❛ HOPE ISN'T SOMETHING GIFTED TO YOU
IT'S SOMETHING YOU ACHIEVE. ❜
in which a small girl from district ten must
protect those she loves, or die trying.
𝘾𝙊𝙈𝙋𝙇𝙀𝙏𝙀𝘿 (UNDER HEAVY EDITING)
― oc x...
Йой! Нажаль, це зображення не відповідає нашим правилам. Щоб продовжити публікацію, будь ласка, видаліть його або завантажте інше.
TWO-HUNDRED AND FIFTY MILES PER HOUR. That is how fast Atlanta says the train runs when they fly through the border between District Nine and Two. It's strange to think that during the night they had travelled out of District Ten and all the way through the great plains of District Nine, further afield than anywhere Silver had ever gone in her entire life.
Silver lets her gaze dance as she looks out the window, the skyline of Two's heavy cranes and intricately designed marble buildings flickering past. Her elbows dig into the windowsill and she carries her head in her hand. There's hardly any mud in the roads below the railway track, only neatly bricked pathways that have enough width to have use of a raised pavement and curbside. She is nothing less than fascinated at the lights which scintillate against the masonry and the rim of the windows on the train.
James, on the other hand, couldn't be the least interested in the sights on offer. Instead, he sits beside her on the sofa against the wall, eyes trained on the television upon the dining table which is consumed by the image of Caesar Flickerman's crimson red hair. Atlanta sparks a conversation about the other Districts' Tributes with the boys and, almost ceremoniously, the television begins playing a roll of highlights from yesterday's Reapings.
"The boy from Ten came second last year," Bradley notes from the armchair in the furthest side of the room. He's drinking some kind of tea and wading through a clipboard of some kind. Silver can imagine dozens of rows filled with stats — each Tribute ever to come from Ten listed by how they died and what killed them. "He definitely benefitted from there not being any weapons in the Games at all. He just. . . ran from everyone the entire time. Smart lad." He takes another sip of his drink. "Did get his head smashed in with a brick at the end, though. That was a shame."
James is wide-eyed. "So there are odds? Good odds?"
"There's always odds," Bradley continues. "But we've only had Tributes in the final three twenty-seven times. Out of that, we've only had six Victors — myself included."
"When was the last time we won?"
Bradley offers a smile. "I was the last time we won. The Fifty-Ninth Hunger Games."
That's why Silver has never seen him paraded around the District all too often. Those games are older than her (albeit, by one year, maybe less depending on the month) and that must mean the five other District Ten victories are even longer ago. To go fourteen years without a win doesn't fuel her heart with a swell of inspiration, nor does it look good on Bradley's track record of mentoring.
