Exhausted

'Maya?' I start violently, jerking my heavy head off my hands and blink stupidly up at Seeder and Finnick who have just entered the District Eleven booth together. It takes me several seconds to focus my exhausted brain but as soon as I do, I glance over at Rue's screen and breathe a sigh of relief; it's two o'clock in the morning and the arena is so dark that I can barely make her out, but the live monitors at the bottom of the screen tell me everything I need to know. Rue is curled in a foetal position in a wide fork between two think branches. Yesterday, after spending two freezing nights in the arena, she stumbled across a large area of dry rushes and spent the day weaving herself a blanket to keep the wind off. I was already impressed when she amazed me even further by folding the construction over on itself and sewing up the edges with bits of creeper. She then placed several armfuls of the sodden moss in the hot sun to dry for several hours and when the chill of evening came along, she stuffed the blanket with it. It seems to be doing the trick; last night her body temperature dropped too low and she was forced to get down from her tree several times in order to warm herself up, a risky business, because the Careers were on the prowl again.

In just a few hours, the sun will rise on the tributes' fourth day in the arena. So far it's been pretty uneventful for my best friend; she's spent her time searching for food and spying on the Career's base camp when they vacate it to hunt for other tributes. I only hope that she continues to watch only and doesn't try to make a raid on their supplies. From the Capitol, we watched the boy from District Three carefully extricate the buried mines from around the Cornucopia. Somehow, he managed to fiddle with the complex internal wiring and reactivate the things, which, as far as I'm aware, is a total first in the History of the Hunger Games. He then buried them carefully around the Career's pile of stores so that they don't have to leave a guard when they go out on the hunt.

'Maya?' I start again and look back towards Seeder and Finnick.

'S-sorry…' The word is broken by a long, jaw-breaking yawn. 'N-nothing to report; they're both still asleep. Oh and someone has signed over another large sum of credit to Thresh.' I glance down at the device that tells me the precise amount with a measure of both disbelief and anger; disbelief that people here have so much money and that someone in the Capitol is clearly awake at this time to complete the transaction, and anger at the fact that the column beside it, Rue's column, still shows a grand total of zero. Seeder places a hand on my shoulder and squeezes gently which makes me squirm away mechanically.

'I'm here now and Chaff has promised to be here first thing in the morning. You can go to bed.' I'm shaking my head before she has even finished the sentence; she's been saying the same thing for the past three days. I don't know why she thought I'd listen now, when I haven't before.

'No, I have to be here.' My voice comes out sounding flat and emotionless. I'm simply stating a fact; I have to be here, this is not up for discussion.

'Maya, you're not doing Rue any favours by keeping yourself up for three days without rest.' I glance over at Finnick with some irritation, because he has no business being in our booth and no business telling me what to do. His expression stops the snappy retort before it can leave my mouth because for the first time since I met him he seems to be serious and sincere. 'You need to be alert if you want to help her. You need to trust your fellow mentors, they're your team mates. You're no good to Rue if you're like a zombie from lack of sleep. You're not a machine.'

'Sheb, look, we're a team. I know you want to protect me and that's okay but you can't if you're like a zombie from lack of sleep. You're not a machine.' I gasp, totally unprepared for the sudden onslaught of memory and find myself blinking back the easy tears that always surface when thoughts of my older brother catch me unawares.

'How…?' I choke out the word and wipe my hand furiously across my eyes. I am suddenly and dizzyingly angry at Finnick; because of his interference, because he brought my brother into the conversation and because I know, deep down, that he is right.

'I was a mentor last year too, Maya.' I nod once, avoiding eye contact with him. 'Go and get some rest.'

'Stop telling me what to do!' I snap childishly, before I can stop myself and I immediately feel my face growing hot. It takes a Herculanean effort to pull myself out of the immature fit of temper so that I can apologise and regain some of my dignity.

'S-sorry Finnick, I… I know that you're right.' I turn to Seeder. 'Are you sure you'll be okay, without me?' I feel my face growing even hotter before I've even finished the question; of course Seeder is going to be okay. She actually knows what she's doing. The fact that I made it home alive last year is purely down to her. 'Will you wake me up if anything changes?'

'Of course Maya.' Seeder pulls me up out of the chair and crushes me against her chest, kissing the top of my head. I squirm away automatically, embarrassed to be treated like the child I am in front of Finnick. Maybe it's because I don't feel like a child anymore. The past year has increased my mental age by several decades and my body is slow to catch up.

