CORNELIUS QUANT (27)

HEAD GAMEMAKER OF THE 110TH ANNUAL HUNGER GAMES

Cornelius knew full well why he had been appointed Head Gamemaker.

He thought back on that single passing comment, idle words spilled from drunken lips that should've just dissipated in the air among the smoke and neon strobe lights that night.

"Your husband's the president, Drusilla—I mean, if you wanted, you could make me Head Gamemaker in a heartbeat."

He remembered the look in Drusilla's eyes that night. They never did lose that mirthful sheen from the moment they met seven years ago, both still students at the Higher Technology Center. They became fast friends, even partnering up to construct a joint simulation for their final-year project.

Cornelius remembered her determination, that familiar eagerness to seize their project by its reins and steer them to success. But as is often the case with the ambitious, Drusilla eventually burned out. Weeks went by and Drusilla seemingly retreated further and further into herself—some days she wouldn't even show up to the Center. Before long, it felt as though their joint creation had been solely built on Cornelius's shoulders, and he could feel himself crumbling under its weight.

He sought his partner, that second pillar to keep their creation raised to the sky. Drusilla was hardly answering her communicuff messages, so he decided to visit the renowned Hennigan Manor in person. Weaving his way through throngs of avoxes—the Hennigan courtyard always bustled with those servants, tidying after gaggles of high-profile guests every week—Cornelius eventually discovered his friend in her room, disheveled as ever.

He learned what had become of his partner. While the burden of their project might've put some cracks in his foundation, something from within had eaten away at her. His second pillar stood withered and bedraggled, her tall form weary from weeks of inner turmoil behind closed doors.

All because of a promise.

Some time ago, over a dinner table, in a room as grand and closed-off as the quarters they occupied now, Drusilla's whole future had been transacted like another Hennigan property sale. It hadn't been a conversation she was invited to, she told Cornelius, nor was she allowed a say in the matter; that is, unless, she was willing to forsake the education her parents were so graciously funding.

One promise, born from one presidential climb, had left every party happily satisfied—everyone but Drusilla herself. She would marry Panem's Defense Minister, Pontius Mirovia. Then, after the ailing President Snow drew his final breath, the ludicrously-wealthy Hennigan family would throw their support behind Pontius. With the Hennigans backing him, Pontius could successfully challenge Tiberius Snow, Coriolanus's son and desired successor, for party leadership. Drusilla's mother would claim a position in Mirovia's cabinet—after all, Panem would need a new Defense Minister—and their joint family would acquire rents and political power beyond their wildest dreams.

Drusilla Hennigan, their scarlet-cloaked sacrificial lamb, glistened beneath the blistering sun as she was shepherded toward a man old enough to be her father.

As Drusilla confided in Cornelius, practically sobbing in his arms, he told her over and over again that she wasn't a coward for acquiescing. He echoed the words of his father—education was the bedrock of everything wonderful in this world, more powerful than any person and more precious than any fine gold. The renowned professor Numitor Quant himself would agree Drusilla was no coward for choosing it.

But Drusilla's cherished education would slip through her fingers if she didn't lift herself up and see this project through. Cornelius could tell she understood that. So before he left Hennigan Manor, he made a point of placing her hand in his, swearing he would always be there for her in any way he could.

And as they finished their time at the Center, just on the precipice of Drusilla's marriage, Cornelius was glad to know that her eyes never stopped sparkling with that zest for life he came to love.

Then things got more distant between them. Cornelius spent a couple years working in an observatory in the Capitol's outskirts, amassing his own new circle of friends, as he was sure Drusilla did the same among her fellow political elites. The two kept in touch, but it was more a sparse series of brief interactions through communicuff than anything else.

He was nervous to return to her when his acceptance as a junior gamemaker brought him back to the heart of the Capitol. It seemed almost better to keep a physical distance than feel the ghost of their lost friendship up-close; Cornelius couldn't bear the thought of being a stranger to Drusilla again, not after all they had been through.

Surely she had new friends now. Powerful ones.

Who was some measly junior gamemaker to the First Lady of Panem?

But when they crossed paths again, both attendees at one of Festus Denaro's ritzy Victory Day parties, Drusilla practically tackled him. Her arms clung tightly around his large form, spinning around in his embrace, knuckles white and limbs trembling. She missed him so fucking much. These people downtown were no friends, she whispered; they were candy-colored serpents who bore wicked sets of polished fangs in their saccharine grins, and as First Lady her job was to keep them from squeezing the life out of her.

Would he be her real friend?

