Hello everyone and welcome to the last training chapter! I'm super excited to be moving on to other Pregames things after this chapter, and I feel like it will definitely be a breath of fresh air for me to not write another training chapter for a long while after this. And fun fact, today marks six months since TCOA was first published! I wanted to be sure to have a chapter out today to celebrate it! Anyways, I hope you enjoy reading! (Also, again please don't mind my desciptions of some of the things that the tributes are doing at some stations, I am no professional at training for the Hunger Games)

Naymena Lachlock, 18

District Four Female

Naymena was ready for the last session of training in the Capitol. It felt like the Games were just slowly inching closer and closer, and oddly enough, she wanted to be there faster than she actually would end up getting there. She wasn't entirely sure why, but she felt like it definitely had something to do with her eagerness to prove the curse that she was better than it.

She could survive that wretched curse and get rid of it for good. Then everything that she'd worked for in her life would be worth it and she wouldn't have to be worried about the curse ruining something that she'd worked so hard to get. It was not going to win against her, and she was going to make sure of it. Naymena Lachlock refused to submit to something so trivial, and her victory in the 80th Hunger Games would just propel her to incredible heights.

Having been awake since the sun rose, Naymena was alert and ready to finish making sure all of her skills were finessed before her opportunity to show them to the Gamemakers for a score. She wanted to get as high of a score as she possibly could, only because she wanted to rub it in the faces of the Careers. She didn't want a high score to get sponsors; she could survive the Hunger Games just fine on her own if she'd survived most of her life like she had. Independence was an excellent piece of her character, and it was what set her apart from any typical Career that would normally be in her place.

It was pretty obvious that Four's mentor, escort, and male tribute had wanted the spot that Naymena filled to belong to a so called "typical Career", but Naymena could care less about what they thought of her. She was focused on herself and herself only. Focus was also a critical factor in her survival of the Games and the curse.

Most would find her mindset unusual for any tribute, not wanting to receive sponsor gifts and have allies, but it was what Naymena wanted and it was going to work out well for her. She had a reason for everything she did, and this was no exception. Now, it was time for her to go perfect those killing throws at the spear station in the training room and maybe do a little bit more learning in short range weapons.

Breezing by the table that was occupied by the other three people that stayed in Four's apartment, Naymena went ahead and exited the shared quarters, walking quickly to the elevators. She wanted to get an early start to utilize all of the time that she had left in training.

Arriving with a ding, the elevator opened with a whoosh and Naymena stepped on board, glad that it was looking like she was going to be the only one on the elevator. It was fairly early, and most of the tributes had a tendency to arrive at training exactly right before they opened the doors and released them to go to whatever stations they pleased. For now, Naymena was going to sit down and wait patiently for the beginning of the last training session. Perhaps she would also take the opportunity to scope out her strongest competitors.

These competitors wouldn't be her targets, but she wanted to have ample information on some of them for when they had an interaction with each other in the arena. She wasn't going to waste energy trying to hunt someone down when she could easily draw them in and eliminate them in familiar territory for her. Engagement would not be occurring between her and other tributes unless they actively came to her or stumbled upon her. They wouldn't have much time to realize that in the first place though. Her camp was going to be riddled with cleverly hidden traps that would help Naymena take out a competitor (or several, she hoped).

She'd spent some of her time over the first few sessions at the traps station, just learning to do the most effective, but simpler traps in order to be able to spend the majority of her time working on her weapons skills. Those would ultimately be the skills that helped her to survive the setting of the arena the most.

People were finally beginning to show up in the lobby that the tributes waited in for the training room to open. Naymena had been the first to arrive, which was very normal for her. Next to walk in was the girl from Nine. To be honest, Naymena really didn't care enough about the other tributes to learn any of their names, but she could identify them by the number on their shirts, and it was good enough for her right now.

As the minutes passed by quickly, tributes began to file in one by one as it got closer to the beginning of the last morning session of training. At last, once most of everyone had arrived and the time had come, the large double doors were unlocked and the lights in the training room turned on. Naymena made her way through the door before most of the crowd had realized that they needed to go find a station, and she'd already decided on the first station that she would visit in the three hours that the session was going to last.

