Hope- The 18th Hunger Games
"Well, this is certainly shaping up to be an exciting Hunger Games!" Bernard Flickerman exclaimed, grinning while sitting next to a stoic Ambrosius Tax. The Head Gamemaker nodded in agreement. "I mean, what a first few minutes! Eight eliminated before lunchtime! I don't think we've had that kind of toll from the first battle since the 13th Games."
Ambrosius nodded. "Yes, it was nine in the 13th. But now, of course, the Games will slow down a bit. All of the tributes will be scattered throughout the Arena. We can only expect sporadic encounters from now on."
"I suppose that's true," Bernard conceded. "But most of the tributes aren't alone. On that note, talk about the mega-alliance this year! I don't think I've ever seen eight tributes band together before."
"I can't say I have, either, Bernard," Ambrosius agreed. "Though we have noticed a traditional alliance of the tributes from 1, 2, and 4, the addition of the girls from 5 and 6 is quite unusual."
"Yes, speaking of the addition of the girl from 6, who would have guessed that the girl receiving the first zero in Hunger Games history would end up joining the pack of the strongest tributes in the Arena?" Bernard said.
Ambrosius shrugged. "The Arena is always full of surprises," he said cryptically.
Bernard grinned. "Yes, the Arena! I don't think that anyone was disappointed with the design this year! Tell me, what was your inspiration for it?"
"Well, I was quite starved for ideas after 17 years, so-"
Hayffie Marsuul sighed and turned the television off. This was ridiculous. She wanted to know what was happening to Piper, dammit! But no, all the networks would air was Bernard Flickerman's talk show and shots of the Career pack hunting through the colorful huts on the other side of the bridge, punctuated by the occasional showing of the boy from 7 hiking through the pine forest. Didn't anyone care to see what was happening to the girl from 3 who had been smart enough to escape the Bloodbath right under the Careers' noses?
But that was exactly the problem. Piper had received a grand total of two sponsors, one of whom was so drunk that he couldn't even remember his own name, and the other who was wondering if she would be able to send her cat, Mr. Mittens, into the Arena to keep Piper company. Seriously. Why couldn't anyone see that Piper was smart enough to survive?
Claude, on the other hand, had received plenty of sponsors. This was probably just based on his size but, of course, Hayffie hadn't been complaining when she had been signing people up just hours before. When Claude had still been alive.
There were no words to describe how Hayffie had felt when she had seen that dagger pierce Claude's heart. The stabbing sensation in her own chest when she had seen Claude fall, his lifeblood pouring out, staining the snow around him. She had known that she would never see him again the moment that the demon from 2 had set her sights on him. Hayffie had experienced that same feeling just minutes before that when she had seen Piper crumple to the ground, Natalia's first knife embedded her shoulder. When the girl hadn't gotten back up, Hayffie had felt her gut sink. She hadn't been able to believe that Piper, sweet, loveable Piper, was dead. Gone. Forever. And so, after the Careers had left, when Piper had gotten back up… Hayffie's smile had been wider than the great Capitol stadium. She knew that Piper could do it!
But the clip of Piper staggering off into the forest had been the last thing that Hayffie had seen of the girl. For all the stylist knew, Piper could have been killed by the boy from 7. Mauled by mutts. Fallen off a cliff. Poisoned. Anything! So Hayffie did the only thing she could do. She repeated her late mother's favorite phrase to herself. "No news is good news," she said.
"… I hope."
"Ana, she's alive!" Kim Say exclaimed, running into the Mentors' headquarters and engulfing her best friend in a bear hug.
"Yes. She is," Anastasia said, smiling, her eyes reflecting her joy at the fact that little Cherry had survived the Bloodbath. This news provided happiness enough to prevent her dwelling on Dante's death.
"How is she doing?" Kim asked, walking over to one of the couches in District 11's Arena Observation Room and flopping down on it. She had only just arrived there, for she had stayed in the Capitol's main square for several hours after Anastasia had left, signing up a few post- Bloodbath sponsors for Cherry.
"She's been walking through the trees for a few hours with the girls from 9 and 10," Anastasia said, sitting down next to Kim and fixing her gaze on the screen showing District 11's female tribute. Situated around the room were screens showing each tribute still alive along with one enormous screen depicting whatever the rest of Panem was seeing at the moment. "It's about time they stopped, though."