The answer was yes, of course. Cornelius barely managed to sputter it out, her lock was so tight. Drusilla then released him, placing her hand in his and guiding him across the dancefloor with a familiar wide grin.

Cornelius and Drusilla danced the night away like they were Center students again. Her husband was off conversing and laughing with the host—he was certainly quite friendly with that Festus Denaro, as was the woman on Denaro's arm. Cornelius could've sworn that was Riss Zapatero, the ninety-ninth victor from Five. Or at least it could've been; perhaps all his rigorous preparations for the upcoming Games had his mind locked on the subject. He needed a fucking break, that was for sure.

For a while, as the artificial night sky glistened over them from the ceiling, Cornelius was able to successfully push all Games-related thoughts to the back of his mind. The pair chatted away about their lives in each other's absence, Drusilla continuously lamenting the loneliness of her circumstances. She didn't belong here, brushing shoulders with Pontius's cabinet ministers and cronies. No one let her in. She was powerless.

Powerless? Cornelius gave her a dismissive wave of his hand. Nonsense. She was the furthest thing from powerless.

And then as he scrambled to find the right words to console his old friend, thoughts of his stifling work schedule and his asshole boss and the stresses of being a Gamemaker in Hunger Games season crashed back into Cornelius like a bullet train at full speed. He ended up uttering the very next thing he could think of.

"Your husband's the president, Drusilla—I mean, if you wanted, you could make me Head Gamemaker in a heartbeat."

Two weeks later, his boss was found dead in an alleyway.

While Aracari Reuter's body was still warm, Cornelius was personally summoned by Commerce Minister Tiberius Snow, the man whose office held ultimate authority over the entire show. Snow practically rolled his eyes as he broke the news that the ragtag kid in front of him would somehow fill Reuter's shoes.

Perhaps it should've felt more wrong than it did when Cornelius accepted his new title. After all, Drusilla had no trouble admitting she pulled a few strings to make this happen. They toasted quietly as the nation mourned, a bittersweet moment Drusilla seemed only to recognize for its sweetness. She relished every glimpse of happiness in his features, every grateful word he spoke; she prodded him to show her just how delighted he was.

Wasn't it amazing she could do this for her friend? Wasn't it amazing how the stars aligned?

Cornelius assured her he was absolutely thankful for what she'd done for him, that Drusilla was a true friend through and through. But sometimes, in his mind, he replayed the details of Reuter's demise, every oddity in his boss's behavior leading up to that fateful night.

Did the stars truly align for him? Or, like the twinkling holograms dotting Denaro's ceiling, did they move by design?

"I don't think a junior gamemaker has ever jumped to Head Gamemaker before," Cornelius mused, tipping back in his sun lounger. He outstretched his legs along the white wicker chair, the sun glistening off of his dark shins. "It's practically a scandal."

"Hey, that's not true." Drusilla grinned, her large pink hat flopping in the wind. The brief drift was lovely out in the heat, rustling the freshly-bloomed summer marigolds lining the Presidential front lawn. To think, the ancients only enjoyed three months of this season every year.

"I mean, have you seen every news station lately? They're calling it the strangest Head Gamemaker pick since Seneca Crane."

Drusilla reached across the little table separating them, lightly smacking his arm. "You're no Crane, Neely. You've got experience. That guy hadn't even been a junior gamemaker for a full year when they tried to make him Head Gamemaker of the Seventy-Fourth."

"Imagine if that would've gone through." Cornelius snorted, both parties laughing at the bizarre notion. "That Games was already wild enough without some bumbling novice at the helm; someone like Crane would've mismanaged it disastrously."

"Oh, I bet," chuckled Drusilla. "My parents like talking about the Seventy-Fourth. Its victor had clubfoot like my dad used to have."

"Yeah, that Ten kid, Colton Geines. I liked his win. Of all the past Games I've learned about, I don't think I've ever seen anyone create fake tracks that flawlessly. I think the clubfoot even helped. He exaggerated his weakness, crept around in the shadows, alerted his enemies to each others' locations and let them rip each other apart so he could coast through the Games."

"Poor Five," said Drusilla. "She really thought she was gonna win by working with Geines. Remember those happy tears when they took down Four together in the final three?"

"And then...thwack." Cornelius swung his arm dramatically, mimicking the great swing of the Ten boy's arm when he brought the tree branch down on his former ally. "Imagine being Head Gamemaker the next year trying to outdo that."

