The others have chased her up a tree before I can think of a plan.

Credit where credit is due. Katniss is much quicker and cleverer than I would have been in that situation. I barely am able to hobble along after the Careers and I kick at the dirt while they exchange quips. My mind races, trying to think of a way to get her out of this, but honestly she is just making it worse.

My heart skips a beat when Glimmer tries to shoot Katniss down with the bow, but Glimmer is incompetent. Nothing like Katniss. Katniss would have shot us all dead given the bow. Given that chance.

An idea occurs to me.

"Oh, let her stay up there," I say. "It's not like she's going anywhere. We'll deal with her in the morning." To my great fortune, the others agree. I look up at Katniss one more time, but she's not paying attention to us anymore. Not that she ever paid much attention to me anyway.

Just please don't hate me. I only want one chance to tell her that this alliance is the lie and not what I said before. Maybe. I mean, I couldn't say I really love her. But I care. I care a lot. Maybe I do love her.

The Careers do what they did before, flirting and playing until they're worn enough to lay down. They agree to take shifts, watching and waiting for the moment Katniss has to come down from the tree. I am not given one, effectively ruining my first plan. I guess despite my proven loyalty to the Careers, Cato still doesn't trust me enough not to help my supposed girlfriend kill them in their sleep.

The fires of our torches burn low and we throw them together in a common campfire as Clove takes first watch. I watch her for a while, willing myself to stay awake, though I'm exhausted. Minutes tick by slowly. Painfully. I watch as Clove trades off with Marvel and Marvel with Cato and Cato with Glimmer. Ariel sleeps soundly. Her turn comes next.

I've positioned myself to try and keep an eye on Katniss, but it's hard to see her in the dark. I know she's still there, though, and my mind races trying to find a way to get her out of the tree safely and away from the Career pack. I've bought her time, though, so maybe she'll think of a plan before I do. When Glimmer falls asleep on her watch, my heart leaps. An opportunity to get Katniss out of here. I'm about to get up when a large object crashes to the ground and bursts into a tornado of buzzing rage.

Glimmer is screaming. Ariel, too. My body is lit up with the sharp pain of a thousand needles piercing my skin. Those aren't needles, though. They're tracker jackers, and the effect is almost instantaneous. I leap up immediately and start running as fast as I can, wobbling from the poison. The weapons don't matter. Nothing matters except getting away. I hear some of the others screaming about getting to the lake. They won't follow us underwater.

My mind clears when I've finally reached that pool of water and the stinging sensation is gone. A cannon goes off. Maybe two.

"Katniss," I say breathlessly. The tracker jacker venom is still working, still making it hard to think straight, much less run straight, but I have to at least know if she got out. There's a sort of shimmery haze around everything. I trip over Ariel, who is clearly lifeless. That's one cannon.

In the distance I think I hear some of the others yelling. Male voice. Not Katniss. Female voice. Still not Katniss.

Please let her be alive. Please just let her get out of here.

The tracker jackers have only slowed the others. Ariel's dead, and someone else, but there are at least three angry Careers tearing around the forest now, the tracker jackers finally gone. I'm now focused on finding the other body and on finding Katniss, hoping those two are not one in the same.

As I run, I find Marvel's spear on the ground. He must have dropped it, deciding it was not worth it while trying to get away from the tracker jackers. I pick it up, just in case what I find back at the camp is not Katniss, and some angry Career. If it is a Career, I will kill them.

But as I burst through the brush, there is Katniss knelt above a body I can't make out right then, an arrow half-heartedly pointed in my general direction. I am overcome with relief, and then panic swells once more. Three Careers are coming back, blinded by a new rage.

"What are you still doing here?" I hiss. Her face registers only confusion and I can see now she's been stung as well. "Are you mad?" I turn the spear around and poke at her with it. I'm probably not being particularly gentle with her in her poisoned confusion, but it's the best I can do while I try to fight off the poison in my own stings and listen for Cato or the others. "Get up! Get up!" I'm screaming now, desperate for her to leave, to find some safe place to rest far away from here. "Run! Run!"

I can hear the crashing and slashing behind me. At last, Katniss darts off, stumbling over herself. I turn around and see Cato, dripping wet, his eyes wide with rage. As wide as they can be. There's a tracker jacker sting under one.

"YOU!" He roars. I know he's seen what I've just done. I've blown my cover. "You were working with her all along!" His eyes then dart down to the lifeless body below me. "You killed Glimmer!" There's no use arguing with him. The sword swings in my general direction. Cato is being just as affected by the venom as I am. I duck, although the sword was actually nowhere near me, and tackle him at his knees.

Cato is a much more formidable opponent than anyone else I've encountered in the Games, but I do my best to keep him down. It's not enough and he throws me off after a minute or so of struggle, grabbing his sword again. I have the spear, but it's a weak weapon in my hands. I miss several times before meeting spear and sword. The spear snaps and the sword comes down, slicing my thigh.

I can hear Cato's maniacal cackle all the way through the forest to the stream where I finally collapse from the pain and the shock. Finally I look down at my leg, and the sight makes me vomit immediately.

Despite the loss of blood, the nausea, everything, I know I have to keep going somehow. I can't just sit here out in the open, waiting for Cato to finish me off. Katniss is still alive. The Careers are still alive. And I'm still alive. Any breath I have left is a breath needed to make sure Katniss stays safe.

So I do what I do best. I create a portrait out of the mud and the grass and the muck all around me, hiding my body, until I at last become part of the earth. The dirt and mud both cool and inflame the pain in my leg and I know this is likely where I will die, but at least I will die still me. I won't die a Career. The whole world, because I made her leave and I did what I could to hold back Cato, will at last know that the boy from District Twelve was more than some kid shoved into the Games, motivated by mere self-preservation.

"Katniss," I whisper. She is alive and there is still hope, and as long as there is still hope for her I will do what I can. "Katniss." I repeat her name until I pass out from the pain and the shock and the exhaustion. Katniss. Katniss. Katniss.