Cheyanne Talor- District three female
It was almost freaky how the Careers ignored all the weaker-looking tributes and singlemindedly focused on the stronger ones. I kept thinking it was a trick and they were going to come for me, but they never did. I was able to gather up an armful of supplies and run off, without anyone even looking at me.
I'd set up a camp in a fallen-down house. There were so many houses and buildings to hide in, but I chose one that had fallen over since I thought the Careers would probably think most of us took the nicer houses. My house was just a pile of fallen walls and rubble with little pockets I could hide in where the walls had landed crookedly and stood up a little.
Some of us are probably eating better than we did at home, I thought. My family always had enough food, but plenty of us went hungry. I'd been expecting to go hungry in the Arena, but with all the supplies I'd gathered I had a lot of food. A lot of it came in bags that had little packets inside where if you tore them open they heated the food up. That was how I came to be eating a hot burrito without an oven or even a fire. It tasted almost like my mother made it.
I wasn't too scared when I heard someone walking around by my fallen house. There was a lot of Arena to look through, and my shelter looked like just a pile of garbage. Probably it wasn't even a Career. But then the footsteps stopped. I was about five feet from the edge of the pile and I looked out at the bit of light peeking through the fallen boards. My eye fell on the beam just at the edge and my heart stopped. There was a smear of dirt where I'd crawled in, a smear of dirt that had five clear finger-sized trails. I looked at that and then I looked at Nero looking down the tunnel at me.
Desiree Redwood, District Seven female (17)
It would have been really hot under any other circumstance. Kjole and I were rolling around on the ground, grabbing hair and smacking each other. But of course it wasn't hot at all, since she was trying to kill me. I'd tried to run away, but unfortunately Kjole was the only one in the Arena almost as tall as me, and she was a soccer player so she could run really fast.
At the start of the fight Kjole had been using her sword, but luckily I was able to find a rusty old pipe. She was hesitant to take any big swings since it might bend her sword, so I managed to get close enough to her to simply grab her like a bear and throw us both to the ground. As we rolled I tried to roll in the opposite direction as the sword.
Kjole punched me right in the nose and I tasted blood. I tried to get back at her by scratching at her eyes, but she saw it coming and bent her head out of the way so I got her ear instead. I grabbed on anyway and she squeaked when I yanked as hard as I could. I gritted my teeth and did what I had to do.
I headbutted Kjole full-strength, my eyes tearing up when the impact jarred my probably broken nose. Kjole half-fell and half-shoved herself off of me to recover her thoughts. As soon as she did I rolled over and bolted, grabbing a nearby half of a brick as I did. Kjole was up and after me in a second so I threw the brick at her. I was aiming for her face, but since I was both half-turned away and also really rushed, I hit her in the stomach instead. As she huffed for breath I ran for it. This time she didn't catch me.
Archibald Pell, District Eight male
I should have grabbed more stuff in the Bloodbath. I'd noticed the Careers were distracted and I'd grabbed a little, but then I chickened out and ran. I had a spare shirt and a fire-starting kit and three cans of beans, so at least I had a little. I also had a hatchet, not that I thought I could use it against most people. I mostly just grabbed it so someone else couldn't take it.
The Careers had a lot of Arena to look through. I was hoping a really gross office building bathroom wasn't their first thought. I'd barricaded myself in as well as I could with a chair shoved under the door handle, so hopefully they would think the door had always been locked and no one was in there. Probably they were too smart for that but I could hope.
The one thing I hadn't been able to get in the Bloodbath was water purification tablets. When I first turned on the bathroom sink, I was surprised to see there was actually water. The only problem was it was kind of cloudy and smelled bad. It definitely didn't look good to drink. I didn't have any purifiers, so I improvised.
It was scary sneaking around the building looking for some wood. I was glad it didn't take me long to find some old broken office chairs. I knew they wouldn't burn well, so I took some scraps of cardboard to get things started. I took it all back to my bathroom and re-barricaded the door.
Since I had the firestarting tool, which was like a little piece of metal with a trench to run the flint bit through, it wasn't hard to start a fire. The nice thing about such an old building was that it didn't have a fire alarm. After the fire was going really strong, I took one of my empty cans of beans and filled it with water. Then I nestled it into my fire and waited for it to boil.
Porsche Romeo, District Six female (17)
My strategy was simple: hide somewhere and never move because if anyone sees me they would definitely be able to catch me, since I can't hardly walk and all. So I picked an unassuming-looking gas station, it looked like, and made my camp. Most of the station was empty and covered in garbage but one or two of the shelves still had some food. I hung a thin blanket from my backpack over the broken window so no one could see in.
All right, how am I going to win this? Honestly, I probably wasn't. I was still going to make plans and all, but I was definitely a long shot. Probably the longest in the games, except maybe the weirdo from Twelve.
I took a look at my supplies. I had a bottle of sanitizer, a thin blanket, a packet of jerky (with taco seasoning), and a pair of light shoes, which would be really handy if mine wore out. Not that they were going to, since I wasn't going to move.
The one thing I didn't have was a weapon. Luckily, I came from the criminal part of Six. Shivs were part of life. I hunted around the gas station, which very inconveniently didn't have any weapons, and found that it did have a screwdriver under the cashier's station, probably in case the gas pumps broke. I sat on the cashier's chair and started sharpening it against the metal cash register. The sun blazed through the blanket on the window, lighting the gas station nicely.
I thought a nasty horsefly bit me on the chest before I realized it was a throwing star. What the heck, I wasn't making any noise, I thought as I fell to the ground in surprise. I looked at the sun streaming through the window and saw how careless I'd been. If the blanket was so thin light could get through it, it was thin enough my shape was visible through it. Nailah had seen it and gone right for the kill. It didn't matter that much, I consoled myself. I wouldn't have been able to run anyway.
I just remembered that in the actual book, a lot of tributes died in the first few days as the Careers hunted. My story was running slower than that so I decided to quicken things up with some really short POVs for more action. There are still lots of people so it was easy for them to find some.
14th place: Cheyanne Talor- stabbed by Nero
There wasn't anything wrong with Cheyanne but I wasn't really feeling any Victor story coming from her so I killed her. She was a nice, realistic person and she definitely could have won, it was just I didn't pick her. Sad to see her go, though, especially since she didn't do anything wrong. thanks, treblenotes!
13th place: Porsche Romeo- throwing star thrown by Nailah
We all knew Porsche wasn't going to win, but people still liked her. She was realistic and blunt about her own weaknesses and did her best anyway, which got her this far. It was a rigged game for her from the start but she refused to go down without trying. Thanks, Silver!
PS this was all the third day