Katniss fully understands Wiress's message and concludes that the arena is a clock: each section unleashes a different Gamemaker attack on the hour, starting at midnight. Fearing the blood rain, fog, and monkeys could spread beyond their zones, Katniss wakes Peeta, Finnick, Johanna, Beetee, and Wiress and convinces them to move. When Katniss tells Wiress she was right, Wiress calms immediately and becomes functional again, while Katniss remembers Plutarch Heavensbee hinting that "it starts at midnight," which makes Katniss wonder whether he deliberately tried to help her.

The group heads to the Cornucopia to test the clock theory and regroup. Beetee insists on recovering his coil of wire, and Peeta explains that wire is Beetee's true weapon because he won his own Games with an electrical trap. At the Cornucopia, Wiress cleans the wire and then accurately predicts the poisonous fog's return at two o'clock, confirming the theory. Peeta draws a leaf map of the arena as a twelve-part clock, marks the known dangers, and helps the others see how much more they now understand.

While they work, Katniss reflects on the uneasy reality of alliance in the Hunger Games: she is relying on people she may later have to kill. She notices Johanna's skill with axes and thinks about how other districts' children learn useful trade skills young, while District 12 tributes are usually disadvantaged. Beneath those practical thoughts, Katniss keeps returning to hatred of President Snow and to the pressure of protecting Peeta.

The quiet suddenly breaks when Wiress stops singing, and the Careers attack. Gloss appears behind Wiress and slits her throat, but Katniss immediately shoots Gloss through the head, and Johanna kills Cashmere with an ax. Brutus and Enobaria attack Peeta and Finnick before retreating, and as Katniss and the others pursue them, the circular island holding the Cornucopia begins spinning violently. The spin throws the dead into the sea, disorients everyone, and nearly drowns Beetee.

After Finnick rescues Beetee, Katniss realizes Wiress died still clutching Beetee's precious wire. She dives into the bloody water before the hovercraft can remove Wiress's body, pries the coil from Wiress's hands, says good-bye, and returns it to Beetee. The survivors mourn in silence, then decide to leave the area and try for the twelve o'clock beach, which should be safe for a time.

Once they try to navigate, however, they discover the Cornucopia's spin has destroyed their bearings and possibly shifted the arena's orientation. They choose a path at random and head into the jungle. As Finnick taps a tree for water and Johanna keeps Peeta back to redraw the map, Katniss finally recognizes a pattern: Finnick, Mags, the District 6 morphling, and now Johanna have all repeatedly risked themselves to keep Peeta alive. Katniss concludes that Haymitch may have persuaded them that Peeta's gift for words makes him more valuable to any rebellion than the others, but before she can understand more, she hears a scream that sounds exactly like Prim's and runs toward it in panic.