A/N: I'll try to update weekly now on every Sunday so everyone will have more time to send in gifts. Also, my computer's audio broke down so I'm getting a new one soon. Since I hardly have anything else to do, I'll write this for a while when I don't have any schoolwork.
Oh yeah, and you can make the gifts as random as you want. Remember, random is good!
Gale's POV
Haymitch sits off to the side. Peeta leans against a tree, probably daydreaming about Katniss. I pace back and forth, pondering any way out of this arena. The black field and forest seem to span endlessly. From the TV at my house, the arenas seemed very large, but they feel a lot bigger when you're actually inside of them.
Two gifts begin to fall from the sky. One lands beside me and one lands beside Haymitch. I open up mine and find the books of the Twilight Saga. Ew. There's no way I'm reading that.
Haymitch opens his gift slowly and wordlessly. Ever since the incident with Peeta's freak-out, we've been mostly silent. Once he finishes opening the gift, he finds an issue of Sports Illustrated. Not just any issue, but a swimsuit issue. Haymitch flips open the issue instantly, probably to begin staring at girls in bras. Maybe he's actually worse than Peeta with these things.
Peeta looks up and instantaneously snaps out of his trance. Two more gifts are falling towards him. He leaps up and catches them both. He is the best catcher I know. Both gifts are labeled 'Peeta'. People certainly are rather generous towards him.
He tears open the first gift and finds a birthday cake. It smells like onions, so it must be onion-flavored. Peeta takes a whiff and his eyes get watery. I'm not quite sure if I'm right about this, but the candles actually look like sticks of dynamite. Thankfully, they aren't lit. I don't want to find out if I'm right anyways.
Peeta shrugs and opens the second gift and finds an elegant black tuxedo jacket. "Finally!" Peeta says, grinning. "Something to wear!" He yanks the tuxedo on, but it doesn't look right.
"Peeta..." I say. "You're wearing it inside out." I yank it back off of him and begin to fumble with it when I notice some mustard on Peeta's chest. Mustard? Was there a ketchup bottle in the tuxedo or something? I'm kind of hungry anyways, so let me see. I lean over and gingerly begin to lick the ketchup. Peeta must be feeling pretty awkward right now.
This isn't ketchup, though. It's blood. Not just any blood, though. I'd know this blood from anywhere. It's Katniss's blood. Instead of stopping, I keep licking. I don't know if it's because of Katniss or what, but I lick every tiny bit of blood off Peeta's chest and feel the sticky substance leak down my throat.
I stand up and look at all the drool I created on Peeta's chest. "Erm, thanks," he says awkwardly. I suddenly feel like a vampire. I have an urge for blood. I LOVE blood. I turn around and look at Haymitch. He's still looking at the Sports Illustrated thing, completely oblivious to what happened with Peeta's tuxedo and the blood. I look down to the Twilight books. I feel no hate towards them anymore. Rather, I actually have an urge to read them. I flop down onto the ground and begin to read the first book.
Peeta's POV
I use the wrapping from the open gifts to dry all the saliva off my chest. In all honesty, I don't know what was going through Gale's head as he licked that blood off my chest. Where did that blood come from, anyways? Did the tuxedo cut me or something? Can clothing even cut you?
Since the tuxedo has been mostly fixed, I put it on, feeling the warmth over me. I flick a flower that's in my breast pocket. Blood leaks out of the flower onto my chest. What the heck? Flowers don't bleed. Did Haymitch drug me or something?
As if in reply, Gale gets up from reading his Twilight books and leaps at my suit, pupils dilated. He licks my suit clean of blood. "What the heck are you doing?" I ask.
"Getting as much of Katniss into me as I can," Gale says. "I never knew her blood tasted so good."
"WHAT?" I back away from the sinister and creepy Gale. So the blood's been coming from this flower. Katniss's blood. The Romance Compartment of my brain (I invented romance because of how good I am at it) begins to throb. "You mean Effie had to hurt Katniss to get this stuff?"
