"Showing off is the fool's idea of glory." -Bruce Lee
Head Gamemaker Philon Basileios's POV
I couldn't wait to see what the tributes had to show us this year. I was excited to see what they had up their sleeves. For two and a half days the other gamemakers and I watched the tributes train in public. We observed them, took notes, and studied them. I saw lots of potential in this year's tributes. Some of them made an impression on me, good and bad. But now was the big question, were they hiding things from their fellow tributes? Or did they show us everything that they could do?
I took a sip of wine from my clear glass cup and called the first tribute up while also making a mental note to myself, don't drink too much wine. Too much wine made me drunk, obviously, and made me lose focus on the tributes. Most of the other gamemakers often did that and missed out on the good tributes from later districts. It wasn't fair to them because some of them could have pulled off good scores if the gamemakers had paid attention. I did that on my first year of game making, big mistake. I was going to give every tribute a fair seeing. Even if it was only me.
And besides, during my earlier years, I had missed out on some amazing tribute showings because I had been too drunk out of my mind to notice them. I swore to myself that I wouldn't let that happen to me again. It took some time, but after a few years, I found myself able to resist the temptation of free wine. A small price to pay in my mind when watching tributes perform. I think becoming head gamemaker improved my health a little.
First up came District One's Griffin Holloway. Griffin was tall, strong, and an over all good career. Though I had noticed that when he was angry, he was really angry. One tribute learned that the hard way by getting his face beaten with a heavy weight and getting his foot crushed.
Griffin walked into the middle of the room before looking at us, waiting for us to tell him to go forward.
"Show us what you've got." I told him. Griffin then turned and looked at the various weapons at his disposal. I then saw him walk to a barrel full of swords and pull out a big, thick, broad sword. The sword looked weightless in his hands as he tested the sword by swinging it around, cutting the air in front of him. He nodded his head in approval and walked over the some training dummies. He then started to hack and slash the dummies with expert skill.
He slashed their torsos, stabbed them, beheaded them, and took out multiple targets with ease. And not only that, he was slicing some of the training dummies through the tops of their heads and cutting them to almost the bottom of the torso. And to add to that, he also threw in some hand to hand combat by punching and kicking dummies in the face and chest as well as bashing them with the hilt of the sword. He then threw the sword at another training dummy and it wedged deeply into it's chest.
Griffin then ran over and grabbed a bow and some arrows. He loaded up the bow started shooting at the bullseye targets. He wasn't perfect at aiming, but he could pull off some kill shoots with those arrows. I remembered that he didn't go near swords a lot during the two training days, but he had practiced with archery a bit.
Griffin had shot about six targets with the bow and arrows before he announced he was done. I then dismissed him and he walked out the exit before the avoxs cleaned up the training area. As they did that, I took some notes on Griffin and saw the others doing the same. They were doing fine now, but I wondered how well they'd do by the time District Six came. Let alone District Ten and above.
Griffin was an expert in close range combat, strong, and had some skill with a ranged weapon. He had balance, and that would aid him in the arena. But from what I had seen from him, his anger might be his downfall.
Next up, I called in Lynsa Fylar. The golden blond haired girl that had excellent skills with bows and arrows. She was one of the fastest shooters I had ever seen. And she hit the targets either dead on or close enough to dead on as you could get. "You may begin." I told her.
She then instantly headed for the bows and arrows, as expected.
She examined the different kinds of bows before picking a long bow. It was a powerful weapon, if you knew how to, and could, use it. She then selected her arrows before looking down the shooting range. She loaded and arrow, quickly aimed at a target, and fired.
The long bow was powerful, so the arrow went through half of the wooden bullseye, but I could still see that it went in the direct center. Then suddenly, another arrow was fired, followed by another, and another, and another. Lynsa then did a shoulder roll to the right and quickly got to one knee and fired at another target, and hit it dead center, before doing a back roll and shooting at a training dummy and hitting it right in the middle of the head before quickly turning right and shooting another training dummy right between the eyes. She was good, really good. She had done all that in a matter of seconds. Not even twenty seconds had passed and she had done all that. Her aim was quick and true, and she could dodge and fire quickly as well.
Lynsa then placed her weapons down and looked up to us. I looked over to see most of the other gamemakers nodding their heads in approval. "Nicely done," I told her. "You may go now." She then nodded to us before leaving.
