A/N: Warning-This chapter contains graphic violence.
"Well, fuck. There went the last three months of my life," Johanna said, rolling her eyes. Both of the District 10 tributes had been killed at the bloodbath. She got up and walked out of the room.
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"You're dismissed," Johanna said as she entered the District 7 mentoring room.
But Cato, who was on his phone with someone, just turned to glare at her, with a finger to his lips.
"Oh. It's nice to see he cares," she said to Trini sarcastically. "He's not even paying attention." She gestured to the screen, which showed Hera sprinting through the forest.
"He's on the phone with one of the gamemakers," said Trini, not removing her eyes from the screen. "I'm supposed to tell him if she gets within the vicinity of another tribute."
Johanna was confused. "What's he talking to the gamemaker about?"
"He's placing an order for her."
"With what? He didn't bother to get her any money."
Trini pointed to the computer screen on the desk, open to Hera's sponsorship account. "Yes he did. He was just sneaky about it."
"HOLY SHIT!" Johanna yelled when she saw the balance.
"Shhhhhhh!" Cato and Trini both hissed at her at the same time.
When he got off the phone, he turned to Johanna. "What do you want?"
"How did you do this?" she asked, pointing to the computer screen.
He showed her the video. "I sent it out to to a bunch of people. This morning. As soon as the hovercraft lifted off. I didn't want anyone to know what she could do while there was still the slightest chance of it getting back to any of the other tributes."
"Any of the other tributes? Don't Clay and Clove know? Didn't you tell them?"
"No."
"I don't understand. When did you take this?" She pointed to the phone.
"About a month ago."
"Wait...how long ago did you plan this?"
"...also about a month ago." He rubbed a hand across his face tiredly. "I'm just relieved it worked. I was worried she either wouldn't listen to me and she'd run into the bloodbath or that it would turn out I'd been wrong and no one would send money and then she'd be up shit creek without a paddle."
Johanna was silent for a minute, trying to digest the fact that Cato was actually helping Hera survive.
What about his District? What about Clay? she wondered. "Cato. You know this means she could win over Clay, right?"
"That's the general idea," he said dryly.
"And it's gonna get leaked to the commentators. They're gonna show it on national television. What you did for her. Your district will hate you."
"I don't give a shit."
"But why? Why don't you give a shit? Why did you do this?"
But he didn't answer. He just looked down at the floor.
And then, all of a sudden, Johanna understood.
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Hera hadn't even been settled into the branches of the tree she'd chosen for ten minutes when she heard it. The delicate chiming sound that signaled the arrival of a sponsor gift.
Shit she thought to herself. There's someone else here. Do they know where I am? Are they looking for me? Is it Clay? Did he follow me here? The second she had looked into his eyes as she stood on her plate, she had abandoned any thought she'd given to going for the backpack, and when the clock hit zero, she had turned and sprinted for the forest with a speed borne of sheer terror. She turned back once to see if he was following her, but no, he had leapt right into the thick of the action. And so she had run for ten minutes, twenty minutes, thirty, before finally choosing a tree and launching herself up into what she had assumed to be a safe haven. But now, someone else was obviously in her immediate vicinity, and she felt another wave of terror wash over her.
But her fear was replaced with surprise a second later when the silver parachute wafted down within a couple feet of her. She reached out and plucked it from the air, surprised at how heavy and large the capsule was.
This has to be some kind of mistake. The gamemakers screwed up and accidentally sent someone else's gift to me.
But no, there on the lid, clear as day, was a 7. When she pried it off, she discovered an olive green backpack inside the capsule. And when she unzipped it to examine its contents, she gasped.
Four bottles of water. Dried apricots. Nuts. Crackers. Beef jerky. A rope. Water purification tablets. A paper-thin blanket that looked like it would be useless against the cold.
And a set of six silver throwing knives.
How the-? What the-? I don't understand. How did he-?
She looked into the capsule again, remembering that mentors usually sent a brief note with each gift. But she didn't see one.
Maybe in the backpack? And there, in the front pocket, was a little slip of paper.
