Panem et Fabulae @panemetfabulae - Tumblr Blog

The 14th Hunger Games

Reading Guide:

D1M Tracker T+09:12:42 - 165 bpm

D1M - District 1 Male

09 - hours since the gong sounded

12 - minutes since the gong sounded

42 - seconds since the gong sounded

165 bpm - heartbeat of the tribute

60 - 90 bpm: normal

100 - 120 bpm: alert

130 - 150 bpm: agitated

160+ bpm: hyper

Flatline: deceased

Day 1 Tracker Update: 7:00 AM Central Area - 24 present heartbeats encircling the main watchtower

D5F Tracker: T+00:00:00 — 165 bpm

I am not certain what I am meant to feel in these final moments. There is no ceremony to mark our descent, no words to clothe the terror that hums beneath our skin. Only the raw, mechanical roar of the hovercraft, and the knowledge that the earth below is soon to devour us.

My heartbeat thrums so loudly that it drowns even the engines overhead. It is a steady drumbeat in my ears, insistent and unrelenting. I sit rigid, staring across at the girl opposite me. Dakota, I think her name is. In this suspended moment, we manage a faint, brittle smile, as if that small gesture could hold back the inevitable.

The hovercraft shudders, then falls still, and my pulse quickens beyond reason. The hatch opens with a hiss, and four Peacekeepers shove us forward into the blinding light. The wet scent of grass rushes up to meet me as I strike the earth, the cold dew soaking into my clothes.

Around me, chaos and noise of the other tributes errupts. The sixes whom we shared our hovercraft are dragged away before they can even stand. I feel hands beneath my arms, steadying me, and find Hertz’s face close to mine. For a fleeting heartbeat I feel warmth in his touch, an anchor in the storm. But then the Peacekeepers tear him from me, wrenching him aside and forcing three bodies between us.

We look at each other through the shifting mass of tributes, our eyes locking in a strange, quiet understanding. We smile faintly, utterly unmindful of what the world intends to do with us. I do not know what awaits in these fields, and in that instant I cannot bring myself to care. All that lives in me is a single thought, burning and unshaken: I will keep him safe.

T+00:00:00 — 169 bpm

My heart gave a sudden leap when a woman’s voice thundered across the field, sharp and commanding. A Peacekeeper stood with a microphone in hand, her words cutting through the heavy air:

“All right, piglets, stay in your designated positions until the gong sounds. The cameras are still being adjusted.”

For the first time, I took in the full sight of it all. Six hovercrafts circled the perimeter, their hulking forms crouched like silent predators, each one that had ferried us here delivering us into this forsaken stretch of earth. And it is a field, indeed. Wherever I turn my eyes, I see nothing but endless grass rippling in the wind, broken only by scattered structures whose shapes elude me, distant and strange. I cannot say where we are. The ride had lasted half an hour so perhaps we are still near the Capitol.

We are arranged in a perfect circle, each tribute standing upon their marked spot. The grass which are painted with crimson are the spot for each tribute. At the center rises a tower, tall and lifeless, with no windows or openings whatsoever. At its base lies a grotesque bounty that includes piles of weapons and crates of food, heaped together like offerings. They have begun adding supplies to make the games longer and more dramatic.

I feel the cold nudge of a rifle at my side and realize that Peacekeepers stand behind each of us. Two for every tribute. A sharp movement to my right catches my eye. The boy from District Two lashes out, driving his elbow into the Peacekeeper beside him. His defiance is short-lived because the second Peacekeeper strikes him across the skull with the butt of his rifle, and he crumples without a sound.

To my left, the girl from District Four begins to sing, her voice rough, ugly and grating, the tune foul yet fearless.

I fuck like a storm, and I fight like hell,

Capitol pigs can suck my shell!

A laugh bursts from the girl of District Ten, who begins clapping in rhythm, wild and unrestrained. The Peacekeepers swing their guns toward them, rifles poised, fingers tense on triggers.

“We are live in five minutes!” calls the woman with the microphone which seems to be the head peacekeeper. But the two girls only laugh harder, their mirth sharp and broken, until the girl from Four sings again, louder:

Your laws are weak, your power’s fake,

I cum for war and I cum to break!

I turn to Hertz, searching his face in the midst of this chaos. For a heartbeat the shadow over him lifts, and his lips curve into a small, steady smile. It is brief, but in that moment, it feels like a lifeline.

D5M Tracker: T+00:00:00 — 163 bpm

My heart is racing like it's about to die which it probably is considering where I am. I have to look tougher for her sake. The smile on Ohmira's face consoled me a little bit.

The first time I saw that smile, it was a cold January and the air had that fresh, merry feel to it — the kind that only comes just after New Year’s, before the real cold sets in. But the daughter of a rebel leader was crying her heart out loud. Her people were executed. And now, she was left alone.

Ohmira’s father, Dr. Gailloux led a group of secret rebels called the Black Voltage. They were electricians, grid repairmen, technicians, and energy runners who refused to bow down to the Capitol. They used their clearance and wiring access to tap into surveillance lines, steal power from the Capitol’s reserve batteries, and send secret messages to the other districts. They aimed to start another war. A smarter one. A quieter one. There were still a few people in our district who hadn’t backed down. They were all executed in one night. Fried like wires in a blown substation.

Before all that, Dr. Gailloux’s door was always open. He was one of the last independent physicians and doctors in our sector. He was an old man with shaking hands and sharp eyes. He fixed people when the Capitol said they weren't worth fixing.

My condition made my father rush me to Mr. Gailloux’s care more times than I can count. Sinus node dysfunction. That’s what they called it. The electrical signal in my heart was faulty. The part of my heart that controls its rhythm and its beat doesn’t always fire right. Some days it beats too fast for no reason. Other days, it slows down until I can’t breathe.

It’s like living with a broken metronome inside your chest. Every tick, every beat, it might be normal and it might be the last. You don’t know when is the last heartbeat. You just live knowing something could stop.

Mr. Gailloux taught me how to listen to it. How to breathe through it. He never looked at me like I was fragile. Just complicated wiring.

Ohmira used to sit in the corner of his clinic, quiet. She didn’t speak much, even when her father was alive.

When the Capitol caught Dr. Gailloux, the whole unit was executed. Everyone they found connected to the Black Voltage. Even the ones who didn’t resist.The kids were left behind. Most ended up on the street. Some got scooped up by the Capitol’s Community Home — "A safe and generous space for orphans of traitors.”

But everyone in 5 knows what it really is: A cage with bright lights. Where they watch the children of rebels grow up and wait for Reaping Day so they can rig the odds.

My father couldn’t bear the thought of Ohmira ending up there. She wasn’t just some rebel’s child. She was the daughter of the man who once crafted an inhaler just for me and gave advice on how to manage my condition. The girl who sat quietly while my pulse stuttered and Mr. Gailloux would tell stories and ballads to us both.

That’s why my father brought her home. Not that it mattered now, both of us are in the Hunger Games even though he tried to conceal Ohmira from the Capitol. Is that his punishment for helping a rebel leader? Now, both of his children are in the Hunger Games. If it had been me left behind, he would’ve wanted someone to do the same. My father took her maybe because I was living with a body always one beat away from stopping, and she was living with a world that had already stopped beating,we were both broken in ways that made sense together.

On the first time I saw that smile, “Here,” I said, holding out a pudding from the New Year’s leftovers. “It’ll be a long time before we taste pudding again.” It wasn’t everyday that it was New Year’s. Soft, sweet things are for rare occasions only. Survival didn’t taste like vanilla and sugar. Survival was gray bread and warm water.

She didn’t smile. Not even when her father was still alive. Usually, there was just this calm, comforting front she gave to everyone like the eye of a storm that had already passed through too many people.

But this time, her lips lifted slightly. Just a little. Not quite a smile, but close. There was a glimmer of joy in it or maybe a flicker of hope that somehow, things might be okay.That life had to go on. Even without her Pa.

Is it just me… or did the world get slower for a second?

Because my heart! My heart started beating fast!

Too fast.

I was suddenly reaching for my inhaler, fumbling. My hands weren’t working. My vision started to double. She moved faster than anyone else could and helped me find it. She held my shoulder while I calmed down. Her hand was warm and not trembling.

At first I thought it was my condition and panic of not being able to find my inhaler that raised my heart rate. I didn't realize at that time that it's because of her and the smile that had caused my heart to beat faster. It didn't seem clear until now. Now that I see that smile again. Now that both of our heartbeats might stop at any second.

D9M Tracker: T+00:00:00 — 159 bpm

If I just move a little bit earlier than anyone, I can grab a powerful weapon and the gamemakers might not notice that split second.

T+00:00:00 — 160 bpm

Ten, nine, eight. That's final. That will be my strategy.

T+00:00:00 — 161 bpm

Seven, six, five. Just a few more seconds and the gong will sound. Four, three, I darted from my position to grab that sword to protect my lif-

T+00:00:00 — Flatline

D8F Tracker: T+00:00:39 — 170 bpm

I jumped startled because of the loud bang that had blasted the boy in my right. His ears, his ears! Are in front of me. I wiped my face with my shirt because it's filled with blood. I missed the gong! I darted to grab a loaf of bread. As I crouched to reach it, I felt a sensation in my neck. At first cold then I felt a hot liquid dripping from my neck. It's my own blood! My neck is impled by a spear! I hear footsteps running away from me. My assailant had run away to kill another tribute.

