Hey guys! So, basically thankyou, again, to everyone who's reading this. I've realised I'm putting in a hell of a lot of dialogue. Is that okay with everyone? I'm trying to not have as much, so you know more of what Cato's thinking. Let me know what you want, less dialogue/if the amount of dialogue is fine or whatever. Remember to review, and stuff. Thanks guys :3!
Chapter 3
"Come on, boy, time to go to the train station" a Peacekeeper said, gruffly, after what seemed like an eternity of waiting.
"Finally" I mumbled.
"What was that boy?" he demanded.
"I said finally." The Peacekeeper came over to me, squaring his shoulders, I knew this look, I gave people this look, more often than not. I squared my shoulders, sticking out my chest. He was older than me, but smaller, so I towered over him. I looked him over, and realised I was probably far stronger than him too, he must have realised too, because he started to back away.
"You're lucky you're on the way to the Capitol, boy. I wouldn't stand for someone speaking to me like that, any other time" he spat.
"You wouldn't do anything, even if I gave you the chance" I snarled.
"'Gave me the chance'? Ha, you're hilarious, boy." he snorted.
"And you're just lucky I don't have any weapons on me right now"
"Is that a threat, boy?" he said, squaring up to me, once again. He stood as tall as he could get, and stared into my eyes. I saw something in his eyes that I knew he didn't mean for me to see; fear. He was scared of me. Good job too, because if I wasn't going to the Capitol, I would kill him right here. A simple twist of his neck, easy as that.
"Cato?" I heard a familiar voice call. It was a Capitol voice. Sapphire's voice.
"Hi, Sapphire." I say, still staring at the Peacekeeper.
"What on Earth is going on here?" she demanded.
"The boy was giving me trouble"
"I told you to get him to the train station, not stare into his eyes like some love-sick puppy" she said, angrily. I tried my best to hide my laugh, but I knew nobody was fooled.
"Take him yourself. I'll go get the girl." he said, finally, and left us a lone.
"You need your temper sorted out, young man." Sapphire said, turning to me.
"No, I don't." I tried to keep my voice steady, and calm, but I knew she could hear it raising. Whenever someone brings up my temper and my anger, it makes me even worse.
"Yeah, that's really convinced me." she said. "We're going to wait for Clove. But, listen to me. Do not make a scene with the Peacekeeper again. Got it?" I looked at her, forced a smile, and then looked away. I knew if I said anything the anger in my voice would be too hard to disguise, so there was no other way of trying to make myself look calm. I knew I had to sort my anger out, but honestly, I'm going into an arena where I have to fight for my survival. Why would I want to sort it out now? Sorting it out would make things worse for myself, I need to be feared. I need them to know that it's either be killed by someone else, or be killed by me. I need them to know, I'm the one that's going to win.
The Peacekeeper came back with Clove after a couple of minutes. He was looking straight ahead, until he spotted me and Sapphire waiting for them. He slowly looked to the ground and refused to make any sort of eye contact with either of us. "Here's the girl" he said, once they reached us.
"My name is Clove. Don't just call me 'the girl'" she said. I could tell she was getting angry too. He looked at her, and then shook his head and started to walk away.
"What is the matter with the two of you?" Sapphire sighed.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"You two have serious anger problems. You know that right?"
"Yes." me and Clove said together. I looked over to Clove, to see she was already looking at me, smiling. I gave her the best smile I could and then looked back to Sapphire.
"We were trained to be killers, do you honestly think that we'd be like sweet little angels or something?" I snorted.
"Come on. We have to go, or we'll be late" Sapphire said, ignoring me.
The car ride to the train station took about fifteen minutes. All around there were people from district two waving us off. When we got to the train station, there were so many people with cameras trying to be the first to get a picture of District two's tributes. That's what it's going to be like, now. Everywhere I go, I'm going to see a camera, pointing at me, getting their pictures of the tributes, and then eventually, getting their pictures of the Victor of the Hunger Games. I'm determined it will be me.
We finally got onto the train after five minutes of constant pushing to get past people. I've got to say, that is not something I'm going to look forward too when I win. I looked around the train, it was huge, it wasn't much different to the room in the Justice Building, but it was clearly a lot bigger.
