Panem High School

Look How We Take

Finch's POV
I've been alone for a few days now, Pexey got out because of the fire wall. Funny enough, I don't think anyone even remembers I'm still in. I believe the only people left are me, Thresh, Rue, Katniss, Peeta, three of the Careers, a guy from 3, and a guy from 10. I'm currently spying on the Careers and the guy from 3. Marvel really blew up last night. He's right though, I would know. I actually wrote about this in my journal once, Cato had broken up with 3 girls in one month and somehow Clove was always the reason so I decided to rant about how offensive Cato is being. He's using all of these girls' insecurities for his own advantage. The worst part about it all was that Clove was letting him. She didn't seem to even notice anything was wrong. I'm not sure what she must be thinking right now, but knowing her there is no way she didn't hear what Marvel said. I watched as the Careers turned in for the night and so did I, leaving Marvel on guard. I woke up the next day and began to watch the Careers again. They're up to something, the boy from 3 wasn't talking loud enough for me to hear him last night, but the only possible reason for the Careers letting a guy like him into their alliance would be because he can do something for them. Cato, Clove, and Marvel left him alone as they went to find more tributes. I watched as the 3 began to dig. He seems to be digging around the pedestal everyone stood on in the beginning of the games. I watched as he stopped at a certain plot of ground and began to really dig. It didn't take long for him to remove a huge disc. I strained my eyes so I could see the object better. It's silver and about the size of a dinner platter. He spent his whole day digging those up, and by the end he had at least 4 dozen. When Clove, Marvel, and Cato arrived back at the camp, there had been no cannons, so their tribute hunt came up with no results. They did have a rabbit though, that appears to be the only meat source they know how to kill. If the Careers were at the same level of hunger as the rest of us they wouldn't even last 24 hours. They've never gone to bed hungry, let alone felt the need to learn how to successfully trap and properly cook an animal, except for a rabbit apparently. Not to mention their lack of plant knowledge rules out any foraging. What I would do to destroy those supplies. I ate my last strip of beef and drank some of my water as the Careers roasted their rabbit and ate from their stash. My mouth watered at the sight of the rabbit turning golden brown, my stomach starting to rumble. I prayed that it wouldn't be loud enough to give away my location, but I am so hungry. I watched the 3 sit off by himself, surrounded by the discs he had collected over the day. I know what those are, but I'm drawing a blank. It's so obvious too.
"Hey 3!! Come over here!!" Marvel said, probably a bit too loudly if he were anyone besides a Career. The 3 left his discs behind and sat on the ground, facing the others around the fire.
"What's your name?" Clove asked. He's been in their alliance for almost a day and they don't even know his name? Unbelievable.
"Plasmic." He replied.
"Freshman?"
"Sophomore."
"What's your plan exactly with those landmines?" Cato asked. Landmines. That's what those discs are. What are they trying to do? Kill us? A lot of the stuff in the arena has a sort of child safety lock on it, for example, Nightlock only knocks you unconscious and Tracker Jackers only give you pain and hallucinations, but not death for either. Explosions are explosions. There's no way to tone those down. Do they know what they're doing?
"Well, I plan on stacking your supplies into a pyramid, then digging up the ground surrounding it. I'll reactivate the landmines and bury them so whoever tries to steal your supplies will trigger them."
"And that's safe?" Clove asked, even her arrogance can't cause her to be stupid enough to miss the fact that this is fatal stuff he's talking about.
"Well, it's as safe as it was at the beginning of the games. If it explodes and ends someone's life now, then it would've if anyone had stepped off their plate too early in the beginning of the games." Good answer. Now all eyes will be on the Capitol, and more importantly, Snow and Seneca Crane. It's one thing to have a kid die of dehydration, the stupid Capitol citizens won't think twice about that. It's another if a Gamemaker-implanted landmine made some kid explode. The Capitol citizens aren't so daft to see that as okay. I watched as Cato took the rabbit off the fire and began to cut it up into four portions. Plasmic's was the tiniest and Cato's was the biggest. Their unfair proportions equaled half of the rabbit, Clove and Marvel each getting the same size pieces. There was a low hum of chatter between Clove and Marvel, but it seems as though no one wants to speak to Cato. Now I know for sure that Clove overheard Cato and Marvel last night. Cato does too, and he's not happy about it. Well, that's what happens when you try to have your cake and eat it too. The four finished eating around the same time.
