Victor by Night | Finnick Odair

Monkey Mutts : 18

Chapter Eighteen

Everyone heals. Slowly, but graciously. In my mind, I know it could have been a lot worse. We could have been like Mags. Like Finnick.

Peeta's face is back to normal. I can feel my arms. Katniss wiggles her fingers, the feeling regained. I clear my throat, the faint burning still roams.

"I'm going to try to tap a tree," I say. My fingers fumble at my belt and find the spile still hanging from its vine.

"Let me make the hole first," says Peeta. "You stay with him," he nods to Finnick.

I can't, I think. I don't know how to deal with another's grief... I can barely deal with my own.

But I don't say it out loud, since Finnick has enough to deal with. He got the worst of the fog, although I'm not sure why. Maybe because he's the biggest or maybe because he had to exert himself the most.

And then, of course, there's Mags.

I still don't understand what happened there. Why he essentially abandoned her to carry Peeta. Why she not only didn't question it, but ran straight to her death without a moment's hesitation. Was it because she was so old that her days were numbered, anyway? Did she think that Finnick would stand a better chance of winning if he had Peeta and Katniss as allies? The haggard look on Finnick's face tells me that now is not the moment to ask.

Instead I try to put myself back together. The flotation belt must be acid resistant, since it looks as good as new. I can swim, so the flotation belt's not really necessary, but Brutus blocked my dagger with his, so I buckle it back on, thinking it might offer some protection. I comb my hair with my fingers, thinning it out considerably since the fog droplets damaged it. I wet down what's left of it.

Peeta has found a good tree about ten yards from the narrow strip of beach. I can hardly see him, but the sound of his knife against the wooden trunk is crystal clear. I wonder what happened to the awl. Mags must've either dropped it or taken it into the fog with her. Anyway, it's gone.

I have moved out a bit farther into the shallows, floating alternately on my belly and back. If the seawater healed Peeta and Katniss and I, it seems to be transforming Finnick altogether.

He begins to move slowly, just testing his limbs, and gradually begins to swim. But it's not like me swimming, the rhythmic strokes, the even pace. It's like watching some strange sea animal coming back to life. He dives and surfaces, spraying water out of his mouth, rolls over and over in some bizarre corkscrew motion that makes me dizzy even to watch. And then, when he's been underwater so long I feel certain he's drowned, his head pops up right next to me and I start.

"Don't do that," I say.

"What? Come up or stay under?" he says.

"Either. Neither. Whatever. Just soak in the water and behave," I say. "Or if you feel this good, let's go help Katniss and Peeta."

We catch up with Katniss. In just the short time it takes to cross to the edge of the jungle, I become aware of a change. I sense the mass of warm bodies poised above us. They don't need to chatter or scream. The mere breathing of so many is enough.

I touch Finnick's arm and he follows my gaze upward. I don't know how they arrived so silently. Perhaps they didn't. We've all been absorbed in restoring our bodies.

During that time they've assembled. Not five or ten but scores of monkeys weigh down the limbs of the jungle trees. The pair we spotted when we first escaped the fog felt like a welcoming committee. This crew feels ominous.