Way 4: Be smart (And having a career ally helps too)

This one is to MRKenn

Because they play overwatch :P

No just kidding I love to read their stories.

Maia Kenn, 15

District 3 female of the 167th Hunger Games

24 tributes remaining

I looked around the circle at every tribute's position. Until my eyes met the district four female a couple platforms away, her name was Ruby and she was a career. I stared at her, still trying to understand why she wanted to ally with me. Then I realised she looked back. Her green eyes were blinking in the bright sun while she looked at me. She skewed her head questioning if something was wrong. I shook my head trying to answer her unspoken question. We had agreed that I would run out of the circle into cover while she acted like doing career stuff. The arena was as far as I could see a forest, my vision wasn't fas because we were on a high hill,so it was easy for me to hide when the gong rang. I had calculated the average time the bIoodbath took in the night before the Games I would have less than half minute to get cover. Then I would watch Ruby for around two minutes. So I watched how Ruby picked up an axe and a knife and scooped up a backpack. Before running in my direction she attacked a boy whose face I couldn't see. Killing the boy didn't even slow her down on the way to me. She tossed me the knife gentilly and looked over her shoulder, her blonde ponytail almost slapped me in the face. She checked if the careers had noticed anything. I tried to look too but I wasn't really tall so I could barely even look over the bushes. I knew the bloodbath would take another minute to finish completely but some careers were already done. When I looked the district two boy was running in our direction, his face was red and full of sweat and he was holding an axe smeared with blood of his other victim, so we both turned around and started running.

The boy stopped chasing us after a really short period of running, so after we lost him out of our sight we lowered the paste we were running at. While walking I thought of my chances to win, I had a career as ally and I was smarter than other tributes. But it was still scary how low my chances of winning actually were. Three hadn't produced a victor in a long time and overall fiveteen year olds didn't win a lot. I looked over to Ruby who was holding her bloody axe and was walking some meters in front of me. Usually people didn't like to get loads of questions fired at them so I didn't ask any. I just followed the tall blond girl.

Hours later we arrived at a meadow with flowers in colours I didn't even know they could have. There was a firm wind that blew through the short green grass and through the leaves of the handful of trees scattered on the meadow, like someone put sprinkles on a piece of cake. While walking Ruby had broken the ice and started a conversation about some unnecessary stuff. But it felt good to have someone to talk to. Back in three people knew me for being very talkative and energetic. They also knew me for the clever thinking I did in the First National Panem Math Quiz (FMPMQ). I sat down on a big rock and asked Ruby where she wanted to set up camp.

"Well, of course we can't stay in the open so I thought about the group of trees over there. Is that ok?" She said pointing to a group of trees.

"Yeah that will be great.' I answered.

So far before the evening we had set up camp, I had made traps while Ruby went out to hunt for food. Ruby offered me the sleeping bag we had found in the backpack with some other useful stuff. Like; another knife, a rope, matches and a roll of bandages.

I fell asleep quickly, Ruby sat next to me in silence. I knew she would have killed me already if this was a short term alliance.

No, I just guessed it.

Ruby Mossel, 18 POV

district 4 female

Day 2, 17 tributes remaining

The bloodbath was a bit small because district seven didn't join the pack like they sometimes did and I ran away with Maia. I chose Maia because she was smart and good company but not strong enough to kill me. I looked at the short skinny girl. Her long black hair rested on her back while she sat in the tree with her knees pulled up. When she looked at me with her brown eyes I sometimes could spot fair. It was normal she was scared. It would even be strange if she wasn't of a career. But it didn't feel good to be a career, people thought of me like a monster. When I went to the academy for my first day it was already too late to go back, my good image was gone and most of my friends didn't want anything to do with me. I met new people on the academy but almost all of them were bullies, they beat other kids up and wanted to go into the Games for the feeling of killing kids. I didn't want to be like that so I left the pack behind. Now I was here with Maia, the smartest girl I had met. A smile spread across my face.

Then the brown scared eyes flashed through my mind and my smile was gone.

She would never trust someone like me.

No one would.

I walked over to her traps, they were complicated rope traps. I took the white bunny, that was stuck in the trap, and slit his throat with Maia's knife. The blood flowed into the white hair. After breakfast we went out looking for water. Maia told us we should look for a hill to get a good view and that I had to listen to animal noises, who had to drink somewhere. Some time later I spotted movement somewhere in the bushes, I grabbed Maia's shirt and pulled her back.

"Something to the left." I whispered.

