Disclaimer: I do not own The Hunger Games. They belong to Suzanne Collins.
Note: Here we are, one of the Games I've been hyped to write for… well, ever since this tale began, to be honest? Diehard fans of The Hunger Games should recall a Games Katniss mentioned in the first novel that was unpopular because 'everybody froze to death since there was no way to make fire', or something to that effect. Katniss is not actually born yet in this year of the Games, but my head-canon is that she never saw them live, instead seeing a rerun of sorts. It makes sense to me that the gamemakers would settle the problem of tributes having no way to stay warm, and thus alive, sooner than towards the end of the Hunger Games era, hence them landing at #57. But, can such an allegedly boring Games possibly be given an exciting story to explain exactly what happened? You bet your ass it can! Read on and enjoy the tale of a girl and her 'imaginary friend'.
"So, you saw these Games," Peeta began. "I was probably too busy in the bakery at the time to even glimpse a TV. What was Arendellian III like?"
"Honestly, it's really hard to explain. They used some medical term to describe a lot of it, can't remember what, but basically… it was like she could see stuff nobody else could. Stuff that was never there," Katniss began, looking at the imprinted face on the ground with a slightly confused sort of look. "She never went mad from being alone in the cold, not exactly… she kept talking to some guy called 'Aaron'."
Peeta wasn't sure what to say for several long moments.
"She certainly sounds like quite the individual," Peeta noted, settling on his go-to plan of just smiling and being polite. "I guess the Capitol liked her?"
"Nope, she got thrown into the arena with a straitjacket on," Katniss said, slowly shaking her head.
Once again Peeta was left in a stumped sort of silence. The kind of silence where you frankly pray for somebody to say something, anything to break it and then get left disappointed when nobody does.
"Wait, so you're saying she not only won the Hunger Games… she won without using her arms even once?" Peeta asked, stunned.
Katniss could only nod blankly.
57th Annual Hunger Games
Name: Arendellian Spinner III
Gender: Female
District: 5
Age: 15
Kills: 1
Schizophrenia.
A terrible condition to have, but certainly one that can be handled with the proper medication, patience from others and a good dose of genuine love. It might not always be an easy thing to live with, but it can certainly be made bearable. In the Capitol it was actually quite simple for sufferers to live long, healthy, happy lives thanks to all that their city of sheer excess provided for those within its walls.
The same was very much not the case in the Districts, including the industrial and polluted place known as District Five.
Life was cheap, as evidenced by all of the accidents that frequently happened on the job around the district. Electrocutions, lost limbs, fatalities due to chemical exposure and even the odd person taking an arrow to the knee, strangely enough. It was hard enough just living to begin with, so one could easily work out how hard it was to have any kind of mental health support.
Simply put, it was impossible unless you were among the richest of those in Five.
Arendellian Spinner III was not among those people. Her family were fairly poor, forced to live in rundown tenants out in the boonies of Five where hope was sparse and safety even rarer.
Her parents worked as low level security guards at a somewhat minor power plant. Her two elder brothers scraped out a feeble living to support the family by collecting various scraps and fragments from wrecked machines in the nearby junkyard, selling them on to buyers who may be in need of spares for a variety of things.
Arendellian herself had no such job. She didn't have any chores around the house either. She was, for all intents and purposes, deemed to be a complete lost cause.
Her family didn't even know what was truly 'wrong' with their little girl. Only that she was prone to violent meltdowns, panic attacks, screeching fits and then suddenly talking to thin air or, as she would insist, her best friend Aaron.
Her family and neighbours, in their more superstitious moments, wondered if it was the girl's name that had bought about some sort of a curse. The name 'Arendellian' seemed to just attract bad luck because both her relatives who had the name were reaped for past Games and ended up dead.
The first Arendellian was eaten by sharks at the very end of the Eleventh Games.
The second Arendellian had her eyes torn out and got stabbed a grand total of seventeen times in the Forty Seventh Games.
It sometimes kept Mr and Mrs Spinner up into the dead hours of the night, wondering if the curse would spare Arendellian over for another year or if she'd meet a worse fate within the arena.
The entire damn family was cursed from top to bottom, Arendellian suffering the full brunt of it. Nobody believed she was going to last a long time after her eighteenth birthday, assuming she didn't suffer the fate of her fellow name bearers.
The thing was, Arendellian did not see herself as being cursed, no sir. She didn't even realise anything was wrong with her in the first place.
She just liked being able to have so much free time to play with her best friend in the whole world, Aaron.
It was the start of the summer in the fifty seventh year since the Dark Days, one of the hottest summers ever seen in decades, and Arendellian was sitting on the roof of her family's tenant building to watch the first light of dawn filling up the sky.
"Whoa, pretty…" she whispered, raising a hand up as if to try and catch the light.
"It sure is," Aaron agreed, lazily laying down beside Arendellian.
Aaron was pretty much a normal looking boy, the same age as Arendellian right down to the last day. Lanky, of an average sort of size, a freckly face and charcoal black hair were the features of her very best friend.
She thought he was ever so tough to be able to keep smiling even when everybody else kept pulling a mean trick and acting like he wasn't even there. He assured her it was cool, he'd grown used to it after all, but still…
"What do you think will happen today 'Dell?" Aaron asked.
"Ummmmmm… I don't know," Arendellian said. "Maybe mama and papa will smile? I'd like to see them smile. They never smile…"
"It could happen. You gotta believe!" Aaron exclaimed. "You trust me, don't you?"
"Uh huh. I trust you," Arendellian agreed, mumbling softly. "Okey dokie, I'll believe."
"That's the spirit," Aaron said, patting Arendellian on her shoulder. She lightly flinched, only to slowly relax.
One thing that people needed to know about Arendellian before meeting her was pretty simple; she hated being touched.
"Oh, sorry," Aaron said, stepping back. "Where oh where are my manners today?"
