James Wild-18(D10M)
I don't know how much longer I can follow Mazie around, especially if she's going to keep darting in and out of buildings and down side streets. Sure it's a good, possibly even great strategy to do so, and it does make her that much harder to follow, let alone track. Unfortunately, there are two sides to every coin, and while she's doing exactly what she's supposed to do in this situation it's making it that much harder for me to do what I'm trying to do.
Then again it's my own fault for thinking that this convoluted, highly unnecessary and downright awful idea was the way to go, as opposed to just talking to her. All I'd have to do is tell her I'm here, apologize for not allying with her from the start and beg her to give me another chance to be her ally. Sure my pride will take a hit, and that's the one part of me I was hoping wouldn't have to take one in the arena, but at this point, it might be better to have a bruised ego and an ally then not.
Unfortunately, I'm too preoccupied with my own problems, not to mention busy trying to talk myself into and out of revealing my presences respectively, that she's able to duck down an alley or into another building without my noticing. I silently admonish myself for letting her slip away again if you count the trouble I had finding her this morning anyway. Regardless I move myself into the middle of the street stop before quickly scanning the immediate area for any clue as to where she might have gone.
Unfortunately, there are no clearly visible signs for me to follow, and with the streets being made of cobblestone there's next to no chance of there being anything remotely resembling a trail. In all my years of tracking and herding my family's' livestock as they roamed across the pastures of District Ten I never lost a one but in my two days in the arena, I've managed to lose track of Mazie twice, this most recent one in broad daylight.
Well, it looks like I've got two choices, the smart one would be to abandon this stupidity and just go it alone like Wren told me too. Or, I can give away the one little advantage I actually have, the fact that no one knows where I am and try to convince Mazie to trust me and reveal herself…..I can't believe I'm really going to do this, but here goes nothing, I guess.
"Mazie...Mazie, it's….It's James. I'm not going to hurt you; all I want to do is talk."
For a moment nothing happens and I start to worry that I just gave away my position for nothing, but, just as I'm about to turn tail and get as far away from here as I can before someone finds me, she calls out in a shaky but surprisingly confident voice from somewhere above me.
"If you want to talk then go ahead and talk, I can't promise to agree with, whatever it is you say. But I will promise to listen."
Well, at least she's here and willing to listen to me, that's a start.
"I'd rather not have this discussion while standing in the middle of the street. Is there someplace less, exposed, that we can talk?"
"At the end of the street, there's a big building that looks kind of like the room where Lanteia interviewed us before the games. Go there and stand in the middle of the stage, and leave your weapons on one of the marble benches, but not one too close to the stage. I'll meet you there in a couple of minutes."
I'm not too keen on the idea of not having my weapon in my hand for this. The list of tributes that ended up dead because they were too trusting is a mile long, but I don't really have a choice. I've already risked more than any sane tribute would just to get this far, so I might as well risk a little more to see it through to the end. Not to mention I'm almost positive that I can take Mazie in a fight even if I don't have my sword, and she never said I had to leave my shield. As long as Mazie is the only one I have to fight at least.
I quickly make my way towards the building she picked for our meeting, all the while doing my best to make sure I'm not being followed the same way I'd been following Mazie before. Once I reach the building, which is clearly marked 'Theater of Triton', I quickly undo my belt and slip my sheath off before slipping the sword back inside and placing it at the foot of a fish-tailed man with some kind of forked weapon before making my way to the center of the stage and plopping down on the highly polished stone.
Finally, after what feels like an eternity she slips into the theater and starts down the stairs towards me with some kind of tube clutched tightly in her tiny hands. Even from here I can see that she's trembling, though whether from nerves or anger I can't be sure but her eyes and face betray none of the fear the rest of her body is currently displaying. Even in the relatively low light of the theater, I can see her determination etched on her face and a glint in her normally calm eyes.
"What part of leave your weapons on a bench didn't you understand?"
"I'm not sure what you mean."
"I told you to leave your weapons in the stands and wait for me on stage. Why didn't you follow my instructions?"
