I have failed. The arena has been damaged, but not incapacitated. The Games continue.
In District 12, we learn about mountains but predominantly the ones that cover the seams of coal that will provide our livelihood. Volcanoes barely get a mention. I know just enough to connect the name to the dazzling bursts of lava, the glowing streams, the cloud of ash flowing down the mountainside, enveloping everything in its path. I picture the
tributes . . . Wellie . . . Hull . . . Maysilee . . . gasping for air . . . suffocating . . . and drop the binoculars. I can’t see them, but I can see enough to imagine their terrifying ends.
A blast of air hits my face, thick with stinging grit and a scent so cloying I begin to gag. I lose my footing for a moment and scramble for
purchase. If the tree branches below didn’t catch me, I’d be dead on the forest floor. I squinch up my eyes against the howling, toxic wind. When I pull the collar of my billowy shirt up over my face, it provides a pocket of protection from the swirling particles. As I’ve learned at the gas plant berm when my shirtfront refused to ignite, and again when Ampert experimented with his sock in the campfire, our clothes provide a shield. This volcano is why. It has to be why. But I doubt our outfits are of much help to those caught on the mountain.
Am I it, then? The last tribute left alive? The victor of the Quarter
Quell? Even if the Gamemakers are firing cannons, there’s no way I could hear them between the aftereffects of the explosion and the roar of the wind. From what Ampert said, everybody else was over on the mountain. Perhaps some, if they’d bedded down near the base, could’ve fled to safety. I don’t
know, though. They might outrun the lava, but not that cloud. It isn’t a real volcano, but how closely did the Gamemakers try to replicate one? Could
the lava set everything on fire? What if that ginormous water tank was built so they could quench the aftermath of the volcano? In bombing the tank, I may have destroyed any hope for those who survived the eruption.
I’m too exposed up in the tree. As soon as I’m able, I shinny down and collapse on the pine needles, using the trunk to block the wind. I retreat inside my shirt; there’s nothing to see anyway with the cloud erasing the
moonlight. Besides, even if I could see, what would I do? Where would I go? If the fire comes, it comes.
The full force of my failure hits me. Who do I think I am? Why did I think I could change anything? That I could take on the Capitol, with all its might, and bring the Hunger Games to a standstill? Me, a sixteen-year-old kid from the trashiest district in Panem with little schooling and no outstanding skills. I’ve got nothing but a big mouth and an inflated sense of my own self-importance. All foam, no beer, that’s me. Near beer.
Plutarch’s words echo through my head, mocking me. “No more implicit submission for you, Haymitch Abernathy. Blow that water tank sky high. The entire country needs you to.”
Well, bad call, Plutarch! Turns out I was built for implicit submission, head to toe, through and through, inside and out.
I grind my palms into my face. What an idiot I am. What a stuck-up, self-centered, incompetent idiot I am. I don’t even know if Plutarch was on the rebels’ side. Like as not, he’s just another Capitol monster who’s laughing his head off now.
But no, that doesn’t make sense. Because even if the Games continue, his advice helped me throw a real wrench in the works. The Capitol’s
gorgeous arena’s gone haywire. It isn’t enough, though, just a minor disruption with no real consequences. Nothing I’ve done is enough.
Ampert’s lopsided grin in the torchlight . . . surely his last smile . . . how he trusted me . . . and now there’s not even a body to return to
Beetee . . . although Beetee could be dead, too. . . .
I find I’m crying, or maybe it’s just my eyes trying to wash out the biting bits of ash. The scratches from the bat claws burn like all-fire and
ooze blood into my clothes, which are no star in the absorbency department. Tear-soaked, blood-soaked, misery-soaked, I lay on my side and curl myself around the base of the tree trunk.
Oh, Lenore Dove, how did it all come to this? The moaning wind conjures up the cabin by the lake last winter, her birthday, the best gift ever . . . me singing her song, which I am beginning to hate . . .
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow; — vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow for the lost Lenore — For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore —
Nameless here for evermore.
Nameless here in this world. Dead and gone as I am about to be. Will I be her lost one for evermore? Will she be haunted by me for the rest of her life?
“Just let me go!” I cry out. I’m furious at myself for not telling her to move on after my death when I had the chance. I pound my head into the
tree bark until blood runs, and then go limp as I await my end. All yours, President Snow . . .
