It had all gone exactly as planned.
Krunk kealt by a blood-coated stalagmite, not long previous had he used it to cave in the skull of a tribute from seven. She had heart, but hadn't expected him. It was a single, calculated move that had killed her instantly. No fuss.
Krunk had his eyes closed, his palm pressed firmly against the moist ground of the cave. The torches they'd been given at the cornucopia had long since been broken, whether in accidents or after being used as crude clubs, so alternate methods of locating your enemy must be utilised.
The silence was interrupted only by the dripping of water from the cavernous ceiling, whoever thought a system of winding caves would be a good arena had no idea how easy it made it to track people.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
Plink.
Krunk heard the new sound and tensed, he pressed his palm harder, feeling for any vibration that might alert him to the position of his enemy. The last remaining tribute, beside himself of course.
Soon enough, he began to feel slight sensations at his fingertips as the tribute walked through the cavern. They were injured, the sensation was irregular. Step. Drag. Step. Drag.
They were either stupid or past caring, because they made no effort to prevent stones skittering across the ground as they pulled a limp leg along behind them.
Krunk opened his eyes and stood up, his hand cold, wet and partially numbed by the hard stone ground. The other tribute froze at the sight of him, a look of utter dismay creeping across their features.
"You're a monster", they said meekly. Krunk tilted his head and looked them up and down, their leg had a large chunk of rock poking out of it. A rock carved to a point. "Please don't kill me", the young boy pleaded. He could be no older than thirteen, only the weakest were left, just as he'd planned.
"That's the game, kid" said Krunk, making no move towards the boy. "The careers went first. Then my alliance, had no use for them after the strongest were gone. Now it's just those nobody counted as contenders. And like the girl whose head I caved in, your death will be swift. Not painless. But swift".
The boy looked horrified, was this Krunk's idea of comforting someone?
Suddenly, and with much more grace than a miner of his size should have, Krunk moved towards the boy, violently dropping to the ground and sweeping his injured leg with a kick that would've shattered his bones had they not already been pulverised by rock.
The kid's scream was ear splitting as his shrill voice echoed around the cavern, he dropped to the ground hard as blood squirted merrily from the now gaping wound in his leg. Krunk leapt across the floor and straddled the boy, preventing him from wriggling away.
Streams of tears flowed from the boy's eyes, his howls of terror and agony almost deafening. Krunk could feel his panic, he took no pleasure in it though he must admit it was intoxicating. Having considered his options in the seconds previous to breaking the kid's leg, Krunk leant back and grasped the pointed rock with a strong hand. The boy screamed in pure, unadulterated pain as Krunk carelessly tore it from his leg; severing muscle, tearing nerves and shifting bone in directions they were never intended to face. Blood flowed like water from a bottle. Krunk didn't even have to do anything, the kid would be dead in minutes, but waiting would be inefficient.
For a single second Krunk studied the boys face, finding the weak point.
"Hey!", he yelled over the sound of the kid's crying. In that split second, the boy looked up at Krunk and saw the last thing he ever would. A large, muscular miner from twelve who had beaten all the odds to win… And the sharp piece of rock raised in one hand, carefully aimed at his eye socket.
Crunch.
Krunk let go of the rock and it stayed in place, he had sunk it deep into the boy's eye penetrating his frontal lobe. Hopefully he hadn't felt anything, but if he had, nobody was around to complain about it.
"This was boring", said President Hapi, gazing intently at the screen mounted to the wall of his office. Head Gamemaker McLellan stood by the door, a single bead of sweat betraying his otherwise calm demeanor.
"I'm afraid I don't understand, sir. We made everything exactly the way you wanted. State of the art. Different. It all works", said McLellan, his voice silky smooth, honed over the years of manipulating heads of departments into accepting his ideas.
"I don't want something that works, I want something that is interesting to watch. This child from twelve, he laid out an entire plan for the games and pulled it off- Not even your damn mutts stopped him!", anger flared up behind Hapi's horn rimmed spectacles. McLellan adjusted his cuffs nervously.
"We can do better", he mumbled.
"What was that?", Hapi demanded.
"We can do better, sir!", McLellan barked confidently.
"And how do you propose you do that? Let's start with the mutts, since you clearly have no idea how to make killers anymore", the president gestured at his screen, referring to the monsters that Krunk had easily led off a cliff edge and impaled on stalactites, "How do you make creatures capable of going against people like that?"
McLellan froze for a moment as an idea sprung to mind. But only for a moment.
"We genetically engineer Gods"
Thank you for reading the first chapter of my first SYOT, I must admit I'm not a hugely big fan of the Hunger Games, but the world itself has a terrific amount of lore to play with. I'll be uploading a form for anyone that wants to submit tomorrow. I hope you enjoyed.
