❤️💜10k don't mind if I do💜❤️

Nightmare hummed softly under his breath, wiping the blood off of his sword on his victim's shirt that was slowly being stained crimson, the blood seeping down the fabric like a live stain.

The victim was the boy from District Six. Adam? Yes, that was his name. He'd tried to ambush Nightmare while he'd been eating some cooked squirrel, but had ended with a sword forced through his chest.

Having the odd urge to do something sick, Nightmare prodded Adam's bloodied chest and let his fingertip be covered with the thick metallic smelling liquid. Chuckling under his breath he pressed his finger against the smooth stoned floor and dragged it in a curve before prodding his chest once more and making two dots above it. There. A smily face.

A grin spread across his face and he let out a loud laugh, wiping the blood off on his trousers. "Nice knowing you Adam, not really."

Pushing himself up to a standing position he walked over to his little campfire and stamped it out, grabbing his stuffed to the brim backpack that contained the contents of about four other packs and flinging it over his shoulder, his tentacles grabbing Adam's sword as well as his own to use for later. And then he left, leaving Adam's dead body and the little smiley face for anyone that wandered across to see.

——————

Geno muffled a little giggle as he heard a shriek, followed by the sound of someone frantically running for their lives. Leaves and twigs were trampled as a boy stumbled into the clearing, sweat pouring down his face and his eyes wide with fear.

Behind him, the cloaked figure of Reaper slipped into sight, his permanent grin wider than ever upon hearing the victims screams.

Geno smiled softly, nibbling at his thumb a bit as the kid scrambled closer to his very position. At the moment, he was perched on top of a branch, his free hand curled around a spindly twig for support as he waited for his partner to push the kid closer to him. His red scarf lay limp around his neck, the wind having stopped suddenly. It was in tatters, the once rich red fabric already stained brown with blood and torn by branches and tributes. But Reaper had said he liked it. He said it had given him a more threatening look. So he kept it like that.

He watched keenly as the boy scrambled closer almost right beneath him. A laugh escaped his lips and the boy tripped, looking up in fear to see the skeleton drop from the tree and land right on top of him.

His feet collided squarely with the boy's back, a sickening crack ringing out as he shoved him down to the ground. His hand gripped onto the boy's hair and slammed his face into the soil to muffle his incredibly loud screams.

Humming softly, he gave a wide grin as his partner stepped into sight, his giant scythe being dragged through the ground behind him.

"What a good boy you are Geno~" He purred, dragging a finger up the smaller's throat so he'd look at him before letting him go.

He shivered, biting his bottom 'lip' and watching as Reaper circled their victim. The dark skeleton looked threatening before they'd gone to the arena, but now they were in it, just call him the God of Death.

"L-Let me go!" The boy yelled, thrashing and twisting beneath him despite his damaged spine. "Get off me!"

"But I don't want to." Geno pouted, letting out a little string of giggles afterwards. "Watching you struggle is fun~"

Reaper gave a low chuckle, his scythe glinting as he gently pressed the tip of it against the boy's neck. "If you knew your place you'd stop talking right now."

The boy whimpered, clamping his mouth shut and squeezing his eyes closed. His scraped fingers clawed into the grounds, pulling up dirt, leaves and little twigs.

Geno looked up at his partner he clicked his fingers, watching as he pointed at the floor by his side. Keeping his head down he stood up on the boy's back, another grinding crack ringing out. Then he stepped down onto the soil, his bare feet sinking into all the moist dead leaves.

He'd lost his shoes in a scramble with one of the boy's from district nine at the start of the games. They'd tackled him down and for some odd reason, wrestled his shoes off of him. Maybe it was because they knew that the floor of the arena would be full of unsuspecting poisonous plants and creatures that could nip, stab or bite at his feet and possibly infect him. But he'd been alright so far. Let's hope he kept the good luck up.

Reaper grinned and stepped over to the crying boy, his scythe raised over his head.