Sleep? No, I don’t sleep, but I’m so exhausted by the night’s exertions and the crushing weight of my despair that I achieve a sort of stupor. Hours and hours pass, I guess, because the wind quiets, the ash settles.
Lenore Dove said there’s no guarantee the sun will rise, and I wish today proved her right. Nothing good awaits me. I’d rather hide in the dark.
But eventually a faint daylight shows through my shirt. I don’t want to
come out, so I don’t. Why am I even still alive? What cruel jokes are the Gamemakers playing on me now?
The humming I noticed last night still radiates from the ground. I remember it directly preceded the return of the fake sky, and I put two and two together. It must be coming from the generator Beetee mentioned. The one just outside the arena. At the top end. Despite whatever disruption the flooding caused to the energy supply, the generator is keeping the arena running. Well, the energy supply was never our target: The brain was.
Though it was damaged, enough of it’s still functioning to entertain the audience.
“Oh, shut up! Who cares now?” I tell myself. I’m sick of wallowing in my failure. Enough. It’s all over.
I try to go back into my stupor, but I’m too antsy. Scratching at the back of my brain are the words Mags spoke when we were about to begin our training. “In the early Games, I didn’t ask the tributes what they wanted because the answer seemed so obvious. You want to live. But then I realized, there are many desires beyond that. Mine had to do with my district partner. Protecting him.”
We had wanted to die quick and proud with a minimum of suffering for our loved ones. I had wanted to outsmart the arena. But Mags had been concerned about her district partner. I don’t know if Maysilee’s still out there, but if she is, she might need me to help her die with her head up. And maybe some other Newcomers could use a hand as well. Multiple cannons must have fired after the volcano, but I didn’t hear them with everything going on. I haven’t been declared the victor, though, so someone else is alive. I won’t have a clue who until nightfall.
Instead of giving up, maybe I’ll see if I can’t be of some tiny use to someone else. Throw myself in front of an attacking Career. Bring a
Newcomer some food or water. I’m pretty hungry and thirsty myself, come to think of it, and I can’t afford to get weak. I might as well see if my
supplies survived.
When I pull back my shirt, I’m once again shocked by the beauty around me. I’d imagined the ash to be gray and dingy but, in keeping with the arena’s design, they’ve made it clear and sparkling, so that everything seems to be coated in a layer of rock candy. Sunlight bounces off the
crystals, throwing tiny rainbows around the forest. I rise, stiff and sore, and knock the stuff from my clothes. I’m tempted to put a chunk of it to my parched lips, even though I’m pretty sure where that would land me.
The ash disorients me, but after a while, I manage to crunch my way back to the butterfly bush berm, where the blossoms look preserved in ice. The berm’s ajar, although the mouth has gone still. No more sparks shoot from the trees, no baby deer rampage around, but I do see a few dead ones under the ash. Damage was done, for sure. Probably throughout the arena. The Gamemakers are going to have to be very careful about where they point their cameras.
Everything looks frozen, like I should be shivering, but the air’s warm and perfumed. I kick the ash from my backpack, retrieve my water, and take a deep drink, leaving about half a jug. My remaining food consists of two potatoes, two rolls, one egg, one apple, and a final glass of grape juice. My belly’s hollow so I smush the egg between the rolls for a sandwich and wolf it down. I savor my last apple, then retrace my steps to the scene of Ampert’s death. His skeleton has been removed, but I find my hammock
and shake it out. When it’s free of ash, I fold it neatly and return it to my pack.
Now what? I consider going to find survivors, then realize I’m as likely to run into Careers as Newcomers. I dig around with my feet, trying to locate the spear I abandoned, but to no avail. Did the Gamemakers take it with his body? I uncover my knife, however, and try to retrace my steps to Ampert’s ax. It takes a while before I can remember I dropped it when the earth shook and I was flung to the ground. I hunt it down and slip it into my belt. I want to carry mementos of my allies with me.
My fingers go to the sunflower at my neck and find its shellac coating has dissolved in the flood, leaving it firm but impressionable. The paint job holds up, so it still looks as good as new. Too bad I don’t have a blasting cap; the stuff isn’t much good without it. It needs another explosion to set it off. What would I blow up anyway? We succeeded in messing up the brain, but either it’s partially working or they’ve been able to run the arena from
the Capitol. Probably some of both. Anyway, no chance I could get to it. At this point, the generator’s also essential to continuing the Games, but the only way to reach that would be to break out of this place.
