Mason Mitchell's Story

The male from district nine was mocking her, and why not? She looked ridiculous, a female as muscular as she was. All that muscle no doubt weighed her down, and he could outrun her easily. But his real plan was to sneak up behind her, wait until that clumsy fool started running and then get her! GONG! He waited. Pausing just a moment to see her run past, only she didn’t. Before he even had time to turn, her hands were upon him. Last breath, and then, darkness.




Glen stood frozen in fear, waiting for the others to run past before he could find a way around them, because he was for sure not going in the water behind him. Those things what were they? The water, he couldn’t stop staring at it. Then, he saw it, just a glimpse, but it looked like a strange mix of a fish and an alligator. Which meant, it could come on land as well. He panicked, turning around to run and then…there she was, Helena. Her hands wrapped around him, he tried to scream. He couldn’t go out like this, no! His mother, his sister, they were all counting on hi-...
“I’m sorry.”
Crack.



Mason ran. That’s all it was, getting out of there. He was large, but he wasn’t careless. Reaching the edge of the tree line, he paused. Whatever was in the water was not the only thing out there; Crimson had made a note of that. He didn’t want to go out unarmed. He turned around, grabbed the club and large hatchet from the center, and turned around. Having the upper body strength he had, duel wielding these items weren’t very difficult. Besides, the hatchet could come in serious handy, it was something he could not pass up. Before he could reach the tree line a second time, he found himself facing the male from district twelve. He winced, knowing he had to get through the boy. He made a scissor like motion, a club to the head, an ax to the stomach. The boy made a small gasp before his entrails spilled out everywhere, the smell hung in Mason’s nose. It made him sick. He ran out towards the woods, not waiting to see if the other Careers were following him. He had made it a point to join them. Then, he saw a familiar face, the girl from two. A fellow Career, “Vespia!” he called. “Im glad you made it out okay!”



The knives, he had to get the knives…
The male from district ten lunged for them, pushing Rhiannon back to get them. She was in his way and he felt no guilt. He seemed in the clear, almost. The male from district four was now coming for him, and he smiled to greet him. He seemed unarmed; a knife to the head should be sufficient. Looking down, district ten picked up a single knife and flung it, hitting him in the lower left of his stomach. He went down, and turned his attention to the boy from five running, he grabbed the knife from four’s stomach and lodged that one perfectly in the head of five. Dead. And then, so was he.

The male from district one had awoken.

His name was Kline, and he wasn’t too happy about his encounter with Britty. His nose was bloody and most probably broken and his lip had been split open. He also had a rather bad bump on his head from falling backwards, she could punch, and he gave her that. That means, she is now the first he wants to hunt. When he managed to get up, he gathered up his supplies, the last sword and the throwing hatchets, and promptly removed the head of district ten. Seeing district four bleeding on the ground from the knife wound, Kline then sauntered over, and ended him as well.
Looking around, he saw the boys from seven, eight, and six all fighting amongst themselves. Six escaped, seven was missing a hand, and eight went in for the kill on seven. Once done, eight then found himself with a throwing hatchet in his skull.
His attention then turned to finding his district-mate, the fellow Career from One. He looked around, called her name. She called back, muffled, scared, and pained. Just before she was dragged underwater by the jaws of….what were those things?? The alligator-fish were coming on land, hunting on the bodies that the hovercrafts hadn’t been able to pick up, yet. She had still been alive. It was time to leave, he couldn’t save her. He bolted through the forest, grabbing the hatchet in the boy from eight’s skull. It wasn’t long before he met up with Mason and Vespia. Mason shot him a look, as if to ask what had happened to the girl, but he just shook his head in response.
“Creatures got her. What happened to yours?” he directed towards Vespia.




Cannon fire shot through the trees. One for every dead tribute after the girl from eight.
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
The faces would be shown in the sky at midnight exactly. It is approximately six thirty in the afternoon now. Hovercrafts removed what bodies remained.

