Suddenly, it was bright and hot. Diana was in a large clearing of dry, cracked earth surrounded on all sides by a sparse drought-stricken forest. No time to feel relief. She forced herself to look around, squinting against the bright sunlight. On her sides were the girl from Twelve and the boy from Seven, who was fourteen and small, but on the other side of the girl was the girl from Two, who was bigger than her male counterpart (who was lithe and agile and could probably hunt anyone to collapse without even a single weapon).
There were a few odds and ends close to Diana, more valuable stuff closer to the Cornucopia as always (Diana was behind it and couldn't see the mouth), and one oddity this year - twelve backpacks a few metres away from them at even intervals, the implication being that Diana would have to fight the girl from Twelve for something absolutely crucial for survival, like five years ago in the mountains with sleeping bags. Perhaps water, going by how dry the forest looked? Weapons-wise, there was a tiny knife just between Diana and the backpack, the implication obvious. 'Everyone knew' that personal evaluations had a major impact on what was easy to get at the Cornucopia.
Plan made, Diana looked around for anything else she could easily and quickly get without being in danger of the girl from Two. A big knife. A small backpack - that was likely to have a lot of useful supplies, they always had little survival kits on the periphery. A little case the size of her hand - might be anything, probably not food. A pack of dried fruit. A hat. A pair of shoelaces. A length of black cloth. A tiny bottle - medication? On her left were the girl from Twelve, the girl from Two, the boy from Five, and the boy from Four - also someone to be wary of. On her right were the boy from Seven, the girl from Nine, the boy from Eleven, and the boy from Eight.
Was there a prayer for when you were about to go fight? Diana didn't know. She instead recited the Shema over and over, just in case these were actually her last seconds in the world. The whispered words felt strange in her ears.
"Sh'ma Yisrael, Adonai eloheinu, Adonai echad…" Hear, O Israel…
How many people had recited these words when going to their deaths? Diana was so angry she was going to be one of them, dying kiddush ha-Shem because there was nothing she could do to live. She imagined her body lying in a casket, and the fear brought tears to her eyes. Why, why, why, why? Her heart felt like it was going to hammer out of her chest. The Tributes around her - any of them could be the one to end her life.
No. She would be the one to end theirs! She would not die sanctifying the Name, she would kill for its glory! Diana stood more confidently, letting the fire course through her, the stories of the heroes who had fought for their people over millennia. Her name would be inscribed on the same page! She would be remembered as a warrior and a hero and a worthy descendant of her ancestors!
Diana turned to the boy from Seven and grinned, feeling manic energy course through her like always before a fight. He drew back slightly. Diana turned back towards the Cornucopia, watching the numbers tick down.
Ten seconds left. Diana prepared to jump off the pedestal and run. It was low enough for her to just step off. Three, two, one-
Diana ran for the knife as fast as she could. She was not the best runner out there, but she was better nourished than the girl from Twelve, so after scooping up the knife, she slowed down and got to the backpack second, when Twelve was picking it up, distracted and not seeing that Diana, not even thinking, acting completely on instinct, jammed the knife into her neck, pulled it out, and grabbed the bag. She shoved the knife into her trousers pocket, turned to the side, grabbed the big knife with her left hand, tossed the bag over her right shoulder, used her right hand to pick up the small backpack, and turned around to run.
The girl from Two was in front of her about to kill the boy from Five with her bare hands, who was putting up more of a fight than the Career had expected. Diana saw two choices - attack, or run away. She forced herself to attack, the two were grappling in the dust and the girl had her hands on the boy's neck, easy prey for Diana, who stabbed her in the back, just between the ribs. She picked something small up from the ground and now ran for the trees as fast as she could, only slowing down when she couldn't hear screaming anymore. She continued to jog through the monotonous sparse woods, careful to not trip over the tree roots. The leaves were all dried up and the branches snapped easily. There was very little greenery, so she could see quite a bit around her.
