The Hunger Games Begin

Training

Tribute training starts today. My stomach has become butterfly paradise. I am smart, fast and strong, there is only one real area that requires real practise, combat. I need to know how to handle a weapon.

All of us tributes are assembled before our training supervisor, Mel, who is briefing us about the different possibilities of how we will die. As you can imagine, Mel is not an optimist. My priority is to be able to defend myself, so I make a beeline for the combat area. I know that I need to learn how to fight, the only question is: which weapon? I decide on knives since they can be thrown as long range weapons and used to stab at closer range. Two other tributes are also at the knives section, the girl from Four and the boy from Eleven. Sweaty handed, I sling a sash of knives across my chest and grip a blue handled knife in my hand. Calmly, I wait for the dummies to light up (if it lights up, you have to kill it), I feel the District 4 girl's gaze resting on me. Flash! An outline of orange appears on a dummy to my left and I send a knife whizzing into what would be it's hip. A sense of achievement rushes through my veins and for the first time, I wonder if I can actually win these games...

After I have hurled a knife into a dummy's heart, or where it would have been, I decide to move on to a different area, survival. I need to know what types of plants are edible and poisonous, since my specialities do not include identification of exotic plants. A Capitol lady sits in the area to teach us how to tell which plants will kill us and which will help our struggles. The lady's eyelashes are about 30cm long and magenta! I will never understand the kooky fashion in the Capitol.

Soon I have the appearances of thirteen edible berries stored securely in my brain, as well as the traits of poison berries. But now I am ready to move on to climbing! Ropes and artificial trees are dotted around the training centre so I attempt some of the smaller trees first but soon I find the knack to it and move on to the complexity of ropes strung around the ceiling.

One week of this. One week to help me survive. The clock is ticking...