Chapter Forty-Nine: Come Out, Come Out (Whatever You Are)

Night Two

Zari Morelett, District Six Female

We finished the food we got at the Cornucopia for dinner, so we're on our own from here on out with that.

With that in mind, we'll need to find water or something to drink in the near future or we'll be very thirsty very soon. The past two days have been soupy, so that's not going to be much help either.

Lacey's been dealing with everything like a champ, the same non-expression on her face almost the entire time. She hasn't complained once, even when she trudged through a patch of plants I realized were poison ivy a few seconds too late. Even now, as she tries to avoid scratching her legs however she can, she's still as resolute as ever.

In some sort of effort to prevent boredom, Lacey decides to start a conversation with me. "Seems like these Games are going to be a long one."

"We'll have to get used to that," I say, and I mean it. If the arena's not actively trying to kill us, I think these Games will at least be average-length if not longer barring some horrendous event that no one sees coming. I wouldn't put it past them, to be honest. Maybe this will turn out like one of those slasher movies Zeke adores but I can't stomach. Oh wait, this is the Hunger Games, we're basically in a slasher movie already. Only with way too many slashers.

The two of us clean up really quickly, but then Lacey stiffens, eyes fixating on a point not far away from here. I'm almost afraid to ask, but I don't have to, she indulges me anyway.

"Hold still," she says, marching forward with a knife in hand. For a few seconds, I'm worried she might have spotted another tribute and just isn't telling me, but then she pounces and there's a shriek far too high-pitched to come from her, and then a second later she emerges with blood all over her fingers and a limp squirrel clutched in her hands.

I suppress a sigh. We were probably going to have to do that anyway at some point unless we wanted to go vegan, but I wouldn't have been able to cross that line. Not yet.

"Well, I think tomorrow's squared away now," Lacey says. "All we need is water. And I'm sure there'll be a river we can find, or at least rainwater. I mean, look at all these plants."

I nod in agreement, then I hear something else. A subtle rustling in the distance, accompanied by a low, twisted rumbling that turns everything to ice. Lacey stiffens, clearly having heard it as well.

"I don't know what that is, but I don't want to stick around to find out," Lacey says. "Grab your stuff, we're moving."

I do just that, throwing everything into my bag and helping Lacey with hers, although she shakes her head when I move to pack the squirrel. She says something about how she can use it as a decoy to get whatever that is to leave us alone, but I'm not quite sure of how much that will actually help.

Then I catch a glimpse of something moving in the bushes that is far too large to be another tribute and both of us take that as the cue to start running.

With a horrific noise that sounds like a garbage compactor, something bursts out of the bushes behind us, sounding very, very angry. Looking back right now seems like a very bad idea, the only thing I should be focusing on is running like hell. Lacey feels the same way, but after about ten seconds of this, spins around in an insane move I'd probably break my legs trying to do and hurls the squirrel behind her.

There's a smacking noise that somehow sounds crunchy and soggy at the same time and then the thundering footsteps behind us stop, although we keep running at top speed. After about five minutes or so of this, Lacey signals that we can slow to a light jog.

Once I regain my breath, I have to ask, even if I'll probably sleep much better if I don't know this. "What was that?"

"Bear," Lacey says. "Hungry-looking one too. Squirrel might only occupy it for a bit, but we definitely lost it. Maybe sleeping off the ground is a better idea, though."

Yep, I definitely would have been better off not knowing that. Unfortunately for me, I don't have brain bleach handy.

Too bad. I have a feeling I'll need it soon.

Godric Runestone, District Two Female

We're back at the Cornucopia to settle in for the night, and now it's time for dinner.

I'm not sure why, but dinner feels a lot more satisfying to make when we collected all the ingredients instead of just having them there. After our encounter with Sienna's district partner, she spent the rest of the afternoon attempting to teach me how to fish. I kind of got it down, or at least I got down enough to catch something she deemed edible, even if she did most of the work. She caught three other fish and found some plants growing by the stream's bed she knew were edible from her time at the academy back home. Now, we have a decent fire going to cook everything, and while I can't say things are nearly as comfortable as they were last night, we have food, water and weapons, plus means to replenish all three if things go south. That's more than enough for any tribute if they use them well.

Dinner's a rather quiet affair. I haven't had much fish in my life, so it's a bit of an experience eating it for the first time. Most certainly a good one, though, and one that I hope I can replicate somewhere else if I ever make it out of here. Sienna's used to this stuff, so she eats whatever goes in front of her and then finishes whatever I can't to boot, ending the meal with grease all over her face.

"Sorry about that," Sienna said. "We don't have any ice or ways of keeping it cold, so if we had any left it'd just be spoiled when we woke up in the morning. And the last thing either of us wants is food poisoning, right?"

