teddy king / nine

Being here, now. Three days shy of aging out of the reaping, sitting in a cold, dark cell as District Nine's female tribute, more than ever before you're inclined to believe him.

You weren't what he had wanted, your father. A darling daughter, who looked exactly like her late mother, stolen from this world far too early at the expense of your first breath. No, Remi Dhawan had wanted a son. An heir. A boy to raise up in his own image, to mold and shape and thrust upon him a sense of entitlement and bravado so he may one day live up to the family name. And as a result, become the perfect child to take over the family business.

The legacy your father built, years and years of hard work, sacrifice, and ruthless ambition, endless nights poured over a worktable with gun oil on his hands and a magnifying glass in his hand. He built so much from nothing. I made money out of dirt, he'd always say, fists clenched and eyes filled with disappointment. And this is how the gods repay me. With an ungrateful brat of a daughter and a dead wife. 

He wasn't a kind man, you learned that early on. But as you aged and explored outside your home, as you traipsed through the streets of Nine looking for a reprieve from your asshole of a father and his newly found second wife, you heard other things about him as well. Dhawan the Destroyer, they'd whisper. Most would talk of his expertise, of his masterful craftsmanship, but some would whisper as quietly as they could about his affinity for explosives. But you were observant. You knew how to hide, but more importantly, how to listen.

You would burst out from whatever dark corner you had been hiding in and called them fools, insisted they have the wrong man. My father makes pistols, nothing more. It's rather boring, actually, you'd say with a flip of your hair and an annoyed purse of your lips. The boys would snicker, tell you that you had no idea what you were talking about, encourage you to go home and stay in the kitchen where you belonged.

Much later, a few years after your half-brother was born, you would learn just how wrong you were and just how popular your father really was throughout Nine. 

With rebels especially. 

It took you by surprise at first. His masterful craftsman ship when it came to a rifle and his generosity when it came to giving said rifles to rebels free of charge. It made no sense. In every other aspect of his life, he portrayed a loyalist façade. He preached about the Capitol's mercy and about staying true to the law. You heard countless times when you were a child that if you just follow the rules, everything will be okay. 

Your father even said as much as they marched him to the town square three days after he was caught dropping off his last shipment of guns. Everything will be okay, baby, he said to you as they tied his hands to a wooden post. Everything will be okay, he said as they put a bullet between his eyes. Everything will be okay, you whispered to yourself as you inherited not only a family business but a network of rebels who relied on a consistent supply. 

Everything will be okay, you told yourself as they called your name at the reaping three years later. 

The other times, you believed it. Despite all odds, despite all the evidence to the contrary. You had hope. 

Now, you only know consequence. 

And certain death.