Lynsa was a dangerous long range attacker, she was quick, she was accurate, and she was deadly. I wrote down some notes on Lynsa while the avoxs took out the arrows from the targets. Though they were having a hard time because the arrows were wedged in deeply. Long bows had a lot of tension in them, it wasn't an easy to pull the string back.
Lynsa didn't seem like the strongest girl around, so even though she shot that powerful weapon swiftly and accurately just now, I had to wonder if she could do the same when the targets were moving. And when her arms started to tire out due to the power needed to pull the string of the bow.
When the avoxs were done their work, I called in the next tribute, Helena 'Howl' Draconix. Another member of the Draconix family, I thought as I saw her walk in. What would she show us? How would this little twelve year old impress us?
The Draconix family was full of victors or trainers, it wouldn't surprise me if she received at least an eight. She looked up at us and I told her that she may begin. She then looked over at the weapons. She then went over to the weapons, but then passed them. What was she doing? She was going over to, the plant section? What could she want from there?
I then saw her start to mix a brew of plants and other materials into a bowl. After five minutes, she had half a medium size bowl full of black liquid. What was that? And how could it possibly help her?
Helena then selected a bow, not a small bow, but by no means something impressive. I hadn't seen her shoot before, was she any good? She then took three arrows and dipped the tips of the arrows in to the black liquid. Was it poison? Was that black liquid poison?
She then loaded up the bow and shot at some training dummies hitting two in the head and one directly in the heart. She then threw her bow down on the ground and walked over to the throwing knives section. She selected some knives before returning to where she had shot the arrows and dipped the tips of the knives in the black liquid, or perhaps, poison, before throwing them into the heads and hearts or training dummies. When she ran out of knives, she went back to the weapons station and selected a crossbow. She loaded a bolt into it, quickly dipped the tip of the bolt into the black liquid, and fired the bolt right into the center of the bullseye target. She then announced that she was finished. I then told her that she may go. She nodded her head before leaving. As the avoxs walked towards the weapons she had used and thrown, she turned around and announced.
"Oh, by the way, those knives, arrows, and crossbow bolt, are all covered in poison." I knew it. With that known, the avoxs avoided touching the tips of the weapons, in fact, they seemed to not want to touch them at all. But they did it anyway. They had no choice.
Helena "Howl" Draconix, skilled with ranged weapons and poisons. If she could get her hands on the stuff to create that stuff, she wouldn't even need to instantly kill the other tributes. She could just hit them anywhere she wanted, and just wait for them to die. Because I doubted that most tributes would know how to cure themselves of poison. Expect maybe a select few that were smart enough to learn that kind of stuff during the training days.
After the avoxes cleaned up the targets, we asked for our next tribute, Lucifer Despar, to come on in. This District Two boy interested me, even though he had some kind of muscular body, he didn't seem to be as strong as he looked. Instead, he was fast, the fastest I had seen people run. I'm guessing his muscles were more speed than strength based. He stood in the center of the room before I told him.
"Begin." Then before our eyes, he quickly sprinted to the knives and picked up two of them before sprinting to a group of training dummies. He ran into the middle of the pack. Now he was surrounded by five dummies with him in the center. He then quickly slashed at a dummy's torso with one knife before stabbing the dummy to the right of it with the other. He then back kicked the dummy directly behind him in the torso causing it to fall to the floor. Lucifer then retracted the knives from their torsos before moving his body to the left, as if to dodge an attack, then twisted to the right and slashed a dummy in the neck before rolling to the left. While he was rolling, he slashed a dummy's legs before quickly getting to his feet and stabbing it in the back of the head. Lucifer then ran to the fallen dummy that he had kicked and stomped on it's head before throwing both his knives at the two dummies that he had attacked first, at close range, hitting them both in the head. Lucifer then lifted his foot up again and crushed the fallen dummy's neck.
"And that's how it's done!" He shouted to us. He was fast and good at close range combat.
"Good job," I told him "you may go." And with that, he sprinted out of the room in less then two seconds. He was very fast, no doubt about it. His speed and skill could get him far in the game. Hopefully his speed and skill would make up for his lack of strength, for an older career.
Taking a bite of roast ham, I thought about the next tribute, Zap 'Tharizdun' Philistone. I read his file when training day one started. Unstable, psychopathic, uncaring, and more. He believed himself to the incarnation of a chained god of evil and insanity, Tharizdun. I couldn't help but wonder how someone could even think of themselves as something as that. Was that how he saw himself? As evil and insane? As a god?
