Day 3 - 15 Tributes Remain

Claudius' Point of View:

It's a miracle that I'm still alive. My mind felt like it was numbing after hallucinating all night. Sleeping only seemed to put my head back in normal shape, as far as mentality goes. I still feel terrible, since the poison continues to shrivel through my body. Fortunately, my leg has finally somewhat healed, and I can actually walk on it. I got up, ready to drive my dying body through yet another day. Who would've thought that the Hunger Games is this deadly?

Upon standing up, I took a deep breath, realizing then how much worse I've gotten. I'm still extremely hungry, I'm awfully thirsty, I'm completely out of breath, and I always get the feeling that I have to vomit.

Ivory is real lucky that I'm willing to do anything for her. Otherwise, I most likely would have killed myself by now. I'm hoping she is somewhere safe, comfortable, and hidden. Kat might have found her already, and he may be teaming up with us like she'd said.

I still don't trust Kat. Part of me knows that he wants to win, and that he is going to mercilessly slaughter both me and Ivory. It's what anyone with atleast a little bit of faith would do.

The fact that Ivory is trusting him enough to consider him an ally worries me. She is a very smart girl, and I always tell her that. If Kat is planning on killing us, then I would bet Ivory had figured that out already. Neither of them are dead, so we still have time to figure it out.

I roam dreadfully through the woods, hearing multiple tributes passing by. I managed to stay out of sight for the most part. Someone ended up finding me, but as soon as I saw them, they gasped and ran away as quickly as possible. I may have looked highly intimidating in the Capitol, but right now, a blind Snom could kill me with little to no effort.

After walking around for what felt like hours, I somehow wound up back at the Cornucopia. I know that sticking around here is like begging for death, but who knows what could have been left behind here. I went into the metal structure in the center, only to find... absolutely nothing...

The entire Cornucopia had been ransacked, emptier than a dessert. I sighed, and looked around one last time. I then noticed something on the wall of the structure. A message written in blood.

The handwriting was a little crooked, but I think it said 'remember Lucky.'

I guess this Lucky pokemon was here at one point. The blood is dry, so it wasn't written today. No memory came to mind of anyone named Lucky. I assume that they are either dead, or alive somewhere. I take another deep breath, and stretch my arms out above me.

My eyes grew twice their original size when my arms were grabbed by somebody else behind me. I was picked up by my arms, and thrown like a ragdoll across the Cornucopia, landing on the side of my torso, where the poison started. I grabbed my chest, wincing in pain. I looked up to see a Machoke looking down at me, smiling.

It picked me up and threw me at the side of the metal structure. My arm hit first, and it bent in a rather awkward way. I screamed in agony. I could hear someone else laughing maniacally, and it wasn't the Machoke.

The Machoke picked me up, and held my arms behind me, trapping me entirely. I tried to squirm free, but to no avail.

"What are you doing?" I ask, only to have my arms pulled on harder by the fighting type. The feint laughing grew louder, and from behind the other side of the metal structure, out came exactly who I had hoped not to see again.

That stupid Ivysaur.

"Ah, long time no see, Claudius! How've you been?" Sunny teased, before she punched me right by my mouth, cutting it open. Blood streamed out of my bottom lip. My eye started to water.

"I hate you so much." I say to Sunny. The Machoke pulls on my arms tighter. I started to feel drowsy.

"Oh, I know. But I hate you waaaay more." Sunny said with a smirk. She came up to me, and I tried kicking her with my open legs. When she backed away from me, the Machoke lifted me up and slammed me onto the ground. My neck recoiled back, and the sharpest pain I've felt in a while shuttered through every limb.

"Can you tell this jock to quit it!?" I yelled loudly, angry, yet terrified.

"Nope. Basil is deaf. You can say whatever you want, king." Sunny mocks. I lay as still as I can to reduce the pain, which is all I really can do.

"Why must you do this to me!?"

