A/N: Two hundred and forty days. That's how long there is until the premiere of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. So why oh WHY did the trailer have to come out so soon? It's just cruel...
Also, I apologise for the lack of chapters in the last few days. Now, this has been partly due to the fact that exams are getting close and spring has finally come (I really have been playing too much football for my own good), but also because I've been re-reading one of my favourite fanfics. If you haven't read "Owned" by speccy13, I really, really recommend it.
There's been a long list of reviewers lately, so here goes... Thanks to richards25, mangesboy01, Burningbrightforyou, charliesunshine, lucylovesbooks, dreamzspark, FScSeG0403 and Roxibilly for reviewing. I really do appreaciate the support.
Also, the name of this victor was suggested to me by and the arena is an adapted version of an arena that I read about in a story by Vykktor, so I'd like to thank him for his influence.
Anyway, without further ado, on with the belated chapter. I hope you enjoy it :)
"Calling all demons, this is the season
Next stop is therapy
We're the retarded and the broken-hearted
The season of misery.
Here's to the wasted, I can almost taste it
The rejects, the wastes of times
Gonna take it further, get away with murder
And no-one here is getting out alive."
- Billie-Joe Armstrong, 2012.
The 34th Annual Hunger Games
Iris Stephenson (18), District 2 Female
Green Day - Dirty Rotten Bastards (2012)
It's odd to think about why we are all here together. Some of us are unlucky. Some of us are brave. Some of us are foolhardy, and others just downright stupid. Many of us are frightened. But that's the Hunger Games for you.
The members of my group have been waiting for this season for the last seven years. It is the middle of summer, and the Hunger Games have arrived once again. Just like my allies, I've spent my life since the age of eleven training for this Games. I was always confident that I would arrive in the arena; one of the trainers at the Training Centre, a woman in her thirties named Rose, always had full confidence in me. Even though Ivy is my mentor this year, I know that Rose will be backing me to win back at home.
Many of us have different reasons for training for the Games. We all knew that it would be a tough life; long hours of training, little time for yourself, every waking moment spent in preparation for something that will only bring misery to the masses. And for the victor, a half-life as a shell of the person they once were. A hollow life plagued by the traumas of the arena. Many victors (including some of the trainers in District 2) spend years with mental illness, unaided by therapy.
Still, some of us are stupid enough to still see the glorious life that victors lead in front of the cameras and train for themselves. Others are so broken by the poverty of the districts that they begin to train to escape poverty, like me. It didn't matter how many tesserae I took for my family; I was trained for the Games anyway. Others, like one boy I knew at home, began to train because there was nothing else left for him to do with his life. An orphan who had dropped out of school, he could only hide the sorrow in his training. And if he was to die, then he has nothing to lose. He died, of course; even though he won his trials, he was defeated by the fact that District 2 is landlocked; he never learnt how to swim. Not properly, at least. Well, he was defeated by that and a strong young boy from District 4 called Cale Edwards. He died at the cornucopia in last year's Games.
Others join because of self-esteem. Rejected by their community, they try to prove to themselves and everyone else that they are of worth by training. There are the odd elite who are the children of victors; a couple have passed through the system. Giovanni Holt became a trainer when his father pulled him out of the trials after almost bleeding to death whilst fighting for the right to volunteer. The other twenty-two male trainees died in the trials, and Darius died in the Games. I guess even victors show compassion at times. We've had Lilac Turner, too; the daughter of Cicero. She's a couple of years younger than me, and the strongest of her year. No doubt she'll be volunteering for the 36th. Then there's the youngest of us, Brutus Cato, who Amadeus has brought into training on a couple of occasions despite only being eight years old. He's already massive for his age, a powerhouse like his father, who is the greatest of us.
But for whatever reason, there are five of us here now. We didn't let the boy from Four in this year; a weak, gangly fifteen-year-old, who, as with the volunteering traditions of District 4, was left to fight for himself in the Games. Having only scored a five, we've left him to his own devices in the arena. I'm amazed that he's still alive.
As for the rest of my group, we try to live up to the stereotype as much as possible while we struggle through the Games.
We are strong.
We are powerful.
We are brutal.
We are unforgiving.
We show no mercy.
We are the Careers, and we kill people.
The arena for the 34th Games was different, as it was a maze. But this made had a twist. There was no cornucopia; all the tributes were given a week's supply of food and water before entering the arena, and there was a random weapon waiting for them by their pedestal for once the Games begun. As for the maze itself, everything in every direction was white; white floors, white sky, white extending seemingly to infinity in every direction. The tributes could all see each other, but not the clear walls of the maze as the Games began. Progress was slow for the first three days as the Careers slowly managed to meet up with each other. By day ten, fourteen tributes were dead, most of which had died of starvation. The only tributes who had survived had done so by taking food and water from the dead tributes.
The numbers were significantly reduced when the four remaining Careers found invisible stairs, adding the issue of altitude to the Games. There were some parts of the maze, they found that were roofless, and their advantage allowed the numbers to be whittled down to five by firing down arrows from above. Then the numbers were reduced even further when the Careers, who were becoming more arrogant with every kill, seemed to forget the fact that the invisible floors that they were walking on were actually invisible. Three of them fell to their deaths over four floors, and the fourth, Iris Stephenson, was severely injured. But the final tribute other than her was a young girl from District 6, who had only survived thus far due to scavenging supplies from other tributes that she had found dead.
The girl had no experience with the weapon she had been given (a crossbow) and Iris, who had the choice of any of the weapons of the dead Careers, easily defeated her with a sword on the fifteenth day of the Games.
A/N: If you liked this chapter, please review! As ever, constructive criticism is welcomed!
I got a record seven reviews for the last chapter. Can we go one better? :)
GM97 :)
