I do not own the Hunger Games. The tributes belong to their respective submitters.

Arena Day 6 - Morning, Part II

And if we could float away
Fly up to the surface and just start again

Birch Styler, District Ten Male

I dodge Necali's sword, the blade producing a thin whistle as it cleaves the air in two. As he draws close, I bring my own weapon down on his shoulder. Blood immediately pours from the gaping injury, but he merely laughs, the bolt in his neck bobbing with the vibrations.

"If it were so easy," he cries, voice laced with dying scarlet. "Maybe then you'd stand a chance!"

Flavia shoots again and a metal rod pierces his chest, just next to his heart. He doesn't flinch.

"You keep doing that," he mutters, staggering closer and closer. "But to what effect?" He wraps his hand around the bolt. Pulling it out, lacking the slightest hint of hesitation, he says, "It doesn't even do anything." His voice develops a feminine undertone, as if two people are speaking from his mouth at once. "You're just useless, Flavia." Dropping the bolt and pulling the other from his neck, he - they? - continue, "First you kill Selene with your incompetence, and then when you actually want to kill someone, you can't even manage that. How pathetic."

"Shut up!" she cries, sending another bolt into the space where the wings of his collarbone meet.

He simply stares at her, dead-eyed, and his lone voice says, "See? Useless."

Beside me, Flavia tenses.

"Don't do it, Flavia. He's just baiting you!"

But she ignores me and, releasing a roar, withdraws her dagger from her belt and leaps at Necali with wild eyes. She lands a deep cut across his face, but he parries all of her other attacks with ease, spewing taunts and blood and laughing all the while.

I launch myself at him, aiming for the back of his neck. He kicks Flavia away and spins around in time to deflect my blow. Blade clashes against blade with a grating shriek, and he leans just close enough that I can smell his blood, warm and metallic and disgusting. He glares at me with pinprick pupils and forces me back with more strength than a dying man should possess.

He swings at me and I dodge. As his arm carries across with the momentum of the sword, I slice through the muscle that connects his arm socket to his shoulder. He screams, whipping around to hit me again, but I take advantage of his still-outstretched arm and pour all of my weight into an attack on his left rotator cuff. The blade bites deep, and his arm immediately goes slack. He stares blankly at me as his sword slips to the ground.

"Pretty good hit," he mutters, the muscles and tendons flexing inside of his half-opened shoulder. He gives another wide grin and adds, "But not quite good enough."

With his right hand, he pulls a tiny vial from his pocket. I move to strike him again, but he whirls out of the way and takes Flavia by surprise. Despite Necali's ridiculous speed, she holds her hand up in time to block his attack. Her nails dig into his wrist and the tendons in her arms and neck tense up, but she manages to keep him at bay. Her adrenaline-fueled burst of strength can't last forever, though.

I cut down across Necali's back, deep enough to expose three ribs and a sliver of his shoulder blade. The needle slips from his ironlike fingers and he turns around to face me, lips still curled into that creepy smile.

Pulling away from Flavia, he takes a step back. A low, rasping laugh rises from his throat, and he lets his head fall back. Two cuts away from mincemeat, and he's laughing. He isn't even human. He can't be.

Career. Murderer. Dead-but-not monster.

My world devolves to a disgusted, angry red, and I bury the knife in his gut, twisting upwards because he deserves to suffer.

His mouth falls open, blood still dribbling from his lips, and I push him to the ground. A black wave runs through his veins, just under the surface of his skin, and he releases an agonized scream. I pull the knife from his stomach and he wraps his hands around the wound. He looks up at me in horror, black tears leaking from his eyes and sliding down his face. With a single convulsion, his fingers dig into his abdomen and his back arches in an anguished line of motion. Only a few seconds later, he goes completely limp.

A cannon shot roars through the sky.

I wipe the crimson blood from my blade and slowly exhale, trying to calm my galloping heart. Necali is my first kill. The first life I've ever taken. And if I intend on getting home, he cannot be the last.

"Are you alright?" I ask, turning my attention to Flavia.

She flexes her hand and gives me a curt nod. "Yeah, I'm fine. He just surprised me." She leans down and picks up the vial that Necali dropped, careful to keep from accidentally pricking herself with the needle point. "What do you think it is?"

