Are you kidding me?

I stand in front of a full length mirror, staring incredulously at my reflection. I'm dressed in a coal miners uniform...of sorts. The jumpsuit only comes to the top of my thighs in skin tight shorts. The top is cut very low, exposing what little cleavage I have, and is all very tight. I feel extremely exposed and uncomfortable. To say that this outfit leaves little to the imagination is an understatement. It is completely wrong to dress a fifteen year old girl this way.

My eyes drop from my disgusting reflection in the mirror to gaze over at my stylist, Jupiter, as he walks back through the door. Jupiter is a tall, dark skinned man with brightly dyed hair the colour of the sky on a bright, sunny day. He has many tattoos covering his arms and shoulders, many piercings, and bright blue lips. My eyes float back to my reflection and I scowl in disgust.

Jupiter walks up behind me and starts fiddling with my dark curls.  I stare at his reflection in the mirror in distain. He catches me glaring and rolls his eyes. "You put on a good show, you get sponsors," he says plainly.

I open my mouth to speak but stop when he sends a glare full of daggers my way.

"Fine," I sigh, grumpily, rolling my eyes. 

Jupiter smirks at me in the mirror and continues styling.

"Why do you enjoy our torture? You people are sick!" I bite.

That only makes him smirk more. "Fiery, huh? You could use that to your advantage."

My jaw drops and I give him an incredulous look.

"I'm just teasing," he smiles this time, and not in a sick way. "Although, you could. Sponsors love a tribute with some fire."

I roll my eyes with a small smile playing on my lips. I still hate my outfit, but I don't think I hate him quite as much.

I stay quiet for a while and he finishes styling my hair and doing my makeup in peace. When he steps away from in front of the mirror I don't recognise myself. My brown hair has been straightened and left to hang down my back in a silky sheet. A small headlamp, resembling one a miner would wear, adorns my hair like a headband. The makeup that was used on my face makes all my features look sharper and more angular - especially my heavily lines eyes and cheekbones, which show a light grey powder that I'm sure is made to look like coal dust.  My lips are coal black and a grey eye shadow covers my eyes. I look more like I'm seventeen or eighteen than fifteen.

Jupiter hands me a pair of black, lace-up boots. I give him a look. He groans. "Just put them on..."

I huff and pull them onto my feet, lacing them up tightly. The boots come halfway up my calves and remind me a bit of my hunting boots from back home.

I stand in front of the mirror for one more minute before Jupiter tells me it's time to go. I stare at myself in this scanty outfit. "Really...?"

Jupiter rolls his eyes and smirks. "Just trust me, Emma. You look great, it may feel weird, but the sponsors will eat you up."

"Yeah," I roll my eyes. "Right after some of the sick people out there mentally undress a fifteen year old girl. Not that they have to try very hard to do that with me in this!"

Jupiter rolls his eyes again. "Perfect. Stay just like that. Go out there and intimidate the shit out of those other tributes with that fiery attitude."

"Do I have to?"

"Yes."

"Fine." I toss a piece of hair over my shoulder with a huff and glare at him. "Like that?"

"Perfect," he chuckles.

"Ugh," I groan.

Jupiter ushers me towards the door and out into the open area where all the horses and other tributes are waiting to start the tribute parade. I suddenly become very self-conscious when I walk out into the open, searching for the District 12 carriage. I find it, and to my disappointment, It's on the opposite side of the room.

I can practically feel Jupiter's smirk. "You'll do fine. Just walk over there, and do it confidently."

I cringe. "Okay..."

This will end badly. Probably with me tripping or falling into another carriage or something similar.

I take one step into the open, and after that I know that I can't stop. So I continue. I take long, steady, confident strides across the open area. It feels uncomfortable at first, especially when I try not to make eye contact with any other tributes, but then I decide to have some fun with it.