I nod. I'm lucky enough that that's never really been a concern for me, but it's definitely something we need to watch out for here. It's hard to swing a sword when you're throwing up, after all.

"Funny story," Sienna says, "I accidentally gave Sirena and I food poisoning the day before she got reaped, in very similar circumstances to ours. Fun fact, now you know why she looked so dizzy and out of it when she volunteered: because we'd both been puking our guts out all night."

A small laugh escapes, stifled soon after by a slow roll of nausea once that image worms its way into my head. "Sounds miserable."

"Because it is," Sienna says. "Oh, in case we're live right now, sorry, Sirena. Probably not the best story to try and start a conversation with. I can't see if you're embarrassed right now, but trust me, I can feel it."

She goes silent for a bit after that, but I'm fine with it. Gives me more time to think, which is something I desperately need now that our long-term strategy's been wrecked. Plus, a Sienna willing to make casual conversation with me is a Sienna I can work with. If I tried doing this with Galadia or Clara, it'd probably end with someone being stabbed and I'm not even sure who it'd be. Or at the very least, with one of us wanting to stab the other.

Sienna doesn't feel that way. Sure, she's trained, but she also feels the most relaxed out of all the Careers, even Nascar. If Dorian bumped into her on the street while he was training, he wouldn't feel like tightening his grip on his gun, which is something I'm not sure I can say about the others.

"Let's figure out our shifts," Sienna says after a while, finally breaking the silence. "Do you care if you go first or second?"

"Not in the slightest."

"Then I'd like to go first. Get some sleep, okay?"

"Will do."

I'll try, anyway. With the luck we've had, we're probably due for a mutt attack in the near future. There's only been one post-Bloodbath death so far and we weren't involved, so the Capitolites are probably calling for action. I'm not sure how the Gamemakers will work to provide said action, but it'll be there. And it'll be scary.

Either way, though, the time has come to hit the sack. Good night, Sienna. I hope you won't face any troubles while I'm out.

Artesia Alexander, District Ten Female

Someone is shaking me, and they're not stopping. My brain tries to drag me back into the void, but the shaking only gets more intense until it accepts that I have to be awake now. "Okay, what's…"

Then someone clamps their hand over my mouth and my vision clears, showing Thomiah in all his terrified glory, sickle in hand and coated in sweat. "Odysea's freaking out. I don't know what's going on out there, but we need to check."

Fortunately enough, I laid two knives beside my bed in case someone decided to bust in while we were asleep, so it doesn't take long for me to grab them and follow in Thomiah's footsteps, slinking outside into the warm, humid night. Once we're there, however, I'm seriously wondering what the heck the point of this was, for while Odysea's frozen in place like she forgot that walking was a thing, the nearby woods are silent if you don't count the rustling of plants.

Thomiah turns to look at Odysea, even though the latter doesn't reciprocate the act. "Odysea, where's the problem?"

Odysea says nothing. Maybe it's another tribute and she doesn't want them to know that we know they're there? Instead of talking, she moves her arm in slow motion, pointing a single, shaking finger at a clump of bushes.

As if we'd just given it its cue, that's the precise moment whatever was in those bushes comes charging out with a vengeance, snarling its fury to the sky. It's too dark to make out much of its form, but even with the moonlight only coming down in slanted rays between the trees, I can still see this creature's eyes. And its teeth. And its claws.

Nope, not another tribute. Definitely not another tribute. Much, much worse. No communication necessary to figure out what this nightmare is.

It charges straight for us, and we know better than to slash at it this early in the game. We all dodge to the side, letting it barrel past us with a head full of steam and giving me a good look at what it's supposed to be. Considering the Games are known for sending ridiculous and sometimes even humorous mutts after its tributes, this one's so ordinary as to be terrifying in comparison: a black bear, maybe a little larger than the ones they describe as prowling the woods of District Twelve.

But this one's different. Gamemaker-made, or at least Gamemaker-controlled.

Either we kill it or it kills us. No running from this one.

I hear a roar as it charges again, then hear Odysea screech as she leaps out of the way. My heart stops for a split second as Thomiah remains frozen, but he dodges at the last second, giving the bear a slash on the back as he does, but it barely seems to notice, instead appearing to size me up like it wonders how I'll taste.

I dodge the jaws and the slash of a claw, but my knives are too short to risk landing a blow without being hit myself unless I want to try throwing them (which I don't). Why I couldn't have picked a longer weapon to choose escapes me, but I don't exactly have time to fix it now, especially since the bear is now standing between me and the cabin.