"It's alright," Arendellian mumbled. "So, um…"
"Tired of watching the dawn sky? Yeah, me too, this is lame," Aaron leapt to his feet, letting out a wacky bout of laughter. "Let's race! Here to the junkyard, let's goooooooooo!"
Aaron ran for the door, doing that odd thing he sometimes did when he phased right through the metal door. He was so lucky to have superpowers; it gave Arendellian no shortage of jealousy.
"Aaron, phasing is cheating!" Arendellian whined as she erratically ran after Aaron. "Wait up, you always win! Always!"
In spite of her complaining she was unable to help herself from giggling as she and Aaron dashed through the tenant building and off towards the junkyard about half a mile away.
She wondered why the residents of the building kept giving her those looks. The uneasy ones, the pitiful ones and the ones that were somewhat uneasily pitiful.
Maybe they were just as confused as she sometimes was when the walls began to change colours without warning. She never liked it when that happened, not when it was so startling.
The reaping was as sombre an affair as it usually was. The four living victors sat on the reaping stage in varying amounts of brokenness, none worse than Crimson. The reaping aged children tried to hide their tears and terror, all wishing that it would be anybody aside themselves chosen.
Arendellia remained silent, save the occasional twitch and mumble. She hated being so close to other people. It didn't feel right, the way they bumped their shoulders against her own and never stood more than an inch or so away from her.
Aaron laid a hand on her shoulder, giving her that assuring smile only he knew how to do. So long as Aaron was there Arendellian knew she would be alright.
He'd promised, sworn up and down in fact, that if she took a holiday in the Capitol then he'd come along with her every step of the way. He was already able to lurk around in the female tribute area right under the Capitol's nose, he could sneak onto a train just fine.
Arendellian smiled to herself. It'd be alright. So long as they could go home and play tag, how bad could life really be?
"Arendellian Spinner III!"
It took a moment for Arendellian to realise that the girls standing around her had suddenly moved to stand away from her, like she'd suddenly become filled with a disease. A few moments of the small girl standing blankly and lightly twitching had the peacekeepers moving towards her.
By that point Aaron had gotten to the reaping stage. He never did break out of the habit of cheeky teleportation, as much as Arendellian told him it made people ever so confused.
All fear went away when Aaron waved her over, a goofy grin stretching across and outwards from his face. Reassured instantly, Arendellian skipped her way over to the reaping stage before the peacekeepers could make a move to grab her.
She barely even noticed that the escort was trying to say something to her. Aaron mimed rapid fire talking and gagged with his fist into his mouth. The whole pantomime performance had Arendellian letting out a mad laugh.
"What's so funny?" the escort asked, puzzled.
"Aaron thinks you talk too much," Arendellian explained, her left eye twitching for a moment.
Everybody was silent, people either cringing with sympathy or wondering who this 'Aaron' actually was. The escort paused for a moment, unsure if she should be offended or if District Five just had odd customs.
"Good one Aaron," Arendellian said, giggling as she playfully elbowed the empty space next to her.
It was at this moment the escort swiftly moved to the boy's reaping bowl, hoping to end up with a male tribute who wouldn't leave her feeling confused. Surely the odds were in her favour for at least that much?
It turned out they were, as the boy ended up being a burly eighteen year old who clearly came from a background where he was not constantly starving. If anything he looked pretty beefy and strong. Perhaps Foster would stand a chance of winning.
More chance than Arendellian at any rate.
After the reaping Arendellian was visited by her family, the whole lot of them crying and wishing their little girl well. Aaron held back at the side of the room, letting things play out without any interruption.
It was a while before Arendellian realised that maybe, just maybe, she should say something to her family instead of gazing around blankly.
"I'll be fine," Arendellian said, smiling. "Just a holiday. Just a few weeks with just Aaron for company and I'll be back."
Her family left the room weeping, knowing it was certain their little girl would never make it home. Whatever it was that made her see what they could not, it was surely to get her killed in the bloodbath.
The worst part was how she had no idea what was going to happen to her. She had no idea just how cruel the world outside of her little bubble was.
Arendellian was taken to the train not long after that. It wasn't easy though, not when she began to scream, writhe and thrash around from the moment the peacekeepers grabbed hold of her. She howled and screamed, hating every little moment of their ongoing hold. They ignored her cries of protest until the moment she was practically thrown onto the train.
Arendellian lay in a daze, her head practically spinning. Aaron glanced down at her from above, a disapproving look on his face.
"Alright, we're both thinking it, those guys were cunts," Aaron said, shaking his head. "Honestly."
"That word is naughty," Arendellian mumbled, shakily standing herself up.
The rest of the District Five team entered the train soon after that. Arendellian still hadn't calmed down from her previous meltdown, so it was no surprise that the instant the escort made the move to reach out at her – intending to simply tidy up her frazzled hair – Arendellian reacted badly.
An entire minute of screaming, panicking and smashing the objects around her followed this, ending with the poor girl fleeing deeper into the train. The rest of the Five team, naturally, didn't know quite what to say at first.
"Well, I never," the escort said, tutting. "There's being excited for the Games and then there's just being rude."
The escort left, claiming she was taking this as a chance for a bubble bath. The victors of Five took a few moments to silently glance between each other. Neon left quickly for the bar carriage, already starting to weep and moan, while Crimson and Porter made the move to start talking to Foster and learning about what skills he possessed. The Games had begun, after all.
Wattzon stood around awkwardly for a few moments, wondering what the hell he was meant to do now. Foster had been claimed as a tribute and, on principle, he hated hanging out with Neon at the best of times.
With a shrug he set off after Arendellian. She couldn't have gotten far, right?
It took Wattzon a grand total of five hours, forty six minutes and eight seconds before he managed to find Arendellian. She sat hunched up and cowering in a pantry, hidden away between a sack of corn kernels and a stack of cookie boxes. Aaron sat across from her, a sad sort of look on his face.
"You can't let them get to you 'Dell," Aaron said, ever the optimist. "C'mon, why don't we play tag and forget about it?"
"Can't forget. Got too close. Scary… wrong…" Arendellian shuddered, clenching her eyes tightly shut. "Aaron, what do we do?"
