FYI, THIS IS THE EYES OF A CAPITOL CITIZEN! Guess you alreadu figured it out.

What Must It Be Like?

I always wanted to meet with a tribute. Every year I try, because I am like not far from the Training Center, but caught. Always I'm freaking caught.

Not this year, though. This year I have a plan.

Two days before the 53rd Hunger Games, I told my mother I was going to Umbella Zeal's house.

"Are you real, Lakeshi?" she questioned, turning away from the television.

"Yes, I am," I answered as honest as I could.

"I'm not going to have any Peacekeepers bring you to my doorstep saying you were scaling the Training Center walls or trying to slip through the doors?"

"No, mother. I'm twelve now. I've outgrown it. I know my punishments. I'll have Umbella call you when I get there in less than five minutes. I'll be back around eleven."

My mother half-smiled. "Alright then. But if I do get Peacekeepers at my door and you're in handcuffs like the last five years-"

"Mother! I won't!"

"Carry on. and please put on some lipstick. And redo your hair..."

After I redid my features to my mother's orders, I slipped out the house and on my way to my friend's house. Umbella quickly pulled me in and called my mother, saying I was there. I even pipped in to make her more reassured. She's so tempered around this time. After that was done with, Umbella stowed me in her room and we talked.

"Who are you going to see this time?" my friend asked. "Or attempt to."

"I was thinking District One. The balcony is the lowest and I'm betting on the girl tribute fifty bucks."

"I was hoping you'd go for anywhere high. You scale that surfaces like a master and I'mma disguise you as arranged."

"Yea but I want a quick escape if I'm caught."

Umbella turned to her computer and pulled up a website. She scanned the twenty-four tributes and said "Here's a good one. The only twelve-year-old in the Games this year, from District Twelve."

"How ironic!" I beamed.

"She even looks a lot like you, but totally ugly and unstyled."

Umbella clicked the girl's picture, pulling up her full I.D. "Her name is Hope Ideally."

Hope had frizzy, uncombed black hair. Her olive skin was dry and her lips thin and cracked. She hardly passed five feet. Yet her eyes were gray and shinning with, well, hope. No matter how repulsive she was, she looked like me. Only the unpleasant District Twelve version. Yet the picture of her chariot costume made her look like me now that she was pretty.

"It says here her betting odds are 1 in 55," Umbella read "Yet she scored an eight, so she must be of some use. You should find out how."

"Won't matter, she'll die in the bloodbath," I groaned. "Isn't the girl from One's name Fuchsia Alloy? She got an eleven, right?"

"Uhh… yes."

"I'll find out how she got her score straight from her!"

Umbella shook her head and said "It says here that Hope seems strange. Her mentors reported that she's not much of a talker and she's usually in her room. Something strange about her token, a pink stick as long as her arm she won't let out of her sight. It had to be confiscated but she got it back."

Hope must be crazy.

At 10 o'clock, Umbella painted my body, except my face, in the grayish-white of the Training Center's bricks. Then I dressed in white boy clothes and hoodies, because it was chilly out tonight. Hiding my painted body and hoodies under my originals clothes, me and Umbella left, telling her parents we were walking.

"I'll be keeping watch," Umbella reminded as I started for the Training Center. I waved goodbye and headed out, a warm and excited feeling in me. I'll be the first normal Capitol citizen to meet a tribute! Maybe Gamemakers brought their children to meet the tributes or something, but I don't count them. They never really meet the tributes, just watch them as I heard. I'll actually talk to the tribute.

Fuchsia Alloy was my targeted tribute. But as I approached the Training Center, I kept thinking about Hope Ideally.

"Her token is a pink stick as long as her arm she won't let out of her sight." What was that all about? People in District Twelve are poor and really don't have anything pretty. Where did she get that stick, and why was it so special to her?

"It says here her betting odds are 1 in 55, yet she scored an eight, so she must be of some use." What is her skill? Maybe people really are detesting her, if she got a eight. But that is in the Careers' score range, eight to ten! But not the highest of ranges, in the Career range. And she's only twelve!

I ducked into an ally that was close to the Training Center to discard my shiny clothes. Umbella's words came across me again: "You should find out how."

I dashed through the crowded streets of the Capitol to the side of the Training Center that had the balconies. I looked up, seeing the tallest one was probably a million feet high. Even if that was an exaggeration, just the lowest balcony was higher than me.

I had quite a climb ahead for me.