As my heartbeat slows down I hear some metals clashing and voice screaming. Already, tributes had reached the center pile and are attacking each other.

T+00:0:47 — Flatline

Capitol:

Lucky Flickerman: Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Four tributes are killed in the first minute of the games! The peacekeepers had fired the gunshots already unlike last year where we waited till the fighting is over. Since we can now easily confirm the tribute's death through the trackers, we decided to fire the gunshots early. But that seems to be a mistake since there are still tributes scattered roaming the central pile and our gamemakers are just getting the hang of it. Next year, we will wait till the initial casualties are really over till we fire the gunshots. Oh! Back to the screens, back to the screens! There's still some action!

D2M Tracker: T+00:01:24 — 100 bpm

My head still hurts from the peacekeeper's hit and the jog exhausted me after I took out the girl from 11. I didn't expect she can run so fast.

Usually, the strong tributes from 1,2,4 and 11 would try to get rid of each other at the bloodbath and the lone tributes would get hunted by couples throughout the games. So it's important to eliminate the strong competitors at the beginning or at least weaken them by removing their partner. This is a pattern from the past three hunger games. I know this because the games had become mandatory to watch for everyone since the 11th Hunger Games.

Tributes are already running away but we can't afford to let our guard down. District 4 and 1 are still in the clearing, collecting some supplies. I can see three bodies. Both from 12 and the boy from 9 who ran too early and his head was blown by some shooter somewhere.

"There's someone else" Pia says. "The girl from 8. I got her when she tried to grab some bread."

"Good" I say. Unsure if that's a compliment for her or I'm just saying that what she did was good for our situation. She notices the drop in my appearance and gave me her tired look. She had explained to me over and over. "It's necessary to kill other tributes, Braxton, one dead tribute means one step closer to home" she said.

"I know I know" I answer. It's them or us it's them or us. I keep repeating my affirmation to myself to get me through this and to calm my heart down.

Several heartbeats later, the pair from 1 ran towards the north. The only tributes left on the clearing are us, the pair from 4 and the pair from 10. We eye each other suspiciously and menacingly. Our weapons raised.

The tributes from 4 approached the two from 10. I exchange warry looks with Pia. If these four tributes would make an alliance, it could be over for us. We'd get outnumbered. As I positioned my feet to run, so did Pia. She's thinking the same thing.

But before I could run, the boy from 4 slashed the boy from 10 with his sword. I fight broke out which resulted in a double duell. Girl vs girl and boy vs boy. A gunfire sounded and the girl from 10 went limp. The girl from 4,after finishing her opponent, hurried to help her district partner but it was too late. Another gunfire sounded. Her scream sounded manic. She repeatedly stabbed the boy from 10 who had killed her partner while humming a mary tune.

Panting, she looked at us and seem to decide that she's no match for two tributes and hurried away. She sprinted west while grinning at us and waving her free hand goodbye.

Tracker Update: 7:00 PM - Western Area - 3 Present Heartbeats: D4F, D6F, D8M

D4F Tracker: T+12:00:24 — 60 bpm

My feet hurts from dancing the whole day on the fields. It's nighttime when I discovered a shack. There's some better structures that I passed while wondering around but I figured this shack might be the safest place to rest. Nobody will likely go here. No one in the right mind would stay at this wretched structure. Except for me. Luckily, I'm actually not right in the head so this place is just right for me I guess?

I opened the rusty wooden door. There's a few boxes and rusty chairs inside. There's some empty sacks scattered around. I could pile those and make it a makeshift bed.

Too bad Sheldon got strangled by that bastard from 10. I could've also taken out those shits from 2 but I was tired at that point. They probably think I'm scared of them that's why I ran away. Nothing really scares me. Even being in this supposedly worst form of punishment. It's strange, I feel calm since they dropped us from the hovercraft. I could die at any moment and I feel extatic. No, seriously, sarcasms aside. We're all going to die anyway so I guess why not now?

The insignificance of life

No purpose, peace, or final strife.

A blink, a burn, a silent scream,

Then nothing more—just dust and dream.

Oh the insignificance of li-

I pause as I see a head behind the mountain of boxes. I quickly pretended to have been bothered by some mosquitoes. "This fuckin' mosquitoes ughhh!!!" Then I opened the door and went outside. As soon as I'm outside, I quickly went into the side of the shack where a small window allows you to see inside. I made a loud stamp on my feet then another, then another, slowly decreasing the sound to give the impression of someone walking away.

Effective! The idiot actually believed I had left. Now I can see her, the girl from 6. Slowly rising up and even stretching her back in a relaxed manner.

D6F Tracker: T+12:02:09 — 66 bpm

My heartbeat slowed down as the girl from District 4 left the shack. Apparently, I'm not the only one who thought no one would hide on a hopeless shack.

T+12:02:20 — 90 bpm

I opened the door and to my horror, she's standing right infront and grinning.

"Surprise bitch!"

Her knife run through my chest repeatedly. My eyes began to blur and I can't grasp anymore air. The last thing I saw is her wicked grin.

T+12:03:14 — Flatline

D4F Tracker: T+12:05:20 — 63 bpm

A hovercraft appeared and collected her. They had started to collect bodies on the 12th Hunger Games because of some disease of a tribute which infected their competitors and ruined their perfect games.

I prepared to left the shack. Surely tributes will come investigate what had happened here so I needed to leave. So much for a safe place. Another giant hovercraft appeared and it projected a hologram in the sky then the shit anthem played so I gladly sang along.

Scum of Panem,

Greedy city,

Through the slaughter you shine anew...

Scum of Panem,

Heartless justice,

Blood still stains your marble throne...

Scum of Panem,

Seat of cowards,

Fleeting power, cruel and fake...

You scorch our land

With armored hand

Our Capitol

Our vice!

End of Day 1 • 15 Beating Heartbeats Remains

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Day 2 • Tracker Update: 8:00AM Northern Area - 5 present heartbeats: D1M, D1F, D5M, D5F, D9F

D5M Tracker: T+25:24:26 — 100 bpm

I awoke with aghast because my heartbeat is racing again for no reason. This happens usually when I wake up at home and surprisingly, it gave me a vague comfort that I was back in our apartment. My mind after waking up is confused and it slowly and gloomily sinks in that I'm actually in the Hunger Games.

The sight of Ohmira calms me down and she pointed at my inhaler. I had fastened it into a necklace and the Capitol allowed it as my token. It's not because they care, I mean they kinda care, but it's not because they are concerned on my well being. They still need a boy tribute from 5. There was a boy from 5 who went in the games with asthma before and I think he didn't even make it to the arena. That's probably why.

"You should've woken me. It's not fair that you stayed up all night." I say.

"I did" she says. There's a teasing in her tone.

"Maybe you shouldn't have tried to run at the supplies when I told you not to. You exhausted yourself too much that you can't even wake up when I shake you."

Yes. I had darted to grab a spear from the pile and snatched a bag along the way. I collided with the boy from 3 and just when I thought he's going to punch me, Ohmira screamed and tackled him to the ground then we ran away immediately.

We found a structure that looks like a small castle. The door looks sturdy and we barricaded it with some barrels we found inside.

"So who got eliminated?" I ask.

"Lot's of them but 1,2,4 and 11 are still up. Though 4 and 11's partners both got killed."

"Breakfast?" she asks and I nodded. The last time I've eaten is when a sympathetic lady threw an apple at my direction after my interview with Lucky Flickerman after she had heard about my condition.

Ohmira had separated our supplies on different random barrels. "If we got killed, tributes won't find all our food." She says. Luckily, she still knows where she had placed them. She's always been good in memorizing.

We each consumed a bread and shared a can of beef strips. It's easy to get bored in this dark room but being stucked with her make it a bit bearable. We are both tempted to go upstairs. There's a few steps of stairs that leads to a lookout point on the top of the tiny castle but we don't wanna risk being spotted.

So this is how we spent our last days. Stuck together on an abandoned tiny castle. Doesn't seem so bad.

T+27:57:18 — 85 bpm

"Did you ever heard of Valentine?" Ohmira asks after long silence.

Mr. Gailloux used to tell us stories and ballads. Real ones that he knows and Ohmira had learned a lot.

"Is that a tribute?" I say.

She laughs. Really laughing. The laugh made me feel stupid in a cute way.

"No. He lived a long time ago. Long ago before the world broke." She started singing a ballad...

There once a man named Valentine

He's got no riches and bear no sword

And he wed the damned

With no cost

Now I can remember. On that rainy day when Ohmira and I were 7, I suddenly can't breathe and my father was hysterical, he brought me to their house soaked in rain. Dr. Gailloux had told this story before but there were lots of versions. He sometimes tells a story through a ballad or a poem and each time is different.

The cloud forbade his puppets of passion

For 'tis thy love that made them weak

But Valentine did his duty

And he gave them happiness in discrete

"There was a Capitol before the Capitol. A different name but still the same" Dr Gailloux used to tell us. The corrupt cloud, the emperor, named Claudius forbade marrying soldiers because he believed that they would fight more effectively in war if they've got nothing to care about.