The District 1 male tribute named Kline and the District 11 male tribute named Mason were talking to each other about the death of Kline's district partner. When Kline asked her about hers, she answered, " I have no idea at all. I was too busy killing tributes off. I expected him to do the same thing. But I haven't seen him since I ran from the metal plate to get my weapons, and he disappeared all of the sudden. Who knows? He may be dragged by those swampy creatures, or ran off into the woods. " Vespia answered as she swung her hatchet expertly to her side. Was Kline teaming up with Mason? He was not part of the career, but anyway, she can always quit the careers and hunt on her own if she wants to. Looking around, the tributes have already dispersed. No one was around to kill, except for the three of them. Seeing the swampy creatures starting to creep up on the land they were standing on, she said, " We might as well look for that mine shaft and get some food to eat "

She started walking beside Mason and Kline. But she knew she had to find the D4 girl, Rhiannon. She was a career too, and at the training center, she felt like Rhiannon was like a sister to her. And she was actually feeling a bit awkward with Kline and Mason. Being the only girl in the career pack was kind of a hassle somehow. " Anyway, does anyone of you have an idea of who to look for first? Or do we just kill all the tributes that we happen to see? " Vespia asked as she scan the woods, with the hatchet in her left hand and two knives on the other hand.

" We might as well look for that mine shaft and get some food to eat "

"Yeah," replied Kline. "It'll get really nasty really quick if we don't find some food."
"Or some water," Mason added, "We're surrounded by it, but I can't possibly believe that this murky shit is fit for human consumption."
Mason ran his hands through the thick, brown water. Kline nodded in agreement, but stopped when he heard a sound. Feet sloshing near them. It was hard to be subtle and sneaky in this terrain, what with ever step making either a sloshing or a splashing, or some sort of watery-muddy sound. Not only that, but it slowed you down, too. Kline drew his sword. Mason, noticing Kline's alarm, rested his hands on his weapons, but did not fully draw them as Kline had. No reason to get all worked up if it was truly nothing, but in here, it is almost rarely nothing.

"It's the girl from district four," Mason muttered. Kline wasn't quite sure how he had known, but he took his word for it. With a look to Vespia, Kline placed his sword back down. He knew they were close, and Four was a Career district of sorts. Why not? They had already lost two Careers, time to pick up the slack. Well, technically they had only lost one, but where was...
BOOM!
Cannon fire.
Then...shaking?
The world seemed to tremble beneath them as they looked around for the source. Then they saw it, a large pack of maybe ten or twenty mutant rats running towards them.
"Get up the trees!" Mason shouted, unaware that these rats were actually apt climbers. Mason and Kline started to scramble up the trees but just as the rats neared them, they ran right past them. "What the..." Kline started.
And then the hissing began.
"Those rats weren't running at us, they were running from something." Mason said, squinting into the trees, trying to see what it could be.

Then, out of the trees emerged three seven foot long snakes. They were bright silver and gleaming, and they were huge. Not only that, but noticing the larger meat, they were no longer focused on the rats.



All over the arena, mutant snakes have begun their hunting hour. These snakes resemble boa constructers, but theres a catch. They are razor sharp. Touch one, and you are sliced like a grater. You will notice them coming by rats running away from them, and they hunt in packs of two to five. And yes, they are coming for all of you as well.