"We can build the pyramid while you reactivate the landmines, it'll make it go faster." Clove said. Plasmic nodded his head and returned to his work. Clove and Marvel went to start stacking, but I guess that's what they were discussing in private since Cato seemed pretty annoyed at the thought of having to help Plasmic. He followed the two anyway, after noticing that neither Clove nor Marvel actually cared that he hadn't immediately followed them. I turned away from the Careers and started to formulate a plan of my own. I'm running low on supplies, so it would be vital for me to steal some of the supplies that the Careers are now forming into a huge pyramid. In order to do that, I'll have to know where the landmines are buried, so I can work around them. Sadly for me, that means I can't fall asleep until Plasmic has buried them all. There's too big a risk that I'll sleep through it if I try to nap. This is too important for me to risk anything for sleep. I surveyed my belongings, which aren't much. I just ate the last of my food, I have a flask filled with water from before the Careers had returned to this campsite, but even that's almost empty, and I have my pack. That's it, besides my token and the clothes on my back. I redid my hair into my signature fox ears, I had overheard Clove call me Foxface and I kinda like it. Afterwards, I turned my attention back to the Careers. Plasmic now has two piles of discs. The original one has way more than the new one, which only has 2. The new pile must be for the ones he has reactivated. I wonder how he has reactivated them, yet isn't worried that they'll explode right now. Must be something above my head. I like to think of myself as intelligent, but when it comes to people from 3 like Pexey and Plasmic, I honestly must sound like an idiot. I look to the newly formed pyramid and see that it's basically Clove taking items from Cato and Marvel and putting them on top of the pyramid, since she's the smallest one and they're practically finished. Once Marvel and Cato help Clove jump down, they walk over to Plasmic, Cato staying by the fire and reigniting the flame.
"What now?" Asked Clove. Plasmic looked perplexed, like whatever he was thinking was above the vocabulary of someone from 1 and someone from 2, which it probably is. He then proceeded to give each of them individual instructions. Each person had a different area to dig up, so that when Plasmic had finished reactivating the landmines, he could bury them and then be done. I memorized each place that he told them to dig into, I'm excellent at memorization, and turned away from the camp. I feel confident enough in my ability to remember things that I let myself doze off for a couple hours.
Cato's POV
I don't trust this guy, Plasmic. The last time we let a tribute from a non Career area into the pack, he betrayed us for Girl on Fire. I can't have another Peeta Mellark situation on my hands. After digging up his certain sections of land, I decided that we should go hunting again.
"We should probably start tracking down that guy from 10. He has a bad leg and it's ridiculous that he made it to the final 10." I stated, but Marvel protested.
