CHAPTER 5 - CIRCLES
Afflatus wished she could sink through the chair in the mentoring room. Heaviness lanced through her body, her metal limbs felt like concrete blocks. Speaking to Bliss right now was the last thing she wanted to do. It wasn't because Afflatus disliked her, quite the opposite. They'd built a tentative friendship over the years.
As much of a friendship as career victors and non-career victors were socially allowed. Still, Afflatus deeply cared for Bliss. She thought of herself as pathetic for how much the valued the casual friendship, because she craved Bliss' kindness.
Afflatus was adrift amongst her fellow D1 victors, she was oil in water.
It hadn't always been like this. She was prized growing up, during her training. Not for her beauty, though, because she had been allowed to be herself. That time was long gone.
Before Afflatus' Games, her best friend, Muse Frill, never left her side. She also got on well with the staff at the training centre, working hard and believing in everything they fed her. The victors gave her time and attention. When Muse won her games then became Afflatus' mentor, she thought she'd won the lottery. Life couldn't get better- until she won the Games- or so she'd thought.
The Games were fine, until they weren't. She gloriously sailed through every challenge, until she didn't.
After, Afflatus had woken with the most extreme Alterations anyone in the Capitol had ever seen; she'd been the most surgically altered victor in history.
The perfect pitch of her voice was just one of them. She also had complete facial reconstruction, surgeons re-shaping the bones like a marble sculpture, raising her cheekbones, thinning her jaw, shaving her nose. The Alterations to her exterior were no less dramatic. A breast and hip augmentation, complete redistribution of body fat, and a show-stopping face.
They smoothed her skin, plumped her lips. The space between her eye sockets had been slightly widened, giving her an ever-present headache. One of her eyes had been entirely replaced with one that could change colour.
Combined with the slightly curved tips of her ears, her appearance was transformed into something fae-like. Her formerly light brown frizzy hair now grew without pigment, platinum blonde, pin-straight and luscious. The procedures erased her ethnicity and replaced it with something that seemed to transcend.
But perhaps the most shocking Alternation was the replacement of her four limbs with prosthetics. Her own body extended down to her elbows and knees, then was replaced with gleaming, diamond encrusted, metal. She'd had a severe cerebrospinal infection during her games, and went into sepsis by the end. The prosthetics were just as functional as they were aesthetic. It was strange to touch things through metal hands, but the sense was intact.
Her transformation made the jaws drop of everyone she came across. They attention they sought, though, didn't stop at conversation. She'd been left to the wolves, other D1 victors unwilling to listen, unable to relate, unable to look at the girl they once knew, who had become a Capitol blow-up doll.
Even Muse was too distracted. She'd married a Capitolite after her Games, and never looked back.
Between Games, now, Afflatus spent most of her time in the Capitol as well, but barely saw Muse. She craved her friend's presence, but grew tired of begging for attention. She hated it from everyone else, but the one person she thought she could rely on kept letting her down. So Afflatus had stopped trying. Muse's absence left a whole in her chest, but she wouldn't dare acknowledge it. It made her hate herself.
The talk shows she was forced to host and the reality shows she was forced to participate in gave little distraction to the emptiness inside…
The guilt over how her tribute was treating Bliss' was eating her alive.
The longer she waited, though, the harder it would be. Afflatus got out of her seat and walked over to Bliss. She wouldn't make the girl come to the career monitors. It was normal for mentors to sit together when their tributes were aligned. They just had to log out of one station and into another. The other victors graciously moved a station to the side to make room for Afflatus.
Afflatus sat down next to the D7 victor. Her black curls tumbled over her shoulders, hiding her face. Afflatus greeted her. The words seemed to startle Bliss, the girl looking at her monitor with tunnel vision.
"Hey." Bliss said. She blinked sleep out of her eyes, or what Afflatus hoped was sleep. Sometimes the Capitol forced Bliss to up her dose of antipsychotics during the Hunger Games. It made the girl's mind move like sludge.
"It looks like they're doing okay." Bliss offered.
Lustre and Basal were roaming around the hellscape arena, doing little more than foraging. Lustre had given up on the hunt for the time being, resources scarce. They had to keep their supply up or they'd become weak with hunger.
"Yes, they've found enough food for the time being. It was smart of Basal to use his jacket to scoop the boiling water from the river. Perfectly safe to drink once it cooled down." Afflatus replied.
Bliss gave her a sad smile. "You're just trying to make me feel better."
Afflatus was, but that didn't mean Basal's break from madness to secure the water source wasn't valuable. She told Bliss as much.
