Catching Fire

Katniss flies into a panic as Finnick gives Peeta mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Finnick is able to revive Peeta, and Katniss’s feelings towards Finnick begin to change. She realizes that she owes him for saving Peeta, and she is resentful that Finnick kept Peeta alive when she couldn’t. She doesn’t know why Finnick saved Peeta when he could have easily let him die, but she is grateful. Katniss hides the fact that she could see the forcefield, because if the Gamemakers find out the trick that Beetee and Wiress taught her, “they might do something to alter the force field so I can’t see the aberration anymore” (284). They discover that the whole arena is shaped like a circle, and the tributes are in a dome with a forcefield all around them. The group tries to find water with no success, but Haymitch sends them a spile to tap the trees for water; spectators of the games can pay to have supplies delivered to their favorite tributes. They watch the list of killed tributes projected into the night sky, and Katniss wonders who else, like Cinna or Darius, might be getting punished back home because of her. At midnight, they hear what sounds like a bell tolling 12 times, and a bolt of lightning strikes a tall tree nearby. Some time later, Katniss sees “fog sliding softly in” around them, and senses that “Something’s wrong with this fog. The progression of the front line is too uniform to be natural” (296-97). As she tries to wake up the others to warn them, the fog reaches her skin and begins to form blisters.

Katniss feels “Tiny, searing stabs. Wherever the droplets of mist touch [her] skin” and the group begins to run (298). Finnick has to carry Mags on his back because she is too old to walk quickly. Peeta has trouble moving fast enough because of recent injury, and Finnick carries him while Katniss carries Mags. They start to have trouble controlling their arms and legs, and they realize that “Whatever chemical laces the fog does more than burn—it targets our nerves” (299). Katniss struggles to carry Mags and when it becomes clear that Finnick can’t carry both Peeta and Mags, Mags “hauls herself up, plants a kiss on Finnick’s lips, and then hobbles straight into the fog” (301). The old woman dies instantly, and the group keeps moving. As they reach the beach, the fog is stopped by an invisible barrier. They soak their wounds in the salt water, which draws the poison out. However, the group is immediately attacked by a horde of monkeys in this new section of the jungle. One jumps towards Peeta, but one of the other tributes, a morphling (painkiller) addict from District 6, jumps in front of Peeta and the monkey “sinks its fangs into her chest” (310).

The monkeys fall back, “as if some unheard voice calls them away” (311). Peeta tries to comfort the dying morphling addict by talking about his paintings, and she dies in his arms. Finnick offers to stand guard while Katniss and Peeta get some sleep. Katniss realizes that Finnick needs time alone to mourn Mags, so she agrees and is fascinated by the fact that “yesterday morning, Finnick was on [her] kill list, and now [she’s] willing to sleep with him as [her] guard” (314). The next morning, Katniss and Finnick play a prank on Peeta, and she starts to think that “maybe Finnick Odair is all right” (317). Haymitch sends them bread and medicine, and Katniss notices that Finnick investigates the bread extensively before eating it. The group witnesses a huge wave rushing downhill to hit the water from another area of the jungle. Johanna Mason shows up on the beach dragging Beetee and Wiress, all having come from another part of the jungle that rains blood. Katniss is not thrilled at the thought of having Johanna as an ally, but Johanna insists that she got “[Wiress and Beetee] out of that bleeding jungle for [Katniss]” (320). Beetee is unconscious and Wiress keeps repeating the phrase “Tick, tock” again and again. Katniss looks around the arena and realizes that Wiress is trying to tell them the arena is meant to be a giant clock.

Katniss remembers how Plutarch Heavensbee showed her his pocket watch a few months ago and wonders if “[Plutarch] was giving [her] a clue about the arena” (327). As the group tries to figure out how to navigate the clock-like arena where a new threat appears every hour in sections of the jungle, they decide to return to the Cornucopia to find more supplies. At the beginning of the Games, Beetee was willing to get stabbed at the Cornucopia to grab a cylinder full of special wire, and he is very protective of it. As the group comes up with a plan to survive the jungle, the tributes from the wealthy and Capitol-loyal Districts 1 and 2 show up and kill Wiress. In the ensuing fight, the Gamemakers begin to spin the Cornucopia to disorient the tributes. Once the District 1 and District 2 tributes leave, Katniss thinks about Wiress and realizes that “Finnick, Johanna, and Beetee have all lost their district partners” (335). She wonders why so many people seem determined to protect Peeta and says that “For reasons completely unfathomable to me, some of the other victors are trying to keep him alive, even if it means sacrificing themselves” (337-38). As Katniss hears a scream coming from a section of the jungle and takes off to follow it. The scream sounds like it belongs to her little sister, Prim.