IT WASN'T EXACTLY AN AGREED UPON DECISION TO LET WATT JOIN THEM. It was something that was simply accepted when Watt trailed right behind Sage and to their camp. But Watt turned out to be useful, according to him he had gotten a decent amount of rest the last few days, so he'd be able to keep watch. Unlike Sage who had barely closed his eyes for a substantial amount of time. So that night, from his place beside Boyde, after watching the faces of the fallen tributes while the anthem filled the arena (including the girl and boy from earlier that day) Sage found himself drifting off into a light sleep. He could have sworn he could still hear the slight breeze rustling the leaves, or Boyde's breathing that was still a bit wheezy. But everything was black still, there was no dream. Which he wished for, specifically one of the woods outside twelve. Whether he was with Ella, his father, Katniss...he didn't care. At least it would have been familiar and normal. Even if it was just a dream.

          It was like a sick joke. He loved being outside of the fences. He loved hunting. He loved being free. It was like this arena was set up special, just for him. It was like President Snow had wanted this place to remind Sage of home just enough to remind him that Sage wasn't here by chance. It made him wonder how many other tributes hadn't been there by chance...how many were there because of something they or their family had done? How often had the games been used as a punishment?

          Sage was jolted awake when the ground beneath him shook violently. His eyes were wide, and at first saw nothing but the dark air around him occasionally lit up with a flash followed by a bone shaking clash of thunder.

"It's a lightning storm," Watt stated, calmly from his seat against a tree not far from the others. Keeping watch while looking in the direction of the stream. "Don't have those in Twelve?"

"No, not too often..." Sage replied, leaning against the tree again and crossing his arms over his chest.

"Why isn't it raining?" Deedee questioned, clearly shaken as much as Sage had been.

"They don't want it to," Watt replied. And as if on cue, the air around them glowed with light and everything around them seemed to feel charged with electricity.

           However, this time before the clash of thunder could follow the sound of splitting wood came from just feet away it seemed. Sage looked up at the trees in the direction just in time to see another bolt of lightning light up the sky as the tree that had been struck by the last bolt of lightning was quickly engulfed with flames.

"That's why they don't want it to rain..." Watt muttered as he began to scramble to his feet. Instantly as he rose up, as if they had been sitting next to a pile of matches this whole time, the flames swiftly began to hop from tree to tree, creeping closer and closer to his alliance.

Everything seemed to start to move in slow motion besides the crackling flames that were engulfing the trees. Sage could vividly feel his body make every movement as he moved to his feet without a second though and Deedee began to violently shake Marena to wake her from a deep sleep. Sage and Watt both began to help Boyde to his feet as Deedee and Marena gathered their supplies before all of them began moving away from the growing fire. They couldn't easily escape the smoke though as the slight breeze that had helped lull Sage to sleep began to move the dark and thick smoke towards them. Engulfing them just like the flames engulfed the trees. The smoke alone began to burn Sages' eyes and throat, it made him want to move even faster. But Boyde's limp kept them moving only at a quick walk or a slow jog, leaving them a fair distance behind the girls who Sage could still see thanks to the growing flames behind them.

Suddenly Boyde's bad leg gave out from beneath him and caused him to fall to the ground. Nearly taking Watt and Sage down with him.

"Boyde come on," Sage pushed him, "you need to stay on your feet-"

"Sage," Watt started, having to speak up quite a bit so Sage could hear him. "we should keep going."

"We will-"

Sage couldn't even finish his sentence before a tree came crashing down towards them from the area they had been in just moments earlier. It didn't get quite close enough to hit them but sparks, smoke, dirt, ash— it was swirled around them. The sparks hot enough to to start smaller fires in the grass or burn them as they hit their skin.

"No, without him! He's good as dead-"

Watt's words didn't need any time to sink in to Sage. But Sage felt something snap in his mind— who had he brought into the alliance? Someone who just wanted one of them to win, or just wanted to make their own way to winning a little bit easier? He was ready to turn on Boyde already after only being with them for a day? Just like that? Like a coin had flipped. Well, Sage wasn't ready for that. Sage rose to his feet and reached through the air and took a firm hold of Watt and pulled him towards him before punching him in the face with his free hand.

"If anyone is getting left here it's going to be you." Sage spat, releasing Watt just for him to stumble back and bring his hands up to his face. One of them pinching his nose. "Now help m-"

Before Sage could finish his order, a shrill scream emerged from the cloud of smoke that the girls were ahead of them had vanished into.

"You get him up and keep moving. I'm going to see what's going on-" more screams surrounded them, was it the fire? Had it encircled them? "-and Watt, if he dies and you live, I'll make sure you don't live much longer. Got it?"

"Fuck, yeah..." he muttered, his voice hushed as he jolted out of Sage's grip before he turned to help Boyde.

Sage stood there, unsure if his initial plan was a good one. But if he sent Watt ahead, he would probably just try to save himself. Not even bothering to catch up with Marena and Deedee.

"Sage," Boyde croaked the smoke getting to him. "It's okay. Go."