"Burn the escort?" Aaron suggested, uncertain. "I'll see what I can find."
Aaron took his leave, phasing away into the wall and the ether beyond it. Wattzon didn't see him at all, his attention having rested on Arendellian from the moment he'd silently opened the pantry door.
"Um… hey," Wattzon said, slowly approaching his tribute. "Arendellian, right?"
Arendellian didn't respond, only gazing at Wattzon in silence. She didn't blink particularly often as she looked towards him. It made Wattzon wonder how the hell he was going to talk to a tribute with such specialised sorts of needs.
He decided 'fuck it' and settled for winging it while hoping for the best.
"So, what happened back there?" Wattzon asked, already fairly lost.
"They touched me," Arendellian practically hissed for a moment. "I hate being touched."
"Well, I'm sure... um… they…" Wattzon groaned. He was shit at actually talking to just about anybody who wasn't Eunicia or Effie. "I'm sorry those assholes did that."
"Aaron was so mad at them. He wants them all burnt," Arendellian muttered.
Wattzon had no idea who Aaron was, but he rather liked the guy's style already. The latest victor of Five sat down across from Arendellian, waiting for the right words to enter his mind.
Suffice to say, they didn't.
"Thanks," Arendellian mumbled.
"Huh, what for?" Wattzon asked.
"Oh, sorry, I was talking to Aaron," Arendellian gestured to the blank spot beside her. "He said he thinks I'm doing alright. …He likes you."
"Well… you're welcome Aaron," Wattzon said, wondering just what he'd gotten himself into. "That's very, uh, nice of you."
"Wait, you can see him!?" Arendellian exclaimed.
"Um… yes?" Wattzon lied.
It was almost like a switch was flipped. Arendellian started to gleefully smile, wiping away her wet, salty tears as she rose to her feet.
"So, um… are you the one who will look after me for my holiday? My… what's the word… chauffeur?" Arendellian guessed. "What do we do first? If Aaron likes you then I like you."
"Well… uh… I'm more of a 'mentor', 'Dell. But… how about we get some cookies and watch some TV," Wattzon suggested, standing up as well. "The reaping recaps will be on. Your fellow tourists will be revealed."
"Sounds fun…" Arendellian mumbled. "…Hey yeah, that's right Aaron. You thinking what I'm thinking?"
A few moments passed in bewildering silence.
"No, not the burning cargo pants game, I think we should claim top bunk once we get there," Arendellian said as she left the room. "Honestly Aaron…"
Wattzon watched as his tribute left on her way, zig zagging along through the carriage until she left through the door. He could only sigh to himself as he blatantly stole a few boxes of cookies.
"Poor kid," Wattzon muttered. "She doesn't deserve this. She'll have no chance."
Wattzon paused, a thought striking him like lightning.
"…Then again, that's what they said about me," Wattzon realised. "Alright, let's do this. Just so long as she can get through the remake centre. Aw shit, that's gonna be 'fun'…"
Fun was exactly the word it wasn't.
The prep team of District Five were already stressed and bothered due to the nation wide heatwave that had been going on. Half of them were able to, for a time, relax as they prepared Foster for the looming parade.
The same was not true of the half who were given the order to prepare Arendellian.
From the moment they had tried to strip her down and put her in a tub of warm water it was like armageddon had begun. Arendellian panicked and entered a complete and utter meltdown, her hatred of being touched overriding any other thoughts or feelings. Within five minutes the prep team had ran away screaming and almost three quarters of the room had been left destroyed and smashed to pieces.
The peacekeepers were called to restrain her, but the stylist got there first. An up and coming star in all things fashion by the name of Elroy, he thought simply ordering the 'thing' to stop her rampage and grabbing her arm would make her cease such chaotic actions.
It did nothing of the sort. The result, instead, was Arendellian causing a very tiny cut to form on his left cheek and a few droplets of blood to faintly trickle out.
He was deep into a freak out of his own by the time the peacekeepers got Arendellian off of the ceiling fan and knocked her out with a syringe. He snarled like a savage by the time the emergency rapid-fire remake work on Arendellian had been completed.
"She cut me!" he screeched, practically hysterical. "She actually cut me! That horrid little savage! Oh, those district folks are all the damn same, savages and animals the lot of them!"
It took an hour of ranting, two hits of morphling and a large mug of cherry shandy before Elroy became anything vaguely resembling calm. Over and over he replayed the thoughts of the 'attack' in his head, more and more sickened by how the lower life form had done something so vile to him.
He was going to get her back.
As he sat amongst the audience watching the parade later that night, glaring at Arendellian as she waved to the crowds, he started to gain an idea. A rather twisted sort of scheme, but one that might be legally approved provided he went through the proper channels and especially if the audience did not like her.
It was time for revenge.
Training was hard and not just because of the terror of impending doom. The extremely hot summer was sapping the energy of the tributes from start to finish. It made it hard for the tributes to properly show off their skills due to the sweat, fatigue and wheezing holding them back for hours of each day.
Some tributes had issues moving around faster than an ambling walk for barely an hour. Others held in there of a few hours before they became terribly thirsty. Either way, the end result was several slow days without any action or highlights for the gamemakers to enjoy. There wasn't even a single case of a career threatening an outlier, the pack being too drained for such activities.
The heat ended up making many of the private training sessions suffer, tributes left either too tired to perform properly or losing their focus from all the sweating and gasping. Nobody managed over a nine and even then only Pluto from Two achieved such a score. The other careers scored eights and the outliers were between one and five.
Arendellian only scored a two, having spent much of her private session muttering inaudibly and foot racing Aaron around the training centre. Aaron won per the norm.
The interviews were similarly a let-down. Caesar provided refreshing drinks to the tributes as well as an on stage fan, but in many cases the sauna-like hallway they'd been waiting in had done the damage already.
Pluto lost his train of thought twice and had to take of his shirt (not that his fangirls minded!)
Surf from Four had trouble speaking above a whisper.
