𝐒𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐖𝐇𝐈𝐓𝐄: 𝐓𝐈𝐄-𝐈𝐍𝐒 || Four Supplementary Stories

Eustace | 3

Murmurs swept through the assembly hall, instantly drowning out President Gumpas' tinny voice as it warbled from the TV propped up at the front of the room.

"In commemoration of the 225th anniversary of the Hunger Games, every eligible child will cast a vote to choose their district's representative tributes."

Ice cold fingers clamped around Eustace's wrist and he yanked it away reflexively, but a moment later his eyes flew to the paper-white face of Jill Pole, staring unblinkingly at the screen as if turned to stone.

And reality dawned on him just as it already had for her.

"Participation in this vote is mandatory. Failure to comply will result in public execution."

The Quarter Quell was a vote.

This was a popularity contest.

His heart skipped a beat as a cold rush of overwhelming terror washed over him, the image of wide toothy jaws flashing into his head with a burst of bright red blood on Davy's high definition TV, spattering the screen as his young eyes stared transfixed at the writhing coil of hulking mutant snake.

“That's… so… cool,” Davy had mumbled, almost slurring his words under the weight of his wonder-struck stupor, so young that Eustace couldn't quite place an age to the memory.

“The bite force has gotta be insane,” Eustace had murmured in return, unable to tear his eyes away from the scene as Capitol commentators wailed with exaggerated disgust and pity.

All his life the spectacle of the Games had filled his head, the humiliating deaths, the shambling creatures that ripped tributes apart in the night, the traps that sliced or caught or stabbed or poisoned, or melted their flesh off as they struggled to crawl free.

All his life he’d gazed on in morbid rapture, but never before had it been real.

Never before had it been possible.

Never before had he even entertained the idea that it might be his name they called at that Reaping, when there were so many others to choose from, so many older, poorer nobodies who took out tesserae, whose families didn't slip bribes into the pockets of the census committee.

But none of that mattered now.

It was a vote.

And he wasn't exactly thriving in the popularity department of late.

He swore under his breath.

Metal folding chairs screeched over the concrete floor and Pole nudged him as the room snapped back into focus with the first grand, swelling notes of the national anthem.

He stood with the rest of the school assembly, trying to brush off the sickening sensation of cold sweat prickling over his flesh, but every nerve in his body flashed with the blinding desire to bolt, to run as far away as he could possibly get from this building, from these people, from the visions of gory destruction playing over and over behind his eyes.

He barely noticed when the anthem ended, or when the voice over the PA system dismissed them to their classes, heart pounding as if it would explode.

"Good luck, Scrubb!" called Davy through the rising babble of students filing out into the hall.

Stanley laughed.

Eustace clenched his jaw and kept his eyes trained stubbornly on the bodies shuffling in front of him, every one of them a living, breathing point against him if the gang played their cards right.

"Can you imagine?" squealed Eleanor. "I mean, really? On TV and everything?"

"I can't," snorted Stanley, "but I kind of want to, now that you mention it."