Disclaimer: I don't own the rights of the Hunger Games, obviously.

This idea has probably occurred to someone else before me, but this is my take, and I hope you'll enjoy.

I've always found Gale's character very interesting, and I was thinking about how different he and Katniss would approach the Hunger Games. Unlike Katniss, who's a very passive-aggressive person, Gale's a man of action. He's very forward and willing to do things a lot of others aren't willing to, like blowing up the mountain in 2.

In the Hunger Games? All the dark things about his personality would be set loose. So this is that. Gale fighting for survival, and fighting to keep himself good.

Part 1

We are accidents waiting, waiting to happen.

Posy is curled up in my arms, her head resting against my chest and her tiny feet tucked under me to fight off the cold. Vick lays by my side, also seeking warmth. I see Rory and Mother on the smaller bed. Rory's lying face up, at the bed's edge, one foot and arm touching the ground. Mother holds Rory's other hand, bent towards him and breathing softly. The corner of my lip twitches upwards. Knowing Rory, as soon as he wakes he'll snatch his hand back, loudly proclaiming himself to be too old to hold his mother's hand, even in sleep. As I gaze at them, my smile turns into a frown, noticing Mother's eyes- still puffy and red from crying.

We fought last night, same as every other year. I argued, as I've done ever since my 14th birthday, that she has to prepare for the eventuality of me getting picked for the Hunger Games. Her response is a furious

"You won't get picked, you won't."

She says it with such conviction, sometimes I believe her.

I can't even get mad at her for her naiveté- it's too easy to put myself in Mother's shoes and imagine one of my siblings getting reaped. The thought causes me physical pain, it clenches my stomach and weighs down my heart. But my frustration with Mother runs deeper than my empathy towards her. I don't understand why she won't accept the possibility- the very real possibility that I'll get reaped.

Yesterday's fight didn't last long, thankfully, everything that has to be said has already been said a thousand times, and this will be my last reaping. After today, our yearly argument will be resolved, one way or another. Then she'll fight with Rory, Vick, and eventually even Posy…

I try not to think about it.

My frown deepens as I contemplate getting out of bed without waking my siblings. I manage, eventually, to slide out. Posy, like me, sleeps light and almost wakes, frowning, mumbling and turning around in my arms until I lay her back on the bed besides Vick.

I dress silently and efficiently, looking back at my family only when I reach the door; Posy's still frowning, Vick hasn't moved at all since he fell asleep, Rory's turned on his side away from Mother, who's wide open eyes stare straight at me. My breathing catches in my throat. For a second I become the little boy I was, terrified of being caught by his parents while sneaking out. The moment passes, and I'm once more 18, not 10. Mother's still not completely awake, as she groggily looks up at me.

"Gale? It's still night out" she whispers so as not to wake up her other children. I cross the room and kneel by the bed, stroking her dark hair, exactly the same shade as mine, to soothe her back to sleep.

"Yeah. I'm going to go see if I can catch something to trade for the early market. I'll be back at midday to help with the kids." I whisper.

Mother sighs, nodding. She curls around Rory in an unconscious gesture of protection. I feel slightly guilty leaving her alone in the house to deal with my siblings alone, but shrug it off as soon as I step outside. The moon hides behind clouds, yet still offers a meager amount of light for me to see the path. I shiver with the pre-dawn chill, zip up my jacket and set off towards the woods at a brisk pace. I estimate the time to be around 4:30 in the morning. At this hour the only one walking the soot covered roads of the Seam is me.

District 12 is separated by a fence from the woods, and I crawl under it to get to the other side. It's supposed to be electrified, both to keep out animals and to discourage poachers like myself, but because keeping the fence on means wasting electricity and money our District doesn't have, the fence remains un-electrified.

I cross the field and enter the forrest.

Walking in the woods has a different rhythm than being in the district.

The leaves crunch softly beneath my leather boots, birds cry in the trees to one another, cicadas and other insects click and buzz around while the leaves rustle with the wind going by. I enter the woods tense and stiff, but eventually, as I catch a couple of decent sized squirrels, that tension wears off.

