Gladiators -- Clato

-Little Finger-

i was sad to kill glimmer ngl
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Stinging. Yes, the first thing I feel when I open my eyes is stinging.

    A shrill scream escapes me and I burst to my feet, swatting at my face as millions of bugs swarm me. I can hear the others screaming, crying out for help. My legs threaten to fall out from under me as I frantically claw at my face and chest, trying to free myself from the bugs.

    And then I feel another pinprick, right on my bicep. I scream and tear the stinger out of the quickly rising lump on my arm.

    "Help me!" squeals a female voice, one I recognize as Glimmer. "C-Cato! Marvel! Clove!" The sound of her screaming out my name for help slices through me like a knife, but then Cato's voice breaks the sounds of her desperate cries.

    "To the lake!" he calls. "To the lake!"

    Registering the destination, I scramble into the trees as fast as I can, paying no heed to Glimmer still screaming on the floor. The branches slap my face, and I have two stings, which have begun to pulsate in pain, one on my bicep and a small one on my left hand. I swat the leaves and twigs brom my face and just run, run, run.

    I'm on the water now. How did I get here? Marvel is holding me up by my left arm, and I look around frantically, just in time to see Peeta make a mad dash away from the water and back into the forest the way he came.

    "Get him!" comes my strangled cry. I watch as Cato leaps from the water like a sea creature and flies in the direction of the runaway tribute.

    I awkwardly struggle to stand upright, prying my arm away from Marvel and looking blearily around at my surroundings. The water has turned a strange, blood-red shade, and I watch as it drips viscously off my hands and streams down my legs. I wonder if it's my own blood, or if I'm hallucinating. When I look out toward the other end of the lake, I see dead tributes swimming around me with fish tails, splashing blood-water on my face.

    A cannon goes off, and at first it doesn't register to me that It's Glimmer. And then, Marina, where is she? Did she run off in the commotion? I look around to find no sign of her. The tributes swim around me now, brandishing my own knives in their fists and chanting unintelligible words.

    And then, Cato. He's coming back now, and the time frame feels too quick, as if I had just seen him leave. He's breathing heavily, glimmering sword dripping blood, a terrible look in his eye. He has one sting that I can visibly see. But then his eyes find mine and he comes charging toward the delusions towards me.

    "Clove!" I don't move, or say anything, as he checks me over for stings and pats me down, and then supports me as he pulls me up out of the blood lake. He tells me to lay down on the bank, and I don't protest because of how much pain I'm in. I hear a second cannon fire.

    "How bad is it?" I hear him ask Marvel.

    "She made it to the lake fine. She passed out in the water, I made sure she didn't drown."

    "Good. Clove, are you alright?"

    "Yeah," I mumble, but my voice sounds like I'm underwater and the buzzing of the wasps.

    "Marvel, what's your situation?" Cato asks.

    "Still seeing some things," He mutters. "I need to lay down."

    But Cato doesn't seem to be watching Marvel, he seems to be watching me. His eyes rove over my body as if I could be hiding a sting
somewhere that he doesn't see. I struggle to prop myself up on my shoulders, and squeeze my eyes to block out the hallucinations. "Cato, we need to rest," I say.

    He seems to agree almost instantaneously, and nods. Without another word, he picks me up and begins to carry me.

    When I wake up, I'm laying on the dusty earth in a damp overhang, framed by hanging mosses. My joints ache with the effort of movement, but my eyes quickly adjust to the darkness and I realize we're in some kind of cave. Marvel is asleep to my left, in his sleeping bag, but Cato is nowhere to be found.

    I test my legs for the first time since the attack. My knees groan in pain, but I'm able to walk to the mouth of the small tunnel, and sure enough, there's Cato.

    "Hey," I say. My voice sounds strangled, unused. Cato turns around to look at me, face illuminated by the light bouncing off the lake surface.

    "Hey," He says softly. I quickly sit down beside him and wince as my body screams in protest. "You should sleep till morning. They got you pretty bad."

    "I'm okay."

    "If you say so." He absentmindedly cleans his sword with a rag. "Glimmer and Marina are dead."

    This is the first time I'm hearing it said out loud. In the back of my mind, this was already an established fact, but the finality of it hits me harder than I had expected.

"Yeah," I say instead, not wanting anyone to see my surprise.

"All because of her." he spits out the last word with a seething hatred.

"We'll kill her," I say firmly. "Painfully, and we'll make it long."

"I'll kill her," Cato growls. "Not you, not Marvel. It'll be my sword to her neck."

I decide to let it go for the moment, although the both of us know that when the time comes the kill will be made by whoever is the most capable in the moment. Instead, I move a little closer to Cato and lay a hand on his arm. A sign of support.

He looks at me, eyes holding a question. I'm sure he notices I haven't been blind to him and Glimmer's behavior recently. He's wondering why I'm making peace with him.

"I'm glad you're still here," he says finally.
I know what he means. He's glad I didn't end up the way Glimmer or Marina did. Their final moments must have been truly awful.

"I'm glad you're still here, too." I say it quietly, so he knows I'm genuine. I wish the prying eyes of the Capitol weren't so close, but I know now they're looking at us more than ever.

So holding his gaze, I lift up the pinky finger on my right hand  and touch it softly to my lips, right in the middle. I see Cato's eyelids flutter in surprise. Those diligent enough to see it back in District Two may understand, but for now, this is my secret gesture of affection. This is me making a promise.