The MCR Games

Chapter 4 Effie was right. We do have a busy schedule.
After the chariots, we were raced to the Training Center and given a few bleak instructions. Now I'm standing here in the middle of the room, watching my surroundings. Observing.
Most of the people are practicing their weapons. I can see the guy from District 4 throwing his trident perfectly at the target in front of him, the girl from 7 practicing her axe skill, hardly anyone's focusing on the survival skills. But, there are a few people at the survival skills, and I think maybe I should be one of them.
I walk over to the fire starting practice and look at what's there. There's a grassy patch, some sticks and pieces of wood, some dead leaves and some flint. Not bad. I take the wood, breaking it into smaller sections I can position. Then I put some of the dead leaves on top. Then I take a stick and spin it, moving my hands up and down as it digs into the stone. Eventually, the stone lets a few sparks loose, lighting the leaves instantly. And the fire spreads onto the wood. Perfect.
I stand up, stamping out the fire. Ok, that's covered. What else could I practice? I know my key weapon's an axe, but I don't think I want these people knowing. I'll keep at the survival skills, but try a few I don't have much practice with.
I walk over to the knot tying practice. That could be useful for nets and traps...I think. Juniper was great it at.
There's only one other person there. One of the younger ones. Next to her is a whole pile of nets. We've only been here about a half and hour, she's quick.
"What're you making?" I ask curiously, watching her weave the rope into a large cuff.
"Just a rope cuff. Been making nets all this time, just taking a break."
"It looks really good." I say calmly. What do you say to children? I dunno. I only ever spoke to Juniper. "Thanks." she says, tying it off, finishing it. "You can have it if you want." she sets it down on the table. "That's nice of you." I say, taking it and wrapping it around my wrist. "So what's your name?"
"I'm Rosie. You must be Gerard, right?"
"Yeah. How'd you guess?"
"I learnt the tributes names and districts on the train. Better to be safe than sorry." she says, starting another net. "So what's your weapon, Gerard?" she asks.
"Oh, I use an-"
"Gerard." says Katniss, setting a hand on my shoulder. "You shouldn't tell other people your weapons. You need to keep a low profile of before you know it, everyone'll have a mental fact file about you."
I sigh "Thanks Katniss." I say. She smiles at me and walks off. "What about you, Rosie? What's your weapon?"
"My weapon? Well-"
"Rosie." says a strong voice from behind me, walking over to the child, sending me an icy glare. "Maybe we should go work on the category practice."
It's the guy from 11.
"Um, alright." she says, confused, walking over to the category practice.
"Are you really trying to sabotage a 12 year old?" says the man to me.
"Sabotage? I was just making friendly conversation."
"Friendly conversation? It's the hunger games, be realistic." and with that, he walks off to Rosie. I look over and see the guy from 4 watching. He walks over to me, trident still in hand.
"Ignore Billie." he says. "He's just a bit rigid about the kid. Don't know what it is."
I chuckle. "Thanks. I'm Gerard." I say.
"Frank." he says extending a hand. I shake it and look at his trident.
"Nice weapon." I say.
"Oh these? We have them everywhere in District 4. "
This guy looks friendly, but don't judge a book by his cover.
"Oi, Frank!" says the guy from 2. "What are you, an outline or something? Come back here with us!" Frank rolls his eyes and ignores him. "Apparently we're not allowed to talk to people from outline districts anymore. Such shxt heads."
Maybe he's a little nicer than what I expected, but I still don't fully trust him. He must notice my expression. "Not everyone here's a dxck. Some of us are actually pretty nice. Like..." he looks our amongst the tributes. "There's Ray." he points to the man with the curly hair at the poisonous practice. "and...that's Hayley." he points towards the girl with orange hair and the spear. "she's from my district. And who else... Oh, yeah, Jack from District 10."
"So you know a lot of people around here?"
"Yeah. My mentor said to find out as much as possible."
"Ah."
"Well anyways, nice to meet you, Gerard." he says. "Bye." and with that he smiles and walks back to the careers.
"Who was that?" asks Katniss, walking over to me.
"Oh, Frank. District 4."
"Gerard, just be careful. Some people may seem nice, but they're probably just trying to get into your head."
"I know." I grit my teeth. She's starting to get on my last nerves. I know what people try to do and I don't need the easiest advice given to me like I'm a child. And instead of her walking back again, I leave her. Maybe I should practice my weaponry. I head over to the weapon practice and pick up an axe from the shelves. Some of the careers look in my direction and snigger. I'll show them.
I look at the weapon in my hands and walk over to the dummy. I turn my back on it and take another look at the judging faces of the careers. They think outliners aren't used to weapons. Let's see.
I turn around in an instant, smashing the blade of the axe into the legs, cutting them clean off. Then I cut hard into the sides, adding just enough pain for major screams, without killing the opponent. And I spin the dummy around, taking he blunt end of the handle and smashing it into the center of the lower back, which would stop all human movement before walking away.
But as soon as I'm about 10 feet away, I turn back around throwing my axe, beheading the dummy perfectly. I turn to look at the careers. They look impressed, one of them even looks a little scared. But I know better than to make allies of them.
Confidence boost, check. Who would've thought that a few impressed faces could get me thinking that I have a chance at winning this thing.
I smirk, crossing my arms. I feel something loosely around my wrist. I look over at it, and remember its the rope cuff. It actually looks pretty intricate. I don't have a token to wear for the games, maybe this could be it. A token from a fellow tribute. Don't think that happens very often, probably for a reason...

Notes

Sorry if it's too long, I just have a lot of fun writing this one. Happy reading ^_^