That disheartening moment when you start seeing the commercials on TV for back-to-school shopping…and you haven't started any of your summer assignments.
Not like that's me…heh.
Annabelle Hallestar, District 10
Brandy must be so proud! She was a glutton for chaos. She called me that a lot. I have no idea why. Anyway, she was going to be so happy!
I ran down the stairs of the steeple, resisting the urge to yell down the spiraled steps to hear my echo. I bellowed earlier into the bell up at the top and it shouted back at me so loudly that my ears started ringing. For some reason, my head was all loopy and the rebounding sound made me dizzy. It was like that when I woke up. I thought it was that morning daze, when the sleep was still in your eyes and made everything bleary. It was as if my eyes were permanently blurry. Before I knew it, I had stumbled and fell headlong. I rapidly somersaulted, my head bumping the stairs and the edge of one jabbing my back. I finally hit the beginning platform, slamming into the door that leads to this stairway. It gave way to my force and I and the door clattered to the floor beyond its threshold, every muscle and bone in my body hurting.
For a long time, I lay on the ground motionlessly. I stared at the ceiling above my head. It was a small room behind the really big one. It was like an office with small windows. Light filtered in from outside but there wasn't much, due to the storm clouds blocking out the sun. Pain radiated through me, licking at my fingertips. It was as if it my body stung all the way to the tips of my curled hair.
Somehow, everything was dulled. The colors in the room, the light outside, the coldness of the air, the pain in my bones. My neck was stiff. I was surprised I wasn't dead. It was always a little surprising to wake up every day and be alive. There were nearly half the amount of tributes. Hear that, half the tributes! Me or Brandy could win! I'd be happy to know if Brandy won, she's great at the Games. It was usually the sneaky people or scary people who won.
Achingly, I limped to the next doorway and to the ginormous sanctuary. Pews lined themselves neatly. Columns ran down on the far walls, intricately designed. The place gave off an air of something old, something sacred. Both my ankles were barely able to move. My wrist was bent backwards at a really strange angle. It didn't hurt as much as my ankles. It didn't hurt at all.
The windows were stained glass with a pictures of people dressed in long purple robes. Their faces were shrouded in the shadow of their hoods. Their eyes were invisible to me but their skin tones were a variety of colors and mouths wide, gaping, sinister things. Chills shivered down my spine. Left weren't nice people. There were other pictures but I vaguely grasped their meaning. Why was that bird on fire?
Suddenly, there was a scream from outdoors. I gasped aloud. That could be Brandy. Or another tribute. If it were Brandy, she could be in danger. If it were another tribute, Brandy would want me to blow them up! I pushed open the large, heavy doors and felt the rain fall down on me. My clothes were soaked almost instantly.
Only a block away, amongst the rubble, a large car was parked. A strange man stood atop of it.
A car? It could only be Brandy! She was smart enough to drive a car!
Awkwardly shifting my feet, I sprinted ahead to help.
Brandy Harris, District 5
I couldn't help it; seeing the centaur on the roof of my car, I screamed. I screamed like the fourteen year old girl I was.
The creature cocked its head curiously off to one side and he lowered his human half down in a sort of bow. Wait, no, he was sniffing me. Its eyes were completely black, looking as dull and stupid as any normal horse. I wasn't even certain if he were staring directly at me. Raindrops began splattering across the window and I pressed myself backwards into the seat. The rain had intensified and I glanced about the dashboard, trying to pinpoint the spot lever that started the windshield wipers.
He can't exactly get you, I told myself. How can anyone, or anything, sniff someone through, like, an inch of glass?
I spoke too soon. Because, at that moment, the centaur slammed a hoof straight through the window.
Glass shattered down upon me and I threw my arms up to protect my face. A few shards managed to cut my skin. Blindly, once the assault had ended, I pushed random buttons and toggled levers. A small part of me hoped desperately there'd be an ejector's seat or rockets or anything. The centaur sniffed me once again, nostrils flared. I was sure I spotted hair growing in there. He raised a hoof again to enlarge the rough circle. I reacted frantically and the only thing I could think to do was plow my foot down on the button.
The hoof shattered through the window again but had lost most of its momentum. In my pandemonium of pushing buttons, I had adjusted the shift to Reverse. The centaur, unprepared for the sudden jolt, stumbled off the roof. He skidded with a horrible scraping sound along the asphalt, crumpled to the ground, but stood and shagged himself off. I was still zooming backwards, checking behind me for any obstructions. I suddenly understood the purpose of the mirror attached to the ceiling. I repositioned it, peering to the road behind me, when I saw the person standing there.