Hark to those silent heartbeats

Hiding from the iron grip

But Valentine still did his job

For his faith is on sacred love

I wanted to ask Ohmira a question but don't want to interrupt her singing. She enjoys discussing about literature and I'm glad I can at least understand this one. Usually, I feel like she has that formality that I'm trying so hard to match.

She uses words like 'tis or thy. There's a certain old-fashioned about her but with a beauty. I sometimes feel ashamed of our home because somehow, I feel like Ohmira don't quite belong to us. Dr. Gailloux was a well educated man, always telling Ohmira stories. There are so many books that he used to hide on their home and when I went over to their apartment, they would talk about things I don't understand.

And in our apartment, the only books we have are some machinery manuals from the Capitol and my father and I are as unpoetic as a stone.

One day the eyes of the cloud saw he

But he stood on what is bigger than he

So the generous man thrown to jail

Awaiting death in despair

I was lost in thought. She'll ask me questions later after singing. Convincing me to try to analyze the song.

So what did she say? The version changes but it always ends on tragedy.

But ere he embraced death

He wrote letters in thy grief

To strengthen his friends' faith

He closed thy letters with one final line;

Remember your Valentine

These are the rare times you truly see her smile. Her eyes would glint and you'd think she's a talkative person when you bring up books and poetry.

D5F Tracker: T+28:01:33 — 60 bpm

For a brief and fragile moment, all our noise falls away. I let the final line tremble in the air, a thin thread of sound, while I lean into the quiet solace of my father’s presence.

To sing old ballads, to murmur lines of poetry is to feel as if my father was here with me. Once they were idle diversions for a lonely soul. But now, they are my refuge in this arena. Even before the world crumbled to dust, I carried this shadow within me. It is as though some hidden filament in my mind was set awry at birth, leaving me forever inclined toward sorrow. I have always looked upon the earth through a veil of gloom. My instincts rarely lie. They whisper to me when darkness approaches. Thus, it was no great shock when I was chosen as this year’s offering from District Five. Not merely because I bear the blood of a rebel leader, but because I felt it in the marrow of my being. I knew. I have always known. The dam that holds back grief is, in truth, already broken.

But what my heart did not foresee is Hertz being reaped. Why can't this soul just die in peace, knowing that my beloved was safe at home? Will I have to witness his death? I feel like I can't. I can't grasp the concept. I'll have to prevent it.

T+28:11:45— 63 bpm

"Love is taboo even in Five," Hertz says, his voice cool and unflinching, and yet, like the trailing echo of thunder in a canyon, it rouses me from the stupor of my own musings after I had sang.

How, I ask myself in silence, shall I speak to him about my love for him without summoning ruin upon us both? How does one confess such a truth in an arena that thrives upon carnage, where affection is weakness, and fondness, a knife turned inward?

I feel worried not because he is my adoptive brother but because what the Capitol might do if they find out that I have feelings for him. We were cast into the same household, yes, but our spirits did not align as kin. We have always moved with gravity toward each other, never brother to sister but soul to soul.

What dreads me is that the Capitol, ever watchful and perverse, might seize upon our affection and render it into spectacle. Should they suspect even the faintest trace of feeling between us, they would not hesitate to exploit it, to twist it into cruel entertainment, perhaps even turn us against one another for the sake of their design. The gamemakers are constantly looking to improve the games. That's why we have to act neutral. We are adoptive siblings and we care for each other. That's it.

Hertz seems to understand this because the way he looks at me he always understands. We can always feel each other. There is in his gaze a wordless knowing, as though our souls had long been entangled. In silence, we understand. And that, perhaps, is our only sanctuary.

D5M Tracker T+28:22:18— 75 bpm

"It's okay Mira" I came closer and gave her a hug. The Capitol will see us as siblings even though we aren't related by blood. What they didn't know is our bond runs deeper than what their cameras can capture.

I almost smiled in sadness at the dark thought that had just passed in my brain. Our situation is no different back home. You have to keep your love a secret.

I think about the weddings in 5. Usually, people marries not for love but for status and necessity. It's always about the needs over the wants. People from the Gridline, the poorest part in our district, where low-level technicians live usually would prefer a partner from the Amp District in which me and Ohmira lives. Middle to upper class families lives in neat buildings and have better jobs like engineers, researchers and they distribute the power and they are usually corrupt. But even in the Amp, love is taboo.

The Capitol assigns a man and a woman who are compatible with their skill sets and productivity compatibility. They got assigned an apartment but sleeps in different beds but the Capitol still allows them to sleep together occasionally to bear children. The Capitol needs human resoure you know.

True love is whispered about in corners of the Gridline, seen as a form of resistance, a flicker of humanity in the cold wires of obedience. If you marry someone you love, you'll find no job because you won't fit the schedules and routines and you end up working on the noisy Gridline where there are occasional blackouts even if you produce the electricity yourself.

District 5 is basically the place where you shut up, blend in, stay neutral and obey. Kids learn that from an early age.

D5F Tracker: T+28:32:25— 63 bpm

"I know what you're thinking. Same as home is it?" I say.

"No different from home" He replies. We laugh and giggled because the Capitol will not understand what we are laughing about.

I laugh because I realize the Hunger Games has bestowed a gift upon me. The games has freed me, if only briefly, from the Capitol’s decrees, from the fate that awaited me at twenty-five, when I would have been paired like livestock to a “suitable match,” as if my heart could be measured by voltage and output. At least I would escape that fate where I will not be with Hertz.

But a darker thought intrudes, sudden and sharp: whether I had remained within the borders of Five, or entered this arena of blood and spectacle, I am denied him all the same. Either way, Hertz and I were never permitted to remain, to endure, to be.

One of us shall perish here. The Hunger Games demand it. Same situation it is. How novel, how utterly delightful.

End of Day 2 • 15 Beating Heartbeats Remains

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Day 3 Tracker Update: 9:00 AM Southern Area - 5 present heartbeats: D2F, D2M, D6M, D7M, D11M

D7M Tracker: T+50:01:30 - 172 bpm

"Ahhhhh!" There is someone I heard who cried in pain. It didn't seem to register to me that the scream had came from my throat. The pain in my ankle makes my vision blurry. The grass becomes multi-colored and my loud heartbeat is the only thing I can hear besides the ringing of silence.

They are coming. The tributes from District 2 who chased me after they entered the small house where I'm resting. There was no time so I jumped from it's window. Glass shattered and I think I have broken my right ankle. Adrenaline had saved my life for a few minutes because I ran like the squirrels back home.

I'm reminded of the time when me and my brother was out in the woods and we were chased by wild dogs. We had to finish the required amount of wood but it is getting dark so he insisted we get the job done. There was a rustling of leaves and some feeling that someone is watching you. Suddenly the dogs jumped and he grabbed my hand and we ran down the hill. That's how I felt when the two entered the house. The vague feeling that there is something wrong and everything had gone quiet. I jumped before I even knew what had entered the house and before they even spotted me. But they had heard the loud thud so I ran on the fields.

T+50:05:09 - 172 bpm

I can hear their footsteps behind me. I nearly got bitten by one of the dogs back then but my brother swung his axe and they fell down. Now, there is no one to protect me.

Where are you?

The dogs are are back.

Please, save me! Brother!

But brother is not here and dogs are right behind me. I felt a swish of air behind me then the tearing of fabric and the sharp sting of pain as something rips across my back. I cry out as I fall, landing hard on my stomach, the breath knocked from my lungs. I try to crawl, try to move, but my limbs feel like they belong to someone else.

Steel sinks into my stomach. Once. Twice. The pain blooms with warmth and then begins to fade into something cold. I gasp, blood rising in my throat like a bitter tide. My fingers clutch at the dirt, the grass, anything. But nothing holds me.

I see their faces. I can recognize guilt and exhaustion but there's also the look of determination and they look like they are already trying moving on.

T+50:09:30 - 50 bpm

The sky is beautiful from here. Blue, with a touch of gold. It looks like home.

T+50:11:00 - 20 bpm

I whisper something. Maybe his name.

And then I stop breathing.

T+50:12:27 - Flatline

D2F Tracker: T+50:16:38- 90 bpm

"Fourteen left," I say with a sigh as we watch the hovercraft collect the boy. I know Braxton is not proud of doing it, but he didn’t show any emotion.

"Let's move on." I follow him, not questioning his silence and the stillness of his voice, because he might break down right here. Not right now. Not when the cameras are focused on us after we killed someone. Though I can't see any cameras in the open field, I'm certain they are carefully hidden somewhere — on the ground, in the grasses, camouflaged on the structures, and maybe even in the birds above or the grasshopper that just passed us by.

I try to remind myself why we are here. We volunteered to have a better way of living. The Capitol created a twisted way to make the rebels bow with degradation. During the war, all the districts rebelled against the Capitol. Some districts were more rebellious than others, and our district was probably the most loyal to the Capitol. But some stonemakers and weapon makers lent their help to the rebels. The people who supported the Capitol are now the upper class of District 2. We, the descendants of rebels, had a chance to redeem ourselves. To be forgiven by the Capitol and become "Loyalty-Born" citizens. Loyalty-Born citizens are families who redeemed themselves to become accepted as a part of society again; they are reborn as restored citizens. Rebels in Two are degraded, seen as taboo, and constantly shamed.

