Public Training Sessions

[L△LIA]

Y'all know what to do! xoxo



Name: Zion Lyons
District: Five
Score: Seven

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nightmares teach
more than dreaming does

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There was preparation, it just wasn’t the useful kind.

Zion woke up on the rooftop, an inch away from the ledge when his body started and an alarm went off in his head. Wake up and save yourself, idiot, wailed the goosebumps on his skin. So he did. Except the first thing his eyes said to him after snapping open was do it! Jump — and he probably should have. It would be better than the death that’s coming for him, but he doesn’t have the guts. Coward, muttered his clenched fists.

It was much too early and all he could think to do with his spare time (why does it feel like he has time to kill? He doesn’t, he doesn’t, he doesn’t) was to paint his face. The smallest touches of pastel lipstick and rouge to give away his lack of confidence, poorly blended shadows the color of a sunset tip everyone off to his lack of skill, and... his fingers toyed with the gold eyeliner pencil. After two small swipes across his eyelids, he didn’t feel done. Something was missing. (So much is missing.)

Seville was the sister who taught him about makeup and the way it can gild you with confidence, but he can’t remember her face right now and even if he could, the surreal perfection of her pixie features can’t be recreated. Certainly not by him. Instead, Denali’s face haunts him — all messy freckles and soul-ripping screams as the peacekeepers forcibly hauled her out of the justice building. She is hellfire and gnashing teeth; she is the second heart that lives outside of his own body and within hers. If he closes his eyes tightly enough to hurt then he can feel her across the distance, her breaths occupying the spaces between his own as she fights thin air on his behalf. Frustrated. Angry. Rioting at the unfairness of it all.

When he walks into his private training session there are golden freckles scattered across his skin. Face. Arms. Everywhere he could reach. They look less like stars and more like sparking embers. If she could see him now, Denali would roll her eyes and grin despite herself — or she would if only she could stop screaming and biting into the skin of her knees. It’s a poor excuse for battle armor, but it does wonders for his confidence, as in, he actually walks in the door instead of fainting from panic. Again.

That’s it. That’s all he’s got.

Time stalls and he feels his skin begin to burn until it aches into his muscles. His feet feel unsteady beneath him and he has to hold his breath and clench his eyes shut in order to stay upright. So useless, mutter his fists, you’re better off unconscious. Just pass out already. It would be more impressive than anything else you know how to do. It really would be.

When he sleeps, he could be mistaken for brave. Without hesitation his body has climbed out of his bedroom and explored the night, venturing into dangerous alleyways or balancing at the edge of a cliff. Fearless. Uninhibited. Competent. Zion is none of these things in his waking moments, repressing any ideas of being daring and crying over baby ducks because they’re too adorable and he just... can’t process his own feelings. How is he supposed to know what to do right now when he can’t even think about what’s happening because —

This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. Panic vibrates through his body until the burning is too much and he grabs the hem of his shirt, yanking it up without pausing to think of the consequences. The high collar refuses to yield to the motion and so there he is, Zion Lyons, male tribute of District Five with his head trapped in his shirt and his unimpressively scrawny chest on display for the gamemakers. Ones! Ones across the board! At this point he couldn’t score worse if he tried and yet the blindness is comforting. Dark as night. Dark as the only bravery he has ever known.

For a moment he goes impossibly still, calmed like a wild cat beneath a blanket. Then his hands knot the hem of the shirt into itself, keeping it wrapped in place. It’s only in the unconscious dark that his body seems to know what to do with itself and so he surrenders to the moment of relaxation, attempting to give himself over to it and turn his brain off as much as he can. When he steps forward, he doesn’t think about it, he only senses the air moving around him and the weight of the ground below. There is a notable difference when the floorboards become a cushioned safety mat and something in his spine shifts to account for it. A breath before running face-first into the climbing wall, he pauses. It’s like a pressure change in the atmosphere. Goosebumps.

One hand reaches out and finds a rope. It’s impossible to be afraid of falling in a world where nothing exists to fall away from or toward. There is no up, no down in blindness. Scaling the wall feels like a strange kind of swimming, but standing on top of it doesn’t feel any different than standing anywhere else. A memory from yesterday tells him that just beyond the edge of this constructed cliff there are more ropes that connect the ceiling to the ground and he swipes at the air, grabbing one and dropping down as if floating. He is still and the world moves around him. A few more steps and the safety mats disappear, replaced by what must be a series of stairs. Simulation machines. He doesn’t miss a step, cutting directly across the rolling series of platforms. Up three. Down three. Up six. Down six. Four. Nine.

