Clove stepped on Foxface's back and took Cato's hand as he helped her down like the gentleman that he was. The two both held large grins on their faces as they walked away, hand in hand, from the dead body of the girl who was still bleeding from a neck wound. They had just found themselves at the large lake when they heard the cannon fire go off clear as day in the sky above them. The grins of their lips spread even further and Clove could feel laughter rising in her chest. They had made history. They were both going home to District Two to be winners!
For a moment, as they washed off the blood from Katniss, Thresh and Foxface, Clove allowed herself a daydream. She had not thought much of Cato at all from when the two of them had both quickly volunteered. It was a race in District Two. You had to wait for the victor to get on stage, they would normally look annoyed because they would be unable to volunteer, and the minute they asked for one you had to shot your hand up and scream it first. They normally picked a person at random because too many people volunteered at once, so it was purely luck that Cato and Clove were picked. Cato was seventeen, and Clove was only fifteen so they had not spoken to one another before this moment. At first Clove did not care and made up plans in her mind of how she could kill him. But now they would both win she stepped back and let herself take in his looks. Definitely destroyed by the games and he wasn't as good as some of the other tributes in the games but he was definitely something. The Tracker Jacker stings were almost all gone but a few remained, there were cuts and bruises and the fingers on one of his hands were sticking at an odd angle but otherwise he would definitely make a good husband. Maybe they would go back, be the next romantic couple. Wipe Katniss and Peeta off the map. Have children that they would train to win the Hunger Games just like their parents. Clove was quite pretty when she dolled herself up, she definitely would look better when Alicia (her stylist) had done with her when they got back so there was no way that Cato could say no to her then.
"What are you staring at?" Cato demanded, scowling at her.
"Oh nothing," Clove giggled. "When do you think they'll come get us?"
"No idea," Cato said but his voice was drowned out by another...
... The earlier rule. It was taken back. They were tricked. Tricked to believe they might both get out but instead it was all a trick to lead it down to this final moment between two tributes. They probably thought it would be Katniss and Peeta. Peeta was a goner but they had only just gotten Katniss. Clove might not have managed to finish her off (slowly and painfully she might add) if Cato hadn't found Thresh sneaking up on her and gotten him from behind. That gave Clove plenty of time to slowly cut Katniss open. It had taken her ages to die. She didn't scream. Which was a disappointment but she had cried and whimpered. Peeta's cannon went off a day after that and all they had to do was find Foxface. It wasn't that hard when they brought in the mutts that lured the three together. They managed to kill her and the mutts disappeared, leaving the two alone. They thought they had won but it was all a trick!
Cato moved first. Clove had been busy day dreaming again about how she wasn't going to get to have Cato on her arm and be the first tributes to both come home. He had taken advantage of that and jumped on her, fist stretched out and catching the side of her head, sending her down onto the ground. Clove let out a shriek in shock and snatched one of her knives from her coat, straight and thin and deadly sharp. She lifted it up as quickly as she could just as Cato brought his foot down on her head and it went straight through his shoe and into the skin of his heel. A tiny drop of blood streamed down onto the blade and he roared in pain, trying to pull his foot free but the blade was in too deep.
"Bastard," Clove whispered. "Sneak attacks are cowardly."
Cato snarled and grabbed one of his machetes from the ground but his fingers could only just brush the handle. Quickly, Clove jumped to her feet and lifted his foot higher in the air, dragging the blade from his foot painfully. He collapsed to the ground but didn't waste any time on pain like Clove had hoped he would. Instead he threw his body away, snatching the machete from the ground and rolling over once more, bringing the blade up towards of Clove's knees.
Clove jumped back, hitting a tree hard enough to knock the wind from her lungs. She gasped and snarled, showing her teeth as she darted forward, raising her blade and bringing it down over his stomach, hoping to punching some important wound or something but he rolled out of the way and into the lake with a splash. Clove paused, staring down at the water, waiting for him to come back up. She wondered if she should go in and drown him but Cato was stronger than she was and he would easily knock her down and reverse her attack. What Clove needed to rely on was her skill and her knives, her size and how quickly she could dart from left to right to avoid his own attacks. Still Cato remained low in the water and Clove was growing impatient. Time to draw him out.
"You know what, Cato... I remember you saying you would finish the girl. Katniss. Especially after she humiliated you time and time again and you couldn't beat her no matter how hard you tried. Yet I faced her for the first time ever and I beat her straight away. I even had her crying. What did you do? Beat a thirteen year old from three by snapping his neck when his back was turned. Or how you beat Thresh, once again from behind. Even Foxface was focussed on me!" Clove laughed.
It worked. Cato exploded from the water and jumped on her, face alive with fury. He jumped so fast that Clove only just managed to step to the side and even then he clipped her shoulder and tripped her up. Clove hit the ground but she bounced right back up as if she was made from rubber and jumped on Cato's back, wrapping her legs around his waist and an arm around his neck, raising her knife and bringing it down over his face. Her plan to was to blind him but he rose a hand and sacrificed it to the blade to save his sight, spinning and slamming her against a tree.
