Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games. They belong to Suzanne Collins.

Note: You know how it is for me. I start typing and then suddenly I find it impossible to stop until a whole new chapter has been churned out. I'd say I may have issues, but 'may' implies room for some doubt. Almost done with the second decade already, how'd that even happen? Enough rambling, let's go!

"So, unarmed combat?" Peeta asked. "How's that work? Like, strong punches?"

"I'd guess so," Katniss said with a shrug. "I know plenty out Outlier tributes could throw a good punch, but how did that overcome the Career pack? They'd be armed with swords, spears and all kinds of other sharp things."

"Maybe the Cornucopia had no weapons that year?" Peeta guessed, unsure. "But then again the Careers would still be stronger than a non-Career hand to hand and there'd be more of them... huh... I don't know."

"I guess stranger things have happened in the arena. Remember what Haymitch told us about the disaster of the Thirty Fourth Games?" Katniss asked, a dark and wry sort of smirk on her face.

"Yeah, that was... really something," Peeta said, a soft laugh without humour passing through his lips. "...I guess Isobel sure proved that you don't need a sword to kill. Or a knife, or spear or..."

The pair stood in silence, nothing more needing to be said.

18th Annual Hunger Games

Name: Isobel Sparks

Gender: Female

District: 5

Age: 16

Kills: 4

Life in Five isn't so bad, really. It's all about following orders, keeping a routine and waiting for that golden opportunity to have a little fun. For me, that opportunity is spending time with Keen when we're not stuck working at the power plants for most of our waking hours. It wasn't much, but what we had together made Five not the worst of places to me.

It could have been District Six. I like to think I'm always aware of how things could get worse.

I always knew, for example, that being reaped for the Hunger Games would make things about as worse as they could become. Having been reaped for the Games this year, I know I wasn't inaccurate with what I'd assumed.

I'd thought that, perhaps, I would stand a better chance than most girls from Five have over the years. I'm strong and quite agile after all; Keen calls me a warrior. A pet name, you could say. But one knife barely missing my neck taught me better. A single mistake and I'm dead. If I'm to get through this, I have to stay completely focused. I have to be smart about this.

I have to kill. The boy from Three hadn't done anything wrong, but I needed that backpack badly... his blood is on my hands, long after I washed it all away.

I've been meditating from my high point in the arena for about an hour, trying to relax and get my focus back, but it's impossible. The bruises on my side are nothing to the guilt.

To think, Keen and I had been not so jokingly bringing up the idea of marriage just two weeks ago. In a place as harsh as Panem, what's the point in waiting?

Two weeks. If the bloodbath twelve hours ago is an eternity by this point, then what does that make two weeks?

This year they threw us into a bamboo forest that covers a large, flora covered mountain. I almost think it's beautiful, but things of real beauty don't cause the deaths of innocent kids. Just an hour ago a rockfall took somebody out, not that I know who it is.

Maybe the girl from Eight. She was the one who called the Hunger Games barbaric and evil. I took the rockfall as a warning to keep my feelings to myself. I've not let much slip, just enough for me to be known as the 'stoic, athletic one'. It's not been enough to get me killed by a rockfall at least.

I'm not sure how much time passes as I meditate, enough that the anthem has ended long ago, but it's not really that long before I can tell that I am not alone anymore. I should've known that tributes would flock for the high ground sooner than later.

On all fours I crawl to the edge of my perch, gazing down below. Sure enough it's the Career pack of the year. I crawl myself back, unwilling to engage them just yet. Not when all four of them survived the opener and, just my luck, recruited somebody to help them slaughter the rest of us.

Of course it'd be Joba, my District Partner. Two year my elder and two feet my literal overshadower.

I return to meditating, relaxing my mind as I focus. Focus, focus, focus...

When you relax and truly drain out all of your distractions it becomes easy to overhear what people around you are saying. Though, heh, I guess the fact the Careers don't bother to keep their voices low helps me out too.

