed to bring her back with the spark of life extinguished.
It’s just a job, and it pays well. Emotion is not part of the job description.
After all, people die in the Hunger Games. They have to, it’s their own fault. That’s what the whole thing is about.
Now, she glances back at the gaunt frame of the Head Gamemaker as he taps his long fingernails on the chrome edge of the holographic table. It’s the latest in fashion for the men of the Capitol to grow their nails long, then file them into sharp points that click and clatter over every surface they touch, tinny drum solos with every tap. A little impractical, and some of their wives are probably rather cross, but since when has practicality mattered when you can be the cutting edge? Some have even gone so far as to imbed gems or rings in the buffed surfaces. Titus is not one of them. His are painted dark, bloody or black with no sparkles, no glitter.
Suddenly the silence flies apart as Titus rakes the points of his fingernails down the metal, filling the air with a juddering screech that seemed to bounce and echo on and on long after his hand had stopped moving. Everyone in the room twitches involuntarily, their eyes flicking to him.
He waits until the silence is absolute again, then turns to face the rows of faces before him.
“I’m bored,” he announces, in a cold flat voice. The clicking of his heels resumes as he begins to pace slowly up and down in front of the map. In front of him, the heads of the other Gamemakers swivelled from side to side, watching his every move with unwavering attention. They’ve all learnt from observation that when Titus Vos speaks to the room, everyone listens. Even the hardest among them still shuddered when they thought of the day he’d caught the woman watching her screen while he addressed them. He’d made sure she’d never look away again, that was for sure.
He pauses, but he’s not waiting for a response from his team. They sit in mute and expectant silence. It doesn’t last for long.
“These have been the most dull Games we’ve had in years! The people aren’t impressed – have you seen the ratings? Every day they drop another few points. The Hunger Games is the proudest tradition of Panem and yet people seem to be more enthralled by whatever Snow-awful trash they’re producing on the other channel! What the hell is wrong with you people?”
They flinch back from the sudden shout, the wheels on their white plastic chairs squeaking on the linoleum of the floor. Titus glares at them for a second, somehow managing to make it gesture personal to every man and woman in the room.
Click, click. The heels resume their march, and the eyes swivel back and forward diligently.
“I want action. Something dramatic. Drive them together – make them fight. The people want blood, we’ll give them blood! That’s what we’re here for, people, for them.”
He stabs his finger in the direction of the window that faces out over the glittering spires and buildings of the Capitol. The eyes follow the action conscientiously even though they already know what he’s pointing at.
They’re still looking when Titus abruptly stalks toward the door. There’s a small scramble as a few of the Gamemakers roll their chairs aside to make a clear pathway for him, but he doesn’t make any sign that he’s noticed.
He’s at the door when they hear him speak again.
“Give ‘em hell. We’ve got the arena for it. And if that doesn’t work – give it a day, and then we’ll see if Tullia, Claudius and Nero can help, shall we?”
In the silence that follows, his low chuckle can be clearly heard over the sound of the heels of the red leather shoes clicking away down the hallway.
It’s late afternoon, and the arena swelters under a blanket of inescapable heat. The air feels thick and heavy, and Byron almost feels like it’s a struggle to get enough breath into his lungs. In the shade of one of the huge trees, Tyrion has fallen into a fitful kind of doze, his hands and legs twitching every few minutes. Byron’s no medical expert, but even he know that the other boy is seriously unwell. The grey skin around his mouth and the constant sweat the beads the forehead under his limp fringe is enough to tell him that Tyrion needs help.
Tyrion tries to scream but his mouth is sealed shut with the heat and the scream stays trapped inside, filling him up until he’s going to burst. He doesn’t know where he is, can’t see anything but the trees and the shadows, but he knows that he’s going to die because he can feel it. It hangs in the air along with the heat, thumps through his veins with every irregular beat and it’s in the digging pain where his hands have been tied together.
He tries to scream again, but all he can make is a muffled yelp; grass bites into his tongue and he tastes blood. Hot and salty, dissolved on his palate in an instant and it doesn’t cool his raging thirst. Tears blind his eyes. How did he get here? They must have abandoned him, left him to go looking for Ellie and he’d fallen asleep and...then what?
He’s been abandoned.
It stings. Bitterly, he thinks that he should never have trusted them, never trust anybody in a game where there’s only one winner and the price of losing is death. The kindness and concern was just an act and he’s a fool to have believed it. Maybe they’ll kill each other. There’d be revenge in that.
But it won’t matter, because he won’t be around to see it. What will happen to him now? Will he just starve to death or is someone going to come along and see to him themselves?
