Chapter 21: Quell, Day 1
Prim has to drag me out of bed and to the Square the first morning of the Quell. We stand by the Mellarks, dizzy from lack of sleep and slightly sick.
When the Jumbotron screens go live at 10 A.M. sharp, my heart plummets into my stomach.
The Cornucopia sits in the middle of a miniature sea, with rocky spokes jutting out from the island it sits on, trapping two tribute pedestals into each watery wedge. Katniss is paired off with Woof Casino, the 70-something grandpa from District 8, while Peeta is more dangerously matched up with Daniel Bernhardt of 9.
When the gong goes off, Katniss dives into the water, beats Brutus to the spoke where he has been in the next wedge over, and sprints for the island. She races Gloss on a parallel spoke for it, and beats him too, but only after he trips.
She reaches a bow and begins shooting tributes back, while not getting a fatal hit. Finnick Odair surprises her with an alliance and proves his worth by killing the man from 5 without a second thought. Then he goes the extra mile and saves Peeta from a tussle with Daniel Bernhardt that the young baker's son barely wins.
Collecting Mags, the 80-year-old partner of Finnick, this quartet escapes into the jungle surrounding the island and that makes up the rest of the arena. I only know it's a jungle from the botany lessons that Estes gave to me when we were married, before the children.
Meanwhile, the Bloodbath continues. Cannons continue throughout the day, as Districts 12 and 4 get farther and farther away. Peeta leads the band with a machete hacking at leaves. Things seem to have relaxed, become complacent.
In the Hunger Games, you should never get complacent.
"PEETA, NO!" Katniss cries out a warning, but it is too late. Peeta is suddenly blasted back, knocking the other three to the ground. He ran into the forcefield.
But the most incredible sight of the whole fiasco is how my daughter descends into absolute hysterics, like how she got when Gale was whipped only ten times worse. She even tries to fight Finnick off of Peeta, even as the handsome fisherman makes it clear he's trying to help. He does a very refined round of CPR - a practice that I have had to use on unconscious miners often - until Peeta comes back to life. Katniss bursts into relieved tears and kisses Peeta soundly on the lips of her own accord.
After that much excitement, the quartet nests right where they are for the evening. They are met at nightfall with eight faces in the sky. The man from 5. The man from 6. Woof and Cecelia from 8. Daniel from 9, as well as his district partner. The woman from 10. And Seeder from 11.
A parachute all at once floats down to the group. A gift from a sponsor! Katniss quickly finds out that the cylindrical object is a spile that can tap water from the trees. Water that the dehydrated tributes desperately need. Drinking their fill, they settle down to sleep, with my daughter taking the first watch.