Chapter Four: Allies

I wake up feeling oddly wary, and I'm momentarily confused as I try to remember why.

Then it hits me – I've just allied, officially, with Cato.

My stomach lurches uncomfortably. For the life of me, I can't decide whether or not that was a smart move. I mean, yes, he's from my district, so I can probably trust – for lack of a better word – him more than anyone else here. But honestly, what if he betrays me? Kills me in my sleep? Here and now, I decide not to sleep at all in the arena. I'll pretend to, sure, but I'm not going to sleep.

I glance at the clock next to my bed and groan when I see that it's three in the morning. No wonder I was so disoriented at first. I sigh and roll over, hoping to fall back asleep. If I'm going to be awake the entire time in the arena, I need to be as rested as possible. Besides, thinking about Cato and even the Games is probably a bad idea this early in the morning.

When I wake up again, I feel much better. I look at the clock – it's eight. Smiling slightly, I crawl out of bed and see that an outfit has been set out for me. I pull on the black pants and olive green tunic, and slip on the pale pink headband. Looking in the mirror, I grimace. My hair looks awful. I pull open all the drawers in my room and, finding a brush, hastily yank it through my dark curls. When I'm more or less happy with it, I step into the black tennis shoes that are waiting for me by my door and walk into the dining room.

Enobaria is waiting for me. "Good, you're up," she says briskly. "Grab some food; we need to go over your strategy for training."

I quickly fill a plate with scrambled eggs and a muffin, then grab a glass of orange juice. I sit down purposefully in front of my mentor. I didn't get a chance to talk to her last night, I was too preoccupied thinking about my new alliance with Cato and those awful District Twelve tributes.

"All right," she says while I shovel food into my mouth. "So we've already decided that you need to, to put it simply, be yourself. Don't waste too much time at stations that you aren't that good at. Stick with the knives mostly, and make sure that everyone knows that you never miss your target. Scare them. And you don't need to be with Cato the whole time, of course, but don't associate yourself with any tributes except for those in your alliance – One, Two, and Four, naturally."

I nod to show that I understand. Mother pretty much gave me this same speech after the reaping, and both my parents have drilled it into me for years prior to this. I could go through training in my sleep, if I had to.

Cato and Yoh enter the room, and I catch Cato's eye. He raises his eyebrows questioningly, as if to ask if we're still allies. The moron – did he really expect me to change my mind overnight? Regardless, I give him a nod to show that we're still good. He fills up a plate with food and sits down across from me, with Yoh next to Enobaria.

I struggle to stifle a laugh at Enobaria's disgusted expression. She detests Yoh; that much is obvious. Normally Brutus always mentors, sharing Enobaria's reasons. But this year he stayed back, for whatever reason. This irritated me at first – it would have been nice to have him as a mentor. Then I thought about it some more, though, and realized that, for one thing, he would have been mentoring Cato, not me. That would have been a problem. Plus, he deserves a break anyway.

Yoh won the Games three years ago. He killed the other tributes by strangling them, which to be honest was pretty horrible to watch. As much as I love the Games, ugh. A lot of people in Two think he did it to impress Enobaria, which everyone finds funny.

Just then, Maio and Cato's stylist walk into the room. They sit down, and then everyone is more or less screaming at Cato and me.

"You were amazing!" cries Maio. I had gone straight to bed last night, and hadn't gotten a chance to see my fabulous stylist. "That was so perfect. No one – no one else could even be compared to you!"

I exchange an exasperated look with Cato – that'll take some getting used to. But really, was Maio blind? Had he seen Twelve?

Either way, I need to thank him. "Oh, I hardly had to do anything," I say dismissively. "It was you who made it perfect! You're right, it was amazing. They loved m—us!" I suppose I'm obligated to say 'us' now, as weird as it is.

Enobaria clears her throat, and I realize that she and Yoh haven't said anything. Wow – was it really just the stylists making all that noise? Yikes. People from the Capitol, honestly…

"Yes, yes, it's all very nice, but we only have so much time before training and Clove and I need to discuss her strategy, so if you'll excuse us…"

Cato glances at me. I shrug. Might as well get this out of the way. "Well, Enobaria," I begin hesitantly, "we were noticing the tributes from Twelve last night, and Cato and I talked about it, and we think we should focus on eliminating them. They could have a lot of sponsors, they could be dangerous. We've already confirmed the alliance," I add. "There's no need to train us separately until the interviews, really."