You can either choose military service, training to become a Peacekeeper and serving at least 20 years without misconduct. Or you can choose The Hunger Games path, in which you train your children from a young age and have them volunteer. Offering a tribute would restore the family’s full citizenship which allows access to Capitol goods, better housing, more privileges, and a public pardon for the district’s rebellious past. A lot of the lapdogs back home just accept the Capitol propaganda without a word, as long as they are being fed.

I keep telling myself I'm not like them, but what difference do I have from them? I have killed at least two now. But a stronger thought pushes the worries away. Pa needs surgery for his heart, and degrading as it is, we need to swallow our pride and accept the Capitol's terms. After we left our district, Pa was immediately admitted to the hospital. By volunteering, we showed the Capitol that we are loyal. Win or not, my family back home has been forgiven and will now be treated as Loyalty-Born citizens — true citizens of Panem.

D2M Tracker: T+52:17:48- 65 bpm

"Where we going again?" I ask Pia. She’s been quiet the whole walk.

"Your call," she says.

"We should head back to base," I tell her. She agrees without complaint. Maybe she’s just tired too. Or maybe she’s being nice ‘cause she knows killing that boy from 7 messed with me a bit. I look at her, catch her eye, but she looks away quick. She’s still watching me though.

"Don’t worry ‘bout me. I ain’t gonna cry here if that’s what you’re thinkin’," I say. I’ve seen more dead bodies than I can count. District 2 has a main city and is surrounded by small villages for every quarry. The village I come from’s got a huge rock split clean in two, looks almost like a cave. Got little cracks and crevices inside, wide enough for folks to squeeze a home in. You throw up some plywood walls and that’s it.

Just outside the split, down a dusty slope, there’s the pit where we cut the same stone the Split’s made of. We’d leave before dawn and climb back up into the crack by night. Blasting rock kills plenty. Premature blasts. Flying chunks that’ll smash you flat. I ain’t a stranger to seeing bodies, but at least back home they died workin’ to feed their families. Here? Tributes die for what?

Same as Pia, my blood comes from rebels. I had to volunteer to make my family Loyalty-Born.

A gunshot cracks loud across the field, making us turn toward each other. She gives me a look. We both know what it means. Another tribute down. One step closer to home.

"Who you think it was?" I ask.

"No idea. But I got a guess who did it. Could be one of the ones from 1, the girl from 4, or the boy from 11," she says.

"How you figure?" I ask.

"I see it in their faces," she says. "Specially the girl from 4. She’s got that look. Eyes dead, grin like she’s hungry. After the bloodbath, she looked at us like a shark looks at meat."

Tracker Update: 9:00 PM Southern Area - 4 present heartbeats: D2F, D2M, D6M, D11M

D2F Tracker: T+63:18:54 - 60 bpm

Another gunfire sounded around 4 this afternoon. Clearly, the other tributes are also on the move.

The base, in which we call our hiding place, actually looks like a base. It's no bigger than a convenience store. There's some marble-cemented floors around it, which implies the structure had been much bigger before but had likely been bombed during the Dark Days. There's only one room with its four walls still standing. There's one bunker, a locker which contained some rifles but has no bullets, and an old radio beyond repair. If I could guess, this had likely been a base during the war.

Braxton had taken the first watch and had just drifted to sleep when the fallen tributes of the day were projected in the sky.

End of Day 3 • 12 Beating Heartbeats Remains

ﮩ٨ـﮩﮩ٨ـ♡ﮩ٨ـﮩﮩ٨ـ

Day 4 Tracker Update: 3:00 AM Eastern Area - 3 present heartbeats: D3M, D3F, D7F

D3M Tracker: T+68:19:59 — 70 bpm

Bombs. There’s only so much I know about bombs, but I know enough. I cannot wait to try out these babies. After three sleepless days scavenging, wiring, and hammering, Pyra and I finally completed them — or almost. Crude, ugly little things, but with enough teeth to bite the Capitol if we aimed them right.

“Is this really going to work?” Pyra asks, her eyes darting nervously toward the boarded windows. She looks three years older than when she stepped into the stage at the reaping. Being a twelve year old, the people back home already know she's not coming back but she had shown how tough she was these past few days.

“It has to,” I reply. My voice sounds steadier than I feel.

We don’t have the luxury of failure. Today, we carry out our plan to break free from the arena.

It started after the Bloodbath, when the firestarters slipped through my fingers. I’d been ready to snatch them, already tasting victory, when that wonky heart from 5 bumped me sideways. My fist was midair, ready to smash his jaw, when his district partner barreled me to the ground. By the time I got up, the firestarters were gone. I cursed until my throat burned, but Pyra had already scooped up the leftover blasting powder spilled on the grass. It wasn’t much, but enough to build something.

We ran, far from the slaughter, farther still from the cameras. We traveled almost a full day, until the grass gave way to scattered ruins, and there against the dim horizon is one of the twelve watchtowers. The towering structure that kept us caged.

Surely, I thought, another tower must be close by. The peacekeepers were combing the fields, rifles slung, always ready to take action. They hadn't spotted us but even if they see us, they'll just leave us alone unless we try to escape.

We ducked inside a broken house, half-swallowed by vines and dust. Strange objects littered the rooms — remnants of the old world. Rusted earphones, warped plastic casings, a cracked square screen that reflected our hollow faces. All junk. But not useless.

I stripped copper wire from the walls. Pyra found nails and glass shards. Together we packed the blasting powder inside hollow metal pipes, tamped it tight with soil for pressure. Crude tripwires, jagged shrapnel, fire in our palms. But still, one piece was missing.

The detonator.

T+68:27:45 — 95 bpm

My heart leaped a bit as I heard a knock on the door.

"It's her" Pyra said with annoyance.

She had been stalking us since night one and she know about our plan.

I opened the door, my knife raised and there she is, Zarina the girl from District 7. Ax marks scarred her hands, her braid tangled and wild. She held the piece we needed: a coil of potassium wiring stripped from ruined generators. The spark we lacked.

“You want this?” she asked, twirling it between her fingers. Her smile was sharp, a dare. “Then I come with you. I’m not dying in a field for their entertainment.”

Pyra bristled. “We don’t need you.”

I give a sharp hush to them. The last thing I need is the gamemakers finding out what we are trying to accomplish.

“You don’t have a choice,” the girl said, stepping closer. Her eyes gleamed with defiance. “You’ve got powder and pipes, sure. But without this, your little toys are nothing but metal rattles.”

Her words were true, and rage flared in me because I knew it. I lunged, my hand closing around her wrist. She twisted like a whip, driving her knee into my ribs. Pyra caught her braid, yanking hard, and the three of us crashed against the dusty floorboards in a mess of fists and snarls.

But even as we fought, I knew the truth: she wasn’t wrong. We couldn’t do it alone.

Finally, panting, I shoved myself off her. Blood smeared her lip, but her grip on the wiring was unbroken.

“Fine,” I spat, chest heaving. “You’re in.”

Her grin split wide, wicked and triumphant. “Good boy.” Now, it's time to test those toys!

D7F Tracker: T+68:30:50 — 85 bpm

We slowly went outside the house and hid behind some tall bushes. Luckily, the grass became taller as we near the watchtower. Behind the watchtower is a dense forest. But there is something else behind that tower. Behind that structure and the shining bodies with riffles is freedom.

"So how are we gonna plant this thing?" asks Femto. Its more like he's asking himself than talking to us. He's biting his thumb and staring intently into the tower.

"I got this" I say. I don't understand people who thinks thoroughly. To me, if you saw an opportunity, you better grab it quick. Better act now than think later. "I'll distract them."

They both look at me like I'm joking. Is it so hard to believe that I'm doing them a favor? "Don't get the wrong idea. I'm doing this for me, not for you. You two will plant the bombs once they start to chase me. Should be pretty easy. They're not allowed to kill me."

"That's right. Better make yourself useful." Pyra finally says.

D3M Tracker: T+68:35:55 — 83 bpm

“Watch me work, kids” she says. Then she’s on her feet, stumbling right into the open like some drunk monkey, arms flailing.

“HEY!” she yells, slurring her words. “Which one of you shiny-helmet freaks wants to dance? C’mon, I been chopping trees since I was six, I bet I can chop your head too!” She swings an imaginary axe, twirling like an idiot. Her laugh is so wild, so stupid, it actually pulls three Peacekeepers from their posts. They bark orders, shove her, trying to pin her down. She makes it worse, grabbing one by the chest plate and hollering, “Your armor squeaks! You a tin man or what?”

Their focus is on her. That’s our window. "Now" Pyra whispers sharply.

We crawl low, hugging the dirt, every muscle screaming. The tower’s foundation is plated steel sunk into concrete, but I’ve seen enough schematics to know the weak spot: the power conduit feeding its lights and comms. We wedge the bomb into the seam, wires snapping into place with trembling fingers. Timer set: 00:20. Not a lot, but enough.

T+68:37:28 — 103 bpm

Tick, tick, tick. My own pulse fighting the countdown.

We slide back into the shadows, barely breathing. Zarina catches my eye mid-struggle, and just as one Peacekeeper shoves her face-first into the dirt, she winks.

00:05.

I grab her arm and yank. “Move!”

We bolt. Our feet pound the ground—

00:00.

