Jada Quinton's P.O.V. (D5)

Geo, Clark, and I push through the dense network of jungle plants and trees with Geo leading the way so he can cut through the vines with his dagger. We decided to try to get to the other side of the island because I don't think any of the other tributes are there. I know that the tributes from Three and the boy from Four have settled down on the beach that is facing the cornucopia, so we are going for the other side of the island. I don't know where most of the other tributes are hanging out. Obviously the Careers are still at the cornucopia for the time being, there's some tributes on the beach, then there's the tributes from Eight and Twelve that are unaccounted for. Also the siblings from Seven. I haven't seen them at all, so I wonder where they've got to?

Geo suddenly stops walking and I hit the brakes just in time to not crash into him. He glances back at us and points through a huge leaf in front of him. Before I even look, I hear voices coming from the other side of the plant. The voices are whispering though, so they must've heard us.

Suddenly, Clark shouts out something before being dragged to the ground. Geo instantly reacts, charging at the person with his dagger. I identify the person to be Wesley when I see the number '12' printed on a grey stripe on his jacket's sleeve. Geo shoves him away from Clark violently and starts pushing for us to run.

Geo doesn't need to tell us twice. The second after he says it, Clark and I start booking it to the beach, Geo following closely. I hear the other tributes shouting behind us, but I don't turn back, that is...until Geo screams. I halt in my steps and quickly turn around, immediately noticing the arrow in Geo's right elbow. It went the whole way through, and blood is already dripping from the tips of his fingers as he quickly gets back on his feet.

"Go, just go!" he shouts as he snatches my arm and continues running, "We've gotta get out of here!"

Two more arrows whiz past us as we dodge through the vines and plants. The beach is so close, probably twenty feet away. At this point, they don't even appear to be firing anymore, but we don't slow down. And finally, we reach the beach safely.

Fynn Salasi's P.O.V. (D7)

"What...happened?" Ace asks the two girls standing on the edge of the island, dripping with water.

They returned from their little trip to the island just a little while ago, but they're one short, so Ace is demanding explanations. He also appears to be concerned about Elsa's hand injury, but he wants to know the story about Gwen first.

"We were unprepared, okay!" Elsa shoots back at him as she stomps into the horn, "Thanks to you deciding not to come. Maybe if you did, Gwen would still be here!"

"I thought you didn't like her anyways..." Ace points out, "So why do you seem angrier about this than me?"

"Because I should've paid better attention to her! I was responsible, not you, because you weren't there! So now it's my fault that we're a man down! How do you expect me to feel about that, Ace?" Elsa says as she wraps herself in a towel and digs through a bin for something.

Ace looks offended, "Oh, so you're blaming me for not going? You're just trying to make it seem like my fault so you can stop thinking of it as your fault, huh? Elsa...you don't need to do that. It wasn't your fault, okay? Gwen was the one who went in and chose the wrong opponent. You told me that you were fighting two of the others, so there was nothing you could do. It was four of them against three of you. We need to expect losses in the Hunger Games and just deal with it when they come. If we waste time guilt-tripping ourselves about them, we'll lose our game and drop our guards. Just let it go..."

Elsa gnaws her lip a moment before finally letting out a sigh, "Okay, you're right. We can't let our guards down. We need to keep our game up...and we need to fix my hand."

Ace chuckles a little as he grabs a first-aid kit. As he works on her hand, Elsa explains that Steve had crushed it with his mace. She also tells us that Harper has a trident, and can fight proficiently with it, and Janice has a sword, which she doesn't use very well. She also says that Myx was there, but then she frowns and looks at Kara.

"Weren't you fighting with her, Kara? What weapons does she have?" Elsa asks.

Kara smirks, sending chills down my spine. For someone of her age, what she says next is quite disturbing.

"She doesn't have any weapons, cause she's dead," she says with a smile, "She was an easy kill, and I took my time."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask and she snaps her head towards me, narrowing her eyes to slits and smirking again.

"It means...that I didn't make it a quick death. And if you have a problem with that, I can happily do the same thing to you...or rather, your sister..." Kara glances at Scarlett and I clench my jaw and rest a hand on my axe handle.

