Chapter Text
She’s late. Again.
Theta is always late on Reaping Day. Partially because time has a habit of slipping away from her, but mostly because she dreads the anxiety that settles over the gathered crowds as the names are drawn. It makes her antsy, knowing that in a single moment, two children and their families are forced to quickly come to terms with the fragility of mortality. Tributes from District 3 almost never win the games, and even when they do, the best case scenario still leaves one of them dead. It’s a cruel system designed by cruel people, and if she could get away with refusing to participate altogether, she would. Unfortunately, her name was drawn fifteen years ago and she won, which locked her into an endless cycle of mentoring and connecting with new tributes only to watch them lose their lives over and over again in front of a mass audience.
She no longer has enough fingers to count the pieces of her broken heart, and every year, she feels as though she’s dancing closer and closer to the edge of her sanity. She doesn’t blame the group of victors who seek comfort in morphling and alcohol. She probably would, too, if she wasn’t too far gone for it to fix anything.
Boots skid on the pavement as she sprints around the corner. Heads turn in her direction, but they all look away as soon as they see the billowing coat and the familiar flash of blonde hair. Being a victor means that everyone knows your face and your name and the exact price that you paid for victory. She spilled less blood than some, but more blood than most, and she cursed herself by doing so creatively . At the time, it seemed easier to use engineering to distance herself from the reality of her actions, but in hindsight, it left too much of an impact. People remember exactly what she did and how she did it, and the only way they could collectively process it was by declaring her mad. That was not true when she was an exhausted, blood-stained fourteen-year-old, but it is certainly true now.
No one bothers to stop her when she leaps over the barrier at the checkpoint. They station the same sentries here every year, and they know the drill. At this point, they’d probably get in more trouble if they bothered to stop her than by letting her pass without identification.
She weaves through rows of shipping containers and makeshift curtains, ducking under the arm of a representative from the Capitol who is already stuttering about her appearance, and avoiding eye contact with a dozen people whose names and jobs she never bothered to learn. Eventually, she comes to rest next to a familiar figure. Straight-backed, hostile, in a neatly pressed purple suit that complements the warm brown of his skin.
He cocks his head at her, and his eyes take their time as he sweeps over the sorry state of her clothes, her heaving chest, and the disheveled mess of her hair. After a long moment of tense silence, he turns his gaze back forward and comments “You look like you’ve been in a wind tunnel.”
Her nose wrinkles in distaste as bitter sarcasm drips from her tongue. “Live in one, actually. You should try it. Very cozy.”
Koschei has always possessed the uncanny ability to place her ill at ease. His name was drawn the year before hers, and he slaughtered almost half the tribute field personally, claiming the first victory for their District and becoming an overnight sensation. Media darling Caesar Flickerman had dubbed him The Master, a title that stuck, and he plays his part well. He offers up smiles in photos and charming jokes in interviews, but as soon as the cameras are off, darkness always comes floating back towards the surface. He mentored Theta while his own pain was still fresh, and dismissed her as a lost cause as soon as the second name was drawn. The other tribute for District 3 that year was Koschei's friend, classmate, and neighbor, and Koschei all but told her that her would not advocate on her behalf for sponsorships or assistance, choosing to instead throw her to the wolves and focus the entirety of his attention on supporting her male counterpart.
That favoritism did not matter in the end. His friend died first, and Theta won the shortest games on record. Thirty-six hours, one meticulously engineered mass slaughter, and it was over.
Fifteen years have passed since then -- fifteen years spent frequenting the same events and being forced to occupy the same space on an annual basis -- and he still has not forgiven her.
“Does your wind tunnel have a closet, or do you still only own the one coat?”
It takes Theta a moment to process that he’s still speaking to her. Despite seeing each other regularly, the pair is not prone to conversation. Often, Koschei offers up a single, cruel quip and then proceeds to ignore her, but it must be a ‘twisting the knife’ kind of day. It makes sense; Reaping Day is the perfect time for misery.