Groot from Seven was only able to say who he was before he fainted.
Arendellian for the most part shivered and mumbled under the gaze of the audience, overcome by the bright lights and the way a peacekeeper had almost shoved her out from backstage. When she wasn't doing that she was constantly asking Aaron for ques and, when the stress became too much for her, ran from her seat and told Caesar to interview Aaron instead.
To his credit, Caesar took her up on this and injected at least a tiny bit of life back into the disappointing show. His genuine attempt to interview what he believed was an imaginary friend and his comical responses to the invisible celebrity were often including on the 'top fifty interviews' lists printed and broadcast over the years.
Arendellian hid under her bed that night, huddled under a blanket. Hot as it was it did at least make her feel safer. Aaron eventually phased through the floor and lay beside her. Neither said nor did anything for a while.
"This holiday sucks," Arendellian muttered, helpless.
"Next time we should try going to Ten," Aaron agreed. "At least they have crispy bacon."
The pair remained hidden under the bed until dawn arrived.
The last breakfast before the ride to the arena was a sordid sort of affair, especially because Arendellian still didn't quite know what awaited her next on her 'holiday from hell'. While Porter tried to run over tactics with Foster one more time and Crimson left sobbing to meet one of her most repulsive 'regulars', it fell to Wattzon to get his tribute ready.
It was that or let Neon do it and the mess of a victor was already three bottles deep into his breakfast binge.
Wattzon had no idea what to say as the clock ticked ever close to the designated time for them tributes to be on the roof. He ended up saying the first thing that came into his head.
"You're going to be playing a holo game," Wattzon stammered out.
"…Holo game?" Arendellian said, her mouth full of cornflakes.
"Sounds fun, right?" Aaron asked, laid out upon the table.
"Very fun. Games are good," Arendellian agreed. "What sort? How do I play it? Um… is it, like, hard?"
"It's… very hard," Wattzon said, slowly. "It'll be a simulation, like you're standing inside the game. The rules are simple, sort of… um… aw geez… stand still until you hear a gong ring. After that, run away and survive until you hear a trumpet. You got all that?"
"Sounds… alright? I think?" Arendellian said, a finger to her chin. "Are the others playing too?"
"They are. Avoid them all. Do not talk to them or approach them, that's another rule," Wattzon said, hasty. "Just… be careful. You only have one life, no continues. Understand?"
Arendellian nodded while Aaron made a peace sign. It was just as well for Wattzon that his tribute seemed to understand what he had told her.
After all, it was time for her to ride off to the arena.
It turned out that, alongside hating being touched, Arendellian hated flying. She'd cried from the heat, been sick twice during the hovercraft ride and then had another panic attack. Even Aaron's jokes and ideas for games hadn't cheered her up.
The way screaming faces kept flicking in and out of existence on the walls had certainly not helped. She was amazed the others somehow didn't react. They were so very brave. Nerves of steel.
How would she be able to beat them at the holo game?
Arendellian was pointed into her launch room by a pair of burly peacekeepers, both wanting to be rid of her quickly. No sooner she shuffled inside they closed the door and Elroy approached her, two packages in hand.
"Your uniform," he said, cold like ice. "Put it on right now. You don't have long until the Games start."
Arendellian took one look at thick, fluffy plum red outfit. She glanced to where Aaron leaned against the inside of the launch tube, as if for a second opinion.
"It looks pretty fluffy," he said, shrugging. "Not as bad as it could be."
Arendellian smiled to herself, rather liking the outfit she'd be taking into the holo game. So fluffy she could practically die! Elroy watched silently as Arendellian quickly dressed herself and got everything into place.
That was when he smirked and took out a second package.
"You should know that not a single person bet on you winning. There is literally no stakes on you making it far in this and only a loss for viewers if you do. They think you're crazy and likely to die really fast," Elroy said, opening up the second package. "The gamemakers approved a, shall we say, pity gift for you."
Arendellian just blankly looked at Elroy. She glanced over at Aaron again, hoping he'd know what to say.
"That guy's a fat fuck. You should burn him," Aaron said, giving Arendellian a thumbs up.
All this made the girl start to giggle, something Elroy did not take kindly to by any means. He advanced on Arendellian with fury in his eyes.
"You won't be laughing for long," Elroy said, scowling. "Hold still."
It was a massive struggle, especially when Arendellian clawed at Elroy's arms and kicked him in the groin three times, but despite the havoc and hardship the stylist managed to get Arendellian into her additional piece of clothing.
He then tied all the knots and straps necessary while holding Arendellian face down against the ground.
"There we are, perfect," he said, stepping back to admire his work. "That'll teach you to cut my cheek. You made me bleed, you savage! This is exactly what your kind out in the districts deserve."
It took Arendellian several moments to stand herself up properly. Mainly because she kept falling down and flopping onto her back or her front.
It was hard to do otherwise when she'd been restrained into a thick, padded, plum red straitjacket. Her arms were bound and immobile, any ability to use them taken away.
"Get it off! Get it off!" Arendellian screeched, trying to wriggle her arms around to no avail. Biting at the straitjacket was similarly useless.
Elroy only laughed, pushing Arendellian into the launch tube. It closed a moment later and started rising within the next minute. The last thing Arendellian saw of her nasty stylist was him laughing and smugly waving.
"Aaron, get me out of this," Arendellian mumbled, trying to stand herself back up again.
"I don't think I can. Those knots are knotted really tight," Aaron said, shaking his head. "Don't worry, it'll be fine. It's a holo game, time to have fun!"
"Hey yeah, it is! Play time…" Arendellian trailed off into a giggle, her head twitching to the side for a moment as the platform rose higher.
It was the hottest summer in Panem's history up to that point, uncomfortably so. Endless heat, constant sweating and even a fair number of objects across the nation melting from the heat.
The same could not be said of the arena of the Fifty Seventh Hunger Games. In fact, only the exact opposite could be said.