I found the whole thing almost laughable. He was a human, like the rest of us.
"Send him in." I told the peacekeepers escorting him.
He always had five peacekeepers by his side, but for now, the peacekeepers would wait out by the exit, this was supposed to be private after all, and the only way you could be in here with us and the tributes is if you got clearance by either me or the president. I told the president that we'd be fine with the barrier protecting us and she had no problem with leaving that guy unguarded. The peacekeepers didn't like that, but they had to obey, it was their job to obey.
I got the avoxs to come behind the barrier so that they wouldn't be in danger as well.
I saw Zap look around, probably amazed that they left him alone with no peacekeepers around. "You may begin." I told him hoping that he wouldn't try to insanely attack us. But all I saw him do was walk over to the knifes and pick out one at random. He held it in his right hand and walked calmly over to a set of training dummies. And what he did simply amazed me, I thought that he'd attack them in rage. But the way he attacked them was highly skilled, he stabbed with precision and expertly cut down the dummies. He then picked up the last dummy by the neck, with one hand, his left hand, and threw it at another set of dummies that were about fifty feet away. Those training dummies weighed about fifty pounds each, and he effortlessly threw one ten feet with one hand. I then looked at the dummies that he had slashed and stabbed, some of them were ripped in half by the knife that he used, almost as much as the dummies that Griffin had cut up with a sword.
There was no doubt about it, he had strength.
"Now watch this." Zap said through his metal mask. I wondered what was behind that mask of his. I then saw him turn the knife around, and stab himself in the stomach, not once, not twice, but three times. I gasped at what I saw, but other gamemakers screamed out in fright and confusion, and some even dropped what they were holding. He attacked himself, and didn't even shout out or anything. "I feel no pain." He told us before dropping the bloody knife to the floor. He didn't even look fazed by it. Blood ran from his wounds before he started to walk out of the room like nothing happened.
By the time the shock wore off me, he was gone. Holy hell, that guy was beyond anything I had ever seen before. He was strong, skilled, and immune to pain. His file said that he was insane, and unstable, but you couldn't deny that he was someone that could put to use what skills he had.
As the avoxs cleaned the area of blood and torn dummies, I quickly wrote down my thoughts before calling in the next tribute, the twelve year old from his district.
In came Nessa Christine Johnston, the reaped twelve year old. She didn't look like she belonged in the games, but, what could she do? She was reaped. She couldn't get out of this unless she either died or won the game. She looked right at us as I told her.
"You may begin." She then looked around rather quickly, like she was trying to get rid of extra energy stored up in her. She then ran towards a coil of rope and began to tie the rope into something. She tied it on metal poles and tied knots on it. Around ten minutes later, she came up with what I'd guess was a trap of some sort. She then ran over to the nearest training dummy before she started to drag it. Or, at least, she tried to. She had a hard time getting the training dummy to go anywhere. When it fell down, she decided to pull on it, but it didn't go any better then it had last time. Little by little, it moved toward the trap that she had created. She grunted a lot as she slowly got the dummy to where she wanted to get it, and my that time, she was sweating all over. I made a note of how, as expected, she wasn't very strong.
"Finally." I heard her wheeze. "Stupid thing, why do you have to be so heavy." She said bitterly. She then, with great effort, lifted it to it's feet, only to push it into the rope's path and send it dangling in the air suspended by its feet. That was some good stuff for a twelve year old. It would come handy in the arena when she has to hunt for food. "Okay!" I heard her call to us. "I'm done!"
"Okay then," I called back to her. "You can go then." She then quickly walked to the door and left. The avoxs then cut down the trap and placed the dummy back to its original position before I called in the next tribute.
Nessa was a little better than your average twelve year old. She knew how to make traps, something that most twelve year olds wouldn't have even tried to learn, or it they did, couldn't learn properly. Most of the time. But like every twelve year old I had ever seen, she was weak. She wouldn't stand a chance against the older tributes.
And there was that energy of hers. She had a strange combination of hyperactivity and low stamina. If strength wasn't her downfall, her lack of stamina would possible bring her down.
The next tribute to enter was Evaline Ellery, but she seemed to prefer being called Eva. She was the only reaped career this year. But that didn't mean anything in the long run, the important thing to ask was, was she good? In training she seemed to be your average career. Nothing fantastic, but she wasn't lame, that was for sure.
