Lost and Alone (Shy v Iris)

Your plan in the top eight begins its execution with a crack of clarity.

And of your leg, too, but that was more obvious.

You'd kept a careful count of the number of days since you'd stepped into the arena. Seven. A careful count of how many other kids had died while you still drew breath. Sixteen.

The number of allies who had died so you could live. Three. And a half.

You were the last one standing from your initial hand-picked alliance of four, from the warrior Mona to the quiet Vervain to the snarky Charlie. Good, you'd thought. Any one of them would have been a pain to deal with yourself. To have them dealt with before your own solo excursion was a blessing - once there were only eight left, any former allies became liabilities.

You'd worked and manipulated the arena to the best of your ability. You'd set Careers on each other, ground the deadliest of your allies to dust against imposing enemy targets, and all the while had stayed above the fray like a guardian angel, smiting foes from afar while the others took the brunt of the assault.

And now, here you were, one of only a handful left. Further than your idiot cousin had ever gotten, with the majority of the traditional threats dead and gone. Only one Career remained - the corpse from Two - while the others were a smattering of lower districts. The boy from Eleven. The girl from Ten. The boy from Twelve. And a handful of others you had yet to meet before your journey back to Eight was completed.

One of those would be your first opponent, the first true trial of grit and strength that you'd have to endure if you were to win, if you were to truly regain control over your life.

As it were, you wouldn't have to wait long to discover just which one of the unknowns it would be.

You see the movement out of the corner of your eye a second too late - your reflexes not used to having to avoid attacks, pain strikes through your leg as something hard and heavy smashes into it with enough force to elicit a cry of pain from within. And oh, the pain is amazing - your leg, once fine, suddenly set on fire in the span of a second, and as you hobble away from the threat before the next target is your own head, you lay eyes on your ambusher, the first test you must overcome.

And are not surprised whatsoever when the figure turns out to be annoyingly familiar.

"The living corpse from Two," you said by way of greeting, trying to ignore the sting of pain radiating from your left leg. Five days of not so much as a single attack sent your way and you'd grown lazy, comfortable, complacent - that had to change now, lest you let your negligence cost you your own life.

And unlike this boy, for you, there were no do-overs.

It made sense, really, even if what made sense frustrated you to no end. You'd avoided suffering the consequences of martial combat for five days, ever since the second day with the muttations. So why wouldn't the Gamemakers set the last person alive in the arena who had trained in such arts before the Games had truly begun upon you? As much as you had proven your worth with the strategic aspect of the games, you knew full well that you were very much lacking in the martial skill aspect.

A trial by fire like no other, one where you're at a disadvantage in almost every way. Never before have you been so close to losing your own life, having your own plans unravel while you become just another corpse to enter another footnote of history. But should you win here, then you may as well be invincible - no one else would be able to stand in your way.

"Tell me," you say, disguising a demand as an aloof question - for what was war if probing the mental fortitude of the enemy along with the physical capabilities? - for the world to hear. "I don't think I've heard you say so much as a single word throughout each of our meetings thus far. Did the Capitol rob you of your voice when they restarted your heart, or is that more of a stylistic choice?"

And you smirk, ignoring the wince of pain through your leg. Unsuited for physical combat your body might be, it'd take more than one lucky shot to knock you out of the count for good.

"Because if it's the latter, I'd recommend an image makeover. Strong and silent? Doesn't really suit you."

You give the boy only a couple of seconds to let the taunt sink in before a knife of ice follows your words, cutting through the falling snow in a deadly arc towards the only other warm body in the vicinity.

When silence is the only thing that greets your words, you wonder if perhaps you've miscalculated. Either this boy physically is unable to talk as a result of, well, whatever happens when you die and the Capitol brings you back to life, or he's more resistant to your taunts than you would have pegged him for.

But that being said, this is a boy who had made the top eight his first time around in the arena. A boy who currently was in the top eight again, facing off against you. And as your knife barely leaves a mark on his skin, as his weapon comes and cracks against your hand this time, the first signs of something wholly unfamiliar begin to prickle against your skin, cold even by the standards of the snow blowing past your face.

Fear.

Not that you'll admit it out loud. You knew it'd take grit to take down a Career in one-on-one combat. You knew that you would be outmatched when it came to this section of the Games no matter who you ended up fighting against. But knowing about a struggle and facing it firsthand are two very different things. But just because you've fallen into an early hole doesn't mean you aren't capable of pulling yourself back up out of it, even if it means you'll have to kick and scream every step of the way.

"Fine then," you decide, with every bit of nonchalance that you'd managed thus far. Two lucky hits a victory did not make. You aren't going to keel over that easily for anyone - not even this living corpse of a Career. "Keep your secrets."

A second icy knife flies towards the boy from Two.

"I think I'd much rather hear you scream instead, anyways."

This time, your blade does more than cut - it tears. Ice strikes flesh and draws forth blood, but you have little time to draw in satisfaction from the successful blow, little time to even calculate that the fight is relatively even as things currently stand, for again the Career boy is surging forward, this time swinging his weapon in a downward arc.

When it crashes against your foot with the same cracking pain as the previous two attacks, you don't even find yourself getting afraid this time around.

Instead, annoyance is what floods your veins, heats up your face. Annoyance that this boy won't die quickly, that his very existence is an inconvenience to your own plans of survival.

And for the first time, you regret not doing more to keep your allies alive. Expendable as they might be, there was a certain comfort in having Charlie and Vervain and Mona by your side, tools that could absorb attacks as well as deal out damage in return. Each of those three knew how to dish out the hurt. Each of those three were able to endure retaliatory attacks without so much as flinching. How many days had Vervain found herself the target of other tributes? How many times had Mona taken a seemingly critical blow, only to soldier on and keep fighting?

