Holland Westbrook

## Childhood

Animal, bone, hide, guts — these are Holland Westbrook’s native tongue. As a child she collected bugs, keeping them in jars in her room, giving them little sticks and leaves, poking holes in the lids so they could breathe. There weren’t many animals in the central city of District Six where she lived with her mother, Irene. She could relate to the bugs, stuck inside a world too small for them, the feeling of the air on their wings too stale.

Her father, Marcus, was born in the Capitol to a family who owned Greater Panem Railways. As a boy, he loved his family’s visits to the Great Lakes region of District Six, where there was a big sky, an impossibly deep lake, and neverending trees. Irene met him one summer at a country resort by the lake, and the two fell in love. Irene gave birth just nine months later, and realized she’d made a mistake a year after that. She and Marcus were incompatible, he was too wild, almost feral. While he treated her well, the edges of him made her afraid.

She moved back to the city her family lived in. Marcus stayed in the countryside near the lakes to establish a taxidermy business, where he recreated life for animals who had died of natural causes, or roadkill that he found on long drives through the District. Marcus visited the city every now and then and sent birthday gifts every year. Irene didn’t want Holland to visit him, afraid that her daughter might become too much like him. Afraid that she, too, would turn out to be antisocial, to have sharp teeth and a cool tongue, to prefer the woods filled with animals and plants over the streets and cars of Irene’s city streets. Afraid that Holland would choose Marcus over her, if given the choice.

Holland learned how much she enjoyed animal and insect anatomy when Marcus sent her a book on the subject for her seventh birthday. That summer she threw fits until her mother allowed her to spend a few weeks with her father. In a large outbuilding behind Marcus’s house was his studio. It was here that Holland learned the art of taxidermy. She loved seeing the animals, frozen in between life and death. Every movement of muscle that appeared beneath their fur was calculated, built by strong and sure hands. In the lifeless eyes of the squirrels, deer, pheasants, and fish, Holland saw the space in which she herself lived: the intersection of wilderness and humanity.

The fall she turned 17, Holland received a call from one of her father’s oldest friends. He’d been killed in a hunting accident; he only hunted once a year, in the fall, with his friend from the Capitol. It was a ritual Holland disliked, but her father didn’t care about her disapproval. She felt a gnawing sensation in her stomach that began with the phone call, but continued to grow as time passed; as the funeral was held in the Capitol, against Marcus’s wishes; as she joined the procession down the city streets.

The weight of grief pressed down on her, but so did the weight of responsibility: he’d left the shop to her, but she was still in school, and had no money nor the power to move away. The shop’s doors closed and the animals inside began to collect dust. She would come for them as soon as she could, she promised herself — she’d fulfill her promise to her father.

Things didn’t work out like that, though.

## Pre-Games & Alliances

Her name was pulled from the Reaping Bowl. She was transported to the Capitol in one of the trains her family owned, on the tracks their workers maintained. She was taken further from the woods she loved, into the city that she hated more than her own. There, however, on the first day she met a girl. Aspen. The two freed a bird that was caught inside the glass-walled Tower, and made a pact to each other, sealed in blood, that they would protect each other. It was an instant connection. Kisses after the Tribute Parade further sealed the deal.

Over the next three days they both spoke of what life could be like if they survived. This was an impossibility, as they were both tributes and one would have to die, but it was nice to imagine. The night before the launch, the dream seemed closer than ever, like if they could just get out of the Tower, they could really live that life. Go into the woods they both knew so well. Live in the Wilds and survive together.

## The Crime

Aspen and Holland escaped the Tower and went to a crowded club to wait out the crowds and figure out their next move. The truth was they had no idea what to do upon escape. A man, Francis Lightbelle, lured the two of them and two other tributes who had escaped for a last night of fun into his limo. The four were given something to drink, driven to his house. The house was glamorous, showy. Francis was a personal injury lawyer, an ambulance chaser some called him. He was also the muck of the earth. Once he’d gotten them trapped in a room, he touched Aspen’s leg. This was enough for one of the girls; she hit him over the head, hard, with a statue, and he fell unconscious. In the panicked moments afterward, Holland’s unique skill set came in handy.

