My first instinct is to scream. I want to scream. Then I remember Gaston's warning to tell him very quietly if I see a threat. Screaming would not qualify as very quietly.
"Gaston," I whisper softly. He must hear something in my voice because instead of making a rude remark, he puts on hand on his sword and slowly turns around.
I watch as his eyes scan the surrounding area, then settle on whatever is watching us.
"Back away from it," he whispers roughly. "If it hasn't attacked yet, it may not be dangerous."
Not dangerous? Yeah, right. But I do still take his advice and lift a foot to creep backwards.
That's when it jumps. I know that I should move, but it's as if my legs have frozen solid. The thing, an enormous streak of black, is about two feet away from killing me with razor sharp jaws when Gaston runs his sword through its neck. The thing's head clatters off my legs and lands just in front of me.
"That wasn't so bad," Gaston says. I try to laugh, but it comes out too high.
"Yeah, not so bad," I whisper, kicking the head. It was a panther. I lean in a little bit closer to study it when I realize that it doesn't look normal. It's eyes and the skin around its head seem to be bulging out, almost like they're going to explode. I furrow my brow and reach in to poke it when I realize that its expanding, like something is blowing it up with air. My eyes find the other half of its body, and the same thing is happening. Almost like it's going to explode…
"Oh, crap," I curse, already starting to run. "Gaston, we have to get out of here!"
To his credit, he doesn't question me, just takes off in the same way I'm going. I'm not quite ten feet away from the panther when all of the sudden… BANG!
My first thought is that the smell is terrible. My next is that someone had to have heard that. Then my last is what is the point of an exploding panther.
That's when Gaston careens into me with a moan. He quickly steadies himself on a tree, but his face is twisted in obvious pain.
"What happened?"
In response, he turns so that I can see his left arm.
I almost throw up. Whatever was inside of the panther had to have been acidic. The majority of his top two layers of skin has been eaten away from the back of his left elbow to his shoulder. His back probably would have been burnt too, but the pack had covered it. Instead, the material on the outside of the backpack is burnt away to reveal a plastic second layer.
But still, his arm is bad enough. I thought the gash was bad, but this is just…
"Okay, don't panic, don't panic," I say, looking around for anything to help.
"I'm not the one panicking," he says coldly. "Now just give me a second, it's not so bad."
"Not too bad? Not too bad? Your skin is gone!"
"And we have sponsors who can make it better later. For now we have to hide out, at least for a short while. That… thing made a lot of noise, and I'll bet you anything that someone is coming to investigate. We can just find a cave or something around this area. I'm guessing that I'll be good enough to finish stacking the grass in a couple of hours."
"Are you sure? Because that thing looks-"
"Duck!"
I drop to the ground, and a knife whizzes about two inches away from my head just a second later. Oh, God. Why now? Why couldn't this have happened ten minutes ago, before my bodyguard was hurt?
I quickly spin around and try to see who attacked, praying that it's not the Careers, because really, they would not be too easy to deal with right now. Instead, it's about the next worse thing. Byre, the big guy from Eleven, is standing in the clearing with a spear pointed at me, but both eyes on Gaston, who has nothing but a sword and a very obviously injured arm. I can almost see the gears in his brain turning, weighing the second that it'll take to kill me versus how long it'll take Gaston to get to him with the sword.
Trying to make as little movement as possible, I reach for the knife that Gaston gave me. Byre's eyes flash back down to me, but before he can throw the spear, I chuck the knife straight at him.
Okay, I don't throw it. There is no chance of it getting a good stick, but it forces Byre to deflect the knife with his spear. Gaston, instead of using the opportunity to charge like a good boy, uses the distraction to sling the pack off of his good arm and onto the ground.
Byre takes the half second before he regains his composure to get in position to chuck his spear. After that, everything is a blur. I think that I see the spear leave his hand, but if it does, Gaston knocks it away with his sword. Byre must draw a sword or lance, or something like that some point in there, because they're sword fighting when my fear has died down enough that I can see clearly.
I scurry backwards, my eyes both focused on the two of them. It's clear that Gaston would have taken care of Byre easily if his left shoulder hadn't been burnt through. Byre has little to no sword fighting experience, whereas Gaston is the most talented swordsman that I've ever seen, at least twice as good as even Dylan. The only problem is that he's basically fighting one handed.
My brain scrambles for some way to help him as Byre backs him further and further into the forest, but I can't think of anything. I couldn't throw a knife at him because I know that it wouldn't stick. If I ran up and tried to stab him in the back, I run the danger of getting whacked with a sword. I suppose the knife may distract him enough for Gaston to kill him, but I have serious doubts.
Then I see the spear that Byre had tried to chuck at me. Without really thinking about it, I pick it up and do my best to sneak up on Byre. Once I'm about five feet away, I take the spear and drive it into his back with as much force as I can manage.
I can see his sword arm go stiff immediately, and Gaston takes the opportunity to go on the offensive for the first time in the fight, stabbing his sword directly into Byre's stomach.
Byre makes this terrible gurgling sound that I don't think I'll ever forget, and I think that it bothers Gaston, too, because instead of just leaving him to die, he takes out his knife and slits his throat.