What's it gonna be? it said. Butcher or cattle?
She sighed and closed her eyes. And then she folded the note up and put it in the pocket of her jacket.
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It was actually boring. But, paradoxically, boring was scary because it meant waiting. Waiting and thinking.
Julian's face appeared in the sky that first night, and Hera felt a little sad. But mostly she felt relieved for him. He was at peace, not suffering, not in pain, and not in fear.
She sat high up in the trees for five full days, and on that first night, she discovered that the blanket in her pack, which she had initially viewed with skepticism, was actually incredibly warm, clearly some kind of advanced technology from 3. And so, even though she couldn't relax completely, she slept better than she would have thought possible, tied to a branch high up in the air, concealed among the leaves.
She only came down to the forest floor to replenish her water supply at a nearby stream. She'd climb to the very top of one of the taller trees to ensure that no other tributes were within easy range of her, and then she'd slip down to the ground, hurriedly fill up her water bottles, and dart back up into the trees.
Her ass was perpetually numb from sitting in the branches.
She didn't want to lose her edge from sitting all the time, so she monkeyed around in the branches for at least a few hours a day, playing a game with herself to see how graceful and stealthy she could be. And sometimes, when she was sure she was a safe distance from the other tributes, she would snap little twigs from the branches and pretend they were knives, flicking her wrist to try to hit some spot she chose at random to serve as her target.
She thought about Rue a lot. She wanted to try to find her, but she knew it would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. She hadn't seen which way they girl had run at the Cornucopia. She only knew that she was still alive.
She shuddered whenever she heard the cannon go off.
At night, she would watch the faces of the dead play across the sky, feeling that, rather than increasing her chances of survival, each fallen tribute brought her closer to danger, closer to open conflict. For Hera, this was the calm before the storm.
A couple of times a day a tribute would pass by, close enough for her to see the top of their head or hear their footsteps. And once, the troop of Careers passed directly beneath her, bantering back and forth with one another, too cocky to worry about anyone hearing them. She felt a stab of fear, but they disappeared from her view within seconds, and after five minutes she couldn't hear them laughing anymore.
And then, on the evening of the sixth day, after the anthem had played, she ticked off who was left on her fingers. Clay. Clove. Marvel. Glimmer. Rue. Thresh. Hera.
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She heard them just before she saw them. She was getting her daily exercise, climbing around in the branches, and she was only about seven feet off the ground when she heard the sound of two sets of footsteps sprinting over the ground. She froze as Rue came into view, literally running for her life, followed closely by that bitch from 1.
"It's no use, little rat!" Glimmer called gleefully. "Your time has come. Just lay down and roll over and give in to the inevitable!"
Hera had assumed that the decision to kill someone in the arena would be a difficult one to make. That she would wage an internal battle with herself as the part of her that couldn't stomach the idea of taking the life of another screamed and raged. But she was wrong. At least when it came to saving Rue.
As though it were a matter of course, an action as natural as breathing or eating or sleeping, she unsheathed one of her knives from the holster on her thigh, and as the the girl from 1 passed beneath her tree, she lodged it into her brainstem.
Glimmer never even knew what hit her.
Rue continued to run for her life, even after the cannon sounded. Hera leapt from her tree and followed after her, but she'd lost sight of the little girl. "Rue!" she called. "Rue, it's ok! She's dead!" There was a rustle from a nearby tree, and Rue poked her head out from behind the leaves. "It's ok. She's dead. You can come down. I'm not gonna hurt you."
Rue considered her for a moment, and then scrambled to the ground and took a few tentative steps toward her.
"I'm not gonna hurt you. I promise. Do you trust me?" Rue studied her intently for just a few more seconds, and then nodded resolutely.
"Good. Come on, we need to get away from here before the hovercraft arrives and gives our location away."
She took a good look at Rue. She was in good shape, and she had a backpack of her own, in spite of the fact that she had fled the bloodbath immediately. You kept your promise, Hera mentally said to Lila Dunderhaven. Thank you.
