Yasmine Jackson, District Six (13)

My fingers twisted around my necklace. Purple plastic beads slid smoothly on my fingers. I tugged it one way, tugged it another.

All at once, it broke. Beads dropped from my hand like bubbles drifting through molasses. They reached the ground with such slowness I could see the pedestal rising to meet them. Like bullet casings they clacked against the hard plastic and bounced lightly. They rolled toward the edge of the platform. I watched in frozen horror to see which one would roll off first and set off the mines. I wondered if it hurt to be blown up.

There was a lip at the edge of the platform. I hadn't seen it before. The beads rolled ever more slowly as their momentum wore out. They came to rest at the lip. A single bead edged up and almost over the lip. My entire body fixated on it as it balanced on the lip, wavered, and rolled back into the center of the platform. When I looked up I saw Adair from District Five on the next platform over, his eyes wide as he stared back at me. We locked eyes in the unspoken acknowledgement of how close we'd come to death and how much more death awaited us.

A tone sounded the start of the Games and I jumped at the noise. People started running, some toward and some away from the Cornucopia. As I stood hesitating on my platform a rumbling noise caught all our attention. Even the Careers looked up at the noise. The piles of garbage around us shifted, some opening up to reveal tunnels, others falling like sand as something under them slid into place. I heard a noise I couldn't place. A rustling, maybe… like leaves blown up the tunnel by a strong wind.

I thought it was a dog when the first animal appeared. It was twice the size of a raccoon and its heavy body was low to the ground. Its mouth was open and its heaving jaws were what told me it wasn't a dog. I'd never seen a dog with a pointed snout and whiskers and orange-tinted teeth. Before I could even make sense of it dozens of others were pouring out behind us. They swarmed into the Arena like a wave of locusts.

The edge of the platform bit into my arm and scraped off skin when I fell backwards to the ground. I rolled over and launched into a tipping run toward the nearest pile of garbage. Rodentlike squeaks filled the air and then were split by the sound of children screaming, some cut off without warning and others dissolving into reedy gurgles. Bits of rubbish and sprays of droplets flew above me as I tore into the garbage barehanded. I ripped a tunnel out of the landscape and shoved forward into it.

There had been Bloodbaths with mutts before. Usually they took one or two people and left. The Gamemakers didn't like when too many people died the same way. But the rats didn't stop. I heard scream after scream go silent and still more started. I shoved my hand in my mouth to cover my whimper when I realized it wasn't intentional. The mutts hadn't worked properly. Something went wrong and they would kill us all.

Knifing pain streaked my leg when one of them discovered me. I pulled forward on my stomach and felt my flesh sliding through its teeth as I tried to pull free. I kicked at it with my other leg and buried myself deeper in the trash when it let go. I could hear it behind me clawing at the garbage trying to catch up to me.

Filth and dampness streaked my face as I sobbed in my garbage coffin. Over and over the mutt broke through to my legs and over and over I kicked it and tore deeper into the earth. A shard of glass embedded itself in my palm and I kept digging with blood dripping down my hand and arm.

The garbage on top of me weighed me down so much I could hardly breathe. Slowly I became aware that the rat hadn't broken through to me for some time. I turned halfway in my self-made tunnel and caught the faint sound of music. It took a long time for me to comprehend the notes of the Anthem. The mutts hadn't stopped. They hadn't stopped until only one person was left.

I was like "nyeehhhh how am I gonna make Yasmine win" but then I had a great idea. Ta-da!