The Arena of the 74th Hunger Games [Wednesday, Fandom time]
Katniss and Peeta had just reached the edge of the area containing the Cornucopia, when Cato smashed through the trees and bore down on them.
He had no spear. In fact, his hands were empty, yet he ran straight for them. Katniss's first arrow hit his chest and inexplicably fell aside.
“He’s got some kind of body armor!” she shouted to Peeta.
Just in time, too, because Cato was upon them. She braced herself, but he rocketed right between them with no attempt to check his speed. She could tell from his panting, the sweat pouring off his purplish face, that he’d been running hard a long time. Not toward them. From something. But what?
Her eyes scanned the woods just in time to see the first creature leap onto the plain. As she was turning away, she saw another half dozen join it. Then she was stumbling blindly after Cato with no thought of anything but to save herself.
Muttations. No question about it. She had never seen these mutts, but they were no natural-born animals. They resembled huge wolves, but what wolf could land and then balance easily on its hind legs? What wolf could wave the rest of the pack forward with its front paw as though it had a wrist? These things she could see at a distance. Up close, Katniss was sure their more menacing attributes would be revealed.
Cato made a beeline for the Cornucopia, and without question she followed him. If he thought it was the safest place, who was she to argue? Besides, even if she could make it to the trees, it would be impossible for Peeta to outrun them on that leg -
Peeta! Katniss's hands had just landed on the metal at the pointed tail of the Cornucopia when she remembered she was part of a team.
He was about fifteen yards behind her, hobbling as fast as he could, but the mutts were closing in on him fast. Katniss sent an arrow into the pack and one went down, but there were plenty to take its place.
Peeta waved her up the horn, “Go, Katniss! Go!”
He was right. She couldn't protect either of them on the ground. She started climbing, scaling the Cornucopia on her hands and feet. The pure gold surface had been designed to resemble the woven horn that they filled at harvest, so there were little ridges and seams to get a decent hold on. But after a day in the arena sun, the metal feels hot enough to blister Katniss's hands.
Cato lay on his side at the very top of the horn, twenty feet above the ground, gasping to catch his breath as he gagged over the edge. Now was her chance to finish him off. She stopped midway up the horn and loaded another arrow, but just as she was about to let it fly, Katniss heard Peeta cry out. She twisted around and saw he had just reached the tail, and the mutts were right on his heels.
“Climb!” she yelled. Peeta started up hampered by not only the leg but the knife in his hand. Katniss shot her arrow down the throat of the first mutt that placed its paws on the metal. As it died the creature lashed out, inadvertently opening gashes on a few of its companions. That’s when she got a look at the claws. Four inches and clearly razor-sharp.
Peeta reached her feet and she grabbed his arm and pulled him along. Then she remembered Cato waiting at the top and whipped around, but he had doubled over with cramps and apparently more preoccupied with the mutts than us. He coughed out
something unintelligible. The snuffling, growling sound coming from the mutts isn’t helping.
“What?” she shouted at him.
“He said, ‘Can they climb it?’” answered Peeta, drawing her focus back to the base of the horn.
The mutts were beginning to assemble. As they joined together, they raised up again to stand easily on their back legs giving them an eerily human quality. Each had a thick coat, some with fur that is straight and sleek, others curly, and the colors vary from jet black to what Katniss could only describe as blond.
There was something else about them, something that made the hair rise up on the back of her neck, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
They put their snouts on the horn, sniffing and tasting the metal, scraping paws over the surface and then making highpitched yipping sounds to one another. It must have been how they communicated because the pack backed up as if to make room. Then one of them, a good-size mutt with silky waves of blond fur took a running start and leapt onto the horn. Its back legs must have been incredibly powerful because it landed a mere ten feet below them, its pink lips pulled back in a snarl. For a moment it hanged there, and in that moment Katniss realized what else unsettled her about the mutts. The green eyes glowering at her were unlike any dog or wolf, any canine she had ever seen. They were unmistakably human. And that revelation had barely registered when she noticed the collar with the number 1 inlaid with jewels and the whole horrible thing hit her. The blonde hair, the green eyes, the number . . . it was Glimmer, the girl tribute from District 1.
