Alder Eltier, 17
District Ten

Alder was shocked by how well he slept on the hovercraft. When he saw the size of his room, he'd assumed that his small bed would also be uncomfortable. Instead, it turned out to be plush and cushy, with a nice puffy blanket and a pillow that one could adjust how hard or soft it was. Rather than feeling sore and exhausted, Alder woke up feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the day.

Stretching his limbs out a little bit, Alder got out of bed and opened the door of the dresser, then pulled out the outfit for the day. It was basically the same thing as the previous day, a pink shirt with a green number ten on the back and black pants. Alder could not understand for the life of him why the Capitol gave them another whole outfit that looked the same as the previous day's when he had worn the previous day's outfit for maybe five hours and didn't get it dirty. If the Capitol was that concerned, they could have just figured out a way to wash the clothes overnight. This was just a waste of resources that could easily have been redistributed to better serve the district population. Alder was sure that there were homeless people in every district who would benefit from one of the outfits the competitors wore. But these outfits would probably never make it there.

Once he was dressed, Alder grabbed his toiletry bag and went to one of the bathrooms to finish getting ready for the day. Then, he returned to his room to drop off his toiletry bag before going to seek out breakfast. When he came back out, he noticed a woman sitting on one of the couches. How long had she been sitting there? It was a good thing Alder had gotten ready before leaving his room.

"Good morning, Alder. Are you ready for breakfast?"

"How did you know?" Alder asked.

"Lucky guess," she replied. "Head down that ramp and take a right. You'll find some of the other competitors there."

Alder followed the woman's directions, going down the ramp and turning right, finding himself in a sterile cafeteria of sorts. Alder went to the buffet and got some food, then looked around to determine where to sit. It seemed as though most of the competitors were already there. Two of the tables were particularly full, and the rest of the competitors were scattered around the area, most of them sitting alone. Alder had a feeling that he should sit with one of the competitors who was sitting alone. After the reveal of the Career alliance the night before, Alder had the strong feeling that he needed an alliance himself, and the best way to form one would be to target one of the competitors who seemed not to have an ally. But before he could approach the person with whom he was hoping to form an alliance, he was intercepted by two boys, one wearing Eight purple and one wearing Six white. "Are you Alder?" asked the boy in white.

"Yes. How's it going?"

"Well, thank you. Can we steal you for a bit? We have a question for you and for Marshall."

"Sure, I suppose. Where is Marshall?"

"He's sitting over there." The boy in purple indicated to one of the tables on the side of the room.

Alder shrugged and followed the boys over to the table, where a seat had been left open for him next to Marshall. "Good morning, Marshall!" Alder greeted his district partner, carefully placing his plate down as he sat.

"Morning," replied Marshall curtly.

"So what's this thing we need to talk about?" Alder asked, cutting a piece out of his pancake.

"Well, I'm Sigmund, and this is Jack, and we were wondering if you would be interested in joining an alliance," said Sigmund, who sounded a little bit rehearsed.

"An alliance?"

"Yes, an alliance. To give us some insurance against the Careers. The best way we can combat them is to have a group of people working together and promising not to send each other into the elimination challenge."

"It's not fool-proof," admitted Jack, jumping in. "Because of the popularity element of the Events, this alliance won't prevent any of us from being sent into the elimination challenge. But it at least provides us some form of protection."

"Who else would be in this alliance?"

"You guys, us and our partners, and the teams from Five and Seven."

"Five teams sounds like a lot for an alliance. Why so many, and how will we make sure we're on the same page?" asked Marshall.

"Well, we want five teams to have a plurality," explained Jack. "That means that we'll have the highest concentration of votes in a voting situation, even if there is no majority. So if, for whatever reason, we have to vote, we have ourselves as protection. And in terms of being on the same page, that's not our biggest concern. We would love to come to an agreement on who we send into the elimination challenge each time. But, if you have one plan and another pair has a different plan, as long as we're not targeting each other until we have to, I think that would be fine. Yeah?"

"I think so," Sigmund backed Jack up.

"Well, I see no problem with this alliance idea," Alder asserted. "I think even a little bit of protection will go a long way in these Events, especially if part of the goal of the alliance is to target the strongest teams."

"I just feel like it's a big alliance," Marshall admitted. "Definitely bigger than I was thinking."

"But think about it this way," Sigmund suggested. "Every outer district competitor should have the same goal anyway: to get rid of the Careers. Even if they hadn't formed an alliance, it still would make sense to target the teams that have the biggest advantages. After all, Careers who are not trained still grow up in better conditions than many outer District citizens; that's already a leg up, their intense physical training notwithstanding. This alliance simply formalizes the plan that everyone should have anyway."