"G-grab his sword, Griffin," Gaston pants. I blanch at the idea of going anywhere near the blood-covered mess, but Gaston gives me a look that clearly says 'do it, or you'll be next', so I sprint forward and pry the sword out of Byre's fingers.
"Okay. I suppose we should probably get going now," I tell him, kind of hovering back. Gaston's covered in small gashes from the sword fight, and his arm has now swollen up a disgusting amount, and it's clearly affecting him. His eyes are glazed over, his entire face is ghostly white, and his chest is heaving.
In other words, he looks weak. Terrible, hopelessly weak. I don't know how to deal with a weak Gaston.
"No shit," he mutters hoarsely. "Go and get the pack and…and pick up your knife." He closes his eyes and leans his head back against a tree. "I'm not going to be able to carry anything. You'll have to… have to drag it."
"Right, okay. That sounds wonderful," I agree nervously, then quickly scramble to receive our things. I don't think that dragging the pack is an extremely good idea, so I put my arms through the straps and prepare myself to heave it up, then nearly pitch forward when I realize how light it is. Right, we left most of the junk at camp. I forgot about that, and apparently Gaston did, too. Although he kind of has an excuse.
Thinking about that reminds me that he's kind of almost defenseless at that moment, so I quickly hurry back to where he was standing.
"Are you going to be okay to walk?" I ask him.
"Fine," he mutters, then takes a deep breath and stands up straight. "You… you can lead, though."
After that, we slowly head deeper into the forest. I keep my eyes peeled for any place that would be halfway decent for some kind of shelter, but there's nothing, and Gaston is clearly in pain. Once we make it back to the beginning of the mountain with absolutely no luck, I order him to stop.
"B-But-"
"But we've got a wall at our backs, and we can see pretty well around us. I've got a sword-" He laughs, but I ignore him. "And you'll be fine in just a second because everyone loves you, and you've got lots of sponsors."
With that sentence, I look up to the sky and raise my arms dramatically. It's almost funny how quickly a parachute comes falling down towards us.
"See? So we'll rest here, grab something to eat quick, and then resume making the huge fire."
He just grunts, really not even paying attention anymore. I sigh and reach down to open up the parachute. There's a small metal jar that turns out to be filled with a putrid yellow cream when I open it.
I turn and start to scoop some up, but Gaston shakes his head. I jump back a little in surprise just because I really couldn't tell that he was still paying attention to me.
"Get the first aid kit," he slurs. I quickly dig through the bag until I find it. Once I've got it out, he takes a deep breath and says, "Now just… just pour that alcohol over my arm."
He closes his eyes and I can see him biting his lip. I know that it's going to hurt like hell when I rinse his arm off, and I'm not very big at hurting people. Even stabbing Byre with that thing made my gut twist.
Except I need Gaston's arm to get better, or I'm screwed. So I take a deep breath and carefully douse his shoulder with the alcohol.
He starts shaking, and his fists are clenched so tight that his knuckles are white, but he doesn't make a single noise. That makes it easier for me to polish off about half the bottle without having any fits of my own.
When I deem that it's clean, I step back and wait for Gaston to loosen up out of his position. It takes nearly an entire minute for his breathing to even out and his hands to quit shaking.
"Okay," he mutters through gritted teeth. "Now put that crap on it."
I retrieve the jar of 'crap' and open it up again. Then I hesitate.
Pouring the alcohol on was one thing. But actually touching his arm? Totally different.
"Do. It."
Right. It's better off than being the one with the acid-burned arm.
I carefully scoop some of the smelly yellow stuff into my fingers, then gingerly spread it over his mangled, scalded skin. Gaston lets out a low hiss of air that makes flinch back a little, but he doesn't ask me to stop, so I keep going until his arm is completely covered in that stuff.
"Now bandage it."
So I listen to him and quickly unroll a roll of bandages and cover his disgusting arm as quickly as I can. Once I'm finished, I have to admit that it doesn't look half as bad as I'd thought.
"Does it feel better now?" I ask. He glares at me. Apparently not.
"Just give me an hour," he says stiffly. I nod, then take a seat beside him on the log he'd positioned himself on. It isn't even two minutes before he's sleeping on my shoulder.
I half expect a tribute to come running out at us at exactly that moment, but no one does. After a while I decide that I should probably be keeping watch, so I grab Byre's sword and hold onto it tightly while I pray that Gaston wakes up soon.
A/N-
Okay, technically I got that updated within a week. Yes, I was cutting it close, and most people are probably asleep by now, but for me, it was a week. So I'm somewhat proud of myself. I just hope that the chapter wasn't too bad. I wasn't too sure about the action scenes since usually I'm writing from the POV of the person actually fighting, instead of the wimp who just sits there and watches. Because of that, they may be confusing, and/or unrealistic. If either of those things are the case, please tell me and I'll try to fix that.
Other than that, thanks to silver cat 777, Laura 2497, brooke13243546 (I will finish the Games even if Alessia dies. As for a sequel, I'm not sure. If there's no sequel, I'll do an epilogue, though), and Hahukum Konn for reviewing.
~bballgirl32~