“People are starving. Besides, I only need one co- OW! ” She yelps as someone behind her attempts to drag a comb through her hair, nearly jumping out of her skin in shock. Eyes narrow as she pivots, seeking out the offender. It’s a small girl, so mousy that the flash and pomp of Capitol fashion almost seems to drown her as she draws back, afraid of the fear and rage that flash in the victor’s eyes.
“You could ask first. Valuable thing, consent. Opens a lot of doors that might otherwise be closed,” Theta says icily, turning back to Koschei as she hears a quiet chuckle creep through the air. “ What ?”
His eyes turn towards the open sky above them, filled to the brim with endless amusement. “These people offered us up as sacrifices without asking our permission, do you think they’ll start drawing the line at combing tangles?”
“Have to start somewhere, don’t they?”
It’s a rhetorical question with dangerous implications, and both she and Koschei know better than to debate its specifics in a forum so public. Though he has minimal association with her and thus is at little risk of being labelled an enemy of the state and disposed of accordingly, she has always been kept at arm’s length in the Capitol. She was banned from state dinners four years ago for a badly timed speech on the morality of consumption, and had come perilously close to blows with a television host on his own show. The President had offered her a list of action items that would permit her re-entry into both the media circuit and those upper echelons of society outside of the context of mentoring during the Games. The first seven bullet points had revolved around settling into a respectable marriage. She hadn’t bothered to read any of the others before tossing the damned thing into the fire.
“
Theta!
” The name floats through the air, carried by a slight breeze and a familiar voice.
Theta’s eyes roll, but she turns around to find herself crushed in a hug. The brim of a hat threatens to gouge out one of her eyes, and she very delicately raises a hand to hold it aside until the embrace is over.
“You really shouldn’t snap at the team, they mean well, and you look disastrous,” the hugger says with a wide smile as she takes a step back, beaming up at them with a wide smile. It is too kind of a smile to belong here, too wholesome a person to be clothed in the garish clothes of the Capitol and participating in the ghoulish spectacle of the Games, but Theta had long ago accepted the fact that just as she had done what she needed to do to survive in this world, so, too, does everyone else within it. She does not blame the flock for the misconduct of the shepherd, even if she sometimes berates them for following along so blindly.
Theta bristles slightly at the condemnation of her appearance, but the woman’s enthusiasm always throws her a bit too far out of step to bite back properly. She is unused to people being happy to see her.
“Still playing this part, Romana?”
“Upward mobility is limited these days. I did apply for something else, but it was insisted that I remain here. I don’t mind. It is a privilege to be allowed to travel, and it means that I get to see you!” A hint of sadness creeps into Romana’s gaze, but it does not linger long. She is practiced at the art of separating oneself from one’s work. It is the only way to keep moving forward during times as dark as these.
A grumble wafts through the air between them as Koschei interjects, “Means a great many other things as well, does it not?”
“Best not to dwell on the negative,” she quips, before turning her attention back to the female victor. “Now, would you
please
--”
The words are interrupted by the pompous, unsettling tones of the anthem pouring out of the many speakers on the other side of the curtain. A shiver of dread spreads from Theta’s chest to her toes, and it takes every ounce of her willpower to keep from racing back the way she came. She had done that once before, and the repercussions had been nasty. It would seem that Panem only values cowardice when that cowardice is convenient for them, and not when it speaks to the pain and fear that races through the veins of everyone who has been subjected to the cruelty of their Games.
“It’s our cue,” Romana says, tone so calm as to be nigh inscrutable. A needless announcement, really. The three of them have done this same song and dance year-in and year-out for over a decade, but there is some scant comfort to be found in pretending that they haven’t. It is always easier to feign innocence than admit culpability.
Theta takes up her position at the back of the line, sulking out onto the stage two and a half steps behind her counterpart, and choosing to stand just far enough behind the little mark that has been taped onto the floor so as to be out of focus when the cameras decide to cut to them. It is a tiny act of rebellion, just innocent enough to be brushed off as a mistake if no one is paying attention to her pattern of behavior, but she knows that there is an entire team dedicated to taking notes and cutting together a reel of her insubordination to play before the court, should she ever be taken to trial. Provided, of course, that they even bother to offer her the illusion of justice.