Clove let go of her knife and her legs and arm unwound from Cato as she dropped down onto the floor. She barely had time to blind before a fist was in her face and she heard a great cracking noice. The centre of her face grew burning hot and she could feel blood streaming down to rest above of her upper lip. Cato left her, dazed, for just a moment to pull the knife from his hand and throw it away. He had no use for knives and instead lifted his machete up from where he had dropped it on the ground. Clove blinked and saw the blade just in time to duck and roll away from him. The blade stuck hard and deep in the tree, he struggled to pull it free and Clove ripped a curved knife so quickly from her jacket that she tore some of the material.
Her face was still burning and the blood was getting her mouth slightly but she didn't dare waist any time to wipe it away. Instead she charged and swiped the blade back and forth, aiming for Cato's stomach so that she might fish out his guts. Cato side stepped backwards, he reached the edge of the lake and suddenly grabbed Clove's elbow as she swung at him, dragging her down into the water.
As they plunged underneath the blood rinsed away from Clove's broken nose. Her eyes blurred and she could only just about make Cato's rough shape. He was heading towards of her faster than she expected, she threw herself back and lifted her feet up at the same time. She couldn't see but she felt the impact as both her feet connected hard with his jaw and sent him backwards. Her lungs screamed and she threw herself to the surface, gasping for breath and spluttering. Her face and head were burning and aching at the same time. She was shaking and she clenched her fists when she realized she had lost yet another blade.
Clove spun around in the water and swam, dragging herself back onto the land and coughing up some more blood. Clove silently wondered what was bleeding inside of her to make her cough blood but then she remembered Cato was still alive somewhere under the water.
The thought had just left her mind when a hand threw from the water and grabbed a hold of her ankle, nails digging into her leg and drawing blood.
"Piss off!" Clove found herself snapping. Couldn't she have a moment's thought to herself? She rolled over and brought up a foot, kicking Cato three times in the face before his other hand found her kicking leg.
"I'll piss off when you die you stupid bitch," Cato snarled he climbed out of the water and head butted her.
Clove fell to the ground, dazed and in pain. She moaned as she felt Cato climb on top of her, straddling her waist and pinning her arms to the ground in almost the exact same way that Clove had pinned Katniss. He sneered down at her and lifted his fist, clear he planned to beat her to death rather than use one of his machete's for a quick clean kill. Clove wondered why on Earth she every thought about marrying this man. He was a sick bastard. Clove was pretty sick in the head herself but at least she accepted it.
"Get off of me and fight me fair and square," Clove snarled.
"What's not fair about this?" Cato sneered and brought his fist down.
The first blow hit her hard in the eye and it rocked her head from side to side and back and forth. Cato didn't even hesitate to punch her in the jaw, and then the head, once more on her already broken nose. He lifted her up by the hair of her fringe and punched her again so she could fall back and her head hit the ground. She imagined how many people in the Capitol and back home were cheering with every punch, while the others were booing.
Clove had flashes in between the punches of her older sister, Carophel, shaking her head at her and laughing. Carophel was a coward and never volunteered for the games. She made horrible jokes about Clove dying within the first day. She bullied her little sister her whole life and mocked her. Carophel claimed she was strong and didn't need to prove herself to the Capitol like her baby sister. It might not have been so bad if she hadn't proved it time and time again when she pinned Clove to the ground, or knocked her unconscious, or tripped her or terrified her when she stopped Clove from breathing for what felt like forever before she let her go just before she fell unconsious. Clove remembered volunteering just to prove her wrong. She was originally going to wait until she was seventeen like everyone else to make sure she won but Carophel had been particular mean the day before the reaping and had gotten all of her friends to shove Clove around and pinned her to the ground while Carophel carved her name with a knife on Clove's left hip. The name was still there and knives had quickly become Clove's weapons. She wanted to prove Carophel, so she volunteered but even then Carophel sneered at her and laughed, tormented her and made the bets right in front of her about Clove dying the first day.
Anger flared and Clove opened her mouth, she caught Cato's fist in between her teeth. One of her teeth went up in her gum and blood filled her mouth. It sent a new shock of wave through her body but she ignored it and bit down as hard as she could. Cato shouted and tried to use his other fist to knock her off but she just tore at his skin, shaking her head back and forth like a wild dog.
Her step father often called her a dog. He was a pig. When he had first showed up when Clove was ten, Carophel made horrible jokes about him molesting her. It terrified her senseless but she soon learned that he was pig but he wasn't a rapist. He treated both Carophel and Clove like they were idiots. Occasionally he would smack them if they ever back chatted him, the worst thing he had ever done was when he smacked Carophel's head against the wall and broken Clove's arm when she was eleven. He slept around with a dozen girls and then still expected Clove's mother to remain loyal. With every punch he ever gave Clove or his sister he gave three to their mother. Honestly, Clove had no idea why she stayed with him. Probably because she had no one else. Not after Clove's father had killed his wife's family and at least a dozen peacekeepers before they shot him down. He just went insane and after that her mother needed someone so she picked up the first man that she could. He was a pig. He called her a dog and he was probably cheering with Carophel at every smack she was getting as she slowly pulled off more and more of Cato's skin, revealing strange pinkish red skin underneath.
