"Hmf..."
He grunted to himself as he managed to pull himself to the bed in his small lair. During his trip back from the encounter with that peacekeeper, rain had started falling. It helped in covering the track of his blood as made his way back to his temporary house. He tried to stay seated up and take a few deep breaths. His hands were covered in the blood coming out of his shoulder.
He managed to fight through the immediate pain of his shoulder when the peacekeeper had fired at him. Through some tumbling, he managed to get the peacekeepers' head in a lock and suffocated him before grabbing his gun and run off. No other peacekeepers had come his way, but they were out there now, looking for him. He managed to get himself over to the foot of his bed.
There was a latch underneath where he had some supplies stored in case of emergencies – medical supplies, Morse-code communication's gear and a weapon. He went through his medical supplies and brought forward some spirits, a needle, a thread and a clamp to pull out the bullet. He removed his shirt, ignoring how cold he was, and took a sip of the spirit, for the sake of courage, and then poured some of the wound.
He had a rag in his mouth to not scream before using the clamp to pull out the bullet. Once he had managed to do that, he took several more breaths before being able to put the needle through his skin. During his military-training, he had done some of the basic medical training, but he had never been good with needle into real flesh. He gritted his teeth as he pierced the needle and pulled it out the other side before going back at it.
It would take him a couple of hours before he could clean up and call himself finished. The pain was still eminent, and there wasn't much he could do with that. He hadn't been given medicine for pain, and what little he had, was not to be wasted. He checked the clock barely hanging on his wall. Peacekeepers would start rounding people up in five hours.
He cleared away all the blood and the equipment he had used on the gun-wound before pulling up his communication-gear. This was for the cases in which he had no way of getting to his primary gear in the woods. In the days to come, he suspected he would have to lie low...perhaps even get pulled out.
"You have two minutes to get out of bed and get to the main square!"
There was a loud bang on his door. Rorke jolted to the sound of it as sleep had eluded for the better part of the night. He tended to his shoulder, obviously being pain just moving his upper body. His wound was slightly bleeding still. The banging on the door came once more, this time with more force.
"Get to the square now!"
Rorke quickly gathered some linens lying around and pressed it against his wounds and covered himself with an extra jacket before getting to the door. The peacekeeper wasted no time in dragging him out and into the crowd. It was a chilly morning, and the sun had yet to grace the land with its warming sunrays. Some people were still in their undergarments. That's when Rorke noticed how cold he really was from sleeping with wet clothing from the rainy night.
The crowd in front of him was clogging up. The grand square was filling up with people. The stage was set in front of them with four individuals covered by hoodies. Rorke swallowed a little tighter as he realized who they were. He also spotted several peacekeepers intensely looking at the crowd, as if they were searching for him. Rorke tilted his head down as he made his way next to a stranger next to him.
In the corner of his eye, he spotted her in her singled-out section next to fellow victor Blight. Johanna Mason knew what was coming, and she had probably been instructed to watch as an example was going to be made. She saw him but had to stay frozen and not react. She was being watched as well by someone far more dangerous. She could not afford to show the President that she was involving herself with anyone.
"On this very cold morning, we have here four radicals! They have collaborated in secret sabotage against the Capitol!"
The lead commander yelled from the stage.
"The Capitol tolerates no acts of defiance! The Capitol protects and provides! You live at their mercy! These four individuals seem to think that the Capitol is the enemy, when it is in fact every single radical out there. As a signal to all of them...this is what we will do all of you."
He said as he stepped behind each one of them, unveiling them first for the public to see. A knot formed in Rorke's stomach as he saw Gray's face be unveiled from under one of the hoods. Gray noticed him, but did nothing, said nothing. He looked like he had taken a beating throughout the night, but nothing would make him single out Rorke...or Marshall as he knew him by. The rebellion was too important.
"Any signs of rebellion against the Capitol, will be brought to an end."
The leader said as Gray was the first to be shot. Rorke and Gray were still in eye-contact when the shot happened. Rorke almost jumped at the sound of it. People turned towards each other, not wanting to see the remaining young men be shot, but peacekeepers would force them to. Rorke put his arms in a cross and tried to look down, avoiding eye-contact with any of the nearby peacekeepers. As the shots kept on coming, it got harder and harder. Johanna could see it from the corner of her eye that Rorke was struggling, but she could neither say nor do anything to help.
"You have thirty minutes to get to work! Your day just became three hours longer and breaks ten minutes shorter! Get on with it, move!"
The leader commanded as his fellow peacekeepers forced people on their feet. The leader walked up to Blight and Johanna.
"The President has given me direct orders to make sure you two are safe in the Victor's Village until the announcements of the Quell Games."
"How very considerate..."
Johanna responded before they heard commotion somewhere in the crowd. Several peacekeepers would fire shots in the air to stop whoever started it, but the people were outnumbering the peacekeepers. The Head Peacekeeper fired a few shots in the air, commanding control over the situation. Johanna immediately felt a knot in her stomach. Blight tried to hold her back, but she wiggled out of his grip.
"Who started this?!"
The Head Peacekeeper screamed out. Johanna was trying to find Rorke but couldn't. She now feared that he was the one starting the commotion to provoke the Head Peacekeeper.
"You will tell me who started the commotion, or I will shoot people at random until someone comes clear!"
His voice was loud and menacing. Johanna could feel her anger boil inside of her. More than anything, she wanted to land an axe on this Head Peacekeeper, but that would almost guarantee getting herself killed, her status would not matter then.
"You started this! You execute four workers on a stage, and you don't expect there to be a reaction?"
She called out. The Head Peacekeeper turned towards her. She almost felt a bit smaller when his eyes landed on her, but she felt it was better for her to take the heat than anyone else.
"You may be a victor, but you are just like them, a slave. You will not interrupt!"
Johanna didn't respond. There was still commotion among the workers and the peacekeepers, but the worst peacekeeper was the one dealing with her. Johanna briefly noticed Rorke was supporting an injured man. Her flicker of gaze alarmed the Head Peacekeeper who turned his head.
"Drop him. Now!"
The Head Peacekeeper told Rorke. The man he was holding, was the one initially punching a peacekeeper.
"No."
Rorke simply responded. He was right in the thick of it now, doing exactly what Johanna had told him not to do.
"DROP HIM!"
The Head Peacekeeper said in such a loud roar that Rorke flinched. The man had his gun aimed at Rorke at first, but then he redirected it towards the man on the ground. Rorke was being pulled back into the crowd and fell out of Johanna's line of sight.
"Any act of defiance is punishable by death."
He simply commented before shooting the man in the head. Johanna felt her insides twist and turn. She could see the Head Peacekeeper was also looking for Rorke now, as he had initially denied putting the man down.
"Get to work!"
Nobody did anything to defy the man this time. People almost couldn't get out of there fast enough. Rorke had also been smart enough to get out of the Head Peacekeeper's sights, but clearly he was now a man who had attracted the attention of the Head Peacekeeper.
Rorke had started to speed-walk away from the scene. The pain in his shoulder was slowly torturing him, and he noticed that blood was appearing through the linens he had put in front of his gunshot-wound. He knew it would raise suspicion if any of the Peacekeepers saw it, but he knew he had gotten their attention on him anyway. He was leaning more and more on the thought of requesting an evacuation from the district, but at the same time, he knew that could be difficult. He could very well be stuck there...which meant he was bound to be found and made an example of at some point.