Name: Melody Basil
District: 12
Partner: Alive


There's something in the tree

I admit that it's not really smart to start a friendship out here and by no means did I plan to do that. But even if I would've chosen to ally with some one, it would not be her. No, she's not really a big help to me surviving these games. Sure I like the company and she does make me laugh. Truth is it's hard enough surviving on my own, now I have to take care of her as well. But it just kinda happened and now I can't imagine these games without her.

"Good morning, sleepy head" She chimes first thing when my eyes slowly flutter open.

"Morning" I grumble back since I'm not much of a early bird and try to roll myself over so the fine rays of the morning sun don't pierce my sleepy eyes.

"I've gathered breakfast" She says in a sing song voice dragging the 'fast' out trying to pursuede me to wake up.

To be honest this doesn't really thrill me. Since I know there's not much tasty food to find in these woods. But I also know that she must've really done her best to find anything since she has no clue for what to look for. So I put on my best morning smile while turning back around to face her. "Hmmmm smells delicious, what ya cooked, freckles?"

"Raspberry pancakes with cream and hot chocolate sauce on the side, just as you like it" She laughs while dropping herself on the ground beside me, making her brown curls jump in response. She opens her hands and lays her gathering on the ground before her. I look down to see some berries and leaves in various sizes and colours.

"Since I have no idea what goes for food around here I figured I might as well pick something of everything that seemed even ramotely eatable." She shrugs and looks at me for encouragement

"Well... you've done great" I say hoping I made her feel good as I try to spot anything good or well not poisionous in the bunch. "That one will do me just fine" I pick a small sized blue berry of the floor and pop it in my mouth picking out another berry I recognize as okay and handing it to her. "Hmmm, fresh cream not the metalic canny stuff" I smile up to her as we begin our 'trying to imagine we're eating better food then we are' conversation.

"Yeah, I've done mine with strawberries, freshly picked out of our own back garden." She picks the berry out of my hand and pops it in her mouth smiling a big, full smile that always makes her nose crunch up a bit lifting the freckles on her pale white cheeks. "So what's the plan for today?" She always asks this as if I have some master plan in store of how to win these games, which unfortunately I have not.

"What about, searching for food, brainstorming about these numbers and trying not to get killed?" I say while picking some other berries before raising myself up and stretching my arms above my head.

"Same as yesterday then, I like it." She bends over and starts unraveling my hair like she does every morning which always makes me sigh "You know my hair isn't as manageble as yours." envy clearly in my voice as I look at her golden brown smooth curls. Almost a reflection of mine, except my hair is longer and my curls always seem to tangle in eachother. "How can you not even bother to try and straighten yourself out. You know Jake is watching your every move, you should atleast try to look decent for his sake." She knows bringing up Jake makes me feel bad. Cause though as awfull as it sounds, I don't want to think of him.

We've been together now for three years, which for other people is a good a time as any to get married, I'm not so sure it is. I mean sure I love him and I want to be with him for ever but that doesn't mean that it's going to happen. Even if I wouldn't have been chosen for these games. We haven't broken up two times this year for nothing. See, there was this itch in our relationship that we couldn't seem to get rid of: our future.
He wants us to move in together and for me to be a stay at home mom while he is of being a peacekeeper. He says he doesn't want to be one but it's the only way he can see to propperly take care of me. Which seems nice enough if I wanted to be cared for.
I on the other hand didn't think there needed to change much. We could've both found a job, whether in the mines or somewhere else. No moving in together, screaming babies or doing jobs we really don't want to do and go against our believes. This plan seemed much better to me.

Looking back now though it's seems silly that we fought about this so much. What does it really matter? As long as we would've had a future together, everything would've been okay. The rest would've sorten it self out.
But now, in these games, I don't want to think about it. Don't want to think about everything that will never be, everything that I'll miss, never will have.

So I shake her hands of of me, pop two berries in my mouth and hand her the rest. I swipe some dirt and leaves of my black pants and straigten my navy green jacket, exhaling loudly so she knows that I don't apreciate her attempt of bringing him up.

"So, shall we walk a circle around the cornucopia or try to reach the end of this arena?" I ask her as I twirl around in my spot.

"Well, let's see where destiny will take us." She walks over to me with a beaming smile on her face. I stop in mid twirl knowing she's got something on her mind. She crosses her arms while taking my hands
'Come on, which ever way you fall we'll go in that direction' She explains and starts leaning to her left.

