7 - The Chase
The Careers leave the Cornucopia united, but the cracks in their alliance are beginning to show even before they reach the edge of the woods.
"...And I say we follow them!" Julian points his spear to the northern mountain, where Bethan Milligan's dark shape is still visible as she scales the rock. "The ones from Eight went up there, if we let them get away with that, they'll get themselves set in, and then we'll never dig them out!"
"What are you, stupid?" Harriet sneers, beckoning the other Careers after her as she continues into the trees. "All the other tributes are in the woods, where there's lots of places to hide, and there's food, probably water too. The brats from Eight are going to have to come down sooner or later. Now shut up, and come on."
"Listen, Keeler," Julian says hotly, "just because your daddy was a Victor..."
"Shut it!" Titus cuts across their bickering, slapping the flat of his sword against Julian's chest. "Whatever we do, you need to shut up, fishboy, or the whole Arena's going to know where we are and we won't find anyone at all. Harriet's right. Woods."
Harriet's white teeth flash in a smile, and she nods to Titus, who glowers back. Julian looks about ready to kill them both with his bare hands, but holds himself back with an obvious effort, his hands tightening on his spear until the knuckles go white. "Fine," he grumbles, his face twisted up with anger. "But you can't just act like this whole Arena belongs to you, Keeler, I..."
"The man said shut it, Julie," Harriet hisses back at him, eyes narrowing, and drops into a crouch. "I saw that giant girl from Ten go this way. Looked hurt. C'mon." With that authoritative command putting an end to the argument for the time being, she turns her back on Julian and the others, setting off at a run through the undergrowth. With various degrees of enthusiasm, the other four Careers follow. For all his sulkiness, Julian's face soon sets in determination, and before long, he's running only a step or two behind Titus and Harriet.
Althea is the first to catch sight of Nate's blonde hair through the trees, and she peels away from the rest of the group, speeding up and beckoning the other Careers after her as she darts through the trees. Her long legs are a blur, her chestnut ponytail bouncing against her back, and she's on top of Nate a split second after he turns to run. Pulling a knife out of her belt, she laughs merrily as she lunges in front of him. He turns, trying to dodge her, but she's faster, and the other Careers are pelting through the woods towards him, silence abandoned, whooping and roaring. The odds do not look like they're in Nate Dixon's favour. The backpack he grabbed at the Cornucopia takes the brunt of the first slash from Althea's knife, but the other Careers are closing in, Julian and Harriet jostling for position at the head, while Titus reverses his sword, ready to slash, and moves around to the left to pen Nate in fully. Now that he's trapped, the Careers lose some of their frantic rush, moving in slowly and with some relish. Nate, who failed to pick up a weapon in the bloodbath, scrabbles for something to defend himself with, snatching up a sizeable branch from the ground and gritting his teeth. He's obviously decided that, if he has to die, he's going to go down fighting.
There's a moment of quiet, as the Careers circle like wolves and Nate pants, sweat standing out on his forehead, Adam's apple jumping as he panics. Then, a flash of movement.
It doesn't come from the Careers. It doesn't come from Nate, either. It comes from Eoin, who thunders into view - running almost as fast as Althea, if far less nimbly – and, before the Careers can react, brings both bunched fists down against the base of Titus' skull. The big District Two tribute folds silently into unconsciousness, and the giant from District Twelve steps over him, beckoning Nate frantically.
"Run, Seven! Come on!"
Nate doesn't need telling twice. He bolts, head down and short legs pumping, his breath huffing out through gritted teeth. Eoin lopes along beside him, making rather better time; after a moment, as Althea gives chase with a whoop and a yell, the District Twelve boy grabs Nate by the wrist, dragging him along bodily. One of Althea's throwing knives lodges itself in Nate's thigh, but she had to slow to throw it, and the gap between the District boys and the Careers is widening. Eoin shoots a glance back over his shoulder as they dart through the thickening trees, and, seeing that Althea is momentarily out of sight, hurls Nate bodily into a thicket with an emphatic finger to his lips as he goes on running. A camera mounted on one of the nearby trees catches a close-up of his face; broad, freckled, and split by an unashamed grin.
"Hey!" he yells over his shoulder, and laughs scornfully. "Hey, Two! Can't catch me!" And then he's gone, laughing as if this was just a romp in the woods with a friend, while the baying mob of Careers give chase. He leaps like a deer over a fallen tree, skids under a low branch, and runs on, still laughing and jeering.
In the tight space where they wormed together after the bloodbath, Deb and Simon listen to the howling and crashing of the chase, shrinking against each other and holding their breath as first Eoin, and then the four Careers, pelt past their hiding place. It isn't until the sounds have faded to dim echoes that the two younger tributes breathe again, drawing away from each other. For a moment, they regard each other in silence, suspicious and guarded, the shy, technologically adept girl from Three and the awkward young doctor from Nine. Neither are armed. Both are mud-streaked and gasping, and look terrified.