"I did leave my weapons in the stands, but you never said anything about my buckler."
I'm not sure if she finds my answer amusing or annoying but the simple fact that she's still here bode well for my chances of at least getting her to hear me out. And to be honest, I'm not sure I'd be willing to do the same if our roles were reversed.
"Why the hell have you been following me?"
"I wasn't…..."
"Don't lie to me James. I came here with an open mind, despite having a litany of reservations and my better judgment, so the least you can do is tell me the truth."
She's right, damn it why does she have to be right? Well, here goes nothing…..
"I'm….I'm sorry Mazie. I'm sorry for lying to you, I'm sorry for thinking about lying to you and for trying to lie to you, I'm sorry for everything."
"That's, nice, I guess. But it still doesn't explain why you've been stalking me."
"It kind of does, if you take the whole everything part and apply it to before the games as well as during. I was….I was too proud and stubborn to realize that the two of us were natural allies. I let my pride make my decisions instead of my brain and that was a mistake, and it took me until the games started to realize that.
"Unfortunately, I talked myself into believing that you'd never forgive me for being such an idiot and with my fear of rejection compounding the mistake I'd already made I decided to follow and watch over you from afar. It seemed like the least I could do, considering how big a mess my pride had already made."
"That sounds….That sounds like a load of crap James. How am I supposed to believe that you're being genuine and not just trying to trick me? After everything you've said and done, how can I trust you?"
"I….I don't know Mazie. Honestly, if I were in your situation, I'm not sure I'd trust me either."
"If you wouldn't trust yourself, then how can you expect me too?"
"I guess….I guess I don't. I guess I can't."
"In that case, you need to stop following me, right now. After we're done talking I'm going to leave this building I'm going to keep heading right, and that means you need to collect your sword and go the opposite direction. If you truly want to protect me like you say you do, you'll put me first instead of your wounded pride. Can you do that James; can you find a way to put me before you?"
I don't know how to answer her question, and in the end, I'm not sure she really wants an answer to begin with. Instead, we spend a couple of extremely awkward seconds staring at each other before I finally answer her in the only way I can, with a nod. She reciprocates and goes one better by offering up a sad, weary smile before motioning for me to look away while she makes her exit.
I turn around quickly and zero in on the sad face of a nearby statue, which incidentally appears to be crying and counting to fifty as she makes her escape. By the time I turn back around she's long gone, leaving me standing alone on the theater stage without any idea what I'm supposed to do next.
Augustus Rowkin-15(D2M)
This has got to be the single most pointless thing I've ever done in my entire life. I mean come on, what are the chances that anyone was stupid enough to stay anywhere near a temple full of bloodthirsty careers? You'd have to be a complete idiot or have a death wish not to have put as much distance between yourself and the careers base of operations. This makes the whole idea of hiding our supplies in that stupid closet, not to mention making me sit here like an idiot while everyone else hunts a complete waste of time.
However, I guess there are a few benefits to being left behind on guard duty, chief among them the fact that I don't have to put up with Cassia's shit for a few hours. Not to mention that if I was ever planning on abandoning this rapidly sinking cluster fuck of an alliance, which I've honestly thought about significantly more than I should have to at this point in the games, this would be a perfect time to do it, hypothetically speaking of course.
I mean it would be incredibly easy for me to raid the storage room of the choice supplies before using the coals, and a heavy coat of oil to torch the rest. After that it would be a simple matter of slipping away and waiting for the inevitable fireworks as Docker, Cassia, Claro and Kerensa tear each other apart over what's left. What I wouldn't give to see that fight unfold, from a safe place that doesn't require me to expose myself to any unnecessary danger that is.
Before long, and despite knowing full well that I shouldn't be, I find myself slipping into the warm embrace of a wonderful little day-dream. In it, I'm laughing and joking around as I watch with morbid fascination as Docker ends Cassia's life in a bevy of painful and satisfying ways. In once he splits her head open like a ripe melon with an ax while in another he chokes the life out if her until her eyes explode out of her head in an almost comically cartoony manner. I've just gotten to the most excruciatingly painful looking one yet, a glorious little taboo where he's forcing her intestines down her throat after cutting her open and tearing them out with his bare hands when a loud crash from the far corner of the room forces me to abandon my extremely satisfying, if slightly disturbing fantasy and focus on reality.
