On the first day of training, Rae listens to an orientation being given by the head trainer. When that's done, she roams around to see what this place has to offer.

She's gonna look for some allies to watch her back. She can imagine herself ordering people around, and if she can't do that, she can leave them behind. It's no problem.

That morning, she joins two girls around her age on the ropes station.

"Hi, what's your name?" the girl from Seven asks.

"Call me Rae."

"Rubie. Nice to meet you."

The two shake hands. "Nice to meet you too." Rae smiles like how she imagines a queen to do it, very subtle yet professional.

"This is Angela."

The girl from Four turns to them.

"Angela, meet Rae. Rae, meet Angela."

The two shake hands and exchange 'nice-to-meet-you's.

After the ropes station, the three of them check out the knife station, in hopes of finding a weapon they'd all be comfortable in using. They train with it until it is time for lunch.

At lunch, the three of them sit together. That's when Rae shares about her own golden environment in District Nine, and it's also when she learns that Seven is full of trees and Four meets the ocean. She knew these before, but not in a lot of detail. Rubie Loganberry is eighteen and drives the truck that delivers the wood in and out of the forest, while Angela Yaren helps out in her family's beach resort.

When lunch break is over, the three of them are curious and decide to tackle the obstacle course. There's a lot of rope around it.

"I'll go first," Rubie volunteers.

A trainer straps her in, and her goal is to follow the rope on the obstacle course, which means she needs to go over, under, in between, or around the course several times to reach the end.

It takes Rubie around twenty to twenty-five minutes before she reaches the end of the course, panting in exhaustion.

"That was tough!"

Rae then volunteers to go next. She follows the ropes course, and takes a few minutes less than Rubie does. Her nimble body helps her in this, compared to Rubie's bulkier build.

Angela also takes on the obstacle course, and she does just as fine as Rae does, if not better.

"Where should we go next?" Rubie asks.

"I think learning hand-to-hand combat would be useful," responds Rae.

"I agree," seconds Angela.

"Alright, let's go!" Rubie turns to exit the station.

With that, the three of them spend the rest of the afternoon learning how to fight with hand-to-hand combat.


Day two, and the triad thinks it would be a good idea to learn about plant identification, to know which plants would be safe to eat and which ones would be harmful. They spend the morning on that station, getting distracted from time to time that they do not have enough time left to visit another station before lunch break begins.

However, they still try out archery, for fun. After lunch, they return to the archery station, and while Angela is getting the hang of it, Rae and Rubie do not see themselves scoring a kill by shooting an arrow.

They try out other weapons for the rest of the afternoon, to satisfy their curiosities, but Rae still feels best with a small handy-dandy knife.

Rae also spent the afternoon interacting with a few tributes, like the pair from the Capitol. She gets to learn that their industry is entertainment, so their city is focused more on producing stuff like films.


Day three is when Rae starts off training with the sword for half an hour, before her allies call her for swimming lessons.

"We don't know if the arena is gonna have water, so Angela thinks it's a good idea that both of us should try getting comfortable with the environment," Rubie says.

"And so that you two don't drown," adds Angela.

Rae thinks through it, before saying, "Fine."

With that, Rubie and Rae learn how to stay afloat on water, and then a few paddling exercises afterwards. As Angela originates from the district with the fishing industry, it is no surprise that she can swim, so she's merely practicing at this point.

The rest of the morning is spent on swimming. Rae honestly doesn't like water, but her allies make very good points. If she can avoid stepping on water for the entirety of the games, that would be great for her. Being on water is like sucking on lemon. It makes her disgusted, but she knows it is better to learn how to swim than die drowning, like somebody she used to know did.

They arrive in time for lunch, and then the private sessions begin right after it. Rae waits for her turn patiently for the rest of the afternoon.


"Raenu Pyrite, District Nine."

She walks into the room, where she can see a panel of gamemakers observing her every movement.

"You have ten minutes to show us anything. Good luck."

