AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry about how late this chapter was published. Also, as a side note, this chapter is largely on the same day as the last one. Enjoy!
Chapter 8: Only The Best
Number Of Different POVs: 4
OPTHALMIUS'S POV (DISTRICT FOUR MALE)
Boom! Later, again, boom! I hope it is Betha and Imber because they left us. That thought rattles around in my skull the entire day. I knew something was between the two of them, but I didn't realize that it was this intense. If any trace of my affection for Imber was left when she went insane, it's gone now. Osher immediately stands up and paces back and forth, occasionally taking out his anger on the sand. They stripped us of our weapons, food, and water.
Here, in the sandy shore with no fresh water or animals, how long can we last without Cornucopia food? The choice is between a merciless forest and slow death by dehydration. I don't call that a choice.
With nowhere else to turn, we head off for the trees. Ordinarily, it would take half the day to pack, but we don't have anything to take with us. I help Osher swim through the water. Our clothes are soaked to the core but I keep them on anyways because my whole country could be watching.
We travel for half the day before finding a snare that someone else must've set up using a cage of sticks. It has caught a juicy rabbit that no other predators have touched when easier game is everywhere. That fact unsettles me because it means that the tribute must be close by. If the rabbit was caught recently it means that the snare is new, and you don't leave an unattended snare lying about it the Games.
Osher grabs it immediately, but we have nothing to skin it with and no weapons to justify the risk of a fever. I wouldn't trust my life in my ability to identify edible plants from harmless ones, so we eat it anyways. I take a relatively sharp branch and slice it up into sections before devouring it greedily.
The sound that alerts me is faint, but years have training have allowed the snap of a twig to be loud enough for me to whirl around. I know hand-to-hand combat because my trainer, Piscus, thought I needed to know everything about fighting. Imber was, even then, beautiful to my eyes, but I thought she was rather arrogant in some respects because she turned up her nose at hand-to-hand. Needless to say, Piscus didn't much like her.
Blon emerges. He is the boy from Nine. Of course, he doesn't have any weapons. His face has a big smile when he sees us. Osher tenses up beside me; I can feel it. Again, training, but Imber saw the importance in this, at least. "You two are going to be my allies—or else."
I feel it before I see it; Osher tackles Blon and pins him to the ground. "Tell me why." Blon struggles to escape, but to no avail. "Tell. Me. Why!" Osher says, slapping Blon across the face. Blon glares at him. "Because you fell into my trap! Rules are rules, and if you get tricked by me then you join me!"
I begin to laugh at his naivety. Just then, he looks up and calls out, "Now!" Something drops around me. A cage made of thick wooden branches tied with vines. I grab it and slam my body against the wood. It doesn't break or even weaken. I do it again and again. Blon laughs. "We reinforced the cage using a trick."
"We?!" I shout. "Who's this 'we' you speak of?"
Blon smiles craftily. "Me and Ridgen, the District Seven boy. You will both join us or I'll leave you to rot in there. The choice is yours." In one swift motion, Osher snaps Blon's neck. The boom of a cannon is instant. I hear leaves shuffling and then I see the flash of our arena clothes. It leaves as fast as it appears.
"Get me out of here!" I scream at Osher. I can see him mentally weighing the benefits of an ally against the downsides of fighting me later. He smiles cruelly. "Goodbye, Opthalmius. I'm sorry, but I don't have the key. The hovercraft takes Blon's body and with it, the key.
Osher turns away, leaving me to die with no remorse. Not that I would've done differently. It is in my nature, in all Careers' natures, to leave others behind if means your own ascension. Like the Capitol, I suppose. If it really was Imber who died this morning then District Four will soon be out of hope for this year. I have to escape somehow. It's the only way to save my family, my district, and myself.
RIDGEN'S POV (DISTRICT SEVEN MALE)
Only the best survive, I think to myself. Only the best survive. This is, of course, the life and law of the arena. But it also is everywhere in the forests of home. I've seen wolves rip the flesh out of rabbits, for wolves are the best when compared to rabbits. Only the best survive. But why, then, am I still alive? I can't be the best; I'm just a boy from Seven with no hopes, no family, and no allies.
Blon is dead, Cleo would probably kill me if given the chance, and the Careers could be anywhere. I have to focus. Only the best survive. I have to prove myself as the best; I have to beat whatever the Gamemakers throw my way. Only the best survive. I have to fight as much as I can. Only the best survive. The others are undeniably alive. Only the best survive. I can't let emotion into this. Only the best survive. I'm almost dead already, and emotion wouldn't hesitate to finish the job. Only the best survive. I am the best; I have to be. Only the best survive.
EDGAR'S POV (DISTRICT 3 MALE)
I have no food and my only water is the snow that I melt with my bare hands and drink. I know that I have probably been exposed to the cold for too long, but my head is foggy and I can't seem to focus on what I'm doing. I heard three cannon shots earlier today, and with each one I felt lucky not to have one played for my death, at least not yet.
At home, I knew how to make electric heating systems with only a battery, a bit of wire, and a paper clip. Here, I have nothing electric to warm myself. I try to pack my things, but when I realize that I have just messed up the semi-organization of the camp, I stop and lie down.
When I wake up, hunger gnaws at me like a wild beast. The world appears to be spinning fiercely. I know something is wrong with me but it's too much work to focus on even that simple fact. For some reason, I feel the need to take off my shirt and hope that the sun will warm my back if it makes direct contact, but I'm too weak for that. I feel my pulse and I realize it is slow, too slow, but I have no idea of what to do. I feel like I can't get enough air, no matter how much I breathe, so I lie back down on the ice and hope it will melt into warm ocean water at my touch. I want to fall as-leep, but the immediate cold is too intense, so instead I get lost in my memories of saying goodbye to the people that feel utterly unreachable now.
My father holds his head in his hands, trying to hide the tears that fall out in the spaces between his fingers. I know why: my mother, who gave birth at eighteen, was reaped just month later. And now I, too, am going into the Hunger Games. I need to win for my father, for my mother, for my three younger siblings. I don't know how they will stay alive without the money from my job as a factory worker where we produce machinery. I gently reach out to calm him down, not until later to be annoyed that I was the one facing death, not him. At that moment, all I cared about was making sure that this goodbye would not be my last to him; that I would come back and say good-bye every day before I went off to enjoy my day. Not to work, of course. I would be a rich victor with more money than I could possibly ever use or need to use.
How stupid that dreams feels now, how distant. I'm a poor, malnourished boy from District Three, not a heartless killing machine like the Careers. I'm not like that. Were I given a weapon, some kind of deadly blade or sword, and the perfect chance to use it, to be the victor of the final two, could I do it? Could I consciously make the decision to take another life, to put a family into grieving, to use a weapon to end the life of someone, even if they wanted to do the same thing to me? I want to believe I could, given the choice between their life and mine.