"Survival"

A/N: Nightly Recap #2 coming at you all with Udon Chang of District Eight. Enjoy!

This is survival of the fittest

This is do or die

This is the winner takes it all

So take it all~

Udon Chang, 16, District Eight

The first day of training had proved more useful than Udon had expected. He spent most of the day at the survival stations, absorbing as much information as he could. If he could have two more days of learning, he felt confident that he could survive whatever the arena threw at him. Inesa had been insistent he spend some time at the hand-to-hand combat station, and even that proved to be surprisingly useful. It had impressed the Careers enough to invite them into their alliance, at the very least. Of course, Inesa accepting their offer on behalf of him was something he didn't appreciate.

He could already tell she was trying to do something. He had been crass with her, blunt and sarcastic, the same way he was to everyone else. And yet still Inesa had been adamant to ally with him, for no apparent reason. Either she was an idiot, or trying to play him. Regardless of which it was, he wasn't going to stick around to find out. The boy from Two was obsessed with finding members for his own alliance, and Udon would be sure to approach him. He seemed to appreciate smarts, and so Udon wouldn't take long to win him over. From there, he'd be in with both alliances, and could stick with whichever one survived the bloodbath. Then he could finish off the survivors and run the arena the way he always intended to: alone.

He was sure that if he shared his idea with his mentor, she would try to dissuade him. They'd be calling him a villain back home, but he didn't care. Nothing that anyone else thought mattered. He knew what it took to survive, what it took to win. And he would come out of the arena, no matter how much blood he had to spill, and when he got back home he would finally have his revenge. His father would pay. Udon had everyone exactly where he wanted to, it was almost sad how easy it all was.

Their escort Gabriel was with Udon on the couch, watching the pre-show for the Nightly Report with him, while Mira and Inesa were who knew where. Udon figured Mira was probably locked in her room, per usual, while Inesa could be anywhere. She had watched the Nightly Report with Udon yesterday, but apparently his commentary had thrown her off and she decided to watch this one alone. Fine with Udon.

"So, any hot tea from the training center?" Gabriel asked, picking at his nails and examining the rose red color in the dim light.

"Yeah, the Career ripped out two of the twelve-year-olds throats out and they had to kick us all out because the training center was a literal bath of fucking blood," Udon quipped.

Gabriel raised his eyebrows. "Now that's steamy."

Udon couldn't decide whether his escort knew he was being sarcastic or not. He decided to hold his tongue. The report was starting up anyways, now that those annoying talking heads had finished blabbering on incessantly about their favorite tributes, ignoring the real contenders like Udon of course in favor of the 'cute' tributes like that weakling boy from Ten.

The report started with the updated popularity ratings, and Udon scowled and muttered a string of expletives when his ranking only improved to a C+. Eighteenth place, and two spots behind Inesa? They were a bunch of idiots, is what they were, but whatever. Once they saw his training score and heard him in the interview, and most of all, saw his plan go into action in the arena, they'd all start flocking to him in no time.

Still though, they were a bunch of fucking idiots, and he would be sure to let them know that as soon as he got the opportunity.

"Looks like you and Inesa are not the hot stuff, huh?" Gabriel said lazily.

"That's cause Capitolites are all just like you, a bunch of dimwitted idiots with no fucking ability to think outside of who looks hot or cute," Udon spat.

Gabriel didn't seem to hear the insult, continuing to hold his nails up and examine them. "I could spread some hot goss about you and Inesa, get the interest rolling. Some real juicy scandal would boost your ratings right on up there. And that would spell p-r-o, 'promotion' for me."

"I don't need any of your pigshit help to get popular," Udon grumbled.

"Whatever you say, mr. eighteenth," Gabriel said.

Udon didn't justify that with a response, even if he felt tempted to rip those long nails right out of his escort's fingers.

The predicted placements left him with enough good news to hold him over, though, with the betters giving him an over/under of ten and a half. That put him in tenth place, which was still stupid, but better at least. And it would only go up once they saw his training score. That was what really mattered anyways, not that glorified beauty pageant, gossip-inspired, dumbass list of 'popularity.' It was the betting corner that mattered, the people with half a brain who gambled big sums of money on their favorite bets. And he would be sure to be first on their list now that he had cracked the 'contenders' list.

The featured tributes were next, and of course Udon wasn't one of the two selections. That was fine with him, though. He still had four more days to be chosen, and the later they picked him the better. That way people would be sure not to forget him when they placed their big bets right prior to the Games starting. Maybe they would highlight him by showing off his private session performance, or him dazzling the interviews, or winning over the everyman during the party. Regardless, he was gonna shine, and for now he could wait it over.

Fabius moved from one attractive girl to another, selecting Ciera this time and gushing over her looks, with a tiny bit thrown in there about her intelligence and her alliance with Denver. Mostly, though, he circled back to appearance, which was about as surprising to Udon as his father saying something manipulative and fucked up on any given day. Meaning: zero surprise whatsoever.

Coira at least put in the effort to dig deeper, but she was no smarter than Fabius, being all about sentimentality and having no actual rational thought. She chose the girl from Five that had earned the nickname "River" and hyped her up as if she were an actual contender instead of bloodbath fodder. Udon mostly tuned it out, but overheard Coira gushing about the girl's survival abilities and independence, and decided it wouldn't be the worst idea to at least keep an eye out for the girl during tomorrow's training.

Finally, they moved onto the Featured Moments. Last time they had featured a dull, meaningless moment of Inesa pestering Udon into allying with her and played it off as sentimentality. Udon muttered to himself that "this time they'd better show me kicking ass."

