Chapter 2: The Capitol
Alyssa
I arrive to the capitol and wave to the adoring people. They all are here cheering for me, scratch that, they are cheering for Andor, he is the one who volunteered. I am rushed into the remake building and meet my stylist, Anne Smith. It’s an oddly normal name for a Capitol citizen. After several painful hours, I am allowed to see the gown. It’s gorgeous; it is a shade of pink that goes with my skin tone great. Then after an hour of makeup, I get to look in a mirror. They highlighted my cheekbones, and made my eyes fabulous with jewel tones. Then I walk in the room that contains all the tributes.
Jory
I am in the tribute “holding tank”. There are a couple of tributes there. I am dressed and ready. I am wearing white pants and a white shirt with a striped black tie, and a black belt. It is really laid back looking with the powder blue/aqua coat I am wearing. I walk over to the careers, all stereotypical, stupid and murderous. Except one, her name is Alyssa. We walk over to a sofa and we talk, we both find out that neither of us, despite being in a career district, trained for the games. I want her as an ally. Her partner is being lifted into their chariot and she hurries over there.
“Wait!” I say.
“What?”
“Allies?” I mouth.
She nods in assent, then smiles. I actually feel confident now.
Ella
I sit in my girly city circle outfit and then walk over to a couch. It was such a rush, arriving to the Capitol and then the stylist and the mean prep team. The girl from district 10 walks over.
Jamie
I walk over to another girl, Ella, I think… Anyways we start talking and we realize that both our mentors abandoned us. Neither of us wants to outright ask, but we both want to be allies. It is hard for me to say it, but I do.
“So, do you want to be allies? We could train together tomorrow…”
“Yes, I really didn’t want to have to do this alone.” says Ella almost right after I ask.
“Great” I reply.
“Well, I better get to my chariot”
“Okay, bye. See you soon.” I say.
Alyssa
I finally reached for the doorknob to my room. Andor had hogged the attention in the City Circle and I might just have to kill him for it.
Jory
I feel bad for Alyssa, her district mate grabbed for all the attention, just like Vaticka did. I sleep easy into my first morning of training.
Ella
Jamie and I ride in the elevator together, I smile and wave good-bye when I get off the 9th level and escape to my room.
Jamie
I twirl my curly red hair the rest of the way to my room. Axel ignores me and I decide that he isn’t going to be on my good side.
Jory
I get to the training center and I find Alyssa at knot-tying.
“Hey”
“Oh, what’s up Jory?”
“Besides being sent to fight to the death in a few days?”
She laughs and says “Okay Mr. Jokester”
We try to make snares but we don’t do well. But I manage to make a decent trap while she is trying to make a net out of grasses.
“Uhh, not to be rude but you’re doing that wrong?”
“I know... in the arena can you be the one who fishes for food?”
We laugh, but that time is going to come before we know it. We give up on knots and we go to the camouflage station where we find Ella and Jamie.
Ella
Jory and Alyssa join us and the four of us start talking and meanwhile I successfully camouflaged myself into a meadow of flowers. We decide to train together and after going through all the survival stations, Jamie excels at edible plants and animals, I can climb great and Alyssa and Jory are good, or better than me, at knot-tying and setting traps.
Jamie
We eat lunch together and that’s when Jory asks Ella and me if we want to be in an alliance with him and Alyssa.
“Well wouldn’t that be a large alliance?”
He replies simply “yes, but it will work, I can feel it”
“Sure” Ella and I both say.
Alyssa
We go to the hand-to hand combat station and Jamie and I do great using the combat knives in hand-to hand combat, but Jory and Ella don’t do great. Jory does better with the square angular knives and Ella does okay-ish. Then we have to go back to our rooms for dinner and bed, we decide on the elevator ride up, that we will focus tomorrow on each of us finding a weapon we like.
Jory
Its training day 2 and we decide to do weapons and such. Ella comes up with the idea of doing long-distance, then short-distance. It is a solid plan and we start at bow and arrows. I immediately fall in love with it. I do great and I am able to hit moving targets, even birds with pinpoint accuracy. Then, Ella walks over to miscellaneous weapons and finds the blowgun. She does great. All it needs is some poison at the end of it and she is golden. We then move to combat knives. We each select one that we like. I like the square angular one. Ella like the one that can saw at the end, then Jamie chooses a long one and Alyssa likes the short one.
