UPDATING:
Yep, third part of District Four, and this chapter is the prepping for the Chariot Rides. In this chapter, tribute wise, is Thane Storm and Luminesque Pigmy. If I spelled that right -_-.
Just a quick announcement, if you would like another good SYOT to submit to, try To Be Determined by Nalia-R. I'm sort of beta-ing for the story. I also have to advertise the collaboration story I'm working on, called Bound by Blood. If you want to join the collab, PM me.
And my short advertisement is over. Enjoy the chapter and remember to review. The poll on my profile is down for the number of people that might die in the bloodbath. I think the most voted number was 7, but I won't use that. If all the tributes are Careers, the bloodbath isn't going to be that low in casualties...
~Megalor9
Luminesque Pygmy, age 16, District Four
"Alright then... I think we're at the Capitol," Prince tells me and the other two standing next to me. Reef and Adrianus. I'd rather be somewhere else than with these two, especially Adrianus. "So we'll need to get into groups. Did someone, like your mentors, tell you this yet?"
Adrianus says no, and I just shake my head. I don't understand what Prince means by groups. "Well, since the chariots were only designed for two people, everyone will have to be paired up in twos. Like... everyone has a District partner? Got it?"
I nod yes, but am surprised. I had assumed I'd be on the same chariot as the seven other tributes of District Four. It makes sense of the Capitol to do that, though, so I guess that's the plan.
"Okay, let me see who your partners are," Prince trails off as he looks at his clipboard, with several papers clipped to it. "Reef, you're with Runyon. Luminesque, oh, you're with Adrianus."
Reef runs off to find her partner, but I stay and glare. At Adrianus, because he's obviously of the type I hate. I don't like the snobs and people who are stuck up. Adrianus obviously made that impression on me at the dinner last night. And after the recaps, he made fun of my voice when volunteering yesterday. "Do you, like, have emotion at all?" I tried to punch him then and there, but he jumped away too quickly for me to do anything.
"So," Adrianus says, drawing out the 'o' in his word. "How're you doing, partner?"
I turn to Prince. "Do I really have to be this guy's partner? Why can't I be with Caleb or Thane?" I ask, my voice taking a light tone of urgency.
"Well, this is what the President wrote down for as the list. Is there a problem?" Prince asks, impossibly innocent. Prince must've seen what Adrianus did to Caleb last night.
"Umm... no, there isn't a problem," I say, calmer than before, but still shooting dagger glances at Adrianus, who is smirking.
"So I think this is it. See if you can get all the other tributes to come out here, to get off the train to the Capitol," Prince says, leaving with a hurry. Adrianus follows him.
I look out the window, getting a glimpse of the Capitol myself. In school, we learn that the Capitol was near destroyed in the Mockingjay Rebellion. But it's really impressive architecture, the arches, and the sheer massiveness of everything. The highest form of transport that I've used is boats, and some pretty fast boats, too. But in the Capitol, I see hovercrafts flying through the air, kids riding boards that seem to be floating in midair, high speed trains that rush over almost invisible tracks. The whole city is covered in some reflective material that makes it look like it's made of rainbows.
"Enjoying the view?" Adrianus's voice creeps up behind me. I turn around slowly.
"It's a lot better view than your face," I say, then turn back to the window.
"Don't be so harsh, Lumi," Adrianus says.
Did he just call me Lumi? He's going to be my first target. I make a mental note in my head. No, a mental annoying theme song, that will play over and over until I can't forget it at all.
I start to think up a comeback to that, but a door opens in the compartment where we were standing. The other tributes enter, with Reef almost giddy with excitement, Isis looking just like I am, sullen, bored, and Elvira, who is chatting to two Peacekeepers that are acting like bodyguards for her. And I haven't seen the Storm brothers smile yet. I can't blame them, they're brothers in a fight where only one can win. I certainly wouldn't want to go into the Games with my sisters, even though I've trained myself for it.
