We head out deep into the woods and pick a good place to set up a net, near where the fire was. The fire girl couldn't have gotten far with all those tracker jacker stings. We lay out three traps, spread out to cover a great deal of area. After we are done, we head out to find someone, slipping through the branches.
We approach the river, finding the spot where Glimmer died. My heart drops at the sight of our abandoned camp. I lean down to see if we can salvage anything we dropped. I find one of my missing knifes buried in the sand, which I pass off to Marvel for him to clean in the river. He walks off a little bit, leaving me alone. After walking behind the tree, I find another silver arrow stuck pointing in the ground. I pull it out, inspecting it. This must've been Glimmer's.
"Can't let you get this, Fire Girl," I whisper to myself. I place it in my pack to make sure she doesn't get it to use against us. I walk around the site a couple more times but nothing else is left. Marvel comes back running through the bushes.
"I found something weird by the river and I'm not sure what to do about it," he says, passing me the knife. I stick it in my jacket, lining it up next to all of my other knives.
"What do you mean you found something?" I ask him, confused. He sighs and puts his forehead in his hand.
"You just have to come see it," he tells me. He grabs me by the wrist and pulls me along to the spot. After helping me get up onto a rock, which I really didn't need, he points down.
"That is the strangest looking rock formation I've ever seen," he points down to a spot in the rocks, dropping my hand to point with it. I kneel down to get a closer look. However, I'm not totally sure what Marvel wants me to do about it. It's just rocks. I take a step off the big rock and climb down closer towards it. What will it do? Kill me?
"It's just a rock," I tell him, snapping my ponytail around to look at him, still perched on the rock. "Come look." He warily steps off and comes around to the other side.
"See, I'll prove it to you just so you can calm down," I reach out and touch the part where it curves upward. When I pull back, the gray rock has rubbed off and the part where I touched is now olive toned, like skin.
"I was right," he says, nodding like he's proud of himself. I flick off the paint texture into the water, wanting to get rid of it. This is obviously a person. This person is obviously not dead. Who does that leave me with? Whoever it is, they aren't budging, even when the sound of an explosion rockets through the arena. I stumble backwards a little bit, but catch myself. I turn to Marvel with a look of alarm. It must've been our food supply blown up, there was nothing else it could be. Cato and Ian probably went off to go catch someone, maybe 5? They left it all alone, those idiots.
I quickly make note of our surroundings before we both take off running straight ahead, the easiest way to make it back. Whoever made the explosion couldn't still be alive; you would have to be really close to get them to fire off.
"Katniss!" Someone screams. It sounds like a little girl's scream which means Katniss will be there soon. Which one?
"I'll go to them, you check on the explosion!" Marvel tells me and before I can even counter, he runs off in the other way. That only leaves me to go ahead. When I approach the scene, everything is gone. Most of the food has been blown to pieces, as well as our weapons, supplies, everything. The only thing we have now is what Marvel and I carried on our backs and whatever Cato and Ian took in their pursuit, which I doubt was little.
As I round the Cornucopia, I see Cato snapping Ian's neck. The cannon goes off immediately. I run up to them, knowing it is too late to stop it. Ian is lying dead by Cato's feet.
"Where's Marvel?" Cato asks, panting. His fists are clenched in rage.
"We got the girl from 11, who was screaming for 12," I report back to him. He nods. Then, another cannon sounds.
"We should probably go over there," I tell him. I begin to head off but he stops me.
"Are you alright?" He asks.
"Alright? Yeah, perfect," I say brushing him and trying to continue but he steps in front of me again.
"You seem very…unapproachable," he tells me.
"Isn't that good?" I respond.
"Not when you are even acting like that to me. What happened?" He asks, whispering the question. He snatches up my hands.
"We are now in an arena getting hunted and now we have no supplies," I tell him, annoyed. I sound a little more annoyed than I actually am though.
"But…" He tries to stammer out.
"It's different now," I tell him. Another cannon sounds off in the background, hopefully fire girl. He presses his lips to mine, hard. Do I want to do this again? Yeah, but also no. I don't kiss him back. There is none of that this time.
I look down before back up at his face, obviously crushed. I choose my words very carefully.
"I think we should separate now," I tell him trying to be gentle.
"Our alliance or…?"
"Both," I tell him. "I'll collect what I can and leave you some and Marvel too." With that, I awkwardly wipe my hands on my pants and head off to examine the rubble.
That was one eventful chapter! :) Next chapter will contain who is in the rock paint (hopefully you already know this), what happened to Marvel, and Clove on her own. I'm not sure when this will be out though because I have finals these next couple of weeks, but I'll try as soon as possible. Thanks for reading and don't forget to review!