I'm shaking so hard it's all I can do not to fall off the launch pad. My stomach is churning and I think I might to black out any moment now. This is it, I think, get a grip on yourself! I become aware of a booming sound ringing in my ears and realize it is the voice of the announcer, proudly declaring the 48th Hunger Games open.
While I'm fighting to stay upright, the platform underneath my feet begins to rise, carrying me upwards through a dark, narrow tube, taking me into the arena. Suddenly there is glaring sunlight all around me, forcing my eyes shut.
The heat hits me a moment later. I never would have imagined that air could be so humid, it's like I have run into a wall of solid steam. Instantly, I am covered in sweat. I can almost feel the thick drops of perspiration forming on the skin of my forehead, on the back of my neck, under my arms, rolling down my back. The heat is unbearable, and it is only ten in the morning.
The platform slides into place with a soft click. I hesitantly open my eyes, shielding them with my hands, but still the sun makes them water. When my eyes finally start to adjust, I can see I am standing in a round flat area of blindingly white sand, together with the other twenty-three tributes, each standing on a platform identical to mine, forming a wide circle. Their contours are blurred by the heat.
In the center of the circle sits the Cornucopia, a tall golden structure shaped like a horn. In the sand around it, strewn about in no particular pattern, are all sorts of weapons, backpacks of different colors and sizes, and other pieces of equipment which in the following days and weeks will mean the difference between life and death. The other kids are eying the prizes eagerly, probably making mental notes which items to grab first, what is worth risking their lives for. The tributes from career districts that are well-trained in hand-to-hand combat usually get their pick of the best weapons, while the other, less skilled, kids (like me) have to decide whether to join in the fight over the good stuff or to just run for cover, at the risk of being at a disadvantage later on. We have sixty seconds to make up our minds, during which we cannot leave our launch pads without getting blown to pieces by the explosive charges buried beneath them. And the clock is already ticking.
Hastily I take stock of my immediate surroundings. Closest to me are a pair of throwing axes, a heavy, double-handed sword, several smallish backpacks, and a sort of hunting knife with a jagged edge. A satisfied grunt from my right informs me that the boy next to me is quite pleased with the selection. Of course I recognize him at once. Nero Crissom. I'm guessing he's going for the sword, as this was his favorite weapon during the training sessions. Not that he would be any less deadly with a different weapon. Being from District 1, which is one of the career districts, he has been drilled to fight with all sorts of weapons ever since he could walk. He is eighteen, three years older than me, and about my height but much more heavily built. With his wide shoulders and long blond hair held in place by a leather headband he might have been a hero from some ancient Nordic legend. Nero is also the tribute who received the highest score of all of us, a perfect twelve, which makes him the clear favorite in this year's Games. Bad luck for me his launch pad happens to be right next to mine. As a rule, he is so high on steroids and other stuff he could probably kill me with his bare hands. I just have to hope that he will ignore me for now because I am not much of a threat to him.
To distract myself from such dark thoughts, I turn to check out who is on my left side. Right next to me is a very young girl, thirteen at most, with green eyes and a mass of brown curls. I can't think of her name but I'm pretty sure she got a very low score, maybe a 2 or a 3. She is nervously dancing around on her pad and quickly glancing around in all directions, taking in the terrain. For a weak tribute like her, the only reasonable strategy of course is to get as far away from the Cornucopia as quickly as possible.
Following her gaze, I notice the lush green vegetation for the first time. The circle of sand we are currently standing in is surrounded on all sides by a very dense tropical rain forest. This jungle in turn appears to be encircled by a solid cliff wall at least 200 feet high. If this should mark the boundaries of the game arena, it is surprisingly small. I estimate one could traverse the valley in four to five hours. Usually the game arenas have a much larger area, so as to prolong the "fun" for the viewers. I wonder what the Gamemakers had in mind putting us in such a cramped territory.
A little to the left I notice something else. In the distance, something dark is sticking out of the jungle, just visible above the treetops. Is this another rock formation, or could it be some sort of building? It seems to be the only structure of any kind, the only one that I can make out from down here at least. I would like to check it out, but for now it is too dangerous, since I would risk running into other tributes there.
Opposite to me, on the far side of the circle I can make out Orestes and his sister Electra, the inseparable twins from District 2, standing only a few spaces apart. In the Capitol, they were nicknamed "The Terrible Twos" because they always fight as a team. Their movements are so perfectly coordinated that it is almost as if they were a single individual. Before, apart from Electra's long hair, they looked so much alike they could easily have been mistaken for identical twins, Electra being very muscular and only an inch shorter than her brother. But now that they have both shaved their heads they are virtually impossible to tell apart. They are scanning the area with their cold, grey eyes, like a pair of predatory animals. Each one of them alone is creepy. Combined, they are the most dangerous enemy in the arena, and I am pretty sure they could even take on Nero easily.
I've often asked myself what they plan to do in the event that they are the two last tributes left at the end of the Games. I've never really understood the concept of career tributes anyway. Their parents sent them here, knowing that even in the best case only one of their children is going to return. The thought sends a shiver down my back in spite of the heat. Where I come from, District 3, at least we don't give our children away willingly to be slaughtered in the arena.
