Author's Note

I do not own The Hunger Games.

I've finished another chapter, so I decided to post another chapter! Yes, so soon! Don't rely on it happening again any time soon, it's a golden egg kind of thing.

Big thank you to TheAmazingJAJ for your support. The reviews do mean a lot to me and I do read all of them.

District Eleven Female, Zinnia Kane (17)

It was her fault Sierra was dead.

They should have stayed on the first island, the one that looked like District Eleven. They were safe there. But she was so paranoid she made them move, and that decision got Sierra killed.

Oliver told her it wasn't her fault, but they all knew that wasn't true. She was the leader of this alliance, and it was her decisions that made them run into the other tributes.

That was one of the reasons she offered an alliance to the girl from Two, Valkyrie, or V as she called herself. When Maizie ran into her they had three choices: kill her, let her leave, or ally. One twelve year old girl had already died that day, and at least this one could take care of herself.

Zinnia offered her the alliance.

To her surprise, she took it.

She reminded her of Sierra in some ways, but in others she was harder and more bitter. In some ways Zinnia liked that. The last thing she needed was another kid she had to babysit. So far though the girl showed no interest in attacking or betraying them. Her main concern seemed to be finding her District partner.

"We'll find him," Oliver told her. "We found him once didn't we, and now we've found you. We'll find him."

"He should have stayed with us," Zinnia said. If he'd stayed with them they would have had another strong fighter. They might have had more of a chance against the Nine boy's alliance and Sierra might still be alive.

She tried not to think about that.

Since V came from the island of wheat and hadn't seen her partner they decided to go back the way they'd come. Perhaps if they did find him she'd offer an alliance again. That could give them a solid chance.

That could be their best chance.

At least Maizie had a decent weapon now, and seemed pretty adept at using it. That made three of them, including V, who could fight, two liabilities – Data and Oliver – and one wildcard, Gadge.

Zinnia would take those odds. They had to be the biggest alliance left in the arena, and with the District Nine boy dead, his alliance would be severely weakened, especially since she was pretty sure the girl from Eight, Tyla, was injured.

So long as she didn't get too attached to any of the others, she could have a genuine shot at this. She could live, she could go home, and she could take her siblings out of that house to somewhere safe.

But she couldn't get too ahead of herself. She needed to take this one step at a time.

District Four Male, Orion Achoda (18)

Their sponsors had sent them medical supplies, bandages for his fractured arm and a series of three injections that would apparently help with his concussion.

That loss had really just been humiliating. The District Ten boy had been even stronger than he ever expected and was seemingly unaffected by Astoria's shots. His sister was uninjured, which meant for the time being they had swapped weapons, with her taking the trident.

This part of the arena however, did seem to be unoccupied. The fire that ripped through it yesterday had probably chased any tributes here away. It had still been smouldering when they arrived last night. They couldn't even tell what things had once been, the only bits left being warped metal and scorched rubber. Everything stank of grit and smoke.

"I wonder why the Gamemakers would burn it," he said, rubbing his head. Astoria shoved his hand down.

"Maybe it's like the One Hundred and Twenty Ninth, where they destroyed sections of the arena day at a time. Or maybe they didn't."

He frowned. "What, you think another tribute did this?"

"That girl from Six had a preoccupation with fire if I remember right from training."

"Gamemakers'll be pissed."

"I'm guessing she's not the kind of person to care brother-mine." Astoria stretched out, sleek like a cat, tipping her head back toward the sky. "At least we seem to have lost the moron for now."

"We can't take another fight with him. Not now, not so soon."

With him injured like this the maniac could injure Astoria as well – or do even worse than that. Astoria nodded. "We need to keep moving then."

He struggled to his feet. They both knew he was lucky to come off without any other serious injury, and the sponsorship taken to get them these medical supplies could mean they wouldn't get anything else substantial for a while.

"Smoke," Astoria said.

"What?"

"Smoke," she repeated, pointing. It took far longer than it should for Orion to understand. In the distance, thick black smoke was rising up into the air.

"Can't go back," she said, thinking of the District Ten boy who might well be injured but could still be looking for them.

"Can't go forward," he replied, thinking of the fire.

"We could if it was the District Six girl. The Gamemakers'll put it out."

"You want to lay your life on that sister-mine?"

"You got a better idea?"

He didn't, so they started moving forward toward the flames.