Past the measured angles of the aptitude machines a rack of axes nearly slice him right through the chest, but metal has a smell, a taste, a chill that radiates. He stops, ghosting his hand along the curve of a blade, feeling the danger of it pressing into the air. It has gathered up all of the coldness from the ventilation system, amplifying it within the steel and echoing it into the palm of his hand. There are dozens of these weapons nested into one another and he follows their deadly path with his fingers, so terribly close but never touching, never ever touching.

The maze of boxing dummies beyond that is more difficult to move through, a dense gathering of weighted gallows. They are not cold soldiers like the swords and hatchets that live in this room, giving no clues as to their placement. Each one hangs with a guarded presence and all Zion can do is make his body as soft as possible — an easier instinct to channel than anything else — so when he makes contact with a dummy, it’s too gentle to cause it to move. Carefully, he pinballs through without leaving evidence of his presence, as if he were a ghost that couldn’t disturb them even if he tried. Soon he will be — survival tactics like these can only save him for so long.

At the end of the obstacle course is a wall, one of the real ones not meant for climbing. He follows it, dodging supply carts and training equipment until he finally finds the door, tearing through it without bothering to unblind himself in order to glance behind him and discover what he has just done. Freedom reminds him of who he is, where he is, of the idiotic show he’s just put on. The embers scattered across his skin are burning him alive. Run, fool, command his feet and he does, he runs for his life.

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[pearl mcclain d4 [ryan]]

Stitch Gabel
D8
Score of 5

[presto][/presto]

Stitch had spent time trying to figure out what he was going to do for his one on one session with the game makers of this game.

He spent time with a lot of people, but none of them really helped him figure out what he was excellent at.

Stitch was a boy who never knew anything but how to sew. That and his eye for a precise stitching pattern.

When he was younger, his mom told him that his father was always good with a knife. And that before they had money, he used to go out hunting all the time.

He would take Stitch with him, thinking that it was good for a growing boy to learn the trick of the trade.

He gave him a knife, but Stitch knew better. He handed it right back to him, telling him that he didn’t want to hurt the animals.

However, his father didn’t take to kindly to that. He grabbed the knife from his hand sent it flying into his prey. Sometimes, you have to kill the animals before they kill you. He said gruffly to him as he put his own knife away and instructed him help him with his kill.

He was a mean man, who Stitch still idolized, mostly out of fear.

---

And so Stitch waited for his name to be called, as one by one, people he knew were crossing into the ether, doing the same thing that he was about to do.

Impress.

And while Stitch sat there, he couldn’t help but think about his father, and how much he wanted to admit that he missed him.

That was a lie though. He didn’t miss him. If anything, he was happy he was gone.

A terrible man that sprouted the roots of evil from his mother.

Its where it all started after all.

Stitch held the scarf that he was able to knit close to him as he watched Florence go off.

He wondered what she would do in order to impress the game makers.

---

Still, he was wondering what he was going to do.

His mind was frozen and his hands perspired more than he expected them too, every couple minutes wiping them onto the uniform that he was accustomed to wearing now at this point.

---

He eyes moved as he watched more and more people move out of the room until finally his name was called.

He took a deep breath as he stood up and made his way out the room and into the hallway.

It was now or never for him to decide what past he wanted to relive while he was in there.

---

”Stitch Gabel, District 8.” He said to the game makers as he looked up at them and wondered what they could have been thinking.

Stitch was taught quite a few things while he was here, and one of them involved how to work a simulator.

The capitol wasted no expense as long as it meant for a good show after all. Stitch knew that in order to win favor with the game makers he was going to have to put on a pageant of sorts. One that involved showing just how much he wanted to live.

And so he walked his way towards the back table, his hands caressing several weapons before coming onto a set of throwing knives.

He pulled them up, counting them closely, noticing how thin the blades were, almost like a set of knitting needles.

Each one felt different in his hands, and for a moment, he thought about naming them, but he knew that would have done him no good.

No. Instead he moved to the platform, where a distance away was multiple dummies in front of him.

”I want to tell you a story…” Stitch started, pulling off his scarf and putting it on the ground next to him. Flipping a knife in his hand. ”… About a boy who didn’t know how to stand up for himself until it was too late.”

He threw the first knife, watching it sail into the dummy on the farthest left, right into its chest.

