Day One

Rosemary

Straight in front of Rosemary, surrounded by twenty-four Tributes, was the Cornucopia. Its dark metal was dusted with bright white snow, icicles were formed in the mouth of it, and a sheet of thin ice covered the sides. It was so bright from the snow that it was hard to see into the Cornucopia where the weapons would be but as her eyes adjusted to the light, she spotted numerous plastic bins, backpacks, small containers, tarps, and even some errant weapons that were strategically spread around so Tributes wouldn't have to go into the ground zero of the blood bath and could, at least, get a supply or two before they booked it.

The timer that projected off the Cornucopia started counting down at sixty seconds.

59...58...57...

With the Cornucopia sized up, Rosemary took a few seconds to look around the arena. All around her was snow, at least a foot deep and fresh. It was cold but there was something about it that let her know that it was very obviously man-made. Maybe it was the texture?

The further away from the Cornucopia, the deeper the snow went, forming into large banks that merged into a huge range of mountains, just as snowy as the rest of the arena. There was a small pond on the opposite side of the mountains, covered in thick ice, and then huge evergreen trees covered the rest of the arena, the north and south sides of the Cornucopia.

45...44...43...

Careful not to move around too much, Rosemary looked for Rye. She quickly realized that he was nowhere near her when she saw that the boy from District 3 was on her left and the girl from District 10 was on her right. In fact, he wasn't even a few people down from her. He was on the exact opposite side of the circle. She couldn't even meet his eyes because he was so far away, so she desperately hoped that he could at least see where she was.

38...37...36...

"Don't move!" she heard Benji from Three yell desperately from her left. At first she thought he was talking to her, but quickly realized that the boy on his other side had wobbled dangerously. She automatically closed her eyes and inhaled, not wanting to see what happened if he fell.

For the sixty seconds until countdown ended, all Tributes had to stand still on their metal pedestals. If one of them stepped off before the gong released them, land mines would blow up around them. That Tribute would usually die immediately but the unfortunate souls next to them sometimes got hit, too, and suffered until the bloodbath was over and the Careers realized that they were still alive. A similar scenario happened two, maybe three years before. It was so bloody that Rosemary had run straight for the bathroom and thrown up.

Luckily, it seemed that the boy didn't fall, which Rosemary considered a good thing. She didn't want to be around when Benji was killed, he reminded her too much of Peeta and she already had one brother to worry about in the arena.

25...24...23...

Rosemary's brown eyes went back to the Cornucopia and the supplies surrounding it. She spied a medium-sized backpack about two hundred feet away from her, a few feet short of the Cornucopia, that was unfortunately, the closest thing near her that wasn't a tarp and flashlight.

Why anyone would want a flashlight was beyond her, it would give away their position if used.

She'd grab one of the tarps on the way to the backpack, she decided. Then, if everything went okay and no one had spotted her, she'd continue onto the Cornucopia to meet up with Rye.

For a second, she spotted a shovel near the backpack and considered its reason for being there. To shovel the snow? Yes, it could be used. How would it be useful, though? Maybe they had to dig for water? If the shovel had a more narrow blade, it could be used to dig up the mines fused to their pedestals. Someone with a basic knowledge of technology could rewire those and use them as weapons–at least, she thought they could. From the couple of books she'd read on landmines, especially the ones produced in Three, it seemed straightforward and easy. She was sure that Benji could do it, being from Three, and if he couldn't, his district partner could.

17...16...15...

She disregarded the shovel for now. She inhaled and exhaled deeply, trying to calm down her nerves and rely on her survival instinct. She knew from experience with her mother that she had some, she just didn't know what it could do up against someone actually trying to kill her.

8...7...6...

She bent her knees and leaned forward, settling into a running position that Rye had shown her one day during all-school gym. It gave her leverage to take off, and then the power to keep going.

5...4...3...

This was it.

2...1..

The gong went off and Rosemary jumped off her pedestal. In her preparation to run, she had forgotten the foot-deep snow and immediately almost fell face-first into it. Stumbling a bit, she straightened herself and started lifting her knees higher so she could somewhat run in the snow. Really, it was more like a fast walk. At least everyone else was going just as slow.

