Wow, you guys are amazing. I didn't know one chapter can change a lot of things. I am so happy to see more tangible supports through more feedbacks, favourites and follows. Not to mention, this story was chosen by one of the communities. Thank you very much!

I have read the feedbacks and realized that there are doubts on whether this story is similar to another story. As I mentioned previously, I did check the story out after it was pointed out by one of the reader. I did mention that I was sorry to say that some of the things may collide but I have my own plot in my mind already. But rest assure, I did not copy anything. So to the writer of the story, flipflop5, I would like to apologise if any of the chapters throughout the story which may be accidental to yours. You are a great and inspirational writer and I wouldn't want to show any disrespect to you and your readers by copying your story.

As for the readers, I will leave it to all of you to judge. If any of you feel this story was very similar to the other story in terms of plots and wordings, do let me know via feedbacks or private messages. I will withdraw the story if the responses are overwhelming on me copying the story. Nevertheless, do wait up on future chapters as I will be throwing in more plots and twists to the story.

After this story, I will be coming up with another story. I have the summary in my mind and started to scribble some details on my notebook. Just to be safe in case I forget any ideas.

I know I have thanked you before, but I would like to stand on my feet and bow down to every one of you for showing me continuous support! It has definitely driven me to post this chapter, and I'm off since it's weekend!

Enjoy, R&R!

Chapter 5

Katniss's fear began rolling slowly. She felt her whole body was turning cold and there were goosebumps at the back of her neck. Her eyes followed Cato's movement who was walking towards her direction.

"You are an ugly piece of filthy rat! Ugly wretch!" uttered one of his comrades who have brown hair.

"You are a piece of dirt, and that puddle of mud suits you well since you are such a low life and you don't deserve to be in a school"

She flinched a little when she remembered the moments where she was kicked by Cato and his two friends. Her right hand slowly ran through to the back to trace the scar where Cato whacked her with a sharp stick. "Damn," she thought while clenching her fist.

Her fear turned to anger as she realized she was no longer helpless and could defend herself. Cato was standing in front of her and she continued to glare icily on him.

As she was completely caught up in her angry thoughts, Gale interrupted her. "Catnip? Knock knock… ," he was knocking her head lightly with his left fist.

"What the hell, Gale," Katniss hissed at him which left Gale lifted both of his hand up to show he surrendered. "Wooh, hold it there. Are you okay?" Gale asked her but stepped back a little to keep his distance from her.

"None of your business," she growled at him.

Little did she realize, Cato was looking at her over his shoulder which erupt her anger even further. But he looked away when,

"Listen up! We are going to have trial run test. Each of you will be doing 100m, 200m, 400m and 800m sprint. As there are too many participants, you will only be given 1 chance for each sprints. So, give your best. Do a 5 minutes warm-up and we will start," Thresh voice was deep and loud.

Gale pulled Katniss away from where she was standing to get an empty spot to warm-up. While they were doing their stretching and sit-ups, Gale couldn't help it but to ask Katniss, "Hey, what's wrong with you? You looked disturbed."

Katniss was lying on her back on the ground when he asked her that. She did not answer him till she pulled her upper body up and faced Gale. "Nothing, Gale, I am just nervous about the selection," Katniss lied to him.

Gale was not convinced with her answer but he did not want to pursue further to avoid setting Katniss' flame. So he continued stretching. As Katniss was doing her 50th sit up, she felt someone was watching her in close vicinity but she shrugged the feeling off and continued her warm-up.

Katniss' concentration was interrupted when she heard loud snickering voice and turned around to see a girl with shiny blonde hair clad with a one-size smaller white tank top and pink sport shorts which were just below her bottom. Her face rang a bell to Katniss' mind. She was one of the first four names which she paid attention when the assistant called out the name. Glitter? Or something like that.

Katniss saw the blonde girl was flirting with Cato and she almost puke to witness that moment. Of all people, the Glitter girl chose Cato to flirt with. As she was feeling disgusted, there it was again, Cato was looking at Katniss while the Glitter girl was pulling him closer to her.

"What is his problem? He wouldn't be able to recognise me after all these years since his head was full of shit and left him with a pea-sized brain," she thought to herself.

"Time's up. Everyone back in the line!" Thresh yelled.

