Hi guys!

Sorry for no updates for a while, things have been crazily busy mainly because I've been in the Domincan Republic enjoying paradise for 3 blissful weeks. But I am back and ready to crack on with finishing this story.

More familiar faces as we reach the 74th Hunger Games in the next chapter!

Enjoy!

67.

Dazzle Thornton, Male, District 1.

We are allowed to wear or bring with us one token from our District with us into the games. I take with me a broach in the shape of an owl, owl's have always fascinated me ever since I saw one of those mysterious creatures perched outside my window one night. It gave me horrific nightmares at first with it's yellow eyes but then it came again and it was affectionate towards me. It became somewhat of a secret friend to me, so I wanted this owl to be my secret friend again. The boy from 2 and 3 gave me odd looks when they saw my unusually, unmanly broach but when I told them it was my mothers they shut up quickly and I knew their hands went to their own significant items. What they didn't realise was my little owl emits a toxic, poisonous vapour like fog which if a person gets too much of it kills them. Destroys their central nervous systems or something similar, you also get some nasty blisters I don't know how to cure and I get a few myself. The gamemakers are most likely furious at me but if they don't make the rules tight enough then things are going to slip through; I'm almost reminding them not to get complacent. It's my main weapon besides the bow and arrow I carry along and soon enough there is only me left, completely unscathed. The next few years my tributes tokens all go through rigorous testing and while I tell them there is no use they still try, necklaces with darts that shoot out, a bangle which can be used to strangle someone without it snapping and a ring with a spike in the centre. The Capitol are not idiots though, nothing ever works out the same way twice and they quickly located and remove all the hidden assets.

68.

Loki Methadid, Male, District 9.

It's an unorthodox weapon that's for sure and it's not what I wanted to kill anyone with. Nor did I expect that such an everyday object could cause so much damage, even if it sounds naive. I also didn't expect there to be no weapons in the games at all apart from those from sponsors and those we could make ourselves. I don't think anyone ever expect a boy from District 9, an outer District who barely ever succeeds to produce a victor this year. It's getting astronomically heavy in my hand and I cannot bring it down on the poor boy's skull again and I drop it to the ground and cry out a little in shock at the shining blood on the brick. It's gleaming sinisterly in the sweltering artificial sunlight and the blood is darker than usual which freaks me out even more. I raise my head up as I hear the crowds screaming in approval even from here and I smirk with a huge smile plastered all over my face. I had done it. I had survived the Hunger Games. I don't look at the boy's caved in skull below me as the hovercraft picks me up and for once they lead me inside instead of carrying the victor. Only the very strong could say that. They remove the tracker from my arm somehow and I sigh as I notice it's the same hovercraft we all travelled in and I'm the only one sitting in my seat again. As I look at all the seats and I'm alone and the quiet presses in on me, reality creeps up again and I bury my head in my knees sobbing. No I didn't kill many, hardly any compared to others, but at the very end I has seized that brick in that ruined, ruined city and beat him till his senses were obliterated and he couldn't think anymore. I don't remember hearing the canon but it must have sounded and I keep on crying. The peacekeepers ignore me, no one says anything. My mentor pats my shoulder gently, her eyes shining from remorse but they are also slightly wary of me. I am by far the most brutal victor from District 9 and my last kill must be up there in the top 5 most horrific murders in the history of the Hunger Games.

69.

Hanley Gauntlet, Male, District 2.

She's a simple girl from District 10. That's all she is really, she's pretty for a girl from that District so much so it's refreshing for the Capitol and they are taking an interest in her. I don't want to kill her, she is interesting. But I've noticed the daggers in the girl's eyes from 1, 2 and 4. It was the moment Finnick Odair wished her luck we knew we had to do something and fast. I am strong, I am handsome I think, I am the best person suited to the job so I ask her to meet me on the rooftop to speak with in person. I subtly mention the infamous career alliance and I know she'll be there for it's her best bet at staying alive. Pretending to have an interest is easy, I'm hardly pretending anything and she's rather forward. A little too forward but I also remember her mentor is Cassius Meropa and know she might be playing me too. So I coax her with sweet nothings in her ear, tell her how beautiful she really is, tells me information meant only for team District 10 and I smirk. I ask her what she's going to do at her interview and she tells me she doesn't know. I encourage her to voice whatever feelings she has and she nods. I leave her that night and wait till the interview, but she's disappointingly blank. It angers me a little because it means she's listening to her mentor more than me. So I try again the next night, I allow things to become more heated and she promises to blow her private training session in front of the gamemakers, because I don't want her to get hurt. When I see her score revealed I smile to the other careers and grin nastily. She has scored a 4.

