INFERNO BONAPARTE, DISTRICT ONE

When Elizabeth Decon found out that her regular morning hangovers were not all that they were cracked up to be, she'd thrown a bottle at her boyfriend's head and then proceeded to snort a line of cocaine off of the living room's incredibly dirty table. It was glass and smudged with a number of different things, covered in bottles of various sizes and cigarettes that sat silently smoking on the foggy glass. By the colour of the ash stained walls and the beer bottles pushed uncaring into the corners, one could easily conclude that the baby conceived in that girl's uterus did not stand one chance in ten.

It was alright, this area of the District was very much used to hopeless cases, they'd welcomed Eliza into their midst when she had been only fourteen years old and leaning heavily on the arm of her then boyfriend; eighteen then and thrilled to have a girl too high out of her mind to say no. They were used to things like this because there was no one to tell them it was wrong, despite the fact that they knew it deep down. It was the benefits of living in a corrupt society.

Eliza probably knew deep down that continuing her lifestyle of substance abuse was not a good idea for the baby that she was going to have. Maybe at one point she did have good intentions too, maybe some nights she locked herself in the bathroom, in a puddle of vomit and tears, wishing she knew how to save herself. However, the problem with addiction is that it isn't called so for being easy to quit. Eliza had never had any strength in the first place, her father had been a hitter, her mother had been dead for a long time. She had issues and was just unlucky enough to add a pregnancy onto her long list.

He was born premature of course and would not have survived the ordeal at all if his mother hadn't already been brought to the hospital when she was found earlier that day with a needle stuck in her bony arm, passed out in the back alley of a rather infamous pub. They had to cut her open to get him out because he was not going to survive otherwise. The placenta had separated from Eliza's uterus and oxygen was not making it's way to him.

When they took him away, she was not conscience to hold him, let alone look at him. He was placed on life support almost instantly, having only a long few months in the hospital to look forward to. The needle in his mother's arm had contained heroine, her blood boasted of other substances as well.

He was born small, delicate, they didn't even know if he would survive his first night, had been shocked even when he had given his first cough and taken air into his lungs. He was not expected to survive as soon as his mother had been brought into the hospital. She certainly had not. She'd died from her overdose only minutes after he had been whisked away, tiny fists pumping despite his weakness, squawling like any baby should for a mother that was never going to be there in the first place.

They were unable to id Eliza and so she was cremated and her ashes were put in a locker for the baby to have when it was old enough, beginning the list of his worldly possessions. The father never came looking for his girlfriend or the baby and so he was an orphan from his very first breath.

You'd think that a child with such a poor beginning would be destined for a happy life, surely the scales would have to tip in his favor after a start off like that?

However, his was a life that was destined for sorrow from day one. Each day was a struggle with him, born premature and so small, they were amazed that he could even breath. His lungs shouldn't have been capable of it, but despite everything he seemed determined to survive. Each day he was still breathing, each day accepting the weaning of the drugs that he had been born addicted to. He seemed to be doing well, but he still wasn't growing much. The constant substance abuse of his mother had most likely ensured his growth to be stunted.

He was a lovely baby, greeting each new morning in the special ward with a smile and a gurgle, waving his arms about in a wish to be held by whoever was walking nearby. The nurses doted on him, half in love with his small stature and tragic back story. He had an excellent demeanor, and an easy grace to him even as a small one. He hardly cried, except when the latest dose of whatever he was given wore off and he was left with an insatiable hunger that he could not understand. When he was hungry for the drugs that his mother had taken, it was like he was a different baby.

Still, each day he improved to the point that weeks had passed and he was completely weaned off of everything that they could think of, his body finally running fresh and clean. He was three and a half months old the day the hospital finally declared him able to leave it's care, having reached a fairly regular size for a premature baby his age.

However, there was no where for the baby to go. There were no contact numbers and there were no loving grandparents to take him in, there was no one for him. No one wanted extra mouths, those loving enough were unable to afford it. All that was there for him were the career families that were always looking for a new weapon to hone and sharpen. However, they often did not go for the babies who had been prematurely, as they often proved to be too weak later on in life.