I quickly force myself out of the semi-comfortable confines of my makeshift chair and back to my feet before scooping up my bow and a quiver of arrows and heading off in the general direction of the sound. I slowly make my way towards the back of the cornucopia where I decide to use the elevated vantage of the statue, or rather its pedestal, to get a better view of the situation without blinding myself to what's going on behind me. Unfortunately, the pedestal, while providing an unmatched field of view and a surprisingly high level of cover, is significantly harder to climb than I'd anticipated, and while I'm still ably to shimmy up the highly glossed and slippery surface there are three more loud crashes before I do.
However, once I finally manage to actually mount the stupid pedestal, it only takes me a few seconds of scanning to realize that this is going to be harder than I thought. From my new vantage point I can see as many as seven upturned altars with three on the left and the other four all the way on the other side of the room. Not to mention that of the four on the right side two are on either side of the hall that leads to our supplies. Unfortunately there's no sign of who or what knocked the altars over which means that in my haste to get a better view of the area I may have inadvertently allowed the perpetrator or perpetrators time to collect and abscond with our supplies.
This realization leaves me in an incredibly fearful and panicked state as all the wonderful images of Docker destroying Cassia come flooding back, only now Cassia's the one laughing and joking while Docker mutilates me in unspeakably awful ways. I quickly scan from one side of the room to the other over and over again in a vain attempt to see something, anything really to alleviate my fear all to no avail.
I'm just about to jump down and head over for a closer look, when out of the corner of my eye, I catch sight of the faintest glimmer of movement next to one of the overturned altars on the left side of the room. Then a few seconds later another altar is sent crashing to the floor just a few feet away from where I saw the flash of movement. I focus in on the newly overturned altar, and in what can only be described as dumb luck I manage to catch the quickest of glimpses of a shoulder with the District Nine seal emblazoned on it.
Despite the very precarious situation I'm still in I can't help but breathe a sigh of relief as I do my best to eyeball the distance between me and my target while carefully drawing one of my two dozen razor tipped arrows and carefully slot it into place on my bow. As I draw back to fire I can't help but wonder what possessed this tribute, who I'm almost positive is Briar, if I remember my names and currently survivors correctly, to come here in the first place. As I let my first shot go I can't help but wonder whether Briar and whoever it is that's with her, falls into the crazy or death wish kind of people?
Paxx Carthage-15(D3F)
I manage to see it coming from across the room long before she does and it takes everything I have not to scream out a warning as I watch the arrow sail directly towards Briar's hiding place. I feel myself start to tremble as the arrow continues to streak towards what I can only assume is a completely oblivious Briar, but then, just seconds before it was set to bury itself in the middle of her skull she throws herself to the ground and the arrow sails by and clangs noisily, but harmlessly off the marble column behind her.
I allow myself a small sigh of relief at her last second dodge before quickly slipping out of my own hiding place and darting towards the nearest altar. I quickly slip behind it and press myself as fully into the alcove as I can before kicking the altar over in an attempt to distract the suddenly dangerous defender long enough for Briar to get back up and hide. And it seems to work, and the next shot is sent in my general direction, but I'm far more alert than Briar had been earlier and by the time the arrow is anywhere near the alcove I'd been hiding in I'm long gone.
Unfortunately, it seems that whoever it is that's guarding the cornucopia has decided that I'm a bigger threat then Briar and the next six or seven shots are all aimed at me. And while I'm more than capable of dodging each one with relative ease, the constant movement, specifically the running, is quickly starting to take a toll. Before long I'm breathing hard and my chest is on fire, but the arrows keep coming and coming with no end in sight.
