~Day After Day~ (Open- Takes place in D8 woods)

[Dark Angel]

Challice walked through the forest lightly, her ragged old boots hitting the ground softly with each step. This was how Challice had survived the daily cold of District 8, the freezing temperatues in winter and fall. Every day, she would spend an hour, scraping soft bark from yew trees, filling a small bucket full. When she had enough, she would use it for an insulator in jackets. It was the next best thing to down feathers. But even a District 8 junior designer couldn't get her hands on down, certainly not at her level. That was best left to the senior designers, or the District 1 designers.

The matter of the fence was not very big; all she reallly had to do was slip under the most exposed to cold spot. The D8 temperatures had long since freezed it, then in spring, had made it go out. Peacekeepers didn't really keep a watch on the fence, ever since they had assumed nobody in D8 would go out in the woods, not at their temperatures in winter, at least. As far as Challice knew, she was the only one to venture out.

At last, she made it to the thick patch of yew trees, some already having suffered her knife. "Damn," Chanelle muttered under her breath, the knife, as she fumbled to get it, having pierced through her left glove and into her finger. It wasn't a very big cut, but it was still slightly painful.

Time to get to work, she decided, grasping her knife tightly, bucket at the ready. Now where should she begin.....

[Dark Angel]

Challice approached a broad, if a bit short, yew tree, grasping her knife and bucket. The yew tree, she could tell, was beginning to wither away. She gave it two, maybe three maximum, weeks tops. She would have to extend her time scraping to an hour and a half to finish this tree before it died. Gently, she applied the knife to the outer bark, raising her bucket to a spot at neck-level.

She started scraping softly, not daring to make any loud noises. Even with the thick trees, someone might hear you. And that would be very, very bad indeed. She worked for about ten minutes, soft shavings slowly falling into the rusty bucket. It was hard work, requiring patience on her part. But she had time.

And that was when she heard the crunch. Slowly, her heart full of dread, she swiveled her head around to face the source of the noise. If it was a peacekeeper, she was done for. If it was a bear, she'd still be done for. Either way, it meant a slow, painful death.

[Dark Angel]

A snow-white hare faced her, about ten feet away, looking daggers at her, if it was possible to do that. Its red eyes met her brown, locking onto each other. Challice's heart was relieved, but she bit her lip, a million thoughts racing through her mind. She didn't need her eyes to know her knife was in her right hand.

Poaching carried one of the most severe punishments in District Eight- Death by firing squad, with everybody watching. But lately, the mayor had been asking for less and less clothes. Meaning less money. And less money meaning less food to put on the table. Just yesterday, her family had finished the monthly meager tesserae Challice had brought home at the beginning of the month. They were slowly beginning to starve.

[Dark Angel]

As she contemplated her options, Challice noted the hare slowly turning away from her, going back to nibbling on a piece of something it had found. Food, perhaps. And food led to being fat. And fat hares led to being good to eat. But would her parents allow it?

SWISH.

She wasn't even aware of it, but she found herself throwing the knife at the snow-white animal, driven to it by pure greed. The knife found itself straying from the target of the behind, lodging itself in an awkward position, halfway through the neck, but stopping abruptly in the middle. The hare fell to the ground, twitching like crazy, as though it were having a seizure. Drops of ruby red blood fell to the ground, staining the snow like wine on a cotton tablecloth.

The animal was too dangerous to approach right now, and what if someone saw her? Challice sat down on the ground, waiting for the animal to become still. Instead, she found tears sliding from her eyes and onto the snow, beginning to freeze as they fell. She had poached. That was the bottom line of it. And Challice had a feeling that sooner or later, she was going to have to suffer the consequences.