It only took me about 60 seconds to realize leaving my little brother out there alone in the forest while I took a piss behind a tree wasn't exactly the greatest of ideas. It was just something I decided to do offhand to formulate a plan while I relieved myself, but I lacked the foresight to worry about the potential worst-case scenario. The possibility that somebody might come after him while I did so. It was only while I was actually in the process of relieving myself I suddenly thought about that, but I didn't immediately go back. I tried to get done quicker, but unfortunately, I wouldn't get a chance to go back immediately. As I was finishing up, I started hearing some sort of noise. It was hard to make out, but the sound of something rustling in the background was unmistakable. Somebody was right behind me. I took a deep breath and held it to try and get a better idea of where it was coming from and what it may have been. I slowly turned my head and found that there was indeed somebody behind me. It didn't take any time to recognize that this was a tribute. A girl, and she was just about as tall as I was. She had a spear that she held out in front of herself. She looked scratched up and her hair was unkempt, obviously due in part due to the arena. I quickly stepped back and grabbed my sword which was leaning off the tree I was next to. I held it out in front of her but I chose not to charge at her. Instead, I decided to wait and see what she'd do first. To my surprise, however, she didn't make a move. Instead, she just stood still and stared. When I first saw her, she looked to be in a pretty aggressive trance, but now her eyes were wide with a bit of surprise mixed in.

"Eleven?" She stated, surprised. I wasn't sure if that was a question or not because it sounded as if she was just caught off guard seeing me, though I couldn't understand why exactly she'd be caught off guard because of that. I ended up answering her.

"You're correct. That's me." I nodded, keeping my sword close and at hand. She seemed to just gulp down some saliva before turning her head away.

"I…" She paused, lowering her weapon a little before looking back at me. "I was thinking of ambushing you. But now that I see you're Eleven, that means you're… 'his' older brother aren't you." My heart began racing as I processed her words. I quickly raised my weapon in her direction, suddenly concerned.

"The hell do you mean by that? 'His brother'. Are you talking about Altar?" I asked. She was silent, but she gave a nod. I continued to hold my weapon up at her. I slowly began to approach this girl, now more concerned than ever. Why was she talking like this? Why was she acting like this? And what does she mean by his brother? Obviously, she's talking about Altar, but why is it concerning to her? I assume she's trying to lower my sense of security but another thought pops up in my head briefly. What if she's just taken out my little brother? My heart begins to race faster. Altar can't be dead at the moment. No canon has fired off yet after all. However, it's possible that she simply left my poor brother for dead. She seems to be racked with some sort of guilt. Killing a 12-year-old isn't exactly something you can walk away from feeling okay with after all. And if you happened to immediately run into a family member of said 12 year old...

"What the hell have you done to Altar" I began to approach her. Without thinking I attempt to strike her in the chest, but she instinctively pulls up her spear, blocking my blow. I pull back my sword before taking a few steps back. She begins stuttering out some words that I can't make out but I quickly charge in her direction again, trying to cut her with my sword to immobilize her. Again though, she blocks my attacks.

"Listen. I-I didn't do anything to him. I assume he's still alive. We were in an alliance." She yelled out at me. My eyes widened. Suddenly I was reminded of Altars' story about his time when he'd been a part of an alliance a days into the game. Apparently, he shared the alliance with a girl from District 4. That explained everything.

"Oh, I should've known. Altar told me he was in an alliance with a girl from District 4. I guess that was you?" I began slowly stepping back while also lowering my weapon. As I did the girl also lowered her weapon before nodding once again.

"Indeed. I was in an alliance with your little brother. Altar was his name. I was going to take you out, but then I realized you were his older brother and… I guess I froze." She lamented. I found myself a little curious now. She seemed to have some sort of attachment to my little brother. I mean sure, they were in an alliance but even now she seemed to care about him a lot.

"I guess I should thank you then. I'm sorry I attacked you. It was a heat of the moment thing." I said. For her part, the girl just took in a breath before looking up at the sky. You could just barely make out the sunny sky under the umbrella of trees that were above us, so I couldn't understand why she did it, but she just did.

