Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games. They belong to Suzanne Collins.

Note: So, turns out trying to get out one chapter a day was a bit ambitious of a claim for me to make. Ah well, let's be real, we all saw that one coming. Still, ideally I can finish this story up by the end of the month. Not many tributes left to receive coverage at this point. Hope you all enjoy Shine's portion of the tale. :)

District One Female
Name: Shine Rares
Age: 18
Training Score: 10
Odds of Victory: 5-1
Fact: She was the hands down hula hooping champion of D1. She made 50 hoops at once look easy!

If there was one thing Shine hated it was dirt.

One had to wonder why she volunteered for the Games with that in mind, but clearly fame and fortune outweighed the risks of getting covered in grime during her time in the arena.

Time that, in Shine's opinion, was dragging on for far too long. It was now the sixteenth day of the Games and somehow there were still six tributes alive. Shine had a bad feeling that her Hunger Games experience was going to drag on for as long as the Fortieth Games did or, perish the thought, the Ninth Games.

Was it so much to ask to be able to just be done with this already and return home to glory, comfort and pampering?

"Keep up Shine!" Midas barked.

For that matter, was it so much to ask to have an ally that wasn't an egotistical potential psychopath? It clearly appeared to be the case.

With the recruits, the Fours and Getafix all dead and Asterix having split off a few days ago it meant that Shine's only ally left was Midas. He was from home, sure, but that didn't mean she had to like the guy. He'd only been getting more and more unstable with every passing day in the arena.

"Gonna kill him, gotta kill him," Midas muttered to himself. "Kill him, kill him…"

Now, Shine would agree to hating Tag as well. How could she not? The boy had been making fools of the pack since the training days and showed no signs of letting up any time soon. If anything he seemed to be finding it funny to mess with them. The thought of the boy's smug face made her want to stab something.

Something like his face, or maybe his heart. Perhaps both?

"Slow down, you're gonna wear yourself out before we even find anyone," Shine called, wisely not adding that it wasn't exactly a sure-fire thing they'd find somebody to begin with. "Haste makes waste."

"The only thing getting wasted is Tag," Midas grunted.

Shine slowly shook her head. Of all the people she could have had as her district partner it just had to be Midas. Sure, he was a serious powerhouse but did that mean he was truly the best? Not in her opinion! Why oh why couldn't it have been Damien, Cheque, Percival or Sceptre who came with her? They were brains, brawn and beauty – the full package!

One thing was clear to Shine as she walked alongside Midas through the deep forest. The smell of acid and dirt in the air was only getting stronger with every passing day and the ongoing thirst was giving Shine frequent bouts of light-headedness. The sponsor parachutes hadn't stopped falling yet, but how long would that persist for? As bad as the dirt was, Shine was growing to hate the feelings of thirst even moreso.

Still, that was a distant second to the pain that continued to course through her body. The boy from Ten was dead, but he'd put up one hell of a fight before Midas killed him. The medical supplies from the cornucopia and what little the sponsors had been able to send in were only able to do so much.

"Gonna kill him, gonna make him suffer," Midas continued to mutter.

"I can't wait to go home," Shine whispered to herself.

It was easy to see why Shine was eagerly awaiting her homecoming. She came from quite the wealthy background, one of a noble. Perhaps not quite to the degree of the Flawless Estate, but still one of the top one percent within the district of the same number. She had it all: a manor, servants, banquets and parents who would give her anything she wanted.

It begged the question of why she would even want to volunteer, but when it came to status within the luxury district enough was never enough, and what better status symbol was there than being a victor?

Shine knew it would all be worth it once she made it back home victorious and, of course, alive. It couldn't be much longer now. Just five more to go, and with how high the acid was rising perhaps one or two of them would die off without her even having to do anything.

Shine idly wondered if her parents were starting to get bored of the show. She'd been doing her best, but Midas kept on stealing the show. Tag was stealing the show! If not for the unspoken taboo of killing one's own district partner Shine would let Midas walk ahead ten paces and throw two knives in his spine.

Alas, it would not do to damage her reputation within the district. The only other victors they had who had killed their district partner, Bronze and Mascara, had their fair share of detractors. The former for taking the Games way too far and the latter for being a pure psychopath.

Good thing Mascara was dead already.

Shine shook her thoughts away. She needed to stay focused. Lowering one's guard this deep in the Games was paramount to being deserving of death.

Shine looked away from her still muttering district partner and off towards her left.

She could distantly see a pair of boys deeper in the forest, totally unaware of their presence. Their goldenrod yellow and charcoal black jackets gave away who they were right away, as if they could be anybody else.

Tag and the boy from Twelve!

"Midas, there they are!" Shine hissed, taking a pair of knives into her hands. "Get them!"

"With pleasure," Midas said, snickering as he readied his large sword.

The careers charged through the forest like a pair of savage tigers, homing in on their prey with deadly efficiency. Strong as they were, what they lacked was silence. Tag and Orinoco heard them coming and were off in a rush long before it would have been too late.

