Hunger Games (DNF)

Part 2, Chapter 25: The Tribute Prison

I just want to show you guys the map of Panem I have been working with since it's layout hasn't really been confirmed.

Just imagine 12 and 13 looking like a bomb site and you're about good.

Sorry for the late upload but thank you guys so much for 25k followers.

Still do not deserve it and I will kill off Gogy if you argue.

And Ezra has been sick all week, it's hilarious.
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Clay POV.

This place was a prison. There was no other word for it. Sure we got relatively warm clothes to wear, that had our district numbers on them, and we got a lot of food and water, but other than that, prison.

Looking around as I ate at all the other tributes I kept note of who was left. Both boys from District 1, 5, 8, and 11 were dead. One boy from District 2 died in the arena and the other apparently was killed for resisting peacekeepers. One boy from 3 was dead with the other missing. And one boy was dead from 6, 7, 9, and 10.

That left 6 of us, and George. All of us were scattered around 4 tables. The boy from 6 and the boy from 10 were both at their own tables, and I was at my own too. Nick and 2 other boys he had met in the arena were all sitting together talking quietly while feeling very awkward.

My best friend's eyes kept glancing over at me, which I ignored. Instead, I just sat quietly and ate the food that was sitting on the plate in front of me. There was a loaf of bread from my district, fish shaped, salty, and made with seaweed, making it slightly green. Beside it was a meaty bowl of soup, and a plastic bottle of water.

I kept focused on the metal table I was sitting at, this was the same sort of meal I typically had at home. Fish, soup made by my mother, and then a drink. What was my family doing now? I wondered.

Maybe my mother had been sent back to work, helping to get ships ready to go out to sea, and Drista would have returned to school. Or maybe they were mourning me, thinking I was dead. For all I know the gamemakers and Capitol may have already told everyone that the tributes were all executed.

The tributes have only had each other for company for the past 2 weeks that we have spent here. But we do see the peacekeepers which are constantly on guard, and the avoxes which serve and clean up our food between meals and occasionally bring us new clean clothes.

Game makers also came by, mainly the head game maker, who I was told was named Sam, not that I cared. He always seemed to be watching me more intently than the others as we all sat in different corners quietly.

One interesting occurrence was when some mentors came into the room. Techno, my mentor, along with some others who have won in recent years, both male and female, came into the room and started arguing with the game makers to give us better treatment.

Eventually they were dragged out by peacekeepers and we haven’t seen them here since. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sam or President Schlatt ordered them to be killed, since both of them seemed on edge.

And yes, Panem’s great president Schlatt came here. He was looking for the head gamer who was currently in our prison-like home, and yelled at him for not having found George yet. That’s a relief at least. And all of the tributes seemed to enjoy watching the game maker getting verbally abused.

For the past 2 weeks we had been living by the same schedule, get woken up at 6am and taken for a shower one at a time, while having to stay in our rooms before and after our showers. Then at 7 we get led into the relatively small main room and eat breakfast before being allowed to sit there for 5 hours until lunch.

We eat, then get locked back in our rooms during the afternoon but get let out again at dinner to use the bathroom if we need, and have dinner. Then we get sent back to our rooms and stay there from 7pm to 6 the following morning.

Just thinking about it made me want to kill myself. And right on cue a peacekeeper came into the room and got us to stand up. The 6 of us got sent to our homely little cells and I have the second door on the right. They organise us by district. Nick is 1st on the right, I’m 2nd. The redhead boy from 6 is 3rd on the right and opposite us are Nick’s 2 friends and the boy from 10.

These cells were quite plain, a little window to let us see into the outside world, but be separated by glass and some metal bars. The rest of the room was only white, the bed and bed sheets were white, the walls were white, the floor was white. You get the point.

We all knew by now that there were cameras in here, but they didn’t record audio, and the peacekeepers didn’t guard right outside our homely little prison cells. We often could talk to the people in the rooms directly next to us.

I didn’t bother going over to the bed, instead heading to the shared wall between my room and Nick’s, and leaning against it. For a few moments I just sat there, before hearing the noise of someone sitting down on the other side of the wall.

“Clay?” the tentative voice of my best friend could be heard through the wall. I gave a hum of confirmation and so he continued. “I’m sorry about George…” he muttered quietly, as though it was his fault.
“Don’t be,” was my stone faced response. “You said it yourself. I can’t fall in love with him. I did, and now look where we are… you were right.”

Nick went silent, the atmosphere between us was awkward and in the silence I started to cry, worrying about George. “Fuck… Nick, this is all my fault. If I hadn’t killed his district partner he wouldn’t have run off and now he’s gonna die… and it’s all my fault…”

I buried my head in my hands feeling ashamed of myself. You could hear him sigh from through the wall. “Clay. It’s not your fault. He could get away. You scaring him away might have gotten him his freedom. If you hadn’t, him, you, me, and a bunch of the other people here would all probably be dead. Thanks to you… even if it was in a terrible way, he is free…”

Nick was an idiot most of the time… but he did have a point. We probably would have all been killed by those mutts or each other. One of us would be here having a final interview in the Capitol, or heading back to their District.

“...and soon we will be too…” my ears perked up at that.
“Nick… what are you talking about?” I asked, turning my head slightly and pressing my ear against the wall so I could hear him better.
“Karl, Alex, and I have been talking about escaping…” he replied, lowering his voice so I could barely hear it.
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1249 words.

Spoiler alert they all die escaping.

/j (maybe)