Hello people of the internet. I do not own the Hunger Games (unfortunately, muahahahahahahaha), only the plot and a couple of the characters. Enjoy.

Nina's POV:

The elevator ground to a halt and the steel doors slid open silently. I was on the roof. Cool.

I had been making a tour of the training centre building and since we weren't allowed in the other district floors, the roof was pretty much the only place to explore. I step out onto the cold stone floor and instantly feel the icy fingers of the wind whip up my back and along my arms. Shit, I should have brought a coat. Oh well, maybe next time.

The Capitol is actually quite amazing from up here, I think, looking over the railings at the partying people below on the streets. They may be freakishly dressed psychopaths with silly accents but they sure know how to celebrate.

I remember the cheers of the vast crowds on the way to the city centre, when I was dressed in a ridiculous silver outfit that apparently represented power, and had roses thrown at me from every angle. I may be being sent to my death but at least I get praised for it, right?

"Hi."

I jump a foot in the air before spinning around to face the owner of the unwanted voice. The boy from District 12 stares back at me. I've forgotten his name. He has sandy blond hair and the most beautiful blue eyes. He's also really tall and I have to crane my neck a little to be able to look him in the face. He looks like a nice, caring kind of guy, though, not the 'I'm gonna break your friggin neck' kind.

"Sorry for startling you."

His voice is fairly deep but soft as well. It would be easy to get lost in his words. Blushing a little, I realised that he was waiting for my reply.

"Don't worry. I guess my mind is already in the arena."

"I know, right?!" he replied, a smile playing across his lips. "Every time a door shuts or someone chews their food too loudly, I jump and raise my hands to defend myself."

"Same!" A smile stretches across my face too. This guy is actually pretty cool. I may have to kill him in a few days but, hey! Those are just minor details that I can deal with at the time! "I'm sorry, I suck at remembering names, so I don't remember yours from the reaping."

"Oh, yeah." He extended his right hand and I raised mine to shake his. "I'm Peeta Mellark. And you are?"

"I would be the fabulous Nina Vixen from District 5, come to eat all the Capitol's food and leave none for the rest of you," I said, with a big, flourishing bow and an over exaggerated flick of my fiery orange hair, causing it to end up spread out all over my face. Peeta snorts, trying to keep his laughter under check. I then remember his districts fiery entrance earlier that evening. "Nice outfit for the opening, by the way."

"Thanks. Your outfit was cool too." We lean up against the railings looking down upon the ant sized people on the streets. Peeta turns to me and raises an eyebrow. "What exactly were you?"

"Well, I tried as hard as I could to act like the object the costume was based on, to make it more realistic." Peeta raises his eyebrow even further. I throw my head back, sticking my nose in the air with sarcastic haughtiness. "I thought I made excellent tin foil."

He chuckles again. It feels good to make him laugh. Most of my friends at home took my sense of humour for granted or found it annoying, but when Peeta laughs, it's like he actually thinks I'm funny!

"So, what do you get up to in District 12?" His eyes grow slightly distant at the mention of his home, probably thinking of all the things he's going to miss if he dies. I've decided that I'm not going to get teary about dying. You can either cry about it or laugh it off. It doesn't change anything. Peeta shakes his head slightly as if to clear it.

"I'm a baker's son. I've been training all my life to flour people to death." I chuckled.

"Sounds pretty cool. We just learn about electricity and shit like that. It's so boring that at least 5 times a year somebody shocks themselves to death just to get out of it." I never saw why people chose to go like that. If you want to die, then you should volunteer in the Hunger Games to save someone else from having to. Better to die, knowing you saved someone and their entire family from grief than die pointlessly. That's how I see it anyway.

Peeta and I stand in silence for a couple of minutes, looking over the city, enjoying the company.

"I wonder what tomorrow's going to be like?" I think aloud. Peeta turns to face me slightly, a thoughtful look filling his features. "I mean, I know we're going to the training room underground and they're going to teach us how to be super ninja's or something, but it sounds like it's going to be terribly boring and… Hey, hey, hey!" I jump up and down excitedly, facing a now greatly amused looking Peeta. "Why don't we go around the hall together?!" I can see him mulling it over. "It will be far less dull, not to mention the fact that we'll be intimidating everyone else by even talking to each other. What do you say?"

I stand in front of Peeta and attempt (and fail greatly) to do puppy dog eyes. Peeta laughs at my expression, but I can see I've still won him over. Just to make it official, Peeta nods his head and I think my smile now looks like that of the Cheshire Cat's from a stupid Capitol movie. I thrust out my hand and we shake on it.

