AN: Written for District 15's monthly prompt, "deserted."
It was a bad year for District 4, no doubt. For a career District, you would think we could take anything that the Gamemakers had to throw at us. This was not the case. They had found our one weakness, and boy, was it ironic. The very sister of our beloved ocean was our downfall.
Figured it out yet? Well, I'll spare you the guessing game. On the off chance you did already guess, and your guess happened to be sand, then congratulations! You won! In regards to what you won, don't bother me with details. The point is, we can now move on.
Sand. When graced with the lovely ocean it becomes pliable and friendly and it's great for your feet. This arena was slightly different. Well, not slightly. It was really freaking different, in fact. Instead of gentle waves lapping over the sand to cool us off from the sunlight, we just had sunlight. And like, cacti, or whatever. Irrelevant.
The point was, we were screwed over.
In regards to who "we" were, that would be me and my District partner. I hadn't been planning on getting any allies. Apparently Ian wasn't either, but us ocean-heads gotta stick together. All it took was one look before the gong sounded for our pact to be made. Neither of us knew how to survive in this dry hell, so we figured we may as well fail at it together.
Together, we managed to snag a hefty canister of water, a loaf of bread, and a knife before we high-tailed it out of there. I don't really know what the Gamemakers were going for. Maybe they thought we'd be stuck fighting to death with nowhere to hide, but we all kind of just ran for it and got ourselves stranded.
That's not entirely true. There are some mountains in the distance-ish-direction, and there are probably trees and water there. More sensible tributes probably headed there and risked getting killed, preferring that over baking to death. But as far as Ian and I are concerned, it was just us, the sun, and the cacti. It's blazing hot in the daytime and bone-cracking cold at night, but being dead on your feet is ultimately better than being actually dead.
To be honest, I was surprised the knife hadn't ended up in my back. Ian was very clearly unhappy being stuck with me, but I had the water. I'd like to put some emphasis on the had part of that sentence, seeing as now I have about as much as… as a thing that has nothing, I don't know.
We had found a small underground cave yesterday. It was probably a burrow for some animal. A muttation, rather. In hindsight, it was a terrible idea to spend the night there. But I lived, so whatever. I woke up in the morning to find Ian gone with the water, bread, and knife. Nice guy, I know.
Yeah, yeah, it's hilarious. Deserted. In a desert. You're killing me.
We lasted two days before he skipped out on me. He could have left me some rations, or the knife, but the bastard took it all. Typical men, am I right? I was probably asking for it. He was a cool kid back home. Sixteen years old, rivaling the famous Finnick Odair in the looks department. His personality was lacking, but girls didn't care when it came to a hot guy. He could have the personality of my little toe and they wouldn't notice. Though, let's face it. My little toe? Pretty charismatic guy.
Right: Ian. Like I was saying, he was the one everyone wanted to be like. I was the weird kid (shocker, huh?). Tyde Stockard. Sounds like a product to clean your hovel with if I ever heard one. No one really got my sense of humor, and I studied more than I illegally trained to be a Career. So clearly there was something wrong with me.
Older kids usually scrambled to volunteer for people younger than them, but no such luck for this fifteen year old. I'm feeling the love, guys, really. The crowd didn't make a peep as I walked up to the stage and stood next to the escort (Some ditz named Kitten. I mean, Tyde is a sucky name, I admit. But Kitten?). They wanted to get rid of the social outcast. It wouldn't have hurt so bad if there hadn't been so many volunteers for our dear Ian. Idiot was too proud to let anyone take his place, though.
I was surprised when he allied with me, even if it was doomed from the start. And for a moment there, I thought he was an okay guy. LOL, nope. And, even worse, I even started to think that the insane crushes all the girls had on him were justified. Like, there was a moment where I wanted to kiss that motherfucker.
Not proud of that.
When he was gone, I took the hint and hauled my ass out of there, too. I was facing imminent death, anyway, so I headed for the distant-ish-mountain area. Because when you're going to die and you get deserted, there's a bizarre longing for being close to another human, even if that human is going to turn you inside out with a knife.
The heat plays tricks on you, and I entertained a fantasy where I won the Games as I walked along. I thought I was totally capable of taking on the fifteen other tributes that still lived. Reality laughed in my face and stabbed me. I'm not trying to make a metaphor or anything. The girl from District 1? Her name was Reality. And she stabbed me in the back.
Har har.
And so ended the super interesting story of my life. Reaped, deserted, stabbed by a girl with a humorous name. It's how twenty-three District kids die each year. It's kind of a bummer, really. When you imagine your death, you think of something noble, dramatic, worthy of a book or a movie. No one wants to go out like a light bulb in an abandoned house. Just like every other light bulb, only no one even notices when you go.