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The games bring out the worst in everyone. It’s the fear, the desperation to live, to return home to the sorry life most tributes in this arena lived before being reaped. It’s life or death and most choose the former, but end up with the latter.
Hakuji, unlike the others, is not afraid of the games. He’s been raised for them, built from the ground up to be strong enough to withstand them and win if he were ever reaped. He and his brother both were, just like most children in their district.
Like Hakuji, Akaza is not afraid of what lurks in the arena, even less so of who lingers about awaiting their own demise. He’s always been strong, fierce, fervently and violently dedicated to victory in anything he’s approached. Akaza knew the day would come when he’d volunteer for the games, when he’d forge his own path to glory and show just how strong he’s become. There had been a time when Hakuji felt the same.
Until their father fell ill.
And he met Koyuki.
And her father began to treat him as his own.
Their father had always loved them dearly, somehow masking just how much his own games had impacted him. He never let the twins watch them, even when they pleaded as children. When they wished to study how he won, he never told them. Akaza’s never taken well to it. Hakuji, on the other hand, respects his father’s wishes.
He loves them both, but did not react when Akaza finally volunteered himself, and Hakuji was reaped by selection. Coincidental or not, it is the fate that was chosen for them. Even with the wealth in their district, they are still a district, and the Capitol still sees them as less. Hakuji wouldn’t put it past them to have stuck him and Akaza in here together intentionally.
As they wade through the underbrush in the arena, Hakuji finds himself thinking of their father, and if he’s taken care of in his absence. How much he’s eating, if he’s taken his medicine, if anyone’s brought it to him.
He wonders the same about Koyuki. She would never volunteer for the games, as sickly as she had once been. For a while, it seemed as if misfortune had set its sights on her on her bad days, too weak to rise from bed on her own, unable to sustain herself. One day, he plans to marry her. Once he’s milked the Capitol for what they’re worth, and he’s living off his victor riches. Once he can give her a life she deserves. Hakuji met her by chance, and he’s stuck around by choice.
Her father trains potential tributes, but unlike most people who share that career field, he has softer ideals. It is not about victory, nor is it about glory. It’s not about strength, or superiority, or pride in their district. It’s simply about survival, and returning to a long life worth living, making sure it’s not cut short when there’s so much more out there waiting for him. At first, it sounded like stupid logic. Hakuji couldn’t get himself to agree, let alone listen to the man endlessly remind him. Akaza never bothered.
Akaza is every single thing that is wrong with Hakuji—all of his shortcomings on full, abhorrent display. He values nothing but his own strength, and rarely does he recognize strength in others. Hakuji has seen it once in the arena so far. Once, when it was too late, and that spirit had dimmed until it became a cannon in the sky.
Akaza plays to win, simply to satisfy his own pride, maybe to prove a point. Hakuji plays to win, simply to return home to those he loves. To those he wishes to protect, to provide for, to people who need him. And there is nothing he’s not willing to do to reach that goal. Nothing. Hakuji will lose every piece of his humanity if he has to. He’ll abandon it and leave it to rot alongside corpses he leaves in their wake if he has to. Anything to return to them.
There is only one winner who will come out of this place, and Akaza has his eyes set on the prize. Despite that, he won’t kill his own brother. At least not yet.
Yet he still curses his weaknesses, as if Akaza doesn’t have his own failures. He acts like dragging Hakuji along is a burden, like he’d be better off without him, and that much is likely true. Without Hakuji, Akaza could surely win the games and end them quickly, so long as his arrogance doesn’t blindside him in the arena.
He snaps at Hakuji, insisting that he fights, that his heart has grown weak. Half of that may be true, but Hakuji has as much blood on his hands as Akaza does. Ruthless and inhumane, taking from opponents before they take his own life away from him. The difference is, Hakuji doesn’t do it for sport, and Akaza measures his worth in the arena by the bodies he collects.
