We all eat lunch together, me and Alexia, Rowan and Ivy, and Bran and Harvey, before heading back to training.
"It is now just past 12:30, you have roughly three and a half hours until you will be escorted back to your district floors. Use your time wisely," Cressida tells us.
"I guess we should split up now," Harvey says.
"Yeah," I say.
"I'll see you later then?" Alexia says to the group, followed by a lot of nodding.
We split up, Alexia heading to the weight training and cardio area to hop on a treadmill, while I head over to the mostly empty plant area to refresh my memory of poisonous plants. When I enter the station and sit down at one of the computer tables, I notice Coral sitting alone at the far end of the second table cluster. She sees me, and I wave. She waves back, then looks around the training center frantically for a moment before looking back to me and waving me over. I walk over and sit across from her at another computer table.
"Hi Coral, I've been wanting to meet you," I say.
"You're Margo, right?" she asks, hurriedly, in a low voice.
"Yeah," I say.
"I wanted to talk to you about joining your alliance. I need protection from my brother," she says, again, looking out towards the weapons station, where Kai is slashing down a dummy with a trident, "I know it sounds stupid, but your group has a good amount of skill with weapons, you'd be able to protect yourselves against the Career pack. I'm not that good with weapons, but I'm helpful. I'm good at fishing and hunting, and I don't actually sleep much so I could do a lot of late-night guard stuff."
"Wait, wait, wait, slow down. Did your brother threaten to kill you?" I ask, appalled.
"It's practically all he's been talking about anytime I'm near him. How he isn't going to let his little sister get in the way of him becoming Victor. He's planning on killing me off early on in the games if he can," Coral says, "He's crazy. He's always been a little bit 'different' but recently it's been getting worse, and then he volunteered. He's gone over the edge."
"Jesus, Coral, I'm sorry," I say, "I'll talk to my sister and the rest of the group about it. We technically don't have a formal alliance formed yet, so when we talk to our mentor, I'll tell him about it..."
"Don't talk to your mentor!" she whispers shouts, "He'll have to tell my mentor, and then my mentor will tell Kai's and then he'll know. He really wants me dead, and I don't want to put other people at risk. It's better if he thinks I'm on my own. Just talk to your sister and Seven and Nine, but don't bring the mentors into it. Please."
"Alright, I get it, I won't," I say, grabbing her hand, "Promise."
"Thank you," she says, "Now, go back to your other table and pretend like this didn't happen."
She furiously starts tapping away on the computer screen, and I get up and walk back to original table. As I work my way through the program in front of me, I can't help but let my mind wander back to Coral. The pure fear that goes through her face whenever she's near her brother. Her own brother! The fact that her mentors forced her into doing a duel interview with him just shows how stupid and deaf to the whole situation they must be. It infuriated me.
After finishing the program, I decided that I should find a way to blow off some steam. I remember the pool and head over to it, and find Carter and Casey swimming around in the shallow end, just playing around. I take off my shoes and jump into the deep end and start taking a few laps. Ever since mother brought us to the little lake in the woods, I've loved swimming, and am actually pretty good at it. I spend the rest the rest of the training session swimming, then hop into one of the drying booths before putting my shoes on and walking back into the training room to find Alexia.
"When we get up to our floor, I need to talk to you about something," I whisper to her as we're escorted out of the room.
"Should I be scared?" she jokes.
"Not really?" I say.
We ride the elevator and enter our floor, and I rush Alexia into my room.
"Coral talked to me today," I say.
"She speaks?" Alexia asks.
"Yes, she speaks, and she wants to join our alliance, but no one can know expect for us and Seven and Nine. She needs protection from her brother, he's threatening to kill her, but if he or any of the Careers find out that she's coming with us they'll just come after us all. So, we know that we'll be forming an alliance, but it won't be official, the mentors can't know, get it?" I ask her.
"Yeah I get it. It'll be safer for all of us at first if they think that she's on her own, we won't be a target until later on," Alexia says.
"OK, good. So, we'll talk to Kolton about joining up with Seven and Nine, but not Coral, and then tomorrow during training we can explain it to them," I say.
"That works," she says, "Now can I take a shower?"
"Yeah, sorry, go ahead," I say, laughing.
"I'll see you at dinner, Mo," she says as she leaves.
I shower quickly, then head out to join Alexia, Kolton, and Vita for dinner. We tell Kolton about alliancing with Rowan, Ivy, Bran, and Harvey, and explain how the weapons training went.
"I thought that you'd do well with throwing knives, Alexia," Kolton says, "And you can throw spears, along with the slingshot thing. And you have four alliance members. Your little not-Career pack is the same size as the Careers, and just as talented."
"The games are going to be exciting this year!" Vita says, awfully enthusiastic about our impending deaths.
"I'm sure they will be," I say sarcastically.
********************************************
Author's Note
Hi! So the way that I'm planning this, in about two or three chapters the games will begin, so hopefully by Saturday I'll be publishing the first chapters of the actual games. Hope your enjoying the story!
Much Love,
Mareena
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The 175th Hunger Games
Fanfic"On the 175th anniversary, for the rebels to remember that the war was fought against their own brothers, the two tributes selected from each district will be siblings, both between the ages of 12 and 18 as per usual." One hundred and one years aft...
