In the dark [Geebs]

[Noah Vau - D2 (Cato)]

Yusei Rhee

It's hard being here. Every moment is moving so fast, and I feel like it's leaving me behind. I have no friends, nobody to talk to, and the one person I wanted to notice me is still at home. I don't know if it even worked. Yeah, I talked to her a bit before leaving, but I don't think it was enough. All my work, my planning, everything has been for nothing so far, and it's upsetting me. I've always been a fly on the wall that nobody notices or cares for. I'm a peasant that nobody wants to be around all because of the stupid rumors of my past. I wish they were only rumors and that I could shut them down. But I'm here and there's only one other person who knows me except maybe the mentors, but I haven't even talked to them. I'm best off alone without them.

I walk through the training center trying to find something to do. Something to distract me from myself. A headache is coming in, temples throbbing, vision becoming blurry as the pain slowly forms behind my skull. Sometimes I feel they'll make my eyes pop out, but that feeling isn't there right now. I stop at the plants because maybe it'll help me figure out ways to prevent them. To help myself more than anyone else. I'm alone in this game. It's me versus everyone else, and that's okay since everyone wants to survive. I once thought volunteers had a death wish, but now I understand more of where they are coming from.

But soon I realize the plants aren't for me. There's so many of them, and I can't keep track of the ones I've just read. I'll never learn these because it seems almost pointless to even consider them anymore. All I want is a relief. Something to save me, and yet I can't even figure out which of them is edible. My hands ball into fists as I smash the plants on the table. It's not worth it. I need to spend time somewhere else, and I can't help but remember what my friend told me back in district one when he was helping me learn to control myself. Frustration only makes things worse. I know that's true, but I don't want to be here anymore. I just want to go home and find Cirque and ask why she barely acknowledges my existence.

80th Hunger Games

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[sbeeg]

The large training gym is years away from District Ten. Everything is white and sterile. Everything glows- even the buffet table in the cafeteria is rigged with lights. Why do they need so many lights? They already have tubes of light bulbs in the ceiling every foot. The light it casts is cold, making the lines of everyone's face severe. The gauntness of the lower districts, the muscles of the upper districts. It emphasizes differences, as if the large numbers embroidered on our chests weren't enough.

I walk slowly through the gym, observing. There is practically an even number of tributes younger than me as my own age and older. I feel like I'm back at school, watching the younger grades trying to impress the young men and women about to graduate. Trying to prove something.

I can't watch them. They all look like Kahinta.

I look for a station to study. There are so many different tables and only so many hours allotted to learn them. My teeth gnaw on the skin around my thumbnail, brown eyes sweeping the gym.

They stop on a boy. He's older, one of the eighteen year old tributes, a career. He's pale, like Enzo, but larger. His hair is light and his face is made of hard lines and harsh features. He's standing at a table covered in plants. The trainer besides it opens their mouth to talk to them but the boy's fingers curl into fists. He slams them into the foliage, knocking over a display of stinging nettle.

I see his face, jaw tense with pain. Like with Mayor Emberstatt, there is string tied around my bottom rib that pulls me forward. I stand looking up at the career, a large silver one is stitched into his uniform shirt.

I catch his hand, his skin cool to the touch. There are better ways of grabbing a career tribute's attention, especially considering the circumstance, but it felt right.

"Something is wrong." I search ice colored eyes. "You can tell me."

[Noah Vau - D2 (Cato)]

Yusei Rhee

I don't want to be here anymore. I want all this to just be a dream. That I'm still home yearning for Cirque to notice me, but it's not a dream. I am here with twenty-three others. I have no friends. I have nothing, and it's killing me. I miss my mom and I want to talk to her, but this isn't how I should go about it. I want Cirque to notice me, but maybe I went about this all wrong. Maybe I should've just talked to her. I should've just said something, but I'm a coward. And that's why supplies are falling towards the ground. I've screwed up in so many ways, and I can't even look at the mess I made. I just stare at the stupid plants realizing I'll never figure them out.

