Just a shortie this time around.
The sun begins to set outside the window. I find myself wondering how the tributes will know when it's daytime and when it's night when they can't see the sun. I wonder if it matters at all. The thought of how twenty-three of them will end their days in that underground hellhole, away from the sun and wind and water and trees, makes me shudder. I can't think of any arena I have hated more. Even the ones set in an ice landscape or a desert seem preferable to this.
The bloodbath at the cornucopia lasted for over two hours and resulted in six casualties. The darkness no doubt helped keep the numbers low. The boy from Three who took the blade to the arm was tackled by the boy from One and strangled to death a few minutes after Tommy made his escape. Three didn't stand a chance at getting the much stronger and heavier career boy off himself, especially with the damaged arm. The boy from Nine suffered the most brutal death of the day, having a sharp weapon of some kind jammed into his head via the ear. It was the girl from Four who did it, and her career companions congratulated her afterward for the nice kill. The other casualties were the girl from Five, the boy from Six, the girl from Seven and the girl from Nine. The career pack is intact. Both our tributes are alive. Both tributes from Nine are dead. Eighteen tributes remain.
I spend some time down in the conference room, checking in on Sally. She seems to be doing okay at the moment. Her small bag of supplies contained some crackers, a bottle of water and a pack of band-aids. When she saw the pack she fingered the cut on her cheek, looked at her fingers and saw that the blood had coagulated and tossed the pack back into the bag. She's made her way quite far into her tunnel and found a nook to sleep in. Every wall is lined with torches which can be lit or put out as the gamemakers desire but for now it seems they're going to let her be alone.
I return to our penthouse just in time for dinner and I ask Peeta for updates on Tommy. He's found himself a nook to hide in as well and the lights have been dimmed where he's hiding. Nothing particularly interesting going on there, so I can only assume that something more exciting is happening elsewhere. The gamemakers enjoy their cruelty but it's rarely haphazard. If other tributes are in greater peril or have more interesting storylines going on they aren't going to work to create a confrontation involving our tributes. Not right now. It's better to save that for later and always have something to interest the audience with. The first day is usually exciting enough without gamemaker interference.
When we have eaten dinner we sit down on the large, black, leather couch to watch the summation of the first day of the Games. Caesar and Claudius wax excitedly about various key scenes and the death of the boy from Nine is replayed three or four times, once in slow-motion. It seems most of the tributes have disappeared into separate hallways, though the boy from Five and the boy from Ten are actually in the same corridor, about a hundred yards apart, neither of them knowing that they have another tribute nearby. Surely this will be enough to provide at least some excitement and tension for the evening.
Once the summation is over they play the national anthem and images of the dead tributes are shown on the walls in lieu of a night sky. The girl from Six bursts out crying when she sees her district partner's face on the wall. I wonder if she knew him before being reaped together or if it's just a reaction to all the stress she is under.
Haymitch tosses Peeta and me our pagers, given to him by Emalda earlier in the day. Mentors are provided with them so they can find out immediately if something is going on with one of their tributes and their attention is needed. It's a fairly new feature introduced during the 89th Games. The career districts had by that time ranked up so many winners that they had a clear advantage over the other district mentors, who didn't have enough people to monitor both tributes at all times. Capitol audiences were beginning to complain that the Games had gotten less exciting due to the clear advantage of the tributes from districts One, Two and Four. The pagers have actually had some measure of efficiency. The 89th Games were won by Spark, a 17 year-old boy from District 3. Last year the winner came from District 1 but none of her three last living competitors were from career districts.
"We should watch the main feed" says Haymitch. "Our kids are asleep, both of them. I'm curious to see what these knuckleheads will be up to."
He nods to the screen where the career pack are heading down a corridor, making an awful lot of noise as they go. They are in a celebratory mood, as careers so often are on the first day, especially if all six of them survive the bloodbath. If you managed to forget that this is a battle to the death between children you could almost find their excitement invigorating. This will change soon enough as the numbers begin to dwindle and they begin to get hungry or thirsty or hurt. Soon enough they will have no choice but to turn on each other and that's when we usually learn who has been paying attention to the others and who hasn't.
"Should we go this way or that way?" asks Maximus, the boy from Two.
"I've heard you should always turn right when you're in a maze" says Lotus, the boy from One. I can't help but feel impressed. He's figured it out, clearly.
"Huh?" says Shimmer, his district partner. "Why the hell for?"
"Keep turning in the same direction at every corner and eventually you'll reach the end" he explains.
"Sounds like it would take forever" snorts Splash, the boy from Four.
"Maybe so but it beats running around getting lost."
"Solid plan" scoffs Maximus, grabbing a torch from the wall. "If this were in fact a maze. It's just a tunnel you idiot."
He holds the torch out to both tunnels they can choose to go down. He's lucky he found one of the few torches that can be removed. Or perhaps he's more perceptive that he seems to be.
"Down this way we have nothing" comments Shimmer. "Down the other… Well it looks like nothing but it smells awful."
"The one without the smell it is, then" decides Splash and sets off down the left corridor, the others in tow.
"Oh, this is exciting!" croons Caesar as we cut back to him and Claudius in the studio. "The corridor they didn't go down does smell but for the time being there's nothing particularly dangerous down there. Let's find out if the same can be said for the corridor they're heading down!"
I roll my eyes at the attempted drama. It's very unnecessary because we're immediately treated to a model of the way the careers have chosen and if they stay on it they will eventually end up at a dead-end with nothing particularly dramatic happening to them. There are two small side-corridors they could go down, one that has a supply station and one that has a deep well full of water. Fall down that well and you'll most likely drown. There's no way out of it unless you have teammates who can think of some way of getting you out.
