Auberon Laurier

Suada District

The first day of training was incredibly stressful, but it is what it is! I had tons of fun trying everything out even if I failed a majority of it. The best philosophers always say that the most talented people have to put in hard work and practice before they…get that talented? I'm sure somebody important said that. And it's not even like it's a particularly profound statement…

So to give me a confidence booster, I started off with something I know I'd be good with. I'm such a good painter that there's no way I can fail the camouflage station, even if all my limbs just pop off before I get there.

But when I arrived there, I saw a very annoyed Karrie who was struggling to paint over something. I kind of felt an obligation to go help her, even if I know that she'll probably growl at me or bite me or something. I thought she'd be nice to me if I were nice back, but nope. That doesn't mean I won't stop trying though!

"Erm...are you alright...there?" I add at the end. Real smooth, Auberon.

Karrie frowns. "Do I look alright to you?"

I look at her up and down. She's crouching in an uncomfortable position, with her arm extended out against a tree. Her shaky hand is trying to paint over her scales, but she's failing. Her breathing is very rapid and short.

"You look fantastic! To me, at least." I try to smile, but she doesn't turn to me.

"Fuck off." Karrie says, as she suddenly drops the paintbrush. That wasn't a smart thing to say, doh! But why wasn't it? Maybe it sounds like I'm teasing her! My sister used to tease me like that.

I pick it up and look at the brown paint, noticing how it's not the best shade. I look through the palette to see there isn't really a good shade. "You're going to have to cover yourself in mud. The paints aren't going to work on your scales."

Karrie suddenly turns to me, looking annoyed. "I-I know that. Do you think I'm an idiot? I was just trying to test it out."

O-oh...I thought I had an intelligent moment there. Maybe I'm not as observant as I think I am...wait, I don't think I'm observant though! And I thought what I said was rather obvious anyway. Blushing red, I pick up a few twigs and leaves, starting to sprinkle them over her arm, as Karrie covers them in the mud. She has to lay in a different position, but it still works! She looks like a tree, in an alternate universe where trees don't have as much detail and texture and are also a completely different object...but still a tree!

"You look like a wooden mannequin." I giggle.

Karrie lifts her arm up, definitely annoyed. "I guess so."

"Or maybe like a laminate mannequin? A synthetic one? A cheap one?" I wonder, going on a tangent.

"Real funny." Karrie rolls her eyes. I frown, looking at her as she shakes the leaves and grass off her arm.

With that, she waltzes out of the station and back into the training centre. She definitely seemed very annoyed.

I didn't think I did anything wrong! Were my comments too insensitive? If they were, I should really go apologise to her but I have no idea how! Do I pour my heart out? Do I do a skip and dance for her? Or do I go short and sweet and simple?

Urgh, why do I have to have haemophilia and why did my parents have to lock me in all my life? Doing simple socialising tasks shouldn't be this hard, should it?

I find myself sitting in the bleachers, instead of in front of Karrie for apologising for my sins. I don't want to be so upset on such a momentous, fun occasion, but I can't help but feel like...feel like shit. I don't like feeling this way, but it'd be foolish of me to constantly ignore them. I don't know if I messed up, but I think that's what's annoying me the most. I keep upsetting everybody unintentionally but I have no idea how to act otherwise.

I'm the...idiot, I guess. I can't do anything right most of the time. Karrie wasn't in the mood for...me, but I still kept going on. I noticed I should have stopped and yet I just didn't? Why didn't I?

"Auberon? You alright?" I hear a voice. Oh, it's Rowan! And Dae, who's following shortly behind.

I nod extra hard to hammer in the point. "Yeah! Peachier than ever."

Dae frowns. "You don't look it. You're not ok."

Oof! My lies have been seen through so quickly. Rowan frowns. "You shouldn't be so...blunt, Dae. We're trying to help him."

"S-sorry! But how can we help him if he doesn't speak?" Dae wonders, looking at me. Like I'm not here. Even if that doesn't make me feel any better, the fact they do care for me makes my heart feel all warm and gooey. Like melted chocolate! I can't help but feel like smiling. But then there's the other side clashing. It's like...the two sides are at war. But it's at a standstill.

Rowan shrugs. He's so quiet and minimalistic! "By giving him space and letting him think. Auberon can come up to us when he feels ready."

"No, I'm fine, really!" I smile, sounding cheerier than ever.

But before I can move, the thoughts come back to me. The thoughts about how I'm worthless and maybe…I'm not wanted or appreciated? They don't disappear that easily. So before I walk down the steps, I decide to ask the question. "Sorry for the weird question, but do you guys...think I'm an idiot?"