'Get away from the situation for a couple of hours. Get some food and some sleep. Nothing will happen until the morning.' I want to ask Seeder how she can be so sure because we are talking about the arena and the Gamemakers unpredictability, but I'm afraid of coming across as a stroppy child again.

'Okay,' I finally say, slowly and reluctantly, 'but just a couple of hours.' I clarify, turning to go. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch Seeder mouthing a silent 'thank you,' to Finnick and my face suddenly flushes again. I walk out of the mentors' suite as quickly as I can without actually running. Seeder's right about one thing; as guilty as it makes me feel, I do need to get away from the situation for a couple of hours.

The District Eleven apartment is sunk in half-light and the silence around me seems unnatural and oppressive as I tiptoe quickly over to my own room, my heart-rate accelerating with anticipation. It's so stupid because there is clearly no physical threat and I should be relishing the time to myself, away from the mentors suite and the multiple television screens and cameras. I glance up at the dark ceiling involuntarily and shudder because I know that the solitude here is just an illusion and the walls here are probably just as laced with hidden cameras and microphones. If he wanted to, I'm sure that President Snow could watch me in the shower if he felt so inclined. The thought repulses me.

Shutting the door between me and the eerie loneliness of the rest of the apartment makes me feel slightly better. My suite of rooms is almost exactly how I left it although someone has tidied the bed clothes and there's a new outfit hanging in front of the wardrobe; a dress the colour of the sky on a summer's day. I override the automatic lighting until the room is illuminated with a gentle orange glow that reminds me of the dying embers of a fire. Then I quickly assess my body's needs; sleep is clearly of highest priority but I also need to wash and eat something. I cross over to the bedside table and use the silver mouthpiece to order the first two items on the menu without bothering to find out what they are. I take a shower as I wait for the food to arrive, hitting blindly at the knobs and dials on the walls so that I am assaulted with a deluge of icy water as well as several different types of soaps, shampoos and conditioners all at the same time. It takes me several minutes to wash off the various cosmetics and by the time I step out of the shower, my skin is tingling all over and I'm shivering violently but I also feel more alive and more awake than I have in days. I ignore the pressurised air that will dry me instantly and wrap myself instead in a thick towel before making my way back to the bedroom.

The food is sat on the bedside table; a thick onion soup with fingers of buttery toast and a large slice of Madeira cake. I'm suddenly starving and I can't get the food into my mouth fast enough. Although there is always stuff available in the mentors' suit, I haven't really been eating much of it. The rich canapés and almost indigestible pastries have become less and less appealing to me as the days have gone by. Less than five minutes later, I slump back against the thick downy pillows as my earlier tiredness returns with a vengeance. I close my eyes and let my body sink into the soft mattress. It feels good to be able to let go, if only for a little while. Nightmares are usually no stranger to me when my head is as disturbed as it is now but tonight my brain has granted me a reprieve and the next time I open my eyes the room is full of bright sunlight.

I sit up too quickly and it takes several seconds for my head to catch up with the rest of my body. Then I look over to the window and almost instantly, I am aware that I have slept long past the intended two hours because the sun is already low over the west of the Capitol. I push shaky legs out of bed and stand up, head swimming. How long was I asleep for? I glance around wildly, hoping to find a clock or some other indication somewhere in the room but there's nothing. The room is almost identical to how it was last night except that the dirty crockery has been cleared away and a basket of fresh breakfast pastries and fruit now sits on the bedside table.

Instead, I stagger over to the window to look at the sky which would normally tell me the time very accurately if I were at home in District Eleven. Here, the rugged skyline of tall buildings makes it harder but I come to the conclusion that it is early evening, perhaps five or six o'clock and that means that I've been asleep for around fourteen hours which would explain why my head feels so woozy.

Rue. Panic seers through me, erasing all trace of the lingering sleepiness in my body and mind. Anything could've happened in the last fourteen hours; I have to get back to the mentors' suite as fast as possible. I can only hope that Seeder really would've come good on her promise if anything had happened to Rue during that time. I glance down at my body, suddenly becoming aware that I am stark naked and that the damp towel from last night's shower is piled on the floor over by the bed. I suppose that will make things quicker.

I cross over to the bathroom to use the facilities before returning to the room to find some clothes. The dress that Clio has selected for me is still hanging from the wardrobe door and I pull it over my head without any hesitation; as much as I'd like to rebel and choose something else to wear from the vast selection in the wardrobe, I don't have the time, and anyway Clio seems to have noted my earlier remonstration and is now providing me with decent clothes once again.