"Show us your stuff." I told her.
She then went over to the knives and also grabbed a whip along the way. Interesting, not many tributes used whips. She then headed over to some training dummies before stabbing away at them. She stabbed some of the dummies in the torsos before throwing a couple of knives at some dummies a fair distance away, hitting them. She then used the whip to grab another knife from out of her reach and bring it towards her. She flicked the whip that had a knife at its tip, and the knife flew towards her before she caught it with her right hand. She then stabbed a dummy in the head before using the whip to slash a dummy in the chest behind her. Impressive work. She used the whip as support and a weapon.
She then dropped her weapons and we told her that she could leave now, and she did. I took some notes before taking a sip of wine and calling in the next District Four tribute.
Even though Eva was reaped, she wasn't to be under estimated.
In walked in Shoney Germoal. During training, I didn't see anything really that impressive about him, but he was a different kind of career in my opinion. He asked for alliances outside the career pack, he didn't harass the other tributes, but he did fight when it came down to it. He was all over the place.
"You may begin." I told him.
"You know what I learned?" He asked, and before anyone could say anything he continued. "I learned that some plants look the same, but they have totally different effects." Looks like it wasn't really a question to be answered. "And that a shelter made out of only leaves and twigs can be as good as a tent? Or that you can start eating yourself if you're hungry enough? Or that you can make tea out of pine needles?"
He then started to say all the survival techniques that he had seen or heard from trainers or other tributes. Then he started to say what he learned about the weapons in the training center and voiced his opinion on them. Somewhere between sword thrusting and dart throwing, I looked around to see that some of the gamemakers had started to drink their wine. They didn't want to hear tributes talking, they wanted to see tributes doing. I, on the other hand, thought that it was interesting. You don't always win by combat.
When Shoney was done talking, he then ran towards a group of dummies and slid beneath them before swing around another and doing a U-turn and showing other ways do dodge attacks. He then ran to a far corner of the room and jumped into a large flower vase. And I don't know wither to be more surprised to see him go into it or that the flower vase didn't break. It looked too small for someone to fit into. Looks like he was nimble, and could turn his body awkwardly to fit into tight spaces. Places to hide, which wasn't bad, sometimes you had to run. That, and it gave the audience a chance to see them fight another day. "Uhhh," I heard him say from the vase. "This vase is smaller then I thought." I saw a couple of avoxs run towards the vase and tip it over. I then saw that Shoney had his arms and legs twisted in odd angles. But he managed to hide in a vase that I thought that he might have never managed to even fit into. The avoxs pulled him out easily before he got his body back to normal and looked up at us. "I'm okay."
"Is that all?" I asked wondering if he had anything else we should worry about. He then walked over to the knives, picked on up, and stabbed a dummy in the head.
"I know how to kill just so you know." He said before he walked towards the exit. "Just so you know." He said when he stopped at the door.
"Okay," I told him, thinking that he made his point. "You may go." Then he was out. Well that was strange.
He was a career more focused on the survival aspects rather than the weapons, something out of the norm for careers. Maybe he was planning something with that knowledge. Perhaps it had something to do with the District Eleven and Seven girl alliance?
Next up was the red eyed, white haired albino of District Five, Alexander Natas. He had his hair cut before the chariot tour began, that meant that we could see both his red eyes. In both those eyes, all I could see was hatred in them. I looked up with his intense stare and I could hear some of the other gamemakers muttering how much of a freak he was. I didn't say anything though, I had to remain the professional one of the group. Which, as I found out, was really easy actually.
"You may-" I started, but then I saw him run towards the knifes and pick out one of the most deadly looking ones we offered before running over to a training dummy. The albino then half jumped, half tackled the dummy to the ground. When the dummy slammed to the ground, Alexander positioned himself on the dummy and began to stab the dummy violently. The stuffing then began to fly up into the air with reach, retract, and thrust. Soon the material began raining down on the albino.
He continued to do that for nearly ten minutes, and by that time, the dummy was nothing but a hollow shell, and that was an overstatement, there wasn't even a body left, everything was ripped to pieces the size of my palm or smaller. The boy, out of breath and sweating like mad, then stood up and threw the knife to the ground before I shouted. "You can go!"
"Fine!" He shouted before storming off. That boy had anger issues, but he sure could murder. The only other thing that he seemed to be good at was pissing people off, even if it was just that peacekeeper. But through that, it seemed to of caused a riff between the group of peacekeepers.
