None of my group had been killed, I guess I could take some form of comfort from that, but that did nothing for the soldiers lying at my feet. They sure as hell weren't innocent, but that didn't mean they had to die. More worrisome than that was that I don't even remember what happened when I snapped. Worse still, me losing control like that meant Dan had nearly come out. Oh, and let's not forget that now I had Jazz and Dani to worry about as well as everyone else. The odds of getting everyone out of here alive are looking slimmer and slimmer.

What the hell did I do to get on life's bad side? Maybe it was the fact that I was half dead and therefore not technically alive.

Dani confirmed that everyone would be okay after a few hours to rest since none the wounds had been too serious, just enough to take them out of commission. The fact that they only had minor wounds was probably the resul of me losing control. At least those bastards know the kind of power they're dealing with now; if I was lucky, they wouldn't go after us again.

We hadn't seen any more attempts at taking Jazz and Dani back out of the arena and that scared me. They had to have one hell of a plan if they were willing to go through all the trouble of explaining why there were suddenly two extra people running around the arena. I needed to get us out of here, and fast.

When most of us were pretty well recovered, I decided we needed to see if Dani and Jazz could still actually get us out of there or not. There was a good chance the officials had fixed whatever loophole they'd used to get in in the first place,

"How'd you two get in here?" I was pretty sure I knew, but I wanted to be sure first.

"They had to use two different shields to keep you in here. We just took advantage of the gap between them." Just as I had thought, this probably meant we needed a new plan for getting out here. What that would be, I wasn't sure yet.

"They've probably fixed that by now, but it's worth a shot to see if that gap is still there." Dani nodded even though the comment had been mainly to myself and flew up into the tree above before reappearing only a few moments later.

"The gap is still there, but it's not big enough to transform in anymore."

"So, in other words, we're screwed," said Sam.

"If that route's been blocked off, how the hell are we getting out of here?" As Fish spoke, we all looked to Jon. Sadly, he didn't have any more of a clue than the rest of us.

Maybe that's a lie though, because one of us did have an idea, he just wasn't in any condition to say so immdiately. It wasn't until half an hour later that Ben finally spoke up.

"We get out the same way they nearly killed us off." He face palmed as we all gave him a quizzical look, completely lost.

"Alright, bright ones. Why were they so confident when our initial shields went up?" Oh. Duh.

Everyone else suddenly came to the same conclusion as I finally had as well, but it was Jazz who was the first to question it. "What makes you think they'll have the same weakness we did? If they were smart enough to find it with us, what makes you think they missed it in their own plans?"

"It's fifty-fifty. Either they aren't sure of themselves and made damn sure to fix that bug, or they're overly confident and made the same mistake we did. Knowing them, they aren't being careful enough to fix something like that, Dani and Jazz wouldn't have been able to get in if they were being that careful." He shrugged as if the whole thing should have been self explanatory. "It's pretty much a given to me, I guess I just see it as a game of chess." Joy. Another chess obsessed person for me to deal with, just what I wanted after the last one turned out to be a complete frootloop. On the bright side, it did partially explain where he learned to strategize.

"When do we make the attempt? It seems a bit too early for that now." Dani was right, it did seem too early to make such an attempt, leaving now would make it way too early for these people to suck us right back into the arena if they found us after we escaped, but the longer we stayed here, the more likely it was we were going to lose a life before we got out if here.

I sighed as I came to a decision. "Tomorrow, the sooner we try, the better chance we'll have of success. If we wait too long, there's a chance they'll find and fix their error." There were nods of affirmation all around, but in the back of my mind I couldn't shake the feeling that something was going to at least partially screw this up.

They were making an escape attempt? I couldn't let this pass me by. Maybe I was mostly aligned with the Capitol, but I wanted out of here as badly as they did. Even if the Capitol did find me again after they got out, I could always say I was just trying to keep tabs on them, trying to make sure they didn't cause too much trouble. So long as I didn't voice my motive aloud, this wouldn't be too hard.

The only thing was that there was no way they were going to willingly let me tag along, not after all those attempts on their life. Oh well, it's not like one hitch-hicker was going to screw them over, even if they weren't going to know I was there until it was too late to put me back.

Yes, I missed an update, deal with it. There really is no real reason for it unless you count a case of depression as a real reason. I'm back now though, so be happy!

Comments and feedback are as welcome as always! :D

Invisible One