A Song for Snakes and Rats

Day 6 of the Games

Female Tribute from District Six, Tressa Whitelock

"Errol!" I scream. Another canon sounds to the far left of us. "Get up!" I yell. I shake him, but his body doesn't move. He doesn't wake. My heart pounds as a horde of gold insects flee the shifting bushes a few yards off. Someone is coming. My mind pictures the girl from District Two. She threw knives. She could toss one through the trees, right now, killing me dead.

"If I become deadweight, you drop me." Errol's words come back to me. I said I would. I said I could. I look down at him. His curved lips, slim nose. Tears start to run down my face at the realization that this is it for us. The plane crashing and the pilot ejecting.

"I'm sorry," I whisper. But then I'm sprinting in the opposite direction of the flying insects and the other canon. While I'm running, I remember the knife I have in my pack. I could stand in fight. I could kill the intruder. The dark might would work to my advantage.

No, I can't go back. I can't risk meeting up with a trained Career in the dark. I just have to keep waiting it out, just like I've been doing. Almost all the Careers are dead. And then the other alliances will turn on each other.

Or they'll do what the Careers do. . .hunt the rest of us down. And I'll be all alone, I'll be without an ally, without another set of eyes to keep watch. My heart races faster as the scenarios play out in my mind. Without an ally, there's still me facing off with six other tributes. All of them bigger than me, I think, except maybe the girls.

I stop suddenly, thinking I'll turn back, thinking this was a mistake. But he told me to leave him. He told that if he became deadweight to drop him. He's been deadweight for a while, though, and I didn't leave. I'm only leaving now because I'm afraid. No, I'm leaving now because I want to live.

And me dying means nothing for our parents. Me dying means Errol's death was for nothing. Our alliance of keeping eachother alive was pointless. Besides, I tell myself, we both knew he wasn't coming home. He's in withdrawals. I try to sound harsh. I want to seem cold. I wipe away at the tears running down my face. I have to stop crying. It'll gain me zero support with the sponsors. I have to seem tough. I can't be weeping at the death of my competition.

It's no use, though. The tears come, harder, faster, fallen down my face. I stop again, wiping away, slightly blinded by the tears. Thunder echoes over my head. I wait for the rain to wash to tears away. I wait for something else to come, for a breaking of twigs, for anything to snap me back into fear—the type of fear that keeps you alive in this place.

But instead the rain holds out deliberate and the jungle goes quiet. The tears don't stop, despite how violently I wipe at them.

I think of Ailya. I wonder if she's disgusted with me for leaving Errol. I wonder if he's family will hate me for abandoning their son to die at the hands of the Career. Of course, they probably expected more. I volunteered. I signed up for this. I saved Alex.

But I can't keep saving everyone except for me. I have to be selfish. I have to save me. From this. From the threat.

I have to survive.

No, I have to live. And at some point, I'm going to have to fight. I'm going to have to stop running.

Male Tribute from District Twelve, Viridian Ahane

The boy lays there. His pale skin only illuminated by the stars. Bright, purple insects flutter around him. I have the urge to leave him, to just keep walking, keep avoiding. But instead of wait, hesitating. I think of the sponsors. I think of the choice I have to make if I want to get noticed. With eight of us left, I'll need help. I'll need something to keep me alive. I barely have enough food. I can count my ribs now. My skin seems to hang in places it didn't before.

Killing him could get me a parachute, I think. But it could also cost me something way more than a piece of bread or a pack of dried meat.

I wouldn't be innocent anymore. But when was I ever innocent? I left that boy to get eaten. I left the girl to die, too. Certain it was her canon that just sounded. No doubt whatever got him got her next. I could have stayed. We could have fought the creature together. I have a knife.

Someone decent would have helped.

But let's be honest, no one here is decent. No anymore. Not since the gong sounded and the first set of faces appeared in the sky.

The insects settle on his skin. If I don't end it, they will. That's not an assumption, because everything here wants to kill us. Wants our blood in the ground. And personally, I'd rather go by blade than by a horde of purple insects.

I walk closer to the boy, noticing how his skin is turning silver in the places where the insects touch. Already, they're injecting poison into him, I think. I set down the pack, taking out the blade. I can do this, I tell myself. It's a mercy kill. He'll die anyway. And the insects don't need sponsors, they don't need a parachute, they don't need to get home to make amends with all the people they've screwed over.

I don't even want their forgiveness, I tell myself. I just want redemption. For them not to think I'm a lost cause just because I'm lost.

Maybe the darkness kept me alive, I think. Maybe I needed it to.

I position the blade over his chest. Should I count? Should I say goodbye. The insects flutter around us. I start to panic a little at the sight of them coming in close. The boy's skin returns to normal and so that causes me to hesitate more. Maybe it wasn't poison. Maybe they weren't going to kill him.

Great, I think. Now maybe this isn't mercy anymore.

I could still walk away. I could still retreat.

Don't think about it. Just drive the blade down, right into the center. On three, I tell myself. I close my eyes, not wanting to watch. One, I count. Two. Three. I drive it down and something grabs my wrist, tight. I scream, startled. My eyes flash open. The boy stares at me. He attempts to jerk the blade back, nearly slicing my throat. I yell, shoving the knife forward. Fear motivates my muscles. I growl, attempting to overpower him.

But his grip is strong. He fights despite me having the upper-hand. My mind reels inward, attempting to ease my fear, my anxiety, my guilt. Stop, I want to scream. But my hands keep pressing, keep digging into him. I feel warmth underneath my nails. His blood. It smells.