Over the course of an hour, she dismembered Francis’s body carefully and placed the pieces of him in separate trash bags. These trash bags were deposited throughout the city. Shaking and pale, all four girls returned to the Tower, having nowhere else to turn in the wake of what they had all been part of.

## The Arena

The Arena was an ancient Roman town nestled beneath a smoking mountain. The first days were marked by betrayal of her district partner, to whom she had sworn loyalty; sex with Aspen using the olive oil they’d been so graciously gifted by the Gamemakers in amphorae; killing the girl from Twelve with an ax; and meeting up with the other two girls with whom she and Aspen shared a secret. Things turned sour and accusations were made on the cameras. Similar accusations were made later to her district partner, detailing her crime: the cutting up, burning in acid, and disposal of a body.

The mountain hovering above the town exploded; Vesuvius had erupted over the town of Pompeii, and ash rained down over all of the tributes. Holland and Aspen managed to make their way underground, where a new landscape awaited them: the underworld.

In the underworld, misunderstandings led to death, and Aspen was killed out of revenge. After her death, Holland used a knife to cut off her hand, having held it throughout the Games so far and not wanting to part with it. In the end, she was faced with a mutt of her mother who tried to convince her to remain in the Underworld. It didn’t work, and she ascended a staircase, winning the Games. As the hovercraft lifted her above the town, she was forced to drop Aspen’s hand into the ash.

## Post-Victory & Sentencing

She was taken not to the usual place but to the hospital wing of the Capitol prison. There she was treated for her injuries and given sedatives to keep her calm. Eventually when she had recovered enough, she was told that she was being put on trial for the murder of Francis Lightbelle. Her lawyer didn’t seem terribly confident.

The evidence was all on camera and it was stacked against her. What’s more, the body parts had all been found by this point, and she had displayed her skill for this type of work proudly on her final day in the Arena. The other three girls had all died, but the Capitol was left shaken, jockeying for punishment for Holland. She had killed one of their own, or at least had been involved in the murder. She had committed horrific and gruesome acts. Her defense, in the end, was weak. The sentence was fifteen years.

## Prison Time

The Capitol prison was filled with some of the most powerful people in the city. For the first few months, she wallowed, and was given a wide berth to do so. To have a Victor in prison was unique, and the press were showing up daily for interviews, which she always turned away. Her cell was comfortable with a mattress and a separate stall for the toilet. The food wasn’t bad, though it wasn’t great either. Every day for an hour they were all let outside into the yard. This was where Holland observed the patterns of her fellow inmates, and listened in on conversations, beginning to learn who everyone was and where the power lay.

Her old life was over and she could no longer go back to it. It was time to get used to where she was. So she started making strategic friends, gaining power slowly so that no one quite noticed it happening. People were afraid of her which helped; everyone knew what she’d done to Francis, and they’d seen her actions in the Arena. They knew she was erratic and driven by emotion. Dangerous. She made connections with some of the most powerful families in the city, and of course in all of Panem. People who could snap their fingers and get something done, even from prison.

## Freedom

In the winter of 104, her grandparents died; as the only heir, the majority share of Greater Panem Railways was left to her. She used this in her case for early release, citing good behavior, but promising everyone involved a healthy sum of her newfound fortune. She was granted a year of parole, contingent on her remaining in the city to report to her officer regularly.

Once out, she purchased a condo on the outskirts of the city near a large park. She spent most of her first few weeks of freedom in her sparsely-furnished new home, thinking about all that was back in Six that she couldn’t yet get to. She longed to get her hands on animal hide, on scissors and thread. After three weeks, and the conclusion of the 131st Games, she received a phone call. The question of her involvement as a Victor in the Games had been decided. While she had committed a crime against the Capitol by killing one of their own, the Gamemakers understood that her skill set could be put to use. What was more, she could be watched more closely with a full-time position as a Gamemaker. She didn’t have a choice, and she didn’t want one — she said yes enthusiastically, agreeing to join the mutt design team.