The Divergent Games[In Editing]

The Divergent Games XVIII: Losing Everyone

     I muster up enough strength, and begin moving my body up and down, as if I were trying to touch my toes. "What are you doing?" Cameron whispers to me. He must think I look like an idiot right now. But I do know what I'm doing. 

     "Remember during harvesting season a few years ago, when all the kids had to go up in the orchards to get the fruit, because they were the lightest?" I say, and I keep bending. It puts a pain in my chest, and my whole body shakes, making me sweat more, but I don't stop. I can feel the blood rushing to my head.

     "Yeah, so?" he retorts, irritated, but I still don't stop.

    I finally get a grip of my feet, and move my hands as swiftly as possible to the vine holding me by my ankles. I might be tall, but I'm lean. I know how to balance my weight. When we went up in the orchards, I was able to climb higher than the short, skinny little girls, because they didn't have the skills or knowledge of climbing that I had. "There's a reason I always got up to the top of the trees first," I grit my teeth as I pull my upper body up against the vine, inching my hands up as I go. The muscles and veins in my upper arms are bulging immensely from the exertion. 

     "And there's a reason I stayed there the longest." I slide up the vines and latch onto the branch with both hands, letting my feet dangle for a moment before swinging them upwards and wrapping them around the branch as well. Using the trunk of the tree, and whatever extra branches and vines there are, I haul myself on top of the branch and stand, taking a deep breath and closing my eyes, letting myself cool down.

     When I open them, Cameron just stares at me with his lips parted. I'm not sure why, but it makes me laugh. I cover my mouth, but it doesn't stop. I end up in a hysteric fit of giggling which Cameron just glowers at me for. He probably thinks I'm laughing at him, but I'm not. I'm not sure what I'm laughing at. 

     Day 2 in the arena of the 6th Divergent Games and Renee Belladonna of Dauntless, District 11, is already going mad. 

     "Renee," I hear through my blaring laughter, but my head is clouded. I'm slowly sinking lower on the branch, clutching my stomach, fighting for air. "Renee, shut up!" Cameron snaps, and I sit up, my eyes so wide with attention and my expression so alert that it startles him how I could change that quickly. It startles me too. I part my lips, taking deep breaths, and he glares at me, his brows furrowed quizzically. 

     "Shut up and pull me up. Please don't do that again." He doesn't look at me now. He tilts his chin back so he stares at the ground below him. I sit still for a moment. "Renee!" he shouts, and I snap back into reality, brushing a piece of hair out of my face and crawling through the vines and branches over to him. 

     "You need to grab the rope-vine thing." I say, and he bends upwards. It takes him a few more tries than it did for me, but eventually, he wraps his long fingers around the vine. I reach down and grab him by the forearm, and he grips me back as I use my other hand to hold onto a branch. I grit my teeth and squint my eyes shut as I pull him up slowly, and finally, he leans over the branch, and crawls on top. We both take a moment to catch our breaths and cool down for a moment, as we untie ourselves from the vines and throw them back down towards the ground. We're about to scale down the trees and make a run for it when I hear a twig snap down below. I quickly wrap myself around the trunk of the tree to the other side, pulling Cameron with me. Hopefully they can't see us from here. 

     I calculated in my head. Zero males and two females left of Abnegation. One male and three females left of Amity. Two males and two females left of Candor. Three males and one female left of Erudite.

      I shudder when I realize I'm the only girl left in Dauntless.

      "Aw, man, you're kidding me!" I heard a little boy say. But he couldn't have been much younger than me. I peered through the branches and vines to see a short, freckled Abnegation boy examining the empty ropes. "I did everything right, I know it! How did a stupid animal get free? I set two to make sure that wouldn't happen!" he looked distraught. I exchanged a glance with Cameron. We were both relieved. To our surprise, it wasn't Astrid or Nicanor who had set the traps. And even more to our surprise, this kid was trying to catch something to eat, not a tribute.