The world tears open. White fire blossoms under the tower. Metal screams, bodies launch into the air like rag dolls. The sound is too big to understand, it drowns thought, drowns everything.

T+68:38:48 — 140 bpm

Shrapnel rains. Screams slice the smoke. The watchtower crumples sideways, crushing two Peacekeepers beneath it. The air reeks of burning oil, singed flesh.

We run. Past the fire, past the chaos. But a shout cracks behind us—“Stop them!” A beam of light pins us like prey. Then the gunfire starts.

Bang.

Pyra and Zarina dives. I stumble forward. Then I feel it. Multiple stings in my back. I crumple but they clutch my side and dragged me along.

D7F Tracker: T+68:40:48 — 110 bpm

I grab him under the arm, the other side held by Pyra. We drag with everything we've got. His weight is dead stone but I won’t let go. Not now, not after the tower, not after the fire. Peacekeepers are closing, shouting through the smoke.

T+68:43:35 — 113 bpm

I felt a sharp pain in my neck and my hold of Femto loosens. My vision blurry and the smoke is not helping. "Go! It's over for us!" I shout at Pyra.

My consciousness is fading and I keep telling her to go. "It's better if at least one of us will escape. It'll make them look stupid!" I shout at her.

She gives Femto's hand one final squeeze and stared into my eyes. "You're not a bad ally at all."

I smile as I see her small figure behind the smoke already flying through the trees.

T+68:55:39 — Flatline

Day 4 Tracker Update: 4:00 AM - Control Area (Gamemaker exclusive only)

D3F Tracker: T+69:00:40— 145 bpm

The female tribute of District 3, Pyra McGowan escaped into the wilderness and has the mind to remove her tracker and destroy it. An immediate execution of the McGowan family will be carried later this afternoon and the remaining nine tributes will taste the wrath of the Capitol.

Day 4 Tracker Update: 5:00 AM Western Area - 1 present heartbeat: D4F

D4F Tracker: T+70:15:33— 70 bpm

I awoke from the loud trumpets above and the voice of Dr. Lunatic Gaul booms all over.

"Tributes… the Games grow quiet. Too quiet. So, to stir the blood, we’ve unleashed our newest creations. They hunt not by sight, not by smell… but by the sound of your fear. Run, hide, tremble. Whoever has the loudest heartbeat will get eliminated. Three tributes have already been claimed. You can see two of them at the center pile where the games began if you wish. Their heartbeats betrayed them so they got mauled by my babies. They left no body to recover for the other one. So, hush your trembling hands, swallow every scream, and pray your pulse does not betray you. Survive if you can and may your heartbeats learn to obey."

I spat on the ground and prepared for the day. Mutts that can hear your heartbeat? Mines been dead long ago.

I have been searching for victims but I guess the mutts will do them for me. But an idea struck me and I grin like I'm back to life.

Day 4 Tracker Update: 5:00 AM Northern Area - 4 present heartbeats: D1M, D1F, D5M, D5F

D5M Tracker: T+70:39:33— 145 bpm

"This can't be!" Ohmira screams. She repeatedly pressess her ear into my chest. "You need to breathe slowly" her voice panicking and she's fighting too hard to keep it steady.

"Okay. Inhale then exhale. Let's do it together." For a moment everything becomes quiet and we're holding each other's hands.

Then suddenly, like when my heartbeat would spike up at any time, the door of the tiny castle burst open and two figures stand before us. You can see their sweat on their faces. They look like they have been running.

For a moment we all stare at each other and then Ohmira shouted. "It’s no use! His heart is wild! You’ll only get yourselves killed staying here!"

Her words were plea and shield, but the boy’s face twisted.."That’s why we’re going to kill you," he spat, stepping forward. "This place is ours now."

I staggered to my feet, rage snapping through exhaustion, and hurled an empty barrel at him. It crashed against his side with a hollow thud. His district partner, a girl with emerald green eyes raised her spear, ready to drive it through me.

But then, a sound split the air.

A rumble. A thousand thundering paws. The stone walls trembled. The earth shook.

The mutts. That might be what they are running from.

And then we saw them — monsters spilling into view. Canines stretched taller than horses, jaws slick with drool, teeth like jagged glass. Their growls rolled through the air like thunderclouds breaking.

"Up!" I shouted, grabbing Ohmira’s wrist. Together we stumbled up the spiral stairs, boots pounding stone.

But the others followed. The boy from 1 lunged, his hand fisting my shirt, yanking me backward so hard my chest slammed the rail. My vision sparked. Ohmira’s scream ripped the air as she hurled herself at him, dragging him down the steps.

The girl snarled, seizing Ohmira’s hair and wrenching her head back. Ohmira twisted, her nails clawing for the spear, yanking, both of them straining, the metal tip flashing like a guillotine.

"Let go of her!" I roared at the girl, while snatching another barrel and smashing it down against the boy’s skull. His body crumpled, dazed, blood streaking the stone.

The girl's spear is inches from Ohmira's neck and I dashed upward giving all my strength on keeping it from piercing her. Both of us holding the tip of the spear while the girl from 1 keeps jamming it.

"Mira, enough!" My lungs burned. "We have to climb!"

The stairs rattled beneath us as the growls grew louder, closer, like a storm flooding into the castle itself. The girl shoved the spear upward, the blade slicing so close I felt air split across my cheek. My arms shook from exhaustion.

Then I noticed something. I instead of keeping the tip away from her neck, Ohmira started pulling the spear as if taking it away from the girl. I immediately knew what she is doing and helped her pull the tip of the spear. The girl from 1 thought we are trying to take away her beloved spear and so she also started pulling. She's bigger and stronger than us and we nearly tumbled down the stairs as she pulls.

Then, Ohmira’s voice, sharp as steel. "Let go."

Her eyes found mine. Knowing this is the time, we both let go at once of the spear. The sudden drop of the force sends our opponent stumbling. She toppled backward, her body crashing down the stone steps, limbs striking hard, until she slammed against her district partner with a sickening thud.

"Let's go!" My scream echoed against the stone.

We ragged ourselves up the last few steps, slammed the trapdoor shut just as the first mutt thundered through the doorway below, claws tearing against stone.

We collapsed on the rooftop, gasping. The morning air slapped against our burning lungs. Beneath us, the castle shook with the weight of monsters, their howls rattling through the trapdoor, shaking the bolts.

The air was cold and sharp. But my heartbeat — my cursed heartbeat was deafening.

Day 4 Tracker Update: 6:00 AM Southern Area - 4 present heartbeats: D2M, D2F, D6M, D11M | Another heartbeat entering the Southern Area...

D4F Tracker: T+71:32:22— 85 bpm

I am careful not to walk briskly towards the others so that I don't exhaust myself and so my heartbeat stays neutral. If my heartbeat rises, the mutts will come for me. I have formed an entertaining idea on how to eliminate my competitors. I care or don't care about life, I want to win these games. To show to myself that I can. I'm not winning for the Capitol. I want to show them that I am free and I can do whatever I want — and that involves killing. I kill because I want to. I am free.

I have roamed the whole area where I'm staying at the other day but found no tributes so I moved southward.

A few moments later, I spotted a boy. He quickly hid himself on bush but it was too late.

"Hey, there!" I wave my hand cheerfully.

The boy freezes. He thinks I didn’t see him. I tilt my head, smile too wide, and whisper, “You’re breathing too fast. The mutts don’t like that.”

His chest heaves even faster. Perfect.

I take one step toward him, then stop, folding my hands behind my back like I’m waiting politely. “Go on, keep running. I won’t follow.”

He bolts. The bushes thrash, his heartbeat loud as thunder in the tracker that only I can imagine. Then the sound I’ve been waiting for — low snarls, claws dragging against the grasses. The mutts.

I don’t move. My pulse stays steady, calm as a lull in the waves. They tear into him. His scream cracks the sky, then dies into whimpers. When the mutts finally scatter, his body is broken but alive, twitching like a fish on land.

I crouch beside him, brushing his bloody hair from his face. "You have the same eyes with your district partner when I killed her."

"Why don't you end me now?" he says. Then I reply, “I want to see the hope leave your eyes.”

He gasps, tries to speak, but only gurgles.

“Why do people fight so hard just to die another day?” I murmur. “Isn’t it funny? All that running, and this is where you end up.”

I hum, then begin to sing, my voice soft and childlike, as though soothing him to sleep:

A line is cast into the deep,

No catch, no weight, no soul to keep.

The ocean yawns, it does not care,

No meaning hides, no answer there.

The insignificance of life,

No purpose, peace, or final strife.

A blink, a burn, a silent scream,

Then nothing more — just dust and dream.

His eyes widen, then glaze. I giggle. “Goodnight, little heartbeat. Don’t worry. It won’t matter soon.”

Day 4 Tracker Update: 7:00 AM Northern Area - 3 present heartbeats: D1F, D5M, D5F

D5F Tracker: T+72:30:32— 120 bpm

The sun had climbed fully over the horizon, its light falling across our faces, but I felt no warmth. The cries of the boy below us still haunted the air, echoing long after his voice was gone. Two gunshots had cracked the silence since dawn — one for him, the boy from District One, and another for some unseen tribute whose end I could only imagine. Perhaps the mutts had claimed them as well. I did not know, nor did I dare dwell on it too long.

