I spaced out for most of the time the head trainer telling us the rules and instead looked around thinking about where I would go first. I figured that since my best weapon was the bow and arrows I would focus on trident throwing to start, then make my way over to plant identification. Then move on to the ropes course before breaking for lunch. When the trainer finally dismissed us to work on our skills I quickly walked over to the tridents wanting to get there first. It turned out that it didn't matter because I was the only one there. I started throwing them at the dummies that were laid out usually hitting my mark. Taking a break for a moment to give my arm a rest I stole a glance around the room. I noticed the tributes from 1 and 2 doing the same. When they saw me looking they walked over and introduced themselves.
"Hi, I'm Valerie Remirez, and this is Chase Rogers, that one there is A.C. Velachoes and her district partner is that one Bruce Bracco."
I look over them quickly, seeing that they all look like strong built tributes, aside from Valerie who seems like a smaller, quicker type.
"What do you want?" I ask offhandedly.
"We've been watching you and we want you to join the careers. Well, you and your district partner that is."
"Yeah, not a chance, of course I can only speak for myself."
I then turn and quickly grab a trident throwing it at the farthest dummy and hitting it straight through the spot where the heart would be.
I turn brushing past them, walking swiftly towards the plant identification as planned.
Upon walking over there I see a girl that I recognize as Ivory. Wanting to strike up a conversation with her since it seams she could be a potential ally, I say "Hello, my names Kaytlin. What's yours?"
She turns and looks at me, her eyes full of pure innocence, yet her body langue confident, as if she could take down the whole arena with one glare.
"Ivory"
She says stiffly, yet her voice as sweet as honeycomb.
Yep she's one to watch, she could be an ally, or the person who kills me.
I raise my eyebrows and ask if she's good with plant identification, and that if she is, could she show me some stuff?
She responds with two quick nods of her head and sets to work.

About 3 hours later I've crammed what seems like every plant in existence into my brain. And finally the clock above the door dings letting us know that, if we choose to, we can break for lunch. I hop up and offer Ivory a hand. It suppose when you spend 3 hours memorizing plants with someone you get to know them better and you gradually become good friends. After helping her up we walk to the cafeteria hoping to grab a table alone and eat some soup and salad. But upon entering the only table with spots open is full of careers, well, and there's one more. But Grey is sitting there so...
I turn to Ivory and say "Do you mind if we sit with my mentor?"
"No, why?"
"Well, it's just that the only other tables open have people who I don't like or that I'm not currently on good terms with."
"Oh. Then ya, sure, wherever you want to sit."
I lead her over to Finnick and introduce them, glaring at Finnick as if daring him to tell her to leave. I then recount how I had brushed the careers off and also how Ivory had taught me all about plants. Hearing this his gaze seemed to soften and after that he was warmer and back to his funny, nice self.
As the clock rang again we quickly jumped up depositing what was left of our food and started to walk out of the dinning hall. Until we were stoped, or rather I was stoped, by Jackson.
Ivory just nodded at me, as if she understood the situation, and I had no doubt that she did, and took off. Leaving us to "chat".
After a long moment he sighed and said "Look Kat, I'm sorry, I was stupid to even think of joining the careers and leave you."
I too sighed and said, holding back tears, "And I was an idiot to ever have gotten mad at you in the first place."
"I'm sorry"
We said at the same time.
Then we heard someone start clapping slowly getting faster each time.
"Well FINALLY! I thought I might have to mentor two people that hated each other!"
We turned to see that Finnick has been eves dropping on our conversation the whole time.
"Oh shut-up." I say slightly annoyed.
Then turn on my heal to catch up with Ivory though out of the corner of my eye I see Finnick motioning for Jack to stay back and talk to him.
I walk quickly back through the hallway down towards the training center, not wanting to loose any more precious time seeing as the original plan included the ropes course BEFORE lunch not after. I contemplated just not doing the ropes course at all but Ivory had mentioned that she wasn't very good with ropes and vines and such so I wanted to show her how to do it and give her some tips. Especially since she had helped me so much with plant identification. When I got there I spotted Ivory right away at the course but, unlucky for us, there was a whole group of people over there too and I was mostly careers. "Crap." I muttered underneath my breath. Walking up to Ivory we made eye contact and I shook my head when she started to come towards me. She got the message and turned away, acting as if she didn't know me. I hopped in line behind some kid from 10 and waited impatiently for my turn to have a go at the course. When I finally got to the front of the line I nodded once at the trainer to started his stopwatch and then started swiftly climbing the nearest tree as fast I could. I then hopped from a branch near the top of the first tree to a sturdy one on the next. I did that a few more times until I got to a place in the ceiling with thick ropes on it. Grabbing on tightly I started swinging. Hard. I heard someone, probably Ivory, gasp from the ground below me but I kept swinging my arms harder and harder until I swung forward one last time and let go. I threw myself forward and landed sprawled out in my stomach on top of the ropes. When I had let go I made sure my feet would go through an open space in the crisscrossed ropes but I hadn't braced for the impact and spent a second catching my breath.
