"Cato!" She squealed as a cannon blasted throughout the arena, notifying us that there has been another death. The corner of my mouth rose, giving a half smile, as I glanced over at the huge grin on her face. "Cato, we could go home! It's us against Twelve!"
"Come on, Clove." I extended my arm out, as if signalling for her to keep moving, and continued to speak, "I'll tell you right now.. We are going home. Twelve can't beat us. They may be unstoppable to everyone else, but we're going to be the ones leaving the arena, not them. We're gonna do this."
"Cato." She said curiously, "What are we going to do when we get back home to Two?"
"What we always did," I answered, almost instantly.
"Is anything going to change between us?" She asked.
"What do you mean?" I asked, sounding a little more confused than I actually was, "What would change? You're always going to be my best friend, Clover."
"That's not what I -" She sighed, "Never mind.."
"Okay.." I said, sounding much more confused than I was just a second ago. What would she be talking about? What could change between us..
We continued walking until we found a stream, so we filled up our water bottles in awkward silence.
She wandered off into a patch of trees as I was filling my water bottle. I know I shouldn't be worried, since she's a great fighter, but there's something about this scenario that feels wrong. Like something is going to happen.
"Clove?" I called loudly towards the patch of trees she wandered off in as I stood up straight, putting the cap back on the bottle. "Clove? ... Are you there? ... Where are you?"
After not getting any sort of reply, I headed into the forest.
"Clove?" I kept calling, which really wasn't a good idea. I was giving away where I was, which in the arena wasn't a good idea. I could just imagine what my sister, Joanie, would say.. 'Cato, you idiot, what are you doing? You're gonna get killed' or 'Cato, shut up, if she's not calling back, she obviously can't hear you'. I glanced up to the sky and said, "Shut up, Joanie."
She probably would have rolled her eyes. I shoot the thought of her away and focused on finding Clove. I walked about 50 yards before calling for her again.
"Clove?" I shouted. I could hear someone calling back, but it was too far away for me to be sure who it was. I began to run deeper into the forest, but if Clove was here, I'd have to take the risk of running into Twelve, though they weren't smart enough to kidnap Clove - they weren't tough enough, either. She could take them both on, easily. "Clove!"
"Cato!" They called. I was close enough to hear who it was, and it was Clove, but she sounded like she was struggling. I started to full on sprint after her voice, "Cato!"
"Clove -" I started, as I reached her. She was wound up in a net on the ground. "What are you doing?"
"Cato, I'm stuck," She said, struggling to get out of the net. "Help."
"Didn't you lay that there on the second day?" I asked, trying to keep down a laugh. She nodded, and I smirked as I said, "Smooth move."
"Shut up," She said, as she final gave up on the net.
I knelt down next to her and held onto her hand with both of mine, as if she was slowly dying in a hospital bed. "Clove.. Hang in there, buddy. You're gonna be okay, don't worry.."
"Cato!" She laughed, yanking her hand back through one of the holes in the net. "Just help me! Please?"
"Alright, alright." I smirked, as I cut away the net with the knife I had secured onto my belt. "Where are your knives, anyway?"
"In my jacket.. Which is in your bag, remember?" She said, as she got up and brushed the dirt off of herself. "We should go back.."
"Yeah, good idea." I said, as I shook my head and smiled to myself.
We headed back to camp, and started a small fire. I brought my bag around and dropped it down infront of me. I took Clove's jacket out and handed it to her, warning her it probably smells like dead animal by now, but she shoot it off and acted as if it didn't matter.
I carefully put the lizards and squirrels we caught in the fire so they could cook, but I had them in a place where they wouldn't burn if we watched it carefully enough.
"Hungry?" I asked. Staring at the fire, unsure of how long this would take.
"Starving." She answered. "Are you sure you know how to cook it?"
"This is just like grilling. I'm a guy, Clove." I said, cockily. "Grilling is what guys do."
"Right," She rolled her eyes. "I've never seen anyone grill in Two."
"Well, I was reading a book one time and it was talking about how guys are the grill masters." I said.
"Wait, you read a book?" She asked, as her eyes widened in shock.
"One time, Clove." I laughed, "It was only once."
"You still read it.." She smirked.
"Oh, please. It was one page." I said, defensively. "Reading is for geeks and weirdos."
"It is not," She retorted, quickly. "Some books are actually good, you know.."
"Sure," I said sarcasticly. I checked back on the meat, which was just about to burn so I quickly removed it from the fire. "Ta-da!"
"There's burnt bits on it, Cato.." She said with a grin.
"Shut up." I laughed. "I'm a grill master."
"Whatever you say.." She said, as she shoot her head and picked away at the burnt bits on her food.
After we finished eating, it was already dark, and Clove suggested one of us should go to sleep, so I volunteered to take the first watch.
If I had to guess the time, right now. I'd say it was maybe around 3AM. This was usually when Clove was suppose to take her watch, but I couldn't just wake her. She looked too beautiful in her sleep. Too innocent, and harmless. But when she was awake? She wasn't innocent, nor harmless, but she was still incredibly beautiful.
"Cato?" She yawned, as her eyes fluttered open. "Is it my turn yet?"
"Yeah." I answered, softly.
"Alright." She muttered as she sat up, and leaned against a tree trunk. "Time for you to go to bed."