The lone bright spot in all of this is the fact that having all the focus on me has allowed Briar to slowly, but surely make her way from one alcove to the next as she continues to inch ever closer to the cornucopia. I mean I'd much rather not be in mortal danger and it sure as hell wasn't part of my plan for the slower and weaker of us to be the one actually tried to collect the supplies, but at least the plan is holding up, so far anyway.
But then, almost as if by magic the arrows that had been coming at a relatively constant, if not slightly predictable rate suddenly stop as a very awkward and uncomfortable silence falls over the hall. Even so I don't let my guard down, after all, this could very easily be a ploy to get me to venture out into the open just so whoever's been shooting at me can take a relatively clean and entirely unobstructed shot, but I am marginally thankful, and just a little bit worried about what prompted this much-needed reprieve.
Unfortunately, my answer comes in the form of a terror filled scream from the front of the cornucopia just seconds before Briar comes running around the edge with an arrow sticking out of her shoulder. As soon as I see the arrow in her shoulder my brain switches off and my gut starts to scream at me to run while I still have the chance even as my heart forces me to start slowly moving towards my wounded friend. But I'm not moving fast enough and neither is she and before we've closed even half the distance between us Augustus, whom both of us should have realized was the one guarding the cornucopia, comes springing around the same corner as Briar before skidding to a stop and lining up a shot.
The next few seconds seem to pass by in slow motion as I watch as a satisfied and slightly sadistic grin spreads across his otherwise fairly handsome face as he pulls the string of his bow back and lets his shot fly. As soon as he lets it go my eyes dart from his to Briar's and I watch in terror as the arrow strikes her in the middle of the back and sends her crashing to the floor in a heap.
My initial reaction to seeing her go down is to run over and check on her, but I know I can't do that. She's already dead and all I can possibly accomplish by running over there now it to join her, and I'm not ready to die. Instead, I stand there for a few seconds as she tries to claw her way across the floor while Augustus stalks over to her with the same disturbing grin on his face as before. Just before he gets there Briar manages to pull her head off the ground long enough to look at me with her wide, fear-filled eyes and tear-stained cheeks while silently begging me to help.
But there's nothing I can do and a few seconds later I'm forced to stand there and watch in horror as Augustus pulls out another arrow and sends it sailing into the back of her skull.
The force of the shot and Augustus's unnecessary close proximity to his target causes her now unsupported body to act like a ragdoll and sends her head smashing into the ground with a sickening thud. A few seconds later the crash of a cannon announces to the rest of the arena what I've Augustus and I already know, Briar is gone, but I can't wait around to see what happens next. Instead, I lower my head and run for all I'm worth huffing and puffing my way towards the hall Briar and I used to get into the building earlier, escape the one thing on my mind. I just hope I can remember which turns I need to take in order to escape this awful place.
Quanta Bomm (District 3 Mentor)
After last year I never thought I'd find something more difficult and soul shattering as being a Hunger Games tribute, until I had to be a mentor. The last thirty or so hours have been pure hell as I've been forced to watch as my tributes fight, and in Will's case die, all to the thunderous ovation of the masses. I mean the way Will died was absolutely awful, no one, no matter who they are or what they've done deserves to have their sternum caved in so brutally that their organs explode through their sides. But that's the hell Will had to go through when he died and the only thing anyone in the Capitol cared about was taking bets on how Docker could possibly top himself going forward. It's just, sick.
"How are you holding up newbie?"
I've been sitting alone at this table for the better part of the last hour and this is the first time anybody has come over and tried to talk to me, Zapp excluded, so I'm more than a little surprised to find another mentor trying to join me. I look up and see the surprisingly concerned looking face of the District Two mentor Claudius.
I try to flash him a disarming and relatively happy smile but it comes off as more painful than anything and he immediately sees through it. My lame attempt at distraction thwarted he quickly pulls up a chair and sets his drink on the table before giving me his full and undivided attention.
"Do you want to talk about what's bothering you Quanta?"
"I….I honestly don't know what I want right now. Is that normal, for a victor I mean?"
"You'd be surprised how common it really is, especially for the first couple of years."
"Does, does this ever, you know, get easier?"
