Chapter 20 - Friendly faces.
Day 3 of being in this damn arena. Rowan has been asleep for atleast 10 hours, he needs it and plus nothing is really happening. I've done some fishing so we can have something to eat when he wakes up and I've assessed his injury to see if its getting better and the bleeding seems to have stopped but its probably going to be a while before he gets better.
I've been sitting here for ages now. Well, 10 hours precisely, if thats how long Rowan has been asleep. I do admit, I am very tired but he needs sleep more than I do. If Peeta where here right now, he would be forcing me to go to sleep. I'd probably laugh at him and go to sleep anyway. He will be more rested than I am. Finnick is probably with him and Peeta says that Finn doesnt like sleeping something is wrong. Which means he is probably awake most of the time, he's a lot like me actually. I cant sleep when something is going on. Like this. I really miss Peeta, I wish he was here.
I'm brought out of my thoughts suddenly by a noise. It sounds like the cannon but a lot quieter and it seems to be repeating. Some kind of warning maybe. Should I wake Rowan? No, I'll check it out by myself first and then I'll wake him if something happens. I pull myself to my feet, groaning because of my stiff limbs and follow the noise into the forest.
As I walk, the noise gets louder, I must be getting closer. Thats when I hear a twig snap as if someone is near by. I raise my bow and circle a couple of times but no-one is there. I carry on towards the noise and what I find is not what I expected at all. I find a parachute. I guess that answered my question about where Uncle Haymitch is. Who else would be sending these down? The Capitol arent that nice. I pull the lid off and pick up the little not. Apply gently and hang in there - H.
He's alive. Uncle Haymitch, I let out a cry of relief and instantly regret it when I hear another twig snap. It wasnt far behind me. I quickly turn around, my bow raised and see a person. They arent looking at me, they are walking away from me but I would recognise them anywhere. Not the person I wanted to see but I'm happy none the less. "Rye!" I shout in happiness. He spins around, raising what appears to be a pointy stick and when he see's me, the stick falls to the ground and he sets off at a run towards me. I catch him in a hug and tears start to spill from my eyes. "I cant believe you're here." I say into his shoulder.
"Me neither. What happened? Why are we here?" He says. I pull away from him and his eyes search mine for any kind of answer.
"Its just like Snow wanted. 2 Victors and 2 Tributes." I say, shrugging my shoulders slightly. We all knew it was coming but not like this.
"But that means that there are 2 Victors from 12 in here?" He asks, obviously thinking about his brother.
"Yeh and its obviously not Uncle Haymitch. I just got something from him which means he is in the Capitol. Which means that Peeta and Delly are in here somewhere and there are no cannon's so we dont know if anyone is dead yet." I say, trying to stop the tears from falling. "I wish he was here."
"Me too." He hugs me again and I pull away quicker this time as I know that I have to get back to Rowan. I have to be there when he wakes up or he might freak out. I grab the parachute and drag Rye along with me back to the beach. "Who's that?" He asks, recoiling once we get there.
"Its alright, he's Rowan Mason. He saved my life, I'm returning the favour." He nods but still looks unsure, I guess thats normal, especially when you're in the Hunger Games but if I'm not scared of Rowan then Rye shouldnt be. He's very big and a very good wrestler, why would Rowan even try and get to him? It would be very stupid.
I drop to the floor next to Rowan and apply the cream that Uncle Haymitch sent me to his chest. Then after his chest is covered, I allow Rye to apply some to my arm that didnt heal at all during the night and is still pouring with blood. Honestly, it had started to make my vision go kind of fuzzy and I lost a lot of my energy but hopefully it will be okay now. "Why dont you get some sleep. I'll wake you up if something happens?" Rye says and I'm about to say no but I nod and lie on the floor next to Rowan, my eyes closing instantly.