By far, she was not the first one to pick up supplies. She made it to the tarp after fifteen seconds and scooped it up, loosely looping it through one of the straps on her forearms. She kept running toward the backpack, breathing hard from the exertion she was using to run in snow and the cold air, and was only an estimated five feet away when she was tackled.

The air left Rosemary's chest as she was thrown into the snow, sinking a couple of inches into it. Biff, from District 1, was on her right away with no weapon in hand. Unfortunately, he didn't really need one; he clenched his fist and swung right at her face, hitting her on the forehead only an inch away from her temple. A flash of horrible, white hot pain spread across her forehead and up around the crown of her head before coming to a sharp point to her nearest temple.

"Fuckkkkk..."

Literally within the first minute of the Games and she was going out. It had to be some sort of joke because, honestly, she didn't even remember seeing Biff by her!

Blood gushed from the wound on her forehead and when she peered up at Biff through the blood, she was pretty sure he spit on her?

Rage brewed in her belly and immediately she struck her hand out, curled her fingers and drug her nails down his face. It was surprising what a little force behind a scratch could do because he screamed, now just as bloody as Rosemary, and scrambled to grab her hands.

"Stupid bitch!" he groaned as she fought back. She was sure that on camera, the Capitol thought that they were just slapping each other like they were little kids who stole each others' pencil.

If she was Rye, she would have said something funny or witty, but only he would think of something so hilarious when he was seconds away from death. Rosemary knew thousands of words but she could simply not use her brain power to string together a sentence, let along a funny one-liner, when she was in the position she was in.

Then, our of nowhere, Biff was tackled off of Rosemary. She looked around for a second, thinking that maybe Rye had come to her rescue, but it wasn't him. Cain, from District 9, had gotten Biff off of her and was trying to stab him with a paring knife.

The blade was too short, he was never going to be able to stab Biff.

Unfortunately, as much as she was thankful for Cain saving her from Biff, she was not going to stick around to find out what happened. She scrambled to her feet, almost slipping when her boots hadn't caught traction, and pushed herself toward the backpack she had been originally going for.

She grabbed the bag and threw it over her shoulder, but paused for a second to look around for Rye. He was nowhere near her. He was either in the mouth of the Cornucopia looking for weapons, he was getting to the Cornucopia, or worst case scenario, he was already dead.

The last action didn't seem likely and when she heard a laugh that sounded remarkably like her brother's, she sighed in relief.

A scream from behind her caught her attention; she turned just in time to see that Biff had stolen Cain's knife and was slitting his throat. Blood spewed from the cut on Cain's neck, painting the snow red, and Cain dropped, landing on his stomach.

Biff didn't waste time lamenting over Cain. He looked straight at her and when they made eye contact, she started running as fast as she could toward the woods. She was hoping that he wouldn't follow her since he was a Career and statistically, he'd stay and kill more in the bloodbath. Fortunately, she had guessed right and was able to reach the edge of the trees with no problem.

Blood now obscured her whole left eye and her right eye was starting to overcompensate for lack of vision on the other side, blinking rapidly. She had turned to look for Rye once more, but she couldn't see anything, let alone two hundred feet away.

"I'll find you, Rye," she whispered and entered the woods, ignoring the cries and screams that she left behind with her brother.

-

Day One

Rye

Rye's start into the snow had tripped him up completely. He fell and he sank so far into the snow that he had a hard time getting up out of it. He pushed himself and did it anyway, finding that he lost fifteen seconds to the whole debacle. His long legs worked in his favor as he could maneuver through the snow pretty easily compared to most of the other Tributes, and he arrived at the Cornucopia at the same time as Xavier, who had been six people to the left of him.

Rye didn't think Xavier was going to kill him, but just in case, he watched him wearily as he went through the mouth of the Cornucopia, looking for his weapon. He picked up a few knives, slipped then in the straps around his thighs, and then laughed in excitement when he saw the bystaff a few feet away from him, leaning against a rack of spears.

