Writer Games: Pending Secrets

Quarterfinals - A Race Against Time - Entries

Peter Mask

He was tired, so very tired. He didn't want to race against the forces of time when his heart was weary and soul was destroying itself from the inside out. Shyen Ann had slept for two days straight, and during those two days, he had done nothing but sit by her side, staring out the broken window as Caste paced, thinking back to the times were he was free. It was barely a week ago since District Thirteen was bombed, when his love, Melody, had been brutally snatched away from him.

Yet, oddly, he no longer felt the vicious, heart-wrenching sensation of grief that had once torn through him with so much force that he doubted he would ever be able to be fixed again. To go back to what he once was before the bombs – the happy-go-lucky boy who wore his heart on his sleeve.

But Caste and Shyen Ann helped him do that.

Perhaps he would never really receive a sense of closure for Melody – both Melody's – deaths. His lover and his friend had both died days after one another, and there was no denying that fact. One could not watch their entire world burn right in front of their eyes and be cracking jokes and laughing the following day – but for Peter Mask, the time for grieving was over. He knew, deep in his heart, that Melody would want him to fight on, to live for her. His soul may be weary, and the world may seem to be closing around, there was something inside him whispering that the light would always be nearer. Thus, when Shyen Ann had told them to leave for the feast, to retrieve what they all desperately needed, he did not protest, though goosebumps prickled his rough, calloused skin. It reminded him of once, when Melody was still alive and by his side, he had admitted to her that he was afraid of something. When asked what, he simply replied, "Losing you."

Peter Mask had lost her. He'd failed his family, his friends, and the love of his life.

However, he vowed – as he set foot onto the hot, grainy sand that crunched underneath his feet – that he would not fail Caste Morea nor Shyen Ann Brooke.

Death would not reign victorious – not this time.

The gong ran out; the race began. Time slowed, quickened, and returned to normal as Peter inhaled deeply, before exhaling and launching himself towards the nearest bag. Each were identical in color, shape and size – charcoal black, with only a white number sewn onto the front to distinguish which package belonged to whom. For Peter, he knew he was tribute number two – the second male to be taken from Thirteen. Caste was five, and Shyen Ann seventeen. The numbers repeated themselves inside his head as he broke away from the stampeding crowd, pushing aside all thoughts and distractions until all that he knew were the three numbers – two, five, thirteen – and with the sight of the nearest bag resting on the sidewalk.

The wind was in his hair; the sand was in his eyes, but he did not care. Leaping high into the air, Peter snatched the bag from its resting place just before the male tribute by the name Caesar reached it. It took naught but a second to see that the bag was a number seventeen – Shyen Ann's – and quickly, Peter slung it over his shoulder before returning his attention back to Caesar. Just in time, he ducked and barely avoided the sharp, glinting blade of a dagger from the enraged tribute. With a frustrated yell, Caesar launched himself at him, and Peter reacted instinctively. As the blade came whistling down, the older boy lashed out with a well-aimed kick to the chest, knocking the wind out of Caesar as he stumbled backwards, dagger clattering out of his hands. With adrenaline coursing through his veins, Peter left the breathless boy there, gasping in the street, and when he heard the cannon boom he did not have to look back to see that Caesar was the one who perished.

During a stampede, one could not idly stand in the middle of the herd.

He spotted Caste at the edge of the crowd, blending into the shadows while the remaining tributes fought one another or tried to run. A bag was clung upon his muscular shoulders; another was clutched in his hands. They shared a nod and set their course back to the building, when all of a sudden, the earth began to rumble. Cracks appeared in the dirt beneath his feet. The tall, towering form of the grey building groaned and shuddered with nature's force, creaking like a rusty door hinge. The two boys shared an united look of confusion and perhaps even terror, until a high-pitched voice pierced the air in the form of a desperate scream, "Run!"