I'm sorry I took so long to update. I kept rewriting and rewriting the chapter because it didn't feel right. I was going to write about Joannie's past, but I deleted it in the end. I might add it later.
I wake up the next morning with Joannie still sitting there. Elysia is tinkering with her tin can. Ferrous and Darin are still asleep. The arena seems more peaceful than usual. Not as many birds are singing. The sun provides a warm ray of light.
"You've been awake the entire night?" I ask Joannie.
"Kind of. I couldn't really sleep," she replies.
"If there's anything you want to talk about, I'm here to listen," I offer.
"Thanks, but I'm fine. Wake the others; we need to hunt for more food," she tells me.
Joannie seems so different. It's like she completely changed. The mischievous look in her eyes is gone. Instead, it's been replaced by sadness and longing. I have a feeling that Melvin is a subject even more sensitive than her parents.
Joannie frowns. "Is there a reason you're staring at me?"
I didn't even realize I was staring at her. I quickly look away. "It's just that you look different," I explain.
"What do you mean, different? Come on, let's wake them up together." Joannie grabs my hand and leads me to them.
We attempt to shake Darin awake. But as we do that, bits of his drool flies on my hand.
"Oh, that is gross!" I shout, and frantically wipe my hand on the ground.
"Hmm?" Darin stirs in his sleep.
Joannie smirks. "I've got an idea." Oh, this is going to be good.
Joannie grabs a stick from nearby and traces it over Darin's sleeping bag. "Darin, get up! There's a snake in your bag!"
"WHERE?" Darin immediately gets out of his sleeping bag and runs around screaming, "Get it off me! Get it off me!"
Joannie and I roll on the floor laughing. We move on to Ferrous and jiggle him awake. He wakes and rubs his eyes. "Why is Darin running around?"
"Is the snake gone?" Darin asks. The side of his hair is sticking out, but I don't bother to tell him because it looks funny.
"There is no snake, idiot," Joannie says, rolling her eyes.
"But I felt it!"
"That was us. We used a stick." Joannie waves the stick around.
Darin scratches his head and thinks for a while. "Oh, I get it." Then, as if a light bulb lit up in his head, he says, "Hey!"
"A little slow, aren't we?" Joannie teases, tapping her head.
"I bet it's Lily's fault." Darin glares at me.
"How is it my fault?"
"You threw a pebble at my head!"
"Oh right, I remember." I chuckle lightly at them memory. "Yeah, that was funny."
"You slowed down my thinking," Darin insists.
"Nope, that's just you," Joannie says.
"Hey, we need to go. We need to reach the cornucopia as soon as possible," Ferrous tells us.
We agree and pack our things, ready for another long walk.
"I just remembered I haven't brushed my teeth in a long time," Ferrous says, smacking his lips.
Gee, thanks for reminding me, I think. Now my mouth feels all funny.
We walk in silence for a while until Darin says, "I still don't understand why you gave our food away."
I shrug. "I don't know. It just felt right at the time."
"They tried to attack us. They stabbed your arm. Seriously, what goes on in your mind?"
"They were defending themselves. I guess I wanted to prove that we weren't bad people." I shrug again.
"I think it was a nice thing you did," Ferrous says.
Darin snorts. "A little too nice."
I look over to Joannie to see if she's uncomfortable with the conversation, but she shows no emotion on her face.
"What are you doing, Elysia?" Ferrous asks.
"I'm trying to make the generator, but I'm still missing a few pieces," she replies.
"What pieces?" I ask, glad the topic of the conversation changed.
"You wouldn't understand, stinky brain."
Oh, so she treats Ferrous nicely but she insults me. Good to know.
"Do you guys find it strange that only one person died?" Darin speaks up.
"I think the problem is that nobody wants to hurt other people," Joannie says flatly. I can't help but think that comment was directed at me.
"What about the girl that died on the first few days? Wasn't she killed by someone?" Elysia asks.
"She died because some bird mutts killed her," I inform Elysia.
She squints at me. I have noticed that she likes doing that a lot. "How do you know?"
"Her brother kind of told me," I confess. "Long story."
"I was there. Saved your butt," Darin grins.
"Oh, yeah. I keep forgetting because you remind me twelve times a day," I say sarcastically.
"Well, just in case you forget." Darin smiles.
A few days passed and I think we're almost there. Anticipation fills me. I wonder if my plan will really work.
"There's the lake!" Ferrous exclaims, pointing to it. He jumps up and down with excitement.
"Woah, calm down," Joannie says, but she's smiling too.
"So…we're actually going to make it," Darin says.
"Don't get your hopes up. We're still not entirely sure this will all work out," Elysia reminds us.
"Oh, shut up and lighten up a little. Of course it'll work. Even if it doesn't, we can still work something out." Joannie looks over at me and smiles.
"You think we can still keep in contact afterwards?" I ask.
"Obviously. We can call each other. We should meet up regularly," Joannie proposes.
"We can do this every week," Darin says. "Work together in the Hunger Games."
"Without all the hunger and thirst. And fear," I add.
"We can have an actual campfire and tell actual ghost stories," Ferrous laughs.
We can actually make it. The lake is getting closer by every step. Once we pass the lake, we will find the cornucopia and break the force field and get out of here. For the past few days, this just seemed like an impossible goal. But now, seeing the lake and the happy faces of my teammates, I truly believe that we can all survive.
