CHAPTER I
- Psychomachy -

{ cw; violence, injury detail }

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The first punch takes a toll on his stability.

Anteros rocks back and forth slightly, swaying from the grisly impact. He still remains light on his feet when the world grows dizzy around him, moving forward with those flowing swerves and jabs that he had been taught to rely on in hand-to-hand combat. His hair is sticking to his temples, soaked by an awful amalgamation of fresh blood, sweat and flyaway tears.

It hardly deters him. Instead of backing down, Anteros bears his teeth to suspire an outcry, wielding his bruised fists and lunging forward like a ravenous mongrel with carrion dangled before its maw, that insatiable hunger for triumph tearing a gaping hole through his chest.

Starvation sours sanity. He knows that with more familiarity than he should.

Regardless, he holds onto that feeling; embraces it, relishes in it. He hones into that primal rage that sparring unearths within and allows for his empathy to turn to ash. Forgetting his feelings just the way Julius had taught him.

Blood pours from his nose. He can feel it growing hot against his skin; the cartilage aches beneath his throbbing flesh - he realises that the bone has been broken and desperately needs reset, hurting like hell. Yet, he can't find the rationality within himself to stop and put it straight, determined to win the spar he's brought upon himself.

His hand peels away from where it's cupping his nose a minute too late. He needs to refine his reaction time. When his legs are swept from under him in one smooth motion, he's forced onto his back with a sickening noise that signifies the beginning of a nasty bruise. He stares up at his opponent through narrowed eyes, teeth ground together hard enough to chip the enamel so that his pain isn't professed for the world to hear.

Not good enough. That was preventable. He curses himself and struggles to catch his breath, the reminder of his own weakness circling his mind relentlessly.

Julius stares down at him, the face of an angel tainted by the vicious glare of a devil. His hair the colour of a dying leaf, his eyes golden like sweet honey or the fading sun. His grin glitters under the dim lights and makes Anteros' gut twist in an indescribable feeling of a thousand sentiments crowbarred together all at once. The warmth soon curdles into incurable rage, leaving him wondering what it'd feel like to crush Julius' regal bone structure with his bare hands, to play God and watch as that same beauty breaks beneath Anteros' fists.

He curls a lip, feeling the warm blood trickle onto his teeth. Before any blows can be landed, Anteros snaps a knuckle across his defined jaw and has them flipped over on the mat. His fists search for any gaps in his polished armour; the weak points of his defence, the decay that crumbles his facade. Anteros gets in a few swipes while the man beneath him fights to regain his breath after being winded, thick droplets of blood matting his dishwater blonde hair.

Julius is quick to fling him off. They both stumble onto their feet, circling each other like two lions fighting their way to the top under the flickering spotlight of the fluorescent gym lights.

"You're getting slow, old man," Anteros grits, rolling his shoulder.

Julius bears his bloody teeth in another grin and lunges forward, twisting Anteros' arm behind his back and wrenching him upright with a death grip on his wrist. His forearm constricts around his windpipe.

"Why, I'm taken aback by the insinuation," he says with mock offence.

Anteros struggles against his hold. He writhes and sputters, twisting his hands to try and wriggle out of his grasp helplessly. His heel connects with Julius' shin but he's not granted so much as a grimace, his mentor standing rigidly behind him with no signs of letting up his asphyxiating grasp any time soon.

"Do you give in?"

Anteros hisses as a bone cracks awkwardly in his wrist. "No."

Julius shrugs. "Very well."

Just as his words trail off, Anteros smashes his head back into his nose, springing across the gym to get away and automatically pulling his fists up into a defensive position. He's prepared to push him past his breaking point, a serpent coiled up and waiting for the opportunity to strike.

Julius cups his battered face, blinking excruciatingly slowly. Instead of doing something trivial like crying out in agony or cursing Anteros for the injury fresh on his pretty face, he simply begins to laugh.

"So stubborn," he mutters. His grin is deadly. "You never know when to stop, do you?"

Anteros doesn't respond straight away. His chest is heaving from the struggle, his body too bruised and battered to offer any coherent words.

"I learned from the best," he mutters.

Julius' grin dissolves into the ghost of a smile, the corners of his split lip slightly upturned. "Come on," he encourages, clapping a hand on Anteros' shoulder and pretending not to notice his wince. "Let's get you cleaned up."

"I'm..." he sucks in a shuddering breath. "I'm fine."