Rhiannon was continuing to walk on through the water, hoping she wasn't making too much noise, but she couldn't help but wonder if others would be able to hear her. She soon got the answer to that question. She could barely hear the sound of two male voices conversing, that is, over the sloshing noises she was creating which, come to think of it, were rather loud. She stopped, hoping to hear what the two were talking about and maybe identify them by their voices.
"It's the girl from district four." muttered a voice that sounded an awful lot like Mason's, the district eleven male. Rhiannon opened her mouth to speak up, but stopped. Come to think of it, how did she know for sure that they wouldn't want to attack her? She may be a career like them, but she wasn't exactly the strongest willed fighter, so maybe they all thought of her as a misfit. While she was still debating over it, she flinched as a cannon blared through the air. Then, the surface of the water quivered and Rhiannon felt the ground shake. She took a deep breath and looked up eyes wide, getting this feeling of dreadin the pit of her stomach that something was coming. Just then, Mason yelled from not too far away, "Get up in the trees!" and only seconds later a pack of large rat-type creatures scampered past. Rhiannon let out a shrill wail as they charged towards her, but much to her shock they just kept on running without stopping at all. Breathing heavily, she looked over in the direction the rats had came from and barely spotted the other tributes through the dsrkness.
"Those rats weren't running from us, they were running from something." she heard, and so she peered closely for any sign of another possible threat. That's when the gleam of silver saw her eye, and she easily identified the long, slithering bodies as none other than snakes. There were about three of them, and one immediately lunged forwards in the direction of Kline. That was when Rhiannon leapt out of hiding and with a loud grunt and a quick swing of her trident, she sent that snake flying far away. She continued holding the trident out in front of her as the other two snakes slowly slithered towards them.

As the large snakes suddenly appeared, she readied herself with her hatchet and knives. " Running from them seems like a good idea. But don't climb up the tress. They are still snakes after all. If you climb up a tree, might as well ready yourself for death " Vespia said as she ran towards Rhiannon. " I'll help you kill those snakes " she told her as she threw one of her knives, hitting the snake in his head, immediately injuring it, although it still squirmed. The other snake was heading to Mason's direction. He was a good ten feet away from her now, and she knew that Mason had weapons to defend himself. " Rhiannon, where have you been? Axel is nowhere to be found and Kline's district partner is dead. " Vespia asked her as she sent a snake flying away from them. She sprinted toward the snake she injured and severed its head off, then grabbed her knife back.

" How about you? Where's your district partner? Is he still alive or not? I haven't kept track of the deaths much " she asked Rhiannon. She looked over Mason and Kline, hoping that they will manage to kill off the snakes. ' Weird things that the game makers do with us. ' Vespia thought, a sudden death glare appearing in her eyes. She suddenly wondered if those snakes had killed anyone inside the woods where it came from, that way, there would be less people to kill.

Rhiannon watched the snake approach Mason and Kline, but she knew that the two of them could defend themselves against one snake, they were both well armed, and of course, strong fighters. She looked at Vespia as she asked about what happened to her district partner, "He got killed right in the beginning of the bloodbath, took a knife to the stomach." she said in a strained voice, "The rest is kind of a blur, but Kline killed him out of mercy and I ran for the trident then swam off. I haven't been doing much since then but searching for an entrance to the mine shafts. I'm guessing you guys must be after them too?'

Vespia watched as the faces of the dead tributes flashed across the capitol-made sky. ' Axel died after all. He would've been great if he were on the career team too ' Vespia thought. But she won't let it become a moment of her weakness. After the capitol theme stopped playing, she looked towards the woods and thought of the dangers that were possibly lurking in them. Holding her hatchet and knives in a hard grip, she asked the other careers, " We better head in there and find a good place to sleep. Or would you guys prefer to sleep out here? "

She went beside Rhiannon, knowing that she also feels the loss of her district partner. Vespia's mother was right after all. Back in District 2, her mother's final words to her were " Contain your emotions. Never let them get in your way "

Looking back up, she saw the face of her family members, knowing that she might not return to them alive. " If were going to die in here, might as well make it hard for the others to stay alive " she muttered absentmindedly.