Thus, no one wanted to adopt the gurgling baby boy who hadn't even had the chance to sin yet. Maybe he'd done something terrible in his past life to deserve a life like this.

He was placed in an orphanage and made a ward of the District.

For a while, it probably wasn't so bad. Orphanages in a world that doesn't care about life one way or another are never good places, usually more like work houses than anything else. As a baby his life was spent in a cradle, in a row along with the other babies. They were not picked up or touched except to be fed, washed and changed. Everything at the place was done with efficient precision, love and kindness was hardly worked into the equation. Every child had chores that had to be done daily, starting early in the morning and ending late at night with time in for career training and eating.

Hobbies were not included in the daily routine, neither was learning or love. The children of the orphanage spent their days cleaning or building items for the District to export to the Capitol. They worked for no pay and the only comforts given them were the meager meals they would get in the morning, noon and evening, as well as the beds with the thin mattresses that they had to sleep on.

A place like that was no place for a child to be raised. It was more like hell, a breeding ground for demons than a home.

As he aged he became aware of the atrocities that were performed daily. Sometimes he would lay awake at night in the huge dorm rooms and listen to the orderlies patrolling between the beds, wondering which one they might stop at tonight, if they'd take the child out of the room first or just rape them where they slept. He'd lay there in the darkness at four years old hoping that they'd pass him by without fully understanding what made him so afraid. He took to wetting his bed most nights in fear.

They never liked bedwetters, not for that. They were too dirty.

(They always knew who had been selected because the next day the kid would be in sickbay.)

To the little boy, this was not irregular. This was life, it was to be expected and he did not know that there was any other way to live. Like all of the other children, his knees and elbows were perpetually raw from scrubbing the floor and stirring the big laundry vats. Like the other kids, his stomach was often growling with hunger and he was often dirty, the same care for the building not taken for the children who lived inside.

The only thing that seemed to save him was his continued small size. He was smaller than most eight year olds, in fact a whole head shorter. It was due to the fact that his mother had taken all those drugs when she'd been pregnant with him, it had stunted his growth. However, it had also served to make him far more adorable and he became someone for the other kids to protect, just as he often wanted to protect them. If there was one thing they had in that hell hole, it was the kinship they all had from a life spent enduring the same things over and over.

Still, for all of their promises to protect each other, there was nothing to be done for one another when an orderly took one of them by the ear and said that they were in for a beating. A beating usually meant the belt and it usually meant at least five strokes. It was impossible to stop the adults from doing as they pleased because they were big and the children were just little, the adults could do as they wished and the children had no power to stop them, that's just how it was.

The bigger you are, the more powerful you are.

When he was ten years old, they attempted a prison break. Late one night, they stuffed their beds with their pillows and climbed out the window, taking only the clothes on their back with them with no idea of where they might go. They were caught out as being gone when one of the orderlies pulled back the covers of the boy and found him gone, his prize for the night stolen from him.

They were climbing the home's yard when there was a hail of rifle fire directed at their climbing backs. Three children died, five were injured and three escaped. The bodies of the three that were dead served as ample cushioning for the bodies of the injured. Out of the five injured, two died from their wounds within hours and one died from his wounds a week later when it became infected. Of the two that survived their injuries, one became simple from brain damage. She was happy in a way and had ironically found a different escape. The last one that survived his wounds had only taken a bullet to the side and it had luckily missed any major organs, leaving him healthy within weeks.

Of the three that escaped, one went on to become a prostitute when no one wanted to take her in. She ended up dying years later in the back alley behind some bar at the age of twenty-three with heroin making her veins jagged. The second to escape ended up running straight into a Peacekeeper and was taken to the Capitol, presumably for Avoxing. The third to escape that night was taken in by a rather wealthy career family and when he was not reaped he went on to become a rather successful Peacekeeper that was in the business to change the way children were treated in the Districts.

Our boy did not escape that night.