I set my fingers into one brick, then another, and pulled myself up. I pressed myself against the wall so my colors blended in. I passed up the first balcony, then the second, all the way past the eleventh. I told myself not to look down. If I did, I'd only be reminded more intensely than before that one wrong movement could make my guts splattered on the sidewalk below.

Why did the wind have to be so strong tonight? So sharply cold, hitting my painted fingers, my bare face, making them stiff with frigid temperatures. I closed my, taking a deep breath. Reopening them after that was quite hard, mentioning how scared I was now. At any moment, I expected some to see me and scream, but none occurred. I've never been so high. The highest I've been was the District Three's balcony, when Peacekeepers rushed to it, tapped the platform's rim with some metal device to disarm the force field, and pulled me through into their clutches.

My fingers just reached the iron bars of the District Twelve balcony when I heard a small voice.

"Whaddaya doing, missy?"

I squealed and lost my grip. A hand wrapped around my arm and pulled me up.

"Sorry if I scared you."

I looked right at the gray eyes of Hope Ideally.

"Probably takes a lot of courage to make this climb."

I grabbed the iron bars and hung there. Hope helped me up to the point my feet were placed in the gaps.

"It does," I replied, gasping for breath. I looked down at the street. So far away…

"Don't get yourself worked up," Hope ushered. Her voice seemed impossibly pinched for a young girl. "So, you need to talk to me?"

"I-I-I always wanted to meet a tribute," I gasped "I mean, being one seems so good! Famous for your sacrifice to maintain peace between my city and your Districts!"

"What peace?"

"Huh?"

"What is peace? What peace is in the constantly starving workers and children, crying from the pains of hunger, slowly withering away to death. Well, maybe the food in the Capitol is worth the price of being a tribute. Then again, being a tribute means dying quicker than suddenly slowly having your life expire of hunger that lasted for your entire life." Hope snickered. "It is the Hunger Games after all."

I didn't understand. I decided to change the subject to something I've wondered for a while. "Wait, so what is life in the Districts?"

"Probably want to ask all the tributes for their input instead of one strange little girl who never left District Twelve. Well, in Twelve, the poorest District in Panem, we have pretty much what I've just described to you: starving workers, crying children, emaciated people. There's also coal miners getting trapped and/or killed underground in mine explosions like my parents. Kids being thrown in dreadful community homes like me."

Dropping my head, I sighed "I'm sorry."

"For what? You got nothing about it. You did nothing to cause it."

"I only wanted to talk to a tribute. I want to know what it is like to be them just from them. It's been my dream for a long time because I believe tributes are special."

"You really, do you?"

I nodded. "What must it be like?"

Hope muttered something under her breath. "You really don't want to know. But I'll show you."

Hope slipped out her pink stick. Up close it looked like a long twig spray painted rose pink and given a dab of glitter. The twelve-year-old waved it in front of my head then tapped my nose. At first, nothing happened except for a small pain on the tip of my nose. Then, it spread all over my face and finally my body.

"What did you did?" I screeched.

All of a sudden, I was somewhere else. Pressed in the dab center of a crowd of twelve-year-old kids. I realized I wasn't in the Capitol, I was somewhere else. It dawned on me slowly as the Panem video was playing.

District Twelve's reaping.

Once the video ended, Effie Trinket exclaimed "Ladies first!" and sent her hand into one of the filled reaping bowls. My stomach dropped in fear as I involuntarily crossed my fingers, hoping not me, not me, not me.

"Hope Ideally!"

At first, I sighed. It wasn't me. Then, I turned into this apprehensive, petrified little girl being escorted by Peacekeepers. My ashy, olive hands were wrapped around a pink stick. This one detail told me what was going on.

I was Hope Ideally. I was experiencing her as a tribute.

After I was plopped onstage, Effie called for volunteers. None came. Then she selected the next name. "Roger Sunners."

No, not him, my… err, Hope's mind wondered. My eyes tracked a huge boy stepping onstage. He hissed at me "Hey, Lost Hope."

He calls Hope that? my own mind wondered. Roger must be a bully. Community home? I didn't know at first, but a familiar, whispering voice in my head told me he was the seventeen-year-old bully at the community home. He calls everyone except his buddies awful nicknames. Like Lost Hope.

"Ready to die? Because that is your fate, not mine."

I shook my head, my eyes growing more fearful than before. I can't even consider winning with him around. He would push me of the pedestals if he could. He'll decapitate me in the beginning. No, he'll have me die a slow and painful death, laughing. Icy tears were streaming down my face as I was taken into the Justice Building, waiting for family or friends to come. After sitting on the couch for an hour, crying, I remembered that I have no more family. I have no friends.