”You see, this boy had a father, who didn’t quite take to the fact that his son was into sewing and threading. That was ‘girly shit’ he would say to him.” Stitch’s hand tightened around the next blade, waiting for the right moment.

”So to ‘straighten’ his son out, he made it mandatory that he would go hunting with him every chance they got.” Stitch was calm in his words as he threw another blade, this time watching it clip the dummies leg right off.

”He would tell him that if he wanted to be a man, he was going to have to learn how to kill…” Stitch continued on, trying to make sure that he was keeping his audience captive.

…That taking lives are what men do…

Stitch continued, letting another blade fly through the air, this time hitting the dummy in stomach.

…It was a way of life that he wanted his boy to be used too. That maybe if he got the taste for killing, he would stop being interested in that ‘girly shit.’” Stitch felt like his chest was on fire, reliving moments from his childhood that he never wanted to visit again.

”But he didn’t stop. His mother would plead with her husband, telling him that he had a gift. That they could use it to their advantage. But he didn’t want to hear any of it. No.” Stitch was crisp in his words, he could hear the echo off the cobblestone. ”He wasn’t going to stop.”

Stitch threw another knife through the air, this time hitting the dummy right in the neck, so hard that he watched its head roll right off.

”And this boy looked at him like he was crazy, but he was afraid. Afraid of anything that the man said to him, because at the end of the day, they shared the same house.” A knife flew. ”A life…” another flew out of his hand. ”Blood.” Another knife followed, each time a thud echoing in the dark room around them.

”And so that boy hid in places that his mother thought he wouldn’t be able to be found.” Stitch said, another knife ready in his hand. ”But one night, while he was knitting something in her room, he walked in on them, and while they were enjoying their time, he looked at both of them like an animal ready to kill its prey.” Stitch felt hot, like someone had blocked off all the oxygen around him. ”He ran after them, cursing them from here to the capitol. But before he could get any closer, the boy took his knitting needles and stabbed them into his fathers foot before making his way to a place where he felt safe.” He took a deep breath, looking at his target before his eyes shifted to one of the trainers that was standing around idly.

”He didn’t hear anything come from that room for the rest of the night…” Stitch flipped the knife in his hand. ”And the next morning, his mom walked up to him and said ”Sometimes you have to kill the animals before they kill you.”” He threw the knife, right at the trainer who was standing there. He watched it hit the cobblestone, the knife piercing the stone.

The trainer looked at him. ”You little shit…” He ran towards Stitch, club out and ready to attack him. However, Stitch was ready for whatever might come his way.

”You see, why I tell this story isn’t because the boy hated his father.” Stitch grabbed the scarf and sidestepped the man, who seemed like he was ready to kill. ”I tell it because it was the only lesson that boy learned from his mother.” Stitch made sure to vocalize that statement as he punched the trainer in the face.

”After all, that’s what we are here for right?!” Stitch exclaimed as he wrapped his scarf around the trainers neck.

He pulled the man close as he began to choke the life out of him. ”You see, Im not afraid to kill the animals either.” Stitch said as he felt the trainers body convulse, trying to find anyway to break his hold over him.

”Not anymore.” He said, as he dropped the man from his hold and kicked him aside, watching him gasp for air.

”Thank you.” he said as he moved towards the doors, making his exit.

[dars]

[pup]

Lavina Cheyne
District 4
Score: 9

My night is dreamless, my sleep full of silence. Then I awake, my eyes blurry as I push myself up, my arms behind my back. The bed is more comfortable than usual. Then as my vision clears of the morning blur, the unusual room welcomes me to the land of the awake.

A grin spreads across my face. I’ll be back in this room in two weeks time, a crown resting upon my head, I know it. I roll out of bed, grabbing the training uniform and pulling it over me. Today was made out to be big and important; everyone in the capitol went batshit crazy over today. Honestly, it doesn’t matter what I score: a number doesn’t affect how well I can stab someone in the gut. But putting up a show was what I’ve done the past few years of my life, and I recognize the artistry involved. The gamemakers need to put on a show of their own, and this is all a part of it. Their art will inspire millions throughout Panam, and I will be the centerpiece of their artwork.

I walk out of room, not pausing to see if my mentor had any meaningful last-minute advice for me. I wouldn’t have cared anyways, but Leon had been distant. I had only spoken to him one or two times. It was a shame. He was pretty cute. It would never have happened, though. When I rise triumphant amidst the blood of my fellow tributes, I wouldn’t go for anybody as weak as him. He allowed himself friendship, but I cannot afford that. Sure, little Flo calls me her friend, but each time she does I feel a wrenching feeling in my heart. I want to cut out her vocal chords first chance I get, but I need the little cutester to get myself some sponsorship first from the adoring crowds. People love the underdog, but they love the underdog’s protector even more.

