PROMETHEUS. CAPITOL. FIN.

Prometheus isn't your real name - never has been.

It's just an alias, but maybe that's obvious.

Because Prometheus is a name from a hero's story. It's the name of a god who had a weakness for mankind, and so he gave them the gift of survival. He loved them and guided them and then he was punished for it.

But that's a different story. A happier one, maybe.

It isn't your story.


"Hey. It's me. I- uh- I just wanted to check up. Haven't heard from you in a while, man. Marco said you got the package though, so, hope you like it! We smuggled her out last night. Thought you might be up to taking care of another one. If you need anything else, just let me know. I still owe you one."

It starts off simply.

Your father drinks himself to death and your mother dreams of being a star so much that she trips off the balcony trying to reach them.

Your sister watches them both fall with a cruel kind of intelligence. It sits dormant behind her eyes, and it scares away all the other children on your street. You probably should be afraid of it too, but you're not.

You've seen worse things in worse eyes.

And so you hold her hand carefully in your fist at the funeral and ignore the way that the pavement burns through your shoes. When the sermon is over, Enyo bites at your fingers until you let go, and so you don't try to comfort her again.

But she has ambitions, and you get roped into them simply because you are the older brother. You are the protector, and in the span of a week you get her out of more fights than most Capitolites will see in their whole lives.

And it gets worse before it gets better.

You're fifteen the first time you stand over the body of a broken man. You listen to him wailing on ground and clasping at the stump of his wrist and try to feel something other than emptiness. You're fifteen when you pour kerosine into his eyes and strike a match against the basement floor of a high-rise.

Enyo stands in the corner with your sweater around her shoulders and laughs.

And your knuckles ache from finishing what she starts, but you still stand behind her when she asks. The old gaudy pews of the church make your back kink and crack, but you still sit there and read scripture until the words start to swim off the page.

"Sinner." Your father's voice still says.

"I know." You whisper to the glass.


"This is an automated message for: David McNeary. Your Cartin Pharmaceutical subscription will expire in 14 days. To renew this subscription, please visit one of our Capitol locations. We thank you for your continued purchase."


You don't know exactly how she does it, she never tells you. You just know that one week Enyo doesn't have the funds and then the next week she does.

You're eighteen when the fighting ring starts and nineteen when you both make enough money to move into the penthouse. You were always the softer sibling, as wild as it may seem, and when Enyo told you to get rid of the bodies, you did.

You were good at following orders.

Maybe that's how you ended up where you are.

Enyo's bloodlust is different than yours. You can see it in the way that she smiles when she makes deals and how she always talks like she knows something you don't. She doesn't get her hands dirty because she has you for that. And it's not like you complain.

When you try hard enough, every face blurs into one. You stand under the glow of a streetlamp and when the light flickers you see your father standing above your mother, but by then your switchblade is already out and pressed below a waiting eye.

You accompany the shipments and make sure none of the cattle try to make a run for it. Enyo is less than particular about those things, but if one of the avox doesn't make it to the ring, she doesn't exactly shed a tear. She'll chew out the supplier, sure, but she won't chew you out.

You think it's because she knows.

Something happens to you between twenty-two and twenty-three. Maybe it's the kids - the ones they start to bring into the ring when they run out of adults. Maybe it's just because, somehow, it feels like you've been doing this for too long already. You watch the greedy hands and eager eyes in the stands, all the gambling and bartering, and you wonder how you got there.

You numb yourself until you can't see the blood under your nails.

But Enyo is still your sister, and you made her a promise, so you try to do your job and tune it out. It's just little things at first; a fistfight in the backroom, getting hammered in one of the top floor lounges and then trashing the place, forgetting to wipe your presence from a dumping site and then being questioned for it. Not that that matters. You buy whatever the fuck you want and you go where you please. You're young and you're above the law simply because you believe yourself to be. You carry a flask under your jacket while you work and it makes watching the fights a little easier.

You remember a redhead putting her hand on your shoulder and trying to worm her way through your apathy.

When a young avox girl with greasy dark hair digs her thumbs into the eyes of her brother, you feel nothing.


"You listen to me you fucking bastard, I want my money back, alright?. ALL of it. Because your rigged little game? That's not gonna fly with my boys. You wait until I get my hands on you, you fucking scum-"


You only slip up once.

But it's a very bad slip up.

It's very bad.

Enyo acquires almost a dozen avoxes in preparation for an event. She doesn't shut up about it -  the way she trills gives you a migraine, and you snap at her more than once.

But there's one avox in the group and -

you make a series of very bad decisions.

Her hair is flaxen and cut short and her eyes are the colour of cornflowers. Enyo doesn't notice when she goes missing from the cells, and you don't bring it up.

She writes her name out for you in the dim light of your apartment - M E L O D I E standing in shaky little letters, and she takes your hands when you trace the letters gently.

You fall for her so quickly that it gives you a headrush.

The two of you spend a handful of months curled up on your futon. Enyo bangs on your door at some point, but you hide Melodie in the spare room and you call in sick. Eventually you have to go back, because you can't stay away from the truth forever, but you think that Enyo notices the way that you suddenly pull your punches. You cringe at the sound of bone breaking and squeeze your hands into fists at your sides when one of the sponsors points it out.

Because all you can see is blonde hair and blue eyes and all you can feel is a set of smaller palms that fit against yours.