"Katniss!" I hear someone shout from the woods. Fear spreads through me as I recognise the voice to be Peeta. "Help me!" I set off running as fast as my legs can catch me. I dont why but I find myself looking down and my stomach is flat, where is my baby. I stop in my tracks, looking around me for some reason as if my baby had just fallen out along the way. "Katniss!" Someone shouts again, this time its Prim. Its coming from the same direction as Peeta and I set off running once again, surprised at how much energy I have.
I crash through the tree's and when I see is not Prim and Peeta but instead its President Snow. "Where are they?" I ask him, pointing my arrow straight at him heart.
"Go ahead Miss Everdeen, you'll never find out where they are." He snarls, crossing his legs. Its now that I notice how is sitting on a chair. An actualy chair, not one that was made of something but a chair that is obviously from the Capitol.
"What have you dont to them?" I ask, trying to make it not sound harsh but spit falls out of my mouth as I say it.
"Dont worry, they wont be a problem anymore." His points his head upwards and everything inside me collapses. Prim and Peeta are hanging on a rope from the tree. Their faces are blue as the rope around their necks have cut off the circulation of blood. My legs give up underneath me and I fall to the ground. I take one last look up at Peeta, noticing something I didnt before, on his back is a small blanket covered thing. Hope. My baby. She's blue. He killed her aswell.
"Katniss! Wake up!" Someone shouts, pulling me out of my nightmare. I shoot up, just missing Rowan's head by centremetres. "You okay?"
"Yeh, sorry, Nightmare." I mumble. I'm about to lie back down and fall back asleep when I hear a voice that I dont recognise.
"Well isnt this cozy." I fly up to my feet noticing the 2 unrealistically beautiful people who have just emerged from the tree line. "You want to do the honour Gloss?" The woman asks. They must be the two siblings from District 1. I have only ever seen them on Tv. Cashmere and Gloss, very lethal, according to Caesar. Rowan and Rye scramble to their feet and stand beside me, Rye has his arm around the front of me, ready to push me back if something happens.
"I think you should do it sister." Gloss replies. Cashmere just shrugs her shoulders and without any warning or anything, the knife that she was holding flies past my right ear, I should be lucky that my foot slipped on something right at that moment or I'd probably be dead right now. "You're getting rusty." Gloss says as Rye throws his body infront of mine. Rowan lunges at Gloss, knocking him to the ground. He doesnt stand a chance again Rowan. I've only known him for a short time but I know that he must be good with that axe. The only person I'm scared about is Rye. Yeh he's good at wrestling but he doesnt have a weapon and they do.
I load my bow and point it at Cashmere, letting it go straight away but she dodges it and throws herself into the sand. Rye takes his chance and pins her down. She is fighting though. She's pretty strong for a girl. Especially against Rye. Within seconds, her knife has found his skin and he falls backwards with blood pouring out of his side. I try to run over but Cashmere knocks me back.
"Where's that husband of yours?" She asks, spitting in my face.
"I'm not answering anything you have to ask." I spit back. Her legs have my arms pinned down to ground and her feet are keeping down my legs, Her left hand is holding a knife to my face and her right has my neck. If she lowers herself just slightly, she'd be crushing my baby.
"Your loss." She mumbles and the knife descends. I expect her to just stab me but I feel the knife slowly cutting through my shoulder, she's taking her time and enjoying it.
When the knife finally stops, I take my chance. Her wrist is just next to my mouth so I reach forward and bite her as hard as I can. When she pulls away I head butt her, momentarily stunning her. The blood loss is worse than last time, she must have hit a major artery or something because my head is already going fuzzy. I take the chance of her pain to grab an arrow and plunge it straight through her heart. My first kill. She falls back onto my legs and within seconds her breathing stops.
I scramble to my feet, hardly able to see anything and catch Gloss hit Rowan over the head with something, knocking him out cold. Then his eyes settle on his sister and he looks at me with so much hatred in his eyes that I know I'm going to die. He sets off running for me and I look towards Rye and Rowan one last time, both of them are on the floor. Rye is trying to get to his feet but he cant and Rowan is just stirring, he came back quick. I focus on Gloss, preparing for my death but suddenly something knocks him straight off his feet. I look to see someone, someone I know very well. I've never seen this side of her though. Its Delly. I let out a sigh of relief.