A tiny ray of light penetrates the gloom of my mind. Perhaps it would be possible to escape the arena and try to break the generator. All I’ve got is
a knife and an ax, but that’s not nothing. Of course, it’s an incredible long shot . . . but so am I. Maybe I’m just the guy for the job.
Doubts swamp me. You can’t do it! It’ll never work! You’re just a
loser with an ax, trying to chop down the Capitol again. Have you really learned nothing?
Maybe I haven’t learned anything and there’s no chance of success and I should double down on my implicit submission. But the truth is, what have I got to lose? Nothing, that’s what. And I owe it to Ampert to try.
What would Beetee do? For starters, he’d get me to the generator. He said it was at the top of the arena, and I must be close. The first thing will be to make it all the way north and find some way to break through the
arena wall. I don’t even know if that’s made of cement or metal or some kind of force field, but I guess I’ll deal with that when I get there.
After consulting the sun, I get my bearings and head north. My whole body’s stiff and sore and the straps on my backpack rub my bat scratches
raw. I’d be quite a sight if District 12 had been dressed in yellow, but the black conceals the bloodstains fairly well. Even though I’m still starving and thirsty, I can’t afford to use any more of my meager supplies. If I find the generator, maybe I’ll celebrate with a slice of potato.
The woods have patches of life — songbirds singing and insects buzzing — and sections of complete silence. I don’t see any sign of the
other tributes, and it’s quite likely that I’m the only one who’s traveled this far north. That means the mutt berms will be fully loaded, but they might also be disabled. Nothing to do but keep putting one foot in front of the other.
After a couple of miles, I hear a pattering in the trees and a gentle rain begins to fall. I open my mouth and catch a few drops on my tongue. It
tastes clean, like the fresh water, not the poison. Where did the
Gamemakers find it with the tank blown wide open? Do they have a reserve tank? Pipes that reach this far from the Capitol? I placed the explosive
chest-high; maybe the bottom foot or two of the tank remained intact and
they’re accessing that. At any rate, I’ve got fresh water and I better not take it for granted.
Quickly, I unscrew the caps of my water jugs and set them in the center of a clearing. I know it’s not ideal, catching stray drops, but it’s the best I can do at the moment. Then I strip down to my skivvies and wash off the blood. I notice the grit under my finger-nails dissolving like sugar crystals, and survey the trees. Sure enough, even the light shower melts the volcanic ash off the branches, and the runoff soaks into the ground. In a half hour, the rain stops, leaving the forest as fresh and pristine as the morning I entered it.
It’s a relief to have the ash gone, but I can’t have caught more than a couple of tablespoons of water. A wasted opportunity. One of Wyatt’s tarps would’ve come in real handy — a mesh hammock isn’t worth diddly for rain collection. You work with what you get.
What I get when I reach the end of the forest is not a brick or a steel or an electrified barrier, but a tall hedge that comes to a point like a V and stretches as far as the eye can see in both directions. On closer inspection, the plants appear to be some kind of holly, loaded with clusters of red
berries and sporting prickly green leaves. It’s not unlike what people in 12 use to decorate at New Year’s, although these berries have little black dots
on their skins. Even the regular ones are poisonous, so I ignore these. I walk along the hedge, pondering how to approach it. The boughs don’t look like they’d support my weight and digging under the mulch at the base doesn’t seem like an option. Then I spy a slight opening, turn sideways, and manage to slip through the foliage without getting scratched. A narrow path leads about ten feet in, then curves farther into the hedge, which appears to be
quite deep. Cautiously, I begin to weave my way through the greenery on the twisty-turny path, feeling I’m headed north but sometimes forced to diverge right or left out of necessity. It can’t go on forever, I think.
Eventually, I will reach the end of the arena.