By the time I return to District 12, the sky has gotten lighter,still before 6, but people are begining to wake up. I go into the wealthier part of town. In 12 no one is actually rich, but the merchant class does have a better living standard than us in the Seam.

I smell freshly baked bread blocks away from the bakery, and my mouth waters, so I head that way. I knock on the baker's back door. He's blond and bulky, with crowfeet around his kind eyes, indicating that he finds things to smile about, even in a place as unjust and despairing as 12. A quiet, polite man.

"Good morning Gale" he says

I incline my head a little in greeting as well before talking, "Good morning Mr. Mellark, I was wondering if you'd trade me these squirrels for some bread?"

I recognize the sorrow in his eyes when he gives me a fresh out of the oven loaf for only one of the squirrels, an unfair trade. On any other day, his pity would insult me, but today I'm just grateful for the unburnt bread, and wave awkwardly goodbye when he calls out a "good luck" to me.

I'm going to need luck today.

I sell the other squirrel to the butcher, getting a couple of coins in return before heading back to the woods. I wait, lying down between the rocks and grass, letting the morning dew seep into my back and watching as the sky changes colors. When I see Katniss coming towards me, I smile. She's wearing her hunting clothes, her long braid tucked into her jacket and her bow in one hand.

"Hey Catnip" I call out, showing her the loaf of bread.

I've speared it with an arrow just to see her laugh. She does, and her presence alone makes me suddenly enjoy the day. Katniss, like me, has the Seam look. Dark hair, olive skin, grey eyes- unlike the merchants, who tend to be pale, light eyed and light haired. She's younger than me, 16, and my best friend.

We talk and eat the bread with wild berries and some goat cheese Catnip's sister Prim made for us. Today is Reaping Day, yet we pretend that it doesn't mean anything, joking about the terrible fate awaiting us this afternoon.

Spending time together in each others company is easy, calming. I look at Katniss as she closes her eyes and savors her food, thinking like I so often do of running away with her. She's beautiful, strong, clever... maybe it's the date or maybe because I've never been one to stay silent about what I'm thinking I open my mouth.

"We could do it, you know."

She blinks at me in confusion, "What?"

"Leave the district. Run off. Live in the woods. You and I, we could make it." I tell her. The moment I say it I can tell it's a mistake. Katniss' face has always been incredibly expressive, and in the 4 years we've known each other, ever since we both took to the woods, trying to provide for our families by filling in for our deceased fathers, I've come to know what she's thinking by just the barest twitch of a muscle in her face. Her slightly raised eyebrow and frowning lips say what a ridiculous idea she thinks it is.

I try to fix it.

"If we didn't have so many kids" I joke, and she loosens up minimally. She probably thinks it's something I've just thought up and haven't thought through. But I have. If she'd agree, I'd tell Mother, get her to pack up, take Rory and Vick and Posy into the woods. Katniss could take her mother and little sister Primrose as well. Maybe even the goat. We could go in pretty deep, find a place well protected. I could build us a house, we could live of the land, be happy and never have to worry about Panem, about District 12, about the Hunger Games. We could start a family.

As if reading my thoughts, Katniss shoots the idea down.

"I never want kids" she says, frowning as I look at her sideways.

"I might. If I didn't live here"

She glares at me, irritated, "But you do."

I get annoyed as well. She can be amazingly dense when she wants to. I've been trying to show her how I feel about her for the past few months. Trying to demonstrate in the little details of our lives how little by little I've been falling in love with her, and she's being incredibly obtuse about it all.

"Forget it." I snap, and we leave it at that.

We spend the morning fishing, Catnip simply enjoying the day, me trying to forget our earlier argument. We catch a good amount of fish, a bunch of greens and pick strawberries to take back. We make a pretty good profit in the Hob, the Seam's black market, and afterwards set off to town to sell the strawberries. Knowing how the Mayor has a soft spot for berries, we go to his home and his daughter answers the door. The girl, I can vaguely remember her name starting with M, is wearing noticeably expensive clothes. A white dress, a pink ribbon, a gold pin.

