The Hunger Grubs

CHAPTER ONE

"Fuck off, Crabdad!" I snap as my lusus tries to unsnarl my hair. He clacks angrily and yanks harder with the stiff-bristled brush. I hate how my hair sticks up funny around my horns, especially when the rest of it is plastered to my scalp. I shove Crabdad away with one hand and spike my hair back up with the other.

I grimace into the small, streaked mirror in front of me. I'm a dumb gray suit with a red tie that I had to do myself because claws aren't really made for tying knots. The pants are too tight and too high. I feel like a sausage roll, all squeezed into a wrap.

I look like a fucking tool.

I don't get why we have to "look nice" for the Reaping. I guess it makes it a celebration of whatever poor sap has to go and get slaughtered for the entertainment of the Empire. Like an early funeral. A big, happy, fucking corpse party.

Great, now I'm making no sense, and to top it off, I'm gonna be late.

Well, this just isn't my day, is it?

"Shit, Crabdad, we're late!" I pelt out the door and sprint to the Square, where the trolls between the ages of six and nine sweeps are already being herded towards the front.

Every year, the Empire mixes up twelve slips of paper in a glass ball. Six say "boy" and six say "girl". They are all drawn out, one at a time, for each district. This sweep, our district, District 12, drew "boy." Which means this time, I'm eligible.

At first, I was pretty happy that our district has guys this year. That means I can sign up for tesserae and maybe get something to eat for myself and my lusus. Now I'm starting to regret getting so many tesserae, seeing the slips of paper in the ball. 36 of them have the name "Karkat Vantas" in neat, grey writing.

There sure don't seem to be enough slips in there. Am I the only one who got a shitload of tesserae? No, everyone in the district is piss-poor. They're all just as desperate as I am to get the pitiful amounts of grain and oil that come for adding your name another time into the drawing. I'm sure it'll be someone else.

All the boys my age are rocking back and forth nervously. Last sweep, District 12 sent a girl to the Grubs. She was a neighbor of mine. I remember when she was called up; she put on a brave face for the cameras. She seemed like she really had a chance, too. She was strong, quick, clever. She got a few sponsors early on.

She got stabbed through the heart in the first twenty minutes in the arena.

Just goes to show, I guess, that highbloods have all the luck. All of it.

Now an adult seadweller from the Capitol of the Empire is mounting the stage. These nookstains make me sick. Just… everything. Their hair, their clothes, their dumb gills and weird accents. I don't think I'll ever understand why the Empress decided that only adults could live in the city and us kids have to live in shitty districts and make stuff for them.

Well, lower class trolls, anyway. Young seadwellers have nearly as many rights as adults do. The higher districts are fairly well off. That's why they always win the Grubs.

Oh, I guess the Capitol drone of a troll is reading the "history" of Alternia. More like propaganda. How long ago, there were a lot of wars and the only way to bring "peace" was for the Empress to force all of the adults off-planet, and how anyone who came against her decision would be culled. Harsh. But I know the story by heart, if not by choice, then because they made us learn it in school.

"And now I shall draw the name of the Tribute from District 12!" The woman calls out gaily. She seems on the verge of tears of joy.

Fan-fucking-tastic. That's why we're here, dumbass. Dressed up like fucking dolls, eager to come play your sick-ass game.

She reaches a manicured, slimy hand into the ball of slips and pulls one out. A few stray scraps of paper catch on her jewelry and she shakes them off onto the stage. She unfolds the slip and reads out the name.

"Karkat Vantas!" She's beaming and I'm so shocked and maybe I didn't hear her right? Yeah that's it there's no way I'm-

Fuck.

I'm a tribute in the Hunger Grubs, and I am most definitely going to die.