Rhiannon looked over at Kline and Mason, watching as the last snake was finished off,but still remained coiled tightly around Mason's leg. "What do we do?" she asked in a strained voice, her face expressing concern. Before anyone could answer, the anthem of the capitol rang through the night and the faces of the deceased flashed through the dark sky. The second face that appeared was Axel, who was Vespia's district partner. Rhiannon glanced over at her and gave her a sympathetic sort of look. When she looked back at the sky, she saw her own district partner appear as well, which made her frown deeper. The sky went dark once again after the death list had finished. Rhiannon had counted 11 fallen tributes so far.
Immediately, Vespia went back into business mode, "We better head in there and find a good place to sleep. Or would you guys prefer to sleep out here? " she said, staring off into the woods.
Rhiannon personally thought it would be wise to stay near the ring, now that all the others had ran off deep into the woods, they probably wouldn't be coming back for a while.She glanced between the others, nervous to make a suggestion considering she still wasn't sure if she was completely welcome in this group. She'd let them throw in their opinions first, but as she stood quietly she eyed the snake around Kline's leg. Those things could clearly cut very deep, likely no one would be able to do anything about it without getting their hands sliced nearly in half. And no matter how they got it off, it'd still leave him in a lot of pain, and it would probably slow him down a lot. It made her nervous because she knew how impatient some careers could be, and she didn't want anyone turning on each other. Then, she realized with a pang of dread that at one point, they all would have to, because everyone but one person had to die.

Rhiannon put her hands on her hips and looked up uncertainly as Kline made his way up the tree. Growing up in a district where you spent most of your time out on the sea, climbing trees was something she wasn't at all familiar with. She frowned slightly and turned back to the other two careers, noticing Mason was struggling to get the dead snake unwrapped from his ankle. She was about to offer him some help when he said to Vespia and her, "You two can get some sleep too. I know Kline will get plenty. I'll be fine."
She chewed her lip as she looked back up at the trees, the branches looking so high and far apart. She was certain she wouldn't be able to climb that, but the ground was unsafe with all the swamp mutations roaming around. Rhiannon had a feeling she wouldn't get much sleep tonight, maybe instead she could be a lookout because they were very in the open, and anything could happen when they were all asleep.
Remembering Mason's question, she turned back to him, "I'm not tired." she said quietly, and sat down across from him, glancing down to the snake he was trying to remove from his leg, "Besides, it looks like you could use some help with that, otherwise you'll be up all night trying to get rid of it." she lifted her gaze back up to look at him directly.

" Thanks for the offer, but I'm not tired either. " Vespia told Kline as she sat down beside Rhiannon. " I have knives. Maybe we can use it to help Mason get that thing off of him " she added as she handed out one knife to Rhiannon. After some time, she stood up and slowly walked towards Mason and started cutting the body of the snake expertly without slicing any part of Mason's skin. She managed to remove most of it, but there were still patches of snake skin attached to his own. " It will be hard to remove that part, but at least you can manage to move now. Although I understand that it would still hurt you. " Vespia told him as she walked around the plates were the tributes were lifted. She again glanced at the woods to where the other tributes had run off. In the center, there were still some weapons lying under the mud. She found a knives and some hatchet. Also a sword and clubs.

' I might be able to use them ' Vespia thought as she picked up the small weapons and placed them inside her jacket pockets. The hatchet was big, so she'll just carry it. " There are still some weapons here. Go get them if you know how to use it " she told the other careers. Deciding that she would give Rhiannon a knife, she told her, " Rhiannon, you can keep the knife ". She was surprised to hear that her voice were in their usual childish tone. She fought the urge to cry. Instead, she just looked up at the sky to prevent her tears from spilling. She did miss her district.