It started with 100m sprint. Gale went before Katniss and he did a good job. He clocked in at 11.9 seconds which was fairly a good record. From far, she saw there was one girl with a short boy-cut punk hairstyle in Team 1. This girl caught her eyes because of her bold appearance and she possessed an athletic body. She observed the girl and she heard her time was 13.0 seconds which raised the standard even higher for women's category.

Her attention turned to her own team and she saw it was Cato's turn. She began to feel angry when she saw him walking to the track for the trial run. She observed him quietly. He has a blonde spiky hairstyle with prominent six packs as his shirt was tight-fitting. He stood at least 6 ft tall. Cato placed his left foot behind the line and right foot behind his left. His hips rose to a position slightly higher than his shoulders and remained motionless. When Thresh blew the whistle, he dashed off.

"Wow, that's a monster record, 11.7 seconds!" Thresh looked at his stop-watch and almost all the girls cheered for him.

As Cato was walking back to his original position, the girls approached Cato and started to throw themselves to him.

"Dang, I must be better than him!" Katniss told herself when she saw the smirk on Cato's face. She saw the perfect opportunity because everyone was paying attention to Cato. So she volunteered to Thresh that she would start next. Katniss did not like attention, so if she ever get a better timing than Cato, she could at least kept her profile low.

As Katniss started to sprint, Thresh stopped the stop-watch in a short time. His eyes were wide open and before he could churn out the right words, Katniss quickly ran to Thresh to check the time. When she went over to his right side, she saw the stop watch showed…

11.3 seconds.

Katniss lift her finger in front of her mouth to signal him not to shout the time. They exchanged glances and Thresh smiled to himself, as he knew Katniss' intention. Although Cato was swarmed by girls, he managed to watch the sprint made by Katniss and the exchange gestures between Thresh and her.

The trial run continued with the 200m, 400m and finally 800m. Katniss was flying high, her records were astonishing and she never failed to choose the right timing to perform her try out. Gale on the other hand excelled in 200m run but was average in 400m and 800m as he was more on the short distance sprint. Cato's performance was soaring high too and the girls continued cheering for him whenever he did the sprint but he seemed to ignore all the attention from the girls.

"Alright, we are done. Come back here tomorrow at 4pm for the results. Thanks!" the assistant announced to dismiss the students.

"Going home, Catnip?" Gale slung his hand across Katniss' shoulder while heading to the changing room.

She nodded, "Yeah, I will be going home to pack my things. Speaking of which, I need to call Madge after I change my clothes."

"Alright then. Guess I shall see you tomorrow?"

"Sure thing, and urmm Gale… I am sorry for lashing out on you before the session started," Katniss said it softly while looking on the floor.

Gale laughed at her instantly, "Catnip, don't be silly. I know you since forever."

He left her after finishing the last sentence. Katniss went to the changing room and retrieved her clothes from the locker. She was thinking the whole incident during the selection and Cato's sudden presence in the university. She let out a sigh when she thought about that, never in her mind that he would be in the same university as her. She thought that judging from his character, he would be a wasted creature. Deep down in her heart, she was hoping that it was just another guy who had the same name as the abusive boy back in Texas.

She whispered to herself, "It doesn't hurt to hope a little."

She took out her phone and started to dial Madge's number. After the third dialing tone, Madge answered the phone.

"Yellow, Katniss"

Katniss giggled a little as she thought to herself that Madge always had something different to express herself.

"Hey Madge, I am done with the selection. Are you ready?"

"More than ready, dear! See you at the main entrance?"

"Okay, see you in 5 mins time."

Katniss slung her Alexa handbag and headed to the main entrance. On her way, she saw Peeta from far. Suddenly she felt guilty as she was thinking of her meltdown in the cafeteria. She couldn't help it but to feel awful at her outburst. He was just being nice, and she thought to herself that he was actually a genuine person. Peeta's eyes wandered around the hallway and his gaze locked to Katniss' gaze. He looked nervous and he seemed like he was fighting with himself on whether he should stay at his current position or avoid Katniss. Before he could think of the next step, Katniss caught up with him, "Hey Peeta."

He stuttered, "He..y, Kat…niss"

There was an awkward silence in the air. Both of them were thinking very hard, trying to choose the right words.

However, Katniss managed to break the ice,"Peeta, I just want to apologise. I did not know what happen and I just snapped at you for no reason."

