Come Back to Me

XXIII

Cordelia sat up quickly, gripping her knife tight before thrashing her arm out wildy.

"Cordelia," A voice yelled, "Cordelia it's me!"

She opened her eyes to find an all but trembling Parker, on his back with his hands up in surreneder. She scooted herself back, dropping her weapon as if it were a burning iron off of a stove.

"I'm-"

"It's fine." Parker sighed out.

Cordelia grabbed her knife and put it back in the belt around her waist, before packing her bag and collecting her spear, "What time is it?"

"I don't know, they didn't give us a clock-"

Carter whacked the boy in the chest roughly before focusing on Cordelia. He pointed one finger to the sky, then held up a four.

"Four," Carter nodded. He then held up a three and a zero. Cordelia narrowed her eyes, "Christ! It' four thirty?"

Carter nodded again shaking his hand back and forth to say around, gazing apologetically. Cordelia took a deep breath at the look on both of the boys' faces, calming herself down.

"Please, next time when I say thirty minutes, let me have thirty minutes and not two hours, huh?"

They nodded in agreement, Parker spewing out another apology. They had spent the entirety of their morning roaming the arena in search of Gretchen, who was still yet to be found. When Cordelia's head started to bother her, they had made their way back to the river to both get some more water and for her to rest. Now, the day was half over.

"How long are we going to keep this up anyway," Parker asked, swinging his axe between the two of his hands as they started to move again, "it's been a day, and I get that you want to find Gretchen - and believe me I'm not trying to sound against that in any way but, I say we have to just focus on us at some point, right?"

Cordelia looked at him, for him to continue but also to warn him to remain careful with his words.

"I don't want to see her die," He confessed lowly, "and if we come across her then we see what we can do but, we all have to break away at some point."

They walked a few more minutes in silence, then Cordelia nodded her head.

"Fine," She agreed hesitantly, "I won't argue that that doesn't make sense. But, I still want to keep moving. It'll do no good being in one spot, especially when there's only seven of us left and-"

Parker grabbed Carter's collar and drug him along behind him as he pushed Cordelia forward behind a set of trees. His reasoning flooded her mind. Maybe he would off them both now. Better now then later, he probably thought. She ripped his hand off of the younger boy but, before she could make another move, a wide eyed Parker held his finger over his lips, tilting his head towards the open area he had conceled them from. Her eyes followed his just in time to see the animal.

The creature walked on four legs, it's ear's perked up seemingly alerted by a sound nearby. Maybe the muffled string of curses Cordelia had let out in her struggle against her ally. It's brown specks littered the skin that otherwise would blend in perfectly with the sand, it's fangs were sharper than the knives in Cordelia's belt. In fact the only thing sharper, seemed to be it's glowing yellow eyes that were zoned in in the group's direction. The creature krept towards them with a hungry intent. It wasn't just strolling along. It had lost something. That was obvious by the crimson stain left on the bottom of it's mouth, and whatever the animal was, it wasn't gonna stop until whatever had slipped from it's sights was dead. Cordelia tilted her head observantly as the animal moved in their direction. It was a bobcat. She had seen the animal in previous games though now, it was not it's regular size and instead the size of a lion. Carter stepped forward, probably to get a better look. His attempt failed when he tripped, Cordelia rushing forward to catch his body before he hit the ground. Parker's eyes widened at the loud noise the commotion had made but to all of their surprise, when the bobcat reached their hiding spot, it kept going, passing them without so much as a glance in their direction.