"How many left again?" the boy from One asks. I've come to see he's a bit slow witted.

"Besides us there are ten," says the girl from One. The leader this year, I believe. "Try and remember the facts for once Glaze."

Glaze has little to say, but the pair from Two sure do. Rock and Roll, a pair of unfortunately named twins who wield giant clubs and yearn to hit something. My plan is to stay hidden up here and ensure that it's not me they hit.

I saw what they did to the pair from Six and it's something I doubt I'll ever forget.

Joba has little to say amongst his powerful allies, a move that is probably for the best. Loyalty only goes so far amongst the Career Pack, especially to the Outlier amongst them. It takes only a slip of the tongue for a blade to enter one's gut.

One moment I'm sitting on my perch trying to get back to my meditation in an attempt to calm my soul. The next moment the platform I'm on breaks. No doubt the Gamemakers forcing a fight. It's only my fast reflexes that save me from falling and breaking an arm, or worse.

But even after my flawless three point landing, I don't think that being seen by the entire Career Pack helps any. Joba remains neutral, while the other four eye me like hungry dogs. Just like the ones that guard the power plant during the dead hours.

"Well, look who it is, it's the midget girl from Five," Rock says, playfully elbowing his twin. "Five feet to match her District."

"And another foot onto that for when she's buried six feet under," Roll adds, snickering.

I don't rise to the bait, five feet is hardly what I'd call 'midget size'. But I don't run either, not when we're up high and only a steep cliff awaits behind me. With not even a small knife to my name, I'm going to have to confront the entire Career Pack at once.

Five against one is really unfair.

They keep up the mocking, but I simply ready myself. My feet are firm, my fists are balled and I'm ready for the fight of a lifetime. I feel ready, but it's hard to keep my focus.

The thought of mom, dad, Grandma Lily and even Keen watching me is a distracting one. The idea that they may even watch me die is even worse. We may have always been poor and busy around the clock, but what little time we had to spend all together... it's a treasure greater than the riches of the entire Capitol.

I was never one to delay the inevitable. That's why, after another minute or two of the twins' mockery I clear my throat.

"So, are we gonna do this or what?" I ask them, my eyes narrowed and my heart heavy.

"Knock it off you two," the girl from One tells the Twos. "Let's kill her and keep moving. You said it yourselves, she's tiny, so this won't take long."

Rock and Roll salute with their clubs, both wearing matching nasty smirks as they charge at me. But I'm not afraid. I stand my ground, ready to do what comes natural once they reach me.

Five against one is really unfair.

...It's really unfair for them.

Rock swings his club, it being a cue for me to leap back. He stares as I backflip through the air, unable to snap out of it before I land a harsh kick against his chest. As he stumbles I take the chance to leap up and spin around five times. With each rotation my boot smacks into his face. As he falls back with a shout of agony I can see his nose is broken.

The yell from behind me confirms that the battle is far from one. Not when Roll is running over, wildly swinging her club around. The sight of her brother in pain has her in a frenzy, but it's a frenzy I can make sure of. She lacks discipline right now.

When people get angry, they start to make mistakes.

I land one hell of a punch between her eyes as soon as her club is lowered. She howls in the night as blood pours down her face. One charge and a flying kick later has her sprawled out on her back, panting.

I shout, struggling as Glaze grabs me from behind. It's clear he's alarmed by what he's seeing and has me held tightly for his District Partner to finish off. I won't make it easy for him though. I make him have to fight to keep me contained.

"Quick, kill her Posh!" he yells, grunting from the effort. He grunts louder when I elbow him in the ribs. "Kill her!"

The girl from One, Posh runs over with a sword in hand. I figure that it's enough time to stop toying around and, upon digging my feet into the ground, spin around. Glaze yells from the motion, and then yells a whole lot louder as Posh's sword cuts into his back. He slums over while I run to the cliff face with Posh after me, right as the Twos start to get back up.

