Crash Landing: Chapter 16

...So much for my promise. I'm sorry, guys. I honestly, truly am. I'm not going to make excuses because you know them already and there isn't much I can do about it. But I promised myself that I'd have it out before the end of the year and here it is.

This chapter was slow going and you have a long car journey to thank for most of it. I've made it extra long so hopefully that will redeem a small section of my sinful procrastination.

Hope you enjoy the chapter. We're almost at the end of the Games, but there's still more to come after that.

Three players remain. Out of the twenty four that began this sick game, only Monster Boy and the Fires are still alive. And I've seen two of them die. One of which was my friend.

It's been almost a day since Fox Girl was poisoned and I still can't quite work out whether she knew what she was doing or not. Thresh had said she was clever and she must've been due to her surviving so long. And yet when the Fires had found her, they'd said that she must've thought the berries were safe due to Fire Boy's own ignorance of their deadliness.

I haven't seen the Fires since then, or Monster Boy. Not that I want to. I want nothing more to do with that bastard other than to make sure he doesn't kill the other two. Thresh died so they can live and I'm gonna make sure that happens.

The odds are break even. It's two against one and I've seen how competent Fire Girl is with that bow. But Fire Boy's injured and I know a little too well just how efficient Monster Boy is. He took down Thresh who was easily stronger than both the Fires combined. If it comes down to close range fighting, it could really be anyone's game.

I push my bangs out of my eyes as I walk through the forest, my ears pricked and my eyes darting from side to side constantly. My pocket knife is open and in my hand, but other than that, I'm weaponless except for my own strength and fighting abilities. Career or not, I'm stronger than Monster boy. Cato.

But he has more weapons.

Judging from the position of the sun, it's about mid afternoon. With every minute, I feel more tense and glance over my shoulder more often. All the birds have stopped singing and the only noise is the wind in the trees and my own footsteps and breathing.

It's the calm before the storm, and when the storm comes, it's going to take at least one life.

What was that noise?

I freeze where I am, straining to hear the slightest sound. After the longest moment in recorded history, I hear it again. A faint scuffling and a low growl. But it's a long way away.

Everything falls quiet again for the longest moment and the silence feels so tense that if I cut through the air with my knife, I could clove it in two.

Then suddenly their air is alive with growls, snarls, howls… And screaming. The first three are animalistic to the highest degree, but the last is unmistakeably human. It's male.

It's Cato.

The screaming stops, but the dog like snarls continue. And they're increasing in volume. Getting closer. Running footsteps through the bush, heading straight in my direction with more footsteps behind. A lot more. Cato is still alive and whatever this new horror is, it's chasing him and hot on his heels.

Within seconds, I'm up in the nearest tree to watch the scene unfold. Not ten seconds later, Cato explodes out of the shrubbery. There's blood marring half his face and long scratch marks down his arm. His bloodshot eyes are wide and even from my position up here, I can see the undiluted terror in his eyes.

As he disappears into the forest, the reason why appears less than fifty metres behind him.

Erasers.

The wolf like creatures are certainly not natural and there's an eerie human quality about them which initially makes me think of the flock's childhood nightmare. But as I watch them pursue Cato, I quickly come to realise that these are not Erasers.

Erasers, for all their lupine DNA never, even when morphed, walk on all fours as these are. These don't seem to be able to speak English, only in the snarls and growls I had heard earlier. They're not as shaggy as Erasers and their faces are too flat. Too human.

These must be examples of what Thresh described as "muttations". Creations of the Capitol. I don't remember him mentioning any wolf like muttations, but if the Capitol's anything like the School, then there's nothing to stop them creating new mutts to catch opponents off guard.

There's at least twenty of them and I'm surprised at the range. They're all sorts of sizes, proportions and colours, some of the colours being ones I have never seen on any wolf, dog or Eraser. All of them are collared, but I can't imagine anyone wanting to walk these things.

All this runs through my mind within a few seconds as they stream by the tree I'm in after Cato. I watch as they vanish through the trees into the distance…

But not all of them.

Two of them have skidded to a halt and have turned back. They retrace their steps, noses to the ground and sniffing. A huge dark one, the biggest of all the mutts and a much smaller one, lithe one with fur I can only describe as auburn. After a moment, an even smaller mutt only a few shades lighter than the dark one runs back and tries to push the large one in the direction all the others disappeared in. But it's like a mouse trying to move a mountain and the big one's having none of it.

It's caught my scent.

It makes a beeline to the tree I'm in with the red one right behind him and the small dark one making noises that almost seem like words of protest. It dances around the two bigger mutts, tugging at the big, dark one's ear, head butting the red one and generally trying to get them to go back to the pack and chase Cato.

Unfazed, the dark one reaches my tree and smells it suspiciously before looking up. It's lips pull back, revealing extremely sharp teeth and a deep growl emanates from the back of its throat as it spots me.

The next moment, all three of them are gathered around the base of the tree, leaping up to try and reach me. They can jump worryingly high and break branches on their way back down, leaving great gouges in the tree trunk from their claws.

The tree shudders. It's a pretty strong one, but if I stay up here too long and they don't give up, I'm not sure how long it'll stand the abuse.

Only a few minutes later and I know the tree won't last much longer. The trunk around the base is significantly thinner than it was before and the whole plant's beginning to sway every time one of them jumps against it. I need to get out.