"Maybe just a needle," Gale says. "Whatever, it doesn't matter to me, I like this blood." Well, fine. If Gale wants to be weird then I'm not going to try to stop him. I'm keeping Katniss's blood to myself, though.
However, as a slight test, I squeeze the flower. Like a lopsided fountain, blood flies out and majestically soars through the air. It lands on my onion cake. A tiny, high-pitched "FUCK!" comes from the cake. The candles light. Ooh, boy! Is it really my birthday already?
Gale leaps through the air and begins eating the cake, gulping down all the blood he can. Freak. This is my cake and my birthday. I kick him sharply in the balls.
"YOOOOW!" Gale screams, leaping five feet into the air. He turns to me and begins advancing, rage on his face. To divert him, I squirt blood at a nearby tree. His dot-sized pupils follow it to the impact. He charges at the tree and peels at the bark with his teeth. "OUCH! SPLINTERS!"
Another "FUCK!" emerges from the cake. How is my birthday cake talking? I'm supposed to eat it. As if it read my mind, the onion cake says, "DAMN YOU! I DON'T TASTE GOOD WITH BLOOD, AND NOW I'M PISSED OFF SO I WILL EXPLODE!"
No! My cake can't explode! That would ruin my birthday! I run over and blow at the candles as hard as I can. They refuse to distinguish. "I think you taste good with blood," Gale says, apparently having finished sucking the blood off the tree. He looks like such a mess. His own blood as well as Katniss's blood is all over his face with many splinters. He licks his face, leaving a clear trail around his mouth. "You should have been blood-flavored, not onion-flavored."
He stuffs the entire cake into his mouth and swallows it whole. He spits out the candles, licks the space around his mouth again, and burps. My birthday is ruined! A large metal gun floats down from the sky. Effie must think that thing with eating the cake was not necessarily good table manners.
I look at the candles. They're still lit. There may still be hope for my birthday. I just have to blow them out. However, Gale is standing between me and the candles, and if I don't reach them without the next few seconds, that gun will blast us to smithereens.
"The flower," Gale says. "Give me the flower. I crave blood." I squirt blood to my right. Gale goes for it. I dive for the candles and try to blow them out, but I have no success. What is up with these candles? I take a closer look at the candles. These aren't candles. They're dynamite.
The metal gun stops directly above me and points at me. I must be Effie's number one target because of how much threat I could pose to her. I look to Gale. Apparently I squirted the blood on Haymitch. Oops. He seems to be finally yanked out of the world of Sports Illustrated and is wiping at the red liquid on his shirt, irritated. Gale advances closer to Haymitch. "So, you're going to take me to the dry cleaners, hunting boy?" Haymitch asks. He then notices the floating metal gun and realizes that this means business. Haymitch takes a run for it, followed by Gale. I'm left alone to fare for myself. As if Gale would actually be willing to help me with his new blood lust.
What is wrong with me? My birthday isn't in a few months. I must have gotten a bit excited there. I pick up all seventeen sticks of dynamite. They kind of remind me of carrying wheat through the bakery. I push the thoughts of home out of my head. Worrying won't do me good. I toss the dynamite up in the air towards the gun.
I run as all of the dynamite explodes. Pieces of gun go flying everywhere. I rub my ringing ears. Effie must be more pissed than that dynamite onion cake right now. I look back to the crater of what was our spot for planning on how to get out of here. The Sports Illustrated issue is burning up. The Twilight Saga is still somehow intact, lying off to the side. Twilight books won't do much good to Gale's new 'vampire' habits, but I take them anyways. He'd probably suck up all my blood if I didn't bring them.
Feeling slightly more safe, I decide to wait by this crater. A giant gift falls from the sky. This has got to be something good. I walk over to the giant package, eager to have fun unwrapping this bad boy. I wonder what's inside. The package suddenly shakes and erupts into tons of pieces of gold. Wait, that's not gold, those are the shiny golden bodies of tracker jackers.
I'm not safe anywhere here.
Haymitch's POV
This kid's out for my blood. What did I ever do to him? I was minding my own business, reading Sports Illustrated. A gift falls from the sky above us. Ooh, goodie. I pace myself just enough to have it bonk Gale on the noggin. Success.