First, she was going to visit the sword station and practice her close combat. It could use some improvement, but Naymena didn't really have much time to do so, she was just going to focus on strengthening the skill she already had at it. After that, she would spend the rest of her time at the spear station, refining her aim and preparing for her private session, where she would finally visit the archery station.

Natalia Maude, 18

District Nine Female

Natalia still felt sore from the first day of training, but it was a good sore and she loved feeling like that. It let her know that she was strengthening her body and that she was doing something with the amazing body that she had. Every time she moved, that satisfying feeling of muscles stretching back out and working the lactic acid out of them put a satisfied smile on her face.

Right now, she was currently walking into the training room, ready for the last session of training. She felt like the sessions had gone by so fast, and she wasn't quite sure how she was feeling on being even closer to going into the arena where the Hunger Games would take place than when she'd first gotten shocked by being reaped. Natalia had mixed feelings about the morals and systems that went behind the Games, but she knew that now that she was going to be involved in it, everything was going to be different.

Instead of being the one to hunt down the criminals for killing people, she was maybe going to be the person that killed people, except she really wouldn't be considered a criminal. Apparently the Hunger Games were the ultimate get out of jail free card for doing basically anything that would normally be illegal back in any of the districts. Hey, Natalia would take it if that was what she was going to have to do to return to her life back in Nine.

Actually, now that she thought about it, Natalia realized that her life would never be the same if she survived the Hunger Games. She would be thrust into the spotlight for at least the next year, possibly more, and nobody back home would look at her the same. Sure, she probably wouldn't have to ever work again in her life, but there were more downsides than maybe one or two positive notes about it. She would have to coach two kids from Nine every year and likely watch both of them die year after year. Not to mention the fact that nobody would look at her the same after what she would have to do in the arena to come out alive.

At least she wasn't someone that would have anyone that would miss her if she died. It wasn't as if she had parents or siblings or both, and she could guarantee that most of the other tributes that were here with her had family that would miss them. Great, now she was spiraling. All these thoughts weren't helping her mental state, and if she wasn't careful, Natalia would cause her own downfall.

The rational side of her head didn't want that to happen, so Natalia took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and cleared her head. She was just going to focus on the station that she was headed towards, which was the hand-to-hand station.

She wanted to practice some of her strongest skills, and this was the best station to do so at. Natalia could look tough in front of the other tributes and make sure her survival skills were on point before the event of the day: the private sessions. She wanted a somewhat good score, just so she could impress some people and establish herself as a worthy competitor and threat.

Approaching one of the trainers, Natalia nodded to him when he gestured to himself and pulled off her shoes, placing them on the side of the mat. It would be good for her to let out some tension and nerves before the actual important part of training.

Natalia struck first, targeting the man's ribs with both her punches and kicks. A couple of her strikes snuck in behind his defense and connected with Natalia's target, and the trainer took a step back and a deep inhale in. With this opening, she went for a bit of a higher target, this time the man's neck and shoulders. He just managed to block her quick moves, and they continued on, each taking turns making moves at the other person.

Their little bout lasted around five minutes and Natalia could feel a few beads of sweat bubbling up on her forehead. Sweat was always a good sign of hard work, and Natalia was confident that her hard work was paying off for now. Now that she was confident she was ready for her private session in the defense aspect, Natalia pulled her shoes back on and thanked the trainer that she'd sparred with before moving on to a different station.

This time, she made her way over to the plants station, which happened to be one of the most popular survival stations in the training room this year. She could get why, if you didn't have sponsors and you didn't know what you could eat and what you couldn't, you were probably done for early on. The station usually had at least a couple of people at it at most times, and it had maybe two people there right now.

Once she reached it, Natalia took a seat a bit farther away from the other tributes that were at the station and began to look over the packets that the instructor had given her when she'd come over to this station in an earlier session. For now, Natalia was planning on making sure she knew a majority of the plants that were both safe and unsafe to consume. If she had enough time after she thought that she knew a good many of the plants in the packets, she'd try and see how much she actually remembered with the projected test.

Billy Gauge, 14

District Eight Male

Strangely enough, Billy had actually been looking forward to today. It was mainly because of his newfound friends in his alliance, especially Val. She was so nice and funny, to be honest, she felt like somewhat of a mother figure that he'd never had. The same could be said for Oscar, who also looked as if he admired the older girl heavily. This situation was just such a prime example of the calm before the storm.

