#capeeto

Peeta watched as the two of them met towards the door, and noted how unhappy she looked about her pairing with the boy from district 11. Glancing towards the boy he noted that he too, was not in the slightest happy about this pairing. Looking back at Cato and Clove he noted how close they seemed. How despite the fact that they were no longer going to be allies in the games, they still seemed like old friends.  

Dinner was quiet and no matter how often Effie tried to get the conversation going, the mood was low. “So how did you find your assigned ally?”, Peeta asked Katniss as he helped himself to some more stew, only to be met with silence. “You two seemed to get along fairly well”, he added, hesitating for a moment and glancing around at the table, noticing that everyone had stopped eating, instead watching the two of them. Peeta felt himself flush. It was embarrassing that she was so clearly dissing him and giving him the cold shoulder in front of everyone. 

“You know nothing has changed, you don’t need to just stop talking. I won’t ask about your strategy”, Peeta finally snapped. 

Katniss looked up at him, her brows furrowed in confussion. “Nothings changed? Everything’s changed, Peeta. The whole game is different now, why else would they have changed the rules?” 

Peeta scoffed. “What rules. The rules are the same. Kill or be killed. The only difference is that you aren’t alone now and don’t have to go it all alone. Is that why you’re pissed? Cause you don’t want an ally? We all know you have this thing going on where you don’t want help from anyone but get over yourself, Katniss. We all need help.”

Pushing his chair away he stepped away from the table “Excuse me, I’m going to my room”, he muttered as he turned around and fled back to his room. At least there he was going to be left in peace and didn’t have to worry about anyone following him or wanting everything from him. He didn’t understand why people like Cato and Clove managed to still be able to talk amicably after everything that happened today and Katniss acted like Peeta was already dead to him. 

Shedding his clothes he stepped into the shower, a hot stream of water enveloping his body at the touch of a button. Maybe the Careers had it all figured out. Peeta went into the games with too much baggage. Too much emotion. At the end of the day not much separated them from animals again and it was the old tale of eat or be eaten. Now that Peeta had Cato on his side he was no longer at the bottom of the food chain. He smiled at the thought that Cato of all people might just be his saviour. He thought about the look on his parents face as the realisation would dawn on them that their son would not be going into the arena alone. Would they feel relieved? Would they finally have a bit of faith in him that he could come back to them in one piece? 

He wondered how the game makers would be presenting the whole game change. Would they simply make an announcement with their pictures next to each other while Claudius Templesmith talked about the games or would they be presented together in an interview with Caesar Flickerman? What if the game makers decided to do neither of the above and just send them out into the arena together. Maybe stick them on one platform. 

Peeta frowned at the thought. The whole time when he had thought about the games he had imagined himself running away from the cornucopia as fast as he could. Now that he was with Cato he realised that the other would want to join in at the bloodbath. It was the exact reason why Cato was training him. Because the second the canon fired and everyone was running towards whatever the game makers were going to provide, Peeta was on his own. Cato would not have time to keep looking over his shoulder to make sure Peeta was okay. He would be trying to kill as many other tributes as possible and he would be expecting that Peeta did the same. Peeta hit another button again, mad at himself for only realising that. It was obvious that Peeta was the weak link in the pairing and that everything Cato was doing was to make sure that he was going to not get killed within the first minute of the games. Turning off the shower he wondered why. Surely if Cato was as ruthless as he pretended to be he wouldn’t care if Peeta died in the first few minutes. He wasn’t sure if staying alive together was a requirement but he assumed it wasn’t. Unless Cato knew more than Peeta. That was most certainly a possibility.  

So Katniss would be paired up with this girl. Peeta had no idea if she was going to be any help to Katniss, but as far as he knew the girl could certainly count herself lucky to have Katniss on her team. From everything he had heard about her hunting she knew how to handle herself. After all, she had been the main caretaker for her own family ever since her father had died. 