Cannons began to sound. Diana counted them. Seven. Were any of them hers? Diana realized that her knife, hands, and jacket were stained with blood. The blood of people she killed. The thought made her want to throw up, but she fought the impulse. It wasn't her fault. She had been ordered here, and it was okay that she was doing everything she could to get out - that was the entire point of the Games. It was like killing in combat. Kill or be killed. Her family had fought on the government's side during the Dark Days, and now it was her turn. Maybe Great-Grandpa Hillel was watching over her somewhere out there. Diana had played with his medals when she had been small. He would have been proud to see her sink her knives into the enemy's flesh.
Diana tried to rub the blood off her hands. She was more worried about the knives, the little one had a hinge mechanism in its handle that was already clogged. She needed water, but she couldn't stop now. The bags, one on each shoulder, were suddenly very heavy. How had she sprinted with them? Diana adjusted the bags so that the big one was on both shoulders, but it still dragged her down.
Diana walked for a little while longer, terrified by every sound. Her arm began to feel tired from holding the knife. There didn't seem to be many animals, or maybe she just couldn't see them. It was hot, but not any hotter than back home this time of year. There was a gentle wind making the treetops sway, the sound of the branches swooshing in the wind or colliding with each other driving her into a state of permanent panic. She looked around constantly, starting whenever she thought she saw someone out of the corner of her eye.
She stopped when she reached a place that was very hilly with deep furrows in the ground and thick bushes you could hide under. Perfect for ambushes - and mutts. Tonight would be okay with the Bloodbath and all, especially since she had fought and drawn blood, but no more than that.
Listening and looking closely, it didn't seem that there was anyone around. Diana climbed under a bush and tried to take stock. As she had thought, the large bag held a rubber sack of water. Banking on sponsors to come through, because this would last days at the most in any case, Diana drank some, cleaned her knives and clothes, and washed her hands.
The little thing she had grabbed turned out to be a small pouch of dried meat, which at least was useful. The small backpack, which was an unfortunate bright-orange colour, had a little bit of all sorts of things as expected - a small bottle of iodine and a rolled-up bandage, a safety pin, several sticking-plasters in various sizes, a small empty water bottle, a pair of sunglasses, a needle and thread, five matches and a striking surface, extra shoelaces, a tiny flashlight, a permanent marker the size of her pinky, and a small jar of water purification tablets with a pictogrammatic instruction saying to put one in a bottle. Diana doubted there was water just lying around in this Arena given how dry it was, but who knew. She put on the sunglasses, sighing at the instant relief from the bright sun, repackaged everything except the large knife into the big backpack, which was a far less blatant dull black, concealed the small backpack with some loose earth, and settled down to wait out the night, acutely aware that the Careers might turn up at any moment. What if they wanted revenge for killing the girl from Two? That was not going to happen, Diana had simply eliminated one potential rival, but the irrational thought didn't leave her. She sat there, trembling at every sound, wishing she was at home with her parents and Leonella and Grandpa.
They were probably so worried right now. Sudden death was one thing, but this was more like being told you had stage four cancer and had two weeks left. And yeah, that was far more likely than being Reaped, but Diana was literally going to be killed on television, which was way worse than dying at home. Was this what her great-aunt had felt when she was conscripted straight from the fields? After some time, Diana calmed down and regained enough presence of mind for afternoon prayers, though she didn't actually speak them, for fear of anyone hearing.
There was enough meat for two or three meals. Diana took a piece and chewed on it slowly. It was as tough as shoe leather. After what felt like eternity and two cannons, the sun began to set and the anthem played. Diana turned on the flashlight and uncapped her marker, ready to record the dead on her arm, the only writing surface she had.
2F
That made sense, Diana had to have gotten her in the lung, she would have been given a mercy death even had the wound not been immediately lethal.
3M
5F
7M
So Rafael was still alive, then.
8F
Phew.
9M
11F
So the twelve-year-old was still alive. Interesting. Absurdly, Diana realized she wanted to live just so that she'd be able to find out what exactly went down at the bloodbath.
11M
12F
That also made sense, no way she had been able to get out of the clearing even if the wound had been minor.
Alright, so the only District fully out was Eleven and fully in were One, Four, Six, and Ten. A rare honour for Six. Diana knew she was lucky there had been the knife and then Two had been distracted. She tried not to dwell on it. She needed to focus on what next. Already nine were dead. Only fourteen more, and she'd be home.
Those fourteen included people who could kill her with her bare hands, but Diana put that out of her mind. Maybe mutts would eat them.