"I haven't seen him since that girl from your district and her friend from Ten…" She began before going silent. Altar was incredibly quiet about what exactly had gone down that ended up separating him from his alliance, but it didn't take much thought to understand that it was something ugly, something that resulted in bloodshed. It's hard to walk away from murdering a child without feeling some pain, but I can't imagine how much pain you'd feel if you believe you could have prevented that murder. I know it wasn't a great idea to lower my guard, but instinctively I felt myself easing up as I recognized her feelings. She went through a lot of grief like I did after I killed somebody here, so I couldn't help but understand her.

"Don't worry about all that. You did your best. And Altar made it out alive after all." I tried to comfort her but she remained silent and continued to look away. Before I could say anything else, however, I heard feet shuffling right behind me and I ended up THIS close to getting stabbed in the back. I rolled forward where I ended up face to face with my assailant. Well, turns out there were actually 3 of them. I recognized them all almost instantly. Two tributes from District 1 and a boy from District 2. The remains of the careers. Generally, the careers were one of the most dangerous obstacles for the tributes in the games and more often than not played a big role in how all tributes strategize during the games. They were a big pain in the ass in my arena initially, but ever since the arena's joined together I hadn't heard much from them. In fact, Altar once told me that the careers in his arena were pretty much dead from the offset of the games which is practically unheard of. It's unfortunate that I had just happened to run into the remnants of them. I was outnumbered, even with the girl from four with me. In an instant, I just grabbed my shit and started running. The girl from four was two steps ahead of me and took off a second and a half before I could.

"We're not going to last long against them so let's just get as much ground between us and them as possible as we can." She ordered me, suddenly speaking to me in a complete reversal of her personality from a few seconds ago. In the midst of our desperate escape, I raised a question.

"Who says you aren't working with those guys?" I asked.

"Because I killed one of them earlier" She told me me bluntly. I found myself surprised, but I couldn't focus on that with the careers behind us. Me and the girl from four scoured the forest at a quick pace while the careers were surprisingly much slower than us, but I could still tell they were right behind us.

"Let's go this way!" The girl from four shouted at me making a steep right turn. Without thinking I followed her. Within seconds, the ground beneath us got steeper and we found ourselves venturing up a hill. However, I'm so high on adrenaline that I dash up without a thought. The girl from four just stops and turns around, facing our opponents who are quickly chasing us up. I turn around and find that she's thrown her whole spear down at somebody. I hear the scream of a man, can't tell who but it sure got somebody. The girl from District One appears and begins to battle with the one from four now. She has a curved sword in hand and is in the middle of an attempt to strike Four down with it. I dash at both of them, hoping to get a shot at the girl from one. However, as I do, I take note of an object flying in my direction. It only hits me in the side of my belly but it sure as hell hurts and cuts me. A spear had just barely grazed me. In my pain I saw the boy from District 2 approaching me, his face fierce with rage. He wrought out a yell as he dashed at me. In his hand was a mace which he aimed for my face. Quickly, I blocked it with my own sword before pushing him off me. He stepped back a bit before coming in again. I was readying myself to slash him through at chest level, but he swiftly elbowed me in the face, knocking me back. However I quickly fired back by spitting at his face, I think I got him around the eyes. He tried rubbing his eyes but as he did I punched him in the face before getting my sword ready for a quick slash. I tried not to think about what his family at home would think about me doing this to the guy, after all I doubt he was going to think about how my momma would feel after he killed me. I was about to put my sword through his stomach when all of a sudden a knife came at my face. I managed to just barely evade full impact as it cut my face. As it did, I realized it'd come from the boy from 1. I assumed he'd been killed by the girl from four but I guess not. Now there were two tributes on me and that was not good. I quickly began to retreat once more, this time leaving the girl from four alone. I figure she'd know what to do as well. I zipped through more trees, hoping to lose both of the boys that hunt me down. I couldn't really tell if they behind me anymore but I knew I couldn't let up. Unfortunately, I was also starting to run out of breath. That checked out given I hadn't eaten much in the past few weeks. Though in hindsight, it's not like I'd ever eaten much in my life, being from District 11 and all. But that was beside the point, after all I was possibly facing my death as the tributes tried catching up with me. I shook my head. I told myself I wasn't going to die and that I had to get back to my mom and that I needed to protect my little brother. It was then that it suddenly hit my. I left Altar all alone back there and I had no idea where I left him either. That thought was enough to make me come screeching to a halt despite everything surrounding me. As I did though, the two career boys caught up, but as they tried to stop, they both seemingly tripped over something because they both hopped into the air and started stumbling over their own feet. Before they could both properly stop, however, they both bursted into the clearing ahead before seemingly just dropping off as if there was some sort of hill ahead. They both let out a yell as they do and I began to head in their direction. I quickly stopped myself as I realized what was ahead of me. Once you get out of the forest, the clearing makes way for a HUGE drop that looks to be deadly. I let out a breath of relief. I'm lucky to have thought about Altar when I did, otherwise, I'd be a dead man right now. On the other hand, though, I don't know how they ended up tripping? I assume there was some branch or something but if so why didn't I trip? I begin retracing my steps which leads to me finding what seems to be a vine that extends between two trees. That sure wasn't there when I walked by. Maybe the gamemakers put it there hoping it would get all three of us. I might've just missed it by a millisecond. Whatever happened, I just got lucky. I sigh thinking about it all. That's so stupid, but ah well.