I shrug. "Probably some sort of poison. Or maybe it's a dose of what made him freak out in the first place?"

"Maybe," she says, though she sounds unconvinced. Wrapping the vial in a strip of cloth and carefully placing it in her pack, she adds, "Either way, I'm keeping it."

Arena Day 6 - Afternoon

Linden Cooper, District Seven Male

Heart thumping low in my chest.

Things are

bright, bleeding

cold

...hollow

and I can feel that bastard's poison running trough my veins, turning my blood to ice. I want to break his neck

but then I remember he's already dead. I killed him.

breathing is so difficult but

It's only for a little while longer because I'm close. Very, very close. So close that her blood is screaming to me, begging to be spilt across the leaves and dirt and trees. I want to watch the life leech from her gaze. And as she lays dying, I'll let her know why it was necessary

Daphne is everything and the living must serve the dead.

I can hear her voice. The voice that was always too good for this world. Close.

I force myself to place one shaking foot in front of the other. I just… need to follow her voice.

trees and dirt, clouds cold air

burning numbness

colors that are bright and gray all at once, and blood - my blood, dripping down to the earth

fuck this fuck Alder fuck everything

Black stars running through my mind at a million miles a second, closing, all of my thoughts falling into the black abyss. Fear of death. But I shouldn't be afraid, because I will see her again and I will hold her and let her know how much mom and dad and I have missed her. I just want to see Daphne again-

...is that really so much to ask?

I force my way through the trees, trying to catch her voice

and then I'm staring at her. Not the alien-eyed girl. A new girl, the one that I arrived in the Capitol with. And she's staring at me. Mouth open with a silent scream. Maybe of fear, maybe of rage. Probably both.

One foot in front of the other. Repeat. Pick up speed. Repeat. She's running, now. Step. Repeat. Axe in my hand, running, step, repeat, step, step, blade held higher. She steals a glance back at me, eyes wide with hatred and abhorrence and distress. Step. Repeat. Close enough to grab her. Close enough to kill her.

"Birch!" she screams. Not fast enough.

She shrieks as I bury the cold axe in her shoulder, the squelching impact audible even to my compromised ears. I place my foot on her back and she slides off of the blade, pitching forward to meet the wet earth. Excruciating female with an unbearable voice and black eyes. Doesn't deserve to live. Her blood is mine to spill, as an offering to the one who shouldn't have died. She will know how much I loved her

her servants will appease

and when I meet her again, she'll smile like she did before

family once more

The blade, my limbs, my words - everything is heavy, but I only have to stay awake for a few seconds longer. One more to kill, then I can sleep.

But as I raise the axe again, she rolls over and kicks upward. Her foot strikes the center of my shin, forcing my knee to bend the wrong way. I stagger backward with a cry as pain runs through every nerve in my body, over-sensitized by the poison. The blade slips from my grasp. Everything is moving faster than normal.

Her ally appears from nowhere, screaming to the injured girl, and slams his shoulder into my throat. I choke and stumble, the agony almost too much to bear. But I have to move. I have to win.

I grit my teeth, Daphne's ribbon burning around my arm, and grab at Ten's throat. This isn't for me. It's for her.

My attack is only stopped by a horrible pain in the back of my neck, the agony quickly spilling over to fill the rest of my body. I turn to see my district partner standing in the rain with pallid skin, a needle in her hand and a sad, pitying frown on her face.

Your pity is the last thing I want, bitch.

My world goes dark and I slip to the ground in a heap of pain. I can't see the fading light-

Daphne, please forgive me.

Arena Day 6 - Evening and Night

Zeno Atticus, District Three Male

Charcoal stands at the mouth of the Cornucopia, bloody hands trembling and head stuck on a swivel. A flash of lightning tears across the roiling sky, followed by a clap of thunder and a gust of wind. The heavy downpour intensifies.

Eyes wide with anxiety, she leans back and turns to me, hair slicked down by the rain. "Hurry up, Zeno."

We'd best not linger long. Sooner or later, someone will show up with murder on their mind, and each of the other four remaining tributes are fully capable of ending us. With our strongest ally gone, we won't stand much of a chance. Not that we stood much of a chance before.