Diana slept poorly from fear. Thankfully, the night had been warm. As soon as it was light, she was out, not eager to seem like a boring Tribute who needed to be attacked by a bear to liven things up. She had no idea where she was. Sure, she had been to the forest plenty of times, but that had been to gather berries and mushrooms, not for any serious length of time, so she didn't know how to orient herself. She was also hungry. Having spent her life solidly in the 'enough calories and nutrients if you're smart about it' income range, she had seldom skipped meals or gone for any meaningful length of time with not enough food. The dull hunger chewed at her insides as Diana slowly ate small pieces of meat, taking her cue from the stories poorer kids had told her. No wonder they had done so badly at elementary - thinking was hard when you were tired.
As the day wore on, it became impossible to still be terrified, and now she felt only a dull anxiety on top of her hunger. She constantly looked around for trees she could climb. If the Careers caught her she'd be dead because the girl from One would just shoot her, but anyone else would probably not be able to kill her.
But what if she came across someone in a tree? Diana knew she had to play a delicate combination here, not just surviving and killing, but impressing the Capitol audience. If she walked away from a confrontation, the Gamemakers might unleash a bear same as if she never met anyone. Which meant that, paradoxically, she needed to fight Tributes to stay safe. She didn't know the exact numbers (Leonella probably did), but if you killed at the Cornucopia, you wouldn't be bothered for a couple of days, and after that, a kill every couple of days would do the trick if you weren't the pack, which got finished off when the audience felt bored.
Diana tried to think about the non-Careers still surviving. It was doubtful any of them were better-armed than her. Diana wished she had paid more attention in training to who was doing what. Trying to figure out who was still alive took a surprising amount of mental energy, so she pulled back her right sleeve, wrote down the ones still alive on the inner side of her arm, and rubbed out the permanent marker on the other side as much as she could. There, better. Now, who was a threat armed or unarmed aside from the Careers? Rafael and the boy from Twelve, and that was it. But what if they were armed? But with what? The boy from Twelve had focused on spears, that much Diana remembered, but spears were deeper into the Cornucopia, so it was unlikely. The Careers usually left one behind to guard, but one person could be defeated with some ingenuity which Diana did not have but someone else might.
And what about supplies? It was so hot, Diana's water supply was starting to run low already. Who had the packs? If they were not Careers, did they have enough sponsor money for more water? The last time there had been no natural water, it had been insanely expensive. People could go for three days without water. That meant nonviolent deaths would only start the day after tomorrow.
And that still left the Careers. Whatever the reason they were suddenly shit at survival, they were going to get plenty of water from sponsors, so the only hope was that the Gamemakers would decide they were having it too easy and orchestrate the proverbial bear to spice things up, as was usually the case. In that case, Diana knew she had to hightail it to the Cornucopia for supplies, but where even was the Cornucopia?
Diana wandered around some more, keeping her left hand on the hilt of her knife, which was constructed in a way that allowed her to keep it on her belt. Someone must have put serious thought into the design of this weapon. It felt strange to imagine a designer sitting at the drafting-table, spending days on a single knife.
No sign of any others. Good thing the Arena was so big - it really was down to luck where the Careers went first. She ate a little bit of dried meat, feeling drained both mentally and physically. When evening came and nobody was dead, she took the risk and slept in the open - or rather, tried to sleep, because every little noise woke her up. The next morning, her back and shoulders hurt before she even put on her backpack, and her feet were sore.
As Diana had predicted, on the third day came the deaths. By now she was deliberately hunting for Tributes and wasn't even that afraid of the Careers because they would kill faster than a bear, but for all of her walking around with her knife in her hand trying in vain to detect any sight or sound of a Tribute, there was nothing. Only three cannons over the course of the day. At night, she crossed out the girl from Three, Rafael, and the boy from Ten. Half left. Then, at night, another cannon woke her up.
A parachute arrived that morning - water and a few energy bars that tasted like sawdust but did a good job of filling her up. So at least someone wanted to see her survive. Diana walked around slowly, feeling the blisters on her feet with every step. She was very hungry and thirsty, tired from both lack of food and lack of sleep, her back and shoulders hurt, and not being able to spare the water to clean herself had resulted in a painful, itchy rash on her butt and genitals that exploded with fresh agony every time she urinated and took at least half an hour to subside. These kinds of infections weren't going to kill her in two weeks or less, but it was extremely unpleasant.