Marshall weighed his options for a moment, then nodded. "That makes sense. The size of this alliance still makes me nervous, but I do see how it could be to our benefit."

"So you're down?" Alder urged.

"I suppose so," replied Marshall reluctantly.

"Amazing!" Jack exclaimed. "Why don't you come and join the rest of us? We have to come up with an alliance name. I was personally thinking the Hovercraft Brigade."

Alder and Marshall picked up their plates and followed Sigmund to one of the fuller tables. He was certainly happy to have an alliance, especially one this big with this much protection. And yet, as he passed all the tables with just one or two competitors, he couldn't help but second-guess his choice.

Would it have been a better thing to do to befriend one of the lonely competitors and give them his support, rather than lend support to a preexisting, strong alliance?

Kamela Wisdom, 14
District Three

Kamela was not happy. Not in the slightest.

For years, since her diagnosis with Asperger's Syndrome, Kamela and her parents had worked hard to help the girl stick to a daily routine. It was the single thing that made Kamela feel the most comfortable and happy, and breaks in that routine, especially if Kamela didn't know they were coming, would throw Kamela off for the rest of the day, sometimes even more. So to have a series of now four or five days where there was absolutely zero routine to them had caused Kamela's anxiety to skyrocket. And things were bound to get worse, too. Thus far, Kamela had always been accompanied by an adult to help her through her issues, first Byte and then Concordia. But tomorrow, she would be on her own in the Arena, no real help in sight. She desperately missed her home and her parents and her friends, and just wanted to be done with these darn Events and back home where things were normal.

Even though she couldn't totally follow a routine, Kamela was doing her best to stick to her routine from home. She still woke up at exactly 6:43, she still brushed her teeth in the same careful way that she did at home, and she still had exactly three pancakes for breakfast. But it felt weird to be sitting alone at a table eating off of a plate she'd never seen before that she had to sanitize before eating off of instead of sitting with her parents at home with the plates that she knew her parents cleaned to her satisfaction. As she'd been one of the first competitors to wake up, Kamela had already finished most of her pancakes, but was absentmindedly pushing around the last bite as she contemplated what her friends were doing right now. Were they hanging out together? Were they splitting up now that Kamela wasn't there? What if Kamela came back and everything was just… different? The thought terrified her.

Kamela was shaken out of her thoughts by a loud, booming voice. "Hello, competitors. Please finish your breakfasts and come through the door behind the buffet. We will begin the day's programming shortly."

At that announcement, Kamela felt herself relax a bit. A day with some structure was better than the free day, which was all unstructured and therefore really bad for Kamela. She quickly ate the last bite of her pancakes, then stood up and followed the mass of competitors moving towards the door. On the other side of the door was a room that looked a lot like a classroom, with 28 metal chairs set out in rows facing a podium and blackboard. Kamela scanned the room then chose a seat in the third row, where she usually sat in her classes back home.

After a few minutes, when all of the competitors had arrived, a man in a very decorated uniform entered the room. Instantly, one of the boys from Thirteen shot to his feet. "At ease, Soldier Peregrine," the man said, motioning for the boy to sit, which he did just as quickly.

"Good morning, competitors," the man opened formally. "I am General Sikka, and I am the top general here in Thirteen and therefore also the mayor of this fine district. We are very honored to be hosting these Events and to help usher in this new era of Panem. Unfortunately, because of the nature of running a military this large and because of the limited amount of space we have, we were unable to take on a lot of the responsibilities of the Events, which is why you've spent the past few days in the Capitol. But we're glad that we were able to figure out the logistics of rearranging the schedules of an entire district to present the Opening Ceremonies. Today, we'll be taking you on a quick tour of the district, and then we'll practice for the Opening Ceremonies later tonight. Afterwards, you'll meet with your stylists to get dressed. Now, if everyone would follow me, we'll begin the tour."

The competitors all stood up and filed along behind General Sikka, who led them out a separate door into an underground hallway. "Most of District Thirteen, including residential quarters and recreational spaces, is underground," explained General Sikka. "Above ground is a forest that we use for some of our wilderness training for various units, as well as a few buildings, mostly for administrative purposes."