But I don’t. The path winds this way and that, sometimes reaching a dead end or coming to a fork, which requires me to make a choice. Too late, I realize I should have been notching trunks or making little piles of mulch or something to mark my path because I’m hopelessly lost. I try to use the sun to orient myself, but I swear the Gamemakers are shifting the thing around in the sky just to confuse me further. Trapped in a dense maze of holly, I start panicking, plowing down paths recklessly, without any real plan but with a rising sense of claustrophobia. Forget the northern wall — I just need to get out of this place. Perspiration pours down my face and I’m dying of thirst, but I certainly don’t think I deserve a drink, given how easily I’ve been duped into this predicament. If the Gamemakers decide to unleash a mutt on me, and why not, I won’t stand a chance of escaping.
This is not how I want Ma and Sid and Lenore Dove to see me die. So very foolishly.
This goes on for hours, with me driven by a fear of taking my last breath in this spiky holiday hallucination, desperate for any change of scenery. Finally, exhausted and frazzled, I sink down onto my knees and try to collect my thoughts. The hedge has muffled the forest sounds, so just the faintest notes of birdsong reach my ears. A breeze is too much to hope for, but if I sit very still, I can catch the slight movement of air. I weigh my options: give up, continue to bumble around, or try to hack my way through
the hedge with the ax. The last seems to have the most potential, but there’s something almost sinister about the hedge that stays my hand. With it towering about me, at least several feet thick, I feel diminished by its size, frightened by what it might harbor. Resigned to my fate, I rise to my feet and reach for the ax.
As I do, a movement ahead of me catches my attention. I look up to see a gray rabbit watching me. I don’t know if it’s really the same one I shared the apple with, but it comforts me to think it is.
“Hey, my friend,” I say. “How you doing?”
After a few ear twitches, it turns and darts away from me. Without thinking, I follow. Maybe it can use its nose to get us out? I stay on its trail, tracking that white cottontail at every turn, and after a minute or two, I see
the forest at the end of a stretch. I give a whoop and sprint for the trees. The rabbit shoots out the opening and I’m a few yards behind it.
As I barrel out of the hedge, a sword blade whistles by my head, just catching the tip of my ear. I cry out and trip backward over a dead branch. After days of isolation broken only by allies, I’ve all but forgotten about the threat of the Careers. Now they’ve caught me completely off guard.
Nothing that happens in the next minute is premeditated, only reflexive. As a girl tribute from District 4 lunges with her trident pointed at my neck, I clumsily deflect it with my left arm and whip out my knife just
in time to drive it into her gut. Rolling to the side, I encounter a leg and hamstring it, leaving her district partner writhing on the ground. Scrabbling to my feet, I pull out the ax and cleave open his neck with a single adrenaline-fueled blow, then turn to take on the owner of the sword: Panache.
For a moment we face off, me, my knife, and the ax against him, his sword, and his shield. With the terrible groans from the wounded girl accompanying us, we circle each other slowly. I take in the burns along his arms and legs, the cracked lips, the mad-dog look in his eyes. A sense of dread fills me. He’s much bigger, better armed, and crazed with pain. My eyes flick to the nearby woods, seeking an escape route.
“Uh-uh,” says Panache.
With a single swoop, he knocks the ax from my hand, his blade drawing blood, and then slams the shield into my chest so hard I lose my grip on my knife. Gasping for breath, I back away, hands lifted, with only my words to defend me.
I start talking fast. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, Panache, think about this. Looks bad, killing an unarmed man. Especially me being from Twelve and all. I mean, I got a one in training. Seems cowardly. On your part.
Think about your image. You don’t want to do something stupid.” I am not making the world’s strongest argument, but the word gives him pause; I
guess I have Caesar to thank for that. I jabber on, saying anything, trying to buy time. “Listen, I know you’re not a meathead — that chariot idea was brilliant, sorry I swiped it — but you need to play this smart, am I right?
Else it could affect your sponsor gifts. How you making out with those anyway? Me, I’ve been doing pretty well. Turns out, some people love a loser. But you, everybody knows you’re going to win. You always win.
Come on, at least slide my knife over here so we can give the people a show.”
Panache gives his head a shake, like he’s clearing my words from his brain. “No! We already fought. You lost. Now you die!” He draws back his sword, eyes locked on my throat, and I brace myself for the blow, trying to look brave and defiant and proud, staring him down so hard he has to admit that even if he kills me, he hasn’t defeated me. In my last moment, I need to see recognition of that.
What I see instead is the surprise that transforms his face as the dart pierces his throat.
