Day 2
Konor
Konor opens his eyes quickly, jumping to his feet and looking around the summer forest. A nightmare had scared him awake. His dream consisted of the seven fallen tributes from the night before. They crawled out of the ground, rotten and decayed. The zombie tributes limped toward Konor as he tried to outrun them, but for some reason his legs wouldn't move. They managed to catch up to him, scratching and biting. He woke up just before the girl from 5 went to take a bite out of his neck. Konor exhales deeply in relief, examine the grey pinpricks of light that are emerging as the sun rises. Thankfully, he did not scream because of the horrid dream. The first thing he notices is that he's very thirsty. The second thing he notices is that it's hot. Konor is positive the temperature wasn't this high the day before. The Gamemakers must have raised the temperature, Konor thinks. He needs water, that is obvious. He doesn't remember seeing any water sources as he ran from the Cornucopia after retrieving his bow and arrows, but he does remember one thing: the winter area. Covered in snow, it would make for an endless water source. Konor remembers that the winter field was to the left of the summer field that he is currently in. He grabs his bow and throws his quiver across his shoulders, beginning to make his way in that direction.
As Konor continues to place one foot in front of the other, his lack of water begins to take a toll. He starts to find himself drifting in a completely different direction than he had been walking. His eyes blur often and he has to blink away the dryness. He doesn't know how long it will take for him to reach the winter area, but he hopes it is soon. He is not close to dying of dehydration by any means, but his thirst is extremely uncomfortable. He has to find water soon in case the Gamemakers throw something at him that would cause him to be stuck in one place. He won't survive long without some form hydration. Konor is wiping the sweat off of his forward when he hears a stick snap behind him. He turns around swiftly, searching for danger. He doesn't see another competitor, but hears the snapping sound once again. He turns and begins running as fast as he can away from the origin of the sound. His thirst prevents him from running as fast as he would like, but he tries his hardest. He weaves through trees, bushes, and other kinds of underbrush as quickly as possible. His legs begin to burn from the strain and he ducks his head, grits his teeth, and squints his eyes shut, forcing himself to press on. Suddenly, he feels himself slam against another object, though he doesn't fall to the ground. He opens his eyes and sees the boy from 9, Nathan, on the ground, gasping for air. "Whatever you're running from," begins 9, "so am I." Konor just stares at him. He doesn't seem hostile in the least, only scared. Konor hears an even larger snapping sound close behind him. Him and Nathan turn and find themselves staring down a huge and aggressive grizzly bear.
"I hope you have some weapons on you," Konor says, drawing his bow.
"Nothing that would help us." Nathan pulls out a pair of brass knuckles from his pockets and slides them onto his fingers. Konor rolls his eyes at the useless weapon and notches an arrow. He had seen pictures of grizzly bears before in textbooks, but this one was much larger and has bright red eyes. As he pulls the string back, the beast roars and begins to charge at the tributes. Konor releases the arrow, watching as it impales the bears left front leg. It winces, but continues charging. Konor quickly notches another arrow and fires, hitting its right shoulder. The creature visibly slows down, roars again, and keeps running. Konor notches his third arrow. This time, his hands are shaking from the fear of not stopping the bear. He exhales deeply, aims, and fires. The arrows silently flies through the air and lands directly into one of the bear's red eyes. The bear's running slows and becomes sloppy until the animal finally falls to the ground, no longer a threat.
"You're welcome for that one, 9," Konor laughs, walking over to retrieve his arrows from the dead animal.
"It's Nathan."
"I honestly don't care what your name is. Now go before you end up like the bear." Konor places the three arrows into his quiver, restoring the amount back to twelve.
"Well, how about this-"
"I am not teaming up with you," interrupts Konor.
"Why not?" demands Nathan.
"I don't need you," he answers simply.
"You need water." This grabs Konor's attention. "I know you do. The only water here is from the snow, and to get to the winter area is at least another day's walk. Trust me, I know."
"Well, then how are you going to help my water situation?"
"I got a backpack from the cornucopia," Nathan explains, sliding his backpack down his arm and showing it to Konor. "It came with a half gallon of water, and there's still a lot left. We can make it to the winter area together, fill up, and just stick together." Konor slides his bow on his shoulder, weighing the pros and cons. If he went with Nathan, he would have to deal with a potential threat of a dangerous tribute as long as they were together. However, if he doesn't, he could easily die of dehydration before making it to the winter field. Was it really as far away as Nathan said?
"At top seven, we split. Understand?" Nathan nods his head eagerly, reaching into his bag to hand Konor the much needed water.
Madison
Sifting through the food supplies, Madison looks for a bottle of water. For her, it is becoming increasingly difficult to stay at the cornucopia, the meeting place of the four seasonal areas. No matter where she sits, cold air from the winter area chills her, but if she sits in the summer area, it becomes much too hot to be comfortable. This has forced her to resort to sitting inside of the golden cornucopia, away from the array of temperatures. "Well, we have to do something!" she hears Amelia calls with an annoying tone from outside. Madison stands up, poking her head out to see what's going on.