He rushed toward the rack and was able to wrap his fingers around the staff just as he turned and slammed it into the person who had been sneaking up behind him. Dean, the girl from Ten, had tried to grab him, her district partner right behind him. Dean went down like a sack of potatoes and he knew she was dead before he had even started toward Rocky.

Rye's heart clenched when Rocky screamed, but he continued with his pursuit. He clicked on a notch in the staff and let the blade fall from the bottom end. He jumped and tackled Rocky's feet. He miscalculated his jump, but it didn't matter much. He brought down the end of his staff and plunged it into his back. Rocky screamed again and tears welled up in Rye's eyes.

"I'm so sorry, dude," he stabbed him again, delivering the killing blow so he wouldn't suffer. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

He climbed off Rocky's body, hands covered in warm blood, and whipped around in all directions, looking for Rose. He saw a lot of Tributes fighting, the Careers mainly winning, but more than half were running off toward the woods. He didn't see Rose, so he assumed she couldn't find him and fled for the woods. She would do that if she was in trouble, he decided.

I'll find her tomorrow, he assured himself. He made sure that no one was coming for him before scooping up a small backpack from nearby and booking it away from the Cornucopia. He went for the mountains, as most of the other Tributes went for the one of the two groves of trees.

He survived the bloodbath. Now, he had to find water and Rosemary. In that order.

A cannon went off, implying that the bloodbath was already over.

That was short, he looked around suspiciously. Bloodbaths usually took an hour at least. It had only been twenty to thirty minutes at the very most.

Boom!

In total, there were only six cannons. That was not enough Tributes killed off in the bloodbath and he knew that the Capitol was going to hate that. While the audience might have thought it boring that only six died in the beginning, this made it harder for Rye, Rosemary, and most of the other Tributes. They were all depending on the bloodbath to take at least ten of them.

There were eighteen Tributes left.

-

He had been walking for an hour or two when he ran into another Tribute. It was one of the younger ones, maybe the 14-year-old from Six? The girl, what was her name?

Whatever her name was didn't matter, exactly. She was staring up at him with wide, pale green eyes. Her blonde hair was darker than Rose's, and much longer. She was tall but very petite, he was sure he could wrap his hand around her waist and touch fingers. There was blood smeared on her neck and she had her hand pressed against her side.

He didn't want to kill her. He didn't want to kill anyone, but the Games had already changed him, just like he was scared of happening.

The girl must have seen softness in his eyes because she let her guard down and winced. She leaned on one leg more than the other and when he got a closer look, there were claw marks around her ankle.

"What happened to you?"

"Some kind of mutt," she groaned. "That stupid Career from Four got me in the side and I guess the mutt was attracted to my blood. It bit my ankle, but I ended up killing it."

She showed him her knife, pulling it out of the strap on her uninjured leg to show him. There was black blood still on the blade.

What the fuck bleeds black blood?

"It looked like a squirrel–woah!" she didn't finish her sentence before she swayed and hit the ground before Rye could catch her. "Shit. I think..." she winced as tears slipped from her eyes. Now that Rye was closer to her, kneeling in front of her to try to help her up, he saw that she had blood coming out of her mouth. "I think it's my side. It's...the pain's going away."

"That's not good," Rye whispered. He didn't know what to do here. He didn't have the emotional vulnerability to be with her while she died, not when he was still in survival mood. And he certainly didn't want to kill her himself. "What are you going to do?"

He felt absolutely...clueless.

"I was gonna ask you to finish me off, but I changed my mind," she eyed him, almost judgmentally, which made him chuckle.

"Yeah, why's that, princess?"

"Because you're shaking," she nodded at his hands where he held his staff, his fingers shaking around the grip. "And I don't want to draw it out, ya know?"

"Yeah, I get that," Rye nodded and stood up. "Honestly, I didn't really want to anyway, so no hard feelings or anything."

"Oh great, I was afraid of hurting your feelings."

Rye laughed again, still quiet and conscious about not giving away his location. "You are funny. You remind me of my girlfriend."

This girl acted more like Kline's sister than Delly did, they were so alike.