A shriek escaped Katniss's lips and she began having trouble holding the arrow in place. She had been waiting to fire, only too aware of her dwindling supply of arrows. Waiting to see if the creatures could, in fact, climb. But now, even though the mutt had begun to slide backward, unable to find any purchase on the metal, even though she could hear the slow screeching of the claws like nails on a blackboard, she fired into its throat. Its body twitched and flopped onto the ground with a thud.
“Katniss?” She felt Peeta’s grip on her arm.
“It’s her!” she got out.
“Who?” asked Peeta.
Her head snapped from side to side as she examined the pack, taking in the various sizes and colors. The small one with the red coat and amber eyes...Foxface! And there, the ashen hair and hazel eyes of the boy from District 9 who died as they struggled for the backpack that Katniss had won on the first day! And worst of all, the smallest mutt, with dark glossy fur, huge brown eyes and a collar that read 11 in woven straw. Teeth bared in hatred. Rue....
“What is it, Katniss?” Peeta shook her shoulder.
“It’s them. It’s all of them. The others. Rue and Foxface and...all of the other tributes,” she choked out.
She heard Peeta’s gasp of recognition. “What did they do to them? You don’t think...those could be their real eyes?”
Their eyes were the least of her worries. What about their brains? Had they been given any of the real tributes' memories? Had they been programmed to hate their faces particularly because Katniss, Peeta and Cato had survived and they were so callously murdered? And the ones they actually killed...did they believe they were avenging their own deaths?
Before Katniss could get this out, the mutts began a new assault on the horn. They had split into two groups at the sides of the horn and were using those powerful hindquarters to launch themselves at the tributes. A pair of teeth rang together just inches from her hand and then she heard Peeta cry out, felt the yank on his body, the heavy weight of boy and mutt pulling her over the side. If not for the grip on her arm, he’d have fallen to the ground, but as it was, it took all her strength to keep them both on the curved back of the horn. And more tributes kept coming.
“Kill it, Peeta! Kill it!” she was shouting, and although she couldn’t quite see what was happening, she knew he must have stabbed the thing because the pull lessened. She was able to haul him back onto the horn where they dragged themselves toward the top where the lesser of two evils awaited.
Cato had still not regained his feet, but his breathing was slowing and Katniss knew soon he’d be recovered enough to come for them, to hurl them over the side to their deaths. She armed her bow, but the arrow ended up taking out a mutt that could only have been Thresh. Who else could jump so high? She felt a moment’s relief because they must finally have climbed up above the mutt line and she was just turning back to face Cato when Peeta was jerked from her side.
She was sure the pack had gotten him until his blood splattered her face. Cato stood before her, almost at the lip of the horn, holding Peeta in some kind of headlock, cutting off his air. Peeta was clawing at Cato’s arm, but weakly, as if confused over whether it was more important to breathe or try and stem the gush of blood from the gaping hole a mutt had left in his calf.
She aimed one of her last two arrows at Cato’s head, knowing it would have no effect on his trunk or limbs, which she could now see were clothed in a skintight, flesh-colored mesh. Some high-grade body armor from the Capitol. Was that what was in his pack at the feast? Body armor to defend against Katniss's arrows? Well, they neglected to send a face guard.
Cato just laughed. “Shoot me and he goes down with me.”
He was right. If she took him out and he fell to the mutts, Peeta was sure to die with him. They had reached a stalemate. She couldn’t shoot Cato without killing Peeta, too. He couldn’t kill Peeta without guaranteeing an arrow in his brain. They stood like statues, both of them seeking an out.
Her muscles were strained so tightly, they felt they might snap at any moment. Her teeth clenched to the breaking point.
The mutts went silent and the only thing Katniss could hear was the blood pounding in her good ear.
Peeta’s lips were turning blue. If she didn’t do something quickly, he’d die of asphyxiation and then she would have lost him and Cato would probably use his body as a weapon against her. In fact, she was sure this was Cato’s plan because while he had stopped laughing, his lips were set in a triumphant smile.
As if in a last-ditch effort, Peeta raised his fingers, dripping with blood from his leg, up to Cato’s arm. Instead of trying to wrestle his way free, his forefinger veered off and made a deliberate X on the back of Cato’s hand. Cato realized what it meant exactly one second after Katniss had. She could tell by the way the smile dropped from his lips. But it was one second too late because, by that time, her arrow was piercing his hand. He cried out and reflexively released Peeta who slammed back against him. For a horrible moment, Katniss thought they were both going over. She dived forward, just catching hold of Peeta as Cato lost his footing on the blood-slick horn and plummeted to the ground.