Enobaria and Yoh look at each other and shrug simultaneously. "Sure," says Yoh. "You're probably right. The last time someone from Twelve made that big a splash at the opening ceremonies, they won. Haymitch Abernathy, remember?" When everyone stares at him, he flushes an ugly maroon color. "I've watched the tapes, all right?" he says defensively.

Enobaria rolls her eyes. "Sure, Yoh," she mutters. Then she turns to Cato and me. "Okay, Twelve," she says. "To be perfectly honest, I doubt they're going to be much of a threat. The boy, at least, Peeta, is obviously not skilled." So that's his name, I think. "The girl might be a bigger problem. She looks very determined, and obviously the crowd loved her." I scowl at the floor. "She's quite small, though," my mentor points out. "I think you should do your best to take her out at the bloodbath, get rid of her early on so you don't have to worry about her later."

Sounds good to me. I turn to Cato. "I want to kill her," I say bluntly. I don't know why, but I really hate this girl. Maybe it's because she stole my spotlight at the opening ceremonies. Maybe I just don't want anyone who could be threat, even a small one, in the picture.

Cato frowns. "Everyone's going to want to kill her," he points out. "You saw them. Usually Twelve just blends in, and no one worries about them. This year they stand out, and none of the other tributes will like that."

Yoh nods, agreeing. "That's true. It might be too dangerous for you to focus on this Katniss. You can't be distracted. I think that if you have an opening to kill her, go for it, but don't go out of your way to eliminate her, especially if it means leaving your back unprotected."

I glare at them. "It'll be more dangerous to risk letting her live! I can tell that she's dangerous. And we can't risk not killing her if she's a threat at all."

Enobaria stares at me, clearly thinking hard. Finally, she speaks. "You have three days of training coming up. Watch her. See what this girl is capable of. When the scores come out, we'll have a good idea of whether or not she's worth focusing on."

God, I'm glad Enobaria is my mentor. She's a genius.

Maio glances at his watch. "It's almost ten," he says. "Clove and Cato should get downstairs."

Immediately, all thoughts of Katniss and Peeta leave my head. We're going to training! Finally, I think excitedly. I've only been waiting for this since, what, I turned five?

Enobaria and Yoh walk us to the elevator, and we take the short ride downstairs. I'm practically bouncing up and down the whole time, and Cato is actually smiling.

Stepping off the elevator, I see that we're one of the first districts to arrive. The only other tributes present are those from One and Four.

Perfect.

I stand up as straight as I can, and Cato and I walk across the room to meet our future allies.

For about a minute, no one says a word. Then, Cato speaks.

"Hi. I'm Cato."

A bit of an awkward silence follows, so I decide to fill it. "I'm Clove."

More silence. The District One tributes – Marvel and Glimmer – exchange a glance. The girl steps forward. "I'm Glimmer. It's a good thing you showed up – we were starting to worry that someone else would get here before you."

The boy from One nods. "Yeah. We all have things to discuss. I'm Marvel, by the way."

Cato nods, and I turn to the District Four tributes. They still haven't said anything.

Finally, the boy speaks up. "I'm Zen. This is –"

The girl cuts him off, glaring. "I can speak for myself, Zen, thank you. I'm Shell," she says, turning back to Cato and me.

I analyze my allies/opponents carefully. Glimmer is pretty, which of course means she's probably not all that smart. She has long blonde hair and bright green eyes. She's a bit taller than me, but doesn't look as strong. Marvel no longer looks scared, as he did at the reaping. Instead, his dark blue eyes look excited, and he keeps running his hand through his oddly contrasting light brown hair.

I turn my eyes to the District Four tributes once again. Shell has dark hair, like me, but hers is wild. This girl looks quite young, maybe fifteen. Fourteen, even. I mean, she's tall and looks strong, but something in her eyes – which are a strange turquoise color – suggests youth. Last of all, I look at Zen. Clearly, this one's a fighter. He's huge, much taller than me. His hair is a color similar to Marvel's, and it's cropped short. His eyes are black.

Cato clears his throat. "Okay. It's… nice… to meet you all. I assume we're sticking with the traditional alliance?" Everyone nods – of course we are. "Well, then. The first thing we need to discuss–"

"—is Twelve," I snarl.

"Here's the deal, though," Cato says, "I don't particularly care who kills the boy. He's worthless. But the girl could be a problem. And you're not gonna like this, but Clove and I have dibs on killing her."

Glimmer hisses and Marvel's eyes tighten. All four of our allies look furious.