"If you so much as touch her, I will not hesitate to put this through your head," I say as I shake my axe for emphasis on my warning.

Kara pretends to look horrified and raises her hands mockingly, "Oh, I feel so threatened! What a terrible thing!"

"You-" I take a step towards Kara, but Ace jumps in the way immediately.

"Okay, that's enough! It would be nice to keep this alliance together just for a little while, you know? We just lost one, so it would be fantastic if we didn't go killing each other off, right?" he reasons, but I can see Kara smiling at me from behind him. I glare at her, but Ace speaks up, "Are we clear, you two?"

"Crystal," I reply, breaking my glare away from Kara.

"And as for you," Ace turns, pointing at Kara, "I don't want to see you starting anymore arguments around here, you got that? Soon enough, you'll have the whole alliance against you, so you better watch it!"

Kara just rolls her eyes and mutters "whatever" under her breath as Ace returns to Elsa to finish bandaging her hand.

I just let out an irritated breath and walk out of the horn to get some space.

Stephen Refiek's P.O.V. (D3)

We all sit on the beach, facing the cornucopia island. Janice is sharpening her sword on a rock while I grab handfuls of sand and let it filter through my fingers back to the ground. Harper is just staring intently in the direction of the cornucopia. He looks like he's trying to concentrate on something. Whatever it is he's thinking about, I probably don't like it, because it's probably some plan about going to the Careers to kill Kara or something stupid like that. He was pretty mad that we stopped him from going after Elsa and Kara earlier. I can't understand why he would want to go to the cornucopia though. I mean, that's suicide. It's five of them over there, and only one of him. I should talk some sense into him before it's too late.

"Harper," I start, and he nods to inform me that I have his attention, "You can't be thinking about going to the Careers. It's craziness."

He rolls his eyes and shakes his head slightly, "What I do isn't your business, Steve, and I'd appreciate that you keep your nose out of it. All you need to know is that everything I do in this arena is to help you guys."

"Why?"

"Cause you're my friends, and I want you to be safe and make it as far as you can. Maybe one of us will even win," he says, shrugging his shoulder.

"That's so sweet, Harper," Janice says as she places her sword on the sand, "But you don't need to take unnecessary risks for us. And definitely don't sacrifice yourself to the Careers. You're a friend to us too, and friends stick together."

Harper just nods and glances at us before returning his gaze to the cornucopia. Janice and I both look at each other, and I nod towards another part of the beach. She gets the message and we both stand up and walk away from Harper, leaving our weapons behind with him.

"We've got to do something!" I whisper once we're out of hearing distance.

"I know! He's obviously going to go to the cornucopia at some point, but the question is, when?" Janice says as she glances back at Harper.

"He's crazy! I don't understand why he would go. It's like he wants to prove himself or something..."

"Or..." Janice says seriously, "What if he plans on taking out as many of them as possible? He did say that everything he does in the arena is to help us. So what if he thinks he's helping us by killing as many tributes as he can? It would get us closer to winning..."

"That can't be it..." I shake my head, "I wish he wasn't the way he is. He seems really set on going. We'll have to get him on the move. He'll probably try to do it during the night, so if he offers to take watch, one of us should also stay up and wake up the other when he leaves. Hopefully, we can stop him then, since we can't seem to talk him out of it now."

"Okay...so I guess we wait until tonight, then," Janice shrugs and starts walking back to Harper.

"Yeah."

~~~~~

Hello!!! Miss me? I apologize for writing such a boring chapter and taking so long about it, BUT I have a really good excuse for taking so long to update. I have had pneumonia for the past two weeks and I've been doing basically nothing but coughing and sleeping. FUN!!! (I'm totally kidding. It's not fun) But anyways, I haven't exactly had the time to get on Wattpad until today and yesterday! No need to worry though, because updates will probably start coming at a reasonable pace again because all I have is a head cold now! Yayyyyyy...

Next few chapters should hopefully turn out more exciting than this one, so that's something for you to look forward to!

Also, happy early Christmas!!! Wooohooooo! So excited!

Okay I should probs stop writing this a/n cuz it's gonna turn out to be longer than the actual chapter soon so bye!!!! Have a wonderful day...or night...or evening...or whatever time it is!!!

~MK out.