Finally the last name was pulled out of the bowl, leaving only two people to be teamed up with in the end. Peeta looked at the two tributes left over, a big, bulky boy from district 11 and small, yet mean faced girl from district 2. Neither one of them seemed happy about being on the same time, but finally the boy moved from his original position and moved over to the girl. 

The advisor who had told them about the rule change just a few minutes before finally looked up from her clipboard again as if she was bored with the whole ordeal. Peeta bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself from frowning. As much as he hated the people from the Capitol celebrating their deaths and portraying it as the most entertaining thing they could possibly come up with, he hated people like the woman in front of him even more. She acted as if she could not be bothered to work with yet another group of people whom she knew would all be dead in a short while. Her job was to make sure that no one killed anyone else before the games began and otherwise she could not care any less about what happened to them. 

“Alright, now that you have been paired up it is time to start with the training, there have been several stations set up around and I advise you not to forget about any of them. You have 3 days of training. On the last day you are to show your skills. Make it count”, she said as she read off a clearly revised speech off of her clipboard, before she retreated. 

There was a moment of silence before everyone turned to their partner, discussing where to go first. In a lot of the pairings there was a clear dynamic. There were stronger and weaker links, and there was almost always someone who you could tell would lead the group. In others there was a lot of uncertainty of what to do and who should take charge, these groups hovered around and shuffled around each other. 

Peeta turned to look at Cato, having to take a small step back, so that he wouldn’t have to crane his neck. “So.....”, Peeta started off, uncertain where to go with this. “We will start with the swords”, Cato said as if his mind had been made up ages ago. It was clear that he had decided that he was going to be the one taking charge. Not wanting to argue right from the start, Peeta nodded and followed him quietly to the station, picking a sword and looked at it dubiously. This was the first time he had ever held a sword in his life, much less any kind of weapon which he was meant to fight with. He looked over at Cato, who handled his sword with ease and had already severed the head of one of the training dummies. Turning around, Cato faced Peeta, looking him up and down as if he was sizing him up. “You’ve never fought before, I assume?”, he asked Peeta, even though it was more of a rhetorical question. “No. Never”, was all that Peeta could answer “You never really find any reason to fight inside of a bakery”, he added, knowing that Cato probably didn’t really care what Peeta did all day back in his district. He had guessed correctly, because Cato didn’t even bother acknowledging anything Peeta had just said. He held his sword up, as if he was challenging Peeta. “Hold your sword like this”, he instructed Peeta. “I don’t want to go into the arena and have to worry about you every second we’re in there. I need you to be able to fight for yourself.” 

Gritting his teeth Peeta mimicked Cato in the way he held his sword. It was then that he realised that being paired up with Cato might not be in favour of him after all. Getting along with the other boy was not going to be easy. With one swift move Cato had knocked Peeta’s sword out of his hands with his own, the weapon clattering to the floor. Narrowing his eyes Peeta glared at Cato “What did you do that for?”, he spat. “You are holding it all wrong. If I can manage to knock it out of your hand that easily than we might as well just step off of the platforms the second we get into the arena and get blown up.” Peeta couldn’t believe how arrogant Cato really was. He was about to pick up his sword again, bending forward when he was faced with Cato’s sword pocking him in the back. Letting out a small yelp he arched his back forward before turning around “Once again: What did you do that for?”, Peeta asked him incredulous. 

With a smirk on his face Cato gave a small shrug. “You never want to turn your back on your enemy”, he replied simply. “Now pick your sword up the correct way.” Peeta circled around his sword once, before bending down, his eyes always on Cato as he did so and picked up the weapon. Holding onto it slightly more tight than he did before he scoffed as he moved closer to Cato again, who was once again in a stance. “That’s better. If I can manage to train you correctly we might actually both win this”, Cato said, and despite the fact that Peeta knew he was right he was not happy about this. With a small scoff he replied, “We can’t all be trained killers. We don’t all want to be”.