Chapter Seven - Peeta and the Dead

Clove pushed open the door labled 'District 2 Female' and was surprised and slightly irritated to see her stylist, Cecilia, waiting to see her off. It's not that she didn't like Cecilia, it was just that she wasn't exactly the type of person she wanted to spend the last moments of her short life with. Wouldn't it have made more sense to say her goodbyes to her mentor?

"Clove." Cecilia muttered sombrely, slipping something into her hand, "Your token. You would have had it back earlier, but the Gamemakers decided to double-check everything...just in case."

Clove stared at the small object in her palm. A scrap of paper with a pressed four-leaf clover on it. Cato had found it in the woods by the quarry. He had given it to her on her first reaping. She couldn't supress her tears any longer.

"Don't cry, honey! You're gonna be okay!" Cecilia sobbed, throwing her arms around Clove's trembling shoulders. They both wept bitterly for a couple of minutes, until a voice announced that there were 30 seconds left before launching. Slowly, Clove wiped her eyes and stood on the launch pad.

"It's been an honour, Clove," sniffed Cecilia, "Being your stylist."

Clove wanted to tell her that she was a brilliant designer, that the dresses she had made were the most beautiful things she had ever set eyes upon...but it was too late. The door to the launch tube had slid shut and she felt her stomach lurch as she rocketed upwards.

Happy Hunger Games, Clove, she sighed to herself, May the odds be ever in your favour.


The clock ticked slowly, almost mockingly. 60...59...you're about to die, Clove...54...53..52...51...and your brother with you...47...46...45...why don't you just jump on a mine?...39...38...37...It'll be over much sooner that way...32...31...30...you're going to have to run into the bloodbath, little girl, you're a Career...24...23...22...21...20...19...you'll probably be the first to die. You'll get stabbed in the back and bleed out slowly...10...9...you'll live just long enough to see the pain in Cato's eyes when he realises that he's losing you...5...4...3...get ready, Mutt-face...1...BOOM!

As soon as the starting cannon fired, Clove felt herself speeding towards the Cornucopia, almost involunterily. She could hear screams and yells around her, but she didn't care anymore. She scooped up a bag of knives, ducked to avoid a low-flying severed arm and whirled around, deftly slashing the throat of the boy from District 9. As the warm blood flowed onto her hands, she let out a slight giggle. Her first kill. It was a lot easier than she had expected...in fact, it was almost fun! No wonder the girls in 2 revelled so much in her pain!

She smiled to herself, throwing a knife into the back of another tribute without bothering to look who it was. Deciding that her allies were doing a pretty good job by themselves, she began gathering supplies from the corpses. Blood was running across the grassy earth like a dozen crimson rivers, but Clove had been covered in blood many times before - it didn't bother her in the slightest.

After the frenzy had died down, the Careers began pulling the gored bodies away from the Cornucopia because (as Glimmer so aptly summed up) it just wasn't hygenic to have dead people right next to their food. As Clove dragged the mangled District 3 girl into the bushes, she felt somebody grab her ankle. She toppled to the ground with a muffled yelp, right on the spot where the 3 girl's guts had leaked out onto the ground.

"Well, well, District 2," smirked the person who had tripped her, "Who'd have thought someone like you would end up dead on the first day..." the boy laughed to himself and threw a spear at her. If she hadn't rolled out of the way just in the nick of time, it would have gone straight through her right lung. As it was, it stuck into her shoulder.

"Get the Hell off me!" she screeched, leaping to her feet and pulling the spear from her arm, "Oh. Lover Boy. I should have known."

Peeta flashed her a maniacal grin, lunging at her. "You should roll around in other people's intestines more often, lucky Clover. It suits you."

"Oh, go burn yourself."

For a couple of minutes, they wrestled in the undergrowth, insulting each other and growling visciously, until Clove eventually became overpowered by Peeta's brute strength. He pinned her to the floor, smiling like a madman, holding his spear above her head.

"Now," he sneered, "I could kill you here and now, if I wanted, but then your brother wouldn't be best pleased with me, would he? I don't know much about your family, but you strike me as the type it would be a bad idea to cross. So, if you let me join your alliance, I'll let you live...for the time being. Deal?"

Clove squirmed under his grasp. Why didn't he just kill her and make a run for it? Why would he want to be in a Career alliance? Why was he threatening her when he knew full well that she could easily stab his eyes out if he wasn't sitting on her arms? After a few seconds of thought, she nodded.

"Okay, you can be in the stupid alliance. Now get off me!"

Thankfully, he obliged. "Good. Come on, the others will be wondering where you are."

Clove scrambled up and ran back to the Cornucopia, still dripping with gore. When Glimmer caught sight of her, she let out an ear-splitting scream of horror.

"Clove! What happened? Why are you covered in..."

"Glimmer, it's okay, calm down! They're not my innards!"

"Oh, Clove!" she cried, wrapping her arms around her ally with an unpleasant squelch. "I was so scared! You went over there to get rid of a body, didn't come back for half an hour and then you run out of the woods with blood all over you!" a couple of straay tears dripped off Glimmer's nose. They landed on Clove's injured shoulder, causing her to flinch with the stinging pain.

"What's that? What's wrong with your shoulder?"

"Oh...it's nothing. I'm fine."

"That is not nothing, Clove Hrocby, that's a serious wound! How did it h-"

She was cut off by a blood-soaked Peeta running into the clearing. If Glimmer's first scream had been piercing, it was nothing compared to the one she uttered now.

"A-a ghost! It's a ghost!"

"What's a ghost now?" asked Marvel, jogging out from inside the Cornucopia where he, Cato and Scylla had been busy setting up camp.

"I'm still alive, you idiot!" Peeta called, brushing scraps of stray internal organs onto the grass, "And I intend to remain so for at least the rest of the day, so please stop trying to aim that knife at my throat, Clove. At least let me make my point before you try to kill me."


A/N: Johnny and the Dead by Terry Pratchett. Apologies to anybody who doesn't approve of literature about two teenagers rolling around in other people's guts. Also, be warned, there may be some severe Peeta insulting and injury soon. He killed Foxface, so I will make him suffer for it! MWAHAHA!

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