Disclaimer: All Hunger Games characters and core personality traits are the property of SC. I own nothing, nor do I plan on profiting from using her work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Chapter Three
Katniss had sixty seconds to adjust to a brightness so blinding, it could have been nothing but one of the many Capital-controlled features of the arena. The forest surrounding her was as familiar as an old friend, but that light… it wasn’t natural.
The first thing she saw was the bow.
Jarring chimes that rang away their last moments of guarantied safety robbed her of her ability to orient herself and the deadly distance between her and the perfect, glinting equipment seemed entirely achievable. Though both men had given her identical advice regarding participation in the initial slaughter, it was Peeta Mellark’s voice that weeded into her head.
“That’s no place for you. Find cover for a few hours. Wait until you hear the last of the cannons. Then I’ll come and collect you.”
Her shaky stance finally solidified with the wave of defiance his order brought out in her. Of course he wouldn’t want her to have an opportunity to find her weapon of choice. He wanted her defenseless, dependent, and easy to kill when she had served her purpose. Should she have the hunting set from the very beginning, she’d have no need for an alliance with the Capital’s pet districts.
It was this logic of duress which sent her sprinting into the most volatile showdown of the games the second the invisible mines surrounding her were deactivated. The resourceful young woman was no stranger to life or death decisions, but this was the first time she felt her existence so acutely in peril. She could battle through starvation with a remarkable lust to persevere but one of Cloves’ knives thrust through her brain would end her before she even knew it was coming.
The finality of such a fate left her pallet dry with dread.
Katniss was still yards away from her intended target when she realized her mistake. The prize she had her heart set on, arrows that would kill without the risk of close proximity, were much closer to the center of the field than the destinations of some of her fellow tributes and she wasn’t nearly the fastest runner present.
By the time she was closing in on her beckon, killing was all around her.
Unable to look away, she watched Cato—whom favored a specific sword but had not been able to control his suppressed blood lust long enough to bother searching it out—push a smaller girl from Nine to the dirt at his feet and stomped her head into the ground with nothing but the standard issue boots.
Katniss’ gut rolled violently, her system stocked by the sight.
When she was finally able to pull her eyes away from the girl’s broken face, they locked right onto the large, volatile hunter looming above the dying body. The district Twelve female fretted internally over the unimpressive distance between her and Two’s practiced killer.
Cato assessed her lazily, unbothered by the crimson liquid spraying up at his pant legs in weakening bursts.
She was sure she was going to die then, the impossibility of out fighting such a predator with no advantage or distraction perforating her awareness.
He lend forward slightly, teasing her with a movement that feigned advancement. Some innate, rodent-like instinct told her that turning and running would only trigger his urge to chase. Her muscles ached with the effort of holding her ground.
A gleaming set of white teeth flashed across his face at the open show of defiance. It conveyed an indulgent sort of amusement as well the healthy measure of malice that seemed omnipresent in the male’s aura.
Though just as physically formidable, it was Mellark’s ability to suppress his air of danger that made him a true killer. Katniss could never be charmed into forgetting Cato’s particular brand of aggression.
“Hm,” he mused, his tenor unhurried despite the carnage surrounding him, “Maybe he’s right about you,” his smile widened to the point of gleeful insanity, “No harm in keeping you around. Plenty of other targets to keep the fun going…
Duck.”
This last word was said as causally as any that had came before it and was awarded no special emphases. It was not the warning at all, rather, the small throwing knife he pulled from his pocket and sent flying as fast as any bullet, that had Katniss spinning out of her inhabited air space a moment before it was due to pierce her throat.
For an instant, she was sure she had been the intended target.
Until she felt the mist of warmth coat the back of her neck.
The body hadn’t even hit the ground by the time she had worked up the courage to turn her head, but stood frozen and gaunt with bright red flowing relentlessly from the base of Cato’s blade. The weapon had lodge square between the boy’s eyes but Katniss was still easily able to recognize her fellow tribute.
She stumbled forward to catch his slight weight just as his lifeless muscles stopped supporting his frame.
Her chest heaved out a little sob as she realized he was already beyond saving, so immediately distraught that she paid no attention to her own safety as Cato gated over to the District Twelve’s twosome on the blood covered ground.
“He was just a fucking kid,” she hissed up at him.
His features—which had held an expression that closely replicated a proud, loyal golden retriever whom had just properly retrieved the master’s newspaper—melted into confusion, then irritation.
“Are you kidding me, Everdeen? Look again.”
Her grey eyes followed his to the boy’s hand, fingers clenched as tightly as death around a small, poised hunting knife.
“He was right behind you, about to gut you like a fish, Kitty Kat,” Cato barked out a laugh unbefitting the topic. “Had more gull than I ever would have given him credit for. That’s one way to make sure your mentor took him seriously.”
Understanding trickled in slowly as she clung to the bleeding child that had been desperate enough to kill her in an attempt to strengthen his chances of returning home to their district.
She gazed down at his tiny hand, the unfamiliar way he griped the blade, how his terrified hold was so tight he had cut open the inside of his own small fingers, and knew she couldn’t blame him for his failed attempt at her life.
Her vision blurred as the salted, metallic smell of his essence hit her. She could imagine nothing but Prim’s sliced palms in place of the boy’s.
At the very cusp of consciousness, just as the petrifying scene around her was turning black to shield her mind while forsaking her body, she felt a pair of huge arms pull her away from her dead companion.
I fucking told you this wasn’t for you, baby, didn’t I?”
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