The elevator comes to a halt, its doors swinging open invitingly, calling out to me to drag me down. I didn’t bother waiting for Andy, he was just so boring. Legit I didn’t realize anybody from district four could be that dull. It doesn’t matter anyways; He’ll be dead in a few days.

The empty elevators bring me down, down, down, down, down to the training center level just below the reception level. I’m glad that I didn’t need to sit through another painfully boring conversation in the elevator. None of the walking deceased had a spark of fun in them.

I walk out, take my seat, close my eyes.

No one talk to me, please. No one talks to me. There’s dead silence among the moribund tributes.

Thank

fucking

ripred.

Finally a moment of silence.

Then I am summoned, and I rise to my feet.

My face is a stone, my features mirroring my lack of emotions. It's merely a part of the show.

As I walk through the large set of double doors, I glance at the avoxes standing nearby. They're eyeing me, trying to remain unfazed, but I can still see the worried sweat droplets. They're either meant to clean up messes made or be the messes made. They shouldn't need to worry, though. Although gutting them would be exhilarating, I know how hard it is to clean blood up, and I don't want my soon to be friends to be annoyed with me. Once I pass their trials, I will hopefully be able to congratulate them on a job well done, but first I need to hope they don't bore me.

I walk further, nodding at the gamemakers. I won't state my name as the trainer outside told me; I don't need an introduction. If they don't know my name by now, they'll fucking learn it.

My shoes are noisy in the dead quiet room as I walk towards a rack of weapons. The blades and curved edges glint invitingly in the fluorescent lights. They call out for me, and I yearn to grab one, sprint back to the door, slit the avoxes' throats, and be done. I yearn for my high, but I can't release myself yet. That will be in a few days when I finally enter the arena.

So I reach out calmly and grab an axe with a wicked looking edge. It was not meant for cutting trees; It is meant for splitting hearts. Then I walk over to the simulation room I had experienced just one time in the past few days, but I enjoyed it. It was a fun game, the holographic figures rushing at you from all sides in order to try to gut you, slit your throat, break your legs, or to shoot you from afar. I would have to deal with spilling holographic blood for now.

The controls loom in front of the entrance, and I set them. It was relatively simple, just four settings: Easy, Intermediate, Hard, Monstrous. They were so cartoonish for a game about killing, but then again everything here was a game. Game's should be fun and easy to understand, and I heard they don't get much of an education down in ten.

I enter, pressing the start button, and I stand with the axe resting at my side, my face a mask of calm. A few seconds pass before I first hear the patter of feet running at me from behind. I wait a moment, then swing around, my arm outstretched. The axe slices through an image of a girl holding a wicked looking curved sword and she disappears replaced by a man to my left who brandishes a spiked ball at the end of a chain. He swings at me and I duck, my arm raising forwards again and the trusty axe holds true as I swipe upwards, slicing off his arm with the odd looking weapon. Then rush forwards and proceed to behead him as well. Two more sets of feet running at me, on my sides. I roll forwards as the swing at me, my arm reaching out as I untuck and slice off a leg of one hologram before pouncing onto the next, swinging my arm down to split his head like a log.

My heart pounds inside me as I prepare my next swift attack, the form of a young girl swinging a sword and my neck. I jump backwards before rushing forwards and quickly planting the axe in her face without hesitation. Another hologram appears and tries to whip me, but I jump out of the way just in time. I grin and mutter, "At least buy me dinner first before you get that kinky," before I swipe off his head. I parry, jump, swing, kill, the axe in my hand as hologram after hologram appears, rushing at me from every side as they try to slice, cut, bludgeon, or whip me.

Suddenly, a girl with a bow appears from far away, an arrow knocked, poised to shoot. However, before she can release the arrow into my heart, I throw the axe with all of my might. The axe plunges into her face, and she disappears. Volkner thought he could throw better than me, but I wish he could see me now. It's what's going to happen to him.

The program ends, and the lights normalize. I exit the platform which houses the simulation, and I grin. Fun. I look up at the gamemakers, and nod my head.

I walk out, giving the avoxes a little smile. I won't hurt them today.

Let the fun begin.