Soon we're circling so fast I know our grip won't hold much longer and I start hysterically laughing as I anticipate my fall.
When it happens we're both left on opposite sides laughing our heads of and gripping our stomachs.

"Faith has chosen for us to circle the cornucopia" I say in an all mighty voice between laughs.

"Well let's not keep faith waiting then" She pushes herself up, wipes some dirt of of her and walks over to me, reaching her hand out for support.

"Yeah, cause so far faith has really been on our side" I mumble as I pull myself up. I know she must've heard me cause she squeezes my hand before pulling me into my fallen direction. She starts skipping, trying to lighten my mood and changes the subject "Let's look for some more food along the way. I don't think those strawberry pancakes will last me long" Her positive attitude must be infectious cause I soon start skipping beside her and so we begin our walk in this pretty little forest. Where wolves dressed as grannies lie wait in shadows.

It is relaxing to walk in this forest the makers have built for us. Cause it's beautiful, even more so after the heavy rain we have gotten yesterday. Though the ground is soggy and mud sticks to my boots making it impossible to walk silently. It's well worth it for the way the leaves glisten in the sun and the smell of wet grass that fills every breath of air. The only thought that ruins it all is the knowledge that the game makers made it all. That there are dangers in every rock, leave and stream. It makes me all the more angry, that they can make something so magical and ruin it with death.

I look over at Carlee to see she has no such thoughts. She's simply enjoying her surroundings, I guess its different for her since she's never been in nature.
See, she comes from the science district and says it's only concrete and metal there. She'd never even saw a tree for real before these games and though I want her to enjoy it, I'm also afraid it will make her forget the threat that hides here. So I'm on extra alert, letting her enjoy it all while I listen to every crack of twigs or wush of leaves.

There for I pick it up right away. Stretching my arm out as to stop Carlee in her tracks and pushing my index finger to my lips.
The sound continues in a endless plea, only stopping to catch breath. It takes a while for me to figure out what the sound is. But Carlee has figured it out before me and starts running towards it.
I quickly try to grab for her but my hand only comes up with air.

"Carlee!" I hiss as I pursue after her. Oh no. Why is she doing this? She knows these games, she knows not to trust anything you see or hear here. And now we're both going to die. Cause there was no way that I was not going after her. I nearly reached her when she came to a abrupt stop and had to lay my hand on her back so I wouldn't crash into her.

"What the -" I can't even finish my sentence cause what lays before my eyes catches all of my attention. My blood must've stopped streaming cause I feel paralysed for a awful second before adrenaline comes rushing back in together with coherent thought.

"Carls, back down slowly now." I whisper to her as I take her left hand in mine and start to try and pull her back with me.

She doesn't even budge, she just stands there. Eyes wide and blank, staring but not seeing, seeing but not understanding and then finally. She catches her breath while her right hand slowly goes to cover her mouth. As if taking a pose for the moment to be captured on photo. She takes one step towards the boy and I take one step back, still holding her hand.

"Carlee!" I hiss at her again, hoping I can get her attention this time.

The boy makes a loud wet coughing sound, trying to catch some breath I guess. And that's it, Carlee pulls away from me and stumbles over towards the boy.
Her hands fluttering over his body not knowing what to do.

I can't help it now, I have to look closer. Seeing what is really there, feeling myself going into shock at the scene before me.

The boy is hanging from a great big white barked tree, which makes the red dotting on the bark even more dramatic looking, only instead of rope he's hanging by his intestines. Wrapped around his neck two times and then knotted to a branch. I never knew our intestines were that long. One eye is loosely hanging by it last nerves and akwardly dangles against his cheek. My mind quickly wonderes what the intestines are doing outside of his body, so my eyes slide over to his stomach. Where a violent looking gap slowly empties his body from blood. Other organs are slowly trying to slip out of the gap but Carlee is now trying to close it with her hands, trying to stop his blood from flowing out. With her other hand she fumbles against the intestines around his neck but they're to soaked with blood and other bodily fluids so her hand keeps sliding of them.

A rock sits on the edge of the tree, covered in blood and I know that must've been the object responsible for the gap in his stomach.

Slowly realisation hits, this is not a dream, the boy is not dead yet. Surely with these wounds he wouldn't last long after they were conflicted upon him.
So who ever must've done this to him must still be near, maybe even watching us now.

My head quickly jerkes to Carlee, who is still trying to get the boy loose. I run over to her grab her blood covered hands and pull her out of this place. Hoping I don't run right into the killers arms.

