President Rosa Snow's POV:

I wake up in one of my private rooms lying on a hard bed that isn't my own; Cyan hovers nervously around my bed while Ajax stands at alert at my door. I sit up quickly and find I need to lie down again.

"Madam President you're okay" Cyan gasps "You had us so worried then."

"Of course I am" I reply trying to sit up again, why did everything hurt so much? "Why wouldn't I be?" Why did I feel so dizzy?

"The explosion Miss" Cyan squeaks "at the tribute parade"

"Isn't that today?" I ask, not fully listening to her "I need to get ready." I try to swing my legs from the bed but they don't seem to want to move. I lie back down and close my eyes as Cyan begins to whiter.

"It was today oh gosh can you not remember miss, oh gosh" This doesn't seem to be boding well for me. I brace myself as I realise I'm about to discover whatever it is I seem to be forgetting.

"There was an explosion Madam President" Ajax tells me, his cool calm voice bringing a bit of stability to my shaking nerves "We believe it was aimed at yourself"

"But who?" My eyes fly open and I look towards Ajax as he takes a few steps towards my bed.

"We have our best men and women working on it as we speak. We will find out who would do a thing like this and make them pay for it."

"During the parade?"

"Yes"

"Oh gosh I need to get the doctor and tell him you're awake." Cyan shouts as she runs from the room. As she does so Ajax finishes walking over to my bed.

"I didn't think we'd get you out of the rubble in time" he says, betraying some of his emotion for me in his voice as he speaks "But there's something else, something I don't want you to hear from some doctor. Your legs."

"They're not working. I've noticed that much at least."

"The rubble from the explosion crushed a portion of your spine. For the moment at least you're paralysed from the waist down."

I take a deep breath and process the information as Cyan and a doctor return, from the way their all acting it appears I'm lucky to be alive. As I lay and let the doctor take some blood and run an x-ray over my legs I look over at Ajax who has returned to the door in the corner. I need to talk to him; I need to know what happened.

"Out!" I cry eventually.

"But Madam President I need to..." The doctor begins.

"I'm not going anywhere am I" I snap back "I need to talk to Ajax alone."

Cyan and the doctor bow and leave me alone with Ajax.

"I need to know what happened. Call your people I need an update."

He nods and flicks a switch near his ear where his communication device is imbedded. "Any news?" he asks, "Yes. Okay. Understood. Then keep looking, I don't want you to rest understand? Good. Over and Out."

"Still no leads" he says "The team are going over the security and camera feeds now."

"What about the tributes?"

"All back in the centre, with the mentors, the pair from Eight tried to run but didn't make it far and the girl from Four has broken her arm but we can fix it before the games. We've put the whole centre on lockdown till we finish interviewing everyone. There were also two fatalities in the crowd, an elderly woman had a heart attack and a young boy was trampled in a stampede."

"How dreadful, that someone would do this today. Why?"

"We have to assume these were anti-games rebels" I'm told "They aimed their attack at you at a perfect time."

"How much did the districts see?"

"Nothing really, the camera was in the studio when the explosion happened and the feeds were all cut off"

"Good" I take another deep breath and relax back into my bed with a yawn, this was an awful lot of information to take in when I felt so weak. "Can you tell Cyan and that doctor to leave me for a while, I need more rest"

"Of course Rosa" he says and I allow myself a smile as I drift back into darkness.

Amethyst Swift's POV:

The tribute centre is on lockdown all tributes and mentors are to remain in their quarters until tomorrow morning when the tributes only will be allowed out to begin to train. They didn't say what us mentors instructions are but I'd guess we'll have to stay up here until the questioning has finished. After all who'd have more motives to blow up the president than someone who'd been forced through the games?

Nero is livid of course, he's already told me that the night after the parade is usually the best night to gain sponsors with our tributes images still fresh in the capitols brains. But tonight all they will see is rubble and carnage. The bomb exploded at a perfect time really, it caused disruption to the parade which was being screened across the country and threw the first few days of the games into chaos.

