A Part to Play // Hunger Games

25 // Are They Hope?

"If she's kidnapped and if she winds up face to face with him himself, she'll kick his ass so far into next year that he'll be hissing for mercy" - Eye Of The Storm (kalopsiclove)

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TW: mentions of death and an almost suicide (kinda) 

The bloodbath was absolutely brutal and Aria was holding back tears by the time it was finally over. Eleven tributes lost their lives almost immediately after the first cannon - announcing the start of the Games - blasted. One of those people was Chase, the boy she had been helping to train for the past couple of days and actually got to know a little bit. The girl now understood the reason Villòn chose not to get even the tiniest bit close to the tributes and just not train them at all. It hurt. It hurt really bad when someone you knew died and there was absolutely nothing you could do about it. How did Josh and Finnick do it for so long, and poor Haymitch. She now got why the Victor chose to get drunk instead.

But the young girl couldn't focus on that at the moment, for Marissa was still alive and she needed all the help she could get. The fifteen year old had ran away from the cornucopia, just like she did during her own Games. The only problem was that her starting position on the metal plates was poor, leading the girl to run off to the forest nearly empty-handed. And that was bad.

The Arena was composed by a huge forest, occupying most of its territory - from what the girl could see in her private computer screen and the huge projector on the mentors lounge - with a big lake near the cornucopia and an extensive wheat field opposite to the forest. Unlike in her Games, however, this Arena looked hot and tropical, the tributes' clothes being very similar to the ones she wore, just less warm, due to the type of weather they would be facing.

It looked promising enough and much better than the previous year's wasteland.

As the bloodbath came to an end, Josh made his way to the girl's cubicle, his tribute being dead. Johanna also came over, both tributes from her District also dead. Finnick's tribute - the girl from Four - was still alive, although her partner was dead too. And both Haymitch's tributes were also alive.

Now, the youngest mentor had help, Johanna and Josh both deciding to stick to her instead of helping Finnick out, knowing she needed the support more than he did, watching as the young girl took a deep breath and blinked away the tears that were starting to form in the corner of her eyes, needing to stay focused in order to be of any use to her tribute. The girl was smart, but without supplies, she was going to need help. And at that point, Aria could only pray that she had listened to the mentor's advices on stealth and stealing from careers. If she was going to survive, the tribute would have to outsmart them.

"I honestly don't know how you guys can do it." She told her two friends, once night fell upon the Arena and her tribute went off to sleep, her voice thick from holding back tears, the youngest girl, overwhelmed. "Last year it wasn't this hard." She sniffled.

"Hey. Ari, look at me. You're going to get through this. The first time is always the worst. I can't promise you it'll stop hurting, but I do promise to stay right here, next to you, every step of the way, okay?" Josh told the girl softly, hugging her close, his heart clenching at seeing the one he considered to be a younger sister under so much pressure. She was so young. She shouldn't have to go through this. And at that moment - and that moment only - he was glad that Em was dead and didn't have to go through mentoring the tributes from Five.

Johanna took it to stroking the younger Victor's hair, trying to comfort her. The woman still remembered what her first time mentoring had been like, her tribute getting killed right off the bat. It had been during Aria's Games, actually, and Finnick and Josh were right there to help her through it. She would do the same for the small girl in front of her.