So I've been periodically editing sections of the previous two chapters because in my haste to get them out I skipped over a lot of the process. Made a few changes, tried to make things less confusing. I know its custom to begin most HG fanfics with the reaping but I wanted to pick up the story during the beginning of Clove's arrival into the Capitol then eventually adding in more in-depth descriptions of the reaping/reaping process of District 2 later on when the story between her and Cato calls for it. Also I tried to keep my version of District 2 as close to the books as possible (taking as much as I could out of when Katniss actually visits there in Mockingjay). Anyway, rant over. Hope you like this!

And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had.
I find it hard to tell you, find it hard to take
When people run in circles it's a very, very mad world

- Mad World, Gary Jules.

3.

In the dark of night, the massive artfully placed stone buildings of the Capitol glow soft changing colors that seemingly touched all areas of the spectrum. Balls of light dotted the wide streets below like tiny flickering stars where animated citizens could be seen sauntering from building to building- their brightly colored bodies and hair giving them the illusion of aliens from another world. Or perhaps it wasn't an illusion- these people were from another world.

Not even Clove who stood with a shoulder pressed against the massive glass wall that separated her from their rainbow city could say that her district, despite being one of the wealthiest, had been anything like this. These creatures of the Capitol would look entirely out of place in her world of mountain people and brick houses built along steep slopes- a realm where food may have been plentiful but life was still hard. She thought of the large muscular masons with their worn skin, hunched over their work like menacing giants. Even the young faces of the aristocrats who trained alongside her in the academy could not match up to this entirely new race of people; these ignorant little beasts who knew of no pain, not even a hardship to weigh on their senseless lives.

Her thumb rubbed against the knife clenched in her hand as she watched them.

Lyme would have been unhappy if noticed when Clove slipped it into her boot as their dishes were being taken away at dinner. She would have thought she was going to use it to kill Cato, or their escort, or anyone else really. But that wasn't the case. It was just something to play with during sleepless nights.

Clove was no stranger to these.

Her inability to sleep for longer than one or two hours at a time used to disturb her greatly- even now there were still many nights spent viscously tossing and turning while staring with blank eyes into the red glow of a clock. But she learned to live with it. It had a minimal impact on her daily functioning, or at least as far as she could tell. Sometimes voices that weren't there would whisper into her ears. Sometimes she would even respond to them. But these occurrences were brushed off as just small mysteries.

For reasons unknown to her, the struggles with sleep had started when she was very young. As a child she would often roam large empty hallways and wander into her town for hours until sun rise. Eventually as she grew she took to practicing with various weapons- her precious knives being among them. This was, in part, how she was able to advance so quickly in the academy: the others in her age class only got a limited amount of daylight hours to perfect their skills. Soon she had begun to believe that sleep was something she was better off without.

After one years' Hunger Games where a boy managed to win by stalking his opponents and waiting for them to fall asleep before he killed them, she came to the conclusion that it was a liability too- a state of ultimate vulnerability. Therefore defiantly being something she was better off without.

Though sometimes she found herself wondering what a dream would be like. Or even a nightmare.

The silence hanging in the air of the room was broken by the sound of light breathing and the crack of an ankle bone.

Cato didn't sleep well ether.

Instantly she hated herself for jumping at the noise. That had been his goal after all – to at least intimidate, let alone frighten her by moving soundlessly until he was right at her back just to make a point that she could have been at his mercy. If this had been the arena, he could have sliced her neck, could have stabbed her straight through the gut- so many of their interactions were of this nature; one trying to intimidate the other, one trying to get under the other's skin. It was childish but after all, were they not still children?

"And what do you think you are going to do with that?" he whispered in such a low rumble it could have been the tremor of an earthquake.

There was something about his tone that told her he had a clue as to what was running through her mind at dinner. Energy bubbled through her veins but she kept her back to him. The ground beneath her bare feet gave slightly as he shifted his weight and crept closer.

"Stealing silverwear now? That seems a little desperate," he continued. She could almost hear the sneer on his face before turning her body to actually see it.

Cato towered over her in height and width a considerable amount. They were close enough that she had to raise her chin to meet his eyes.