Shell is the first to recover. "Maybe we want to kill her, too," she snaps. "You don't have any right to claim her like that. You're not the only one who hates her!"

I raise an eyebrow. "Sorry, that's not how it works. We have dibs on the fire girl, and that's that."

Marvel glares at me. "Oh? And how do you know one of us didn't call her before you did?" he challenges mockingly.

Cato rolls his eyes. "Well, seeing as you can't officially call dibs until the whole alliance is together, and Clove and I have just done that, and you haven't… well, I'd say it's a pretty safe bet."

I somehow manage to stifle the laugh that desperately wants to escape me. I take one look at the faces of my allies, though, and think that laughing at them might not be the greatest idea. Quickly, I think of a solution.

"Yes, Cato and I have dibs on actually killing her. But no one said we can't have some fun with her before that," I say, the corners of my lips turning up in a vicious smile. "We can give the audience a really good show… scare her, of course, and make sure she doesn't die quickly."

Glimmer interrupts me, but she sounds excited now. "Remember that girl from Eight four years ago? The year that boy from Four won?" As she says this, she glances at Zen.

I do laugh this time, because that was my favorite Games ever. "Exactly."

The girl's name was Violet. She was really strange; none of the other tributes liked her. I mean, that's normal, but she didn't have allies or anything. But she had a lot of sponsors. Violet actually made it into the final six. Then she got cornered by the girl from District One – which is probably why Glimmer seems so excited about it – and was killed. Obviously. But the thing was, the girl from One was absolutely vicious. It took her six hours to get rid of Violet. It was insane, yet awesome. She used knives mostly, cutting off various body parts – ears, lips, tongue. She pulled out all Violet's hair, too, and her fingernails. That part was actually hard to watch – and I could barely hear anything for days after because Violet was screaming so loudly. Anyway, the girl from One – ugh, I wish I could remember her name – eventually got around to the actual killing part.

Well, the girl didn't win – she made it to the final three, but then the boy from four – who ended up as the victor – snuck up on her and put a knife in her head. Either way, I've always admired her. And ever since that awful Katniss Everdeen stole my spotlight at the opening ceremonies – as short as that time has been, it feels like years – I've been picturing killing her, having her die like Violet.

Glimmer grins at me now, and I can tell we're going to get along fine.

"So," Cato says, "Clove and I will do the actual killing, but you can help with everything else. There'll be plenty to do – trust me."

That's when I know that Cato and I are the leaders of this alliance; everyone else is looking at us with something that resembles respect. We're smart, and unmerciful, and we want to win. What else can someone ask for in an ally?

I nod. "That's settled, then," I say with finality. Just then, the elevator doors open and the tributes from District Nine walk in. We all glare at them, and move closer together.

"Here's the plan for today," Cato says quietly. "We'll split up before lunch, then we regroup. Everyone, stick with your district partner. Keep an eye on all the other tributes, especially Twelve, got that? Good. See you all in a couple of hours."

Glimmer, Marvel, Shell, and Zen smirk at us and walk away. Every couple of minutes, more tributes enter the room. Twelve is the last to arrive. I glare fiercely at them, and am pleased to notice that Katniss flinches when she sees us. I notice smugly that she doesn't look nearly as dangerous or beautiful as she did during the opening ceremonies.

A tall, athletic woman walks into the room and introduces herself as Atala. She quickly briefs us on all the stations and the rules, and then every tribute has their district number pinned onto their shirt.

When we're released, Cato drags me over to the spear throwing station, probably so that he can show off. But then, as he picks up a huge, deadly looking spear, he leans down to whisper in my ear. "So, what do you think? About them?"

I hesitate. "I don't think they're much to go on. I think I'll actually get along okay with Glimmer, but Marvel and Shell seem really irritating… and Zen looks like a threat. So I'm not sure…"

Cato nods. "Yeah, that's more or less what I thought too. So, let's say that if someone goes after one of them at the Cornucopia – particularly Zen – we won't try too hard to help. Agreed?"

"Perfect. And just so you know," I say with a grin, "that stuff about them being able to help with Twelve was absolute bullshit. She's all ours."

Cato laughs and we high-five.

It's great to have allies.

Thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far! I hope you liked this chapter, even though it's kind of a filler... but I'm trying to get past all the pre-Games stuff quickly... actually, I'm failing at that. The actual Games will start in Chapter 10, or (possibly) 11. Anyway, please, please please review, I can't tell you how much I love going to my inbox and seeing new review/favorite/author alerts. (:

~What the Quell