(Since in the OOC there were still some weapons left, I just took advantage of them XD)

As Kline slept silently, Mason worked with Vespia and Rhiannon to get the snake off his leg. It took several hours, but it wasn't that bad. They needed to get up and moving, though, if they were going to get to that supplies before everyone else. After all, they were careers. That meant, at least for Kline and Mason, they had little to no skills of getting themselves supplies out here in the wild. Mason had ripped off a bit of his uniform to wrap around his leg, keeping it for the most part, blood and gunk free. For the most part. Getting up, he knocked Kline from his tree with a stark, "Get up."
Without a second to realize what had happened, Kline reached the same fate as his partner. A gator mutt snapping his jaws up around him, and then BOOM, cannon fire. There was no helping him.
"Move!" Mason shouted, knowing quite well these things could come up on land. Not even pausing a second to grab Kline's sword. It wasn't their most important prerogative at the moment. The gators were about, and he wasn't going to end up like Kline.
Running through the expanse of trees and muck, he came upon a camp fire. Or at least, saw the smoke from it. Peering through the trees, he found the girls from districts 3, 9, and 11 hanging around like best buddies. Didn't they know they were supposed to kill each other. Well, Mason was going to have to do it for them. He waited for the two girls to catch up to him first, it would help round them up if he had more people.

Rhiannon's eyes widened and the look on her face turned to one of horror as she saw those huge, menacing jaws close around Kline...
Before Mason even had to yell for them to run, she was already doing just that sprinting off in the opposite direction, Mason closely tied with her. She kept running as fast as her tired and sore body could allow her, only to stop when she realized that Vespia wasn't for sure following behind them. She took a quick glance at Mason who was continuing to run without waiting for either of them, but she didn't care, he could leave her behind, but no way was she leaving Vespia behind. They could catch up with him together soon enough. She stood there, breathing ragged and heavy as she peered through the trees and waited.

And just like that, Kline was dead. She wanted to kill all the things that suddenly appeared. But she knew she couldn't finish them all night. Having no other choice, she followed Mason and Rhiannon to the other direction, away from those bloodthirsty gators. She was a fast runner, but she hesitated to run away from Kline. Before she can even hear the cannon sound for his death, she saw Kline's eyes beg for help before those gators killed him. And that was why she hesitated. She saw that Rhiannon had waited for her. She ran as fast as she could, with all the weapons that she can find. When she finally caught up to Rhiannon, she told her, " You shouldn't have waited for me. Who knows what awaits you here? "

Seeing that there was smoke not far away from them, she saw that Mason was poised to attack them at any moment. " Stay here first. I'm going to climb up that tree and see what I can find " And with that, she climbed up the nearest tree. She had cuts and gashes along her legs and arms, tearing her attire slightly, as she was no expert of climbing trees. But she does know how, and that was better than not knowing how to climb at all. When she reached a point where she knew that she couldn't be seen, she peeked at the female tributes surrounding a campfire. She had no idea who they were. But if Mason was going to attack, then she won't be holding back too.

" You shouldn't have waited for me. Who knows what awaits you here?" Rhiannon just looked at Vespia and shrugged, "I 'm not about to leave my closest ally behind." she said in a low voice. Then she saw Vespia looking off in another direction and followed her gaze to see somewhere where smoke was rising through the trees and Mason was standing there with his back to them, looking like he was ready to leap out at someone.
Rhiannon felt her throat close with fear when she realized that the moment had arrived, the moment where she'd been faced with having to hurt, fight against, likely even kill somebody. It was a moment she wanted to put off for as long as possible but now here it was, right in front of her. If she wanted to stay with the careers and have some people she could depend on in this game, she'd have to fight with them. Her face went a dozen shades paler than normal, and as Vespia spoke she turned to glance at her, a blank expression on her face, " Stay here first. I'm going to climb up that tree and see what I can find." Rhiannon nodded quietly as she watched Vespia climb up the tree, cutting herself up pretty bad in the process.
"Are you okay? You should probably come down- be careful." Rhiannon said in a slightly strained voice. But Vespia was too busy staring down at what was going on to hear her.
"What is it?" Rhiannon asked in a slightly hushed, lower than usual voice. She tried to hide how immensely terrified she was. She glanced over at Mason who was still watching the people through the trees, and she felt chills go down her spine at the thought of taking an innocent life, and for what purpose? She clenched her fists and waited for one of her allies to make a move.