(Hi guys sorry did this chapters really long but I wanted the showdown to be One chapter. I hope you all like this chapter, please review!)
Every single mentor is in the hub today. Every single person in Panem is glued to their screens. Nobody wants to miss a single second of this showdown.
To be completely honest it seems like a million years ago since Erin and Barker were killed. It seems like forever ago that the little girl Rue was buried in flowers. It seems like forever ago that we all watched Clove's final seconds of her life as her caved in skull emptied her of life.
And now there's only 3 remaining. One to die and two to go home. I despise the 2 lovebirds from district 12 but I can't help think it would be better if they did win. After all the games have clearly sent Cato insane. It has turned him into a monster like the rest of us. It has made him unworthy of living.
I might despise Katniss with every bone in my body but even I have to admit that Peeta is worthy of victory.
He wouldn't have made it alone but he has to be the purest person I've seen in the top three in a while.
With fur as thick and glossy as a lions mane, twenty one snarling wolves rampage through the arena aiming to find their kill. There is twenty one wolves for a reason. Just like there was twenty two man-eating birds my year. These mutts resemble the tributes. It's an inexcusable tactic. It has the ability to drive one to insanity. When you are about to be murdered by a mutt that resembles someone you have killed, there is no other pain worse. When a mutt that looks like your ally is trying to rip your throat out, there is nothing worse.
Cato is the closest to these beastly animals but he has a good start on them. The ash blonde wolf resembling Glimmer from one is just about to snatch hold of his back when he enters the clearing. The wolves teeth clamps with his metal armour stopping it in its tracks for a moment.
Katniss and Peeta are immediately rose from the ground and to their feeds as Cato charges towards them? What must they be thinking? Do they think he has surrendered? It's to late for them to think much longer.
Haymitch is cursing and cussing by the side of me in frustration. This has to be the most annoying thing. Why couldn't the gamesmakers just let them fight it out?
Cato must still have some sanity because he's sprinted towards the Cornucopia. Even if these beasts can climb, he's probably prolonged his life for a small amount of time. Little Miss MockingJay has twigged on and is now running towards the Cornucopia herself. With a look of faintness, Cato's skin is completely drained from colour as he slams his body against the metal.
Katniss' hand clamps on the metal just when she twigs on. You forgetting something Miss MockingJay? The boy your supposedly in love with? Convincing.
"Go Katniss! Go." The plea of a more love struck boy bellows. She continues to climb and nobody blames her because she cannot protect either of them on the ground.
For a split second everybody thinks Peeta is about to die. With the mutts at his heels, there is no way he'll out run them in time.
"Climb!" She screams at him as he reaches the tail. Hampered by his weakened leg and also a knife, Peeta begins climbing up the tail as quickly as he can. She drives an arrow directly into the throat of the one that is about to take her District partner away from her.
He's at her feet now so she pulls him up to the side of her. Cato is still panting heavily as the top whilst Peeta just about manages to not pass out.
"Can they climb?" Cato chokes out crippled over with cramp.
"What?" Katniss screeches back.
"He said, 'Can they climb it?'" answers Peeta.
Her eyes snap back to the horn where the other 22 wolves have began to assemble. They'd be acting naive if they thought these wolves couldn't get to them. Even on their back legs they reach a great height.
Her piercing brown eyes widen, when she registers exactly what these mutts are designed to do. They are designed to crush you from the inside. A small shriek escapes her lips and her hands loosen too weak with terror.
A worries Peeta grips onto her arm in concern. "Katniss?" He says.
"It's her!" She cries. There's the same terror to her voice that we have to hear every year. It's not the terror that she might die. It's the terror that it's really them. I know for a fact that even if this girl lives, these wolves will plague her nights for the rest of her life.
"Who?" Asks Peeta obliviously. He always seems to be the last person to realise everything. To be honest I think he's the only one now who still believes her little get up.
"It's them. It's all of them. The others. Rue and Foxface and. all of the other tributes," She chokes out.
Peeta gasps in recognition. 'Clever boy!' I mutter to myself sarcastically.
"What did they do to them? You don't think. those could be their real eyes?" He cringes his face draining from colour altogether.
The eyes are not a problem. What if they've really used their heart? Their brain? What if they've used everything and just sent a pile of bones back to their families.
I have to close my eyes because I'm scared that if I see Erin or Barker then I'll never be able to function again.
A Mutt grabs Peeta in its teeth and tries yanking him off the side. The girl on fire fights back pulling him back with all his force. Haymitch is pacing in front of me in terror. Of he lets these lovers die then he will never be able to live with the guilt.
"Kill it Peeta! Kill it!" She screams. His knife goes straight into the wolves neck loosing the grasp.
Cato has regained is feet and is creeping up behind a distracted district 12. It's not just Haymitch shouting out for his tributes this time. It's all of us.
