A/N: I'm really excited about this fic! Thanks to all who subscribed, favorited, and/or reviewed!

He was swinging a heavy-looking sword at a training dummy.

I was watching from afar.

It amazed me the sheer power that he could wield with such a large weapon. To me, any blade that I couldn't quickly and easily throw was clumsy and unappealing, but I supposed he relied more on his strength than on his wits. He fastened his sword back into his belt, and walked toward the dummy. He had taken only one slice and the head was completely detached from the body. It fell to the floor with a thud as the boy ran a hand through his spiky blonde hair. I watched as his clear blue eyes surveyed damage and his knobby fingers ran over the cut on the dummy. He was kind of cute, even for a brainless, sword-obbsessed boy.

"Everyone, please listen up" the voice of a Marius, the victor of the 64th Games, boomed throughout the gym that we were in. "We have some fresh meat joining our ranks today and I want you all to make her feel welcome. Clove, can you please come up here?"

I stood, frozen, as the eyes of about 30 or so other kids turned my way. The boy with the sword who I had been watching leaned back lazily and yawned.

Then, just like that, I felt my feet carrying me over to where Marius was standing.

"Very good... Now Clove. Show us what you can do" he said as he gestured to three targets set up on the wall opposite us.

"You want me to throw my knives at those?" I smirked, bored, as I tightened my grip on the two in my hands. Without waiting for his answer, I whipped the first out of my right hand, landing a bulls-eye in the target to my left. Then, from my left hand, I thrust it forward, hitting the right target dead center. I turned to Marius, and with a smirk on my face, started to speak.

"Oh, you didn't want me to wait, did you?"

His beaming face wavered, if only for a second, but he quickly composed himself before addressing me.

"No, that was near perfection" he said. "Welcome, Clove, to the long road to becoming a Career."

The other kids slowly lost interested, and began to turn back to their individual activities. I stamped my foot in anger. Near perfection? Only near perfection? This angered me. I was perfection. And if that stupid old man couldn't see that, then I'd demonstrate my "near perfection" skills on him. I pulled the last of my knives out of my belt and glared at the center target, imaging it was Marius Skeeter himself.

I threw. And as usual, I didn't miss.

Just then, the boy with the sword walked over to me, an arrogant grin plastered on his face.

"Hey" he said cockily.

"What" I snarled as I walked over to retrieve my knives. If they had really wanted to challenge me, they could have at least made the targets moving or something else. Anything else, really. Stationary targets just felt like cheating. If I hit to moving target, dead on, would that be perfection? Because I could do that, with ease.

"So where did you learn to throw knives like that?" the boy asked as he leaned against one of the targets.

"My dad taught me when I was little" I muttered, as I dislodged my first knife from the target.

"I dunno, you're still pretty little" he said, grinning again. He had a point, though. At a measly 4' 8", I was still pretty small for my age, and he was easily 5'5". I turned to glare at him as I reached for my other knives, but he had already turned his back to me and was walking away.

"Wait," I paused, immediately regretting speaking. "What's your name?" I asked as I tucked my knives back into my belt. I was going to have to sharpen them; their points were nearly ruined from such simple throws. What a shame.

"It's Cato," he winked as he flashed me his perfect rows of pearly whites. "I suppose I'll see you around, then?" He asked as he looked at me with his bright eyes. I thought about this for a moment before I nodded.

Perhaps I would like to see more of The Boy With The Sword.

A Note From The Author:
I'm really stoked right now, because I know exactly where I want to take this. Eeep!
Reviews are highly appreciated as they help me know what I'm doing right/wrong.
So please, review!