Geno stared down at his feet, smiling softly to himself as the sound of the blade swinging rang out and the boy's scream was cut off suddenly.

——————

"I know someone is here! Just come out and show yourself, coward!" Error growled, his grip on his metal tipped spear sweeping through the bushes and undergrowth.

No answer came from the forest around him and he hissed under his breath, eyes narrowing. Someone was here. He knew it. He'd seen movement around here five minutes ago and had immediately rushed over to kill whoever was hiding. But for whatever reason, he couldn't find them anywhere. It was like they'd disappeared. And it wasn't like they could have ran away, that would have made far too much noise.

He stabbed the spear into the side of a tree in anger, yelling. He hadn't expected the tree to yelp.

Before he could even process what had happened a figure had lunged from the tree, their hands digging into his shoulders and shoving him back.

Error overbalanced and fell, struggling under his attacker's grip as the two of them rolled down a little slope clawing and hitting at each other. Somewhere down the fall Error lost grip on his spear, the weapon now useless as his fingers scrabbled in the dirt.

The stranger shoved their thumbs into his eye sockets, sending a flashing pain through Error's body and his vision being obscured.

The dark skeleton lashed out in response, feeling a crunch as his fist connected with their jaw.

The tangle of bodies eventually reached the bottom of the ditch, no longer rolling. Almost as soon as they'd lost momentum Error felt their hands grip onto his shoulders again and his back was slammed into the ground, his skull doing the same and instantly sending stars through his vision. He weakly kicked and struggled, but the person above him simply pressed a blade against his neck.

Error froze, his struggles reducing to nothing as he felt the cold sting of the metal blade press against his throat. His vision was still black and clouded, but he could make out the blurry outline of his attacker above him.

They stared down at him, a sneer forming on their face. "Error from district three, huh? I must say you don't look very high up when you're under me like this."

He let out a growl, alarm bells ringing in his skull. He recognised that voice, but who was it?

"Not going to say anything? I was expecting you to be half way through a goodbye speech by now." The person above him laughed, pressing the blade against his neck harder.

"W-Wait!" Error gasped and forced himself not to swallow. He froze a bit as he felt his fingers curl around something long and hard, it's surface smooth. His spear!

The attacker paused, raising a brow. "What? Decided you actually have a speech for me?"

"No-" He gritted his teeth, making sure his grip on what he hoped was his spear was tight. "But I do have something."

"And What is that?" They narrowed their eyes, readjusting their fingers on the hilt of their knife.

"This!" Error grunted and swung the spear up, listening to the loud crack that rang out as he did so.

His attacker cried out and fell to the side, slumping into the soil and clutching their skull in pain. Their knife lay dropped on the floor, it's blade dripping with red.

He sat up quickly, one hand wiping at his slightly bleeding neck while the other pointed his spear at his attacker. He panted softly, his vision slowly going back to normal as he glared at the groaning figure.

And then he recognised them. It was the boy from District Five. Ink.

——————

"Don't leave my side, okay?"

"Okay..." Blue gripped tightly onto Dust's hoodie sleeve as the two of them trekked through the creepy forest.

"If I tell you to do something, you do it. Got that?" He glanced down at the smaller momentarily and frowned.

He nodded softly, biting his lip and glancing around as if someone would lunge out at them from nowhere. "I-I will, Dust."

"Good." He muttered, glaring at their surroundings distastefully. It was clear he didn't like the forest surroundings. He'd hoped for an arena more rocky and mountain like. Or maybe even a desert like arena where it would be easy to see where everyone was hiding. Not this bullshit forest where people could be hiding all around them and they wouldn't notice until a sword got shoved through their chest.

He hadn't planned on taking Blue with him. He'd barely interacted with the smaller while in the Capital, apart from the odd conversation. Blue had tried to spark a conversation hundreds of times with the taller only to get a grunt or a mumbled answer in response. Sometimes even no response at all. Eventually his efforts died down and he just let the moody skeleton do his own thing while making friends with their female mentors and relatively nice stylists.