Sage turned and began to run. But every step was painful, not only was he exhausted, and his eyes stung from the smoke and the air had begun to boil it seemed like. But the air clawed at his nostrils and his throat with every step he took. Following the screaming, it lead him the edge of the stream. But by the time he got there, the screaming had stopped and it was quiet. Besides the fire that was closer to them than it had been when it first started.

"Sage where's Watt and Boyde?!" across the stream, swiftly moving her shirt collar back up over her mouth and nose was Marena.

"They're coming, was that you?" Sage questioned, "That screaming?" he asked as he began to move across the water and to the other side where Marena stood.

As Sage neared her, Marena could barely bring her eyes to look at Sage. Instead she merely shook her head, "We ran into a nest, of those snakes...there were too many..." Marena tried to explain simply, her voice cracking and as Sage stood before her he could see tear stains on her cheeks as she glanced down the stream.

"Deedee?" Sage question, perhaps stupidly. But he also didn't wait for her to respond. There hadn't been a cannon yet, or maybe he hadn't heard one that was entirely possible too.

Sage ran down the side of the stream until he saw it. On the edge of the water there was a mound that looked like it was moving. The closer Sage got to it, he saw that it was a swarm of snakes slithering over what he wished was a rock but instead he knew that beneath them was actually Deedee. Sage felt like his heart completely stopped, and he couldn't hear anything besides his own pulse in his ears. He could barely feel the beads of sweat forming on his body as the air around him got hotter.

"Sage! The hell are you doing!"

Sage's eyes ripped away from the snakes to a tribute that had found his way to him, finally catching up...and as if his nose hadn't just been broken after he suggested leaving Boyde...

Sage didn't even bother to ask Watt where Boyde was. Instead he grabbed Watts' shirt again and this time dragged him down to the ground. And into the cool stream.

"I told you-" Sage pressed on Watt's chest to hold him in the water, "-not to leave him!"

"He told me it was okay! To go!"

Sage didn't buy it, he didn't want to. And before he could really think things through, Sage found himself holding Watt just beneath the waters surface. There wasn't an ounce of remorse like there had been with the tribute he killed before. Not even the smallest bit of him wanted to give Watt the chance he had asked for at the stream. Watt struggled beneath Sage's weight but the ripples in the water must have caught the snakes attention. Before they suddenly all slithered off of Deedee's still body, giving Sage a pretty clear view of it; her neck and face, her hands, everything that he could see had matching bites to the one that Boyde had gotten. And Watts struggling drew them nearer to them.

What happened next was so quick, almost like one movement. It came natural and smooth.

From the water, Watt's hand that was already riddled with bites flew up into the air and in his hand he held one of the snakes and he held it as close to Sage as he could before the snake struck out and bit Sages shoulder. Again. And again. It's small fangs pierced through his clothes like it was nothing. Instantly Sage reached over his wounded shoulder and pulled out one of his metal arrows and stabbed it into the water. The water around him began to flush red as he pulled the arrow out again before getting out of the stream. But as soon as he was on his feet, he felt the throbbing in his shoulder spread into the rest of his arm. Into his back. His chest— and as soon as the venom from the snake reached his heart he felt the aching pain spread throughout the rest of his body.

"Marena..." he called out. This was what Boyde had to live with for days? He had thought it was only like a bad skin wound...not anything like this. "El..." Sage shook his head as his head began to pound, "-Marena..." he corrected as he struggled to move farther from the stream. But before he knew it, his legs gave out from beneath him and he fell to the ground.

·𖥸· 𖥸· 𖥸·

Nobody had expected Haymitch's tribute to switch so quickly in the arena. Sage had a level head on his shoulders from day one. Haymitch didn't want to give Sage some false hope that he really had a chance to win. But right from the start, Sage ended up being one of the favorites, at least among the people in the Capitol. Panem's Prince Charming and Panem's Big Brother were what he was sold as, it got him a fair amount of sponsors right away in the games. It had people cheering for him. His biggest trait that Haymitch could pitch was his loyalty and his desire to be a good person. But what happened just now in the arena changed that entirely. Sage resembled a career tribute right then and there at the stream, a brutal killer that nobody was expecting him to be.

But the late-night Capitol viewers loved it.

As three cannons filled the arena, Haymitch watched as his cuff lit up. A stream of gifts awaiting to be sent to their tribute of choice. However Haymitch didn't move to send in anything, there was too much smoke, the flames hadn't been controlled yet. Sending something in was useless. Sage wouldn't have been able to see it anyway, even if he was awake. Which he wasn't, thanks to the snake venom. Which Flickerman claimed had been from a full grown snake while a majority of the ones from the nest Deedee had ran into had been babies.

Haymitch watched the games as the footage then moved to an overview shot— showing the size of the fire that had chased Sage's alliance from the safety of their camp that they had made. As it did, it was almost like the gamemakers were telling the viewers the excitement was over because the clouds that had just been releasing lightning and thunder began to release rain, all just to put out the fire. As the rain started, the camera flicked back to the stream only now Sage wasn't alone. Helping him to his feet was Marena— Haymitch had begun to wonder if she decided to leave him. It would have been easier on them both, in a matter of minutes three of their allies were gone. That left eleven total tributes lefts— that meant that Sage had made it to the top twelve. It also meant that eventually, things might come down to Sage and Marena.

*edited*