District 2: Ben Valencia's POV

"So what is your plan now," Anna sneers at me as we make our way through a dimly lit hallway. I pretend I didn't hear her and continue to peer into the cabins. They were clearly made for lower class citizens and had nothing worth anything inside them. "Don't pretend you can't hear me. I asked you what your next plan was since we made it out of the bloodbath with little supplies, assuming you have a plan. And no, I don't count looking through cheap cabins as a plan."

I roll my eyes before I turn to face her. "Fine, I don't have a plan. Is that what you want to hear?" I am not shocked when she smiles smugly in response. Now I have to wait for what I know is coming, Anna's plan. I'm sure it will lead us to certain death if I accept it, which I won't.

"Lucky for us, I have a plan," Anna says with a triumphant grin. She pauses to let me reject it before she says it, but she doesn't get a word from me. I want to at least hear this before crushing her little idea. "Why not screw the Careers even more by stealing all their supplies?"

"That's your plan? That is your plan?"

"Why are you acting like that is the funniest thing you have ever heard?" Anna asks, giving me a vicious glare. I don't answer her right away. My laughter prevents me from it.

"No, no, it's a great idea. You know, if you want to screw us rather than the Careers. Why not walk right back into the pack we worked so hard to separate from? I'm sure they would happily accept us traitors back," I say, still laughing slightly.

To my surprise, Anna doesn't try to slap or punch me. Instead, she looks somewhat hurt. I am furthered surprised at how well she can pull of this angle. I almost feel guilty for insulting her horribly thought out plan. Almost of course since the plan is ridiculous. "Look, I am not trying to insult you in any way, but that plan is never going to work and it will just get our faces up in the sky and our bodies shipped home in coffins."

I turn my back to her and start back down the hall. "That won't make daddy proud, will it?" I halt as I feel my blood run cold from her words. "Oh wait, daddy is already disappointed." I whip around, ready to punch the smirk right off her face. But I don't. I can't easily ask her how she knows all this with her bleeding on the ground.

"How. Do. You. Know. That," I say, my breath becoming short and my teeth almost breaking from how hard I am biting down. Anna only smiles wider and shakes her head. "Answer me!"

"I was in training too. What, did you think no one knew about your daddy issues? It was the biggest joke in the Training Center. I'm surprised you, Mr. Know It All, didn't know about that," Anna says. My eyes widen in disbelief. Everyone really knew about my problems with my dad? I begin to feel faint from shock and I have to grip one of the pipes on the low ceiling for support. "Aw, is poor Benny going to cry?"

"Benny, keep up! Felix wants to show us what will be his winning throw in the trails!" I don't pick up my pace a bit. I actually get slower. I refuse to respond to my mother when she calls me Benny. Quite frankly, I don't respond to my mother even when she calls me Ben. Not like she calls me on a regular basis. Mrs. Beauty Queen needs to sleep until noon then worry about turning Marcella into a miniature version of herself. She has no time for her fourth son, a failure in her husband's eyes anyhow.

"His name is Ben, Lila," my older sister tells my mother bitterly. Jana's relationship with our mother is like my relationship with our father, on one side is disappointment and the other is silent anger. However, Jana takes more jabs at mother than I do at father. It's because it is easier to break a twig and nearly impossible to break a boulder.

"I know my own son's name. Is his mother not allowed to call him pet names?" my mother asks in response. Jana just shakes her head and gives me an apologetic look. That is all I get though. Felix is at the knives station, clutching a knife in the worst way possible. I knew this was going to be a joke. Felix won't even get past the first round of Trails. He just wants to make sure father knows he is not a complete screw up like me.

Felix throws his first knife and barely makes it on to the target. My mother still cheers while my father nods. It angers me a bit that he doesn't reprimand Felix for his horrid throw while he yells at me for everything I do just a hint wrong. "He isn't throwing it right," I mutter under my breath.

I meant it to be just for myself, but as usual, my father hears. "You think you can do better kid," My father asks and then laughs like it was a hysterical joke. My mother laughs with him that encourages Felix to try again. He barely gets it on the board again.

"Come one, son," my father says, but the comment was meant for encouragement. Felix throws again and this time misses the board entirely. I shake my head a bit. This is, again, picked up by my father. "You can shake your head all you want, kid. It won't make you better."

"Benny, just watch for once," my mother tells me as she smiles fondly at Felix.

"Don't call me that," I say softly, my voice full of anger.

"What was that?" my mother asks, shocked even though she didn't hear what I said. I refuse to look her in the eye and answer her stupid question. "Benny?"