Gabriel murmured back something that Udon couldn't make out but vaguely resembled doubt, and so Udon scowled at his escort, before switching his attention back to the television so as to not miss any important information.

The lowest ranked moment was unsurprisingly the weakling district Six duo, as they both woke up two hours late and scrambled down to training still in their pajamas, forcibly sent back up to their floor to change into training gear. Earhart was allowed to wear their pilot goggles from the chariot, though, and they seemed content with that. Coira and Fabius both agreed that the Six duo were cute, but two to avoid for betters, unless you were gambling on who dies in the bloodbath.

The second lowest moment flashed as District Eight, and Udon just about popped a blood vessel. The moment was him kicking ass, going toe to toe with the trainer at the hand-to-hand combat station, something Udon was glad they showcased since his intelligence would shine naturally, but then switched to Inesa sneaking her way into the alliance with District Four with ease, and adding Udon in without consultation. Any reservations of ensuring Inesa died by the end of day one, while already absent, were doubly removed from his thoughts. His stupid district partner was holding him back and keeping him at the tail end of the highlights, where nobody was even paying attention. He would have to be sure to make a splash tomorrow.

"Don't even say a fucking thing," Udon spat out, too aware of the way Gabriel's mouth opened to undoubtedly suggest spreading gossip about him again.

The next few moments flew by, a string of dull moments that Udon's easily should have been placed ahead of. There was the boy from Seven looking mediocre with the axes and being recruited by the Careers, and then Aphrodite taking charge and solidifying the six person alliance at lunch, an alliance Coira was quick to call the weakest, flimsiest Career alliance she had ever seen. Udon hardly disagreed.

Next up was District Nine and the other Career alliance, as Maya went back and forth in a battle of wits with Talon of District Two and impressed him enough to earn her spot in their alliance. Udon found himself even more attracted to the other alliance, enticed at the idea of not being surrounded by total idiots. But then again, if he intended on slitting their throats night one, maybe idiots were for the best. Coira and Fabius both agreed they had cautious optimism for the other Career pack's prospects, depending who else they added.

In seventh place, the small boy from Ten yet again got a high placement just for doing some stupid, meaningless thing that the Capitolites gushed over as being cute, as if this were a pageant and not a deathmatch. Sixth place was equally boring as they highlighted the stuttering boy from Twelve as he chatted and tentatively allied with the girl from Eleven.

Next up was River, as she showed precision with the bow that even Udon had to admit was surprisingly impressive. He doubled his note to keep an eye on her, though mostly to check out who tried to start an alliance with her, and less out of a personal interest. The last thing he wanted to do in the arena was babysit a weird girl who never seemed to talk.

The Three duo won fourth place, as Ty and Julie competed in a climbing contest that Ty showed decently impressive skills at, while Julie skipped up the wall as if she were walking on flat ground. Her splint had only been removed an hour before at lunch, yet it looked like she had nothing holding her back at all. Udon made a mental note to himself that if he ever ran into her, to not let her get anywhere that she could climb and take advantage of her vertical abilities.

The first of the top three moments was Marquise, who skyrocketed in the rankings as he had a conversation with one of the hand-to-hand trainers about martial arts and what he called 'Aikido.' Udon mostly tuned it out and wondered why anyone could possibly find talking so interesting, then was forced to regain interest as the two sparred, and Marquise showed phenomenal skill with a staff as he redirected and disarmed his opponent with relative ease, and without harming the trainer in any meaningful way. Coira pointed out that betters looking for a dark horse could do much worse than the quiet man who was sure to skyrocket up predicted placements once training scores were released.

Second place was District One, as they narrowly missed getting back to back first place moments. This one was all Troy, as he faced off against three trainers in a brawl with swords, and defeated the three of them without so much as breaking a sweat, bulldozing through them as if they were children and he were a man. With how large he was, that certainly seemed to be the case for the arena. Udon hoped that he met his end in what was sure to be a chaotic and messy bloodbath, because otherwise he was unsure of anyone's ability to defeat him in a square fight.

Finally, the top moment of the day was won over by Lana Birkhead of District Two. Udon watched with piqued interest as his potential future ally entered the simulation room on the highest possible difficulty, armed with two knives held in reverse grip in her hands. The simulation started, and scores of enemies stormed at her with weapons while arrows flew at her. She deftly dodged away from every strike, sliding and ducking her way through opponents and carefully placing her slashes on fatal arteries and muscles that left her opponents crippled. Within a few moments that left Udon's head spinning and unable to comprehend fully what was happening, all of Lana's virtual opponents were disarmed and motionless. Udon expected the clip to end, but it kept rolling just long enough to show Lana walk up to each individual opponent, methodically slitting each of their throats to insure the kill.

Udon felt his hands go slick with sweat, and he bit down on his tongue, shaking away the nerves that threatened to slip into his system. He was a survivor, he knew that. It didn't matter if the other tributes were trained and deadly in a one on one fight, because he'd never give them the chance. All of them would be dead by the end of the first day, and he'd be free to hunt down the weaklings that survived the bloodbath all on his lonesome. It didn't matter what he had to do to win, he would do it, and because of that he would be the one to earn the crown. No hesitation, no doubts, nothing that he'd refuse to do.

Udon Chang would survive, no matter what.

A/N: As always, Nightly Recap is posted to my blog if you want all the info from popularity rankings to predicted placements, to a summary of the featured moments and the confirmed alliances. Hope y'all enjoyed and see you next week with training day 2, featuring Marquise, Juniper, Talon, and River!

Trivia (1 point): Any moments that stand out to you/have you curious?