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After we had gotten away from the silly eyes of the Sagacious people I was chuckling at my stupidity. Since after all, it was just stupidity that had caused me to do that. I felt bad for disgracing my mother. Even after her threat to kill me, which it am sure she would have followed through with, had I stayed there. But Treasure was gone now, going to her new home in Astute, though I knew that she would have to go through the hardcore training and the challenges. I almost shiver at the thought of what is waiting for me at the Audacious capitol. I could only hope that it wasn't as bad at the elders told it to be. Somehow, I could tell from their faces it was worse, though. I noticed how the agents were beginning to back away from me. Then I notice that they were not backing away from me, but a very tall and scarred man that was walking towards me.
"Olivia Alex Hunter?" He asked me, his stare was penetrating.
I puffed out my chest conspicuously, and then cleared my throat importantly. "Yes?" I asked, he seemed to raise his eyebrows slightly at my response. There were a lot of eyebrows being raised at my snobbiness.
"Come." He growled.
I coughed lightly, and then followed him. A grim look on my face, I was alone now. My family was gone, but I was used to having no friends, there wasn't anything that surprised me there.
He led me silently to a group of people. There were only thirteen people standing in the group, fourteen including me. The man pushed me into the group and left without another word. We all just stood there without speaking. Then finally a girl broke the tension.
"You're a Sagacious?" She asked, I didn't have to look up to see that she was staring at me.
"Yeah, so what? Problem?" I snapped at her, I heard the whipping of air and could tell she was holding out her hand for me to shake. I clutched her hand with mine and smiled slightly. All natural Sagacious had enhanced sensed that allowed them to hear things very far away, which came in handy. It also allowed us to smell things with enhanced smell and our eyesight was much better. We could see way better in the dark, which would come in handy here. I rolled my eyes as I heard someone whisper that I wouldn't last a day.
"And you won't last another ten minutes; by the smell of your cheeks you've cried the most out of all the people here." I stared directly at her still shaking the girl's hand. I heard a quiet whipping noise near my ear and ducked out of the way as a boy swung out at me. I gave him a disapproving look and he purse his lips. But didn't make another move to try and hit me.
"I'm Miley, but you can call me Miles." The girl I had shaken hand with said confidently, we were going to be good friends. I could already tell.
"Prometheus, but Nine is fine." She gave me the, is that really your name look. "My mother had an unhealthy obsession with the Greek gods."
Miley nodded in understanding, very good friends. I whipped around as I heard the sound of the hover crafts, they traveled around the whole of the Audacious, but they also went over Astute. The Astute and Audacious both use it for transportation, but they didn't stop is Audacious in case they used it to transfer out of the wasteland. They stopped is Astute because they were known for their loyalty, if anyone dare try to leave they would be instantly killed on-site. Some Audacious have been killed before, I had heard it on the news.
Once I turned, everyone turned, knowing that I could hear almost a half mile with perfect clarity.
"Hover craft." I whispered.
Now I knew what we were going to do, we had to hop on. The hover crafts flew pretty low, but you had to be strong to jump up and catch the handle bars on the bottom. Once you had clung on you had to use them to get yourself to the cockpit, though they were unmanned and were only
My going through our land to get back to Astute. I looked around at the others faces I saw they were drawn with anticipation and fear. I stepped away from the group and motioned for Miley to follow, we had to get away from the crowd if we were to catch on without hitting someone else.
She followed without a word as the hover craft came into view, I realized that I was full of adrenaline and it would give me an edge when jumping up. Right as it passed over I focused on a bar and jumped as high as I could, it was going at least thirty miles an hour. I caught onto a bar, Miley was after me. We were the first ones into the cockpit and I sighed with relief. We hit our knuckles together right as a couple more people began to jump on, you could feel the craft lurching every time. The craft was about a quarter mile long and three-quarters that size wide. It was giant but the bars were only in one long strip and you had to time it perfectly to get on.
Once more people had got on I looked out the side of the cockpit, there were a few on the floor still chasing after the craft. They wouldn't get on, then I watched a small blonde girl fall off the bars, hitting the floor and not getting up. I shivered silently. Miley coughed for my attention as I turned around. I turned to see a tall male with a long nose, blonde hair, and very muscular build. He was a couple feet from me, staring at me.
"Hey, Sagacious, lucky you heard the hover, eh." There was a threat laced in his voice.
"Oh, yeah, I guess so. I really am amazing though." I shot him a devilish smile before heading over to Miley. She was snickering lightly at my response. "I could have been a comedian." I chuckled.
