The Hunger Games; Beyond Chaotic (Orange Universe x THG)

10. The 3rd Tribute / Ray

Every tribute was to gather tonight for one last dinner. As the Capitol workers would say, it's a great chance to get your goodbyes in!  When really, these dinners were only ever used to choose which tributes you wanted to team up with and who you wanted dead. I fully expected the games to be canceled after the stunt this morning, since multiple tributes had terrible injuries inflicted upon them. But Mamby announced that the games would still go on, injured or not. I managed to escape with only minor injuries, a scratch from a random piece of flying debris and a slap from Storms. I expected Storms to be heavily punished, but instead Alex got the worst of it. We still didn't know what had happened to her. Storms had been crying ever since the incident, partly because she didn't want to of hurt anyone, and partly because of the games. Surprisingly, Storms had mostly be untouched by the bomb. Small shards of glass had shot into her hands but that's all, the medics had been able to pull those out for her. Some tributes had sustained way worse injuries such as a finger being blown off, a large glass shard to the ankle, and many other scars. The worst punishment that Storms got was most of the tributes now hated her. 

I found Storms cradled in her bedsheets. 

"Come on, it's dinner-time." I told her, tapping her shoulder softly.

"Do you think we can skip? I wouldn't be surprised if I got my head blown off."

"I don't think we can." I pulled her up to her feet and we walked down the hallway to the communal dinning room. She stayed a few paces behind me, but at least she wasn't crying anymore. I pushed open the large doors that inclosed the room. When I opened them, I was greeted with many hostile faces. Juno in particular. Juno was the District 10 tribute with a sibling from a whole other district. They had a raw scar running across their face from their right eye to their chin. It was obviously new and had been caused by Storms's explosion. Storms quickly adverted her gaze from Juno's. Marie sat next to Mewo, deep within conversation. Marie had been another one of the tributes who'd been injured in the explosion. A glass shard had dug deep within her ankle and caused her not to be able to walk on her right foot. I moved towards the end of the table with Storms. All hopes of allying up with any of the tributes were gone. Storms's eyes kept flickering from me to another tribute in the room. Like the rest, they eyed Storms carefully. I had seen Storms talk to this tribute once in the training room when she'd had a outburst.. Maybe they wouldn't hate her.

"Hello once again, tributes!" Time Freakyman sat at the head of the table, rocking back and forth in their chair. They had a smug look on their face, polished and scarless. No scratches or anything could be seen on Time. I knew Time had been at least a bit injured from the explosion because I remember their high pitched scream as something thumped into their face. Surgery in the Capitol worked fast when they needed it to. 

"I'm Time Freakyman and I'm excited to see you all once again! As we know, there was an explosion recently. I see many of you here with angry faces directed at our young tribute, Storms Rain. You should all know, it wasn't her fault. Really, it was.." Time dramatically paused. They turned around in their chair and called something out to one of the escorts. She had bushy hair with specks of gold in it. She ran behind a secret passageway and came back out with someone I knew all too well, handcuffed. Alex. The look on Alex's face was horrible. Dried up tears pooled underneath her eyes and her cheeks were bright red. Time took in a deep breath.

"This is Alex Mercia. District 12's Mentor." All eyes in the room turned towards our mentor, Alex. I had never really liked Alex. She'd always favoured Storms over me and her jokes made me want to put a gun to my head. The bomb made me dislike her even more. But seeing her in this state, it was horrible.

"I think it's time I revealed her.. punishment." Time paused for a second. "Alex Mercia, is there anything you'd like to say?"

"Please, I didn't know that that would happen. Please..." The strain in her voice was hard to listen to. 

"Well, Alex. As your punishment for almost killing multiple Capitol citizens and tributes, you will experience something you have experienced before." I already knew what Time would say next.

"You will participate in The Hunger Games once again."

The rest of the dinner was a blur. It didn't make sense. District 12 couldn't have 3 tributes, could it? Alex was quiet the whole time, her eyes wide and scared. I had no idea what had happened to Alex in that last arena, for all I knew it could've been terrible. And what were the chances of Alex surviving the games again? I watched as tributes chatted together about teaming up and who'd they'd aim for first. I heard my name get thrown around in there a couple times. Since the training score event was cancelled, we only knew who was best in this room through observing. I scooted around to look at some of the teams forming. In one corner, a team of six stood. I had heard Mewo basically begging Marie to ally with her this whole time and it looked like she had finally succeeded. Mewo, Marie, Flow, Saf, Ash and Jay all talked amongst themselves about what they'd do at the start. In another corner, I spotted James and Skyler from District 5, Juno and Fey. I wondered what it was like for Juno and Fey, being siblings from different Districts. I had no idea how they'd been split up. In another corner, I saw Nephthys all alone, looking into a locket around her neck. I saw Eve from District 6 and Lana from District 7 gossiping away about one of the other tributes. I saw another loner, Cody from District 7. Finally, I saw Storms and Mattie talking. I walked over to them. 

"Hey Ray! This is Mattie, District 7. They would like to ally with us." The looked in Storms's eyes.. I hadn't seen it for years. Clearly they were friends. I didn't exactly want to team with someone I hardly knew.. but then again, the more the better. 

"Okay."

I didn't sleep that night. Tossing and turning just thinking about the death that awaited me tomorrow. A knife to the throat? A mace to the head? A arrow to the heart? Would I die that early? Would I slowly starve to death? Die of infection? I felt something touch the back of my neck. I quickly rolled over and tossed my hand over a small furred rodent. I cupped both my hands around it, and brought it up to my face. A small, baby rat with matted grey fur. A rat? Normally, I'd think of this as one of Alex's jokes. But Alex wasn't really in a joking mood. The rodent hopped from my hand to my neck where it curled up and begun to snore. The rat's body was hardly bigger than my thumb, just a tiny baby. I couldn't just.. leave it here to be killed by the Capitol people. 

I ended up with a rat hidden in my pocket the next day. I was almost sure that it would be detected by some sort of security check but surprisingly, no one noticed. I saw other tributes being escorted in to closed off rooms, some of them with hard, serious looks on their faces and others sobbing desperately for their parents. I clenched my jaw as hard as I could to stop myself from crying. Storms on the other hand..

"Please, please just let me go. I did nothing. I've never done anything wrong! I'm just a kid why are you sending me to kill other kids? Please!" Me and Storms were split up. We planned to find each other as fast as we could when the games started and then go and find Mattie. We didn't plan on going anywhere near the cornucopia. That was practically a death wish. The rat in my pocket squirmed and shivered but I shoved my hand into my pocket to stop it. I was taken to a room where I saw Alex for a split second before she was shoved off into somewhere else. Just before I missed my opportunity, I raised my hand and flipped her off. She snarled back. I had no mentor to come and say goodbye to me. None of my stylists had come either. It was time. My escort brought me over to a separate booth where a tracker was injected into my arm and then we turned into another mystery room. And finally, I saw it. In this room there was a loud, buzzing sound. In the centre of the room stood a giant tube which would soon carry me off to the games. My escort spoke to for the first time today, he was dressed in all black, only his face was shown.

"Any last words before your taken into The Games?"

"Goodbye."