Second chapter, hope you like it! Read and review ;D

That was me. My name. Mags.

I was going to the Hunger Games.

Telling myself to be strong, I march up to the podium, where our district escort from the Capitol is reaching her hand into the boys' bowl.

I avoid Matt and Aunt Julie's eyes – they would make me burst into tears, and I didn't need that when I was on national television.

When we had the hour to say our goodbyes, only Aunt Julie and Matt came. That was what I wanted. They were the only ones I cared about.

Matt gripped my hand, and I remembered another time when he did this, to comfort me, when Lisa was dead. Now I was going to die.

"You can win, Maggie. You're smart, you're resourceful, you can do this." Matt had said.

But Aunt Julie had said, "Stay true to yourself. Don't let the Games change you."

Watching the Reapings, I noticed that the tributes from District Two looked trained. You can tell, easily, that they know how to kill.

Me, I looked small and insignificant. But at least I didn't look scared.

My mentor wasn't much help. He gave some advice, but he'd said, "I'd given up a long time ago. It's better not to win the Games."

I learned fast. I knew, from training, which plants were poisonous and which weren't. I could start a fire and camouflage myself decently. I didn't spend any time at the fighting stations, since I knew I wouldn't be able to beat anyone in an actual fight. Matt used to tease me, saying that the wind could knock me down. I wouldn't be able to win in a straight-up fight.

But there are other ways to kill people.

When we did the personal training with the Gamemakers, I just showed them survival skills. It got me a score of 4, but it was all I had.

I didn't have many sponsors. Everyone gave their money to the giant killing machines from District 2.

The gong sounded, and I ran – into the Cornucopia. Dodging the fighting, I grabbed the nearest backpack and ran. A knife, aimed at someone else, hit the ground near me, and I grabbed it and continued running.

No one else noticed the small girl, with the low score of 4, run into the woods.

I saw a tribute, lying in a clearing. I could've killed him. That would be the easier route. Slit his throat and be done with it. That's what anyone else would've done.

But I couldn't.

He wasn't very smart, sleeping without even trying to hide. But he was human too. His family was watching the screens right now, with bated breath, hoping for him to wake up. I couldn't kill him.

It's either him or me.

And being the coward that I was, I chose me.

I woke up to a sound.

I stayed in my small shelter between some bushes and listened. It was dark, and completely quiet. But I knew I hadn't imagined it.

Then a girl ran straight at me.

I immediately jumped up and to the side, my hand reaching for my knife. But I knew that I wouldn't win, not against a trained fighter.

This tribute was from District 1, I recognized. She looked thin. Probably didn't get any food when the tributes from One and Two split up their alliance.

She had a sword, a thin, deadly blade. I ducked and ran, dropping some berries from my fingers. It was a long shot, but I was desperate.

Luckily, the tribute wasn't too bright. She probably thought that I dropped them in my haste. Whatever her reason, she stopped chasing me for a second to pick up a berry and popped it in her mouth.

She fell to the ground. A cannon sounded.

"I don't want to have to kill you."

Willow, the girl from District 10, decided to break off our alliance. We worked well as a team, sneaking around and surviving. We even took down a boy from Seven, together. But it was down to five tributes, and I understood.

"I'll leave after tonight," I said.

Willow nodded, and we began dividing up our supplies.

I don't want to have to kill you either, Willow, I think as I slip some deadly poison in her bread.

"The winner of the 10th Annual Hunger Games is… Mags Davis!"

A hovercraft comes to pick me up. Normally I would be examining it, committing it to memory. I used to be curious how the Capitol built their hovercrafts. But now, I barely notice myself being pulled up and laid out on a bed.

I had no serious injuries. At least, not physically. You don't get physical injuries when you kill people with careful tricks and poisonous plants. Instead, you feel nothing. As if nothing happened. A bit of pain would've been nice. Just to know that I was alive.

I sat on the throne, wearing a beautiful blue dress. My skin was healed of all the scratches and scars from the Games. When I walked onstage, the Capitol people cheered and whistled.

I barely saw them.

They put the Games on the screen, and I knew that I shouldn't watch, but I couldn't tear my eyes away.

They shot past the Reapings and the chariot rides. I saw myself on the interview seat, but the favorites were from District 2, and they died. My interview had been short and useless.

Five minutes into the video, the Games started. The camera swept across the plain, catching blood and death onscreen. The camera flashed to me, a small, unnoticeable tribute weaving through the bloodbath and into the forest.

Then the cameras concentrated on the tributes from Districts One and Two. They were strong, and even went out at night to look for tributes to kill. The girl from Two held a sword so easily, I was sure she had trained.

They showed me killing the sleeping boy. My face was emotionless.

The boy and girl from Two died fighting each other, and the tributes from One separated. I remembered what happened next, but I still watched, as she picked up the berries I dropped and ate them.

Then I found Willow, and we teamed up to survive, sharing food and knowledge. But throughout the whole alliance, I always knew that Willow would have to die for me to go home. They showed one conversation we had:

"You know that this alliance can't go on forever." I was looking through a backpack. The boy from Seven was wearing it when we killed him.

Willow laughed. "I know. We can break it off when a few more tributes die."

Afterwards, it scared me how easily Willow talked about killing. But at the time, I hadn't flinched.

"And if it comes down to us?"

Willow looked me in the eye. "You understand this, just as much as I do. I will kill you if I have to."

I had no doubt about that. Willow was strong, she could hold a weapon, and she was loyal to her family – enough to do anything to get home. In that respect, we were a lot alike.

"So will I."

The cameras concentrated on me when we broke off the alliance, and even added in a slow-motion closeup when I stuffed a few poisonous leaves in her food. It's a blur, I did it so quickly, but it became obvious after Willow stopped moving and settled down for the night, when she took out her food and bit into it. She fell to the ground, but she didn't immediately die. She was in pain for a few minutes before the cannon sounded. During those minutes, I could tell that she knew who had killed her.

The Mags on the screen didn't even flinch when she saw Willow's face in the sky.

I realized that I never actually got in a real, physical fight, with weapons and swords. The tributes from District Two put up a great show, with blood, dirty tricks, and mocking laughter. My final battle was simply me, hidden in a tree, watching a boy step into my trap. He got trapped underneath a net, and I killed him with my knife.

I felt, underneath the folds of my dress, that same knife that kept me safe. I'd refused to go anywhere without it, and the doctors couldn't keep sedating me, so they agreed.

After the three-hour replay of the Games, Caesar interviewed me, calling me smart and cunning and amazing, and the Capitol laughed and agreed and cheered. I answered his questions with all the right words, but my heart wasn't in it.

I wondered what Aunt Julie would say. About the traps, the poison, my long kill list. Don't let the Games change you.

I'm not going to update this, since this isn't really my favorite story, and I don't feel the Mags love anymore . Sorry!