The Name of the Game I Finnick Odair

The Arena

"Ladies and gentlemen, let the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games begin!" the voice of Claudius Templesmith, the Hunger Games announcer, hammered through Kenzie's ears.

She had less than a minute to get to her bearings. Kenzie blinked and forced her eyes to adjust to the bright light. When she saw the arena she grinned in delight. Blue water, pink sky, white hot sun beating down on her. She turned to look at where her front was facing and saw the Cornucopia. This year the Cornucopia was a shining gold metal horn, about forty meters away. At first, it appeared to be sitting on a circular island, but on closer examination, Mackenzie saw the thin strips of land radiating from the circle like spokes on a wheel. Kenzie quickly counted how many there were. The tribute was pretty sure there were twelve and they seemed equidistant from one another. Between the spokes was water and a pair of tributes.

That was it then, Kenzie realized. There were twelve spokes, each with two tributes balanced on metal plates between them. The other tribute in her watery edge was Chaff from District 11. He was about as far to her right as the land strip on her left. Kenzie scanned the circle of tributes, in hope of finding Finnick or Katniss, but they had to be blocked from her view by the Cornucopia. Kenzie decided to focus on her own survival first. While Chaff was probably in on Haymitch's plan, she had to be careful anyway, not only for the cameras. If Chaff wanted to, he could easily win a fight against her, however this was her arena. She was by far one of the best swimmers. It seemed like the arena had been made for her and Finnick.

As the water washed in Kenzie quickly caught a handful and smelled it. Like suspected it was salt water. She decided to try a bit of it to see if it was clean, so she touched the tip of her wet finger to her tongue, before smiling. The water was just like the waves back home, besides it was indeed clean.

Kenzie knew what she had to do, so as soon as the gong sounded she jumped into the water and swam towards the land strip. She arrived there quickly, pulling herself onto the land strip, before she sprinted down the sandy stretch for the Cornucopia. She couldn't see anyone else converging from her side, although the gold horn blocked a good portion of her view. She didn't care though. The only thing she cared about at the moment was getting her hands on a weapon, maybe more than one.

This year the weapons seemed to be piled at the seven-meter-high mouth of the Cornucopia. While Kenzie got her hands on a golden spear and a net, Katniss grabbed the golden bow.

Suddenly, Katniss felt someone behind her. She didn't know what she was alerted by, a soft shift of sand or maybe just a change in the air currents, but she pulled an arrow from the sheath that was still wedged in the pile. She armed her bow as she turned.

Finnick, glistening and gorgeous, stood a few meters away, with a trident poised to attack. A net dangled from his other hand. He was smiling a little, but the muscles in his upper body were rigid in anticipation.

"You can swim, too," he stated. "Where did you learn that in District Twelve?"

"We have a big bathtub." Katniss answered,her response an obvious lie.

"You must," Finnick exclaimed. "You like the arena?"

"Not particularly. But you should. They must have built it especially for you and Kenzie." Katniss said with an edge of bitterness in her voice.

It seemed so to her, anyway, with all the water, when she'd bet only a handful of the victors could swim. And there hadn't been a pool in the Training Centre, no chance to learn. Either you had come in here as a swimmer or you'd better were a really fast learner. Even participation in the initial bloodbath depended on being able to cover twenty meters of water. That gave District 4 an enormous advantage.

For a moment both Katniss and Finnick were frozen, sizing each other up, their weapons, their skill.

Then Finnick suddenly grinned, "Lucky thing we're allies. Right?"