Training: Day One
I wake up early and dress in comfortable clothes that were easy to move in. I run downstairs for breakfast, give aquamarine morning greetings, and catch up with Lilly in the hall. She fits us all into an elevator and pushes the button to the top floor.
Infront of us are two doors with at least twenty other teens peering into the window. As soon as everybody arrives, we are told the guidelines of the training room, and that there was to be no sparing with other tributes- only trainers. The doors are finally opened, and I go immediately to the swimming pool. Who knows when that would come in handy?
After a few minutes of improvement, I decide to show off my bow skills. I impress everybody by doing the usual- splitting arrows in half. It both amazed and irritated the trainer, and he told me to to go jump in a lake, so I jumped into the pool. I stayed for a few minutes to watch everybody practice. A guy from district one was rocking the throwing knives, while another girl from the same district was beating up a sparring partner. Now I know who to make an alliance with.
For the rest of the day, I work on hand to hand combat, swordsmanship, throwing knives, and decide to try my luck at weaving, and stink at it. First of all, I could fit my head through it, and I could break it in my sleep. Next, I try my luck at the berries, and realize that these berries are forest berries.
Relief flows through me, and I practice what berries and plants that won't kill me. Ha, good for me. Know all I have to learn is how to not feel guilty about killing somebody around my age.
I decide to look around, and discover that the girl from number eleven that rocked at throwing knives was very trustworthy, and knew all about herbs and edible stuff. I walk over to her, and she jumps as soon as she sees me. I realize that she's one or two years younger than I am, and her face is filled with fear.
"It's okay, I was just going to ask you if you wanted me to be your ally, but-" I say.
"What? You want to be my ally?" She asks. "What is this world coming to. Careers asking puny seventeen year olds if they want to be allies." She mutters.
"I mean it. See, here's the plan. I'll stick with the careers untill nightfall, when it's my guard. Then I'll steal supplies and weapons, and snag as many throwing knives as I can for you. The next day, I'll light a fire, and you can follow the smoke." I tell her. Her expression looks surprised.
"How come you don't want to stick with the others of your kind?" She asks.
"Well, my brother was vote too, and I don't want to be around when he dies." I say.
"Oh." She says. "Well, I trust you, but I won't completely trust you until you risk our life for mine." She says.
"Okay, deal." I say, and we shake. At least I have one ally so far, and I think I want it to stay like that. "Wait, will you be making any other alliances?" I ask.
"No," she says. "Any more than two people in an alliance can cause more starvation if it's a bad hunting and harvesting day." She finishes.
By the end of the day, I'm exhausted from the day of training, but I know that I should fight any feeling like that in the games.
Training: Day Two
I slip on another pair of comfortable clothes, grab my breakfast, and meet all of the tributes in the training room. I decide to run laps to work on my endurance, which is a necessity for the games. After I get exhausted from that, which takes about three hours at full speed, I jog to the weaving center to practice my weaving skills. After I try my luck at twisting the grass, It turns out a little bit better than my last one. This time my hand fit trough it, but it was really hard to break.
Next, I get tired of my fails, and head for the shelter making center. At this station, I successfully make a lean to. I mean, it didn't topple over very easily.
By the time I finish, it's time to go back for dinner, but I just manage to keep from falling asleep and drowning in my soup. After dinner, I practically drag myself up the stairs, and go to bed with my clothes on, with nightmares of weapons. I can't seem to push away the nagging feeling that I have about the games. This is really happening!
Training: Day Three:
I slip on some comfortable pants and a shirt. Same old same old. I run to the dining room, eat my pancakes, and rush out the door with enough time to spare so that I can talk to my ally.
As soon as the elevator doors open, I rush over to meet my ally, and to ask her a question. "You know, I've been wondering. What's your name?" I ask.
"I'm Poppy, and you are?" She sort of answers, sort of asks.
"I'm Emerald." I answer. Right then and there, the doors open, and it's chaos to get to be the first in. This was my last day of training. Today I would have to work on combat.
I race to the sword station, and spar with the training, but we never did have a clear cut winner, because then I had to hit the bow and arrow station, but apparently I had been banned from it. Lousy archery trainer. Next I go to try to throw spears. You can guess how that went.
"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH" THUD! CRASH! BANG! Yep. Complete chaos. I actually was aiming for a dummy, but stuck some person's lean to, and that caused some sort of a chain reaction. Yeah, not good. Note to self and other people: Never let me touch or catch sight of a spear again. Ever.
I run laps for the rest of the day because now it's the only station that I haven't been banned from. Oh well. By the end of the day, I'm not as tired as I was the last, and ate dinner before heading back to the training center for my score. I am the first to go, and know exactly what to do.
I grab a bow and arrow, and split every single arrow because of my wonderful aim. Next, I beat the stuffing out of a dummy with throwing knives, and then I create a lean to. I leaned up against it, and nothing happened. I got a standing ovation from the game makers, and skipped to my quarters, and turned on the TV to see my score. I gasped. I got an 11.5. The highest score on record! I think of that, and I have more peaceful dreams, but I still feel a nagging. The games are in two days.