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Beau is fast. It was something she always kind of knew; she'd won a bunch of races in school, and later had always been able to outrun Peacekeepers when she got caught sneaking home from the Hob. And from watching past Games, she knows it’s an asset a lot of people underestimate.
So when the bell rings to signal the beginning of the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games, she is off her plate and running towards the Cornucopia before the other tributes have even started moving. She passes an empty backpack, a single loaf of bread, a loose pile of knives. There are swords and even more dangerous-looking weapons piled at the mouth of the monument, as well as bags stuffed with fresh food and other precious supplies.
Beau grabs a pack near the edge of the pile, full of something, and a long metal staff that’s got a rubber grip in the middle. Holding it, she can feel it’s weighted for maximum impact, and smiles.
“BEAU!” Someone shouts, off to her left, and instinctively Beau spins to look. The skinny boy from District Two swings a fist at her head, and she uses her momentum to turn the spin into a dodge. Her staff comes around and cracks into his ribs—she can feel the bones break. Jester was the one shouting, of course. She has nothing in her hands but a small hooked knife, and her shout draws the attention of two newly armed tributes.
She can’t leave Jester like that, even if it’s getting too hot to stay here. Beau’s quick, but she doesn’t have the training to survive the opening bloodbath. Despite the odds, she pushes out into the crowd, side-stepping a cut from a huge sword the girl from Ten picked up. Both tributes from that district went for brutality this year—one of their talents was how quickly they could cut up a side of meat. Turn it from something almost animal-shaped into chunks of red meat.
Beau reaches Jester just as the other girl finishes stabbing one of her attackers. The boy from Six goes down, hands clutched to his belly. Dwelma, the girl from Eleven, uses the distraction to wrap her arms around Jester’s side, pinning her. Beau jabs the metal stick into Dwelma’s face, and again she feels bones crunch under the impact.
She hadn’t even meant to hit her, just distract her long enough for Jester to get out.
It’s Jester who turns and stomps down onto Dwelma’s face with one soft booted foot. “Thanks, Beau!” she says brightly, like they just met each other for breakfast at the market. “Let’s get out of here, maybe?”
Beau grabs Jester’s forearm and pulls her in close, out of the range of a stray body as one of the tributes is sent flying back away from the Horn. “Let’s get this straight,” Beau hisses, and she’s so close she can feel Jester’s lungs heaving. “I don’t want to owe you anything . There’s only one Victor, remember? Don’t let me see you again.” She shoves Jester back, hoping her glare is enough to warn the princess off before she ducks and runs. For real this time, weaving in and out of fighters. Her staff manages to deflect a bolt out of midair. Beau just sees something coming and swings wildly, but there’s a solid ching of metal on metal, and she doesn’t get hit.
After that it’s just a couple hundred yards to the treeline, and whatever safety you can find in the Arena.