Lumara Barrett, 15
District Four Female
Deep breaths, Luma, she thinks to herself as she sits next to Triton and waits to be judged by the game makers. It's a long, long wait. Every fifteen minutes or so, another tribute enters the room and she bites her lip in impatience. She just wants to be able to show what she can do, she wants to prove herself.
Maybe if she does that, the careers will fully accept her.
Right now, the only reason that she's with the careers is because Dimitri has left the alliance. Lumara's well aware of that - she's not stupid. Triton and Thetis seem to tolerate her, but Frosty gives her a few curious glances every so often, as if she's waiting for Lumara to make a mistake. It makes her feel nervous - she doesn't like to not be in control. If only she had something like her river, where she could dive into the waters and pretend that nothing is happening. That everything is normal.
But she has to keep performing the way everyone wants her to. She has to keep proving herself, or they'll get rid of her early. She's seen the way Fletcher looks at her. He doesn't like the idea of someone as young as her in the alliance, and the other careers seem to not care about her. If she messes up, if she doesn't do what they want her to do, she'll be killed in the first few minutes.
And everything she's ever dreamed about will disappear right in front of her.
And now Dimitri enters the room, the doors closing loudly behind him. Lumara watches the peacekeepers take their places in front of the door, one checking her watch before standing in the stiff, emotionless stance that all of the peacekeepers seem to have perfected. He seems like he's a nice guy, just too judgy. Why wouldn't he want to work with them? She didn't even volunteer, and that's what Thetis said he's been mad about. Maybe he's just mad at the rest of the careers, and she's not the one he's angry about.
Oh, she doesn't know what to think anymore. She just wants to show what she can do.
"Are you ready for the private sessions?" she whispers to Triton, who's busy staring at the doors to the training centre. "I think I'm going to show them what I've learned with the longbow, then do some memorization challenges. I'm good at those - the teachers at the tech school say that I have an eidetic memory. What that means is that I'm good at memorizing things, nothing special."
"Tech school? Lumara, have you ever realized that you're filthy rich?" Triton returns, still staring at the doors. "I'd give almost anything to be half as rich as your family is, and I'm from a fairly well-off family."
"Oh, so you don't have many bathrooms or bedrooms." Lumara nods wisely, knowing what Triton means. "Some of my friends say that my house is huge, but theirs are still fairly large - a bit cramped in the top floors, though."
"Try two bedrooms, a bathroom, and two other rooms besides." Triton laughs. "I'm lucky - I was the only kid, so I got the room all to myself. If Thetis lived with me, we'd share a room… we'd have to fit a lot more in, but it'd be worth… worth it…" he trails off, going back to staring at the doors.
Oh. Lumara hadn't thought of that. But what about larger families? If they were in places as small as Triton, how would they fit themselves in? Would they have to live in those five rooms? She knows families with tons of kids, and she knows that they're supposed to be poor.
She just never really thought about what that meant. Perhaps there was always a little nagging voice in the back of her head that reminded her that she was lucky, but she had always assumed that everyone else had it decently. Life was supposed to be good, and if wasn't, there was a reason for that.
Oh, she's a poor, poor fool.
A hand touches her shoulder, and she looks up. It's one of the peacekeepers, tapping a foot impatiently. "It's your turn."
She looks around for Triton, but he's not there - she must have missed seeing him go into the training centre. She was too wrapped up in her own thoughts to pay attention.
And now, she has to get her head back in the game. She has to be smart. She has to be aware.
She has to remember that she's half a step behind everyone else here - and she has to catch up.
The game makers are up above her, in a room that overlooks the training centre while watching her closely. A few have clipboards, and others are sipping drinks as they adjust glasses and prepare to watch - to decide how much potential she has, Lumara realizes with a shudder.
No, she can't get nervous now. She's good at being strong, she knows that. It's time to perform.
She can do that.
The first thing she takes up is the longbow, almost dropping her first arrow in her rush to shoot quickly. But she holds onto it, drawing the arrow back as far as she can before letting it go with a twang from the bow. The string vibrates back and forth, hitting her shoulder, but the protective gear she's put on makes sure that it doesn't hurt her.
Her first arrow lands in the target. So does the second, and the third, and the fourth. She keeps switching positions, showing them that she can shoot from different angles. A few miss, but not many - and she's able to get one in the chest of a dummy she aims at.
She's learned well.
As she begins the plant identification test, she sighs, relieved that she knows what she's doing.
She might make it through this. She just might.
Ellington Lockwood, 18
District Nine Female
She's nervous.