Footsteps jolted Diana out of her self-pity. A single pair of footsteps, thankfully. She scrambled up a tree with difficulty and saw that it was the boy from Five she had accidentally saved. He was small, but he had a knife and one of the large bags. And he saw her.
The knife went flying and missed the tree completely, let alone Diana.
"Oh," he said. "I don't want to fight you."
"I don't want to fight you, either," Diana said. She tucked her knife into her belt and climbed down. He stepped closer. Did he have another knife? He looked malnourished and drawn already, and Diana at least was drinking enough water. She could chase him down from here. She pulled out her knife, and his eyes widened. He screamed and tried to run. Diana swiped at his back and barely scraped him. He turned around and tried to grab the knife out of her hands, but Diana had spent two days drilling a fight with a big and strong unarmed man, so this tired boy was no threat. But she was also tired, so he was able to put out his hands in time for her slashes to hit them. She cut his arm, his shoulder, even got him in the thigh. Finally, she got him in the stomach, which made him fall down, and then slit his throat.
Diana realized the fight must have taken just seconds but she felt like it had taken hours. Taking deep breaths, she went through his pockets and bag. There was a little bit of water which she used to clean herself, an energy bar, a pair of shoelaces, and a small carving, his token. Since she could think of no use for it, she put it in his hand and went to pick up his knife. She had half a mind to take his clothes, but with no water to spare, there was no point to having two pairs of socks. Once she had walked out of sight, a hovercraft came for his body.
That night, she could cross out two more. The boy from Five and the girl from Four. So maybe the Careers were boring the Gamemakers.
Diana was very careful to ration her food. There was barely anything growing and she wasn't an expert on finding food in any case, and while water would be the number-one priority, if there wasn't enough money for food, she'd be on her own there. Diana by now felt like she had been in the Arena for forever. She had long since lost count of the days, and only remembered who was still alive thanks to the writing on her arm. She reached a pile of fallen trees, decided that was the new edge of the Arena, and didn't try to climb over, lest there be bears there. Instead, she went back in what she thought was the same direction. What the hell were the others even doing? There hadn't been any cannons for a while. Were they doing something interesting? Diana scanned the ground in front of her, trying to see if there were any animals about to attack her. Unless you were a Career, it was rare that an animal would actually try to kill you, the Gamemakers preferred to see the Tributes kill each other (especially in Arenas where the climate was killer enough), but there were no certainties in the Arena.
Diana came across a bunch of mushrooms. The only ones she recognized were gigantic deathcaps fifteen centimetres in diameter, so she passed them by. This part of the forest seemed a bit greener, with the odd plant that seemed to be doing just fine. She then saw a patch of blueberries, but there was no Grandpa around to confirm that they were indeed blueberries and not some near-identical mutt that would kill her horribly, so she ignored them, too. She even ignored the chanterelles, the only mushroom Mom sometimes trusted herself to pick.
The sun began to head towards setting and a parachute descended, as it always did. It had two foil containers, one with water and one with an energy bar. Diana poured the water into her canteen and took a few sips. The energy bar kind of made her feel less hungry. She crumpled up the parachute and foil and buried them in the soft, dusty ground. Maybe someone else could think of a way to use them, but not her. As it was, the two she had in her bag just in case would hopefully be enough.
What she really wanted to do was clean herself, she felt itchy all over and probably had a yeast infection. Her hair felt greasy and she was constantly scratching it. The veterans always mentioned lice, but that was one problem she didn't have, since she wasn't in close contact with anyone. Her legs and feet hurt badly from the constant walking, as did her back from having the backpack on her all the time. Diana tried to massage herself between the shoulders, but it didn't really work. She was so tired.
Once it was getting too dark to see, Diana sat down under a tree and tried to get comfortable. It didn't work. She put her head on her backpack and tried to sleep. She wished she had thought of recording the days on her arm, too, but there was no point to it now. Eventually, she fell asleep, and woke up in the middle of the night from the cold, shivering uncontrollably. She then drifted off again, and woke up with the sun feeling exhausted already, muscles sore from the cold, uncomfortable sleep.