I keep my head up and look around with a smirk on my face. I would never normally do this, but hey, I don't look like myself...so why not have some fun with it? I glance around at the other tributes around the area, and most of them are staring at me. I smile and wave at a few, smirk at a few others, and I even wink at one young boy standing beside a short, Asian girl who looks to be my age. I recognise them as the tributes from District 3. I knew they would stick out in my mind...

When I get close to my carriage, I let the smirk stay on my face. Connor and Miguel finally look up as I get to them. Both of their jaws drop and they gape at me.
"Emma?" Connor gasps.
"Yeah?"
"Is that really you...?" Miguel eyes me.
"Yeah," I say, still smirking. I toss some of my hair over my shoulder. "Why?"

Miguel just stares at me in shock. Connor tries to speak, but he looks utterly taken aback. Even though I don't outwardly show it, I'm trying so hard not to laugh.

"What?" I ask innocently. "You look like you've never seen a girl before."

"Y-you...," Connor stutters, really lookin at me. "You look different..."

"Oh, I know," I say sassily. I take a step closer to Connor and lean right in to whisper in his ear. "But honey, you love it...don't lie."
I pull away and stare at his face as his blue eyes bulge and his somewhat tanned face goes a deep red.
It takes everything I have not to laugh.
As if on cue, an announcement rings through the air. "All tributes please load your carriages, the tribute parade is about to start."
With a smirk I wink at Connor, then turn and climb up into the carriage. I glance back at him as I lift Miguel into the carriage because he has trouble reaching, and his face is priceless.
Still flushed, and a little bit shocked, Connor climbs up beside me.
The carriages start moving and the first one, holding the three tributes from district one, rolls out into the open.
It continues like a steady stream, until we are the last carriage left inside.
Jupiter, and two other female stylists (I'm guessing Connor's and Miguel's), rush up to us.
"Remember what we told you!" Jupiter calls, his vivid blue hair flying about in the wind from outside.
I just nod, chuckling at the blue flames flying around on his head.
"Boys," one of the female stylists calls. "Shirts, remember?"
They both nod and she smiles.
Shirts? What about their shirts...?
Suddenly the horses start to walk, pulling our carriage out into the open with them.
Here we go...
The sound of the roaring crowd of Capitol citizens is absolutely deafening. I can't hear a damn thing other than their yelling voices and the ringing in my ears.
I wish I could tell them to shut up.
Our carriage rolls smoothly along the ground as we make our way down the pavement to the circle in front of the Presidents mansion.
I catch a glimpse of myself in a passing mirror.
I look bored and unamused, which is the opposite of what I'm supposed to be doing. Remembering what Jupiter said about being fiery, I force a smirk to play on my lips and a determined look to hopefully glint in my eyes. I don't really know how I make my eyes glint...but I give it my best shot anyways. To be honest, I probably look constipated.
Suddenly, Connor and Miguel both move beside me. The both grasp at their shirts, get ahold of the buttons, and yank  it open. Then they pull them off in sync, and throw them out into the crowd.
My face must look shocked because Connor smirks when he glances over at me, but I can't help but look at what was hidden beneath the fabric.
My god, Connor has had abs all this time and I never knew?
Geez. I'm really not very observant. I mean, I know they've been under his clothes but still. It makes me realize that I've never really seen him shirtless before. The realization shocks me a little bit to say the least. We've been best friends for so long, you would think I'd have seen him shirtless by now.
Realizing my smirking face had dropped into awe, I replace the smirk with a smile. A genuine one.
Then I take his hand, interlacing our fingers, and pull out arms up so they are above our head in a determined, yet confident and triumphant pose.
Miguel, who's also shirtless but with no abs (what would they expect from a starving ten year old?), looks up at me with a smile on his face.
I grab his small hand in mine and raise our arms too.
We may look a little bit crazed, or maybe we look hot...I don't really know. But what I do know is that we aren't going down without a fight. And we are in this just as much as everybody else.
We want Victory.