𝐒𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐬 ☘︎ 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐇𝐚𝐰𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐧𝐞

𝐇𝐔𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐑 𝐆𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒 ☘︎ 5

After dinner, which was just Austin and I getting congratulated again and again on the parade, I head back to my room. There, I would've just gone to sleep if I hadn't noticed a little remote on my bedstand. I picked it up, noticing it to be of the same type of the tiny TV remote we have at home. We only use it to watch the games and mandatory Capitol viewings.

I press a button on the remote and suddenly what I had, up until then, judged to be a normal window, changed scenes. It now depicted a snowy field. I tilted my head to the side as I clicked the button again, changing the scene to a burning desert. It didn't look inviting, so I changed it again.

And all of a sudden it changed to about the only place I've ever been happy.

Luscious green woods appear on the screen, with trees to climb and (most likely) game to hunt. I walked towards it unconsciouly, it was slowly pulling me in. I remember when Gale, Katniss and I would talk about running away, just like my idiot yet brilliant brother had said on the morning of the reaping.

How was that only two days ago?

Thinking about all this made me feel stupid. I'm not going home, and even if I was, I would be changed. I would be a pariah, an outsider.

I changed the window back to the original scene, jumping into bed. Wishing with all my heart to be home.

☘︎☘︎☘︎

"In two weeks, twenty three of you will be dead. One of you will be alive. Who that is depends on how well you pay attention to these few days."

Before the games even starts, all the tributes get a chance to train. The tribute centre has a big training room in it, with knives, bows, arrows, swords, spears, tridents, and, most importantly, axes.

"Particularly to what I'm about to say," Atala, the woman who runs the training, says. "First; no fighting with the other tributes, you'll have plenty of time for that in the arena," she chuckled.

I see the boy from District Two (I hear someone call him Cato) looking at me again. I turn away and tune back in to Atala.

"There are four compulsory exercises, the rest will be individual training. My advice is; don't ignore the survival skills. Everybody wants to grab a sword but most of you will die from natural causes. Ten percent from infection, twenty percent from dehydration. Exposure can kill as easily as a knife."

She dismisses us to go train but before I do, I cast a glance upwards. There, the people that everyone calls the 'Gamemakers' (the people who make life hell for us in the arena, basically) are watching us. I narrow my eyes at them as I go over to the knot tying station.

I quickly make the trainer at the station, Tax, very impressed. I show him my knowledge for snares (Gale's the best at those) and a few other traps. He then teaches me a few more before I move stations.

I go to the 'monkey bars', where you can practice core strength and see the boy from District Nine fall there and hurt his knee. I feel bad for him, though, as the careers mock him. I get through it without falling.

Soon I'm at the hand to hand combat station, standing in front of the two career girls, who I soon find out are called Clove, the girl from District Two who throws knives, and Glimmer (ridiculous name), the girl from District One that, to my horror, throws axes. I get all of this information by eavesdropping, though, I'm not talking to them.

Soon it all kicks off. Cato from Two suddenly yells. "Jason, where's my knife?" He grabs the boy from District Six.

"I didn't take your knife!" Jason yells back.