Diana wondered what her family was doing. School had to be over by now, so Leonella would have been at her summer job. Everyone was probably watching the Games at work. What was being shown on mandatory today? Usually, when nothing happened, they'd air snippets of Tributes walking around. Diana waved at nothing in particular. She wanted to say something, but she was too scared, and besides, she hadn't spoken for so long, she didn't think she could even if she wanted to. She barely moved her lips when reciting prayers. It gave her some sense of routine, even if she had no idea what exact time it was, because she had no idea how to interpret the sun besides 'morning', 'noon-ish', and 'afternoon'.
Was Nate watching? Diana's last partner was an apprentice welder who worked at the same shop as her cousin Mina, who had introduced them to each other. They had had fun together, but Nate had broken up with her because he hadn't felt for her what he wanted to feel. Diana hadn't been too upset. She, too, hadn't felt anything particularly strong about him. He was nice and kind and had very nimble fingers, but he also became violent when he was drunk, so honestly, she was better off without him.
The sun continued to rise. It was so hot, Diana had to take off her jacket. She was glad for the cap and sunglasses.
It was strange to imagine everyone she knew watching her on television. Six hadn't made it far in quite a while. Leonella was the real Games expert, in grade 6 she had won the city Games memorization competition by naming every single Tribute from Six ever (and then done pretty well on the District competition where you had to know all Tributes from all Districts), and some of her rambling about statistics had rubbed off on Diana, who at that age had struggled to name a third of the Victors. Thanks to her sister, Diana knew that statistically speaking, the odds of a District making it into the top ten, as she had done, were 41.6%, or slightly less than half, but it felt like Six made it that far nowhere near that often. The odds of making it to the top eight were 33%, technically speaking, but Diana did know that Six's actual statistics were more along the lines of 20%. By making it so far, Diana had become Six's most successful Tribute in five years.
The odds of Six winning should have been 8.3%. The three victories so far were 5%. If Diana won, it would be 6.5%, and if she died, it would be 4.9% - Leonella had run the numbers a few weeks ago, not even thinking for a second that it could be Diana in the Arena.
Diana amused herself with statistics as she limped through the Arena, the balls of her feet burning with each step. Leonella's most recent obsession was the Arenas themselves. Of the past sixty Arenas (a nice round number to work with, counting this one made it too hard), the first ten had been the same soccer field in the Capitol, but that had been ended after someone tried to attack the audience. After that had been thirteen years of purely natural environments closed off with tall walls of smooth stone and with the odd mutt thrown in. The force-fields had been tried after that, but the first Arena to be fenced in only with a force-field had been Young's - a good thing, given that it had been the most barren Arena up to that point. 75% of Arenas were forested, and of the other quarter, all but three had been rugged in some other way, like mountains or caves. Aside from Young's, there had been one flat grassland, which ended fast, and one giant cornfield, where after the Bloodbath, nearly everyone died either from mutts or from exposure because they couldn't find each other.
The inside of her mouth felt dry. Diana scraped at her teeth with a somewhat ragged fingernail, feeling the dirt come off. It felt wrong to be so dirty. She had, with difficulty, trimmed her fingernails with a knife, but she didn't even want to imagine what her feet looked like. Since she had no spare socks and didn't want to sit down without need, she never took her boots off. The upper part of her back, between the shoulderblades, felt stiff and burned from the backpack even though it was very light.
Diana hated the forest. She hated how there was nowhere to hide with these barren trees standing a good distance from each other, hated the deceptively open sky. In school, Leonella had been taught about how the force-field was a marvel of engineering. Diana wanted to stab the engineer that had built it.
It felt strange to be roaming around aimlessly, never seeing another person. The days came and went without deaths. Diana wondered what everyone else was doing. She drank a little bit of water, wishing she had more. If you survived the Bloodbath, odds were you'd die from an accident or the environment, not at the hands of a Tribute. But the more the field thinned, the more likely the Gamemakers were to collide you with someone else. It was most likely thanks to her killing of the boy from Five that they were leaving her alone for now. They had something interesting to show about her, and that was the important part.