We take a short break by the lake and test the water to see if it's fit for generating electricity. I stick my hand in the water and feel the current of it.
"It's not fast enough," Elysia examines. "We need to get to the upper reaches to see if the water is more rapid there."
I nod and study the water closer. There's something dark swimming around at the bottom…
Out of the water, a giant fish launches itself at me and snaps its razor sharp teeth. I yelp and bat it away. Its teeth cut my hand.
More fish spring out of the water. I've never seen this type of fish in my entire life. Dozens of these fish jump out and attack us. Everything I see is a blur of brown-scaled fish.
"They're piranha mutts!" Darin shouts.
These piranha—whatever they are, keeps jumping on us and biting us. Even out of the water, they seem to know how to breathe. I have no idea how that is even possible. I try to shoot down as many as I can with my arrows, but I have a limited supply of them. Soon, I run out of arrows. I use my quiver as a bat to hit the fish, but it proves to be of little use. I bite back a scream as a piranha chomps off part of my thigh. I feel hundreds of little teeth sinking in my limbs.
Joannie slices a piranha flying towards me in half with her knife. I only have time to murmur a short thanks before I have to dodge and hit more fish again. I look around to see if Ferrous is there, but I can't see him anywhere. He has no weapons. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Elysia swinging a short metal rod around.
"Ferrous!" I shout. "Where are you?"
"Lily, get out of the way!" Joannie pushes me to the ground. She screams as a piranha sinks its teeth into her chest. I hack at it and try to bat it away but it only sinks its teeth deeper.
Then, as if a voice is telling them that it's enough, all the piranha jumps back into the water, like their job here is done.
And their job is to kill Joannie.
Joannie falls over, her body twitching madly like a fish out of the water. I immediately rush over and cut off the fabric covering her wound. Blood trickles out of the teeth marks, but I think it punctured a lung, or even her heart.
I can't believe what I'm seeing. No, this can't be happening. The other three just stand there.
"What are you doing?" I shout at them. "Do something!"
They shake their heads sadly. How can they just give up on Joannie? We have to try something. She never gave up on us. We're a team. We help each other.
One of Joannie's twitching hands take mine. "Lily, listen," she says softly.
I turn my stricken face to her, and tears start spilling out of my eyes. This is my fault, I got distracted looking for Ferrous. This is my fault.
"Tell my parents…" she starts, and she gasps for air. "Tell them Eden wanted to please them. I failed." She gaps for air again. "And tell Melvin…I'm sorry." Her chest rises and falls rapidly as her body struggles for more oxygen.
"No," I say firmly. "Tell them yourself. You'll be fine." I know in my heart that she can't make it, but I refuse to believe it. She can't just give up on herself. This isn't the Joannie I know.
"Please," she pleads. Her eyes plead me silently to promise her last wish. I can't say no. I force myself to nod.
"Tell me…a story," she requests. "A bedtime story."
I wipe the tears form my eyes. This is all happening too quickly. Weren't we talking about how to contact each other after we leave just now?
I've never been very good with stories, but I need to try. If this is her final request, I shall grant it.
"Once upon a time, there was a little girl who lived in a happy family."
Joannie closes her eyes contentedly. I continue with the story.
"She would go home every day and her parents would greet her with hugs and kisses. She would laugh and smile and dance around."
Joannie's body stops twitching and a cannon fires. I go on with the story anyways.
"She had beautiful brown hair and her name was Joannie. The end."
The story didn't make much sense, but I guess Joannie liked it. But I can't ask her if she liked it or not. She's gone to sleep forever. I uncurl Joannie's fingers from my hand and put them at her sides. I take her backpack and her knife. She would want me to have it. I brush her hair out of her face and say goodbye.
I throw Joannie's backpack at Elysia. "There. You can have your own backpack. You happy?"
I know it's not Elysia's fault, but I wanted to take my anger out on someone. Elysia looks frightened by my words. I'm not the least sorry.
"Lily—" Darin calls out, but I cut him off.
"Just leave me alone," I say and walk toward the cornucopia by myself and bandage my wounds. None of my wounds are very serious, only the one on my thigh deserves extra care.
I need some time to register what had just happened. I never expected any one of us to go. I thought we would all go home happily.
I remember that time where a panther was going to attack Joannie and a lion pounced on Ferrous, and I chose to save Ferrous. Of course, Joannie was all right in the end, but it still made me feel extremely guilty. Now she sacrificed her life to save me because I was distracted looking for Ferrous.
This is all my parents' fault. If they had sent us more items, gave us a little more guidance, this wouldn't have happened. All they gave us was a picnic basket. Did they think that just because they were tortured in their Games we deserved the same?
I look up at the sky and see a hovercraft coming to collect Joannie's body. I want to run over there and stop them, in case they made a mistake and she's still alive, but I know that's impossible. If I had arrows, I would kill the people carrying Joannie.
I look back to direction I'm heading to. I can see the shimmering body of the cornucopia. Once I'm out, I will be seeking revenge.
I don't know if you're sad because Joannie died, but I can tell you I nearly cried while writing:( Unfortunately her death was foreseen a long time ago. HermioneJMalfoy, I honestly think that Darin and Joannie would have gotten together if she were still here.
Further explanations of everything (why so few people died, why was there a picnic basket) will be provided in Chapter 14. Please be patient and read on:)