They heard him hit, the air leaving his body on impact, and then the mutts attacked him. Peeta and Katniss held on to each other, waiting for the cannon, waiting for the competition to finish, waiting to be released. But it didn’t happen. Not yet. Because this was the climax of the Hunger Games, and the audience expected a show.
Katniss didn't watch, but she could hear the snarls, the growls, the howls of pain from both human and beast as Cato took on the mutt pack. She couldn’t understand how he can be surviving until she remembered the body armor protecting him from ankle to neck and realized what a long night it could be.
Katniss didn’t know how long it had been, maybe an hour or so, when Cato hit the ground and they heard the mutts dragging him, dragging him back into the Cornucopia. Now they’ll finish him off, she thought. But there was still no cannon.
Night fell and the anthem played and there was no picture of Cato in the sky, only the faint moans coming through the metal
beneath them. The icy air blowing across the plain reminded her that the Games were not over and might not be for who knew how long, and there was still no guarantee of victory.
The next hours were the worst in her life, which was saying something. The cold would have been torture enough, but the real nightmare was listening to Cato, moaning, begging, and finally just whimpering as the mutts worked away at him. After a very short time, Katniss didn't care who he was or what he had done, all she wanted was for his suffering to end.
“Why don’t they just kill him?” she asked Peeta.
“You know why,” he said, and pulled her closer to him.
And she did. No viewer could turn away from the show now. From the Gamemakers’ point of view, this was the final word in
entertainment.
It went on and on and on and eventually completely consumed her mind, blocking out memories and hopes of tomorrow, erasing everything but the present, which she began to believe would never change. There would never be anything but cold and fear and the agonized sounds of the boy dying in the horn.
Peeta began to doze off now, and each time he did, Katniss found herself yelling his name louder and louder because if he went and died on her now, she knew she would go completely insane. He was fighting it, probably more for her than for him, and it was hard because unconsciousness would be its own form of escape.
But the adrenaline pumping through her body would never allow her to follow him, so she could not let him go. She just couldn't.
The only indication of the passage of time lay in the heavens, the subtle shift of the moon. So Peeta began pointing it out to her, insisting she acknowledge its progress and sometimes, for just a moment Katniss felt a flicker of hope before the agony of the night engulfed her again.
Finally, she heard him whisper that the sun was rising. Katniss opened her eyes and found the stars fading in the pale light of dawn. She could see, too, how bloodless Peeta’s face had become. How little time he had left. And she knew she had to get him back to the Capitol.
Still, no cannon had fired. She pressed her good ear against the horn and could just make out Cato’s voice.
“I think he’s closer now. Katniss, can you shoot him?” Peeta asked
If he was near the mouth, she had a chance to take him out. It would have been an act of mercy at this point.
“My last arrow’s in your tourniquet,” she said.
“Make it count,” said Peeta, unzipping his jacket, letting her loose.
So she freed the arrow, tying the tourniquet back as tightly as her frozen fingers could manage. She rubbed her hands together, trying to regain circulation. When she crawled to the lip of the horn and hanged over the edge, she felt Peeta’s hands grip her for support.
It took a few moments to find Cato in the dim light, in the blood. Then the raw hunk of meat that used to be her enemy
made a sound, and she knew where his mouth was. And she thought that the word he was trying to say was 'please.'
Pity, not vengeance, sent her arrow flying into his skull.
Peeta pulled her back up, bow in hand, quiver empty.
“Did you get him?” he whispered.
The cannon fires in answer.
“Then we won, Katniss,” he said hollowly.
“Hurray for us,” she ground out, but there was no joy of victory in her voice.
A hole opened in the plain and as if on cue, the remaining mutts bounded into it, disappearing as the earth closes above them.
They waited, for the hovercraft to take Cato’s remains, for the trumpets of victory that should follow, but nothing happened.
“Hey!” Katniss shouted into air. “What’s going on?” The only response was the chatter of waking birds.
“Maybe it’s the body. Maybe we have to move away from it,” said Peeta.
She tried to remember. Did you have to distance yourself from the dead tribute on the final kill? Her brain was too muddled to be sure, but what else could be the reason for the delay?