With the little breath I have left, I begin to make my way back to where I'd been before. Where I'd left the girl from four. I just hoped she was doing okay. As I was making my way through, I heard two cannon shots. Presumably for the boys from one and two. I feel a bit of guilt in my heart thinking about the fact they died trying to catch me. However, their death was likely caused by the gamemakers intentionally so that does relieve me of a bit of guilt. Poor guys though. I do wonder why the gamemakers chose to do something like that. Maybe they thought it'd be more entertaining to have us all tumble to our deaths in the heat of the moment or something. It'd be really stupid, but perfectly in character for those sickos in the Capital. I may live, but they still more or less got their desire frustratingly enough. I pushed my thoughts aside and carried on. Eventually, I heard the sounds of a scuffle which lead me to the sight of the two girls who were still fighting. Four had once again gotten her spear and looked to be on the offensive. One didn't seem to be stepping down on her end, so I decided to step in. I slashed the girl in the back which causes her to let out a yell. She fell to the ground in pain, holding the cut which had gone straight through her jacket. I didn't mean to cut that deep, but I figured that would do the job.

"Wait. Don't kill me." She cried. I was about to say something, definitely about how hypocritical that sounds coming from her, but I stopped myself and simply remained silent.

"We won't then." The girl from four said before observing the girls cut. She pulled out her knife and stabbed down into her cut, digging further into it. The girl from one howled and screamed before letting out a few more sobs and whimpers.

"I'm sorry about this. I'm not going to finish you, I just wanted to make sure you eventually bleed out here." Four said as she took the One girls backpack and tossed it to me.

"We'll look through this later. Let's just get out of here." She said before walking away into the woods, seemingly in a hurry. Truth be told, I couldn't exactly blame her. I got one last good look at the girl from one. She was sobbing and begging us not to leave her. Crying about how she had medical supplies in her backpack and that she'd do anything for us as long as she let her live for a little while longer. It made me sick. Even after everything people like her did, I still felt pity. I was holding onto the medical supplies given I was holding her backpack. At that moment, I could've stopped and attempted to tend to her wounds as best I could. But before my brain could even process the entire thought, the Four girl came back into view.

"Don't even think about it. It's better if we just leave her here to die." She told me before rushing back into the woods. I looked at her before looking down at the girl from 2, who seemed to be sobbing and begging even harder now.