That was about all of the tour that Kamela internalized. A part of her wanted to learn about Thirteen and its history. At the same time, this was not exactly a subject that interested her, and anyway it was very difficult for Kamela to focus for more than thirty minutes. The girl found her mind wandering to various physics problems she'd been pondering for weeks, such as what would happen if the balls used for Newton's cradle were different sizes or weights or both. She tuned back in at various moments but was very quickly sucked back into her thoughts ever time. The few things that stuck with her about Thirteen were all centered around the district's reliance on schedules. Every day, every single person in the district was given a schedule for the day, and everyone followed their schedules every day. Routine and order were clearly valued highly by this district.

It was nothing short of Kamela's dream.

The tour ended in one of Thirteen's biggest formal spaces, where the tour was met by a lower-ranked general who introduced themself as Major General Martinez. "I will leave you here in their capable hands to prepare for the Opening Ceremony."

It did not surprise Kamela to learn that the main role of the competitors in the Opening Ceremonies would be to march in a procession in district order, the Capitol competitors leading the way and the competitors from Thirteen at the end. Kamela expected this to be a simple goal. But nope! The goal was for everyone to march in perfect sync with each other as if they were actual trained soldiers. This was the kind of thing that people in Thirteen spent weeks learning how to do. The competitors had under two hours.

Kamela recognized how important it was for her to pay as much attention as she could now. But she simply couldn't find it in her to focus for more than a few minutes at a time. As she watched Major General Martinez explain how to walk, she found herself focused on the way that his arms moved to counterbalance his legs and keep him balanced. As he explained the way the competitors were to walk in and the mark they were to hit, Kamela's mind wandered on how she used to do experiments throwing balls against a wall at an angle to hit a point on the other side of the room. The less she focused, the more agitated Major General Martinez got and the more they screamed; the harder she tried, the less able to focus she was. By the end of the two hours, every competitor was frustrated, but Kamela was close to tears.

All she wanted was to go home.

Atticus Peregrine, 15
District Thirteen

Soldier Peregrine couldn't help but scoff at the sobbing girl from Three. While he knew that it was a societal norm to feel bad for people who were upset, that just wasn't Atticus's style. Nor was it the style of Thirteen, for that matter. Thirteen was not the place for people who are sensitive, who couldn't handle learning something that children in Thirteen learned to do soon after they learned to walk. If this simple task was overwhelming Kamela, what was she going to do when the Events themselves started?

After what seemed like an eternity, the competitors had either figured out how to march in time to the satisfaction of Major General Martinez or they were simply out of time to perfect it any further; judging by the frustrated look on the general's face, Atticus had a feeling that it was the latter. Another group of officers came to escort the competitors back to the hovercrafts on which they came, where they were met by their stylists. Atticus found his stylist, Lorenzo, rather quickly, then followed him into one of the extra hovercrafts that had come to Thirteen in caravan with the competitors. They walked down a narrow hallway until they came upon a black door labeled with a big black number "13" outlined with a thin white line. Lorenzo placed his finger on a small sensor that turned green and made a small clicking noise. "After you," Lorenzo offered, pushing the door in to allow Peregrine inside the small room; Lorenzo followed and closed the door behind him. "All right. I've been asked to confirm with you about your bottoms. Would you prefer pants or a skirt?"

"Pants, definitely."

"That's what I figured."

Moments later, Atticus was dressed in what was essentially his military dress uniform, which was precisely the outfit he would expect to wear for a formal ceremony such as this. However, the uniform was missing something. "Where are all of my medals and ribbons?"

"What do you mean?" asked Lorenzo, who was shining Atticus's dress shoes.

"My dress uniform has various ribbons and medals attached to it right here," Atticus explained, gesturing to the left side of his chest. "This just has my nameplate."

"Ah. Well, I'm not sure. We could ask General Sikka or Violet Emerald or someone like that if we see them. But it's probably because this isn't your actual dress uniform, just a very, very accurate copy." Lorenzo paused for a moment. "Is your normal dress uniform black?"

"Yes."

"Ah. See, the only other competitor to have a black uniform is the other Atticus. All of the other competitors have uniforms in their district color. So they probably just made you another one, so that it would match the pattern of the other competitors' uniforms." Seeing that Atticus wasn't convinced, Lorenzo added, "Also, this way nothing will happen to them in the craziness of this Opening Ceremony. You wouldn't want to lose or damage an award you earned."

"That makes sense," replied Atticus grudgingly. While he understood the logic of not wearing his medals, Atticus was proud of the medals he'd earned and was somewhat disappointed that he wouldn't get to show them off to the whole country. But he knew that nothing good was going to come from arguing, and he didn't want to set off a chain of events that would lead to him not winning, so he figured he would grin and bear it until he won. Then he could wear not only that but also a victory medal!