“Okay. Think you could make it to the lake?” she asked.
“Think I better try,” said Peeta. They inched down to the tail of the horn and fell to the ground. If the stiffness in her limbs was this bad, how could Peeta even move? She rose first, swinging and bending her arms and legs until she thought she could help him up.
Somehow, they made it back to the lake. She scooped up a handful of the cold water for Peeta and brought a second to her lips.
A mockingjay gave the long, low whistle, and tears of relief filled her eyes as the hovercraft appeared and took Cato’s body away. Now they would take Katniss and Peeta. Now they could go home.
But again there was no response.
“What are they waiting for?” said Peeta weakly. Between the loss of the tourniquet and the effort it took to get to the lake, his wound had opened up again.
“I don’t know,” Katniss said. Whatever the holdup was, she couldn't watch him lose any more blood. She got up to find a stick but almost immediately came across the arrow that bounced off Cato’s body armor. It would do as well as the other arrow. As she stooped to pick it up, Claudius Templesmith’s voice boomed into the arena.
“Greetings to the final contestants of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked. Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed,” he said. “Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor.”
There was a small burst of static and then nothing more. Katniss stared at Peeta in disbelief as the truth sank in. They never intended to let them both live. This had all been devised by the Gamemakers to guarantee the most dramatic showdown in history.
And like fools, they had bought into it.
“If you think about it, it’s not that surprising,” he said softly.
Katniss watched as he painfully made it to his feet. Then he was moving toward her, as if in slow motion, his hand was pulling the knife from his belt -
Before she was even aware of her actions, her bow was loaded with the arrow pointed straight at his heart. Peeta raised his eyebrows and she saw the knife had already left his hand on its way to the lake where it splashes in the water. She dropped her weapons and took a step back, her face burning in what could only be shame.
“No,” he said. “Do it.” Peeta limped toward her and thrust the weapons back in her hands.
“I can’t," she said. “I won’t.”
“Do it. Before they send those mutts back or something. I don’t want to die like Cato,” he said.
“Then you shoot me,” she said furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. “You shoot me and go home and live with it!” And
as she said it, she knew death right there, right then would be the easier of the two.
“You know I can’t,” Peeta said, discarding the weapons. “Fine, I’ll go first anyway.” He leaned down and ripped the bandage
off his leg, eliminating the final barrier between his blood and the earth.
“No, you can’t kill yourself,” she said. She was on her knees, desperately plastering the bandage back onto his wound.
“Katniss,” he said. “It’s what I want.”
“You’re not leaving me here alone,” she said. Because if he died, she would never go home, not really. She would spend the rest of her life in this arena trying to think her way out.
“Listen,” he said, pulling her to her feet. “We both know they have to have a victor. It can only be one of us. Please, take it. For me.” And he went on about how he loved her, what life would be without her, but Katniss had stopped listening because his previous words were trapped in her head, thrashing desperately around.
We both know they have to have a victor.
Yes, they had to have a victor. Without a victor, the whole thing would blow up in the Gamemakers’ faces. They’d have failed the Capitol. Might possibly even be executed, slowly and painfully while the cameras broadcast it to every screen in the country.
If Peeta and Katniss were both to die, or they thought they were....
Her fingers fumbled with the pouch on her belt, freeing it.
Peeta saw it and his hand clamped on her wrist. “No, I won’t let you.”
“Trust me,” she whispered. He held her gaze for a long moment then let her go. She loosened the top of the pouch and poured a few spoonfuls of berries into his palm. Then she filled her own. “On the count of three?”
Peeta leaned down and kissed her once, very gently. “The count of three,” he said.
They stood, their backs pressed together, their empty hands locked tight.
“Hold them out. I want everyone to see,” he said.
She spread out her fingers, and the dark berries glistened in the sun. She gave Peeta’s hand one last squeeze as a signal, as a goodbye, and they began counting. “One.” Maybe she was wrong. “Two.” Maybe they didn’t care if they both died. “Three!” It was too late to change her mind. She lifted her hand to her mouth, taking one last look at the world. The berries had just passed her lips when the trumpets began to blare.
The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouted above them. “Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you - the tributes of District Twelve!”
