The Day I Die

Fifth Entry

The swelling of my arm went down some as I carefully venture through the forest.

Carefully I observe my surrondings. If I'm right, there's five tributes left including me. Five. Which means four more tributes to kill.
I can win. I will win.

I  decide to take a break. If these other four tributes don't kill each other, then I'm going to need all the energy I can get.

I pull out my jerky that I've carefully saved this long, and begin to eat. I've forgotten how good food was.

Then out off nowhere a thing flys by my head at an incredible speed. Then another and another.

I stand up, and only feet away from my head sit several exotic birds. I quickly shove the jerky back into my backpack. Wrong idea.

The sudden movement startles the birds, and they take flight, the largest of the flock flys right towards me an awful sound erupts out of its beak.

I duck down just in time, and the bird misses me, but he gets a hold of my backpack.

I quickly jump up and grab ahold of a strap, and yank it out of the bird's talons.

Once again that was the wrong idea.

The other birds take me as a threat, and barrel down toward me. I grab one of my homemade arrows and jam it into the chest of the closest bird.

It falls to the ground lifeless.

The bird's legs twitch, and the other birds fly down around it forgetting about me.

That's when I realise I can't hear anything. All the sound of the jungel has stopped.

I quietly back away from the mourning birds when I step on a twig and it cracks in half.

All the bird's heads turn in my direction.

After all the torture I've gone through these birds were going to be the death of me.

Fat chance, birds.

I spin on my heel, and run. I know the birds are coming after me, their horrible squeals echoing behind me.

That's when I begun to get hit. Sharp pain erupts from my leg. Then pain shoot out of my neck and soon all over my body.

I take a glance behind me to see one of the bird's shoot a piece of ice at me. It hits me on my cheek.

I run faster. I'm not too sure how long I run, or when the birds gave up on killing me but I do know it's getting increasingly hot.

I stop and swipe some sweat off my forehead. The wool I tied around me was tattered, so I rip it off. I look up into the sky through some branches. A cloudless blue ocean is up there.

I need to get out of here.

All of a sudden I hear leaves rustle to my left. I turn, and right there, only feet away, stood a tribute.

Tommy Finch. Another career.

He looks right into my eyes, into my soul, and I do the same back.

Sweat pours off of me, and I can tell the heat is effecting him too. That's when I even question if he's actually in front of me.

"Dad." He says in a questioning tone. "Dad, I'm tired. I want to go home." His tone turns toward anger. "You told me I should do what's best for district one. You told me to kill myself pretty much."

He's blinks a few times, the anger on his face clearly visable.

What is he talking abo...

"You did this to me! You should have let the loser who couldn't swim go!" He yells.

Does he think I'm his Dad? I grin. This is going to be fun.

"You made the decision to volunteer." I simply say.

"Dad!" He roars. "You never told me killing people would be, would be so horrifying!" He takes a step towards me.

He's a good foot taller than me, but I'm not afraid.

"You never told me you were a baby." I answer smoothly.

A tear runs down his face. "Dad, I can't return home a killer. I can't bring home my demons. I'm so sorry." Then Tommy turns and runs.

I want to chase him. I want to kill him, but somehow I have a feeling he's already dead inside.

I watch as he disappears from my sight.

I sit with my back to a large rock. There's some relief from the heat there, but not much.

I don't have much water, and I carefully sip a little bit of it trying to make it last.

I look out in front of me. Something changed...

I look to my side and where trees just were is nothing.

I fall onto my back. The air is knocked out of me. I struggle to my feet, the rock I once rested upon now was gone.

I turn in a circle trying to make since of what's happening. It has to be the Capitols doing.

I watch as all the scenery around me disappears. Then in a blink of an eye it's cold.
I turn slowly and I watch as the once hot jungel fades into a wintery wasteland in front of my eyes.

The temperature drops quickly, and in responce my water freezes in its bottle. I drop it no longer needing the dead weight.

I pull off my backpack and grab the remaining scraps of wool that I've saved, and wrap it around my upper half as best as I could.

My fingers turn blue as I fumble with the fabric. The headache from earlier increasing in intensity.

The pain reminds me I'm still alieve.

I stand there on top of a snowy hill, the wind howls and pure snowflakes fall down gently around me.

My legs threaten to give out on me, but I refuse to die.

I let out a laugh.

Somewhere deep inside me something snaps, and a strange smile forms on my lips.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath in, and slowly exhale.

I let out a roar as my inner animals fights to escape, my sanity begining to crumbel.

Then I run, knife in hand, into the wasteland.

Someone must die.