Survivor: The Forty-Seventh Hunger Games

Chapter 21

Potato Springfield, D11

The strange, colorfully-dressed woman kept following me around. She kept her distance after I bit her when she got too close to me at breakfast, but she kept following me. She was obsessed with me or something.

"Hel-lo Par-ker. Do... you... want... some... lunch?" she asked, pointing at a table.

"I can talk," I said. Her blue eyelids flew up and her purple lips drew into a surprised ring.

"Oh! Dear me, I never thought. Why didn't you say anything?" she asked.

"Had enough food," I said. "Name's not Parker."

"That's what was on the form," the woman said, looking confused. "What is it, then?"

"Potato," I said.

"What a funny name!" she said. I glared at her.

"Potatoes not funny," I said. "Potatoes everything."

"Everything?" the woman said. It was hard to understand her, what with the funny accent and all the words she used. "Why are potatoes everything?"

"Potatoes are food. Potatoes are life. Potatoes are holy," I said, stretching my vocabulary to the limit.

"Potatoes are holy," the woman repeated, screwing up her face and backing away.

"Yes," I said. "Give life. Appear in ground. Fill stomach," I said.

"You worship potatoes," she said. "He worships potatoes," she whispered.

"At home, there is holy potato. Men would not let me bring. Is still holy," I said. Just because my special potato, the one I never ate, was still at home, that did not make it less godly.

"I am very sorry to not be able to meet the Holy Potato," the woman said.

"Maybe can meet it someday," I comforted her.

"I can't believe I'm asking this," she said, most of it sounding like nonsense to me. "If potatoes are holy, why do you eat them?"

"Why eat potatoes?" I asked. "Is right. Eat potato, potato goes back in earth. Make more potato."

"Of course," she said. "How could I be so silly?"

Deme Fields, D9

I didn't know what to do. Potato was... not right. He was handicapped or something. Whatever age his body was, his mind couldn't have been older than eight. It was a horrible, ghastly thing to vote to kill someone like that. I'd never be able to live with myself, but I wasn't sure there was any way around it.

I had to vote for someone. Titian said abstaining wasn't allowed. No way around it, I had to name someone to kill. Best-case scenario, every vote ended up being in the minority. If I did everything right, I might never be directly responsible for killing someone. But if I did that, I gave up any influence that might help me save myself. I didn't know if I was brave enough.

He's going to die either way, I told myself. No matter how things turned out, there was no way Potato would win. So then it doesn't matter if you vote for him, I thought. Partially, it was true. It would make no difference to Potato whether or not I voted for him. But no matter how I phrased in it my head and no matter how many arguments I made, I couldn't change the fact that it would make a difference to me.

Words and rhetoric weren't anything outside of arguments. Right was still right and wrong was still wrong, no matter how pretty someone talked. I could say I did what I had to or that there was no way around it, but I couldn't lie forever. Whatever I did was my choice. No one made me do it. I decided what was most valuable and acted on it.

Why did it matter? Why did I have to beat myself up over something I never asked for? I didn't choose to vote. I only chose how to vote. You wouldn't call someone a thief if someone else held his hand open and put something into it. The Capitol did the killing. More words, more rhetoric, maybe I'd convince myself.

I made myself one promise: I'd never vote for Sammy. She was the youngest in Heilala. She was the closest to a little kid. Morals aside, it was just my nature. I couldn't vote for a little kid. I knew in my heart the same would likely apply to Potato, but we'd have to wait until voting day and see how deep my morals really ran.

Aliara Bavier, D12

I promised Zelena I'd get home for her. Whatever I had to do, it was worth it for her. She was my everything, and nothing mattered more. I didn't want to kill anyone- none of us wanted to- but sometimes things had to be done, even if you didn't want to. None of us asked to be here (minus Abrexa) and none of us was to blame for what we did.

Gael might or might not believe I was really in love with him. Of course he didn't believe it yet. These things didn't happen at first sight. Even I wasn't that romantic. I might be able to convince him over time, but he'd be on the lookout for double-crosses just like that. I was a good actor, but this was a tough audience. Anyway, the most important thing wasn't to fool him into thinking I really felt anything. It was to fool him into thinking he was smarter than me. If he thought he knew what I was up to, he'd think I was easy to manipulate. He'd expect me to favor him in the votes because he was my patsy, and he might possibly favor me in return so he'd reap the benefits longer. It was a tangled web I wove, and it would only get more tangled.

For now, the priority was to make sure I wasn't the one that got more votes than anyone else. Instead of a free-for-all, this year was a game of musical chairs. One left without, and then another, and another. Maybe hot potato was more appropriate. Everyone passing the buck to someone else, doing anything necessary to make sure anyone but you was holding that potato when the time ran out. Wouldn't that Potato kid be happy?

I had to try to keep myself in check. I was an all-or-nothing person, and that would definitely be a problem. Despite my best efforts, I got attached to people, and once I was attached, there was no going back. I'd done some pretty stupid things in the name of love. Part of the reason I picked Gael (other than the unfortunate limitations of orientation- Rahina was setting off my gaydar something major, but that wasn't happening for half a dozen reasons) was that I definitely wouldn't ever get attached. My friends were another story. Honestly, that ship had already sailed.

Random note: Aliara's gaydar is correct.