"Nice dress" I tell her, and she looks at me, wondering if I'm making fun of her or actually complimenting her. A little bit of both, actually, but mostly it just bothers me knowing that what she's wearing could be traded into a couple weeks of good food for my family.

"Well, if I end up going to the Capitol, I want to look nice, don't I?" she says.

My face goes blank, a preventive measure I developed years ago to disguise the anger always simmering beneath my skin, momentarily spilling over now, and I snap back.

"You won't be going to the Capitol" I tell her, trying to control my voice and face. "What can you have?" I wonder aloud, "Five entries? I had six when I was just 12 years old."

The girl's face has become stony as well. It's something you learn from an early age if you live in 12, how to disguise your emotions and thoughts, so no one can know if you're thinking something you shouldn't be, like I so often do. I hear Katniss and the girl say goodbye, and we head back home, to the Seam. Catnip looks at me from time to time, frowning.

She doesn't understand, not really. Katniss knows the system is wrong. She knows I hate the government for forcing me, for forcing us to pick up Tesserae, to be put in extra danger each year. I've got 42 entries in the death bowl condemning me, Katniss has maybe 20, and she's still got 2 years to go.

But Catnip's mind doesn't work like mine. Unless something affects her directly she won't do anything to change it. One of the most frustrating things about her. She's incredibly talented, incredibly beautiful, but also incredibly indecisive.

"Wear something nice" I tell her snidely when we part, and try to control my rage before heading inside my own house.

Posy jumps me as soon as I'm inside the door, screaming happily and tugging on my pant leg to let her see what I've brought. I leave the food- fish, salt, bread and strawberries- a good meal- all on the table before picking up my sister from the ground and kissing her cheek. She squeals delightedly.

"Gaaa-leeee! You're scratchy!" she says, rubbing her cheek but grinning anyways. I put her down and rub Vicks head as I pass him by, messing up his still wet hair. He squawks indignantly.

"Gale! I just fixed it!" he hisses.

I snort in amusement. Vick's hair is thicker than the rest of us, more like our fathers, so it always looks matted and messy no matter what he does. It amuses me to watch him struggle with it. My eyes hunt for Rory, and I find him sitting on his bed, arms and legs crossed, glaring at the wall. Sighing, the moment of playfulness gone, I catch Mother's eye. She looks resigned, shakes her head.

Today will be hard for Rory, no doubt about it. It's his first reaping, and he's nervous. Lately he's decided to be difficult, entering that stage when teens tend to rebelliously lash out at family and friends. I get it, I wasn't 12 that long ago, but being on the other side of things shows how annoying it is to deal with a boy who wants comfort but doesn't want to show it.

"Hey Rory," I say casually, walking towards the wooden dresser holding all the family's clothes. I rummage around, looking for something nice, or at the very least clean.

"Join me out back will you?"

I don't wait for his answer and instead take a rough towel, a pair of trousers and a shirt that used to belong to my father and go out the kitchen door. I don't take a bath; our shower has been acting strangely for a couple of days, and I've been meaning to fix it but haven't found the time. Instead, I strip down to my underwear and take the water hose and spray myself with it. The water is ice cold, prompting me to be fast. The neighbors daughter, a 14 year old girl whose name I don't know takes one look at me and squeals, dropping the clothes she was setting on a line and running back into her own house.

I let water run down my hair and turn off the hose, shaking my head to get the excess out of my hair. Rory yelps behind me having followed me out, getting wet for his trouble. I grin.

"Sorry" I say, quickly toweling off and putting on my clothes. With a bar of soap I wash my hands, and use the foam to lather into my face. With my hunting knife, the sharpest and most well taken care of item I own and a cracked mirror we have outside I quickly shave. It's just a bit of stubble, less than a weeks worth of hair, but between the Mayor's daughter's pretty dress and Posy getting fussy about my rough face, I decide to get rid of it.

After the initial protest of getting wet, Rory stands quietly behind me, so I start to talk.

"Did you help Mother this morning with Posy and Vick? You knows how she gets on Reaping Day" He grumbles a bit, shuffles his feet around but nods.