"Lustre looked pissed he didn't figure it out- that the material was heat-resistant." Afflatus added.
Bliss cracked a real smile. Now that she was broken out of her stupor, she couldn't look at the screen for more than a couple moments. Afflatus tried to unravel what it was about.
If Bliss' anxiety got too bad, she started hallucinating. Terrible things- death, decomposition. Which is why the Capitol usually upped her meds. Afflatus didn't want to pry, but wanted to help in some way if she could. If Bliss was seeing things, maybe a different view would help.
Afflatus reached over to Bliss' monitoring station. The girl looked at her curiously, but let her fiddle with the control panel. After browsing a wormhole of settings screens, Afflatus changed Bliss' monitor to a black and white view of her tribute within in arena.
Bliss was taken aback, but look relieved at the same time. "Panem, I wish I knew how to do that years ago." She cleared her throat. "Thank you, Affy."
The nickname spread warmth through Afflatus' chest. She only allowed Bliss to call her that. Formerly, Muse and the other D1 victors did too, but after their coldness towards her, they'd had their 'Affy' passes revoked. It was reserved for Bliss, now.
"Did you hear what happened to the tributes who were formerly in hell?" Afflatus asked.
"No, but I assume they've gone to heaven?" Bliss asked.
"Yes." Afflatus confirmed.
"How did they actually switch arenas? Or did the arenas themselves change around them? This is confusing." Bliss said.
"I think the tributes swapped arenas via hovercraft. Their tracking implant released a chemical to knock them out first." Afflatus said. Being sought after had a perk- in the form of information.
"Thanks for telling me." Bliss said, genuinely.
"Of course." Afflatus said.
The Games were getting boring again, Afflatus feared. After the arenas switched, the tributes had wandered around for a few more days. There'd only been one kill, in the heaven arena. The gamemakers would surely switch things up soon.
A throbbing headache settled over the bridge of Afflatus' nose, as it often did around mid day, every day. One of the consequences of her 'beauty enhancement' from widening the space between her eyes. Her brain didn't quite know how to process the new spacing of the sockets, and competing signals from her real eye and implanted eye.
She usually tried to stay away from painkillers until at least the late-afternoon.
The pair sat in comfortable silence, watching their tributes share a meager meal. Bliss seemed more relaxed now that her screen was black and white.
Lustre began putting rocks on Basal's food tray, telling him they were nuts.
Basal broke a few teeth before deciding to swallow them whole.
Afflatus' stomach dropped. She'd only had coffee today, and it was threatening to come up. Her visions darkened. She excused herself to the bathroom before a memory could completely take over.
It was Prep Week, before Afflatus' games, year 41. Her mentor, Muse, had talked her ear off for half the night in preparation for meeting the other careers. Based on the Reaping footage, Afflatus decided it would be better not to assert herself right away, as there were powerful personalities in the career pack this year.
The D2 male tribute, Walan Kershaw was the most chaotic. One moment he was sucking up to the careers, complimenting their use of weapons, or personality, or physical characteristics. Then, he'd turn around to another career and disparage someone for the very things he complimented them for.
It was like a mean girl act, but Afflatus had seen better during her first years of high school. She clocked the behaviour immediately, and didn't engage with him. Quickly, she became the subject of most of his verbal assaults.
Walan broke from the career pack too, to taunt or draw other tributes into a false sense of security. He gave instructions at the edible plant station, but slipped in deadly poisonous cards into the 'safe' pile. The out-district tributes he spoke to seemed none-the-wiser.
Afflatus thought it was pointless. Careers were taught to fight with honour, not underhandedly take out weaker kids with manipulation. Walan grated on her nerves.
When she found a cockroach in her lunch salad, she didn't have to guess who the culprit was.
…
Basal was tired. Or, Basal thought, tired was too gentle of a word. The exhaustion seeped into his very being, the atoms and molecules holding his body together. He'd lost track of how many days it had been since he got more than an hour or two of sleep.
The odd career hallucination wanted him to stay awake and keep watch over him. That was fair enough, Basal thought. He had to keep his hallucinations happy.
The cavernous, red space around them bounced around approaching footsteps. Lustre perked up. Basal hoped it was the D6 girl, carrying what was left of the D6 boy, they'd vanished after the new hallucination arrived. He missed them.
Instead, the mousy career who'd cut the D6 boy in half strode around the corner. He was on the prowl, serrated sword extended, ready to use.
Basal growled, bounding to his feet. He wanted to see the look of fear and impending death in this boy's eyes. He wanted to kill him over and over again. Beside him, Lustre looked amused.