Dae quickly shakes their head. "I feel like I'm obligated to say no but...I really don't think you are." Rowan tells me, mumbling. It's hard to hear what he's saying as he also tends to look away.

"Yeah! Why do you feel like an idiot? Who made you feel that way?" Dae looks very, very annoyed now. Angry at whoever made me feel that way. I...I feel selfish now, as Dae's proving to me that all these thoughts are wrong, but I still feel that way. I'm still clinging onto those ideas unnecessarily. But it's oddly comforting knowing that I am that way instead of pretending like I'm not.

"Nobody!" I try to say with my usual pep but it doesn't come to me. "Kind of. Maybe. No. That's a lie. Karrie. And just...me."

Dae gasps. "Don't listen to Karrie! She's rude to everyone!"

Rowan nods. "Yeah...she's just a dickhead, Auberon. She is like that to everybody."

I'm still frowning. "Maybe...but what did we all do wrong then? How have we all upset her?" And why should she make us feel like shit and get away with it? But I don't say that out loud.

"Some people are just like that." Rowan frowns. "Maybe she's just woken up on the wrong side of the bed today."

"Every day actually!" Dae pitches in.

I guess lots of people are...but again, this isn't making me feel better! Stupid brain and stupid emotions and stupid Auberon. Why do I have to feel this way? And why am I feeling this way more and more regularly? I never used to be so...pathetic! But now I am! Why?


Nefeli Brightberry

Virtus District

"Hey, do you want to race with me on the obstacle course?"

Willow's voice snaps me out of my mopey state, as I shoot up from laying on the table, head down. I was…planning the rest of my day out, but after a sleepless night and an overwhelming urge to conserve some energy, I sort of almost fell asleep? Maybe Willow's doing to keep me alert and sane…or fuck it, she's mocking me, isn't she?

"Why me?" I say as seriously as I can, not looking enthused.

"You're the only one around." Willow shows a slight smirk. I look around and see that I'm the only one not at a station. Great, I am wasting my fucking time.

I'm about to tell her to fuck off and leave me alone. But I realise that beating her at the course would be way more humiliating for her, as I can tell how confident and suave she is. And the competitive side of me breaks out. I feel the urge to beat her and soak in the victory in every pore of my skin.

Or, I could just be respectful and play along. She's only been nice to me so far, so I can't be that unreasonable. I think I'll settle on this side and have a bit of fun, for a while.

"Challenge accepted." I smile, not saying much else.

We stand at the start of the station, waiting for the timer to countdown so we can start. Every station seems to spawn us in a random meadow. The sun is directly above us, the heat being rather unbearable and the light blinding us. Every obstacle is directly above a large pool of water and each one has a short run between them.

As soon as it hits zero, Willow sprints off. Oh fuck, she is quick AND she got a great start. I'm left to scramble in her dust, but I manage to quickly catch up at the first obstacle. There's a bunch of dangling circular platforms hoisted above the water, seemingly connected to nothing. Each one gets smaller to the point where it's hard to stand on one.

Willow takes the slow route, stopping at each podium before she jumps again. But I'm confident that I can get across. I quickly and easily run across them, getting across with no problem. I've got quite the lead now as Willow seems to take the slow and steady method. I should be careful, as the tortoise did beat the hare.

The next two obstacles are pretty similar, but with different shapes, sizes and length between each jump. I stumble at a roadblock when I come across a large wall I have to climb. What the fuck am I meant to here? I can't climb at all! Am I just stuck here now?

Willow manages to catch up to me, but she doesn't climb up the wall. She stops, looking at it and me. "Why aren't you going ahead?"

"It wouldn't be fair for me to leave you behind like this, would it?" Willow smiles. It sounds like she's being nice, but it's still unsettling. "Do you think I could hoist you up?"

"There's no way, it's too high up." I frown, not too happy that I have to be friendly in the competition now. "There's something you could do…"

"What is it?" Willow giggles. But before I answer, I shove her off the side of the platform, into the water. She lets out a small shriek as she falls, not expecting it. I manage to hold in my laugh as I look at her fall so helplessly. As soon as she hits the water, she respawns back in front of the wall. "What was that for, you bitch?"

"Just testing something out, sorry." I mumble. I start to run and take a leap that's as big as I can go. I don't even feel the water touching my skin as I've respawned by the time I landed. I open my eyes to see that I landed far enough to hit the other respawn point, as I'm on the other side.

Willow quickly climbs the wall though, catching up to me in no time. She's not holding back anymore, going at a full speed. I think she was trying to be nice before, but I don't need her to limit herself. I don't need her pity and I especially don't want it.