He struggles against the bonds again but he only feels blood trickle down his wrists and his heart hammering like crazy, desperate to get out of this body running on limited time. Every beat hurts, but he has to get out, somehow...
Someone is in front of him. Straight in front of him, like they’ve appeared from nowhere. A short squat build, flanked by two shadows, lengths of grass-rope twisting between her stubby fingers. It’s the girl from One...Ruby? Something like that. Her eyes are all menace and he tries to scream again; this will be painful, pain to end all pain. She has no bladed weapon so is she going to choke him instead? He could be choking already, screams stoppering his throat, lungs empty of air. He’s heard that in extreme situations people can feel like they become detached from her body but no such luck for him; he can feel every fibre of fabric clinging to his skin, every nerve alight and painful. His luck ran out the day his heart gave in.
She leans in closer. Her breath is rancid and he can hear the slithering of the grass-ropes between her fingers. It sounds like snakes. Any remaining strength drains from his body, not wanting to waste its time on a dead body. One last tug but the binds around his hands don’t budge.
“Actually...leave him, Ruby. We’ll deal with this.”
That voice!
The shadows are no longer shadows but they’re taking on features, shape, expression. Ruby glances up, hurls the ropes onto the floor and retreats, her heavy footsteps the only sound beyond the cacophony of his body. Even the trees don’t rustle.
Byron and Carmen are looking down on him. Relief floods through his shaking limbs but it doesn’t last long; Byron’s expression is cold and Carmen is grinning slightly.
He would try to scream but the breath has been knocked from him. He can only watch, puzzled and scared, as Carmen crouches next to him, playful curiosity in her eyes but malevolence curling around her mouth. He looks to Byron but the older boy only looks back blankly.
In the background, Ruby says something that he can’t make out.
Shivers dart down his body as cold fingers gently push the hair from his temple. It’s like they’re freezing him too; he can’t move. He can only watch and feel as Carmen part his hair, peering intently at him as though she’s looking for something.
A searing pain rips through the side of his head and the memory of a gleaming throwing star spins across his vision.
Tears trickle from his eyes, pooling around the gag that is again holding back a scream. One of the cold hands cups his cheek and he finds himself looking straight into Carmen’s eyes. Through the pain and the chill he’s dimly aware that Ruby paces backwards and forwards, footsteps noiseless now, and Byron is knelt by his side, a distant hand on his shoulder. It feels more like it’s to keep him here than for comfort and there’s no reassurance in it at all.
His hand automatically tries to feel for blood, but he only succeeds in rocking a little, the binds snapping at his wrists. Byron’s grip tightens until it’s painful; holding him still.
“Second time would have been here,” Carmen murmurs, and with her spare hand taps his chest, just above his heart. It contracts in response, wrenching his insides. “You would have been dead a long time ago.”
The boy from Nine in the sky, she slipped back into camp as though nothing had happened. Before that: don’t trust me? He’d said nothing, of course. What was he supposed to say? She’d promised, she’d said she wouldn’t be able to kill him even if she’d wanted to, and then the dart gun thing had arrived and the expression then is the one she’s wearing now.
“Stay still,” Byron urges.
“Hurry up,” Ruby says.
Carmen gives them both a glance and there’s a dagger in her hand.
Everything stops.
The blade feels cold against his skin as she slits through the gag, grass falling away around his knees. He spits blood and the ground absorbs it up, and now what? He could scream, now, if his throat wasn’t hoarse. He wants to shout, to yell and call them traitors, but the words don’t come. What spills out of his mouth sounds like pleading, begging.
“You...you...you said you wouldn’t.”
“Easy now,” Byron mutters, placing an arm around his back. It doesn’t stop the shaking that’s making his vision blurry. His heart pulses and twists. She looks straight at him, right in the eyes, and he sees turbines in the distance and the muddy river, the laugh of children playing and the agonising press of reaping day, and a family in the Justice Building.
“I lied.”
The dagger rips through his skin and he wakes up screaming, a crack of lightning tearing the sky overhead.
And somewhere in a warm and lavish apartment in the centre of the Capitol, Titus Vos watches. A chuckle bubbles out of him as he watches the boy from Five scream and push away his allies, buckets of rain tumbling from the sky. Elsewhere, the twins look to the sky, unfazed. Ruby scowls. Abi and Benji cower at separate corners of their room as thunder rolls across the arena.
“And so the end begins, my pretties,” he purrs, rubbing his long nails over the sharp lines of his face, “May the odds be ever in your favour!”