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Authors: Harvard Lampoon
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hand. “What if one of my high society friends is watching troo da window?” she says.
“Any final advice?” I ask Buttitch.
“Stay alive,” he grunts. Then he leans into my ear and whispers, “And kill Pita on the fourth day with a blunt instrument. You put me in a real hole with that coughing business.”
I promise him I’ll think about it. On my way to my room, I see Pita staring out the window. He looks over the Capital’s skyline, lost in thought.
“What’s on your mind?” I ask him.
“I just hope …” he begins emotionally, “I just hope that all of the tributes will stay friends after the Hunger Games end!”
Groaning, I walk to my bedroom and fall asleep. It’s not easy. I’m pretty nervous about tomorrow, the start of the Games.
Cinnabon wakes me up the next morning and takes me to the roof, where a hovercraft is waiting for us. A Pacemaker tells me to be still and sticks a needle in my forehead.
“Ouch!” I exclaim.
“Shhh … That’s just your tracker,” Cinnabon reassures me, “so that the Capital will know where you are at all times.”
“But they take it out after the Hunger Games end, right?” I ask. “Say that I returned to the Capital as part of a secret revolution … hypothetically speaking, of course. Would they be able to track me?”
“Of course not!” the Pacemaker says, aghast. “The Capital takes your personal privacy very seriously in this one particular case! You have rights, you know.” I breathe a sigh of relief.
As Cinnabon and I board the hovercraft, a Pacemaker walks by with a large cowbell. “We ran out of trackers,” he explains. “One tribute will have to make do with this.”
The hovercraft journey is short. Before I know it, we land and I am ushered to my platform in the launch room. Any minute now I will enter the arena and the Games will begin.
“I almost forgot to give you this,” Cinnabon says, taking out my THE CAPITAL SUCKS! pin and fastening it on my outfit. “It barely cleared inspections because of how sharp it is. You’re lucky. The inspectors declared one tribute’s token a weapon, and he was disqualified on the spot.”
I gulp. “What happened to him?”
Cinnabon shakes his head sadly. “He was immediately sent home. He will never have the honor of competing in the Hunger Games.”
Just then a voice booms over the arena’s loudspeakers, “Errwl halwannn hoanwah wohhhhh!”
“Bear with us, folks,” another announcer’s voice follows. “Greg, our announcer, is a Notalks from our Jobs for Felons program. He was trying to say, ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Hunger Games!’”
M y tube rises into the arena. The golden Cornucrapia lies straight ahead, its mouth brimming with weapons and supplies. The Varsities will no doubt call first pick on the Hula-Hoops. I can survive by exercising my core with old-fashioned Pilates, but I seethe with jealousy to think of them toning so easily. The inexperienced tributes will go straight for the stacks of old TV Guide s, which look great but you can find all that information online nowadays. Buttitch would want me to run for the forest immediately, but that’s just because he fears strong independent women. I refuse to let gender roles decide whether or not I am bludgeoned to death with a pogo stick.
Before we begin, I take a look at my surroundings. All things considered, I lucked out on location. There’s a lake for water, a forest for cover, and a synagogue for prayer.
During the training period, I overheard horror stories about the Forty-Fourth Hunger Games. They say it tookplace in an Arby’s. Those who weren’t killed by the other tributes willingly starved to death. Other years were no better. An abandoned coal mine, a nonabandoned hippie commune, inside a whale: I could be a lot worse off.
The voice of Greg the Announcer booms over the intercom. “Leh ah sebity fawb Ugga Gaes bega!”
For a moment, all is silent. “Um, what?” asks a visibly
“Any final advice?” I ask Buttitch.
“Stay alive,” he grunts. Then he leans into my ear and whispers, “And kill Pita on the fourth day with a blunt instrument. You put me in a real hole with that coughing business.”
I promise him I’ll think about it. On my way to my room, I see Pita staring out the window. He looks over the Capital’s skyline, lost in thought.
“What’s on your mind?” I ask him.
“I just hope …” he begins emotionally, “I just hope that all of the tributes will stay friends after the Hunger Games end!”
Groaning, I walk to my bedroom and fall asleep. It’s not easy. I’m pretty nervous about tomorrow, the start of the Games.
Cinnabon wakes me up the next morning and takes me to the roof, where a hovercraft is waiting for us. A Pacemaker tells me to be still and sticks a needle in my forehead.
“Ouch!” I exclaim.
“Shhh … That’s just your tracker,” Cinnabon reassures me, “so that the Capital will know where you are at all times.”
“But they take it out after the Hunger Games end, right?” I ask. “Say that I returned to the Capital as part of a secret revolution … hypothetically speaking, of course. Would they be able to track me?”
“Of course not!” the Pacemaker says, aghast. “The Capital takes your personal privacy very seriously in this one particular case! You have rights, you know.” I breathe a sigh of relief.
As Cinnabon and I board the hovercraft, a Pacemaker walks by with a large cowbell. “We ran out of trackers,” he explains. “One tribute will have to make do with this.”
The hovercraft journey is short. Before I know it, we land and I am ushered to my platform in the launch room. Any minute now I will enter the arena and the Games will begin.
“I almost forgot to give you this,” Cinnabon says, taking out my THE CAPITAL SUCKS! pin and fastening it on my outfit. “It barely cleared inspections because of how sharp it is. You’re lucky. The inspectors declared one tribute’s token a weapon, and he was disqualified on the spot.”
I gulp. “What happened to him?”
Cinnabon shakes his head sadly. “He was immediately sent home. He will never have the honor of competing in the Hunger Games.”
Just then a voice booms over the arena’s loudspeakers, “Errwl halwannn hoanwah wohhhhh!”
“Bear with us, folks,” another announcer’s voice follows. “Greg, our announcer, is a Notalks from our Jobs for Felons program. He was trying to say, ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Hunger Games!’”
M y tube rises into the arena. The golden Cornucrapia lies straight ahead, its mouth brimming with weapons and supplies. The Varsities will no doubt call first pick on the Hula-Hoops. I can survive by exercising my core with old-fashioned Pilates, but I seethe with jealousy to think of them toning so easily. The inexperienced tributes will go straight for the stacks of old TV Guide s, which look great but you can find all that information online nowadays. Buttitch would want me to run for the forest immediately, but that’s just because he fears strong independent women. I refuse to let gender roles decide whether or not I am bludgeoned to death with a pogo stick.
Before we begin, I take a look at my surroundings. All things considered, I lucked out on location. There’s a lake for water, a forest for cover, and a synagogue for prayer.
During the training period, I overheard horror stories about the Forty-Fourth Hunger Games. They say it tookplace in an Arby’s. Those who weren’t killed by the other tributes willingly starved to death. Other years were no better. An abandoned coal mine, a nonabandoned hippie commune, inside a whale: I could be a lot worse off.
The voice of Greg the Announcer booms over the intercom. “Leh ah sebity fawb Ugga Gaes bega!”
For a moment, all is silent. “Um, what?” asks a visibly
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