I smile at him, trying to lighten his mood. "Good. You don't have to be worried you know, the odds are very much in your favor."

It's true, even though he's put his name in twice this year for the extra tessera. Two slips of paper equals a very low chance of reaping. Even a school dropout like me knows that. Next year Rory will have to put his name in at least four times, but probably more, and I'm truly pissed off about that, since I'll be out of the sorting by then, and so unable to help. That's still an entire year away, so for now he's still relatively safe, and we'll worry about the next reaping tomorrow.

My words don't have the effect I thought they'd have on him, and Rory clenches his fists and glares at me. Surprised, I nick my cheek a bit, close to my chin, and stop shaving. I'm pretty much done anyways.

"You stupid… It's not me I'm worried about!" He looks away brusquely, tears he refuses to let fall gathering on his lashes.

Oh.

Well, damn. I don't know what to say to that. I clean my face with more water, rub the towel on my face, thinking. When I'm done, I go over to Rory and kneel in front of him, like my father used to do with me. A pang goes through my heart thinking about him. It feels strange, imitating my father like this. Out of us all I think Rory and Vick took Dad's death the worst. I had to grow up fast after his death, yes, but at least I had a pretty okay childhood for a Seam kid before that.

Rory and Vick knew Dad, knew how capable and good he was at being there for us, despite all the hardships. Then, suddenly he was gone, and all they had to fill in that void was me. That's pretty rough for a six and eight year old. Unlike Posy, who never got to meet him, they know I can never measure up. Still, for the sake of our family, I have to try. Closing my eyes for a second, trying to think what Dad would say to me, I speak to my brother.

"Rory, listen. I know the odds aren't great, but I might not be selected-"

He interrupts me before I can finish. "You've got your name in the bowl 42 times this year! 42 times! I don't think anyone has as many slips as you do! I'm not an idiot Gale I know what that means! It's why you fought with mama yesterday! What happens if-" He cuts himself of, avoids my eyes by looking at the sky, bitting his lip, struggling not to cry in frustration.

I grab his hands and shake him. "Rory. Stop. Look at me."

When he does I try to smile reassuringly, but considering how shaken I am, I'm not sure it comes out that way.

"Look, yes, 42's a lot, but there's thousands of names in that bowl okay? Its just about luck. Besides, even if I do get picked…" I have to stop for a second, my heart clenching at just the thought of it, and force myself to say the rest.

"Even if I do get picked… I might have a good chance." Internally I wince, unsure of how much I believe that myself.

Objectively thinking about it, I'm 6 feet 3, have been in a lot of fights since I was a kid and sure, I've been hunting these last 4 years and so know how to get food without much help… but it's the Hunger Games. 23 to 1 odds, everyone trying to kill you, not hurt you, kill you- plus careers with advantages, terrible arenas and Gamemakers out to get you. If I am reaped... I don't think I could get out at all.

But Rory doesn't know that I think that way, and he looks hopeful.

"Really Gale? You think you could win? Wait, of course you can! I bet no one would expect you to come out of District 12, you're great."

I smile sadly a little at Rory's sudden change of heart, at his obvious hero worship for his older brother, yet can't help but feeling guilty. Giving false hope isn't something I like to do. I stand up and hug him.

"We'll be fine either way okay?" I say. He smiles up at me, nodding.

"Promise?"

I nod once, holding out my pinky finger, an old ritual of ours. He holds out his as well, wrapping it around mine, then cuts it with a chop from his other hand.

"Promise" I say.

Rory turns around, heading back inside. I pass my hand through my still damp head, and looking up see my mother's face staring at me through the cracked window, a blank look on her face.

I look away.

We all finish getting ready to head out to the town square. When we leave the house I squeeze Mother's hand and smile shakily at her. She sighs and leans her head on my shoulder for a second before visibly putting herself together, grabbing Vick's hand and walking ahead, head held high and back straight. I carry Posy until I reach the edge of the square, then hand her over to Mother.

I hug them- Mother, Vick and Posy, and they hug me and Rory back, wishing us both luck. We turn away and get into the lines. Rory's shaking a little, and I know despite his earlier words, he is very much afraid for himself as well. I squeeze his shoulder and leave him in the back with the boys his age before heading towards my own age group.