[and we are out of the Games! Once again, blatantly stolen from The Hunger Games. Warning for spoilers and violence, as well as general effed-up-ness. NFB, NFI, OOC is love!]
He had no spear. In fact, his hands were empty, yet he ran straight for them. Katniss's first arrow hit his chest and inexplicably fell aside.
“He’s got some kind of body armor!” she shouted to Peeta.
Just in time, too, because Cato was upon them. She braced herself, but he rocketed right between them with no attempt to check his speed. She could tell from his panting, the sweat pouring off his purplish face, that he’d been running hard a long time. Not toward them. From something. But what?
Her eyes scanned the woods just in time to see the first creature leap onto the plain. As she was turning away, she saw another half dozen join it. Then she was stumbling blindly after Cato with no thought of anything but to save herself.
Muttations. No question about it. She had never seen these mutts, but they were no natural-born animals. They resembled huge wolves, but what wolf could land and then balance easily on its hind legs? What wolf could wave the rest of the pack forward with its front paw as though it had a wrist? These things she could see at a distance. Up close, Katniss was sure their more menacing attributes would be revealed.
Cato made a beeline for the Cornucopia, and without question she followed him. If he thought it was the safest place, who was she to argue? Besides, even if she could make it to the trees, it would be impossible for Peeta to outrun them on that leg -
Peeta! Katniss's hands had just landed on the metal at the pointed tail of the Cornucopia when she remembered she was part of a team.
He was about fifteen yards behind her, hobbling as fast as he could, but the mutts were closing in on him fast. Katniss sent an arrow into the pack and one went down, but there were plenty to take its place.
Peeta waved her up the horn, “Go, Katniss! Go!”
He was right. She couldn't protect either of them on the ground. She started climbing, scaling the Cornucopia on her hands and feet. The pure gold surface had been designed to resemble the woven horn that they filled at harvest, so there were little ridges and seams to get a decent hold on. But after a day in the arena sun, the metal feels hot enough to blister Katniss's hands.
Cato lay on his side at the very top of the horn, twenty feet above the ground, gasping to catch his breath as he gagged over the edge. Now was her chance to finish him off. She stopped midway up the horn and loaded another arrow, but just as she was about to let it fly, Katniss heard Peeta cry out. She twisted around and saw he had just reached the tail, and the mutts were right on his heels.
“Climb!” she yelled. Peeta started up hampered by not only the leg but the knife in his hand. Katniss shot her arrow down the throat of the first mutt that placed its paws on the metal. As it died the creature lashed out, inadvertently opening gashes on a few of its companions. That’s when she got a look at the claws. Four inches and clearly razor-sharp.
Peeta reached her feet and she grabbed his arm and pulled him along. Then she remembered Cato waiting at the top and whipped around, but he had doubled over with cramps and apparently more preoccupied with the mutts than us. He coughed out
something unintelligible. The snuffling, growling sound coming from the mutts isn’t helping.
“What?” she shouted at him.
“He said, ‘Can they climb it?’” answered Peeta, drawing her focus back to the base of the horn.
The mutts were beginning to assemble. As they joined together, they raised up again to stand easily on their back legs giving them an eerily human quality. Each had a thick coat, some with fur that is straight and sleek, others curly, and the colors vary from jet black to what Katniss could only describe as blond.
There was something else about them, something that made the hair rise up on the back of her neck, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
They put their snouts on the horn, sniffing and tasting the metal, scraping paws over the surface and then making highpitched yipping sounds to one another. It must have been how they communicated because the pack backed up as if to make room. Then one of them, a good-size mutt with silky waves of blond fur took a running start and leapt onto the horn. Its back legs must have been incredibly powerful because it landed a mere ten feet below them, its pink lips pulled back in a snarl. For a moment it hanged there, and in that moment Katniss realized what else unsettled her about the mutts. The green eyes glowering at her were unlike any dog or wolf, any canine she had ever seen. They were unmistakably human. And that revelation had barely registered when she noticed the collar with the number 1 inlaid with jewels and the whole horrible thing hit her. The blonde hair, the green eyes, the number . . . it was Glimmer, the girl tribute from District 1.
A shriek escaped Katniss's lips and she began having trouble holding the arrow in place. She had been waiting to fire, only too aware of her dwindling supply of arrows. Waiting to see if the creatures could, in fact, climb. But now, even though the mutt had begun to slide backward, unable to find any purchase on the metal, even though she could hear the slow screeching of the claws like nails on a blackboard, she fired into its throat. Its body twitched and flopped onto the ground with a thud.