I'm not surprised to see that Joba has taken the chance to run off by this point. I guess he'll live longer that way.

"Get back here!" Posh yells, ignoring her dying District Partner.

I see fit to grant her wish, as she asked me so nicely. One run up the wall later has me flip backwards and land right behind her. I've punches her face first into the wall before she knows what I've done. As she howls and screams over her broken tooth I see I've got bigger problems now.

Two twins with a club each and equally bad tempers.

But, like I said, anger makes people start making mistakes and if you ask me the twins are making a lot of them. They swing wildly without really aiming. It's all too easy for me to keep dodging out of the way while Posh keeps screaming and Glaze's cannon fires distantly.

"Fight us you coward!" Rock shouts.

"Only a coward runs away!" Roll screams.

I know they'll be angry at me for obeying them, but I make it a personal rule to do as I am told. That's why both end up laid out on the ground with extra bruises a few moments later, both snarling and shouting from the two for one roundhouse kick they got hit with.

"Had enough?" I ask them between panting. "Still think I'm a helpless midget?"

Clearly not. Posh is back up and ready for more, swinging her sword viciously as blood pools from her mouth and down her chin. It's easy to dodge out of the way, but all it takes is me making one mistake and the blade making contact.

"You can't keep dodging," she shouts, coming close to gutting me. "Sooner or later you'll have to stop. We can take punches, we're trained to absorb the pain better than most. You're fucked!"

I hadn't wanted to kill another person, but it's looking like I have no choice. Especially when Rock and Roll are starting to stir again, soon to be back for more. A jump kick knocks Posh back, her sword falling away. I don't give her a chance to grab out a knife or take a few steps back. I grip her by the front of her shirt, readying my fist.

Readying the most powerful punch I can muster.

"You said you can absorb pain, but that doesn't mean you're immune to it. It means you've got a limit to what you can take!" I shout, clenching my fist tightly. "So allow me to go all out and force you to surrender! As my dear Grandma Lily once told me... go beyond, plus infinity!"

One moment Posh is shouting and screaming for the Twos to back her up. The next moment my fist throbs as it makes contact with her face.

The next moment my fist is covered in blood and Posh's skull has been completely caved in, her cannon firing right away. I let her corpse fall backwards, down the steep cliff. I do, after all, still have a pair of aggressive twins to deal with.

The sight of their dead allies and how their other ally has ran away makes Rock and Roll wisen up a bit, both vanishing away into the night pretty soon after that. Once I've looted the bodies of any useful gear I do the same, leaving their remains for the hovercraft to collect.

I spend the night besides a tranquil, shallow river. Once I've cleared away all the blood, the physical blood of my victims anyway, I return to meditating. After the battle I just went through, I need to sooth myself. I need to get the screams and deaths off of my mind.

By the way, I forgot to tell you something. You and the Gamemakers, that is.

I'm a karate master.

Time passes slowly in the arena. It's another long Hunger Games, no doubt caused by how I wiped out half of the Career Pack during the first night. With two of the biggest killers already dead, it's little wonder that the Games have already dragged on to the ninth day with ten tributes still left.

Joba is out there somewhere, but so are Rock and Roll. By now they'll have probably been sponsored all the medicine they need to recover after I thrashed them. I can't take them so utterly off of their guards again, so I know it'll be a tough fight if we cross paths again.

Since then I've probably not done much from a viewer's perspective. Just surviving on what fruit I can find growing around the mountain and spending the nights up in the trees growing here and there where the bamboo doesn't. The bamboo gave me the perfect material to craft a staff out of. It's not perfect, but it's been enough to drive off the panther mutt that came my way on the sixth day.

I'm confident that I can handle a tribute with my fists and feet alone, but for a mutt I'll admit to needing a bit more.

I sit by a shallow stream, trying to keep myself calm with my meditation. It's a lost cause though. Any time I let my mind wander I'm reminded of myself slaughtering Posh on the first night.