Elle doesn't want to admit it, but she isn't prepared for the private sessions. Most of training had been spent trying to ignore the voices in her head, to ignore the fact that she's supposed to die. She doesn't want to die.
But the voices are telling her that she will.
She bites her lip as the girl from Four enters the training centre, taking a glance back before heading to her session. Elle remembers watching her try not to break down on the reaping stage, and wishes that she could have given the girl a hug then and there. She deserves it.
The other tributes are fidgeting in their seats, the boy from Five letting out a sigh of relief as he realizes that all of the careers have left the room. Everyone's nervous around the careers, the pack that's determined to hunt down them all. They've kept to themselves for the most part this year, but a few rumours have been floating around that the boy from Two has left the alliance and that they're looking for another partner. News travels fast among the outliers, despite the fact that they don't know one another, and Elle heard from the girl from Eight that they were supposed to have approached the girl from Five before one of the Fours had argued them down from it. The careers are a strange, strange group.
Elle doesn't want to have anything to do with them. The less they notice her, the more likely she is to escape them in the bloodbath.
She's doing exactly what Falcon tells her in the bloodbath: when the gong sounds, she'll run for the hills and never look back. Granted, it might be an indoor arena, but there'll be a place to run. There always is.
And she won't waste one moment. She doesn't trust herself around the weapons for now, not when she gets overwhelmed so easily. She only likes the bow and arrow - there, she can plan. It's not spur of the moment, it's a weapon where she can prepare and push away the voices before she does something stupid.
She doesn't want to know what would happen if she had to use anything else.
As the boy from Five, then the girl from Five, and then the boy from Six enter the training centre, Elle looks around at the rest of the tributes. The girl from Six is sitting quietly where she is, rocking back and forth in her seat as she waits to be called up to enter the private sessions. Elle shudders a bit at how pale the girl is, with bright red eyes and short, snow-white hair, but she seems nice enough. And when she disappears, Elle can't help but hope that she does well.
The pair from Seven are having a quiet discussion, as well as the two from Eight. Elle smiles when she sees how they playfully banter - they look like they're having fun.
"Elle, do you think I'll do well?" a small voice asks, and she looks down at her district partner. Del has straightened up and is puffing his chest out in an attempt to look stronger than he is, but he's simply too small to look intimidating. With a pang of regret, Elle realizes that he's only a year younger than her. It doesn't feel like that.
"You'll do lovely, Del," she replies, giving him a warm smile. "You'll show them your throwing knives, and you'll be strong enough to complete the ropes course that you were talking about with Falcon. They'll love you!"
"They'll be awestruck by the sheer size of my frame, you mean," Del says, and they dissolve into snickers. He's quite the funny guy, but Elle knows that he's hiding whatever pain he has in his past. She hasn't learned much about him - something that she regrets - but she's learned that his mother is abusive. The poor guy, being abused by the mayor herself.
At least he's safe here. She should convince him to run away from the bloodbath as well, so they can both get out. She wouldn't mind working with Del.
He's a nice guy.
Soon, Del enters the training centre as well, and she's left all alone. She sits by herself, with only eight other tributes and the voices to keep her company.
She'd rather talk to the tributes, but the voices won't go away.
You'll die alone.
Don't trust Del.
You won't do well.
You should give up.
You'll die, you know.
She looks up, beads of sweat forming on her forehead when she sees the peacekeeper. "It's time to go?"
"Yep."
Elle enters the room, taking a glance up at the game makers. Most of them are watching her, but several are chatting amongst themselves and eating a meal that's being prepared for them. They won't watch her closely, it seems.
She grabs the bow and arrow, and fiddles around with the string to get it just right. It takes a bit to make sure that it's in a place she likes, but she prepares the bow and pulls back the string. One… two… three…
As she aims, she focuses on the red in the middle. She has to hit the target, she just has to.
And then her mother is in the room and standing in front of the target, and the arrow flies towards her. Closer and closer and closer and closer and it goes right through her heart.
The truck comes closer, and Elle walks across the road -
And now she's screaming, stuck in place as the voices attack her yet again -
And her mother flies through the air, knocking her away and onto the side of the road as the truck comes closer -
It's all red. It's all red.
And as Elle starts to scream, she doesn't notice that she's pierced the centre of the target.
New chapter! Hurray!
What do you think? We're getting closer and closer to the bloodbath - three chapters to go! I'm quite excited :D
Keep having fun, being awesome, and reading! I'll see you soon with the next chapter.
Enjoy. Until next time, TheAmazingJAJ