After the avoxs cleaned up the violent mess, I called in the next tribute, Valerie Snake. I hadn't seen anything impressive from her, she was an average tribute, but she might surprise us.
"You may begin." I told her. She then went over to the knife section and started to stab a training dummy. And very badly might I say. She hadn't stabbed with the skill of Eva or Lucifer, but she also didn't powerfully do it like her district partner did. She made no impressions on us when she left.
We then called in the District Six girl, Rayne Page. The multi-blond haired girl walked in here with an air of confidence, but I doubt the others would see that, because they were now starting to drink even more. The careers were done with, they didn't think that anyone else would be interesting. They weren't drunk, not yet, but they were buzzed.
"You may begin." I told her. I then saw her look towards the sword section. Hmmm, interesting, her being mostly good with knives, but I never saw her go towards the swords during training. She walked towards the barrel of swords and began digging through the barrel. Was she looking for a pacific kind of sword? My question was answered when I saw her pull out a Kukri. One and a half feet long and curved a little more then half way through. That was an odd weapon for a tribute to use.
She then examined the weapon before throwing it at a group of training dummies. The kukri sliced through a dummies neck as Rayne was quickly running towards the group of dummies. She then punched on dummy in the face before her weapon boomeranged back to her. She caught the handle of the weapon before slicing the dummy she punched. She then twisted the handle, now holding the weapon backwards, and stabbed the dummy behind her repeatedly. She then retracted the blade from the dummy's torso and gave a sharp one-eighty turn and sliced though it's neck before turning to the right and started to climb up a thick piece of rope while still holding the weapon. She then used one hand to throw the weapon through the top of a dummy's head while being suspended thirty feet in the air. She then slide down the rope before landing on the ground and pushing the dummy with the weapon in the crown of it's head over. The dummy crashed to the ground and all I could think of was, this girl was impressive. She was like a career with that weapon. "You may leave now." I told her. She nodded before leaving the room.
I looked to the other gamemakers and saw that they were impressed to. I then saw an avox standing by the door holding his hand out like he wanted something. She then sighed and handed over a knife. Did she steal it? How? Wouldn't I of noticed it?
While wondering that, I sent the avoxs to clean up the mess.
Next tribute that came up was Ricky Coler. I don't remember too much about him, he just seemed to slip my mind every time. Then when he came in, I saw his pale skin and his almost black eyes. Oh yeah, now I remember who he was. That still didn't mean that I remembered much of him.
"You may begin." I told him. Ricky then went over to the spear section and started to spear dummies at midrange. He wasn't good, but he wasn't bad either. Average was all I could say. When he was done, he had mostly stabbed the dummies in the torso, but a few lucky shots got to the head as well. "You may go." I told him before he left. There wasn't much for the avoxs to clean up this time.
Next came in District Seven's Bo Heatherfield. As far as I could see from him, he hadn't uttered a single word during the three days we observed him.
"Whenever you're ready." I told him. I then saw him immediately go towards the axes. When he got to the weapons he picked up a couple of hatchets before walking over to a group of dummies. Then he started to chop off the dummies head to ease using his duel hatchets and before long, there were five dummy heads rolling before his feet. He then quickly turned to two bullseye targets and threw the axes at them. They both hit the bullseyes, blades first.
Bo, he was from District Seven, so I shouldn't have expected anything less, but during training, he did mostly survival stations and tried some archery. I looked down at my notes and saw that he never even went near the axes. Maybe he didn't need to, as he was from the lumber district and it was expected that he work in some kind of wood work trade.
I looked up and said. "You may-" But he was already out the door. Okay then. I then told the avoxs to clean up the mess that was made in nearly sixty seconds.
He was effective with axes, but if it ever came down to fighting, I don't think he'd make it far. He seemed unwilling to fight. Sure there was that time where he jumped on Helena, but that wasn't so much as fight as it was pinning someone to the ground.
He allowed people to push him around, and when he somehow did come up with the will to defend himself, I could see that he didn't really want to hurt anyone. That unwillingness to hurt people will end up getting him killed.
Still, the scoring wasn't about tribute mentality, it was for their display of skill and whatever else they decided to show us. The examining of them during training days also factored, but only exteriorly. It was a waste really, because in previous games, I had seen tributes just like him. Skilled, got high scores, but were unwilling to kill.
