(A/N: Welcome back to the arena, Hungry Gamers, where anything can happen at this point. So far, a snob, a colonel, a criminal, an easy-goer, a mute, a songbird, a Career, and a superhero have all fallen. Which means one third of the tributes is pushing up daisies. Fifteen more heartbreaking deaths lefts. :'(
Let's see how the Careers are handling themselves, hm? Onward!)
~Rhymer's POV~
I find myself watching the block rain as it spills onto the other side of the arena and hoping that it kills someone, but somehow, I think it's too early for the Gamemakers to target and kill someone else. They must've gotten Marie less than an hour ago, and there's sixteen of us left. Shaking my head, I turn and look around at the now mostly-barren 'landscape' where walls are no more than three blocks high. Luckily, I'm only two blocks tall, so that helps out a bit.
My armor is still at ten, and I'm full of energy right now, so I guess it's time to go kill someone. Food will come later. As I'm walking through the strange maze of blocks, my eyes turn up constantly toward the moving block formations in the sky, still glowing, despite the blocks on the ground being unlit. Moonlight, I guess. I'm hardly looking where I'm going, I'm so focused on the sky, and more than once, I shoulder a wall or bump my knee against a block. I don't mind, or really notice, until I touch my arm idly against a block to my right and a sharp warm shock makes me yelp and jump back.
I rub my arm and frown deeply as my armor ticks down to nine, then I look to see what hurt me. The top block on a two-block pillar is humming lowly and sharply and glowing a bright red. I hold my hand out to the block, and it warms me like a fire would… Gee, the Gamemakers really thought this arena through. I wonder what else could be in this weird place.
I ease myself to a sitting position beside the fireblock and just distractedly observe everything about it. The Gamemakers must've implemented these to keep us from freezing in the night. But as I look at it, I realize that it just might lead me to my first kill. I stand up and stare at the bright glow of the fireblock, then scan the area, gasping as I see the rise of a similar red glow not that far from where I am now!
I don't make time for myself to think as I sprint away from my own fireblock and start to weave past pillars and jump over short walls toward the other fireblock nearby, and hopefully an enemy. Excitement blinds me as I finally see the actual fireblock and a form crouching beside it, warming him or herself. I roar as I leap into the air with fingernails bared as claws, prepared to pounce on my prey, but he or she reacts quickly and rolls out of the way. My roar turns into a yell a I slam into the ground chest-first, evicting the air from my lungs. I gasp and flounder for half a moment before fighting against the soreness in my boobs to rise to my feet and face my opponent, or rather, his weapon.
The tip of a glowing energy blade is about an inch and a half away from my armor generator. There's a long and tense moment of me staring up the length of the blade, the firm chest and blue circuit-nodes of it wielder, and finally, the frowning face of my District counterpart.
~Bronwyn's POV~
As more and more falling blocks smash into the ground around me, I press my back against a wall and keep my eye above me, staying as still as possible and moving quickly when I see one directly above me or in my general vicinity. I end up moving quite a bit… It seems we're being targeted. And the more seconds pass, the harder it gets to maneuver the growing forest of blocks. If this keeps up, I'm going to be trapped…
Thinking quickly, I fit myself underneath a block that protrudes from the wall and tuck my knees to my chest, waiting out the remainder of the block rain. When the rumbling of falling blocks dims down and eventually quiets, I uncurl and ease myself out of the shelter. I sigh, and I don't like that I can see my breath so well. It's incredibly cold in the arena now, and I'll die with half-full armor if I don't find some warmth fast. I rub my hands together as I walk as quickly as possible through the twisted block forest, but it doesn't take long at all for me to start to twitch and shiver. Another minute passes, and I begin to lose feeling in my face and can no longer identify a clear rhythm to my heartbeat. Panic would set in if I could think straight.