Jamie
We move on to knife throwing. Jory does great, but only with that square one. The others he misses sometimes.
Ella
After the knife station, we head to short-distance. Alyssa is a great sword wielder; she holds the thin one with great confidence and is massacring dummies left and right. Jamie is okay with swords, but her true strength is in an axe. She was even able to decapitate a dummy with one of those. She can use its momentum great in hand to hand combat, but can throw them great. I am glad to have her as an ally.
Alyssa
It is time for the training session with the gamemakers now. I do well and show them my sword skills.
Jory
I show the gamemakers the skills I have at the butcher knife and decide to leave the bow and arrows for a finale, and I puncture the rope of a punching bag with an arrow.
Ella
I play with my blowgun awhile but the gamemakers aren’t paying attention until I manage to hit a moving dummy from 50 yards away, while climbing the rock wall.
Jamie
I play with that awesome axe and some hand spears and do great. The gamemakers like it.
Jory
Since our mentors have abandoned all of us, we decide to watch the training scores together in the lounge. We watch pointless news then the training scores are announced. Surprisingly, we all get 7’s.
“Not too bad, huh” I say.
We all laugh together and walk over to the elevator.
Jamie
“Good night” I tell Ella as she gets off the elevator. I actually feel really confident that I have a shot of winning now. I am glad that I have found a good weapon.
Alyssa
I decide to watch a recap of the scores on the T.V. in my room. It is presented like a graph.
Andor Purpura 10
Alyssa Rubine 7
Kriz Phillips 11
Anise Argor 10
Ian Barner 6
Dev Divorjna 6
Jory Marronelle 7
Vaticka Malnack 9
Ceaser Garnett 5
Anette Dragonflow 5
James Korman 6
Penelope Persopolis 5
Kai Long 3
Lola Cabernet 4
Raff Gonezmi 5
Chrysanthemum Ling 3
Grant Kloss 8
Ella Oathart 7
Axel Zepherson 8
Jamie Mare 7
Hayden Pitt 9
Lavender Temble 9
Alexander Macedon 8
Iris Mum 2
Jamie
It is time for the interviews. The four of us spent the day doing nothing since our escorts and mentors abandonded us. We walked around the building then we went to our stylists. My stylist put me in a lovely long deep purple dress with silver shoes. Alyssa is in a short dress that ranges from yellow to salmon to red. Ella is in a one-shouldered dark green dress and Jory is wearing white pants, gray shoes, a light blue shirt and a gray cardigan. We all sit down in our respective seats.
Alyssa
I am first up for the interviews. My name is announced and I walk up on stage.
“So… Alyssa how do you think you will do in the games?” asks Ceaser.
“I think I will do great”
“Any allies?” he asks.
“Well, there has to be some surprise element in the arena, so no comment”
*Long minutes of pointless banter*
“Well good luck to you Alyssa” he says excitedly.
Jory
I sit in my chair and watch Alyssa, she was okay… Then the pair from 2 are acting like ruthless killing machines. District 3 looks exasperated. Vaticka is charming and sly. I get up there and I hope I don’t fail.
“Hello Jory” says Ceaser.
“Well hello there.”
“So, what is your life like back home?”
“My parents own the butcher shop and other than that my life is pretty normal I guess”
“How do you like the Capitol?” asks Ceaser.
“I like it, I guess I will be seeing it this time every year from now on, so I better get used to it…”
The crowd laughs and then my buzzer sounds.
Ella
I sit on that dang chair on the stage, I don’t do anthing special like the desperate ones from 6,7, and 8. I just am myself and Ceaser turns it into a few jokes, but other than that, my interview is pretty boring overall.
Jamie
I walked up on stage to ooh’s and ahh’s about my dress.
“So, Jamie do you like your dress” asks Ceaser.
“Well who wouldn’t?”
“Agreed, so what do you think of the games.” Says Ceaser.
“I am confident, I believe I can win.”
“Wonderful” Ceaser trills.
After a minute of pointless talk and a few comments about my dress involving a purple cow the buzzer goes off.