District Seven Male, Tupelo Barker (18)

A hovercraft came by shortly after the anthem, when it had obviously been decided they weren't moving camp, and collected Silas's body.

"Do you feel bad my love?" Willow whispered during the night.

"Not at all. I picked a side and it wasn't his."

Mind you, it wasn't Tyla's either.

Tyla wasn't much better in the morning. She said again that they should leave her.

"We're not leaving you!" Willow protested. "No way, no how. You're our ally, and we'll stand by you."

"Bleeding hearts romantics the pair of you."

"You can stay here at the camp, and we'll see if we can kill any of these other beasts, score us some meat. We gave plenty of drama yesterday, we can afford to rest for a day and start moving again tomorrow. You might feel better by then."

"Aye," muttered Tyla. "So how are we sharing his supplies?"

Due to his pillaging of the two tributes he'd killed, Silas had a lot of supplies. They piled them up in the centre of the camp, divided into food, water, and other. In a moment of indulgence, they decided to eat the food, and share everything else between them as fairly as they could. The biggest issue came when they were left with his fancy scythe, his knife, and a waterproof jacket as the last items.

"Seems fair I should get another weapon, since there's two of you," Tyla argued.

"But you're going to be staying here. We'll have more need of it."

"So you take the fancy scythe and I'll keep the knife."

They agreed to that after some more arguing. Without Silas the atmosphere seemed more lighthearted.

"We should go hunting," said Willow eventually. Tupelo frowned.

"Not for tributes. For the animals. More meat."

He nodded. "Yeah, that makes sense."

They would be seen to be doing something without following Silas's example of relentlessly hunting other tributes.

"You think you could guard the supplies Tyla?"

"Hey, I'm injured, not an invalid! I still say you two should leave me though. I would've done."

"That's nice to know, but we're not you, and we're definitely not Silas. You're our ally, and for now we want to keep this alliance together. Are you in or out?"

Tyla sighed heavily. "I'm in."

District Twelve Male, Ash Coleman (13)

There was an almighty din coming from outside. Ash clutched his knife tight and climbed from the mine shaft.

A short way away there was a flailing figure caught in one of his bigger traps, cursing and snarling. Without getting too close, Ash would hazard a guess it was the girl from One. Both her feet were caught fast in one of his wire traps, and she was trying in vain to pull them free or cut the wire with her sword at the same time. Neither were working. Ash ducked back into the mine shaft.

What did he do?

Oh, he knew what he should do. He should take this knife he was holding so tightly his knuckles were turning white and drive it through her back.

Or preferably through her eye. That was the easiest way to do it when hunting. How he'd get close with her swinging that sword around was a different matter though.

What did he do?

Oh, he knew what Ember would say. Kill her. You can come home to us, I know you can.

But it wasn't that easy. She wasn't a rat, or a rabbit, or a bird, or a deer. She was a human being, and he was holding her fate in his hands and she was holding his in hers. If he did go over there, if he did try to kill her, she would fight back. Even with her feet in the trap.

What did he do?

What should he do?

Could he really kill someone in cold blood?

You can come home to us.

You can come home.

Ember might not be the most caring of sisters, or the most loving, or the most sisterly, but she was his family. He could go home to her.

Ash clutched the knife a little tighter.

He knew what he had to do.

Still didn't like it very much though.

District Ten Male, Colby Marshall (18)

The injury to his right shoulder would start bleeding again every time he moved his arm. He would have that girl for himself, and let her know exactly what he thought of her pretty face. Slowly and painfully, preferably. He'd have that brother of hers too, make him watch while he took his time with the girl and then kill him too.

He'd never had a boy before. The one he killed in the bloodbath didn't count. He was quite looking forward to it.

First though, he had to do something about his arm. He was already behind the two, he didn't need any more delays. He gathered what little kindling and firewood there was left here and built a fire. Once it was hot enough he heated the blade of his knife and pressed it to the wound as he had done a few times from wounds back home. When it became too much he let the knife drop and tested his arm. It still hurt, but it didn't bleed. Good.

There was smoke rising up in the distance. Too much for it to be a small fire like his. His beautiful twins couldn't possibly have gone that way then. This arena was big enough for them to have got back past him. Colby gritted his teeth.

He wanted them now more than ever.

They'd made him hurt. They had to pay for that.

They would pay in blood.

