Chapter 6 – The Recognition
AN: Longest Chapter so far! I'm sorry, but i really didn't know where I should have split it up to without making it boring :/ Enjoy! :)
After having changed into some loose-fitting greenish-brown training suit and matching boots, that had magically been prepared in my room, I was constantly running my hands through my messy hair. I wondered when I had combed myself the last time. On the day of the announcement? I couldn't remember. The fact that there was not only a lack of windows in this room but also a lack of mirrors annoyed me. I didn't exactly understand why I cared on how the other tributes saw me, but I found it important not to look too terrible. Maybe because looking untended made a weak impression? But then my thoughts wandered to Johanna and the beastlyness of her uncombed hair. A shiver ran down my spine. It did absolutlely not make her look weak in any way. Her style gave her something wild and untamed, like an aggressive dog, who you wished would never be strong enough to rip his leash. But Johanna had. She had ripped her leash and killed the one who had been holding it tightly for so many years. The Capitol.
I tried to concentrate on something different than Johanna, who was more than likely allready picturing multiple deaths for me, and made my way out on the corridor again. With every step I took down the hallway my stomach ache got worse. I wasn't prepared for what was coming and I knew that there was no way I was ever going to be.
Every few meters I checked the labeling of the doors I came across. But I had no such luck to find a door with the writing AG. Wasn't that what briefing should have been about? Showing me my way around so I could be a good tribute and properly prepare for being killed?
Followed by the eyes of recruits, garding every door I came across, I made my way through the hallway. Eventually I was sure to have checked all the doors, but I still couldn't find AG, and gave up. Reluctantly I turned to a recruit who looked fairly sympathetic.
„I'm sorry. I seem to be lost. Could you tell me where I can -", I started friendly but the recruit interrupted my question and nodded towards the end of the hallway. I looked to where he was sending me, but couldn't make out anything in the poorly lit corridor.
„Thanks, I guess...", I muttered stepping in the direction he had motioned me to go. I squinted my eyes together and could make out something that I hadn't seen before. A grey elevator, that was, other than the screaming white doors I had managed to oversee before, fitting perfectly in the grey of the walls was now more or less visible. I cursed at the weak lights of the hallway and pressed my hands ran over the neat surface of the elevator doors, searching for a button.
„Present day structur please.", a metallic female voice rang through my body. I swallowed down the moment of surprise and obediently held my forearm into the redish laser beams that were now coming from the slit inbetween the elevator. The laser was tickling my arm as it ran over the imprinted letters and then disappeared again, when the elevator doors opened.
„Tribute 1. Training above ground", the voice said and I felt like a moron when I realized what AG was standing for. Sighing, I stepped inside the elevator. This is going to be fun, I thought sarcastically.
When the elevator doors opened, the first thing I noticed was the beaming sun blinding me. Shielding my eyes from the brilliant light, I stepped outside of the metal elevator doors. Breathing the air here was like I imagined breathing to be like after you spent an eternity under water. I sucked the fresh air eagerly into the very depth of my lungs. Compared to this freshness the air underground was in a very poor condition. Only having spent a few seconds above ground, I allready didn't want to go back down there. Back to the engulfing little space and the sticky hot summer air, that had been encaged underground for years.
I looked around to where the elevator had brought me and it was truly as if somebody had built an elevator to paradise. In front of me towered beautiful juicy green trees. I could hear the hapy chattering of birds, the rustling of leaves as animals ran over the mighty tree branches and I loved the soft kiss of the sun on my skin. I closed my eyes for a few seconds, simply enjoying the pureness of all of this. I had never been out in any kind of forest before. Of course there were a lot of parks filled with rich green grass and flowers in District 1, but never any kind of forest. The grass in District 1 was shortened to an unchanging height of perfect 4 centimeters, and i had always loved it's sight. It had always looked healthy and perfect to me, but this was so pure. Beauty didn't need any kind of perfection I saw now, dazzled by the first forest I had ever seen. The grass was growing in all directions, in a height that partially went to my knees, dotted with colorful little flowers that held their proud heads high, as if they wanted to smile at me. The wild trees were higher than I had ever imagined them to be. They were bushy and irregular, but much more interesting than the perfect slim green trees of District 1. Everything looked so lavish and full of perfect life. I imagined how it must be like to live in such a place as the forest. Opening the doors and feeling the nature tickle awake all your senses.
My daydream was disrupted, the second I recognized the sound of sword clattering coming from behind the group of trees that loomed before me and I remembered why I was at this place. Training.
I made my way through the trees, my vision limited by dense leaves in front of me. As the sound came nearer I could make out a path under my boots that seemed like many people before me had made this way. It was obviously different from the wildly growing grass that was bent flatly and partly not growing on the dirt path. I walked along the way and gasped when I saw, what was most likely something that came close to the legendary preperation hall in the Capitol.
A large square had been chopped out of the natural forest. The other tributes curiously turned around to face me when I accidently rustled a large branch loudly. I blushed deeply, but they turned back to what they had been doing after a few seconds of interested stares.
Eyeing the broad land I made out the stations that were always described by victors. There were weapons stacked on one side. Axes, bow and arrow, shuriken, all sorts of knives in any fancy way I could imagine and some weapons I didn't have a name for, but they looked deadly anyways. Beside the neatly stacked weapons were rows of targets and wood to sharpen your skills on.
