No Time to be Abandoned: Chenille Anders, District 1 Female Tribute

"Don't abandon each other. Ever."

My mentor's words hung in the air above the dining room table. Fabian's mentor, Haven, was silent, as was our escort, Feriah. No one spoke. It just wasn't practical advice for a Career-they weren't supposed to be concerned with their allies 'till the end, or even at all, depending on the Games. I wasn't going to let anything get in my way of winning these Games. Not my allies, not my mentor's advice, and certainly not anything else.

"You should go to training now," Haven suggested quietly.

I couldn't have agreed more; I cleared my throat and stood abruptly from the table. Without another word, I started to head towards the elevator. Fabian was close behind me, clearly also eager to get out of there.

"You have a habit of storming off without saying anything," he informed me. "And you're also not a fan of 'family breakfasts'. Both could be potentially fatal flaws of character."

"Shut up," I told him as the elevator doors opened and I walked out, towards the training room.

"There you go again, with the storming off thing!" Fabian called from behind me.

"That's not my only skill, which I think you'll learn very clearly if you choose to annoy me again in the arena," I hissed at him, barely even turning around.

"They say that anger is a form of passion."

"Well, 'they' can just go-"

"Whoa." The word was in unison from the two of us as we entered the gymnasium. It was huge, and I mean huge. There were more weapons and tools than I'd ever seen in my whole life. And it was all just there in front of me at once.

Spotting the knife throwing station, I had to resist the urge to sprint over there as fast as I could. My favorite weapon-in mass amounts-was just there, waiting for me.

"Let's go," Fabian said, already approaching the gathered group of tributes. We were the last tributes of the Career pack to get to training, so we approached the others.

After the initial greetings, Samantha said, "We were talking about our tribute outfits-like, if we'd want them to be matching or not."

I nodded in a pretty general response. "Sounds reasonable."

"What are we, little kids?" Arsin argued.

"He has a point," Marco put in.

Fabian shrugged. "I don't really care."

"I think it'd be cool!" Samantha added.

Only the District Four girl, Ionia, really gave a reason. "They'd be good for recognition," she commented. "So, I say yes."

"That's three for matching, two against it, and one who doesn't care," I said. "Fabian? If you pick matching, that's it. If you pick going against it, it's a tie."

"This isn't a democracy!" Arsin blurted out.

"Oh, whatever," Fabian said, ignoring him. "I'm with the girls-I say yes."

"So, what're our outfits going to be, then?" Samantha asked.

Since we still had time before training started, we decided on our outfits and filled in the forms, being very specific, probably just to annoy the people who had to supply them: basic undergarments and socks (which didn't count towards our maximum amount of clothing, apparently), tight-fitting, rather simple black boots made of leather, beige denim pants, a dark green t-shirt and camo jacket, as well as a belt.

Just as we were finishing, someone was starting to explain all of the stations to us. But I wasn't listening-I didn't need an explanation.

All I knew was that once we were released, I felt barely conscious of my fellow Careers. "Where do you guys want-"

"Knife throwing," I heard myself say, as if in a trance, not even knowing who it was that had spoken.

"Swimming." The District Four pair must've said that.

"Climbing or sword practice." That one I wasn't so sure of, but I was pretty sure that it was the District Two girl.

"Let's do all of those," Fabian suggested, and those things took up all of our first day, with some debate on the order.

We started at knife throwing, at my insistence. I was the first person out of all twenty-four tributes to reach it. "Pick a knife, any one will do as long as ya' got one," the instructor told us.

I picked up one of the sleek blades that looked the most like my main practice one at home. But I could tell that it wasn't the same-it was lighter and shinier than my usual one. He started us off with some basic throwing techniques, but quickly learned better, at least, when it came to me. If anyone else was advanced as fast, I wasn't paying any attention. I talked him in to letting me do a demonstration of basic combat with them with his help. My fellow Careers seemed somewhat impressed, even if they weren't about to admit it.

I wasn't such a big fan of swimming, even though the District Four pair, were, naturally, better at it than the rest of us. It was annoying for them to be so much better at something than the rest of us, but Ionia seemed to be an okay teacher.

When we had first got to the swimming room, we were given bathing suits to go in to the bathrooms and change in to. After that, the lesson began, though the instructor really seemed less than interested in us, so it was a good thing that we had both of the District Four tributes as a part of our alliance.

Ionia basically taught us how to not drown and move quickly and smoothly through the water, about holding our breath and being as quiet as possible. Arsin was also a natural at the swimming, but he didn't seem to be all that interested in helping the rest of us. "What are the odds that all of us will need it?" he said.