Maia turned her head to the left. She looked in the same direction I was looking. The movement was close and suddenly a deer's head shot out of the bushes. A cannon rang and the deer spirited away.

"It's just a deer." Maia said relieved.

"You said it yourself: If there are animals there is water." I quoted her.

And yes, after walking a minute the bushes opened up and we encountered a river. We drank as much as we could and I washed my face, the cold water streamed from my head and when we got out water was still dripping from my chin. My eyes followed the river down to an area with more trees. I saw the career pack coming out of the bushes.

The career pack!

Maia had already diven underwater so I followed her. I jumped into the water carefully trying to make no noise. The careers past walking at a high tempo, they had probably seen a new target. We both surfaced at the same time. I quickly climbed out of the water, my clothes were soaked and I was cold.

"Four" Maia whispered.

I looked at her questioning if her brains were working. She certainly noticed I was stumped.

"There were four careers hunting, so there is one back at the cornucopia." Maia explained.

I stood there still confused about what she was saying. That was when it hit me: She wanted to attack the cornucopia. We ran for an hour with some walking in between while walking we heard another cannon. When we were near the top of the highest hill we started crouching. I looked at the silver building and saw Claire, the district two female, sitting on a chest. Claire was a tall, somewhat heavy girl who loved to use a mace. I asked Maia for our second knife, the one we found in the backpack, and she gave it to me.

"I will be the bait" Maia whispered and she ran onto the open field wielding her knife.

Claire jumped up and sprinted forward ready to finish the stupid fifteen year old. What she didn't know was that Maia was the youngest contester and first winner of the National Math Contest and with that title she was one of the smartest kids in Panem ever. I jumped out of the bushes when Claire was near Maia and threw the knife into her stomach. Her eyes widened of surprise when she saw me and when the knife hit her she started coughing up blood. I ran forward with my axe and finished the job. The cannon rang.

Maia had received several sponsor gifts. I only saw a bunch of random stuff but Maia knew what to do. She had a gas spray, fishing rod rope, a catrol and a lighter. She told me to go find a roll of duct tape and I came back with the biggest roll I could find. I was disappointed when she only took one little piece. She told me she was making a trap for when the careers came back.

The trap worked like this:

At the entrance of the cornucopia the fishing rod rope was spun, it was super thin and invisible in the dark. If someone stood on the rope the rope pulled down a piece of wood with the help of the catrol that activate the gas spray at the corner of the opening. The lighter was always active by the button being pressed down by the duct tape. Maia put the lighter in front of the gas spray, that was pointing towards the rope.

"If someone steps or trips on the rope it will trigger a flamethrower that will certainly set their hair on fire and might burn the face of the closest one depending on how good the gas is." Maia told me.

We had put Claire's body in the cornucopia in a way she way visible from the outside and you could see she was wounded but not that she was dead. Maia wanted us to sit in the cornucopia but I didn't think that would be smart so we sat at the edge of the open field waiting for the careers.

And they came. They were laughing and talking very loudly.

"I got three kills" one of the boys bragged.

"What the fuck" a girl yelled when she saw Claire.

The boy, who couldn't see Claire yet, said: "Yeah, I'm amazing."

When everyone saw Claire they ran into the cornucopia and triggered the trap. As expected their hair was on fire and total panic came. The one closest to the flamethrower fell to the ground and a cannon rang.

"Three" Maia whispered.

"To the river" someone yelled. The three careers ran out of the cornucopia so we could see the trap worked better than we expected. The clothes of two were on fire and the other one had almost put out her hair.

They ran in a row to a place around six meters to our left. I threw a knife landing in the back of the last one, whose clothes were on fire. He, you could hear his gender from the loud scream that I could feel in my bones, fell to the ground and lyed there burning to death.

"Two, lets move." I whispered and we ran into the forest. To the opposite direction from where the careers went.

Maia Kenn, 15 POV

district 3 female

Day 3, 12 tributes remaining

We had killed three careers.

Only two left.

And Ruby.

This day was planned to be a day to rest. We had picked a beautiful spot around ten minutes away from the cornucopia. In the morning I was sorting the loot we had gotten yesterday and Ruby was hunting for food. I put the saw knife next to the two others I had found the bag we filled with stuff. I opened the first aid kit and put in our own bandages and checked the stuff. Needles, painkillers, bandages and some more pills I didn't know the use for. While sorting a cannon rang. I had no religion but I still wanted help. I put my hands together like I had seen my mother do.

