Training Day Number One.
Krumr is back.
*parties*
D12- 18- (Krumr Strongthews)
Life is rough. And some people can whine and cry and sob because their life sucks more than others', but while I may not be a perfect example of taking the upper hand—what fun is that?—I embrace it, so doesn't that make me better than them? And yet, then again, who cares? Emotions, the things that weaken the world, are no use to living life and should be disregarded. They should not be disregarded fully, as that would make you completely inhuman, and everyone needs to be a little human.
Just a little.
Training fairs well with me. I like to watch the trainers from a corner, and when they tell me to get to work I smirk and pretend I don't hear them. When this fails, I roll my eyes and give them a careless look, slumping back against the wall lazily. One trainer even approaches me in the middle of the first day of training, his Capitol-corrupted face making his menacing-sounding voice pathetic, so he's basically like any other Capitol citizen.
"Young man—"
"I'd advise you not to call me that," I interrupt coolly, sighing as I stare out at other tributes: Careers obliterate dummies, weaklings flock around other weaklings helplessly or cling onto weapons pitifully, and those who are somewhere in the middle try not to flip out. I see the frightened gleam in their eyes though; I love that gleam. That gleam is my opening to kill them.
"I'd advise you not to backtalk those helping and in charge of you," he retorts, raising an eyebrow. Not bad. I can do better though. "Don't you want to train to prepare yourself for the—"
"Don't need to."
"But certainly you've—"
"I'm bored with you. Screw off," I tell him. I was bored of him from the start, but I figured I might be able to scrape some entertainment from the slab that is his imbecilic, dysfunctional, crappy mind and the ways of its workings; there's no purpose to his existence and I can't make any purpose out of it. I can't even get his tiny little stupid responses to give me something to feed comebacks off of. Hell, he's so idiotic that if I flipped him off, he would probably just stare.
His eyes widen, then narrow. "Young man!" he snaps. "That is not—"
Before he can finish, I stand up and walk off.
D4- 13- (Nelly Carter)
Walking into the training center is like walking into the world that my greatest nightmares live in: The place screams death and despair, the people are menacing and want to kill me, and the lighting is not bright, perky, and like every other damn Capitol place I've known. Many people tower over me, including the head trainer on a circular stage-like platform—ugh, platform; I believe the word will become one of the scariest—as she talks about training, the rules, and other boring things like that.
Unnecessary.
I want to get my hands on everything around here, and not specifically to train. It's striking me that Ryan was here. This training center is my last piece of Ryan besides the mediocre gravestone in the Tributes' Graveyard, a haunting place where all the dead tributes' bodies from over the years reside. Next to it is a smaller cemetery called the Victors' Graveyard, which is even scarier, the tales of insanity circling the world of gravestones and singing in visitors' ears. Both are creepy beyond comprehension and I dare not step in them unless to visit Ryan. I block out the whispers my imagination dreams up to frighten me when I step in there.
My question is: Which cemetery will I end up in?
Really, it's obvious; I am a small, frail (ish) thirteen-year-old with no experience in anything but anger overwhelming me and sending me on a spree of insults. The outturn of my existence as a tribute is a no-brainer, but I'm trying not to be depressing and a downer. Live life to the fullest, right? Well, there is no fullest when you're a tribute. Maybe a halfest or a fourthest, or if you're really unlucky and eigthest. I'm still hoping I'll have a gravestone right next to Ryan's on the other side of the fence—it's lucky his is right on the edge; if I die as a tribute, I can be by him; and if I die as a victor, I can still be by him, on the other side of a fence, but it's all the same to me—meaning on the victors' side of that dreary land of death.
The head trainer dismisses us to train.
As everyone scatters, I scan my eyes around for something so utterly Ryan that I know he touched it last year…unless they replace the weapons. Maybe they do. Of course they do. With my luck, this is the first time in years that they've done this too! Of course. Of course. Of course. There's no way I can ever just be a little sentimental because I miss Ryan, is there? Of course not.
So maybe a sixteenth of the fullest would be where I am.
I wander over to the planets station gloomily and plop down on the floor, then wince slightly, as I plopped a bit too hard. The trainer and a girl who had also just sat down stares at me a moment; my entrance probably wasn't too normal. Then the trainer lectures us about edible plants and gives us two booklets to go over them with. I study mine and she studies hers, both of us silent.
I look up at her for a moment. Her eyes drill into the book, her dark hair—black, maybe?—falling in her face. "Uh," I get out quietly, and her head jerks up in surprise at me starting conversation. "Um. Back home, in…in District Four, whenever my friends and I have big tests in school, we…we study together. Except Jordan and Ryan—well, not Ryan—and Stacy… We all sort of fight over studying with Sam."
She frowns slightly. "What're you saying?" she asks quietly.
