Child's Play: The Forty-Third Hunger Games

Chapter 16

I INTERRUPT MY STORY to give you this.

Ava Hanson

This is not my job. This is the exact opposite of my job!

We Careers liked to think we were ready for anything. Really, we were ready for exactly one thing. Anything else, from cooking to driving, was a mystery to most of us. And we certainly didn't know anything about having babies.

"I'll carry you! No wait, that'll jar the baby!" I said as I rushed around frantically. Pray sat on a chair, bent over her watermelon belly. She wasn't wearing her claws, luckily for her skin.

"Cool it, Ava. The medics will be here in five minutes. I already called them," Pray said. "And I called Rudolph too. He's not getting away. If I have to poop out a baby, he has to watch."

"It wasn't supposed to come yet," I said. This wasn't the Dark Days. In the Capitol, we planned labor so it would be induced at the right time. Pray and Rudolph had planned their "activities" so the baby would come when she was back in the Capitol to mentor. That way they had access to the best hospitals.

"She wants out now," Pray shrugged.

"She got that from you, not Rudolph," I said. A team of medics came screaming around the corner with a stretcher.

"I can walk," Pray said. She waddled toward the door. Her short frame and huge midsection made her look like a bumblebee.

"It'll be faster on the stretcher," I pleaded. "She's gonna fall out if you walk." Pray grumbled and got on the stretcher.

For all her complaints about Rudolph sharing the fun part but not the hard part, it wasn't that much of a trial for Pray. She'd opted for a water bath, and the water was both optimally warm and sitzed with painkillers and supplements for the new arrival. Pray was never a prude, so she didn't mind the doctors and witnesses huddled around her uncovered bottom half. She'd had half a dozen pre-birth appointments with the medical team to ensure they were used to her and didn't give themselves heart attacks trying not to anger Silver Claws or accidentally scratch her baby.

People said birth was a miracle, but it kind of grossed me out. I wasn't sure about it for myself. For people like me, anorexia was always in the wings, looking for a way to drag me back down. A protruding stomach might give it that chance, and I didn't want to go back. There were other ways to have children, and I could change my mind if I wanted. It was weird how much Pray's body changed during pregnancy, and it got weirder during labor. The doctors administered relaxing medications and hormones to temporary increase skin elasticity, and soon the baby's exit was a lot bigger than I knew that thing was supposed to be. She didn't even have to push. A furry head poked its way out and then the whole baby slid out like a torpedo. It started crying right away and the doctors took it to cut the cord, which was still attached and was super gross.

It was a lovely little sack of skin. It was wrinkly and furry and small as a head of lettuce. But something was a little wrong.

"Uh, Pray?" I asked. "I don't want to start anything, but your baby's black."

Pray Jager

I was probably the last person anyone expected to be a mother. Some people might have thought I wanted to even my scales, but I'd have had to have a lot more babies in that case. Really, I wanted a baby for a lot of reasons. It wasn't to coddle it or play dress-up. I expected my daughter to be as strong as her mother. It was up to her to continue mine and Rudolph's line.

I got distracted when I first saw her. She was a little tadpole with her dark hair matted down by the water, and her flabby arms flapped spastically. She had a shrunken face and wrinkly skin, but I loved her right away. She was perfect. I held her to my breast and smiled at her. She was so little and cute and soft. That wouldn't last forever, of course. I could already see her potential, and I was going to make sure she had everything she needed to get it.

"Uh, Pray?" Ava asked. I'd been afraid she was going to throw up into the bath, but she looked better now. "I don't want to start anything, but your baby's black."

"Guess I have some explaining to do," I said. Rudolph burst out laughing. "We had them do a little designer work. I always thought dark skin was pretty."

"Of course you would," Rudolph said.

"Did you two figure out a name yet?" Ava asked.

"You bet," I said. I held the baby up tilted on my arm so she could see Ava. I took one of her arms and waved it at her. "Meet Enobaria."

So... if Pray was already pregnant last year, she'd be 13 months pregnant if she's just giving birth now. So this took place nine months (minus a week because Enobaria was impatient) after she got pregnant. Her baby will be in the mentoring parts as a baby of indeterminate age because I'm lazy. This has been in the making ever since the 28th Games. I had to wait all these years to make sure the timeline was right, because we all know I take timelines very seriously.