Based in the heart of what remained of Alaska, the arena was a complete and utter frozen wasteland. The cataclysms of the past had made the northernmost state far colder and inhospitable from how it used to be, even at its worst. Snow, ice and horrible, horrible coldness was all that awaited the tributes.
This was apparent from the moment they were launched into the arena and began to violently shiver. Even Pluto was unable to ignore the effects of the cold.
The cornucopia was already coated in thick snow and a blizzard was ongoing. Day time though it may have been, it was colder than a typical night. Far, far colder. Not a single tree was anywhere in sight, only snow and ice.
Arendellian shivered slightly less than the others did, trying to get her straitjacket off and keep her balance upon her launch pedestal. As she struggled uselessly to free her arms she could see Aaron had began to float around in the air beside the cornucopia, laughing like a fool.
"Aaron, come back!" Arendellian exclaimed over the roar of a sudden frosty wind. "You can't move yet, it's cheating!"
"I make my own rules," Aaron said in response.
Arendellian decided to be a good little girl and stay right where she was. She didn't want to lose the holo game so quickly, not when it had not even started.
The supplies at the cornucopia were plentiful, food and slightly frozen water in great numbers, with weapons, medical gear and even two portable heaters up for grabs. Nobody wanted to be lost in the cold without any supplies at all.
Arendellian did the same as the boy from Nine and the girl from Six either side of her. She got into a running stance and tried to spot something to grab. She figured the pink backpack about forty yards from her pedestal would be nice to have.
The gong rang and the tributes were off… slightly slower than usual due to how horribly cold it was. They, at best, traipsed awkwardly towards the cornucopia with the careers and the boy from Three in the lead. The boy from Three grabbed some gear and ran for his life while the careers armed themselves and prepared to start killing.
Arendellian paused in place, suddenly realising that picking up the backpack was going to be hard without being able to use her arms.
"What should I do Aaron?" she asked her friend as he floated beside her.
"Run? These people are crazy," Aaron suggested.
Sure enough around sixteen of the tributes had flocked the mouth of the cornucopia, desperate to grab one of the two heaters. Those not inside the horn already were either fleeing into the tundra or, in the case of three unlucky teens, laying dead in pools of their own blood.
Arendellian quite agreed with Aaron's words and, after grabbing a strap of the backpack into her teeth, made a desperate run towards the south area of the arena. Nobody paid her any mind at all, all of them far too busy trying to grab the heaters.
The careers had been knocked down from the sudden hoard of outliers while the outliers realised only too late that their constant kicking, punching and swarming had broken both of the heaters already.
They ran for their lives en-masse after that, grabbing up small scraps along the way. The careers got back up, but by then most of the tributes were gone into the snow. The girl from One barely managed to shoot at arrow off at the boy from Eight, only killing him by complete fluke.
The Capitol groaned over the four death bloodbath and how boring it had been.
The districts sobbed over the dead children who died far too soon.
Foster's mother, his only family, hanged herself five minutes after her son's cannon fired. She no longer cared to live, even with the money she had to her name.
Wattzon sat at his personal mentoring desk, observing how his tribute carried a backpack in her mouth and had no ability to use her arms. He felt like he was going to be sick.
How could she possibly win now?
"Whoa, check out that kid from Five!" Dragon exclaimed, amazed. "Is she trying to, like, win this without using her arms? Holy shit, go Arendellian!"
A punch to his side from Olga made him settle down, but Dragon clearly had his favourite outside his own district all figured out. Winning with no arm usage? Even he hadn't managed to do that! Mainly because he'd never thought to try it.
If Arendellian somehow pulled it off he knew he wanted to become her friend.
Wattzon just wanted a damn drink.
The day was cold to begin with, but things got far worse when nightfall arrived. It was here when the gamemakers realised they had made a critical blunder in planning.
The tributes were simply unable to bare the freezing temperature. Many of them had stopped moving, huddling in little balls or inside tiny caves.
Sponsor items such as blankets, heaters and such were bought by the audience and directed to be sent in, of course, but this is when the biggest blunder of the entire sixth decade of the Games happened.
Well, second biggest beside Trevy escaping that is.
Regardless, the blunder happened and happened hard! The gamemakers had been messing around with the blizzard settings to make patterns in the night sky for the audience to enjoy, not quite realising just how powerful the all new blizzard generators actually were.
They were strong enough to take the hovercraft out of the sky. It crashed into a snowy ravine at the edge of the arena, killing all who were onboard and ending up somewhere inaccessible for anything aside a ground team.
Naturally the Capitol could not send peacekeepers in while the Games were ongoing, so they were forced to wait until the Games ended.
The tributes were all on their own, even the careers.
The careers spent the night freezing their asses off inside the cornucopia, trying to stay warm within blankets. It wasn't easy and they hardly slept for two hours between each other.
Some tributes like the boy from Three, Groot and Bell from Eight huddled inside caves within the massive snowbanks. The latter two tributes had crossed paths but called a truce and huddled together to try and stay alive.
Some like Surf burrowed into the snow itself to escape the blizzard.
Some like Arendellian raced their imaginary friend to keep their blood running and eventually found an abandoned animal den to hide in. Ok, it was less 'some' and really only Arendellian who did this.
Most, however, lay helplessly in the tundra. It was far too late for them and before dawn arrived they'd drifted off into frozen slumbers they'd never wake from. In just one night seven of the twenty tributes had died, their cannons booming every so often, keeping the other awake through most if the night.
"So loud," Arendellian muttered, trying and failing to free her hands so that she could cover their ears. "Aaron, cover my ears!"
"I'll just phase through you, you know that," Aaron said, apologetic. "Come on 'Dell, it'll be alright."
Arendellian could only hope so. This holo game was nowhere as fun as she thought it would be. The cold, the volume, the hunger… why were the other players not quitting yet? At least the straitjacket was keeping her chest area slightly warm.
Warm enough to hang in there until the sun finally rose, something the boy from Twelve was unable to say. The deathly cold never have much to say.