I stretched my left foot and brought it down with everything in me onto the brake. The wheels shrieked mercilessly and the person idling in the road stared with dopey eyes like a deer in the headlights. I swore aloud and squeezed my eyes shut, bracing for impact.
A loud thump came, followed by what sounded like a large body being dragged. The car eventually stopped and I slowly opened my eyes. Dammit!
My knuckles were ghostly white and my face matched the sickly color as I glanced into one of the mirrors. I raised my eyes to see the road ahead of me. Black tire marks etched themselves into the pavement and my stomach squelched at the sight of blood smeared between the lines. Honestly, I didn't feel guilty. I regretted looking, not my actions.
A cannon fired.
Farther up the road, the centaur was charging after me with a broken pole in his hand. It reminded of one of those cavalier types from long ago, mid-stride in a joust. At first glance, you'd suspect such a thing, a bare-chested man riding his steed. But a second look proved the man and horse were one. And the end was pointed directly at me.
I fumbled for the lever on the side of the car. He was closer now. My limbs became panicky and I barely managed to open the door. It swung open and I tumbled out, legs still tangled up inside.
The centaur got there a second later. The pole tore through the headrest, just where my head had been a second beforehand. I screamed again, scrabbling away on my hands and knees, finally climbing to my feet. My eyes were able to sweep the rear of the car and the body beneath it. I frowned in confusion.
…That wasn't Annabelle's body. That was…that was a troll.
Whose cannon fired?
I whipped my head around and spotted the bloody mess of filthy fabric that was Annabelle Hallestar. She lay a fair distance away from the car. It didn't take too long to comprehend that her head was bashed in.
I released my hammer from my waist and raised it defensively. But the centaur wasn't advancing. His head wasn't even directed my way. I followed his gaze to the small pigtailed girl.
She was kneeling down beside the car, examining the road kill tangled within the tires. She prodded him once, twice, her eyes shining sadly with tears. She stroked the stubby, filth covered foot sticking out from under the car.
Silently, I began creeping away, carefully stepping over Annabelle. Her block shaped head was literally dented. Blood still leaked out from a fresh kill. That alliance was nice while it lasted. To think, without me, how far along would we be in this competition? There'd be about five tributes still playing the Game.
The centaur clopped forward and rested a hand on the young District One girl's shoulder. She gazed up at him and smiled wearily. I continued tiptoeing past. I stepped right into the puddle of blood, slowly being washed away by the downpour, and groaned inwardly at it. That was literally going to be a pain in the ass to clean. That car was looking real comfortable now. They have heaters if I'm not mistaken. Nice, warm heaters and a big back seat, great for napping. I stepped over a branch…and found it not to be a branch.
The wood was roughly polished and had an array of nails or, more appropriately, thorns embedded in the side. It was a roughly crafted club, large unreal leaves wrapped around the bottom as a grip for the handle. The opposite end was splattered with blood. Ah, so that's what happened to the brick. I quietly grabbed it, dragging it along beside me.
The car was running, I observed. How long could it last? It needed gas or something, right? It looked like it could work still, despite being crushed by a centaur.
"Come back for it later," I muttered. Alice Lynn was distracted but the centaur would easily trample me if I stepped anywhere near here. Wait, how did I know her name? I pushed the thought aside. That was a stood thing to worry about at a time as crucial as now. So, instead of advancing, I receded. The little girl was in over her head. She volunteered for this shit? And thought it'd be fun? Welcome to the real world, where your little fantasy creatures get run over.
A pointed object stabbed into the small of my back.
My heart instantly jolted and I reacted on instinct. It was possibly one of the only things I remembered from the training days, not to mention it was roughly edited to the point that I just went with it.
Hammer in my hand, I spun around. The sharp edge dragged along my skin and I felt a wound open along its path. I hooked the hammer's head around the blade pressing into me and thrust it off to the side. I literally sighed with relief as I saw it was simply a knight in shining armor. His sword flew away and slid through the slick grass.
The knight hissed angrily at me. Through the gaps in his helmet, I saw a face that was anything but normal. Now when a person wears a hundred pounds worth of metal on him, what problem does he face?
I kicked him hard, with every ounce of strength I had, right in the middle of his metal abs. With a heavy clatter, the creature toppled backwards, flopping like a fish out of water as he attempted to rise again. I heaved the club up and, with a mighty swing, smashed it down on the knight. He squealed like a crazed demon.
I looked over my shoulder and mumbled obscenities. The centaur plowed forward and I spun in a complete circle, using the momentum to throw it. It nailed the horse man in the knee and he collapsed almost immediately. He whinnied in pain, a strange sound to hear from a human mouth.