I get pushed out of the train and onto the landing platform of the train station, where millions of flashes hit my eyes. Cameras, people, just tons of people, everywhere. I could go blind from staring at all the cameras, so I instead face the ground. I might look depressed, but that's better than having the afterflash and blurry vision of the flashing lights.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Adrianus is hamming it up, waving, smiling, blowing kisses, long with Runyon and Reef doing the same thing. When the mentors come out of the train, there's even more noise, because the mentors are the favorites in the Capitol. My father comes off the train waving and smiling at everyone, playing up his part pretty well.
There are four cars for the tributes, so Adrianus and I get into one, while the other tribute pairs get into the other four cars. I get a quick glimpse, just for a second, of the tributes from the other Districts. That's why there was so much commotion, all the Districts got off at the same time. The car glides smoothly against the stone paved roads of the Capitol, and eventually stops at the Remake Center.
When I step into the Remake Center, it's immediately the most massive building I've ever set foot into. Many corridors branching off of a main room, gold everywhere. If it's fake gold or real, it doesn't matter. It's way better than the District Four Justice Building where I said goodbye to my parents.
A pale-white skinned attendant comes up to me. "And your name is?"
"Lumineque Pygmy," I say. This is probably my stylist I'm talking to.
"Oh, you and Adrianus will be seen in hallway F11, if you could head that way right now," the man says, and moves off to talk to Thane.
"Where's hallway F11?" Adrianus asks, in a voice that makes him sound absolutely stupid.
"The one with the sign F11 on it, idiot," I tell him, harshly.
"When did you get so harsh, geez," Adrianus says, with a smirk.
Him and I walk to the hallway and go through it, coming into two rooms. There are two men standing at the front of each room. both of them wear light red and yellow robes. "You must be Adrianus and..." the first man trails off.
"Luminesque, right?" the second man finishes the other mans sentence. "Luminesque, you're with me. My name is Janus, and I'll be your stylist for the Games. And this is my compatriot-"
"Janus. I'll be helping you, Adrianus," the second man, Janus, says.
"Wait, so you're both named Janus?" Adrianus asks.
"Yeah, that's what our parents named us. Pretty crazy, right?" the first speaker, Janus says.
"Can I call you Janus 1 and Janus 2?" Adrianus asks to both of them.
"Sure, why not," Janus 2 says, as I mentally label them in my head as well. Might as well, because it'll get pretty confusing with them being the exact same. "Now, Adrianus, if you could come this way with me, I'll show you to your prep team." The two of them leave into a doorway to another room, where I can glance three more people in there. Prep teams.
"So, Luminesque, do you want to find out what you're wearing for the parade?" Janus 1 says with a grin.
"Um... no... not exactly..."
"Don't worry! I swear it's not bad!"
Thane Storm, age 16, District Four
Ack. The soap they use in the Capitol burns like crazy, especially when it gets into your eyes. I can't even open my eyes, and my prep team apparently thinks that's a good thing. "Yes, keep your eyes closed, we're working on your hair now," the tallest one, who could either be wearing stilts or have leg alterations says.
"Piff-" I spit some soap out of my mouth.
"Eww!" is the reaction from another member of the team, a lady with completely white hair.
In District Four, white hair is an achievement. I'm pretty sure in the Capitol, you can just go into a beauty parlor and get it dyed in about five seconds. That's how wrong everything here is. People have the weirdest fashion cravings. I've only done one thing with my body, ever, and that was tattoo a lightning bolt to my left calf, an identical tattoo that my brother also has, and my younger brother, who's at home.
I can still see Caleb's enraged face after the reaping, in the Justice Building. We got put in the same room to say goodbye, because we're related and all. He hated me for volunteering, he said that he would be able to win the Games by himself, had I not volunteered. Well, I think the jokes on him. He only thinks with his head, and is really impulsive. I, however, actually think before acting. This will help us both in the Games, plus, me volunteering tips the odds in our favor.
The slogan of the Hunger Games says, "May the odds be ever in your favor!" I hear it almost every day, if you turn on the television. So if I volunteer, that gives our family a 1/12 chance of winning, more than any other tribute can claim. Because one of us needs to win.
"Get out the cans of dye," the tall prep guy says. "We need the exact right color."
"Y-You're dying my hair," I manage to sputter out, because soap is still pouring on my face.
