When Luck Runs Out

Reception Ladies With Actual Fangs

    I jumped the last few rungs and landed right on top of a wolf, driving my dagger right into the base of its neck and jumping off as if fell over.
"What an entrance!" Jeanette called. She had the bow, and was shooting down the wolves as they came closer. John and she were on the reception desk, kicking, hacking, and shooting all of the wolves that tried to get close. They were now swarming me, and I felt extremely overwhelmed, all of these black wolves with their sharp teeth, all flooding around me, trying to bite me... I was hacking as much as I could, kicking away their gnawing mouths, splitting open their skulls with the long blade. Greg appeared at my side, swiping his sword in great strokes and taking two at a time.
"Get to the doors!" he called. Sunlight was now flooding through the glass, it was daylight out, and the wolves were blocking our path.
"Easier said than done!" Jeanette sighed, but she hoped off of the counter into the mess of rabid wolves, chopping one's head cleanly off with one strike. Greg and I made it outside without too much difficulty, but Jeanette and John were having trouble wading through the pack of hungry mouths and sharp claws. John was doing the best he could, kicking, stabbing, slashing his way through the door. Jeanette, on the other hand, seemed to be having the time of her life, twirling around and slicing multiple wolves away. Greg and I stood outside, trying to make the path clearer for them, but I was a bit apprehensive about going near those wolves once more, now getting an up close and personal look at their claws and teeth as I stood outside the fighting ring. Finally, John dove out of the pack, kicking a wolf that tried to follow him. Miraculously the wolves didn't seem to be able to get out of the building, either they didn't want to or there was something blocking their way, but they just stood there, growling at us. Jeanette was the last to get out, slicing the stomach open of one last wolf before prancing through the doors into the sunlight street.
"Haven't had that much fun since that mob of paparazzi." She decided, cleaning the blood and fur off of her blade with her sleeve.
"You killed a mob of paparazzi?" John asked, horror struck.
"I don't think any of them died..." Jeanette muttered, looking thoughtful for a moment. I guess this is what happens, you either come out of the games kill crazy or you come out mentally unstable. In some ways, I think my way was better.
"So, where now?" John asked, looking at the wolves in the door, who were still growling timidly. Now that I could get a good look at them, they weren't just wolves that you'd see outside. Their matted fur was midnight black, and their eyes were bright yellow, as if they had been genetically engineered to kill.
"Well, not a building, I don't want to get trapped like that again." Greg decided.
"So let's just camp in the streets!" Jeanette exclaimed sarcastically, her exasperated voice echoing off of the buildings.
"Keep your voice down." I hissed.
"I meant not inside a building. If we stay here we're sure to get killed by either wolves or tributes, but we could always go up." Greg decided.
"Up?" I asked, craning my neck to see if anything substantial was up there.
"You mean on the rooves?" John asked.
"Arial view of the arena, almost impossible to access if you're a tribute, or a wolf, and it's bound to be pretty up there." Greg insisted.
"How would we get down?" I asked. "If the building is flooded like that again?"
"Jump from rooftop to rooftop, it can't be that difficult." Greg shrugged.
"You watch too much TV." Jeanette decided.
"It's that, an apartment building, or the streets." Greg insisted.
"I don't see a problem with it. But shelter isn't our biggest concern right now, all of our water is in that building and I'm certainly not going in after it." John insisted.
"That ice machine is done, we used the last of it and it's definitely not going to make anymore without power." I decided.
"Oh, brilliant." Greg groaned.
"Oh get over it, we'll find more." Jeanette insisted.
"Where?" I asked.
"Where do you find water in a city?" she asked.
"Um, a faucet?" John guessed.
"Oh you two are so thick, in the pipes! The water pipes, under ground!" she insisted.
"Knowing me, I'd walk into the sewer instead." I guessed.
"You think there would be water down there?" John asked.
"I can't see why not, there has to be some water around here, and if they want to keep us alive long enough for a final battle then I'm sure we could get some." Jeanette decided.
"I think the wolves proved they don't care too much about us." I guessed.
"We held our own; I think those things were more for scaring us off than for killing." Greg guessed.
"Well then, they did their job I suppose." John decided.
"Come on, let's set up camp and then we'll worry about the whole water thing." Greg insisted.
"I think water is more important." I decided.
"But we don't want to be climbing stairs with all of this luggage and buckets of water, do we?" Greg asked.
"Touché." John agreed, and Jeanette laughed quietly.
"So, pick a building." I groaned.
"Well, let's get one that's wide, and not too tall. That way we don't have to climb too many stairs every time we want more supplies." Greg plotted.
"And let's move away from those bloody wolves, they've probably caused a big scene." Jeanette insisted.
"But we know there's no one around here." I insisted.
"You don't know that." Greg debated.
"Ya, you thought we were perfectly alone and these two happen to be across the street." John pointed out.
"Since when were you on their team?" I asked, scandalized.
"Since they were right." John pointed out. I just rolled my eyes, too annoyed and too tired to care at the moment.
"Alright then, knock yourselves out." I sighed. I really shouldn't have said that. We walked for a good hour down the streets, Greg and Jeanette telling the most boring stories you could ever imagine, all about their old games, their lives, their family, funny dinner parties they've attended, odd preferences of Jeanette's cats, every subject under the sun. John and I trekked along behind them, just tuning out their voice and trying not to focus too much on our aching legs and our parched throats. The sun seemed to be especially hot, beating down on us like we were being microwaved; I had shed my leather jacket and started to really hate the tight pants the capital had provided us when finally Greg stopped. At first I thought he was simply taking a rest, but he craned his neck up at a building, about ten stories tall, a long, flat building that kind of looked like a stack of pancakes. It was some sort of mall I think, because it rose up only a couple of floors and there were large picture window on every floor, letting the light floor in.
"Perfect." Greg decided. He walked in first, the rest of us following behind. It was indeed a mall, a very fancy one at that. The floors were marble, and some of the upper floors were made completely of glass, so that the people shopping on that level could see straight below them. Most all of the stores were gated off with those iron fences that show they were closed, but a precious few remained open, even though the merchandise seemed to have been looted.
"This is nice. Well, it probably was nice, at a time." Jeanette decided, walking over to a dry fountain. There were carvings of multiple dolphins, mermaids, and swans, all with jets in them, but no water was coming out.
"Oh, brilliant!" Greg exclaimed, jumping into the empty fountain and scooping handfuls of coins.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
"If I get out of these games, I'm buying a life time supply of marshmallows." Greg planned, stuffing the coins into his pockets.
"You'll attract too much attention with all of that come back for it later." Jeanette insisted. Obviously she knew him too long to question what he was going to do with a lifetime supply of marshmallows, but she was like an annoyed mother.
"But what if someone else comes?" Greg muttered, kicking his foot through the mountains of loose change.
"I doubt they'll be as resourceful." Jeanette assured.
"If someone else comes they'll either kill you so that you can't spend the money, or we'll kill them, so they can't take it in the first place." I pointed out.
"That was probably the most optimistic thing I've heard you say." Greg decided, dumping out his pockets, which were filled with so many coins I wondered just how much the whole fountain would be worth. Even if Greg did win, he wouldn't need all of this money, he'll have plenty just for winning. Greg hopped out of the fountain, a couple of coins falling to the floor as he came.
"So, roof?" he asked, looking like a happy child who had too much caffeine.
"I guess so." Jeanette agreed. There was a maze of motionless escalators in the middle of the mall, so we all headed for those.
"Oh no, they aren't running, how shall we ever get to the top now!?" I exclaimed, trying to do my best horror struck look.
"You're kidding, right?" Greg asked. I dropped the act, scowling at him.
"Of course I'm acting, I'm not an idiot." I snapped.
"Well....." John started.
"Shut up." I snapped, leading the way up the escalator and hiking to the top. There were five more escalators to climb (one big mall, am I right?) but we had to find a maintenance staircase to bring us to the roof. Finally I emerged on the roof, the bright sun once again reminding us of how hot and sweaty we already were, but there was a nice cool breeze wafting through the air.
"This is nice." I decided, looking around the rooftop. It was hard cement; with large metal boxes that once operated heating and cooling way back when.
"It is nice, plenty of space." Jeanette agreed.
"Space for what?" John asked.
"For being spaced out." she shrugged. Greg went over and spit off the side of the roof, as if he thought it would hit someone. I really hoped it didn't, just because that would mean some other tribute was there, and that they now knew exactly where we were as well.
"Alright, this is nice, very nice, water." John decided.
"Are you ever satisfied?" Greg asked.
"When I have an all you can eat buffet with refills on water, yes, I'll be satisfied." John decided.
"Rhetorical question." Greg snapped.
"But honestly, where can I get some water around here, my throat is so dry I'm sure a spider is nesting in it." Jeanette agreed.
"Oh god, that's so nasty." I decided. Jeanette just laughed, but it sounded like more of a raspy cough.
"Let's go check the pipes then, dump the crap here but take your weapon of choice, in case we're not alone." Greg decided. I nodded, happily dumping my blanket backpack and following him back down the stairs. First we checked the water fountains, when they didn't produce water by pressing the button, Greg and Jeanette took turns trying to pry it from the wall. Finally, when John drop kicked the metal fountain (while I watched, not much use to the situation), it fell off of the wall. Unfortunately there was no water in the pipes, just rust and bugs. Sanitary conditions, A+.

