You whisper his name,

The first thing Dean noticed when his platform rose to ground level, was the darkness. The Cornucopia was standing tall and proud in the distance, in a beam of light. Dean blinked a few times to get his eyes used to his surroundings.

Fifty-one.
Fifty.
Forty-nine.

Dean looked around, searching for Jo. She was three platforms away, in between the girl from 3, the girl from 6 and the boy from 11.

Thirty.
Twenty-nine.
Twenty-eight.

They wouldn't pose a threat. Dean nodded to Jo. He tensed his muscles when something in the corner of his eye distracted him. The girl from 9, a redhead named Charlie, sneezed and fell off her platform. The mines around her exploded and the first canon boomed.

Fifteen.
Fourteen.
Thirteen.

Dean stared at the dirt and blood around the girls platform.

Nine.
Eight.
Seven.

Jo snapped him out of his trance. "Winchester!"
He turned back towards Jo.

Three.
Two.
One.

A horn called. Dean leapt off his platform, sprinting towards Jo. There was moss beneath his feet. Thank the Lord it weren't stones, that would have slowed him down enormously.

He passed the two Tributes (the third one had chosen to ignore the Cornucopia and was speeding towards the forest).

He bashed into Jo, blindly grabbing her wrist and they ran towards the Cornucopia together. They were the first to reach it and Jo grabbed two bigger backpacks, not looking at the content and two flashlights, while Dean stacked up on weapons. He found a slingshot and a small pouch with leaden bullets, blindly snatched a couple of daggers and turned around.

Just in time, Michael had grabbed the sword and he was raising it above his head, to slice Jo in two. Without even thinking about it, he threw one of the knives towards him, grazing Michaels arm and almost chopping Jo's nose off.

Michael turned to Dean. "Woops." He grinned. "You almost killed me there, Winchester."

He raised his sword again, but now to strike Dean down with one, killing blow.

Jo ran forward and kicked Michael in the knee, momentarily stunning him.

They ran out of the Cornucopia together, arms full with weapons. Dean saw Castiel standing at the mouth of it, he was fighting another pack tribute with a long, round and almost sword like silver dagger.

Dean caught his absent gaze again.

Castiel didn't seem to pay attention to the fight. He smiled to Dean. Dean wanted to smile back, but Jo dragged him back into running.

"Hurry up you asshat!" she scolded. "We don't have time for goodbyes."

They ran into the forest, where it was pitch black dark. There was no moon, there were no stars in the night sky.

"I wish there were stars at least," Jo sighed. She turned her flashlight on and gave the other one to Dean.

"Why?" He asked. He knew the answer though. He felt the same about it.

"Because I could navigate much easier with a couple of stars." She shrugged.

Dean chuckled. That wasn't the answer he was expecting.

"What?"

"I thought you were going to say something along the lines of 'The sky is so cold without her stars' or 'If I'm going to die, I want to die with the nightlights on.'."

Jo laughed.

They kept walking for a while, dividing the weapons on foot. Dean had been able to get hold of four daggers. He gave two to Jo, a really small one, for piercing through armour and a regular one, double-edged, with a brass hilt and a leather handle.

He kept the other two, a large one, with a wooden handle and an iron brass and a rather peculiar blade. It was double-edged too, one side was smooth, and the other was jagged. His other knife was also bigger, but not bigger than Jo's regular dagger and it had a similar blade and handle.

A canon boomed.

"Have you been counting?" Dean asked.

They had slowed down their frantic running to a fast walking pace.

Jo shook her head. "I tried, but I lost count."

They kept walking for a couple more hours, when they soft moss under their feet suddenly changed too wet sand. Dean could see rocks and mountains in the distance too. They had been walking towards the mountain for a while now.

"We're near water." Jo said.

Dean nodded. "Let's rest for a while. See what's in these backpacks."

It was still unbelievably dark, but they shut their flashlights off anyway, since they were just able to see enough to unpack their bags.

Deans backpack contained a box of matches, rope, night-vision goggles, blankets and some provision. Dried fruit, crackers, bread and an empty water bottle.

Jo's bag had a first aid kit, provisions and the bottle too and a long string of fishing rope.

"There's a lot of burn heal cream in here." Jo frowned, opening the first aid kit.

"Maybe there are some bad jokes included," Dean shrugged.

Jo re-packed her bag when she pulled up another item, one she had missed on her first sweep.

"Shoes!" she smiled. She was holding a pair of heavy, leather boots up.

"Good!" Dean smiled. "We'll need those if we're going to climb those mountains. What size are they?"

"Seven." Jo said.

"Oh- then you take them, they won't fit me," Dean said.

"Liar."

"Take them anyway."

Jo was putting the shoes on, mumbling something about sharing, when the anthem started playing and the sky lit up with Panem's eagle.

"I believe the slaughter is over." Jo said.

Dean looked at the crest, counting the Tributes.

The girl from 3.

"One."

The boy from 4.

"Two."

The boy from 6.

"Three."

The girl from 8.

"Four."

The girl from 9.

"Five."

The girl from 10.

"Six."

The boy from 11.

"Seven."

The girl from 11.

"Eight."

The Eagle, and then darkness again.

Dean jumped up. "Let's find water and shelter."

They started walking again, heading North (according to Jo).

"Look at that!" Jo pointed to a small group of fireflies that passed them on the left. They didn't appear to be shy at all.

"I wonder if you could eat them," Dean asked out loud. He reached out to catch one, but they voluntarily landed on his hand.