They started it. I just defended myself. That's been my mantra that I tell myself in hopes I might stay sane.

I soon abandon meditation and look at my reflection in the water. My dark face is one of a killer, something I can never take back.

As Grandma Lily would say, this world of ours has no time for tears. You either get busy living, or get busy dying. I know which of those things I would prefer to be busy with.

"I'll be home soon," I whisper.

The boom of a cannon tells me that home suddenly got closer, or perhaps my own death did. The hovercraft descends further down the mountain to pick up the body, an action that has me quick to move to the high ground. I don't fancy the idea of running across a panther mutt or Rock and Roll anytime soon.

But an hour later my solitude is gone, thrown away the moment I stumble across Joba. Over a week on the mountain hasn't been kind to the burly boy from the power plants. Between the dirt and the dried blood, he's a mess.

It's a short while before he speaks, perhaps not even recognising me until now.

"Isobel? You're still alive?" he says, clutching his hip.

"For now," I say.

"No shock. After what you did the first night..." he trails off, hissing in pain. "How did you only score a five?"

"I didn't show off my skills," I tell him. "I wouldn't want to make myself into a target."

"Right, right," he trails off into another hiss of pain. "The Twos are gonna be hunting for you."

"They can try," I say, punching a tree. As I expected a large plum falls into my hand. "Plum?"

"Allergic," Joba says, still hissing and wincing.

Unfortunate luck, but as I bite into the plum I know that it means more for me. It's a frightening, strange thought that one plum may mean the difference between life and death.

It's some time before either Joba or I say another word to each other. I can't lower my guard even around him; in the arena, District Loyalty won't last forever. Especially not if only nine of us are left now. If he tries to attack me, I'll have to be ready for a fight.

But after he saw me fighting the Careers on the first night and ran away into the darkness... I don't think he will.

"It's hopeless," he says after a while, sitting at the base of a tree. "Hopeless."

"What's hopeless?" I ask him, moving closer. "And how so?"

"Everything," he says. "Just... we cannot win. Five almost never wins. Shunt only did because he knew how to build a flamethrower. I'm bleeding on the inside, you won't be able to catch them off guard again... and the twins have armour now, so your punches will be futile anyway. It's hopeless."

"It's only futile from the moment we give up, and that's not what I'm about," I tell him, kneeling down out of range of his knife. "You need to have some hope if you want to survive, in the arena and out."

"Hope's dangerous and dead," Joba says, turning away from me.

I know a lost cause when I see it. I can't remain in place anyway, not when the other seven could be anywhere at all, perhaps staring at us from the cover of darkness. So, I wish Joba well and take my leave from this part of the mountain and towards the looming mass of bamboo.

"Hope's not dead nor dangerous, Joba," I tell him as I leave. "Hope's a good thing, maybe the best of things. No good thing ever truly dies."

I leave him with those words as I make my way through the bamboo and further up the mountain. I can't help but wonder if I, too, may end up like Joba and have my hope torn away. I can't predict the future, whether it's short or long, but I can't deny that ending up as a hopeless husk is not impossible.

I wish, not for the first time, that I'd been born into an era before the Hunger Games. Alas, it's all I know and all I may ever know.

The thirteenth day is wet, a downpour covering the mountain and consuming the lower levels. It's nowhere near me, but I don't dare to assume that this puts my odds any higher than they were top start with. Are they high or low? I honestly have no idea anymore.

During the eleventh night, they came. The mutts. Horrible black beings I never got a proper look at aside their red eyes. It seems that we'd gone too long without killing each other and the Gamemakers wanted to do something different than a Feast this year.

Nine tributes became four. I had no time to feel a sense of relief that Rock had fallen victim to the mutts, not when Joba's face appeared in the sky right afterwards. I wonder if he died as hopeless and in pain as he did when we last spoke.

I think deep down I know the answer to that question is a sure-fire yes.