Melodie makes you feel a little more human, and when you wake up in the middle of the night, sweating from a memory, she tucks your forehead to the hollow of her throat and hums.

You harbour an avox in your arms for over a year and believe that Enyo is never the wiser.

And you don't think you'll tell her that she's going to be an aunt, not with how her temper is shortening. Because, yeah, maybe you've been slacking off, but Melodie's cravings are strange and demanding, and you spend more time at home in an apron than in some alley or in some interrogation room beating the shit out of someone.

You think you could stay like that forever - and it's a foolish thought.

Melodie gives birth in the spring and you panic, calling in every favour that you can afford. In the end, it isn't very many, but your neighbour seems to take pity at the panic in your eyes and brings an armful of towels over to help.

You hold your son in your arms hours later, the smallest thing in the world, and he's so fragile that it scares you.

You blink and see blood on your hands. You wince and feel a sternum crunching under your foot.

But Melodie smiles at you, and your son lets out a weak cry, so you hold them both closer.

L O C K E, Melodie spells out on your skin.

"Locke," you say back.

The baby coos.


"Heeeyyyy man. So, I kinda need a favour. I know, I know, this is the last time, I promise. You're just the best I know. That's a compliment, by the way! That's a compliment. Anyways, let me know as soon as you're free. I've got a wad of cash with your name on it."


There's a tip, or a mole, you don't know. Avox fighting isn't exactly legal, and the business brings you more enemies than it does friends.

Either way, Enyo tries to pin it on you.

Men in strange uniforms raid your apartment in the middle of the night and you don't remember leaving. You remember the sound of Melodie's soft breathing beside you, and then you waking up somewhere cold and and white and sterile.

Melodie and Locke aren't with you when your eyes adjust, and you throw yourself against the cell door hard enough that it groans under the weight. You kick at the shitty little bench and chuck it at the wall but it doesn't make a difference.

You know what their absence means.

And after what feels like an eternity, a man with shadows across his shoulders strides into your cell. He offers you a choice.

You consider strangling him right there.

But he tells you about your family, and he tells you that you can stay there and rot, or you can work for him.

It isn't a very hard decision.

Enyo sends her lapdog after you once she finds out, and you laugh when it climbs through your window in the middle of the night with a knife.

You send it back to her in a box.


"Hi, I'm not sure if this is the right number, but this is Rachelle! We met last night, and we were both pretty out of it so, uh, if this isn't Tick, don't worry about it. If it is - give me a call back! I'd love to continue our conversation."


Having no family means you have nothing to lose.

That makes you expendable.

Useful.

When the Fenwicks find out about that, well, that's when it changes. Or maybe they always knew, and the first year was just a test. You become less bodyguard, more hitman. You're strong, tight-lipped, angry. You're their muscle.

You're used to being treated like a watchdog from working with Enyo. Or, you suppose, working for her.

But you don't see her face again for a long time. You think it's because you're afraid of what you'll do to her if you do.

There isn't really a difference between getting rid of avox bodies compared to Capitolite ones. It's still done in the dark, away from the public eye, and the only people that see you work are the ones that are meant to.

You're good at sending messages.

And it's simple - a name ends up in your pocket, and then you have a week to deal with it.

It never takes longer than three days.


( You drive your fist into his face until his concussion will be too strong for him to recognize yours. A business card with the Fenwick name flutters down to land on his chest and you leave him sprawled on the stairwell. A dial tone rings out. )


Fenwick is different. You're not sure if it's a good different or a bad different, but he's just

different.

You spend a long time working for him, and you go through so many aliases that you wake up one rainy morning and actually have to work to remember your name.

Enyo still has her little business going. Although it's not so little anymore. Fenwick doesn't seem to care that you still keep tabs on her, just like he doesn't seem to care about the menagerie that slowly finds its way into your apartment.

You're loyal to him, because after all this time, why wouldn't you be? You take care of the thorns in his side and you're compensated greatly for it. You're given an outlet and a home and you try not to see Locke in the features of his son, but its hard.

You're grateful. You really are.

Because there's no morality in the underbelly. There's no black and white in the Capitol - there's hardly even any grey. You've done things that would make any man squeamish but Fenwick still keeps you on the payroll.

It's all you could ask for.

There's a mutual sense of understanding there, and you wish that it didn't make your gut twist.

Because that's the thing about sobriety. Everything gets a little clearer the longer you look. Everything gets a little more painful.

Eventually you're so close to the 10 year chip that you can practically taste it. You'd like to think that Melodie would be proud of you for that, just as much as you'd like to think your father would hate it.

You're a creature of habit, and this is really no different. You work and you eat and you sleep and then you do it all over again. You stand in the shadows of Fenwick's office and clean your hands in the stairwell. Melodie doesn't have a grave, but you think if she did, then visiting it would be part of your routine too.

The years haven't exactly been kind to you, but you've carved out the smallest space in the Capitol to exist in. Enyo doesn't bother you anymore, not in any way that truly matters, and the days that feel like they cost a tremendous effort start to spread themselves more sparsely across your calendar.

It's a bit like these days - where the evenings are long and warm and you watch a puff of cigarette smoke curl across the iron railing of your balcony. You a press a palm against the slip of paper in your shirt pocket and test the way the name written on it sounds, when Delilah rips you from your musings. She digs her claws into the perch of your arm to nip at your fingers and caws so loudly that someone down on the street glances up.

She must be hungry.