“You lost sight of that boy with the Hanafuda earrings,” Hakuji tells him, sick of Akaza’s constant berating. If Hakuji is such a burden, his brother should just end it now that he has the chance, but he won’t. Hakuji doubts it.
Akaza seethes, whipping his head around to face his brother with bloodlust in his eyes, an intensity that would freeze any other tribute right where they stand. “And you? He slipped past us because of your weakness.”
“I wasn’t the one who pursued him.”
“Yet you should have been!”
His rebuttal gets caught in his throat, only because Hakuji knows his brother is right. In a game of life or death, everyone in this arena is an enemy, and no one is spared. When they run, they’re not let out of sight. When they’re backed into a corner, only one of them will emerge. So when that boy had slipped from Akaza’s radar, Hakuji should’ve been the one to pick up the slack, if only to rid them of one more opponent.
“You’re not expected to win the games,” Akaza tells him, taking a step towards him. “And you won’t. You still have a heart, and that’s what’ll kill you.”
Hakuji can feel his hands tremble at his sides, his pulse racing, pounding in his chest, felt through his skin. “Enough, Akaza.”
“You know what happens to weaklings? They’re punished. They’re weeded out. Look at father. Look at his fortune even in sickness. His only sons, both in the games while we watches at home. He’ll probably die soon after this. You’re not foolish enough to believe that was a coincidence, right?”
His mouth feels like cotton, and it burns as he swallows. “Stop it.”
“And the sickly girl you insist on seeing, like you’re a caretaker and not a warrior. Like you can actually help anybody. Why waste your time away with such useless, virtuous acts?” Akaza presses. “You care for others more than you do yourself, and that blinds you. You let lowly tributes out of your sight, but that’s just another target on your back. What will happen when everything catches up with you, and she’s watching it happen, Hakuji?”
Hakuji’s vision blurs until he can only see a couple of steps in front of him, only focused on Akaza and the smug grin on his face, like he’s proud of the reaction he’s pried from his brother. How he’s stunned him into livid silence, like he can see the fury reaching its boiling point within him.
“Father. That girl. You. So weak it makes me sick to my stomach. You know why her father took you in to train? He pitied you. You are nothing worth saving, yet he decided to try anyway. What a fool.”
Hakuji has no words that would be worth saying to his brother, only a thick, dehydrated string of spit catching on his cheek. Akaza’s eyes grow wide, slowly wiping his cheek with the back of his hand in disbelief.
Then Hakuji is tumbling to the forest floor, his back crashing against the ground, his bones aching at the blunt force. Akaza pummels into his body, landing punches anywhere he can. His face, his shoulders as Hakuji writhes, the ground as Akaza misses.
He is Hakuji’s every flaw reflected back to him, and yet, Akaza is everything Hakuji is not. Akaza was not born with a heart, only a cold, hallow cavity within his chest. Zero regard for others, no one that he loves, only the consideration for his own stupid, corrupted ideals.
Hakuji is not expected to win the games, and that might be true. His heart has grown weak because he has those whom he loves, and he knows that is true. But damn everyone who bets against him, who doesn’t consider him part of the odds. If there is no way home for Hakuji then he’ll make one, even if he loses himself on the way. If only it means he’ll be able to return to his father, to Koyuki, to her father as well.
If only he can return home and he’ll stop damning the gods for making them sick, for giving them lives and misfortunes they never asked for, nor have they ever deserved. Hakuji will shoulder all of that pain if it means they never have to. He’ll provide for them for the rest of his life, for the rest of theirs. He’ll witness horrors in the arena, become a demon who’s lost his sense of self and commits atrocities if only it means he’ll get out of here and back to them.
Hakuji doesn’t realize when he’s gained the upper hand, on top of his brother, his hands in tight fists, striking and bashing until his skin is no longer fair but bright red, and his knuckles are raw, and he can’t feel a pulse any longer.
And he hears a familiar cannon in the distance.
And another tribute has lost the games.