"At least I'm not breaking it," she breathed. The knife felt light in her hands as she placed it to his abdomen, moving upward and grazing it across the defining line between two fan-shaped chest muscles with deliberate slowness. He instantly tensed up as she did but his fingers didn't latch around her wrist until the blade was against the curve of his thick neck.

She watched the protrusion of his throat rise and fall as he swallowed. The skin puffed slightly around the blade with delicate softness, as if it had been pushing into a pillow instead of his neck. Her vision was darkening again. What had started off as innocent teasing turned into something else entirely. Excitement fluttered through her body, her arms, her fingers. Her jaw clenched shut and her eyes widened at the thought of his blood. All it would take was one push. She could do it.

So she did.

For just a second, with such a faint movement of her wrist, the blade sunk into his soft bed of skin. If he hadn't been holding her back, she could have slashed it across and splattered his blood onto the walls. But instead the thick fingers closed in on her thin wrist with enough force to send the knife out of her hand and to the floor. A gasp from the pressure exerted on her wrist escaped her mouth before she had time to control it. Her other hand, which she only now noticed had been clenching the fabric of his thin shirt, was quick to fly to his face in defense only to be caught by the deadly fingers of his other hand as well.

The now-red glow from the Capitol lights was nearly reflected in his vacant eyes as they weighed down into hers. An involuntary cry slipped through her lips unchecked as his grip tightened, but this time she couldn't even bring herself to care. Like a trapped animal she had reverted to basic instinct and struggled from his grasp to save her wrists before they shattered. The hard line of his mouth curved into a smile at the sight of her desperation.

"I'd be careful with that thing if I was you," he whispered in a raspy voice, pulling her body into to his as if it were weightless. All her eyes could take in were his broad shoulders and neck which was now marked with a thin pink line.

She tried to keep the pain from her voice as she asked in a mocking tone, "Why? Are you scared?"

"No," he said. "But you are."

The statement set off a fire inside her and the pain from his iron grasp dulled for a just moment. He could rip off her hands, she didn't care. She was not afraid of Cato, of anything.

With gritted teeth she nearly spit the words, "I'm not."

Then his square face was in hers, tilted just slightly enough for his hot breath to touch her lips. Light eyelashes lowered over his pale orbs as they stayed locked on hers in an expression she had never seen his features display; one that could only be described as somewhere between lethargic and seductive.

"Then maybe you should be. You're so…" his voice trailed off for a moment as he gave her wrists another squeeze which made one of them crack. The pain was suddenly unbearable. He was going to break her wrists. She hated this. She hated not being in control. Tears of agony sprung to her eyes as she chomped down hard on her lip to keep from screaming. "Delicate."

"I could kill you," he breathed. "Right now, I could kill you. It would be so easy to just snap that pretty little neck of yours."

And then it was his turn to feel discomfort. When her knee went straight into his groin he instantly doubled over and threw her hands back with enough force to send her entire body to the ground. A dull thud rattled the air along with Cato's voice, hissing a dozen different ways to call her a bitch. With difficulty she managed to crawl over to the discarded kitchen utensil lying on the ground that was about to be used as a weapon. He was going to suffer for that little stunt. She would make sure of that.

"You're pretty delicate yourself, sweetheart," she snarled.

The room was whizzing past her eyes before she could even turn back to stab him, and her head was suddenly smacking hard against the wall. Bright lights spotted her vision. Cato had her pinned by the throat, slowly pushing in. With ease he snatched the knife from her weak hands.

"You are going to pay for that," he huffed, though she could barely hear him over the ringing in her own ears.

Saliva was gathered in the side of her cheek ready to be spit at him when the lights of the room suddenly flicked on, blinding her eyes with their abrupt brightness.

Brutus stood leaning against the end of the staircase across from them. The clarity of the lightened room allowed enough visibility to see the smirk his mouth was twisted up in across worn skin dotted with sprouting dark hairs and his eyes which were wide with something Clove couldn't read.

"Bravo Kiddies, the crowds going to love that," he praised. Then added in a tone much more serious: "Cato, let off her."