What consumed me now was Hertz. His heartbeat faltered like a failing drum, irregular, uncertain, as though it might stop at any breath. His skin burned with fever one moment and trembled with cold the next. Sweat gathered upon his brow, and I fanned him desperately with his own jacket, fearing that if I stopped, he might slip further into the shadows. When I pressed my ear to his chest, the beat was faint, too faint — sometimes no louder than the rustle of leaves in a dying wind.

They call it a sickness of the heart’s rhythm, a broken signal within the body itself. Hertz’s own pulse betrays him, stalling without reason, then quickening as though in panic, only to collapse into silence again. It is not something I can fight, and yet I try, though my hands shake with the knowledge of my helplessness.

And still, there is another terror. The girl from One has not perished. This morning, through the crack of the trapdoor, we saw her alive and unflinching seated cross-legged beside the body of her district partner. He lay still, half-consumed by the mutts, but she sat in meditation, her face as calm as stone, her breaths measured, as though she had bent her own heartbeat into submission. The creatures circled her, their snarls close enough to graze her skin, yet they did not touch her. They seemed to sense no struggle within her chest, no fear to feed on.

It is me they should have torn apart for my heart rages against itself, unsteady, loud, betraying every secret of my fear. And as Hertz slips in and out of consciousness beside me, I can feel the terror tightening its grip. The monsters wait below, patient, but it is not only their fangs I dread. It is the silence I hear creeping between each of Hertz’s heartbeats, threatening to claim him before the arena ever does.

D5M Tracker: T+72:50:16— 100 bpm

When I'm fully conscious again, the nightmare hadn't stopped. The mutts are still below us. My chest was still hammering like it was trying to break out of me. Ohmira’s warning about the mutts kept circling in my head, that heartbeat line gnawing at me. But if I was going to die, it wasn’t gonna be with District 1 laughing over my body.

I glanced at the mutts below the trapdoor. Just a flick of my eyes was enough. It can raise my heartbeat again. "What we need is a plan" I suggest. We didn’t need words. Ohmira always knew what I was thinking.

We peer again at the trapdoor. The girl from 1 was still sitting trying to maintain her calmness. Her eyes closed and breathing calmly. And is that a smile on her face? She even started standing up and started doing some yoga poses while the mutts swarmed her. All we had to do was open her eyes and make her see what's she's trying to ignore.

I picked up a jagged debris and hurled it hard, the crack echoing through the tiny room like a signal flare. The girl’s head snapped toward the sound.

The moment her eyes landed on the mutts, her scream ripped out almost instantly. She could not take it anymore. She scream even louder high and sharp, before the gnashing and tearing drowned it out.

Suddenly, the trapdoor creeked and we plunged into the mutts below!

D5F Tracker: T+73:03:16— 130 bpm

The trapdoor groaned beneath us. I felt the stone tremble, then break, and in a rush of breathless terror Hertz and I were swallowed by darkness. We hit the floor hard, our bones rattling, and then the sound came — the slick shuffle of claws, the guttural growl of something bred for the end of us.

The mutts closed in, a crawling tide of teeth and hunger. I could hear Hertz’s heart before I could hear my own. Too fast, too loud, as though each beat was a drum summoning his death. I pressed my hand against his chest as if by touch alone I could soothe the storm inside him.

“Calm,” I whispered, though my voice trembled. “Calm, or they will know.”

Because love is a weakness here. Affection is no secret in the Capitol’s eyes — it is a currency, a leash, a weapon to make puppets out of dying children. We had hidden it well. The glances passed like contraband. The brushes of fingers that could be mistaken for accidents. We had denied our own hearts for survival. Yet now, in the dark, with the hounds of the Capitol circling, I could not deny him.

I shut my eyes, summoning the words my father once told me as comfort, the way a child recites prayers in the night. Poetry was his rebellion, small and unremarked, but to me it was the only sword I had.

I tried to steady myself. My father once told me that words could hold the soul together when the world tried to tear it apart. He used to whisper old stories when the nights grew long, and my favorite was of St. Valentine — a man who loved where love was forbidden. I swallowed down my terror and spoke the poem I had woven from his story, each word soft against the roar of the mutts, each syllable my lifeline:

They say there’s a name for the way that we burn,

For the hearts that don’t beat — they twist and they turn.

For the glances held long, though the moment is brief,

For the love that shows up like a thief.

Hertz’s trembling eased for a moment. His eyes met mine in that flicker of stolen time, and I could see it — the truth we had tried to bury beneath ash and silence.

D5M Tracker: T+73:04:00— 100 bpm

"Come on, help me compose this poem." she says. Murmuring lines of poetry always calms Ohmira down. And so I really really try my best to calm my heartbeat and focus on creating the poem while the mutts encircle us.

They say there’s a fever that lives in the chest,

I say the lines in tears.

It flares up in silence, it hides with the rest.

She continues.

What should we call this thing called love without the Capitol knowing it? It doesn't really matter now. No point on hiding our love. The Capitol knows it. But now I understand that love is rebellion. Like that empire which Dr. Gailloux used to tell us where the emperor forbids love. And in our district where love is taboo that gets you shamed and sometimes even killed. You try to hide it but your pulse betrays you. Like the men and women in our district who secretly meets and love each other. It's like a sickness, a syndrome — the syndrome of St. Valentine.

They call it a sickness — a fault in design,

But I call it St. Valentine.

I add to the line.

D5F Tracker: T+73:06:15— 99 bpm

We were sick in their eyes. Diseased with something that did not serve the Capitol’s spectacle, yet something they would seize upon the moment it slipped through the cracks. So we had hidden it, buried it beneath layers of sharp words, half-truths, and the pretense of indifference. But here, with the mutts shrieking for flesh, there was no hiding left.

It starts when you look, and forget to pretend.

It lingers in places where touches would end.

It’s not loud or proud — it lives in the small,

Like a pause, like a breath, like the risk of it all.

I pressed my forehead against his, breathing him in as if I could etch him into my veins. “They will know,” I whispered. “They will see.”

"It doesn't matter." he whispers. He's breath hot and his tears kept pouring. Love, like life, was never meant to survive in Panem. It was meant to be torn apart for their amusement, left in fragments on the stone.

The mutts growled. I resolve on my decision. I force myself to think about the life without him and my heartbeat quickens. The mutts draws close to me. I listen to his heart. It's slowly calming down. I again force myself to think that we will not be together and my heart leaped so much in unease, agitation and sadness.

I hear his heart starting to rise again and my lips found his. He seems shocked but his heart calmed down.

I pushed Hertz forward the door while he's heart is calm and his mind still processing the kiss. My last strength poured into him, even as the mutts reached me first. His scream tore the air realizing too late what I am doing. But I pushed him out on the open fields where there are no mutts and I closed the door. My father’s words still echoed, fragile and trembling, in the hollow of my mind.

They call it a sickness — a fault in design,

But I call it St. Valentine.

T+73:14:02— Flatline

Day 4 Tracker Update: 1:00 PM Southern Area - 4 present heartbeats: D2M, D2F, D4F, D11M

D4F Tracker T+78:01:15 - 60 bpm

Amazing how there's an additional two cannons that sounded earlier. A total of 7 tributes have died now just half of today. What an interesting day.

I continuously searched for victims and even went at the clearing where the games started. There I saw the bodies of the girl from 7 and the boy from 3 hanging on the tower at the center. But Gaul said there's three of them and the third has no body to retrieve because it was torn apart by the mutts. Must be district three's partner. That makes three tributes dead.

I stayed there for a while and talked to their corpses swaying on the tower. But I quickly got bored and went south.

The gunfire that sounded next after those three died, I don't know who did it belong. Then, I killed the boy from 6 or more like I sent him to his death. I didn't even have to do anything. I feel so aroused seeing someone causing themselves their own demise. And finally there's another two gunfires that sounded.

I try to recall who's possibly left. Me, both from 1, 2, 5, and the boy from 11. But there are three gunfires I didn't know who's death it signaled for. Could be those two weaklings from 5 but I'm really hoping it's one of the district 1,2 or 11 tributes. I don't really care if I encounter them but I just want to win or die in my own way. Not being killed by those try so hard shits.

I smile as I see someone's back. It's the boy from 11. That's right. Do not look at my direction. I tiptoed towards him and raises my knife. But to my surprise he turns around and twisted my arm. I can't believe I have been surprised.

His grip is iron. My wrist burns as he twists it back, forcing the knife out of my hand. I almost laugh of the idea that me, caught like a fish on his line. How ridiculous. How humiliating.

The knife on my throat now and so I need to find a way out. My only salvation are the mutts. I need to raise his heartbeat.

"You should’ve killed me faster," I tilt my head, my smile too wide, my eyes too bright, letting every ounce of madness bleed out. Still nothing. His eyes are stone. "The mutts like hesitation. They like weakness. Do you feel weak?"

He doesn’t flinch. His face is carved from stone, no reaction at all. His heart is steady and calm. Is he not scared of me? Infuriating.

So I lean closer, pressing my lips near his ear, letting my breath run hot and uneven. "I can smell it, you know. The way your chest tightens when you’re afraid. I can taste it when your heart skips…"

Nothing. Still stone.