The trainer just stares at me without saying a word. Surely he's seen someone upset before. Maybe he just hasn't seen a career mad, but then I think most spend their time at weapons mostly trying to show off. But none of that matters. I'm stuck unable to do anything. My plan, volunteering, it's all for nothing. Maybe I have to go home for all this to make sense. Maybe I have to survive. Maybe I just have to be me. I don't know. And it's so frustrating. Being here. Listening to these people. But before I can hit the table again, a girl is touching my hands telling me I can tell her what's wrong.

I stop what I'm doing and look at her. I don't know who she is, and I don't understand why she's standing here. I'm just doing my job. I'm training. Learning all these things, but it won't even matter. She's from ten, and that's all I need to know. Knowing names is hard because we're all here for one thing. One prize. One moment, but for me there's more. I want her to know me. Cirque. I wish I would've told her so long ago what I thought. That I like her. That I care for her. That I admire her. But I don't think it matters. A heavy sigh leaves my chest as I pull my hand away. For a moment my eyes stay on the ground, but I soon turn to face her. "I think I made a mistake. A big one."

80th Hunger Games

[googlefont="Oswald:400"]

[sbeeg]

He stops, returning my gaze. He's bigger than me, taller and built like, well, a career. Trained all his life to hurt others, except right now he was the only one who looked hurt. He sighed, slipping his hand from my grasp, but turned his body towards me. An open position.

"I think I made a mistake. A big one."

I feel my heart clench in my chest. The pain that carried in his voice broke my heart. He was born and bred to compete- he volunteered to be here yet there were regrets. I could not imagine that kind of change of heart, carrying that mistake on your shoulders as you're about to be thrown into the most stressful situation of your life.

He had pulled away before so I rub my palms against the thighs of my pants, too wound up not to move but careful to give him space. Sometimes the cattle got irritated when sick and you needed to give them a wide berth, but still keep a watchful eye on them. I was used to watching from afar.

I don't push further. The details of his life were his to hold close and his to give away if he chose.

"What are you going to do about it?" I ask. I'm not sure what he can do. If he wants to go back home that was impossible now. He had offered himself up to the Capitol and now he was their toy. There was little he could do now.

I could feel my heart twist for a stranger. There was so much pain here in this single room, it hovered in the air like a heavy cloud. If no one faced it it's smother us all.

[Noah Vau - D2 (Cato)]

Yusei Rhee

What am I going to do? I have thoughts running through my mind, but none of them are coherent. I have ideas I want to think about, stations I want to try, people I want to talk to, but none of them will help me make it very far in the game. Plants aren't something I'm good at, and I know that I'll never be, but I have to try something before it's too late. But trying means I mess up, and then it makes me think about everything I've every done. I just want to sleep and find a way to escape. Even though it feels impossible.

I want to walk away, to just go back to my room and pretend I'm okay. I can't believe that I've done this. That I put myself here. That I've screwed up my entire life. That I've set myself up to die. I'm not going to win this - I stand no chance, but I have to try. I have to do something, and she's right. What am I going to do about it? I have a few options. I can either sit here and be all sad about it, or I can move on and try to find a way to survive. I can keep trying. I can keep going even though it all feels like it's for nothing.

But I can't stop the sigh from escaping. I'm nothing. Just a boy with a horrible past. I'm trying to redeem myself. Trying to make this all worth it. I shrug my shoulders and drop my gaze once more. I don't know what I'm going to do. In fact, I don't even know why I'm training. I've spent most my life doing this. Learning and fighting. Doing what needs to be done to succeed, but I can't succeed here. I won't fight until I have to. I won't do anything except try to keep myself alive and stay out of the way. It's best that way. But I can't just leave her hanging, so I at least have to say something. "Go home." I mutter the words in a coffin under my breath.

80th Hunger Games

[googlefont="Oswald:400"]

[sbeeg]

"Go home."

I hold my breath. There are two ways to take that statement. A career usually means in the traditional way- of fighting through the games and coming out on top. Stealing the crown and returning to their district victorious. I'd watched a lot of cocky careers state as much in their interviews over the years, but I've also watched a lot of them fall.

There was something in his tone, in his eyes, they told me that's not how he meant it. He sounded defeated, like he'd already fought through the games and lost. An echoed mantra of a career who had changed their mind.

I was at a loss for words. This boy's life seemed a million years from my own. I looked up at him, catching sky colored eyes.

"No matter what, we'll all be going home soon."