Now that the pool of tributes has decreased, I'm changing the number of POVs per chapter to five...
More banners are up on s1150 -dot- photobucket -dot- com/albums/o602/amatalefay! New pics of Chantelle, Emily, Marius, and the bloodbath tributes. Please check them out!
Fun Fact of the Chapter: Fromme Lin (the late Thalia's mentor and narrator of last chapter) won the 182nd Games. Her method of operation was to knock out the guard of whoever was on watch, drag them to a nearby cave, and ambush the rest of their allies when they went searching to find their missing partner. After five days, Fromme had managed to destroy every alliance in the arena, including the Careers. She won by shooting the boy from Two with a stolen crossbow.
…..
Emily Raine, District One
I'm starting to regret leaving the alliance. Now I'm out here all alone, no one to talk to, not even sure where I am or where I'm going. The light is all gray and starting to fade, and it's hard to tell one area of forest apart from another when all the landmarks are the same.
Just think of what would have happened if you had stayed with those Careers, I tell myself. They would have killed you. I think about Uncle Spark, who would've also been killed if he hadn't slipped away from the pack at the last moment. And he won the Games. So maybe I made the right decision...
The anthem plays. I look up at the sky. Two cannons had gone off about an hour ago. They sounded like they were very close. I think I even heard one of the tributes—a girl—screaming.
Sure enough, the first picture in the sky is the girl from Three. She got the same training score as you, I think. She had seemed so smart at her interview. Her district partner, the one with the mechanical leg, had gotten a nine, shocking everyone. Was he the one who killed her?
The second tribute gone is the boy from Six, the one with the creepy interview that was cut off short. Maybe the Gamemakers arranged something to get him out of the way as soon as possible.
The Gamemakers. If they want you dead, that makes surviving the Games a hundred times harder.
I wonder what they have in store for me.
I shudder slightly and wrap my arms around myself, trying to shake off the thought. It's getting cold out here. My tribute uniform has a jacket, but it's been soaked by the rain and only makes me colder. Maybe Spark can get me a warmer one, if I need it. That is, if I have sponsor money.
I look up, but no parachute drops from the sky. At least you're still alive, I think. Three full days in. Thirteen tributes left, plus you. Plenty good odds for right now.
A low growl comes from a dark patch of dense trees to my left. I jump up in surprise, immediately shooting an arrow in its general direction. Nothing happens. Whatever-it-is is still growling, and now I've lost another arrow. I try my best not to start screaming as I stumble back and run off in the opposite direction.
Uncle Spark, please, please, send me something! I think, but I know that this is something I'll need to face on my own.
…..
Veras Valdez, District Five
I haven't moved from my tree for hours on end, at least. I know exactly how stupid this is—I'll get dehydrated if I stay up here much longer, and there are no leaves to provide cover; if another tribute with a ranged weapon were to wander this way, I'd be dead in seconds—but the wolf circling around the base of the tree is looking particularly vicious, and I just know that if I were to climb down into its reach, I would die an even more painful death by the hand of the mutt.
It's the Gamemakers, of course, trying to keep up the suspense for the audience while scaring the crap out of the tributes. I have no way of knowing for sure, but I suspect that they're targeting the ones who aren't in alliances. This arena seems to be quite large, so there's less of a chance that lone tributes would be found by the Careers, and there's only so much footage of teenagers walking around looking for food that the Capitol people can stand. Adding mutts creates a similar sense of ever-present danger as an unstable alliance.
They aren't killing us, not yet... but they do seem to be pushing us toward something... I shudder at the thought.
Suddenly I begin to feel feverish all over and remember that I haven't eaten in some time as well as not drinking. Food has gotten increasingly hard to find. I would chew on some leaves if the trees had any left... I lift up my hand, which is clenched around my knife. It's shaking uncontrollably, like the rest of my body. If I were to throw it down and hope it injures the mutt, it would probably miss.
The wolf gives me an evil-looking grin. Don't think like that, I immediately reprimand myself. It's just a wolf. You need to stay rational. Maybe you can divert its attention away from you...
My eyelids grow heavy and close, blacking out my vision. No, no, you've got to stay awake... if you fall asleep and then fall out of the tree you'll die... I reach out and grip what I hope is a sturdy branch with my unoccupied hand. Maybe I can find something in my hiking pack to tie myself to the... to the tree... before I... before I fall asleep... and then I'll get water... when I wake up...
If I wake up...
…..
Bri Geers, District Seven
I lean back against the tree and close my eyes. It is night, and the woods are dark, but both A.J. and I can see clear enough to recognize my father's face. Yet we can't see the face of the man he's talking to, and that's the one that matters.
"Mr. Geers?"
"...who is this?"
There is a cough, and then a husky voice replies, "Raine. Spark Raine."
My muscles tense. I try to spring up, to dart out from behind the bush we are using for cover and pull my father away from the man whom I know is going to kill him. But I'm frozen, eyes wide in horror as I witness the scene once again in my mind, powerless to change anything.
