Alicia Stevens, Head counselor, Hermes cabin POV
Chiron was dead.
It was hard to believe. But the battle we'd just fought through was one of the hardest Camp Half-Blood had seen in a long time. The carnage from the volley of monsters that had just shattered the border and leveled the dining pavilion, as well as the lava wall and arts and crafts center, wasn't going to vanish from our minds anytime soon.
All around me, campers nursed their wounds and comforted those who'd lost friends. I saw one of my closest friends, Lacey Gray, Aphrodite head counselor, sitting on the step of her cabin, crying softly into her hands. I think I knew why. Her boyfriend, Charlie Warren from Athena, had taken three arrows to the neck saving a crowd of kids from a hoard of dracanae. He died as all of us hoped to, a hero. But that didn't make it any easier.
I walked over to the Aphrodite cabin and sat down next to Lacey, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and letting her cry into my shirt. I didn't say anything, instead letting her let out all of the emotions inside of her. In my experience, sometimes just letting people cry was the best thing to do.
A flash of light made us all look up from our mourning. Dionysus, camp director and everyone's least favorite god, materialized into the air. A tall, thin man stood next to him, leering unpleasantly at all of us.
"Good evening, campers," Dionysus said. "I'm sorry for the loss you all have just suffered." That was bull. The small smirk on his face gave away the lie straight away. He didn't notice our displeasur, though, and kept talking. "Losing Chiron is something that we won't be able to recover from for a long time. However, were he here, he would tell us all to stand up, dust off our wounds, and prepare for next fight."
As much as I hated Dionysus, he was right. Chiron wouldn't want the grief to overcome us. I sat back and waited for the god to continue. "With that being said, this is our new activities director, Tantalus. I'll let him take it from here."
Tantalus stepped forward. "Thank you, Dionysus. It is a great honor to fill Chiron's shoes, and I sincerely hope that I can take the place of someone so beloved by all of you." I couldn't tell what it was, but something about Tantalus seemed off, as though he didn't quite mean what he was saying.
"Now, as part of my new, er, training program, I've decided to institute a little something called the Hunger Games. The premise is simple, and one that I'm quite excited about. To find the best and strongest campers here, we will randomly select one male camper and one female camper from each cabin to compete. The rules are simple. Last one alive wins."
It took me a second to fully process what he was saying. A fight to the death? They couldn't do that. They were supposed to protect us and keep us safe, not send us to be butchered!
Another boy stood up at the other end of the green. It was Luke Callister, Charlie's successor as Athena head counselor. A small part of me breathed relief. If anyone could sort this out, it would be Luke.
"There must be some mistake. Surely the gods wouldn't allow something like this."
This was a mistake. Tantalus seemed to grow to twice his height, looming over Luke's quivering form.
"The gods have given me their seal of approval, insolent boy, and I will do whatever I see fit! Now you will sit down and do as you're told, or I will personally throw you off the side of Olympus. Understood?"
Luke nodded, too terrified to speak. As he slowly sank down to the ground, Tantalus returned to his original size and turned to the rest of us. "Any more questions?"
I had a thousand questions, and I was pretty sure I wasn't the only one, but we all knew to keep our mouths shut. Tantalus grinned. "Excellent. Get a good nights sleep, campers. We choose names in the morning."
I've wanted to write an SYOT for a really long time, but up until now intended to just wait until I finished my Hunger Games universe and did a post-rebellion SYOT. I'm still totally going to do that, but I'm also doing this. Rules and form are on my profile, and please, have fun with this. I will take anything you send except Mary Sues/Gary Stus. Enjoy!