The Writer Games | 1 - 3

Situation 3: Answers

Aryn's POV

I stopped and looked up at the sky, marveling at the darkness that spread over the arena. There were sparkling, silvery dots in the sky, and I reminisced of the stars back home. I would tie myself in the tree, preventing myself from falling to my death, and I would watch the stars until I fell asleep. Now, as I stood in the maze, my eyes narrowed as I spotted a discrepancy between those stars and these. The stars from home were stationary and small; these were moving and getting larger. The moonlight appeared from behind the cloud cover, and I rolled my eyes at what I saw.

Green, perfectly symmetrical leaves falling elegantly toward the earth. As they got closer, I noticed every plant they touched was shredded immediately. Razor leaves. I'd seen this in previous Games but couldn't remember how the tributes had avoided them. I would have to improvise because they were getting closer to me.

I needed to find shelter, but so far, I hadn't found any. As I rounded another corner, I cursed loudly; I had circled back to where I had been. The dead carcasses of the giant grasshoppers were right where I had left them, and thankfully, the tracker jackers hadn't returned to their decimated home. The leaves flittered down, and I pressed my back against the hedge in an attempt to escape their sharp edges. My eyes widened as I saw the tiny green petals hit the grasshopper's exoskeleton; they caused no damage.

I didn't waste any time. I pulled out my pocket knife and flipped the dead insect over. The tracker jacker venom had made the stomach skin pliable and easy to cut. A couple of the leaves hit my back, and I had to brush them away before they could cause serious injury.

After about five minutes of dissecting the insect, and eviscerating its insides, I sat back and examined what I had done. I had made a temporary shelter. I recoiled at the ungodly stinky, but realized that if I wanted to survive, I'd have to tolerate it. With one last breath of fresh air, I curled up inside of the exoskeleton. I could hear the gentle tap-tap-tap of the leaves hitting the outside of my shelter, and I stayed as silent as possible. Although I was safe from the leaves, there was no telling who else was around.

The leaves finally stopped after a few hours, and I was able to crawl out. I looked down at the metal detector in my hand; it was getting hard to move with all the weight. As I glanced at the pool of water, which I had hid from the tracker jackers in, I nodded in approval of my idea. I dropped the detector in the water, and it sank to the bottom. After having submerged it in water before, I knew it wouldn't cause it any harm.

I turned away, my handmade spear in hand, and started moving through the maze. I wasn't looking for anyone in particular, but I was hunting nonetheless. There was a strange noise coming from beyond the hedge walls, and I recognized it immediately; it was another one of those damn grasshoppers. Very slowly, I peered around the corner and noticed that the creature wasn't alone; the girl from District 10 was sitting on top of it. I had to give her props for harnessing the creature; very ingenious. Still, admiration aside, she's in my way.

I turn and immerse myself in the foliage around me, camouflaging my body from the eyes of the girl and her unwilling pet. My breathing is a steady rhythm. Not too loud, and not too fast. I am not gripped by fear, but merely by my heightened senses. I can hear the creature move around the corner, it's antenna sensing something that its eyes cannot see. The girl—__________, that's her name—is too arrogant to realize what's happening.

The cold air moves through the maze, and as she turns away from the breeze, she opens herself up to me. My hands are steady, my form is perfect, and with incomparable precision, I thrust my spear out and into the girl's chest. A scream fills the silence, and I aptly pull the handmade weapon back in my hiding spot. She falls off the creature, and the lure she used to harness it hits the ground. The grasshopper devours the food in a matter of seconds, and when the scent of blood overwhelms its senses, it turns on ___________.