"Are you talking about knowing what you want, or, something else?"
I honestly don't have an answer for that question, and that's part of the reason all of this is so hard for me to digest. Fortunately, my silence says more than I ever could and after taking a swig of his drink Claudius leans in and motions for me to do the same.
"The disgust, the shame, the feeling of being lower than low for having to do this, that never goes away. Just like the disgust and hatred you're feeling towards the Capitol citizens for laughing and cheering while watching the reruns of your tribute having his insides forcibly ejected through the sides of his body won't. All you can do is learn to bite your tongue and find a way to live with it in the hopes that doing so might save one of your tributes down the road."
"I….I didn't think careers felt this way about the games. Aren't you guys supposed to be all gung-ho and excited about the games and what they 'stand for'?"
"Some mentors do, my partner Julia is a prime example and I'd be lying if I told you most people in District Two didn't love the Games, but that doesn't mean everyone is like that. Some of us play the part we're expected to play all while silently resenting our younger self for being selfish enough to survive the games and putting us through this hell on a yearly basis."
It's only after hearing him say District Two that I realize that it's his tribute, or one of them anyway that's currently chasing mine.
"Is this your way of saying sorry for what your tribute is about to do to mine Claudius?"
"Honestly, the fact that Augustus is chasing Paxx didn't even register with me when I came over here to check on you. The only thing I saw was an obviously conflicted, and very emotional fellow mentor that looked like she needed to talk."
"I….Thank you."
"Don't mention it, after all, it's not like we're required to hate each other just because our tributes are competing against each other for the one ticket out of that hell hole."
"I guess you're right, and….Thank you. I'm not sure I'll ever be comfortable or 'find my groove' as a mentor like Zapp says I will. But it's nice to know that someone else understands how I feel. Even if you are a middle-aged former career whose tribute is trying to end my childish dream of bringing one of my tributes home in my first year."
"Don't mention it, and try not to let yourself stop dreaming of bringing a tribute home. You should strive every year to bring one of them home, no matter how hopeless doing so might seem.
"So, are you ready to join the other mentors for lunch, or would you rather be alone for a bit longer?"
"I guess….I guess I'm ready to eat. After all, it'll be hard for me to pound the streets for sponsor money on an empty stomach."
"That's the spirit newbie, that's the spirit."
A/N: Hello everyone :) I hope you all enjoyed the chapter and the fun new twists and turns, along with one sad death that it provided. Now originally this was a significantly longer chapter as it had an additional 3 tribute POV's, but it felt too long and a tad difficult to follow so I decided to cut out the other POV's and move them to a stand-alone chapter that I'll post this weekend. I hope that's ok with everyone and that my cutting them had the intended effect of making what you just read more meaningful and impactful.
Now on to the mentor poll :) and in a shocking twist we ended up with a 4-way tie for first between Districts One, Four, Seven, and Ten with 5 votes apiece. This means I'll be working a mentor for each district into the story over the next few chapters to give everyone a taste of how the different mentors, and Johanna, view the games as they unfold :)
Other than that please review and I'll be looking for all of your smiling faces this weekend for the next update :D
Death Order/Cause/Place
24-D5M- Barrett Martinez- Decapitated by D2F- Cassia Maximus
23-D8F- Twyla Monroe- Face grinded off on a pedestal by D4M- Docker Henderson
22-D9M- Hudson Levanten- Neck snapped by D4M- Docker Henderson
21-D12M- Frazier Von Haren- Skull split open by D7M- Bryden Maier
20-D5F- Tesla Brite- Speared while trying to escape by D4F- Deverin Aldous
19-D11F- Tepary Plantae- Throat slit by D2F- Cassia Maximus
18-D3M- William "Will" Java III- Chest caved in by D4M- Docker Henderson
17-D4F- Deverin Aldous- Stabbed in the forehead by D2F- Cassia Maximus
16-D9F- Briar Sycamore- Shot in the back of the head by D2M-Augustus Rowkin
Kill Total
3- Docker
3- Cassia
1-Augustus
1- Bryden
1-Deverin