An Extra Tribute

-unawkwarding-

And that is my first thought in the morning. I stretch and hear the mockingjays chirping away their own special melodies. I stretch and quickly eat a biscuit before climbing out of the cave. It's time to work. I left my bag in the cave, so my walk is quick. My technique to finding a potentially and likely camouflaged Peeta is to softly call out his name and scrape my foot along the bank. I work in small areas, patting down in rows until I get the full length of the creek. It takes about an hour to go down about a mile and a half east of my cave, so I start on the west, wanting to be sure that I don't miss him for days to only realize that he's been two minutes to the left. So, I go, patting my foot down onto the mud.

I get about ten minutes into my first section before feeling something weird. Crouching down, I file my hand through the mud and grab at what I felt. It's a paracord-type string. Wait. It's a shoelace. I look up and walk what I assume would be Peeta's length down. Suddenly, two blue orbs pop out of the mud and I hear a hoarse chuckle.

"Surprise," he says. I fall backwards into the stream and he laughs, pulling his hand from the mud.

"Why are you always getting me soaked with water?" I ask, shaking off my sleeve. Then, I start digging the mud away from his face and torso, pulling him up in the process. He sits up, mud coating every inch of him. I scrape off some on his face and do this until I can somewhat see his features.

"You need a shower," I comment under my breath. He chuckles.

"So do you," he replies. I shrug.

"Who's the one covered in mud?" I ask as a response. He gives me that one. "Okay, let's get you cleaned up." He puts a hand to his chest.

"Hey, I like my camouflage," he argues. "And do you even have anywhere for us to go?" I point to my heap of boulders.

"You see that?" He nods. "That is my cave. I've been next to you for half the day and neither of us knew."

"I knew you were looking for me," he comments.

"And you didn't tell me?" I ask, appalled. He shrugs.

"It was funny," he defends, laughing lightly. I roll my eyes.

"Take off your jacket and shirt," I say. "I'll wash them off if you do your pants." He nods and pulls off his top layers. Somehow, mud is still caked onto his chest, so I start doing the same thing I did to his face. I pull water from the creek up onto it and wipe it off, revealing a lightly-tanned, toned chest. My ears tinge pink as I keep washing.

"You know, I think it's clean enough," Peeta laughs, then grunts as he shifts. I nod and suddenly remember his leg.

"You're leg! Oh my gosh!" I exclaim, sliding down to get a good look at it. I roll up his pant leg and wash off the wound as mud is coating it as well. It's begun to swell and a clear, goopy liquid is oozing off of it. There is dried blood surrounding it as parts of the cut continue to drip the icky substance and I know that once I begin deep cleaning, it will begin to bleed more heavily. I rip off a piece of my shirt and tie it tightly around his calf.

"We'll deal with this in the cave where it's a bit easier to manage, okay?" I ask. "We just have to clean you off first." He nods and I stand up, taking his shirt and jacket with me. I walk a bit down the stream and begin to thoroughly clean his clothes. I wash all the mud out of it quickly and work up the courage to turn around and go back as he is supposed to be cleaning his pants. Luckily, he's still in his undershorts when I stand up from my crouch and walk back over to him.

"Are you done?" I ask, staring at the ground. He laughs.

"Yeah," he says. I put my hand out.

"I'll take 'em," I say.