It worked.
Thank god, I thought I might end up dead before the games even started for a minute there. I wasted no time before starting to army crawl to the other side where I dropped into a wall covered in rock and started a tedious climb down to the floor. Dropping down and touching the floor the trainer called out my time. "8:23! That's our best time yet today." He kind of muttered the last part, but I was close enough that I heard it and by the look on Jackson's face he did too. He smiled at me and I smiled back. Then I arched my eyebrow and gave him a look that clearly said "We WILL talk later". I mean what can I say? I was curious to know why Finnick had wanted to talk to him, and besides I needed to talk to him about Ivory and see how he felt about having her as a potential ally... speaking of Ivory where was she? I looked around but couldn't see her so I shrugged it off and headed over to the hand to hand combat station. The trainer there showed me some stances and gave me some tips before I squared off with about her another trainer. This one was very rude and kept smirking and saying I would be too easy to take down. I may not look strong but I am after so many years of swimming and fishing. This guy had another thing coming. He threw the first punch aiming for my gut but I darted out of the way, always keeping one hand up near my face to protect it. We squared off again and I did a roundhouse kick aiming for his face. I met my mark. Then I spun the rest of the way and came around with a right hook landing it on his jaw. My left hand left the place it had been hovering near my face in and I brought an uppercut to his chin. Kicking him in the stomach was the last straw for him and he went down. I pinned him on the floor by sitting in his back and the other nicer trainer declared me the winner. When I glanced up at the clock I realized that this had taken a lot longer than I'd thought it would and it was almost time for us to clear out. I decided to stand and watch Jackson while he finished up at the knife throwing station turns out after years of throwing spears he was actually pretty good at with knives. I knew that the moment he picked up a spear or even a hatched he'd be good to go.
When the bell rang we walked out in silence and entered the elevator, pressing the button for floor 4.
"So. I've been thinking..." I started.
"Try not to think to hard, you might hurt yourself." He joked.
"Hardy Har Har, anyways I'm being serious, I think you should write a letter to Madison and tell her how you feel because if you win she won't ever see you the same and if you die then she'll never know how much you loved her." I state confidentiality.
"Love is a strong word." He said, conveniently avoiding answering.
"And anyways, speaking of a love life, what about you?" He asked trying to change the subject.
"First off, don't change the subject. And secondly, I don't even currently have a freaking love life. But I'll let you know if I happen to fall in love in the next, what, else 4 days? The last sentence was laced heavily with sarcasm, I mean what were the chances and anyways considering the fact that I would probably die soon who cares if I'm sixteen and I've never had a boyfriend or kissed a guy other than my relatives?
"Whatever!" He said laughing.
The door dinged and we hopped off walk towards the room we'd been eating in with Finnick. He was already seated when we got there so we took seats next to him and an Avox came and took our order. I went with chicken and some different vegetables that sounded good. Jack did the same. When our food came Finnick broke the silence that had been thickening by the minute and said "So. How was the last half of training?"
"Fine."
"Terrible."
I looked at Pax skeptically. "It couldn't have been that bad?" I questioned him.
"Oh but it was, I spent practically the whole 4 hours trying to throw some stupid knives and I was only alright by the time we left."
"So? You've never done it before and I'd say you did well, your starting to rival me with the knives!" I laughed at the last part and he too cracked a smile.
"Well, what did you do?" Finnick said, attempting to change the subject away from something we might argue over.
"Umm I beat all of today's records in the ropes course with a time of 8:23, then I did some hand to hand combat and took down a trainer."
"And she was bloody brilliant about it too!" Jackson said, pride seeping into his voice. I just laughed and finished my fried okra before moving on to something they call "Asparagus".
"Well then sounds like a pretty good day." Finnick said ending the conversation. I cleared my plate quickly and then stood up.
"Well boys, I'm off to shower and then to bed so I suppose I'll see you in the morning."
"Goodnight!" Jackson said standing up and hugging me.
Finnick just kind of nodded at me, he was obviously tired from today but he still half smiled and I turned and walked out of the room. When I got to my door I locked it behind me and shedded my cloths hopping into the shower. I washed my hair and body then stepped out and used the automatic dryer thingy before throwing on shorts and an oversized hoodie thing that seemed to be missing the hood... but whatever it was, it was comfortable and I quickly fell into a dreamless sleep... though it wouldn't stay dreamless for long...

Hey my little cucumbers! Sorry it's been so long since I updated last... *guilty face* but I've been uninspired and I've had a lot of schoolwork as well. Feel free to come at me with pitch forks and torches. On the bright side this chapter (minus the authors note) was 2232 words long! YAY!
- Padfoot