I am the people
I am the storm
I am the riot
I am the swarm
Cyra Sloane
District 8, Female, 17
(Day 2)
...
I wake up to the sun beating down onto my already sweating face, it takes a little while for my eyes to get used to the light but they eventually do and I sit up against one of the trees that we are using for shelter. We had spotted them and decided to sit and wait for the faces to appear in the sky.
The Boy from Two, the Boy from Four, the Boy from Five, the Boy from Six, the Girl from Seven, Thauk, Devon, Darla and finally the Boy from Twelve. I had fell asleep last night with only Darla on my mind and the sound of constant bickering from Tenzin and Gena. We had a plan, a simple plan, Darla and I would run into the cornucopia and get a few supplies before running straight out and back to where Tenzina and Gena would be waiting. That was the plan I had appointed and that was the plan that had caused Darla to be violently murdered.
I look up at the sky to where her face had been. Devon had, of course, died too but it was different for him. Devon had wanted to go in the bloodbath and he had wanted to face his death, Darla wanted to live and go back to her family. Her family. Do they blame me? Are they cursing my name as I sit here? Silent tears roll down my face and I don't wipe them away, I let them drip down onto the grassy surface.
As I'm looking at the sky, I spot a small object floating toward us. At first, I think it's a trap or something sent by the other tributes but, as it gets closer, I recognise it as a sponsor gift. Had someone sponsored me? Do The Capitol like me? I grab it from the sky and turn it over.
Tenzin Mainali.
My heart drops, it's for Tenzin. Not me. I look to his still body, lying on the grassy ground and to Gena's next to him. They look so peaceful in their sleep, maybe it would be better if I ended the horrors for them now. Our only weapon is in my possession, it's in my bag. I place the sponsor balloon on the ground and dig through the backpack I had grabbed from the bloodbath, there's a few survival items and a pocket knife but what I take out is a sharp knife with an extremely long blade. I had taken it from the bloodbath just in case.
I now look to the knife in my hand and toward Tenzin and Gena. I could slit their throats swiftly and calmly, they wouldn't even feel any pain. Maybe it would be better for them to die this way rather than in a far more violent way. As I look at their innocent and young faces, though, I know I can't do it. I'm not a monster, I'm far from it. Sure, me and my family support and are loyal to The Capitol but I am not in support of murdering innocents and I shall stand by that.
I put the knife back in the backpack and gently shake the two of them awake. "We have a delivery." I say and they scramble over to the balloon.
"Ugh, for Tenzin? I want something!" Gena cries, stomping her foot and walking off to another tree to moan.
"What's inside?" I ask as he opens it. He takes out a knife with a curved blade, it's labeled 'Kukri'. "Just a knife?" He shakes his head and pulls out a can of soup, one slightly bigger than the other, and two loaves of bread. "That's great! We'll be needing some food. Do you wanna keep it in my bag?"
"Uh, sure. I'd like to keep the knife though."
"Yeah, of course, it's all yours." He smiles warmly at me. "Need a sip of water?" I ask him as I take out the water bottle and take a sip myself, he nods his head and takes it from me.
"Leave some for me!" Gena cries as she storms toward us and grabs the bottle off of Tenzin, she downs what we have left and I sigh. We have yet to see a water source and we better find one soon with this sun beating down on us.
"Congrats Gena, you have earned us a day of walking until we find some more water." Tenzin snaps at her and I sigh.
"Come on then, the sooner the better." I say, standing up, putting the bottle back in my bag and begin to walk. The two of them follow behind me and I tune out their annoying arguing.
Kathryn Mallerd
District 3, Female, 16
(Day 2)
...
It's taking every ounce of strength I have in me not to break down, I could easily say that yesterday was the worst day of my life. I saw death, not only that, I caused death. I was too weak to even finish him off, I allowed him to bleed out from the hole where my knife had impaled him and he had laid in agony. I force the sob back down.
It's going to be okay, Kathryn. You knew you had to kill.
The voice in my head is right, I volunteered for this knowing full well what I would have to do. I just need to stay positive, that's the only way I'll ever make it out of this arena. My only issue right now is the massive idiot in front of me, I despise myself for getting tangled up into Silver's alliance but if I had refused then the body of the boy from District Four would be my own.
I didn't sleep at all last night, Silver refused to as well. The only way I can really kill him is to gain his trust and that's exactly what I'm going to do, not only to free myself from this alliance but to avoid getting hunted down in the process. We've been walking since daybreak, in search of anyone to hydrate Silver's blood thirst.
"How did she past you anyway?" He asks, raising and eyebrow and looking back at me. I know he's talking about the girl from Six that had escaped from us last night, in truth, I had let her go out of spite for Silver. I do hold sympathy for her, of course I do, but I hold sympathy for most people in this arena and that has to be let go of if I want to get out of it.
"She pushed me." I mumble.
"And you didn't chase after her?"
"She was fast." I snap back.
