Chapter 3: Clove
Frozen shock. I quickly shook myself and analyzed my surroundings. I was directly in front of the mouth of the Cornucopia; several clumps of shambling death surrounding it, some pounding on the glass that encased each tribute. I put my hand on mine, needing to know the minute it disappeared. It seemed to be our only protection against the rotting creatures before we could leave our platforms.
The instant the gong sounded, the glass melted away, and I lunged for a belt of knives near the edge of my platform with a smirk. It was almost as if someone had placed it there explicitly for me. I buckled it in place and drew out a long, curved blade. I noticed off to my right side the District 9 male fighting over a backpack with the Girl on Fire. Sneering, I flung the knife at the back of the male to get him out of my shot for the District 12 girl. When my second knife only lodged in the pack, I was furious, and ready to chase her when the stench of rotting flesh filled my nose. One of the dead mutts had wandered into my path, and I made a quick swipe of my sword across its neck. Something black oozed out of the cut, but it did not hesitate or waver in its progress toward me.
I felt mild panic overtake me as I stared, frozen, at the single eyeball it had left, swinging out of its socket by a tendon as if to hypnotize me. Its cold hands had found a grip on my shoulders before I was suddenly splashed in black liquid. It flew into my open mouth, bitter and rancid. Cato's grinning face appeared through the split in the dead mutt's head. It collapsed at my feet, jaw still moving sporadically as if still determined to take a bite out of my shoes.
"What would you do without me?" he sighed dramatically as I spit out the congealed blood. "Aim for their brains if you can."
I drew a handful of smaller knives and quickly took out several of the rotted beings closest to me.
"What are they?" I shouted to Cato.
"Who the hell knows or cares?" he answered. "Just kill them like you would a normal tribute, except, you know, through their heads."
Glimmer suddenly turning into one of them after receiving a small bite on her ankle spooked me, but provided us with a valuable lesson to stay as far away from the dead things as possible. Our original plan at training had been to stay at the Cornucopia and keep our supplies concentrated, but with the dead mutts wandering around everywhere, that would be impossible. When Cato led us toward the relative safety of an open field, I was relieved. We'd be able to see anything coming for miles around. I convinced Cato to let the District 3 boy live, not looking forward to one of us having to babysit the supplies while we could be out hunting. The sooner I got away from those rotting corpses the better.
Having Lover Boy hang around with us was unexpected, but he did save Marvel from having his face eaten off by Glimmer. I was not surprised, however, when he did manage to betray us by helping his district partner escape. Waking up to a zombie several inches from my face, sticky drool landing on my neck, had not been pleasant, and I swiftly pushed a blade through its skull. It immediately collapsed on top of me, heavy and stinking of decay and rot, showering me again with black ooze. Yelling for Cato, he had to pry the thing off of me and hold onto my shoulders while I took a couple of breaths. I had planned on helping him with the zombie hoard that descended on us, but he pushed me back toward the field, telling me he'd catch up. I took down about 5 of them before I was completely out of knives and then I ran. True to his word, Cato found me about 10 minutes later slumped against a tree trunk and we were reunited with Marvel and the District 3 boy at our base.
When Cato started ranting about the District 12 girl, I felt the anger in me well up and I punched his arm until he quieted, glaring daggers down at me.
"Do you want to bring the entire hoard here?" I hissed. "There are only 4 of us left, and I'm completely out of knives."
He pulled out the five I had flung at the corpses on my way out of the forest and angrily thrust them at me.
"Maybe work up the courage to pull them out of your targets next time," he growled. "They do stay dead."
Frustrated and furious, I retrieved the knives and sank down to the ground. The boy from 3 came up to me, silently handing me a small pack of beef jerky and pointing to the tent he had set up for me. I crawled into it, not even bothering to ask about watch, and sulked. Sighing, I realized that I had been rather cowardly lately. I just could not help myself around the mutts; they gave me the creeps unlike anything I'd ever encountered before.
I emerged from the tent and gathered up the water bottles, making my way toward a groundwater well I had passed earlier. As I lifted the lid, a guttural groan echoed out of the dark hole. Falling backward with a yelp, I scooted away from it as fast as I could. Taking a few deep breaths, I remembered the scorn Cato had directed toward me and approached the well cautiously. I peered in slowly, cautiously turning on my flashlight to shine into its depths. A bloated, rotting corpse stared back at me, hands reaching upward and grasping, rotten teeth bared and snapping. I picked up a boulder sitting nearby, aiming carefully, and dropped it on the head of the mutt. A thud resonated out of the well but the unnatural moaning continued. I seemed to have only made it angrier.
