It was brought to my attention by a helpful member of Critics United that I need to do more with emotions in my writing. This is not too surprising, because I am very much like Sheldon Cooper from Big Bang Theory: while I am clearly a superior being, I suck when it comes to emotions in my writing. So buckle up, because I am about to get emotioal, despite how illogical emotions are. Spock is currently turning in his grave.
This was written on a German Computer, so please forgive any spelling and formatting errors.
Complicated
Over. Under. Left. Right. That's what my life has always been. Katniss had been the closest thing in my life to an actual complication and even that relationship had been pretty straightforeward: we were friends and even if I made a move, nothing would ever come of it. Katniss and I were a lot alike in that sense: we always kept our emotions in check, never overthinking anything. Hell, the two of us could have gotten married and Katniss would act as if abdolutely nothing had changed. Even being as emotionally stable (or disconnected, Thom would argue) I would have changed. Katniss was a whole new level of being emotionlessly calm and collected. Though I have never been anywhere near her level, I always thought that I was somewhat close. But Madge... There is just something about her that can knock me off of my balance.
However, now is not the optimal time to have a "heart to heart" over this (whether it be with Madge or in my head), especially when it would be broadcast on national television. No, it's much better if I just don't think about it, like Haymitch might have slurred at some point. It's sad, but I almost wish that I could beg him for advice right now. It's hard to keep my emotions in check when Madge is around. There's just something about her that's so... Strong, but still kind of pure and innocent. I'd never really noticed until just before these stupid Games. Just like with Katniss. Besides, it's too late to do anything about those maybe almost feelings now. At least one of us is going to die in the next few days.
If it comes down to the two of us, I decide, I'llmake it quick. And then, like the moron I am, I look over at her sleeping face and know that, even if I did manage to kill her, I could never live with myself. I'd have to kill myself because it would be too horrible for her to die some awful death and know that I did nothing.
I've never given the idea of a "higher power" of sorts being out there, but I decide that a quick prayer can't hurt at this point. Look, I have no clue how this works, but if there is some sort of way to get me out of this, I would really appreciate it if you would act on that. I would really owe you one.
A crackling sound stirs me from my thoughts. I feel a sudden wave of heat wash over my body. Though it receeds slightly, the newly found heat is still present along with the almost sinister sounding cackling.
I am about to go investigate when I have an epiphony: it's fire.
Shit.
Transition
It turns out that Madge is about as useful as a bullet to the head when she's woken up suddenly. She's staggaring around like a chicken with its head chopped off and the fire isn't exactly receding. If anything, it's chasing us like it has a mind of its own.
"It's like it's trying to catch us," I shout to Madge. A canon echos in the distance and I swear she rolls her eyes.
"The Game makers, Gale," she replies. I feel a bit stupid, bit now isn't the time for berating myself.
"Shut up, that's not helping!" I snap, but I don't even have to look at Madge to know that I've said the wrong thing. I can feel her scorching glare burning into my back almost as intensely as the radiation from the fire. I hope that I can think of a way out of here before she (or the fire) kills me.
"Is there a space or gap large enough for us to fit through?" Madge calls out as we gaze at the walls of flames closing in on us and the cornucopia.
"If there was, I don't think that we'd be here!" I reply.
Her eyes narrow, giving new meaning to the phrase "if looks could kill". A part of me thinks that she might actually be pissed off enough to do it, too. But instead, her intelligent blue eyes dart around the rapidly shrinking clearing, settling on the illuminated silhouette of the cornucopia.
"The cornucopia is made of metal, right?" she asks.
"You're right, it wont burn!" I shout as I pull her towards our new safe haven.
Almost as soon as we arrive, however, I cab see an obvious problem: neither of us is tall enough to reach the top of the cornucopia. It's at least a foot out of my reach, even when I jump, and Madge is no better.
"Gale, there's no use. Neither of us will ever be able to get up there," Madge gasps, as her fingers manage to miss the edge of the cornucopia during a third desperate attempt.