The aggrivated Gale sits up and tears open the gift. It's a unicorn pillow pet. Gale hugs it. How romantic and cute! As if searching this thing for blood, he digs his teeth into it and tears out all the stuffing to find a bomb. Well, that's just dandy.
We both take cover. The bomb explodes. I was expecting a crater, but it actually reveals an entrance to some sort of cave. Inside of that cave, there must be the answer. The answer to the question, "How the fuck do we get out of here?" I beckon for Gale to follow me into the cave.
Gale just shakes his head. "No. I'm not going anywhere until I get some blood and Twilight books." He's apparently given up on trying to get that blood off of my shirt. Maybe's he's starting to get a lick of sense that's enough to know you shouldn't try to hurt people. Gale walks off. Well, fine. If I have to go into this cave myself then I'll do so.
I begin to walk in and submerge myself in darkness. I run my hand along the rough stone walls and find a light switch. A light switch inside of a cave? That's strange but convenient. I flip it and the dark tunnel gets illuminated. I'm amazed by what I see.
This isn't just a cave, it's also some sort of underground facility.
Peeta's POV
I run as fast as I can. I don't want to face any tracker jackers again, no way. One swoops at me. I dodge it. The tracker jacker smashes into the soft ground and explodes. Whoa. Apparently these mutts have been muttated again. They've been infused with explosive methane gas. This only makes me want to run faster.
Some of the tracker jackers group up. I'm guessing this is to make bigger explosions. Several of them fly ahead of me and crash into the ground. Yep, bigger explosions. I cough through the haze of smoke, only being able to see about a foot in front of me. I keep running, even when one stings me. Crap.
Wanting to give up, I curl into a ball and close my eyes, ready to die. I don't want to see the visions. I don't want to look and see. Even with my eyes closed and shutting out the world, I can hear tracker jackers crashing into random trees and exploding. I'm stung several more times with sears of pain, but I don't care. I get knocked around by explosions from tracker jackers even touching a blade of grass. They'll surely just kill theirselves off. But I'm still going to outwait the venom.
I let three hours pass before I even dare open my eyes. Everything's fine, nothing out of the ordinary aside from hearing a couple of occasional strange and disturbing sounds while my eyes were closed. I feel my breast pocket. The flower's gone, probably from all the explosions. I look up at the sky. The sun is setting, signalling the start of the conclusion of our second day in all of this mess.
I examine my surroundings. There are many craters nearby, making a somewhat ashy clearing. Outside of the clearing, there's the usual forest. The flower lays to the side in a large pool of blood. I quickly run over and pick it up. There's no doubt that Gale would have sniffed this much blood from a mile away. He's probably coming right now.
Gale emerges from the trees. Yep, here he is. The first thing he does is leap straight into the pool of blood and begin drinking it. Big surprise, but Gale's behaviour is horrifying me. This is Katniss's blood, for heck's sake! There's not really a way I can reverse what Effie's done with the flower thing, though.
Once all the blood is gone, Gale gets up. He doesn't bother to wipe his lips, considering how much crusty dry blood is already on his face. Honestly, how do people find vampires sexy? This is disgusting and disturbing... Well, you get the point.
"Give me more," Gale says. What a bitch. I chuck the Twilight Saga at his face and he gets knocked back. Instead of angrily reacting, Gale just opens the book and reads it. Not quite the reaction I was expecting.
I walk away. I need to get rid of all the blood in this flower. Once I'm a safe distance from Gale, I hold the flower. I squeeze it somewhat cautiously. Blood squirts on my face.
"AAAAAGH!" I scream. "KATNISS! I'M SORRY!" I roll onto the ground and begin crying hysterically. Blood-hungry Gale arrives.
I give him the finger.
"Well, fuck you too," Gale says, approaching to lick my face. I'll probably freak out if Gale goes anywhere near my hair. I can't afford to get my blond curls messed up.
I jump to my feet and squirt blood into his eyes, squeezing the flower as hard as I can. Gale screams and claws at his face. The spout of blood begins to falter. Then it hits me. If there's this much blood, then Katniss is probably dead. But Effie wouldn't do that, would she? She still needs bait for me.