"And you aren't?" He retaliates, spinning around. His kama is clutched in his hand and I grip my sword tightly. "You felt sympathy for her, didn't you?"
"No, Silver, just stop it!" I shout back at him.
"If we wanna work together then we must be equally putting effort into this alliance, Kathryn." He says arrogantly and turns back around, continuing down the rocky path. The temptation to stab him right through the back is hard for me to fight but I resist, there's no doubt that Silver would still be able to fight even if he was stabbed through the back. If I want to kill him, the wound needs to be fatal.
I continue walking behind him, anger surging through my veins. It's against all my morals to even call myself an ally to Silver but I must if I want to be able to make it out of this arena alive. Then, an idea comes to me, an idea that would cause Silver to be gone been sooner than I expected. I may only need to spend one more night around him.
"We can retrace our steps. I don't think anyone would've gone out this far already but we may find some people heading this way, plus, it will lead us back to the cornucopia and we can check on The Careers." I tell him, setting the trap. I know Silver could hardly stand watching The Careers parade around with all their things, he'd walk right into that cornucopia with his arrogance and lose in a 4 to 1 battle.
"Fine." He states. "Let's go then." He takes his backpack off his shoulder and takes a sip of water from his water bottle. I do the same with my own, there's only a few drops of water left and my mouth is already dry with the taste of dehydration.
"We'll go back to that pond and use some of our iodine too." I suggest and he nods firmly, leading the way back down the path. If this works then these Games could be a lot easier than I'd thought. If it works, though, and it better or I'll just have to fight him myself.
Xavier Ivuluh
District 3, Male, 14
(Day 2)
...
I perch upon a large brach of a tree. The tree gives me shelter from the burning sun and I'm also hidden among the leaves, however, the best part was what I was able to see. The tree was on top of one of the hills that surrounded the cornucopia, this gave me clear sight in what the Careers are up to. It's dangerous to be so close, especially if they come hunting in my direction, but I ran straight here from my pedestal and haven't left since.
I have no water or food and not a single weapon, that's why I'm waiting, I'm waiting for The Careers to leave the cornucopia or let there guard down and that's when I'll make my move and grab something. It's the strategy I had thought of on the trains and discussed with my mentor, it's the reason I didn't want any allies as it would've been a lot tougher. My plan is to wait it out on this tree and collect things from the cornucopia when needed.
So far, they had only ventured a little further out into the arena but every single time they had left the boy from District Seven by the cornucopia, holding his bloody axe. The cold and ruthless look he has to him tells me all I need to know and that is to steer clear from his path, I don't doubt he could slice my head off in a mere second. The sun starts to set and the arena becomes much cooler, my eyelids keep forcing themselves closed but I refuse to sleep because doing so would mean getting down from the tree and finding another spot. I need some rope to tie myself onto the tree and ensure I don't fall and break my neck in the middle of the night.
I hear a vague shouting noise from the cornucopia and look toward it. "There is no way we can waste another day with no deaths! We don't have the supplies for that." The girl from Two and the boy from Four seem to be arguing.
"It's just one day, Andi! It's not that big a deal." He shouts back.
"Let's just do something for god's sake."
The girl from One and the boy from Seven make there way out of the cornucopia. "We could look for a water source." The boy from Seven suggests.
"Yeah, whatever, at least that's something."
"Who's staying behind?"
"Let's just split up, it's getting dark anyway. Nobody is going to dare coming here, there'll be sleeping. We'll take some torches with us." My heart starts beating fast and I hold my breath, the moment is almost too perfect. The two duos start to walk toward different sides of the arena and I climb swiftly down from the tree, I wait a little longer until night really falls and then sprint down the hill, I'm a fast runner and arrive at the cornucopia within a minute.
There isn't much scattered around and it seems they collected most of it and brought it into the cornucopia. I take a deep breath and slip inside, my assumptions were mostly correct and I find a big pile of bags. I slip one on each arm. Two isn't many, they won't notice. I then look for a decent weapon, however, it's hard in the dark and I slowly hold my hand out - looking for anything.
My hands touch a blade and I follow my finger along it until I find a handle, it seems sort of like a thin sword and the handle is strange with several curls of metal around it so you're able to slot your hand in. I pick it up and swiftly slip back out into the darkness, running back to my tree. Once I reach it, I finally let my breath out and silently laugh to myself.
That wasn't so hard.
A/N: No deaths planned for this chapter and it was mostly used to check up on everyone to see how everyone is holding up after the bloodbath/1st day of The Games. Sponsoring is still open, check on the blog for more information and thanks for reading this chapter. Also, two people sponsored Tenzin so that's why he got so much.
Alliances
Lira, Andromeda, Eric and Daniel
Tenzin, Gena and Cyra
Vinicio, Carina, Emerald and Charity
Silver and Kathryn
KILL COUNT:
Silver - 2
Andromeda - 1
Eric - 1
Kathryn - 1
Lira - 1
Charity - 1
Vinicio - 1
- Neb