Other than the brutal section, as I started calling it, there was a station with a long metal table and lots of books spread out on it. Probably the learn-what-kills-you-if-you-eat-it-section, I figured and looked on past the shuffling tributes. A few trees were left uncropped inside the square which had millions of ropes tied in between. The learn-how-to-climb-like-a-monkey-section.
Even though I hated Johanna, she had been the only person I had talked to in the last few days and I was really missing a normal human conversation. Normally we should have mentors now, who would tell us what to do, where to go and what skills to start training for long survival in the arena, but I had nothing of the sort. Then again I figured that even a mentor, who was meant for supporting me would have probably allready given up on me. Pearl, the girl who could do nothing. Sighing I looked at the stations. The other tributes were eagerly working at their skills, partly showing off impressing throwing of climbing techniques which I could only be jealous of. Looking at the tributes, my head started thumping again, just like waking up in the hospital yesterday. How many are they? I started counting them mentally. Four here, six there... 18, 25, 30,..? Looking at the large amount of children I gasped loudly, probably even shrieking. These were more than the usual amount of 24 tributes. How many, how many were going to die? Only one may survive... from all of these!
I struggled to shake off the thought of all their corpses being extracted from the arena. Why was I so naiv to think the victors would have a normal take at the hunger games? Revenge was what they were lusting for, and the more families they destroyed, the better for them. I shook my head, grasping the true brutality of the games for the first time. I am going to die.
For what seemed the hundredths time today I shoved all of this from my mind and let my feet lead me to the first section in reach. Brutal section. Halleluyah. A dozen of other tributes were gathered there, weighing heavy instruments in their hands, or practicing slicing up some tree trunks with sharps knives. My stomache twisted at the thought of the sharp weapons ripping through my body instead of those targets.
I stepped in front of the long metal shelf that seemed so utterly out of place in this light forest. The sharp weapons were gleeming in the brilliant sun, their deadly surfaces throwing around rays of beeming sunlight in every direction. My gaze wandered over all the terrible things that were prepared for us to kill each other with and I couldn't stop my fingers from trembling slightly as I reached for a knife.
„That one might be a bit to heavy for your size", someone offered from my side. I pulled back my touch from the weapon and turned in surprise. Shocked recognition struck me when I saw the perfect features of the boy.
„You're... you're the son of gamemaker Priblan Jekile, aren't you? You're Raey Jekile!", I stuttered dumbly, remembering him from several advertisments and appearences with his prominent father.
He looked at me, a smile on his lips.
„And you must be...", he started, peeking down at my forearm, „Pearl Creal!", he said, now just as astonished as he realized who I was. „You look so different, than you usually do. I'm sorry I didn't...", he started but I only laughed dryly. Of course I looked different. My blond hair was frizzy and I could, even without a mirror, tell that it had strong resemblance with a nest. A big nest, for at least five bird families.
I must have looked nothing like the prominent girl on the pictures. That girl was well dressed, in the most fancy outfits, her light blond hair laid elegantly over her slender shoulders and her green eyes beaming with the most luxurious make up affordable. And now I was standing here and just looked horrible. No wonder he doesnt recognize me.
Looking at him I hoped to find he also looked different than ususal but I was let down. He did have those well trained arms, and tanned skin, that made his light blue eyes were even more accentuated. And even under these circumstances, dressed with the same simple green shirt and trousers, that his well trained body filled out easily, he looked amazing. I wondered how old he was. 16? 17?
Still having my fascinated gaze locked on his brilliant eyes, I didn't here that he had said something.
„Pearl? Hello?", he asked waving a hand infront of my face, trying to wake me from my daydream. I blushed deeply, and turned back to the weapons, trying to act interested so he wouldn't see the deep red blotches appearing on my face.
He also turned back and reached for a smaller knife.
„Here, try this. The other one would have probably been to heavy for a girl of your size", he said and handed me a lighter knife. I tried not be angry for him practically calling me weak, and closed my fingers over it's wooden clamp.
I stood there a bit dumbly, not sure what to do with the deadly instrument in my hand. Raey himself picked up a heavy sword. The way he swung it around with testing eyes, made me think that he would have probably been a volunteer in the next few years. His perfect muscles tensed and loosened as he turned the massive weapon in his hands and I couldn't help but have respect of him. I would have bet that he was raised as a killer machine, one of those children who were born to win the hunger games. And judging by the his trained body, didn't make it seem so improbable. Still, to me he wasn't the bad guy. Most of the Careers, or soon-to-be-Careers, were usually total machos or in the case of girls, absolute bitches. But thinking about how Raaey was really friendly up to know, I couldn't see him that way.
In any case, I knew that I would have absolutely no chance against him.
AN: I hope you liked it! Personally I am a bit sceptical about it, especially since I am not good in writing conversations and I don't like how the ending with Raey turned out :/ Tell me your opinion by writing a review please, it would mean a lot to me! :)
Short shout out for: QueenOfTheButterflies whose GALACTIC GAMES story is just WOW! So if you are fed up with Tributes Of The Capitol go read this! :)