Peeta shook his head vigorously, "No Katniss, I think I was just too pushy and made you feel uncomfortable. I totally understand that."

Katniss felt relief at his reply and she did not know why she felt that way. She offered her hand to him but Peeta's head tilted slightly and had a confused expression on his face.

"Well, we should start anew? I am Katniss Everdeen,"she smiled at him.

Peeta's eyes were lit up and shook her hand, "I am Peeta Mellark."

She stood there and wonder to herself, the word seemed so familiar. Her eye brows frowned as she was trying to think really hard. After a few seconds, it clicked her mind and her eyes grew bigger while looking at Peeta and her jaws dropped.

Not too far away, Madge saw the situation and quickly ran to Katniss and grabbed her arms.

"Katniss, let's go. We will be late and I think I saw your uncle's car is out there already," Madge uttered the words in a rush while closing Katniss' jaw.

"Oh hi and bye Peeta!" Madge glanced Peeta quickly and pulled Katniss away.

"… oh bye…" Peeta was taken aback with the sudden interruption but managed to bid his goodbye to both of them.

As Katniss and Madge reached the main entrance, Katniss regained her senses and it hit her. "Madge, what was that for? You lied. You wouldn't know my uncle's car because we just reunite today and my uncle told me he will only be here by 6. What's going on?"

Madge looked at her watch and realized they had 30 minutes to kill. She scanned through her surroundings and saw a long bench nearby. "Follow me, I will tell you in a while." Katniss obliged and followed Madge from behind.

As they were seated on the bench, Madge started talking, "You know Katniss, after you left the cafeteria, I was pretty mad at Peeta too because he was ignoring me."

She paused a while to look at her surroundings to make sure no one is around and was satisfied with the current atmosphere.

She continued, "I was about to leave the table till Peeta pulled me back. When I told him off that he had stared at you since you entered the class … he corrected me and said he has done that since he was 6. I was so surprised at his reply and asked him further."

"What? What do you mean by since you were 6?" Madge looked confused.

"You don't remember me? I was the boy who asked you about Katniss after she left Texas," as Peeta explained.

Madge was digesting all the information and she remembered her little notes exchanged with Katniss where she mentioned that Peeta looked like the boy in Texas. But she did not want to tell Peeta that Katniss suspected that he was the same boy back in Texas.

"B-ut why didn't you tell Katniss that you know her before this?" Madge asked.

"I assumed she forgotten about me. No point bringing up the past and maybe she might not want to remember about her past judging of what happened to her before," he looked slightly hurt when he told Madge his thoughts.

"Oh…" that's the only word came out from Madge's mouth.

As Madge finished her story, Katniss looked disturbed.

"Hey, what's wrong Katniss?"

Katniss let out a loud sigh, "Madge, there are just too much of things going on. First, Cato… now Peeta…it's just overwhelming…"

"Wait wait wait, what do you mean by Cato? Who is Cato?" Madge voice became louder and before Katniss could explain further.

"Shoot! Do you mean that psychotic Cato back in Texas?" Madge shouted.

Katniss was shocked and quickly closed Madge's mouth while looking around to check whether were there anyone who might overhear their conversation.

"Are you crazy, Madge!" she whispered with an angry tone.

As Katniss slowly let go off Madge, Madge was trying to calm herself down.

"Yes, that Cato. You know he was there for the selection. I was shocked to hear his name was being called out. Although deep down I was hoping that it might be just another dude that has the same name but his feature is so similar… you know blonde hair with blue agonizing eyes," Katniss explained to Madge but avoided her gaze.

Madge observed Katniss' behaviour she was shaking a little and was playing with her braids. She leaned in closer and hugged Katniss."You know what, I'm here for you. You have Gale too. And look at you, you are a tough girl. I don't think this psychopath can do any harm to you anymore. Worse come to worst, take an arrow and aim his brain."

Katniss let out a small laugh at Madge's sly remark. "Yeah you're right, I am not scared of him, I am just angry. Everytime I see him I was so fearful that I might turn into Hulk and just smash his head!"

Suddenly Katniss and Madge heard a familiar honk. It was Uncle Haymitch.

"Hey, that's my uncle, let's just not think about it and have fun! I can't wait to introduce Prim to you."

Madge squealed, "Whee, I am so excited!"

But deep down, Madge was feeling slightly guilty...