"No, you're not," Julius replies. His hand goes to rest on Anteros' chin, ignoring the way he flinches and urging him to pull it forward. "Keep it at that angle or else blood will enter your throat and you'll choke. Besides, if we don't do something about that nose, then your breathing will suffer from nasal obstruction. We don't want your nose to collapse with the Games so close on the horizon, do we? That wouldn't do for the cameras."

The ramblings of a failed doctor. He turns on his heel and makes for the exit, hand twisting the doorknob and pushing it open until a grating creak echoes around the gym.

Anteros glares at the back of his head in defiance, yet his legs spur him on to pursue Julius out the door. "I thought I wasn't mentoring this year."

They take a short walk down the narrow hallway to one of the nearby bathrooms, ducking inside the doorway in search of bandages and potential painkillers. The metronomic ticking from their footsteps bounces off the walls of Julius' manor as they slink away from the gym in his basement, the house as empty as it is grandiose.

"Change of plans." Julius rifles through a med kit. "Though I wouldn't get too fixated on it. There's always time for alterations in the planning. The Gamemakers are awfully indecisive these days."

Julius Mountebank's way of speaking has always perplexed Anteros. The language weaponised by his silver tongue is almost reminiscent of the Capitol's, his vocabulary refined to disguise himself amongst the prim and proper peacocks that he's encountered over the years. He's always praised by his... customers and other associates for how he acts with such sophistication, his manners polished to shine under the spotlight like fine china. ( He's so civilised, he could almost be one of them! Anteros has seen first-hand how often that comment has his eye twitching. )

However, he doesn't quite carry that gaudy accent that's been popularised in the Capitol - no, Julius is all District in that respect. His voice flows as smoothly as a rippling brook, though the syllables on his tongue are rough like hardwood. He shifts to fit the rhythm of his audience, his way with words altering to accommodate those around him the way a chameleon would shift to camouflage in the undergrowth. It's impressive to watch, albeit a little unsettling.

Anteros is brought back down to earth by the gentle brush of fingers across his injured hand. He flinches away almost instinctively, recoiling back into himself and hastily waving off the apology that follows. He turns his head away from Julius' searching eyes to pin them on his dirty shoes, leaning back onto the sink for support when his breathing grows shallow.

He catches a brief glimpse of his reflection and it makes him wince. The shape of his nose is sickeningly askew, crooked amidst the scars on his face - scar tissue near his ear from a fire in the arena, a raised laceration from a sword running across his collarbone, a chip in his skin from the signet ring someone had brought in as their tribute token. The reminders were endless. His complexion is a blooming canvas of violet and yellow bruising intermingled with rapidly drying cuts, a little gem of blood weeping down his temple and slithering over his cheekbone in a fluid motion that makes his skin crawl. He goes to wipe it away, only to hiss out a complaint at the way it stings.

"Ah, ah," Julius says, pulling his hand down. "Don't touch. That'll only make it worse."

Anteros grumbles something unintelligible under his breath but complies, folding his arms across his chest and discreetly checking for any bruised or broken ribs. He hears rustling out of his good ear and watches from the corner of his eye as Julius rifles through the cabinet above his sink, his hands eventually finding purchase on a battered old tin that's rattling with bottles and unfurled rolls of gauze.

Julius comes to stand before him. His t-shirt sticks to his broad shoulders from sweat and blood, similarly to Anteros; his typically meticulous hair falling into his eyes as he fumbles with all the supplies.

"This is going to sting," he warns.

"Yeah, yeah. Just... get on with it."

He settles his fingertips on the bridge of Anteros' disfigured nose. The pressure begins as no more than a jabbing sting, bearable yet irritating. It soon develops into a throbbing agony as Julius snaps his bones back into place with a gut-wrenching crack, his aching skin protesting all the sudden changes.

Julius disappears for a moment only to come back with something in his grasp. An icepack is pressed upon the tender area and his hand is guided to hold it down in place. Anteros has to sit like that for a few silent minutes, his eyes fixed onto the ceiling as the glacial feeling radiating from the ice soothes the screaming of his flesh.

When he's satisfied that it's been long enough, Julius gently applies paper tape onto his nose, dressing the wound to the best of his ability and tutting at the state of him. He wraps some of the extra gauze around his bleeding knuckles for good measure, taking a cotton pad from his med kit to dab it across the other small cuts that sit angrily across his face before they have the chance to get infected.

"Will I live to see another day, doc?" Anteros jokes dryly. His eyelashes flutter subconsciously as Julius grazes his thumb over a mark on his jaw.

"Mm. You're lucky it isn't too severe," he remarks. "It doesn't look as though it needs to be drained of blood or anything. A few days of rest will set it straight, I'm sure. Can you manage to abstain from fights for that long?" His words are blatantly patronising.