Each year the Capitol forces us to send one boy and one girl to the Hunger Games, but we do not compete for this "honor". Who goes is decided by a lottery. However this also means we are not trained to fight. The specialty of District 3 is technology, so in school we focus on perfecting our minds, not our bodies. I myself had been top of my class in Logic and Mathematics. I was planning to go to the academy to become an engineer like my brothers. Of course these kinds of skills are of little to no use in the arena. I have no illusions of making it out of here alive, but I vowed to try my very best not to bring shame to my family. I look around for Ivee, the female tribute from my district, but I don't see her anywhere. She must be directly opposite of me, obscured by the Cornucopia.
By now my dark blue overall is completely soaked in sweat. I long to tear off the jacket, but I know I might need it later, so I settle for wiping my dripping face with my sleeve. Next to the young girl to my left I notice another girl with long black hair, staring intently ahead. I remember her too. Wing Jetsam, seventeen years old, from District 4. Back home in District 3, people often make fun of our neighbors from 4, which is known mainly as the fishing district. I grew up hearing that the girls from District 4 are all ugly and smell of fish. And since it is a career district, all girl tributes I have seen were masculine types with crude, meaty faces and hardly any curves. But this girl is slender and graceful; in fact she doesn't look like she has had any career training at all. And I know she doesn't smell bad either. One time during training I happened to be very close to her at the sword-fighting station. While she was fencing with the instructor, leaping and striking and twisting her body to avoid her opponents thrusts her long hair flew all around her and I thought I caught just the slightest whiff of cinnamon from her.
Almost as if she has heard my thoughts, she suddenly turns and looks right at me. Her grey eyes are neither friendly, nor are they hostile, but her stare makes me uncomfortable, like I have done something wrong. Our gazes meet for only half a second when I hear a wild cry.
"Mom, I'm sorry!"
BOOM!
I am hit by a shock wave and showered with what feels like warm drops of rain but is really blood and little bits of flesh. My hearing is gone, replaced by a high-pitched ringing in my ears. Struggling to keep my balance, I look around for the cause of the explosion. There is a gap a few spaces to my right. That tribute must have deliberately stepped off the launch pad before the sixty seconds were up to blow him- or herself up. What a nasty way to go. Suicides are not unheard of in the Hunger Games, but usually these are committed later in the games, by tributes that are starving or faced with a hopeless situation. I don't think anybody has ever died before the Games even really began.
The kids who were closest to the explosion are covered in gore, their eyes and mouths wide open in shock. They are probably screaming their lungs out, but I can't hear a thing over this ringing. I wonder who it was. I think it was a boy's voice that called out, but I can't be sure. Perhaps it was the overweight boy from District 9, whom everybody called "Moonface" and made fun of? I talked to him a couple of times because I felt sorry for him, and he seemed like a nice enough kid. Although nice doesn't get you very far in a battle to the death. But no, there he is, standing farther to my right, very pale but apparently unharmed. He notices me looking at him and meets my gaze.
#
Then all of a sudden everybody around me is moving, and a few precious seconds pass until I realize the gong must have sounded and the mines have been automatically disarmed. Still disoriented, I stumble off my pad and head in the direction of the Cornucopia, scanning the ground for a weapon. The blond boy, Nero, has already seized the large sword and is charging straight towards the mouth of the horn, viciously hacking away at any other tributes that dare cross his path. Right in front of me, another boy is bashing a young girl's skull in with some sort of club. Wing and the girl with the curls are nowhere to be seen.
The knife with the jagged edge miraculously is still there and I snatch it up quickly. Gripping the handle tightly, I take a few more steps toward a medium-sized black backpack to my left before I notice that it is partly buried in the sand. And what's more, with every step my legs seem to become heavier, as if my feet are stuck in the ground. And when I move I only sink in more deeply. Quicksand. My left foot is already covered up to my knee. I look around and see that none of the other tributes are running anymore, but are moving quite slowly. Some are making weird twisting movements to free their limbs from invisible clutches.
The scattered supplies are apparently being sucked into the ground as well. As I watch, the backpack disappears completely in a matter of seconds. My chances of survival will be very slim if I don't manage to get a hold of at least a bit of equipment, but if I don't get out of this sand right now I will not even make it through the next five minutes.
Thankfully, Nero and the other careers seem to have gotten stuck as well, I can see them over by the Cornucopia, struggling to break free. The ringing in my ears must be starting to subside, because I can hear muffled shouting. Traditionally, the career tributes often form an alliance at the beginning of the Games to systematically weed out the weaker tributes, but two of the careers seem to be wrestling with each other, continually sinking deeper into the sand while the others are trying to pull them out. It looks to me like the Terrible Twos decided not to team up with the other careers but are attacking them instead.
Now that I've stopped moving, I have also stopped sinking, so maybe there is still hope for me. Willing myself to stay calm, I let myself fall on my butt. Then I spread my arms to provide as much support as possible while I attempt to extract my legs from the sand. But it's not much use. Despite all of my efforts, I have only gained a few inches. Suddenly I feel a hand on my shoulder and look up to see the round-faced boy kneeling next to me. With the ringing in my ears I can't quite make out what he is saying, but I think he wants to help me. And it's not like I have any other options. I allow him to take a hold of both of my hands and he starts to pull with surprising strength. It hurts like hell, but just when I think I am going to dislocate my shoulders, my legs come free. Moonface helps me to my feet and we make for the tree line.
"Thanks! I'm Corvin," I tell him in between breaths.
"Caesar. My pleasure."
I guess I have made a new friend.