The rain beat down hard that night, soaking the coal dusted streets of the twelfth district. In the merchant's village, a woman scolds her son for spilling water on the floor of the bakery, whilst another complains of the lack of demand for new shoes. Everything is normal, albeit quiet, disturbingly undeveloped, compared to the shining city of rule, The Capitol.

However, not a mile away from the normality, one would reach the edge of the district, where, though it is not talked about, few people dare to go beyond the fence in search of much needed, yet scarcely acquired food. One such girl- a young one by the looks of it, barely twelve years old, fresh from her first reaping the previous week- clambered through the patch of the supposedly electric fence that she knew would be safe to the touch. She slides through the fence, eyes squeezed shut, biting her lip. She clearly hasn't gotten used to this yet, the sneaking around.

With her eyes closed, however, she didn't see him. Couldn't see him, in fact. Couldn't see him until she bumped right into him: the Peacekeeper. He must have been a new one, because his mask and helmet were off, and the girl didn't recognize the red hair that grew in thick tufts around his boyish face. The Peacekeeper knew that he was supposed to report scenarios like this, even shoot the poachers on sight, as he took in the girl, he just couldn't. He wouldn't. From her cracked lips to her sunken cheeks to the desperately overgrown hair, woven into a fraying braid, he could think of no greater displeasure than executing this child. Because that's what she was, not a poacher, or a traitor or a thief, but a child. A child who didn't know the delicate cycle of exactly what she was doing, and was more concerned with feeding her family than serving for her country. And at such a young age, who could blame her?

"What's in the bag?" the Peacekeeper asked, following district protocol. When he couldn't get a response out of the frightened young girl, he let out an exasperated sigh. "Hand it over, Miss."

With trembling hands, the girl passed over her burlap bag, grateful she had stowed her bow away in a hollow log, per her late father's instructions. The Peacekeeper peered into the bag, surprised at how well this girl made out. A rabbit, two squirrels and some plants were in the mix. Nothing that would be substantial, though, taking into account the need for other things; things the meat and greens would have to be traded for. Cloth, thread, coal. Things that people from the Capitol wouldn't think twice about needing.

Checking over his shoulder to make sure nobody was around, within eye or ear shot, the Peacekeeper reached into a pouch in his uniform and withdrew several gold and silver coins, printed with the face of the "beloved" president, and threw them into her bag.

"You found the money in the street," he tells her. "Outside the mayor's house. Understand?"

The girl nods, frightened, and the Peacekeeper walks off, briskly. Every now and again, the two would run into each other, under the same circumstances, and every time, the girl would return home to her mother and sister several coins richer.