70.

Annie Cresta, Female, District 4.

My arms are propelling me through the water and my legs are kicking out on their own.

It's like I'm a fish born for the water and I don't need to give them any instructions.

We've been flooded, the gamemakers have washed away the other tributes.

The careers I abandoned have no chance, none of them can swim at all.

My mind keeps jumping back, it's not a whole mind anymore.

There is something missing up there, it's abandoned me.

It's an earthquake splitting the dam apart in two.

I want to cover my ears from the screams.

All of them are drowning.

I can't save them.

Or him.

71.

Johanna Mason, Female, District 7.

I stand there in front of them all and there is no smile on my face. It is a look of cold indifference, as if the Capitol is beneath me and no one deserves my eye contact. It is my honest opinion towards them. Right now I could reach out and strangle each and everyone of them, oh if I had my axe I would cut away at them till nothing remained. I would burn the Captiol singlehandedly if only it was possible. But it's not. I'd be killed in an instant and my desperation to live in that arena and my weakling strategy still sicken me to my core. I still don't want to die and yet it would be such blissful relief. I feel lost. I have lost, you don't win the Hunger Games. No one ever wins the Hunger Games and I tell my tributes this now. They don't believe me they scoff at my notions. They argue my case against me reminding me that I fought my hardest to win the games so naturally my argument is void. While most of the mentors hit the bar the moment their tributes are killed I silently thank whoever is really in charge. I'm grateful that none of them have survived and I haven't bothered trying to get them sponsors, I leave all that to Blight and he seems content to know I'm going to put in the least amount of effort I can. Love is weird. I haven't experienced much of it and I've sealed my heart away from ever having the chance to know what true love really is. There is no love in the Capitol. It doesn't exist, it's been eradicated as if it were a rebellious District and I suppose in its own way, it is. It's ripe in the Districts, I see it everyday when I'm not holed up in my mansion. They all have someone to protect, someone they don't want to get hurt so they bear their souls and allow themselves to be beaten into submission. They are forced to bend into positions on their knees and are finally humbled and meek when it is mentioned. I was the most arrogant, they believe it was bravery. I'm not brave if I was I would have marched into that Cornucopia, got my axe and kept chopping away as if those tributes were just trees and wood. I was arrogant enough to believe I was invincible that no one could touch me or the ones I cared for as long as I was a victor. I paid dearly for that price and I cannot explain what is crystal clear to me. The only way a victor can be happy is to have no one, to survive on their own, there can be no weak emotion such as love. I refused them and they were not bluffing. So no one can scold me for wanting them all to die, wanting them to never know the pain that can be endured and overcome when crowned a victor. Finnick Odair and his rightousness can go and suck it on a Capitolite's mouth.

72.

Charm Valiatine, Female, District 4.