I shiver, not for the first time or even the fiftieth. It's cold and I'm in bad need of some shelter. The bite marks across my back from those red eyed mutts only serve to make me shudder even more. I wonder if the other three are getting close.

I wonder who the two besides Roll are. I've honestly forgotten.

My tired legs carry me onwards until I come to a large, gaping cave built into the mountain. It seems about as fine a place as any to take shelter from the rain. I stumble forth, about ready to slump over and lose myself in slumber for a few hours.

The battle cry tells me I'll be doing no such thing.

The small girl from Eleven charges at me, swinging a knife to and fro. She looks half mad, her appearance beaten, bloody and scratched. I see the madness in her eyes as she keeps her knife in a flurry of movement. Under the rainfall I dodge and leap about, her knife failing to strike my flesh.

As tired as I am and insane as she must be, it's not really a contest of any kind. I'm still stronger and a few inches bigger than the twelve year old. I'd intended to just punch her in the face and send her fleeing into the night.

I hadn't intended to knock her backwards and over the side of the cliff. The crack and the cannon confirm the worst to me

Sitting in the cave, meditating deeply, I suddenly see that I was wrong. It is a contest after all.

It's a contest to bare the storm of my guilt that threatens to swallow me up.

"Remember what Grandma Lily told you," I order myself. "It's not always about baring the storm, but learning how to dance in the rain."

I think for a fair while as the rain keeps falling. I think about my Grandma, always so wise. I think about mom and dad, so caring and worn out from work. I think of Keen, the smile always on her face even when things looked pretty grim.

I need to win and make it back. I must, I must, I must.

A parachute eventually falls outside the cave. When I open it up and put on the metal gauntlets contained within I clench my fists tightly.

I'm as ready as I possibly could be. After killing three people... what's one more? Either I die and don't feel anymore guilt, or I win and have decades to learn how to deal with it. It's no excuse to not give it my all in the finale.

I walk into the rain at sunrise, ready to confront the others.

The cannon makes my chest tighten, but I'm still ready as ever.

A day passes as I head up the top of the mountain, passing thousands of bamboo shoots along the way. The anthem showed that, besides the girl from Eleven, the boy from Eight died during the night.

It's just myself and roll left. Fists against club. Small against big.

I just have to find her first, hopefully before she finds me and takes me by surprise.

Sooner than I expected I make it to the peak and settle down to meditate once more, perhaps for the last time if I can't overcome Roll. Thoughts of family fill my head, enough to give me a sense of brief relief from the pain in my body, mind and soul.

Two hours pass before I hear footsteps drawing near.

It's her.

I'm up and ready in a moment, watching as Roll walks up the slope not far from me. Like me she's filthy and her clothes are caked in dried blood, but I see something else upon her too.

The twitches of madness.

As she gets closer I can see her eyes are unfocused, full of all sorts of pain and insanity I can't imagine. Or maybe I just don't want to?

"Rock, Rock, Rock... oh Rock..." I hear her mutter as she makes her way towards me.

I knew she and her twin were close, but I didn't think it was this close. Not to the point she'd have a breakdown if he died. Was it just him dying, or was it the fact he probably got torn apart by those mutts? Any thoughts I have of District Twos logic for sending in twins to the arena are put on hold when she spots me.

"You!" she shouts, her bloodied club gripped tightly.

"Me," I confirm, looking her over. The armour is easy to spot, thick and firm. I can only hope the gauntlets can break through it. But with her head exposed, perhaps that shan't be an issue.

I stand corrected very quickly as she puts on an armoured helmet and makes a run towards me. I'm in a fighting stance a moment after that, ready for what may come next.

This time though, she's ready for me as well. As much as she's lost it she doesn't allow me to narrow the gap, always keeping out of fist range and swinging the club around wildly. The rain falls hard as we keep up the fast, frantic duel at the mountain's peak with both of us looking for an out. Any way to harm our last opponent.

