InsaneJournal

Who: Caroline Forbes and Peeta Mellark
What: Peeta dreams the start of the Hunger Games
Where: Peeta's place
When: This morning!
Rating: Mediumish, talk of death and FTB
Status: Complete


Peeta wasn’t a huge fan of these dreams, but so far they had been spread far apart, which was fine and manageable but he knew the actual Hunger Games were looming in the future. He was hoping that he wouldn’t have any kind of supernatural aspect to his dreams like Caroline had because turning into something non-human was something he wasn’t keen to experience. He had enough crazy things going on in his life without something like that happening. He was more than happy to focus that kind of energy on taking care of Caroline when she needed help due to her vampirism, which he had been ingesting vervain frequently now.

However, that evening his dreams decided to bless him with the experience of the rest of his training in the Capitol which consisted of Katniss painting a target on her back, telling Caesar Flickerman that he was in love with Katniss, and then a heart-to-heart with Katniss where he explained that he just wants to die of himself and not as a piece in the Capitol’s game. The wait in the bunker before being brought into the arena for the games was the most stressful thing he had experienced thus far in the dreams. Once he was inside the arena that stress turned into just quiet panic as he tried to figure out his game plan. Haymitch had said not to go to the cornucopia because that would be a bloodbath, but he wasn’t sure what to do after that. The countdown ended, the siren went off, and he took off running. He could hear the screams behind him, turning only once to see the blood bath briefly, before making it into the forest.

He woke up with a start after that. He sat up, drawing in deep breaths, and tried to keep quiet to not bother Caroline.

The thing about being a vampire was that all Caroline’s senses were heightened. She felt Peeta wake and sit up in the bed, bringing her out of sleep. With her eyes still closed, in that half awake state, she heard his heartbeat quicken and the deep breaths he was taking. That caused her eyes to fly open.

“Peeta?” she asked a hint of alarm in her voice as she shot up as well. “What’s wrong?”

“Dreams,” Peeta answered, now remembering about her heightened senses and giving up on being quiet. He took another deep breath, reaching up to run a hand over his forehead, and sighed, “The games started in my dreams. It was like a fast forward of all the crazy training things we had to do and then we’re inside the arena, the sirens go off, and it started.”

He wasn’t sure if he wanted to tell her about the blood bath just yet because he knew it wasn’t going to end. Not until only one of them remained alive and he knew it probably wasn’t going to be him. There was no way he could survive against the Careers.

Caroline knew a little about Peeta’s dreams. At least what he had told her. So she knew that the games he was talking about were the Hunger Games where children or well teenagers she supposed but still, were sent in an arena to kill each other until one was left. She knew Peeta was selected to compete and hated the thought of it. What would happen to him there, what that could mean for here, both physically and emotionally.

Caroline gently reached out placing a hand on Peeta’s arm, running her fingers over his skin in an attempt to calm him. “Wow,” she said her voice soft. There wasn’t really much else she could say to that. She knew whatever he had seen had to be beyond horrible. “That was fast.” Or at least it felt fast, probably because she had been dreading it for him. “Do you want to talk about it?” Whatever he wanted or needed she would be there for.

“Well, it’s been a little while since my last set of dreams. I’m guessing that whomever set this all up maybe wants to torture me by drawing out the game as long as they can,” Peeta really didn’t understand why they dreamt and he really wished he knew the reasoning. Were they supposed to learn a lesson or something? Why did they get these particular dreams? None of it made sense, “Nah...not yet. Just seeing people die is never a good topic of conversation. I don’t really know these people but they definitely don’t deserve to die for bullshit.”

Caroline didn’t fully understand how the dreams worked either. She hadn’t had any new ones since she got her daylight ring and that was months ago. She didn’t understand why they could be dream free for a while and then have a ton. But then not much about dreams made sense.

“No,” Caroline agreed, her voice soft. “No one does.” A small frown formed on her face, she couldn’t imagine what it was like for Peeta to have to watch all that and know that he could be one of them. She hated it. She didn’t want to dwell on it too much though, especially since Peeta said he didn’t want to talk about it. “Do you want to try and go back to sleep?” she asked, changing the subject. “Or…” she began a small smirk forming on her face as she leaned in closer to him. “Should I distract you?” she asked with a brow raise.

Peeta couldn’t help but chuckle at her second option and it was definitely pushing away the dark clouds in his thoughts at that moment, “Yeah, I’m really not thrilled at the idea of trying to sleep right now, so I am definitely okay with a distraction.” He leaned over to kiss her on the cheek and reached to take her hand into his. He was happy to be distracted but he also wanted to push some of those thoughts of his head before they started getting into the distraction. Caroline had definitely proven to be a rock for him lately and he was grateful to have her around.

Caroline took Peeta’s lead. She was all ready to have her way with him, but he didn’t seem to want that much of a distraction just yet. She squeezed his hand and gave him a kiss on the lips, tender and gentle. Not full of the usual heat that would lead to sex. “You’re pretty amazing, you know that?” she asked him as she pulled away.

It was a little quick to jump from a dream like that into having sex with your girlfriend, but once the dream faded away for the most part he’d be ready. He returned the kiss, enjoying how tender it was, and pulled her back so he could rest his forehead against hers once the kiss broke and spoke with a laugh, “You’re just saying that because you want to have sex. But thank you. I appreciate that you’re here to talk to after something like that.” He knew in the back of his mind that he might be facing his own death soon and the idea of it didn’t appeal to him especially since he had already done the near-death experience.

“Maybe a little,” Caroline said with a grin. She was joking for the most part. Obviously she wanted to have sex with Peeta. But right now she mostly just wanted to be there for him, whatever he needed. “But that doesn’t make it any less true.” And then before she could stop herself the words came tumbling out of her mouth. “I love you.”

Woah. That definitely sent all thoughts of the Hunger Games out of Peeta’s mind. His jaw dropped slightly in surprise and then slowly his mouth turned into a smile and he leaned in to kiss her deeply before he pulled away, “I love you too.” He captured her lips again as he moved over her definitely ready to be distracted by sex now especially since they were expressing their love for each other.

Caroline let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. She hadn’t told Peeta she loved him just to distract him, she had felt it for awhile now. Since he had been so accepting of her vampirism. But she had been scared to say it. Now though it felt right, like something he maybe needed to hear. A smile spread clear across her face when he said the words back to her. She didn’t say anything though, she didn’t need to. There were much better ways to express herself right now and she intended to show Peeta just how much she loved him.