Disclaimer: The Hunger Games trilogy and all its characters are the property of Suzanne Collins.

- Dark Horizon -

Chapter 1

"There's not enough time-"

"Stop. We'll figure something out. It's gonna be fine," I reply, hastily rummaging though the remaining supplies I had left in my bag. Tears blurred my vision. I felt pathetic, useless and above all, guilty. I could feel Peeta's eyes on me, but I could not face him, not when I knew that there was a possibility that I could not save him.

"Katniss," he whispers.

There was something in his voice that made me want to burst into tears. Acceptance? Defeat? Hopelessness? Or maybe all of those things? Peeta's wound was deep. Pus was oozing out of the infected tissue creating a vile smell, but the smell was the least of my worries. Dark, red lines crawled up his leg, almost web-like, and it only took me a fraction of a second to put the pieces together. My stomach dropped. Blood poisoning. It all made sense. The chills, his fever, the deathlike pallor of his face were all caused the bacteria that had worked its way into his bloodstream. I don't even think that my mother would posses the skills to heal this and there's nothing that my chewed up mint leaves could do to help him. We needed strong medicine from the Capitol and we needed it fast.

The cost of such medicine would make it impossible to retrieve. Gifts from sponsors go up in price the longer the games continue. We're in the latter stages of the Games so medicine that strong would cost a fortune for Haymitch to attain. There aren't many of us left and the audience will begin to grow impatient soon. One less tribute would mean one step closer to crowning their Victor.

"Here, take these," I say, handing him fever pills. It's the only option for now until I figured something out.

I wait for him to swallow the pills, then the entire container of water, and after that I tend to his minor wounds to reduce his pain as much as possible. It is the least that I can do right now. After I tend to his burns and stings, I wipe my forehead with the back of my palm which is covered in sweat. I've been fussing over Peeta for hours and I never took note of how brutally hot it was. It's clear that the Gamemakers were progressively increasing the temperature during the day to make us as uncomfortable as possible, which only makes me hate them more than I already did.

While Peeta rests, since there's little more that I can do, I rummage through my supplies to see what we both have to work with until I can figure something out. What I need most, and what I don't have is anti-infection medicine. You wouldn't find medicine like that at the Cornucopia in the pile of supplies. They didn't want to make it easy for us. The supplies would normally consist of weapons intended to kill, not medicine to heal. That would only slow the process of the Games and the audience thrived on death.

Sighing, I walk to where Peeta is sleeping and I place a cool cloth on his forehead. It's futile, but anything is better than nothing.

And so we wait. I don't know how long we waited exactly. Minutes? Hours? My mind is foggy from the heat. My body is drenched in sweat. I wish they would stop messing with the temperature… I need to keep Peeta's temperature down or else he'll-

The sounds of the trumpets startle me, jolting me into an upright position. Peeta wakes up immediately, waiting nervously for Claudius Templesmith to speak. The more I hear is voice the more I hate it. His accent makes me nauseas. Everything about the Capitol makes me nauseas.

As expected, he's inviting us to a feast. I won't risk it. They do this nearly every year towards the end of the Games when things are starting to get slow and boring for the audience. Food isn't the biggest problem we have, it's Peeta, and I won't risk another encounter with the Careers just for a meal. But Templesmith continues, "Now, I know many of you are already declining my invitation but I must warn you that this is no ordinary feast. Each and every one of you remaining needs something desperately. Something that you would risk your life for."

Peeta's medicine. That's what I need. That's what I would risk my life for.

"At dawn at the Cornucopia, you will each find something in a backpack, marked with your district number. Until then, use your time to consider this generous offer that we have bestowed upon you as for some of you, this may well be your last chance. May the odds be ever in your favour. Good luck to all of you."

His words lay hanging in the air and neither of us speak for quite some time. "I'm going," I say with determination.

"No," he says sharply. "You won't risk your life for me."

"What? You think I'm just going to leave you here and do nothing? Wait for you to die while I sit here and watch?" I would never forgive myself if I did that. The audience would hate me, and quite frankly, I would hate myself, too. Leaving him is not an option and so I would have to think of something else.

"Yes! I will not let you be butchered by those animals. They will be waiting, Katniss. They will be there and they will kill you!" He sits upright and yells out in pain, falling onto his back. He doesn't say anymore. He just stares at the roof of the cave, breathing heavily.

I don't know what possesses me to do what I do next. We're both tired, hot, emotionally unstable, and in Peeta's case, in unbearable pain, but I try to forget all of that when I lean in a place a feather light kiss on his lips. They're soft and warm like before. The kiss is comforting and safe and for a moment it's like I'm back home in the Meadow, free from the cameras...far from the Capitol...Peeta tenses up, almost startled by it, but then, with what strength he had left, he pulls me into his arms and kisses me back. The kiss is different than the first. It's deeper and filled with passion. I could only imagine the reactions of everyone watching us. The gasps of everyone in front of a screen, witnessing the star-crossed lovers from District 12 display their love for each other in front of the world. Our first kiss was meant for the cameras, but now the cameras felt like an invasion of privacy.

My right hand touches his face and I pull back immediately when I feel the searing heat beneath my fingers. His fever is getting worse. We're wasting time.

"Where are you going?" He asks, surprised at my sudden withdrawal.