After Olivia and Cassius go to their rooms to get an early night before the training, I'm stuck for something to do. Tertia has headed home and I can hear Nero shouting down the phone at someone about disgusting treatment or something, it's rather diva of him but I guess he's after two wins in a row like the rest of us are and the curfew isn't going to help that.

I slop onto the couch and flick around some of the many channels for a while before I get bored of that too. I'd have thought my first night in the capitol mentoring would be actually fun.

"Bored" I cry out and Nero looks up from his phone

"Then go to bed then" he says

"Not tired" I sigh, "I need some fresh air, but all the windows are locked"

"Try the roof" he says "the elevator will take you up there and back to here only though so you can't visit any other districts floors."

I don't have any reason to visit any of the other mentors as I barely know them yet so I decide to go for a trip up to the roof. Without a word of goodbye I jump from the couch and head into the elevator, if I'd known I could have been up in the fresh air looking over the city this whole time I'd have gone up there hours ago. The doors open to a rooftop garden with benches and a small green house and I wonder what the purpose of it must be, surely no tributes ever discover it, it must be for the mentors then, when they need to get away from it all. I picture a couple of the District Eleven mentors gardening in the greenhouse and ones from Seven relaxing beneath the small tree in the centre.

Breathing in the air I wander to the edge and look down to the streets below, they're mostly deserted except for a few people hurrying to where they need to go. Nero had told me about the sights and sounds of the first nights parties but tonight it seems no-one wants to celebrate the games.

I'm looking out towards the mountains and thinking of home when a clatter behind me catches my attention.

"Crap" swears a young male voice, a tribute I think, he must have snuck up here after me or was he here first?

"Hello" I call, putting on the voice I use to tell off tributes in the training centre "You shouldn't be up here you know"

"What you gonna do about it?" he replies calmly stepping out of the shadows, I can see a wisp of smoke rising from his hand and realise he's smoking.

"You shouldn't be smoking either" I say

"What can you do though Amethyst Swift?" he says with a shrug "Tell my mentors, they suggested here so I didn't stink out our rooms."

"It's not good for you" I say

"Neither are the games"

I must admit he has a point, who am I to deny him a last bit of freedom?

"Your life kid" I sigh eventually, my peaceful trip to the roof feels wasted now, I may as well just go lie in my bed till I fall asleep. I turn and walk towards the elevator.

"Amethyst, can I ask you something?"

"If you must"

"How did you ... I mean how do you win the games?"

"By trying bloody hard" I reply, continuing my walk towards the door, my advice was to be used on my own tributes not this kid, the less I thought about him the better.

"I tried to get away tonight with Lurex" he says "I tried really bloody hard and all we got were black eyes from some peacekeepers."

"You ran?"

"Yeah, when the stage blew up, we just went for it." He laughs "thought we'd made it too till we bashed into two peacekeepers."

"You're fools to think you can escape" I say looking out to the city's skyline "Just play the games like everyone else."

"Easy for you to say Victor" he murmurs as I finally step into the elevator and the doors close behind me. As I fly towards the bottom of the tower I hold onto a rail to steady myself, easy he'd said as if he thinks it's over for me now.

But it's not over, I have the rest of my life to meet kids just like him, full of life and promise and watch them be snuffed out from the world. Running during the chaos though, that was clever, he might have a chance. But then Olivia and Cassius... no.

The doors fly open and I see that Nero is still sat on the phone, yelling at someone else about getting our tributes images up in his gyms. Before he spots me I straighten up and remove any emotion from my face. I'm a District Two victor I tell myself and victors and mentors take this in their stride. We don't sob over nameless bloodbaths and we focus on the prize and when we go home empty handed we don't look back on our failures just keep looking forward to the future.

A/N: Just a filler chapter today, writing the training may take a few weeks so I hope you won't mind the wait.