I make my way to the mentors' suite in record time but as I step out of the lift, the noises coming from the room beyond the carved wooden door directly across from me, suddenly has my heart skipping as adrenaline thrills through my veins. My joints lock and for half a second I am frozen in place, with one foot inside the lift and the other on the thick plush carpet of the hall. Then I am pushing open the door to the room, with no recollection of ever crossing the intervening space.

'What?' My exclamation is not heard over the noise in the room beyond because the arena is on fire and the huge screen opposite the door shows an aerial shot of a scene of total destruction. The camera flicks back to a more normal view of the Career group surrounding a tall oak tree, seemingly containing a cornered victim. I pause only long enough to ascertain that it isn't Rue before I sprint over to our booth.

'What happened?'

'Maya,' Seeder's voice is surprisingly calm, considering the situation.

'Hello Miss Maya,' Chaff says jovially, waving a hand containing a delicate cut-glass goblet in my general direction and slopping its contents all over himself in the process. The smell of raw spirits makes my head spin from the other side of the booth and I gag involuntarily.

'What happened?' I repeat. My searching eyes find Rue's screen and I exhale a long breath of relief as I see that she is alive. After the initial relief, I become aware of her situation and turn in horror towards Seeder.

'How did she get up there? And do they know she's there?' Because Rue is perched high in the branches of an ancient oak tree at the edge of a small clearing. It's the same clearing that I saw seconds earlier and below her the tributes from the Career pack are grouped around another tree, predators surrounding a cornered quarry.

'They don't know that she's up there,' Seeder reassures me quickly. 'They're more focused on the girl from District Twelve.' I spin in a quick circle so that I can see the footage that is being broadcast onto the main screen on the wall behind me and feel my heart twinging slightly when I see Katniss Everdeen's terrified face peering out through the foliage of another oak tree. I still feel that strange connection to her, in spite of the fact that I have never met her in person and probably never will now; she's trapped with no way out.

'Rue will be able to escape after night fall.' I'm actually rather surprised by Chaffs sobriety in spite of the glass of liquor he is holding and his earlier over-the-top greeting.

'There was a fire?' I ask shakily, sinking into a chair without taking my eyes off my best friend; Rue is trembling with fear and exhaustion and there is a long burn on her arm which looks excruciatingly painful. She needs medicine but we can't get it to her without the necessary funds.

'The Gamemakers set about a third of the arena on fire.' Seeder presses a button on the holographic device in the centre of the table and the arena is beamed up into the air in front of me. My eyes flick down briefly, noting the area she is pointing at before returning to Rue. 'Clearly they intended to drive the remaining tributes together which was obviously successful given the situation that Katniss and Rue are now in. Several of the others were also close at the time but they are now moving outward again.' I glance down at the holograph again, noting that two of the pulsating blue dots are creeping slowly outward from the clearing. I lean in closer to read the labels; the girl from Five and the boy from Ten. Not that it matters.

I look back towards Rue's screen and bite my lip hard to stop the hopeless, panicky tears that are now pricking at the corners of my eyes at her desperate situation and the pain that she is clearly in. I can't do anything except sit here and watch.

'Why didn't you wake me up? You promised!' I say, loudly, suddenly lashing out at Seeder, despite the fact that I know it is unfair of me to do so.

'I'm sorry, Maya,' Seeder doesn't react to my rudeness; instead her voice seems to get even more gentle and this only serves to make me even more angry towards her. 'I was too busy trying to put pressure on the Gamemakers to stop the bombardment. Sometimes in the past they have been known to listen to us mentors. Rarely…' Her voice trails off; clearly they were unsuccessful this time.

I wonder how many of the other mentors were with her. I'll bet that Finnick tried to help. I realise that I'm finally starting to mellow slightly towards Finnick. In spite of his 'golden boy of the Capitol' persona, he's not all bad. I guess that sometimes you have to make the best out of the situation you find yourself in. I grimace ruefully and turn back to Seeder; I'm not ready to let this go; she should've woken me up when Rue was in danger.

'You could've sent Chaff!' It feels good to point my anger at someone other than myself. I feel so horribly helpless, watching from the comfort of the Capitol as my best friend suffers.

'Chaff only just arrived, a few minutes ago.' Well I suppose that explains his sober state.

'You said you'd be here this morning!' I snap, turning my annoyance onto him instead. I'm hoping that he will react because Seeder is staying so annoyingly calm and collected.

'Then I must've overslept just like you,' Chaff says easily, also refusing to rise at my anger.

'In case you haven't noticed, I…' And suddenly, like a pricked balloon, my anger disappears as quickly as it arrived and I sink slightly in my chair, defeated. 'What do we do?'