Cato has Peeta in a headlock trapping his air pipe effectively. I'm quite handy with a similar technique myself.
Gaped open like a flower blooming from its bud, Peeta's leg pours with blood. He tries to fight back but it'd no use. Cato has body amour on and all he has as a weapon is his nails.
Katniss goes to pull back the string of her arrow. But all Cato does is laughs. "Shoot me and he goes down with me."
Right. Now Little Miss MockingJay is in a predicament. Either she shoots and they both die or she watches the life drain out of the boy she's kept alive for days.
"I think she should shoot." Haymitch whispers to me quietly in a pained voice.
"Why? That's horrible." I say more because I prefer Peeta than her.
"Look at him Johanna. At that rate he might not even make it to the hovercraft. He's weak." He whispers.
With every second, Peeta's lips turn more and more blue. If she doesn't act quick then he will die of asphyxiation. But what can she do? How can she shoot when it means Peeta being torn up by a ravenous mutt?
For the second time showing his intelligence, Peeta pulls his shaky fingers to his leg dipping his finger in the blood. He then paints a cross on the back of Cato's palm. It takes Cato about the same as it does her to realise what this means. Her arrow drives into the back of his hand before he can even think.
Cato's body falls from the cornucopia and goes crashing down on the ground. This is going to be a showdown to remember. Trapped in his armour, his death could take days.
Moans and cries escape from this child as the Mutts attack him. What kind of a world do we even live in? How could any human being find this entertaining? He's just a child!
"Bet you wish you didn't put him in the armour now." I snarl at Enobaria as we watch her tribute be mauled. This could take hours.
Hours pass and all District 12 can do is hold each other and pray that this nightmare will end soon. We're all praying the same thing because I've heard nothing but mains and snarls for the last several hours. Finnick holds my hand and I bury my face in his chest unable to watch or hear for a second longer.
My attention is brought to focus again when I hear her pleading voice. "Don't go to sleep," she tells him.
"Are you cold?" he asks. He unzips his jacket and Katniss presses against him as he fastens it around her.
It's cold in there and just as I am thinking it the same words escape her lips: "Cato may win this thing yet," she whispers.
"Don't you believe it," he says, pulling up her hood, but he's shaking hard now.
The next hours are the worse. Nobody cares who this boy is anymore. They don't care what he's done or how monstrous he has become they just want the pain to stop for him. Even the parents of the children that Cato killed couldn't wish this upon him.
"Make it stop." I whisper to Finnick. Make it stop.
She soon does though. Katniss puts the boy out of his misery and sends an arrow straight through his head. Dead. After all them hours everything is finally over.
But no fireworks or announcers voice blares over the arena yet. They make it over to the lake when the announcement blares out. "Greetings to the final contestants of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games. The earlier revision has been revoked. Closer examination of the rule book has disclosed that only one winner may be allowed," he says. "Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor."
Nobody breathes for the next 21seconds. We all just stare in utter sickness as Haymitch smashes up the hub controllers in pure anger. He'll get his girl out but she won't be in any state to lead a rebellion. She'll be messed up.
This was Snow's plan all along wasn't it? Play her like she's played him?! This, in his eyes, will be the biggest showdown in history.
"If you think about it, it's not that surprising," he says softly like a gentleman. He stands to his feet taking his knife from his belt. Doing herself no favours, she sees it as a threat pulling back her bow but instead he drops his knife in the lake. She stops herself.
"No," he says. "Do it." Peeta limps toward her and thrusts the weapons back in her hands.
"I can't, She say. "I won't."
"Do it. Before they send those mutts back or something. I don't want to die like Cato," he says in a strained voice.
"Then you shoot me," she says furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. "You shoot me and go home and live with it!"
"You know I can't," Peeta says, discarding the weapons. "Fine, I'll go first anyway." He leans down and rips the bandage off his leg, eliminating the final barrier between his blood and the earth.
"No, you can't kill yourself," she cries falling to her knees, desperately plastering the bandage back onto his wound.
"Katniss," he says. "It's what I want."
"You're not leaving me here alone," she says. That there sends a hushed silence over the whole hub because we all know exactly what she means. If he dies then she'll never leave this place.
"Listen," he says pulling her to her feet. "We both know they have to have a victor. It can only be one of us. Please, take it. For me."
She shakes her head furiously and begins fumbling about in her backpack pulling out a handful of berries. Her eyes are full of pain as she says: "Trust me." Then on the count of three the lovers from 12 shove the poisonous berries into their mouths.
What has she done?
The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouts above them. "Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you - the tributes of District Twelve!"
The whole Hub is silenced. Katniss Everdeen is going to have to pay for this. Just like I did when I played my little stunt. But she is going to pay even harder.