fragments { lang & nan day 2 }

I try to ignore the way her face seems to harden at my words, the way she seems taken back by my harsh tone. But I maintain my look of indifference, picking a price of dirt from my pants and dusting them off slightly. “I was actually hoping you’d pull some weight around here and help me with this." My eyes narrow at the words, my jaw dropping slightly before I quickly close it once again.

"Pull some weight..." I whisper in disbelief closing my eyes as I give my head a gentle shake. I had killed one of those things. Largely contributed to saving her life and Flynns life and fucking Revan's life. But I force the anger down, taking a deep breath and dropping my gaze, my eyes landing on the bloody mess on her forearm.

She hadn't wrapped it up correctly. If she left it like that the chances of infection would increase. She needed to cover it, to shield it from the toxin and dirt that sulked around us in the shadows. “Could be dinner for all of us." My stomach growls at the thought of food, but it quickly turns into a sick feeling when the memory of the lake and the stench that still lodged itself deep within my nostrills. "But feel free to sulk in peace, I suppose. Your reputation is still intact, Carter. All of Panem thinks you're a bad ass, so give up the pity party.”

I sit silently for a moment longer, just staring at the girl below me. I wasn't sulking, exactly. Well maybe I was, but not over what she believed it to be. I wonder what she might have thought if she knew what was really going through my mind. If she was to find out that what was causing my sour attitude was being conflicted over what she thought of me. I cared about what the people back home, my loved ones might think of me. What did my mother think of me? I know I handled the situation with Revan poorly, my hand still tingled where it had connected with his face. I touch it with my free hand, massaging it gently. I couldn't understand why he continued to bait me, to provoke me. It was almost as if he wanted me to hit him, to fight him. It was almost as though he found a sick pleasure in seeing my skin crawl because of him.

The coldness in my gaze melts and a long sigh escapes my lips as I silently make my way off the rig, kneeling down beside her to dig through the stags remains. "I wasn't sulking, you know. I was... Contemplating." I pause, looking down at the flesh between my fingers, remembering the harshness that I had spoken to her with only a few moments before. "Sorry... Sorry for snapping at you. I'm- it wasn't fair. I- it wasn't about you," I lie continuing my work on the stag.

"Your arm. You need to wrap that or it will get infected." My gaze moves over to her, from her eyes to her arm. "Let me help you with it." My teeth snag my lip, chewing on it for a moment before I let it go.

Cheeks dusted with a petal of a rose Langley scrambles telling me not to fret about it. But I ignore her, my hand reaching out to grab her wrist and gently, but firmly, pull her arm closer. The injury was jagged, the slice messy and the flesh red and tender. The bleeding had slowed, starting to clot around the edges. We needed to clean it, the risk of infection was extremely high in an environment such as this. But this shithole had nothing that could help us, this arena didn't want to save us, it wanted to see us all dead.

Langley tries to rip her arm from my grip but I hold tight, my eyes locking determinately with her own. I give her a look that almost seems to say to just give in, tucking my loose strands of hair behind my ears as I turn my body to face hers. Finally Langley gives in, submitting with a choked voice, "just don’t hold it against me in the future. This doesn’t count as saving my life.”

My lips pull back into a grin and I give her a knowing look, this could save her life. Gently my hand runs up her arm and I shuffle in a little closer, unwrapping the tourniquet. Using a tourniquet might not have been the best idea. You were only supposed to use them as a last resort. It cut off circulation to the rest of her arm and could potentially cost her the arm itself. "You shouldn't use a tourniquet to stop the bleeding if you can help it. Had you of left it on much longer you could have caused more damage than anything else." I carefully then try to flatten the piece of material out on my lap, folding it into a nice square which I placed over the wound.

"You've got to apply pressure, and hold it. Thats the best way to stop the bleeding- here use your hand to hold this in place whilst I get the bandage." Maybe it sounded condescending, the way I spoke as I moved. But I didn't know what else to say, I needed to keep Langley at arms length. I couldn't- wouldn't- allow her any closer. I couldn't allow any of them any closer. I didn't want them to know me, and I sure as hell didn't want to know them, right? I didn't want it to hurt, really god damn hurt, if I had to watch them, her, die. 

I'd seen it before. Too many times. Tributes getting close to one another, leaning on one another, and then having to watch one another torn into pieces, screaming and begging and crying for it all to stop. The pain in their voices, their eyes, their souls. It fucking hurt to just watch it, let lone allow myself to become a victim to it. 

But maybe it was unavoidable. In an environment when every little sense is magnified, maybe I was playing a fools game in trying to close myself off.

Reaching into the bag that lay beside Langley I pull out some pristine white bandages. They wouldn't stay that way for long, in fact it seemed the moment they were exposed to the toxic hair they seemed to yellow ever so slightly. My hands a gentle once again, one cradling her elbow, the other lining up the edge of the banged with the black fabric that I had asked her to hold in place. Then I begin winding the bandage around her arm, firmly but not so tight that it would cut off circulation. Just the right amount.

"There, that wasn't so bad was it," I give it a gentle pat as I release her arm, my eyes looking back up to notice the blood bone crown which she had placed upon her head. My eyes dart from the crown to her eyes and back again. She looked like a queen of death, her fingers and arms covered in blood, her hair tangled and messy and a crown dipped in the blood of her allies and the monsters they had slain. Unconsciously I reach out to touch the crown, my fingers skimming the edge of the bone, to her hair- then I realise what I was doing and my hand drop immediately.

I stare for a moment longer before my lips spit into a wide, shit eating grin. Pushing my armour back into place I pull back. I would play the fools game, keep her at arm length for myself, to save me from having cared enough to let it break me when she died so that I could make it home. I would save myself some pain. 

"I still think a badass trumps a queen."