"Dust." The smaller said suddenly, catching the older skeletons attention.

"Hm?"

The smaller pointed shakily at a bush, his eyes wide and pupils shaking.

Dust blinked rapidly and looked over at where Blue was looking an eyebrow raised. "Uh, I don't see anythi--"

As soon as he tried to finish that sentence a spear thrust from the bushes, it's barbed tip just brushing Dust's cheek as he lunged to the side.

Blue cried out in fear and stumbled back as a figure emerged from the bushes, a knife gripped in each hand.

It was a girl, one of the ones from District Seven. Her usually clean blond hair was looking a bit knotty, hanging in wisps over her green eyes.

Dust gripped onto the sword in his right hand, swinging it up to collide with a flying knife. "Blue! Run!"

"B-But you said not t-to leave your side!" He shook his head, hiding behind a tree and watching with terrified eyes.

"I know what I said!" He yelled before letting out a grunt as he was tackled to the floor. "But forget it and run! NOW!"

Blue whimpered and didn't move for another few seconds before he tore himself away from the tree and forced himself to run away as fast as he could.

He stumbled over roots and twigs, pressing his hands over his non-existent ears as the sound of muffled yells and screams rang out behind him.

"Oh god Dust, p-please be okay. J-Just please be okay!"

——————

"I'll be back in like ten minutes, okay Abi?" Dream called, taking two of their water bottles in his hands and slinging his bow and quiver over his shoulder.

Abi raised an arm in acknowledgement, rooting through all the crates stacked at the top of the pile of supplies, hair falling over her face.

He nodded to himself and walked off in the direction of the small stream that he knew was a few metres away from the arena centre. Don't ask how, he just knew. Pushing through the leaves and foliage he continued onwards for around five minutes before he found the stream.

It was pathetic really, barely having enough water to fill their two water bottles. Even so he crouched down by the banks and dipped the first bottle in, cringing at how a few flicks of dirt and moss slipped in with the cloudy water. Maybe the gamekeepers made this water poisonous? He personally didn't think their would, but he'd make Abi check first just in case. Yeah, great guy, I know.

But then the sound of a twig snapping made him stop. His head whipped upwards and within a second he'd dropped the water bottles and drawn his bow, an arrow notched to the string and pulled back taunt.

A person stood on the other side of the stream, hands in the air in surrender, frozen. Their eyes were wide, but expression calm. It was the boy that irritated him so much. Killer.

The two stood there frozen, staring at each other. Neither of them moved. And for whatever reason, Dream didn't shoot. He kept the arrow pointed right at his chest, but didn't actually fire it.

Killer blinked rapidly and decided to take a risk, slowly crouching down with his own water bottle in his hand. He kept his eyes fixated on the arrow, which followed his movements and stayed continuously trained at his chest. Biting his 'lip' softly he slowly filled his water bottle to the brim before easing himself up to a standing position again.

Dream continued to stare at him, not sure for the life of him why he wasn't just shooting this guy. It would be an extra kill for the sponsors to love, and it would be a seriously annoying pest gone from his life. Yet he didn't shoot. Not even as Killer suddenly booked it and sprinted off into the bushes, gone in seconds.

He sat there dumbly, slowly lowering his bow. He was aware of the sound of someone coming up behind him, and then a hand resting on his shoulder.

"Dream, are you okay?" Abi asked, picking up their discarded water bottles. "Did you see someone?"

Dream blinked rapidly and shook his head, sliding the arrow back into his quiver. "No... I, no. It was nothing."

————————————————————————

2,448 words wow

Thought you'd like to see how the others are doing rn :3

And if you're wondering about Dream and Killer, they get a whole chapter to themselves later in the book. (A while later) and the others not so much so idk

uwu

Which one did you liek the most?

Nightmare's was the shortest, but I liked his. Though Ink and Error's was my favourite to write :DDD

-Jess-