Chapter 10
As Gale sees the bird's eye view of the arena, he can't help himself from breaking into an ear-to-ear grin. He looks to the Everdeen and Hawthorne families—each of them is smiling too. They know what he does: Katniss will probably feel more at home in this arena than she does in the woods of district 12.
The seconds start to wind down and Gale holds his breath. He can't tear his eyes away from the screen with her face, so he listens to see if the rest of the square is making a sound—they aren't. His chest swells with pride as he realizes how much everyone here cares about her safety. Keegan starts to giggle when she sees Katniss on the huge screen. He points and says, "Yes, baby girl. That's Mommy!"
5… he sees Katniss eye something near the cornucopia.
4… the camera zooms in on it; a bow.
3… he sees her jaw set and knows what she is thinking. She wants to go after it.
2… "NO KATNISS!" he knows she can't hear him, but he screams it anyway.
1… her eyes flirt to the woods and he realizes she's thinking of her family.
0… she hesitates. He sees her eyes narrow and knows she's pissed she missed her chance. She settles for a backpack 5 feet to her left and sprints for the woods.
When she clears the tree line, he picks up on screams, shouts, applause. He turns and sees the entire district cheering her on. Several of the people he knows come and clap him on the back, congratulating him on her living through the blood bath. He numbly accepts, forcing smiles and Thank Yous. Thankfully, Mrs. Everdeen starts to excuse him to the house, saying that it's time for Keegan's nap. Hazelle and the kids start to take all the thank yous and hugs from the various people while Gale, Keegan, Mrs. Everdeen, and Prim escape to their house.
Before they reach the house, Gale starts to feel the tears start. He hands the four month old to Mrs. Everdeen before he heads to somewhere he can be alone. The tears start to flow as he watches the screen in front of him. He misses her so bad that it hurts. He's had to be strong for so many people that he finally begins to break down.
20 year old Gale Hawthorne, strong, proud father, begins to cry. It isn't the few tears he's spouted here and there along the way, this is a need for blowing off emotions. He can't remember the last time he cried like this. He doesn't even notice when Prim comes in and wraps her arms around him comfortingly. He breaks from Prim and looks into her red-rimmed eyes. She's had to be too strong, just like me, he thinks. He and Prim just hold each other, crying for the dark headed girl they both need to come home. Eventually, after they have cried themselves out, Mrs. Everdeen comes in and says it's time for supper.
Over the next few days, Gale settles in to his routine. Wake early, check the screen for Katniss, hunt with Rory, wash up, check the screen, feed Keegan, head to the bakery, check the screen fifteen times, rush home, check again, feed Keegan again, eat supper, check again, play with the other kids, check again, go to sleep.
Every day, he is disappointed when he discovers nothing has happened. He guesses that's a bit of luck though—seeing her would mean something bad has happened. The commentators have discussed what all she had in her pack, and how dangerously close she was to dehydration. Other than that, they don't really comment on Katniss at all until the Career pack trees her.
It happens while Gale is at work. To be nice, the baker keeps the television with the games on full-time, just in case something happens. His only condition was that Gale didn't continuously sit in front of it, to which he happily agreed.
He is stacking 100 lb bags of flour when he hears her name come from a commentator's mouth. All of his senses become twice as desperate to hear what they say next, "Katniss Everdeen, stuck in a tree with the entire Career pack beneath her after outrunning those deadly fireballs! What a bit of unfortunate luck! She will have to come up with something great to get out of this one."
He drops the sack in his hand and is in front of the TV in three seconds. The baker comes and puts his hand on Gale's shoulder, "She'll be okay, son. She's smart. She's had to escape being cornered by wild animals before."
Gale tries to use this fact to comfort him, but it doesn't. "Animals don't think, sir. They react."
"Well then," he smiles, "she's going to have to do something to pry their instincts out of them, won't she?"
Gale watches her in the tree for another 30 minutes, and the recap of the fire balls, before he decides it will take her a little while to think of something. The cameras realize this too, and they start going back and forth to the remaining tributes.
45 minutes before Gale is set to clock out, just before the sun is setting in 12 and in the arena, Katniss sees little Rue from District 11. Gale groans, she's so much like Prim that he knows Katniss will try to win her alliance, and he's not sure she can bear to kill the little girl. They're pointing to something in the trees, and Rue makes a sawing motion. Gale and the baker look confusedly at each other before the camera zooms in on a tracker jacker nest. Gale swears out loud, she'll get stung for sure if she tries to cut it down.
But it's either cutting it down and risking a few stings or Cato figuring out how to scale the tree by morning.
The baker puts his hand on Gale's shoulder again, "Run home, son. Go hold your daughter." Gale doesn't have to be told twice.
…
Peeta and Haymitch look at each other in the control center, unsure of what to do. "Well, kid," Haymitch begins, "we have two options. We can either send her the burn medicine and hope she figures out the leaves for the stings, or assume she doesn't have a clue and send the tracker jacker medicine. But either way, she's going to have injuries that risk getting infected."
Peeta thinks for a moment, although Haymitch is older and wiser, Katniss is technically Peeta's tribute, so he gets the final say. "What about that little girl? Rue? She's from 11, she'll know about the leaves, right?" Haymitch nods, "she was headed toward an alliance with her anyway. Let's send the burn medicine."
In less than five minutes, the button is pressed and Katniss receives her parachute. She smiles her thank you and begins to apply it generously. She nods to Rue and starts to cut down the nest while the Careers sleep on.
…
Gale makes it home just as she finishes applying the burn cream. With the nod, she takes out the only knife she has and starts to saw the branch. She takes three stings, and Gale feels every one as if they are stinging his own flesh. When the branch finally breaks, hell breaks loose as the careers begin screaming, freaking out, and thrashing to get away. They follow their instinct to run, and Gale smiles, seems like the baker was right. Only one is left behind, and Gale turns his daughter away from the screen as the girl from 1's body swells up and she dies.
But, Gale looks closer, this was the girl with the bow! He starts jumping up and down as he yells at Katniss to take the bow, as does the entire family. He can tell she is feeling the venom, but she recovers enough to grab the bow and find a hiding spot so she can wait out the venom's power.
She tries to sleep it off, but Gale can see that it is affecting her more than she thought it would. He can only imagine the horrors of whatever she is seeing, and judging by her whimpers, it is centered primarily on him and Keegan, which Gale and Rory dub as a good thing. Mentioning her family again should earn her more sponsor money.
"I went to the Hob this afternoon, Gale," Rory says, "Ripper and Greasy Sae have started a collection for money to send to her. Something about Cray can have it sent directly to the Capitol for her."
Gale smiles genuinely for the first time all day, "Really? Guess we better give her our savings then."
The television goes off and everyone decides to get some sleep, Gale especially. It's been a rough day for him and he knows she will be safe while she's asleep and the Careers recover too. He takes his daughter to bed, rocking her and singing the familiar lullaby to keep his love safe.