The only person who was probably not cheering at her home would be her mother and that would just be because she was crying too much. Carophel had always been the favourite. She pretended she loved them both equally but that was a dead lie. Clove imagined her sitting there, sobbing, and no one bothering to comfort her. Clove used to hug her when she cried but she never wanted Clove. She wanted Carophel to comfort her and pushed Clove away, so she slowly stopped hugging her mum when she cried.
Clove let go of his fist. he pulled back and held it, gasping and swearing as he pushed the bleeding skin back into place.
"When I win..." Clove began, panting and smirking even though she could only see out of one eye as the other had swollen shut. Cato frowned and glared down at her. "I'm going to live in the victor home on my own!"
She managed to rip her hand free. Instead of going for a knife or his face she went for a much more delicate part of his body and squeezed so tightly that when Cato shouted, it came out as a squeak. He reached down with shaky hands and tried to rip her free but she just tightened her grip on his manhood under he was in so much pain that she could push him off. Cato fell to the ground, gasping and still clawing at her hand. His voice was nonexistent now. Just a high pitched squeak as he slapped at her to get him off.
"If you win..." Clove whispered. "You ain't havin' babies."
Cato barely saw it coming when she pulled her knife out. He didn't die from the stab, no he was too stubborn for that, but there was no way sex would ever be pleasurable for him again. Clove imagined laughter from the females in the capitol, while the men were probably furious at the cheap shot she had given. Who cares? Causing people like Cato pain was worth people disliking her.
"Pathetic." Clove whispered, standing up and leaving the knife inside of him.
He was clutching the body, his voice wavering from screams to squeaks. He clearly had no idea what he was supposed to do. Rip the knife free and risk bleeding to death? Or stand the pain and fight like that until someone could save him. If Clove disappeared now he'd probably die if he took the knife out or not, but this was the Hunger Games and they didn't want to see a slow bleed to death. They wouldn't let her disappear now, so instead she pulled another knife, the last one she had on her, from her jacket. It was tiny. The smallest one she had collected. She decided she would use it for tiny details. She had used it when cutting Katniss's eyes and digging into each one of her fingers and under the nails. It wasn't her first pick but it was all she had left.
"Bitch!" Cato gasped, sitting up and reaching blindly for a weapon, never taking his eyes off of her. "Stupid fucking bitch!"
"Aww, so you won't give me a kiss goodbye?" Clove taunted, she stepped forward and sat down directly on his legs. She raised the small knife while her free hand reached down and gently jogged the handle of the other one. His voice went high again before no sound at all even came out from his open mouth.
Just as the small knife reached for his neck to end it, she felt a pain blindingly sharp in her side. It threw her off of him and she hit the ground hard. The stick, a plain old branch that had snapped from the tree by some bird or squirrel, was deep in her side, just bellow her lungs if not it had scratched them. She cough in shock and struggled to stand up again. The stick was making her legs shaky but it was not going to kill her. All it did was piss her off. Clove turned to Cato, who was laughing hysterically at her, and raised a hand, slapping him hard around the face. The sound of the slap echoed around the lake and she slapped him again. She did it a dozen or so times before she quickly brought the knife up and cut into his cheek. His laughter had lasted until then but the minute the blade cut open his cheek he shouted again. She'd cut right through into his mouth and she sneered.
One of her legs, the one with the knife sitting just above it, gave way and she collapsed, sending the stick deeper in her skin and making her scream in pain as part of it broke off inside of her. Clove threw herself at Cato and used the small knife to hack at his throat and chest. Anyone else probably would have seen there was no way they could live and let her do it, but Cato did not want to go alone and he rose a second branchy and drove it deep in her stomach. It broke against her skin and didn't make her bleed, but it stalled her enough for him to stab at her stomach three or so more times before he began to draw blood.
Clove shrieked and brought the knife down a final time. It went straight through the middle of his face, in between his eyes and his arm fell down. His whole body was limp but his eyes were wide and staring at Clove. She panted and stared down at him, blood filled her mouth and began to stream down her chin but she ignored it and stared Cato in the eyes. He seemed to still be alive, his eyes were open and trained on her, but there was no light in them. No life.
"I win." Clove whispered, then lifted her head and shouted. "I WIN YOU BASTARD!"
She started laughing, one hand encircled around the bloody wound on her stomach just as the cannon went off. Cato's eyes were still wide and focussed on her. She clutched her stomach, ignored the people approaching her from behind. They would take her up and heal her injuries but for now, she focussed on Cato. She reached up and stroked his cheek, still laughing.
"I win, darling." Clove whispered.
He had called her darling when they found themselves alone together on the train. From that moment he treated her like a baby; it wasn't until he saw her in training that he started to take her seriously. He never called her "darling" again but for some reason the little nick name had stuck in her mind throughout the whole games.
Leaning forward, she pressed a bloody kiss to his own bloody forehead before her eyes fell shut, she slumped against Cato and the guards rushed towards her. When she next opened her eyes she would be back... Back as a victor.