Of course, part of the fun of murder in the Games was the thrill of the chase. At least, that was the case for the average tribute from One. Shine and Midas kept up the pursuit of their prey, working themselves to the limit in order to narrow the gap. The knives Shine threw proved to be inefficient, the boys proving too difficult to hit due to their constant weaving through trees and bushes.

"Get them!" Midas barked. "Focus dammit!"

"I'm trying!" Shine retorted. "I don't see you doing any better!"

"I have a sword. Swords aren't for throwing," Midas snorted.

Shine snarled, but didn't resort to cussing Midas out. With his temper flaring and his sanity clearly dwindling how could she be sure he wouldn't kill her if she insulted him one too many times? It was best to just suck it up and focus on the battle.

She didn't bother to stay back and help Midas when he became entangled within vines, roaring in fury as he failed to cut himself free from his binds. Stopping would just mean allowing the boys to get away and drag the Games out even further.

Besides, a few minutes away from Midas and two kills to her name sounded just fine to her. In fact, once the boys were dead would she even need Midas anymore? Shine knew she could take care of herself in the arena. Besides, she was over halfway convinced that Midas would be eaten by a crocodile mutt if left to his own devices.

It was to Shine's surprise that, after Midas had been left behind, the boys stopped running away and turned to confront her in a two on one fight to the death. It was a bigger surprise that they were actually able to put up a solid fight.

The terrible thirst and the dehydration that came with it had negated the major advantage Shine once held. That was to say nothing of the beating she'd endured from Piggy mere days prior.

But a career was one thing above all and that was persistent. Careers wouldn't give up a fight unless there was zero chance of victory, and as far as Shine saw it she still had a chance.

She, somewhat ironically, continued to see this even after taking one of her own knives to her eye.

One moment she was writhing in pain, the next moment she'd managed to get Tag down to the ground. The moment after that she'd sent two knives flying into Orinoco's chest.

"ORINOCO!" Tag howled, his hand outstretched futilely as his ally, best friend and in-all-but-blood brother died on the ground.

Shine was in pain, great pain indeed, but pure adrenaline kept her ready to continue the fight. Of course, by the looks of things there wasn't going to be much of a fight left to resume. Tag had an ear taken out and was fairly winded and bruised from the fight so far. All this and his short sword had fallen out of his range.

It was all too perfect.

"Heh… needed years of training to take down somebody three years… younger than you?" Tag wheezed, pausing to spit out some blood.

Shine narrowed her eyes, taking out a pair of knives. She would take great pleasure in making the long term thorn in her side shut up for good.

After making him scream until his vocal cords broke, of course.

"I've had enough of your attitude," Shine hissed. "I'm gonna enjoy shutting you up."

Tag brandished a metal bottle, a firm look in his tired eyes as he uncapped it. "I'll enjoy making you do just the opposite."

With victory so close she could taste it and images of the high life of a victor filling her mind, Shine lunged forwards with her knives at the ready. One lunge and two stabs was all it would take.

Tag acted faster, roughly splashing the contents of his metal bottle all over Shine's face. He rolled away to the edge of the clearing, fighting to catch his breath back.

"Ack, asshole!" Shine yelled, thinking the foolish boy had simply thrown water in her face.

In barely a second her shouts were not of anger nor annoyance. They were of pure and unrelenting agony. The metal bottle had contained a pint of acidic water from one of the many deadly streams and now it was all over her face and neck.

"AAARRRRGGGGHHHH!" Shine screamed and howled, thrashing around in agony as her skin was gradually melted away to nothing.

Tag or, rather, Spool watched with unease as Shine staggered around in a dying fit until, with her skull partially revealed, she crumpled over to the ground. After one final twitch from Shine the cannon fired, leaving district one with one less noblewoman than it had a mere minute prior.

The nation watched as Spool, the sole survivor of the battle, staggered to his feet. He ignored the blood flowing down one side of his dead and suppressed the urge to vomit.

He still had work to do.

"You were a valiant knight… my best mate" he said, kneeling by Orinoco's – or, rather, Ozzy's – corpse. "A sock knight to the end. I'll make them pay."

Spool lingered long enough to cross Ozzy's arms and close his eyes before grabbing the gear of the fallen tributes and leaving the area. He was still beaten and worn out. Certainly not the state he wanted to be in when he and Midas had their inevitable clash.

Spool took off, content to delay the inevitable fight. He may have left, but the cameras lingered on the corpses of the two dead tributes until the hovercraft descended to take their bodies away.

Shine's corpse was collected second, she having been the last to die in the skirmish. The once mighty career girl had entered with everything; brains, beauty and ferocious brawn.

She left the arena with nothing. Not even her life.

Tribute Deceased
Ranking: 5th
Cause of Death: Face and throat dissolved with extremely corrosive acid (by Spool)
Time lasted: 16 days, 7 hours, 46 minutes and 14 seconds