The fourth quarter quell

by The Lonely Geek

What if Katniss' rebellion had been crushed? This is what would have happened. It's 25 years after the rebellion and a new quarter quell. This time there are two twists. The first twist is that all tributes will be given a serum that makes them see all the other tributes as the same person. The second is that every time someone dies, the landscape changes.

14. Chapter 13

This chapter is some of the individual trainings in detail. I haven't written them for every tribute because a lot of the stuff would be similar so it would be boring to read and write. Next chapter is going to be the training scores and the tribute's reactions. I will be doing all the tributes for this, but I will add a short overview of what each tribute did in the individual training so you can either a) remind yourself of roughly what they did or b) find out what they did, so you know how they got their score. As usual please drop a review I love receiving them, even if you don't like the story TELL ME, I'm writing it for you guys after all, how am I supposed to write it so you like it if I don't know what you want it to be like? Anyway, hope you enjoy.

Chapter 13

Individual Training

Flynn's POV (D1M)

I'm the first one to be called through. They always start with the District 1 male tribute then District 1 female and so on until District 11. That's a good thing for me. The game makers tend to get bored towards the end and don't pay attention, I'm first though, they won't be bored, they'll be expecting something good too. I'm not going to disappoint them. I want to get at least a 10. My mentor says I should.

"You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." Grayson says from the game maker table as I walk in. I head to the sword section and take two long curving ones and then get five avoxes to come and fight me. I swing my sword up to block the first attack, but twist my sword around at the last minute, to force the avox to either break his wrist or drop the sword. He chose the former. One down already. The second was slightly more challenging. I could tell she was way more skilled. Maybe she just always ends up on swords every year. I don't know. We spend a few minutes sparring. She was an excellent sparring partner to be fair. She could predict and block most of my attacks, as I could with her. We go back and forth across the training room, attacking and blocking. Attacking and blocking. Back and forth. Until she finally doesn't anticipate a feint and I trip her up and kick her sword away before she can get a firm grip. I turn to the next one. She's easy compared to the last one. Just a flurry of attacks, one after the other and she made a simple mistake, allowing me to flick the sword easily from her hand. Three down two to go. The last two attack together. This may have been a problem if one of them had been the skilled one, but it's obvious from about 5 seconds of sparring with them that neither of them have really held a sword before in their lives.

That was easy. The game makers all look pretty impressed but I still have some time to kill so I drag several dummies nearby the rope course and take a bow and quiver of arrows. I go around the rope course, I've swung the bow over one shoulder so that it doesn't interfere with hanging on. My amrs are throbbing slightly, but I push through the pain. It'll be worth it for a decent score. I swing from rope to rope. Every time I pass a dummy I shoot it, twice: once through the head, the other through the heart. I always hit straight on mark. It's weird though. I'm used to there being so much noise when I shoot. Now there's just the twang of the string, the bonk of the arrow hitting mark, the quiet scribbles and whispers from the game makers, and occasionally my grunts from the effort of holding myself up and shooting. Usually there's people talking. Laughter. The sound of sword attacking. Whips being whipped. Axes thudding. I guess I'll have to get used to it. There won't be much noise in the arena.

"Thank you, you may now leave." Grayson says as the rest of the game makers scribble away. I'm pretty sure that should deserve I high score. If not, I don't know what will.

Hank's POV (D3M)

I know exactly what I'm going to do. I think I've spent my time training wisely. I've learnt how to hunt and find edible insects and plants. I didn't bother learning how start a fire, that'd only alert people of my whereabouts. I don't want that. I've been practising archery a lot and I think I'll have enough time to put my plan into action. I think if it works, I could get a 6 or even a 7 for my training score. That'd get me a few sponsors. I only wish that we're allowed to say what we do in our individual training, lots of people would probably be impressed. I'd probably get more sponsors. I guess that being from a more outlying district will help though. People from 3 barely ever get more than a 5 as their training score. People will start looking out for me. I hope.

"You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." The head game maker says. I rush and grab an arrow from the archery then go to the electronics area. I know I'm really up against the clock. I should do it though. Providing there are no problems.

I twist the wire around the arrow tightly to make sure it won't affect the aerodynamics of it. I have to make sure I do it sleekly, or the arrow won't fly. I soon forget about all the game makers watching me. It's like I'm just working on a project back home.

I just have to set the delay now. I have made like a mini makeshift radio control thing, so it should fire when I want it to. I look up at the game makers, half of them look bored out of their wits, the other half look intrigued. I only have a couple of minutes left. I take the arrow and run to the archery station. I grab a bow. I can't mess this shot up.