"I'm saying we need to stay right here. It's safest!" Autumn answers in rebuttal.
"Yesterday's bloodbath was the smallest there's been in years," explains Ross. "There have been zero deaths today. What do you think a small bloodbath and a deahless day two makes? Bored Gamemakers. And if we have bored Gamemakers, that means natural disasters that are going to ruin your little 'stay put' strategy."
"He's right," agrees Madison, walking out of the cornucopia and next to her allies.
"We have to go somewhere. We have to kill somebody, or else something's going to happen to us," says Jesse.
"Well what do you suppose we do?" Autumn asks, aggravated.
"Let's just send out scouts," says Madison. They turn to her. "Why don't we just load about two people down with supplies and weapons, send them out in separate areas, and have them come back before sundown."
"Well, what happens if just one person isn't enough to take on what's out there?" Autumn crosses her arms defiantly as she says this.
"Oh, please," laughs Amelia, "Are you saying you can't take on some little kids from the outlying districts?"
"Conner's out there. What if we meet up with him?"
"Conner went into the winter area, just send the two to different quadrants and they'll be fine," answers Ross. Autumn's argument is becoming less and less valid.
"Well, who's going to go?" asks the District 1 girl.
"I think you should go just so we don't have to hear you complain," says Amelia with a roll of her eyes. Autumn draws her knives and steps closer to her.
"I would keep your mouth shut if I were you, 2." Amelia reaches for her short sword, but Madison steps between them.
"I'll go," she says. Madison can easily take on any of her enemies as long as she has a spear in her hand. However, she hasn't made a single kill yet. Would she be able to handle ending a life?.
"I'll go, too. Just to get away from you," adds Autumn, glaring at Amelia.
"So, it's settled?" asks Ross. "Madison, you go to the fall field, and Autumn, you go to the summer one." The two girls nod as they begin to fill a backpack with food and water. Madison grabs and spear and throws two knives in her backpack just to be safe. Autumn stows as many sharp objects as she can. It appears that she's packed more weapons than food. Amelia walks over to Madison, handing her an extra bottle of water.
"Be careful, okay?" she asks, appearing to be genuinely concerned. Since the training days, Madison and Amelia have formed a type of companionship. They share many common interests and have similar moral standings.
"Don't worry," Madison says. "I'll be back before sundown." The District 4 girl turns, nodding to Autumn before they begin walking for their respective areas. Madison grips her spear tightly as she walks into the forest full of red and orange leaves, afraid of what she may find.
Amberlyn
"I can't believe it worked!" squeals Amberlyn as Claire unties a fat rabbit from her tripwire trap.
"I told you it would," Claire answers, throwing the animal to Amberlyn. "Now, skin it." Amberlyn begins to work on the rabbit with her hatchet as Claire begins to re-coil the wire. The trap expert in training said that most people just leave their traps after they are used, but not many people know that the metal coil that Claire obtained is reusable as long as it doesn't snap or bend terribly during use. Amberlyn finishes skinning the rabbit in about ten minutes time. After she is finished, she lays it on the ground.
"Can we cook it now?" she asks.
"No, of course not," Claire tells her as if it is the most obvious thing in the world.
"Why not?"
"If we start a fire, the Careers or some other tribute will see it and track us down. Now, one or two of the other tributes, I'm not worried about. It's that whole career pack that scares me," Claire explains.
"Well, when can we cook it?"
"At night. No one will be able to see the fire from the smoke, and it'll be safe then."
"What do we do with it before then?" Amberlyn asks, pointing at the pile of cut up, bloody meat.
"You sure ask a lot of questions," Claire sighs, throwing her hair back behind her shoulder. She begins to to gather some of the more durable leaves and a few of the vines she had seen from yesterday. She identified them as an inedible plant. It's actually quite poisonous, but only if it's ingested. However, it is very durable. She begins to gently weave a type of lopsided square made up of the red and orange leaves. She places the meat on it, wraps it up, and ties it secure with the vines. She hands it to Amberlyn. "There, now just put it in your jacket pocket until we can eat it. Amberlyn smiles at her ally's resourcefulness.
"I knew you would be useful."
"Yeah," Claire answers absentmindedly. She begins to gather more and more of the green vines together.
"What are you doing?"
"Do me a favor," Claire says, adding more and more of the green vines to her pile.
"What?"
"Grab as many of these vines as possible. Try to get the long ones."
"What are you going to do with them?" Amberlyn asks, severely confused but still walking toward a vine covered tree.
"I'm making a net. When we leave here, I'll set it. If someone comes here, they'll set it off and be stuck. They'll either starve to death or get killed by another tribute," explains the 12 girl as she begins weaving her vines.
