sebastian carter || district one || done

bast carter

He's got his mother's eyes. The color of broken sea glass, lifeless as the pretty little marbles his father had sewn into the teddy bear he'd given him for his fourth birthday. It had little pink bows tied onto the ears though he'd quickly knotted them around it's scraggly neck instead and hung from the windowsill. He's always been a bit of a problem child.

His father's hopelessly, pathetically in love with his mother. He looks at her like she's the moon and the stars in the sky and every time she speaks to him he melts and Bast knows he'll be spending the rest of the hour scraping the remnants of his father up off the floor.

His mother looks at his father like he's nothing. A mistake made in the throes of grief after her first husband's funeral. And she insists she's never loved him but then carried their child to term. She even lets him tend to this big empty mansion alongside his father. A fact he's certain she hadn't shared with her second husband, or her third. Well, fourth time's the charm as the saying doesn't go.

He's got seven siblings now, maybe, it's not like he's bothered to keep count. Frankly he's never understood what makes them so much better than him, pure enough to be trained as a career because their blood runs mottled gold instead of copper. Bast bets he could beat the shit outta most of 'em. Except maybe Hallie, she's really buff and kind of terrifying.

This morning is like every other. Bast wakes before the sun, binds his chest and forces himself into a suit that chafes at his neck and makes his movements stiff. It's been months since his father had slipped up and referred to him by the name he gave him instead of the one Bast had chosen.

And his mother? She never referred to him to begin with.

Still he sets the table for his brothers and sisters, keeps his eyes to the floor and ignores snide comments about his bedhead and wrinkled jacket with fists clenched white behind his back. "Aren't the help supposed to look pleasant?" A younger one chides as Bast pulls out her chair, he doesn't remember her name but he's taken to calling her 'Carrot' due to the wash of fiery red curls tumbling down her shoulders. Husband number three's handiwork no doubt.

He sneers at her before leaving the room.

As the sun crests in the sky and dawn gives way to afternoon Bast trades tidy linen for ragged cloth. Most of his shirts are three sizes to big with jagged holes torn into them after an adventure gone south. He's only at home when he's made of bandages and broken bones. Maybe Bast isn't allowed to be a career but he could best most of them in a fistfight. Bet. He used to be pretty good at picking those until Kang started getting tangled in their midst. He didn't like to see his bruises mirrored on that pretty face.

Speaking of, the sorry bastard is waiting for him somewhere in town, probably sitting in a coffee shop sipping a drink with absolutely no sugar and staring out the window forlornly. His friends are few and far between - Bast prides himself on being an acquired taste - but Kang has been there for as long as he can remember.

They were both outcasts. A scrawny, sickly boy born to a career tycoon and a bastard who desperately wanted the silver spoon he was choking on. Bast had hated him at first, he remembers breaking his nose and calling him a little bitch but somehow he always found himself sitting beneath the tree that separated their properties, waiting.

Kang might have been the only person who never questioned who he was. He was the first to call him by his name, to call him him. Without hesitation, without question or doubt. Insufferable as he is, Bast is pretty sure he would be dead by now without him.

He was pissed when the ugly bastard moved away a few years ago but they've remained thick as thieves.

"You look like you brushed your hair this morning." Kang comments, teacup resting on his upper lip to hide a smile. "Congratulations."

"Well I fucking didn't." Comes a smug reply as he pulls out the chair across from his friend and throws himself onto it.

Kang doesn't laugh much, but it almost looks like he might for a second there "So, I'm assuming we have plans tonight?"

"Hell yeah dude!" Bast leans forward, managing to slam his elbow into the corner in his haste. "Aw FUCK. OW." He rubs the wounded area, smacking the offending table as hard as he could -

which only ends in his knuckles throbbing alongside his arm. "SHIT."

Kang laughs and it's soft and sweet and and Bast collects the sound.

For later blackmail of course.

"Alright so here's how it's gonna go-"

Miserable as it might make him, Bast wouldn't trade his life for anybody's. He's certain of that.