Fatal Reality: The 800th Hunger Games

District 7 Reaping

*Nianna Vance's P.O.V.*

I pull on the only nice outfit I have: a flower-pattered cotton dress that's way too small for me.  I put my other clothes in the small closet that I have.  I live by myself in a condemned home that the peacekeepers forgot about ever since my parents died in a fire.  I pull my blonde hair back with a blue pin and survey myself in the dirty, cracked mirror: a small thirteen-year-old girl with scrapes on her knees and elbows.  I take a deep breath and walk downstairs.

I hope they don't reap me.  I've had to take tesserae so many times, I don't think the odds are exactly in my favor.  But, I was lucky last year.  Maybe I'll be lucky again.

I register and scamper off towards the other girls my age, who cleverly avoid me.  I'm not a pleasant person at all.  Violent, rude, show-off Nianna.  That's me.  Uresti Joh, our freak of an escort, bounces on stage, his peircings completely horrifying.  He flips his amethyst-colored hair out of his eyes and begins to announce himself, the Hunger Games, blah, blah, blah...

"And now, for our ladies!" Uresti pulls a small slip of paper out.  Please, not me...not me...

And it's me.

*Alder Grove's P.O.V.*

That thirteen-year-old got picked, the one who lives by herself.  This morning, I made up my mind to volunteer.  I need to get away from here.  Ever since Mom died, I've not been able to stand it.  Plus, I stand a chance, what with the axe work we do here and all. Uresti pulls out the male tribute.

"Duncan Ad--"

"I volunteer!"  I step out of the shadows of the eighteen-year-olds and make my way to the stage, with some fourteen-year-old looking at me as if I was his savior.  I say my name in the microphone: "Alder Grove!"

~*~

"Alder, how could you?" My fifteen-year-old sister, Aspen, yells at me.  Birch, thirteen, and Oak, twelve, cower behind my dad as Aspen goes off on me.  

"Look, I had to," I yell back at her.  Aspen draws back, her hazel eyes filled with tears.  

"Fine," she whispers.  She takes one look at me, gives me a quick hug, and runs away.  Dad walks up to me with Birch and Oak awkwardly.

"I found this," he says huskily, holding out a small, wooden marble that I made years ago.  I feel my eyes widen as I take it, give him and the boys hugs, and wave good-bye.  Nianna and I are taken away to the train where all of the tributes are.