Game Plan

Ok so I did have a game plan for that third day. There were three things I had hoped to accomplish by the end of the day: one, tell Jett that I had agreed to work with Caden as well, if he didn't like it employ similar tactics like those that had worked on Caden, begging, pleading so on. Two, find a way to display both of my supposed talents, running and throwing knives, to the judges. And three, get a perfect score in my individual training session. I'll admit the last one is a little ambitious but I pretty much decided that if I didn't want to get a score of three I needed to motivate myself.

So it was with those three goals in mind that I entered the training room on that third day, only to find that Caden and I were almost the last two there, which was surprising because we were no later than we had been the first two days but for some reason everyone, spare maybe four or five people, was there. Unfortunately for me and my game plan one of those people was Jett.

I was kind of used to getting to training before Jett so I just assumed that as soon as he arrived he'd come find me like he had the last two days. But as time went on I found that I was constantly looking around the gym for him and soon enough I was becoming so anxious that I had become a safety hazard to my knife throwing instructor. Once I had subconsciously decided that Jett was not going to show up I decided to focus on my second objective, find a way to run and throw knives at the same time. After putting together some pretty... shall we say 'inventive' ideas in my head I saw the male tribute from seven, who was probably one of the few tributes I hadn't met and/or heard the name of, doing an obstacle course in which he had to run, dodge obstacles and hit targets with a sword. I decided that was probably my best bet. Before I started the instructor told me I could use any kind of weapon I wanted to hit the targets but Haymitch had specifically told me not to show anyone how good with my knives I actually was so I decided to follow the boy from seven's lead and use a small light sword.

Since this little exercise was really just to familiarise myself with the course I took the first time slow, which mind you was still twice as fast as the boy from seven. The course itself was relatively easy it was just the placement of the targets that made it complicated. It was uncanny how many I would have to hit straight after jumping over, or rolling under an obstacle. There was this one target that I just could not hit. It was about twenty metres from the end of the course and you had to duck under this moving beam then do a complete one-eighty and hit the target on the back of the beam and for some reason I would either forget about it or in my rushed state miss it by a country mile. I figured that as soon as I could throw a knife at it rather than actually hit it I would be able to do it as the risk of getting hit in the face with a big metal beam would be greatly reduced. I stayed on that course for a good hour, switching weapons and even once trying with my knives, surprising myself let alone the instructor with my speed and accuracy.

Know my panic really started to set in. It was almost twelve by know and still no sign of Jett. In half an hour they would start calling for our individual training sessions and I hadn't even eaten lunch yet. Unfortunately there really wasn't much I could do and I hadn't eaten much this morning because I was so ridiculously nervous so I was really hungry. I went into the lunchroom, grabbed a huge plate of food and sat down by myself. I found that because I was even more nervous than I had been this morning I had one bite of my bread and immediately felt sick in the stomach. After forcing down a few pieces of meat and some more bread I heard someone whisper in my ear.

"Miss me?"

I almost literally jumped out of my seat when I felt Jett's breath against the back of my neck. I turned around and glared at him furiously.

"Where the hell have you been?"

He laughed as he sat down next to me and slid his food tray across the table.

"My mentor said that the best way to prepare myself for such a 'big day' was to sleep in. So I did. Why were you worried about me?" He batted his abnormally long eyelashes at me.

I frowned, "No, I just needed to tell you something. And P.S then how come Velvet got here before me this morning?"

"She had to practice."

"And you didn't?"

He smiled cockily, "I don't need the practice. Besides I don't want everyone to know my super secret talent."

"True," I took a deep breath. "Well you know how I said I needed to tell you some- "

"You know speaking of super secret talents," he said completely cutting me off in the middle of my sentence, "You broke a promise you made to me yesterday."

My eyes widened. Oh crap Caden told him before I got the chance to.

I made the most apologetic face I could and decided it was time to start begging...quietly though because there were a few people, the girl from eight (whose name I had forgotten again) in particular, who looked a little less uninterested than they were trying to act.

"I know Jett but I swear I plan to keep my side of the bargain."

He put his feet up on the table and leaned back on his chair.

"So tell me."

I frowned, "Tell you what?"

"What your super secret talent is."

The confusion on my face must have been really evident because Jett sighed, rolled his eyes and explained.

"Remember yesterday when you asked me to tell you what my strength was and I agreed only on the condition that you would in return tell me yours. Well yesterday I told you about me and my shoge and then you, ever so slyly I might add, steered the conversation into a different direction by asking me how and why I learnt which then lead into me describing my family and so on so on."

I nodded still not completely understanding what we were talking about.

"Well I told you my weapon of choice but you never told me yours. So if you want to keep your promise you need to start spilling."

I sighed a sigh of relief. "You want to know what my talent is."

He laughed, "Yes. What did you think I was talking about?"

"Oh I don't know I was just really confused that's all," I lied smoothly.

"Well are you going to tell me or not?" he said a humoured expression on his face.

"Oh yeah sure in a sec but I really have to tell you something before I-"

"Oh no you don't," he said cutting me off again, "You got me side tracked once but I am not as blonde as I look. I don't make the same mistakes twice."

"But I really have to-" I pleaded before being cut off a third time, which was getting annoying really fast.

"No buts. Just spill."

Deciding I wasn't going to win this one I let out an exasperated sigh and said,

"I run. And I throw knives," I said bluntly, "There. You happy?"

He made a sceptical face, "Really?"

"Excuse me," I said just a little bit offended, "So I'm not a fancy as you with your shoge."

