Allegiance (Minho x Reader) Hunger Games AU

Chapter One: The Reaping

~Sarah's P.O.V.~

I hugged my sister as she cried, she'd had a nightmare, I didn't know what exactly it was about. But I had a feeling what had caused it. Harper had many fears but the one she shared in common with all of the kids in District Twelve was being chosen for the Hunger Games. I even had this fear.

"It was me." She whispered.

"It's your first year, they're not gonna pick you." I assured her. "Your name's only in there once."

She looked up at me, her eyes still watery. "Thank you."

"Of course, go back to sleep, I gotta go."

"Where?"

"I just gotta go, I'll be back. I love you."

I got dressed and grabbed my jacket from the hook by the door. I saw the cat, Harper had named him Buttercup. He was a good cat, caught mice and sometimes birds or squirrels. He was eating a mouse but he looked up at me. I liked Buttercup, a black and white cat who used to be covered in worms and fleas until my mother took care of them. I petted him before I left.

"Good kitty." Buttercup usually slept with Harper but I'd feed him leftovers if we had any so he'd let me pet him. I didn't really want a cat, a dog would've been better, but we're poor enough.

Our part of District 12, nicknamed the Seam, is usually crawling with coal miners heading out to the morning shift at this hour. Men and women with hunched shoulders, swollen knuckles, many who have long since stopped trying to scrub the coal dust out of their broken nails, the lines of their sunken faces. But today the black cinder streets are empty. Shutters on the squat gray houses are closed. The reaping isn't until two. May as well sleep in. If you can.

Our house is almost at the edge of the Seam. I only have to pass a few gates to reach the scruffy field called the Meadow. Separating the Meadow from the woods, in fact enclosing all of District 12, is a high chain-link fence topped with barbed-wire loops. In theory, it's supposed to be electrified twenty-four hours a day as a deterrent to the predators that live in the woods — packs of wild dogs, lone cougars, bears — that used to threaten our streets. But since we're lucky to get two or three hours of electricity in the evenings, it's usually safe to touch. Even so, I always take a moment to listen carefully for the hum that means the fence is live. Right now, it's silent as a stone. Concealed by a clump of bushes, I flatten out on my belly and slide under a two-foot stretch that's been loose for years. There are several other weak spots in the fence, but this one is so close to home I almost always enter the woods here.

As soon as I'm in the trees, I retrieve a bow and sheath of arrows from a hollow log. Electrified or not, the fence has been successful at keeping the flesh-eaters out of District 12. Inside the woods they roam freely, and there are added concerns like venomous snakes, rabid animals, and no real paths to follow. But there's also food if you know how to find it. My father knew and he taught me some before he was blown to bits in a mine explosion. There was nothing even to bury. I was eleven then. Five years later, I still wake up screaming for him to run.

Even though trespassing in the woods is illegal and poaching carries the severest of penalties, more people would risk it if they had weapons. But most are not bold enough to venture out with just a knife. My bow is a rarity, crafted by my father along with a few others that I keep well hidden in the woods, carefully wrapped in waterproof covers. My father could have made good money selling them, but if the officials found out he would have been publicly executed for inciting a rebellion. Most of the Peacekeepers turn a blind eye to the few of us who hunt because they're as hungry for fresh meat as anybody is. In fact, they're among our best customers. But the idea that someone might be arming the Seam would never have been allowed.