"Yes, we need to dye your hair so it matches your partners'. It's our directives from your stylist. Turn the soap off, will you, Romi."
"Yes sir," the third prep team member, squeaks out, turning a pipe, and I don't feel soap spraying on my body anymore.
"Uh, thanks," I say, bringing up my hands to wipe soap out of my eyes. This is so bad. It took an hour of adjusting, mainly to the fact that there are three people cleaning up my naked body, and I have nothing to cover up with. The prep team at least didn't do a full body hair removal, I doubted they would.
The tall guy sprays some stuff into my hair, and there's a long process where they rinse my head out with this machine. "Okay, I think we might just have it. Let's call Demie in so she can get a look."
Romi, the small lady, brings over a mirror and places it in front of me. "So, how do you look?"
They have dyed my hair dark red. Sort of like an really bright auburn color. It looks weird, seeing it on my head. I look like a vegetable. "Isn't this supposed to take longer? I thought I had to be prepped all day," I ask. The light coming in from the windows suggests that it's about noon.
"We haven't gotten to the difficult part yet," the tall guy says. "Ah, here's Demie right now."
Another tall lady enters the room, but this lady, Demie, is naturally tall. Not freakishly tall like the man on stilts. "Hello, Caleb," the lady says.
"I'm Thane."
"Sorry, I'm new, and got mixed up with the names," Demie says, with a cool, chilling voice. "Would you like some lunch?" I nod, but already realize that servants, Avoxes, have already brought in trays of food. "I need to discuss your costume with you."
I sit down, and start eating the food. I'm immediately overwhelmed by how good the food is. The standard fare at our house is basically mush compared to this. We've never had great food at our house. I'm pretty sure all my siblings would die to even see this much food. I eat as much as I can, naturally. "Enjoying the food?" Demie asks. I nod again. "Well, here, take this towel so you can cover up a bit."
I've been eating this whole meal absolutely stark naked. Wow. Romi giggles in a far corner.
"Now, for your costume, we have two ways of doing it. There's a long and difficult way, or there's the easier way. I'll have to work on you for about three hours or so to get the makeup on correctly. So I've left the choice up to you. Easy or hard?" Demie asks. It sounds formidable, the way she says it, like it'll be the end of the world if I don't follow through.
"The easy way," I say, because three hours of makeup is not going to be fun.
"Alright then. Get Thane some chocolate pudding, please," Demie says, the harshness in her voice gone. Within a minute, there's some chocolate pudding dip, with ripe strawberries on the side. I eat the strawberries, savoring every bite.
I'll need all the food I can get for the arena, so I'll just stuff myself. That'll work pretty well as a strategy.
But after I eat the pudding, I start to feel... tired. Like, I should sleep. "Can I sleep now?" I ask Demie.
"Sure," she answers, with a smile that makes my blood chill. "We've got plenty of tim-"
When I wake up again, I'm sitting on a cold metal table, in the same prep room as before. The light coming in is low, so it must be close to the parade time now. Did Demie just... drug me? I think I just ate some pudding and then fell asleep.
I check out my body in the nearby mirror for a second, and hold in a yell. I look inhuman. Like a monster. No wonder it took them three hours to do the makeup. All the parts of my body that aren't covered in a golden net are made to look like fish scales. I'm a... fish monster, like a bad Capitol muttation they could come up with. This is just crossing the line.
Demie is also standing in the room, smiling. "I told you that was the easy way."
"Is.. Is this stuff washable?" I ask.
"Of course. We don't want you to look like a fish forever. But don't take it off until after the parade."
I really, really feel the need to scrape this stuff off with my fingernails. It itches. But I somewhat smile inside, because if I look this stupid, then imagine the other tributes costumes...
Alright, sorry for the late update, but we're almost at the Capitol now!
So, how many people liked Thane's costume? Thane's partner is Isis, and she'll be wearing something similar at least.
Please review, because those are like candy, and brighten my day. Again, I suggest taking a look at Nalia-R's story. You can actually submit to it without the story being abandoned.
Right then, see you next chapter in the Chariot Rides,
~Megalor9