Diana tried to focus on numbers. She didn't remember the ages of the Tributes, but she remembered the percentages Leonella had worked up, and the theory behind it. Presume same amount in each cohort, thus, you can reduce to one for twelve-year-olds, two for thirteen-year-olds, and then three, four, five, six, and seven for Diana. Add 1+2+3+4+5+6+7 to make 28. That was a tricky fraction, but the numbers had stuck in Diana's head. 1/28 = 3.5% chance of a twelve-year-old's name being pulled. 2/28 = 7.1% for a thirteen-year-old. 10.7%, 14.2%, 17.8%, 21.4%, 25%. A quarter of the Tributes were eighteen, somewhat less - seventeen. It had probably been designed that way deliberately.
The math made no sense to Diana. She had never been held behind in school, but that was the most she could brag about. She remembered Leonella's numbers and could recite the mathematical operations, but she had no idea why you added 1+2+3+4+5+6+7. Well, if it worked, it worked.
Numbers made everything more soothing. The odds of winning the Games were theoretically 4% (Leonella knew the exact number, but Diana simplified it to 1/25 instead of 1/24). And even she could work with an easy number like 25. That didn't sound like much, but someone did it each year. With ten Tributes remaining, it was now 1/10, another easy number. 10%. With ~10/25, or 40%, of the field remaining. Diana's thoughts made no sense to even her. She ran her hand along the rough bark of a tree before drawing it back. What if an insect stung her?
As she walked, relatively green sections of the forest alternated with completely bone-dry ones. Despite increasingly cold nights, even the green sections were too dry to risk a fire. Diana saw a strange bug crawling over a rock and squatted down to look at it. It looked like a giant pillbug, black with orange stripes and very, very cute. Diana had to hold herself back from touching it - what if it was venomous?
Another bug crawled out. Then another, and another, and soon enough they were swarming all around her. They weren't so cute anymore when there were so many of them. Diana ran, hoping they were not carnivorous. A couple tried to climb up her legs but she shook them off. Some time later, the forest was totally dry and dead again and there were no bugs to be seen. Her heart was beating normally now.
The sun beat down overhead. At least it wasn't raining. For the past few years, the Gamemakers had been getting better and better at manipulating weather inside the Arena. They'd be able to summon snow if they wanted. Diana fidgeted with the sleeves of her jacket, which she had tied around her neck, the tan fabric camouflaging the backpack a bit. She was terrified of the slightest movement, the slightest shadow, seeing Tributes out of the corners of her eyes and turning around, heart hammering, to see nobody there. Any second, something could happen. It didn't happen. But it could always happen. The next second. The second after that. On and on, Diana waiting for something that did not happen, but could happen at any moment.
A Feast was announced. Diana had no idea where the Cornucopia was. She acted as if she had better things to worry about than that, not wanting to seem incompetent to potential sponsors, whom she knew to be more crucial than ever to her water supply. In fact, she really wanted to eat something that wasn't energy bars. She daydreamed about food, about what she had eaten back home, what she had gotten to try in the Capitol.
That night, the sky revealed that the boy from Eight and, praise be to God, the girl from One died. Though there was no outrunning the boy from Two, so no time to relax yet.
The final eight. The last Tribute from Six to make it this far had been Popescu herself. Diana wondered if Rabbi Simon was being interviewed, or if that would go against the general taboo on mentioning religion in the media.
The weather was completely unbearable. The days were scorching but the nights were so cold, frost appeared in the morning, and Diana was very thankful for the sleeping bag Elly was able to send. She even thanked the sponsors in gestures they hopefully understood, so they'd keep it coming. Things were extremely expensive by now, that she knew. The amount of water she was getting was enough to prevent serious dehydration in the blisteringly hot days, and no more.
Some walking on feet blistered and sore from the endless wandering around (probably in circles) brought her to another tree barrier. The Arena was being made smaller because nobody could find each other. The next morning, Diana stumbled on a metre-wide path of bare earth. Had this always been there? She walked down it, acutely aware that walking on it might mean colliding with the Careers but walking off it could bring on Gamemaker wrath.
Final eight. Now if only the Careers could all get eaten by bears and the others died of dehydration, that'd be great.