The bullet wound only troubled him on very cold days, as if the frost was freezing the scarred skin as well. It still does, although with age the scar has gone lighter, it is still twisted and foul looking, as if someone dug into him with a hooked claw and gave a tug.

Life became more difficult after that, harsher, bleaker. His friends were wither dead, gone or simple. The hope of escape was gone, they cuffed him to the bed every night unless it was his turn to be taken into the other room. It happened more frequently after he was healed, as if it were a punishment. He took it as one that he deserved. He took the torments silently and without much complaint, shutting himself off instead so that he wouldn't have to focus on them. He didn't bother dreaming of escape much anymore but turned himself into a ghost and went on with training and his chores without complaint.

Life was quiet and like that, a routine for the next year.

His chance came again when he was eleven years old and they marched all the children out to the games square for the reaping. They stood in line in the only pair of worn clothes they had and the orderlies had to stay to the side with the other adults. For the first time in his life, the boy could witness what a mother and father were, what they looked like. The pairs of adults stood on the side, hands linked. He studied them more than the other children around him. Some of them stood tightly, strung, nervous. For some of them, the nervousness was excitement, for others it was fear.

"What would it be like," he wondered, "For someone to worry for you?"

He could not imagine it, how it would feel to have someone fold your clothes and put them inside your drawers, to tell you to eat your vegetables, to make sure you were staying hydrated, to give you piggy back rides, to toss around a ball with you, to cook your favourite meals, to remember your birthday, to smile with you, to laugh with you, to treat you like a kid, to tuck you in at night, to remind you to brush your teeth, to ask you to do the dishes, to kiss your wounds better, to tell you stories, to hug you, to hold you, to love you.

To be loved.

To be loved.

As soon as the crowd was dismissed the orderlies began to head toward him and the other children and he knew that if he missed the chance now he would have to wait another year for the next reaping to escape. The idea of that was something that he could not bare, he knew he would not make it to his next birthday with another year in that place. So, making a split decision, he turned on his heal and tried to blend in as best he could with the dispersing crowd, weaving in and out of the bodies until he was well and truly lost.

He blended in with a boy who was walking purposefully beside him, nearly two heads taller and with eyes that screamed death at whoever would listen. He wore all black and beside him walked a conservative looking man that seemed disinterested in most things while being interested in everything at once.

Our boy glanced over his shoulder, knowing that the orderlies were looking for him by now, that there was no way he was going to get away even though he knew that there was nothing they could do to him in broad daylight, he hoped. He was so interested in the scene behind him that he did not respond to the question of the taller boy who was walking beside him until his voice became such a mixture of cold interest that he found himself having to listen. "Who are you running from, boy?" He asked the question almost lazily, as if the answer really didn't matter all that much even as it did matter a whole lot.

He debated telling him, wondering if he told him he would send him back to the orderlies, to be put back where he belonged. He looked like one of those rich and proper types who knew everyone's place and just where they should be. On the other hand, our boy had little experience with the outside world, all he knew was that lying was a sin, so was stealing, so was sloth and gluttony. He hadn't been taught anything about killing or kindness but for what the orderlies had shown by example. So he opened up his mouth and he told the taller boy the truth, that he was from the state home, that he was running away today because he was going to die there otherwise and he lifted up his shirt to show the boy his gunshot wound too, with the hint of pride that all young men have for disgusting but cool things.

The taller boy's eyes seemed to widen with interest, he rested a guiding hand on our boy's back and seemed to quicken his pace and he nodded encouragingly at all the right places in the story. See, this tall boy was a snake in the grass, a Grimm. He seemed like a saviour but all he was doing was creating a debt for the boy, tying him to his service, making our boy owe him his life. It was even easier than fishing, especially with the gullible little boys that ran away from orphanages.

When they were in the safety of the Grimm's enormous house, Xanthus Grimm had the butler bring them hot chocolates and he had the maid draw our boy a bath and he had the tailor come and measure our boy for clothes. He insisted that our boy drink a chocolate with him in the parlor and he insisted that our boy tell his story again. Never before had he been asked about his life so intently, never before had anyone draw him a bath or made him a hot chocolate or even suggested giving him clothing that hadn't been worn by at least twelve other people first. It was if he had died and gone to heaven and he was seriously questioning the fact of whether he was still alive or not.