Simon speaks first, his voice low and cracking from the strain. "Are... are you going to try and kill me now?"
Mutely, Deb shakes her head, her muddy brown eyes wide. Crushed in the confines of the hollow tree, with the camera forced so close against them, the audience get a very narrow view, but what they do see is in enormous detail; the tearfulness of Deb's eyes, the way Simon shakes slightly as he speaks.
"They will," he says, quietly.
Still mute, Deb nods, but there's something a little sarcastic about her nod this time, as if to say of course they will.
"You got a high score. In training." Simon leans out of the tree a little, looking to and fro warily, and incidentally elbowing Deb in the ribs where they're wedged together. She winces visibly; his elbows are bony and sharp. "You've got to have something that can help us."
Now Deb seems to find her voice. "Us?" She frowns. "There's an us?"
Simon opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again. "Um. I mean. I kind of assumed." He's gone pink, which makes him look even more awkward and gangly, as does the fact that he's trying to disentangle himself from Deb without touching anything inappropriate. "Since, um, you know, we don't have much chance on our own, and..."
There's an audible pop as he manages to push himself out of the tree, landing in an undignified sprawl on the pine needles. "You know what? Never mind. I'll just, I..." Scrambling to his feet, he tugs off his reflective jacket and bundles it up so that the reflective stripes are on the inside, shoving it under his arm. "Thanks. For, um, for not killing me." Cocking his head, listening to Eoin's distant yelling, he smiles weakly at Deb and lollops off in the other direction.
Inside the hollow tree, Deb frowns after him, moving as if to call after him, then sighs and collapses back into the small, damp hollow of the tree. Adjusting herself into a more comfortable position, she reaches out to rearrange the low-hanging branches Simon disturbed, effectively hiding herself again.
Hearing the whooping and yelling from the forest, Sart uncurls gingerly from his hiding place among the rocks, his big brown eyes peering out through the scrubby undergrowth as he tries to see what's going on. Although Eoin is leading the Careers a merry chase all around the Arena, still yelling and whooping to draw attention, none of it's visible from Sart's hiding place. He cocks his head, listening to the raised voices echoing off the rocks, and risks leaving his cover after half an hour or so. His crippled arm tugged against his chest, his bony body close to the ground, he scuttles along the bare rock, looking up every few seconds, like a rabbit that smells a hunter. He's quiet, but his breath rasps in the cold air, huffing out into clouds.
The mountains claw up towards the sky in jagged symphony, and Sart casts a look to the sharp horizon of the Arena, his dark eyebrows pulling together. Mostly, though, he keeps his eyes on the ground at his feet, where the treacherously loose rocks clutch for an unwary foot. Once or twice he stumbles, catching himself with his good arm as scree skitters out from under his foot; each time he freezes, supporting himself on his hand and holding his breath for a moment, only moving on when he's sure there's nobody watching.
He makes slow time over the rough ground, scurrying across the open spaces like a mouse, his breathing increasingly laboured. At last he makes it to cover, diving the last few feet to the heap of boulders, and not a moment too soon – down by the woods, Eoin bursts out into the open, head down, heading straight up the hill, while the Careers string out behind him. Sart watches from between two slabs of granite as the distant figures wheel and stumble up the hill, all of them clearly tiring.
Titus doesn't stir for a long time, although the cameras catch the thin steam of his breath, confirming that he's not dead but unconscious. The District Twelve giant struck him a good blow, and it's clear that he'll have a hell of a headache when he wakes up. If he wakes up, because just in view of the cameras, there's a stir of movement. Alice Calle, the girl from Nine, edges cautiously through the trees, her eyes on Titus' unmoving body. The bow she retrieved at the bloodbath is slung over her back, along with the quiver of arrows. She's made a largely unsuccessful attempt to cover the reflective strips of her jacket with mud, and smeared more mud on her brown cheeks, breaking up the lines to make herself less of a target.
She moves quietly, cautiously, towards where Titus lies with his limp hand still gripping his sword. Looking this way and that, clearly suspicious, she squats down next to him; her pose is taut and tense, ready to break into a run at any moment. Holding her breath, her movements slow and delicate, she reaches out.
When she touches the sword, she freezes, but Titus doesn't move. Encouraged, Alice shifts a little closer, eyes flicking to and fro one more time. Her fingers close around the pommel of the sword, and she tugs it out of his grip.
He wakes up. Half-conscious, he grips the sword tighter, fingers catching under the haft, and yanks back against her grip on the sword, his eyes flickering blearily open. Alice makes a strangled sound that isn't quite a scream, recoiling, but at the same time she wraps her free hand around the haft of the sword. There's a lot caught up in the noise she makes – angry and panicked and disgusted – as she leaps to her feet, kicking him in the face again and again, still hauling all her weight against the sword they both hold.