I load the arrow into the notch, I fumble a little because I have the small control in my hand as well. I hold the bow up and pull the string back. I take a while to aim but I soon let go. I bring my bow down and push the button on the control. I beam of light comes out of the arrow and blasts at the dummy I aimed at. I dummy blackens and then the arrow pierces it straight into the heart of the dummy. I look at the game makers. Most of them look shocked.

"Erm. Thank you, you may now leave." Grayson says, sounding surprised. I guess none of them were expecting that. I guess they forgot that I'm Betee Latier's son.

Phoenix's POV (D4M)

When I walk in, the game makers sit up expectantly. I guess they must have got bored between the last career and me. Because it goes District 1 then 2 then 3 then 4, they have to watch 2 tributes who are probably useless before they can watch the rest of the careers.

I go to the sword section and pick two up. I strap it to my back, then grab some throwing knives and put them inside my jacket and grab a sickle. I go to the combat simulation room and set it up for 9 out of 10 on difficulty and add mutts on.

When I go in, I suddenly start shivering. I always forget that to make it more realistic they change the landscape each time. This time it's tundra. I raise the sickle as a holo-figure appears in front of me. I slice it down on its neck before it can attack me with its spear. It crumbles into nothingness. An arrow wizzes past my ear I spin around quickly and duck as a holo-figure shoots another. I charge at it and quickly stab it in the head with the sickle. It vanishes but two most immediately spawn, both of them with swords. Their swords both have a long reach than my sickle, so I know it would be unwise to attack them straight out. I run for a little way, putting distance between us, before dropping the sickle and taking out a throwing knife. They are getting closer than I like, one straight behind the other. I fling the knife at the first one's heart and it sails straight through and into the second one's too. They both vanish. I don't have time to pick my sickle back up before another is firing at me with a slingshot. I grab the first of my swords from my back and weave through the sharp holo-stones until l reach it. Defenceless this close up, it tries to punch me, but it exposes its chest and I swipe in a huge arc across it. It's too shallow to be a kill shot, but now it's wounded it's easy to stab in the heart now.

When I come out, I look up at the game makers. Some look pretty impressed, some only mildly so. I still have 5 minutes to kill so I head to the climbing wall. I strap myself up on the highest route and start to go up. I had a practise on this earlier so I know roughly where I need to put my hands and feet. I get about ¾ of the way up before my time runs out.

"Thank you, you may now leave." I did all I could, I guess now I have to wait. I did well though, hopefully an 8 or above.

Attaya's POV (D6F)

The weirdest thing about being in the Capitol has been being clean. It's the first time, well I can't remember, where I haven't been high on morphling. I start to get butterflies in my stomach when they call me through.

I still have no idea what I'm going to do. I've spent the past couple of days learning how to start fires, climb, swim, learning about edible plants and insects, knot tying and I even had a small go at using a knife. I'm okay at the edible plant and insect stuff. I find it easy; I have a good memory. I doubt they'll be impressed though at that though. I'll probably only get a 3 or 4. I'm not very good at anything else though.

"You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." The head game maker says. I only really I have one option so I head to the big screen thing with pictures of a tonne of different plants and insects on. I have to sort them into edible and not.

The first few are relatively easy. Simple stuff like blueberries and cockroaches. After the first 7 or so, it gets more difficult. Lots of them look very similar, but have tiny black dots on instead or something so it's much easier to have the actual plant or insect with you so you can feel the texture or look closer at it. I work out where the zoom in button is though, which makes my life a whole lot easier. I finish in 5 minutes and I got them all right. I guess spending all my time at the edible plants/insects station paid off. A couple of the game makers look mildly impressed. Most people probably make at least one mistake.

I'm not sure what to do for the remaining ten minutes, but maybe they'll score me a little higher if they can see how quickly I can start a fire. When I first went there I just watched a couple of other tributes do it and I just copied them. It turns out I was one of the fastest tributes at fire making though. The training instructor for that station thought I used matches. I grab a long, fairly thick piece of wood and press it against a log, rubbing my hands up and down it. Soon a wisp of smoke appears and I get some dry leaves ready and when a tiny flame appears, I light some, before putting them onto a pile of dry wood, which quickly catches alight.