"Please let the cannon not be Ruby, please help us."

I opened my eyes and saw green eyes luring at me from the bushes. I climbed the tree behind me, taking the stuff with me. A boy walked out of the bushes. He was around my age but he was a bit taller. He went through his wild red hair with his fat hand. In his other hand he was holding a crochet knife. I looked at his face, his freckles got interrupted by a gaping wound left to his nose.

"Come down here!" he squicked.

"No"

"I just want to play" He laughed extremely scarily like I had never seen anyone do the laugh galmed through my head. He grinned when he saw my face. I tried to throw one of my knives and it landed in the grass a few meters next to him he picked it up and taunted me with it.

"Hit me, hit me"

He started climbing the tree I was in and I threw another knife. It cut through his shirt and landed in the bark. He got it out easily. I had one more knife. The one with the saw blade. I climbed higher and he followed. I was an ok climber so I was a few meters higher. I couldn't miss. So I took something I wouldn't miss with. I sawed through a big branch above me and threw it down to him horizontally. The heavy brach hit him hard on the head and he fell down to the ground getting knocked unconscious. I dropped carefully and took my last knife. I brought the knife to his neck and hesitated, was I going to kill a kid? I slit his throat with shivering hands and my tears dripped on his body.

I waited half an hour next to the body

An hour.

More than an hour.

Then I accepted Ruby's death. Tears ran down my face.

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to yell.

I wanted to curse at the gamemakers.

But I didn't I sat there in silence next to the boy's body. The gamemakers wanted to pick it up so I stumbled away.

I ate the leftover food from the nights before. I climbed in a tree, still crying, I sat there in my sleeping bag waiting for the faces to show in the sky. They first showed my district partner who died in the morning, then they showed the boy from five his eyes looked at me and I stared back. I killed that boy. Then they showed the female from nine and it ended.

It took me a while to realise Ruby was alive.

Ruby Mossel, 18 POV

district four female

Day 4, 9 tributes remaining

I had been running after this girl for fifteen minutes, but it felt like an iturnity!

Yesterday the leftover careers found me while hunting. I ran the opposite direction of camp so the careers wouldn't find Maia. I ran for an hour before I was sure they weren't following me anymore. But the problem was I didn't know the way back! When a cannon rang I cursed and some time later another one rang. I was sure Maia died until I didn't see her face in the sky.

During last night I was obnoxious, constantly checking my surroundings and listening if I could hear someone. Late in the night I fell asleep and early this morning I was woken by this girl. She was trying to sneak up to me but her steps were too loud and they woke me out of my light sleep. I had leaped up and tried to track her down. But my muscles were still tired of the running I did a day before and my face was still full of sweat so the girl could run away.

The fifteen minutes had felt longer. My lungs were burning and my face was red. I couldn't take it much longer but I saw the girl was having a hard time too. After around every four steps she almost tumbled but until now she had succeeded to recover. It all changed when they girl fell over a tree strunk. She fell hard face firsts to the ground. She shrieked and stuttered:

"P-please don't kill me."

I looked her in the eyes almost showing mercy. Almost.

"I'm sorry but you have to go. I want to get home too." I

"You did great tho, your family will be proud" I assured her.

"I'm sorry honey" I said, meaning every single word.

She laid there, looking almost satisfied at me. When I killed her I was certain I could hear her say thanks. I moved quickly trying to find my way to the old camp. I thought of Maia, I thought of her black hair and the fact that I missed her. I knew it wasn't good to build a friendship in the arena but I didn't really care. The friendship was there. Period.

While walking I recognised more and more things, I knew I was heading the right way when I found the river back. On my trip I another cannon. I hoped and hoped.

When I arrived at the tree we had slept I saw her. Maia was sitting with her back to the tree. I started running to her and she noticed me. She gave me a big warm hug. I told her what happened last day and she told me about her fight with the boy from five. I was surprised Maia had killed someone by herself.

We looked through the stuff Maia sorted together and took the things we wanted. I took a big knife, some food, bandages and a canteen full of water. Maia took the same things with the only adjustment being extra knives. Another cannon rang. I jumped up looking at the sky. A hovercraft stopped about onehundert meters to our left.

"Want to look at whl the killer is?" I asked Maia.

Maia answered with a simple nod.

