The sun is gone. The last rays have faded from the sky. Cato should be dead by now, but he's not.
When will it end? When?
I can hear the mutts growling and snarling as they make a chew toy out of Cato.
I actually pity him now. Wow. Never thought I would even think that.
The growling moves around and inside the cornucopia, under us now.
I think it's been an hour – maybe more – since he fell. He would've been dead by now, but whatever sort of body shield he's wearing is preventing the mutts from eating him alive.
I can hear him moaning in pain as they chew the unprotected parts of his body. Katniss hears him, too. She shudders now and then when he moans. It's very cold now, too, so that's not helping much. The scorching metal the cornucopia is made of is now ice cold.
The cold I can handle, but my leg in the other hand isn't making much progress. Even though I have my hand pressed against the gash, the blood flows freely, leaving a warm trail as it runs down my ankle, pooling in my shoe. As the night progresses I feel weaker and weaker. I don't really feel pain though, just an uncomfortable numbness in my entire leg. I don't tell Katniss this, because I don't want to worry her, but of course I don't fool her.
She takes off her jacket, removes her shirt – I feel so weak I can't even really appreciate how beautiful her bare skin looks in the pale light of the moon – and then zips the jacket back on.
She makes me lie down, and then checks my injured leg for a few seconds. She rips a sleeve off her shirt, wraps it twice around my leg, above the gash, but under my knee, and then ties a knot. She takes her last arrow and secures it in the knot, twisting it very tightly. I clench my teeth together to prevent from screaming.
"Don't go to sleep," she whispers to me in a concerned voice.
"Are you cold?" I ask, though I know she must be freezing.
I unzip my jacket and she presses tightly against me as I fasten it around her. I feel much better with the little extra heat. I wrap my arms tightly around her – well, as tight as I can, anyway.
"Cato may win this thing yet," she murmurs after a few minutes of silence.
"Don't you believe it," I tell her firmly, pulling her hood up.
We lay there, shuddering harder as the temperature drops even further. By this point Cato's moans just add to that torture. No one deserves to suffer so much, and so long. Not one of us deserved to suffer so much. Yet here we are. Freezing to death. Freezing and bleeding to death in my case and in Cato's. How is any of this fair? How does any of this bring pleasure and excitement to all those monsters watching us back in the Capital?
"Why don't they just kill him?" Katniss whispers as if reading my thoughts.
"You know why," I say, and pull her closer to me.
After a while my eyelids feel too heavy, and my whole body just screams for some rest. I jump startled every time I begin dozing off and Katniss yells my name, each time louder. I take a deep breath and fight against sleep. Against death. Not for me, but for her. If it were me, I would have given up already. It's just so tempting to just close my eyes and never open them again. But I must fight. I can't leave her alone while the Game is still on. As strong as she is, I know she'll feel scared if I leave her.
I know it must seem like the time has stopped for her. That's how it feels like to me. So I begin pointing the moon to her every so often, so that she sees the progress it makes on the sky. So that she know that time is passing, and this will hopefully be over soon. Hopefully.
She dozes off, and it's so tempting to let my eyes close, too, but I can't while she's so vulnerable like this. I don't wake her up either. She deserves to escape this cruel reality even if just for a little while.
Finally the first rays of sunlight begin to illuminate the sky.
"Wake up," I whisper in her ear. "It's morning."
She open her eyes and look up the sky for a couple of seconds before she look at me. Her forehead creases in concern and despair as soon as she sees me.
"That bad, huh?" I ask her in a raspy voice. I clear my throat.
"Everything is going to be okay," she says in response, evading my question.
She presses her ear against the horn.
"I think he's closer now," I say. "Katniss, can you shoot him?"
She deliberates for a moment.
"My last arrow is in your tourniquet."
"Make it count," I whisper in her ear and then let her go.
She frees the arrow, tying the tourniquet back as soon as she frees it.
She crawls to the edge of the horn. I grab her ankle, just in case.
I hear the whoosh of the arrow as it rips through the air, and finally the sickening muted thud as it hits Cato.
"Did you get him?"
The cannon fires then and I need no other answer.
The cannon fired.
"Then we won, Katniss," I say in a hollow voice. I can't believe it. We won. We made it. Together.
"Hurray for us," she says in the most miserable tone.
A hole opens in the ground, and the mutts jump into it, disappearing as the camouflaged door to the hole closes above them.
We wait for a hovercraft to take Cato's body away – or what's left of him, anyway – but nothing happens.
"Hey!" I shout into the air. "What going on?"
The only sound is that of the birds and the soft whispering of the breeze.
"Maybe it's the body," I say. "Maybe we have to move away from it." What else can it be?
"Okay," Katniss says after a minute. "Think you can make it to the lake?"
Not really, I think, but what other choice do I have? "Think I better try."
We inch down the side of the horn as far as possible. She jumps to the ground.
Oh-oh, I think, that's gonna be painful. I take a deep breath and let myself slide down the horn. Even though Katniss supports must of my weight as I fall, I can't help but gasp when my bad leg touches the ground.
"Are you okay?" she asks, her eyes wide, unsure of what to do to help.
"Fine," I gasp. "Just give me a sec."
I take a deep breath. I can do this, I tell myself. I can do this.
"Okay," I whisper. "Let's go."
Somehow we make it to the lake, and although she's half carrying me, the pain in my leg is still great. Not as bad as when she found me that day in the mud, but definitely bad enough to make my head spin.
She helps me down and then scoops up a handful of water for me, and then one for herself.
A mockingjay gives a long, low whistle, and a hovercraft materializes above the cornucopia. In the next second Cato's body is lifted through the air and into the hovercraft.
I look at Katniss and her eyes are filled with tears of happiness, of relief that this is finally over.
Home. Home. Finally.
The hovercraft disappears. We wait for the second Hovercraft that will take away from this hell, but again, nothing happens.
"What are they waiting for?" I wonder.
"I don't know," Katniss says staring intently up at the sky.
She turns to me, and suddenly she's on her feet.
"What are you doing?"
She looks around, searching for something, but as she stoops to pick up something, Claudius Temple smith's voice booms in the arena.
"Greetings to the final contestants of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked," he says.
What?
"Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed."
No. No. This is not happening. This can't be happening!
"Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor."
We stand there, frozen, trying to make sense of what just happened.
But it isn't that much of a shocker. Of course they would do this. It's their job.
"If you think about it, it's not that surprising," I say, using my last bits of energy to get up.
I know exactly what must be done.