The Black Widow | A Hunger Games Fanfiction

The Victory Tour

Three months of training Sapphire had been slowly sapping my will to live. She was so convinced she could win and it wasn't that I didn't agree, it was that I wondered if a twelve year old's brain could handle the aftermath.
So far, she was better with most weapons than I was and she was pretty lethal in hand to hand combat too. If she'd been older, I would've bet all my money that she would win those games. But even if she did now, I wasn't sure she'd survive the trauma.
Even as an eighteen year old, I still didn't sleep most nights and if I did, I'd wake up screaming. Every time I'd close my eyes, I'd see death.
Blink. Disembowelled boy from eight.
Blink. Headless Jupiter.
Blink. Kids choking on their own blood.
I knew that as long as I lived, I would never forget the Hunger Games.
But it seemed the Capitol wanted to make extra sure.

Exactly six months after the reaping, I was roused from my bed by my prep team. Despite my complaints, they dunked me in the frigid bathwater and began to attack my hair with a variety of products. Thankfully, I was spared the torture of waxing although I remembered the pain well.
They spread some makeup over my face and then handed me some clothes to change into:  a red jacket with white fur lining, tight black trousers, a grey woolen polo neck jumper,  black boots with stilleto heels and black gloves.
Victoria entered the room shortly after I was dressed and smiled,
"Perfect," she commented, before leading me downstairs. "You know," she told me as we walked, "your clothes for this tour are absolutely divine. I have missed designing clothes for victors. The budget is always so much better." I hated to think how much money she'd wasted on this wardrobe if her 'low' budget for my games had involved covering my entire body in diamonds.

We went straight to the train from my house led by a woman I had never seen before. On the train, I saw Cinna was sitting on one of the armchairs, deep in conversation with Cashmere and Gloss (they both had to come since they were both my mentor at some point).
"Who's the new lady?" I asked as I flopped down beside the group. They turned to me, their faces painted with various degrees of awkwardness,
"She's the new District 1 escort," Cashmere said with an obviously feigned brightness,
"New?" I asked, tilting my head the side, "Why'd they replace the other lady?"
"She made a mistake," Gloss said, "that kind of weakness isn't acceptable." Clearly none of them were going to give straight answers, but I got the general gist of it: the escort was gone. And judging by the capitol's previous actions, I thought her fate was pretty obvious.
We sat in silence for a while before the new lady came over to introduce herself,
"It's a pleasure to meet you darling," she said, taking a seat uncomfortably close beside me. I shifted up the couch slightly so I wouldn't have to touch her horrific green skin. If she was offended she didn't show it and launched into her explanation of my victory tour, "Over the next two weeks, we will be visiting each of the districts in turn, making a speech at each and attending a dinner party with the victors. Then finally, we will wrap up our tour in the Capitol," she squealed with excitement, "with a party at the home of President Snow himself."
Excitement radiated off her as she said this, but all I felt was trepidation: the last day of the Victory Tour would be the day Snow made his offer if my plan hadn't worked. And I hated to think what would happen after if I had failed.
But that would be a problem for later. First I had to face the families of the children I had murdered.

We arrived in District 12 a day after we had left one and my first impression was that it was dark. It was probably from all the coal dust in the sky.
I hardly remembered the tributes from 12- they had been weak so I hadn't really paid attention to them. But from the looks of the people here, the lack of food to go around was probably a factor in that.
The speech I had to give wasn't too bad- I hadn't killed or caused either of their tributes deaths, but that didn't mean I went into that dinner guilt free. No, it was the mentor who made me feel bad.
12 only had one mentor- Haymitch Abernathy, Victor of the 50th Games. He looked awful, a wreck of the person he had been nearly 20 years ago (I had seen his games when we rewatched them at the Academy). He carried a flask of what I assumed was alcohol into the dinner party, sipping from it instead of his wine, although I had no doubt he would drain that too when his flask was finished. I felt so sorry for him. He was alone, having to watch as every single one of his tributes died and was forgotten instantly. I wondered if that would be me someday: watching and dreading the moment when my tribute died, or worse that they won.
We left halfway through the dinner when Haymitch passed out into his soup, splattering it all over the new escort's dress. I was glad to get out of there though.