Then someone else shows up. Finnick. He finally found us. But where's Peeta? I quickly look around to find him but my vision is failing. I glance back at Finnick and Delly just in time to see them kill Gloss. "Katniss!" Finnick shouts, looking at me.
"Finn-" I say but then darkness takes me and I fall, I think I feel him catch me, or someone catch me but I'm not sure.
"Katniss?" I hear someone say as I feel myself stirring. Pain is rippling through my shoulder and I feel someone's hand on my other shoulder. "You awake?" I slowly nod and my eyes finally open. Delly is leaning over me with a look of worry on her face. "Thank god."
"Delly?" I ask. "Where's Peeta?" I ask her as she helps me into a sitting position.
"We dont know." Finnick says at my side. I turn to see him, Rowan and Rye eating fish. "Hey. Its nice to see you awake."
"Finn!" I say in relief and pull myself up to hug him. He returns it happily and pulls away not long after. "What do you mean you dont know?" I ask him.
"There was blood, falling from the sky like rain and then he ran off with my little brother, We dont know where either of them went. We didnt have much time to follow them as the blood made it impossible to breathe. So I grabbed Delly and ran in the same direction as them. We where looking for them when we heard what was happening here." He replies. I feel the tears again. Thats when Hope wakes up and kicks me in the ribs, my hand finds my stomach and more tears fall. "You okay?" Finn asks and I shake my head.
"She's kicking." I say in reply.
"Nice timing." Finn says as if its a joke.
"We where talking about Peeta of course she's kicking." I mumble and surprisingly enough, the first person to comfort me is Rye. "I wish he was here." It feels weird to be saying that to Rye but I needed to say it.
"Yeh me too. He would do so much better at comforting you than I am." He laughs, causing me to laugh into his shoulder.
"Right well I think its about time we talked about some stuff." Delly says behind me and she sounds so serious, so unlike Delly that it scares me a little.
In minutes we are all sitting around waiting for someone to speak. "So what happened Katniss? How did you end up here?" Delly asks me.
I guess now is as good a time to tell her what happened. "I'm so sorry Delly but its all gone." Her eyes narrow in question. "When they took you from 12 they started dropping bombs. Its all gone. We got as many people out as we could but I dont think there was that many. The Town Square went up first."
"My family?" She asks, tears forming in her eyes.
"I dont know, I want in my right mind, I was caught up in one of the blasts. I'm pretty sure I saw Harvey but that was it." Thats when the tears that where forming, fall from her eyes.
"He must be so scared." She mumbles.
"Dont worry, Lev promised to look after him." Rye says from my side. I didnt know that. "He will be okay." I can see the tears forming in his eyes now as he actually knows what happened to his family.
"What about everyone else?" Delly asks. "Who else died?"
"Erm... My parents died and Holly got injured but Evelyn will be able to keep her alive." Rye starts. "I didnt see Madge. River was there. Gina and Eric lost their parents. Brooke and Bailie lost their parents. I cant remember seeing anyone else." Thats when I start to cry.
"I cant believe its gone. My home. My parents. Everything is gone." Delly says, dissapearing into a pool of tears. I wrap my arms around her and cry with her.
When the tears are gone, I turn to Finn. "Where did Peeta go?" I ask him.
"I dont know. He and Kai just ran off. We tried to follow them but they where nowhere in sight after we got out of the blood rain." Finn says.
"I didnt even know you had a little brother?" I ask him. I know I dont know him that well but I figured that his brother might have atleast come up that time he was in 12. I guess not though.
"Yeh, no-one does. He was a secret." Finn says. "I had to keep him safe. Only Snow knew about him. Which was probably the worse thing." He laughs slightly. "I cant believe he put him in here though."