No sooner have I made her cry out in pain from a hard punch to her chest she sends me reeling back from a smack to the gut with the club. I'm lucky the spike wasn't facing towards me, but with the breath knocked right out of me it may not even matter.

"Just die already," she groans, rearing back for another swing.

She swings and I surge my hands forth, catching the club as it comes down. My arms burn as I push back against it and I'm sure Roll's own do as well. We struggle hard and fierce, trying to gain advantage.

I come out on top, sweep kicking her over. The club is sent flying away down the slope, but Roll had a back-up weapon all along. A nasty dagger. It's blood-soaked already, surely having taken a few lives prior to now.

The club had me wary, but the much smaller blade doesn't. By the time Roll has it raised I've already leapt forwards, landing my best ever flying kick right upon her chest. She falls backwards with a scream and in a moment she's begun to live up to her name.

She rolls down the mountain.

Down and down and down...

She's keeps rolling until she smashes right into a cluster of rocks far below. The cannon booms loud, thundering across the mountain.

It's like a switch has been flipped. My firm, stoic side is gone in a flash and I drop to my knees, blubbering. All the pain and stress since I was reaped comes out in a flash, my eyes left nearly aflame from how much the tears sting. I barely hear the trumpets, only continued to sob as the hovercraft descends to lift be aboard for the journey home.

Home.

I'm going home.

It's not long before I go under from something they inject into me, but I maintain enough clarity of mind to think before I completely pass out.

The Capitol watches Victors closely, Shunt said it himself. I'm unlikely to ever get any privacy again for as long as I'll live. But they can never find what I keep locked away in my mind.

Right now, the only thing on my mind is how sick and horrifying the arena was. How I can't, in good conscious, let it ever happen again to more innocent children.

Perhaps nothing can be done for the children next year, but what of the children in five years? Ten years? Fifty years? I'd be disgusted at myself if I didn't try to do something.

The last thing I remember thinking before it all goes dark is if Shunt may have rebellious ideas and, if not him, perhaps some of the others from the other Districts. Surely at least one among them wants to take these fiends down and leave them gasping for air...

"Ready to move on?" Peeta asked Katniss after their moment of silence for Isobel.

"Yeah, I'm ready," Katniss replied. "Still a lot of people to get through. Think any of the others were as powerful without weapons as Isobel was said to be?"

"Perhaps we'll remember as we keep going down the street," Peeta said. "I think, in their own way, all of the Victors were strong."

"Or, in Snag's case, just very lucky," Katniss said, as she led Peeta along.

The pair moved a few paces on and soon came to the next face imprinted upon the sidewalk. It showed a cocky looking young man with a well groomed appearance, his expression nothing short of arrogant.

"Bronze Marley," Katniss noted, reading the name below the face. "He sure seems full of himself."

That was a fun one to write, I'd say. Who couldn't like a badass karate girl who took on all four Careers at once? Presumably at least several people out there as I've yet to see a character literally everybody likes. But yeah, a Victor who excels in unarmed combat, the first Victor who hid her true skills from the Gamemakers in training and a bit of an inkling of rebellious thoughts as well. What may that lead to as the decades go by? Stay tuned and perhaps you'll find out!

Stats

District 1: Peridot Gaudy (8th Games), Crystal McCree (14th Games)

District 2: Baron Overwhill (4th Games), Runa Peace (7th Games), Olga Machete (10th Games), Rook Valiant (17th Games)

District 3: Honorius Perthshire (5th Games)

District 4: Museida Selkirk (3rd Games), Mags Flanagan (11th Games)

District 5: Shunt Gaspar (12th Games), Isobel Sparks (18th Games)

District 6: N/A

District 7: Pliny Aransio (2nd Games), Fir Buzz (9th Games)

District 8: Woof Casino (16th Games)

District 9: Mizar Aldjoy (1st Games), Gwenith Rosebud (13th Games)

District 10: N/A

District 11: Bear Redfoot (15th Game)

District 12: Duke Saint-Rose (6th Games)