She struggles and screams and calls me names but I don't care. I tighten my grip on her knowing it must be hurting her and keep dragging her through the forest as quick as I possible can.
We've just barely made it a few metres away from the boy when I hear the faint thuds of approaching footsteps. My heart pounds in my chest as hysteria strikes through.

Oh no, he's coming after us, we're next. I was really not looking forward to a painfully, slow, tortured death. And dear sweetness my Jake won't be able to handle seeing it.
With those thoughts I become even more aggressive in getting Carlee and me out of here, so my grip tightens around her even more.
When she stumbles or falls I simply jerk her back up and drag her after me, sometimes not even giving her enough time to fully get back on both her feet. It's harsh I know, but the only thing on my mind right now is our survival.

As we begin to get a faster pace I can hear our pursuer gaining speed as well and I know that he will reach us soon. Not willing to give up I keep up the struggle, sweat seeping out of every pore of my body. Dripping down my back and between my breast, making darker patches on my green tank top.

Carlee is struggling less and less, whether this is because she knows we're in danger or that she is simply to busy trying not to get dragged across the floor I don't know, but I am ever thankful.
Not that this means that we can out run him cause he is getting closer by the second and I can already feel my muscles trembling in protest, thankfully adrenaline keeps them running for now.

I'm nearly ready to give up, to just fall down and let death come. When the steady thumps of the footsteps stop, continued by sounds of a crash. I can't really hear exacly what is hoing on and francly I don't really care. He has stopped his persued after us so I gather the last of my strength and continue our escape as quick as we are both capable of.

After a few minutes I can feel my heart beat in every inch of my body, my mouth has run dry and I can feel my muscles protesting my every step as they burn like acid needles . I slow down to a walk, never letting go of her hand. I know that she is going to be pissed at me, even though I just saved her life.

I finally stop walking all together and let go of her hand, walking over to a tree to lean against. I fall forward leaning my hands on my knees and try to catch my breath. I hear her footsteps coming towards me and see her feet in front of me before I look up. She raises her hand as if to slap me but stops in mid motion and then suddenly starts crying hysterically, letting herself fall down and cradling her face in her hands as she does

Shit, this was not what I was going for, I wanted her to yell and scream at me. Call me names and yes maybe even let her hit me. But not this I can't see her break down like this, it tears my heart open to be in the face of such pure sadness.

I let myself fall to the ground, still leaning against the tree for support that I can't seem to find in myself. I stretch out my hand as to comfort her, but when she feels my touch she cringes away and starts crying even harder. Feeling tired and useless I let her cry it all out, hoping that that will be it. That we don't need to talk about it, that we can go on as before. That hope is shattered when she finally starts screaming at me.

"How could you! How could you just leave him like that! We could've saved him! We could've -" Words transform into sobs and more tears slide down her face.

"I-I- It was- We had to" I stumble back to her not knowing what to say and if she is even listening. "Carls Hey freckles" I say as I try approaching her again, curling my arm around her and pulling her towards me. At first it seems like she finally let's me comfort her but then the loud bang of the cannon echoes through the trees and she wrenches herself away from me.

"Don't call me freckles! I hate it when you call me freckles!" I can't help but smile back at her, thinking our fight is over and things soon will return back to normal.

"Owh come on Carl, everything will be okay" I lean towards her again planning to give her a hug and a kiss on the head.

"No it won't! Stop lying to me, things won't be okay. I can never go back now, not ever what we've just done. I hate you Melody! I hate you for what you are and for what you have done!" she pushes me away hard and I fall back against the tree. When I look back up she has gotten on her feet and is running away.

I get up, knowing I need to run after her but when the ground beneath me starts to violently shake my tired body disagrees and I'm back on the floor before I know it.
What's with the constant earthquake's? This one felt a little to close for comfort though. So I muster all the strentgh left in my body and together with some adrenaline I manage a slow jog after her.
Of course she is tired to so I'm not that far behind her, however her body is driven on emotion and mine is not. So sometimes I lose track of her.
I catch a glimp of the black shiny material of her jacket and jog towards it.
At first I think she's standing still cause she is just tired but when I step closer to her I see that there are three other people with her, surroundings her in half a circle.

"Well, well, well what do we have here? Looks like we have found ourselves another one" The tall blond one says as he measures me up with his eyes. "It seems to be our lucky day Daemyn"

"So it seems." The other guy with the darker hair says showing no kind of actual interest and looking kind of bored.