The rest of the obstacles pass by like a blur. Jumping over red bouncy balls, trying to avoid boxing gloves punching us on a wall, swinging over ropes (which I have to use the same trick for) and finding the right doors. But Willow manages to outpace me, cutting across the finish line just as I see it.

"Ha! That's what you get for playing dirty, fucker." Willow taunts me. I'm in shock as I watch the screens display Willow. The fact I lost despite putting all my effort in just...confuses me.

I'm about to mumble something under my breath but stop as she walks up to me. Willow offers a handshake, which I begrudgingly shake for a second before walking.

She didn't deserve that win, she just got lucky because I accidentally stumbled on the punching wall. I was leading for a vast majority of it and she didn't even beat me by much.

But…she pulled back and did play fairly. I shouldn't be too harsh on her. Nobody likes a sore loser.


Gratiana Lamb

Egeria District

We promised Miri we'd go back to the plant identification station. She said she didn't feel confident enough and it's always nice to recap your knowledge, so there's no problem revisiting here. It's a shame I keep getting distracted and losing my train of thought every other minute.

"I've been thinking." Miri tells us, as her screen flashes a bright red. Err, maybe you should be putting some more thought into the test as you're still failing. I don't say that out loud though. "Where do all of these plants come from? Like...they're not like grown in the Capitol, are they?"

"We probably don't have the appropriate climate or conditions for them to grow here." I mumble, as I look at her screen flash green! Yay, she made a correct matchup! She is slowly getting better. I find myself paying more attention to what she's doing with the test than what she's saying.

Miri thinks about it for a second. "That's a shame. I wonder where they're grown?"

"Probably somewhere in Panem…" Willow mumbles, as she lays on the floor, her head resting against the wall. She looks a bit bored but she's still sticking with us.

"Oh! Do you think if we can figure out where these plants are grown, it might give us a hint to what the arena will be like? There must be a trend." I suddenly think, speaking before Miri can and derailing the conversation slightly.

So we scroll through the info for each plant, trying to find any correlations, though there doesn't seem to be too many. There's a variety of different biomes present. We could try to have a stab in the dark, but I still wouldn't feel certain. We frown, upset our efforts have gone to waste.

"I wonder what the rest of Panem is like…" Willow dotes. I already know this is a dangerous topic to talk about, so I need to be extra careful with my words and inputs.

"Isn't it like...really disgusting?" Miri says, showing her shallowness. It can't be that bad, can it? But I don't think I'll ever be able to know. "I'm happy staying in the Capitol. There's nothing more that I could want outside."

I think about it too. "I'm happy to stay here too. But the idea of escaping it all is nice...I never would though." I add, making sure my opinion is clear and not easy to misunderstand.

Miri frowns as the screen lights up a lovely shade of green again. "That's what the arena is for, isn't it?"

Willow shakes her head. "But what if it's like...a swamp? I'm not going to act like I'd be happy to escape there."

Miri frowns. "I hope not...it'd be so icky. I don't think I can function in a swamp for all that time."

"At least all this time we spent at this station won't go to waste." I think.

We go back to silence for a bit, as Miri finishes her test. But I'm still pondering over the idea of escaping the Capitol. It's not that I want to leave, but the idea of there being something bigger and better out there for me to find is a tempting one. And having the choice of where to live and go and what to do sounds better than not having one. If only the Districts weren't so...poor…

How terrible…I can't help but feel bad for them.

I finish one of the harder tests quickly, to pass the time. I start off well, but suddenly the screens turn black. An automated message starts to play, asking for us to leave our stations and regather at the waiting tables, as the day is done. And it is just when I was starting to get my head properly into training mode…at least there's always tomorrow.


Lycoris Ashford

Suada District

It's hard to find a way to spend my evening here, so I just decide to sit on the roof of the training apartment, to watch the stars slowly appear. I've never seen so many of them at once...and I'd love to watch them with somebody else. But I'm alone, as I slowly freeze in the late night air. Snow is lightly falling and caking the hills, but there's not enough for it to settle properly yet.

I look at the only other people on the roof, Dae and Auberon, who I haven't spoken to much yet. They're not fit to join the alliance and they're quite immature, so I don't want to have to handle them.

"I've never played in the snow before." Dae smiles, their eyes twinkling at the pretty sight.

Auberon gasps at this. "Wait, for real? So you've never built a snowdog before?"

"Isn't a snowman?" Dae giggles.

He shakes his head. "Err...maybe? My family's always built dogs!"

"I think your family is quite unique." Dae decides. They speak very...properly. With an accent only found amongst the inner circle of the city, where the richest live...I wonder if my accent is that similar. "Tomorrow, we should build as many snow creatures as possible!"

Auberon smiles. "Yeah! I want to build a snow monkey."