"Because it's fun to torture you. Killing you slowly is way more satisfying than quickly." Sunny explains. She sits down near me, staring me right in the eye, and begins to whisper to me. "I'm going to destroy everything you love."

It was then that I actually got a glimpse of Sunny. Her face seems very red, almost like she was burnt. She might have had problems with fire for all I know. Her left is looks extremely swollen, almost like she can't even see through it.

"Did you wrestle an Ursaring or something?" I ask her. She rolls her eyes at me, and reaches towards my face. I'm completely defenseless, so I close my eye tightly. When I open my eye, I see Sunny taking off my eyepatch and putting it over her swollen eye.

"Finally. Peace at last." Sunny says with a grin. I pin my face on the ground, keeping my missing eye out of view. The Machoke holding me down, Basil, chuckles. "Now to get rid of that other eye." Sunny mutters. I turn so my present eye can see, and find Sunny with a knife in her hand. I pin my face back on the ground. "Come on dude. It'll be fun!" Sunny says. Basil holds down harder on my arms, and it feels like they could just snap any second.

Suddenly, I hear something zip through the air, and making it cutting sound. I hear Sunny gasp, and I look up again, able to see. Basil had let go of me, yet I stay put on the ground, too weak to stand up.

The sound of a thud was heard, and I turned to see Basil laying on the ground next to me, completely limp. An arrow is stuck right in the back of his head.

The cannon is fired in the distance.

Sunny is backed away, looking at something behind me, shocked look on her face. I can hardly move, and when I try to lift myself up, a rush of pain hits my arms, sending me laying right back on the ground beneath me.

I'm grabbed by a pair of paws, and helped up to my feet, and I stand between two others.

On my left.... a Houndour.

On my right.... a shiny Sylveon.

I stand still, catching my breath. Sunny looks at all three of us in disbelief. Kat whispers in my ear.

"What's the plan, Claud?"

I shake my head, unable to comprehend what is even happening. Blood quickly rushes through my body, and I suddenly feel extremely light-headed, as if the poison had reached further through my body. I continue to stand, however, unable to respond.

Sunny scoffs at us, and she runs away from the Cornucopia in a hurry. A pile of relief washes over me.

I turn to Ivory, who looks very worried. I smile the happiest I have all week at her, and the tears flow down my face. My eyelids droop, my body weakens, and I feel myself relax. I faint into a slumber, falling right into Ivory's arms.

I don't hit the ground. Ivory catches me. This is no hallucination.

Ivory's Point of View:

Claudius falls right on me, all of his weight layed against me. My arms can barely keep him up, as his entire upper-body is planted right onto mine. Surprising me, I almost drop him, but manage to keep him up. I blush redder than a Sweet Apple.

"K-Kat... help." I stutter. Kat grabs onto Claudius' waist, and pulls him off of me. Kat, being significantly smaller and younger than Claudius, topples over on his back, with Claudius's weight piled on top of him. I pull Kat out from under his limp body.

The cannon hasn't been fired since I shot the Machoke that had him caught. That's my first kill. I'm honestly proud of myself. And since the cannon wasn't fired since, that means that Claudius is still alive. I help Kat to his feet and wrap my arm around his shoulder.

"Well, we found him." I say with a sigh of relief. I almost want to cry.

"He's poisoned!" Kat exclaims. My eyes widen when Kat points to the side of Claudius' torso, showing an obvious purple tint to his fur. I clasp my paws to my mouth in shock.

"We've gotta get him out of here! The Cornucopia is no place to be!" I say, grabbing Claudius' arms. Kat grabs onto both of his legs, and we begin to slowly carry him away.

We bring him back to a small cave. It's not really a cave, but more just a little hole that goes beneath an incline in the ground. It's dark, but cozy. It's located directly next to a lake. Kat and I have been sheltered her for a bit. We set down Claudius inside the cave, and catch our breath.

"What should we do about his poison!?" I ask Kat. He rubs his chin for a few seconds before putting his pointer finger in the air.