The two girls took off at a decent pace, and stopped a couple of miles away when they found a suitable tree to shelter them for the time being.
"How many tributes have you killed so far?" Rue asked her.
"Just her." Hera was unnerved. Now that the adrenaline and fear for Rue's safety had worn off, she was trying to dissociate herself from the events of earlier, and the little girl's question forced her to verbally acknowledge what she'd just done to another human being. She pushed her guilt down. You don't have time for that right now, she told herself. You have a little girl to look after.
"Really?" Rue looked surprised. "Why did you help me? You could have just stayed up there and she never would have seen you."
"You're the same age as the little girl I take care of back in 7."
"The one you volunteered for?"
"Yes."
"What's her name?"
"Tara."
"What's she like?"
So Hera told her all about the Callahan children, and about Uma.
And then Rue told her about life in 11. About her older brother and her little sister, and her friends at school.
"What about that guy?" Rue asked a while later.
"What guy?"
"Tara's dad. The one who was going to ask you to marry him?"
Hera felt herself blushing. "Oh...I…"
"He's handsome," Rue said, and giggled.
"Yes, he is," Hera admitted.
"Has he kissed you?"
"Rue!" Hera chided her. "That's not your business." But she couldn't help but smile.
"That means yes," the little girl giggled.
"Stop!" Hera said laughingly, and ruffled her hand through Rue's curls.
The sun was starting to set, so they secured themselves in their branches with rope for the night, Rue resting in one just below and to the right of Hera's perch.
"What do you miss most?" she asked Hera after the anthem had played and Glimmer's face had faded from the sky.
Hera thought about it for a minute, glad to be distracted from the new wave of guilt the sight of Glimmer's face had brought on. "Holding Tara's baby sister Mia. What do you miss most?"
"Peach pie...and my mom singing me lullabies. Did you ever sing to Mia?"
"Yes."
"Will you sing me to sleep?"
Hera had never sung in public, only to Mia and the other Callahan children, and she dreaded the idea of singing to the entire nation. But she didn't have the heart to deny Rue this comfort. So she placed her hand on top of Rue's head and smoothed her springy curls back, closed her eyes, and sang lullabies softly until she heard the little girl's breath slow itself and even out.
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In the mentoring room, Cato froze. He knew that voice. It was low and soft and sweet and rich like honey.
And he knew those songs. They were the exact same lullabies that had comforted him for the past few months.
He reached out and took hold of Gianni's sleeve. "Did she know about my nightmares?" he asked, but his eyes stayed on the screen, on Hera's face.
Gianni gave him a puzzled look. "Yeah. She said they woke her up a couple times a week. Why?"
But he just shook his head and stared at Hera in wonder.
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The three remaining Careers sat at the Cornucopia staring at the sky in astonishment when Glimmer's face appeared.
When the cannon had gone off earlier that afternoon they'd all grinned at each other. She had gone off hunting by herself, and they figured she'd caught and killed 7 or 11.
"Well, she wasn't the brightest crayon in the box," Clove said. "She probably fell off of a cliff or something."
"Or maybe she ran into some kind of mutt," Marvel said. "Or there's always Thresh...but she went west and he's been hanging out to the east, so it's unlikely."
They didn't even consider the possibility that Hera had killed her.
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The arena was warm and sunny, and they spent the day after Hera killed Glimmer alternating between sleeping and talking.
Rue had gotten a sponsor gift every day, so she had lots of little treats in her backpack. Bread and oranges and little cheeses wrapped in red wax. She'd even gotten soup a couple of times, she told Hera.. "I got a lot of sponsors. My mentor was surprised." There was a sly look in her eyes, and an affected offhandedness to her voice.
"Who's your mentor again?" Hera wanted to change to subject.
"Finnick Odair."
Oh, yes. Finnick Odair. The Capitol women loved him almost as much as they loved Cato. Finnick was the charmer, the smooth talker. A perfect contrast to Cato's bad boy allure.
"Did he help you?"
"Yeah. He taught me to climb. And hide. He was really worried after the Sponsor Gala that I wouldn't get a lot of donations. He seemed kinda mad at himself and said he should have tried harder. But then he laughed when he saw my list." There was that tone again.