"Ew," the girl wrinkled her nose. "Look I'm not Caesar, I don't wanna hear about your love life."

"Totally valid, especially since you're on death's door and all."

She laughed breathlessly, her face deathly pale. "Get outta here."

Rye nodded and started walking away. He stopped when she called his name.

"Rye."

He turned. "Yeah?"

"Win this thing, okay?"

Rye just gave her a closed mouth smile, not about to tell her about how torn he was feeling about whether or not he or Rose were going to make it out of the arena. One, that was deep, deep stuff that no one else needed to know about. Two, she was literally dying. Three, she was presently waiting for him to leave so she could off herself.

"Rest easy, Six."

The girl nodded and Rye walked away. He would say he was about two hundred feet out when the cannon boomed. He didn't stop walking but he did press the three middle fingers of his right hand to his lips and held it to the sky, saluting the girl from Three who was brave enough to end her life on her own terms.

-

Night One

Rosemary

There had been one cannon since it initially fired after the bloodbath. The thought that maybe it was Rye nagged at her brain, but she had to keep walking. The woods were huge and though the snow wasn't as deep under the trees, there was still so much further to go. She had climbed one of the trees and tried to get a good lookout, but they were so tall and sappy, and the branches would hold anyone's weight. Her best guess was that she was a mile or two out from where the woods and mountains touched and so far, she was unsure if she should just get to the mountain or stay in the woods overnight.

She'd been unsuccessful in her attempt to find water so far, but she wasn't dehydrated yet. Rosemary's first thought had been to eat the snow, but she licked her finger, dipped her finger into the snow, and tasted it. It somehow tasted like salt and plastic at the same time. The snow would give no one relief as far as dehydration went.

Rosemary was tired. Her calves ached from the very slight incline she'd been walking for the past two miles she'd already journeyed through, and the new boots were giving her blisters. Temperature-wise, she felt good. The white jumpsuit was well insulated and she hadn't gotten too sweaty from exertion, as it seemed her long-sleeve shirt and leggings were moisture-wicking. Her forehead was giving her the most trouble so far, other than lack of water.

The wound above her eyebrow had finally stopped bleeding, clotting naturally, but the congealed blob that acted as a scab itched like crazy. She really just wanted to pick it, but then she'd bleed again and it took a lot of snow to clean the blood off of her jumpsuit and face. The snow may not have been made out of water, but it was made out of some liquid and it could be used for some things. The impact from the punch hurt more than the cut, anyway. Her head pounded like she had a migraine and honestly, she was afraid if she slept, she wouldn't wake up.

And Rosemary was so very tired.

Panem's anthem started blaring through the arena, signaling the end of Day One. Rosemary stopped walking and leaned against a tree, watching as the Capitol's seal lit up the sky, projected from a drone that the Gamemakers controlled. The anthem faded away and the sky went dark for a moment.

If they had been watching the Games from home, they would see a replay of highlights from the day. Each and every Tribute's death was rewatched painstakingly by the country, including their poor families, but the Tributes in the arena were not. The Gamemakers thought it would give them an advantage to see who killed who and how.

In the arena, the only thing the Tributes saw were the portraits of the Tributes who died, the same ones they featured when showing their training score. Instead of a score now, they just had district numbers. No names. If the Gamemakers put a name they were afraid people would get too attached.

The first Tribute shown was from District 5, so that meant every single Career was still alive.

"Barth," Rosemary whispered. "Bearded man."

Then both Tributes from District 6.

"Rain, abundant blessing from above. Uma, tranquility."

Rosemary's eyes stung when Cain's portrait was shown next. "Cain, acquired."

Both Tributes from District 10 were dead as well. "Rocky, rest. Dean, valley."

Last was Jesi, from District 11. "Jesi, gracious."

There were seven gone. As the anthem faded out again and the projection disappeared, Rosemary kissed her middle fingers on her right hand and raised them to the sky, saluting the fallen.

Darkness fell still and it was unsettling. There were no stars, no moon.

It's been a long day, she sighed mentally.

Now, she needed to go through her backpack.