Klaus Riviera- District Five male

Most Tributes thought of things like building fires and shelters, but the most difficult part of wilderness survival was just knowing where you were and where you were going. You couldn't purify water if you couldn't find it because you didn't even know you were walking around in circles. That's what led me to the navigation station. I was going to get to what I needed, and before the Careers got there.

"All you need to find your direction is a stick," the instructor said. Since we were inside, he pressed a button and a holographic sun appeared. "You know anything about geometry?"

"Oh yes, I was really good at that," I said. I wasn't good at everything, but I liked to think I was pretty smart. I could prove it, too, I thought. I got good grades and never had much trouble in school. That was going to be my biggest weapon.

"Put the stick in the ground and mark its shadow," he said, demonstrating in a sandbox. "Wait a few minutes and mark again. Do this near noon, when the sun is high. Keep marking until you have an arc where the shadow gets to its shortest point and then starts to get longer. Where do you think north is?"

Truth be told, I didn't know. We never learned that in geometry, I thought a little peevishly. I couldn't be expected to know. But what I didn't have in book learning I'd have to make up for with cleverness. Since he was talking about an arc, it had to be on there somewhere. The obvious answer was the only unreflected point.

"The shortest point?" I asked.

"Right on. Put your back to the stick and you're looking north. At least, pretty close to north," the instructor said.

I was glad I knew now, but more glad that I got it right. The instructor's whole job was navigation, and I was keeping up with him. Sure, he knew a lot more, but I was learning quickly. That would be all the difference in the Arena. The Careers had their whole life to get ready. Anyone who wanted to win had to be smart enough to catch up after all that head start. It was a long shot to think it would be me, but so far I was doing all right.


Meenah Turbine- District Five female

"Hey, Tapey. I know that's a dumb name for a tape recorder, but I used up all my creativity selling stuff, okay? So. I'm going into the Hunger Games. They let me keep this as a token, provided I don't try to take it apart. I just have a few things to say for myself. Not for anyone else, like what I say all the rest of the time. Just for me."

The mentor luncheons and events were generally for mentors to mingle with sponsors and secure donations. I finagled my way into mine by convincing Sky that I could attract sponsors myself. How did I do that? By convincing her I could convince them, and thus convincing her I was convincing by… convincing her. It was kind of meta. So I sat at a fancy table with well-dressed Capitolites, spinning one story after another about how I was the perfect sponsors, tailoring each iteration to the person I was talking to at that moment.

"I just want do something important. That's silly, I know. I have lots of money for a Five girl and I can sell people anything. But that's not important. Important would be mayor of Five or inventor of perpetual motion, or I guess being a Victor. I guess to me, important things mean something I can't talk my way into. Something I actually did."

The gray-haired woman eyed me from across the table. I could see it in how she looked at me. She loved children. She was one of the few old enough to be mature before technology got to where pretty much anyone could have a kid. She was here to sponsor someone she could nurture and love and pretend was her very own.

"You look like my grandmother," I said to her.

"I'd do anything to get there. I just want to feel good about myself and know I actually accomplished something. Even if it didn't really mean anything, I think I'd do anything for that feeling. I'd pretend, even though that's all I've done all my life. Just let me find something worthwhile. Something that makes it all mean something."

"It's such a great opportunity," I said to the man who kept talking about how Tributes were "Panem's future". "I could do so much as a Victor. So many of us have great ideas, and we just need a champion to have one sliver of faith in us."

"Something real! Something actually real! Not stories and fakery and putting lipstick on a pig. I want an actual pig! I mean… You know what I mean. That's irony or something. The only thing that matters, and I don't know how to say it."


Enzo Ranger- District Six male

Camouflage and traps. They went together, and they were both things I had experience with. Camouflage so people wouldn't see my prank coming, and traps as the actual prank. I was already halfway there.

I rubbed moss on the rope until it was green and blotchy like a vine. No one would think twice, as long as the Arena was outside. If it was inside, I'd either have to make it look like it belonged or hide it in shadow. I tied the knots that pulled tighter the more you fiddled with them and the more weight was on them. I laid it out in the simple but tricky folds that balanced it on itself and tied it all together.

"It's ready!" I called to the attendant. She gamely walked across the ring marked out on the floor. She could see the trap, since she had helped me make it, but she pretended she couldn't. She stepped into the loop of rope held up by some sticks. The twigs broke under her weight, springing the trap. The rope slid off a coil of wire, letting it snap back tight, yanking the rope around her ankle. She twisted to land on her butt as it pulled her off her feet. She slid ten feet or so across the floor, coming to rest by the table leg we'd secured the rope to. If I wanted, I could use a tree in the Arena. Then she'd dangle from it like a fruit.

"Yeah!" I cheered. I ran over and stood triumphantly over my catch. I could already imagine the blustering Careers coming by and getting tangled up before they knew what hit them.

"Good job, kid," she said.

I preened over her, proud I'd made it work. Then something came to mind that ruined it entirely. In the Arena, I wouldn't be high-fiving my smiling catch. I'd be bending down to slit the throat of the child who'd wandered into my trap. This wasn't a prank. In a good prank, everyone laughs. No one would be laughing then.