And here you were, frustrated because you kept getting smacked around by a corpse who wouldn't or couldn't talk who kept hitting you with an oversized icicle. Laughable, really. The old Iris would have found the situation ridiculous.

But the current Iris was here, right now. The current Iris was fighting for her life against one of the biggest threats left in the arena. And if she couldn't overcome this, then she never deserved a shiny crown or a reclamation of her own life in the first place.

The corpse boy seems reluctant or unable to engage in the war of words you tried to initiate. That's just fine with you - you can conduct murder in steely silence just as well. It's comfortable, familiar, and allows you to focus on greater things.

Such as sending your third knife of ice directly into his cold dead heart.

It's typical, really, that the moment you disengage the battle of wits and words, the boy finally breaks his own silence.

The strike of your latest knife, missing the boy's core but landing in his leg instead, seemed to shake him out of whatever vow he'd been holding up until now. "Nice shot by the way," he says, as if commenting on the snowfall, and then plucks the ice knife from his own leg as if it was nothing more than a bothersome thorn.

So he can talk after all. Interesting.

Careers, you think. Treating serious wounds like annoyances in the thick of battle. Typical.

"Next time, try aiming for the head." A chiding, unexpected from the silent boy, follows more pain, as this time his weapon catches you right in the chest. Again, something cracks. Again, the searing blaze of fire torches your innards, yet again, you stand strong. One, two, three, four hits from the Career boy, and still you stand strong. Still, you stand defiant.

"Nice piece of advice," you say, smirking even as the greater sum of pain pushes itself onto your face. Impassivity and ignorance to your body's own shortcomings is no longer an option right now - so might as well embrace it. "Can't believe I didn't think of that before."

Damn, this is like snarking back and forth with Charlie.

In truth, aiming for the head with your level of skill is a fool's errand. Better to aim for a larger target like the torso, so that if you miss you still have a chance of hitting an extremity, just like you had been.

But the boy is wearing you down. There is no denying that. Four hits you can endure, but what if that number becomes six? Seven? Even ten?

This is only the first fight out of three you need to complete as well. So what's a bit of risk, when the payoff could be so much higher?

This time, when you throw, the target isn't the boy's heart - it's right between his eyes, instead.

You're quickly realizing that logic is abandoning the scope of this fight in droves.

For one, you've taken several hard hits - five now, the fifth striking your other hand with yet another crack - and are still standing.

For two, your aim is holding up well enough that you're effectively going toe to toe with this Career, this boy who'd not only trained his life for one of these Games but had already gone through the entire damn experience once before, and not losing.

For three, well, said boy just lost one of his fingers to your ice knives - as in, the weapon had cut cleanly through bone and muscle as well as flesh - and what was his first reaction to it?

He laughed.

You blink, just for a moment, at the absurdity of it. You were bruised and battered and likely broken, yes, and each breath hurt, but your level of concealment involved being impassive. And it wasn't successful, either - you knew that pain was lacing itself through each flexing of your fingers, each wince that found itself on your face.

Whereas this boy had just lost an appendage, and he found the entire thing laughable. Did they really train Careers to be so numb to their own pain that such mutilations were treated as a joke? Or was this another case of a Jacynth - someone who was finding themselves pushed so far beyond their own comfort zone that instead of adapting, they simply snapped?

Either way, you'd seen one mad Career already these Games. That was not something you needed to deal with a second time.

So you set your face in stone, ignore the pain flashing through hands foot chest leg, and fling your fifth knife towards the boy from Two.

Let him suffer. End his suffering. You care not what happens, so long as at the end of it all, you're still standing.

Is this what dying feels like?

Your fifth ice knife went wide, cutting where it should have sunk in. And the boy changes tactics with his next strike - opting to tear instead of break like he has been. A feint, and then suddenly your leg is awash in crimson and fire, burning despite the freezing cold wrapping you in its embrace.

Your vision blurs. Your head steadies. Your jaw clenches, and then you wince in pain. A dichotomy of feelings and experiences all tearing you apart - and holding you together all at once.

You sway on your feet, but you do not topple. Will not topple. You'd told yourself, way back on the day you'd volunteered, that if your luck would indeed run out, you'd face your fate on your feet instead of on your knees. And you don't keep promises - but goddamn, that is one you will not break.

Not here.

Not now.

Not ever.

"You were doing so well up until now." You decide you liked the living corpse better when he didn't respond to your provocations - there, at least, he held some sort of intriguing mystique. Now, he's acting the same way as every cocky godforsaken Career that has ever walked this earth acts. Not that you were really expecting any different. "I was hoping you would do better than this."

You look down at your last remaining knife. One shot. One chance. One final desperate struggle against the encroaching darkness, all rested on your own two hands. This one singular blade of cold, deadly sharp and wildly unpredictable.

Die on your feet, not on your knees. The vow you'd made long ago - the only stipulation you'd planned for should death catch up with you before you left this frozen wasteland and not after.

"I-if you want to die so b-badly," you manage, teeth chattering - and from cold or from blood loss or a combination thereof, you're not sure - "T-then feel f-free to stand s-still."

One last heave, filled with desperation more than finesse. One last throw, aimed with the intent of spilling the blood of another kid to further the flow of yours through your veins. One last knife, twirling through the blizzard with the intent to kill.

One last scream of defiance, shouting into the storm. The boy from Two may banish you to the hell where you belong - but you'll go down kicking and screaming every bloody inch of the way.