I'm fully convinced that I'm going to die from shock until I see the warm glow of a red light nearby. I saunter as quickly as I can toward the light, hoping against hope that I'm not hallucinating. When I come close to the light, warmth begins to hug my body, and I all but collapse in front of the glowing red block sitting in the middle of a small clearing. The sudden heat flowing into my body is stinging and painful at first, but after a minute, I relax, pulling myself up to a sitting position.
Though my body is relaxed, my mind is in pieces. My hands come up to clasp against my temples to keep me from spinning out of control. I felt so strong as a goddess on the chariot… Even stronger when I got a nine in training, the highest female D4 tribute score since the last Quarter Quell. I felt my strongest just last night, sleeping beside Hunter. I even felt strong standing naked in a mechanical tube chamber, seconds before being translocated to the virtual arena. After all that, plus the Careers being beside me, I didn't think these Games would scare me as much as they do now that I'm here… Now that I'm alone with only two javelins to protect myself against tributes and mutts.
I look around at the ominous unlit block forest and realize that I have no idea where I'm going to start to try and find the rest of the Careers, or if I should. Marie died less than thirty minutes after the bloodbath ended. All of the remaining tributes are at the mercy of the Gamemakers. They could spawn a muttation right on top of me if they wanted. I wonder if the mutts' appearance will reflect the arena, or if they'll just be… well, mutts.
The blocks being unlit is supposed to represent night time, but I refuse to even think about sleeping until I find an ally. I pull myself to my feet and drink in the warmth of the glowing red heat block for a few moments longer before I turn and start running as fast and as silently as I can through the block forest. Envisioning one of my two remaining javelins, I summon and brandish it in front of me to protect myself. Cold slowly begins to grip me again as I look quickly around for the glow of nodes or the glow of another heat block. As my head turns in one direction, something solid slams into me on the other side and sends me spinning and sprawling on the ground. I keep my grip on my javelin and stand to see who I ran into. Whoever it is, it's too small to be Agate or Jet, so I'm hoping it's Rhymer. Still to my surprise, but mainly my disappointment, I see that the person's nodes are orange, and I watch as the tiny boy from Eleven, Chiro, fights to stand to his feet. He and I meet eyes for half a moment, and all I see is terror. Wordlessly, he turns and continues running in the direction he had been running before our collision. I get the feeling he wasn't running away from me…
I turn my head in the direction he came from and see the red glow similar to the one of the heat block I just abandoned. It's too close to be the same heat block, though, and then I hear the grinding noise and realize that the light is getting closer. I dive out of the way as something giant roars across the ground. I look back and brandish my javelin again, trying to determine exactly what the thing is.
It's entire body appears to be composed of thick metal rings that start small at the tail and get bigger all the way to the head. The rings rotate in a clockwise-counterclockwise pattern, and the large ring that makes up the head emits a gentle orange glow, which could easily be ignored for the bright red glow of the small blocks lining the inside of the head ring. It has heat blocks for 'teeth'… As the rings spin, they grind against each other and make a terrible din… It's a literal ringworm. It's also my first muttation of the Games…
As the beast turns its head toward me, the faint orange glow quickly turns as green as my nodes. Its head starts to spin rapidly, making its heat block teeth look a thousand times deadlier. I slowly back away, holding my javelin up, fully aware that the change of glow color from Chiro's nodes to my nodes means that it's now targeting me. With a terrible screech, it starts to lunge at me, and I move just in time to avoid having my armor, and subsequently my head, shredded to pieces. As the ringworm recovers, I turn and begin to run as fast as I can. There's no way I can fight that thing, and if there are other mutts even worse than that, I'm suddenly unsure of my chances in the arena…
~Jet's POV~
It was hard for me to fathom at first who would be brave or stupid enough to announce their presence as they tried to strike me… When I saw that it was Rhymer, it started to make sense. When she sees its me, she sighs.
"Oh, Jet, it's just you." she says, visibly relaxing.