After both Lorenzo and Atticus had looked over the uniform to make sure that it was laying right with no wrinkles or creases, Lorenzo did some very basic makeup – "For the camera," he explained – and used some hair gel to tame Atticus's curly dark brown hair. "Now, be careful not to do anything that would cause you to sweat off your makeup or mess up your hair. So no exercising."

"Really?"

"Yes. You need to look good for the cameras and the country. Promise me?"

"I promise," groaned Atticus.

After a final once-over, Lorenzo led Atticus back out of their prep room and back towards the formal space for the Opening Ceremonies. When they arrived, Lorenzo said goodbye to Atticus and went into the formal space itself, while Atticus was led down another hallway to a green room for the competitors. Most of the competitors with shorter hair were already there, but the longer-haired competitors, particularly the female-identifying ones, were yet to be seen. Atticus figured it would be a while until the ceremony started, so he needed to find a way to occupy himself. The problem, of course, was that most of the things Atticus did when he didn't know what else to do were active, and he had promised Lorenzo that he wouldn't exercise. Atticus took a seat in a chair on the side of the room to try to think of something he could do to pass the time.

Perhaps he could work on some sort of mental skill. After all, being a good soldier wasn't just about training physically. It was also about having the mental capacity to handle challenging tasks. Atticus decided to work on his memory by playing the word chain game, where he would think of a word and another word that started with the last letter of the previous word. His goal was to remember as long of a chain as he could without repeating words; his previous record was 65 words.

Arm.

Arm mark.

Arm mark karma.

Arm mark karma affect.

Arm mark karma affect teal.

Arm mark karma affect teal leaf.

Arm mark karma affect teal leaf friend.

Friend.

That was a word Atticus didn't spend much time thinking about. Sure, he sometimes interacted with other people, but Atticus preferred to focus on himself and his own success. He had worked hard to obtain his position at the top of his age group, some would even say the top position in the whole orphanage; distracting himself with people or things not related to that goal didn't strike him as a good idea. But as Atticus stopped playing the word chain game and started looking around at the other competitors, he noticed that almost everyone else was standing or sitting in clumps, conversing casually with their fellow competitors. Atticus had never learned how to converse casually; in fact, he wasn't at all conditioned to socialize. That fact had never before bothered Atticus. Now, though, watching all of the other competitors interact, a little nagging thought poked through the rigid barrier that Atticus placed between the thoughts he allowed himself to think and the thoughts he'd been conditioned not to think.

If everyone else had friends, or at least people to talk to, and Atticus didn't, was he missing out on something?

*peeks head around doorframe* Well, hi there.

I know it's been quite a while since I updated even though I had this chapter stockpiled but as I'm sure a lot of you can imagine, the last few weeks have been a bit rough. And then as I was feeling ready to upload I realized that I wanted to wait a bit because I was getting so close to finishing another goal, which I did! So anyway, here's the chapter! What did you think of your first introduction to Thirteen? Did you think Ten would be joining the alliance? What about Atticus's sudden revelation? How will Kamela do as the Events progress?

A few important announcements! First of all, I've reached a point in this story where there is no way for me to keep my POV count even for all the competitors. I need to be writing the POVs that are going to progress the story to where I want it to, and particularly because of how the Events are structured, I can't be sure that every single character is going to get exactly the same number of POVs. What I'm going to do my best to do is make sure that every district gets an equal number of POVs, because district partners are going to be rather prominent in each other's POVs.

Second, we've hit another check in point! This one is going to be different from other POVs, so please pay attention here. On my profile you'll see a second form labeled IDIDE Participation (Ch. 35 on). That form will ask you to rank all fourteen teams from your favorite, which you'll rank as 14, to your least favorite, which you'll rank as one. Again, you're giving the highest possible points to the team you'll like best, and the lowest possible points to the team you like least. I'll explain next chapter how those points will come into play, but I don't want to bog down this chapter; I will say that if you are not caught up on reviews, now is really the time to do so. The secret word for this chapter is READ.

And finally, the real reason why I was waiting to post this chapter: I have a new SYOT up! It's called Only Time Will Tell: The First Centennial. And like all of my stories, you're going to want to read the chapter before submitting because lots is happening.

Anyway, thanks all for your patience! We're looking at one more chapter and then the Games, which is super exciting! I can't wait for you all to see what I have in store.

Yours,

Goldie031