traveling north {kiara day 2}

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i count the copies, i kept receipts
I kept the blisters on the bottom of my feet
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Another endless - or seemingly endless, it was actually only a mile or two - through the sand. Thankfully the sun was not as strong as it would be if it weren't been refracted through the sides of the massive hourglass that was Kiara's prison, but it still made sweating it out in her skintight jumpsuit far from comfortable. If she could take shelter in the shade of a nice, large sand dune and just rest for a while it would've been much more tolerable. But she couldn't; she had to keep moving, find another tower and explore it for useful things. There was no time to waste; if she waited too long the sand would pile up and block the entryways completely.

The small tribute was fairly certain she'd figured out how this arena worked by then. The sand was constantly rising due to the perpetual stream that fell onto the Cornucopia, and as it rose, the tributes gained access to higher levels of the glass towers around the place. If you went in a tower and stayed in too long, the sand would rise and trap you in forever, just as she'd suspected when observing one the evening before. As long as you could get in and get out before sundown you'd be fine, but there was no taking cover in a tower overnight. Every tribute who didn't want to become hopelessly imprisoned would have to camp out in the sand from now on, just as she had the previous night. It was an ingenious idea, Kiara grudgingly admitted; she had to hand it to the Gamemakers, they knew how to put on a good show.

She ran at a steady pace, staring at her feet as they kicked up deep red sand and erasing every other thought from her mind. Thinking about anything for too long - about home, about the Games, about the brother she'd lost in the same situation she was in - would be nothing but counterproductive in a place like this. The Gamemakers wanted to play games with the tributes' minds; fifty percent of the Hunger Games was mental, and Kiara wasn't about to fall for their tricks. They've already got me imprisoned in a giant hourglass; I won't let them have my mind, too. So she simply ran and ran, breathing hard, until she spotted the distant tower at last.