Rae immediately picks up the rope and quickly ties a noose. She uses it on a dummy, before moving on to stab the dummy. She then tries to throw knives at some of the other dummies, which proves to be not that much of a good idea, since she misses a couple of times. She changes her plan and stabs at them on the neck, on the back, and on the chest.

"Miss Pyrite, your time is up."

"HYAH!" She launches a knife straight on the forehead of the dummy.

"Thank you," the gamemaker continues.

Upon exiting the room, she feels confident that she did just fine, not too bad, but not as perfect as she hoped it to be.


That evening, Navi is with both Rae and Flash, watching the scores on the screen. If anything catches Rae's eye, it's the boy from Four who scores the highest so far – a ten. She wonders what he did to garner such a score.

"Next we have Flash Meadow from District Nine with a score of…

Flash anticipates his score with a grin on his face.

"Six!"

"Yes!" Flash cheers.

"That's a decent score," comments Navi. "It's right in the middle, so people won't pick you off as too weak and won't deem you as a threat."

"My turn, my turn!" Rae says impatiently.

"His district partner, Raenu Pyrite, has also garnered a score of six!"

"Same sentiments, Rae," Navi says. "Good job!"

She exclaims, "Hell yeah!"


On the free day before the Hunger Games, all the tributes are brought to a tall multi-purpose building. Rae and her allies go around looking at some interesting things, even entering a museum at one point. They bump into another triad they've seen in training. Rae, Rubie, and Angela introduce themselves, and the other triad also introduces themselves – Luna is the girl from Zero, Hera is the girl from One, and Rayquaza is the boy from Two.

They eat lunch together, at some buffet. They also get to know each other more. Aside from what Rae already knows about Angela and Rubie, she also listens to what the other three have to say after she talks about her harvester life. It turns out that Luna is training to be a nurse, as District Zero specializes in medicine. Hera is a model, and Rae can see it from her appearance alone. Ray talks about his father being a competitive eater and how he wants to follow his footsteps.

After lunch, they continue to talk in the restaurant, before they enter the arcade altogether, where they just have fun for the rest of the day until the facilitator tells them that their time is over. They order takeout before returning to the bus. Rae had fun on her free day. She gets to meet people she didn't think she would ever interact with. Hopefully, they'd cross paths in the arena to give each other a hand. After all, they made a soft deal about it after lunch.


The following day, her stylist preps her for the interview. She is wearing a golden kimono with a real golden crown. She is given golden sandals for her footwear, and a fake katana as a prop. She also has golden eyeshadow on as well as some sparkling powder sprinkled on her face. She feels like a warrior now, with a touch of royalty. Rae enjoys herself with this aesthetic between the time her stylist left her on her own and the time Navi arrives to give her tips about the interview. Navi may be a bit too awkward for him to give advice himself, but Rae can manage.

When the interviews begin that night, Rae would fiddle and twiddle impatiently. Her attention has been flickering between herself and the tributes' interviews. Then her turn finally comes.

"From District Nine, let us please welcome Raenu Pyrite!"

The crowd cheers as she enters the stage regally with her golden warrior attire. She smiles and waves to the crowd to show them that she enjoys being here, and when she takes her seat, she does it feeling like a queen.

The interviewer starts off with, "You look majestic tonight, Raenu!"

"Thank you! You can call me Rae."

"Ah, like the Rae from the sunshine?"

The crowd laughs at the interviewer's joke, and Rae chuckles along.

She responds with, "Yeah. It helps that my golden outfit makes me shine like a queen, don't you think?"

"I think so too! In that case, how exactly do you plan to get all the way to the victor's throne?"

"I would lead my own path going into these games. I refuse to be someone's peasant or stepping stone. A queen is able to stand up in her own right. That's what I plan to be."

The crowd cheers, and she looks around the crowd with a professional and regal smile. She gives the camera a sly and smug smile, hoping to say without uttering a word that she's just as good as Aveline, if not better.

Oh wait, she's dead. Mwahaha!

She gets asked about her life back home and her family, and she talks about her family and how she cares for them, just right before the buzzer goes off. The crowd cheers aloud as she stands up like the golden queen she feels like tonight.

"Rae Pyrite, everyone!"