I tilt my head, and for once I let the mockery fade. My voice softens, low, dangerous. I needed to change my tactics. "What about this?" I slide my hand across his chest, lower than it should be, and watch his jaw clench. His pulse finally stumbles.

The sound in the distance answers it: the padded thunder of paws. The mutts. I laugh high, hysterical, beautiful. "See? You’re mine. I own your heartbeat now."

And before he can speak, I kiss him, mocking, violent, tasting the sweat and fear I’ve craved. Then I shove him backward, toward the shadows at the treeline where the beasts are emerging.

But then he suddenly grabs me. His fingers, in that last desperate clutch, press flat against my chest.

And for the first time in years I feel it. I suddenly felt the drum of my heartbeat.

T+78:15:16 - 102 bpm

"What? no!" I gasp, stumbling back, clutching my sternum as if the thing inside is betraying me. "No, no, I buried this. I killed this. I am free, I don’t—"

But the memories flood me. Saltwater filling my lungs, my father’s boots pressing my head beneath the tide when I failed the nets. My mother’s voice hissing that softness was death. The laughter of the boys who drowned my dog, told me it was better that way.

Love, kindness, softness is dead. I killed them. I burned them all, so why, why is my heart still alive?

The boy from 11 looks at me, I expect anger or malice but his expression was unreadable. I could not understand that kind of expression. As if he had just tasted sour. Is that pity? As if for a moment he sees me not as predator, not as tribute, not as monster but as something human.

That look is worse than death because my chest feels like it will explode.

T+78:17:16 - 110 bpm

The mutts circle. They smell his fear, but they hear my heart. My betrayal. My weakness. My own body is a beacon.

And for the first time, I don’t smile.

T+78:19:16 - 120 bpm

The mutts attack him as I try to calm myself down but the memories keep flooding. When did life became meaningless to me? Why did I became like this?

It started as how I cope. Everything simply goes wrong. Life has shown me nothing but cruelty. My father when he slaps and submerges my head on the water. My mother who doesn't care if the other kids push me around. But all of that is nothing compared when two peacekeepers did something to me.

My heartbeat rises. Tears streaming down my cheeks. "I don't want this a anymore!" I scream at the top of my lungs. Life is a game. The Hunger Games. But what if I don't want to play anymore? Life in general not just inside here.

When cold nights come by, I always tell myself that one day I will lay six feet underground and all my worries won't matter anymore.

The insignificance of life,

No purpose, peace, or final strife.

A blink, a burn, a silent scream,

Then nothing more — just dust and dream.

A line is cast into the deep,

No catch, no weight, no soul to keep.

The ocean yawns, it does not care,

No meaning hides, no answer there.

The mutts turns toward my direction but I don't fight anymore. I'm simply tired of playing this game. If I have to choose to exist with pain and not being born. I'd choose the latter. On those insignificant days back home where I just live to die. I always eagerly await for death.

The waves erase the marks we make,

Each breath a ripple soon to break.

We rot, we sink, we’re pulled below,

Forgotten currents let us go.

Hooks rust, nets tear, the boats decay,

All struggles fade and drift away.

Life’s just a flash—then cold, then still,

A void that swallows, never filled.

T+78:21:16 - 130 bpm

I want to feel free. To prove myself that I am strong. That's why I break the rules at home and do what is not expected from me. Life is a prison.

The mutts come closer but I won't allow them. I didn't have the choice to be born into this kind of world but at least I have the freedom to choose when will I die.

The insignificance of life,

No purpose, peace, or final strife.

A blink, a burn, a silent scream,

Then nothing more—just dust and dream.

I grab the knife that had fallen out of the grasp of the boy from 11 who had woken my sleeping heart and jammed it in my throat. The mutts came but before even the first bite came, I finally freed myself.

T+78:25:37 - Flatline

End of Day 3 • 3 Beating Heartbeats Remains

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Day 5 Tracker Update: 12:00 AM Western Area - 2 present heartbeats: D2M, D2F

D2F Tracker: T+89:16:54 - 92 bpm

I glanced at Braxton as the anthem played and a large hovercraft flew overhead. This is where we find out who is left. This is where we find out if we are still allies. If we're gonna go our separate ways or stay by each other's side.

It's not that I have any misgivings about him. He's the kind of guy that do his work quietly at the quarries. The kind that grows up to be one of those big man back at home who are strong and powerful but content on what they have. The kind you could already picture years from now. Broad-shouldered, weathered by the sun, who lived simply. Content as long as he eats three meals a day. Plus, he doesn't quite have the guts. He's not exactly a scaredy cat because he had proven himself more braver than I thought today.

When we first spotted the giant canines, we ran and ran 'till our feet hurts. They encircled us and he smashed their heads with huge rocks and slashed them with his sword. He let me stepped on his back so I can climb an elevated water tank. The structure is rusty so we didn't dare climb higher but still a little higher where the mutts can't reach us. We both stayed on the top hanging on the metals of the tank's structure. Our hearts beating and the mutts growling below us.

After more gunfires sounded, the gamemakers announced that the mutts had retreated. At first, we didn't move but the mutts left us and ran towards a giant truck that had appeared on the fields. They seem to be drawn inside it. Two peacekeepers closed the truck and drive away.

The truck drove towards the direction where the sun is setting, we can see the blurry outline of the watchtowers that guards us. That is where they'll probably got picked up by a hovercraft and return to the Capitol lab.

We slowly climbed down and went to the west. We both collapsed on the grass just as midnight came.

So here we are waiting to see which of our competitors had died. This has been a very gloomy day for us tributes. Gunfires everywhere and the threat of the mutts sensing our heartbeats. Therefore I felt my stress lift as the face of girl from District 1 appears first in the sky.

Seraphine Cutter D1F | Age: 17 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 8 | Kills: 2 (1 shared kill) Killed by: Canine mutts caused by D5M | Placement: 7th/24

Carbryn Drape D1M | Age: 16 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 7 | Kills: 2 (1 shared kill) Killed by: D5M + Canine mutts | Placement: 9th/24

Scylla Doomhart D4F | Age: 16 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 2 | Kills: 8 (4 direct 3 indirect) Killed by: Accidentally stabbing herself • suicide | Placement: 4th/24

I look at the sky in disbelief. More than half of us died yesterday. With all that running around from the mutts we hadn't been good at tracking who is left. My plan is when we reach the top 5, I'll secretly leave Braxton. Maybe on his sleep or not paying attention. I couobring myself to kill him. But I have missed my chance. The only other tribute left is the boy from District 5. The one with a heart condition. That means we don't need each other anymore. We both know one of us can easily take him out.

"Last two steps from home." I shuddered at the calmness of his voice. He's back towards me and his hands infront of his so I cannot see what's he up to. I try to picture the expression on his face. "Braxton?"

T+89:16:54 - 110 bpm

He turns around and the gleam of his sword helped me dodge his first strike. I was wrong about him.

D2M Tracker: T+89:20:00- 105 bpm

"You're not wrong 'bout me. I'm exactly what you think of me. All brawns with no brains. It's just that I have a heart too. And it aches for my people back home."

"Sorry."

D2F Tracker: T+89:23:00- 115 bpm

"I have my people too." I need to get back to Pa. Now that the doctors can cure him and I can give him the a comfortable life.

His eyes met mine and I think we have an understanding. There's no way out of this. It's just how it is.

Our swords met each other. Steel screaming as sparks flew. He pressed hard, driving me back, but I twisted, breaking the lock. His blade slashed wide. I slipped beneath it and struck upward. My sword slid past his guard, burying into his chest.

His eyes widened, breath caught in his throat. For a moment, he staggered, blade clattering from his hand. Then he fell, silence swallowing the echo of steel.

"I'm sorry Braxton." I felt some tears pouring into my eyes. I promise I'll help your people back home. He's look is resentful and fury. He clutched his chest until his heart stopped.

T+89:26:00- 100 bpm

Now, what to do? I hurried over to his supplies and took out some of our bread. As I dropped the first piece on his forehead, I immediately felt pointless on doing it.

I scream at the top of my lungs clutching the bread as his empty eyes stared above the sky.

Day 5 Tracker Update: 6:00 AM Central Area - 1 present heartbeat: D5M

D5M Tracker: T+95:30:04 - 40 bpm

My feet wonders here and there unsure where to go. The gamemakers announced that the giant canines are gone but it doesn't really matter now. I don't care who I encounter.

My heartbeat feels unnaturally low but who cares about that anymore. The air tightens.

It feels like I'm back when I was little around five years old. The time when there is no Ohmira. Life was difficult with me and my father, always waiting for a cure that never comes. My condition was a curse until we met Dr. Gailloux who lifted our burden and I met her. My condition didn't vanish but they made it bearable. Dr. Gailloux helped me understand it and how to control it but Ohmira is the icing on top of the cake. When she came into my life, it was as if the air became cleaner and every breath feels new. Now I'm back on that dark place. It felt like I was five again. Small and fragile.

Part of me wants to go back to that castle. There's a voice inside me telling me that she's still there. She's just trapped and waiting to be saved. "Go my love go! Run away for me!"

I keep trying to break the door but it's as unforgiving as a... Why did it budge so easily when the two from District 1 ambushed us. Why not now!!! "Mira just open the door please!"