"We already went today, can we at least wait for the anthem to play before deciding what to do next?" Marvel asked. I turned to Clove, she being the tiebreaker. She agreed with Marvel. Clove didn't meet my gaze, she hasn't since last night where she must have overheard Marvel's conspiracy theories. Marvel was the one who called her a homewrecker, yet I'm the one who appears to be getting punished. I don't understand what her issue is, she can't possibly agree with Marvel. It's ludicrous, why would I ever use Clove to get out of a relationship? Is Marvel seriously suggesting that I'm too chicken to break up with a girl if they aren't super clingy? That I'm hiding my emotions or whatever crap he's trying to sell? That's stupid and so is Marvel and so is Clove. I just can't seem to please Clove these days. We were fine one minute and then the next she has exceedingly high expectations of me that don't even make sense half the time and she's getting hurt by every single thing that I do, which is apparently all wrong in her eyes. I haven't changed my personality that much in the past decade that I've known her, she knows how I am. I've always been cold and terrifying and, admittedly, a player when it came to women. It never bothered her too much before, but now it's like she sees me as the Devil. I don't want her to see me that way, but at the same time I'm not gonna change into wimpy Peeta Mellark who has probably had a crush on the same girl for his whole life and still doesn't have the nerve to tell her, even though at this point all of Panem knows about it. He's the complete opposite of me, and Clove for that matter, yet he probably knows more about Clove's feelings on her most intimate secret than I do. The two of them were idiots if they thought I couldn't hear them talking about Clove's mom. That's the one thing I can't help her with. The one thing that hurts her most in the world and I, as her best friend, am completely clueless and according to her I'm just making it worse. That fact already hurt, the fact that there were some things I just couldn't protect her from. Then she had to go and rub salt in the wound by having a total heart to heart with Lover Boy. It's not like either of us like the idea of sitting there and listening to each other spill our guts, but I always thought when she did, it would be with me, not with some 12 we used to not even pay attention to. She just totally opened up to him after having him as an ally for, like, 6 hours. She gave Lover Boy the same amount of trust I have worked years to attain in about a day. Imagine how that feels. Just imagine it. I was ecstatic when I got the proper chance to hurt him, and we haven't seen him since. The anthem began to play as Plasmic started on his sixth landmine. Nobody died today. That means whatever stings Girl on Fire got didn't get her out and that somehow Lover Boy has managed to survive without the use of an entire leg. So far. I turned back to the group as Marvel began to whine about not wanting to leave just yet. Clove seems indifferent. An idea sprung into my head as I decided to take advantage of the situation.
"Marvel, how about you stay here and guard Plasmic while Clove and I go try and find another tribute?" I asked. Marvel seemed reluctant as he shared a look with Clove. I'm starting to fear the alliance between those two is overpowering their alliances with me. Their silent conversation was over within minutes.
"Sure, why not?" Marvel replied and Clove and I stood up. We grabbed our packs and our weapons and headed West. The two of us silently trudged through the forest as the distance between us and the Cornucopia got bigger and bigger. I finally decided to speak, since it was obvious she wasn't going to.
"You heard what Marvel said last night." I stated. Her head whipped around to look at me.
"How did you know that?" She asked.
"I know you, Clove. We were fighting before last night, but I could tell we were warming up to each other again. At least, I was. There is no other possible solution for the sudden silence today. Not to mention all the looks you've shared with Marvel, like it's some big secret that you know what he thinks about me."
"Marvel doesn't think of you that way. He just thinks of the person around girls you are that way. If that makes sense."
"Clove, the person I am and the person I am around girls is the same person."
"Well I sure hope not. That would mean you're a complete ass."
"Excuse me, you're a girl and I act the same around you as I do around Marvel."
"No you don't, but that's a completely different side of you. We're talking about the side of you who uses me to end relationships with girls when you get bored of them. That guy is the issue here."
"Clove, I promise you that I do not use you as a coward's way out."
"You so do, I can't believe I never realized it. I think every single one of your breakups leads back to me somehow."
"They do not!!"
"Name one that didn't end in you breaking up with her because she was jealous of you and me." I thought for a couple minutes, but I could feel Clove getting cocky, so I just said the first name that popped into my head.
"Adrianna Hennessey." I could tell that was the wrong answer by the way Clove immediately tensed up.
"I hate that girl so much. Don't you dare say that you don't remember what she did." Then it all came flooding back. Adrianna is a girl from the 4th area who I dated in 8th grade. I had dated a lot of girls that year, but I cannot believe I didn't remember Adrianna before I said her name. Stupid. I had convinced myself that she was "the one". I was 14, give me a break. Of course, Clove was very blunt about how she highly doubted that I was dating my future wife already, but I didn't care. Adrianna did though, but not about that. She cared about keeping me all to herself. At first, I didn't understand why Adrianna was pissed off whenever I'd hang out with Clove. Unlike what Marvel thinks, I didn't use Clove as a reason to break up with this girl. Nope. Adrianna screwed it up all by herself. You see, she gave me an ultimatum. Her or Clove. The decision was easy, Clove, but I didn't get a chance to tell her that at the right moment before she ambushed Clove. I knew something was up when Clove and Sagara kept glaring at me during training, so I went over to Clove's house to see what was wrong.