"Come on, just get rid of them already. I'm not in the mood for games." The female who stands next to the blond one says.

Though I haven't really paid much attention towards my other contestants during the pre-game events, it's obvious that their careers. Which is odd since careers normally form a group the first few days of the game. All of them, not just three.

"Now don't think so selfish, my dear. I know we've been having allot of fun but maybe our friend Daemyn would like to have some too." The blond one turns his head towards his darker haired friend but I can see that he doesn't completely shifts his whole focus of of us. Though it's obvious we're no threat.

I step closer towards Carlee and hold her right hand, pulling her back some what. The blonde one immediately looks back at us and I can't help but freeze while I stare at the huge chainsaw that hangs from his waist.

"Y-you can t-t-take me." I stumble quietly, hoping I can get Carlee out of this situation. "j-just let her go... please"

The dark haired one exhales exasperatedly. "No thank you, I like my girls with a little bit more... spunk" Though his words are dismissive, his body turns more towards us now. As if he is finally bored enough to enter this event. Let's just hope he doesn't end it.

"Yes, they do seem rather... spooked don't they" The blond turns his full attention towards us again and narrows his eyes down to Carlee. "So tell me, are the shivers that corupt her body for our sake? Or has something or someone else caused your shirt to soak with sweat?" The darker haired one cautiously gazes behind us while the blond continues to stare us down.

"We just-we got into a fight, with each other and she ran-I ran after her and and well" I stammer as I try to dodge telling him the actual truth. Afraid that they might force us to take them back there, to that blood awfull scene.

"Right so who's blood is on your friends hands then? Is it yours?" The darker haired one says never dropping his gaze from the looming forest behind us.

I look over at Carlee, who's been quiet this whole time, and I can see her mind recapturing the picture that made the stains on her hands. She starts to shiver more intensly and squeezes my hand a little to hard. I can already feel the veins in my hand protesting their sudden lack of blood flow. But I just stay still and try to think of a believable reason for the blood.

I can see the girl giving the blond a impatient look, like she can't understand why we're still talking and not just killing us right this second.
"Come one, they're not gonna tell us anything. She knows they're dead if they do and dead if they don't." She steps closer to the blond and lays her hand on his arm. "Just kill them honey" She says in the sweetest voice she can muster.

"What's the rush dear? Can't handle a little competetion?" The blond smiles at her dispense.

"What competetion" she grumbles while jerking her hand back.

"Besides, Daemyn and I haven't killed anyone yet. Let us enjoy our first and prelong this moment. You know like foreplay" The blond winks at her and she glares at him in response. "That's bull" She snares back.
"What is? You don't enjoy foreplay?" He mocks back at her "You have killed before, remember sponsorship?" She raises her eyebrows obviously frustrated that he doesn't remember.

"Pfff she didn't count." The darker haired one interveins, finally satisfied that there's nothing lurking in the bushes after us.

"Why not?" She snares back at him.

The blond let's out a heavy sigh "She just doesn't, you wouldn't understand. So just step back and let us handle this." He dismisses her as he turns his back on her completely. You can see anger rising in her as she clamps her hands into fist down her side but she just takes a few deep breaths and stays queit.

"Well, where were we? Ow yes the blood." He turns his attention back to us, I take a deep breath knowing what I have to do.

"She's wrong, I'll tell you what happened." I take one step forward releasing Carlee's hand. "I'll tell you, if you let her go."

I hear a growl and before I know it the darker haired one has Carlee clutch against him, his right hand pushed against her throat and in his left he's holding a sword that's pressed against Carlee's stomach.
It all happened so fast I hadn't had any time to respond and I'm still in the same spot I was in when confronting the blond.

"I think your forgetting who's in control here little one. See, if we want to get any information out of you we just ask and you give. We don't do deals." He growls at me while tightening his hold on Carlee. She's so suprised that she didn't even scream when he grabbed her but slowly realisation hits and her body starts to protest this life endangering situation that she's in. Her struggles are pittifull and don't make any difference, he just pushes the sword deeper against her and she stiffles in response, letting out whimpering breaths as she looks at me in hope. Like I could possible safe her from him.

