A Golden Dove

Training

She'd always dreamt of the ocean, of its vastness and beauty. How it was uncontainable, free. It was always her silly little icebreaker that the Academy required students to do at the beginning of the year to introduce themselves to new kids. I hope one day to visit District Four and see the ocean, and their cities... On my Victory Tour, of course. 

That last part had always been added after the fact. The games meant a lot to her, sure. She'd been training her whole life to win them, she'd be a fool not to recognize that, but... It was never a priority when she dreamed of the ocean. The circumstances never mattered. She wished she could say that they still didn't matter, but now, more than ever, they did. If she didn't make it out of the arena, she'd never see the open ocean under a wide sunset orange sky. She'd never sail on a boat simply because she could. Suddenly, all the time in the world seemed to be much shorter than she thought.

She'd learned the past few nights, that the picture-changing wall could emit noises, so every night Lilac flipped the screen to the oceanside view, turned on the sound, and slept peacefully under the navy-colored sky. It made waking up in the morning that much more exciting, and that much more dread-induced. Another reminder that her dream might never come true.

So when a loud knock had her flipping out of bed and flopping on the floor in a heap of bedsheets, along with a feminine voice calling, "Training, Dear! Time to get ready!" Lilac didn't bother to hide the obscene gesture she made at the door. Aurelia seemed to think that sleeping in was for the weak and simply refused for anyone she spent time with to be seen as weak. Not that they did anything but lounge around the large apartment that was labeled for District One tributes, eating breakfast and discussing strategy they'd already gone over a million times.

Lilac forced herself off the ground, shrugging out of the bedsheets that tangled around her muscular body, and trudged to the closet that had been filled with lounge clothes, and the clothes intended for training. She slipped the dark jumpsuit over her bare skin and found that it was perfectly tailored. If there was one thing she admired so greatly about the Capitol, it was the stylists' commitment to their jobs. It seemed to Lilac that Rosemary slept very little in comparison to how much she designed new clothes. Lack of sleep was yet another similarity that Rosemary and Aurelia shared, along with luxurious outfits.

- 

Sterling caught her up before they left the room, and rode the elevator down to the training arena with two peacekeepers in tow. 

"You ready for this?" He asked.

She sent a teasing glare his way, "Well, I wasn't top of the class for nothing."

"Top of your class." He scoffed, emphasizing the word.

Lilac merely said, "We'll see."

-

Lilac and Sterling were lined up at the front while the other tributes trailed in behind them. Peacekeepers herded them in a group in the center of the room where they were met with an overseer, who addressed them all. It was all Lilac could do to keep her head on the woman before her when she heard feet scuffle as if someone had been pushed and a boy spit nasty words at the peacekeepers. The same boy who caused a scene at the parade, if the memory of his voice served correctly. Despite that, the woman continued speaking and it fell quiet behind Lilac.

"In two weeks, 23 of you will be dead. One of you will be alive. Who that is depends on how well you pay attention over the next four days, particularly to what I'm about to say. First, no fighting with the other tributes. You'll have plenty of time for that in the Arena. There are four compulsory exercises, and then the rest will be individual training. My advice is don't ignore the survival skills. Everybody wants to grab a sword, but most of you will die from natural causes. 10% from infection, 20% from dehydration. Exposure can kill as easily as a knife."