“Katniss?” She felt Peeta’s grip on her arm.
“It’s her!” she got out.
“Who?” asked Peeta.
Her head snapped from side to side as she examined the pack, taking in the various sizes and colors. The small one with the red coat and amber eyes...Foxface! And there, the ashen hair and hazel eyes of the boy from District 9 who died as they struggled for the backpack that Katniss had won on the first day! And worst of all, the smallest mutt, with dark glossy fur, huge brown eyes and a collar that read 11 in woven straw. Teeth bared in hatred. Rue....
“What is it, Katniss?” Peeta shook her shoulder.
“It’s them. It’s all of them. The others. Rue and Foxface and...all of the other tributes,” she choked out.
She heard Peeta’s gasp of recognition. “What did they do to them? You don’t think...those could be their real eyes?”
Their eyes were the least of her worries. What about their brains? Had they been given any of the real tributes' memories? Had they been programmed to hate their faces particularly because Katniss, Peeta and Cato had survived and they were so callously murdered? And the ones they actually killed...did they believe they were avenging their own deaths?
Before Katniss could get this out, the mutts began a new assault on the horn. They had split into two groups at the sides of the horn and were using those powerful hindquarters to launch themselves at the tributes. A pair of teeth rang together just inches from her hand and then she heard Peeta cry out, felt the yank on his body, the heavy weight of boy and mutt pulling her over the side. If not for the grip on her arm, he’d have fallen to the ground, but as it was, it took all her strength to keep them both on the curved back of the horn. And more tributes kept coming.
“Kill it, Peeta! Kill it!” she was shouting, and although she couldn’t quite see what was happening, she knew he must have stabbed the thing because the pull lessened. She was able to haul him back onto the horn where they dragged themselves toward the top where the lesser of two evils awaited.
Cato had still not regained his feet, but his breathing was slowing and Katniss knew soon he’d be recovered enough to come for them, to hurl them over the side to their deaths. She armed her bow, but the arrow ended up taking out a mutt that could only have been Thresh. Who else could jump so high? She felt a moment’s relief because they must finally have climbed up above the mutt line and she was just turning back to face Cato when Peeta was jerked from her side.
She was sure the pack had gotten him until his blood splattered her face. Cato stood before her, almost at the lip of the horn, holding Peeta in some kind of headlock, cutting off his air. Peeta was clawing at Cato’s arm, but weakly, as if confused over whether it was more important to breathe or try and stem the gush of blood from the gaping hole a mutt had left in his calf.
She aimed one of her last two arrows at Cato’s head, knowing it would have no effect on his trunk or limbs, which she could now see were clothed in a skintight, flesh-colored mesh. Some high-grade body armor from the Capitol. Was that what was in his pack at the feast? Body armor to defend against Katniss's arrows? Well, they neglected to send a face guard.
Cato just laughed. “Shoot me and he goes down with me.”
He was right. If she took him out and he fell to the mutts, Peeta was sure to die with him. They had reached a stalemate. She couldn’t shoot Cato without killing Peeta, too. He couldn’t kill Peeta without guaranteeing an arrow in his brain. They stood like statues, both of them seeking an out.
Her muscles were strained so tightly, they felt they might snap at any moment. Her teeth clenched to the breaking point.
The mutts went silent and the only thing Katniss could hear was the blood pounding in her good ear.
Peeta’s lips were turning blue. If she didn’t do something quickly, he’d die of asphyxiation and then she would have lost him and Cato would probably use his body as a weapon against her. In fact, she was sure this was Cato’s plan because while he had stopped laughing, his lips were set in a triumphant smile.
As if in a last-ditch effort, Peeta raised his fingers, dripping with blood from his leg, up to Cato’s arm. Instead of trying to wrestle his way free, his forefinger veered off and made a deliberate X on the back of Cato’s hand. Cato realized what it meant exactly one second after Katniss had. She could tell by the way the smile dropped from his lips. But it was one second too late because, by that time, her arrow was piercing his hand. He cried out and reflexively released Peeta who slammed back against him. For a horrible moment, Katniss thought they were both going over. She dived forward, just catching hold of Peeta as Cato lost his footing on the blood-slick horn and plummeted to the ground.
