Starve On Pixels

Chapter 10: Something Smells Fishy

Natalie's POV

It's now my fourth night in the arena. I can keep count due to the deep scratches I leave on my arms; each angry red line symbolizes another day of listening to "Unicorns Dancing on Rainbows". I have had enough.

The only deaths I've witnessed lately have been quite quick and I feel a lot of violent emotions that can only be let out through murder. The Careers have been active; 2 members, Vivian and Vanessa, are dead. Kate, Schuyler, and Charlotte are all dead.

The only slightly satisfying death was when I spied on Helen who accidentally stomped on Sophie, who had been camouflaging in a river. I don't think Helen even meant to kill her; it's hard to tell with Helen though- she's gone a bit loopy since she entered the arena. From what I've seen she eats raw animals, mutters about world domination (something about crazy talking walruses?), and runs around frantically most of the time. It's entertaining to watch.

I waited until I began to hear the creepy muttering of zombies outside of our makeshift cave, "We should probably head in now guys."

"Tacos from outta the sk-" Diana pauses, "Oh, as long as Valerie and I can continue singing inside, we're cool."

Molly and Nicole F lead the way inside. We cook a pixelated chicken and it instantly changed shape- this world doesn't make any sense. Molly, always the sensible one, tells us to eat our vegetables. Like the mature teens that we are, we protest and gag when she tries to get us to eat carrots.

"Yuck! No way, that's gross," we screamed. Molly really shouldn't have tried to force-feed us, it moved her higher up on my painful deaths list.

"For once I agree with lazybones over there!" Nicole wrinkles her nose in disgust.

That scored Nicole some major points. Too bad- I already had her death planned out. In the package I had received on the first day was a little bottle with a skull and crossbones- I couldn't read very well because all the teachers in District 12 belonged in senior housing. They usually just mumbled under their breath while the children threw spitballs and chatted.

"Diana, Valerie, would you like some veggies?" Molly brandished her evil carrots.

"A duck walked up to a lemonade sta-" Diana pauses her singing because we just heard Valerie talk. Valerie NEVER talks- she either shouts, or doesn't say anything at all. "Erm... Carrots aren't- I mean- I'm- n-not hungry anymore! Yeah, that's it."

"How about some fish then?" Molly pulled out some fish we'd caught earlier.

We hadn't been seeing a lot of other tributes, so we'd had an abundance of time to master new skills such as fishing. Fishing was probably the most boring sport- I felt sympathy for the poor folks in District 4 who had to do it for a living.

"Yeah! Fish!" Nicole exclaimed.

" I thought you weren't hungry!" Molly threw her hands up in the air, "Can you cook it please Natalie?"

"Sure." I was jumping up and down with glee inside my head. This was a perfect opportunity to enact my plan.

Molly sighed heavily in disappointment before lying down on one of our pixelated beds. The beds were some kind of torture device. We had put together some wood and wool and... Voila! It had turned into the hardest, lumpiest, most ugly bed ever- it was almost better to sleep on the floor. Almost.

I waited until everyone was facing away from me before I took out my small glass vial of poison and poured it into Nicole's portion. I couldn't have too many people suspiciously die at once- the people who hadn't eaten the fish would catch on.