When I look at the clock, I see I still have 5 minutes to spare. I've shown my main skills though. I waste about 30 seconds before hurrying to the ropes station. I grab the longest rope there and chuck it up to the pole that is two meters or so above the ground. I jump up on a table and tie it securely so it doesn't just undo at the slightest bit of force applied then jump down again. I start tying the other end. I learnt this knot on day 1, I'm not sure how helpful it will be in the arena but I guess if I don't have a weapon but rope it could be useful. I could just strangle them though. I look up at the clock. 30 seconds left. Grayson looks like he's just about to stop me, but I quickly slide a dummy's neck into the rope and give it a tug. The rope pulls the dummy up and it hangs forlornly with just seconds to spare.

I face the game makers. Not many look impressed. I wasn't really expecting them to be, they like gore, not someone who can start a fire and tell the difference between poisonous plants and edible ones.

"Thank you. You may now leave." Grayson says, and I walk to the elevator slowly. As I press the down button, my heart drops as I hear one mutter:

"That's a bloodbath kill." I did try my best after all.

Ciaran's POV (D7M)

I'm pretty nervous. What happens in that room, may affect whether I die or not in the arena. If I get a big score, it'll make the sponsors have their eyes on me. I'm going to need a lot of sponsors if I want to survive. I'm not very good at the survival stuff. I can't really use most weapons either. I know I'll have to risk the bloodbath to get gear, but I know if I don't I'll die anyway. It'll be worth the risk if I can get my hands on food, water and an axe.

In my individual training I'm going to do just about the only thing I'm good at. I've practised tonnes of things since training started, but I'm only really good at one weapon. I'm going to be the typical District 7 tribute. Yup. Axes.

I've been using then since I was little. Most tributes from 7 use axes. I can throw them pretty accurately as well as in close combat.

"You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." The head game maker says as I walk in. I look up at them. They look pretty bored already. Great. I probably won't be getting as high a score as I would if I had been earlier. I pick up an axe and chuck it at a dummy. It embeds into the dummy's heart with a solid thump. I walk over to it and yank it out. I aim and throw. I keep doing this. Aim and throw. Collect. Aim and throw. Collect aim and throw. A few game makers are starting to pay a bit more attention now. Most of them are more interested in laughing, chatting and drinking. Some of them are already pretty drunk. They're talking pretty loudly and their voices are really slurred.

I pick up a slightly lighter one and call an avox over. We spar for a while. I easily disarm them though. There's still a couple of minutes left to go, but I don't have anything more to show that will get me a higher score, so I just chuck a few weights around. I think I should get a 5 or 6. If I was a career it would probably be 7 or 8, but not many were paying attention. At most half of them were.

"How did it go?" My escort asks as I get in.

"They weren't paying attention." I say, storming through to my room. Why do I have to come to a district that no one pays attention to? These games are just rigged so the careers are most likely to win.

Lily's POV (D9M)

I've been practising and I've found a weapon I'm pretty good at. I also spent some time at the survival stations, but I'm not going to show those skills because game makers want to know we can spill blood, not that we know how to find plants to keep us alive.

When I walk into the training room, it is, at first, eerily quiet. Then the game makers start to chat again, by this point most of them completely and utterly smashed. Even the head game maker, Grayson, seems pretty red in the face.

"You have 15 minutes t-" Here he lets out a huge belch. Gross. "Oops. Sorry." The over game makers laugh. "You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." He manages to say it on his 2nd attempt. This isn't a good sign, but there's nothing I can do about it.

I walk straight over to the knife throwing area, and grab a tonne of the knives and then go to the combat simulation room. I set it up to 4, I know it's a low setting, but I'm not amazing, and I don't want to look stupid by setting it up to a really high level. Just as I'm about to go in, I notice a small box at the bottom. I wonder what it is. I press it and a password box comes up. I figured the Capitol would be pretty dumb on their password choice so I just guess 'Trusta' and it lets me in. It comes up with an option to make sure the holo-figures don't 'kill' you. I press it and after 30 seconds more of fiddling around with it basically make it so I can't lose. My training score should be pretty high. I go back and change the setting to 10 and step inside.

In the time I spent fiddling, the few game makers that were watching, have become distracted and aren't watching. I pull out my first knife and send it flying into the shoulder of the first holo-figure. It's not an amazing shot, it certainly wouldn't kill anyone. Slow them down maybe, but certainly not kill. Not for a while anyway. It may kill you slowly if it got infected. The holo-figure disappears though. Must be one of the effects of my fiddling. The game makers are starting to look impressed, clearly they believed that a shot like that would actually kill. They're dumb.

My next shot probably would have killed someone. Straight into the guts. Two more spawn nearby. I take one knife and just stab it in the heart, and then through it through the head of the other one.

