The 45th Hunger Games: The Tribute of District 4 (Watty Awards 2012 completed)

Chapter 23

I wondered about the dart that hit me. There was probably no poisonous plant that could be potent enough to kill. The District 3 tribute was probably allies with the one from 10. It was a good plan to leave me defenseless. I could have just been left there, or killed by one of the other tributes.

And then there was Slate, the wonderful boy who I unluckily met at the Games. Would he turn on me when we finally got rid of the others? What events would occur in a few days? I couldn’t answer confidently and say that I was certain that either one of us would emerge the victor.

At the rate things were going, Xavier was the one who was playing the entire thing smartly.

Slate looked at me intently. We both knew that Panem was watching us right now. I didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of peering into something that I cared about so much.

“What are we going to do?” I asked him. He knew what I was referring to. His eyes darkened at my question.

“I don’t know.”

“You need some sleep, Slate. You’ve probably been up this whole time just watching over me. Go ahead. I’ll keep watch. You need all the rest you can get.”

He didn’t argue, since he knew that he couldn’t protect me properly if he was exhausted. I didn’t want to argue about the whole protecting thing either. If he wanted to keep doing that, it was going to be his decision.

Through the leaves and vines that hid our shelter, the rain poured dismally.

~

The filtered moonlight entered the shelter and woke me up. I scolded myself for falling asleep, but it didn’t seem to do any harm. I had to wake Slate from his nightmare though, since eyebrows were furrowed and his grip on his spear was tighter.  I made sure that I was well out of his attack range when I woke him.

Just as I figured, he held out his spear tautly as he bolted upright and was wide-awake in seconds. His breathing was rapid and his eyes darted around the cave.

When his eyes spotted me, I knew I had to reach over to him and wrap him around my arms. For all the times that he made me feel protected, it was my turn to reassure him that he was safe with me.

I kissed the top of his head and murmured words of assurance. They were empty words, but he slowly relaxed his grip around my arm.

I don’t know how many hours had elapsed, and I wouldn’t have known if there was a tribute dead, since I might have slept through the cannon boom.

Luckily, the anthem started to play and I peeked outside to see whose faces were going to be there tonight.

There was none.

We were probably still 6 in the game.

“Do you feel better?” I asked Slate. He stretched his arms over his head and grinned. That was a good sign. I felt better than I did the last time I woke up. I was fairly certain that I could combat properly if there weren’t external forces working against me. “Good, because we have to end this.”

For two Careers, we had expended all the time we had to rest. We were killers, and it would be up to us to hunt down the rest.

We left our shelter and didn’t bother to cover up the tracks. The island had been gigantic at the start, but now, with the water rising, the tributes would definitely bump into each other. I scaled a tree to see if this guess was correct.

It definitely was. I wouldn’t be surprised if an attack came at any moment. Hunting at night would be good though. They would hopefully be resting.

The noises of fighting came after an hour of walking through the forest.

The voice rang in my ears. It was Xavier. Without bothering to hide the sound of my footsteps, I ran towards the sound. In the distance, I saw Xavier fighting with Boone, who was barely managing himself, even though he was twice Xavier’s size.

Xavier had his trident though. If only I could get to him. He just had to hold on a few more seconds.

I saw the girl from District 3 before she saw me, but not before I could stop her from shooting that dart at Xavier, from a thin piece of straw that she blew on.

Everything seemed to go slowly after. “No! Xavier! No!” I remember screaming, throwing my spear at the girl before she could run away again. She was so nimble and my throw was so powerful, that she ended up skewered by the spear to the tree behind her. A cannon fired.

I couldn’t stop it though, what happened next. I remembered the immediate woozy feeling from the dart, and how my senses seemed to numb. I could feel it all as Xavier let go of his trident and one of his knees hit the ground for support. This gave Boone ample time to behead him with one clean swipe.

I lost control. I took out all the knives from my belt and started flinging it in his direction. Boone, who was exhausted from the fight with Xavier, ended up running away into the opposite direction. He probably knew that he had no chance in winning a fight against two Careers, and one of them was immensely angry for killing her district partner.

One of the knives slashes through his arm, and the other one that missed his back fell onto the back of his leg. This didn’t slow him down. I knew he was going to get away, but I would be the one to kill him.

I went over to Xavier’s decapitated body. I lay him down and took his head and put it where it was supposed to be. The ground was bleeding. With his eyes closed and with blood all over him, I could see how young he really was. It had been stressed so much during the entire Games, but this was the first time that I realized it.

“Have a safe voyage, Xavier,” I said, and stood up.

Slate had collected the knives and was handing them to me just as the cannon for Xavier went off.

“This ends tonight,” Slate said.