The Tribute From the Ocean (A Hunger Games Fan Fiction)

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I shift in my boring green dress and pull the sleeves further on my shoulders. I bought the dress from a girl named Coralie, one of my friends. She ran Valerie's old shop of clothes after she came down with fierce dementia.

Even if I wasn't to volunteer this year, I still had to attend the reaping. Most years we had careers volunteer for District 4, but some years we didn't. Every once in a while, you'll have a year where there are careers, but they've been instructed to wait until they were at the peak of their career.

I still had three more years, but Keyon insists I wait two. He has two other kids he has been training to volunteer that year so I won't be able to wait that long. Jermier and Jade are twins that Keyon trains. They are better than me already he says. But they are only thirteen and they have three more years of training. I only have two.

I stand and straighten the him of the dress to meet Brandan by the dock. It was quiet on reaping days since none of the fishers were gathering their catches.

He waited on me there dressed in a white shirt and black pants.

"Do you know who's volunteering?" I ask him. He shakes his head and stares at the Ocean.

"I haven't heard of anyone who wants to for the next two years. Jermier and Jade will the next ones I know of."

A funny thing our District was. We weren't poor, but there weren't always people willing to turn themselves in for what seems to be certain death.

"Do you really want to go into the arena, Kya?" Brandon asks me. He trained too. His entire life he's practiced throwing spears and shooting arrows, while I started seven years after my life began.

"Of course. It's supposed to be all glorified and what's there to actually lose?" I shrug. "All we are doing is getting ourselves killed to save a kid who has no chance of winning."

He doesn't say anything, but he looks at me like he wants to. He turned his head back to the Ocean.

"Why?" I ask him.

"I think it's wasteful." Wasteful of what?

"Well..." I struggle to find words. "It's wasteful to train for eighteen years of your life and not volunteer."

I pause for a minute.

"Sorry. I shouldn't have said that." I mutter and out my hands behind me to lean back.

"You aren't volunteering this year right, Kya?" Brandon asks me.

"No." I say in a strained voice. I can't say I hadn't thought of it. "Keyon told me to wait two more years."

"Then I will volunteer next year and you the year after that. We shouldn't be in the arena at the same time, but you aren't going in first." He says firmly.

He didn't mean anything against me, and he didn't want the glory of winning before me, he just didn't want me in the games when he hadn't even been there yet. I wasn't sure why.

"Okay." I say firmly. Maybe too firmly to be believable, but Brandon didn't do anything but look at me until we had to go back so we didn't miss the reaping.

On our way back he looked back at the Ocean. I look back to see if there is something there, but there isn't even a sign of anything. Me and Brandon weren't particularly close I wouldn't say. I'd only met him a few years ago when his dad brought him over to make sure Keyon didn't send me in the year he was going. I wasn't sure why for this either.

After that I'd talked to him by the docks a few times and even trained with him once or twice. Mostly it was talk of how to survive the games and each other's technics.

Brandon's dad was a victor years ago, but didn't help to mentor anymore. Finnick has seemed to taken over that. His father has trained him and has prepared him to be as glorious as he has been.

I look at the small crowd forming around the square with stone tiles the shape of scales on a fish.

"I'll see you after the reaping?" Brandon asks.

"Probably not. I have training again today." I tell him. He nods and shrugs.

"I probably will too honestly." Brandon say honestly. "I was told to keep you safe now, don't do anything stupid."

"What?" I ask but he's dissolved into the crowd behind him. I see his dark head bobbing through the crowd, but I wouldn't be able to push through all these people to get to him and ask what he meant.

Protect me? He barely knows me? I forget it and wade through the crowd as though the people were the water in the ocean and high tide was approaching.

"Excuse me." I mutter occasionally to the people I bump trying to get to the sign ins. I wasn't paying attention when they pricked my finger and printed my blood on a square and I didn't even reenter the world as I walked to the roped off area for all the girls my age.

Gabrielle Snow. Direct descent from our President. She had dyed her hair the color of snow and she wears a long furry cape that trails meters behind her.

"To cut straight to the chase." She says pronouncing specific words deeper than the others. "But first let's play the short tape of the reason we have the Hunger Games!"

After the film they play every year about the rebellion the mayor stands to give a small speech that basically states what the video shows.

"Ladies first!" Gabrielle says and gracefully bounds like a deer to the container holding every girl from 12-18 in the entire district.

"Marlee Opial!" They call out. I don't recognize the name but my eyes find the girl in the ropes in area behind me. Her parents screeched and it was clear why. One of her legs twisted at an odd angle and the other was nearly a stub.

I wait.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine.
Ten.

Nobody.

I walk out of my ropes in area and the peacekeepers don't even seem to see me. I look around for a moment. I see Brandon shaking his head slowly mouthing words I barely comprehend. Over and over.

I look at Keyon who stares his cold stare with his needle like eyes like he would penetrate my skin with a dagger.

"I volunteer as tribute!"