A rustling of bushes and harsh whispers drew me around, and before I knew it, a knife had lodged inches away from Cato's head into a tree branch. Glaring at me, and pulling the knife free, he tossed it back, thankfully into the ground in front of me and not at my head.
"What are you doing out here?" he hissed. "You've been gone for almost half an hour."
Pointing wordlessly down the well, he peered in, disgust shining plainly on his face.
"Leave it there," he muttered. "That water is not safe to drink anymore. The most we can do with it is to give it to another tribute to try to poison them. Even that's not worth it at this point. Let's go find another well. If there's one, there has to be others."
We set off together, Cato with his sword drawn as I poked at the ground with a stick, trying to find the characteristic thud of the lid of another well. When I finally found one, I hesitantly lifted the lid but this one was empty of mutts. The water drawn from it tasted of minerals and dirt, but it had none of the stench of decay that the previous well possessed.
"Don't tell Marvel or that District 3 boy about the mutt well," Cato rumbled as we made our way back to camp. "It might be useful if we need a quick way to dispose of either of them in the future."
Looking up at the cruel grin on his face, I suppressed a shudder and renewed my vow to keep Cato within my sight at all times. I knew of his cruel streak and had heard rumors at the training center in District 2 of what he did to those who displeased him. I fingered the knives in my belt, smirking. Even Cato couldn't recover from a blade piercing his skull.
When we saw the smoke signals in the forest, Marvel and I hesitantly followed him into the forest and I even more hesitantly separated from the group. When the ground shook with the force of the explosion, I immediately began carefully making my way back to camp. I met two dead mutts on my way, slowly shuffling their way toward the source of the noise. Creeping up behind them, I threw two knives into their skulls. Running to retrieve them, I was tripped by one of them grabbing at my ankle, the blade having hit its head at an angle that missed the brain. I tore the knife out of the unmoving mutt's head and buried it into the forehead of the mutt that was crawling its way toward me, mouth snarling.
Breathing heavily, I laid on my back on the ground, surrounded by the dead. Gritting my teeth against the nausea, I pushed onto my feet and sprinted toward the base. Hearing a groan coming from behind me, I twisted my head to see if there was one behind me when I smacked into something warm and fleshy. It gasped and I immediately rolled to my right, two knives in each hand. I recognized the boy from District 10 and, realizing I didn't have time to play with him, simply ran while he was still frozen in fear and slashed his throat.
Cato snapped that boy's neck just as I reached camp and I took in the wreckage left of our supplies. Everything had been disintegrated and there was a 9 foot hole in the perimeter where the charges had been buried. When I saw Cato's wild expression, I was drawn back to our training at the academy, where one of the mentors had pushed him too far. Cato had thrown himself into such a fit, he had smashed in the face of that mentor and 4 others sported broken bones before they finally managed to knock him out with a sedative. Since we didn't have a sedative handy, I knew it was imperative that we stopped him before he could get into a full rage.
Luckily, Marvel backed me up and the dead District 3 mutt that rose from the ground convinced Cato that we had more important things on our hands than his tantrum. Grabbing onto his arm, I directed Cato away from the wreckage of our camp and we headed back toward the farmhouse, and settled in to watch the dead announcement. When Cato realized that the culprit was still alive, a feral look came into his eyes again, although he kept himself calm.
We split up the next morning to hunt the Girl on Fire, and I headed toward the direction of the second smoke column. Not finding any clues, and hearing the groans of multiple mutts being carried in the wind, I headed back toward the fenced area we stopped last night. I waited there for Cato and Marvel to return, expecting no results of our search. The girl had proved far more resourceful than I had ever thought possible. I pulled out my knives and started absently digging a hole in the ground, startled by the cannon shot that rang out through the arena several minutes later. I shot to my feet and was surveying my surroundings when a second shot rang out. Cato emerged a few minutes later through the trees, and I sighed in relief. He nodded at me and settled down next to me, handing me his filled water bottle.
We waited until nightfall for Marvel to return, and my stomach sank when his face was projected in the sky during the announcement along with the little girl from 11. Body tense next to me, Cato pulled out the remainder of the food from his pack, asking me what I had left. Showing him the beef jerky and dried fruit I had left, we realized that we would need to find a food source by the following day or we might starve.