Anteros rolls his eyes, flexing his newly bandaged fists. "Of course."

You're a liar. He nips the inside of his cheek until the tissue tears between his teeth, flooding his mouth with the grit of his own blood. A bad one, at that. Yet another thing you're no good at.

Julius studies him for a few seconds, eyes concentrated as if memorising every cleft and curve of his facial features, his scrutiny making his skin crawl. Anteros is accustomed to feeling insecure around just about anyone after curating his gallery of gruesome scars, though the feeling is amplified tenfold around his oldest friend. He's always carried a certain talent of making everyone around him squirm with a demanding sense of inferiority, one sweeping stare enough to paralyse someone with self consciousness.

"You should've told me to stop," Julius says at last. "I went too far."

Anteros' stare hardens. "There's no such thing as too far."

I'm just weak. He can't bring himself to say it aloud, to express that self-doubt for the world to hear. What would Julius think? He'd be disappointed in every one of his flaws. He couldn't bear to let him know that there were even any to begin with.

"Perhaps not," he says coolly. "Although, you had taken more hits than you could handle. Know your limits, Anteros."

Frustration flares up inside him. "Oh, I know exactly what my limits are. I could've withstood much more than that. You were the only thing holding me back."

"I'm not trying to dispute your strength," he murmurs. Anteros is beginning to feel like a child. He hates being spoken down to. "Nor am I trying to hold you back. I only have your best interests at heart."

"If that were true, you wouldn't stop me from reaching my full potential."

That hangs heavily in the air for a solid minute, though they hold eye contact for what feels like a century longer.

Julius' lips twist as if he's bitten down on something sour. "Go home, Anteros. Get some rest. I think you're going to need it."

"I don't-"

"That wasn't an offer. Go."

Anteros frowns. He curses under his breath at nothing in particular and slips towards the door, shrugging his tatty jacket over his shoulders despite the sting that courses through his ripening bruises. The tiles protest beneath his heavy footfalls, the overly expensive porcelain groaning beneath his scuffed up shoes. He has half a mind to dig his heels in and watch as they shatter, just out of spite.

A hand upon his shoulder stills him. He stiffens up and has to resist the urge to shrug it off immediately.

"I meant what I said about the fighting," Julius warns. Anteros opens his mouth to protest but he's silenced by a stern glare. "I know how you tend to frequent the fighting ring back in that mining village of yours. The illegal fighting ring." He spits the word out as though it's venom leeched from a puncture wound.

Anteros tenses his jaw like an admonished child. His mind is ticking with desperation as he scours every cobwebbed corner of his imagination for an excuse to save himself the embarrassment, only for nothing to come. There's no way to worm his way out of this one; he'll have to swallow his pride and accept the scolding for now.

"You're destroying yourself, Anteros." His eyes flicker with the faintest trace of what could be mistaken for worry. "Scuffling with the lowlifes for money that you don't need isn't getting you anywhere. You need to do better."

Anteros scowls. "I didn't come here for a lecture."

He shoves Julius' hand from his shoulder and continues to amble towards the door, a limp altering his gait from the odd angle at which his ankle is now pointing. He doesn't get much further. That grasp from before is quick to return and anchor him in place, this time on his wrist. It's stronger than it had been the first time and holds more warning behind it, intense enough to leave crescent bruises along his sallow skin.

"I'll see you in the morning," Julius says firmly, as if it's a fact and not a farewell. "Goodnight."

Anteros' eyes flicker between the hand and the face opposite him. He contemplates asking if he'll be alright to deal with his own injuries before deciding that it's a fool's errand, drawing away until the bathroom is a few paces behind him and the floorboards of the hall feel solid beneath his shoes.

"Goodnight," he replies curtly, voice gravelly as it grates against his throat.

The short walk home is spent in silent contemplation. He nurses his injuries with soft touches from a calloused hand and allows his mind to wander away from the likes of Julius, his thoughts straying in the territory betwixt all the upcoming events as they surmount the horizon. It doesn't take long for him to drift onto the topic of the Games, his heart dropping at the reminder.

The Quarter Quell is soon. Too soon for his liking.

His stare hardens, his fingertips fumbling to slip the key into the door. Something about the upcoming Games causes his gut to twist in a sensation that can only be labelled as terror, judging from the way his breathing shudders in his lungs and his hands began to tremble viciously.

He just doesn't know why.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

well this was definitely something

idk how to write fight scenes i hope this reads alright 😭😭 but yeah!!!! he's a lil crazy!!!!however i do love him lots (even if i'm planning to put him through immense trauma in the future)