Sounds up ahead. Diana grasped her knife and prepared to run. Not the Careers, thankfully, just one person. The girl from Seven. She was near collapse and had nothing with her. Killing her was trivially easy, but it got her extra water and a pair of thin gloves that were better than nothing.
Over the next few days, two more died - the girl from Nine and the girl from Ten. Little wonder, with the freezing nights. So now it was the Career boys, the boy from Twelve, and her. Just five people, but Diana had to admit that it was hopeless. With these paths keeping them on track, she would eventually collide with the Careers, and it would happen soon, way before anyone could get bored.
No, there was still a chance. Perhaps they had forgotten about her. They would kill each other and leave themselves as easy pickings for her, and since it would be such a hilarious sight for the audience, they'd let her sit there in the forest and wait for them to be weakened. Or she'd outlast them accidentally and never even have to fight. With her kill count (two full and two that might be partial), that was allowable. It was only when someone hid the entire Games that they'd start to be pressured around this point. Nobody wanted a Victor who sat and hid, just like nobody made movies about veterans who never got to actually fight anyone.
Diana walked back and forth slowly, feeling a horrible pain in her lower abdomen. On top of her yeast infection, she also had a UTI. She constantly felt like she needed to pee and there was blood in her urine. But that wouldn't kill her in the next few days. And while her enemies were all boys, there was plenty that would have weakened them by now.
The paths intersected, so she had to turn sometimes, still with no idea where she was and where she was going. There must have been a large betting pool of the 'haha how long can they keep this up' variety going on, that was the only reason to allow her to wander around like this when nobody was dying. One day, she awoke to see an arrow labelled 'Cornucopia' pointing down the path. Clearly, they weren't interested in her missing the final fight. Diana really hoped she wouldn't have to actually fight - or if she did, that they were very badly injured.
She made sure to eat well and drink some water before setting out. As she buried the parachute, she smelled smoke. The forest behind her must have been burning.
Diana ran without picking up the bag, forgetting about the pain for a second. She kept her knife on her belt, because she knew this was meant to herd them all right now this minute because the audience was fed up with it, there was no need for the bag now. She slowed down, keeping herself at a pace she could keep up for a while, constantly glancing back to make sure there was no fire behind her. And then she saw the flames.
Terror. Diana ran as fast as she could. Her knees felt like jelly, her cap flew off her head, her lungs began to burn from the smoke and she was so exhausted, but she kept on going, ignoring her trembling legs and the stabbing pains in her abdomen that made her want to bend double. Diana realized she was whispering the Shema over and over and forced herself to stop wasting air. A cannon sounded, then another. That was at least one Career down, so they had also been caught in the woods. That gave her hope. They'd also be weakened. The fire was catching up to her, it was so hot, too hot to breathe. Another cannon. It was just her and one more Tribute. She could do this, even if the fire was catching up, it was roaring all around her, she felt like she was burning-
She made it to the Cornucopia. The fire could not touch the completely barren circle of dry earth. Diana pulled her shirt over her face, trying to breathe properly, and jogged towards the Cornucopia, praying there would be more weapons there. Her eyes were stinging from the smoke. Whoever was alive, he was stronger than her, she needed a better weapon.
But no. The entire forest around the Cornucopia was a ring of fire. He wasn't getting out of there. Diana coughed and sank down to the warm ground. She couldn't breathe. How much longer? There was no air, only heat and soot and ash and pain.
The sound was terrifying. No wonder people said Hell was a burning pit - this was the scariest thing she had seen in her entire life. It was too hot to breathe. All Diana could do was curl up and breathe through her shirt. She wished the boy would die already. Her eyes and skin hurt. The flames moved as if alive, darting and sweeping across the dry forest, and for a second, Diana felt like they were angry they could not reach her.
Another cannon.
"I am pleased to present the Victor of the Sixty-First Hunger Games! I give you - Diana Cohen of District Six!"
Diana opened her mouth to speak for the first time since the Games had begun. "Am Yisrael chai," she whispered, because that was why they would have been donating. The nation of Israel lives.