"I got it! I'll be right back. Stay here and keep watch of him." Kat says.

"You sure you don't need me to come with?" I ask Kat.

"Definitely. I'll be fine." Kat tells me, before he leaves the dark cave. I wish that he told me what it was he was leaving for.

I look at Claudius' body as he lays completely still. His bruised face, his cut lip, poisoned torso, and now that I look at it, his arms and left leg look almost as if they've been dislocated. Not to mention that he's missing his eyepatch since Sunny stole it from him. I can't wait to kill that witch. Compared to me, he's absolutely miserable. I still have that cut on my forehead from Lucky yesterday. There was a lot of blood to clean up from that.

There's only been a few times when I've seen Claudius without his eyepatch. Once when we were sledding way back in fifth grade, we got wiped out and his patch came off. He got up covering his missing eye, embarrassed over it. He ran around everywhere looking for it, until I found it buried under a pile of snow. I handed it to him, and he then went on to act as if nothing happened. I giggle at the memory.

Another time was actually in school, back in seventh grade. One day, we had a substitute teacher, a Slowbro, that was just a massive jerk. He demanded Claudius take off the eyepatch, saying it was a 'distraction to the class,' when he was explicitly told to wear it from his doctors.

The Slowbro ended up taking it off of Claudius himself, which was a horrible idea. Claudius then practically dove at the teacher to get it back. When the Slowbro refused, Claudius ran out of the classroom to the main office, which was actually pretty close to our classroom since the school was relatively small. Long story short, we never saw that substitute again.

As shocking as memories like that are at the time, whenever I look back at it, I can't help but laugh. Sure, Claudius had every right to be angry, but the way he reacted was just humorous.

I still can't believe we were able to find Claudius at all. For the first time in a few days, I feel genuinely happy. Claudius is okay as far as being alive goes, Kat and I are doing alright, and the number of tributes keeps dropping every passing day.

I realize now how incredibly lucky I am to have the bow and arrow. Kat gave it to me because he felt so bad about killing Lucky, and he trusts me with it.

It always comes to my mind every passing day that if I really am going to win, then Claudius is eventually going to have to die. I obviously don't want that to happen, but there's really no other option. We're either gonna have to get killed, or kill each other. And I really don't want to kill Claudius.

There's so much that's gone on between me and him that I don't want to leave behind. All the memories we've shared, all the laughs and good times we've had, and everything we haven't got to do. I still haven't told him how I truly feel.

But, now that he's here with us, maybe I can tell him.

I've been trying to get him to figure out my crush for years, and it's insane how oblivious he is. Heck, I could literally kiss him at any moment, and he still would not get it!

"Ivory, I'm back." a voice said quietly. I turned and saw Kat holding something pink in his paw, along with a leaf that was in the shape of a bowl, which had water in it.

"What did you get?" I asked in a whisper tone.

"It's a Pecha berry. It heals poisoning." Kat explains. I raised a brow, looking at the leaf bowl with water. Kat smirked. "I'm gonna mash it up into liquids for him to gulp down. Since he's probably weak, it would be better for him to just swallow it like a drink than to chew it up. It'd be less rough on his throat and stomach, y'know."

I nodded in agreement, since I guess that makes sense. Kat turned the Pecha berry into liquids in the water, and poured it into Claudius' mouth. He closed his jaw, and the juice washed down his throat. The purple tint in his fur grew less noticeable, showing that the medicine berry was working. I smiled at Kat, and he shrugged with a smirk. Then, I hugged him.

"Thanks Kat! You're amazing!" I say.

"Don't mention it." Kat replies.

"When is he going to wake up?"

"Probably some time tomorrow morning. Best we go to bed. Good night, Ivory." Kat says.

"Good night, Kat."

Kat instantly curls into a ball and falls asleep on the other side of the cave. I lay down, recapping the day in my head, before falling asleep.

Let's hope things will be smooth sailing from here.