That first night, after our boy was all clean and sipping a hot chocolate with a fire roaring away, and Xanthus Grimm swilled his mug of what our boy assumed was also hot chocolate, (In this case he would be wrong as Xanthus Grimm does not often deign to drink anything less than blood, the fresher the better.) they spoke of many things.

"Boy, you have not given me your name yet," said Xanthus, looking for all the world like he had simply sat down in the middle of the woods and all the finery around him had simply sprung up, rightly so just because he had willed it. It looked like he was meant to be here, in this grand room. By all rights, he seemed to be too. His parents had loved him, although they were unfortunately deceased, he was an orphan too. However, the difference between Xanthus Grimm and our boy was that he had had parents that cared about his well being and he had been raised in a real house.

Our boy could not tell him that no one had bothered to name him from shame. So with the audacity of one that does not realize that he would be stuck with the name forever, he glanced around the room, trying to look inconspicuous about it, as if he wasn't looking for inspiration in the common house hold ornamentation. "My name?" he asked, buying time, "It's uhh....it's uhh.....it's uhhhhhh....." His eyes fell on the roaring fire, and for a moment he stared so intently that the flames were most likely imprinted on his retinas for life. "My name is Inferno," he said almost hesitantly, "Yeah," he added, nodding in confirmation.

"Last name?" asked Xanthus Grimm, managing to quirk one perfect brow bemusedly and look cool doing it, even though he himself was only eleven years old as well.

Our bo-Inferno had a good answer for this one. "I don't know," he said snappily, "I never knew my parents, see," and then he took a large swig of hot chocolate as if to congratulate his intelligence and burned his tongue. He could have stopped drinking as soon as he realized that it was too hot to drink fast but he had already started and he couldn't lose face in front of the boy who'd saved him, so he endured it.

Xanthus Grimm clapped excitedly and to this day, Inferno still isn't sure if he was applauding his amazing hot chocolate drinking skill or if he was clapping in excitement because he could make up a name for him. "Then if you'll excuse me, I will give you one myself. I knew it was perfect as soon as I met you, the namesake is the first person I thought of at seeing your...height," he said. Inferno looked over the rim of his mug and tried very hard not to cry at the pain in his tongue. unable to protest because he knew that if he opened his mouth he would scream, he merely nodded. "Excellent," said Xanthus, "Then what do you think about Bonaparte, it's the name of this blah blah blah blah......."

Inferno cannot remember what Xanthus said after that moment because he was far too busy saying his new name over and over in his head. Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonaparte, Inferno Bonapa-"Inferno?"

Groggily, he looked over the rim of his mug, which his mouth was still resting against and looked quizzically at Xanthus Grimm. "Do you like the name?" his host asked, hiding a smile behind lips that had been told sternly to never laugh again. Inferno considered it for a moment. He had never had a name before and it was probably high time that he did. He had no idea who this other 'Bonaparte' fellow was, but he liked the name a lot, he thought it made him sound dashing, like a prince from Enna's stories, before she got simple and forgot them all.

Xanthus' shoulders seemed to physically loosen as Inferno slowly nodded and then got faster and faster like a wind up toy going at hyper speed. It was as if the day had suddenly become too much for the soul weary boy. A lot had changed for him in twenty-four hours and it was all catching up with him at once. Xanthus launched into one of his stories but Inferno was nodding over the now empty chocolate mug, falling asleep into the couch that was far comfier than any bed he had ever slept on.

That night was the first really good memory he could ever really remember having.

He was only with Xanthus Grimm a a small number weeks but he learned a lot about the other boy in that short time. He also learned how to button a waist coat and how to tie a tie and how to look presentable all of the time instead of once in a blue moon. Xanthus seemed intent on teaching him everything that there was to be being rich in as short a time as possible. He didn't know why this was or why it was important to know what sort of fork to use for eating crab. He didn't even know what a crab was.