"Its gonna be okay Finn. We will find them." I cant say that he will be okay because this is the Hunger Games, they only have 1 winner and I dont think they would allow more than one after what last year caused. "But right now I think we all need to rest. We can start tomorrow." He smiles and we all settle down to sleep. Well they do, I have to keep watch. I havent long since woke up so it would be a bit selfish for me to go to sleep now. I can still feel the pain rippling through my shoulder which reminds me that I have some cream on Rowan's belt. I had to give it to him because I didnt have a belt. Rowan's axe came with a belt so he attached the parachute to one of the holes.
Around midnight, Finn wakes up and I only know its midnight because of them stupid cannon sounds that they do whenever its 12 o clock. It rather annoying actually. "Hey. How you feeling?" He asks me and I shrug my shoulders.
"Like death." I reply as he takes a seat next to me. "Who else do you know in here?" I ask him.
"Well, here was Cashmere and Gloss from one. Enobaria and Brutus from 2. Beetee and Wiress from 3. Me and Kai from 4. Mags died last night in the blood rain, she ran into the forcefield." He looks like he is trying to hold in tears. "Than Johanna and Rowan from 7. Blight died I think. Seeder and Chaff from 11 and Peeta, Delly, You and Rye."
"I didnt know Mags was here?" I ask him. He never told me about it until now.
"Yeh but I'd rather not bring it all up if thats okay?" He asks I nod.
"So what happened to Uncle Haymitch?" I ask him. He isnt in here and I know that he is mentoring us, or he apparently is, for all I know he could be dead. "I got some medicine from him, or it said it was him but I'm not sure."
He looks up at me as if he is worried about something and I feel my heart start to beat faster. "We dont know whats going on out here. We were sort of dropped into here just like you. Except we woke up in the launch room and went through the whole blood bath thing. You lot where just dropped in here a few days ago. We've been here for over a week now." He says and I watch him as he seems to think about something.
"Have you seen anymore of us?" I ask him. I know its a stupid question, he would have already told me if he had.
"No and-" He's cut off by a blood curdling scream coming from the forest.
"Finnick!" He's on his feet and running in seconds. He must recognise the voice. I jump up and follow him. I hear someone behind us, someone followed us from our camp. I dont question who it is though and carry on running, following Finnick towards the voice.
We come out into a clearing, much like the clearing I woke up in. Johanna stands there and suddenly someone runs past me and towards her. "Johanna!" Rowan wraps his arms around his older sister.
"I cant believe you're alive." I catch her say. Thats when I notice the 2 people passed out on the floor. I nudge Finnick and motion towards them.
"Its Haymitch and Annie." Johanna says, pulling away from her brother. I drop my bow to the floor and fall down next to the male.
"Uncle Haymitch?" I say, crying. His eyes open and he smiles at me.
"You're alive." He says, taking my face in his hands and bringing me to him for a hug. "Whats going on?" He asks.
"You're in the arena." I say, pulling him up to his feet. I feel the presence of Rye and Delly behind us which means everyone is here now.
"Haymitch, what is happening out there?" Finnick asks behind me. I turn to see the little red haired girl attached to his side. This must be the infamous Annie that I've heard so much about. I dont really remember her games because that was the year my father died so I was hunting most of the time.
"They came in the nigth and killed everyone. They even took Effie. We are all thats left." He says, wiping all the grass off his clothes. He isnt wearing one of these stupid suits. "All the Victors, all the Mentors. Everyone was rebelling so they killed everyone. Katniss, I need to talk to you."
"Go on." I say.
"Your little tip about the survivors of 12 annoyed Snow and he sent the Hovercrafts back to find them. Apparently it was a success. They're all dead. Evelyn, Prim, Leaven, Brooke, Everyone." He says and I feel my legs give up. Prim, my little Primrose is gone. I hear Delly cry out behind me and I turn to see Rye trying to comfort her but breaking down himself. I suddenly go really light headed and I lie back on the floor, the tears falling like a waterfall. "Katniss, its be okay. We've got eachother."
I look up at him and once again Peeta is on my mind. "I need to find Peeta. He needs to know." I am finding it really hard to breathe right now and thats not good for me or the baby.