When in Rome - HG Competition Entry

Task 6: Interview with a Loved One (QF)

All throughout the night Jaiden had feverish dreams. Dreams of floating through space, admiring the sun. Herding cows. Epic struggles against beasts the likes he had never seen before. Flights of fancy, chasing lovely creatures whom he tried to win over with his skills in poetry and song.

And an awful lot of falling through nothingness.

Somewhere in that tangled mess he kept seeing the faces of the District 1 tributes. A crow landed on a tree during one of his herding episodes. Knowing crows to be messengers he had stopped and looked at it only to find it had Tyberius' eyes.

The Python he slew only moments later had a mane of honey blonde curls and he could swear its roars and hisses were sometimes interrupted by familiar sounding chuckles and giggles.

Had he actually killed them earlier? He wasn't sure.

Currently he was chasing Phlegyas, king of the Lapiths, through his castle. He sought revenge for the irate king had destroyed his temple at Delphi. The royal, previously defiant but now realizing the terrible position he was in being chased by an angry God, called to his guards for help but they just stood there. Jaiden (Apollo?) caught up with him effortlessly and struck him down with a single blow.

Just as he saw the King of the Lapiths' drawing his final breath their face contorted and morphed to resemble Phaedra.

Jaiden awoke with a start.

Coughing violently as some of the sand had gotten down his throat he clambered slowly on to his feet. He was still in a wide open wasteland but the tree had gone. It wasn't warm and welcoming as it had been before and he found he was once again wearing his Hunger Games outfit.

A dull throbbing just behind his eyes informed him that whatever had happened earlier it had his brain working overtime. That, combined with dehydration, had caused quite some havoc.

All of the muscles in his neck and back were tight and sore. He tried stretching them hoping it would relieve some tension and thus make the pain go away but this wasn't the case. In fact it only seemed to make matters worse.

It made him feel very tired and slightly ill.

Searching his near vicinity he found the backpack from before. Luckily it had stayed with him through all of the insanity. He knelt beside it, opened the top and pulled out the bottle of water.

It was about half full still and he took a swig. He needed to drink more but it didn't look like there would be any opportunities any time soon to refill the bottle. Until such an opportunity arose he would continue rationing it.

Putting the bottle away and hoisting the pack on to his shoulder he turned around slowly.

Aside from the occasional broken pillar there was nothing but dust and sand. Searching the horizon he was glad not to spot anyone near by. He wasn't sure who were still left but he knew he wasn't alone. If he had been the only one left he imagined there to be some kind of fanfare in the sky and a hovercraft coming down to collect him.

None of these things were happening and so he racked his brain for his next course of action. The poor, aching grey mass didn't appreciate being put to work just as it was busy feeling sorry for itself but it complied grudgingly.

There were about ten cages with tributes at the Colosseum. Most likely they all had individual duels meaning only five people left the arena alive. During his encounter with Apollo two more had fallen, if it hadn't just been his mind playing tricks on him.

That meant there were about three to five people left. The anxiety he had felt when the door had closed to the tube leading up to the platform returned in full force. He had forgotten to feel scared or nervous between then and now but now that the finish line was so close he started to wonder if perhaps he'd make it after all.