"Guys!" Odysea's yelling now, which attracts the attention of both us and the bear. "Back away! I need a clear line of sight to shoot this thing!"

Well, that and she doesn't want to hit us, which I can't blame her for. I don't want to hurt her either.

The bear roars again, charging a panicked Odysea as she manages to nock and fire a single arrow, which proceeds to go wide as she just barely clears the range of the bear's claws.

Thomiah's not liking this. "We need to hurry up, we're running out of near misses!"

He's right in that front. I'm pretty sure we have a limited amount of luck per encounter with something that can kill us, and we've already burned through most of it. We have to kill this thing, and we have to kill it now.

The bear's staying relatively still for now, trying to figure out which one of us to attack. Then, I have an idea. An insane idea, but an idea nonetheless. Before I can even think about its practicality, I hurriedly remove my jacket, plus the shirt underneath it, leaving me naked from the waist up except for a bright red, skimpy bra attached by little more than an elastic band. Uncaring about who sees what's coming next (in more ways than one), I remove that also, then start shaking it in front of me as fast as I can.

Thomiah gives me a look like I have two heads just as the bear starts charging. "What the hell are you doing?"

I leap out of the way as it rushes past in a burst of rage, barely missing its outstretched claws once more before continuing to shake the bra as fast as possible. "I've seen this back home! I'm trying to keep its attention!"

Well, technically I've never seen this with bears, but you'd think angry bulls and angry bears would behave in a remarkably similar fashion. All I need is the bear to charge me a few times so Odysea or Thomiah can get the killing blow in.

Either by Gamemaker control or just plain good luck, it seems to work, the bear almost ignoring Thomiah and Odysea to come at me a second time in a row, roaring in fury as it does. It's coming from the front, Thomiah from the side, while Odysea nocks an arrow, aims, and fires, all as I throw myself to the side…

Straight into the path of Odysea's arrow, which scrapes the bear's shoulder just before sailing into mine. It wasn't going too fast, but I still have a damn arrow stuck in my shoulder now, which is still painful as all get-out. Both in pain and as another tactic to lure the bear, I let out one long scream, continuing to shake the bra with my good arm, before yelling, "Come get me!"

And it does, seeming to even ignore Odysea despite her having shot it. It comes at me in a blur of madness and teeth and I try to dodge to the side but somehow, impossibly, it swipes a paw at the arrow and hits hard, wrenching it out of my skin but also sending me to the ground in the process. Now it's on top of me and I'm screaming and it's roaring and slashing at my exposed upper body, claws hitting home again and again before it gets bashed aside with a scream from Thomiah and a blow from his sickle. Now, bleeding out fast but apparently wanting to take me to hell with it, it roars again and knocks Thomiah aside even as an arrow from Odysea's bow finally lands true in its neck, more blood spilling out. I manage to roll over to the arrow that knocked me down and grab it as it reaches me again, and it sticks its claws into me once more but that gives me enough time, even through my newly fuzzy vision, to reach up with the arrow and stab it in the eye.

It seems to give up at that moment, collapsing right on top of me in a great furry mass that I can't push off no matter how hard I try, and then there's a dull humming in my ears and an ache in my wounded shoulder and a sensation in my stomach I'm not really sure how to describe. I hear shouts from Thomiah and Odysea and I want to answer them but my mouth isn't working right anymore and it tastes like something that came out of a manure pile.

Before I'm ready or can even say anything, I feel a sudden warmth as everything disappears into darkness, then nothing at all.

Maxxer "Max" Bent, District Twelve Male

I want to sleep.

I need to sleep.

Yet I cannot sleep for the life of me.

I get it, at least somewhat. Hunger Games and all that. Don't want to die any faster than I'm already going to, and getting ambushed while I'm out is probably the easiest way to die here. However, if I'm so exhausted that I can't pay attention to whatever's around me, that's going to kill me as well. Not to mention, right when I was about to finally reach a state of unconsciousness, the cannon firing woke me right back up. Go figure.

One fewer tribute between me and the finish line should be something to rejoice about, but I'm past the point of caring. I just want to get some damn sleep so I can wake up refreshed before I eventually die.

I'm used to sleeping with noise in the background, given where I live, but right now I'm in the woods, not just "in the woods." There's no walls deafening the sounds of the outdoors, nor the snoring of almost a dozen people in various states of slumber to drown them out. Nothing but me and the woodland critters.

Between the heat and the surprisingly comfortable position I've managed to find on the ground, I've finally started making some progress on my journey to dozing off when I begin to hear rustling that's loud enough and directional enough that it can't be the wind. Grumbling nonsense at whoever dares interrupt the one time during the Games my worries will leave me behind, I rise, gaze on where I think the noise came from so I can figure out whether this is nothing or if I'll need to run.

