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So sad.

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Or sad. Very sad. Or happy... It's up to you~

That night I slept on a full stomach, in a comfortable bed and in silken PJ's, and it was one of the best night's sleep I had ever had. I hadn't slept well since the reaping, so I suppose the exhaustion finally caught up with me. Or maybe I was just relaxed because all the stressful social niceties were over, and I would only be judged on my ability to fight from here on out.

I woke up to Aelia knocking on the door, saying it was time to get "up, up, UP!", and I just groaned and rolled over in my bed. After a few minutes I did get up, though, and went to the closet to find an acceptable outfit for the day.

There was only one outfit in the closet, and it was hanging from the door. It was a simple, black, skin-tight black training uniform with the number twelve written in gold thread on the left side of my chest, with a belt going over my hips for no apparent reason aside from decoration.

Well, it could be worse – it could have been one of Aelia's outfits, and then I would probably die of embarrassment.

I pulled my freshly dyed fiery curls into a ponytail and glanced at myself in the mirror. I didn't look quite as not-me as last night, but there was still a certain otherworldly quality about my eyes, which was probably just because they were such a bright blue while my hair was so incredibly orange. I straightened the necklace that Dad had made me, and brushed a stray yellow curl out of my eyes.

Today, we weren't really supposed to train. The uniform was just for looks, I knew that, but I couldn't help but wish we started training today. All we were supposed to do was go on a tour of the Capitol for the next three days, featuring in various parties with our symbols and our uniforms, trying to get sponsors. We didn't start training until after then, and then it was a week solid of training, one day of relaxing and then we went into the arena.

That meant we had eleven days until I was supposed to kill most of the inhabitants of the building I was sleeping in, and I couldn't say I was looking forward to it, but I did want to get this out of the way.

I took a deep breath, looked at myself in the mirror one more time, and then I went outside. John walked with me to the breakfast table, not entirely sure of himself while standing next to me.

"It's brave," he said after a long silence.

"What?" I asked, not sure what he meant.

"What you're doing for your brother," John said, glancing down at his toes. "I wish I had someone who cared that much about me."

"Oh," I replied, unsure of how to react. It was how Mom had raised me, to always take care of your siblings because you never know when they'll be gone.

"I want you to know that I'm not going to hurt him," John said, setting his jaw and meeting my gaze. "Or you. I can't say that I'm not going to kill anyone, I think I will under pressure but I'm not going to hurt either of you, I know you too well."

"Oh, uh... ah... thanks." Now it was my turn to look down, awkward and embarrassed.

"Well... yeah," John said, just as awkward, and then he sat down on the other side of the table and began serving himself breakfast. Suddenly, I found myself not particularly hungry and instead I just stared at the food.

Naevius sat down next to me, and served himself some strips of bacon.

"Where's Hadriana?" Ash asked, glancing around.

"She's still sick," Naevius said, worry furrowing his brow slightly. "She's getting worse, I think, but doesn't want to see a doctor. Don't worry, she should be better in a week."

"Oh,"Ash said, returning to his own plate.

"You did well in the interviews." Naevius glanced at me, scooping some eggs into his mouth. "You captured everyone's attention, the whole Capitol remembers you now."

"Oh, cool," I said, distracting myself by grabbing a piece of toast and nibbling around the edges.

"I've already got six people lining up to sponsor you, you know," Naevius continued after he finished his bite of eggs, "You brought some drama to the screen, and that's what everyone likes in the games."

I remembered Mom telling me about how it was her dramatic relationship with Peeta that got them the sponsors required to win the games, and I nodded.

"Make sure you keep up that fire while going around town today," Naevius added, and I realized with disappointment that the stressful social niceties were not over.

I nodded again, and waited for the others to finish breakfast. After what seemed like an eternity, it was time to go downstairs. We piled into the elevator and went down through the levels of the building; eleven, ten, nine, eight... two, one. I stepped out of the elevator, brushing that one stray strand of hair out of my eyes again, and looked around.

"You are going to be in groups of thirteen while going around the city," Aelia began, clapping her hands together. "Because everyone wants to meet someone from each district, so that is how it's being divided up!"

We were ushered around in no particular order, and to my dismay I ended up standing next to Ty Hawthorne on the far side of the room, waiting to go tour the Capitol.

"Hey," he elbowed me gently in the ribs, and I took a step further away from him. "So, we're allies and stuff."