"Well, I shall see you tomorrow, Bread Boy," giving Peeta a mock salute, as I slowly back away towards the elevator. He returns the salute.

"Good day to you too, FoxFace."

I raise my eyebrows a bit but nod my head in approval to my new nickname as the doors to the elevator drift shut with a ding.

I may have to kill him later, but for now, I've got a friend!

Peeta's POV:

I woke up to a persistent knock on the door and Effie's promise that today was going to be a "big, big day!" Instead of yelling obscenities at her, I rolled out of bed and began to get ready in the outfit set aside for me on the end of my bed. I think of my conversation with Nina.

She was really fun to be around and I find I'm actually quite excited to see her again. Maybe she can cheer Katniss up. On second thoughts, Katniss is forever sullen and cynical. I used to have the biggest crush on her as a kid, but to be honest, it kind of washed away over the years.

I slowly stroll into the dining area. Effie immediately starts having a go at me for being slightly late and Katniss looks like she's trying to shit bricks. Haymitch just looks depressed because of his new ban on alcohol. I ignore everyone and gather together some breakfast from the cart. I smile a little when I remember Nina's comment on how she was here purely to eat all the Capitol's food. When I'm finally sat down and starting to eat, Haymitch speaks up.

"Okay, you two. I've been through all of your strengths and abilities on the train, but there is one last thing I need to tell you." Katniss and I look up from our food and share a puzzled look over the table. Haymitch continues. "In public, I want you by each other's side every minute, okay?"

Katniss's face turns murderous, but she doesn't object. I, on the other hand, blush slightly. I already agreed to train with Nina…

"Umm… Haymitch…" He whips his head around and dares me with his glare to continue. I clear my throat and carry on speaking. "I… kind of… already agreed to… train with someone…"

I trail off at the shocked looks and raised eyebrows being sent my way. No one ever usually makes friends with others in the Hunger Games unless they're careers. Everyone else pretty much just tries to stick it through alone.

"And who might that be?" Haymitch asks.

I nearly reply with 'FoxFace' but I catch myself and surpress a grin. "District 5 Female, Nina Vixen."

Katniss sniggers across the table but I send her a death glare and she shuts up. Haymitch, meanwhile, nods to himself murmuring under his breath. Eventually he looks up at me.

"Yes, that's fine." He looks at his watch. "You two should probably get going."

Katniss and I stand up and follow Effie to the elevator.

Training. Piece of cake.

Nina's POV:

I bounce around excitedly inside the elevator, my District partner giving me increasingly annoyed looks the further we descend. As soon as we reach the correct floor, I sprint out of the elevator to the middle of the huge hall and jump up next to Peeta. He's standing beside a girl who looks so far up her own arse that it's killing me to not point it out. She looks at me with disgust and turns to listen to whatever the head trainer has to say. Bitch.

I nudge Peeta's arm to get his attention.

"Heya, Bread Boy."

A tiny smile pulls at the corners of his mouth as he replies. "Heya to you too, FoxFace."

We listen to the head trainer for a bit and then she finally dismisses us. I turn to Peeta.

"What shall we do first?"

Peeta opens his mouth to speak but the little bitch from before pushes between us. "I think we should tie knots." She starts striding over to the knot station, but turns back when she sees we're not following. "Come on, Peeta."

I raise my eyebrows at Peeta. She expects him to go with her. Peeta gave me a slightly nervous, pitying look. "My mentor said that me and Katniss have to go around and train together." He rolls his eyes to show that he was nowhere near happy about this unfortunate situation. I let out a sigh.

"Knot tying it is."

And so the day goes on. Every time Peeta or I try to make a suggestion on what to do next, the bitch pulls us in a different direction. After knots we ended up doing fire starting (which I sucked at, but Peeta was awesome at), hammock building (which I was okay-ish, but Peeta was crap at) and finally berry identification (which I excelled at and Peeta almost ate nightlock). We then had to go into a side hall with the other tributes to eat lunch.

We got to the food trolley and Katniss bent over the cart to reach something on the other side. I act out shooting myself in the head to Peeta and he bursts out laughing. Katniss jumps up and glares at the two of us. Peeta tries to choke down his laughter but Katniss's constipated look of 'frustration' just makes him laugh more. I quickly sidestep around Katniss and guide Peeta to an empty table before she explodes on him.

We spend the rest of lunch ignoring Katniss and whenever she tries to get a word in edgeways, we change the topic. When Katniss is pissed, her right eye starts twitching. It's hilarious.