"Beautiful, right?" Sapphire said, making her way to the food cart. "Eat whatever you want. The Capitol is only a few hours away, we should be there by about 10, okay? The rest of the reapings will be on in a minute, so you better watch them, you know, get to know who you're up against."
"Excuse me, Sapphire, but I think that's our job." an unfamiliar voice said, coming from behind me. I turned around to see Brutus and Lyme standing outside the train. "Well, go on, move, so we can get on." Both me and Clove moved quickly to the other side of the train. I'm not scared of most people, but Brutus was one person I was scared of. He was tall, and big built, and he permanently looked angry. Lyme wasn't much different. She was middle-aged, about the same age as Brutus. She was very tall, over 6 feet, and very muscular, but her face was unforgettable. She was brutal as well. Most people from District two are, but these two in particular, are probably the worst, along with Enobaria. I was just glad she wasn't mentoring. She had her teeth surgically altered after she won her games by tearing open tributes' necks with her teeth. She's worse than Brutus!
"Oh. Sorry." Sapphire squeaked.
"Saph, how many times do I have to tell you, he's joking. He's a big softy, really" Lyme laughed, nudging Brutus. "Right, Brute?"
"No. Not right, Lyme" he scowled at her. "So, let's see who we have this year. Come over here, the pair of you."
Me and Clove hesitantly walked forward, and watched as him and Lyme looked us over, walked around us slowly, and then looked us over again. "They seem like a good pair." Lyme said, eventually.
"Yep." Brutus said, nodding in agreement. "Clove, isn't it?" Clove nodded, slowly.
"What can you do? You look strong, but forgive me for this, you're small"
"I can throw knives, and fight and I'm a fast runner." she said, trying hard not to shoot Brutus evil looks.
"How well can you throw?" he asks.
"Well enough" she shrugged.
"She can hit a bullseye, every single time. Whether the target is moving or not. She nearly killed me this morning" I say, backing her up. "She missed me by a centimetre."
"That was on purpose. I didn't actually want to kill him, just scare him. He scared me, so instinctively, I just threw a knife" she added quickly.
"Right." he looked to Lyme and they both nodded at each other. "Cato, right? What can you do?"
"I'm fast, I'm strong, I'm pretty good with spears, just my aim needs a little more practise."
"Right." Brutus and Lyme looked to each other and nodded again. "Seems like we've got a pretty good pair this year, hell we might even have a winner"
Clove and I smiled to each other. I wonder what she's thinking? Is she thinking of a way to kill me? Is she wondering how far she'll get, or even if I'll kill her? "Let's go watch the rest of the reapings" Clove smiled at me again. "Like Sapphire said, it would be good to see who we're up against"
"See, you should always listen to me" Sapphire squeaked from the corner of the room, everyone turned too look at her. I didn't even realise she was still here.
"Oh, Saph, we do listen to you. We just have a lot of other things to do" Lyme laughed, walking over to her. She put her arm around her and guided her to the next compartment with the television and couch, and sat down beside her. We all followed and sat down to watch the recap of the reapings.
District one was up first, two decent looking tributes, both volunteers. The girl, Glimmer, I think, was tall, sexy, and had long blonde hair, the outfit she was wearing looked like it was a size too small. It was tight and revealing, only making her look more sexy. The boy, Marvel, looked strong and tall. Good, we're going to have strong allies this year.
"That Glimmer looks like she could be trouble" Sapphire said, quietly.
"Why?" Clove asked.
"Look at what she's wearing. She just, doesn't look like a nice person." Sapphire shrugged.
District three's tributes didn't stand out, at all. The girl from District four looked fairly strong, she might be able to kill off a few weaker ones for us, the boy from district four made no impression on me. Neither did the tributes through to District 11. The girl from District eleven was tiny, she made her way to the stage gracefully, she reminded me of some sort of bird. She didn't look frightened, she looked confident, like she might have a chance. The boy from District eleven was huge. He was probably bigger than me, which surprised me, because District eleven was one of the underfed districts. They never lasted long, and they were never big and strong like him.