"No wait!" The girl suddenly interupts. The blond angrily turns around planning to smack her as his hand reaches in the air. "She's got my number" the girl continues, not even flinching at his raised hand.
The blond stops in mid motion which leaves his hand hanging in the air as he turns to face Carlee. Suprise lighting his eyes as he zooms in on the red scarred 12 that's on her bare neck. Then he turns to the girl again and harshly brushes her hair away with the hand he was planning to smack her with only seconds ago, to reveal the same reddened scar on hers.

"Things have just got interesting" He whispers more to himself then to anyone else. He turns to the dark one with a smile that shows his teeth. "Told you it was our lucky day. How about we find ourselves some more weapons to play with." Somehow the smile doesn't lighten his features, it only seems to make him look more evil.

"Sounds like a plan to me" He lowers his swords and puts it back in it's sheath, pushing Carlee to the girl he says "Hold her will you, while we take care of the other one."

"Well, I guess this will be it for you." The blond simply says with that smile on his face as his hand goes behind his back. And some how I'm sure he won't come up with a puppy. I can hear Carlee whimper and I'm about to get ready to take of or try and fight back, which one I'm not sure.

"She's good with plants!"Carlee screams out "She provided us with berries and leaves and water from trees. She's really good at it." She beams a shy but proud smile at me and I give her a small smile in return. Feeling honoured that she is trying to safe me, though I know it won't do any good.

"We already have food and water, we don't need her as well." The girl hisses angrily. As she sees the two guys hesitating at their weapons. Probably thinking over this new piece of information.

"The Girl has got a point. Tell you what, you tell us what happened and we'll let your friend tag along as well." The darker haired one says as he turns back to face Carlee.

"Don't say a thing Carls! They'll kill me anyway. You just go with them okay." I say encourangingly, ignoring my survival instinct to say or do whatever these guys want.

"You know I can't do that." Carlee shakes her head and takes a trembling breath before she spills the truth. "We walked into.." she stops not knowing how to describe what she saw. But the blond mistakes her pause for hesitation and quickly approaches her.

"You have my word that she can come with us, unharmed. Atleast till the time we find your tree. And of all the things I am, I'm a man of my word, of honor" He holds out his hand and Carlee's trembling right hand shakes his. I know that she hasn't a clue what he just meant, about the tree part. Well atleast I don't, but I guess this is as much of a garanty on our safety as we are going to get.

"We saw a body, a on the verge of dying body to be more precise." I intervein, not wanting Carlee to remember the scene we walked upon only hours ago. "He was brutally tortured, hung by his own intestines." I say as bravely as I can, begging my body not to tremble, not wanting to show any signs of weakness. "I dragged her away and we got into a fight, she... she... has a hard time with death."

"Not death, Mel! Murder!" Carlee suddenly yells at me, her old anger rebursting. This is so not the time nor the company for this.

"That's it?" the girl bursts out. " That's what granted you safety, this is rediculious. Ofcourse your going to find murdered bodies around here. We're in the fucking hunger games for fuck sake."

"Woman, control yourself!" the blond bursts at her as he pushes her away before walking over to the dark haired one "What do you think?" He askes him, clearly respecting this guys insights.

"Well your fuck hole there does have a point; people tend to get murdered around here. But what's different is that he tortured the person intensely and then left him alive, so it seem he enjoys the torture itself more instead of the actual kill. Which is odd in a game with the soul purpose of killing each other off. That being said, maybe he did tend to kill the person but was interupted by two girls and simply didn't want to get noticed or take the risk of being outnumbered." He ends with a frown on his face, clearly not liking that he has no idea who this person is or what this persons intensions are.

"Seems we've found ourselves a true contestant, if only we knew who he is so we can hunt him down." The blond says also frustrated.

For a moment I think that they will ask us to lead them back to the place of the murder. But thankfully the dark haired one dismisses this idea.

"Well, no need to go to the body, it's probably been picked up by now. And besides we have new toys to find. Your on baby sit duty for the next... days or so." He grabbs for me and pushes me towards the brown haired girl and Carlee, who I try to hug as I approach her. But she dodges me and sets of after the two guys, still angry with me then.

Helene pushes me forward after them. "Come on, we've got a tree to find"


As always Thank you for reading!

It's been ages since the last up-date I know.
But things are going well and we have less and less tributes with each chapter.
We've got some amazing ideas in store and we promise that we will finish this story!

As for this chapter: I found it hard to present a strong friendship in just one chapter since friendships takes longer to develop.
I hope you guys felt the connection between Melody and Carlee none the less.

Please let us know your thoughts - REVIEW :D

xoxo Miss-Almond