He lowers his voice to a whisper. My ears strain to hear what he is saying, but no matter how hard I try, I can never make it out. There is a beat of silence as he stares into the other man's eyes, and the next thing I know my father has fallen to the ground, knife in his gut-
I shake my head and open my eyes. He's dead, nothing can change that, I tell myself, but I can't exactly stop the feelings of guilt rising to the surface of my mind. I had been there. I could have stopped him, jumped up as soon as I saw him and delayed his meeting with Raine...
Raine. Raine and his niece. Right now, I don't give a damn whether she's innocent or not—I am going to kill that girl from District One, if only to let everyone watching know exactly what will happen if you hurt the people I love, and then I am going to win these Games and go home to District Seven and live the life that my father never got to.
She'll be with the Careers right about now, I think. I'm going to need a plan if I'm going to ambush them and live. I glance at my sleeping allies. I doubt they'll want to risk their lives taking on the Careers. But I'll need to act soon, before someone else gets to finish her off before I do...
For a moment, I waver in my resolve. I don't want to leave—Jace and Caprice are among the best allies anyone could hope for. They may even be my friends. But then I remember my seven-year-old self cradling my father's bleeding body and my decision is made. "Thank you," I whisper to them, and, after taking one of the boxes of crackers out of our backpack, I disappear into the darkness.
…..
Gabriel Maddox, District Four
I've started making it a habit to stay awake for at least half an hour after each switch of the night guard, to prepare for the inevitable split of the pack. I have a feeling that I'll be one of the first targets, but if I stay alert and keep my sword at the ready, I'll have a considerable advantage over everyone else. I don't know about the others, but I'd rather not get sliced to pieces by Luka Saroque, thank you very much.
Emerald's on guard now. There is silence for the first ten minutes, but then a low whisper drifts over to my ears. My muscles tense. I continue to feign sleep, but roll over in order to better hear who is speaking and what they are saying.
"When?" The boy from One. Speak of the devil. "Now's as good a time as any. And I'd rather get over with it sooner than later."
"It can wait," says Emerald. Her voice sounds a lot older than it usually does. "There are still tributes out there for us to hunt as a pack."
"Seven," he says with a snort. "That's nothing. Besides, the Fours are getting problematic." Really? I think, somewhat sarcastically. I hadn't noticed.
"This isn't about your personal vendetta against Gabriel Maddox," Emerald says, annoyed. "If you want to off them, fine, but it had better not interfere with the plan." Her voice drops in volume and there are several exchanges of murmurs that I can't make out.
"Emily left, why shouldn't we?" Luka whispers harshly. He seems to be having problems controlling his frustration.
"Because Emily just left. She didn't try to take down the pack with her," the girl replies. "Besides, she was weak. We could afford to cut her loose."
"Well, do you have a better idea of the right time to strike?"
There is a pause. This is the critical piece of information—not who, we all knew that, but when. Emerald's answer could very well affect both my and Carreen's lifespans.
"Not particularly," she finally says. "Whenever it'll surprise them the most. After a couple more tributes are dead. I'll let you know."
It sounds like a lie.
…..
Teagan Stratus, District Five
I'm starving. I'm exhausted. I'm more frightened than I have ever been before, so much that I can barely think about anything other than the wolf-mutt with its eerie glowing eyes ceaselessly pushing me toward a vantage point only it can see. No time to sleep, only barely enough breaks for water, just constant movement. I'm surprised that I haven't run into any other tributes yet—and if the wolf's not leading me to them, then where?
"What are you trying to do to me?" I want to yell to the skies in hopes that the Gamemakers might hear me. "How long are you going to make this last?" But my throat's so dry that I don't have enough of a voice for yelling.
Occasionally, I find my thoughts drifting toward my parents. The possibility of them not being dead is dwindling in my mind, but if they are alive, are they watching this? Do they know that they're daughter's being tortured to the brink of insanity? Do they care? No, Teagan, don't think that, of course they care, I try to tell myself, but it doesn't work. If they cared for a moment about me and Kari, they wouldn't have gotten us all in danger with the Capitol. Surely they knew that even if they were able to divert the government's attention away from us for a little while, in a few years they'd catch up to us and put us in the Games as punishment. And me—I hadn't done anything wrong. It was all them. All their fault...
"Someone to pull you up short, to put you through hell," I mutter under my breath, recalling the words from the Nine boy's slip of paper, from the old-world song that somehow survived to be used as rebel code. At least Noaa Carpenter died early, I think bitterly. Before they could give him a more horrible death for possessing... that. Behind me the wolf snarls, as if it knows what I'm thinking is punishable by death. It keeps pushing me forward.
The rebellion. Why would anyone join it if they knew the Capitol would stamp it out? First the dark days, then Katniss Everdeen's defiance and the return of Thirteen, and now this—put down every time. Just more pain for everyone, in the long run.
Suddenly, the wolf stops and begins circling around me. In the darkness, I squint to see where we are. I'm standing on a cliff. A sharp, rocky cliff that juts out of the forest, coming out of nowhere. There's a sort of low orange glow coming from below, like the sunrise starts here. I peer over the edge and immediately suck in a breath.
This is it, then. Nowhere left to run.
The wolf behind me howls, and its call is immediately answered by the growls and snarls of tens if not hundreds of others prowling the ground below. I snap my eyes shut and watch my life flash before my eyes as the mutt shoves me off the ledge and into the jaws of the beasts below.