"What if they have a knife? They can just cut themselves out of it."
"It'll be too high. If they cut themselves out, they'll fall and get hurt."
"Will the vines be strong enough?"
"Once I weave them all together, they will be."
"Where do you think of these things?" asks Amberlyn with a giggle, absolutely overjoyed at how well the partnership is working out.
"I payed attention during training," she says. Amberlyn collects more vines and adds them to the pile, and that's how things went on for the two girls for a while, until they heard a voice.
"Well, well, well, looks like an alliance if you ask me." Claire and Amberlyn turn around to see the blonde girl from District 7, Sydney. She's brandishing a large knife that looks much different than any knives Amberlyn had seen at the Cornucopia.
"Where did you manage to find that?" Claire asks.
"Sponsors. My friends at home must have some faith in me. But that's not important right now." Sydney charges at Claire, but she rolls out of the the way, holding out her leg to trip Sydney. The District 7 girls stumbles on Claire's leg, but doesn't lose her footing. Amberlyn pulls out her hatchet and leaps at Sydney, not letting another tribute go like she did Brian. Sydney slides away just in time to avoid Amberlyn's swing. She slashes at the girl with her hunting knife, but misses. Claire jumps Sydney, stomping on her wrist. There's a sickening crack and he blonde girl screams. Amberlyn brings her leg up and crushes the girls windpipe with her boot, stopping the screams.
"Finish her," Claire growls, picking up the knife. Amberlyn swings the hatchet, ending their competitor's time in the games. A canon sounds. "Quick, take her jacket and the laces off of her boots."
"Why?"
"Just do it," Claire answers, reaching down to pull the black jacket away from the body. Amberlyn quickly unlaces the boots and pulls the black laces off, handing them to Claire.
"Looks like we make a pretty good team," says Amberlyn happily.
"Looks like it, huh?"
Nikki
Treading through the terrain of the summer forest, Nikki breathes in and out deeply. She focuses on keeping her breathing regulated and her legs moving. The sound of the canon in the distance caused her to be more alert. She began to walk away from the sound, hoping to avoid whatever caused the death. Too afraid to try her luck at the cornucopia, Nikki simply ran as fast as she could into the summer forest, hoping for the best. She had heard a bear or some other animal roar in the distance earlier that morning, but the sound was far away and she hasn't heard it since then. Thankfully, she had consumed as much water as possible in her days leading up to the games. She was thirsty, but it wasn't unbearable. Her tongue was dry, but she wasn't hallucinating or experiencing any serious symptoms of dehydration. When she woke up in the morning, she began her trek for the winter field, eager to eat some of the snow covering the ground. The arena confuses Nikki. She doesn't have a very acute sense of direction in the first place, but this multi-seasonal field has her completely turned around. She hopes the direction she is walking in will lead her to the winter quadrant, but she has no way of being sure. She hasn't seen any competitors since she ran from the cornucopia, and she's praying things will stay that way. The way Nikki figures it is, as long as she can avoid the other tributes in the early stages of the games, she will easily be able to dispatch the remaining few competitors. True, she didn't have a weapon, but her father had taught her to fight when she was younger, and she grew to be very skilled at it. She desperately needs a knife or sword, but when it comes down to it, she could put up a good fight with just her fists and powerful kicks. A sound of movement and a slight rattling prompts Nikki to spin around, fists already up. "Hey, you," greets the girl from 1, Autumn, with a taunting sense of friendliness.
"Oh, that's so nice of you. Did you bring me some water?" asks Nikki arrogantly, gesturing at Autumn's backpack.
"You'd like that, wouldn't you, 8? Actually, I didn't bring you water. I just came to kill some annoying little tributes that are standing in the way of my victory."
"Aren't your Career buddies standing in your way too?" Nikki asks, trying to stall in order to plan out her method of attack.
"Well, yeah, but do you think I'll let them live past top 6? I'll just offer to take watch one night and stick it to them," Autumn explains, making a cutting motion across her neck with her threatening blade.
"That's how much the alliance means to you?"
"Oh, please, it's the Hunger Games, not the Best Friend Games. I'm not here to make buddies. I'm here to kill, and I'm here to win. Now, let's start with you." Autumn runs at Nikki, a single knife drawn. Nikki, side steps out of the way, making a grab for the other girl's backpack, but the pack is tight on Autumn's shoulders, and it won't budge easily. Autumn turns and swipes with her knife, but Nikki jumps back, narrowly missing it. Nikki makes a sweep for Autumn's ankles with her leg. The impact causes the Career tribute to fall on the ground, but she manages to roll backwards and back onto her feet faster than Nikki can aim a kick at her. Autumn growls, pulling a second knife out of it's sheath, charging at Nikki. The weaponless girl turns and runs for the nearest tree, climbing as fast as she can. "Can't you just stay still?!" shouts Autumn, visibly angry.