I nodded and sprawled out across the ground. I heard her laugh lightly, and with that I fell straight to sleep.
"Cato." Clove said as she repeatedly shook me. "Cato, get up. Wake up. "
"Mm, okay, okay." I said, as I tried to brush her off and go back to sleep. "I'm up, I'm up."
"Cato, there's no water left in the arena." She said.
"What?" I said in panic, my eyes flicking open as I bolted up from the ground. "You're joking, right?"
"Well, the stream close by is dried out. We'll have to go by the lake.." She replied.
"What time is it?" I asked. I'm guessing around 10AM, but I was probably wrong.
"Not sure, probably around noon." She answered. "Come on, we have to go."
"Where?"
"The lake. Near the Cornucopia."
"Alright."
We grabbed all our stuff, which contained 2 bags and a jacket, and set off to the lake.
"I think this is it," Clove finally said after maybe 5 minutes of silence. "I think this is the finale."
"What?" I asked.
"It's the final 4." She started, "They know Twelve wont hurt each other, and they know we wont hurt each other. So this is the finale. They're bringing us together. They're probably driving us to the lake or something."
"That-" I said, then thought about it for a minute before continuing, "That makes a lot more sense.."
After walking for a little while longer, it started to get dark. Too dark to be natural. We stopped, and looked around us. That's when we heard the howling. It wasn't far off, but it was coming from all around us.
"Come on," I said, tugging at Clove's arm. "We gotta run. Lake's not safe. Cornucopia, now. Let's go."
We broke off into a run into the direction of the Cornucopia. But the mutts jumped out from behind us, and took off after us.
"Clove! Run!" I yelled, pulling her infront of me so she'd be able to get there before I did. We were running as fast as we could until we slammed into the metal Cornucopia. I helped her climb up the side, and I followed behind her. When we reached the top, we collapsed and layed there on the Cornucopia trying to catch our breath.
"Katniss!" Peeta yelled from maybe a hundred yards away from the Cornucopia, "Katniss, help!"
"Clover," I said under my bread, "Get your knife ready, okay?"
"Ready," She mumbled, still having a difficulty breathing, as she reached into her jacket and grabbed a knife.
After a couple minutes, Twelve was climbing up the Cornucopia with the mutts following behind them.
"Peeta," Katniss said under her breath, "Peeta, are you okay?!"
After a few more minutes, Clove and I finally caught our breath, and unfortunately so did Twelve.
I dove after Peeta, and brought him up into a headlock, ready to snap his neck almost imediately.
Clove went after Katniss, who was steadying an arrow to shoot at me.
"Do it and you'll be dead. As will Lover Boy." She whispered into Katniss' ear, as she brought a knife to her throat. Katniss lowered her bow, her entire body shaking.
"Do it, Clove." I encouraged her. I tightened my grip around Peeta's neck, and waited for her to kill Katniss. "He needs to watch her die."
"Say goodbye to Lover Boy," Clove laughed, and gave Katniss a couple seconds to say something, but nothing was said. "Nothing? Well, alright then."
Clove quickly drove the knife across her throat, slitting it, so blood spewed out as she collapsed to the ground.
"Katniss!" Peeta screamed, out of pure horror. A small smirk lit on my face, as I slowly snapped Peeta's neck, increasing his pain.
After a few seconds, Clove and I pushed Twelve off from the top of the Cornucopia, and off the side, down to the mutts. Then two cannons sound, finalizing their deaths.
We collapsed into each others arms, still staying ontop of the Cornucopia.
"We won," I breathed. "We did it. We won."
Everything cleared up, and the mutts vanished, as did Twelve.
Clove and I carefully slid down the side of the Cornucopia, waiting for the Gamemakers to announce our victory, but they didn't.
"What's taking them so long?" I said as I leaned back against the building.
"I know." She sighed, "I just wanna go home."
"Clove," I began, "What if-"
"Attention Tributes," Claudius Templesmith's voice boomed through the arena. "Earliers rule change has been revoked. Only 1 Victor may be crowned."
"What?" I shrieked. "No!"
"Cato!" Clove yelled. "We should have seen this coming. These games are never fair."
"I know, but I just..." I panicked, "They're telling us one of us has to kill each other. I can't do that.."
"But we're not doing that." She assured me, as she placed her hand on my shoulder.
"Clove-" I cut myself off. "What if we killed ourselves.."
"What?" She said, as confused as ever.
"We could use this," I said as I pulled out 2 small bottles of rubbing alcohol, that I got from sponsors, out of my bag, but I had already used the rubbing alcohol within the first week in the arena and instead filled them with water. "We could both just drink the entire thing and try to commit-"
"Let's do it then." She said, as she took a deep breath. "How do you know this would kill us, though?"
"From a chemistry project back in Two." I answered.
We both unscrewed the lids and brought the bottles to our mouths.
"Wait! Wait! Stop!" Claudius' voice boomed, just before we took out first sip. "I present you this years victors! The tributes from District Two. Clove Ivory and Cato Ahmet."
We dropped the bottles and embraced in each others arm.
"I love you, Clove." I confessed. "I always have. I've just been so scared. And I couldn't tell you in here. It's just-"
"I love you, Cato." She smiled, and kissed me.
We did it. We were finally going home.