I climb further up the tree where the forest is less dense, much to the obvious annoyance of the creatures below if their snarls are anything to go by. Once I'm satisfied that my wings won't catch on anything, I launch myself into the air.

The snarls stop abruptly.

My curiosity gets the better of me and I look down to find them all staring up at me, still and silent. Now that their faces are no longer twisted in anger, canines bared and baying for blood, it strikes me just how human they really look.

How human…

Are they human lupine combinations that just turned out differently than the Erasers? Maybe there's a greater percentage of wolf DNA. I study the lithe red one and it stares back up at me with green, round pupiled, very human eyes.

That's when I see the number 5 engraved on her collar.

'So you're from District 11. The Fires are from 12 and Monster Boy and Knife Girl are from 2?'

'Right,' Thresh replies, biting into a piece of bread.

'What about Fox Girl?'

'District 5.'

District 5.

Fox Girl.

It's her. It's her DNA combined with that of a wolf to create this mutt.

And I thought the Capitol had run out of ways to make me feel sick.

My gaze flickers over to the tiny dark one. Huge brown eyes, almost feminine features. Number on the collar…

11.

Rue.

This is Rue. This is the tiny girl Thresh cried over so many nights ago. To have everything that Thresh told me about her; her singing, the way she hopped through the trees, the way she never seemed to stop smiling, how brave she'd been at the Reaping when her name was called… To have all that and see her DNA being used in this way…

Suddenly I can't look at the biggest wolf. Because I know exactly what I'll find and there's no way I can face it. I can't see him in this way.

It makes sense now, why it's these three who are the only ones to break off from the main pack. Thresh and Fox Girl are the only ones (apart from Cato, who's still alive) to have ever seen me. They must've recognised my scent. And then Rue came back because of her ties with Thresh.

But DNA doesn't contain memory.

If it was just their DNA used, they wouldn't recognise me. Rue wouldn't have any sort of link to Thresh.

What have they done?!

'I'll kill you,' I hiss, glaring up at the sky and hoping, for the first time, that the Gamemakers can hear me. 'I swear to God I'll kill you, you fucking bastards.'

I beat my wings to carry me up, away from the dead Tributes still staring after me. As soon as I'm out of sight, I hear them take off again, running in the direction that the others left in, once again pursuing Cato.

I fly in the opposite direction, wanting to be as far away from the fight which will inevitably happen. I don't want to see it. I don't care if the Fires get involved. What the Gamemakers have done has shaken me harder than anything since the two month period five years ago when we were still at the School and I thought Max had been killed during an experiment.

I fly aimlessly for a length of time I don't give a shit about, having to double back when I almost fly into the force-field. Eventually I land on a rock formation in the middle of the forest. The only sounds around me are the wind and my own breathing. No animals. No water.

The hours progress and the light dims and still these is no sound. There's only one sound I'm listening for. A canon. A single canon to signal Cato's death and The Fires' victory.

But none comes.

Night arrives and the temperature drops. I wrap my wings around myself to keep warm, but it's still too cold. Still no canon. Where could Cato have hidden that the mutts can't get to? Up a tree? They'd tear it down with time. A cave? But surely they'd be able to get to it.

I run through all the features I've seen from flying around this arena, trying to work out which could keep the wolves at bay. The lake? Wolves can swim and I have no doubt these can too. I'm considering that he might've been able to lose them in the cornfield, but then I remember that they have heightened sense of smell. And in any case, he wouldn't have been able to run for this long.

Then it hits me.

The cornucopia.

I've only seen it briefly when I was flying away from the hovercraft two nights ago, but I remember deeming it as climbable. But only just. Cato could make it up but the wolves couldn't.

That's where he is. And maybe the Fires too.

I finally make up my mind to go and find them just as the first rays of the sun begin to light up the sky.

It's still colder than comfortable, but I don't feel like I'm about to get frostbite anymore. Besides, flying will help warm me up.

I push off from my rock formation and take to the sky. A quick scan of the surrounding area and I have my bearings. One of the many perks of being a genetically altered bird-kid. The cornucopia is South-East.

Still no canon. The only thing I can think of is that Cato is there alone and the Fires are hiding elsewhere, waiting for the mutts to get him. They can't be on the cornucopia together because either they'd have killed Cato or he'd have killed one, if not both of them by now.

But when I finally arrive, I see that I'm wrong. All three of them are there together, but they're not all on the cornucopia.

The mutts are gathered around the mouth of the cornucopia and there's lush tearing sounds, accompanied by snarls and half cries, too weak to scream. I don't see Thresh among the throng and I don't look for him. Instead, I turn to find the Fires curled against one another on the cornucopia, Fire Girl doing something to her partner's leg. If they're up there…

As much as I hate him, it makes me feel sick to know that somewhere amongst that mass of muttations is Cato, slowly being ripped to pieces.

But how is he still alive?

Movement from the top of the cornucopia catches my eye and I look over to see Fire Girl stringing an arrow to her bow, taking aim and…

The canon sounds.

The mutts draw back, then turn and race into the forest.

Fire Girl and Fire Boy turn to each other and embrace tightly.

The Games are over.

They think...

Ok, I'm not going to promise that I'll have the next chapter out withing a certain amount of time. However, I am going to promise that no matter what, this story WILL be finished. Even if it takes me until I'm forty to post the last chapter, it WILL be done. This, I promise you.

Once again, I'm sorry for the extended wait. I don't ask for forgiveness, I just ask for acceptance of my apology.

~EndlessMidnightSky~