UNDERDOG | FINNICK ODAIR

Chapter 15

The game Katniss had managed to catch was a possum or maybe more of a rat like creature that looks nasty, but no one came here for the five star meals so I'll take what I can get.

To answer our curious faces Katniss said, "No water, It's out there though, he knew where it was." She lifted the rodent so we could see. He had a wet muzzle.

"He'd been drinking recently when I shot him out of a tree, but I couldn't find the source. I swear, I searched every inch of ground in a thirty yard radius." She added.

"Can we eat him?" Peeta asks.

"I don't know for sure but his meat doesn't look that different from a squirrel's. He ought to be cooked..." she trailed off.

We can't cook it over a fire, that's basically a smoke signal to the careers, so Peeta comes up with the brilliant idea to spear cubes of it and cook it with the force field.

"So how high up was it in the trees?" Finnick asked after finishing off his fourth cube of the rodent.

"About half way up, he was hanging from a branch like a possum." She answered, silently eyeing the grass hut and mats we had finished making an hour earlier.

"What was he doing? How long did you wait to shoot him?" Finnick inquired curiously, he glanced at the trees to picture what the possum had been doing.

"He was just... hanging there I guess. Maybe looking for food but I shot him pretty quickly." She responded.

Before Finn could ask anymore questions the bright moon rose over the trees and we all stood to hear the anthem. Peeta and Katniss are holding hands, looking sullen.

Finnick puts his hand on my shoulder, maybe for support or encouragement. I look over my shoulder to see him looking worried. Some of the dead tributes they are about to show had been his friends. He had known them almost a decade, and most would be slain in the next few days.

He looks down at me and I realize I've been staring. I quickly turn back around as I feel my cheeks heat up. I press my hands to them in an attempt to cool them off but my warm hands don't help the situation at all. If only we had some water.

The capital seal flashes over the sky, followed by the district 5 male that Finnick had killed earlier. Seven other tributes are shown, including Seeder and Celia who I had just had a conversation with mere days ago.

The capital seal appears one last time before the sky grows dark agin with the exception of the moon. We are all silent, mulling over the fact that eight people had died today, some who I had known and others I hadn't, but all equally deserving of a better ending.

Our grieving is interrupted by a silver parachute falling from the sky. We all stare at it blankly for a few moments before I break our silence.
"Whose do you think is it?"

"No telling, why don't we let Peeta have it since he died today." Finnick suggests.

Peeta untied a small silver object that looked absolutely foreign and useless. "What is it?" Katniss asks.

We pass it around trying to figure it out. When it reaches me I see that it is a curved metal tube with a slightly pointed end. It could literally be anything.

I pass it to Peeta, he blows on it to see if there's any sound. Finnick is next and he slides his finger in it to see if it can be weaponized. No luck.

"Can you two fish with it?" Katniss asked.
I glance at Finnick to see him as doubtful as I was. I pick it up to examine it again before handing it to Finnick. "I don't think so."

"No." Finnick affirms after a moment of looking at it.

It's passed to katniss again and she briefly stared at it before holding it up to the sky. She twisted it and looked from every angle before jamming it in the ground.

"I give up. Maybe if we can join Beetee or Wiress they could figure it out." She said as she flung herself on a mat. Peeta gently rubbed her back as she sighed loudly.

We all sit there for a minute or two, not quite sure what to do with ourselves. Me and Finnick share worried glances over Katniss's stressed form. 

"A spile!" She exclaims, shooting up and grabbing the metal mystery.

"What?" Finnick asked.

"It's a spile. Sort of like a faucet. You put it in a tree and sap comes out." She explained as she glanced around the dense jungle, "Well the right kind of tree."

"Sap?" Finnick and I ask.

"To make syrup" Peeta explains to us, "but there must be something else inside these trees."

We look around and realize what must be in these trees. Water.

Finnick grabs a rock to hammer the spile into a large tree.

"Wait! Stop, you might damage it. We need to drill a hole first." Katniss orders.

I remember the awl I had grabbed at the cornucopia and I hand it over.

Peeta grabs the aw and is able to drive it at least two inches into the wide tree. Finnick takes a knife and is able to go another half a inch. Peeta stabs the tree again a few more times with the awl and it's finally deep enough to put the spile in.

Katniss sticks it in carefully. Nothing comes out of it for a few moments and I'm about to give up on the whole idea when a trickle of water falls out of the lip into Katniss's awaiting hands.

Hey I'm back! After months of falling off of the map. I had a writers block but I've gotten more excited about the story so I attempted to write again.
If your feeling generous then leave a comment telling me what you think so far and your favorite parts!