The scoring was outdated in my opinion.
When the avoxs were done their work, I called in the next tribute, Sami Lavisa. I looked at my notes as she walked in. She didn't seem to be much of a threat when she was training, but she could have just been hiding her abilities. I looked up from my notes to see her waiting for me to tell her to start.
"You may begin." I told her. I then saw her walk towards the bows and arrows before selecting a standard sized bow. She then looked over and I saw another thing catch her eye. She grabbed some arrows before walking over to some dart shooters and some darts. She then slung the dart shooter over her shoulder and placed the darts into her pockets before looking back at us. I looked back to her to see what she was planning on doing.
I looked over to see that the other gamemakers were less enthusiastic. They had started to drink again.
I looked back to Sami and shook my head telling her to continue. She then turned back to a group of dummies and shot them with her arrows. She wasn't that fast, but she was accurate. Managing to hit the targets, but not a bulls eye. The others, unfortunately, had seen Lynsa's abilities, and to them, this was nothing.
She then walked over to a ladder made of rope and started to climb up it. Then while hanging from the ladder, she pulled out her dart shooter and shot at the dummies. She then climbed up higher and shot at them with arrows and darts. It wasn't the best thing, but it was still good. She climbed down the ladder and I told her that she could go. She nodded before going out.
Even though Sami wasn't as display as her district partner, I had a better feeling about her than him. Even though I had never seen her fight, I had a feeling that she was more willing to murder than Bo. so even though she was going to get a lower score than him, I'd rather put my money on her than Bo any day.
Next up was District Eight, and this was going better then expected, the other gamemakers weren't drunk, at least not yet, but they were getting there.
I called in the next tribute, December Juliet Varen, also known as Ember. Bit of bad luck for her to see her father here, but there was nothing that could be done about that. I thought of the chain of events that had to happen for it to happen, and found it amazing that it had actually happened. I mean, what were the odds of any of that happening.
I saw her standing there looking at us before I said. "Begin when you're ready." She then walked over to the throwing knives and picked up six of them. She then turned towards six bullseye targets and started to throw them. She was better than normal tributes, but she still wasn't as good as the careers. Her knives struck the target, but it wasn't center. And for that, the gamemakers didn't pay that much attention, but I could hear some slight clapping from some. But that still didn't mean that they were impressed. They were just glad that she could still the right end of the blade into the wood. "You may go now." I told her, and she did.
If she was going to rely on throwing knives, I hoped that she could do some close ranged combat, because once all the knives were thrown, what else could she do but fight or run? If she ran, she'd have no weapons on her.
The next tribute was Dave Anders. Again, he was one of those kids that didn't make an impression on me. And I was right, when I told him to begin, all I saw him do was stab some dummies with a knife. It wasn't skilled or clean or anything, it was just stabbing. But it was expected for a non-career tribute.
"You may go." I told him before he left.
Dav, during the training days, didn't even seem to put in an effort to learn anything. He was big, but he was more round than he should be. Lazy. That's a good way to sum him up. He was a bloodbath for sure.
After the avoxs cleaned up his mess I called in the next tribute, Arrowe Winter. The boy with one black eye and one bright green eye looked up at us and had a look on his face that looked like he wanted to impress us.
"You may begin." I told him. And immediately, he ran towards the rope ladder and began climbing it with ease. He climbed it to the top and jumped onto the overhead chandler above, just catching the one of the lower rings with his fingers. Wow, this kid was crazy. If he had missed, well, let's just say he might not be in the best shape to enter the arena. Assuming he survived the fall.
Arrowe then climbed the lighting chain and climbed up to the steel beam that was supporting the chandler, stood up on it, and balanced on it. He then started to run to the other side of the room while balancing on the steel beam, balancing like an expert while not seeming to care that one miss step meant disaster.
When he reached the end, he grabbed the top of a thick, tall plant and jumped off the steel beam that was over fifty feet up in the air. If it weren't for the plant, he'd be dead, but the plant slowed him down as it bent and the top descended to the floor. But I thought that the plant was going to snap in half, and that almost worried me, because if it did snap, what would become of Arrowe?