"No please! I have a family!" She cries out. I clench my fists, frustrated. At this moment my brain was just consumed with various different emotions. I pitied the poor girl despite everything she'd done to us. Her pleas about her family especially hit home. However I recognize that the less tributes, especially career tributes, the better. We definitely don't need more people to watch out for. Even if she joined us per say, she'd still be a problem later. But that thought reminded me that the girl from four could be a bit of trouble as well. I tuned out the girl's cries and walked away. She begged me to not leave her, but I sadly ignored her. It was ultimately the best decision I could've made.

Eventually I caught back up to the girl from four who happened to walk quite a distance from where I'd last seen her. She sat on a stump, her head lowered and her face covered by her hair. I could tell, she was definitely not proud of herself for that kill.

"Why didn't you take those other guys' backpacks?" She asks me. At that moment, I remember what happened to One and Two and just scratch my head with my free arm.

"I would've if I could've. But they both ended up over a cliff. Saved me the trouble of killing them thankfully." I sigh. She looks up.

"I see." She accepts as we both try and catch our breath. I do wonder what supplies those other tributes had, but at the very least we're guaranteed to have some medical supplies. Altar had some, but two sets are better than one. I handed the Four girls my bottle of water as I start trying to retrace my steps. I'm sure if I search hard enough, I could find my little brother again. I'd rather not be separated from him again. On the other hand, there's this girl from Four. As much as I'd prefer to lower the amount of tributes, hopefully giving me or Alt a better chance of making it home, I'd never be able to live with myself if I killed somebody he considered a close ally. Even if it may have been a good idea. Even then, I was just as winded as she was, so there was no guarantee that I could've lasted against her. She seemed to have been trained, whereas I'm was not. I had brute strength from working long hours from practically birth, but otherwise I wasn't exactly a tactician or anything like that. In hindsight I didn't even get much of an education, most of the stuff I know I only know because of Altar. I clenched my fists thinking about him.

"We need to find Altar." I told the girl from Four.

"Yeah, I was wondering where he was. Don't tell me you just left him all by himself or something." She said. Annoyed, I just turned in the direction I assumed we came from.

"Yeah but it was to take a piss. I didn't plan on going on this big exhibition across the arena with you, ya know." I fired back. In response, she just made a "hmph" sound.

"I take it that you want to help me find my little brother?" I asked her. She raised her eyebrows before lowering her face to the ground.

"Of course," She confirmed. "But… I don't know…" she began to trail off.

"I still feel a bit of guilt. I couldn't save those other two. I think about it everyday. The fact that the girl and boy from 6 we're just… right there next to me and I couldn't protect them." She put her hand on her head and pushed down, as if she's trying to keep those thoughts in. I sighed before patting her on the head.

"Don't dwell on it too long. It'll just slow you down. You did the best you could and I bet their families are happy that someone like you even gave their children the time of day they deserved. I'm happy you were there for Altar after all. He spoke very highly of you." I said. The girl from four just shook her head.

"It doesn't matter. I just wish I'd been the one those two killed instead." She said, frustrated.

I turned away, hoping to come up with something to move away from this subject. I was reminded of the fact that I didn't know this girl's name so I promptly raised the question.

"What's your name?" I asked. She finally lifted her face. I notice just how exhausted she looks. She looked as if she didn't get any sleep at all during the entire duration of the games. That aside, she answered the question swiftly.

"Monica." She said. I nodded. Monica, that was a pretty standard name from four from what I knew. Not a bad sounding name though.

"My name is Alma. I guess we can be an alliance for the foreseeable future if that's okay with you." I extended my hand to her. Initially she just looked up at me like I was crazy or something, but eventually she took my hand after about a few seconds.

"Sounds like a plan then. I wouldn't mind it. Especially to help you find Altar." She said, shaking my hand. With little thought given, the two of us were now an official alliance. Right in the middle of our handshake though, a canon went off, catching the two of us completely by surprise. We both shot up before our nerves calmed down.

