A/N: Lately I've been fussing over the title of this story. It just started sounding stupid to me. Anyone have a good suggestion?

Oh, and cybercookies to anyone who can figure out why Maddox's last name is Butler. I'll give you a hint: it has to do with his district partner...

Read & review & I will love you. :D

Maddox Butler, District 11

It's lunchtime at the Training Center. In other words, time for our strategy to get started.

Oakley and I hurry to be the first ones in line, pile up some food, and sit down together.

And now we wait, trying to look as pathetic and enervated as possible, looking around the tributes getting ready to sit down.

Admittedly, trying to use pity—which I hate, but it's all I have to work with—is not a killer strategy to lure people into an alliance. But there are a couple of people here foolish enough to try a worthless alliance with us. And we have three days. Hopefully someone will attempt to befriend us.

—And seconds after I finish my thought process, the girl from District 4, Circe, sits next to Oakley. Oakley raises her eyebrows a little, but doesn't turn to look at Circe.

It's all right not to start the conversation. We want to seem pitiable, but not so much desperate for an alliance.

...But Circe doesn't start a conversation, either.

So the three of us just eat in tense silence—though I keep looking around at the other tributes, who have refused to sit by us—until it's time to go back to the stations.

Well. That didn't seem to work, I muse with a frown as I step back from the table. An Avox boy picks up the plate and trash once my back is turned.

Oakley walks out a few steps, toward some of the further stations, before she starts conversation with me.

"Well. That didn't seem to work."

I almost laugh at her echoing my thoughts, but the situation's bleak enough to stop me from doing so.

"Yeah. We still have two more days. And it looks like we didn't really scare her off, so there's still a chance."

Oakley nods. "Good point."

"So," I sigh, putting my hands behind my neck, "what do you want to do now?"

Oakley clicks her tongue, something she does often when she's thinking. "Let's try... Weapon-making," she suggests, pointing at the station closest to us.

"Sounds good."

We take the few steps over there, and the instructor, Weld, starts us off on making spears out of tree branches.

I should be paying more attention—after all, the odds of us getting our one kill without weapons is slim, and the odds of getting a real weapon from the Cornucopia even slimmer—but I can't help my mind from wandering.

I wonder what Dad and Anson are doing. Dad's probably not going to be able to take as many short breaks from work to check on baby Anson, since I'm not there to help with income.

So, Anson's probably just going to wander around the little room, digging a tunnel through my meager pile of clothes and cuddling them like he does a lot. And Dad's going to be worried out the wazoo for him and me.

But let him be worried. When I step in that arena, and Oakley and I get our first kill, I'll get to relieve him. Tell him, "See? I can do this. You don't have to lose sleep over me. Just take care of yourself and the baby, and I'll be back in a few weeks."

Because I will be back. It'll be hard. I'll have to kill other humans. I'll have to decide exactly when to break the alliance with Oakley without leaving myself defenseless. I'll probably get pounded and horribly injured.

But I'll come back victorious.