Titus' nose makes a horrible noise, gushing blood onto the packed earth as it breaks. He spits crimson from a split lip, and his grip loosens for a split second, long enough for Alice to haul the sword out of his grip and leap away, her thin chest heaving with effort and fear. Her hands shaking, she tries to heft the sword, but it's heavy and she's clearly unused to the weight, and despite his injuries, Titus is getting up, and although his charge is a little unsteady, he's twice her weight and rapidly regaining his senses. Alice hesitates a moment, and you can almost see the cogs ticking in her mind – this might be the last time she gets a chance to kill one of the biggest threats in the Arena, but he's bigger and stronger than her, and she's clearly having trouble hefting the sword, let alone using it.
As he charges like a bull, shaking the disorientation from his head, she takes the initiative. When Titus ducks under her first wild swing, though, and keeps coming, Alice's nerve breaks, and she bolts, dragging the heavy sword along with her. Titus follows, but only for a few steps, then slumps back against a tree with his hand against the rising lump on the back of his head.
Alice keeps running, not looking back. Unbeknownst to her, her path takes her in the Careers' footsteps, and she pelts over already-disturbed ground. From the bush where he was thrown, and where he now lies dizzy and bleeding from the leg, Nate watches her pass, then collapses back onto the ground, relaxing again, as soon as she's out of earshot. The whooping and yelling of the chase has faded to nothing; Nate is clearly struggling with his injury, nudging the knife in his leg and almost fainting from the pain. It's obvious he has to get it out, but the first time he tries, it's just as obvious that it's stuck deep, the vicious blade jammed up against his thighbone, through the thick muscle of his leg. The knife, and now his hands, are slick with blood; Althea's aim might not have been true, but she threw hard, and it's lodged solidly.
"Brought you someone," a voice says quietly behind him, and although Nate must recognise the District Twelve boy who saved him, there's still undisguised fear when he rolls over to face him. Eoin is red-faced and sweating, and there's a bloody gash across one of his broad biceps, but he looks less hurt than simply exhausted. Beside him, white-faced and terrified and with Eoin's hand around one bony wrist, is Simon Naysmith.
Nate blinks, but he must register that he doesn't have a chance if he fights, because the rock he'd lifted to defend himself with now drops out of his hand. "What's your game?" he rasps, licking his lips. "Why save me? Why not kill him?"
Eoin replies with a wordless grunt, kneeling down next to Nate and wrapping one massive hand around the knife's bloodsoaked grip. Simon, now released, hesitates for a moment between running and staying, then drops to his knee next to Eoin. "Not yet," he mumbles, with a frightened look at the older boy. "We've got to..." His bundled-up jacket is still under one arm. Carefully, with the air of someone who knows his every move is being scrutinised, he rests it against Nate's leg, just above the knife. "Okay." He takes a deep breath, looking at Eoin, who smiles a smile which would be reassuring in any other setting. "Okay. Now!"
Eoin yanks the knife out, grunting with effort, his hands slipping and sliding as he struggles not to widen the wound further. The second the tip leaves the wound, as Nate stifles his own scream with both hands, Simon clamps the wadded-up jacket over the hole, stemming the bleeding. On his nervous, but firm, direction, Eoin quickly yanks off his belt, fastening it tight around the top of Nate's thigh. They stay there a moment, in tableau; Simon with his white face set in fear and determination, Eoin holding the belt tight around Nate's leg, and Nate himself stretched out on the ground, hands over his mouth, while his eyes roll up into his skull and his consciousness fades.
At last, Simon hands the jacket to Eoin, indicating for him to keep it on the wound, and takes off his own belt to strap the makeshift dressing in place. Eoin waits, watching as he does so, but the moment the dressing is buckled into place, he straightens up. "We can't stay here," he observes, still breathing harshly. His hands are red with Nate's blood. "We've got to find water, something to wash out the cut, somewhere to hide, right?" Without waiting for an answer from Simon, he lifts Nate's unconscious form across his shoulders and sets out with determined tread.
"We?" Simon repeats, blinking, but he follows without argument. It isn't until a while later, when they've left the little wood for a cave in the foothills, that he speaks again. "Why... what he said. Why'd you save him? And me?"
Eoin looks up from the fire he's building in the back of the shallow cave, and glances at Nate, still unconscious in the corner. "Because I won't..." he starts, then closes his mouth, running his blood-crusted hands through his hair. "Because there's a lot of people gunning for me now," he amends, "and if there's one thing I've learnt from the Games I've seen, it's that the Careers don't do best just because they're trained. Simple maths. There's strength in numbers." He smiles a little, and in the evening light from outside, his grey eyes look almost damp. "It's our best chance, sticking together. So I'll look after you."