"What the fuck is this?" The mousy career said.
"My humble alliance." Lustre replied.
The other career scoffed.
"Really, Jet, do you have to be such a prick?"
"That's rich coming from you." Jet replied.
Anger flashed in Lustre's eyes.
"Go get him, Basal." Lustre commanded.
Basal didn't have to be told twice. He grabbed hot boulders from the ground, ignoring the pain in his hands. It wasn't burning, just deeply painful. He stood at full height, spit flying from the sneer on his mouth.
Jet's confidence faltered.
"You fucking piece of shit!" Basal roared at him.
Basal swung his massive arms. The career ducked out of the way, but the adrenaline made Basal limber. He kept his attention on the boy's torso. There was only so much the career could do against Basal's mass, speed, and fury.
Jet's sword penetrated Basal's arm. Basal barely felt it, swung with his other hand, and cracked the boy's skull open. The flesh seared as his bones separated.
Jet fell. A cannon boomed.
Lustre whistled. "Damn, Basal! You made that look too easy."
Basal barely heard the words, seething, standing over the body of the mutilated boy, sword through his forearm.
He looked towards Lustre dangerously.
"I meant that as a compliment, big guy." Lustre said to him, palms out, approaching him like a rabid dog.
The cavern started to shake.
Steaming magma began to flow towards them. Touching it would mean losing whatever body part came into contact.
Angry still shaking his body, Basal began to run in the other direction. Lustre followed.
The magma flowed from the main cavern they'd occupied the last few days, pushing them towards a tunnel. The tunnel descended into darkness, they'd avoided it thus far. Now, that wasn't an option.
The magma was hot on their tracks. Basal yelled for Lustre to hurry up. Lustre was trying to be sure of his footing, while Basal bounded forward. "There's no time!"
They blew through the entrance of the tunnel, running down the spiralling descent. The speed of the magma flow increased with the downward pitch of the floor.
Basal and Lustre emerged in a cavern filled with a dense fog.
"Don't lose me." Basal joked, as if his hallucination could lose track of him.
Lustre took it seriously, though. He held onto Basal's backpack.
The fog swallowed up the tunnel flowing with hot death. The magma didn't follow them into the cavern.
Ominous voices jarred Basal from all directions. He was used to it, though, and didn't let it distract him. Lustre, on the other hand, nearly hid behind Basal. His hallucinations didn't usually get scared, but it happened.
"We have to find a way out of here." Lustre commanded.
Basal crept forward, more careful with his footing now. The voices shrieked and pitched high and low. Still, it didn't bother him too much. He'd been through worse.
Something swooped low, shrieking.
Lustre flinched, and tripped, landing on his ass.
His eyes shot to Basal's. "Why aren't you scared?" He demanded.
"This is nothing." Basal replied. "Try being in my head."
Lustre mildly recoiled and seemed to regard Basal differently. His attention had thus far been shallow and callous, but there was a hint of something else in his gaze now- dread? Basal wasn't sure. It wouldn't do to wallow.
"Come on, let's go." Basal said. He offered a hand to help the boy stand. To Basal's surprise, the contact was warm. The tactile aspect of this hallucination unnerved him.
Lustre seemed unnerved as well, and grabbed onto Basal's backpack again.
The fog was so dense, it was difficult to breathe. Luckily, it wasn't too hot or cold, or their lungs would have exploded.
After what felt like hours of pawing at walls, Basal finally found another opening. The duo entered another tunnel, thankfully devoid of fog. Basal looked at his hands, the skin was raw and cracked. He whimpered.
"Hold up for a sec, bud." Lustre said.
Basal stopped.
Lustre shouldered off his bag and rummaged through it until he retrieved a small tube. He squeezed out a couple pea-sized dots of cream, and applied them to Basal's hands.
Immediate relief washed over Basal, the sensation so foreign it made him tremble.
"Is that better?" Lustre asked.
Basal nodded. His knees gave out, and he sunk to the ground.
"Are you real?" Basal shakily asked Lustre.
Lustre looked perplexed. "Yeah, buddy. I'm real."
Basal nodded. A new fear accompanied Lustre's presence. He could slaughter Basal at any moment. He hadn't yet, though, and Basal thought maybe he wanted to try to make it to the end together. That wouldn't be so bad.
"What district are you from?" Basal asked.
Lustre had the grace to wipe off whatever expression was forming on his face. "District 1." He answered, carefully.
"Hmm." Basal said.
Lustre cleared his throat. "We should keep going."
"Alright." Basal accepted Lustre's help up.