Where Is the Blood

Chapter Two: The Reaping

Buffy stared around wildly as they were taken to the square, looking for her mother. She saw her, remembered where she was and looked back at the stage.

The mayor of District Twelve was going on about the history of Panem and all that crap. Buffy didn't care a bit and she was sure no one else did either. They just wanted to hear the tribute's names being called so that they'd know they'd averted disaster for another year.

The mayor called out the name of their last victor, William Pratt. Buffy remembered him. Not from the games; she hardly watched them. But from before. A year before his games, she was ten and he was seventeen. He'd been babysitting her for six years, when she was four and he was eleven. He'd done it to get some pocket-money. He helped teach her to read and they'd played together a lot. But Buffy had never spoken to him since he had won his games.

He was walking up to the stage now, head down, hands deep in his coat pockets. He looked so different since the Games. In some ways, he looked more like a citizen of the Capitol than of District Twelve. He had dyed his hair platinum blond and he wore a long black coat. But he didn't look as fake as some of the Capitol people did. His hair may have been dyed, but it was still his hair and not a wig. But he was nothing like he'd been before the games. She remembered how he was with his floppy, brownish blond hair all messed up… And that girl he'd liked. He'd killed her.

The person who was to read out the names of the tributes – Buffy didn't know whether it was a man or a woman because she wasn't looking at them – walked over to the glass bowl where the tributes names were. Buffy didn't think it would be her. Her name hadn't been in there many times, not compared to a lot of the kids from the Seam. She'd taken tesserae a few times, but they hadn't needed it much. They were poor for part of the merchant class, but they were still bigger, more well fed than the kids from the Seam.

"Buffy Summers!"

Buffy gasped, shocked and not sure what to think. A girl behind her pushed her forwards and she walked on shaky knees towards the stage. She'd been picked. Against all odds, she'd been picked.

As she walked up to the stage and took her place, a warm hand brushed her own. She looked to see William, right beside her now. He had changed. His face still looked even younger than his twenty-three years, but there was something about him… In his eyes, something had changed. Something had snapped. This wasn't the same boy who used to look after her when she was a kid. She was staring into the eyes of a cold-blooded killer who had killed his own lover and then watched eight teenagers be taken to their deaths, unable to do a thing. That sounded terrible to Buffy, but she couldn't imagine it. It seemed wrong to her that it was him who was staring at her with sorrow and pity. To him, she was still the little girl she had been back then.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. Buffy drew in a sharp breath, trying to keep herself from crying. She didn't want to die.

"Liam Thomas!"

Buffy heard the announcer person say the name, but it meant nothing to her. She'd only seen Liam a few times. But then, she had seen him enough to know that he was hardly a skinny guy and could probably kill her with his bare hands. She remembered how he'd been a few years back. Always drinking and partying, even though he was barely saved from starvation. He'd always been trying to escape the pain and the stress of everyday life. But a while ago, something had changed in him too. He'd become more responsible, started helping his family and making up for all he'd done. It didn't sound major, but when you were dying of starvation, the things he'd done could have got them all killed. Buffy did know what had happened. His father had died in a mining accident.

The mayor started speaking again, something about the Treaty of Treason. Buffy didn't care. She was still staring at William, right up until she shook hands with Liam. That was probably the first time she ever looked at Liam Thomas properly. He was seventeen, she knew that already, but his build suggested that of someone older, at least William's age.

After that, the anthem played and Buffy was glad, knowing that they'd be released from all the camera's. She needed to cry.