Skipper woke with a start. He was in an unfamiliar room that had a rather sinister vibe about. Sitting up, he surveyed the room. It looked like a hospital room without the medical equipment.
    Skipper slipped out of bed. His toes curled at the contact to the cold white tiles as he walked over to the door. He opened it and found himself in a long hallway, facing a door with a plaque on it. Skipper read the plaque: Kowalski.
    Skipper opened the door. He was met with a room that looked exactly like his. Kowalski was curled on the bed, sound asleep. Skipper was reaching out his hand to revive when he heard a voice behind him; “Well, well, well, Skipper, what are you doing out of your bedroom?”
    Skipper spun around. A man was at the doorway. He was in a wheelchair, and had thick blond hair, a smug smile, and a strange blue eyepiece that almost covered the pink scar that ran across his eye.
    “Blowhole,” Skipper said loathingly.
    Dr. Blowhole entered the room. “Indeed, I am.”
    “What am I doing here?” Skipper demanded.
    “For now, you’re being confined. Later, you’ll be dying.” Blowhole handed Skipper a labeled map of a building. “This is the building we’re in right now. Go to the main room at twelve and I’ll explain everything.”

Skipper entered the main room to find it crowded with people. Someone waved at him. Kowalski. He made his way over to him.
    Rico and Private were with him. Private clutched Kowalski’s sleeve, as if he was afraid of being swept away in the crowd.
    “What’s going on, Skippah?” Private asked nervously.
    “I’m not sure, Private. It’s gonna be fine though, okay?” Skipper said as comfortingly as he could.
    They heard the squeal of a microphone turning on. Blowhole sat at the front of the room, the mic in his hands. “Hello, my…wait a minute. Where’s the Danish one?” Dr. Blowhole said.
    One of Dr. Blowhole’s guards came in, dragging an unconscious man with long, dark hair. “Sorry, Doc. He wouldn’t come, so I had to knock him out.”
    “What good is an unconscious man?” Blowhole asked sarcastically.
    “Well, they’re really easy to steal from,” the guard said.
    “Wake him up!” Blowhole shouted. The guard bent over the unconscious man and got punched in the face.
    “Ow! I don’t think he’s unconscious, Doc,” the guard said.
    “Really,” Blowhole said. “Well then…hello, my enemies! Get up, Hans, everyone knows you’re awake.”
    “Hans,” Skipper said. “Why does he have to be here?”
    “You are here today because you are all my enemies, and so you must be punished,” Dr. Blowhole said. “I wasn’t certain how to punish you at first, and then I read a book in which children were sent to fight to the death in an arena until there was only one left.”
    “The Hunger Games,” Kowalski said to Skipper. “This is not good.”
    “I decided I would send every single one of you to an arena to fight. The last one standing will be punished enough, having seen friends and loved ones die. Now then, on to the arena!”

Kowalski stepped into the elevator that would bring him to the arena. His heart was thumping, his breathing quick.
    He wasn’t ready to die—but he knew he had to save Private.
    Kowalski, Rico, and Skipper had reached a decision. Since Private was so young, he was going to be the one they made sure survived—even though it meant them dying.
    The elevator stopped. He stepped off and surveyed his surroundings.
    Behind him was a large jungle. He could hear bugs trilling and frogs croaking from inside it. On his left, behind a few other of Blowhole’s enemies, glistened a huge, sparkling lake. In front of him, over the Cornucopia—just like in the Hunger Games, Kowalski thought—was a mountain. It wasn’t very steep, but it was tall.
    And on his right?...just a long stretch of grass, further than his eye could see.
    Suddenly they heard Blowhole’s voice, crackling like he was on a loudspeaker. “Kowalski, Skipper, and Private, I’ll have you know I pumped Rico’s stomach; you’ll only be getting supplies from the Cornucopia. When I say go, all of you may begin killing each other. Go!”
    Kowalski dashed over to the place Private was, slung him over his shoulder, and ran into the jungle.
    “Kowalski?” Private asked.
    Kowalski set Private down. “Keep running,” Kowalski said. “What’s wrong, Private?”
    “I don’t want to die,” Private said.
    “I know, Private, neither do I.”
    “But I don’t want you and Rico and Skipper to die either.”
    Kowalski stopped for a moment and placed his hand on Private’s small shoulder. “We’re gonna find a way out of this together,” he said, looking into Private ice blue eyes.
    Private nodded.
    Suddenly a knife whistled past Private’s ear. Kowalski and Private turned to see a young man with a strong jaw line and strawberry blond hair lifting another knife. Kowalski pulled Private out of the way. The knife buried itself in the ground where Private had been standing.
    An arrow whizzed through the air and went straight through the man’s throat. He made a strangled choking noise, clutched his throat, and fell to the ground.
    Private whimpered.
    A man with black hair down to his chin came out of the woods. He had a bow and a quiver of arrows. He didn’t seem to have noticed Kowalski and Private.
    Kowalski pulled Private behind a large rock.
    The man extracted the arrow from the strawberry blond man’s throat. Then he took the knives and turned to go, so Kowalski and Private could see his face.
    “Hans,” Kowalski whispered.
    Suddenly Private was lifted up into the air. He screamed.
    Kowalski spun around and looked up to see what had lifted Private.
    A huge man loomed there, the biggest man Kowalski had ever seen. He lifted Private to crack his head on the rock.