Author's Note: Ever had one of those days when you're writing a Hunger Games fanfic and you start to feel like a terrible person?
...Well, that sounded mildly ominous.
"The Gamemakers don't want me dead. Not yet, anyway." –Katniss Everdeen, The Hunger Games
It was the middle of the night when Vale awoke to the sound of an earsplitting crash. At first, she worried that their tree was about to come tumbling down, with herself and Kit still attached.
Then, as the lethargic fog that seemed to surround her all-too-slowly began to clear, she realized: it was the sound of thunder.
Beside her, Kit jolted into consciousness. "What's going on?"
The rain was pelting down harder now, driven directly into her face by a howling gale. Flashes of light seemed to bombard them from all around—lightning. Suddenly, Vale was wide awake, fingers fumbling awkwardly with the knots of wire that bound their sleeping bag to the tree limb.
"We have to get down from here! We're thirty feet up in the air: a perfect lightning magnet!" she shrilled, practically shouting to be heard over the wind and the rain.
Groggily, clumsily, she and Kit worked the knots until at last, they were disentangled, from the wire and from the sleeping bag. Vale didn't even bother to wrap up the bag and stow it away in one of the backpacks; she just tossed it down to the ground and slung the backpacks down on top of it.
A bolt of lightning struck a tree no more than fifteen yards away, and Vale nearly fell from the branch in fright. The lightning was an unnatural fuchsia color, she noted in the back of her mind—a nice "surprise" specifically engineered by the Gamemakers to shatter the halcyon atmosphere that had been pervading the arena.
"We have to get down!" she screamed again at Kit.
Her vision nearly obscured by thick sheets of icy rain, even despite the frequent bursts of pinkish lightning illuminating the world around her, Vale began clambering down from the tree. First, just a two-foot hop down to a lower branch, then another and another—a scary leap here and there, though nowhere near as alarming as the thought of being electrocuted.
Once, the toe of Vale's boot got wedged between a branch and the thick tree trunk, and she paused for a fleeting instant to catch her breath as she struggled desperately to pry it out. Then, the ethereal fuchsia lightning struck a neighboring tree, and a large limb came crashing to the ground, only missing them by a few feet. Vale wrenched her foot free and hastily continued her climb.
It was only once she reached the ground and began hurriedly garnering their supplies that she noticed—Kit was still only halfway down. He was currently clinging to the tree trunk for dear life, a look of wide-eyed terror on his face.
"Kit!" she called out as another explosion of thunder shook the inundated earth beneath her feet. "Hurry!"
"I-I'm trying!" he said frantically.
His foot groped for a limb just a few inches out of reach, but as another flash of lightning hit nearby, he gave a start. His boot caught the edge of the branch, but it was slippery from the downpour. Vale watched in horror as his feel skidded out from under him, and for one long and dreadful moment, he seemed to be suspended in midair, a look of sheer panic on his features.
"Kit!"
Vale's heart gave a little flip of vivid relief as Kit managed to latch onto a limb and catch himself. He was now dangling precariously, still quite some feet from the safety of the ground.
His mouth hung open in a wide "O" of alarm. "Vale, help!"
Vale froze. What could she do? What was she supposed to do? Dense curtains of rain poured down on her, leaving her feeling drenched to the core. The ground was soaking wet and slippery. And every time she tried to move, another jagged bolt of lightning would strike nearby, and she would stiffen up again in shameful, spineless fear.
Then came the biggest bolt yet. Kit saw it crackling down from the angry black clouds, straight towards the tree. And so, he did what instinct commanded him to do: he dropped.
He hit the ground with a sickening crack that didn't come from thunder. A strident yowl of pain escaped his lips, and he curled up on the waterlogged forest floor, arms twined protectively around one leg.
At last, the spell of fear that held Vale immobile was broken. She flew to Kit's side and knelt down in the leaves next to him. "Kit! Kit, are you all right?" she asked in a sob.
He didn't answer. He had gone awfully pale. He continued to clutch his left leg, and she noticed that fat teardrops were carving paths down his cheeks, along with the rain. He was whimpering.
"Kit, what is it? What hurts?"
He shook his head, slowly rising into a sitting position, still holding his leg. No words came out of his mouth; he seemed incapable of uttering any sound that wasn't a gasp or groan of pain. His eyes were squeezed tightly closed, and his jaws were clenched.
