One Lucky Winner

Chapter 16 ~ Hermione

"Go train, now," the head trainer says to us as soon as she gets done explaining all the stations. I feel my stomach jump with nervousness. I'm not good at anything, survival or weapon training. No matter what I do today, I'll make a fool out of myself.

Even with this sickening nervous feeling, I turn to Harry and Ron. "Don't train at any of the weapon stations," I say to them. "We have our wands for that. Focus on survival skills. We have none of those."

They both nod.

"And try to make some friends. We need allies," I add.

"I don't think anyone wants to ally with us," Harry says, looking at the tributes scattering around.

"Still try," I say with a sigh.

I look at Ron, who's looking at the floor. He's barely talked to Harry and I ever since last night at the tribute parade, only because the sponsors started 'shipping' Harry and I. I guess Ron is jealous. I don't like Harry at all. He's a good friend, but there's nothing romantic between us. I wish Ron would just realize that.

"Think I'll go try that," Harry says, looking at a station. I look where he's looking and see that it's fist fighting. I feel a spark of anger and annoyance. Fist fighting is the exact opposite of what I just told him to do.

"You'll get yourself killed," I tell him.

"It would be a good skill to have, though." He looks at me, then Ron. "See you at lunch." He walks away.

I look at Ron. It's awkward between us. I've been giving him the silent treatment back at Hogwarts because of him and Lavender. But now that we're forced to be here together, I don't know if I should continue that or just forget it. We've only said short sentences to each other since we got here.

"Don't do weapons," I say to him awkwardly. Then I walk away from him, eager to escape the drama.

I scan the different stations, looking for a survival skills one with no people at it. A lot of people seem to be doing survival stations. There is one without anyone at it, and it's knot tying. I would go there, but I highly doubt I will need to do that.

I see the berry game station. Knowing poisonous and non-poisonous berries would be helpful, especially if we get a backpack without any food in it. The station only has one other tribute at it, and it's a station with no trainer, so I walk over there.

I remember the head trainer's instructions for the berry game. All you have to do read this article about poisonous berries and non-poisonous berries on a tablet, and then you play this game on the tablet where you have to drag the berries into two columns: Poisonous and Non-Poisonous. Then you keep reading it and playing it until you get them all right. Easy enough. It involves no communication with other people, so I'm in. And it's impossible to make a fool out of myself doing it.

I pick up a tablet. Apparently, a tablet is a thing with a touch screen that you can read things on. I've never seen one in my life.

I look at the chairs and glance at the other tribute that's there. It's that guy with the purple juice stain on his shirt, the one who wouldn't shut up when the head trainer was talking. I feel a twinge of arrogance. He's clearly careless and dumb. I think I'm better than him. I know I'm better than him.