Sunshine - A Hunger Games Story

14| Space

As we are walking through the golden sand and as the sun starts to set, we agree to head back to the trees for cover when sleeping. The gentle breeze of the evening is a relief from the searing heat. The tree line is about a mile away so it should take only 15-20 minutes walking. I glance at Faith. 20-30 minutes if one of us is sleep walking.

I drop into the sand.

I don't know how, or why, but I just dropped into the sand and landed hard 6 feet under. Looking up real quick, I can see a circle in the ceiling close up. Everything is pitch black once the ceiling circle closes up. My heart rate starts to pick up and I feel around for any wall. Two walls 1 foot away from me on each side.

I can hear the rest of my party yelling from above. I can't push the floor up to get out that way. A faint clicking sound comes from someone around me.

It is never too late to admit your fears. I, for one, am afraid of the dark. It was one of my childhood fears, but now I mean it for real.

"Hello?" My voice echoes off of the walls meaning I must be in a cave. I start walking along the wall to be able to find my way back. As I am walking, a circle opens up in the ceiling about 20 feet away. Sand spills in and It seals back up. In that split second, I can see the cave that I am in. Smooth gray walls, floor and ceiling; a few stalagmites and stalactites hang along the path; and there are multiple turns and intersections in the tunnel.

The clicking sounds again on my left.

I quickly move following the left wall. As I do, I hear a faint scurrying sound following me. Another circle opens up in the ceiling 35 feet ahead of me and stays open for a while now. Enough time for Faith to stick her head in and yell "Ayesha! Are you in there? If you are, come here."

"I'm here! I'm here." I run underneath her and reach up as the door starts closing. We are both forced to pull away.

A nice creepy hissing sound seems to be following me along with the occasional clicking and buzzing.

The next circle appears behind me. It illuminates enough for me to see a swarm of odd bugs coming at me. I squeak and run in the opposite direction. With my hand still running on the right hand side, I miss the opening on the left and smack right into a wall. I fall back dazed, it takes me a while to get back up and continue running to the left. My arms rub on my sandy, wet shirt and rub creating an uncomfortable rash. A rash is the least of my problems. The walls of the cave feel like they are caving in on me, making it harder to breathe and creating more panic in my mind. The next circle that opens up is up about 30 feet ahead, a little later than the others were. This time, instead of seeing the sunset, Sydney falls down.

"Sydney! Run!" I exclaim. I continue running toward her, but my jacket gets caught on a stalagmite. Leaving the jacket, I sprint to Sydney and tug her along with me. Around 400 yards and 3 turns later, we hit a dead end. The bugs are buzzing even closer. "Put your jacket on. Zip it up and sinch the hood. Quick!!" I command Sydney as the buzzing gets closer.

I pull Sydney along the right hand side once we turn around to find another way. A sharp pain digs into my exposed arm. Then another one on my wrist. I scream out in pain as I can feel my being ripped apart. Waving my sword around doesn't help but I still do it, trying to get rid of the pests.

Me and Sydney continue to sprint down different pathways to out run the flying swarms of pain. We turn another corner and subsequently see a small flicker of light off in the distance. The light appears to be from a torch, illuminating facial features of a tribute. Let's hope it's a tribute and not another shape shifting mutt. We run towards the tribute seeing as our other option is the insects and occasionally run into stalagmites and stalactites. When we get close enough, I see that the tribute from before is the non-career boy from district 1. His spear is ready in his dominant hand ready to kill whatever is running at him. Judging by his flickering eyes and apparent anxiety, he hasn't seen us yet. I have to kill him before he kills us and the bugs eat us alive.

With my sword still drawn, I charge Tiny Tom, using my left hand to move his spear out of the way and stab his heart. I'm sorry Tom. I tried to make it quick.

I grab his torch and try not to look at the large pool of blood growing on the stone floor below me. I see why Tiny Tom stopped where he did. It's another dead end. I huddle in the corner with Sydney and raise the torch a little ways from my face to stop it from burning me.

The bugs bite at my wrist, hand, and lower left arm but don't come any closer. I look over at where the numbing pain is clustered in and see that they are flying into the fire like a moth would to a lamp.

Suddenly, a circle opens up above us. I make an instinctive decision and throw the torch out for the insects to follow.

They do.

The buzzing stops. I stand up and take Sydney's hand. We have to go back to where we started and maybe we'll be able to get back up. Sydney leads with my instructions and the sword so that I can try and remove the bugs leaching off my blood from tiny burrows in my skin.

We end up somewhere not where we started, by still underneath a circle as it opens up. Quickly, I lower down to let the district 4 girl stand on my knee then shoulder to get out. Just as I am about to pull myself up, the circle closes. From the opening, I could tell that the sun is just starting to rise, just barely. We've been in these tunnels all night long.

Another circle opens up a few minutes later, just a few feet in front of me. I run quickly up to it and jump up far enough up to get my forearms up. My arms start slipping on the sand, but my mind reminds me that I only have a few seconds before it chops me in half. I get the rest of my arms up by shimmying up. From there, I push my abdomen up and get my butt on the sand before the circle starts to close. I yank my legs out just in time.

"There you are," Sydney says. The young girl runs up to me and hugs me. I can see her long platinum blonde hair waves back and forth and her big brown eyes rimmed with tears. After her, comes the rest of the gang. Most of them look like they were just waking up. Henri hugs me too.

"What's with your arm, 9?"

I look down at my arm and see 5 black slugs with wings sprouting out of the skin around my arm. Blood circles around where they have burrowed into my wrist. Even in the early morning light I can still make out the paleness of my numbing hand.

"I should probably take those out." I gulp.

"That would be best," Faith agrees and I tentatively move my good hand over to one of the leach-mutts.

When I grip it, the leach-mutt's slimy black tail squirms around. Now or never. 3. 2. 1. I pull the mutt out in one fluid motion. It stings like getting stabbed in the arm. The wound starts to pour a significant amount of blood, the red liquid flowing down my forearm to my elbow. "Ow," I gasp.

"Oh my, let me do it. You look like you're just about to pass out." Faith rushes towards me and takes control of the situation.

Each leach she pulls out of me makes a wave of spots wash over my eyes. Each time I blink out of it and try to stay strong. Henri is watching, sponsors are watching, my family is watching. Don't let them see you in pain.

A few leach-mutts came out of my exposed leg and two were on my back, but none of the others were as bad as the ones on my wrist. Every time another one comes out, I scrunch my face up in pain making my scab from the shapeshifting mutts tear apart in the littlest bits.

Afterwards, My wrist is bleeding quite profusely. I take off the belt from my pants and cinch it up to my lower arm at Faith's request to stop the bleeding in order to bandage it up.

"Are we done babysitting 9 now. We need to get to cover before the Careers come to murder us," Rhett states blatantly.

"Yeah, we can go," I force out, still queasy and light-headed from my wounds. I'm glad to be out of there and to be able to breathe in fresh air.