    "All right, no luck there I guess." Greg muttered, poking at the pipe in case something was blocking up the water.
"It's cold though, and it smells damp. There's water somewhere." Jeanette decided. I was just leaning on the banister, watching this all go down. I could barely lift my blanket backpack; much less pry a water fountain off of the wall. Good thing I had a big strong man to do that for me.
"So, down we go." John decided, trying his best to fix the horribly dented water fountain back on the wall, but to no result. In the end he just set it down on the floor, as if guilty that he had destroyed the property. We went all the way down to the ground floor, walking back outside to find a water main. It wasn't hard to find a manhole with 'water' engraved on the top of it; the problem was getting it open. Having used all of their physical strength on the water fountain, it took all four of us to pry open the heavy metal cover, but when we did we were hit with the smell of fresh water, and it was the most rewarding thing I could've asked for.
"Oh, brilliant." Jeanette decided, descending the rusty ladder first, into the little cement maintenance floor.
"Not much room down here, two can fit, at most." She called up.
"Is there water?" I called.
"Yes, there's water, a couple of puddles of it. For three people, I'd say it will last about three days." She guessed.
"Good thing we won't be alive that long!" I said happily, descending the ladder to see if she was correct. There was actually quite a bit of water, puddled along the cement tunnels, looking clean enough.
"We'll need to decontaminate it, there could be all sorts of bacteria in that stuff!" I called up.
"Up in the supplies we've got some containers, they came with those little chemicals you put in to make it drinkable." Greg pointed out.
"Brilliant, go get that!" I agreed.
"Come on John, I'll need backup." Greg decided.
"Wait, no, I'll come..." I started.
"It's fine Sherlock, I won't touch a hair on your little boyfriend's head." Greg assured.
"I'll be fine Sherlock, I trust them." John assured. I nodded stiffly, but I couldn't agree with John. I didn't trust these two, no matter what they did to help us or what John said. My dream plagued my good thoughts; I couldn't help but feel that they were working with Moriarty and Moran this whole time. I knew it wasn't probable, but still, I couldn't get relaxed about strangers in the games, they could turn on us any moment.