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THE WINDFALL
(Day 2, Dawn)
Hiccup wakes when the light of the rising sun strikes his eyelids, filtering through the tangle of branches high overhead. Grimacing, he starts to sit up. Every muscle in his body screams a protest; he cringes and curls back into the crook of the branch, still half asleep. Where is he?
A bird calls, clear and lovely.
Oh, right. He's in the Arena, halfway up a pine tree, where he managed to climb last night to avoid the psychotic Career pack that probably spent last night trouping through the woods and murdering every kid his size who didn't find a decent hiding place.
"Well," Hiccup sighs, knitting his thick brows into a frown, "at least I didn't fall out of the tree..."
He leans out of his perch and peers at the branches below. "How did I get up here, anyway?" he grumbles. It didn't seem half so high last night, when it was getting dark. He couldn't climb high enough, then. It's tempting to just stay up here, but starvation is supposedly a pretty unpleasant way to go.
Gingerly, Hiccup gets one knee under him and hangs his free leg out into space, feeling with his foot for the next branch down, then cautiously shifting his weight onto the new foothold. One branch at a time, come on, just one branch at a time...
He is three branches from the ground when a flash of light bounces across his vision, reflected from something metallic.
"Gah-aahhh!"
Fear shoots through Hiccup like a physical blow. He flinches back - his boot slips on the mossy branch - and suddenly he's tumbling through the air and landing with a dizzying thump on his back in the dirt.
A cloud of dust and airborne pine needles settles slowly around him as he gasps for breath. Something else floats down with the cloud, and lands gently in the decaying leaves next to his outstretched hand. The silver parachute wavers, then collapses silky-soft across his fingers.
Hiccup struggles up into a sitting position with some difficulty. There are bruises curling around his ribs; he prods them with his fingertips and hisses in pain. "Stupid, stupid, stupid," he spits, disgusted with himself, and grabs at the parachute.
The contents spill across his lap, and Hiccup freezes.
Matches, wrapped in protective plastic. A coil of thin, strong rope. A knife, sturdy and serviceable, in a leather sheath. Hands shaking, he unsnaps the catch and pulls the blade out. It's as long as his hand, sharp and strong, and the polished steel gleams like a mirror. He can see his own wide eyes reflected back at him, strangely blurred.
Hiccup blinks hard. Somewhere, a camera is probably recording this, drinking up his shellshocked reaction to having a small fortune's worth of assistance dropped on him from the sky. It can't be sponsors. He doesn't have any sponsors.
Not in the Capitol, at least.
Hiccup swallows, slips the knife back into its sheath, and buckles it to his belt.
"Thanks, Dad," he whispers, hoarsely.
They had better broadcast that much.