The 80th Hunger Games: A Time for Revenge

Day Three

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Chapter Ten:

I awake to Stingra not-so-gently kicking me in the back. I help her wake the rest of the Careers up in the same way. Once we're all up, Edison hands out water bottles, a chunk of wheat bread, and part of an apple to everyone. It seems sponsors won't really be needed, we have almost every piece of food and weapon in the entire arena. Finally, we hear a tribute close by. Everyone silently grabs a weapon and creeps around the Cornucopia to see who it is.

The person come right up to us, unarmed. Not a good move on their part. Then again, it wasn't the first time a District Twelve tribute in the Hunger Games did something stupid. This time, it's Prim's District partner, Cyrus. I'm not exactly sure what he was expecting to see, but by the way he is shivering and looking frightened, it wasn't a bunch of armed Career tributes. This is getting weird. He had been standing in front of us in fear for at least thirty second, just staring at us and our camp. I am officially annoyed and confused.

"So do you just want to stand there and wait to get killed or what?" I threateningly ask him.

Don't judge me because I'm simply stating a fact, I mean, that's exactly what he's doing.

He finally talks, and everyone's listening, "I want to join your alliance," he says quietly.

There is about a second of awkward silence, but then we all just completely crack up, even including Edison. While we're laughing our brains out, he tries to sprint away, only to be grabbed by me. His terrified look is priceless, I wish Hunter was here to see it.

"I don't know why you thought that we would even consider your offer; you should know that anyone that's from District twelve has absolutely no chance of joining a Career alliance. None. The fact that Primrose Everdeen was the tribute also Reaped from your District certainly doesn't make me want to kill you any less, in fact, it makes me want you dead even more."

There's a perplexed look on his face. I guess he didn't know about my brother and Prim's sister.

Rosie notices this too. "If you didn't know, Prim's sister, Katniss, killed Aqua's brother, Cato."

Knowing that Cyrus was at least not stupid enough to run away, I let go of him. At this point, we had all surrounded him, armed with various weapons. But Parker, to everyone's astonishment, dropped his hedge trimmers. But now, not to anyone's astonishment, he punches Cyrus in the stomach and he collapses on the ground. Seizing the opportunity, Parker slowly walks up to him.

"Rosie, and me a knife," he ominously says.

Rosie reaches into one of her vest's pockets and pulls out a bigger knife than the other. She hands it to Parker. He's twisting it around in his hand, deciding what to do, when I guess he figures out something. He stabs Cyrus in the chest, the side not containing the heart. The seventeen year old screeches in pain, which results in the rest of us chuckling like psychopaths. From there, Parker switches out with Jack, who has his hammer with him. Since Cyrus is lying on the ground, Jack shoves his boot in his face, making his nose crack in a painful sounding way that could only mean that it was broken. He kneels over, still with his boot in Cyrus' face, and delivers the death-blow to the side of his head. BANG! Emberlynn must be so proud of him.

"Now that that lunatic's finished off, you guys should go to the bog," says Rosie, "there's just enough time to get there before everyone wakes up. Good luck and happy killing."

While she and Parker stay behind, Edison, Jack, Stingra, and I each pack a backpack with food, water, and small knives, and also take our other weapons. With six Career tributes and only five others, it will be hard to find someone to kill, but we are determined. We can tell that we are close when the air starts to smell of acid and poison, it's truly vile. When we can finally see the poisonous water, we can also see a person kneeling over it. It's Sophia's killer, Constance. We silently decide with our eyes that Jack and I will attack. We creep down to the water until we are around five feet away from Constance and the water's edge. From here we can see that she was dipping a set of daggers into the bog. They make a sizzling sound when they come out. She has a good idea, but it seems like something that wouldn't work with a group of Careers standing behind her.

No longer oblivious of our presence, Constance sees a reflection of Jack and I in the boiling water. As she spins around, I sharply kick her in the face, but she sees it coming, and quickly dodges the blow. Unfortunately for me, when my foot comes down, it lands partially in the 'water'. My boot burns off where it hits the water, but it doesn't stop there.

"OW!" I screech in pain as the acid reaches my foot. The pain is horrible. It feels like my toe is burning off. I even start to get a bit drowsy, but I snap myself out of it. I'm smart enough not to go after Constance again, so I leave it to Jack. When I look over, he had just hit her with his hammer, and she fall into the bog. Every spot on her skin turns into a huge boil as it touches the acid, definitely the most disturbing part of the Games so far. I savor it. BANG! Her cannon goes off. As her disgusting body floats farther down into the bog, an alligator-like mutt snatches her body in its gargantuan mouth, leaving an opaque cloud of red, from the blood, and yellow, from the boils.

When I can't see her anymore, I look over at Jack. He has a deep cut on his cheek from one of Constance's daggers. One of her poisoned daggers. I can tell by the look in his blue eyes that he is becoming lightheaded. Then he passes out.

"JACK!" I yell, hoping he can hear me, but I know he can't. He lands with his black hair in the bog, which is burning off. Before any of us can pull him away, the alligator mutt comes back up, grabs Jack by the head, and pulls him under. BANG! He is instantly dead.

For the first time in the Games, I cry. Not only because of Jack's death, but also because of how bad my foot hurt.
But I push back more tears when Stingra and Edison come over. I have to face the truth.

"I'll help you up," kindly suggests Stingra. I don't want Edison to think that I'm weak, but I can't walk on my foot, so I accept Stingra's offer.

I limp over to the camp on Stingra's shoulder, and when we get back, Parker and Rosie are waiting for us. This won't be good.

"What happened to you, Aqua?" Parker worriedly asks me when I limp in.

"And who died?" curiously asks Rosie.
Stingra and I exchange worried glances. Rosie and Jack were good friends in District Four. She won't be happy to find out that he was dead.

Stingra breaks the news to her, "Well... After Jack killed Constance, he might've fallen into the poisonous water too... I'm so sorry Rosie..."
I looks like Rosie was going to cry for the first time as well. I can even see tears welling up in her brown eyes.
Before we can try to comfort her, she runs into the Cornucopia with her hands over her face. I always knew that she would break down when he died. Up until now, I'd known that they were friends, but now I'm thinking that they were a little more than just friends.

Parker breaks the silence. "So what happened to you?"

"After trying to kick Constance into the bog, my foot hit the water, and the poison seeped its way to my flesh," I explain.

"I don't think we should go back there, it's much too dangerous," adds Stingra.

Just then, I hear a silvery tune. When I look up, a silver parachute is descending to the ground. It lands directly in front of me. As I twist open the metal lid, I hope that what's inside is medicine. But before I see the contents, I read the little note on the top:

"You should know what to do with this. Use more than once, Enobaria," I read aloud. As I hoped, there was medicine inside. It's creamy white. When I carefully take off my boot and sock, I see my foot for the first time: It's red and bulging, and part of my big toe had been scorched off, as I thought. I put a little bit of the cream on my fingers and smear it all over my foot. It burns at first, and I stifle a scream. But before long, the pain starts to disappear.

I reapply the cream more throughout the day while sitting around with the others. Rosie had never come out of the Cornucopia, and is still lying in silence at the tip. At the end of the day, I see the faces of the fallen: First up is Jack, and I look over to Rosie, and she has tears welling up in her eyes again. After that, it's Constance, then Cyrus. When I see Cyrus, I wonder how Prim's doing. I hope she's suffering. I have a feeling that she's with Sam, and she will probably keep her safe. I just wish she wouldn't care about Prim, and that Prim was starving and alone. But that's irrational, sadly.