Flashback
"S'up Sevina." I said as I sat in one of her chairs.
"Hey." She said curtly, not looking up.
"What's wrong? You didn't talk to me at training and now you're acting as though I don't exist."
"Nothing."
"Don't be passive aggressive, Clove. I have to tell you something so you might as well get whatever your issue is out of the way." She heard me getting angrier, so she put down her pencil and looked at me.
"Fine, you wanna know?"
"Yeah."
"Then I'll tell you. I got a visit from your lovely girlfriend this afternoon, before training. She seemed pretty adamant that I stay away from you. That you think I'm a weird little girl who has an unhealthy obsession with knives and never smiles. Apparently, now that you have her, you don't need dead weight like me dragging you down. Also, she said that you don't really like me, you just feel sorry for me. Then she told me that she gave you an ultimatum. Me or her. She said that you practically didn't even let her finish before you said you'd talk to me after training. Well, it's after training. Just let me go, Cato. I obviously mean nothing to you." Every single word of her explanation stung and tears began to escape her eyes.
"Clove-" I began.
"I just thought we were friends, that we cared about each other. You were my best friend, and I thought I was yours, but I guess I was wrong. I just feel so stupid. I must have looked like an idiot, thinking you cared when it was all just an act, a cruel joke."
"Clove, please listen to me. I do care about you, you're my best friend."
"I find that hard to believe."
"Well believe it, you're stuck with me. It's true, Adrianna did give me an ultimatum between her and you. I did know my answer the moment she said it, but I didn't choose Adrianna, I chose you. It was a no brainer." The tears stopped as she furrowed her eyebrows at me. I sat at the foot of her bed, carelessly tossing my shoes on the floor.
"I don't understand. Adrianna said you were gonna talk to me and here you are."
"I did say that and I said it because I needed to ask you how I should break up with her tomorrow. You see, she's kind of a psychopath and I needed to know where I should breakup with her so I didn't have to worry about her losing it."
"Oh."
"I can't believe she said those things to you, and tried to make you believe I said them. Clove, I don't see you as some charity case. I don't see you as a weird little girl who's obsessed with knives or as dead weight, you know that right?"
"I... I knew you'd never say those things, but she was just so... she pointed out that most girls in our grade hate me, which I already knew, but she just continued to say all these mean things to me. It's like she knew exactly which buttons to push and she rammed them all. Really hard." The tears began to resurface in her eyes.
"I'm so sorry, Clove. I never should've let her walk away after she gave me that ultimatum. I should've told her it was over right there."
"I thought you said she was the one."
"What?"
"Cato, you've dated a lot of girls, but this is the only one you've ever really cared about. You said she could be the one. You can't just let her go because of me."
"Clove, if she doesn't accept the fact that you're my best friend, then she's definitely not the one. Why would I ever want to be with that horrible person who made you doubt how I feel about you?"
"Because I'm a weird girl who likes weird things who drives perfect girls like Adrianna away from you without even trying." She put her head in her hands. I move closer to her and wrap my arms around her and hold her close to my body.
"You are my best friend, Clove Sevina. You're different, but in a good way. Adrianna never stood a chance."
"Thank you. I'm being such a wimp about all this. Crying."
"You're just being human. So, how am I breaking up with Adrianna tomorrow?"
"Public humiliation."
"Perfect." The next day, Clove and I were back to normal. We were talking to Sagara, Glimmer, and Marvel when Adrianna finally arrived.
"Excuse us, Clove and I have to go breakup with someone." I said and we left the group and went to where Adrianna was standing.