"Oh I swear that wasn't supposed to sound like it did. Don't get me wrong as soon as I saw you run I knew you were obviously really good. But I also saw you at the knife throwing station and I have to say you threw a few really...erratic throws."

"Staged," I said simply, "I didn't know you well enough to show you how good I actually am."

"I'll take your word for it."

I took a few more bites of food and tried to let my bubble of anger cool down.

"So what was it you so desperately needed to tell me?"

And here lay the real flaw in my brilliant three objective plan. I had planned to have a really long time to explain all of this to Jett, enough time for him to get mad and me to get mad and then the two of us discuss it maturely and reach a compromise that we could both live with. The reason I planned to have such a long time was because they call the tributes out for individual sessions in chronological order and boys before girls. So for all you who hadn't all ready figured it out I, as the female tribute from district twelve, was going to be the last tribute called in for individual training. But I guess that most of you have already spotted the flaw in my plan that it took me up to that moment to realise. Yes I was last but Jett, who was the male tribute from district one, was first. This sudden realisation came crashing down on me in a matter of two words.

"Emerson, Jett."

It was one of the Gamemakers who had decided that right then was the perfect moment to start calling in the tributes for individual training. Just. My. Luck.

Jett got up and gave me a confident smile.

"Wish me luck," he said before looking down at his still half full plate of food, "oh and you can have my chocolate mousse."

"Gee thanks," I said contemplating whether or not to throw the mousse at his self-righteous face.

He laughed one last time before turning around and walking towards the training room. As he was walking he crossed paths with Caden who had apparently just left the training room and got his lunch. I gasped a little as I saw Caden say something to Jett as they crossed paths but then he just kept walking towards me even as Jett stoped and turned back around to look at me, his face kind of like a disbelieving frown. He raised an eye at me and I waved him towards the door as I had no idea just what happened so there was no way I was going to explain it to him. When Caden came and sat down I quickly asked,

"What was that?"

Caden shrugged, "I wished him good luck that's all."

I did a very good job of not letting my jaw drop, "I thought you hated him."

"I'm just, you know, being the bigger person or whatever."

I beamed at him, "Well I'm very proud."

"You should be."

I sat in complete silence while Caden ate and I swear several times I had to remind myself to breathe. I watched as one by one the crowd slowly started to disappear into the training room until Caden and I were the only two left in the lunchroom.

"Eora," I heard Caden say breaking the silence.

"What?"

"You're shaking."

I looked down at my hands and saw that indeed I was shaking uncontrollably, which of course only made me start to breathe really fast as well. Caden saw me starting to panic and took my hand in his. I flinched for a second at his touch, but only because his hand was so much warmer and steadier than mine. He looked deep into my eyes and said,

"Shh, just breathe, long deep breaths," he said before mimicking how he wanted me to breathe. I tried to do what he was doing but my heart was beating so hard inside my chest that it was hard to act calm and chilled. Eventually I started to feel a little better and much less lightheaded. I was still shaking but not quite as badly as before. I had always been like this, I got really anxious and nervous really fast but normally I snapped out of it this close to the actual event. And normally no one was there to see me panic, which I had always been glad for.

Caden smiled at me, "You don't need to worry you know," he said giving my hand a little squeeze, "you're going to do great."

I let out a nervous, sarcastic laugh, "Of course you can say that. You are going to do well."

"So are you, you need to give yourself some credit. I saw you throwing those knives this morning and you're as good as anyone else here. Put that together with the ridiculous abnormal speed at which you run and you're as good an assassin as any."

I smiled weakly at him. He was too sweet, I mean first he volunteers in the hunger games as an act of love, now he was comforting his pathetic, nervous wreck of an ally in the middle of a slight breakdown. I almost felt sorry for whoever it was Caden left back in twelve because they probably never got to see the side I was seeing then.

"Rhoades, Caden," I heard one of the Gamemakers say, in a voice much louder than it needed to be considering there were only two people left in the lunchroom.

"Good luck," I whispered with a small smile.

"Thanks," he said as he walked towards the door. Just before he reached it he turned back around, "Eora."

"Yeah?"

"Breathe," he said with a smile, "You'll do great."

I beamed at him before he turned back around and walked into the training room and I was all alone. It was so eerily quiet that I could hear my own slow composed breaths echoing off the walls. I tried to focus on what I should do in my training session but all I could think of was, 'This is the last time I'm going to be in this room.' It seemed like in the few weeks I had left I was going to have a lot of lasts. Maybe it was a bad habit to be getting into, counting the things I was doing that I'd never do again but I found this one at least a relief. I didn't like this lunchroom, it was bland and boring and all the food that had been in here an hour or two ago had left a strange mixture of smells behind. It almost reminded me of the Hob back home. The Hob was our kind of 'Black market,' back home. There were always so many different stalls there selling different things. The first time I went there with my step father before he and my mother got married. I remember that when he was buying some meat for that evening there were so many smells from all different types of food, meat, fish, bread, wine, greens. To me all the smells didn't really mix together and it made me feel a little sick. My step father had taken me home back to my room but it turned out I was genuinely ill. Well it was my room back then now it was Dori and Raine's room and I was in my mother's old room. There it was that pain straight through my heart as soon as I started to think of my sisters. How did my train of thought lead me here?

"Reagan, Eora," the Gamemaker shouted. I felt like yelling at him that of course I was going to be here, I was the last one left. I took a deep breath, took one last look around the lunchroom then walked towards the door.