The ride to the Capitol was no better. Roger poked me, pushed me, punched me, and called me names, any if not all of the bullying techniques until Haymitch found out and separated us apart. He did the best he could to keep us separate when he was around, except during training sessions, where Roger had all the freedom too taunt me. It started out that way the first day, then Roger realized he too needed training. I was at peace.

But that same day, Fuchsia Alloy and her District Partner, Platinum, went about. They were worse replacements than Roger by being better at, well practically everything, and shoving their skills in the weaker tributes' faces. Probably to make the tributes scared of them.

Fuchsia and Platinum approached me which I was still figuring out how to throw a spear straight with a few other tributes. Platinum tapped my head. I looked.

"Your District Partner calls you Lost Hope," Fuchsia reported. "Is that your true name?"

I looked at the other tributes and shook my head in denial.

"Shame, it should be. You know there's only two, yes I said two victors from your shanty little District?"

I bit my lip and nodded. Fuchsia laughed. It was sweet thing to my own ears, but to Hope it was like a devil's laughter.

"My District is a Career District, so my District has a lot of victors than you," Fuchsia boasted. "So much more they had to build more houses to the Victor's Village. Then my allies from Two and Four have the same situation in their Districts." Then she began listing things, poking my chest after every statement. "Yes. It is all true. We're bigger than you, stronger than you, more skillful than you, and definitely not pitiful like you. If your name is really Hope Ideally, then you are ideally lost hope. You will die in the 53rd Games. In my hands, you will die a slow and painful death full of blood inside your eyelids, coming out your mouth, your head and body separate."

An image of that hit me. I shuddered, tears rolling down my face.

Platinum nodded, then said a string of harsh words that would've set fire to the floor. He turned to another tribute, who quickly fled the moment the Career's eyes fell on her. Fuchsia was done with me too and left since all the other tributes who were at the spear throwing station had abandoned me with the Careers. I thought I was done with her.

For the day.

The next day, I was doing quite well with the spear throwing, talking quietly and nervously with the boy from Three, who was just as tensed as I was, with a plan of alliance when the District One Careers came back.

The boy fled at the sight of the two bullies. I cursed him under my breath as Fuchsia and Platinum towered over me.

"What were you doing with the Three boy, teaming?" Fuchsia asked.

I bit my tongue and nodded.

"Pitiful. Even if you allied with everyone except me and Platinum, you'd still die. You know why? You aren't worth becoming allies with. That boy would probably slit your neck in your sleep." She ran out of ideas and looked at Platinum to continue.

"You are from District Twelve, full of poor, sooty people," Platinum rants. "Your mentor won the Games out of luck. He strongly is not favored in District One. God knows how your first victor won. You are Lost Hope, no one cares much about you. Unless they see you die slowly and painful, wallowing in your gore!"

The pair shared a long laugh that reminded me of witches. Instead of just tears, anger boiled and showed up on my face. I took my stick and smacked it across Platinum's face.

He stopped laughing immediately, pawing the red line across his cheek. Then his once turquoise eyes turned a silver gray. Platinum flew backwards on the ground and began twitching, coughing up mucus that was swirling with blood on the floor.

Fuchsia wanted none of it. She grabbed me by the arm and shouted "What have you done to him!" Then she became enraged, hissing "You will die for that! By my hand!"

All of a sudden, she began strangling me. As I was gasping for breath, staff and trainers pulled us apart. My stick was taken from me, said I'd get it back if it passed inspection. Platinum passed me on a stretcher carried by Avoxes, his silver-gray eyes slowly turning to a faint turquoise, wide open in fear and astonishment.

"Give it back!" I screeched. The spear-throwing trainer held me back. "Give me my stick back!" I wailed.

"Why do you care so much about that stupid stick?" Fuchsia yelled from across the pathway, being held back by the weight-lifting trainers.

I didn't answer her. Instead I muttered "Let's see about Platinum now."

Why? I thought with my own mind. What did Hope do?

The next day, I did notice Platinum. He was keeping close attention to keep away from me. Even though Fuchsia was urging him to go at me for him because she wasn't allowed to, even though my stick wasn't in my possession anymore. At lunch, he seemed happy to be called out for private sessions, making a scared look in my direction as he sped out. Actually, everyone was avoiding me, even Roger.

