The very next day we were taken to the training center. Before we left Oliver told us to stick to the smaller things. Tie a snare, lift weights but don't reveal how much we can lift. "Don't let them know what your capable of until your private sessions."
All the tributes wore the same kind of work-out type outfit: knee and elbow pads, black fabric to wrap around our hands and fingers, a short-sleeved tunic made of a soft stretchy kinda fabric with a number telling the world our District on the right of our chest over black leggings with black boots.
I admit I had a good feeling getting a better look at the other tributes. Sure they were bigger than me, but it was obvious that they had never really faced life or death situations like I had.
Our instructor was a tall red-haired woman with rather bird like features who called herself Shayera. I didn't know her as a winning tribute, but she couldn't have been from Metropolis because she knew what she was doing when it came to surviving. She didn't sugar coat how most of us would probably die from the elements and not each other.
That monster of a boy called Mongul clearly didn't believe her, along with most of the Careers. The Careers are the name for the tributes from Districts 1-3, because in those Districts being chosen for the Games is seen as an honor. The kids were put in special training schools until they're about eighteen, and by then they're lethal. When they get out they volunteer. It's against the rules but since it makes for great entertainment it's overlooked.
It's almost always a Career who wins.
They looked at me and Kaldur'ahm with contempt. They went straight for the deadly weapons in the room first chance they got and handled them like they'd been born doing so. Mongul tossed a spear through a dummy's head from fifteen yards like it was nothing. The female tribute from his District, a red-head with a tattoo on the shaved half named Shimmer, threw knives into targets with ease. Kaldur'ahm and did what Oliver told us. We went for the camouflage station.
The trainer seemed happy to see us. He gushed over Kaldur'ahm's ability to swirl a combination of clay, berries, and mud around on his dark arm so that it became near indistinguishable from an actual tree. When I complemented it he smiled and said "I decorate the cakes at my mother's bakery." I'd seen those cakes. Even Jade admitted they were beautiful. Then he'd kinda looked over my shoulder.
"You have a shadow." I looked over my shoulder. He was right. The little boy from Ten ducked out of sight as soon as I laid eyes on him. His black hair and blue eyes made him look kinda like Damian, Dick's youngest brother and Bruce and Selena's biological son. Billy, his name was. Billy Batson. He was so small. It was obvious that he'd had the bad luck of being picked in his first year.
He followed us the whole time. I didn't get it but I didn't mind it either. Except on the third day.
Mongul snapped at the tribute from Seven, thinking he'd stolen his knife. I look up and, lo and behold, there was Billy, relaxing in the netting hanging from the ceiling, holding a knife and looking smug. The girl from his district, a red-head named Barbara Gordon, looked up at him with the same smug look.
And despite Oliver's order to appear average, Kaldur'ahm wiped the floor in hand-to-hand combat, and I breezed through the edible plants test.
We took a break for a minute to look at our fellow tributes. The Careers stuck to the more combat type stations and the ones who had gone to the other stations had dubious looks on their faces, like they thought there was no way it could work.
That's how the first four days passed. On the fifth the Gamemakers showed up early on in training. About twenty men and women dressed impeccably sitting in the elevated stands in the back of the gymnasium, looking and taking notes, eating from the ridiculously large banquet set up for them or consulting with a trainer when we ate lunch but never once talking to any tribute. A few times though I looked up and met the eyes of one before he or she hurriedly looked away and pretended like they hadn't.
On the sixth day we're one by one called for our private session, district by district, "ladies first" followed by their male counterpart. No one came back after. We, that is Kaldur'ahm and myself, were alone with each other when a robotic voice called my name. We didn't look at each other when I stood up. Before I got out the door, Kaldur'ahm called my name. I turned back to look at him.
"Shoot straight." I nodded a short nod that was more like a head tremor of some kind.
The Gamemakers didn't even acknowledge me, instead talking among themselves. I knew I was in trouble. They'd done this twenty-three times now. They were drunk and as ready to get out of there as I was. There was nothing I could do about it. I walked to the weapons station. I'd been chafing at the bit to get my hands on one of those bows every time one of the Careers looked at me like I was nothing.
I chose a bow, strung it and walked to the starting line for the targets some fifteen feet away. I planted my feet at shoulder width, drew back, shot... and missed the bull's-eye by five inches. Fortunately, or unfortunately, not one of the Gamemakers was looking at me. I repeated the gesture, hitting the bull's-eye dead-on. And still not a glance at me.
And suddenly a waiter pushed in a wheeled cart holding a roasted pig. That got their attention. It was infuriating. There I was, trying to get their attention, with my life on the line and they couldn't even pretend that they were paying attention to me.
I wasn't really aware that I had grabbed an arrow and was drawing it back until suddenly the apple that was in the pigs mouth was instead lodged in the wall behind it, my arrow holding it place.
The Gamemakers got quiet then, looking at me in disbelief. "Thank you, for you consideration," I said, giving them a slight bow before walking toward the exit.
This day has sucked royally for me. Now I'm gonna go drown my sorrows in some Blue Bunny cookies n' cream and Pepsi. Please leave a review to brighten it up.