Gale, having given up on his stinging eyes, finally manages to pry the flower from my grip. He squirts the blood into his mouth, swishes it around, and swallows. I scream and punch him in the face, knocking him backwards. I bring my arm back for another punch when Gale shoves the flower into my mouth.
I make a muffled scream of terror as Gale squeezes the flower. I feel the blood on my taste buds. Ugh. It kind of reminds me of tree sap... But it tastes like Katniss. Beautiful. I'm not sure what flavor Katniss is, but this blood is great. Before I know it, I'm craving more. It's just irresistable.
"It kind of tastes like tree sap," I blurt out. Gale's eyes widen.
"Yeah. It IS tree sap. Why didn't I realize that earlier? It's just food colored and Katniss-flavored. Effie knew how much terror you'd be in, and-" For whatever the reason, we randomly burst out laughing at how stupid we were. We take turns drinking the flavored tree sap. We'll never have a shortage of good drinks again for a while. All is well until we hear footsteps.
"Who's that?" Gale wonders.
"Is it Haymitch?" I ask.
"No," Gale says. "He went looking for something in a random cave. I think he was looking for a possible way out of here. If he does find anything, he'll come back and tell us if he's not a selfish prick."
"So who is it then?" I ask. Gale shrugs.
A blond haired boy emerges from the trees. Well, actually, he looks almost exactly like me except for a few things. For instance, he's a little taller than me. If you loved me when you read The Hunger Games, then you'd probably piss yourself in love and longing if you saw this guy. I admit, I'm kind of jealous. He's three times sexier than I am - his hair is almost perfectly conditioned with smooth curls trailing down the sides of his head, he has a stronger build, and his gaze is confident. He has the same blue eyes as me and even similar clothes to what I had when I first got here.
"Who... who are YOU?" I manage to choke out.
"I am Tortilla Mellark, your alter ego. I was created from special DNA samples before you arrived here." He flashes a smile much more dazzling than I could ever do. Copy cat! There can only be ONE of me! It's just not fair!
"Why?" I ask.
Tortilla brushes his hair. "Effie wanted me to kill you."
Gale voices my thoughts. "Oh, crap."
Conveniently, we're by that tree I hid that super cute murple purple elephant under. I yank it out and hold it in front of Tortilla. He gets in a trance from looking at it's cuteness. Gale catches onto what I'm doing and sneaks around to behind Tortilla. He pulls out a frying pan, raises it, and smashes it down onto his head with a loud "clang!"
"Where did you get that frying pan?" I ask as Tortilla staggers about, slightly dazed.
Gale shrugs. "Let's just get out of here before his head clears."
We run for the hills, knowing that the refined me will soon begin to take pursuit. As we begin to leave the vicinity of the crater area, I swear I hear Tortilla mutter, "I'll kill those two, and maybe I won't need to have a stupid name anymore. I'll be the new Peeta."
Haymitch's POV
I've decided to set up camp outside the underground facility. I'm hoping bread boy and hunter guy will show up soon. It's been about three hours. I hope they're alright. Or maybe not, I wouldn't have to lug them along anymore.
I'm calm until I hear the grinding of steel against steel. Oh, boy! Must be a random incoming shipment of beer bottles! I look outside and sure enough, there are two large carts rolling towards me with tons of beer bottles inside. The only problem is that the carts are being towed by giant pencil sharpeners. Ooh, boy.
Gale's POV
My mouth drops open at the stunning truth. "OH, CRAP! I LEFT MY TWILIGHT BOOKS BY ALL THE CRATERS!"
Peeta rolls his eyes. Bother.
Tuxedo Suit With Flower from Blazefire02
Twilight Saga from Blazefire02
Sports Illustrated Thingy from Blazefire02
Methane Tracker Jackers from Icy-Zoe
Evil Birthday Cake With Dynamite That Can Get Pissed Off from MegthextremeoverlordofdaWURLD
Exploding Unicorn Pillow Pet from PureAtHeart