"Definitely, Nine." She looked smug as she said my name, they she elbowed me suggestive in the arm, starting another round of laughter. We were probably adrenaline happy, but it still felt good to laugh.
"Hey ladies!" An older man's voice screams over that chatter and coughs.
I looked up at the voice, a huge man was climbing into the pit. When I said huge, I meant huge, he was at least six feet and very muscular.
"My name's Logan, and I'm leader of Audacious. You little girls are gonna jump outta this plane, or you are going to die." He hollered at us. "Jump at the dark spot, now, which one of you pansies is going to go first."
I didn't want to go first, but I didn't want to die either. Fear was compelling me to actually jump out. I felt a rush of excitement and butterflies every time I thought of jumping. I know that wasn't right at all and I rolled my eyes at my silliness. But I found my arm had shot up within permission. I looked over at Miley, she was staring at me with confusion and looked really nervous.
"I-I will I guess." I stammered without taking my eyes of Miley. "We'll have to jump out anyways." I murmured under my breath to her. I was positive only she could hear.
"Alright then." Logan slapped me on the back, I winced slightly and I saw Miley shoot me a warning glance. I nodded slightly and headed forward. She was on my heels, I stared at her in surprise. I hadn't expected that she would follow me.
She was staring at me with expectant electric bright green eyes, her brown hair falling in her face. She brushed it away roughly and I felt a pang of jealousy I wished I had her looks.
I stared down at the ground below us, seeing the black patch as Logan had said down below us. I readied myself to jump, I felt Miley station herself behind me, probably to make sure that no one tried to push me.
Once we were over the dark patch I launched myself out. The wind in my hair was exhilarating. We had risen to fifty feet and it felt like forever as I fell. I actually had time to comprehend what I was shooting down at. It was water, that's why the fires light wasn't reflecting off it since every thing was now pitch black from the night falling. I drew my body in as close as I could into a pencil dive feet first. I was only inches away from the water before I took a deep breath. Landing in the water hurt quite a bit. I scooped my legs up into a spoon shape as to stop myself from going to down too far. Once I surfaced I turned to the craft.
"It's fine! You land in water!" I screamed mainly to Miley at the top of my lungs. I looked around me, my eyes struggling to see anything. I noticed some large rocks and began to swim towards them as not to get hit. I heard a girl's scream above and a large splash. I saw Miley's head show up and I waved at her to follow. I heard voices, calling me from the directions of the rocks.
"Over here New Audacious members!" The voices cried. I hurried over with a cough and begun to shiver at the freezing water. My mother hadn't told me anything about Audacious because Sagacious members were not to speak of them. But I hadn't expected this.
Once I reached the rock with Miley tight behind me, someone grabbed me with a strong hand and yanked me onto the rock.
"You'll need to jump in like a pencil, then swim into the rock, there is something underneath. But make sure you are at least seven feet below the water." A man's voice told me. His voice a velvety and I found myself lost in it. But I didn't have time. I took a deep breath and jumped in the water, swimming down a little more before opening my eyes. The water was fresh and not oily or dirty like I had expected, but it was still to dark to see a thing. I went towards the rock and expected to hit my head, only to find myself running out of breath.
I had to come up and I hadn't hit the rock yet, so I swam upwards, my lungs screaming for air.
Expect to hit my head and get knocked out I was highly surprised to see that I entered a cave instead of drowning. It was dark, but there were lanterns on the sides of the walls. I looked around, there was a sort of ten by ten expanse of water. Then, there was walls on everything except a corridor with a rope that helped you onto a slate of rock. It looked attached to the walls instead of floating. I stared at it for a couple of seconds, as this was one of the most curious things I had seen.
"The first diver!" I jumped out of my skin as a man's voice called at me. A scream escaped my lips and I clamps my hand over my lips, embarrassed. A man was emerging from the shadows with a truly happy smile on his lips. I felt a rush of cold water and looked below me. A dark shape was coming up, it was a human for sure and as the face arose I recognized Miley and smiled slightly. She coughed out water and I grabbed her shoulder, hauling her toward the man.
As we reached the water I grabbed the rope and Miley's hand, pull in her put with me I hit her back as to get some water up from her throat.
"Gave you a scare, eh?" He chuckled and I smiled lightly, just a tad.
"Just a bit." I chuckled freely, it felt good to laugh and it made me feel even better. He held out his hand for me to shake and I gripped it firmly.
"James, but most just call Jay."
"Prometheus, but Nine is better."
"Strange name you," he glanced at my clothes. "Sagacious..."
Then his eyes were alight with nothing other than hate. I cringed and realized that this would be the reaction of all the Audacious members. He turned away. "Should have known."