She did not answer. Instead a gunfire responded to me. The mutts howl inside and my vision goes black with rage. I press my forehead to the door and whisper with teeth clenched, “I will smash them. I will tear their bones to powder. I will rip the Capitol’s throat out with my bare hands.”

I stayed infront of the door. I banged till my fingers bled. But I know what she wants. As hard as it may be, I need to keep moving forward. Just like how I taught her to do the same when her father died. Now I understand her more. I felt stupid like slapping my face for telling her that it's all going to be okay when her father. Now it is me who has lost. And I finally know what she carried all those years. I hear her ten-year-old self weeping in my head and I join her. My tears burns and my chest shatters.

I wondered around till the sight of the two hanging bodies at the center caught my eye. The boy from 3 and the girl from 7 who got eaten also by the mutts.

T+95:35:15 - 140 bpm

My anger flares inside. Hung like carcasses, their heads loll in the wind as if mocking me. Their corpses sway gently while the Capitol paints lies over their deaths. I cannot breathe. I cannot keep it in anymore.

T+95:36:01 – 160 bpm

I beat my chest. Once. Twice. Over and over again. A drum. A rebellion. My heartbeat is no longer just mine. It is hers. It is ours. The rhythm she left inside me.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

“This is for you, Mira!” I scream to the skies. “You hear me, Capitol? You will not erase her! You will not silence me!”

T+95:37:55 – 180 bpm

My fists slam harder. Each strike echoes like thunder. My ribs ache. My chest rattles. The pain feeds me. The cameras are watching. Let them. Let them see me bleed rebellion into the air. Let them hear her heartbeat living in me.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

I am not hiding anymore. My heart is hers. My heart is war.

T+95:38:40 – 200 bpm

I collapse to my knees, still striking. My breath comes ragged, but I do not stop. I will not stop. The whole arena will know. The whole Capitol will know. They call it love and forbade it. But I'll call it the St. Valentine Syndrome. The symbol for resistance that no matter how you hide or suppress something, it will always break free. I make it my banner. My weapon. My rebellion.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

“Come take it from me,” I snarl. “Come take her from me again.”

Day 5 Tracker Update: 6:00 AM Western Area - 1 present heartbeat: D2F

D2F Tracker: T+95:40:03 – 85 bpm

"Tributes who are not on the central area in five minutes where the games begun will have their tracker explode." I hear a voice in the sky. It sounded frantic and commanding.

I'm right about the finale taking place at the center. I ran but there's still a long way to go.

T+95:41:00 – 100 bpm

I sprinted not daring to break my speed. The wet grass from the morning fog makes the ground slippery but I persist on moving.

T+95:42:00 – 120 bpm

If I could enter the central area, I could block the boy from 5 from entering and let his tracker do the work for me.

T+95:43:00 – 140 bpm

My lungs burn as if they’ve been scraped raw, but I don’t stop. I can already see the central area in the distance. It's so close, yet impossibly far. The voice still echoes in my head: five minutes or the tracker will explode. My time is running out.

T+95:44:00 – 160 bpm

The boy from 5, Hertz lies sprawled at the center, chest heaving, eyes half-closed, barely clinging to consciousness.

I stumble. My arm, the one where the Capitol welded that damned tracker feels heavier than the rest of me. I can almost sense the ticking beneath my skin, a bomb waiting to go off. My vision blurs with sweat, blood, and desperation.

T+95:45:00 – 180 bpm

I scream. I push my legs harder, but they betray me, trembling like reeds in the wind. I am not ready to end here, not when victory is so close I can taste it. Hertz doesn’t even fight me for it. He just lies there, broken, like a ghost waiting to be erased.

I let out a sob that is half rage, half surrender as the heat sears through my arm. It starts as a burning pulse, then a deafening eruption of white light and pain. My body convulses, my scream swallowed by the explosion. The world tears apart. My vision covered in crimson and the pain is unbearable. I was thrown forward and I reached the central area tumbling. But it was too late.

Day 5 Tracker Update: 6:00 AM Central Area - 2 present heartbeats: D2F, D5M

D5M Tracker: T+95:45:30 – 180 bpm

I hear a girl's scream and the sobbing that followed it which made me look at her direction. What have they done? Force the other remaining tribute so that they will distract the viewers from my rebellion?

Not that I'm complaining. I'm too exhausted, tired. I am ready to end this.

D2F Tracker: T+95:47:30 – 190 bpm

"Let's end this bullshit!" shouted the boy.

"Why, are you tired of your skippy breaky heart?" I shout back.

He snarls and crawls towards me fast. I raise my sword with my right arm. I have lost a lot of blood in my left arm, my shirt the only thing keeping my blood from pouring out like a river. The brief moment I let go of the wound made my vision double and I fall to the ground but I still raise my sword.

He comes and punched me hard on the head. Multiple times. My sword keeps swinging wildly but I'm hitting air.

D5M Tracker: T+95:47:50 – 179 bpm

"Just let me go home please." she begs. Her tears pouring out.

"Trust me, I don't want to go home! There's no reason for me to live anymore!" I shout.

"Then die here idiot!" She spit blood on my face.

D2F Tracker: T+95:48:30 – 180 bpm

"But I have to continue living, for her so her sacrifice won't go to waste." I reply.

I snarl through broken teeth. "You greedy cow!" My sword swings again, nicking his arm. Blood sprays. I let out a broken, desperate laugh. "Just let me go home! You’ll die young anyway. Heart’s a ticking bomb. You’ll rot before you’re twenty."

D5M Tracker: T+95:49:33 – 185 bpm

The words slice through me but fuel my fury. "That’s life," I snarl, wrenching her wrist back until she cries out. "You keep living with the risk. You keep breathing even when it hurts."

My pulse pounds in my ears like drums of war. "Is it worth it? Maybe not. But you still fight. You still crawl through the dirt."

D2F Tracker: T+95:49:20 – 189 bpm

His eyes are wild. He looks like a corpse that forgot to stop moving. For a heartbeat, I falter. His words, his rage, grief, defiance, they infect me. "Maybe…" I whisper, dizzy. "Maybe life is…"

D5M Tracker: T+95:49:33 – 185 bpm

Her grip loosens. Fool. I tear the sword from her, and without hesitation, drive it straight into her chest. Her scream rips the sky apart.

Her blood spills warm across my hands as her body crumples. She stares up at me, mouth trembling, but no more words come. Just silence, just the anthem swelling.

I let her drop.

Her heart stops before mine.

Pia Draycor D2F | Age: 17 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 8 | Kills: 3 (1 shared kill) Killed by: D5M | Placement: 2nd/24

Braxton Marshall D2M | Age: 16 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 8 | Kills: 2 (1 shared kill) Killed by: D2F | Placement: 3rd/24

Hertz Ballantyne D5M | Age: 16 | Evaluation Score (Limited Training): 4 | Kills: 3 (1 indirect, 1 shared) Victor of the 14th Hunger Games

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Hertz at 76 years old during the time of the 74th Hunger Games

The pain aches like it happened yesterday. Sixty years. That's how long it had been but I can remember every detail vividly. Sixty years ago was yesterday. They had forced me to forget about her. They "cured" me according to their propaganda. My heart stopped beating just right after I killed my final opponent. It would have been better if I had stayed like that. Because when I woke up, everything is gone. The way my heart would spike up or drop so low is gone. My heartbeat feels steady, normal but empty. My condition which ties me to her. The condition she and her father helped me to manage is gone.

I'm glad at first to forget about her. To move out of that apartment and into the Victor's Village. To forget all the things and places that make feel the pain. But when they found me a match, at twenty-six, I came back to her and plead for her understanding. I'm forced to marry to protect my father. I have to fulfill my duty even though I'm a victor, I'm still a citizen of District 5. Or so they tell me. But no matter what words they use, I know the reason. They just want to prove to me that it's not love. It's not love. We had two children but nothing romantic between us. But my heart still broke a second time when one of my child's kid, my granddaughter went as one of the female tributes for the 50th Hunger Games.

Twenty four years after that horrible Quarter Quell, I'm again watching at home for another round of Hunger Games. When the female tribute from 5 died, I'm just ready to shut down the television but something happened. Are they joking? The love that they had suppressed throughout, are they really using it as a propaganda now? Usually the theme of the games are about honor, sacrifice and glitter gore but this is the first time the main angle of the games is love. The Capitol, who had forbidden me to love, now selling love as their grand narrative. The irony made me howl, manic, bitter. For once, their lie had stumbled into the truth. Love is real. Always has been. Always will be.

And so, I think of you. Of the way your lips shaped the words of the poem we made together. From that long ago 14th Hunger Games. How you spoke of it like an ailment, a syndrome — St. Valentine’s Syndrome. You whispered it as if naming a star no one else had seen. I have added my own verses throughout the years, clumsy and awkward, reaching for the dignity of your language, but falling short. No one writes poetry like you.

St. Valentine Syndrome

They say there’s a name for the way that we burn,

For the hearts that don’t beat — they twist and they turn.

For the glances held long, though the moment is brief,

For the love that shows up like a thief.

They say there’s a fever that lives in the chest,

It flares up in silence, it hides with the rest.

They call it a sickness — a fault in design,

But I call it St. Valentine.

It starts when you look, and forget to pretend.

It lingers in places where touches would end.

It’s not loud or proud — it lives in the small,