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"You really did it," Reeve muses while District 8 is doing their interviews. They are quite dull, as are all the other Tributes, so I haven't been paring much attention to the other discussions. But I rather pay attention that listen to Reeve make me out as a fool. "I can't believe you actually did it."
"I can't believe you actually prompted me," I snap. "Now shut up and listen."
"Really just wanted to see how far you would go." He smiles slyly. "To look good in front of an audience. For all you know, you could be breaking some kind of major rule. They could have to—"
"Shut up," I growl. "Or I'll have to gut you."
He rolls his eyes. "Very mature."
The boy from District 3 glances nervously in out direction, like he's afraid he's going to get in trouble for our actions.
"I can't believe it," he mutters under his breath, obviously not for me to hear, but I do nevertheless. I huff a sigh, wishing that three minutes could so how go faster so I could get the hell out of here.
As it turns out, one of the tributes from District 11 also had a relative in the Games—an aunt or something. This almost always happens, just to give things an extra spin, I guess. I guess they choose from the same families on purpose; it's too bad for them. I'm the rarity, going in voluntarily when my brother didn't even make it out. This aunt of the tribute didn't make it out alive either, but that's not unheard of. Tributes from 11 aren't winners very frequently, although now and again they'll pull an extra tough one.
At last the interviews draw to a close with the girl from 12 bursting into tears thirty seconds before time. They let the rest of the time tick away, and Caesar Flickerman signs off with his arm around the girl, who seems to look even more bedraggled than she usually does, coming from District 12 and all.
I think it's all very pathetic. If you've resigned to death, at least go down fighting, not balling like a child. Reeve on the other hand shakes his head sympathetically, as if he wouldn't slit the girl's throat as soon as we landed in the arena.
"You look gorgeous, darling," Berlin sashays over to me and Reeve. "Very dapper, sir," she says to Reeve, straightening the collar of his heavily pressed and admittedly plain suit. He still looks handsome though, but that's not really saying much, considering you could but him a barrel and he would still be a stunner.
I rise from my seat and smile at Berlin, fusing over us like we were her own children. Frankly, I find it a bit annoying, but at the same time it feels good to have someone paying attention to me for once.
I begin to look around, and find Crystilla, standing by an extremely agitated looking Liare, and glowering at me.
I begin to push through the crowd, determined to get through the rest of my life without seeing Crystilla again, but Berlin stops me.
"Where are you going, Silly?" She asks, and she sound a bit miffed, and her smile is looking more and more forced every second. "You have to wait to be escorted. By your mentors."
"You wish," I mutter under my breath. "I know that," I say in a louder voice, but I can tell she heard my remark. She looks at me through narrowed eyes. "I'm just about to go over to Crystilla."
"Of course," She murmurs, still gazing at me. I start in the direction on Crystilla, but as soon as her eyes are else where, I dash into a car with a few other tributes from a variety of districts.
I'm obviously the highest ranking of all of them, and when I slide in, the chatter comes to a halt.
I make a joke about escaping from mentors, thinking there are none present. Then I notice the girl wedged in the corner of the seat across from, dangerously close to being crushed by who I assume are her tributes. They are huge and muscular, but they seem to cower in the presence of their mentor, a slight girl, not even a woman yet, with skinny arms and a fresh young face. I recognize her as the thirteen year old from District 5 who won two, maybe three years ago. No one had believed that a child could have won, let alone a petite little thing like her, but they had made you mentor anyway. So far she hadn't gotten any tributes out alive, but if these brutes were afraid of her, she must have some brains.
I decide it would be more appropriate for me to remain silent for the rest of the trip.
We all spill out of the car and trail into the Training center building, and I end up in the same elevator with the little girl and her tributes—Dalia, I think her name was. Her beasts take up most of the elevator, so she and I are forced to stand obnoxiously close to each other.