"I suppose," I acknowledged, without looking him in the eyes.

"Oh, come on, Rosa," he said, laughing brightly. I shot him a look. "We're allies, you could at least look me in the eye, mate."

I turned slowly and looked up into his face. He was smiling a lopsided sort of smile and his dark hair was pushed back behind his ears, but it was too short and kept falling into his eyes. He was much taller than I'd realized, so there was no uncertainty as to whether I was looking up at him or not – I was definitely looking up.

"We are going into an arena to fight to the death," I said, my tone clipped and cold. "Pardon me if I don't want to get close, personal and friendly with you or anyone for that matter."

"Well, you're going to have to get over that if you want anyone to sponsor you," he said, crossing his arms over his chest. "They like friendly people."

"I don't need to be friendly with other tributes right before killing them, though. I think it would be kind of rude and two-faced to be making jokes with them one minute and then stabbing them through their throats the next, don't you?"

"Well someone's feeling icy today," Ty said, the smile finally disappearing from his face. When it did, I felt guilty for being the one to take it away... He was doing his best to stay positive, and I wasn't really helping.

"Sorry," I sighed. "Just a little edgy, I didn't mean to be that rude."

"Don't worry," he said, some of the smile returning to his face. "It's pretty understandable."

I glanced around the little group that was gathering there. We had Dianna from District One, Ty from District Two, and a boy from three and a girl from four. We had Kiki, the little girl from five, some guy from six, Mirabella from seven, the bigger of the two guys from eight, a guy from nine, one of the Benson twins from ten, a boy from eleven, me, and then the twelve year old girl from thirteen. All together, not too bad a group, at least I knew some of their names...

"Hi," Dianna said awkwardly, waving at Ty and I.

"Hey, Dianna, right?" I asked, reaching out a hand to shake. She hesitated, but shook my outstretched hand anyway. She had pale blonde hair and a healthy glow to her skin, but what struck me most were her eyes. They were slightly different shades of blue, her left being lighter than the other and without a pupil, and I remembered that she was blind in one eye.

"Yeah," she said.

"So, District One... does that mean you're a Career?" Ty joked.

"You're from District Two, what does that make you?" Dianna replied smoothly, flickering those unnerving blue eyes up at Ty. I realized with a start that I had assumed being blind in one eye would put Dianna at a disadvantage, but she had a benefit the rest of us didn't... unnerving the enemy. If I wanted to distract the enemy, I was going to have to flash them or something, all she had to do was watch them.

And so Dianna and Ty went back and forth easily, and I found myself studying her. She was pretty enough, with a heart-shaped face and blonde hair, tan skin and blue eyes, not too skinny or too fat and she had lean muscles coiling around her arms as though she would be good with heavier weaponry, like an ax. She was calm but there was a tenseness in her shoulders and a slight bend to her knees as though she was prepared to spring away at the slightest sign of trouble, but what was the most interesting thing about her posture was in her facial expression... it was obvious that she didn't want to be here.

Most people from District One, Two and Four seemed to be Carreers. With the exception of Ty and maybe the other girl from One, none of them had been too terrified. On some level, they had been eager. They had been strong and confident in their interviews, and they seemed as though they might actually enjoy what they were getting into. Dianna was different...

"Rosa?" Ty said, dragging me back to the real world.

"Hmm?" I asked, glancing up at him.

"You know we're supposed to be going, right?"

I glanced around and realized that aside from Dianna, Ty and I, we were standing alone. Kiki was skipping ahead of us and went around a corner, so we followed her and saw everyone piling into a bus. The bus was crisp and clean and metallic, and inside there were fourteen seats and a drivers seat, all of which were plush chairs with no seat belts. Ty, Dianna and I took three of the four seats left, which were in the very back of the bus.

A woman from the Capitol popped her head into the bus. "Is this Group Two? The one with Dianna Janson, Ty Hawthorne..."

"Yeah!" Ty said loudly, waving his hand from the back. The woman stopped reading off the list of names, pushed her spectacles up on the bridge of her nose and took the fourteenth seat at the front of the bus. A man in simpler clothes than the woman walked onto the bus and sat down in the drivers seat.

"First, we are going to drive by the government buildings. Then, we are going to join President Snow's granddaughter for tea, and then..."

The woman continued, but I tuned her out.

It was going to be a very, very long day.