For a moment she was unsure that Cato would listen but after a beat his hand shot back from her neck as if it had bit him. The air burned uncomfortably in her throat when she inhaled a deep urgent breath, causing her to instantly choke on it. As she grasped at the sore areas his fingertips had left in their wake, her hands still quivered.

That was when she realized the real damage that could have been done. Her wrists. Her hands. Her controls. Without full capability and precision of her hands she was nothing, she would be useless in the arena. In the light she could now see the already almost black bruises mainly concentrated on the sensitive skin beneath her palms. Nervously she rolled one of her wrists which resulted in a cringe worthy-crack and a pulse of scorching pain that ran its course through her arms.

That bastard. That fucking bastard.

Her eyes lifted to glare at Cato who stood across from her and found that he had already beat her to the punch. Brutus's large form then blocked him from view.

"Clove, let me see your wrists," he said with unusual softness

In resistance she shook her head and stuck them firmly to her sides. The only way to hold on to the little dignity she had left was to suffer alone. She didn't want his help, and she especially didn't want his pity.

Instantly the softness in his voice evaporated and she realized she would be receiving no pity from him.

"Give me your God damned wrists." He barked the order with enough harshness to break down her stubborn wall and they nearly flew from her sides.

Roughly he turned them over in his own calloused hands, ignoring the winces she did her best not to make. After a moment he eyed her with earthen orbs and said in a flat voice: "Not broken."

She knew what this meant. No real injury. Live with it.

Relief didn't come with his words though. She couldn't be sure he wasn't lying. It occurred to her that Brutus may have seen the whole incident and chose to not intervene. He was Cato's mentor after all. Why would he stop his tribute from putting competition at a disadvantage? Likewise, why would he actually care if her wrists were really damaged? After all they would be one of the key ingredients in a knife piercing directly through Cato's chest.

Lyme's face appeared in her mind and she cursed herself for the desire of her mentors pressence in her already physically weakened state.

"You two are lucky Lyme was out tonight," Brutus said, clearly reading her mind. But instead his eyes were locked on Cato. "Of course I will have to tell her about this. Well some of it at least." He directed his attention to Clove now, "You will have to get that little injury fixed before training tomorrow. You can't walk around with those bruises. It looks bad for us."

No mention of how it will debilitate her during training.

A dark smile then crept slowly onto his lips as he flipped Clove's knife around in his hand. She had not even noticed he picked it up.

"I have to say, you two are by far the feistiest tributes our district has had in quite some time. And that's truly saying something. Those attitudes are going to get you a lot of sponsors. And that eagerness to kill…" His voice dropped an octave. "-is going to get you far in the games. I haven't been with you at training but from what you've told me, the other tributes this year sound even weaker than they are usually."

It was true. The districts served up little competition for Two this year. Clove had been watching them during training; the crippled boy from Ten, the pair of long gangly-looking tributes from Six, the thin under-fed boy from Nine, the girl from Eight who constantly looked on the verge of tears, the girl from Twelve always tying knots who looked only slightly more difficult to kill than the sister she had so boldly volunteered for, the little girl from Eleven…

Then the enormous looming presence of the boy from Eleven crept into her mind. There was something about him that put her at unease. He would be competition. Perhaps that was why.

Brutus pulled her away from her thoughts.

"It sounds to me like the way is paved for a District Two victor this year," he said and Clove doesn't miss his eyes lingering on Cato's. "My advice to you two is to monitor your timing. First off control yourselves till the games. Once you're there focusing on taking out the weaker tributes first. Use District One until the majority of your competition is dead then take them down too."

He began to back away with his head tilted down and a smile that looked as if he was bearing his gleaming white teeth at them.

"Then, when the time is right," he said. "You can put all your effort into killing each other."

With that he turned off the light switch, leaving Clove and Cato in the dark again. The only break in their silence traveled down from somewhere up the stairs where Brutus had paused before shutting the door to his room to say, "Goodnight, you two."

Please do review! Like I said before even if you think this is awful I want to hear it. My goal is to better myself as a writer so even a poor review is better than none at all. Also if anyone has any suggestions I'm open to those too! Thanks again ;) xxx