Their somewhat happy little alliance (well, not that little since they were the second largest alliance from what Billy had seen) would likely be shattered by the Games, which were only a few days away. In all actuality, Billy had just blocked off a majority of his feelings about the Games overall. He wasn't planning on being one to survive long, and since he was going to end up dying anyway, he wanted to go in a way that was easy and fast. After all, that was the whole reason behind him volunteering. Well, that and getting to see the luxuries of the Capitol before he kicked the bucket.

From what he'd gotten to see during what had happened so far, it was incredible. Eight didn't even have a candle to hold against the insane technology and wealth of the Capitol and its luxuries. Not to mention, it also was nice that he wasn't breathing in any more smog. That was another lovely bonus to being in the Capitol and about to be thrown into a death game with twenty-one other teens, twenty of whom were older than him.

"Hi Billy!" Val waved as he walked into the lobby where she and Vince were standing, "We're just waiting on Oscar to get here and for the doors to open."

"Hey Val, morning Vince," he greeted them.

He got a smile and a grunt in response, the latter in which was not bad from the normally silent and always grumpy Vince. It was fairly clear that he wasn't happy with his sister's choice in allies, and Billy wasn't very insulted at that fact. He would be upset too if he had to drag around a bunch of young kids in the Hunger Games.

Val was still bouncing on the balls of her feet and when she spotted the youngest member of the alliance, she waved eagerly at him so that he could spot where the group was standing while they waited. Once Oscar joined them, they chatted for a bit about random things while the few minutes before the doors would open passed.

Soon enough, they were let into the training room and Val led the way to the camouflage station. She'd been going on about how it would be fun to learn how to hide herself and others with just earth materials, and this didn't sound too shabby to Billy. It might be a useful skill to learn.

When they'd all found spots to start work at the station, the trainer came around to give them a little bit of instruction before they just jumped off the deep end on their own.

"First, you guys need to find a material that you want to blend in with. This may be a rock, a tree, a bush, or anything really. Secondly, you need to make sure that you have the correct items to help you blend in with that chosen setting," the man informed them.

Billy followed these instructions closely, finding a nice tree among the several settings that were at the station for someone to compare their camouflage to. Then, he looked over the table full of paints and other stuff to camouflage oneself with, but he held off on grabbing anything before he received more instruction.

Looking to his sides, he could see that the rest of his alliance was doing something similar to what he was. That was good, he seemed to be doing the right things for now.

"Next, you're going to select your colors and materials based on what you chose for your background to blend in to. For example, if you chose this tree (which Oscar had), you would grab some brown colored paints and materials that resemble bark and the tree's trunk."

Doing as the instructor had told him and the group, Billy grabbed all of the items that the instructor had suggested one use to blend in with the tree and returned to his station with his chosen materials, again waiting on further instruction.

He listened carefully as the instructor demonstrated the art of how to paint what you wanted to conceal, then adding the textured material on top, then adding a final layer of paint to pull it all together. Billy did his best to follow the demonstration, and once he was finished, he mentally compared how his camouflage on his arm looked compared to how the camouflage on the instructor's arm looked. It was okay, not the best, but not the worst.

Poor Oscar looked as if he was really struggling with his own camouflage attempt, and Billy really felt bad for him. He also really felt bad for the younger boy and the fact that he'd landed in this situation just because the escort drew the slip of paper that had his name on it. Maybe Billy did have another thing he wanted to do before he died. He wanted to make sure that Oscar had a better fate than anyone else in that arena, except not one that meant he had to murder to survive.

Elias Walker, 17

District Nine Male

Elias was frustrated at the world. He so desperately wanted to do something drastic in order to get a message out to the brainwashed citizens of the Capitol about how wrong the Hunger Games truly were, but he was focusing on taking deep breaths and following his father's advice of trying to stay as low as he could to avoid utter hatred by the Capitolites.

It would put him in a very bad situation when the Games came, and Elias wanted to survive this terrible form of entertainment so that he could continue defending the innocent people that the Peacekeepers back home punished unjustly. Plus, maybe he could find a way to point out to the Capitol that their Hunger Games were barbaric and morally wrong. But first, he needed to do the one thing that disgusted him: pretend to like the Capitol so that he could get sponsors.