"Get some sleep, Cato," I suggested. "We'll set out in the morning to find somewhere we can get some food. I noticed some animal tracks in the woods, so maybe we can hunt something."
Nodding, he started to lay down, when I stopped him. Pointing upward, I told him we'd be safer in the trees from the dead mutts. Their basic motor skills seemed severely impaired, so even if we could get above their heads in the trees we would be more secure.
He rose and grabbed a hold of the thickest braches in the large tree above us, heaving himself up. He reached down a hand and pulled me up next to him. We continued like this until we were about 10 feet in the air, and I leaned on the trunk straddling a thick branch. His snores filled the air, and I peered out through the leaves at the distant farmhouse, a dim light shining through one of the windows. Cato woke several hours later, saying that he felt rested and that he would keep watch. I hesitantly fell asleep, only to be awoken several hours later when I hit the ground to the sound of Cato's roaring laughter.
He quickly climbed down the tree, dropping the last several feet, and, still chortling, checked on me. He took each of my limbs, bending and prodding them to make sure nothing was broken. I had, thankfully, landed on a rather soft patch of earth, and was just bruised and winded. Groaning as I pushed myself into a sitting position, I drank from the water bottle Cato handed to me and tried to stretch the soreness away.
"Come on big baby," he snorted. "Might as well try to find some breakfast now that we're both awake."
Setting off in a circle around the farmhouse, we realized there was nothing. We stumbled on a few more wells that we used to refill our water, but there was no garden, chicken coop, or even a barn. What kind of farm was this?
The anthem brought our attention to the sky, and the announcement of a feast at noon, containing packages for each of us, gave Cato and me a new spring to our step. Grinning, we quickly started to strategize. There were only six of us left at that point: the two of us, the large brute from District 11, the red-head from District 5, Katniss, and Peeta. We immediately made our way back to the Cornucopia, where we encountered a swarm of dead mutts surrounding it. It seemed the Gamemakers intended on making this difficult for us.
"I'll clear a path for you," Cato whispered urgently. "Follow closely and keep my back clear. When we break through the line of mutts, you go after the packs and I'll keep the dead off of you. Maybe I'll even manage to kill a few tributes as well," he added with a grin.
When the table rose out of the ground, 5 packs of various sizes neatly lined up, I immediately zoomed in on the two packs with 2 sewn onto them.
"Go!" I shot at Cato, running after him when he took off. Breaking through the barrier of mutts, I was delighted to see Katniss just reaching the table. Drawing a knife, I flung it at her, disappointed when it only caught her above the eye. She froze, wiping at the blood flowing out of the cut, and eyed the mutts. I also stared at them apprehensively, knowing that if they charged, neither one of us would survive. Surprisingly, they made no move toward either of us, and seemed to be held back in a circle about 100 feet in all directions.
Sneering, I started taunting her, asking what was in the tiny pack that she clutched in her hand.
"Too bad that Marvel got to your accomplice from 11 before I could," I scoffed, tackling her to the ground and holding a knife at her throat. "I've always been good with little girls. I think I'll actually leave you alive. Eventually the barrier holding back the mutts will drop, and then they'll come to eat you. I don't think I've ever seen one that wasn't hungry."
As I prepared to slice her open, I felt myself roughly lifted off of her and held in the air. Startled, I cried out to Cato, thinking that he had betrayed me for some reason.
"What are you doing you idiot," I yelled. I was suddenly turned and found myself face to face with the dark, menacing face of Thresh.
"What did you say about Rue?" he demanded, shaking me roughly.
"Nothing! I did nothing to her!" I shrieked. "Cato! Help me!"
I heard his answering call, but he was going to be too late. I tried to draw a knife, but the large tribute slammed me against the ground, winding me for the second time that day and picked up a rock. My eyes widened in fear as I realized what he planned, and I called Cato's name one last time before it descended on my temple.
The first blow stunned me but the second knocked me out. When I came to, I could smell blood, but it was not fresh. I stumbled to my feet, detecting a solid wall of flesh near me. Screams surrounded me quickly as well as the sound of running feet. I slowly took off after the loudest, bumping against other objects that welcomed me into their midst with guttural groans.
Author's Note: Thanks for the reviews I've gotten so far! I loved the scene in Walking Dead with the bloated zombie stuck in the well, but never really understood why they tried so hard to get it out. :/ Thanks for reading and feel free to leave a note!