She really likes to talk about this sponsorship thing, doesn't she? "Did he tell you about the ocean and District 4?"
"Yeah," Rue said.
"What did he say? I really want to see it some day." This time she succeeded in changing the subject, and the topic didn't come up again.
They were eating their dinner when the cannon went off. The two girls looked at each other with wide eyes.
"Who do you think it was?" Rue asked.
"Not sure." Hera hoped it had signaled Clay's death, but she had a bad feeling that wasn't the case.
"I hope it wasn't Thresh," Rue said. Hera smiled at her sadly. She thought about trying to reassure the girl that it wasn't, but that just seemed like a ridiculous thing to do at this point.
They held their breath as they sat next to each other in the branches when the sky turned dark and the anthem played. When Thresh's face appeared, she heard Rue sniffle next to her. "I'm sorry sweetie," she whispered as she put her arms around her and kissed the top of her head.
When Rue had cried herself out, Hera told her it was time for them to tie themselves in, and then she sang her companion to sleep. It took her a while tonight.
She sat and looked up at the moon as Rue slept. It was just the two of them and three Careers left. The thought made her shudder with fear. What was she going to do? What should her next move be? Should she keep hiding out or should she attack head-on? She didn't know if she had it in her to simply cast knives into their eyes as though they were no different than the green holograms back at the Training Center. But what if she waited until they actually threatened her and Rue and something went wrong?
The night grew chilly and she shivered and blew on her fingers to warm them, and then she pulled the blanket up around her chin. She put her hands into her pockets and the fingers of her right hand brushed against the note from Cato. She took it between her thumb and forefinger and rubbed the edges of the paper.
Butcher or cattle? Butcher or cattle? Butcher or cattle? What's it gonna be? She didn't know the answer.
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They ran out of water the next afternoon. A quick canvas of the immediate vicinity to look for a source proved to be unproductive. It was going to start getting dark in a couple of hours, and Hera wanted to make sure their bottles were filled by then. So she decided to go for the sure bet.
"There's a stream about two miles south and a little to the east of here," she said to Rue. "Near where you found me." She briefly considered leaving Rue behind in case she ran into trouble on the way there, but she'd be pushing it timewise, and it might be too dark for her to see before she could make it back to her. The idea of Rue spending the night alone didn't sit well with her, so she decided to bring her along, cursing herself for not setting out earlier.
They were about halfway there when Rue spoke up out of nowhere. "Look, I know what you did for me. I saw you at that party. Talking to all of those women with babies and little kids. Finnick showed me my list of sponsors the night before they put us in here, and it was all of them. Those women. You got them to sponsor me."
Hera stopped walking and turned to look at the little girl. She thought about denying it, but what was the point? "You weren't supposed to know about that."
"Why did you do it?"
"Because I think you should go home."
"But what about you?" Rue whispered, and her bottom lip was trembling.
"Don't you worry about that," Hera said gently, putting a hand to her cheek. "Ok?" She turned and began walking again.
"You stay back here," she instructed when they were about a hundred yards from the stream. She didn't like how open the ground was on its banks, and she knew that the Careers would be scouting out places near water. "I'll fill the bottles."
She didn't see Rue when she returned to the spot where she'd left her. "Rue!" she called softly. "Rue! Where did you go?" She spun in a circle slowly, scanning the area. And then she saw her.
Her body was propped up in a sitting position against the trunk of a nearby tree.
Her head sat upright, eyes open but lifeless, on the ground beside it.
Her outstretched legs were crossed casually, one over the other.
One hand was placed in her lap. The other rested on top of her own curls.
Her killer had made a joke of her death.
Hera dropped to her knees as shock took over her. I'm not here. I'm not here. This isn't happening.
The sounds of the forest disappeared and a steady rush of white noise filled her ears. I'm not here.
She put her hands over her head and buried her face in the ground. This isn't happening.