Two days snailed by, far too cold for much action of any sort to happen. The arena was basically just a few square miles of Alaskan tundra with a forcefield over it, so the nastiness of the weather remained as it would in nature. In other words, far beyond the gamemaker's ability to control it.
The careers tried to hunt down their prey, but it was frankly close to impossible. They were having so much trouble moving around that they were unable to find any of the outliers, even those who were barely moving a few meters and slowly freezing to death.
In a fit of sheer desperation for supplies – they were, after all, oblivious to the fact sponsors had been accidently barred – Pluto turned on his alliance, cutting down the boy from One in short order and fleeing into the cold wasteland.
He was certainly more popular after that, but no supplies were coming. He wandered off aimlessly, furious and miserable over how the Hunger Games he'd dreamed of had ended up going. The career girls stayed together, heading away towards the north.
Arendellian had remained alive through the cold days and colder nights by messily eating the contents of her backpack and munching on the snow itself. She was shivering madly, but the straitjacket held back the very worst of it.
The races with Aaron in long, haphazard circles around the vicinity of the burrow also kept her active and therefore slightly warmer. As was always the case Aaron beat her to the finish line no matter how fast she ran.
"What do you want to do when we go home?" Aaron asked one afternoon.
"Stay in bed, hug my teddy and keep warm," Arendellian said, laying on her back and staring at the roof of the underground burrow. "So cold…"
"We could make it warmer," Aaron suggested, a mad grin on his face. "We could burn stuff."
Per Aaron's prodding Arendellian ended up stumbling around the tundra for two hours in search of some firewood.
Not even a toothpick was there to be found.
It was around this time that President Snow felt he'd seen enough and ordered the Head Gamemaker be executed, his children also ordered to die for good measure. The Games were a flop and such failure was not going to go unpunished.
Especially when watching these terrible Games seemed like more of a punishment than it normally was. Nothing was happening!
By the sixth day in the tundra hardly anybody was still alive. The career girls had frozen to death the previous night, completely immobile at the base of an insurmountable hill for a total of six hours before they died.
The same hill Arendellian's burrow had been at the base of. Using only her mouth she managed to take away the career's backpacks and claim the scraps of food inside. All too soon it was gone and the chilly silence was all that remained once again.
Even Aaron was running out of ideas for what to do.
"You should explore," he eventually said. "Go explore. There's nothing to do down here."
Arendellian was reluctant at first because of the cold outside, but it only took a few figures leaping from the walls and screaming in her face to get Arendellian moving once again.
For an hour or two the nation watched the last six tributes doing hardly anything at all. Pluto slowly walked one way, Arendellian roughly ambled another, Surf lay immobile against the cornucopia he had foolishly tried to return to, Groot and Bell huddled uselessly in a cave with the reaper practically standing over them and Rotor from Three used what little energy he still had to dig out a burrow down into the snow to evade the incoming blizzard.
Surf's cannon sent Arendellian into another fit of panic, hunching over and trembling from the horrible sound. She eventually managed to calm down but that was when another cause for alarm was revealed to her.
Pluto stumbled towards her, taking his sword out from the holster he'd had it sheathed in for days. Arendellian looked between him and Aaron, unsure of what she was meant to do. Hadn't Wattzon told her to never speak to the other players?
Pluto clearly hadn't been told the same. He weakly muttered out a request for her to die quickly and tried to swing his sword down at her. It was a close miss, enough to make Arendellian start to enter a particular nasty panic attack.
"What do I do?! What do I do?! What do I do?!" she screamed, scrambling to try and wriggle herself the right way around so that she could stand up. "Aaron, what do I do?!"
Aaron stood atop the highest snowbank that surrounded the impromptu battle site. He drew a finger across his neck.
"Only one thing to do. Eliminate this player," he suggested.
Pluto had assumed that, even with the nasty cold, it would not be hard to kill the crazy girl from Five. She lacked anything that made the previous girls from Five who became victors any sort of a threat. She didn't even have any usage of her arms!
He was right on all accounts, but failed to realise Arendellian still had one thing she could use. Two things, actually.
Her legs.
Arendellian was driven by panic, fear and a desire to do as Aaron told her. She awkwardly leapt at Pluto and landed a hard kick into his chest.
The next kick was a lot less awkward and struck him painfully in his left knee. The pain combined with the cold was quickly making it hard for Pluto to keep fighting, or even moving. Meanwhile Arendellian kept panicking and fighting, still having enough warmth throughout her body to pull off a few roundhouse kicks, painful stomps and even a headbutt.
It took three minutes for her to get Pluto down on the ground, his sword landing just out of his reach.
It took a further two minutes of kicking and stomping for him to finally die and his cannon to fire.
The massive boom sent Arendellian into yet another fit of panic and had her running away in search of any sort of a sanctuary from the horrible sounds.
Aaron was ahead of her, of course, suggesting turns to take every so often. Before long, though, she was simply too tired and far too cold to keep up with Aaron any longer. She just wanted to lie down and fall asleep.
She stumbled upon a nice cave near a cluster of boulders to do exactly that.
Arendellian was awoken by two cannons firing in quick succession during the dead hours of the grim night. Somehow they were audible over the violent blizzard going on outside.
Arendellian was only able to sob, a few tears ending up freezing as they cascaded down her cheeks. She shakily sat in the centre of the cave, rocking herself back and forth over and over again as the night slowly went by. Aaron kept guard at the entrance, always loyal to his friend. Arendellian knew she could trust him to warn her of danger.
Three hours passed before, at long last, the final cannon fired. This and the trumpets had Arendellian cowering and hiding away in the darkest, deepest corner of the cave like a little mouse.
"Ladies and Gentlemen! May I present the victor of the Fifty Seventh Annual Hunger Games, Arendellian Spinner III of District Five!"
"I don't want to play anymore!" Arendellian wailed. "Let me out! Let me out! I don't want to be in this holo game! I want to go home!"
"Let her go!" Aaron roared, facing skywards.