"Not today." Nikki grabs a thick branch near her and jumps off the tree. Her weight causes the branch to snap on the way down. Nikki twirls, branch in hand, and slams it into Autumn's side. This causes her to gasp, dropping one knife. Before Nikki can make a grab for it, Autumn kicks it away as she tries to catch her breath. The District 1 girl screams, sprinting at Nikki. She jumps to the side, making another swing with her branch, but Autumn ducks out of the way. She manages to make a grapple for the branch, pulling it from Nikki's grasp and throwing it off toward the knife.
"You're all out of tricks," Autumn grins, however, you can tell the girl is in pain.
"You keep telling yourself that." Nikki throws a kick at Autumn's stomach. It makes impact, causing Autumn to stumble backwards and almost drop her second knife. Nikki steps forward and punches Autumn hard in the cheek, but Autumn manages to swipe Nikki's forearm with her knife, causing a thin trickle of blood to flow from the newly formed slash in her sleeve. The cut isn't deep, but is still extremely painful. Nikki throws a second punch with her other fist, this time knocking Autumn to the ground. Her knife falls out of her grasp, and this time, Nikki manages to retrieve it. Grabbing Autumn's shirt collar, the District 8 girl finishes her opponent with just a few plunges of the knife. She pulls the backpack off of the other girl's body and opens it up as the second canon of the day sounds off. As Nikki takes inventory, she counts at least seven knives, three pairs of brass knuckles, a pair of night vision glasses, a half gallon bottle of water, a first-aid kit, a box of matches, five packs of beef jerky, and two packs of dried fruit. Grinning at the oddly large amount of weapons, she tries on the brass knuckles, already knowing how useful they will be. She puts the supplies back in the bag, takes a sip of water, and continues to walk toward the winter field as the body of her fallen competitor is dragged into the sky.
Jared
Jared and his district partner continue to casually stroll through to spring forest. There have only been two canons that day, but both had been a fair distance away, so the two aren't worried. Jared had snapped out of his minor shock from killing Brady late the night before. They shared one beef jerky strip and began to walk. They knew they needed water, but they weren't terribly thirsty. The temperature of the summer area, however, was very high. "We have to talk about the Careers," Erin says.
"What about them?" Jared asks with a fake innocence. He had been avoiding the topic of confronting the Careers since early that morning.
"We need to think of a battle plan!"
"Does getting killed count as a battle plan?"
"It's not a sure thing that we'll get killed. If we have a good plan, they won't know what hit them," Erin explains, pleading for Jared's ideas.
"What are we going to do, Erin? We're from District 3. Throw us some computer parts and we'll be fine, but we're fresh out of those right now. We have no fighting skills at all!"
"Well, you killed Brady!"
"The only reason I killed Brady was because I snuck up on him. If he saw me coming, we'd both be dead, and you know it," counter Jared.
"Well, maybe we could sneak up on them while they're sleeping," suggests the girl.
"That won't work. They'll have someone keeping watch."
"But it would be two against one."
"The other Careers would have woken up by the time we managed to kill the first."
"Why can't we just shoot at them from afar with the bow?" Erin is becoming increasingly annoyed at Jared's constant negativity. She turns to look at the setting sun, extremely aggravated.
"They'd see us if when we got close enough to actually hit them. Any farther away and we'd miss."
"Well maybe if you'd-" Erin began, but she was interrupted at the sound of running and the rustling of underbrush.
"Who's there?" asks Jared, drawing his knife. Erin does the same. From behind a grouping of trees in front of them, the girl from District 4, Madison, walks out, holding a spear. She stares at them, and they stare back. No one moves, no one charges, no one raises their weapons. Madison's eyes flicker between Erin and Jared over and over again as if she is racking her brain to make some kind of decision. Erin considers taking Madison's hesitation as an advantage and leap at the girl with her knife, but she doesn't. Jared is afraid to breath, scared he will snap the District 4 girl out of whatever stupor she is in. Madison shakes her head slowly and takes a step back slowly. She takes another, gives one final look at Erin, turns around completely, and runs from the scene.
"Should we go after her?" Erin asks urgently.
"No. We won't catch up, and she let us go. Let's not push our luck."
"But why would she do that? She didn't even try to attack?"
"I don't know, but I'm not questioning it." After that, Erin tries to discuss what had just happened more with Jared, but he shuts down all conversation, afraid that poking holes in Madison's logic would just bring her back to kill them. The two reach a fairly large and thick tree, climb it, and watch the sun go down. After hearing the Capital anthem, only two faces shine in the sky that night: Sydney, the girl from 7, and Autumn, the Career from 1.
"Well, that's one Career down," says Erin optimistically, but Jared doesn't answer, only closing his eyes as he leans against the tree, preparing for another day of surviving.