They heard him hit, the air leaving his body on impact, and then the mutts attacked him. Peeta and Katniss held on to each other, waiting for the cannon, waiting for the competition to finish, waiting to be released. But it didn’t happen. Not yet. Because this was the climax of the Hunger Games, and the audience expected a show.
Katniss didn't watch, but she could hear the snarls, the growls, the howls of pain from both human and beast as Cato took on the mutt pack. She couldn’t understand how he can be surviving until she remembered the body armor protecting him from ankle to neck and realized what a long night it could be.
Katniss didn’t know how long it had been, maybe an hour or so, when Cato hit the ground and they heard the mutts dragging him, dragging him back into the Cornucopia. Now they’ll finish him off, she thought. But there was still no cannon.
Night fell and the anthem played and there was no picture of Cato in the sky, only the faint moans coming through the metal
beneath them. The icy air blowing across the plain reminded her that the Games were not over and might not be for who knew how long, and there was still no guarantee of victory.
The next hours were the worst in her life, which was saying something. The cold would have been torture enough, but the real nightmare was listening to Cato, moaning, begging, and finally just whimpering as the mutts worked away at him. After a very short time, Katniss didn't care who he was or what he had done, all she wanted was for his suffering to end.
“Why don’t they just kill him?” she asked Peeta.
“You know why,” he said, and pulled her closer to him.
And she did. No viewer could turn away from the show now. From the Gamemakers’ point of view, this was the final word in
entertainment.
It went on and on and on and eventually completely consumed her mind, blocking out memories and hopes of tomorrow, erasing everything but the present, which she began to believe would never change. There would never be anything but cold and fear and the agonized sounds of the boy dying in the horn.
Peeta began to doze off now, and each time he did, Katniss found herself yelling his name louder and louder because if he went and died on her now, she knew she would go completely insane. He was fighting it, probably more for her than for him, and it was hard because unconsciousness would be its own form of escape.
But the adrenaline pumping through her body would never allow her to follow him, so she could not let him go. She just couldn't.
The only indication of the passage of time lay in the heavens, the subtle shift of the moon. So Peeta began pointing it out to her, insisting she acknowledge its progress and sometimes, for just a moment Katniss felt a flicker of hope before the agony of the night engulfed her again.
Finally, she heard him whisper that the sun was rising. Katniss opened her eyes and found the stars fading in the pale light of dawn. She could see, too, how bloodless Peeta’s face had become. How little time he had left. And she knew she had to get him back to the Capitol.
Still, no cannon had fired. She pressed her good ear against the horn and could just make out Cato’s voice.
“I think he’s closer now. Katniss, can you shoot him?” Peeta asked
If he was near the mouth, she had a chance to take him out. It would have been an act of mercy at this point.
“My last arrow’s in your tourniquet,” she said.
“Make it count,” said Peeta, unzipping his jacket, letting her loose.
So she freed the arrow, tying the tourniquet back as tightly as her frozen fingers could manage. She rubbed her hands together, trying to regain circulation. When she crawled to the lip of the horn and hanged over the edge, she felt Peeta’s hands grip her for support.
It took a few moments to find Cato in the dim light, in the blood. Then the raw hunk of meat that used to be her enemy
made a sound, and she knew where his mouth was. And she thought that the word he was trying to say was 'please.'
Pity, not vengeance, sent her arrow flying into his skull.
Peeta pulled her back up, bow in hand, quiver empty.
“Did you get him?” he whispered.
The cannon fires in answer.
“Then we won, Katniss,” he said hollowly.
“Hurray for us,” she ground out, but there was no joy of victory in her voice.
A hole opened in the plain and as if on cue, the remaining mutts bounded into it, disappearing as the earth closes above them.
They waited, for the hovercraft to take Cato’s remains, for the trumpets of victory that should follow, but nothing happened.
“Hey!” Katniss shouted into air. “What’s going on?” The only response was the chatter of waking birds.
“Maybe it’s the body. Maybe we have to move away from it,” said Peeta.
She tried to remember. Did you have to distance yourself from the dead tribute on the final kill? Her brain was too muddled to be sure, but what else could be the reason for the delay?
“Okay. Think you could make it to the lake?” she asked.
