The Capitol's Tribute (Hunger Games FanFic)

The Little Mason

Cinna had Brant and I dressed in identical black outfits, a pair of pants and a short sleeve shirt, both skin tight. They were flexible and I had a strong feeling they probably sucked in sweat like no other because I was definitely sweating buckets without a single sweat mark. The right sleeve had the numbers 12 embroidered in to let everyone know who we were. I was surprised Haymitch hadn’t had the Capitol symbol tattooed on, milking my Capitol angle for all it was worth. But, all the other tributes had the same outfit on with their own District number. We had to be uniform now.

Brant wanted to stay together but I had no other choice then to go along with Haymitch’s plan.

“You go over to the combat area, I’ll check out the knot tying station.” I told him gently, “The more we cover, the better our chances.”

Brant seemed to find this logical and made his way to the combat area where Malum and all the other careers were. I gulped as I caught Malum’s eye again. With his piercing blue eyes and buzz cut blonde hair, he stood at a towering five foot ten and always had a devious smirk on his tan face. Every time I caught a glimpse at him, or caught him smirking at me, the hairs all over my body stood up on edge.

I shook it off and wandered toward my station. A balding middle aged man, wearing his own sweat outfit with the Capitol’s symbol on it, smiled brightly at me. I could see why, no one really came to these stations. They really kept toward the weapons and fighting ones where they could show off how strong and deadly they were.

The man showed me how to tie a few simple knots. When I barely mastered them, we moved onto complicated ones that I had no hope of doing. After about twenty minutes on one knot, I decided it was time to give up and move to a new station.

As I made my way to a new station, I noticed that Malum was not the only one watching me. Up in the box about ten feet above us, were the Gamemakers, sitting in and evaluating all the tributes. I pushed on, trying to ignore that I was being watched by everyone. It was a new pressure added on top of all the others.

I ended up at the berry and plants station and there were two others there: Holland, the redhead from 5, and Freddy Mason from 7. I smiled lightly at them. Holland looked at me, alarmed and wide eyed. But, I guessed I could have just been reading too far into it because her face always seemed to be like that.

Freddy, on the other hand, waved happily at me and started up conversation.

“So, you’re the girl from the Capitol?” His youthful voice asked. His chocolate eyes were bright and carefree. His curly brown hair was unruly on his head as if someone had tried to make them flat but failed terribly.

“That would be me.” I answered, unsure whether to be on my guard. Haymitch had said this boy was dangerous but he just seemed like a regular kid to me, trying to mask his fear with over zealous happiness. I could see the fear in his eyes; it was in everyone who wasn’t a career.

“Is the Capitol a cool place to live?” He went on as the instructor started to go over which berries were poisonous or held healing properties.

I smiled, chuckling a bit at his enthusiasm. “You bet. Much better than Twelve, but that’s to be expected. We don’t have much running hot water, or running water in general.”

Freddy nodded, in awe by my simple words.

“Wow.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. He seemed to genuinely blown away by my words and company.

“I’m Frederick Mason by the way! Or Freddy as everyone calls me.” He held out his tiny hand and I took it.

“Nice you meet you, Freddy.” I told him, “I’m Rixa Hart.”