Over and Over: The 32nd Hunger Games SYOT

Chapter 3

Emmeline Blythe POV

I stirred a pot of oatmeal with one hand while I doled out spoonfuls with the other. There were seven bowls to fill, and each one only got a few spoonfuls before the pot was empty. I shrugged mentally and poured the contents of one bowl into the others. If I got Reaped I could eat on the train, and if I didn't I'd be too relieved to eat. Maria must have felt the same way. I saw her pass her bowl to Thomas and Charlie, who eagerly divided it.

I took Maria's hand as we left our little brothers and sisters behind to take a chance on death. This was the only day of the year I was glad Mom was gone. As much as I wanted her there to comfort me, I was thankful she didn't have to worry anymore.

In honor of one of Three's latest breakthroughs in cosmetic technology, Bubbles' eyelashes were lined with fiber optic extensions. She must have thought she looked grand, but all I saw was the hours of labor I put in testing materials to help invent them and the dozens of test subjects blinded or killed along the way. The rich never realize who provides their wealth. Let her spend a day in the factories and eat nothing but slop. She batted her decadent eyelashes and addressed us.

"Let's start with the ladies," she said as she held up a name. "Emmeline Blythe!"

Logic flew from my brain and I started to scream. A hulking figure grabbed my arm and I remembered something an urchin of a coworker had told me once. Solar plexus, instep, nose, groin. I punched the man's stomach, but my fist cracked against a solid plate. I held my hand in pain and the man scooped me up. Another one joined him and I thrashed every step of the way onto the stage.

"Now for the men!" Bubbles shouted as if I wasn't there. "Wyatt Sparks!" I wasn't paying any attention to the boy that came onstage. He started talking to the crowd as the Peacekeepers dogpiled onto me to keep me from squirming away.

My family came to see me in a blur of emotions and words. They probably said something about loving me and doing my best, and I probably responded. It wasn't until I was waving them off that I realized I had no memory of the last ten minutes. There was a locket around my neck, and I opened it. Inside was a picture of all of us back when Rory was just a baby. There must not have been any more recent ones. Smog filled my head and blocked thought. I stared at the wall and merely sat.

Wyatt Sparks POV

"Did you hear the one about the egg?" I asked the boy beside me. He looked at me like those words didn't make a proper sentence.

"Nah, it's rotten," I said before he could tell me to stop. He looked back ahead like he didn't hear me, but the boy behind us started snickering. I turned to a more receptive audience.

"You like that one? I got another one about a star. It's out of this world," I said. He cracked up completely and started shaking. His nerves may have already been on edge, but better laughter than tears.

I was supposed to be quiet when Bubbles was talking, but it's hard for witty "Watt" Sparks to stop talking. It's like my jaws are made of rubber and jokes bubble up out of me. Heh, "bubble". I can't stop even if I want to. Bubbles called up Emmeline Blythe and immediately chaos descended on the Reaping center. Two Peacekeepers dragged a flopping girl onstage like a dying fish.

"They can make me go but they can't make me go with dignity," I observed. Emmeline was putting up a valiant fight, and I could only imagine she'd go farther than she thought. Bubbles had to scream to be heard over the racket.

"Wyatt Sparks!" she shouted.

"Oh, crap," I blurted. My musing on death and dignity had just gotten real, and now I would have to live it. Screw dignity and pride. My show was just about over and I was about to end it with a bang. I sauntered onstage and grabbed the microphone away from Bubbles.

"Thanks, toots, and good to see you, Three! I just flew in from my house and boy are my arms t-t-tired!" The nervous stutter wormed its way in as I faced my own mortality. "S-s-sorry about that. You know how they always say 'he must have gotten d-dropped on his head?' I a-a-actually did." The crowd was divided between the impropriety and possible repercussions of laughing and helplessness in the face of such humor, and I got a good helping of laughter before one of the Peacekeepers wrestled the mic away.

"F-f-fight the power!" I shouted in my last second of airtime. The Peacekeeper shot me a look of such venom a lesser man would have wilted.

"Pity you two couldn't see the show. I killed it," I said when Mom and Dad came back with Avis and Gigi to say goodbye.

"The Careers won't be able to hurt you. They'll be laughing too much," Avis said. I wasn't sure what good humor would do against a sword, but maybe my rapier wit would compensate for my lack of rapier skills.

"S-see you soon," I said when our time was almost up.

"Never change," my mother said. "You light up the world. Panem would be empty without you."

"Mush," I said bashfully. Trust a mom to say something like that.

After they were gone, I realized they didn't even give me a token. I was about to face near certain death without so much as a plastic car or a wooden whistle. What a perilous calamity.

One way or another, Three refuses to go gentle into that good night.

I need Sky Levings' profile before I can do Five. Sorry if you already sent her. I will look through my messages.