While sprinting my heartbeat was raising like crazy, if it were the careers we were screwed. If it was one of the two left outliers we were lucky. My feet landed hard on the ground and they hurt every step. I slowed down so Maia could run next to me. We arrived at the spot where the hovercraft was in under a minute. We were lucky, a boy was packing some supplies from what looked like a camp. That he killed the girl was confirmed by the pool of blood on the ground.

"If you sneak up I will throw" Maia whispered into my ear and she pointed at her knives.

I snuck around until I was almost standing next to the boy. I knew Maia had missed a few times yesterday but I was confident she would hit someone. The first knife landed in his feet and he screamed from pain. The second knife flew through the air so quickly after the first one I didn't have time to look at Maia. The second knife landed in the ground. The third knife landed in the boy's, who was trying to get up and run away, shoulder. I rushed out of the bushes and finished him off. His cannon rang. Maia picked up her knives and we walked away, looking for a place to sleep.

Maia Kenn, 15 POV

District Three Female

Day 5, 5 tributes remaining

We woke up together under the tree we had picked last night. We woke up to a big wall of fire that had already burned through a lot of trees. Ruby packed her stuff while I tested if the rope we had would burn easily, already thinking of a plan. The rope was completely on fire within seconds but it didn't burn away that fast. We ran through the forest in the direction from the edge of cornucopia. A wall of fire separated us. I had to go left and she was forced to go right. I guessed my path would be longer because we were already able to see to cornucopia on our right. I was alone again but I had my stuff and the backpack from our first days. I heard a cannon and started running faster. I arrived at the edge of the cornucopia and looked at the dead body of the last outlier with a career standing next to it.

Ruby rushed onto the field and I saw how she was tricked, behind a case the other career put out his leg, letting her trip. But Ruby recovered by doing a roll and landing on two legs. They started dueling. All careers were fighting each other while I had some time alone. I looked at the sky and noticed the sun was extremely bright. I came out of the bushes but still stayed at the edge. As expected the grass was very dry. The grass would burn good.

I put the beginning of my rope around a strunk and started running around the circle. I heard a connon and looked to see Ruby pulling back her axe from the boy's head, that was split in two parts. I ran harder, almost sprinting and came back at the strunk. I connected the two pieces of rope. The rope formed a perfect circle around the cornucopia. I only needed to take a… BOOM! another cannon rang. I looked and saw Ruby lying on the ground without any sparkle of life. Tears came rolling down my face but I made them go away:

"I didn't kill her." I said to myself.

The last career looked at me and screamed:

"What are you gonna do now? Without your friend."

I took the matches I had hidden in my pocket and ignited a lot of them. Throwing them at the rope around the strunk. The rope caught fire and it spread around in a circle. Then the grass caught fire too and the whole floor was burning. I took all the knives I got and started running into the fire, I knew it would hurt but if I could kill her faster it was fine. I aimed a knife and threw. I had missed my target, who was surprised by the fire, completely. The pain was imense and aiming was hard. I threw another one, this time more precise, I hit the girl in the leg. She yelled something at me I couldn't hear. She was holding a big sword and tried to run at me but I slowed her down by hitting her leg. I aimed another time and hit the girl in the waist. She started stumbling instead of walking. I rushed forward, trying to ignore the pain, while constantly tossing knives at the girl. Out of five I hit one in her arm. We were just five meters apart when I slowed down. I threw one of my last knives and missed. I threw another one and missed again by some centimeters. I had two more knives I threw one and it hit her other leg. She fell to the ground screaming, still holding her sword. I wasn't going to take any risks and threw the last knife from a distance. It just missed her head. I rushed to the cornucopia picking up the knife that flew far away, not wanting to get close to the girl so she could pierce me with her sword. I climbed on the cornucopia and pulled of my pants. The pants had caught fire. I checked my wounds. My legs were almost burned completely to my knees.

I got up to look at the girl. She was desperately trying to get up but she couldn't. The fire was almost gone but it burned her enough when it was still knee high and she was lying in it. Her sword laid in the grass, a few meters next to her. I saw her breathing, slowly. Her clothes were burned away and her skin was full of wounds. I dropped down from the cornucopia. Instantly regretting it. The pain was horrible when my injured legs hit the ground. I stumbled over to the girl and slit her throat. This time without hesitation. She had killed Ruby.

"Maia Kenn you are the winner of the 167th Hunger Games!" the head gamemaker announced.

Bruh..

Didn't have wifi and google documents didn't work.

I chose to kill Ruby instread of Maia because…. idk.

I don't know if the flamethrower trap worked.. ask Maia.

I will probably be updating less because of my holliday.