Twenty Four Shades of Blood [A Hunger Games Fanfic]

The First Night - 18

Nova can’t sleep; her heart is still pounding painfully against her ribs.  She doesn’t want to die, not here, not in this place of shadows and shades of the past.  The building she’s taken refuge in for the night is mainly collapsed, and the jungle as taken over, thick brown moss and lichen growing over everything.  Nova tries not to look at the vines hanging from the roof; they look  disturbingly like snakes.

She swallows the sob that rises in her throat and wraps her arms around her knees, trying to keep warm.  It’s not really cold, but there’s a creeping dampness that crawls through her clothes and leaves her shivering.

The second sob escapes and echoes for a moment off the rubble around her.  Nova’s heart leaps again. 

Something moves in the darkness.

Nova presses herself against the floor, hand curling around a lump of stone.  It’s not much, but it’s the best she’s got.  The rest of her supplies will be of no use, a small loaf of bread and some ratty looking twine.  There’s a terrible dull feeling in her chest, like a hand closing around her heart, stopping her breath.

The noise stops, and Nova lifts her head, just a little, and the torch snaps on, blinding her completely.

“Well, well, what have we here?”  

The voice belongs to the girl from Two. Nova remembers hearing it in the training days.  She sounds almost bored.  The light is hurting her eyes, and all she can make out is a vague figure behind it.

“Please...please, don’t hurt me.  Please just let me go...”

As she speaks, Nova pulls herself upright, keeping the rock behind her as she does so.  She’ll have one chance and only one to do this.  The girl laughs, a hard, cold noise.

“Let you go?  I think you are rather missing the point of the Hunger Games, dear.  We’re not meant to let you go.”

The torch dips for just a second, and Nova moves.  Vasilissa lets out a growl as the rock hits her arm, and the torch falls to the ground.  Nova is already on her feet and is turning to flee when she slams into something.

Something tall, and warm and breathing.

There’s a soft snigger as big hands grab her arms painfully tight and push her back the way she’d come.  Nova’s throat is so dry, it feels like she can’t breathe.  

“Look what I found!”

The boy holding her is the cocky giant from One.  A new voice interrupts.

“This one’s mine. You promised I could have her if we found her.”

Another torch snaps on and Nova sees the hard, angry face of the girl from District One glaring at her.  The boy holding her shrugs and lets her go, and Nova collapses in the middle of the circle. 

“Grab her arms, you two.”

The twins give each other one short look and does as they’re told, hanging on a little more tightly than necessary, identical faces leering in the torchlight.  Nova lets out a little whimper and struggles against them, but it’s not good.  The faces staring at her don’t even change.  A sob wrenches free, and Nova can feel the tears sliding out of the corners of her eyes.

“Aww, how cute!” the girl from One drawls, “I hate cute. You can stop crying. It’s only going to get worse from now on.”

Nova stares into the cold eyes and feels the last little flicker of hope die.  

“Please...please...I don’t want to die!”

One of the twins holding her lets out a little laugh.