I don't have many guy friends- actually, I don't have many friends at all except for Catnip, but as I approach the other 18 year olds Thom Hornwood waves at me. I shake hands with a couple of old classmates, nod to a few other boys in greeting and go to stand besides him.

"All right there Gale?" He says, and I shrug.

"As all right as could be expected today I suppose," I respond, "Yourself?"

He moves his head from side to side, balancing at the same time from foot to foot.

"Not too bad, not too bad... My missus promised she'd take me to her parents house today if I wasn't reaped. They have rabbit stew. Rabbit stew, goodness, I can't even imagine how good merchant rabbit stew must be like."

He twists around to look for his girl, a small grey faced thing he fooled around with until he got her pregnant a few months back. I wave a hand in greeting before focusing my attention on finding Katniss.

I spot her with a couple of other Seam girls and exhale sharply. She's wearing her hair up, and a blue dress and looks absolutely incredible. I stare at her all throughout the beginning of the ceremony- the Panem anthem, the Mayor's repetitive history lesson… from time to time I do look up at the stage and so see when Haymitch Abernathy, District 12's only living victor and the town drunk stumbles on stage and flops onto Effie Trinket.

Afterwards, she tries to regain some dignity by giving her typical introduction, "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor!"

When I look back towards Katniss I find her finally looking at me, smiling at the obviously ridiculous antics on the stage, and I almost smile back. But the moment doesn't last long, and her eyes flash with fear. We remember who and where we are; me with 42 death sentences and her with 20, so I turn my eyes away.

Effie steps up, her pink wig a little crooked, and thrills in her capitol accented voice "Ladies first!" like she always does.

I find it difficult to breathe, not blinking as she gives one, two, three, four steps towards the big bowl on her left, hear the absolute silence as her hand enters the bowl, shakes the slips of paper a bit. With delicate, clawed fingers she grabs one and holds it out. Smiling, she opens it, looks at the name, goes back to the microphone and-

"Mera Danod!"

An audible breath of relief goes through almost everyone in the square. Some girls hug each other in comfort, some cry, some laugh softly. Everyone but the girl whose name has been picked. I see her, a skinny Seam kid with hunched shoulders, charcoal black oily hair that hangs limply bellow her chin. She trembles, holding back tears as she slowly… ever so slowly walks towards the podium. Poor kid. I judge her age to be around 13, though considering how underfed and small most Seam people are, she might be older.

My eyes find Catnip again. The tension has all but drained out of her. She looks on with sadness at the girl, but I know her. In her mind, her thoughts are I'm safe. It's not me. Always the survivor, my Catnip. Mera arrives to the top of the stairs and walks on to the podium. Effie grabs her hand.

"Well then! Everyone, a round of applause for our first tribute!" Some people clap, others don't. It's done mechanically and somberly, an obligation. I stay still, staring at the poor girl quietly crying on the stage. She's already given up. She's not even going to try. I've seen her type before; she'll probably die fast.

"Well now! It is time to choose our boy tribute!" warbles Effie Trinket, leaving Mera on the stage alone as she crosses over to the second bowl. Everything seems to slow down again as I see her put her hand into the bowl, stir once and take out the piece of paper.

Just as before, she opens it and reads it first before turning back to her microphone.

It's me, It's me, I think, my conviction so great I almost don't hear when she actually reads the name. I see her lips move, I process the sound, but I don't get it, not at first.

It sounds like me, but after a moment my brain understands Effie Trinket's exact words and I realize.

She said Rory. Not Gale.

Rory Hawthorne.

A.N:

Quote is from the song There There by Radiohead.

The first couple of chapters will be similar to The Hunger Games, then its going to start drifting in a different direction.

Mera Danod is an OC, but she's got a small role in the story, so I hope it doesn't turn anyone away from this. Her name is an anagram of Andromeda, of Greek mythology fame.

This story got into my head and refused to go away. I feel quite proud of it, and hope you, the reader, enjoy reading it as much as I'm enjoying writing it!