For their last session, he and Zain had decided that they were going to do some more work with weapons, so they'd returned to the sais station. They'd been there for a few minutes since the tributes had been released into the training room at the start of the session.

Since the pair had been to that particular station before, the trainer easily recognized them and had just let them do their own thing since he seemed confident that they didn't need or want any more instruction. Elias was pretty glad to not have anyone interrupting him and his ally when they were training, and he was especially thankful since nobody was going to interrupt his session of anger management.

Plunging the sai in his right hand into the dummy, he let out a loud grunt and pulled it out just as aggressively as he'd stabbed it in. Due to this, Zain looked over at him a little curiously, but quickly turned right back to what he was doing. Maybe just a little less aggressively, Elias supposed.

The boys practiced at this for a long while, both of them working up quite a sweat from the exertion of their actions. When they finished their long session, Elias and Zain both wiped their faces on their shirts before they placed their weapons on the racks and stepped away from the station.

"So, where do you want to go now, Elias?" Zain asked him.

"Uh, I guess we could go to the traps station if that's good with you. It wouldn't hurt to learn how to make some traps that could catch us some food, you know."

"Yeah, that's fine with me."

With their next location agreed upon, the pair started to make their way over to the traps station, which annoyingly was on the entire opposite side of the room. Elias supposed that it would make sense that the weapons stations were on one side and the survivals stations were on the other side, but it was still annoying to take up a bit of their precious time just walking across the large room.

To their luck, there was only one other person at the traps station, so they pretty much had a majority of the station to themselves. They hadn't been to this particular station before, since they chose to focus on learning to use some weapons with most of their time in the previous sessions. Both boys took a seat across from the instructor and listened to him as he instructed them on how to start making basic snares that could catch food in the arena.

Elias was watching the demonstration carefully, because he didn't want to mess anything up and potentially create an incorrectly made snare that might end up giving away their location or letting their dinner loose. He was going to pay as much attention as he possibly could and practice these snares until he could do them in his sleep. His survival would likely have some dependence on it, plus on his skills with weapons that he and Zain had spent so much time on practicing and improving.

Now that the instructor had finished up his detailed explanation of how to make the simple snare and Elias was confident that he remembered exactly how to replicate it, he started to do so. He gathered his materials that he needed to make it first, then started on the beginning step.

Taking the assembly of the snare step by step, it only took Elias about ten minutes to finish his first attempt at making the snare that the instructor had shown him. Once he'd finished, Elias took a glance at Zain, who wasn't finished yet. He would wait on Zain to finish, then he would ask the instructor how he did for his first time making a snare.

As soon as his ally finished, Elias asked the instructor to inspect their snares and see what they needed to fix and improve on. Elias' snare was actually fairly good for a first snare, and the only thing he really needed to do was tighten up some of his ties and knots. As for Zain, he didn't do as well. He'd gotten tripped up on some of the more complicated steps and he'd mixed up a knot or two. It was okay. All they needed was one person to be good at snares. Elias could do that, and Zain could find another talent to contribute to their alliance.

Almost as if it was mocking them, the bell rang shrilly shortly after they'd gone through a few more snares and had them checked. Training was officially over. As the boys made their way over to the door to line up for lunch, Elias took a deep breath in, calming himself once more. He could get through this without completely losing at the Capitol. His family and friends back home needed him to.

Alliances:

The Dysfunctional Career Pack - Goldena, Sublime, Goneril, Ruga, Kasai

The Survivalists - Reverie, Anne, Milo

The Long-Lost Besties - Taraji, Kassi

The Capitol Haters - Zain, Elias

Val, the Grump, and Val's Adopted Children - Val, Vince, Billy, Oscar

The Agriculture Buddies - Indigo, Agri

The Loners - Zeno, Naymena, Georgette, Natalia

And with that, training is officially wrapped up! I'm super excited to be moving on to different parts of the Pregames, and I hope you guys are too! I can't believe that it's been six whole months since I posted that first chapter of TCOA, and this journey so far has been incredible and I really appreciate all of the support I've gotten so far. You guys are the best. I hope you enjoyed reading and I'll see you in the next one!