I decided within the first 3 minutes that I didn't like the Capitol.

Sure, it was nice... if you wanted thousands of freaks fawning and screaming over you.

Had nobody here heard of personal space?

It took all that I had to keep from whipping my knives into the crowds, but something told me that murder was frowned upon outside of the Arena. So instead, I just smirked at the crowd and crossed my arms, letting them know who the superior one was here.

As Cato and I were escorted off the train and into our private room with our Mentors, I couldn't help but feel a slight pang of jealously as I watched Cato grin and wave to his sea of female admirers. I know such a simple gesture shouldn't set me off, but I can't help and be a little angry.

"Clove, what's your deal?" Cato muttered from the corner of his mouth, still smiling and winking at the crowds around us.

"Nothing" I hissed through gritted teeth as I forced myself to keep smiling while imagining slitting the throats of all the Capitol freaks surrounding us. Especially the girls.

We continued this painstakingly difficult trek through the crowd until finally we were behind closed doors and I could drop the ridiculous act. I yawned and stretched my arms out, stabbing the table with one of the knives strapped to my belt.

"That is mahogany!" Chestnut, one of our hosts cried, but she was immediately silenced with one look from me.

"Don't bother, you'll be lucky if everything is shredded tomorrow. You should see what she did to the train" Cato chuckled, as I whipped around to stare at him.

"How did you find out about that?" I demanded. There was no way he could have seen, our rooms were on opposite ends of that stupid train.

"You're not nearly as sneaky as you think you are, Clove" he grinned and flopped down on the couch.

"So, when are we gonna meet our stylists?" he asked Chestnut as he popped a few chocolates from the dish on the table into his mouth.

I just stared incredulously at him as Chestnut babbled on and on about how great our stylists were going to be and how they would "capture our true essence and put them on display for the whole world to see."

I snorted.

Sounded unappealing, to say the least.

We were shuffled from room to room, the stylists primping and prepping us to look "absolutely fabulous" for our debut into the Capitol: the tribute parade.

They finally decided on simple gold gladiator outfits to outline our intimidating persona and accent our ferocity. Normally I could care less about all of that aesthetic crap, but I admitted that we did look pretty menacing. Cato's bulging arm muscles were left out of his chest plate, giving him the look of a hardened, actual gladiator, while I had a golden crown placed upon my head. A crown meant to symbolize the Victor crown, and how great it would look placed upon my head.

"Ready for this ride? Cause I'm already bored shitless" Cato whispered to me as they loaded us onto our chariots.

I bit my lip and temporarily hated myself. It was almost like the past couple of days had never happened, because such a simple comment reminded me of all of the years that Cato and I had been friends. When we were little, he would swear and I would cover my mouth and pretend to be offended while all the while laughing to myself. If he continued to remind me of all the memories we shared, it would make it that much harder to kill him, in the end. It would be hard enough, betraying him, and all of this wasn't making it any easier on me.

"That makes two of us" I murmured, as I attempted to keep my eyes fixed ahead and my face void of all emotion. But as Cato's eyes narrowed, trying to analyze my thoughts, I saw the familiar spark of recognition cross his face and the triumphant smirk that followed.

Once again, Cato had managed to break through yet another one of my masks.

And I was powerless to stop him.

A Note From The Author:

Needless to say, this kind of digressed from where I originally imagined it, but whatever!
That's creative writing for you!
Anyways, please review!