Get Into It [bards v cowboys]

*

For all the faces that showed up in the stars the first night, when the anthem played and not a single person came across the night sky, I couldn’t help but shake my head.

“Five people and then none isn’t a good average of things,” I’d said as though getting impatient with death was something I’d earned from my spot under the stars. If I hadn’t been so dark under the trees of the forest, Cor and Alpha might’ve spotted how red my cheeks got a minute later. Even for as much of a dick I pretended to be, I hadn’t forgotten how I’d wanted my sisters and brother to be raised. The last thing they’d needed to see on television was me cursing that few more kids hadn’t lost their heads.

That would all come in due time, and hey – careful what you wish for and all that, right?

I chose not to eat the second night more as a test to myself than any real strategy. Something about how the gnawing hunger felt real. I may not have had much control over where we were going or how the rest of my life turned out, but this? I would let my hunger and thirst tap me on the shoulder for now and lie in wait a few steps behind. Almost reminded me of home in a way, saving what little I had for the long days, when things would undoubtedly get harder.

I’d been last to keep watch, which had probably been for the best. I’m no gonna lie to you, I didn’t really know what I was supposed to do, other than stand around in the dark waiting for something to pop out and try to kill us again. And maybe, because it’d been another night of hardly any sleep and not really eating or drinking, my eyelids had started to get heavy and the wind creeping up through the branches of the trees felt a whole lot warmer than it’d felt the night before.

When I’d nodded off, it hadn’t been much more than the sight of our farm overhead: a crisp, bright little space sky where the weathervane tilted in the wind and you could hear the chickens clucking in the distance.

I’d half-hoped that I’d get to see all their faces again. Or that I could go back to the night when Xavier and I had been out in the fields alone, shooting the shit before the reaping.

But his face doesn’t come, and I’m left with the sight of an empty fantasy, all bones and no fat.

My snoring woke me up before Cor had the chance to bash my head in for falling down on the job.

“Hope you’re having a good long laugh at me, Xavier,” I muttered out for the cameras.

All right. That had been enough moping for one evening.

Because I had still been alive, after all, unlike almost a half-dozen kids that had gone tits up the first day. So instead of turning into a serious sad sack, I was going to make sure my legacy didn’t have y’all thinking too hard. Nothing worse than having to crawl into someone else’s head and thinking about how miserable life was for a while.

Fuck that noise.

Instead, I decided on the early morning march out the forest and into the meadow I’d bust out a song for my lovely allies that went something like this:

“We’re walking on the path
And the girl who’s leading me
Is from district one –

Yeah

And she’s got a face to kill
And a voice that’s so shrill
That she makes my ears bleed

Oh!

She’ll cut you in half
If you dare to even laugh
Because she has no fun

Yeah, yeah, Cordeeeeeelia

Then there’s Alpha, too
I haven’t forgotten you
Yeah, yeah

Quick with a threat
Or better yet,
An axe to cut you in two

Yeah, yeah, Alphaaaaaa

Okay, LUTE SOLO!”

I started hopping and skipping around, strumming my lute. I gave a good two minute solo, until I dropped down on my knees with one last flourish.

“THANK YOU HUNGER GAMES ARENA, YOU’VE BEEN GREAT!” I shouted, holding the lute above my head.

I blinked, still breathing heavy from my performance.

Two figures were heading in our general direction – unfortunately for me, I couldn’t remember much more than one of the two of them had knocked the shit out of me in the bloodbath. The other I think was from a lower district like me.

I strummed a few chords with a grin.

“Are y’all here for an encore performance?” I asked. I stood up and gave a little strut with the lute in tow. “I seem to remember you wanted a piece of me, right? What was it – uh – Six? Or Eight? I honestly didn’t pay much attention when they told me. My bad.”

I swung the lute behind my back and unsheathed my sword with all the grace of a boy who’d learned how to do both two days ago – which was to say it took a couple pulls to get the whole sword out.

“All right ladies, I know you want me to defend you so it’s only the gentlemanly thing to do,” Because if there was one thing they would love me saying is that I had to protect them, “No offense uh – California? Ah, no – Texas!” The name had been on my tongue since I’d heard it. Tex felt like a name from Ten. “But I’d rather not beef with the lower districts today. Solidarity.”

I turned back toward Six and charged.

The roar that escaped my lips was more a screech but, uh, watch the replay and you decide.

[cachimorro olentzero attacks kiptyn nott with his sword]