So basically, like the summary says this is Finnick/Annie. She's a pro cheerleader and he's a football player. I don't own The Hunger Games.

"Congratulations, recruits!" Mikayla Bronwell yelled the microphone on the podium. "I know that two years can feel like a really long time when you're training for something you've wanted since you were a little girl, but some of you have finally made it! Not all of you will have the honour of graduating to a team, but I want to personally thank you for trying your absolute hardest!"

Annie took a deep breath, attempting to calm her nerves. Mikayla Bronwell was in the same room as her, and Annie's hands could not stop shaking. Mikayla had been a hero of her's ever since she had risen to cheer stardom at age sixteen, in 2001. Annie may have only been six at the time, but she could remember jumping around on the couch trying to copy her routines. Mikayla had won the Cheerleader of the Year award in 2004, 2007, 2009, 2010 and 2011. If you asked Annie who the most inspiring athlete in the world was, she would say Mikayla Bronwell every time. Even now that she was twenty eight, she still looked like the blonde haired blue eyed teenager who had first started cheering for the California Golden Bears and had gone on to be one of the Giants' most famous cheerers ever.

"So, the first cheerleader will be going to San Diego!" Mikayla announced. "It's Cashmere Gold!"

Annie wasn't stupid- she'd known from the day she'd stepped into the Elite Academy of Athletic Supporters at age twelve that not all fifty girls and sixteen guys would secure themselves a place on a team. They trained liked crazy and did all that they could, but in the end they didn't get to choose. The teams chose them, not the other way round. Annie could only pray that she'd done enough to impress the officials.

"Talia Trescott has been selected by the 49ners!" Mikayla said into the microphone, and a small girl with black hair whooped in excitement. Annie's worry grew as more and more names were announced. If she wasn't selected, she didn't know what she would do. She didn't have a back-up plan.

"And finally, we have a very special announcement to make!" Annie had almost lost all hope by that point. There was only one spot left and an elegant girl with long red hair that could flip circles around Annie was left, as well as a strong boy who had thrown her twenty feet into the air in their first week of training at the academy.

"The Panem Allstars have made a selection!" Mikayla said excitedly. "This is the first time in eight years that they've chose one of the Elite Academy's girls!"

The Panem Allstars were Annie's dream team, and they by far had the hardest cheer squad to get into. She had supported the Allstars football team ever since she could remember. The tiny slither of hope that Annie had left had been completely crushed.

"They haven't been able to find a flyer, and with the season fast approaching they're sounding pretty desperate! So they've asked for…Annie Cresta!"

Annie was surprised to find that she hadn't collapsed on to the floor. Panem Allstars wanted her? Panem Allstars wanted her? Annie stared at the ground with her mouth dropped open until the girl to her left elbowed her sharply in the ribs. She leapt forwards and all but ran towards the other girls who had been selected.

"Panem Allstars flyer, hey? Lucky girl." Morgan, a boy who had been in a few of her training classes since they were twelve, grinned at her.

"I know." Annie grinned back. "Very lucky indeed."

The first thing she noticed when she walked into the Allstars squad training room was the amount of sweating girls and the coach that stood in the centre of the room, yelling at the girls to 'pick it up, pick it up, pick it up!'.

"Oh my God." One of the other new girls muttered.

"This is incredible!" The gym was huge, bigger even than the one at the academy. One section consisted of just mats to practice tumbles and stunts, there were balance beams, running machines, exercise balls, weight lifting stations, one of the biggest stereos Annie had ever seen, and one wall that was all mirror. When the coach saw them, she shut off the music and blew her whistle twice. The cheerleaders ran to get into line, and the coach barked at them to be straighter and quicker next time.

"My name," She yelled. "Is Enobaria. But you can call me 'coach'. My squad consists of eighteen females and one male, but if all of you newbies make the cut then there will be twenty two females and two males. We had three dropouts at the end of last season, and two slackers were kicked off the squad. The Panem Allstars require only the best, the brightest, and the healthiest of girls to cheer them on to victory. They require men with the right attitude and the strength to toss the lightest of the girls twenty feet into the air. If I do not think that you meet the requirements and if you are not a good enough cheerleader then I will let you go. Understand?"

"Y-yes coach." Annie muttered along with the other new cheerleaders.