Last I was. When I was called, I expected to be only doing my spear-throwing skills, expecting the Gamemakers to be ignoring me as Haymitch warned me they might. Surprisingly, I was handed my pink stick the moment I entered the floor.

"We want to determine what it does," explained the Head Gamemaker, the only one standing on the Gamemaker's platform. "We don't know exactly what you did to that District One boy yesterday, but we can't figure it out." He motioned to the spear-throwing trainer, who was the only other person on the floor besides me. "Try it on him. Then you will proceed on your own session."

I walked up to him, the trainer, who towered over me, his face expressionless. Obediently, I swung my stick and hit the trainer in the face like I did Platinum. He winced.

Nothing happened. I tried again and again. Nothing happened except the trainer getting a red line across his face.

"The situation yesterday was a whole piece of luck," I choked out to the Gamemakers. I knew I was lying. At what? "But Platinum deserved it. You should really keep an eye on the tributes."

The Gamemakers nodded. The Head Gamemaker waved his hand, saying "Well, go ahead. You can keep your… stick token."

Since being told, I began throwing spear, feeling better with my stick in my possession. This gained me an eight in training.

Okay, current day, I thought as I once again was involuntarily moving away. Am I done, Hope?

No answer. I found myself in a beautiful cloth gown, covered in silver glitter to go with my red and pink outfit, my hair straight and non-fuzzy, my face glowing with makeup. I… err, she actually looks nice for once.

I hardly was able to get words out to Caesar for my interview. My last words to the Capitol weren't words at all, just a sly smile and a big wave.

Finally the interviews were over. I started moving out at once but a hand tightly wrapped itself around my arm. I looked at Fuchsia, Platinum a few feet back.

"Whatever voodoo vision, flashback, nightmarish thingy or something you gave my District Partner now has a price you gotta pay. If you considered yourself out of the way by scaring Platinum, you are dead wrong. Speaking of dead, tomorrow that will be you. Don't think your death will be fast and painless."

Fuchsia shoved me against a wall. Platinum quickly passed me. I smirked to myself for a few seconds, then felt the tears on my face.

"Do you now see what it is like to be a tribute?" A voice like the one that explained who Roger was said in my mind. "The pain we go through even before entering the arena. Prepare, Lakeshi, because it isn't over."

Before I could ask how it knew my name, my stylists was fitting blue jeans, gray shoes, and a gray T-shirt that had a big "12" on the back in black. He shoved me in a glass cylinder, waved with a big fat smile, and watched me rise up into sunlight.

All the tributes were dressed like me. We were in a village, one that wasn't old and rotting wood, but new and standing firm. The only things that made it seem out of place was the Cornucopia in the middle, the pedestals we stood on, and the dirt paths that represented streets.

The gong rang. Instead of dashing to the center like the most of the tributes, I spun on my heels and ran in the opposite direction. The village seemed endless as I ran, the screams of the bloodbath behind me. I used to cheer it on, but in Hope's body it was agonizing. I covered my ears, running, not stopping but only a few times to catch my breath. When the cannons shot out, I crumbled into the dirt, gasping for breath. When I calmed, the tenth cannon had finished. Fourteen left, including me.

I felt like cheering Hope on, yet again I was her, feeling and talking and my actions the way she would've done it. I crawled into a small, two-story house, and sat.

I'm alive, Hope's mind thought But for how long?

Not long. When it was nearing nightfall, another cannon had shot out. I waited for the death broadcast to appear in the sky, but I heard voices first.

"Check every house and make sure you find a tribute. If it is Hope Ideally, I kill her myself."

It was Fuchsia's voice! In fear, I almost ran from the house. Peeking out the window, I saw her leading five other Careers with her, them inspecting every building they passed. They were approaching mine. I ran upstairs, finding it with only a few beds and storage chests. I was thinking I might fit in one of the chests when I heard the door slam open.

The chests would make to much noise. I dove under the bed, closing my eyes.

Step, step, step and eventually there were six pairs of feet in that upstairs room. Holding my breath, I watched as they inspected every corner of the second level. The Career boy from Two looked under my bed and flung it from above me.

"Look who I found-"

I screamed, jumping up and hitting the boy with my stick. His brown eyes immediately turned silver-gray and he fell to the floor, twitching and coughing up so much blood I knew I killed him. His cannon shot out. I make a desperate escape to run, but I was caught.

"We meet again, Lost Hope," Fuchsia said, her hatchet ready to kill. The girl from Two and the boy from Four were holding my sides. The girl from Four and Platinum watched, glaring.

