Chapter 6:

Sylvia Skylar, District Two, Age 15

Victor of the 81st Hunger Games

Sylvia carefully creeps along the edge of the hallway wall, heart racing as the lights flicker overhead. A streak of fresh blood leads her down the hallway, but who's blood is it? It could belong to a tribute or one of those terrifying mutts.

She shudders at the thought of the mutt she narrowly escaped from as it chased after her, knocking over glass tubes full of other disturbing creatures floating in green liquid, tentacles reaching out for her. If not for the door locking behind her, she doesn't doubt that she would have died.

Yet it gave her an idea. She hadn't made it out of the bloodbath with any weapons. Not that she had the skills to use any of them. She had discovered food and water in the laboratory cafeteria, but food doesn't kill tributes. As terrifying as it is to face the mutt again, well, she can use that to her advantage.

But first, she had to find the remaining tributes. Somewhere, there are three more children of rebels in the complex of buildings. Surely the Gamemakers will let her win if she purposely targets them. They have to. She must get home to her younger sisters.

Sylvia reaches a corner and pauses, hearing whimpering from the other side. She slowly peers around the corner, hesitant about finding a mutt with the tribute. But she finds one of the tributes she's looking for. She finds Urie, the boy from Six, bleeding out on the ground as his District partner Pani hovers over him, pressing bandages against his wounds that quickly soak up with blood. Sylvia can tell that they're bite marks from a mutt, explaining why there was blood smeared as if someone was dragged away.

"Come on, Urie, you're going to be fine," Pani mutters to him as she tosses aside a soaked bandage. The boy doesn't respond and Sylvia can see his chest stop moving.

Boom.

Pani lets out a scream of anger at the cannon, almost looking like she might be in tears. "Damn it, don't leave me alone in this nightmare!" The girl sits back and finally looks up, her eyes widening at the sight of Sylvia peering around the corner before scrambling to her feet, slipping on Urie's blood. Sylvia takes off back down the hallway, hearing Pani following her. "Get back here!"

Sylvia only glances back to make sure the rebel's daughter is following her before sprinting down the hallway, passing open doors but not having the time to hope that there won't be any mutts in there that will reach out and grab her. Almost there.

She can hear Pani quickly closing the distance between them as Sylvia gets closer to the mutt she just trapped. She slips in the blood, slamming against the ground. As she tries to get up, she slips once more before Pani tackles her back to the ground. Pani starts wrestling her, struggling to get a good grip on Sylvia's neck with the blood covering her hands from her District partner. Sylvia fights against her, slowly crawling over to the doorway that she can hear the mutt hitting against.

The button to open the door glows red and Sylvia strains to reach it as Pani grabs her arm away from it. She throws her elbow back, feeling it strike Pani's face and the girl lets go of her arm, allowing Sylvia to reach up and slam her fist against the button.

Before the doors can fully slide open, disgusting black tentacles slip out and wrap around Pani's legs. She lets out a loud scream and grabs tightly on to Sylvia, desperate as the mutt starts to pull her into the room. "No, fuck no!"

Sylvia struggles against Pani's hold, trying desperately to not be dragged into the room as well. She grabs the doorframe, struggling against the weight of Pani being pulled by the mutt. The creature lets out a terrible snarl and Sylvia glances back at it, immediately wishing she didn't turn around to see the writhing mass of tentacles. She kicks around her legs, hearing a groan from Pani and the grip lighten on her. Sylvia pulls herself through the doorway as the mutt drags Pani off of her.

Sylvia scrambles to her feet and slams the button to shut the door, but not before catching sight of Pani being pulled to the mutt and a large mouth ringed with teeth. The closed door does nothing to stop the screams from reaching her as the mutt tears into the girl's flesh, and Sylvia knows that sound will haunt her forever.

Boom.

She can feel a sob building in her chest at the fear and her heart racing, but stops when she hears a growling sound. She slowly turns her head to the right, a sweat breaking out on her forehead as a mutt that looks like a black lion starts slinking out of one of the open doorways she ran past. Except instead of a mane of fur, the mutt has tentacles writhing around. It locks its gaze on Sylvia and bears its teeth as it growls at her before Sylvia starts racing down the hallway once more, this time towards the sanctuary she knows in one of the med labs.

The mutt follows closely behind her and she can feel tears of fear pouring down her face, yet she refuses to look back at it. She can't afford to waste time when that fraction of a second could allow it to reach her.

She slams her fist against the button on the door and swings in as the doors shut. The mutt slams against it and she can hear it continue to growl as she stares at the door getting dents in it, praying that it will hold.

"Thanks for trapping us in here."

Sylvia jumps at the sound of the voice and quickly turns around to find the boy from Nine standing on the other side of the room. But from the sword he holds, Sylvia doubts he wants to be her ally. "Oh shit," she mutters as he starts running towards her.

Before he can reach her, she twists out of the doorway and slams her fist on the button, letting the mutt charge in right at the boy. She runs out as he starts screaming while the mutt snarls at him. Sylvia once again races down the hallway, desperate to get to a new building and away from the mutts in this one.

Boom.

Two tributes dead in the span of a couple minutes, all thanks to her using the mutts in the arena. Well, at least it wasn't three. And now, there's only three other tributes remaining. Maybe she can do this.

I give you a victor we have heard a whole lot about before: Sylvia Skylar, Victor of the 81st Hunger Games!

This chapter has been written for a long time because I was really excited to finally write Glacia's grandmother after people talking about Sylvia so much in later stories and get into the emotional trauma that she has gone through as a result of her time in the Games. And as you can see, they were quite traumatizing, but she did what she had to do to get home to her family. And if she hadn't, we wouldn't have one of our favorite victors later on!

Alrighty I will see you soon with the next chapter!