When he was about ten feet off the ground, he let go of the plant and landed on the ground, hard. While the plant snapped back in place, Arrowe shoulder rolled forwards before running to a group of training dummies and showed a bunch of ways to dodge attacks. If he wasn't dodging, then he was just running around doing a much of random moves on his feet. I was impressed with his abilities. I looked over to the others, they were still recovering from him falling from the ceiling. They faces were full of disbelief and fear. I laughed happily and said that he may leave now. He looked up, smiled, and left. And for once today, the avoxs didn't need to clean up anything.
Arrowe by far was the craziest and perhaps bravest tribute that had came in this room today. Crazy in a different way from the likes of Tharizdun, but crazy neither the less. He was agile and seemed to want to challenge himself. But would his thrill seeking go too far in the arena? I had to wonder.
I then called in the next tribute, Talliana Messine. I had seen her all around the training stations, what was she going to show us? She stood in the middle of the room before I told her.
"You may begin."
"Begin what?" I heard a voice behind me. I turned around quickly, wondering if someone was trying to scare me. There was nobody behind me. "What are you looking at?" A voice asked to my right. I quickly looked there and saw the other gamemakers looking there, just as confused as I was. "Over here!" A voice shouted at the far left side of the room. I looked over there, to see nobody over there either. I looked at Talliana and saw that she hadn't moved from the center of the room. She was smiling as well, like she was about to laugh. Okay, this was a little creepy. "Is there something I'm missing there?" Her voice asked, like it was inches away from me.
It was then that I knew what she was doing, she was throwing her voice. It was a good talent, and it could be useful in the arena. She could trick her opponents, make them go to the places that she wanted them to go. She could make them walking into a trap, or if she needed to, she could use her voice to escape.
"Nothing." I told her impressed with her and her ability. "You may go now."
"Thanks." She said with her voice inches away from me. She then left.
Up next was District Ten's Life Lee. She walked in looking both determined and angry. I wondered why.
"You may begin." I told her. When I finished my sentence, I saw her go towards the axes. That seemed to be the weapon that she was best at, every other weapon she held fell short of the axe.
I saw her pick up an axe before going over to a training dummy. When she was inches away from the dummy, I saw her look at the dummy, sigh, then she practically butchered the training dummy. She severed the arms, the head, the legs, she ripped apart the torso with the axe sending parts of it flying through the air. She was quick and effective with that weapon. She was like Alexander with that axe. But she only destroyed the dummy for only a little while before stopping. I then saw her shake her head before turning towards us.
"I could do this all day to something like this!" She shouted to us. "But to a tribute though, this is just too damn cruel! My mama taught me better then this." Strange I thought. Considering that she ran up and willingly fought with Colin, Lucifer, and Helena.
"You're dismissed." I told her, and she left. She was a kind of strange girl, wonder if she'd really not kill anyone? Probably not, she'd kill, she was just trying to hide that she was a fighter. Did want to think that she could really hurt people.
When the avoxs were done cleaning up, I asked for the next tribute, Max Starling. Other then Nessa and Helena, he was the youngest tribute in the games. Like Life, he seemed to be good with axes.
"Okay, you may begin." Max then walked over to the axes and picked up a good sized axe. He then, with some difficulty, went to some training dummies and started to attack the dummies. But from the way he swung it, the axe was too big and heavy for him. He didn't seem to be doing too much to the dummies. He did some heavy damage, but he was slow and clumsy. He should have used the hatchets instead, they would have been more effective.
After a few minutes, I told him that he could go. He wasn't doing too much. He dropped the axe and left before the avoxs started to clean up. I noticed that the other gamemakers were starting to get drunk at long last.
The display with Max probably had something to do with it. Max didn't seem like the smartest tribute ever, but at least he didn't talk constantly, like he had in the training center. I think his ally, Nessa, found him almost as annoying as some of my fellow gamemakers when he opened his mouth. Lord help the interviewer this year.
The next tribute up here was Aerin Sevani. He was an interesting person, he was too nice to really be in the games, but I could be wrong, people hide emotions and true intentions. After all, he had practically wiped the floor with Colin, injuring him enough to get him medical attention. And then there were his reapings. He had to be searched for. I couldn't help but wonder what that was all about.
"You may begin." I told him. He then went over to a scythe. A scythe, hadn't seen anyone use that in a while. I saw Aerin effortlessly pick up the huge weapon, walk over to a group of training dummies, and started hacking at them. He was severing heads and limbs with his slices and he also cut the torsos deeply. He was skilled with that scythe, and strong too, but not as strong as Zap or Griffin. But Aerin was only fourteen, so it was to be expected.
