Harmony Calesque, D10
I got through the first night by luck. I ran away at the Bloodbath. The Careers looked for the biggest threats, and the murderers picked targets that didn't happen to be me. Beth, Mist, and Dante were already dead, so things went much better than I expected for the voting Games. When the dogs came out at night, I saw them running on the horizon, but they went after someone else. If they'd come for me, they would have gotten me. There was nowhere to hide in all the short, gray grass. I knew I couldn't let it stay that way.
I found only one tree in all the Arena. It was thin and bare, so I couldn't hide there. The dogs wouldn't be able to get me, but I'd be even more visible for the Careers. I kept walking until I reached the edge of a gray stone cliff. The rocks were sharp and rough, and they scraped me up something horrible as I picked my way down to the bottom. I hunted along the rocks until I found a tiny hole right next to the ground. It was maybe two feet high and not quite three feet wide, and it felt like a coffin when I slid into it on my belly. It was about seven feet deep, and I had just enough room to turn onto my stomach or back.
My hope was that the rock around me would blot out my smell, and it must have worked, because the dogs either didn't smell me or they were busy eating somewhere else. I stayed in that hole for six days. I was too scared to even look outside. I would have died of thirst if there hadn't been a tiny stream of condensation that trickled off a rock above my head. No luck on food, though. On the bright side, it made the bathroom situation... slightly less disgusting.
I had a lot of time to think in that dark, moldy hole. I thought about my family the other Tributes, but mostly I thought about why everyone had voted for me. I hadn't thought I was a terrible person, but why else would they do it? I sat awake at night listening to the dogs and racking my brain for the horrible thing I did to make everyone vote for me. Sometimes I talked back to my parents, and sometimes I forgot my chores. But other people shouldn't even know about that. I didn't make trouble or throw loud parties or talk about rebellion. I was just a normal girl. Maybe there weren't any mean people in Ten this year, and they had to vote for someone and I just got unlucky. It was balancing out with all the luck I'd had so far in the Arena, but it was going to take a long time before things were even.
Cannons went off every day. I kept count as they added up. I hardly ever heard any sign of the people who were dying. Only once did I come close to another Tribute. Some pebbles and dirt slid down across the mouth of my tunnel, and I heard footsteps as someone else wandered across the cliffs. Then whoever it was coughed, and I heard a splat as someone fell and slid down the cliff to the ground just feet away from me. I cowered with my back against the far wall of my shelter, praying that whoever killed the Tribute wouldn't come down for a closer look. I stayed there until I heard the hovercraft motor. I watched the Tribute's back arc as the claw grabbed his clothes and he flew away.
I couldn't believe it when the third-to-last cannon went off, leaving just me and one other Tribute. I'd forgotten who it was, but I assumed it was one of the Careers. It was getting harder to move. My mouth was dry and all my bones hurt. Breathing seemed to take a lot more energy than it used to. I wished I could gnaw my hand off just so I would have something to eat.
The last cannon was so faint I barely heard it. I thought it might be mine. Someone like me couldn't win. People voted me in here so I would die. I didn't know what I did to deserve it, but I'd disappointed them again.