After lunch we head to the weapon's side of the main hall. Katniss, now in an even sourer mood because we'd been ignoring her, went to the throwing weapons section. Brilliant.

Although I was hopeless at most things, there was one object that I was actually pretty good at using. Shruikens. I grabbed Peeta's arm and dragged him over to the station, even though Katniss was aiming for the knife throwing section.

"Come on! Let's be Ninjas!"

I go over to the rack and gaze at the beautiful selection before me. I run my fingertips, softly, over the sharp edges of a silver, four pointed one before picking it out delicately. For the whole time I was doing this, Peeta had been watching intently. He'd probably sussed that I was at least slightly good at these, given the way I was acting.

I stood up to the mark and faced the dummies.

I breathe in and out slowly. I set my sight on a dummy over 80 feet away and concentrate on the target and the target only. Katniss is watching and this is the closest thing I can get to bitch slapping her. I bring my arm back and then fling it forward, letting the shruiken fly.

There was a vicious whistling sound before the resounding thunk of metal on metal as the weapon found its target. Then silence.

I slowly turn around to see why the chatter from around the room has come to an abrupt halt. Everyone, game makers, tributes and Capitol attendants, are staring at me with mixed expressions of shock, amazement or in some cases (Katniss and the Careers) pure anger. Peeta was the first person to break the echoing silence.

"You have GOT to teach me that!" He gives me a huge high five, oblivious to the prying eyes of the other onlookers. "Do it again!"

I hear the people in the hall begin chatting to one another again, so I give Peeta my biggest smile before swiping another shruiken and hurling it at another target, further away. Bullseye.

I'm about to start setting Peeta up in the proper stance to throw a shruiken of his own, when a snarky whine reaches our ears.

"Peeta, can we move on already? Haymitch said we should stick to the survival skills and District 5 doesn't need any more practice at this station."

God, she is such a BITCH! Peeta sees my fingers flicking to the weapon rack and puts a calming, warm hand on my shoulder. Taking deep breathes, I turn towards Katniss with a forced smile in place on my face.

"Hey Katpiss… Oh, I'm dreadfully sorry… Hey Katniss. What do you say to me and you having a little wager, eh?" She looks me in the eye to show that she's listening. "You can pick any activity in the entire room that we can have a race with and if you win, I will leave you to drag Peeta anywhere you want without me lightening his mood and holding back the boredom. If I win, you shove off and mope away, by yourself, and leave us the fuck alone."

Katniss' eyes narrow but soon she's smirking maliciously at me. Uh Oh. What have I got myself into?

"Climbing."

I force a look of shock and worry upon my face, but inside I'm break dancing in joy. Well, what I think is break dancing. I could just be having some kind of fit in my head but let's just go with break dancing. Peeta looks terrified, the poor guy. I guess the fate of his boredom is hanging in the balance and if I was told I might have to spend any more time with Katpiss I would be a crying heap on the floor by now. "Very well. What do we have to do?"

"We start over here." Peeta and I follow her over to a climbing wall, which goes up to the ceiling, on one side of the room. Katniss points to a large rope net that stretches across the ceiling and leads to another net that goes from the ceiling net to the floor on the other side of the hall. "Climb up this wall. Along the net. And down the other net across the room."

Hmm… she's very sure of herself. Get ready to fall down several pegs, bitch.

Katpiss goes towards one of the trainers and asks if he could judge the race while I turn to Peeta. He looks ready to shit an elephant. I sigh in exasperation. "Have you absolutely no faith in me?" I whisper so the bitch won't hear me, flashing Bread Boy a wry grin. His eyes twinkle adorably when he realises I'm not as shit as I'm making out to be.

"Blow her to smithereens, Fox Face."

Letting the smirk on my face fall, I turn back to Katniss and see we've gathered quite a crowd. The Career boys from 1 and 2 have wondered over, leaving their scowling district partners at the weapon station. Several others stand around us, gazing on, curiously.

I gesture for Katniss and the trainer to wait for a second, before stepping forward to address our audience.

"Welcome, Ladies and Gentlemen… and BreadBoy," I say winking at Peeta. "You are about to witness my excellence in live action. Pay close attention as I beat Katpiss Neverclean… Oh I do apologise,… Katniss Everdeen in the most epic climbing battle you ever did see." Several snickers echoed through the hall as Katniss scowled at me, her right eye twitching in anger. Holding back my laughter, I did a flourishing bow to the crowd in front of us, before heading over to the starting line with Katniss.