I was taking an interest in his skill, but I could see about half the other gamemakers were kind of drunk and not paying as much attention as they should be. It made me glad that I wasn't in their current state of mind. When he was done destroying the training dummies, he placed the scythe down looked up at us. I was impressed. He may be young, but he was skilled and strong. "You can go now." I told him. He nodded before exited the room. The avoxs cleaned up before I called in the next District Eleven tribute, Angel Hale.
Angel walked in looking ready to show off her skills, and I could tell that the longer the waiting went, the less likely the other gamemakers would pay attention to her, no matter how good she was.
"Begin." I simply told her. She then walked over to the throwing knives and began throwing the knives. She wasn't as good as Helena or Evaline, not even close. While she threw the knives and managed to hit the targets, only one of the ten knives that she threw managed to stab into the target. I had to wonder why she choose this as something she wanted to show. Throwing knives were hard to use properly, and weren't something that you learned easily. December was an exception, because like everything, there are always exceptions. Rare, but there.
I could hear one of the gamemakers to my right slurping his wine loudly, and I had to restrain myself from telling him to quiet down.
She then walked over to the bows and arrows and started to shoot them at the targets. She still wasn't as good as Lynsa or Helena, but she, again, could still hit the targets.
When she was done, I told her that she could leave. The avoxs then cleaned up the knives and arrows before I asked the next tribute to come in.
Now in walked in the second last tribute, Evanlyn Scott. She had mostly worked on the survival stations and not much with the weapons, but fighting didn't always lead to victory. And she seemed to be a fast learner at that.
"Let's see what you got." I told her. And unlike most of the other tributes before her, she ran towards the rope ladder. I wondered if she was doing another Arrowe stunt. I looked at the other gamemakers to see what they were thinking, but I might of well not have bothered, most of them were now too drunk to notice anything. Even if she pulled off another Arrowe, she would no doubt get much less attention. If she got any at all.
I looked back to Evanlyn and saw that she was already half way up the rope ladder. And now she was turning her body until she was upside down on the ladder. She then began climbing down on it upside down. That was some skill. And when she got to the bottom of the ladder, she did a half back flip and landed on her feet before running over to the table holding all the spears and agilely jumped over it before shoulder rolling and sliding underneath a training dummy close by. She was agile, and good on her feet, something that could come in handy later.
She then stood up on her feet and looked up to us, and she was done. I'm surprised that she didn't show off her camouflage skills, she was really good at it during training. "You may go." I told her before she headed off.
Evanlyn might be in the younger years, but I'm guessing she knew what she was doing. She didn't try to show off with weapons, she showed us that she was agile, which might of been better. She didn't seem to be the strongest girl this year, so her agility would probably help her more than anything else. Besides her smarts.
The last tribute was Colin Aldrin. And he, in no way, made any impressions on me while training. He wasn't strong, fast, or skilled at anything as far as I could see. When he walked in, I didn't see him as much of a threat to the other tributes. And he was a laughing stalk of all the tributes due to him getting defeated so early on. Before the games even started.
"You may begin." I told him knowing that all the other gamemakers were most likely too wasted to even know what was going on, or else they weren't paying attention anymore. I then saw Colin walk towards the swords. Huh, this could be interesting. Maybe he could actually do something.
He grabbed a sword handle and pulled out a sword, only to send the rest of the swords to the ground. He had some how knocked over the barrel and spilt the swords to the ground. I held in a sigh as he walked over to a group of training dummies, only to bump into almost every other object on the way.
He had a bad sense of direction, that much was obvious.
When he finally got to the training dummies, all he did was swing around his sword randomly. Sometimes, he even missed his target. It pained me to see this.
"You may go." I told him, just wanting to save myself from the sight of him doing whatever he was doing. He dropped his sword, and clumsily made his way his way out.
Thank God that was over.
I looked over to my fellow gamemakers, and let out the built up sigh I had been containing. They were blasted, pure and simple. I saw empty wine bottles scattered around the table, and they were protecting those empties like crazy. I don't think they knew that they were empty. Some of them looked like they wanted to pass out.
Of the ten of us, I think only myself, and three others were in any shape to be grading the tributes.
I drank my wine and thought of how much trouble it was going to be to work with these people.
Okay, time to score the tributes.
A/N: Changed some things, changed the scores some, yeah. Oh hey, look at that, interviews in two chapters. Great...