Chapter 6: Career Rumble

Nearly another week passes without incident. No new deaths.

But on Day 11, all hell breaks loose. And it starts with my boyfriend.

He is still on his remarkably straight journey through the trees, when three Careers emerge out of them. Three of the five Career survivors. Since the volcanic eruption, most of them are half-naked with their skin signed, and they look worse for wear.

But their harrowing deal has done nothing to their rippling muscles.

Yet my boyfriend shows no fear. He pulls a trusty knife, which he has already proven remarkably skilled with - his father, Markus Abernathy, is the tanner for almost the whole district.

The three Careers attack. The first is the Asian boy, a volunteer for District 4 named Jayson (at least I think his name is Jayson), who swings at my love with a branch as a weapon, which Haymitch ducks. Haymitch slices through his chest as though it is paper. Then she spins and slices another boy, one of the two males from District 2 before kicking him down. The other District 2 boy Haymitch punches full in the face. Chest bleeding, Jayson lunges for Haymitch again with the branch. This time, the knife gets Jayson in the neck and he collapses.

Haymitch moves to take out one of the District 2 boys, but the boy grabs his knife arm. They grapple for the blade, soon down on the ground and tussling. Neither of them notices the dying Jayson, hands at his throat, his legs beginning to dangerously twitch from blood loss.

The two tributes briefly fight over Jayson's dropped branch, before falling back to the grass again, Haymitch beneath. Somehow, he lost his knife in the tussle, so both boys fight with the only weapon they have left: their hands. They roll around on the ground - at one point right over Jayson's body - until my boyfriend gets on top as the Career's hand tries to push his face away.

So Haymitch simply bites him. I've seen him fight in the district before, and he is not above playing dirty.

"GRRRRR!" the Career growls.

Jayson finally dies. The bite gives Haymitch enough time to lunge for his knife in the grass and he just gets a hold of it when the Career holds him back. Pinning Haymitch, the Career begins to methodically push the knife towards my boyfriend. I stand still with fear. "Haymitch..." I whisper, wanting to sob but unable to.

Haymitch barely keeps the blade from pressing into his neck. He twists violently, flipping the Career over and seizing the knife, slices it across his throat, just as he was surely shown in Training.

He looks up to see the last boy from 2 - whom I had almost completely forgotten about - rush over and slam Jayson's branch into Haymitch's face. That damn branch!

The last Career gets Haymitch into an execution position with the District 12 tribute's own knife and is about to deal the death blow when -

He coughs up blood. Feels beside his head, and then falls over lifeless. Haymitch scrambles away, his life spared but deeply confused as to how. What -?

Maysilee Donner suddenly emerges from the trees, armed with a blowdart dipped in the arena's poison. She has done well for herself over the last week and a half, and the arena has not ruined her natural beauty yet. "We'd live longer with two of us," she rationalizes.

"Guess you just proved that," Haymitch concedes, and I know from experience just how much it takes for my boyfriend to be impressed. "Allies?"

She nods.

My father promptly swears at this turn of events, loudly asking anyone who will listen why this is happening now. I don't mind. Thanks to Maysilee's intercession, Haymitch has survived a tussle with three Careers. Only thirteen tributes now remain: a girl from 1, a girl from 2, a girl from 3, a boy from 5, a girl from 7, a boy from 8, three tributes from 9, a girl from 10, a boy from 11 and Haymitch and Maysilee. This is all according to my cousin Anna, who notes how District 12 is only one of two districts to get multiple tributes this far.

I sob into my pillow in relief that night.