Trance, Birch, Flavia, and Waverly. All three of them probably take no issue with killing.

I continue sorting through the piles upon piles of backpacks, furiously tearing through the zippers in my quest for something, anything that could prove useful. At the bottom of the fourth backpack, I find a good-sized cotton sack, weighing about two-and-a-half pounds. I carefully open the bag, and inside I find a fine, light gray sand. I draw a sharp breath.

Gunpowder. A lot of it.

This is far more than I had before, back when I was with Wade. And all of that powder went to cauterizing the wound that Linden inflicted. But this… if I detonated this, it could easily take out everyone within a twenty-foot diameter, not considering the damage caused by the shockwave. This could save Charcoal and me during the finale.

Or it could just save me.

No. I can't think like that. I've come this far without sacrificing my loyalty, or my humanity. And logically speaking, at this point in the game, I need her more than she needs me.

I pull the bomb from my own pack and fill it with the gunpowder, careful to keep it as dry as possible. It all fits, but just barely.

Casting away the sack, I place the bomb back in my bag and determine that it would be best to keep Charcoal ignorant of the weapon. She has enough to worry about, and even though she's acting tough, I don't think she is strong enough at this point in time to consider the possibility of taking another life, let alone blowing someone up. No. This is my burden, and my burden alone.

I rummage through the other few packs, and discover a backpack within a backpack, like a collection of nesting dolls. The tag on the side says that it's a parachute.

I scrunch my nose, wondering why we would need a parachute when we have hoverboards. Nevertheless, I tuck the parachute into the larger backpack, using it to cover up the bomb. None of the other backpacks hold anything of value.

"Let's go," I say, tapping Charcoal on the arm.

She jumps from the contact, but quickly recomposes herself. "Did you find anything useful?"

"Just a parachute," I say, shouldering my backpack. As I exit the shelter of the Cornucopia, I'm greeted by a thick wall of freezing rain. "I'm not sure what it's good for, but I figured that we're better off safe than sorry."

With a weak bob of her head, she asks, "No food? No water?"

"Nope. The Careers took all of the edible resources before we arrived."

As we cross the platform, we pass a blackened bloodstain and I can't help but think of Mariah's corpse, staring up at the sky with glassy, dead eyes. I involuntarily gag, clamping my hand over my mouth in an attempt to keep the bile down.

"Are you alright?" Charcoal asks, activating her hoverboard.

Ascending alongside her, my teeth already chattering from the cold, I answer, "I'm fine. I just need to get out of here as soon as possible."

She stares down at the wet stone. "You and me both. There's been too much death here. It's unbearable."

And before this Game is done, there's sure to be more.

Arena Day 7 - Early Morning

Flavia Reeves, District Seven Female

The pain in my shoulder is like nothing I've experienced before. It's mercilessly unrelenting. Every time the pain starts to plateau, I convince myself that maybe, just maybe I will be able to tolerate it. But then the agony intensifies, and all of my hope is torn to shreds. And the bleeding hasn't stopped, not entirely. This... I can't manage this for much longer.

I lean my head back against the tree, letting the rain fall lightly against my face. It's cold. I'm cold.

How long have I been locked in this box of pain? Days? Weeks? It couldn't have been just one night. If I could just... let go.

Someone touches the side of my face. "Flavia? Flavia, stay with me."

I open my eyes and train my bleary gaze on the boy from Ten. He's so persistent. And I'm just tired. "I'll try," I mutter. "No promises, though."

"Tell me about District Seven," he says, in an obvious attempt to distract me from my injury. "What's your family like?"

Funny that it's taken him a week to ask about my personal life. I guess that's what happens when death is looming - everyone starts to care. At least, they pretend to.

"Dad's a prick," I say, unable to keep my head up any longer. My neck strains as my skull slips back, but Birch places his hand under my jaw to keep me steady. "Mom's alright. Quiet. Kind of a doormat. My sister is... troubled. But I love her, and her story isn't mine to tell." I hiss as the agony climbs in intensity. "As for the district? Fuck, I don't know. Trees. Lots and lots of trees. Lumberjack fantasies everywhere you go." In spite of himself, Birch laughs. I laugh a little, too, even though the pain makes me immediately regret it. "There are mountains, but the ridge runs past the district fence so I don't really know how far it goes. And there's a lake. I used to go there when I was a kid, before dad left." My mind starts to drift, giving me a brief respite from the gaping chasm in my shoulder. "What about you, Birch? How'd you get yourself into prison?"