I look at my feet awkwardly as she sizes me up, like she was the powerful one in this enclosed space. I had to be at least two years older than her, and roughly twice her size, and I'm not particularly big.
She doesn't say anything the whole ride, but when the elevator stops on the second floor with a ping, she smirks at me cockily, like there's something I don't know. A big juicy secret right under my nose.
I duck into my room, paranoid about meeting anyone who will tell me off for my actions in general tonight. I wash the make up off my face, and change into more comfortable clothing for the recaps of the interviews. I've accepted the fact that I will not be able to go for very long without seeing Crystilla again—maybe an hour or two more at most—and prepare for a very intense reprimanding.
But when I join everyone else, including Liare, in the television room for the recaps, no one says anything to me. Not a word.
Crystilla frowns through the whole thing, and commends neither Reeve nor me our spectacular performances. Spectacular, according to Berlin at least. Liare won't even look at me, which is pretty low, even for him.
"Go to bed," Crystilla and Tennyson order at almost exactly the same time, and push Reeve and me out of the room. They follow us, and I see Tennyson stopping Reeve a little ways down the hall. Crystilla doesn't say anything.
"Any final words of advice?" I prompt.
"Finally admitting someone knows more than you. Maybe you're not all that, huh?" Crystilla smirks. I am not amused. Of course she's knows more than me, in this field anyway. She did make it out, right? Does she think I'm stupid or something? "Anyway," she continues, ignoring my annoyed look, "I might as well say it. I have no advice for you."
This takes me off guard. "None?" I ask. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure." Crystilla glances over her shoulder, and sees Reeve and Tennyson bumping shoulders, Reeve's face beaming like he's just been given the best guidance anyone could ever ask for. Crystilla steps into my field of vision, blocking them.
"Maybe I should just go over there and ask Tennyson," I snap.
"No, no. He's not your mentor. But as I was saying, the best advice I can give you is, wing it."
Wingit? That's all she can say? "Seriously, Crystilla, I'm going to ask Tennyson."
"Come on." She snorts, like I would actually have the nerve to do it. "We wrote the book together. He told Reeve the exact same thing. You guys are smart. Independent. Remember, we'll still be there to give you what you need. You'll do better that way."
"Thanks," I mutter. I'm convinced Tennyson had some way better advice than Crystilla, but by the time she was done lecturing me about how much better I'll do on my own, without any advice, he was gone. I don't believe a word of about her and Tennyson "writing the book together," whatever that means.
I push the door of my room open and fall into bed, not bothering to change my clothes. I close my eyes, draw the curtains, order warm milk, and do everything I can possibly think of, but sleep fails to find me. I have no anxiety for what is to come tomorrow, but I cannot rest. And every precious moment is important.
Finally, after all else fails of course, I go down to the infirmary and tell them that my hand is paining me, though to tell the truth I haven't thought about it all week. They give me some pain killers and sleeping pills, and I almost don't make it back to my room, dozing off several times on the elevator ride.
Though I do sleep, it's not very peaceful. I dream of little girls stalking through tall grass, knives flying through the air, tributes screaming, last breaths, and weeping.
I want to wake up, but there's a thick, heavy fog impeding me. I can't even move.
My prep team arouses me at some unholy hour to start getting me ready; when I ask them for coffee, they just laugh at me.
"Tributes aren't allowed coffee," says the one with the spiky hair. "They'll get too jittery. No one's been sneaking it to you, have they?"
"No." It's not even a lie. No one's been sneaking me anything. Having it deliver to me on a platter, yes, sneaking, no. Imustbespecial, I decide.
My prep team chatters about how exciting the Games are going to be this year, who's going to die first, and whom they think is going to make it out. I am a main topic of most of these banters, but they act like I'm not even there.
When one of them pulls on my hair so hard I'm sure my head must be bleeding, I've had enough.
"Will you shut up already?" I snap, and the conversation comes to an abrupt halt. "Or at least talk about something interesting."