I should club her on the head for that stupid move, but instead I just squint and lower my weapon, dismissing it with a thought. "Rhymer, what the hell did you think you were going to accomplish by screaming and leaping onto a tribute with no weapon?"
"Well, you're the last one I would've thought that trick would work on." she responds, rolling her eyes. "I was hoping it was one of those twelve-year-old brats."
The way she casually expresses her desire to frighten and murder a twelve-year-old perplexes me a little more than it should, but I just cross my arms. "You've still got no weapon. You threw it away at Kyrain." I say, which still confuses me. Then again, everything about Rhymer confuses me.
She gives a sore wince as she squeezes her breasts together. It's way too hard to try and keep serious around her when she's so damn quirky! "He would've killed the Eight boy." she responds, not looking up from her chest. "I want to be the one that takes him and his sister out. Besides, it was just a little knife. I'll find a better weapon. Maybe a spear or a sword, like yours."
As she talks, she walks over to the heat block and squats down right where I'd been sitting before she showed up. This irks me, but I dismiss thoughts of hitting her and sit beside her.
"Guess this is where-" I pause in my thought and pull Rhymer's hands forcefully away from her breasts. "Guess this is where the Pack starts to come together again." I say, looking back to the heat block. "With Marie dead somehow, the only ones still out there are Agate and Bronwyn. Once we find them-"
"Once we find them, the first thing we're gonna do is hunt down the siblings from Eight." Rhymer interrupts, crossing her arms under her chest.
I frown. There are much more dangerous targets than the two from Eight… "Why?"
"To prove a point." Rhymer answers. "No one stands against District Two or anyone allied with us."
At least she's honest in her misguided intentions. I shake my head. "That shouldn't be our priority."
"That was always our first priority." she throws back.
"Yeah, it was. We killed two of the older members of that Anti-Pack, Bronwyn destroyed the armor of the third, I'm betting, and then three are kids. Besides, they're most likely all lost and frightened. We got our point across." I tell her, hoping she'll see sense. What she responds with, though, surprises me.
"You can't kill a snake by cutting off its tail. You've gotta crush its head, or else it's still a threat." She looks me right in the eye as she quotes something that Alto said near the beginning of this semester at JACCT, during the first Art of Strategy lesson he taught the guys. I don't know how she could hear Alto say that, but that's the first time I realize how much he must mean to her. It's admirable.
"As long as the Siblings are still alive, there's that threat to us looming in the air. And with us so separated, right now, the idea of the Anti-Pack coming together faster than we can, or even coming together at all, is a bigger threat than Kyrain or Hunter. To me, at least." Rhymer finishes.
"Alright, fine…" I sigh. "But first we've got to find Agate and Bronwyn. Think they're on this side, or where the block rain fell?"
Rhymer shrugs and gets up to her feet. "Doesn't matter right now. It's too cold to start looking for anyone right now. I say we just fortify here until the blocks come back on. I'm not tired, so you rest up first.
No arguments there… I shrug my shoulders and get as close as I dare to the heat block, laying on the hard ground and trying my best to sleep as comfortably as I can.
~Franklin's POV~
Turns out, there was reason to go somewhere… We watched as the block rain fell upon the other half of the arena, and for a while, we were pretty warm, just sitting together eating crackers talking… After a while, we decided we needed to move and put the crackers away, beginning to rove the clearer half of the arena, watching for any tributes. No more than a minute after we started moving, the arena suddenly became incredibly cold… We keep walking, hugging each other to share heat, but it's not long before we're too cold to give each other warmth anymore, so we're just walking as quickly as we can right now, trying to find warmth somewhere. If we die out here, better that we die trying.
I have to almost literally drag Aylau along with me. She was unbearably cold when I found her, but it's starting to get too much for her, I can tell. She's coughing every few seconds, and her skin is turning blue, clashing evilly with her jaundice. She can barely walk, and there are signs of frost in her hair.
