Not a soul speaks in the room as metal clinks against plates. Occasionally Haymitch will unscrew a flask and take a quick swig before getting back to the brunch.
It's Brutus who breaks the silence and Katniss, despite the heavy atmosphere, wishes he didn't.
"So you can shoot a little bow and arrow? Tell me, do you think you can actually kill somebody?"
She bites her tongue to stop from showing any expression of shock or fear. How could she admit to them that she had so many qualms about killing in the arena? She couldn't very well say that to her new ally and his mentor who would likely be dealing with much more sponsor money than Haymitch would.
She tries to find the right words to explain that she's still useful to them but to her surprise it's Haymitch who comes to her defense.
"Sure she can shoot. Back in 12 she's the best hunter around."
"Hunter?" Brutus asks.
"Hits all the little woodland creatures between the eyes." He slurs and then takes another drink before realizing he's gotten to the bottom of the flask. He looks at it as though it was a betrayal and slowly puts it back into his pocket.
Brutus, no longer paying attention to them but rather focusing on what this means for Cato, seems rather happy by this new tidbit of information. "Assuming there's a fair number of animals in this year's arena then we can save a fair amount of money on food."
This seems to make everybody at the table happy.
Cato speaks for the first time, though Katniss had noticed he'd been following every word spoken at the table very carefully. "What about tomorrow at the interviews? How should we play that? "
"The wonderful thing about the lineup is that he," Brutus nods to Cato, "can drop this little bombshell and get all of Panem excited. Then they'll be waiting the whole time for you." Brutus indicates Katniss this time.
Haymitch finally finishes the food on his plate and throws his garbled thoughts out there.
"The District 1 kids will go first but I doubt they'll have anything interesting to share. If the boy does a good enough job then nobody will really pay attention to the girl. District 4 isn't all that impressive this year so I wouldn't worry too much about them." He taps his chin, "Then that District 6 kid might have something interesting to say." He pauses, still thinking about the ramifications of what the District 6 boy speaking with Caesar might be.
He's unaware of the scowl that suddenly takes over Cato's face or the way he suddenly looks like he wants to break something. Katniss wouldn't doubt it.
Brutus smiles, loving the anger that clouds his Tribute.
Haymitch finally gives up on thinking of the potential outcomes tomorrow night may bring and instead claps his hands.
"You two," he points his shaky fingers to Cato and Katniss, "keep your little alliance to yourself for now. If anybody else figures it out then they'll have time to pull some stunt during the interviews."
Katniss is unsure of what kind of stunt somebody could try to pull and Cato must feel the same way because he voices her question.
Haymitch shrugs. "Your little district partner finds out and she goes running to the District 6 boy. You drop the bombshell to Caesar and maybe the two of them have already planned something much bigger that overshadows you two. Something stupid like her confessing she has feelings for him. Katniss here may be a good hunter but she's about as interesting as a slug."
Katniss's eyes flashed dangerously over to her mentor. She still wasn't sure whether Haymitch liked her or not but moments like these hinted to her that he didn't.
The group finishes up with their drinks before getting ready to head down and have their skills evaluated for a score.
Katniss rushes out of the room, pushing past Effie and Haymitch and heading straight for the elevator.
It opens with a cheerful ding that she can hardly hear through the pounding in her ears and screaming in her head.
She'd done something terrible, she attacked the Gamemakers. More specifically their food, but still she was sure there would be ramifications. Would they arrest her? Kill her family? Give her a zero?
She practically fell out of the elevator when it finally opened to the twelfth floor.
Peeta was sitting there twiddling his thumbs and looking at her anxiously. "So how'd you do?" he asks in a voice that would so genuine in curiosity that it almost hurt.
She can't stand looking at him or knowing that he'll be dead soon. She storms straight to her room and locks the door behind her as she throws herself onto the bed.
About a half an hour later Haymitch comes to see her.
He's upset when she tells him what happened, but not totally discouraged.
"Let's just wait until tonight."
Her hands are shaking when she sits down with the others. She draws her knees to her chest despite Effie's protest. She wonders what Cato will think when a 0 pops on the screen for her.
She tries to think of any other Tribute from the past to score a 0, but none come to mind.
In her peripheral vision, she can spot Haymitch watching her. She's reassured when Cinna takes her hand and gives it a light squeeze. He lets go when the music blasts through the room and Caesar Flickerman appears on screen. The host is the same as always, a ridiculous new hair color and a smile that stretches from ear to ear. He gives the usual speech about how Tributes are scored on a scale of 0 to 12. He gets right down to business and Tributes faces begin to show up on the screen with numbers appearing beside them.
Both Tributes from District 1 score 9, a decent score for Careers.
Cato's face shows up accompanied by a 10. She glances to Haymitch but his face is wiped clean of any expression.
The District 2 girl also scores a 10.
The District 4 boy gets an 8 and the girl gets a meager 7.
Katniss and the others are slightly surprised when the District 6 boy, Jason, gets a score of 5. She knows that both Brutus and Cato must be grinning right now.
The only other scores that Katniss pays attention to are the District 11 Tributes. Thresh with a 10 and Rue with a 7.
Caesar moves on to District 12 and her heart begins to beat erratically.
She offers her congratulations to Peeta when he receives in 8, an impressive feat for somebody from their District. They quiet down when her face suddenly appears with a number slowly appearing beside it.
At first she thinks she scored a 1. It's only after blinking and the screaming in the room that she sees the additional 1 beside it. An 11.
Caesar thanks everybody for watching and reminds them that tomorrow will be the interviews.
Katniss doesn't hear this as she is suddenly being hugged and thrown around the room as people grab her shoulders and pat her on the back.
"Well who knew you had it in you?" Haymitch chuckles lightly.
Jason watches the screen unmoving. His mentors are useless, completely bugged out on morphling. His District partner is quiet as she slips from the room.
All he can see is that 5.
He had the Careers wrapped around his fingers but after tonight he wasn't so sure.
He could tell them it was a ploy, a way for him to be less noticeable until the official announcement of his leadership.
Could they respect that though? They were, after all, brutes who only cared about victory. He finally turned the screen off and slowly heads to his room.
The 5 was only a setback.
Tomorrow at the interviews he would fix all of it.
Enobaria leaves the room without comment. This makes Brutus laugh as he's never seen her speechless before.
She doesn't know about the alliance of course, but she must feel shame for encouraging Clove to ally with the boy who only scored a 5.
Clove left the room the second Caesar said good night and Brutus was fairly certain he wouldn't see her again until the morning, when her room and manicured nails destroyed.
It's not until Antony leaves the room that Brutus pours a glass of whiskey and lets himself smile.
"Well who knew the little Girl on Fire had an 11 in her?"
"I told you she was good with a bow."
"Glimmer's good with the bow."
"Glimmer doesn't hit the bull's-eye every time."
Brutus throws the drink down his throat and pours another. "You don't get an 11 for hitting the bull's-eye. I want to ask her how she did it before the interviews tomorrow."
"Same."
Brutus could tell that Cato's ego had doubled when Jason's score had shown up. He also knew that Katniss's had been a slight punch to him.
"Cheer up boy. Your little ally just brought in a fair share of sponsor dollars."
Cato doesn't answer. Instead, he plots out his interview for tomorrow night.