"That isn't my name!" I snap. My hand curl into little balls, but I know hitting mother would be a bad idea. My father would take no time in seeing I don't see fourteen. Instead, I release my anger by grabbing a knife from my brother's stash and chucking it at the board. It hits perfectly in the center.

My mother, brother, and sister gape at the board and at me, but I'm not looking at them. I am looking at my father dead in the eyes. He doesn't look proud. He doesn't look pleased or interested. But, he doesn't look disappointed. For once in his life, he is showing interest.

I hate it.

Anna is still looking at me, but she looks guilty for saying the things she did. "I'm really sorry, Ben. I didn't mean to say those things. I just hate when people think they are smarter or better than me."

I take a deep breath and regain my composure. I release the pipe that now looks slightly dented and nod at her apology. "It's okay. I'm sorry I laughed at you. You can make the plan. Just please not that one." Anna nods and I can see her brain try to work out a new idea. I motion for us to begin walking again and she follows.

I'm still not sure we are on the best of grounds, but I think we have put off killing each other for a bit longer. I think I need to keep her at arms distance though. Her back-handed remarks and deathly glares don't make her a great ally, but if I have learned anything, I don't need her interested in me.

District 2: Anna Sinclair's POV

"I know we just got past this, but this has the makings of being of very bad idea," Ben comments as we peer over on to the deck below us. The girl from 11 must have accidently dozed off on one of the chairs and has left her pack in an enemy's reach. However, this simple one step plan doesn't seem good enough for Ben.

I sigh and turn to Ben with a resentful look on my face. "Please grace me with all the reasons why you think this easier done than said plan is dangerous." Leave it to Ben to bring up something we just finished fighting about. I assumed this would be a rocky alliance, but I also assumed we had little more common sense than to push the other's buttons. I guess I am forgetting that Ben is only fifteen and doesn't know how to let things go.

"For one thing, this plan is not easier done than said, more than likely it is the other way around. Second, see that ball of light up there? Yeah, that's the sun and it will let everyone on this deck see us. Three, if she wakes, we are going to have to kill her, meaning a cannon goes off. That means the rest of the tributes will assume we were to blame being from District 2 and the Careers will have no trouble tracking us. And fourth…"

"I'm going to stop you right there," I say, hushing him with a wave of my hand. "Number one, this plan is easy. We go down and we grab the pack. Second, no one is on this deck. Because you know that sun you pointed out? It will allow us to see everyone. Third, she won't wake up. If she does, we will kill her. That is just a risk we have to take. I am assuming you are a fast runner. We can do this!"

"Fine," Ben mumbles. "I was just pointing out that you might not be thinking this all the way through with all the calculated risks."

"Come one," I snap, pulling him by his jacket collar down the upper deck's stairs. I release his jacket as we grow closer to the girl and her pack. Ben is still moving sheepishly along, so slow I am in fear of snapping at him to hurry up. I don't think Ben calculated himself as a risk.

We are barely breathing as we reach her. I place my hand on the pack and slip my arm through one of the straps. I jerk it upwards and slip it over my shoulders. The girl doesn't even stir. I begin walking back towards the stairs. Ben is quickly ahead of me, rushing to get away from the scene or our petty crime. I hear breath release a long breath when we reach the top where we had been before.

"See, we did it and no one got hurt," I say with a large smile at my success. I lift the pack up to admire my job well done. It is then that the silver parachute drops down. My face drops immediately. "We just stole a pack to have a gift drop down the next second? Really great use of our resources Season."

Ben picks up the parachute and the gift under it. It turns out to be just a tiny slip of paper. Ben unrolls it and reads. I crane my neck to see the writing on the paper. Ben prevents me from looking though. He finishes quickly and crumples it up despite my protests of wanting to read it. He simply tosses it over the rail of the deck. "Let's get going." He begins to walk towards the other side of the boat. I stick around to peer over the edge.

The girl from 11 is awake. She notices her pack has disappeared, but she is way more focused on the crumpled paper that had landed on her lap thanks to my District partner. She may be facing away from me, but I can tell she is smiling.

I consider telling Ben about his slip up, but I think about it and decide against it. If he threw it away, it must not have been important. And if it was, I can't be to blame. After all, he threw it on to our enemy.

…

I hope I have shed some light on Ben because I feel he has been a little too mysterious. I am also starting to add a little suspense, but it might be awhile until someone is actually brutally murdered. Next up is Miles and Shiloh!

Capitol Question of the Day: Do you think Ben and Anna will end up working together or getting each other killed?

Reviews make my day. Peace, Love, and All That Jazz.
-Emma