However, he could hardly not accept the lessons, nor could he say no to the continued, yet more advanced career training Xanthus decided to equip him with. For once in his life, it was as if there was someone who cared for him. For the first time in his life, there was someone who wanted to know about his progress, about his day, about what sort of things he thought about. He lent him books so that he could learn his letters and didn't mind it when Inferno went to him, asking him to help with hundreds and hundreds of words.

The walls in the house were thick enough that Inferno did not wake Xanthus Grimm up when he woke up screaming. No one noticed when Inferno left his light on all night, or at least they pretended not to, just as they pretended not to notice the dark circles under his eyes. AS he learned more words, Inferno tried not to self diagnose himself, why he was so short, why he always had trouble sleeping, why learning words was so difficult. He tried to stay out of the medical books that lined the walls of Xanthus' father's study but one day he couldn't restrain himself and he needed to know anyway.

The only thing he'd ever been told about his mother is that she had been an alcoholic, an addict and a whore. That's what the orderlies liked to tell him often. It turns out that drinking alcohol while pregnant is a bad idea. So is doing drugs and smoking and probably one hundred percent of the activities that his mother had partaken in. Stunted growth and insomnia and nightmares and depression and adhd and premature birth and mental problems and the list goes on and on.

The conclusion he drew from that was that his mother had hated him before he was even born which wasn't fair but since nothing in his life had ever been fair anyway, it didn't bother him as much as it should have. He shrugged and went off to learn more about forks and those fancy spoons that looked like they should be used to scoop out eyeballs.

It was a few weeks later when he was lounging in the lounge, books spread around him that Xanthus came to him. Inferno was freshly showered after a morning workout and had chosen his outfit for himself, it was nearly Grimm standard fashionable and overall a good effort. He was reading the third book in the Lord of The Rings trilogy and there was a box of tissues hidden under the table beside him. He had used seventeen already and he was only on the eight chapter.

"You're ready, Bonaparte," Xanthus said, regarding him from the opposite chair, perfectly manicured nails tapping out a rhythm on the centuries old wood of the furniture. After a moment of silence, Inferno placed his finger along the inside of the book and shut it, placing it on his lap, finger holding his place firmly inside.

"Yes, alright, for what?" he asked, trying not to show off how ridiculously curious he was, despite himself. He had learned early on that Xanthus was not a fan of big displays of emotion and that one should keep outbursts to themselves.

For his part, Xanthus Grimm looked as pleased as a cat who had gotten cream for dinner as well as his neighbor cat's cream as well as the next neighbor's cream because as it turned out the cat ran an enormous crime syndicate and could have whatever he damn well pleased. "You're going to be my cousin's bodyguard but pretend to be his friend by pretending to be from a rich family," he said firmly, looking incredibly pleased with his decision as if there was absolutely no problem in this plan at all.

Inferno Bonaparte looked at Xanthus Grimm as if he was a foreign object, for example a cactus, which was something he had never seen before and he assumed it was most likely odd looking, so he looked at Xanthus Grimm with a similar expression. "Xanthus," he began, trying to figure out how to phrase things delicately and failing, "My mother was an alcoholic, nicotine addicted crackwhore from the slums?"

"Yeah, but Cerberus won't know that because I'm going to say you're a family friend from one of my business partners, of course," the Grimm boy said, as if it were completely one hundred percent obvious and Inferno was absolutely ridiculous not to understand the fabulous plan. There really wasn't room for argument either. Although they had a tentative friendship, Inferno knew that nobody gave something for nothing, not in this life. He had been expecting the other shoe to drop since things had changed so wonderfully for the better.

"I do have practice taking a bullet, I guess," he said with a sigh, opening the book back up in his lap, needing to distract himself thoroughly so that he wouldn't burst into tears in front of the Grimm boy, knowing he seemed to hate weakness. He didn't want to show weakness, not after he had just been told he'd be being a bodyguard for someone important to Xanthus. He wanted to appear capable, cool, strong, not like a big wuss.