I was going to die. Hungry, thirsty, scared, just like at home. Fuchsia shouted "I bet you regret killing my ally and scaring my District Partner. Well, now today is your deathday!"

She swung the hatchet in my stomach. Blood splattered onto her, followed by my screams. She laughed viciously "You knew it was coming! You knew it!"

Fuchsia swung her hatchet into me so many times that my blood made the Careers holding me loose their grip. I was on the floor, staring up at the ceiling, then Fuchsia's face. Her face was red with my blood, her eyes wide and wild with victory.

"You won't be recognized when I'm through with you," Fuchsia promised. She swung her hatchet at me again. I couldn't believe I was alive when she finally stopped.

"Now let us all watch as Lost Hope slowly looses her pitiful little life…"

I let out a scream, followed by blood. Darkness came at the corners, finally. I dropped my stick, letting it roll on the floor. I closed my eyes and sobbed.

"Oh shut up!"

I opened my eyes, just to see Fuchsia aim her hatchet at me for the final death blow.

I blinked, finding myself staring at Hope from the balcony.

"Is it all true?" I choked out.

"Yes, it is," Hope said. "Not all tribute's deaths are as horrific as mine will." She waited for me to answer. I had nothing to say, so she continued. "What must it be like? Well, it is answered, Lakeshi. And the Capitol you reside in cheer it on. It was nice talking to you." She raised her stick.

"Wait!" I screeched "How do you know all this? And is your stick some magic thing? Who are you?"

Hope didn't answer. Her eyes beginning to produce tears, she tapped my forehead and I found myself on solid ground. Shaking, I looked up at the Training Center but couldn't see Hope.

Things played exactly how Hope showed me. What I could see. Her interview, and what happened the first day of the 53rd Hunger Games. I didn't want to watch the part when the Careers burst into the building she was hiding in, but I did. My family around me cheered when Fuchsia killed Hope, only blood and disembodied flesh when the Careers left. Suddenly enraged, I stood in front of the TV and shouted "YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE FOR THE TRIBUTES! DO YOU WANNA KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE TO DIE PAINFUL, BLOODY DEATHS AND HAVE AN AUDIENCE CHEER IT ON LIKE IT IS A FREAKING GOOD THING?! I AM SICKENED OF YOU! SICKENED OF YOU! DEEP TO MY CORE!"

I sat back down on the couch, curled up in a ball, the house suddenly, dreadfully quite. I didn't say another word for the rest of the Games. As I watched the Games (forced by my mother - "Everyone watches it, sweetie, so you must too"), I hoped Fuchsia died a death as painful as Hopes. My wish came true the 14th day when Fuchsia and Platinum ran after the pair from Seven. The boy of that District whipped around, stabbed Fuchsia in the gut, and didn't stop stabbing her until her cannon shot out. Apparently that boy was as insane as she was, so his District Partner and Platinum ran away.

I didn't even care that I lost fifty bucks.

Something inside me nagged to say it, so I muttered, "She deserved it."

After twenty-one days in the dreadful arena, Platinum won. Hope's nature seemed to catch him, as he hardly said anything in the victor's interview. He seemed smaller, shyer, and more frightened of everything. What I noticed was that his turquoise eyes were silver-gray now.

Platinum deserved it. He killed too.

Finally, when the aftermath of the Games calmed down, my mother took me aside to talk.

"What happened, the first day of the Hunger Games ? What came over you?"

Then I told her everything. She seemed mad to know my plan of scaling up the Training Center, but then she seemed very astonished.

"The girl… from Twelve… Hope Ideally… she showed all that to you?"

I nodded. "I think she was mad that I liked the Games. I mean, all us of Capitolites see the Games with an entertainment factor. Hope showed me the other side of the Hunger Games, the real side: macabre affliction."

My mother sucked all that in. Then she hugged me, crying, "Oh, I never knew! I grew up loving the Games, I was taught that! I was so blind! Every year, twenty-three children are slaughtered and we do nothing about it! Just cheer it on! What if it were our children dying this way?"

"I want the Games to end," I said sharply.

"Me too, and everyone else should. We have to tell everyone!"

I expected this kind of enthusiasm from my mother. But she really still doesn't understand. She doesn't understand what it really is like to be a tribute.

Only me and Hope truly do. And every other tribute ever, dead or alive, in the sadist Hunger Games.

A review will be appreciated! Love that people are just reading it! It took me most of the week to get this just right.