"Be careful Dean," Jo said, but it was too late.

Dean felt a stinging, burning sensation spread across his hand.

"Son of a bitch!" He swore. He wildly shook his hand to throw the fireflies off. Jo chased the others away by wildly flinging her flashlight around.

They ran towards the mountains, with the fireflies on their heels. They ran into the first cave they saw. It was damp, cold and possibly darker than outside, but the fireflies didn't seem to follow.

Dean sat down, panting. "Fireflies," he said, "Note taken."

Jo chuckled and grabbed her first aid kit. Dean inspected his hand under the flashlight. The burn was really ugly, as if the flesh had melted away to the bone.

Jo got the burn heal cream out.

"That's probably why they put so much of this stuff in the kit," She said, smearing it onto a bandage and wrapped it tightly around his hand.

Dean groaned.

"Don't be such a kid." She smiled. "I hope your skin grows back quickly. Or can you fight with left?"

"We'll find out." Dean said.

Jo looked around. "Maybe we can sleep here, I don't know what time it is, but I could do with some sleep."

Dean nodded. "It'll probably stay dark anyway. You catch some sleep, I'll take the first watch."

Jo rolled herself up in one of the blankets from their backpacks and wanted to give the other one to Dean, but he turned it down.

"You use it as a pillow or something. The cold in here will keep me awake and if it really gets too cold I can always step outside and warm up for a bit."

Jo rolled the blanket under her head and fell asleep. Dean kept watch, but nothing happened.

Now and then a white flash of fur ran by his feat, but he was too slow to catch a glimpse of what it was with his flashlight and since his encounter with the fireflies he was more cautious.

After a couple of boring hours, Dean hears two canons blast, quickly after each other.

"Dean!?" Jo awoke with a startle.

"Sssh! I'm okay Jo." Dean got up. "It's probably the pack."

Jo yawned and folded the blankets back in their backpacks.

"So what are we going to do?" She asked.

Dean scraped his throat. "I've been thinking."

"U-oh." Jo joked.

"And we've got two options." Dean ignored her. "We can climb up that mountain and hope there's some fresh water up there and a that hero will kill everyone plus himself for us, or we go and hunt the pack."

"I know that in the training centre we decided on hunting the pack, but at the moment I feel better with climbing up that mountain."

Dean nodded. "But then there's the problem of water."

Jo was silent for a minute, tying her shoelaces. "Why don't we check the back of the cave? It's freezing in here, there has to be a source."

Jo led the road, pointing her flashlight to the ground and cautiously checking for obstacles that could hurt Dean's feet.

After half an hour of stumbling through the dark, Jo laughed: "Water!"

She sunk to her knees, enthusiastically dipping her face in the cool stream. Dean smiled too and wanted to fill the water bottle in his bag, when Jo shot up, gasping.

"What?" Dean asked concerned. "What is it? Are you okay?"

Jo looked pale in the white light of Dean's flashlight. "Jo?"

She was gazing at her wrist and Dean followed her gaze with his flashlight. Her wrist was a mess of open flesh and blood.

"Shit," Dean swore. "How are you feeling Jo?"

"Fi- miz- dizzy…" She stuttered.

Deans mind worked as fast as he could. Los of speech could indicate poison. He quickly grabbed Jo's wrist and started sucking the blood out, spewing it out on the cold, stone floor when his mouth was full. It tasted sweet, not the way blood was supposed to taste. He kept sucking until Jo's blood tasted normal, metallic again.

Dean pointed the flashlight on the water and saw three long silver lines, like silk.

"Snakes." He breathed. "Sons of bitches."

"What?" Jo asked, still a little dazed.

Dean kept chasing them down with his flashlight and like anything in this Arena it was afraid of the light. He filled his bottle, slowly, cautiously, with his flashlight on the water. Bless Jo for snatching them, they would've been nowhere without those things.

He cleaned Jo's wound, like she did with his hours earlier. He chuckled.

"What?" Jo groaned.

"Well, we haven't seen another Tribute, yet we both managed to get ourselves wounded." He smiled, tying a knot in the bandage.

Jo groaned.

"Don't be such a kid." Dean smiled, recalling their earlier conversation.

"Shut up." Jo grinned. "Let's just hope you sucked all the venom out."

"Pleasure." Dean smiled. "I was thirsty anyway."

Jo got up. "Wait you swallowed it? That's disgusting!"

"Of course I didn't you idiot!" Dean rolled his eyes. "Why would I suck venom out of you to get it in my own system?"

"Oh, right,"

Dean sighed. "Okay, we got enough water for a couple of days, so are we going to climb that mountain or not?"

Jo nodded. "Maybe there's something behind that. Safety, refuge,"

"Light." Dean groaned.

They walked out of the cave (which took them a good hour, with Jo stumbling around like she was drunk) and when they exited, Dean gasped.

"Wha- O my God," Jo looked up, the sky was lit by stars that shone bright like a thousand candles.

"I bet it's night," Dean said. "But there's still no moon."

"But the weird thing about this is, the stars also shine during the day, but the sun is too bright so we can't see them." Jo said. She clicked her flashlight off, the stars were bright enough to light the path and there was no use in spilling batteries. Dean followed her example.

She nodded, tugging at her bandages. "Okay. Let's see if we can find a path that leads up the mountains."

"I bet there's monsters up there, like poison rabbits or rabid dogs." Dean whispered, following Jo.

"Mmh-" she said, "I could eat three rabbits."