Climbing. Had it really only been two days ago that I'd been practicing it in my backyard? With mother back on the ground, offering instructions, and Laecia in the tree next to mine? Just two days? Was I already that absorbed by the Games?

I shook my head as we approached the station, blocking out the thoughts. I was a Career. Careers were supposed to get engulfed by the Games.

Samantha was our teacher at this station, helping us get ready to scale the rock-climbing wall in front of us. "Just look at how I'm stepping!" she called down to us, already several feet up. I did try to watch, though scowling. I couldn't see anything from where I was on the ground.

Finally, we all started to climb up. The District Four tributes were positively awful at it, not slipping or falling, but going so slowly that if mutts were chasing them, they'd be done for. Marco was hesitant to even start climbing, though he was clearly trying to swallow his fear. But he wasn't doing too much better than District Four-he was a lot less steady, though a bit faster. Fabian was actually doing pretty good, once he got started.

It was going all right for me, until I hit a rough section where there were very few pegs about ten feet up. I studied it for only a second before I tried to stretch my leg up to the next spot. But I missed and just hit the wall itself. My leg slipped out from under me, dragging my other one down with it, until I was just dangling in the harness, holding on to one of the pegs for dear life with one hand.

Okay, so, looking back on it, it might not have been "for dear life", thanks to the harness, but, still.

I started to repel back down the wall, but something must've gone wrong with the harness, because about a yard or two off the ground, it just dropped me down.

It didn't really hurt, but I did fall on my left leg sort of weirdly. The instructor rushed over to me, already babbling out questions, and gesturing for one of the medics that was always standing guard to come over. "Are you okay? Does anything hurt? Here, let's get you out of that harness."

It did feel good to get out of the climbing equipment, I'll admit. The medic looked at the instructor like he was being overdramatic, which he was. "She has a twisted ankle," he informed the instructor. "She'll live. Really."

"But shouldn't we wrap it?"

"Yup. Maybe put in an ice pack, too. But that's about it, really. It takes about a week to heal, and she won't be able to wear the wrap in to the arena. But it might be all fixed by then-it all depends on how bad it is."

"That won't be necessary," I said, trying to sound sweet. "I'm fine, really."

"No, no, no, we wouldn't want you to hurt yourself anymore than you have to." There was just something so wrong about that sentence that I couldn't quite put my finger on. In the end, I let him wrap it up with the ice pack from the medical kit. My ankle was starting to ache a bit.

But I ignored it, and tried to not favor it too much.

The next station, sword fighting, had a much-preferred instructor. It wasn't really my thing, though-the weapons were too heavy for me, since I was the youngest Career. In fact, I was the only one who wasn't eighteen!

We'd added first aid to our list of things that we had to do, in honor of my so-called "injury". "Guess that twisted ankle'll give you a pretty big disadvantage in the arena, huh?" Arsin taunted as the first-aid instructor went over the contents of the first-aid kit. I glared at him, and I thought I heard Marco laugh.

"Just another flaw of character," Fabian whispered to me. "Tendency to get injured." I shoved him in to the conveniently nearby wall in response.

The rest of training wasn't really all that interesting. The first day was the most impressive, by far. When it came time for our private sessions with the Gamemakers, I was the first tribute up. Good. I'd have the Gamemakers attention.

I walked in to the room, trying to look innocent yet confident, and stood in front of the Gamemakers silently.

"You may begin."

I walked over to the knife station automatically, not quite sure what I was doing there. I picked up the same knife that I'd used on the first day, and a few others like it, holding them all in one hand. I looked around the room for a good target. The ones set for the actual knife station were too close.

No, my eyes fell on the dummies used for archery-across the room.

I started to run sideways, away from the Gamemakers, wincing at the slight extra pain in my ankle as I did so. By the time I was halfway across the room from the Gamemakers-horizontally-I'd sent the three knives hurling towards one of the dummies, all three lodging themselves deep in the arm, leg, and stomach of the dummy.

But I wasn't done yet, as I sprinted forwards, towards the dummy, retrieving the knives and throwing one back towards the targets at the knife station, one to the slightly closer targets at the spear station, and the third one upwards to hit the little bell at the top of the rock-climbing wall. It rings as the knife bounces off of it, and it's such a perfect rebound that I catch it in my hand-my left hand. My bad one.

Then I put down all of my weapons, and walked back to stand in front of the Gamemakers.

"You are dismissed, Chenille Anders."

I nodded politely and walked back out of the room, allowing myself the smallest of smiles.

Later that night, I saw my score: a ten. Fabian got a nine, Samantha got a seven, Marco and Ionia got eights, and Arsin got a ten. Average Career scores, but I was glad that mine was tied for the highest score out of all of the tributes.

So I fell asleep with the number still running through my mind.