"Can you at least let me look at it?" Vale asked, a discernible note of worry present in her tone.
But now, Kit didn't even moan anymore. He turned even paler, and as a brilliant flash of lightning illuminated his tiny form, he reeled backward onto the leaves again.
"Kit? Kit!" Vale called his name over and over again, but he didn't answer. She took him by the shoulders and shook him. "Kit?" He didn't respond. His sodden head lolled from side to side as she jerked him around, and finally, she stopped, her pulse thundering faster than ever now. "Kit…?"
She pressed her ear to his chest. Thank goodness—his heart was still beating, and rather rapidly at that. His hot breath still came fast against the side of her face. He was just unconscious.
Vale knelt down and examined his left leg. His arms had fallen limply away from it now, and the hem of his pants had ridden up past his knee, allowing her a good look of the injury. Almost constant flashes of lightning granted her good visibility, even in the dead of night; she almost wished that it didn't. Immediately, a wave of potent nausea swept over her, and she had to struggle against the urge to cringe and turn away.
There was a tip of jagged white bone jutting out a centimeter or two from Kit's shin, and red, sticky blood was seeping out from the gaping wound, faster than the rain could wash it away.
Vale felt herself begin to panic and freeze up again. What do I do? How do I fix this? She had heard something about treating open fractures before—she was fairly sure that was what this injury was called—but her mind had gone awfully blank.
She tried again to wake the boy. "Kit. K-Kit?"
He remained unresponsive. She looked back down at his leg again and nearly gagged at the grisly sight of blood and bone.
What was the proper way to treat an injury like this? She really wished she could remember….
She opted to try and staunch the bleeding first; that, at least, she knew to do. She zipped open the backpack and sifted frenetically through its contents, tossing aside the things she didn't have immediate need of onto the slick surface of the sleeping bag.
At last, her gaze settled on the extra green shirt that she had found when she had first picked up the backpack at the Cornucopia. It was far too big for either her or Kit, anyway, but it would be good for soaking up the flow of blood from Kit's fractured shin.
With trembling, inept movements, Vale wrapped the shirt around his lower leg, trying to move the limb as little as possible. In seconds, the dark green, cottony, thin fabric became a brownish-red color. She could still see the tiny point where the bone protruded out through the break in the skin, and she gagged again. It was only the utterly surreal nature of the moment, coupled with the thin fog of exhaustion that still hung over her head, that kept her from vomiting.
Kit was still lying unconscious in the leaves. He was still unusually pale. She hoped that he wasn't losing too much blood, even with her makeshift bandage.
In desperation, Vale tilted her head upward to the sky in a plea to Lavinia—the sponsors—anyone, really, who could provide her with some kind of assistance. "Please," she gasped out, her voice sounding abnormally small and breathy. "What am I supposed to do?"
Tears stung her eyes now—hot, salty tears mingled with the cool, fresh rain. She knew that she must be live on every television in Panem right now, and she was well aware that any display of desperate emotion would be perceived as a grave weakness by the unsympathetic, unforgiving crowds. But she didn't care. Her partner, her friend, her only family here was badly hurt, and she had no notion of what more to do for him. She broke down in hysterics on the damp forest floor, face in her hands, her entire body shaking with harsh, racking sobs. Rain pelted down on her back, falling harder than before now; she hardly noticed.
When she finally cracked open her eyes, it was to see a tiny parachute floating down toward her. Her first thought was that it shouldn't be capable of floating so slowly and gracefully in the pouring rain, especially with such a large parcel attached to it, and that it must be another of those things specially engineered by the Gamemakers, one more peculiarity of the Games. Her second thought was: Wait, a parachute? That means… a gift! From Lavinia and the sponsors!
She snatched the parachute out of the air and quickly unwrapped the attached parcel. It was something stiff, white, and shin-sized; she wasn't sure whether to classify it as a bandage or a splint, only that she was overwhelmingly grateful for it.
She lifted her face to the sky again and managed a weak smile. "Thank you, Lavinia."
It was difficult to secure the bandage around Kit's leg—she kept the shirt wrapped around the shin, as a precaution and because she didn't want to undo it and have the wound start bleeding again—but at last, she managed. The downpour began to lighten as she worked, and it was nothing more than a pale mist when she finished.
