Stay with me? [Finnick Odair]

24

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Chapter twenty four: Help us
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We had been searching for what seemed like hours with no signs of Oliver or anything to help Charlotte, I was beginning to give up when I heard the low groan, someone was hiding in the very back of the cornucopia. I pushed past all the remaining weapons, trying not to hurt myself on them, and I let out a sound of happiness at the sight of Oliver laying on the ground.

"You bastard! I thought you were gone," I exclaimed while pulling him up, throwing my arms around him, he let out a laugh while weakly returning my embrace. That's when I noticed the blood all over his face and shirt. "What happened?"

"Careers. I tried getting away, but one of them got to me," he said while revealing a large cut on his ankle, I sighed. "Then I had to fight through the girl from seven before being able to hide," he shrugged, I nodded as he took a seat beside Charlotte. There was no time for everyone to introduce themselves, so we just grabbed what we could before heading back into the woods, I managed to grab a medical kit and some more food as well as a few more throwing knives— sticking them in my belt, I caught up with the others and we all headed back into the woods.

It had been hours before we would rest again, we found a small clearing, but we couldn't stay there for long knowing the careers were perusing the woods for their next victims. It was enough time for us to tend to Oliver and Charlotte.

I searched the medical kit, finding a couple different creams that might help with Charlotte's wound, I handed them to Archer and warned him not to use too much, then I turned to Oliver with a needle and thread as well as the hydrogen peroxide.

"You're not going to like this," I mumbled, shuffling towards him, he shrugged and began gritting his teeth as I carefully moved the cloth of his pants out of the way of the cut.

"I'll be fine," he said through his teeth, I nodded and carefully poured the hydrogen peroxide over his wound, he let out a small groan but managed to keep his voice contained as I cleaned him up. Then came the fun part, I threaded the needle, and began to sew his cut shut. He didn't like it one bit, kept spewing out curse words with every little movement, but once it was done he was thankful, I wrapped a bandage around it and shoved the supplies back into the bag.

I knew the cameras would be on us now, the audience reeling that I helped both Charlotte and Oliver and that I wouldn't stop until I found him, maybe they were even more inclined to sponsor us, I didn't know but what I did know was not to let the cameras get in the way of surviving this thing.

We set off once more, I helped Oliver to his feet and the grim look on Archer's face told me the creams didn't seem to be working, I gave him an apologetic look as he tossed the creams to the side angrily, picking up his sister, we went to find a place to set up camp as dusk was rapidly approaching. Hours had passed, and I could tell the game masters were getting antsy with how the games were moving slowly, there wasn't anything we could do about that, so we found a place to stay the night and set up camp.

It was close to what we had the last time, an open space with plenty of room to sleep, cover from anyone trying to sneak up on us, and an easy escape route. I set up a place high up in the tree, watching the ground carefully for any movement, it wasn't long before I allowed the tired feeling to take over me and I slipped into a dreamless void of sleep...

I woke up to an unimaginable heat swallowing me whole, my brows furrowed, I groaned quietly and my eyes cracked open. Suddenly, I almost fell out of the tree I had secured myself in. Tearing me from whatever remaining sleep I had, I was met with a ghastly orange grin; tearing through the woodland where we had secured a safe place to stay. Unfettered flames, devouring the once green scenery hungrily like a wolf devouring its prey, it was hurtling towards us.

I untied myself as quickly as I could, discarding the rope and sleeping bag and falling to the floor in a desperate attempt to escape, I rushed towards the others as the fire crept closer to their sleeping bodies.

"Fire!" I exclaimed. "We have to go!" They all jumped up in a panic and saw the flames, twisting and swaying in a dance without rhythm, they all scrambled to gather their supplies before we bolted. The sky was still black, meaning we hadn't had the chance to sleep long, we didn't bother to talk, all we did was run away from the hungry flames that followed us on our paths to safety.

We had no idea where to run, anywhere but into the flames, the only problem was that there were now fireballs being thrown at us. That led us all to believe that the game masters wanted a little action.

We ran for what seemed like hours, dodging the flames, hoping to outrun whatever it was the game masters had thrown onto us, there were a couple close calls but we managed to make it out of there. We had ran so far that the sun had began to rise and we had made it back to the cornucopia, nobody was there so we assumed it was safe to stop running, I was doubled over and trying to catch my breath when I heard Archer cry out.

"Charlotte!"

My head snapped upwards, only then did I realise that Charlotte was nowhere to be seen, Archer had grabbed her when we had began running so my only thought was that he had lost track of her somewhere along the way. There were two ways that could've went...

That's when we heard the cannon.