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They set fire to the justice center in District 11. They attacked the Peacekeepers. They hung their mayor, a notorious Capitol loyalist, from the balcony of his mansion. Reinforcements had to be sent in from the Capitol and from District 2. It took them more than 12 hours to restore order.
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In the Capitol, no one would say it aloud in a group of people. But they started to murmur it to their family members as they sat next to them on their couches, to whisper it to their closest friends at their viewing parties.
Maybe this was just a touch over the line.
Maybe the games had become just a bit too cruel.
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Hera didn't know how much time passed. It could have been five seconds or it could have been an hour. But when she lifted her head, there was Clay, standing not more than ten feet from her, holding his sword and laughing. Or at least she assumed he was laughing, because she still heard nothing but the constant rushing. But his body was shaking and his chest was heaving and his head was thrown back, his eyes half closed, his mouth wide open.
When he saw her looking at him, he stopped laughing, but his eyes were still merry. His mouth moved, forming words she couldn't hear, and he tossed his sword to the side before throwing his head back again in glee.
Her shock was replaced by a pure, uncontainable rage, and she leapt to her feet and charged him.
Only to be thrown backwards by his fist in the side of her face. But she felt no pain.
She stood and spit out a mouthful of blood and two teeth. But she tasted no iron.
Of course. Because I'm not here. This isn't happening.
His mouth was forming words that, once again, she couldn't hear, and he lifted his arms wide at his sides. Then he resumed his laughter, with his tongue poking out between his teeth.
She charged him again, and this time she managed to pop him just under his chin with one tight, precise uppercut. It wasn't all that powerful, but it caught him completely off-guard. His head snapped up, and a small spray of blood shot from his mouth as his teeth severed part of his tongue. Without a thought, she sent a jab straight into his windpipe. The blow made him step backwards, and she lunged forward and shoved him. He fell backwards onto the ground but almost immediately, he sat up, reaching for her leg to try to yank her down to the ground. But she was anticipating it; Cato had taught her that a skilled opponent was more likely to do that so they could jump on top of her and take control than waste their time trying to jump back up to a standing position. So she leapt up and over his arm, and remembered what Cato had taught her to do next.
She landed a solid kick into his left temple with a satisfying thud. Stupid fucking Clay.
She landed a second one. And his stupid-kick-fucking-kick-head-kick.
He fell to his side, rolling away from her and lifting his arms to shield his head.
So she kicked him in his stupid-kick-fucking-kick-kidneys-kick.
He rolled away from her again, this time onto his other side, so that he was facing her, and she kicked him in his face (stupid fucking face). In his nose (stupid fucking nose). In his teeth (stupid fucking teeth). But she couldn't get a good kick in, because his arms (stupid fucking arms) were in the way.
So she dropped to her knees and rolled him onto his back, and she straddled his torso. She peeled his arms, which were starting to grow limp at this point, away from his face. She gripped his hair with her left hand, and with her right she pounded her fist into his mouth and his jaw over and over again.
He was looking at her and his eyes-his stupid fucking eyes-reminded her of a puppy dog. A sad puppy dog. Afraid and begging for mercy without a word. It pissed her off. Because he wasn't a puppy dog. He was a monster. He had no right to look at her like that. She punched him again. First in the left eye. Then in the right.
Movement flashed in the bottom right corner of her peripheral vision, and she turned her head. He was trying to raise his hand from his side, but he was so weak he could only get it a few inches off the ground. He was reaching, she realized, for one of the knives at her thigh. She had completely forgotten about them.
An excellent idea. Now she wouldn't have to see that stupid look in his eye.
She unsheathed one of the knives and then raised her hand and brought the knife down. First in his left eye. Then in his right.
And then again in his left. And then again in his right. Leftrightleftrightleftright.
His blood spattered up in her eye, making it hard for her to see. Stupid fucking blood.
She turned her head to wipe her eye on her shoulder and something shiny caught her eye. His sword. His sword in the grass.
She pushed up off of his body and retrieved it, and then she dropped back to her knees beside him and pressed the blade into his neck. His blood spurted up into her eye again. God, his stupid fucking blood.