Silent as the night, they go about working on me. I suppose they didn't have anything else to talk about, but I would have thought they could have mustered up something to say about themselves. But no. They do not speak.
I dawns upon me then: I frightened them. Good, three down, the rest of the world to go.
What seems like hours later, the door opens and Liare steps in and glares at me—that seems to be the only way he'll ever acknowledge me now. He taps his foot as they wind my hair into cornrows and tight braids. He taps his foot as they paint my perfectly rounded nails a pale peach, and dot them with tiny intricate little flowers. What the point of doing my nails is, in such feminine fashion as well, I don't know. Liare taps his foot the entire time, like he shouldn't be wasting his time on me, but his mother made him.
At long last, they finish, and Liare takes over leading the way to the Launch room, silently of course.
It's charming little room, with a couch and some posters, a table and some books, like I'll have some reading time before I get shot up into the arena.
LIare gives me what looks like a thin leotard, fur boots, what seems to be a poncho, and some fresh undergarments. Firstly I think how impractical these boots will be—tromping around in these clunkers will be a task—and second, I think of how badly this will all look together. Whoever came up with these insane get-ups was thinking of neither functionality nor fashion.
"I look ridiculous!" I complain, but Liare just shrugs. "None of this was my idea," is all he says.
I sit down on the couch a while, and examine the posters on the walls. They all turn out to be pictures on previous victors, just to motivate us, I guess.
Liare barley looks up when they announce launch, and I as I step onto my metal plate, the fact this is irreversible dawns upon me. Irreversible, as in, none of it can be undone. No turning back. Ever. None. I have chosen my fate, whether good or bad.
I have to blink twice when my metal plate rises into the arena. One second I smell the pines under my nose, and the next I see swirling dust. Truthfully, I am standing in the biting cold and wind, snow flurries swirling around me. I suppose that's what the boots and poncho are for. I still shiver despite my gear.
"Welcome to the sixty-third Hunger Games!" The voice of Claudius Templesmith, official announcer of the Hunger Games, booms all around us. I just have time to locate and make note of where the Cornucopia is. My vision is impeded by the flurries, but I can still see the snow drift in my mind's eye, right before me, maybe a couple of hundred feet away.
"May the odds be ever in your favor!" Templesmith booms. The glass is raised and I am nearly blinded by the snow. I haven't even looked around for any of my allies, and now I am going to be stumbling around in a blizzard. I manage to make out the shape of a poised body and few plates away from me, waiting like a strung bow, anticipating, but I can't tell who it is. Thirty seconds until the conch horn, I'd guess. Twenty. Ten.
It blows about five seconds before I expect, but I still bolt in the direction I think is the Cornucopia… and immediately collide with someone who obviously thinks otherwise.
I throw them off me, jump over their limp body—with any luck they'll freeze to death, or at least get the bottom of the barrel when it came to the Cornucopia, and everything of use would be gone.
I put my hand out in front of me, a simple way to avoid crashing into any other tributes, and start running. The boots have surprisingly good traction in the snow, and after running in circle for another minute or so, me hands meet a cold metal surface. Only, it's the tail, not the mouth. I'llhavetokeepgoingaround, I think.
I skirt around the base of the horn, but either no one else has found it, or whoever else may be attempting this method has somehow not reached me. On a sudden hunch that I may need some assistance, I start moving in the other direction and someone else touches my hand.
I have to squint to recognize the face, that belongs to the miraculously warm hand. Luna. Good. I had an unreasonable fear that it would be someone like Reeve, or some other random Tribute.
"Enobaria?" She shouts. I find this unnecessary because I am standing right next to her.
"Yes!" I snap. "I think we're the first ones here. I need someone to carry everything!" I start off. Luna is so stealthy that I have to look over my shoulder frequently to make sure she's actually following me. She's unusually quiet, for her.
The next time I look back, she's not there. I stop dead and back track until I trip over something.