"I've made my decision. Well, technically I made it right after you made me choose." I said.
"Okay, so Clove, I'd say don't be a stranger, but..." Adrianna said.
"I'm breaking up with you."
"What?"
"I don't do ultimatums, especially when it's between two people. You said you or Clove, so I choose Clove. Plus, the fact that you said all these cruel things to her and then said I said it makes you a huge bitch. I don't date bitches. Especially when they're being mean to my best friend." Clove and I left, both of us smirking.
"My best friend is awesome, but man can she cry." I stated.
"Shut up, that was so embarrassing." She whined as I laughed.
End of Flashback
How could I have forgotten about that? Clove doesn't like to talk about it, but I still should have remembered. I much prefer Clove when she's cocky to Clove when she's upset.
"I'm sorry, I just said the first name that popped into my head. I didn't realize until after I said it-" I began to explain myself.
"It's fine." Clove said through gritted teeth.
"Clove, it's not. She was horrible to you and it wasn't okay for me to bring her up, accident or not." I said, softer this time. I hate it when I hurt her, I never know what to do.
"Whatever." She began to push ahead as I quickly followed her.
"Clove, wait." I eventually caught up with her speed, but we didn't speak. About 10 minutes later we heard rustling around us and the guy from 10 ran, well, limped, straight into us. Idiot. Within seconds one of Clove's knives was in his chest and my sword was at his throat. Clove threw another knife into his stomach as I made sure he didn't move. His cannon went off minutes later. Clove claimed her knives and led the way back to camp as the guy from 10 waited for the hovercraft. I didn't argue with Clove's decision to go back, I just want her to speak to me again, and the easiest way to get back on her good side is by not aggravating her.
"That was kind of a boring kill, don't you think?" I asked. Clove just grunted and continued walking. I silently followed her until we were back at camp, just as the sun was starting to come up in the sky. Plasmic was still awake, but Marvel was passed out.
"I'll stay up with Plasmic." Clove stated. I nodded my head and laid down, thinking about what my parents have been doing ever since I left. Probably fighting. The last thing I remembered was Plasmic starting on his last landmine, then it was time to wake up. Marvel shook my shoulders as I groaned, only getting a few hours of sleep.
"What?" I whined as I stood up.
"Someone started a fire. We can see the smoke from here." Marvel replied.
"No remaining tribute is that stupid."
"Everdeen or Mellark probably are, or maybe it's the freshman." Clove stated. I noticed then that all of the landmines were gone. Plasmic and Clove must have buried them while I was asleep.
"Plasmic, let's move." I ordered. Plasmic looked up at me in shock.
"Why are we taking him?" Marvel asked.
"There's no need for a guard anymore. Besides, some of the dumber tributes might try to steal some if there's no one around, resulting in them getting out."
"Do you have any weapons?" Clove asked.
"I'm okay with a spear." He replied, and Marvel reluctantly gave him one. The four of us sped off into the direction of the smoke. It was a long run, but when we reached the fire, it was abandoned.
"Look, another one!!" Marvel exclaimed and pointed to smoke rising in another direction.
"This seems fishy to me." Clove stated as we sprinted off in the direction of the next fire.
Rue's POV
The last fire is near the Cornucopia, probably too close, but in case the Careers were getting annoyed, I thought they would actually go for the last fire since it was near their camp anyway. It was right on the outskirts, near their pyramid of supplies. I lit the fire and began to run to my and Katniss's meeting place. Before I could get too far, I heard an explosion. I looked at the supplies pyramid which was in flames, and the first explosion seemed to be setting of a chain reaction. I have to get out of here. The Careers must have reactivated the landmines from the beginning of the games in order to protect their supplies. That would explain why they let that boy from 3 join their alliance. The explosions were getting closer to me as I ran. I was almost free, almost safe, when the landmine closest to me went off. I felt a sudden searing pain as I was lifted into the air, and then I felt nothing. Everything was black.