My time is almost up by the time I finish, the game makers have clearly started paying attention, because they look stunned that a girl from 9 has that many skills. I can understand that. I mean, I don't have that much skill. Just luck. It feels like the first time since before the reaping I have had any luck.

Maximus' POV (D10M)

There's only four of us left when they call me through. When I walk in, I am surprised to see, though most of them very drunk, they are all paying attention. I had heard the rumours about them getting so drunk they don't pay attention.

I consider going to the fire lighting station, I liked it there on day 1 with Vincent. I don't think the game makers will be impressed though. I'm quite strong because I grew up in a community home. The older kids always tried to beat you up for food and money and then you grew up and became an older kid and did exactly the same. It meant I was strong, strong to first escape a fight, and then later to start a fight. I head to the sword section and dig through the swords for one the right weight. At the bottom, I find a long double bladed one. I pick it up, and drag several metal dummies to form a circle and then I go in it. I start attacking them. The first stab is directed at the head, and once the blade is in, I push up on the handle, and launch myself onto the dummies chest and pull it out, while twisting around to stab the opposite dummy in the guts.

I soon get into a routine. Stab, move to the next dummy bring my sword across in a wide arc across the chest. Spin around for the next. Leap onto it, stabbing its back in the process. It's acutally quite fun. It requires a lot of energy though, so I have to conserver it. I sometimes bring the sword above my head, for the larger dummies and spin it around to constantly swipe the dummy's head.

By the time I've finished with them they're well. Not too different from when I started. I wasn't strong enough to do more than scratch them, apart from the first one which I leapt off. Nearly all of them are laying on the floor with tiny scratches in them. Oh well. I tried my best. I thought I had used all my time, but when I look up at the big clock, I still have 5 minutes left. I go to the whip station. I'm fairly good with them, I do come from 10 after all.

Soon one of the metal dummies has lots of fine red marks covering it. The red is just paint that I dipped the whip in to show where I was actually hitting because it can be hard to see.

"Thank you, you may leave." Grayson says as I raise the whip again. I look at the clock. I still have two more minutes left. Surely they aren't allowed to do that? I flick the whip angrily at the clock, and it hits it so hard the glass on it smashes. One game maker lets out a small squeak of terror. I fling the whip in my hand across to the other side of the room as I storm out. Maybe my act with the clock will educate them in how to read the time. Never put Maximus Halington at a disadvantage. Not even if it's only ending his individual training 2 minutes early.

Thalia's POV

I'm the last person to go in for my individual training. I should be going soon, my district partner's been gone for quite a while. Sure enough:

"Thalia Cortis please report for individual assessment." A voice on the intercom says and I get up and go through, slightly nervous. I know exactly what I'm going to do.

"You have 15 minutes to present your chosen skill." Grayson says, and I'm off. I grab a knife and some wire from the traps station and set up 3 or 4 basic traps around the camouflage area. I've been practising camouflaging myself as quickly as possible in this area, and I think I just about have enough time. I put the knife down and put on a body suit and quickly start. I don't need to paint my whole body because I'm going to go amongst the fake bushes and shrubbery on the floor, so I can lie underneath them. I can hear faint murmurs from the game makers. I guess they like to see what I'm doing.

"Should I go down?" One whispers.

"Yes." Grayson replied. I scramble under the bush, but carefully so as not to rub the paint. I don't think they'll be able to see me, but I quickly grab the knife. I hear a squeal; I guess they forgot about the traps. I can hear a rush of feet which means all the game makers must be coming down now.

"Argh!" Another must have got caught in a trap. There's only one left. Sure enough a second later, there's another squeal.

"Very funny." Grayson says "Now come out." I can just about see the clock from my cramped position. I don't have to; there are still a couple of minutes left. I wonder what has happened to the clock though; all its glass is gone. Below there are smashed shards of glass. Grayson steps inside the fake tree circle. He does a double take. This is quite amusing really.

"Thank you, you may now leave." He says nervously. I guess he's just remembered that I took a knife with me. I may leave. I also may not. There are several of them in here now. One is inches away from my foot. I guess my camouflage is working. The game maker near me takes a step back, a step closer to me. I ready my knife, and grab his ankle.

"Arghh!" She screams. I shimmy out and hold the knife up to her throat while she shouts "Help! Help! They can't do this." I chuck the knife to the side and walked out whilst ripping the paint covered body suit as I go. The three game makers caught up in my traps, are still there. The one that is hanging upside down is starting to go purple in the face.

If this doesn't give me a high score, I don't know what will.