“Think I better try,” said Peeta. They inched down to the tail of the horn and fell to the ground. If the stiffness in her limbs was this bad, how could Peeta even move? She rose first, swinging and bending her arms and legs until she thought she could help him up.
Somehow, they made it back to the lake. She scooped up a handful of the cold water for Peeta and brought a second to her lips.
A mockingjay gave the long, low whistle, and tears of relief filled her eyes as the hovercraft appeared and took Cato’s body away. Now they would take Katniss and Peeta. Now they could go home.
But again there was no response.
“What are they waiting for?” said Peeta weakly. Between the loss of the tourniquet and the effort it took to get to the lake, his wound had opened up again.
“I don’t know,” Katniss said. Whatever the holdup was, she couldn't watch him lose any more blood. She got up to find a stick but almost immediately came across the arrow that bounced off Cato’s body armor. It would do as well as the other arrow. As she stooped to pick it up, Claudius Templesmith’s voice boomed into the arena.
“Greetings to the final contestants of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked. Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed,” he said. “Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor.”
There was a small burst of static and then nothing more. Katniss stared at Peeta in disbelief as the truth sank in. They never intended to let them both live. This had all been devised by the Gamemakers to guarantee the most dramatic showdown in history.
And like fools, they had bought into it.
“If you think about it, it’s not that surprising,” he said softly.
Katniss watched as he painfully made it to his feet. Then he was moving toward her, as if in slow motion, his hand was pulling the knife from his belt -
Before she was even aware of her actions, her bow was loaded with the arrow pointed straight at his heart. Peeta raised his eyebrows and she saw the knife had already left his hand on its way to the lake where it splashes in the water. She dropped her weapons and took a step back, her face burning in what could only be shame.
“No,” he said. “Do it.” Peeta limped toward her and thrust the weapons back in her hands.
“I can’t," she said. “I won’t.”
“Do it. Before they send those mutts back or something. I don’t want to die like Cato,” he said.
“Then you shoot me,” she said furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. “You shoot me and go home and live with it!” And
as she said it, she knew death right there, right then would be the easier of the two.
“You know I can’t,” Peeta said, discarding the weapons. “Fine, I’ll go first anyway.” He leaned down and ripped the bandage
off his leg, eliminating the final barrier between his blood and the earth.
“No, you can’t kill yourself,” she said. She was on her knees, desperately plastering the bandage back onto his wound.
“Katniss,” he said. “It’s what I want.”
“You’re not leaving me here alone,” she said. Because if he died, she would never go home, not really. She would spend the rest of her life in this arena trying to think her way out.
“Listen,” he said, pulling her to her feet. “We both know they have to have a victor. It can only be one of us. Please, take it. For me.” And he went on about how he loved her, what life would be without her, but Katniss had stopped listening because his previous words were trapped in her head, thrashing desperately around.
We both know they have to have a victor.
Yes, they had to have a victor. Without a victor, the whole thing would blow up in the Gamemakers’ faces. They’d have failed the Capitol. Might possibly even be executed, slowly and painfully while the cameras broadcast it to every screen in the country.
If Peeta and Katniss were both to die, or they thought they were....
Her fingers fumbled with the pouch on her belt, freeing it.
Peeta saw it and his hand clamped on her wrist. “No, I won’t let you.”
“Trust me,” she whispered. He held her gaze for a long moment then let her go. She loosened the top of the pouch and poured a few spoonfuls of berries into his palm. Then she filled her own. “On the count of three?”
Peeta leaned down and kissed her once, very gently. “The count of three,” he said.
They stood, their backs pressed together, their empty hands locked tight.
“Hold them out. I want everyone to see,” he said.
She spread out her fingers, and the dark berries glistened in the sun. She gave Peeta’s hand one last squeeze as a signal, as a goodbye, and they began counting. “One.” Maybe she was wrong. “Two.” Maybe they didn’t care if they both died. “Three!” It was too late to change her mind. She lifted her hand to her mouth, taking one last look at the world. The berries had just passed her lips when the trumpets began to blare.
The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouted above them. “Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you - the tributes of District Twelve!”
[and we are out of the Games! Once again, blatantly stolen from The Hunger Games. Warning for spoilers and violence, as well as general effed-up-ness. NFB, NFI, OOC is love!]