Those Who Rise Shall Fall (Hunger Games fan fiction)

The Beginning of the End

Chapter Nineteen: The Beginning of the End 

Later on, Lucy and Marvel decided to move on again. It really did get tiring moving from one area to the next daily but this way Cato had less of a chance of locating them. The only people sure to be able to locate them were the Gamemaker's because of the trackers they had in their arms. The only way they would stop tracking them was when they died. Well, if they died. 

Lucy trudged along slowly as Marvel followed closely behind. They were both very miserable about having to spend their time in the arena...Lucy had lost count of how long they'd been here, she didn't know the time either. But the actual time didn't matter anymore, the only time that mattered was the countdown to when they got out of the arena and that time relied on them. The faster they killed the five remaining tributes, the faster they could get home. But, they could never seem to find tributes anymore...

Lucy twanged the string of her bow miserably as they walked along but then gasped and stopped dead and she held out her arm for Marvel to stop too. He stared at her confused but she pointed forward and Marvel followed her finger. 

In front of them was an area of burnt trees. It wasn't a recent fire, it seemed that it had happened quite a while ago because the place was smoking. Marvel frowned and wondered what had caused the place to be set alight. 

"What do you think happened?" He asked and Lucy stepped forwards, stepping onto the burnt area. "Do you have any ideas?" 

"Well, judging by this place, the incident happened early in the games. If this had just happened it would have smoke and possibly even had f — " Lucy paused mid sentence and narrowed her eyes and then turned around and faced Marvel. "Remember when we first found Katniss, and she was in that lake? She had an injured leg, remember?" 

"I do remember, but what are you trying to say?"

"Perhaps Seneca Crane got a little inventive with her nickname and decided to give the Capitol audience the real 'girl on fire'." 

Marvel thought for a moment then smiled. That was why Katniss was injured. The Gamemaker's had tried to kill her with fire, it was so ironic yet so amusing to him. The Gamemaker's could be their friends and also their enemies. 

"Lets move on, we don't want to be killed by fire either," Lucy said and tugged on Marvel's sleeve. 

"If we're keeping the ironic thing up, I think we'll be killed by diamonds, Miss Dime," Marvel grinned and Lucy giggled as Marvel took the lead and they walked nearer to the centre of the arena. They would be avoiding the cornucopia now because of Cato. Lucy had figured that Cato would only go to places he knew now that Clove was gone, she was the one with the sense of direction.

"I'm going to go hunt for some food, you stay here and gather up some leaves or anything else you think is edible. But for goodness sakes don't even attempt to eat it before I get back, Rookie taught me what's edible and what's not around here..." Lucy sighed and loaded her bow. 

"Alright, I promise not to eat a thing even if it is very tempting." He replied. "I'll only eat it when you say it's safe." 

"OK, and if you need my help just whistle that tune I taught the Mockingjays yesterday. They'll repeat it and I'll know you need my help." 

"Got it, but just to confirm — " Marvel looked up and whistled Lucy's tune and the Mockingjay's swiftly repeated it back. "Alright, got it." 

"See you in a little while." 

"You too." 

And with that, Lucy left and Marvel watched her until she was swallowed by the trees. He then looked around at his surroundings and tried to decide as to what was edible and what was not...he thought that just to be on the safe side he wouldn't pick any berries, he could end up killing both of them even if Lucy had checked to see if it was edible or not.