kill for your love - the hunger games

(020) and again. and again. and again

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KILL FOR YOUR LOVE.

act two. 

(chapter twenty, and again. and again. and again)

the justice building / capitol train, 75 ADD.

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FOR THE THREE-YEARS since her Games, one would think she had absorbed too much liquor and morphling to even run down the muddy road, even Juniper herself thought that, but over the few months of training, the Hale woman found herself to be in a good shape. Lucy couldn't say the same. 

Every morning, the mentor insisted they do exercises to strengthen their bodies. They lifted things and stretched their poor muscles. Juniper found this simple, so did Lucy. Then every afternoon, they worked on combat skills such as hand-to-hand fighting and weaponry. Juniper found this, as well, to be easy, whilst Lucy always finished breathless. Then in the evenings, it was their sprints around the district, timing each other to see how fast they went. Juniper found this less simple, but still rather okay while Lucy never managed to make a full lap. 

The older woman was not fit, far from it, but Juniper didn't blame her. She won around fourteen-years-ago when she was sixteen. She was thirty now. She wouldn't have the same stamina and strength she had all those years ago. But she wasn't a drunkard nor a morphling addict. She was simply Lucy Stevens. It was age and long years that had changed her fitness. But she was determined. Despite the aching muscles, the tiredness, the near-fainting into the mud, she would knock loudly on Juniper's door morning, afternoon, and night, making her train.  

But there were benefits with working their bodies until they couldn't no longer. Brent Higgins was not joining them. Lucy had visited him and asked if he would like to join, but apparently the man didn't say anything and slammed the door in her face. Juniper skipped around the Village with glee when her mentor told her that. 

And with every day finished, the two women would come back to the Hales's house and be greeted with only the most nutritious, healthy meal that Orion Hale had cooked, who had placed them on a special diet to gain weight. And after dinner, he would tend to their sore muscles with treatments he had gathered up from the district's nurse, who was really just an old woman in the housing strip that divided the Justice Building and the Breeders.

Juniper supposed she should have been grateful to Lucy Stevens and Orion Hale for even making her train because it took her mind off of the Quell. With the amount of exercises and combat that the two women were doing, the fear that she would be put into the arena again disappeared. But with the excessive training and forgetfulness, time flew. 

And then suddenly, it was Reaping day. 

Juniper didn't even realise it until she saw the look on her father's face that morning. Defeat. And it still didn't strike her that she could possibly be going back into the arena when she got showered and dressed. And it didn't even feel real as she, Lucy Stevens, and Brent Higgins were escorted out of their homes in Victors' Village, going through the district, past the Barn of Death, through the strip of housing, passing the Milking Station, strip of housing, the Breeders, housing. Finally, the Justice Building.