Just as Anastasia said this, Leila Vaniel from 9 brought up this very point on the screen. "Hey, do you want to stop soon?" she asked. "I think we're far enough away from the Cornucopia."
"Wait, you want to stop? I could go on for days like this! After all, a foot of snow is just so easy to walk through when you're a shrimp," Cherry said, rolling her eyes and then grinning. "Yeah, I think it's a good idea. We can see what's in that box of yours."
"Personally, I'm in favor of edibles," Gray said, clearing a space beside of one the numerous pine trees, scraping away most of the snow and then sitting down. The other two girls followed suit.
"Yeah, I know, I really wish I would've eaten more for breakfast," Leila grumbled. "Hey, do either of you have a knife? I lost mine fighting the girl from 8 when I went in for this box." Gray and Cherry both nodded, and the girl from 11 handed Leila the dagger, its bright red ribbon still attached.
"Didn't have to use it," Cherry said, shrugging at Gray's questioning look. Leila took the knife, tossing the ribbon aside, and ripped the reindeer wrapping paper, uncovering a cardboard box. She then cut the box open, revealing a stuffed animal horse.
"What the hell?" Cherry asked, aghast.
"Are you serious?" Leila exclaimed, outraged, tossing the toy to the ground. "I risked my life for a stuffed horse?" Cherry nodded in agreement, but Gray's eyes had just opened in realization. She leaned in to whisper to the other girls so that the cameras couldn't pick up her words.
"Wow, a stuffed horse!" Gray said once she had looked up, a delighted smile on her face as she picked the plush animal out of the snow. "Thanks, Mr. Tax! It's just what I've always wanted! He looks like one of the ponies at the ranch I work at. I think I'll name him Ambrosius." Cherry and Leila had both been trying to stifle their giggles but, upon hearing the horse's new name, they burst into laughter and gave Gray high-fives. Gray then tied the discarded red ribbon around the horse's neck, grinning too. "Pretty awesome Hunger Games present," she declared.
As their laughter died down, the girls' mood soon grew serious. "So, what are we going to do about food?" Cherry asked. "We can't exactly eat Ambrosius."
"Well, we've got plenty of water," Leila said, gesturing to the snow surrounding them. "And I remember from the plants station back in training that pine bark is edible. That should hold us over for a few days at least. And maybe we can steal supplies from the Career camp if they don't leave a guard. We could probably take one out from behind if we had to."
"Or we could just be sneaky," Cherry said, who had blanched at Leila's suggestion of killing another tribute.
"That works, too," Leila said. "Hey, d'ya want to keep moving? The Careers can move faster than we can and we don't know which way they went after the Bloodbath." The other two girls nodded their assent and got to their feet, Gray tucking Ambrosius under her arm and Cherry putting the wrapping paper scraps into the cardboard box and picking it up.
"Kay, let's go," Gray said.
"They'll probably keep going until the death recap," Kim said, leaning back and putting her arms behind her head, stretching.
Anastasia nodded in agreement. "So all we have to worry about is all of the different things that could kill them in there. We don't have to worry about the Career pack- I saw them go across the bridge to the little village thing- but there's the boy from 7. He didn't have any trouble killing the little girl from 8, and he's got a few more axes."
"Yeah, he could be a problem," Kim said. "I'd forgotten about him. C'mon, let's see where he is," she suggested, walking over to another screen and flopping down on a couch nearer to it than the one she had just vacated. Anastasia followed.
This screen showed Desmond Chordus hiking through the woods, several boxes tied together with ribbon and strapped to his back to make a makeshift backpack. He was moving quickly and purposefully, one of his axes drawn for protection. He appeared to be unscathed from the battle at the Cornucopia.
"Well, he looks well supplied," Anastasia sad resignedly.
"Not necessarily. Remember what was in Leila's box?" Kim pointed out.
Anastasia smiled. "How could I forget? Explosives, stuffed horses… what could be next? I wouldn't be surprised if they put Tracker Jackers in one." Right after she said this, her face paled when she realized that this was a definite possibility.
"Well, I think we can assume that at least some of the boy's stuff will be useful, so he's probably stocked for a week out in the woods, maybe more," Kim said, not mentioning Anastasia's all-too-true previous comment. Anastasia nodded. "So I guess that's the bad news. The good news," Kim continued, "Is that you can see on the map here that he's headed northwest down the mountain. The girls headed due south from the Cornucopia. The huts are more northeast, so Cherry is far, far away from both the Careers and the axe-boy." As she said this, Kim had been gesturing to the map of the arena situated on the coffee table at the center of the room, each tribute represented by a little colored blinking dot.
