The Hunger Games

ꜰɪꜰᴛᴇᴇɴ

The first thing Aspen saw was the big cornucopia Charles had told her about. Surrounding it were weapons, food, medicine, all things that would be of benefit to them. Then, she saw the grass and trees in front of her and surrounding the grassy land her and the other tributes were on.

Pen then looked around and saw the tributes all standing there in the same position she was in, standing on the closed tube compartment beneath them.

It was eerily calm. A strong robotic voice started counting down, and a few of the tributes got in position to run. Pen looked over at Michael, who was ready to run for the cornocopia before him. She wished she could warn him, but remembered he had been training for this and probably new what he was getting into to and the fighting he would have to partake in.

Then, a light on the cornocopia started counting down from ten. Aspen felt the pit in her stomach start to form, nervousness growing and growing, slowly consuming her.

Three.

Two.

One.

Everyone ran, even Katniss and Peeta. But Aspen stayed where she was, watching tributes in front of her slaughter each other for whatever they could find to help them. She watched Michael grab a knife and slit someone's throat with it, picking up a bag and running for the woods. She then looked over and saw Katniss, who was also watching the scene.

"Katniss!" Aspen yelled, starting to run the opposite direction of the cornocopia and for the woods. She didn't care about whatever the cornocopia had to offer. She knew that if she took even a step near it, someone would come up and try to kill her.

Katniss ignored Aspen and started running for a bag no one seemed to be paying attention to. Once Katniss grabbed it, though, a man came up behind her and tried to take it. He was hit by a force behind them, and Aspen saw it was Clove.

Then, Clove started attacking Katniss.

"Shit." Aspen muttered, running over to help.

Katniss didn't stop running, which Aspen was grateful for. She had made it at the cornocopia, and saw a line of swords. She stared at it for a second before picking one up. She didn't have any time to admire it, because a boy came up behind her and punched her in the side.

Aspen fell over, but hit the sword at the guy's ankle, cutting it and tripping him. He winced in pain, and Aspen put the sword in the compartment Edda designed on her outfit.

She then got up off of the ground, not ready for another attack and running in the direction Katniss ran. She saw Katniss's bag running, and called for her. Katniss heard her name and stopped for a second, letting Aspen catch up.

When she did, the two girls tackled each other in a hug. From this point on, they knew they would have to stick together to have even a small chance of making out of this alive.

"We have to keep running. There was a girl right behind me." Katniss said. Aspen nodded, and the girls ran away, further and further into the woods. As they ran, they didn't see the dent in the ground leading for a big drop. So, each of them tumbled into the dent, forcing themselves to pick each other back up again and keep running.

Eventually, they came to a secluded enough spot to stop and take a second to catch their breath. Aspen leaned on a tree nearby, the two being surrounded by them. Katniss sat down on a big tree branch that had fallen, taking her bag off and seeing its contents.

The first thing she pulled out was rope. Then, a silver bottle. After that, there was a tarp, and something that looked like fishing line.

"What's tha-" Aspen started to ask, getting up from the tree to walk over to Katniss. A loud cannon's boom interrupted her, making her and Katniss look up quickly.

The single boom was followed by another, and another, and another.

"Twelve." Katniss said, looking over at Aspen. There were twelve tributes that had died.

Aspen went to sit down, but noticed a butterfly under the log Katniss was sitting on. She let it crawl on her finger, smiling and showing Katniss. Katniss smiled as well before the butterfly flew away.

It wasn't long of the girls resting before they decided to start on the move again. Eventually, Katniss noticed that the ground was damp. They kept walking in that direction and found a small pond.

They tried their best to make contraptions and start fires, but nothing was working out for them too well. Soon after realizing all of their tactics were failing, Katniss and Aspen decided to end the night on top of a big tree branch where they would sleep.

They climbed the tree and tied themselves to it. Katniss looked next to her and saw a camera lodged into a hole of the tree. She tapped Pen's shoulders and looked at it, both girls staring at the camera.

"Fucking freaks." Pen sighed, collapsing down out of tiredness next to her friend.

Music started up, which sounded like the Capitol national anthem. Aspen and Katniss stared up at the sky at a big hologram, showing all of the dead tributes. By the time the hologram was gone, both Katniss and Aspen had tears in their eyes.

Neither of them slept. How could they?

Aspen didn't know what time it was, but was startled by a scream in the middle of the night. The scream was followed by the noise of the cannon. Katniss heard it, too, and both girls huddled up closer against the tree to hide.

As Aspen looked down, she saw a group of tributes walking and laughing, making fun of the girl they just killed. She was dissapointed to see Michael was apart of that group, but not surprised.

"Hey, loverboy! You sure they went this way?" Michael asked. Aspen watched as Peeta appeared from the dark, nodding.

Pen tapped Katniss side, making her shuffle to watch the view as well.

"Yeah, I'm sure." Peeta confirmed.

"You better be." Michael said.

Aspen saw Katniss lean back with furrowed brows. She wasn't sure if Peeta was actually helping them, or trying to get them off of Katniss and Aspen's back.

"Are you sure we shouldn't just kill him now?" Glimmer asked. A guy behind Michael, who Aspen recognized as Cato, shook his head and spoke up.

"Nah. He's our best chance of finding them. Let's go." Cato said. 

The group walked off. Aspen thought about how Michael was with them. He promised he wouldn't kill her, but he never said anything about killing Katniss.

Which only pissed Aspen off.