"Nowhere, I'm going nowhere. Sleep, I'm just going to get water," I say.

"Promise?"

"I won't go anywhere. I promise. Just sleep and I'll bring back something to eat. I'm not gonna let you go hungry."

He seems to accept that I'm not going to run off to my death and so I gather a few supplies and make my way out of the cave.

The air is cold and the sky is beginning to darken rapidly. I walk to the stream on high alert, scanning the nearby trees almost as if I'm waiting for Cato or Clove to pounce right at me. I wonder that they need so desperately. Food? Medicine? Weapons? I try not to think about them. I don't want to think about what they could do to me, or Peeta. Cato has already wounded Peeta, but I'm almost certain he can do a lot more than a mere cut to the leg. I try to imagine what they'd be like had the Games never existed. Would they be normal people going about their day like everyone else without the desire to kill?

My thoughts suddenly turn to Prim. She could have been in the arena, facing the Careers. There's no way she could have made it out of here. I can just picture her. So young, so delicate, lying in a pool of her own blood with Cato standing above her with a sly grin on his face. I could never forget his face, especially his eyes. Those pools of ice blue are forever ingrained in my memory. Perhaps they'll be the last thing that I see before I die. If I die...

I'm so lost in my own befuddled thoughts that I don't even notice the parachute float right by me. It lands in the nearby bush and I sprint right after it, my heart leaping with joy. Haymitch did it! He got the medicine for Peeta – I don't know how he did it but it means that I won't have to go to the Cornucopia after all. The vile is very small, so it must be incredibly strong to cure Peeta's infection. I open it and my stomach drops when I'm hit with the strong scent of sleep syrup. I recognise it immediately. This stuff is cheap and very common in District 12. Everyone uses it from time to time. My mother keeps several vials at home to knock out patients that are in agony. A vile this size could easily keep a person asleep for a full day...

And then it all clicked. A day was more than enough. He'll hate me for it, but I'll hate myself more if I don't do it. I quickly collect a handful of berries, mash them up and pour the syrup over them. I walk back to the cave, my heart racing and my palms sweaty.

"I could only find these berries. It's not much but it'll give you energy," I say, eyeing him carefully.

Peeta gladly takes the berries from me and eagerly swallows a large handful. His expression changes almost immediately and his eyes dart to me. Just when he's about to spit them out I quickly cover his mouth with one hand and his nose with the other before he can spit it out. He's already weak from his wound and before he could muster the strength the push me off, I feel his grip on me weaken.

I look into his eyes right before he looses consciousness and all I can see is anger and betrayal. For a second I feel guilty about what I had just done, but logic quickly replaces my personal feelings and I feel a sense of accomplishment when he finally falls into a deep slumber. It had to be done, I tell myself. I was doing this for him.

XxxxXxxxX

Twenty-four hours. That's all I had to work with until the syrup wore off and I could not afford to waste any of it. Before nightfall I prepare my weapons, fill every water container that I have and then I get started on camouflaging the opening of the cave. I leave a container of water beside Peeta in case he wakes up and I'm not there. It may keep him alive for a little longer but in the end his wound will kill him. Slowly and painfully. I keep telling myself that I will return before he wakes up, that I will save him before the infection spreads anymore than it already has because if I die at the feast, District 12 will not have a victor.

My biggest worry at this point is confronting Cato, Clove and Thresh. I know for a fact that they'll be waiting at the Cornucopia. Perhaps they're already there, or somewhere close by? And then that leaves Foxface. She's an odd one. I don't think that direct confrontation is her thing and I certainly can't imagine her running towards me with a knife. She'll probably be hanging around nearby, waiting for the rest of us to take each other down.

I watch the sky, hoping to see a face so that I'll have one less person to worry about at dawn but no more faces appear in the sky tonight, but tomorrow there will be. Feasts always result in death.

It's cold tonight. Freezing, actually, so I decide to go back in the cave, now camouflaged by a large pile of rocks, and lie next to Peeta. His fever is worse. Without medicine he'll only last a couple of days before the infection finally kills him. Those final days of his life would likely drive him to insanity. A quick death would be the more preferable option and without the medicine, relieving him of his suffering would likely fall into my hands.

But now there's a possibility that I could save him. There was a small chance that I'll succeed but at least the chance is there.

Spirits are probably high in District 12. No one has made it this far in years. Since Haymitch, probably. Our tributes are always killed in the early stages of the games, usually in the bloodbath, so people in the District usually avoid watching the Games. Some are curious, but most go about their day, trying not the think of the innocent children that are being slaughtered in the arena while an audience cheers on.

It's late now and I'm positive that there'll be no cannons going off until tomorrow morning. There probably aren't many watching the Games at this hour. It'll be quiet in the arena for the next few hours while everyone prepares for tomorrows feast. I take Peeta's jacket off, deciding that he doesn't need it and I put it on and return to my position beside him. In a few hours I'll be at the Cornucopia. In a few hours I could come face to face with Cato. In a few hours I could be dead.

A/N: This first chapter was intended to follow the same path as the book. I just wanted to confirm that I am not rewriting The Hunger Games in my own words. The rest of the fic will follow a different plot. I just wanted to get things started before the real action begins *evil laughter*.