Behind him, the girl walked forward. Her eyes had lost all the light in them. I could no longer swallow and I swore that face was going to haunt me in my dreams tonight. She glared intensely. Her small fists were tensed and she clamped her jaw down hard. She looked like she was about to break a tooth.
"Don't hurt my babies," she barked. "Never, ever, ever, ever, never, ever hurt them!"
I glanced from side to side. Casually, I inched to the left. A few more inches and it'd be a clear shot to the car door….
"Uh, I think it may be too late for that," I said. "But, you know, maybe some band aids, a parachute with some needle and thread." Keep her distracted for just a few more seconds…. "The horse dude, well, he won't be the same adventurer as he was before, but he'll be fine. Let him heal for a day or two."
"That is totally mean! You are…you are…" her face burned red "…a big fat wart-faced meanie head with yellow teeth and bad breath!"
I laughed. "Sorry, hon, but I've been called a lot worse. That's toward the top of my list though. A plus for originality."
She growled-literally growled like some monster-and pointed a stubby finger at me. "I have words in my head that my brother uses that my mommy told me to never ever use because they are really bad! Don't you make me use them, because I'll say you said them and you'll get in a lot of trouble."
I placed my hands on my hips. We were facing off and the palms of the Alice's hands were darkening. She was near ready to explode like she was a balloon and I was puffing the angry air into her. "Oh, I'm shaking in my saddle shoes! Please, my mommy will be so upset!"
District One screeched, "You-"
"Oh, shit, look!" I pointed behind her. Hooray, for the attention span of a five year old! The girl's evil gaze drifted in the direction of my finger. I swiftly dived back into the car, shifted it into drive, and floored it. It sputtered for several seconds, burning rubber, but shot off down the road. Glass stabbed parts of my ass that should not be stabbed and I nearly lost my fingers as I closed the door shut. I didn't check the mirror to see if the girl was pursuing.
I didn't want to know.
Chrys Gord, District 11
"What?" Zander inquired. My eyes flickered from his arm around my shoulders to his face, up to the sky, then back to his face. I wished I could say it was his mutation that made him this good-looking. It'd be so much easier if he was. But he wasn't trying to morph his appearance. He thought it was funny to make himself look uglier. No, the boy had to be gorgeous. And he had to be such a flirt.
"I'm not that cold," I said. Did he hear my teeth clicking together?
"Yes you are," Zander smirked. We dashed out in the open, following Neve. We both had silently agreed she could take the reins for a while. A small part of me itched to ensure that everything was moving productively. My life was no longer on schedule and it drove me insane. One could not live like this. Life certainly wasn't going to last much past this. Neve and I were alike in that way; we were both goal-oriented. I admitted to myself she needed to be distracted for the moment. I still couldn't shake the thought of Leon lying there…blood all over….
"What about Neve? She must be cold." The girl tilted her head towards us, acknowledging her name.
"Oh, well, she has less curves on her, it won't take as much energy to warm her up. You, my friend, need the extra effort." Neve narrowed her eyes quizzically at him, waving us under the cover of a doorway to a diner. We stood cramped together as we tried to avoid the rain.
"May I ask how good your grades in school are?" she asked. She pushed on the door of the diner and it opened.
Zander slicked his soaking hair back. "Mainly B's, with a few A's. Why ya' ask?"
"No reason." Neve stepped inside. We followed closely behind. The scene that met us was one I knew was going to haunt me.
Blood. A lot of it. Neve actually slipped in it upon entering and I grabbed her arm, providing support. She laid her hand over mine as she steadied herself. Zander's finger dug into my shoulder.
"Are they dead?" he whispered tersely in my ear. I wasn't prepared to be the one to find out. Instead, I released Neve and she bent down over the nearest girl. I could honestly say I've never seen her before in my life. I didn't remember seeing her at any point during the pre-Games or during recaps, anywhere. She was about fourteen with a splattering of freckles across her nose.
Zander wrapped his arms around me. I was too stunned to push him away. Instead, I leaned into him. His warm breath tickled my neck but it was comforting to feel against my skin. Neve held two fingers to the girl's neck and we stood quietly.
"She's alive. But barely. She's bled out a lot." She crossed her arms tightly around herself. She strode over to the next girl, not much smaller than the first. Neve checked her pulse. The girl stirred momentarily and we all leapt back. The wind whistled in through the broken windows and Neve's skirt fluttered.
"Alright. She's alive too," Zander said tensely. "She's from District Six. Lauryn, I think her name is." He guided me, putting a hand in the crook of my elbow, to the farther part of the diner. He put a noticeable girth between us and the two young girls, stopping once we stood behind Neve. She rose to full height, which wasn't very much, and dusted herself off.