I'm not asleep like them, I told them I'd take the first watch and they let me at once. I'd killed three at the Cornucopia already and saved one of them, they trust me completely. No one knows of my plan except for the Head Gamemaker himself, I gave him a little taste of what I had planned for these games and I knew I had his attention when I saw the darts in the very back of the Cornucopia and stole them away before anyone else knew they were there. I think the boy from 2 might like me a little more than he wants to let on, I'll leave him as the last of them. I get up and adjust my all black ensemble, feeling like an assassin as I load up the dart gun while picking up the girl from 1's spear she's abandoned. I decide to start with her, I shoot a dart into the nearby tree, then with a gloved hand I remove it and make sure I'm right beside as I stick it into her neck allowing the paralysing substance to spread throughout her body, her eyes don't even open as she become drowsy and I end her quickly. I peer round at once and as I planned none of the others have stirred at all. I go about the girl from 2 and the boy from 1 in the same manner, the girl puts up a little struggle and her eyes snap open as I spear her and I close my eyes. I didn't want them to open their eyes, but stealth was my only advantage over them. She dies in my arms with respect in her eyes for me and I nod making sure to close her eyes before moving on to the boy from 2. He doesn't make a single noise and I let a tear fall from my eyes and watch it splash his cheek, my blue eyes are glazing over as I remove the spear and lie it beside him. I can't bear to take it with me. I leave the pile of careers and gather up all their supplies before heading off in the opposite direction. I feel invincible as I realise the extremity of my actions, wiping our the whole career pack of the games single handedly. As I walk past the stream I fill my canister and a parachute winds its way towards me as the canon goes off four times and a way up ahead of me I can already see the other alliance around a fire staring at the four canons before whispers break out amongst them. I take the parachute and open it dropping the container to the floor as I stare at the words on the note before holding the pendant close to me and clutching it tightly as more tears travelled down my cheeks staining them.

'I did not expect this.'

The words were simple and my lips whisper a thousand apologies as I think again about my decision not to tell him of my plan, why I'd left my mentor out. His gift is more meaningful to me than he realises and I put it on understanding what it means; but he must understand that I have no choice but to carry on down my path, and I walk up to the firelight tucking his words into my pocket as a reminder to not lose myself along the way. The tributes look up as I enter, all six of them and I nod. "It's done." I say slowly and they nod smirking and making room for me in their small camp. I wait for them to fall asleep pretending to do the same and reload my dart gun.

73.

Draco Vaunore, Male, District 2.

I launched the axe into her chest the moment my fingers found it. It was large, nearly the size of the girl herself and I found it right at the very back of the Cornucopia which meant it was going to do a lot of damage. She was pleading with me not to take her life and I smirked at her, I had such an advantage over her and I decided to tease them all and wait till she was the last one left in the bloodbath, I grinned as her eyes darted over to her District Partner and I stood tall over her watching on making sure she wouldn't dare make a move to save him as the rest of my career pack circled him, closing in on him so tightly even the tiniest of cameras wouldn't be able to see what they were doing to him till they stepped away but the blood curdling screams were more than enough to chill even me to the bones. He was nothing but a bloody pile when they stepped back and I stared at the mass long enough to let the girl momentarily slip away, but she'd lost her head completely. Instead of bolting for the nearest weapon she ran to her tribute and they seized her at once allowing me the honour of being the last face she'd see. I didn't move though, I just flipped the axe in my hand as if back in my private training session and there was no one watching but the gamemakers; before launching the axe right into her stomach. A direct bullseye. They let her fall to the floor and we all grinned at each other, the example had been made we let the others run off when they saw who we had chosen to target and the four of us were ready for the hunt. It's much more fun this way. I look up at a camera a bit away from the Cornucopia, take my axe and begin to carve. The other tributes look at me questioningly as I abandon my axe and instead favour a knife to make the markings as I carefully draw the District numbers in descending order, two numbers to signify the two tributes for each District in the games. Then I turn towards the camera, I know their mentor is watching me horrified and I grin before blowing him a little kiss and hurling the knife so it obliterates both of the number 4s etched into the side of the horn.

So there we have it folks! I wanted to try something slightly different for Annie and I hope it worked out well to show the disintegration of her sanity. I loved writing for Johanna she is such a kick ass character, nothing brings me a greater joy when a character practically writes herself as did Charm Valiatine.

Charm is a character I am considering developing into a full on story for fanfiction, she is an experimental OC for bigger things in a way so if you liked her or in other cases didn't like her then please let me know! Both of your opinions are great in this case haha she isn't truly a likeable girl right now. Also there is a hint of whom her romantic interest will be haha!

Please keep reading and reviewing till the end, not long to go now. Peeta and Katniss are next whooooo :)

xoxo