An hour passed by as a new hovercraft was finally prepped and staffed. It collected the bodies of the dead tributes as quickly as it possibly could. Finally, it slowly lowered down in front of Arendellian 's cave.
It was clear to all that a squad of peacekeepers coming in would only send her into a further panic and likely end up with somebody getting themselves hurt, perhaps even bleeding badly.
It was a good thing that Snow had foreseen this likely outcome and ordered somebody else to go along with the hovercraft to get the nation's newest victor out of the cave peacefully and quickly.
Arendellian timidly looked up at the parka clad figure who entered the dark cave, flashlight in hand.
"Are you ready to go home?" Wattzon asked her, slowly offering his hand to the tribute he mentored into a victor.
With great hesitation Arendellian slowly moved towards Wattzon. He quickly and carefully undid the knots and straps of the straightjacket, finally freeing Arendellian's arms.
Arendellian liked Wattzon. He was like Aaron, all things considered. He made her feel safer.
So much so that she clung to him tightly and didn't let go until she nodded off three hours into the flight back to the Capitol.
The Games had been a complete disaster.
Bloodless deaths, a major lack of screams, the tributes too cold to really do much of anything, no sponsors being sent in, the ruined hovercraft… a disaster.
As if that wasn't enough in and of itself, the victor was on a completely different reality to anybody else. One moment she was practically an innocent little girl, the next she could become panicked and animalistic in her severe meltdowns. All this and she won the games, killing the pre-Games favourite even, without using her arms.
The straitjacket had saved her life, its thick padded form keeping the worst of the cold away from her. The blame for it rested entirely upon the shoulders of Elroy, the man earning himself an all expense paid trip feet first into Snow's wood chipper.
After all the meltdowns before and during the Games, Arendellian was rather quiet and shy for the whole of the after events. She didn't say much at the interview, letting Aaron do the talking for them both – Caesar, naturally, played along without missing a beat – and only mumbling the bare minimum of words.
"What will you do now?" Caesar asked her. "You've done what only a few dozen boys and girls have done in the history of our nation. You're famous! Surely a popular girl like you has plenty of ideas for what to do back in Five."
Arendellian, dolled up like a princess in a pink ballroom dress and white opera gloves, glanced at Aaron for reassurance. Her special friend, standing beside Caesar, gave her a reassuring smile.
"I… I think I'm just going to play tag with Aaron. Maybe have a race," Arendellian whispered. "I might beat Aaron this time. He always wins."
"Well, we wish you all the very best of luck," Caesar said, a smile on his face. "Run fast and live free. Let's hear it for our victor everybody!"
The party was similarly quiet. By now the Capitol citizens were aware that approaching Arendellian in loud flocks was a bad idea. None of them could withstand the tiniest bit of pain and so none risked going too close to her. No autograph was worth a tiny scrape.
Arendellian spent the party sitting quietly by herself, carefully watched over by Wattzon and Aaron. She had a nice slice of cake to call her own, so what did she have to complain about? Her holiday may have been a let-down, but at least she could go home and settle into normality again.
She missed running around in places that weren't cold.
"So, ready to go home?" Wattzon asked her, his every word lacking certainty. He glanced to where Aaron was sitting, seeing nothing at all. "Are you ready Aaron?"
Aaron gave a thumbs up, sitting with his feet upon the table.
"Yeah, we're ready," Arendellian said, finishing off her cake. "This place is crazy, We don't like it…"
"They should all burn," Aaron added.
Wattzon gave Arendellian a comforting sort of smile. He couldn't deny how attached he'd became to his little victor.
"Just one more night and you'll be home," Wattzon replied. "Both of you. I'm sure your family will be glad to see you."
"We missed them," Arendellian said, reaching for another piece of cake. "They won't believe how awful this holiday has been."
"Burn the holiday runners," Aaron added.
"…You'd be surprised. I think they would believe you," Wattzon said, awkwardly. Oh, he was so bad at talking to people. What was he supposed to say?! "You did great Arendellian."
"Thanks Wattzon. I… um… never… have to play that holo game again, right?" Arendellian said, wringing her hands and twitching in unease. "I didn't like it."
"Neither you nor Aaron will ever have to ever again," Wattzon assured her.
Wattzon, accidently of course, ended up being proven as a liar.
Years later after the unprecedented outcome of the Seventy Fourth Hunger Games there was a reaping like no other. A reaping of the victors of Five for the victor only quell.
Crimson stood shaking and sobbing, her life a ruin and fear filling her up. Porter managed to at least eye the cameras with an indomitable glare.
Arendellian was off in her own world, just the same now as she was back then. She was still innocent and within her own reality. Still side by side with Aaron.
"Arendellian Spinner III!"
Wattzon, himself up for the reaping and with a fifty percent chance of being picked, watched in pain as the peacekeepers had to lead Arendellian up to the reaping stage. Her responses to the escort came out quiet and distant.
She hardly seemed to recall she'd been in this deadly game once before.
Wattzon was wondering if he should play the Games for his surrogate little sister to win, only for Neon's name to be pulled instead. Between the screaming, drunken lout and his little victor it was an obvious choice of who to mentor and try to save.
He put all his effort into it, trying to get Arendellian at least one sponsor and telling her all the tips and tricks he knew. Crimson and Porter did the same with varying degrees of half-heartedness.
She managed a score of four this time.
She was hardly given any airtime compared to the Twelves and the biggest players like Gloss, Cashmere, Brutus, Enobaria… most of the tributes, really.
She faced it all with Aaron backing her up, an innocent smile on her face and a faint sparkle in her vacant eyes. She said she knew she'd be fine in the holo game so long as Aaron and Wattzon were watching out for her.
Due to her mental health Arendellian had not been informed of any rebellious plans. Wattzon hadn't either, though for the separate reason of how he had Capitol friends and wasn't known for his effort nor usefulness in victor circles.
He watched the bloodbath play out, Neon dying in the first minute while Arendellian ran away into the jungle.