Finding nothing else to do, she began repacking her supplies in the larger backpack, including the objects from the smaller one. Everything fit easily inside, and she elected to abandon the small backpack here. There was no need for it, and it was just an extra burden to carry. (And anyway, it had belonged to the girl from District Seven, and Vale wanted no lingering reminder of her first—and hopefully last—kill.)
It was around this time that Kit regained consciousness. He came to with a faint groan. He didn't look as pallid-faced as he had been, but he was still paler than normal. His hands flew without thought to his shin; he felt at the rigid bandage, and a perplexed look took over his face, illuminated by the recurrent bursts of forked, fuchsia lightning.
"What…?" he began. His voice came out small and thin.
"You fractured your leg, I think," said Vale. "Lavinia sent us this to bandage it up."
"F-fractured?" Kit echoed, his eyes bulging. His teeth still ground together in pain, but at least he wasn't crying or whimpering anymore.
She nodded solemnly. Just a dozen yards to her right, another bolt of unnatural electricity struck a tree, and another limb came crashing to the ground. Both Vale and Kit gave a start as thunder boomed in their ears.
"Shouldn't we get out of here?" Kit called out. "We're gonna get fried!"
"But your leg…" Vale started.
He winced as he tried to shift the limb. "I know."
Another blast of lightning hit far too close for comfort. Vale flinched, her gaze falling on the stretch of woods that lay ahead, where the clouds overhead were whiter and didn't flash an eerie pink with electricity.
"Go ahead and go," said Kit, following the path of her eyes.
"What?"
"Go," he repeated. "I can't walk like this. And we could both get hit if you stay."
She crossed her arms, a stubborn glint in her blue-gray eyes, an uncharacteristic obstinance in the set of her jaw. "I'm not going to leave you, Kit."
He opened his mouth to argue. "But…"
"I'm not," she repeated. "I made a promise, and I'm going to keep it. I'm going to keep you safe, come better or worse, and there is nothing at all that you can do about it."
Kit started to speak again, then seemed to think better of it. Despite himself, a tiny grin spread across his harrowed face. She realized that, no matter what words came out of his mouth, he didn't really want her to abandon him at all.
Vale stood up, slung the backpack over her shoulders, and stretched out an arm to Kit. "Here. See if you can stand."
The small boy reached out and gripped Vale's arm tightly. Then, he yanked himself slowly, agonizingly to his feet. She saw him grimace again and thought she heard him swear under his breath, but she decided to ignore it.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
He sucked in a painful breath through his teeth, wrapping an arm around her shoulders for support. "Just great," he groaned.
She eyed him with unconcealed concern. "Do you think that you can walk?"
Another bolt of forked lightning struck nearby—this time, so close that Vale and Kit could feel its heat as it cut through the air. Deafening thunder clashed and left their ears ringing.
"Do I really have a choice?" said Kit.
So Vale slipped a hand underneath his arm to sustain some of his weight, and together, they began to walk. It was slow going: both were tired, and Kit was leaning heavily on Vale to avoid putting weight on the injured leg, and Vale wasn't strong enough to support him as well as she should have. The backpack on her shoulders seemed to grow heavier with every step that she took.
But nevertheless, the two continued to carve out their path through the forest. Flashes of lightning continued to illuminate the sky, but they no longer struck so close as to cause much anxiety in Vale and Kit. In spite of their exhaustion and weakness, they kept going on through the night, in search of a new haven to rest.
Family, thought Vale in wonder. The word meant more than just sitting in a tree together and talking about favorite colors, or sharing jokes about ridiculous Capitol accents, or even putting up with a kick or two from Kit as he tossed and turned in his sleep.
It was about patching him up when he was hurting. About holding him up when he was unable to stand by himself. It was the self-sacrificing sort of love that kept her going now, supporting most of his weight as well as her own, no matter than her arm and back were beginning to ache.
Love was a profound thing, she thought as she took a glance as the ashen, wincing face of the little boy who had, through circumstances wholly beyond their control, become a brother to her. A very profound thing, indeed.
"The road is long, with many a winding turn that leads us to who knows where, who knows where. But I'm strong, strong enough to carry him. He ain't heavy; he's my brother. So on we go. His welfare is my concern; no burden is he to bear. We'll get there, for I know he would not encumber me. He ain't heavy; he's my brother…." –The Hollies, "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother"
Author's Note: And I'll ask you again: ever had one of those days when you're writing a Hunger Games fanfic and you start to feel like a terrible person?
~Lily