The trainer that was going to be judging the competition was fighting a grin, trying not to anger Katniss anymore. As Katniss bent forward into a good starting position, he winked at me over her head. "Ready…. Set….GO!"

And we're off! I leap at the climbing wall and start racing up it, hand over hand, foot over foot. I glance quickly to the side and see that the bitch is slightly ahead of me. How dare she!

Soon we're at the ceiling net and things begin to get hard because we have to climb upside down. I persevere in not trying to look down because I know I'll probably have some sort of freak out and fall. I simply keep going, hand over hand, foot over foot.

Katniss is still in front of me so I step up the pace a little bit so that I am now directly behind her. As we're reaching the 3 quarter mark, I see Katpiss's head turning to look at me. Her face shows shock that I can keep up with her. Then she smirks.

Everything seems as if it's running in slow motion. Katniss drops one of her feet from the net, but instead of bringing it forward to continue climbing along, she thrusts it backward… into my face!

I hear Peeta yell my name as my hands slip from the net. I feel a sense of falling… and then suddenly I'm jerked to a halt, still upside down. I open my eyes that I had unconsciously shut and look up at my feet. My left foot had got hooked in the net which had prevented my fall. I let out a shaky breath as did a few others below me. Looking down, I see all the onlookers gazing up at me, some in shock, some in relief. Even the Careers look a bit stricken. Peeta is pacing back and forth underneath me, worry etched into all his features. It's nice to know that he already cares about me even though we've only known each other less than a day.

I look along the net and see that Katniss is already nearing the opposite wall. Stupid bitch! How dare she kick me in the face! I think my nose is broken or at least badly bruised because I can feel the warm, thick blood trailing down my face and into my fiery orange hair. Damn, it going to take ages to get it all out!

I quickly swing myself back up to the net and untangle my left foot so that I can continue. I have to go as fast as I possibly can to catch up and beat Katpiss.

When I reach the last net, Katniss is already half way down. I have to get down before her. For Peeta.

But, what to do? I can't climb that fast… hmm… what is faster than climbing?... Ah Ha! Gravity is a bitch, Katniss!

And with that, I let go of the net.

People gasp below and Peeta, for the second time in less than five minutes, shouts out my name as I tumble through the air. I can't look to reassure him though. I have to concentrate. I see a dark blurred blob whiz past me. That was probably Katpiss. Shh… Focus!

The ground was coming closer and closer. I have to act now.

My hands shot out towards the net and they slammed closed on the rope. My arms scream in the strain of holding on when my body jerks to a halt. I shakily look down and my eyes widen. My feet dangle less than a meter off the ground. I could have died… But I beat Katpiss!

I drop to the floor and smirk up at the bitch, who is frozen in shock, still half way up the net.

Then I turn around to the open mouthed crowd, take a deep bow and said, "And that my friends is how you beat a bitch."

There was silence from every one. And then they all burst into applause. Even the game makers. Peeta comes forward and high fives me. I make note in my head that we had to come up with some kind of secret hand shake but think that that would have to be an activity for later.

Everyone starts to head back to their other stations, the Career's giving me a wink as they look between me and a very unhappy bitch who just reached the bottom of the net. I give them a retarded salute in return. Katpiss sulks off to the animal identification station, ignoring my malicious smirk. I want to blow a raspberry in her direction but steal myself when I hear a voice from behind.

"Umm… Hi."

I turn around towards the voice and see a girl about a year younger than me. Her hair is just shorter than shoulder length and it's curly and chocolate coloured. I smile. "Hi. Did you enjoy the show?"

The girls smile turns cheeky and impish. "Yeah, that bitch had it coming. You could literally see the steam rolling out of her ears when you won." She holds out her hand and I shake it. "I'm Ishbel, by the way, Ishbel Russel. District 3. But most people call me the TishMonkey."

"I'm Nina Vixen, otherwise known as FoxFace from District 5 and this," I say, pointing at Peeta who had been watching the Career's decapitate the dummies, "is Peeta. District 12, but I call him BreadBoy."

Upon hearing his name, Peeta turns around to me and Ishbel, smiling and shaking Ishbel's hand.

"So, FoxFace and BreadBoy," TishMonkey grins, "What should we do next?"

-END OF PART 1-

Hope you enjoyed! I'll write another chapter if I can be bothered. Please review or I'll die of sadness. No flames please. Unlike Katpiss and Peeta, I don't do fire.

It's coming up to Valentine's Day and I'm still forever alone. At least I have you random strangers on the internet, right?

'Til next time. Bye.