"So," she said. "What do we do?"
We exchanged a look between each other. Neve paled considerably. I gripped my frying pan tighter. No one spoke.
"Do you recognize this one?" Zander indicated the fourteen year old. Both Neve and I shook our heads. So it wasn't just me. "And you said she was barely alive?"
"If she doesn't get medical treatment and depending on the last time she ate, I'd say another day," Neve said. "She was closer to the windows. And…it's like she was playing with the glass or something. There's this really big one," she gestured to a shard stuck in the skin above her knee, "that cut a major artery. It's where most of the blood is flowing from, as you can see." She widened her eyes and they glistened sadly. "I'm sorry, I can't kill her. Not like this."
"Who ever said we were planning to kill them!" I snapped.
"Who ever said we weren't?" Zander said in a monotone very unlike him.
That shut everyone up.
Zander released his hold on me. It only took one yank for him to pull the frying pan out of my hands and he strode toward the girl. His chest heaved heavily as he took in a breath. His shoulders sagged forward as he blew it out once again. He was smaller. It was like he was caving in on himself. He rose the frying pan up with one hand and I swore his hands were shaking. Neve shook her head. She instead pinched the bridge of her nose and brushed her damp hair behind her ears. I silently made note to tie it back in a braid for her later.
"That won't do it," she said. "It'll take too long."
"What ideas do you have then?" Zander said.
Neve shrugged, throwing her arms up helplessly. "I don't know, okay?"
"Why do we have to kill them?" I added.
Zander walked towards me again. He cupped the sides of my face in his palms. I glared off to the side but Zander's gaze demanded I look at him. "Do you plan on going home?" I tried twisting away but he only gripped me tighter. "Tell me, do you?"
"I hope so," I whispered.
He was right. He didn't need to explain himself any further. If we had any hope of going home, everyone else would have to die, including these girls.
I pulled away, slipping our bag off my shoulders. There was a more inconspicuous flap in the front and I dug my hand in it to the bottom. I handed the knife to Zander.
"Since when did we have this?" he asked. I remained silent. Zander opened his mouth to argue but I shook my head, motioning to the girl.
He pressed his lips together and kneeled down beside her. How long ago was it that this was Leon's body?
"One…" Zander whispered.
Instead, she was still alive. And it was our decision to kill her.
"Two…"
We were murdering her in cold blood. A girl we didn't even bother to know the name of or the place she came from. Brandy at least gave Leon a fighting chance. Zander was killing her in her sleep.
We were killing her in her sleep.
"Three."
The blade slice across her exposed throat. And god, you never realize how much a throat bleeds until you sever the jugular in half.
Her cannon sounded almost instantly. Neve refused to watch. My attention wasn't focused on her. It wasn't even focused on the dead girl or the bloody Zander shakily holding a knife in his hand.
I was fixated on Lauryn, whose eyes were widening in horror as she stared at the murdered tribute.
Alice Lynn Wonderland, District One
Balthizar Demarkos, District One (Death by curiosity of Annabelle's lights)
Foe Sterling, District Two –(Bree, Sandy, Lupe)
Shale Van Newhouse, District Two (hammer to the temple from Brandy)
Neve Hadron, District Three- (Zander, Chrys)
Leon Cabler, District Three (bludgeoned to death by Brandy's hammer)
Bree Maysee, District Four –(Foe, Sandy, Lupe)
Santiago "Sandy" Aquitaine, District Four –(Foe, Bree, Lupe)
Brandy Harris, District Five
Zander De La Fuente, District Five -(Chrys, Neve)
Lauryn Rivera, District Six
Cameron Wynn, District Six (Blown up by Annabelle's lights)
Silvia Arbres, District Seven (axed by Cede)
Cede Demeter, District Seven (stabbed by Lupe)
Heather Aurum, District Eight (Stabbed with trident by Bree)
Brodric "Bro" Loveless, District Eight (stabbed by Xavier's ninja star and Lupe's blade)
Poise Adriona, District Nine (Blown up by Annabelle's lights)
Alix Estelle, District Nine(Throat slit by Zander)
Annabelle Hallestar, District Ten (Head bashed in by Alice Lynn's troll)
Hydran Ash, District Ten (killed by Santiago)
Chrysanthemum "Chrys" Gord, District Eleven –(Zander, Neve)
Lupe Ismene, District Eleven –(Foe, Bree, Sandy)
Avara Zenia, District Twelve
Robin/Damion Garven, District Twelve
Chelsey Skyeren, District Thirteen (Burned and stabbed by Foe)
Xavier Drascal, District Thirteen (Stabbed by Bree)