The Threshing Ground

(Disclaimer: I have no business connection with HUNGER GAMES. My only purpose in writing this story is to have fun and maybe share it)

In the grasslands, Thresh was literally lying low. Not only did the tall stalks offer him some concealment, but he had found a ditch in which he could actually stand up without being spotted. Nobody could see him unless they were right on top of him. Of course the Capitol's cameras may have spotted him, but they weren't going to attack him or betray him to the Careers. He knew from agricultural experience how to live off of the plants. He was safe for a while.

For the first time in his life, he had a long period of inactivity. In District 11, if he ever had a period of peace, somebody would notice the huge Thresh and put him to work, slaving away for the Capitol. Here in the Hunger Games, ironically, he was safe from District 11 taskmasters, and had time to think over his situation.

He had resolved, days ago, not to play the Capitol's game. He did not suck up to Caesar Flickerman or his audience, nor would he fight against tributes who were basically as much victims as himself. Somehow, maybe when most of the tributes were dead, the Capitol would find some way to force him into a final duel, but he intended to resist as long as he could.

His one regret was that he had been unable to give any protection to Rue. He had discussed the problem with the girl, but unfortunately they could not make plans because they did not know what the arena would be like. The Capitol always kept that a deep secret until they actually entered the arena. Even the Careers never seemed to know, though Thresh suspected that the Career districts tried to spy out the secret each year.

When they had been lifted into the arena, Rue was nearly a quarter of the way around the Cornucopia and it was impossible for them to talk. The arena seemed to consist of both forest and grasslands. Rue must have considered the forest a perfect hiding place. She was light and expert in climbing trees; she could easily take refuge in some tall, thin tree where enemies could not reach her. Thresh, on the other hand, was too heavy to climb any but the most sturdy trees, and too large to hide behind one. The grasslands were the place for him. And so they ended up fleeing in opposite directions.

Thresh had worried ever since about how Rue was doing. The damned Gamemasters who transmitted every detail of the Games to the rest of Panem denied that information to the actual tributes. From a distance he saw hints of things going on: a forest fire in one corner of the arena, an explosion near the Cornucopia area, cannons going off nearly every day to mark deaths. He carefully examined the pictures of dead tributes when they were projected, but Rue was not there.

And then she WAS there, the evening after the explosion. She was accompanied in the sky by two boys, one from District One and the other from District Three. Thresh felt grieved, and wondered who had killed her. Actually the specific killer didn't matter. The damned Capitol had killed her, by putting her in the Hunger Games. Could he have saved her? In the long run, he doubted it. In the long run either she or he would have been killed anyway.

The isolation in the grasslands was somewhat an illusion. This was proved when, starting the day after Rue's death, Claudius Templesmith started making announcements which Thresh could hear perfectly well. Where the speakers were, Thresh didn't know and didn't care.

The first announcement was an unprecedented rule change: that two tributes could jointly win the Games if they were from the same District. This mattered little to Thresh, since he had already lost his fellow district tribute, but he wondered what had driven the Gamesmasters to make such a drastic change in their rules.

The second announcement, which came two days later, was different. Templesmith announced that there would be a "feast", an offer of gifts to the surviving tributes at the Cornucopia. It sounded positive, but Thresh knew from previous games what it really meant: the Gamesmasters wanted to lure the tributes all to the same spot in the hope that they would break out fighting for the entertainment of the Capitol.

Thresh at first decided not to fall for the trick, not to play their game. But the possibilities worried him. However devious the motives behind the Feasts, the rules required that the gifts be genuinely valuable. One example of a valuable gift would be technology that would enable other tributes to detect Thresh's location. He could even think of one: infrared viewers, which were occasionally used in District 11 to detect hidden animal nests. The tall grass was currently protecting him from normal sight, but his own body heat would be detectable in infrared. Nor were there any other large animals nearby to confuse the detection.

On the other hand, Thresh's own gift might be some sort of cloth that would block heat and make him undetectable again.

Thresh had to go to the feast.

As he approached the Cornucopia the next morning he saw that at least 2 tributes had not only fought but one had already prevailed: One of the girls was sitting on another one, waving a knife in her face. But instead of killing the other, the girl on top was making a speech. Thresh was puzzled at the way she spoke it so clearly and at such length, then realized why: she was putting on a scene for the Capitol.

"Where's your boyfriend, District 12? Still hanging on?" she asked in a grisly parody of girl talk.