They start to talk about skiing and sledding and how much they want to go, but can't. I start to tune out then, not too bothered about what they're speaking about. It's cute, but it's only making me feel even worse. Every single goal and aim I've set to try to achieve here has failed! I haven't made any strong friendships, I haven't formed a proper relationship and my career alliance has failed terribly. We haven't found anyone else yet, so we might have to turn to Auberon and Dae.

I can't help but beat myself up, for taking the wrong turn every time and acting like such a failure.

But then I realise, it's not truly because of my failures. It's because I'm not enjoying my time here that much, like I hope I would…

This is hardly the best time to reflect though. I'll just have to work with the cards I've been given and try to find a way to make the best out of this. I've always been able to work well in tricky situations. Even if this is much trickier than anything I've ever experienced before.

"Hi Lycoris! Are you alright?" Dae asks me, shouting from the side. They both approach me.

I nod, flashing a smile. "Yeah, I'm doing...amazingly, thanks."

"Would you like to stare at the constellations with us?" Auberon asks.

I shake my head. "No...I wouldn't want to interrupt what you've got going on…"

They blink for a few seconds. "I like men." Auberon responds blankly.

Dae's eyes suddenly flare open, as if they've just realised. "Oh! I like girls…well I'm trixic but…!"

"Oh no, that's not what I was implying…" I lied. Oops, that's kind of awkward...oh well? It's a good thing I haven't really tried to flirt with Dae much. I guess I haven't been as good at assessing them as I thought I was either.

We stare at each other in silence for a few seconds. I used to easily be able to fill this silence in...but what can I stay? "So...err...what constellations can you see?"

"Gemini." Dae points a finger at the stars, which don't really look like twins to me. "Castor and Pollux, or Lugal-irra and Meslamata-ea."

"They sound like groovy guys." Auberon smiles. "Were they lovers?"

"No, they're twins." Dae giggles.

Auberon frowns. "Oh."

"A gemini is said to have two sides. They tend to be sociable, communicative and ready for fun, with a tendency to suddenly get serious, thoughtful and restless." I cite word for word. I kind...of learned the traits of every zodiac sign and their compatibility charts as a fun icebreaker.

Auberon gasps. "You're into astrology? My dad says it's a bunch of hokey pokey nonsensical bullshit though!"

"You're dad would probably be right." I smirk.

"I say it describes you quite well however!" Dae declares.

Auberon crosses his eyes and pokes out his tongue. "I'm serious and thoughtful?" I kind of agree with his doubts.

"Not really but…" Dae suddenly stalls, clearly panicking. "Isn't snow so pretty?"

"Huh?" Auberon looks confused.

"What's your sign, Dae?" I ask, steering the conversation back onto topic. They seem like she's into all of this, clearly taking it all in.

"Virgo!"

"Virgos are always paying attention to the smallest details and their deep sense of humanity makes them one of the most careful signs of the zodiac. Their methodical approach to life ensures that nothing is left to chance, and although they are often tender, their heart might be closed for the outer world. This is a sign often misunderstood, not because they lack the ability to express, but because they won't accept their feelings as valid, true, or even relevant when opposed to reason."

"Huh? That doesn't sound like me at all! Am I robotic like that?" Dae questions, the idea of believing in astrology going out the window for her.

I shake my head. "No, I'd say you're the complete opposite."

"What if we're all robots? Androids? Cyborgs?" Auberon suddenly looks confused by all the different terms.

"No, I think we're all actually humans...we're all unique, while a robot is programmed to think somebody's else's opinions." I think. And swaying over a robot could be much easier, as you could just...change it's programming.

"I guess so." Auberon shrugs.

After a while, I head back in, tired of the cold. I can only stare at the snowy stars for so long before my fingers fall off. But as I start to walk down the corridor, I suddenly have to cough. My throat burns suddenly as my head gets lighter and something travels up my stomach. I feel the urge to cough, so I do it a couple of times, each one getting louder and more guttural.

I wipe my mouth and open my eyes again to see blood on the hotel floor. Aww shit, not again...this hasn't happened in a while, so why now of all times? I thought it was all over, so I never bothered to get it checked out and explained, as I assumed it was a passing infection. But...it's back?

Do I clean this up? Do I go to the medical bay to see what's wrong or will they pull me out? I can't be pulled out...I can't go back now on all of my dreams and reasons why I joined this show. I'll just...have to hope that nobody sees this, or I could lie and smoothly persuade them that I just...injured myself? There must be a solution.

For now, I think I'll just sprint. The cameras aren't on and I don't think they spy on at these hours…I'll just have to hope I'm not discovered or it isn't linked to me.