All of Haymitch's questions were only meant to make Peeta's job easier. The former mentor was hoping to cover the bases that Peeta had yet to think of, and with training coming quickly in the morning, everyone needed to be thinking of what they could do and if they could do it well. Truthfully, he wasn't very worried about Gale and knew that he was just as good as Katniss when it came to most things, and if he could hunt, then he certainly could kill. These were the realities that came with the games, having to get over the fact that blood was going to be spilled, that people were going to die and that no one who wanted to go home was going to get there with clean hands.

“You should get comfortable with a sword,” Haymitch told Gale, not wanting him to bother with archery. “There's only going to be one bow, and Katniss isn't the only archer. If they can lure her into the Cornucopia for it, they will.” It was quite obvious that the Capitol would do anything they could to take Katniss out early and Haymitch was already trying to anticipate every dirty trick. “Besides,” he said, looking back to Gale after chewing another bite of steak, “you're a big guy. You might as well have a weapon to match.” 

He wasn't surprised when Peeta questioned him and his abilities, but Haymitch hadn't been very worried about that. “I used an ax last time, there's bound to be a few of them lying around,” he explained with an unconcerned shrug of his shoulders. He had been practicing that with Katniss anyway, brushing up on his old technique and although he was now much older, Haymitch still thought that he was pretty deadly. Foraging skills weren't going to matter, not if they were going to be staying in a group and Haymitch knew from experience that sometimes the arena didn't even provide anything edible.

The real issue was Prim, and had been all along. She was Katniss's Achilles heel, the one person she would defend until the very end and Haymitch was sure that the girl knew it. There was no sense in harping on Prim about her lack of combat skills, but he agreed with Katniss about a distance weapon. If Prim could defend herself from far away, Katniss could focus on keeping herself alive. “A blow gun would be good too,” he added, thinking of Maysilee. Prim sort of reminded him of her, but Haymitch could only hope that she didn't meet a similar fate in the arena.

Prim knew that no one was expecting much from her, and if she felt like starting some kind of argument, she would have admitted that she wasn't expecting much either. She knew enough about the Hunger Games and had watched enough tapes to know that many tributes like her didn't make it past the first five minutes. Maybe it would have been easier that way, for her to die early and not slow Katniss, Haymitch and Gale down. They could move on, and make it to the end, they might even be able to go home. She sighed to herself and finished with her dinner. “I'll do the best I can,” she promised. Even though weapons weren't her thing, she wasn't going to waste all of the free training, and the extra days before the games.

Thankfully, Effie was there to break up the tension and dessert was finally passed around. From the tray, Prim picked up a raspberry tart with lots of whipped cream piled on top. The taste was sweet and the confection was so much different from anything she could have gotten back home. “Fruit?” she asked, looking to Gale after licking away a stray dollop of whipped cream for her lip. “That's surprising.” 

The rest of the evening was spent relaxing and made sure to mind Peeta's advice of going to bed early. After not sleeping well the night before, and all of the excitement from the parade, Prim was really exhausted. For an hour after dinner she had sat with Katniss in the lounge area and watched as Haymitch and Peeta played an oddly interesting game of chess. She watched that for a while before her eyes began to feel heavy and Prim announced that she was going to bed. She gave Katniss a kiss on the cheek and said goodnight to Haymitch, Effie, Peeta and Gale before heading back to her room. She took a quick shower and relaxed further before throwing on something simple to sleep in and crawling into bed.

“I'm going to bed too,” Haymitch said, moving one of his pieces on the chess board. He and Peeta could finish their game tomorrow if there was any sort of time for it. “Goodnight,” he nodded to everyone else in the room and made his way down the hall. He had yet to actually go to his room and hadn't inspected any part of the suite until now. The room, as usual was nice. There was the standard closet off to the side, a plush-looking bed and various decorations that it made the interior feel less cold. Pushing his hair from his face, Haymitch unbuttoned his ruined his shirt and tossed it in a chair by the door, along with his pants and tie. He padded over to the dresser and chose a pair of black pants to sleep in before turning down the heavy covers of the bed and sliding between the sheets.

One thing he could say for the Capitol was that they really liked to go all out in terms of comfort. Quickly, the blond man settled down and sleep began to take over. He was so tired that his worries didn't play any sort of factor in sleep that night, and it came easily. He was out like a light for a solid few hours when an outside noise caught his attention. He sat up in bed, hair a mess as he listened closely, but there it was again. It sounded like a call for help, albeit a muffled one. Rubbing at his eyes, Haymitch began to fully wake and he threw the covers back.

After walking out into the dark hallway, Haymitch was able to hear better and it was clear that the pained noise was coming from Katniss's room. He knew that she had nightmares, that was something they had talked about on one of their many nights in the woods, but Haymitch had hoped that those dreams wouldn't bother her here. He walked toward her room and entered quietly, vaguely able to make out her body under all of the blankets.

“Katniss,” he said, coming to her side. “Katniss, wake up...” He reached out gently and gave her a shake, hoping not to startle her too much, but he knew all too well what it was like to come out of a nightmare without realizing that it was over.

On the other side of the penthouse, Prim had been lying awake since going to bed. Although she had been tired when she had gone to shower, once she laid down she was wide awake. It was her mind that was racing, playing out every scenario over and over and each one ended with her being dead. The guilt that she had felt all along was even worse now because Prim didn't want anyone to feel like they had to carry her, or that they needed to keep her alive, but she knew Katniss and Gale would never want to leave her behind. The games were going to be a mess, and Peeta was right, she had the most to prove and she was going to fail miserably. 

Even though she had learned a lot from Gale the year before, those skills weren't developed enough to keep her alive and there was only so much time to train. It wasn't like she would be at Katniss's level with anything in just a few weeks time. Frustratedly, Prim sighed into her pillow and turned onto her side, trying her hardest to shake the thoughts that were keeping her awake. “Just sleep,” she whispered to herself, “you need to sleep.”