From the bright, shining sun, I walked down the hallway of the Justice Building. Each of the walls are painted in a beautiful gradient of the color black, descending from the darkest shade at the top. By the time the gradient was at the bottom of the walls, the color faded out, leaving it white. But since white is considered ‘too simplistic’ for District 8, the Capital decided to add some artistic details and lines into the color as well.
The decorations were very ornate, especially around each of the doors. The doorframes were painted bright pink with beautiful baby blue lace circling up and down around it. The colors of the walls and the doorframe contrasted nicely; there were barely any areas of dark black to unbalance the contrast. The colors matched perfectly in my eyes.
The ceiling was extraordinarily high with beautiful silver chandlers hanging down every hallway. I was in awe how beautifully decorated the building was. Alec must feel the same way, because every time I looked at him, his mouth was opened in awe or he was nodding his head up and down, scrutinizing each detail.
I was escorted to a room that was labeled "Reaping F." There were already two large Peacekeepers on each side of the door. I glanced behind me and saw Alec being escorted to the room across from mine, labeled "Reaping M." The Peacekeeper behind me gave the two guards a small nod and they let me into the room.
The room wasn't as magnificent as the halls, but it was still beautiful. The walls were painted a dark red with a gold lace rim hanging off the perimeter of the ceiling. A large, soft red carpet was plastered on the floor as well. There were pictures of the two past District 8 female victors, Mackenzie Kadlen from the 59th and Brooke Dae from the 82nd. Brooke was the last District 8 female victor, 17 years ago. I already have pity for the children who get reaped next year for the Quarter Quell, being that it's the 100th Annual next year. Gamemakers will most definitely make a large twist in the Games next year, considering it's been an entire century since the games first begun.
At least some things have been altered and tweaked from the very first Hunger Games. At first, only one sole tribute could be crowned victor; meaning, if both the male and female tribute from the same district survive until the final two, they are force to kill each other to win. Isn't that preposterous? Gamemakers could also enter in twists such as storms or animals to kill the tributes if they don't do it themselves, but I won't get into the details at this moment. Unfortunately, 1701 innocent children had to be slaughtered in the span of 74 years before someone took an initiative to change a rule in the games. In one of my Supportive Education classes, History, we learned about the origin of the Games and when and why a rule was altered or overturned. From what I learned in Supportive Education, Katniss Everdeen, from District 12, is the militant that altered one of the rules of the Hunger Games. There was an entire chapter based on Katniss and her life story. Katniss Everdeen had not been reaped for the 74th Annual Hunger Games; she had volunteered to take her sister's spot in the Games because her sister had been reaped. Katniss's district partner, Peeta Mellark, was a baker and he and Katniss had a backstory before becoming district partners in the Games. When there were about five tributes left in the Games, the announcer at the time, Claudius Templesmith, informed everyone that there can be two victors if they originate from the same district. Katniss and Peeta were the only two who were from the same district, so the other two tributes were flying solo. This gave Katniss and Peeta motivation to continue fighting and win because now, they can both become victors and return to their home district. Somehow, they both managed to survive until they were the final two. That is when Claudius Templesmith's voice boomed over the speaker once again and informed both Peeta and Katniss that the information that there can be two victors was a hoax and there can only be one victor. The point in this was to give the audience something interesting to watch, but Katniss strongly opposed of the trickery. She opposed it so much that she and Peeta almost committed suicide with Nightlock Berries (poisonous berries that were taken away from all the districts because the Capital felt that it gave the people a symbol of rebellion based on what Katniss did), so there would be no victors. The point of the Hunger Games is to have children fight to their death until there is a sole victor, but if there isn't a victor, the purpose of the Games vanishes. As they were about to swallow the berries, the speaker boomed again, congratulating both Peeta and Katniss for being the victors of the 74th Annual Hunger Games. This angered President Snow, the President of all the districts at this time, that there were two victors instead of one. He killed the head Gamemaker of that year, Seneca Crane and went after Katniss next. This sparked a rebellion that lasted about a year. The rebellion unfortunately failed and Katniss was killed, but her legacy still lives on today. In order to prevent another rebellion among its people, the Capital and Gamemakers changed the rule so that two people (if they're from the same district), can win the Games, like Peeta and Katniss did. That's basically all we learned about Katniss and the 74th Hunger Games in Supportive Education. But the main point is, it took 75 years for someone to take the initiative to bring about change to the Games and Katniss was the first to do so.