She crosses her hands in front of her and settles into the wait, grateful that her only job is to stand and look solemn. She doesn’t have to draw names, doesn’t have to read them, doesn’t even have to look at their faces until later. Of course, that does nothing to make the air any less stifling or the atmosphere any less tense, but it is a tiny grace in an unforgiving world.
Romana's tightly scripted speech is always the same. It speaks of the glory and honor of the Games, what an honor it is to be chosen, the peace that has come as a result, the riches that await the victor. Though Theta had not been alive for the first games, she had heard that some people used to cheer during these announcements, used to buy into these lies and believe in the bright future that they represented. However, horror after horror and broken promise after broken promise had broken that trust. People in this District are poor and angry and haunted by loss. They meet the words with chilly silence. The faint cry of a baby rises from somewhere in the crowd -- the only person present who is both young and foolish enough to admit its misery.
There’s a brief pause as Romana closes, storing her cards and drawing a deep breath that is barely audible through the microphone. Theta’s eyes slide sideways, eyebrow lifting at the peculiarity. Could Romanadvoratrelundar, ever the consummate professional, be nervous? Fondness rises in her chest at the idea. Theta has, after all, been fighting for years to feed the flames of doubt among those who she encounters. It would be enormously satisfying if those fires are finally burning of their own accord. It is about time someone burned this horrible institution down and unseats the government that continues to fund it.
The blaze, however, has not yet reached its peak. It is not strong enough to stop the reaping.
Romana’s delicate fingers pluck first one name and then the other from the designated bowls, reading them aloud for the benefit of the crowd. Theta listens to neither, and she does her best to keep her eyes fixed on the horizon to avoid witnessing the sweep of horror that inevitably follow the announcements. It is the same every year; she does not need to experience that revulsion for yet another time.
When they speak, the tributes’ voices sound enormously childlike. To Theta, it feels as though they get younger every year, though perhaps that is merely a side effect of her own age staggering ever higher, despite her best efforts to bait an early death.
It is half an age before they are finally played off the stage. They exit in the same manner in which they had entered: in a tight line behind Romana, though this time, Theta finds herself stuck in the middle.
Once they reach in the safety of the curtains, she feels strong fingers wrap around her wrist, dragging her to a halt.
“I need to talk to you.” Koschei's words are little more than a hiss into her ear.
The tickle of his breath sends a shiver down Theta's spine, and she twists her arm in an attempt to pull away. He doesn’t let her.
“You never need to talk to me,” she observes, eyebrows raised in a challenge. “Fifteen years and we’ve barely had a handful of conversations, unless you count the time you got drunk and shouted at me for forty minutes. Or the time you told me you wouldn’t help me. Or the endless string of insults. How long was the shouting in the headlines again? A couple months, I’d say. Wouldn’t risk a repeat if I were you.”
She watches, quietly simmering, as the man casts his gaze about the people around them, ensuring that nobody has taken notice of them, before he turns his attention back to her. When he speaks again, his voice remains dangerously quiet. “It really needs to happen in private. Can you meet me at my home in an hour?”
“Why? Is it atonement day? You going to finally kill me?” Theta knows that she shouldn’t taunt him, but nerves flutter in her stomach and worry coats her tongue. She has a habit of babbling her way through uncomfortable situations, perhaps because she was denied that very luxury throughout her own experience in the Games.
“No.” An impenetrable layer of ice coats the syllable. “I was given a directive, and I think you’d rather hear it than be caught off guard later.”
Silence stretches between them as he awaits her answer, brown eyes searching for meaning in her own. She says nothing, but something must have satisfied him, because he lets her go and strides away, hands leisurely perched in his pockets as though he is doing nothing more than strolling through the marketplace on a sunny day.
For a long moment, she stares after him, curiosity fighting against fifteen years of bitter resentment. She cannot imagine what he might have to say to her, unless it is a long string of apologies that hardly seem to be forthcoming. Her brow creases with concern as with a small groan of resignation, she shakes back the sleeve of her coat to check her watch.
Today seems a decent enough day to die, should that be his mission. She only hopes that it’s quick.