He gives me a sidelong smile. "So, you were listening?"

"Yeah, yeah. Don't let all the attention go to your head."

"There you go again, ruining my fun."

"That's my job." No matter how hard I strain to keep myself present, my thoughts keep slipping. I'm finding it increasingly difficult to keep up the conversation. "Seriously, though. What'd they convict you of?"

I can't tell what sort of expression he's wearing, but the memory obviously isn't doing him any favors. "First-degree murder. Specifically, double homicide."

I let out a weak whistle. "And here I was, thinking you were just some pansy." The edges of my vision are starting to turn black. "Did you do it?"

"No."

"That's what they all say."

Shaking his head, he says, almost spitefully, "I didn't kill my parents, Flavia."

"Oh. Well, now I feel bad for bringing it up. Good job."

He smirks. "It's alright. You're the first person in six years to ask me if I did it, rather than automatically assuming I did."

I can't keep myself from laughing, even in spite of the pain. "They think that a twelve-year-old could kill both of his parents? In cold blood?" My world slowly fades to black as my vision fails, and the laughter stops. "How stupid. How incredibly stupid."

"You're telling me," I hear him say.

I don't respond. I can't... I can't feel my own heartbeat anymore. There's just an empty, silent, heavy space in my chest.

"Flavia," he says, frantically pushing the hair out of my face.

Warm tears fill my eyes, and I can't stop mouthing the words 'I'm scared', over and over again, until my lips go numb. I can't feel the saline running down my face, even though I know it's there. My weakness is abhorring, but I can't help it.

"It's okay," he says, his voice incredibly far away. "It's okay. I'm here. Don't be scared."

But I am scared. I don't know what's waiting for me on the other side.

I don't want to die.

And lift off before trouble
Just erodes us in the rain

The lyrics are from the song "Us Against the World", by Coldplay.

Early update, yaaaaay.

Necali Reinerston, District Two Male

Linden Cooper, District Seven Male

Flavia Reeves, District Seven Female

In terms of strength and training, Necali was the strongest Career (and therefore one of the strongest tributes) in Atmosphere. He possessed complex motivations, an adroitness with weapons that none of the other tributes did, and was part of the only (pseudo) romance in the entire Game. But it was high time he joined Erizelda in death.

Linden… hmm. He was a sexist, brutal sociopath who had an on-again off-again relationship with reality, and that's why I loved writing for him. From his reason for volunteering to his method of murder, he was a unique, useful character with a twisted mindset, and I'm grateful that I had the opportunity to include him in the story.

Flavia had a hard-edged sort of strength, and coupled with her judgmental attitude and overall hostility, she was one of the more difficult tributes to properly capture. Entertaining, but difficult. Without Selene's mediating presence, though, her alliance with Birch would have broken sooner or later. I chose to make it sooner, when they were still on acceptable terms.

Hey, look, another three-death chapter. It's almost like we're getting close to the finale…

Actually, I originally planned to have two deaths last chapter and two deaths this chapter, but another, better plot demanded otherwise. (We're close to the finale, too.) And as you can see, I also added another POV. Honestly, that's due to poor planning on my part. I tampered a bit with the original death order, and I ended up having to include the thoughts of an extra character in order to keep everything running as fluidly as possible.

***Questions (I'd love to hear your thoughts on the matter):

-Of the five remaining tributes, who do you want to win?

-Who do you expect to win?

-Any specific fights or confrontations you want to see?

***For those of you kind enough to point out the circumstances under which three of the tributes were submitted to me, I greatly appreciate your astuteness and concern. I've known since before the arena started, but I couldn't bring myself to sacrifice a decent set of plots simply to satisfy my desire for immediate vindication. (It was very tempting, though.)

The blog has been updated.

Careers: Trance Berrill (1), Waverly Capri (4)

Non-Careers: Charcoal Paxton (12), Zeno Atticus (3)

Loners: Birch Styler (10)