He fights, pushing, but he's losing. The blade itches closer to his chest. And when the blade slides in, his eyes widen. But I keep pushing, keep digging, until I feel the heat on my hands, swimming up my wrist.

He screams. I scream, too, and then there's the canon.

Then there's another scream. A girl's. I look up, seeing her. She aims the blade at me.

"You killed him!" she screams.

And I'm up and running, heart pounding, terrified of her and the thoughts that form in my head.

Murderer.

Killer.

He was innocent.

He was weaponless.

You coward.

You snake.

Male Tribute from District Eight, Denim Lane

"Just do it," I say.

Tassia positions the blade over the fire. In the distance, Proteus and Rahni watch the vines. They stay dormant. They don't move, which makes it harder to believe that they could have killed Zenna. But then why would Proteus lie about that? Maybe because he killed her. Maybe because they've already worked a plan to end us all.

"It's going to sting," she says.

It doesn't sting. It bites. My eyes roll in the back of my head. I see blackness. I feel on fire. The pain commands everything. It's all I think about. I try to breathe. But I can't. My mind feels like it's being burned with the knife, too. I smell rotted flesh. My own. Then I see darkness.

Tassia comes back to me, shaking me.

"Where am I?" I ask, dizzy.

"You passed out," she says. She moves her hands, bandaging up the wound.

"How long was I out?" I ask.

"Not long," she says. "A few hours. I've changed your bandages twice."

"So I owe you?" My voice sounds colder then I mean it to.

"No," she says back, unfazed.

"Then why are you helping me?" I ask. I look over at Rahni and Proteus. They're still standing guard. How long have they been watching the vines? How long have they been keeping watch over us? And when does that watching turn to killing? "You're not stupid. You know this ends."

"Of course, it ends," she says. She keeps wrapping the wound, unbothered.

"So what's your plan?" I ask. Maybe this girl is one to watch. I mean, none of us have made it this far by luck.

"Why would I tell you?" she says. She finishes up the bandaging. "This ends, remember?" She stands, rolls down her sleeves. "Drink fluids."

"Were you a medic back home?" I ask, attempting to gain any footing with her. We'll need each other if Rahni and Proteus decide to turn. Of course, I don't want them too. But like with the streets, we need numbers.

"No," she says. She looks me in the eyes. "It's all easy."

"What's all easy?" I ask.

"Helping," she says. "Hurting. It's all easy when you don't really think about it."

"The hurting's coming, isn't it?" I ask.

"Only one of us can win," she says. She looks back over at District Seven. "There's only one Career left." I take a sip from the canteen. "When she's dead, who do you think the biggest threat is."

"Us," I say.

She shakes her head. "You."

I swallow down the fear. I'm not ready to die, not ready to see if I meet Zenna in the afterlife. I don't want Neem to stand over my body, tears hitting my lifeless faith. I want to be with him again. I want what started in the goodbyes to end in old age.

"We have to kill them first," I say, surprised. But it's the truth. Seven has to die right after we kill Rowena.

"Betray them," she says. "What's in it for me?"

"You want to live?" I say. She has to know that her chances of surviving go up when Seven dies. "Don't you?"

"Of course," she says. I watch her. Her eyes don't seem to shift down. I make a note then that she doesn't seem scared. She reminds me of the kids in the streets who carried glass up their sleeves. They had plans when confronted. This girl with her shifting eyes and short words is carrying glass.

The only question is who does she cut?

"You have a plan, don't you?" I ask, bold. I realize how tired I am of Games, of playing around like we're all buddies. That we're all in this together. We only served each other. We only stayed together to survive.

Now surviving calls for something different. It calls for solitude, I think.

"I don't have a plan," she says. She takes back the canteen. Takes a sip from it, wipes her lips. "I'll go get Rahni and Proteus. We should all probably talk."

I exhale. Stupid, I think. What would the spider do? I wonder. How would she spin a web to catch Nine?

I think about that as Rahni, Proteus, and Tassia come back over and sit around the fire. I think about a web, hoping to catch them all, one by one, as the seal appears, revealing the boy from District Six, followed by the girl from Eleven.

I think about a web as Rahni gives Proteus some dried meat. I think about webs as Proteus tries to make jokes about losing his abs. I think about webs as Rahni talks about the vines not moving. I think about webs as Tassia picks at the fire.

And then it hits me. How I can catch all of them. The vines. They'll be the webs.

A/N: We're down to seven. So much is about to happen. Some of it you'll be able to predict. Some of it you want. Seems Denim and Tassia have similar plans. But sadly, only one of them will be the snake, the other the rat. (am I going to far with this analogy. Probably. Oh, well.)

Side note, it's getting so much harder to take out these tributes. These last seven have all been such a joy to write. Thank you for submitting these tributes to my story. Thank you for reading. Sorry, the updates came a year late. But I'm proud of myself for coming pack, picking this story back up, and finishing what I started. I have a big problem of getting bored, dropping projects, and never looking back. But I'm working on me this year more than I ever have before. (why am I treating FF like a therapy session)

Questions / interaction :

Thoughts on the chapter?

Favorite fallen tribute?

Favorite muttation so far?

Deaths are based on realism, plot development, and if I struggled to capture the voice of your character.

8th. Male Tribute from District Six, Errol Acosta. Axe Smelling God, Errol was personally one of my favorite characters to explore. I really enjoyed writing his dialogue with Tressa. They were probably my favorite alliance to write. Sadly, though, it couldn't last. With his withdrawals. With him becoming deadweight. Thank you for submitting "the plane" to my story.