Your district stood before the state Effie was on, the air tense with bated breath and silent pleas for mercy from whatever god the speaker believed in.

The Panem anthem played, the sound ringing in everyone’s ears before cutting out like a moral hairdresser had snipped everyone’s minds free from it.

Effie pulled from the boys bowl first, and read off the first name. Peeta Mallark. The bakers son whose eyes carried a bit too much pain for someone who spent their days icing cakes. She went to put the slip of paper down when another flipped its way down. She had picked two names.

Everyone was silent and still.

One of the peace keepers got an alert on his radio, and answered it- there was mumbled talking from the other end before he walked onto stage and informed Effie of the capitols decision regarding the other name. Both tributes would be going into the arena along side the name from the girls bowl. The man returned to his previous position at the head of the stage.

“Well- the games this year will be quite exciting, wont they?” Effie quipped, the odd haired woman trying to lighten the blow of the situation. The tension in her smile didn’t pass as she grabbed the second name off the floor, reading it out.

Gale Hawthorne.

There was a solem silence as both boys stood and walked onto stage, settling on the left side in front of their now mentor- Haymitch.

Effie’s heels clicked across the stage as she walked over to the girls bowl. It was a repeat situation- two slips of paper, two different names. The first girl was Primrose Everdeen, to which her older sister quickly challenged, yelling out that she volunteered in place of the small 12 year old girl.

After the commotion had passed and Katniss took her spot on the stage, the second name was announced. Yours.