"I know, I saw," Anastasia said, smiling. "I just hope that it stays that way."
Sea was alive and doing well. Jamee had been watching the little girl hike through the woods, heading down into the valley between the two mountaintops sporting the Cornucopia and the colorful village where Elijah was hiding out, respectively. She had stopped for a brief rest about half an hour before, opening her box with the knife she had retained from the Cornucopia and discovering a massive bar of chocolate inside. Jamee's first reaction had been anger upon seeing the contents of the gift. What did the Gamemakers think they were playing at? But then she had realized just how valuable chocolate really was. It was made of sugar and carbs- just the things that Sea would need to survive in the Arena.
Sensibly, Sea had stowed the bar of chocolate and wrapping paper scraps back in the cardboard box before ploughing on, apparently intending to put as much distance as possible between herself and the Careers. Little did she know just how close to the danger she really was. Mind, Elijah was in far greater peril than Sea, but he could also defend himself better, and he could run, if need be. Sea, though a now-deadly archer, didn't have a bow. If she wanted to get one, she would have to trek all the way back to the Cornucopia and try to steal one from the Careers- a pack now eight tributes strong. Needless to say, it would be a daunting prospect for a 13-year-old girl from District 12 armed with nothing but a knife, chocolate, and pure wits.
For now at least, Sea was relatively safe, as there was a fairly long, steep descent from the huts into the valley where the girl was now setting up camp in a tree. Elijah, however, was now hiding out inside one of the huts in the little village on the second mountaintop. How stupid could the boy be? Didn't he know that the Careers would go for the easy targets first? He would be a sitting duck. And the Careers were drawing ever closer to the hut where Elijah now sat, curled up on a cushion under a table in a corner and totally relaxed. Apparently totally aware to the danger that would soon be knocking on his door.
Cecelia Dawning was worried. Sure, Savannah and Jayce had survived the Bloodbath, but that was the easy part. Being a Career came with its advantages. You knew how to use weapons. You knew how to get through the first battle unscathed. You knew how to kill. But you were also part of the Career pack.
Of course, there was safety in numbers, so Careers almost never got killed by anyone but their allies. It was in Savannah's and Jayce's allies where the danger lay. This year, the Career pack was eight tributes strong- the largest it had ever been in Hunger Games history. That meant that there were only eight non-Career tributes left in the Arena, and they could be killed quickly and easily. The boy from 7 and the giant from 10 might pose small problems, but neither of them would be able to escape when outnumbered eight to one, even if the sniveling girl from 6 was totally useless.
It was funny how the weakest tribute in the Arena could prove to be the undoing of some of the strongest. Savannah had told Cecelia about the tension between the tributes from 1 and 2 and the rest of the pack. Cecelia feared that this tension could come to a head all too soon. Perhaps over the issue of the continued survival of the little girl. Natalia clearly hadn't been joking earlier that day when she had threatened to kill Savannah.
At the moment, all eight tributes of the Career pack were digging around inside the second hut they had inspected, looking for anything that could be useful as well as the tribute whose tracks they had seen earlier. He had done a good job erasing his footprints after crossing the bridge, so the Careers would have to scour every hut for the boy's hiding place. The one-room building they were searching at the moment was chock-full of little wooden men with white beards, red suits, blue hats, and sticks jutting out from their backs. Cecelia wondered what they were for.
"Found anything?" Rosalie called to the rest of the group from her position in one corner, rifling through a cardboard box full of more of the wooden men.
"Nope!" Sparkle answered, sitting back on her legs and pausing to fix her hair. "All I can see are these stupid doll things. Natalia, can we move on? This place is boring, and it's so ugly. The orange on the walls is hideous, don't you think?"
The smallest Career extracted herself from another box she had been digging around in and nodded. "Yeah, I think we should leave. We won't find anything here," Natalia said.
"Cool!" Sparkle said, getting to her feet and reaching for her parka. The room was heated, so all of the tributes had shed their coats. "Can we go to the one with the pretty yellow roof a few huts down?"
"Yeah, good idea! I saw that one! It was so pretty!" Sierra exclaimed, standing up from the corner she had banished to when Sef had declared that he couldn't stand another moment of her whining.
"We'll work our way over," Natalia said firmly. "That way, we can be absolutely sure that we don't miss a hut."