Arendellian wandered around with Aaron for hours, fleeing from any noises she didn't like the sound of. She was starting to get scared all over again, vague memories of fear bubbling within her. Why hadn't Wattzon come with her, again?
She walked through the hot jungle on the second day, lacking any ideas of what to do. She turned to her oldest and most loyal of friends for ideas.
"What should we do, Aaron?" Arendellian asked.
"How about we have a race?" Aaron suggested. "Just like old times. Come on 'Dell, let's race!"
The pair began to laugh like children, sprinting through the jungle. They ran and ran, screaming as they went. Neither noticed that a new hour had arrived, and a tidal wave had became active behind them.
Eventually Aaron fell behind, amazed that he was being beaten at his own game.
"You're doing it 'Dell, you're doing it!" he cheered, gleeful.
He continued to cheer as the tidal wave consumed him.
Arendellian ran down one of the spokes near the cornucopia island, screaming ever so loudly. She kept screaming up the moment the tidal wave finally caught up to her.
She wasn't screaming in fear like the mockingjay, not far at all from her current position, thought she was.
Why would she be afraid when, after so many years of trying, she had beaten Aaron in a foot race?
"I finally did it! I beat Aaron! I won!" were her final thoughts as the wave carried her towards a cluster of trees.
Outside the arena Wattzon couldn't hold back his tears as the innocent girl he'd grown so close to left the world, a cannon serving as the final gut punch. Even at the very end she had still been herself.
She'd been happy.
"No… 'Dell…" Wattzon whispered, his hands over his face.
A hand rested upon his shoulder. It was with great surprise that he glanced up and saw Dragon looking down at him, hardly pleased himself. He'd always liked the younger victor who did what even he couldn't do; winning the Hunger Games without using her arms even once.
"How about we go get a drink in her name?" Dragon suggested. "A toast to one of the finest victors there ever was."
Wattzon couldn't find it in him to send the career victor away. He didn't want to be alone in that moment.
"I'd like that Dragon," he choked out. "I think she would have too."
Dragon and Wattzon left the mentoring area to start the journey to a fine bar fifteen miles away.
When the arrow flew and the arena was taken out both were out of the mentoring area and out of the violence and carnage that followed right after.
Katniss and Peeta held a respectful silence for Arendellian III. Upon concluding this they resumed walking down the street. Barely a few moments went by until they came across the next face imprinted into the ground.
The boy who looked back at them had long hair that flowed untamed past his shoulders with much of it fairly out of place. He had a cocky look in his narrow eyes and a reckless, irresponsible sort of grin plastered across his face. His look was completed with a bandanna around his forehead.
"Oh boy, this guy," Peeta said, a troubled frown quickly forming on his face.
"What? What did he do?" Katniss asked.
"It's a long story," Peeta replied. "But Yohan Fairbane's reckless attitude landed him in a self-inflicted hell."
So, that was the hands down coldest Hunger Games in history. Hopefully I did these Games justice that, presumably, the books did not, what with them being deemed a failure and fairly dull. I found it interesting to base some of the plot around the sheer coldness, from the weakened career pack up to the hovercraft outright crashing. No sponsors certainly levels the playing field! Beyond the horrible cold, I found Arendellian to be a fairly interesting character to write for, as in my view tributes with mental illnesses tend to allow for stories and events that you'd not see in the tales of tributes without them. Arendellian's bond with 'Aaron' and detachment from the reality in Panem was a fun perspective to write for, through the highs and lows. A tribute like her, I believe, could only stand a solid chance to win in a Games like these where nobody is at full power. Good thing she had the straitjacket to warm her up, huh? I do so love it when an attempt of sabotage ends up saving the day! Hope you guys enjoyed Arendellian's tale, and whether you did ot didn't we still have plenty of victors yet to come. Next up is a familiar face from Bloodline Betrayal, Yohan! Stay tuned!
Stats
District 1: Peridot Gaudy (8th Games), Crystal McCree (14th Games), Bronze Marley (19th Games), Crown Martins (24th Games), Dollar Dettwieller (32nd Games), Mascara Court (41st Games), Platinum Twist (44th Games)
District 2: Baron Overwhill (4th Games), Runa Peace (7th Games), Olga Machete (10th Games), Rook Valiant (17th Games), Boulder Atherston (20th Games), Vercingetorix Carnby (25th Games), Dragon Batofel (27th Games), Rhyder Overwhill (39th Games), Mercy Gregor (46th Games), Brutus Gunn (49th Games), Lyme Rabe (51st Games)
District 3: Honorius Perthshire (5th Games), Pi Orbit (22nd Games), Beetee Latier (37th Games), Wiress Plummer (47th Games)
District 4: Museida Selkirk (3rd Games), Mags Flanagan (11th Games), Tide Luther (23rd Games), Librae Ogilvy (35th Games), Anchor Paddock (52nd Games)
District 5: Shunt Gaspar (12th Games), Isobel Sparks (18th Games), Crimson Flanders (29th Games), Porter Tripp (38th Games), Neon Erg (48th Games), Wattzon Holmes (55th Games), Arendellian Spinner III (57th Games)
District 6: Chassis Macalister (31st Games), Bentley Corduroy (54th Games), Porsche London (56th Games)
District 7: Pliny Aransio (2nd Games), Fir Buzz (9th Games), Jack Tylos (21st Games), Snag Nakamura (34th Games), Blight Jordan (53rd Games)
District 8: Woof Casino (16th Games), Paige Murphy (30th Games), Spool Nylon (42nd Games)
District 9: Mizar Aldjoy (1st Games), Gwenith Rosebud (13th Games), Teff Withers (28th Games), Laurel Flamsteel (36th Games), Tabbock Summers (43rd Games), Trevy Vex (Escaped 55th Games)
District 10: Stallion March (26th Games), Lammy Phyronix (40th Games)
District 11: Bear Redfoot (15th Games), Seeder Howell (33rd Games), Chaff Mitchell (45th Games)
District 12: Duke Saint-Rose (6th Games), Haymitch Abernathy (50th Games)