The two talked about somebody named Peeta. Thresh hadn't kept track of other tributes' names earlier, and he didn't pay much attention now, except to see if it made it easy to grab his gift. The girls were preoccupied, but he did not know how many other tributes were still around and possibly nearby. He should have paid more attention to the death announcements.

Then he heard one syllable that changed everything. Knife Girl mentioned "Rue".

"First Rue, then you, and I think we'll let nature take care of Loverboy. How does that sound? Now where to start? I think we'll start with your mouth."

This was sick, even sicker than Thresh had anticipated. The rules of the game were that if you were in a position to kill a competitor, you did. There was no reason to torture her first, unless you were a sadist or was playing to like-minded people in the Capitol.

Then Thresh realized something horrible. "First Rue, then you." This girl had tortured Rue. His original notion, to pick up his "gift" and ignore the fights, was no longer an honorable course of behavior. He must at least avenge Rue.

Thresh strode over and grabbed the girl by the back of her uniform, throwing her to the side. She was so startled that she dropped her knife. "What did you do that little girl? You kill her?"

The sadistic girl suddenly turned groveling coward now that strength was not on her side. She did a bizarre backward crawl on her arms, reminding Thresh of some vermin or other in a District 11 field. "No no it wasn't me!"

"You said her name. I heard you. You kill her? You cut her up like you were going to cut up this girl here?"

"No no I – Cato!"

Thresh didn't believe her denial. It was just part of her grovelling. But it sounded like she had an ally around. If he was to avenge Rue he had to do it immediately.

Thresh didn't have weapons, but he didn't need them. They were within meters of the Cornucopia. Thresh rammed the back of her head into the metal frame, twice. Her eyes started and her body went limp in his hands. Thresh had never killed anybody before, and had never thought he would ever kill a girl, but this one deserved it for what she had done to Rue.

Only then did he remember the other girl, that she might be a threat. Everybody killed everybody, that was how the games were played. But when he turned around she was still sitting on the ground, having apparently watched the murder of her tormentor with a sort of fascination.

Now he recognized her. The girl from District 12, the one who had pulled the elaborate publicity stunts with the flaming dresses. "What did she mean, about Rue and you? Were you allies?"

"I-I- we teamed up. Blew up the supplies." That must have been the explosion Thresh had seen. "I tried to save her I did. But he got there first, District 1."

She was talking fast, and at first Thresh was wondering if she too was grovelling. But he could see tears in her eyes as she described Rue's death. And he remembered Rue's fascination with the "Girl on Fire" when they were back in the Training Center. It was plausible that they could have teamed up.

And what that meant was that while Thresh had been thinking of his own integrity, determined not to get mixed up in the games, this girl had tried to protect Rue. That should have been Thresh's job.

The girl finished, and wiped her eyes, and stared at Thresh coolly. "Do it fast, okay, Thresh?"

She had misunderstood Thresh's motives. She thought Thresh was simply eliminating the competition, first the knife girl, then the girl from 12. She had not been trying to talk him into sparing her; she thought her life was forfeit. Her story was most likely the truth. And she had made no attempt to kill him while he was distracted with the knife girl.

Why did this stranger have to be his enemy? Because the Capitol wanted her to be, which was the worst possible reason.

Should he ally himself with her? Bad idea. It was late in the Games. "Loverboy" was apparently badly wounded, "Cato" had failed to protect the Knife Girl. It was conceivable that Thresh and Miss 12 would be the last 2 standing, and be forced to fight the final duel. Thresh was not prepared to throw his life away in that case. But now—

"Just this one time, I'll let you go. For the little girl. You and me, we're even then. No more owed. You understand?"

Relief showed in her eyes, but also respect. She understood "owing". She also understood that if they were forced to have the final fight, it would at least be a fair fight, between adversaries that respected each other.

There was another male voice, calling "Clove". Thresh suddenly realized that was the name of the girl he had killed, and that he also did not know the name of the girl he had spared.

"You better run , Fire Girl."

She nodded. "Katniss". She leapt to her feet and ran into the woods.

Thresh picked up his gift, and on a moment's thought, picked up District 2's as well. Not just to deprive them of a possible weapon, but to do an extra favor for "Katniss'. Cato would chase Thresh to get his gift back, and leave Katniss alone for a while.

Thresh ran back to the grasslands, but he realized that his isolation was over. Cato was going to chase him and force him to fight. After that, with so many dead, the Gamesmasters would try to force the survivors together for the final duel. But Thresh could take pride in the fact that, in this encounter at least, he had not descended to playing their game.

THE END