The flesh gave way easily. And the veins and arteries. And the trachea and the esophagus. And even the muscles and the tendons. The spine, though-stupid fucking spine-was more troublesome. She had to saw back and forth. Backforthbackforthbackforth.
But finally, she got all the way through it. She picked his head up by his hair and then she hurled it into the trees as hard as she could.
When she turned back to his body, she saw a funny looking lump in one of his cargo pockets. She leaned down and fished around in it before producing a shiny red apple. Then she made her way over to take a seat at the base of a tree. She polished the apple on her shirt, and gave it a big bite.
"Mmmm," she said, even though she couldn't taste it, and relaxed back into the bark to enjoy her snack and watch with interest as the hovercraft appeared to retrieve Clay's and Rue's remains.
When she was done, she tossed the core behind her and jammed her hands in her pockets and her fingers closed over her note from Cato. She took it out and reread it.
What's it gonna be? Butcher or cattle?
She giggled, and she felt her mouth form the words. "Butcher, of course." And then she giggled some more.
This was all just a bad dream. And all she had to do was find the remaining tributes and kill them and then she would wake up in her bed in the Training Center.
But it was almost dark now, and one couldn't hunt tributes at night. So she folded her note carefully and put it in her jacket pocket. She pulled one of her knives out of her holster and toyed with it as she sat, cross legged, on the forest floor, and she rocked back and forth and hummed lullabies softly to herself to pass the time until the sun rose again.
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They sat in stunned silence in the District 7 mentoring room, their mouths hanging open.
Hera was covered in blood. Her gray t shirt was stained almost black from the fountain that had shot up out of Clay's throat when she'd decapitated him. Her hair was matted and wild and sticky. Her teeth as she grinned shone white against the ruby red smudges on her cheeks.
She didn't seem to notice that when she attempted to polish her apple on her shirt, she accomplished, in fact, the very opposite, and smeared it with blood. "Mmmm," she moaned as she took her first bite, and the juice trailed down her chin, leaving flesh-colored rivulets on a crimson background.
Her giggle was unnaturally high-pitched and saccharine.
The glitter in her eyes was feverish, but superficial, a thin layer that couldn't disguise the vacancy beneath.
Johanna and Cato turned to face one another, deathly pale and terrified.
"Oh fuck," Johanna whispered. "She's lost her goddamned mind."
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As soon as the sun's rays began to peek through the leaves, Hera stood up and made her way to the Cornucopia, stealthy as a fox.
"Hello!" she called cheerfully when she reached the clearing an hour or so later. Marvel and Clove were eating their breakfast, and they both jumped at the sound of her voice. But they quickly recovered, sneering as they pivoted to face her. Marvel's hand was on a sword in his belt, and Clove's was on a machete. Their faces fell, however, as they took in Hera's appearance.
"What the…?" Clove started to say.
Hera smiled at her. An affable, friendly smile. Then she whipped out a knife and sent it straight into her left eye.
Marvel had started to charge towards Hera at full-speed, sword raised, but he stopped when her knife sailed past him. He turned his head and gaped as Clove's body crumpled to the ground, but only for a second. Then his body followed his head and he fled in the opposite direction.
"Don't run!" Hera called out, plucking another knife from her holster and chasing after him, but her shout was overpowered by the sound of the cannon. "There's nothing to be afraid of! This isn't real! It isn't happening!" But he didn't stop running. Until he tripped and fell flat on his face. "Marvel!" she called as she caught up with him. "It's ok. It's just a dream." But he didn't move. And then she noticed the red, seeping out from under his body.
She sheathed her knife and knelt beside him, pushing at his shoulder, but he was too heavy for her to roll him over. He looked up at her and she thought maybe he was trying to say something, but all she heard was a raspy, bubbling, gurgling sound. She put her face to the ground and lifted his shoulder as high as she could to peek under his body. He had fallen on his own sword, slicing himself diagonally through the chest and abdomen.
"Oh good. Now I can wake up," she said to him, and sat back on her heels to wait for her nightmare to end.