"I'd say the Third Quell did." Drusilla held her glass away from her chair, a cue for house avoxes to refill the now-empty flute of champagne. A faint breeze took her dark hair in its stride, flashes of orange permeating the flying strands as the aging sun bid its farewell. "The twist about younger tributes getting more slips seemed super shitty, but man, those gamemakers knew what they were doing."

"So much rests on a good team of gamemakers." Cornelius exhaled, casting his gaze down at his chair. Pensively his eyes found a place of rest by a rogue thread of bamboo, sticking out like a sore thumb among its neatly-woven counterparts. Severed from the rest. Abrasive and inconvenient. The worst kind of anomaly. Was that Cornelius in all of this?

The soft touch of Drusilla's hand on his shoulder was enough to break him from his thoughts.

"Listen, I know you're nervous about leading your colleagues." Drusilla gave a reassuring lift of her brows, creasing her forehead. "But my word only goes so far around here. You wouldn't have been chosen if you didn't have everything it took and more to make this Games unforgettable."

She had a point. Drusilla wasn't the president, and from the glacial picture she painted of their relationship, it didn't make sense that Pontius Mirovia would blindly stick his neck out for some random as a mere favor to his wife.

"They want your vision, Neely. If they wanted the status quo, they'd have put Langhorn or whoever else as Head Gamemaker, not you."

Cornelius's vision. It was one of the first things noted about him as he stepped through those ornate doors as a junior gamemaker—he was young and he was hungry. Being Head Gamemaker was the focal point of his ambition since adolescence, an honor so tantalizing and elusive that the chase itself was enough to rouse him each morning, propelling him through the motions of life and muting the backdrop of screams and shattered plates just beyond the corners of his vision. Numitor Quant might have raised one fuckup who regularly ransacked the house and now rotted in a prison cell, but he also raised the man who would be his redemption.

The corner of Cornelius's mouth quirked into a lopsided grin. "If it's my vision they want, then it's my vision they shall receive."

Cornelius welcomed Drusilla's smaller hand as it squeezed his, releasing a pulse of confidence through his veins. He may not have secured his position quite so quickly without her, but Cornelius would prove himself worthy of that hotseat so many failed to hold down before him. There would be no hurling Head Gamemaker Quant from his vantage point above the rest in the Gamemakers' Dome; he had this beast firmly gripped by its horns, and he was going to make it his bitch.

"I know I can't tell you much, but I'm thinking big, Drusilla. Real big."

"Oh really?" He noticed a coy lilt to her tone as Drusilla pushed a strand of hair behind her ear.

He was never much good at playing along with this type of banter.

Awkwardly he laughed out a response, trying to sound as self-assured as he did seconds ago. "Yes. Really."

"Well I look forward to seeing it, mister Head Gamemaker." She raised her flute as though she meant to toast him again. "I know you're gonna blow Reuter right out of the water."

The reminder of his late boss put a damper on Cornelius's momentary high. Perhaps it was the chill of nightfall cascading over him, or perhaps it was that manic gleam in Reuter's eyes the night Cornelius walked in on him rifling wildly through his desk drawer, but Cornelius could feel goosebumps hiking up the back of his neck. He never believed in ghosts—unless they were muttations, of course—but it felt like the apparition of his old superior was stroking him with a hand made of ice, trying to alert him to something.

Bzz, bzz.

The vibration of his communicuff indicated a new message on the watch. Two consecutive buzzes denoted a message from someone not yet added to his contacts—for all he knew, it could be another damn advertisement to stake some coins in the upcoming Games. You people are seriously barking up the wrong tree.

But when he activated the message, it was certainly no advertisement, nor any sort of junk message at all.

"What's that?" inquired Drusilla, craning her neck to peer over at the stereoscopic text above his watch.

"An invitation." Cornelius narrowed his eyes. "An invitation to dinner tomorrow."

Drusilla's brows furrowed into a skeptical glower, blemishing her otherwise beautiful features. "With who?"

"Festus Denaro."

A/N: As you may have gathered, I did some switching around in terms of POVs, so today you just got to hear from Cornelius Quant! Let me know your thoughts, opinions, music you listened to while reading this, anything you like lmao.

Mad kudos to all of you for the kind reviews and support since I posted prologue one, and a special thanks to ladyqueerfoot and david12341 for taking the time to shout out APD in their own amazing SYOTs, Domestic Tranquility and The Temple of Empires: Book One respectively. These two are both insanely talented and you should absolutely check them out if you haven't already.

Yes, I may have pushed back the deadline twice, but submissions officially close at 11:59pm EST on February 21st! After that, I will post the third and final prologue along with the cast list and eventual blog.

Stay safe everyone!

Deuces,

Maggie