I turned away from him with a frown, then pushed past. I couldn't dwell on things that didn't matter, I had to focus on my goal of becoming an actual Audacious and not getting killed. Miley was followed with a quiet hmpf noise, I smiled slightly.
I looked ahead as people were beginning to stare at me with confusion and hate. More of the others were beginning to surface with coughs and welcomes from the man named Jay. There were many people in the corridor ad I looked around, looking for someone who wasn't giving me a hostile glare. There was no one and I stared at my feet after staring into to many gazes.
Then once all of us were at the surface the clan members began to move us forward down the corridor but we walked into a huge cavern. There was a pool if glowing bluish green water, it was crystal clear and light up the whole cavern. There were many people sitting on benches that were wrapped around the pool.
"This is the cavern." A voice called out, perfect name really since it was a huge cavern.
"Welcome, newcomers." A man's voice called. I recognized the voice of Logan. How had he got here before us went we had got under first?
"You're actual training begins now." He smiled slowly and I felt a shiver down my spine, this time it wasn't the icy water giving me the chills.
"That wasn't training?" A handsome boy called out, I hadn't seen him before but he seemed to have mos if the transfers revolving around him. He was obviously Cavalier by the was he was standing, chest out, head high and looking very superior. I stared at him with an unamused look and he caught my eye. He stared at me for a short while, his devious smile turning into a frown and I broke his gaze with a small blush.
He looked back at his friends and laughed with a gang of friends laughing along with him. I narrowed my eyes and huffed slightly. Miley had crossed her arms and was looking at the group if boys with eyes like mine.
"Oh, you think it's funny that you'll probably die. Usually the people who will die aren't this jolly about it, but I can understand that you could laugh. Until you're stone cold with a bullet in your head." Logan snarled at the boy. "I believe you are Pierce."
The boy nodded. "And I believe you are wasting my time, and time is money."
I rolled my eyes. "And you are wasting mine!"
Pierce winked at me with a grin and I clenched my teeth. We held gazes again, but even though he looked away first this time, I still found my neck and cheeks warm.
"As I was saying, let's begin. Orientation time." Logan's eyes scanned around the crowd to see if there were any objections. There were none. "You are all here to train then take part in the games, if you aren't here to do just that then you can line up for a shooting. And if you are, you will listen close. You shall go through all of your training, it is to get you physically capable but also mentally capable. You will have finals that are tests of everything you will learn here. If you pass those tests, and I mean if, then you will receive your power and enter the games. Your heart is what it will decided if you live in the games or die. There will be ten winners of the games, they will be accepted into the clan. The losers will obviously be dead. If you kill anyone before the games. You will be killed on sight... actually, to make it more interesting for me, you will be killed slowly. Any complaints, questions or testimonials?"
"When do we start?" I asked stepping forward after a long silence.
"When you learn how to raise your hand."
"Well then, I've already learned that, shouldn't we have started when I was... five then?"
I couple gasps broke the silence while Logan and I were staring each other down. Finally he looked away and I smirked smugly.
"Lets go, pansies." He growled with a husky tone and I followed with Pierce coming behind me. I felt a tap on my shoulder and narrowed my eyes.
As I turned my blonde hair fell in my eyes, I could see shock on Pierces face, he had probably seen my discolored eyes closer up and not noticed before. One of my eyes was blue, very electric light blue with green streaks through it, and the other was topazish gold. My eyes caused people to stare into my eyes for long periods of time, this was probably one of the most uncomfortable things I had to experience.
I looked down without a second thought, I hated it. People staring into my eyes.
"So... your... Um... hi. Names Pierce." He stammered, his eyes were still on mine, I could tell even though he wasn't looking at me.
"I heard when Logan was yelling at you." A smile played at my lips.
"Everyone thought that you blushing was stupid and lovey dovey, but I think it's nice."
I widened my eyes and went scarlet. I clenched my teeth and grunted with narrowed eyes.
"Very nice." He murmured, then his presence was gone.
I glanced up, Miley was glaring away him while he was laughing with his group of friends. He looked back at me quickly, seriousness on his face. Then he smiled and turned to his friends, I didn't even try to hear what they were talking about.
"Dick." I hissed to Miley.
She chuckled and elbowed me. "Who, me or him?"
I rolled my eyes at her for an answered and she purse her lips, obviously holding back laughter.
We walked through many caves and I was beginning to think they went on forever till we came to a highlighted room. It had many training courses and weapons and it was even bigger than the cavern.
"Lets get started." Logan smirked at our shocked expressions.