So a week later, Xanthus Grimm threw a ball and Inferno Bonaparte was on the guest list. According to the rumours, he was a heir to a large fortune, his father and mother deceased. To make his background check out, Xanthus Grimm placed a large sum of money in a bank account for Inferno Bonaparte, which made Inferno nearly faint at the amount where Xanthus barely batted an eye. No price was too high for the safety of his cousins. Despite his situation, Inferno highly enjoyed the party. The lights, the dresses, the suits and food and drinks. Everything was incredible to him, he hadn't seen so many lovely things in one night ever before in his whole life.

You'd think that the best moment of his life might of been the day that Xanthus Grimm rescued him from a life that would prove to be too short, or maybe the day where he finished reading an entire book all by himself, or maybe even the day he walked into the living room on his twelfth birthday to find his first birthday cake ever. However, all of those memories paled in comparison to the day he met the person he would end up caring the most about out of all of the people in the entire world.

At first meeting he actually hated his guts. A lot. Not just a little bit, but very much. It was something in the way he seemed to looks off the edge of his nose at him, as if he could smell the low birth from one hundred miles away. It was something in the way that he seemed to be so different from Xanthus, not the quiet house haunter, but the party-going maniac, even at eleven years old. He seemed more like what you'd expect a Capitolite to be like rather than a boy from District One.

Maybe that is what he thought of him at first. To be honest, half of what he thought probably ended up being true, but as a secret bodyguard, one tends to learn a lot about the person they've sworn to secretly protect and despite what Cerberus Grimm would have you think, he isn't the person he often pretends to be.

Before he'd met Cerberus, Inferno hadn't really lived. Oh, he'd breathed and drank water and used the toilet and done the regular people things. He hadn't laughed and looked at beautiful things for the pleasure of it or met so many different people, or done so many completely stupid, life threatening things before. He hadn't gone for a morning stroll at three in the morning in the hopes of vandalizing the new Peacekeeper building and not get caught, or crashed endless parties and he didn't even know someone could drink that much champagne.

Somehow, sometime, he ended up moving house to Cerberus', to the satisfaction of Xanthus Grimm who was satisfied with the completion of his plan. As far as Inferno and Xanthus both knew, Cerberus had no idea that Inferno wasn't the person he pretended at being. As far as Inferno knew, Cerberus assumed that Inferno really was interested in friendship alone, not in blocking any stray bullets that might head towards his body. He didn't know that Inferno was hired to befriend him.

The year came that Xanthus was reaped. He had been expecting Xanthus to let someone take his place, but he went to the arena happily, as if he had been waiting for the Grim Reaper to come calling for a very long time. He greeted death as an old friend. For a while, Inferno was heartbroken, able to remember the smiling eleven year old that saved his life with perfect clarity the day that Opal Shore cut his bones down into the ground. Yet he still had the money in the bank and Cerberus Grimm had become a friend. He would honour Xanthus' wishes until he no longer had the strength in his body to do so.

Before he knew it, he was eighteen years old and Xanthus Grimm had been dead for a long time. Not much had changed otherwise. He was still really short and he still couldn't sleep most nights, he still woke up often with nightmares. His style had changed slightly, probably due to Cerberus. His hair was bleached blonde now, to the point of crispiness, his undersides shaved. He didn't dare leave the house with Cerberus unless his eyeliner was expertly applied.

Somehow, in that time Cerberus had stopped just being the person that Inferno needed to protect above all else. He was definitely still that, but more so. He was the only one left that Inferno truly cared about because Xanthus was dead, Inferno's secret had died with him, perfectly kept between the two of them. There was no one to tell the secret anymore but Inferno himself and he certainly wouldn't. He was afraid to at this point, certain that Cerberus would eat him alive for lying to him.

Besides, he didn't want Cerberus to look at him as anything less than his equal. He didn't think that he could bear it if his friend of nearly seven years looked at him any differently than he did now.

So he did what he always did, worked out in the mornings, read in the early afternoons, partied with Cerberus in the evenings, just as he always did. He kept the secret stuck to the roof of his mouth and spoke around it.

And I got a lump in my throat
'Cause you're gonna sing the words wrong