Suddenly, water fell on the forest, warm drops reaching her parched skin. More water. Hovercraft were putting out the fire, at least around her. Another one landed right in front of her, the hatch open. Diana walked towards it on shaking legs, unable to believe it was real. One foot on the bottom step, she remembered something. She turned around to face the smouldering Arena, saluted, and bowed, like a soldier honouring their fallen enemy. As soon as Diana had both feet on the steps, it began to slowly move upwards. Hands took her by the arm, guiding her inside the hovercraft. They were dressed like medical personnel, and indeed, they began to examine her and had her breathe oxygen through a mask.
"Congratulations," one said with what seemed to be sincere warmth. "Can you stand?"
"I'd rather not," Diana whispered through the pain in her throat and chest, struggling to wrap her head around her survival. One moment, inferno, the next, she was out of there.
"Why don't we get you washed up?"
There was an entire shower set up in the hovercraft. Fortunately, she was able to sit in a chair as she wiped away the grime with a soft sponge. The skin on her hands and face was scalded and there were small mild burns that stung when water fell on them. Her feet, bloody and torn, felt like they were being scalded, but Diana forced herself to wash them with a cloth. She kept on coughing from the smoke and her arms were refusing to obey now that she was safe and who knew how many days of exhaustion were all pressing down on her.
Once she was clean, she put on a medical gown and paper slippers and went back out. Her hair was dripping water everywhere, but she was too tired to care.
"How's your breathing?"
"I'm breathing."
"Here, have some water. Do you mind if we give you a quick examination?"
"Go ahead."
They checked her all over, finding nothing more than extreme fatigue, mild dehydration, a serious yeast infection and UTI (Diana would have wished the combination on her worst enemy), a lower body mass than was advised for someone her height, and small burns that they put salve over and bandaged. Her feet were the most damaged part of her. Diana just sat there like a doll, being poked and prodded. She didn't mind that. Nobody stabbed corpses in the vagina with a metal stick to determine the severity of their infection, so that meant Diana wasn't a corpse.
"How about an energy bar?"
"Oh for fuck's sake, another one?" Diana hadn't meant to say that, but she hadn't talked to anyone in weeks. It had just slipped out.
The person chuckled. "I promise this one tastes much better than that cheap stuff from the surplus store."
Diana took the bar, feeling a little bit awkward at her outburst. It was wrapped not in flimsy foil that threatened to disintegrate in her hands, but a much tougher aluminum foil, and had a paper label glued to it. The label proclaimed it to be made up of dates, apples, and peanuts, and smiley faces advertised the 200 calories, 5 grams of fat, and 5 grams of protein that it had. 200 calories sounded like just what she needed. Diana unwrapped and chewed the bar slowly, enjoying the tastes dancing on her tongue.
As she ate, the medical personnel continued to flutter around her, taking notes and doing things to her. Diana was too tired to care. She sat there, breathing and drinking water, and had to force herself to get up when the hovercraft landed. She was taken to a clean, sterile-looking room and allowed to finally get some proper sleep in a real bed.
A/N: 'Hashem', which literally means 'the name', is one of the ways God is referred to. According to Wikipedia, 'Any action by a Jew that brings honor, respect, and glory to God is considered to be sanctification of his name.' Also, 'The ultimate act of sanctification of the Name is a Jew who is prepared to sacrifice his life rather than transgress any of God's three cardinal laws', one of them being committing murder. Diana's somewhat unhinged inner monologue at the beginning (and the fact that she doesn't think even for a second that killing other Tributes is morally bad) is only meant to represent the mental state of someone somewhat familiar with some Jewish precepts whose worldview was mostly shaped by the extremely violent and militaristic society they grew up in.
The bugs Diana saw were pill millipedes. They look like giant pillbugs, are adorable, and some species are capable of swarming.
I hope nobody's too disappointed by how little space I gave to the Games themselves. When writing from the POV of a Tribute who remains on their own, there's nothing really to put on the page.
While Diana goes through all this, thousands of kilometres away, a seventeen-year-old girl named Thumeka Makwetu is sad because someone left a mean comment on her blog post about the role of religion in Panem, but cheers up when she goes on a date with a hot girl from her class. (Thumeka is an OC from my story The Sword and the Scales). The things we overlook just living our lives, even when we try to pay attention to them.