The career pack run down their corridor, hollering and joking as they go. The girls from Two and Four seem to have become close friends and even begin holding hands after a few minutes. When they stop by the hallway that leads to the supply station the girl from Four, Ellie, wraps her arm around the waist of the girl from Two, Mara.
"Go check it out?" suggests Ellie.
"Later" decides Splash. "I want to see where this tunnel ends up."
"I'm telling you, it will be a dead end" says Lotus.
"You're a dead end."
"If you had to pick a winner out of the career pack, right now, who would you pick?"
It's Peeta who asks the question and both Haymitch and I give him surprised looks. Haymitch then seems to ponder the question but I go with my gut instinct.
"The boy from One. He's smart. Perceptive. I hate the ones with muscles and brains. It's a bad combo for our tributes."
"He can't be that smart" argues Haymitch, more or less just to argue. "He volunteered at seventeen."
"So who would you pick, Haymitch?" asks Peeta.
"The girl from Four. She's got a deadly throw and seems deceptive. That's always helpful if you find yourself in the need of disposing of your comrades."
"You think she'd kill the girl from Two in her sleep?" asks Peeta, nodding at the two girls who are once again running hand in hand.
"Wouldn't surprise me."
"Yeah but I still think-" I begin. My reply is cut short when the boy from Four trips over a large rock, catching our attention.
"You okay there, Splash?" laughs Maximus.
The camera is zoomed in on Splash whose eyes begin to look frightened as he, and us at home, detect a faint beeping. Before he can get up from his spot on the ground an explosive goes off, lifting his body a foot from the ground before it falls back down again. Staring wide-eyed at the screen I try to figure out what just happened. The career teens seem to be wondering the exact same thing, all except for Ellie who shrieks loudly and covers her face with her hands.
"What the hell was that?" she then asks, grabbing Mara's hand tight.
"Uh-oh, it seems our young Splash made an unfortunate discovery" says Caesar as we cut back to the studio, seeing the careers approach the boy from Four on the screen behind the two hosts. The sound of a cannon confirms that the boy is dead. "Quite the bit of bad luck there, wouldn't you agree Claudius?"
"Bad luck indeed" nods Claudius. "That blast shouldn't have been deadly but must have detonated right over his chest."
"One might say he made a bit of a splash."
"Can we turn this damn thing off?" I ask, getting up from the couch. I can never get used to how I'm supposed to feel relief that a tribute from another district has died, nor to the cavalier attitude from Caesar and Claudius.
"No" says Haymitch sternly. "I want to see how they react."
Peeta gives him an unsure look, seemingly debating with himself whether it's better to stay and find out how this year's career pack reacts to losing one of their group or to take the opportunity to call it a night and head to bed. After a few seconds he decides on the latter and gets up, following me to our bedroom.
I walk inside the room and go over to the bed, sitting down with a weary sigh. The first night is usually the worst, an emotional rollercoaster unlike any other. Peeta walks up and sits down beside me, reaching down to remove the shoe on his right foot.
"Seriously, this arena…" he sighs.
"I know" I say. "What sick gamemaker thought this up?"
"Magnus" says Peeta. "Had to be him. I wish they could have saved this design for the next Quarter Quell and gone with something more standard this year." He rises and unbuttons his pants, pulling them down his legs. When the pants are off he sits back down and falls backwards on the bed with a huff. "Can you imagine being Tommy or Sally, stuck in that dark cave? Not even knowing whether it's night or day? Knowing you'll probably never see the sun again?"
"No" I say. "No I can't imagine it. I can't imagine anything worse."
"Just thinking of what traps they might have hidden in this damn arena makes me nauseous" he grunts. "It's like I can't stop imagining it. Like I think I could somehow help Tommy get through it if I could figure out in advance what traps they might have set and think of ways to get around them." He snorts. "Even if I could I would have no way of getting that information to Tommy."
"I wonder how many of them will starve to death. Or thirst to death."
Peeta sighs heavily and sits back up again. He gets up and walks to the bathroom to start getting ready for bed.
"Do you think they might do something with the walls?" he asks while he squirts toothpaste on his toothbrush.
"Like what?"
"Like… Like making them burning hot or corrosive."
"Perhaps it's best not to speculate" I say, getting up and pulling my shirt over my head. "From your lips to the gamemakers' ears if we're unlucky."
He sighs heavily, then closes the door between us to brush his teeth and use the bathroom. When he comes back out a few minutes later I have changed into my bedclothes and pulled the bedspread aside.
"I can't stop thinking about things like that" he says, taking his place on the bed and resting the back of his head against his hands as he stares at the ceiling. "For some reason burning hot walls in particular are on my mind."
"No use trying to speculate" I reply, walking to the bathroom to get ready myself.
Peeta huffs and roles over on his side, propping himself up against his elbow.
"What do you suppose the harmonica is for?"
"Perhaps Magnus is a music buff" I say dryly. I begin to brush my teeth and Peeta doesn't engage me in further conversation.
Once I am done getting ready for bed I turn the bathroom lights off and walk back into the bedroom, closing the door behind me. Peeta has rolled over on his other side, facing away from me, the covers pulled all the way up to his neck. I get in beside him and look at him for a moment. What I really want to do is spoon him and immerse myself in our wordless way of giving one another strength and courage but he doesn't seem to be very receptive towards that. Sadness fills me as I am reminded of another time in our lives when he kept physical distance between us both during the day and in the bedroom.
"Peeta" I say. "It might still turn out okay. Tommy has a chance."
"Yeah" he replies in a monotone. "Sure. He does."
Exhaling in a huff I lie down and try to make myself comfortable. It's hard to fall asleep. Whenever I close my eyes all I can see is the walls of the underground labyrinth closing in on me.