"Good. Now get into line." Coach Enobaria blew her whistle again, and they fumbled to get in line with the other cheerleaders. Annie found herself sandwiched in between a girl with dark hair tied back in a long ponytail and the new boy.

"Introduce yourselves." The coach ordered, and the first girl stepped forward.

"Tammy. Frontspot."

"Rachel. Backspot."

"Clove. Vice-captain, flyer."

"Glimmer. Tumbler."

"Louise. Tumbler."

"Marvel. Main base."

Annie quickly zoned out, until the girl next to her stepped forward.

"Johanna Mason, secondary base and head cheerleader."

Annie glanced around the room before stepping forward.

"Um, my name's Annie Cresta. I was picked from The Elite Academy of Athletic Supporters to be a flyer." She said, stuttering on some of the words.

"Best stunt?"

"The basket toss, with a double full twist."

"Well, you and the other flyers can discuss moves later." Enobaria pointed at the boy next to Annie. "Name?"

Once everyone had introduced themselves, Enobaria slowly walked up and down the line. She surveyed each and every one of the cheerleaders, and Annie could feel her knees shaking. How long had she waited for an opportunity like this?

"Alright, newbies. You passed first inspection. Take five for lunch, Johanna and Clove will give you all the details." She said, clapping her hands together once. Annie followed the other cheerleaders through the double doors at the end of the gym, into a small cafeteria. She walked over to the serving ladies with Johanna and the main, bass.

"So, is the food good?" She asked, eager to start up conversation.

"Sure. If you're not Cassidy." Marvel shrugged, picking a tomato salad out of the cold foods section. Annie picked out her own lunch, a chicken Caesar salad.

"What do you mean?" She grabbed a bottle of water and followed them to one of the tables.

"Cassidy's our third flyer and she thinks that being a cheerleader is all about starving yourself stupid." Johanna said, rolling her eyes as she sat down opposite Annie.

"It's not, so don't try it." Marvel warned. The girl they had been talking about, Cassidy, slid into the seat to the right of Annie as Clove the vice-captain sat down next to Johanna with a ham, lettuce and tomato sandwich.

"You gonna eat that?" She asked, raising a slender brown eyebrow.

"Um, yeah." Clove took an overdramatically big bite out of her sandwich and swallowed it with a smile.

"Gross. You'll get too heavy to lift." Cassidy wrinkled her nose, pushing her lettuce around her plate.

"Newbies, over here!" Johanna yelled, beckoning over the other new cheerleaders. "Enobaria asked us to give you the lowdown, right?"

"The first thing would be maintaining a healthy diet." Clove said, glaring at Cassidy.

"Yeah. Keep up with training- your personal fitness is something you'll have to deal with in your own time. Make sure you know the routines by game day, or there'll be big trouble." Johanna added.

"If you drop me, I'll kill you." Clove said coolly.

"Do not, under any circumstances, become romantically involved with any of the players. Things go wrong, it gets messy, and when it's your word or his you'll probably get the boot. You wanna be friends? Great, be friends. We'll be spending a lot of time with them. If Enobaria or I even think that you've been messing around with one of those idiots then we will come down on you like a ton of bricks. Understand?" Johanna was scary, but not in the typical cheerleader way. Annie was starting to get a sense of why she was a base.

"Try and be civil to each other. Trust me; I know that it's hard. If you're arguing with your squad mates, then how can you cheer with them?" Clove leaned back in her chair and smiled sarcastically at Cassidy, who rolled her eyes in response.

"Annie- You, Cassidy and I will be working on stunts and lifts with the bases after lunch. The new bases are gonna need to stand back and watch Johanna, Marv, and Leah lift. The frontspots and backspots will be working with Tammy and Rachel, and the new tumbler will be working with Glimmer and Jackie. Everyone else will be undergoing training as usual with Enobaria. If you have any problems, take it up with me and see where it gets you." Clove added, finishing off her sandwich.

The cafeteria door swung open, and two boys in the red and black Panem football uniforms walked in. They both clutched empty water bottles, and their hair was sticking to their shiny foreheads. Annie almost let out a strangled gasp, but managed to hold it in. It was Finnick Odair, Panem's gorgeous captain and starting quarterback and Cato Stone, Panem's star tight end.

"Hey." Cato slid in between Clove and Johanna.