"That was probably the girl from one." Monica said, again a sad tone in her voice. I couldn't focus on that though. I was so concerned about Altar that I was worried that that could've been him instead.

"I hope for our sake it was. Let's go find Altar. He must be really concerned right now. Come on." I shouted as I immediately started running through the woods, barely caring about Monica. I just need to catch up with my little brother again. I would never be able to forgive myself if anything else happened to him. He's already gone through so much as is. In this arena, out of this arena too. Though that reminded me that that would mean that if the plan was to get Atlar out of the arena, I wouldn't get out of this arena alive myself. That was an unfortunate fact, but I was willing to accept it. Though with that being said, I wasn't so sure about Monica. I very much doubted that she would have the same mentality. But I decided then that whatever her feelings were, I could deal with that later. That could be until when Altar was found.

Unfortunately, on that day that never happened.


The entire day, me and Monica ran around, yelling Altars name in the woods. We didn't care who heard us, the only real danger would've been Ceres and the girl from 10 but otherwise we didn't really care. Altar meant that much to us I felt. But unfortunately, he left no trace. Neither of us had heard any canons aside from the ones for those careers, but we were a bit concerned for Altar's life. When it came time for the anthem to play at night, we were grateful to learn that Altar was alive, but that made his whereabouts any more confusing.

"I can't see Altar being the type of person to run off on his own like that." Monica said to me as she pulled out her sleeping bag. I had to agree with that. Altar wouldn't just run off on his own for no reason. Me and Monica suddenly began speculating as to why we couldn't find Altar. We retraced our steps but couldn't find him in the area so he had to have run off somewhere in the face of danger.

"Whatever happened. We'll have to catch up with him quickly. Anything could happen to him in here after all." I sighed anxiously. Monica just replied with a "Yeah." and after that we both went silent for a few minutes. After a while though, I heard Monica speaking up again.

"Given we took care of the careers. Aside from the 10 and 11 girls, would you say there are any other tributes who are a particular threat to Altar?" She asked. I didn't really wanna think about it while I was trying to sleep, my stomach was hurting from just imagining the possible worst case scenarios. But she raised a good question. Aside from me, Monica, Ceres and the girl from 10, the only other tributes were a handful from District 9 and 5. Generally they aren't anything to write home about, though District 9 was the home of the prior games winner (but even then, he really just won off the backs of his alliance), and this year seems to be no different. I'm not too sure, but they could be in an alliance. That could pose a problem but honestly I feel me and Monica could take a few of them in combat easily. And going off of how we held off 3 whole careers, I honestly think it'd be possible for us to take out all of them. But that just sounded like stupidly wishful thinking. I told Monica all that and she just gave a deep breath.

"This sucks." She groaned. I couldn't help but agree. Afterwards, we decided to take turns sleeping and keeping watch. I decided to go first, and while we agreed Monica would come next, I'd already figured it'd be much better to let her sleep the whole night. Not a great decision, but to be honest I still wasn't completely sure if I wanted to trust her. At the end of the day though, we both had a long day ahead of us and I was still wide awake thinking of how I was going to catch up with Altar, and if he was okay.

Please be okay...


Currently Living Tributes

District 4 Female (Monica)

District 5 Female (Volva)

District 9 Male (Kona)

District 9 Male (Bran)

District 9 Female (Zina)

District 10 Female (Bella)

District 11 Male (Altar)

District 11 Male (Alma)

District 11 Female (Ceres)


On my profile I say I'm leaving and moving accounts. While this is the case, I recently noticed that this story is soon to turn 5 years old and I was slowly approaching the conclusion and I got a little sentimental. I'm gonna conclude the story around the time of its anniversary and then leave my account. Whispers of the Wind is far from perfect, in fact I'd describe it as being pretty poorly written, but in spite of that I still wanna wrap this story up for myself and end this chapter of my life. I've already written the 3 out of the planned 4 or 5 chapters so expect them to be up pretty soon. Catch ya'll later ^^

- AlphaZero21