^{table by ryan <33333}

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[Lyn𝛿is]

Name: Neela Chiffon
District: Eight
Score: Two

Neela Chiffon

They say that life'll pass you by if you spend all your time watching it instead of living it. Even now - even as an instinct hisses within you that you're reaching the end of your life, that you won't survive more than a handful of days in the arena, even still -

you're floating above the training center;

not your body, your body is reaching for swords that you don't know how to handle, knives that feel so foreign, because they were meant to cut up humans instead of dicing food - and you watch her, as though Neela Chiffon is just another face in the crowd, as though all of it is happening to somebody, somewhere, in a dream;

or a story?

And this could be a story about a girl named Neela, but the girl by the weapons rack, spindly arms and legs going through the motions of swordplay, is not you; not the wisp of a girl who felt too much, who learned that you could get less hurt shutting yourself behind a window, even if it meant your little heart selfishly drank in the pain of others instead of your own; the girl who bottled up her fire till it turned inward and ate at your insides, and sought the tiniest gaps in your cracked tongue to escape from its confines.

You're no Hope or Imberline, nothing like the heroes you grew up admiring; their fires burned outward instead. Chiffon - you are as fragile as your name, carrying yourself on a thousand paper wings (no, not yet a thousand) and you wished too hard for life to be different, wished too hard that you could be the sort of girl that was part of other people's stories too.

The cold steel slips from the girl's fingers, because - this could be the story of a fighter or an adventurer, but it's not; it's the story of a girl swallowed up, by a world too small to hold her and too big for her to change. You pick up instead the wire, bright copper in your fingers tracing memories of figures and creatures twisted of metal; yet here - you wrap it tightly, coiling it around the smooth handle of an axe -

Fast fingers and nimble hands run in your blood; since childhood you've learned to braid and sew and turn ordinary yarn or rope into better things, useful things. You can envision now - an axe, held aloft by a tripwire, to slash another tribute to ribbons; ropes to strangle, blades to gouge - and what was it like, to be one of the boys and girls who reveled in chaos and destruction, who were excited instead of sickened by blood?

You could conceal this axe in the rafters, braid the rope amongst the fake vegetation until it is well hidden at neck height (well, neck height for someone like the huge District Two dude would miss someone like Ollie entirely, not that you minded), wait for someone to run headlong into it and find a blade buried in their chest; you could set up rope and wire and taunt the Careers, maybe the big bad wolf would get angry enough to take the bait and end up with his hands pulled off;

but instead you stare at the rope, the table, the everything for too long. It's indecision that paralyzes you; just as soon as you've got an idea it drags your mind somewhere else, chasing what you're convinced will be better. You stare and stare and stare as the clock ticks, as the Gamemakers get impatient, as you know how the next step ought to be connecting the rope with the wooden beams but you somehow can't bring your hands to do it.

Too long, you're taking too long; you're running out of brain and time and everything except for the doubt that creeps into your heart;

What if the trap doesn't work? What if I put together everything, and it misses, and the Gamemakers laugh?

For the impending specter of death has not sunk into you, not quite yet, but you are well familiar with the gut-punch feeling of you're wrong and I'm right and silly little girl I told you so and you look at the rope you're holding and wonder if it's worth it -

It's not worth it. Nothing is worth it. Everything you make is, was and will be trash. And did you really think you're capable of creating anything meaningful?

You will be gone in a few days, a silly girl who lived in her head erased from the pages of history, while there are others, worthier ones, to continue surviving in the arena.

Then why? Why are you doing this, Neela, making traps you don't want, for Gamemakers you don't like, to get a score that doesn't matter?

The Gamemakers must be internally ridiculing you, zoning out, until there are surely not enough minutes remaining to implement all you imagine yourself creating; your sister always chided you not to waste time wallowing - so what if you are inadequate! if you can't stop feeling sorry for yourself, you always will be! - but you can't do it, you can't, you can't -

It's all pointless. We're born, we get reaped, we die. Nothing matters.

You slide yourself down to the ground and with a careful touch, slide the coil of wire off the axe handle. You unravel it slightly, twisting it forward, bringing the remaining wire on the table to hook into the existing shape, another turn here, a loop there;

you weren't meant to make traps. You weren't meant to form mechanisms and levers, and then watch the soft form of training dummies squirt fresh, fake blood onto the mats.

So - silently, you present Hera Levelwright with the intricate copper sunflower. Without looking at them - trying your best to hold back your tears, and tune out the whispers of the two Gamemakers - you walk out of the room.