"F-Franklin…" she wheezes. "I'm…. g-going to d-die… C-Cracker…"
"We're gonna f-find warmth, A-A-Aylau; s-stay with m-me… We'll s-stop and eat the last t-two crackers once we g-get warm." I respond.
My day brightens as I see a red glow not far from here. "Aylau, s-stay with me! W-We may have f-found s-some heat!"
"C-Cracker…" Aylau repeats, more urgently now.
"You'll g-get your cracker soon, Aylau. J-Just-" I start to pull her as fast as I can toward the glow, but a voice stops me dead in my tracks and freezes me colder than I am already.
"You can't kill a snake by cutting off its tail." says the voice of the twitchy girl from Two. "You've gotta crush its head or else it's still a threat."
I can see her, and her District partner, sitting beside a warm-looking red block. I can almost feel its heat from here… If one of them turns their head even slightly, they'll see us! I quickly clasp my hand over Aylau's mouth and pull her aside, behind a low block wall. Her eyelids are low and her breathing is incredibly shallow. She could die within the next five minutes if she isn't warmed up fast! But that's the only heat block visible around here…
"Aylau…" I whisper, pain in my voice. She blinks slowly, and I can barely feel her breath on my hand.
"I'm not tired, so you rest up first." I hear Rhymer say nearby. There's no moving them… Aylau's gonna die in my arms.
"I'm so sorry, Aylau…" I croak softly. She blinks slowly again and nods her head. She speaks slowly, and I can just barely hear her.
"C…..C….C-Cracker…"
I think about the pack of crackers we shared and it appears in my free hand. There are only two crackers left… I hiccup painfully as I take one out and put it carefully in Aylau's mouth. She chews slowly and when she swallows, it looks painful. I'm glad I could've granted her last wish... I close my eyes, expecting to hear Aylau's death cannon any second now…
"Eat your cracker…" I hear her voice say, stronger. I open my eyes wide, in time to see her weakly pulling herself out of my grip and standing. She looks a lot less cold. In fact, she seems to be making her own heat…
"W… What…. how…." I whisper, confused.
"Franklin, look at the cracker." she whispers.
Utterly flabbergasted, I take out the last cracker and examine it. It's a flat wafer. Just a flat wafer… Then I turn it around and realize… On the back of the flat wafer is a small red drawing of a cartoon fireball.
"Firecracker…" I mutter, quickly stuffing it in my mouth. That's how we stayed so warm! The crackers were keeping us warm, ad when we stopped eating them, the effect wore off after about a minute! If I had known this earlier, I would've saved them…
As soon as I swallow the cracker, my entire body feels incredibly warm. I stand up with Aylau and she grabs my hand with her good one, silently pulling me away from the two Careers.
"We've got about a minute…" she says, quickly starting to look around. I hear her gasp, then pull me along quickly. "Another fire block!"
Just as icy hands grip my body again, we find the second fire block and crouch beside it, sighing with relief.
"I thought I lost you…" I sigh quietly. Aylau looks at me and smiles.
"If you had listened to me the first two times, this wouldn't have happened."
"Oh, you're a jokester now…" I snort. This makes her laugh a little. I can't remember what else was said after that, but less than a minute later, she's asleep against me, and it doesn't take long for me to fall asleep, as well…
(A/N: Merry Christma-geddon, everyone! It's not the end of the world, but it's the beginning of a new era! Today marks the official continuation of the story that was brutally murdered months ago. That story fell under the banner of Shadowheart10, but rises again twice as good under the banner of Calamity Heart! :D
Leave your reviews, if you please! I'd love to hear what you think about what's going on and hear support for your favorite characters. For those of you interested, there's a poll on my profile page, asking whether you're for Team Jet or Team Hunter, which I've dully noted as being existent within some comments. If you're for a different cheesy Twilight-esque team, be sure to let me know in your reviews. ;3
From your appreciative author, Calamity Heart, have a very merry Christmas and a slap-happy New Year!)