"What are doing in here?" Clove demanded as Finnick slipped into the space on the bench in between Annie and Marvel. His arm brushed Annie's, and she shivered a little.

"Hiding from coach." Cato shrugged, leaning across the table and helping himself to a tomato off of Marvel's salad.

"He's in the worst mood ever. He's had us doing sprints since ten this morning." Finnick groaned. He pointed to Annie's water bottle.

"You mind?"

"No." Annie squeaked. She couldn't seem to stop staring into his eyes. He offered her a smile and took three long swigs from her bottle.

"Enobaria's way worse." Johanna scowled. "She made us do fifteen laps of the gym, two hundred crunches and five minute wall squats as our warm-up. Then after rehearsing for four hours, she made us do fifty sit-ups as our cool down before lunch."

"Yeah? Well Brutus had us jumping rope for twenty minutes yesterday. Then we did one hundred knee-ups, fifty knee-to-shoulders on each leg and then straight leg lifts for a half hour." Finnick said, taking another sip of Annie's water.

"That's nothing compared to being thrown in the air for three hours straight. I have to take vertigo tablets some days." Cassidy scoffed.

"I know that you're not just here to fill up your water bottles, hide from hard work and get on our nerves. What are you doing?" Clove asked, flicking crumbs at Cato.

"Scoping out the new cheerleaders. Surveying their pep power. Checking out the cheers. Seeing-"

"We get it. Stop." Johanna interrupted Finnick.

"You know that signing next week?" Cato asked.

"Yes?"

"Are they going to that?"

"Duh." Cassidy rolled her eyes. "They're cheerleaders."

"I'm Annie. I'm a 'newbie'." Annie said. She smiled and offered her hand to Finnick for him to shake. He took it, and Annie felt a blush creep up her cheeks. She quickly turned away.

"Where is the signing?" Erin, one of the new girls, asked.

"Dallas." Johanna pulled a face. "There's a game there in a couple of weeks."

"Don't say it like that, Johanna. It'll be fun!" Cato mocked in a Texas accent.

"We should really get back before Brutus kicks our asses." Finnick suggested. Cato nodded, and the two boys stood up to leave.

"Here." Finnick offered Annie her water bottle back but she shook her head.

"Keep it." She smiled.

"Thanks." He smiled back, and he and Cato jogged towards the exit.

"Congratulations, newbies. You just survived your first interactions with the Panem Allstars' own reigning idiots." Johanna said, clapping her hands.

"Why are they so hot?" Cassidy sighed, completely ignoring Johanna's remark.

"You know the rule." Clove warned.

"I hate the stupid rule." Cassidy frowned, crossing her arms over her chest. Annie found herself agreeing with her. Finnick Odair was not only gorgeous, but had had made her laugh and smiled warmly at her.

"Yeah, me too. Trust me; I'd be all over Cato if it wasn't there." Clove shrugged. "But it is, and now lunch is over so we had better get back to work."

"Alright Annie, here's how being a flyer works. We discuss the stunts we want to do with the bases and coach, and then we talk to the tumblers and the choreographers. They're the ones that come up with the routines and work our stunts in." Clove explained. Instead of using the mats in the gym, she had opted to take the girls and Marvel out back to the field that they practiced on before game day.

"I'm guessing that the Elite Academy had you flipping and twirling and learning stunts on your first day?" She asked.

"Yeah." Annie nodded.

"We should start with a cradle, to see what she can do." Cassidy suggested.

"That's a bit basic, isn't it?" I mean, if you want to see what I can do we should start with something a little more advanced." Annie said. Cassidy narrowed her eyes and pointed her finger at Annie.

"You know, I know academy girls like you. Think you're better than the rest of us? You're not. You're just rich." She snapped.

"Back off, Cassidy." Clove rolled her eyes. "Annie's right. Let's start with the stunt you name earlier. The bucket toss one?"

As Annie practiced with the other flyers and the bases, she felt a growing sense of belonging creeping up on her. Cheerleading was her life, and the cheering for the Allstars football team was her dream. She would most definitely not be throwing it all away because of one stupid rule and Finnick Odair.

Okay, so I know that in real life the cheerleaders and football players probably wouldn't even talk to each other all that much but for the sake of this story not boring everyone to tears with four bitch fights a chapter, they know each other and get along (sometimes) but just aren't allowed to date.I hope you enjoyed it. :)