Trust Me

Kip was collapsed in a pool of his own blood on the rocks, his chest rising and falling in a harsh broken rhythm, and he forced a slight smile up at me as he saw me. "Winnie, you're okay!"

I glanced down at him, wondering why he was suddenly so friendly, but thoughts about his temperament were wiped away when I got a closer look at his face. His skin was beaded with sweat and his eyes were dark as more and more blood poured from several harsh wounds all over his body -- the worst of which was on the side of his stomach and half a foot long. "What happened to you?" I asked, shifting away as I eyed what was behind him unsteadily.

"I got hurt. Bad." He said with a slight chuckle. "But I guess that part's pretty obvious, huh?"

"Just a bit." I said. "Do you know who did that?" I raised my finger and pointed to the words painted in blood on the rock behind him. Come play, 4 it read in angry red letters, a few drops of blood still dripping from the smeared letters.

"The same group of people who did this." Kip said, glancing down at his mutilated body.

Something wasn't right. This wasn't set for Kip -- if they'd written it in Kip's blood, then they hadn't written that for him. "That's for me, isn't it?"

He nodded slowly. "Yeah. Yeah, it is."

"So, you basically helped them lure me into a trap." I growled.

He shook his head with such a sudden ferocity that I could feel my eyes widen in surprise. "No, I didn't! They're not here, I promise!"

I took a step back from him, my eyes running through the trees and searching desperately for some sign of life. "Why should I believe you?"

"Because I'm already dying. What would I have to gain by luring you to your death?" He said. "You're from my district, Winnie. If I couldn't win, I'd want it to be you anyway. They want me to tell you that they're going to wait for you near the cliffs. They think you're going to want to avenge my death, which is stupid. Please don't go. As great as you are with knives, there's 3 of them and 1 of you. It's exactly what they want."

I took a baby step closer to him, keeping a firm grip on my knives as I tentatively accepted his story. "What happened to you?"

Kip tried to sit himself up, but quickly stopped after letting out a wince and a sharp gasp. His hand flew to the gash on his stomach as if trying to shield it from the pain and hold the blood in, but we both knew the damage was done. "The first day was fine. Parq and Jill found me just on the outskirts of the Cornucopia and the alliance was still good. Parq somehow managed to convince Tam -- you know, the boy from 10 -- to join the alliance, but I guess Tam's only choices were to join the alliance or to die. The roles were set; Parq was the hunter, Jill worked on keeping us alive, Tam stood guard, and I did whatever else needed doing. I gathered wood, ran to get us water, took on an extra watch shift if the others needed sleep. I was kind of like the gopher, but I still helped."

"But that wasn't enough for them." I offered, trying to prompt him to continue his story.

"Obviously not." He said with a bitter laugh. "The first night was the worst. When your face wasn't on the list of the Fallen, they panicked. They figured you were weak, but Parq knew you'd be mad at him for not saving you from Adri. He had some deranged fear that you and Adri were in an alliance -- he was a little paranoid." Kip said with a bitter chuckle.

"Hah...yeah. Like that would ever happen." I said with an unsteady chuckle.

"Exactly. He was just panicking. Anyway, the second day was worse. I don't know if it was because they thought I was somehow spying on them for you or if they just started to get tired of me not providing anything they found 'useful', but they started getting really irritable with me. If I took too long to get water they'd hit me, if I couldn't gather all the wood needed for a fire in one trip then they'd pull out whatever weapon they had and threaten to kill me. They made me stay up all last night so they could all sleep. I debated running away, but I knew I wouldn't get far in the cold. Then, this morning they seemed fine. They were nice again -- but in retrospect, they were too nice. They lead me here and then they started to cut me up slowly, inch by inch. I guess they wanted me to yell so you'd hear me -- somehow they must have known you were nearby."

"Who did it?" I demanded.

Kip's eyes flew downward as if he was ashamed. "Jill."

"You're lying." I accused harshly, then regretted it. He was on his deathbed and I didn't believe him when he told me who his murderer was?

Kip chuckled. "I would have said the same thing three days ago, but she got very cruel as soon as we got in the arena. She's like another Ingrid. This whole plan to lure you to them was her idea, and she begged Parq to let her be the one to cut me up like this. Except this stab wound here," Kip gestured to the gaping wound on his stomach. "That one was Parq himself."

"So Parq is in charge, then?"

Kip nodded and winced. "I don't have a lot of time left. Parq poisoned his blade with the venom of a snake he found. He said it takes about twenty minutes to kill you, but there's no way to get the venom out once it's in your blood. There's not even an anti-venom for the snake in Panem, let alone in the arena. By my watch, I've got about five minutes."

"Is there anything I can do?" I offered quietly.

Kip grabbed my hand and tried to squeeze it, but his grip was weak. "Don't leave me, please."

I nodded. "I won't, I promise." I shifted myself around so I was sitting next to him and gently placed his head on my lap before stroking his sweat-soaked hair off his face. "Do you remember the time your mother found me stuck in that mud pit in front of your house?"

Kip chuckled. "I remember. I heard someone screaming and crying, and I looked out to see my mother trying to pull a tiny 8 year old girl out of a vortex of mud."

I nodded. "I was just walking home and all of a sudden I was being sucked down into the mud. I still swear it must have been quicksand."

"My mother pulled you out and washed you off. She said that, for some reason, your parents wouldn't come pick you up." He mused, and I flinched. It seemed as if all the adults in District 4 knew of my father's negligence towards raising me. "You had to wear my clothes on the way home."

"You grabbed my hand and pulled me into your room and tried to pick your best clothes for me. If your mother hadn't stopped you, I would have walked home in a little suit." I remembered with a laugh.

"I wanted to impress you, since you were a girl. I wanted to be a gentleman when I grew up. I guess that dream's shattered now -- it doesn't look like I'll ever really grow up. Besides, I wasn't much of a gentleman when I told you off on the day of the Reaping." Kip murmured.

"Shh. Don't say that." I instructed. He was right that he'd been an asshole that day, but I didn't want him to spend his last few moments beating himself up.

I heard a rustling in the trees and Kip instantly tried to sit up, but he was too weak. His breathing quickened and his eyes widened, darting madly around as he tried to figure out who was coming.

"I'll protect you." I promised, grabbing my knives. I watched the place in the trees where the noise had come from, ready to stand up as soon as I had some confirmation of who it was.