The figure emerges in parts. An arm sticks out of the bushes first. Then comes a head, revealing them as being distinctly human. The rest of them detaches themselves from the shadows with some difficulty, revealing a stick figure of a frame and a stiff posture that looks stolen straight from a Peacekeeper. After a couple of seconds of a seemingly meaningless pause, they begin marching almost directly towards me, either oblivious or uncaring to the fact that I'm standing right here.

Whatever. Maybe they'll make it quick, and that's probably the best I can hope for here. So, freely embracing the knowledge that I'm about to do something very stupid, I shout-whisper, "Hey! Over here!"

They take one more step forward, then they freeze in place. They don't spin around, but their head jerks in a couple of different directions, probably trying to figure out where that noise came from and whether they can trust its source. I'd be doing the same thing if I were them, so I don't blame them one bit.

I've made one stupid decision already, so nothing's stopping me from making another. Trying not to make too much noise but still wanting to attract attention, I make a move toward where the other tribute is standing, trying to get in their line of sight. A bit of walking on my part and a few awkward-looking turns on his part later, it seems to work, and both of us are aware of the other.

For a moment that stretches for far too long, neither of us say a thing. Maybe we've got nothing to say, maybe we're afraid the facade of normalcy the other is putting up for the time being will shatter once someone speaks. In the end, the result is the same and it brings us to the same position as before, so why bother figuring it out?

The other tribute breaks the silence, finally dispelling all illusion that this is a farce. "Show me your hands."

I do just that, making sure to keep my palms wide open to make sure he can see I don't have anything I can hurt him with. "Okay, now show me yours."

He does the same thing with his hands, but my focus instantly switches to the hands themselves. They're badly mangled in a way that looks too clean to have been done by a mutt, missing several fingers and riddled with enough scars that the skin on his hands looks fake. His remaining fingers bend in ways that look quite unnatural, a move that would disturb me were I not in the middle of the Hunger Games.

Wait a minute. I know this kid. We've talked before. "You're from Eight, right?"

"Yes," he says while nodding. "And you're from Twelve, right?"

"Also yes," I respond. "So…"

"How about I take the lead here," the boy from Eight says. "I want an alliance. That okay with you?"

Yes it is, I'm glad you asked. Misery loves company, right? Time to set aside whatever bullshit that had been holding me back at the training grounds and just go for it.

"Let's do it, I say, holding my hand out for him to shake. "I'm Maxxer."

"I'm Romeo," he responds, shaking my hand.

And that's the moment I realize that not all might be lost.

Eulogies:

Artesia Alexander, District 10 Female, 17th Place (Killed by Odysea and Bear Muttation): Artesia was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On one hand, she came from a set of circumstances that was fairly unique and had some interesting quirks to her, but on the other, I didn't feel like I did enough to distinguish her from the likes of the other tough girls that got sent my way. There's no one back home to miss her, but she'll be missed all the same. Thanks for sending her, SparrowBirdEliza.

Kills:

-Clara: 1 unassisted (Remi), 2 assisted (Faolan, Alexa)

-Galadia: 1 unassisted (Fox), 1 assisted (Alexa)

-Other: 1 unassisted (Aryion [suicide]), 1 assisted (Artesia [bear muttation])

-Godric: 2 assisted (Faolan, Marius)

-Odysea: 2 assisted (Nascar, Artesia)

-Sienna: 1 assisted (Marius)

-Artesia, Thomiah: 1 assisted (Nascar)

NOTE: From this point forward, all tributes who have killed another and are also deceased will be italicized in these counts, but will not be removed from the leaderboard.

Alliances:

-Loyalist Careers: Godric, Sienna

-Separatist Careers: Clara, Galadia

-Anti-Careers: Thomiah, Odysea

-Two Broke(n) Girls: Zari, Lacey

-Opposites Attract: Spark, Catarina

-Misery Loves Company: Romeo, Maxxer

-Loners (for now): Rhaemyr, Sotia, Vick, Toren

Author's Notes:

-Wow, we've got a lot of different factions working simultaneously right now! I sense some clashes coming up in the near future. Maybe not next chapter, I might want to take a break from all the murder after two deaths in a row, but soon. Definitely soon.

-My sophomore year of college starts next Monday, and since classes are in-person that means I'll likely have less time to write. I'll try to keep the updates coming, but there's only so much I can do.

-We've hit the big 5-0 in terms of chapter count (for those of you who count the prologue, that is). I doubt it'll get to 100, so this is probably the biggest milestone I'll hit. Time to celebrate while I still can.

-Hope you enjoyed this chapter. See you next chapter!