"Come on, Madge! There has to be something that we can do besides just stand here and wait to burn to death!" I am almost crying, at this point. There is something so horrible, so painful, almost, about knowing that you're going to die and not being able to do anything about it. I try not to think of mom and Rory and Vick and Prim and, oh, God, Posy and the way she would always swing herself up onto my shoulders...
It hits me then.
"Madge, get on my shoulders, okay? Then you might be able to reach the rim and pull yourself up," I instruct. As soon as I bend down, I can feel her weight. She's heavier than most Seam girls would be, but she still seems to have the underfed nature of most kids from Twelve so it's nowhere near as hard to lift her as I had anticipated. Even so, it still takes her a few tries to finally, firmly grasp the rim.
"Do you have it, Madge?" I yell.
"Yes!" her reply is strained and strangely squeaky, but there's no time for me to wonder if anything's wrong. I feel her weight leave my shoulders and I can hear the squeaking of her shoes as she scrambles to get up on top of the cornucopia.
"Gale, hand me my sleeping pad!" she screams.
"What? Why?" I ask, desperately trying to think of any good reason why Madge would need a sleeping pad right now.
"Just give it to me, Gale!" she screams, and so I comply.
An edge of the pad hangs down as Madge pulls me up. She's bigger and slightly stronger than Katniss was, so she can actually manage. It's one of the advantage of always having more than enough to eat.
"Thanks," I gasp as soon as I catch my breath.
"Any time," she replies. I quickly take in her appearence an am shocked. There are more holes in her shirt than in my oldest, rattiest minning uniform. The ends of her hair are singed as are her sleeves and, from what I can see through the holes in her clothes, her body. I catch a glimpse of her hands and they are both bright red.
"Oh my god, Madge, what happened?" I ask.
"Turns out that metal can get really hot when it's surrounded by fire," she whispers, trying to smile through her pain. She just looks crazy.
"Do you know anything about burns?" I ask, hoping that she can instruct me on how best to treat her.
"Only that it's pretty easy to die from them," she replies, sighing as she cautiously lies down on the pad. I help lower her head to the pad and grab my full bottle of water. The mud's not going anywhere so there's no harm in using the water to clean out her wounds, despite the fact that, unless we get some medicine, she's for sure a goner.
"Deep breaths, Madge. This will probably sting a little," I coach her, knowing from experience that this will actually sting a lot. Burn wounds are, by far, the worst. They hurt and scar and blister and feel so hot, no matter how much ice or snow or water one puts on them. And then there's the incredibly high risk of infection.
"Mmmmmm," Madge moans.
"You'll be okay, Madge," I soothe. I'm starting to feel light headed now. Dealing with wounds and others being in pain has never come easily to me.
"Do you think we have enough sponserers?" she whispers, her voice hoarse and strained from her intense pain and the smoke billowing around us.
"Come on, Madge, what do you think? My best friend almost won last year and we both got amazing scores in training. We'll be fine," my voice sounds so ridiculous that Madge seems to be on the verge of laughter. My fake smile probably makes me look completely nuts.
"You're really horrible at this, Gale," she whispers softly. She shuts her eyes gently.
"No, Madge, you are going to be fine. We'll get you medicine and you will be fine," I plead. I'm not sure who I'm trying to convince at this point: me or her.
"Seriously, Gale, your delusions are pretty frightening. This is the Hunger Games. I was going to die anyways, whatever you end up doing," she tries to comfort me, which is rather ironic seeing as she's the one who's dying.
"Come on, Madge, could you just shut up and at least try to live?" I plead. I can feel the tears starting to form behind my gray Seam eyes and her dark blue ones already seem to be wet with them.
"I'm going to die and you're telling me to shut up? That's not very nice, you know. Maybe I was right thinking that you were a jerk for all of those years," she tries to joke. It's starting to get annoying now. I know that we have to have somewhat decent sponsors, especially after District Twelve's sucess last year and our great training scores.
