Chapter 70:

Gwen McCormick, District One, Age 18

Victor of the 145th Hunger Games

Careers aren't supposed to break down like this. They're supposed to be strong and confident, fighting to the very end to win! But Gwen is barely keeping it together after the Gamemakers separated the pack from each other, chased off by zombies crawling after them.

She takes a couple shaky breaths as she hides out in a mausoleum, putting her hand over her racing heart. She can still hear the sounds of the zombies scuffling past her, and she is just praying with everything in her that they won't come in here and find her. They never should have gone into the church and graveyard within the abandoned suburbs. Why did they think it would be a safe place from the zombies? Of course it wasn't. They've been so foolish, the whole lot of them!

And after a couple minutes of quiet and no mutts barging in, she finally lets herself hunch over and hug her knees. Then the sobs start, slowly at first and she tries keeping them quiet, but it's impossible to do so. This isn't at all what she thought the arena was going to be like. She didn't think she'd be chase by mutts and separated from her allies, leaving her alone so soon into the Games. She just wants to go home, she never should have let her family and the trainers and every adult in her life convince her to volunteer. And for what? Glory and money? She doesn't care about that, she just wants to escape this nightmare.

Then she hears it. The slow scrapping of stone against stone from behind her that has her holding her breath as she slowly turns to see what is coming to get her. Of course she couldn't escape the mutts in here, she's in a damn mausoleum! And when she sees a body slinking out from it, just barely illuminated by the moonlight sneaking in through small cracks in the wall…

She doesn't think, she just acts.

With a feral cry she leaps forward, knife in hand. And she starts stabbing and stabbing and stabbing, not about to let this mutt kill her. She's so tired of it and scared, and wants to go home! She will not let this mutt kill her and trap her here forever!

It's only after a cannon fires that she stops, confused by that and then the slow realization starts to sink in. It's not a mutt that's under her, stabbed over and over and over again. It's a young boy from one of the outer Districts, emaciated and covered in blood.

And that sight sends her crawling backwards, trying to put space between her and the young boy. She throws her knife to the side before holding up her shaking bloody hands, so terrified of how quickly she killed him. So she starts frantically wiping her hands on her pants, trying to get the blood off of them as she starts hyperventilating, not caring about what noise she is making. "Get it off, get it off!" she yells as she can't get all of it to go away.

She has to get out, she can't stay here with the body and the blood – so much blood. The iron smell of it is in the air, it's still all over her, and she has to get away. So she scrambles to her feet, stumbling in her haste to get out of the mausoleum, and doesn't even look where she's going, she just runs. She sobs as she runs, then they're cut short by gasps for air as she weaves around the gravestones, hearing mutts in the distance.

"Gwen!"

She cries out at hearing her name and makes a sharp turn around a large obelisk, needing to get away from it all. The voice keeps calling after her, terrifying her and making her run faster. Right up until she slams into someone who grabs onto her. "Gwen, it's me!"

Gwen lets out a feral scream at that and starts clawing at the boy holding onto her, kicking and scratching and lashing out however she can until he lets go of her. Then she jumps on him, shoving him to the ground and wrapping her wrists around his neck, squeezing and squeezing harder as he slaps at her arms and tries to get her hands loose. She lets out another scream at him through her tears, unable to see his face in the darkness and she just keeps strangling until the fighting slows, the body starts twitching, and then stops.

Boom.

Gwen blinks and lets out a little noise of surprise at the cannon, then wipes at her eyes as she looks down at the boy below her. And when she recognizes her ally, she quickly scrambles off of him, and then just runs from there. No, she couldn't have killed him, she couldn't have. She never would have hurt him like that!

…But she did. The Games have turned her into a monster. Someone who kills without thinking twice, kills brutally.

"No, no, no," Gwen mutters as she slows and looks around at where she's run to, not even knowing anymore. She just falls down to her knees and stares down at her hands, full of disgust in herself for what she's done. She doesn't deserve to be a victor, not after doing this. Let someone come find her, someone who deserves better. Or even let a mutt kill her. "I don't want this."

And yet, she just sits there staring at the ground for what feels like forever, with no escape from this hell coming for her. No one comes to save her from her inner turmoil, her disgust at herself.

Forcing her to keep doing this.

And there we have Gwen! Forgot about this sweetheart that got downright tormented in the arena, yikes.

Anyways, move that counter down to six!

Next chapter, we're on to the final home stretch of recognizeable victors. First up, we're heading to District Eight.