District twelve was the most surprising. They actually had a volunteer. The girl volunteered for her sister, which was shocking. Families do whatever they can to protect each other, but when the games come into it, you're on your own. Especially in places like twelve. I couldn't help but admire her bravery, for a minute. Clearly she wasn't going to win. She wasn't going to make an impression on the sponsors, surely she knew that. As soon as the training scores come up, and after the parade, everyone will have forgotten her, even if she had volunteered for her sister. I could see why she did though, her sister was tiny, like the girl in eleven, she would be dead within the first night. Everybody must have adored her, she looked like a sweet innocent little girl. The whole of district twelve made some odd gesture that I'd never seen before, once she got up onto the stage, nobody applauded, or made a sound, which was weird.
"That's a gesture to show thanks." Brutus explained. "They do it to say goodbye, I think, and thanks. I guess that little girl was really important to them"
I looked at the girl on stage again, she was really scared, I could tell that much, her face was full of fear and pain, but there was a slight flicker of happiness in her eyes, probably because her sister was safe for another year, at least. The boy that got picked, looked strong. He was average height, with blonde hair, but quite strong, which surprised me again. Nobody from district twelve is ever strong.
"Well, looks like we've got an easy year" Clove said, cheerily.
"Watch it. That boy from eleven looks like he might give you a hard time. The girl from his district too, watch out for her" Brutus said.
"The girl from eleven? What is she going to do, kill me by her cuteness?" Clove laughed.
"Did you not see the look on her face? She looked confident. Don't let her size and age get in the way"
"She shouldn't have been picked. She's too young" Sapphire cried. "Why didn't anybody volunteer for her?"
"Because none of them want to die" I said, softly.
"I hate these stupid games!" She cried again, before walking out of the compartment.
"Is she always like this?" Clove asks, raising her eyebrow.
"Yes. Every year she will cry and complain about how much she hates the games. As soon as they start, she's just like every other Capitol person and can't get enough of them" Lyme sighed. "Come on Brute. We got some stuff to go talk through." Lyme and Brutus got up and quickly left the compartment, whispering things to each other, that I didn't quite catch.
"So, what do you think about the two from twelve this year?" I asked, after a minutes silence.
"I don't know. They surprised me. They both looked terrified, but, the girl at least had a choice, it makes me wonder if the look was just a way to make us believe she's weak, and scared, but really might be a strong contender."
"Remember the girl like that from seven, a few years ago? She got right to the end pretending she didn't have a clue what she was doing, and was weak, so nobody bothered her. She turned out to be the complete opposite."
"Oh yeah, Johanna Mason, right? I remember her. Maybe she does, too. But, if she won that way, I doubt Johanna would be that happy about it. I've heard she's quite a handful" she laughed, softly.
"Yeah, me too. But, it makes sense, right. I mean, if she knew that she was going to die, why would she take her sisters place."
"Maybe she just really loves her sister and doesn't want to see her go through all of this. I'd probably do it too, if she was my sister. She looked like a right sweetheart." She shrugged.
"What's this? Does Clove Jacobs actually have a soft side?" I teased.
"No." She snapped. I laughed, which made her shoot me an evil look, which caused me to laugh even harder. "Shut up, Cato. Remember what I said earlier? I wont miss next time" She reached down to the knife she had hidden away in her shoe.
"You actually have a knife in your shoe?" I asked, after I finally stopped laughing.
"Yes. It makes me feel safe. I always carry it around."
"If you wanted to feel safe, you just volunteered yourself for the wrong game, Clove" she shot me an evil look, again, which started me off laughing once more.
"Whatever" she said, tucking the knife away in her shoe, before getting up to leave.
I'm left alone, on the couch, with something to do with the games on. That's all that's ever on TV, just pointless things to do with the hunger games, that you've probably seen a thousand times. They show the mentors for this years tributes, and then a quick recap of their time in the games.
I find myself thinking about Clove again, which I try to remind myself that I have to stop. I can't think about her, as a friend and especially anything more than a friend. Not where we're going. I think about what it would have been like if we had met before today. I wish I could have gotten to know her. I might have even wanted something more to happen. She's different from the other girls. Most other girls take one look at me, and fall to my feet, can't help but flirt with me whenever they get the chance, always want something more to happen. I don't mind it, most of the time. It's flattering, I guess, but I like that Clove isn't like that. I like how her priorities are different, than just wanting to get me into her bed. It adds to her attractiveness. It makes me wish I could have known her before today.