"Maybe we should work together," I say, proud of this restatement compared to my first try at suggesting this, rambling about tests and people the girl has never heard of. "As allies."
"Allies?" she questions, her pale face falling back towards the booklet. She lifts her head, her eyes skillfully scanning the room without a turn of her head. They glue onto something behind me. I turn around and see what she's staring at: a scrawny boy undoubtedly from her district. "I don't know… I've already promised Ry and he's so…shy and only wants one ally…"
I shrug. "I was just wondering. There are others I can ask…"
She looks over at my face, her eyes narrowing ever so slightly like she's seriously considering my offer. I don't know if she's doing this out of courtesy or if she's actually considering it, but either way I appreciate the gesture, my eyes alight with a little hope. I can certainly get further in the arena with an ally, a partner, right? Most likely so. Someone to watch my back, help me out… And perhaps she won't think I'm too insane to ally with.
"Well, sure," she finally tells me, smiling a little. "Rylan—he's not even talking to me, so how are we supposed to be allies?" She pauses. "You said District Four?"
"I don't train," I assure her quickly, shaking my head. I shove my hand out. "I'm Nelly."
The girl shoves her hand out into mine and shakes it back. "I'm Calypso."
"So…where do we start?" I ask, looking down at the book.
She leans over and tells me what she's picked up so far, which is only a couple things, but it's more than scatterbrained me has. Yes, I think an ally was a brilliant idea. If I weren't trying to memorize edible plants, I'd pat myself on the back.
D1- 17- (Daphne Summerfield)
Today is the first day that all the Careers assemble together. The first day of training is essential to the world of the Careers: It's basically the day where we size each other up and a leader, without being asked to, steps up. It's usually the District Two male, but he seems a little airheaded. Well, they all seem airheaded, all the District Two males. We'll probably end up under an airhead's reign like any other Career Pack.
Adelina nudges me towards the other Careers. We walk over to them—it's more of a strut, really—and wait for the straggling District Four male to realize that we're all gathering together. He comes over to us and stands next to one of his district partners. The other is a tiny little thing. Useless. We don't want her. For a moment it's silent as we size each other up, except the young District Two female: Stonesia Zhunder.
"Are we all here?" the District Two male asks. He's taking charge, just as I expected.
"Yes," Adelina tells him, counting all of us as she says this. I look down to avoid smiling as she nods with a flirty smile. She told me she'd be flirting with the Career boys. I have Jeff back home, and I don't think he'd appreciate his girlfriend flirting with an airhead like Beck. That was his name, right? The only names I retained were Stonesia Zhunder, Gleam Diode, and Vixen Payne. "I believe we are." After a nearly imperceptible wink, she adds, "Beck," and he melts under the pressure of her soft, sweet, clear voice.
I think she'll kill him.
"Never mind the flirting," Gleam, the other girl from my district, snaps at Adelina. "There's no time for that."
"We really shouldn't start off arguing," the straggler from Four tells us. "So don't get into an argument."
Seven heads turn to him.
"We should train," the older girl from Two says, nodding at the boy who mentioned arguing.
I roll my eyes. "Well, we need to group together first," I said, crossing my arms. I bet I'm the smartest and best strategist in this pack.
"Says who?" the District Two male asks, his voice hard and thick, but not overly deep: It's very powerful, is all. "Grouping is for—for the losing Career Packs."
Good one… I think sarcastically. "Fine. Train and die. Who wants to actually be smart?"
We end up exchanging names—thankfully, for I didn't pay much attention to names when watching the reaping recaps—and forming mental ideas on all of us. We're quickly organized into a little line in front of the basic knife station that we should all have mastered as we continue to talk. Adelina and I particularly stick together, talking mainly only to each other as we comment on who'll be the first one down and who'll be assigned to guard things, etcetera. We also chat idly with Vixen between turns, as she's in front of us. She chats with Azaleigh when not talking to us.
"…the leader," I pick up on Vixen saying with an eye roll as she turns back to Adelina and me. "Right?"
"Who will be the leader?" I ask, watching Jackson stab the dummy skillfully, though noticeably contritely, and throwing a possibly…spiteful glance at a passing Peacekeeper.
Vixen huffs. "Beck. Of course. And he's just going to be totally the average Career Pack leader," she snaps, her voice ever-so obviously spiteful as she glares at Beck. He steps up to the dummy and artfully throws the knife into the dummy's head. Vixen shuts up, turns around, and all I catch from the rest of Azaleigh and Vixen's conversation is bits of whisperings.
"…annoying. . . . I bet…go for him. . . .and we're supposed to be…! I know… I know… . . . forget it. But— Forget it!"
And so begins the reign of the One Hundred Fifty-Second Hunger Games' Careers.