District One Female, Diamond Blush (17)

Did this arena ever let up? No sooner had she escaped the glass torture than she'd stumbled into whatever new hell this was!

One of her legs was stuck tight in a small hole with wire wrapped around her ankle, and the other was caught in what looked like an animal trap. Diamond screeched at took another swipe at the wire with her sword, but it only twanged and failed to break. No doubt this would never happen to pretty perfect Tiara!

Something made her stop, listen. Movement behind her. Years of training at the academy made her twist to the left and her attacker stumbled past her, rolling out the way to her right. They were a small figure with messy dark hair and covered in mud and dirt. Clearly an outer District tribute. They scrambled to their feet, clutching a knife. The boy from Twelve, she recognised now.

"You little brat!" she hissed. Just wait till she got her hands on him! He waved the knife around as though thinking about throwing it.

"Go on. I dare you!"

He scampered round behind her, still clutching the knife. Diamond twisted to watch him. He circled around her, at one point darting forward and jumping back as she swung her sword at him. Every time she moved the wire cut deeper and deeper into her legs. At last she gritted her teeth, grasped it with both hands, and pulled, wrenching it out of the ground. At the same time the boy from Twelve launched himself at her, wrapping one arm around her chest and stabbing the knife frantically at her neck. Diamond screamed and tumbled to the ground, wrestling for control of the knife still flailing far too close to her neck for her comfort. The boy pulled at her hair. She rolled over, pain shooting through her ankle, pinning him behind and under her. He kicked furiously, but she had the upper hand now. Leveraging herself against the ground she flipped herself over and glared down at him. He was an ugly, scrawny creature with feral eyes, kicking and slapping angrily at her. She tried not to think about what she was about to do and just did it, driving her sword through his neck.

BOOM.

Diamond collapsed to his side, gasping for air. Her body shook. She killed someone. Not just someone, a little kid.

She smiled and wondered whether her parents would be proud of her now.

District Eight Female, Tyla Calico (17)

Now that Silas had gone, Tupelo and Willow had gone right back to being sickly romantic.

Maybe it would have been better if that cannon had been for one of them.

Currently, they were feeding each other bits of cow mutt carcass and making disgusting lovey-dovey cooing sounds. Tyla wasn't sure if she was better or worse off when Silas was leading this alliance. Currently, she wasn't sure who the leader was, but it sure wasn't her. She seemed to be occupying the role of family pet.

"How are you feeling?" Willow asked between mouthfuls.

"Awful," Tyla grunted.

"You had your painkiller?"

"You my mother?"

"You had it?"

"Yes. I'm almost out."

"Well, without Silas we might finally start getting somewhere. Look at us, we've already had a feast for kings!"

Tupelo laughed and fed her another chunk of meat.

"I think I should leave."

The two of them froze.

"What?" asked Willow.

"I think I should leave," Tyla repeated.

"We already said we wanted to keep this alliance together."

"You two do, but there's no room for me. I'm holding you back, and you're keeping me down."

"Because you're injured! You need to stay down!"

Tyla grabbed her spear and used it as a crutch to push herself to her feet. "I think it would be best for all of us if we parted here. We always said it would be until Silas died, well he's dead. Sooner than we expected, but all the same."

Tupelo stood and held his hand out for Willow. "Are you sure?"

Pain shot through her chest as she grabbed her backpack and heaved it onto her back. "Yes. It's been good, this alliance, but we always said it was only a matter of convenience."

Tupelo nodded. "Well. Good luck then."

Willow clasped her hand and shook it. "Best of luck to you. If we run into each other again, how about a deal that we don't kill each other?"

Tyla smiled. "I'll take that deal mother."

Walking away from them felt… odd.

Very odd.

But it was for the best, their best as well as hers. Without her, they could play up the lovey couple act, and without them she could play up her tough girl angle. She might have liked to stay with them a bit longer, but she couldn't risk becoming dependent. That would lead to complacency, and complacency would lead to her being killed. She'd been dealt a bad hand, she just had to deal with it.

Tyla smiled through the pain and kept walking.

Author's Note

End day five (although a night five chapter is still to come). I'm pretty sure this is the last day for a while to be contained in all one chapter. The next few days are all in pieces. What are your thoughts from here on out? Any ideas on what's to come next?

I'm hoping I can stick with the write one chapter/post one chapter with this story for a little bit, so I can still stay ahead of the game with writing. We'll see how that works out.