Hunger Games: Fandom Style

District 12 (Sherlock)

Characters are the property of their respective owners. I'm just borrowing them.

Mrs. Laveen was pregnant again. She'd been eating peppermints, a luxury she only allowed herself right after the news came in. The smell was heavy on her breath today as she ordered the inmates of the children's home to line up for the reaping.
Smeared lipstick, the scent of pine, Lucy's new ring. Daniel had kissed Lizzie. Ellis had snuck out to the woods again. Lucy had been stealing again, probably from the Hob.
He hadn't realized he'd been muttering his deductions out loud until Mycroft nudged him.
Right. Don't stand out, don't be different, stop upsetting people. Why try to impress when you'll only end up in the mines anyways?
"Nervous?" John whispered as they filled up the holding pen.
"No."
"I am. What if they pick Mary?"
Sherlock rolled his eyes. "So this week's crush outweighs your two oldest friends. I'm touched." He was John's oldest friend. John was his only friend. It worked out nicely.
"Why would I be worried about you? If you get picked, I can just volunteer. I can't do anything about Mary."
Sherlock blinked. "You would do that?"
John shrugged. "We're friends."
Sherlock had seen blood brothers turn their back on family on Reaping Day. John would do it for a friend. For him.
Two years ago, the skeptical side of him would have assumed he was lying, but by now Sherlock had seen enough of his roommate to know the truth. John was loyal to a fault.
The ceremony passed in a blur. "Ladies first," the woman trilled. (Plastic surgery, three places. Heel twisted from impractical stilettos. Wig, probably synthetic.)
"Mary Morstan."
John jerked forward. Sherlock grabbed his wrist. "You can't help her by getting shot," he hissed.
John tried to shake him off, but Sherlock's grip was iron. Pale faced, Mary ascended the stage.
"Now for the boys."
Not me, not me, not me -
"John Watson."
Sherlock froze. No. No. No. John tried to tug his arm from Sherlock's deadlocked grip.
No. No. No.
"Sherlock, the peacekeepers are coming," John whispered frantically.
They marched through the pen, shoving aside the other boys.
They would take him. They would take him, and Sherlock would watch him die on that television screen, and he couldn't let go, he couldn't, so Sherlock stepped in front of John.
"I volunteer," he blurted out. "I volunteer as tribute."
"No," Mycroft said. "No, you can't! Sherlock!"
Now John was holding on to him. "He didn't mean it, there's something wrong with his brain, it's a condition - "
But Sherlock twisted his arm out of John's grip and ran past them onto the stage. "My name is Sherlock Holmes. And I volunteer as tribute."