As if Haymitch can hear my angry and desperate thoughts, a parachute appears out of nowhere, drifting lazily through the billowing smoke to rest on the cornucopia just inches from Madge's head.
I lunge for it like a starving beggar would lunge for a loaf of bread. My fingers shake violently as I unwrap a large bottle of Hydrogen Peroxide and a tube of pus yellow medicine. The medicine smells horrible, like the "wash" bucket outside of the east entrance to the mines, but the moment I press a glob of it onto a cleaned burn on Madge's stomach, she sighs in relief.
"That feels so much better, Gale," she sighs. Already, I can see faint traces of a healthy pink returning to her cheeks and diminishing the gray green color they had turned from the extreme pain she had been in.
"Don't worry, we have plenty left," I breath in relief. We might just find a way to get through this alive.
Transition
I roll up the singed remains of her dark green shirt. The Hunger Games are not a place for modesty and we both know it, but I take care to keep... certain areas of her chest as covered as I can. If she wins, I'm sure that she'll be greatful. I do my very best to thoroughly inspect all of the burns and clean them with water and the Hydrogen Peroxide as best I can, but healing has never been my forte and I have to actively prevent myself from throwing up sometimes. At some point, Madge becomes too exausted to stay awake, even with the sting of the Hydrogen Peroxide, and her eyes flutter shut. Her mouth is still twisted into a tight grimace of pain, though.
As I work, I hear the canons sound again and the anthen plays at some point, but the most information I can retain is that three tributes die and none of them were very big threats. The fire starts to recede until in is nothing but a faint glow on the edge of the eastern horizon. I realize that it is the sun and I have worked throughout the night. I gently rouse Madge.
"Is everything okay, Gale?" she asks.
In the faintly strengthening light, I can see the remains of her burns. The skin is still pink, but it looks like new skin; like the skin of a baby, almost. It wont be strong and will be very open to infection, but it's better than the burned ruined skin that she could have.
"It's getting light out and the two of us will be sitting ducks up here in the light. We ought to get down into what's left of the forest," I explain. Madge nods, trying to be as cooperative as she can through her obvious pain and discomfort.
"How much of the forest do you think that the fire damaged? Do you even think that there will be anything left?" Madge croaks, her voice almost as hoarse as mine from all of the smoke.
"I have no idea. I guess we'll find out when we get down from here," I reply, squinting out into the darkness in a vain attempt to see.
In the dim light from the sun just barely peeking over the horizon, I can make out that the once flat, snow covered ground now seems to be uneven and bumpy. It's a bit unnerving for the arena to become so different so rapidly, but I force myself to leap off of the golden rim of the cornucopia.
My feet hit the ground first and I sway violently. I thrust my arms out in a desperate attempt to steady myself, finally balancing off the side of the cornucopia. It's still warm from the fire that nearly consumed us.
Madge slides down next to me and grasps my upper arms as she struggles and wobbles to catch her balance. Eventually, I can feel the pressure of her small, delicate hands leave my arms. I fight the desire to grab her hands and hold her so tightly that she can't breath. I settle, instead, for grabbing her pack and slinging it over my shoulders. She makes a few sounds of protests, but she knows full and well that she wont be much good carrying anything for a while. Hell , the girl can barely stand!
"Got a game plan?" she asks.
"Stay alive," I groan as the sun finally breaches the horizon, flooding our surroundings with light.
They are strikingly reminiscent of a previous Hunger Games from years and years and years ago. It might have been from one of the years when those tall, blonde siblings from District One were victors. In fact, I'm almost sure it was from one of their years beacause I remember a lot of "fire and ice" themed jokes from Claudius Templesmith regarding the fact that the previous year's arena had only ice. The arena the next year- and now- is the complete opposite. One would give anything for some ice in here.
The precise word feels strang and foreign on my tounge.
"Desert," I whisper.
My sincere apologies for such a short chapter. The next one will be up wenever I have time. Most of the story is completed or at least planned at this point, so yay!
Also, please check out the poll on my profile! It's about my next project!