"Oof!" the breath escapes from my lungs as I land on the ground. No, not on the ground. On Luna. I expect her to cry out, make a noise, to do something. Then I notice the blood trickling out onto the snow, and the arrow right at the base of her spine.
I jump back just before an arrow sends an explosion of snow in the air, right where I was standing just seconds ago. I look to the front of the Cornucopia and see the boy from District 5, holding a bow and wearing a pair of goggles and a sneer.
From were he's standing, the Games could be over in matter of minutes. He could kill anyone and everyone who comes near him, and anyone who had the good sense to run wouldn't be able to go for very long, because there's no possible way anything could sustain life in this icy desert.
The cannon finally fires; I suppose Luna wanted to spend the last moments of her life in silence, without crying out in pain, even when I landed on her.
Another arrow plants itself in the ground dangerously close to my foot. I run as fast as I can without tripping over my boots until I smack into someone else.
They wrestle me to the ground, and I instinctively go for their throat with my teeth. Isn't really an effective method of killing a man, but when you aren't armed, you don't have much of a choice.
"This doesn't seem like such a good place for a snuggle." The body underneath me is strong and muscular, and I'd know that voice anywhere.
"Reeve!" I stand up quickly, and warmth rushes into my already flushed cheeks. "Sorry about that," I mutter.
"You frequently try to kill your allies?" He asks, aggravatingly smug. This isn't the time or place for jokes, so I ignore him.
"Where are the others?" I ask impatiently. He shrugs.
"Everyone is still stumbling around, I guess. Except you and whoever that cannon was for." He sounds bored. I suppose he didn't expect one of our own to be the first to die.
"Not everyone." I point to the mouth of the Cornucopia. I'd come full circle before I found Reeve. He steps to see into it, and I don't have time to warn him. Just act.
"No!" I tackle him to the ground. The wave of relief that passes over me is short lived.
"Agrh!" Reeve lets out a strangled cry, and my stomach drops. The arrow has somehow managed to hit him.
Blood is spilling out of the wound, which appears to be in his arm.
"Don't pull it out!" I order. Cloth. I need cloth for a bandage, and then maybe I can remove the head. "Break off the shaft," I instruct, but Reeve is already doing just that. He takes a deep breath.
"I'm fine," he says, a little wearily. "Don't worry about me. Right now we need to figure out how to get up to the Cornucopia."
I realize there is no real method to get up to the Cornucopia. The boy from 5 has got it guarded from all angles, and all of the weapons are at his disposal, and no one else's.
"We can't do anything!" I say desperately.
"Shh," Reeve consoles. "We'll figure something out." He notices me shiver and offers his good arm. I huddle close to him and he wraps it around me. Almost like old times. Almost. In old times we weren't plotting ways to stay alive. I almost wish things were back to normal. Almost. I put the thought out of my mind.
I stand out, deciding not to play right into Reeve's hand. He probably knew I was going to do just what I did. I curse myself for being so predictable.
"Wait here," I say. "I'll find someone else. Hello?" I have a feeling that the home viewers, despite being amused by the inevitable crashes, aren't having much fun watching tributes stumble around in the snow, and they probably wanted more than a trickle of blood from Luna.
Someone else emerges from the snow, rubbing himself. Fayne.
"Great," he says immediately. "Where's the Cornucopia?" I gesture with my head and we start for it at a run.
"You can't go over there without some sort of a plan." I fill him in the boy from 5.
He sighs. "We should've picked him up!" he says with scolding ferocity. "I guess that's why I heard a cannon shot. Know who it was?"
"Luna," I answer quietly, and he curses. Another cannon shot splits through the air.
"How do we deal with this guy?" I have no ideas, so I remain silent.
"We'll just have to figure it out, then." He charges.
I hope we figure it out.
I kind of feel like my chapters always end really weird...
Anyway, if you liked it, review! If you didn't like it, reveiw!... Please :)