"But it's so ugly! Its roof is red. I hate red. Why can't we go to the yellow one?" Sierra protested, her voice grating and quite painful for Cecelia to hear. She could only imagine what it would be like in person.
"Listen, closely little girl. You don't like red? Too bad. I can make the snow bright red real soon if you don't shut up. You don't speak unless spoken to. If you do, I'll make everyone's life easier and just kill you. Clear?"
"Y-yes," Sierra said, stepping back into the safety of her corner, eyes widening in fear. Natalia nodded, satisfied, and sheathed the knife she had drawn. The tiny Career then donned her own coat and led the way out of the hut and into the frigid air. She hurried across the open space between the hut she had come from and the one with the red roof, slipping quickly inside to the next house, the other seven following closely behind her.
Once all eight tributes were out of the cold, the camera shifted to show the interior of the hut. Contrast to the warehouse-like space of the previous building, this room was furnished almost like an ordinary Capitol living room. It had a couple of couches, two coffee tables, one of which was sporting a plate of cookies and a glass of milk, and a fireplace with several rather large socks hanging above it. As well as a boy who was sitting under one of the tables in a corner, curled up on top of a couch cushion.
At the sight of Elijah, cornered and completely vulnerable, Natalia smiled. "Look what we have here," she said, stepping forward so that she and her dagger would be in full view of Elijah. This had the double effect of releasing the rest of the tributes from the entranceway where they had been trapped. They formed a semicircle with Natalia at the center, blocking Elijah's escape through the only door in the room.
When Elijah had seen the Careers, he had visibly paled, but he now replied in a friendly tone. "Hi there! Eight people have come all this way just to visit me? Here, have some cookies," he said cheerily, gesturing to the plate of chocolate chip cookies sitting on one of the coffee tables. "And help yourself to the rest of the milk, too."
"Oh, we'll be glad to," Natalia said, copying Elijah's falsely friendly tone. "It'll save us the trouble of finding refreshments for your funeral."
"Natalia-" Savannah interjected, trying to defend the boy.
Natalia cut her off. "Shut it, District 4. We kept the girl. We don't need the weight of another pathetic excuse for a tribute. If the girl dies opening the gifts, we'll just use you next." At this, Savannah glared at the smaller girl, but she said nothing. "Tell me, boy," Natalia said, turning back to Elijah. "Can you give me one single reason why your life is worth continuing?" Elijah remained silent and still. He was tensing up. "You're pathetic, District 12," Natalia sneered. "Well, at least no one in your pathetic little District will miss you when I kill you."
Natalia drew back her silver knife, aiming it straight for Elijah's heart. And then the boy moved. Snatching up the cushion he had been sitting on, Elijah used it as a shield, holding it up in front of himself. The blade embedded itself in the cushion almost the instant Elijah had raised it. He then yanked the knife free and smashed it through the window situated just above the coffee table he had been sitting under. Shards of glass flew in every direction, causing the Careers to naturally duck away, shielding their faces, giving Elijah the time he needed to climb up on top of the table and leap through the window, cutting his arms on the shards of glass still left on the frame. Natalia let forth an animal cry of rage when she saw that Elijah had escaped, and she leapt through the window after him, drawing another knife. Elijah was running headlong towards the edge of the flat top of the mountain. Natalia smirked. He had nowhere to run. She threw another knife at Elijah's retreating back. The blade embedded itself in the boy's calf, just where Natalia had aimed it, causing the boy to stumble and collapse to the ground. Smiling evilly, the Career began to walk slowly towards the boy, drawing yet another knife. But Elijah didn't simply wait for death. Grimacing, he yanked the blade out of his leg and limped away from the girl, heading ever closer to the steep descent. When he glanced back and saw the Career advancing on him, he did the only thing he could do. He jumped.
A/N: The first real Arena chapter! We've waited so long to finally get to this point. I hope this lived up to your expectations! I actually have the plot planned out for next chapter, so I should be able to write that pretty quickly. Thanks so much to all of my lovely reviewers :)
~ Lily
P.S.- Is everyone getting the little references to the Christmas legends? The little dolls were Nutcrackers, and the house Elijah was in was like one on Christmas Eve :).
P.P.S.- Can anyone think of a good title for this chapter? I'mawful at coming up with titles in any shape or form.
P.P.P.S. (I know, this is getting ridiculous...)- I've posted a poll on my profile where you can vote for who you think the Victor should be. Please feel free to vote :)