TWO
The newspaper headlines. Every day, more of them. They persisted, piling up in her head until she could think of nothing but the words and the gruesome pictures that were printed alongside them. They filled her thoughts daily, the mutilated bodies, the unexplainable circumstances.
It was as though there was a war being waged just below the surface of reality. She itched to understand. She wanted to stop just sitting around watching all of it happen and do something. What, she didn't know. The entire world felt wrong, off-balance. She didn't understand.
And when it wasn't the deaths or disappearances, it was the presidential campaign. God, she was sick of it. The suddenly bipartisan Western States were drawing the attention of the candidates, and now they wouldn't leave it alone. There was a political ad poster on every block, and flyers stuck to every streetlight.
There was something odd about all that, too. Something about the ferocity of the competition, the odd, almost secretive air that surrounded the campaigns, and the candidates themselves, something that sent chills down her spine. But what? What was it that was so odd? She was frustrated, jumpy. More than anything else, she wanted answers.
He had arrived. He wasn't quite sure how. His brain had learned to block anything that wasn't a necessity. He had received instructions and directions, and he had followed them, from there to here. His name was Sean now. Alias number 78.
In front of him was a large brick building. Kids lounged on the front steps, and an American flag waved on a pole in front. It didn't look like anything worth recording. But oh, it was. His eyes took in every detail of the building: the façade, the dirty windows, the trash that littered the lawn. He noted the faces of the people out front. And he noticed the two billboards, one on the north side and one on the south. Both with smiling faces and American flags, both promising the impossible.
He'd done that once. Promise what he could never fulfill. He wouldn't make that mistake again.
The face on one of the billboards looked eerily familiar. But then again, he knew many people. He was a Bookman, after all.
He shook off any unease and walked through the front doors.
She was late. Again. She ran into the school, skidding past the perpetual losers by the front doors, and ran down the main hallway, cursing traffic. Normally, she wouldn't have been so bugged at the thought of being late, but she had a test first period…a massive, potentially disastrous test that she had to be there for.
She reached the stairs and prepared to leap up them, but the crackling of the intercom stopped her in her tracks.
"Cassia Marston, please come to the office. Cassia Marston."
Why would she be called to the office? She racked her brains for things she could have done wrong. True, she had sluffed a few times…well, more than a few times, but it wasn't as though anyone cared about that.
Shuffling feet behind her and an arm casually thrown around her neck accompanied the overpowering smell of coffee.
"Sam," she said.
"Me!" he said back, bright as ever. "I heard the announcements! Are you in trouble? Why would you be in trouble?" He pulled her along, back the way she had come, to the main office. "Woah…look. He has RED HAIR. RED. Like a LION." Sam was pointing in the office, at an uncomfortable looking red headed teen standing by the desk.
"Lions aren't red, Sam," she sighed. "Are you high?"
"Not high! Just caffeinated! Three cups of espresso already!" He held up three fingers, rather unnecessarily, then started laughing hysterically.
She blushed under the bemused stare of the red haired kid.
"Gotta go!" Sam shouted, then dashed off.
The red haired kid was still staring.
"Sorry about him," she said. "He's…uh, like that. He drinks lots of coffee."
Becky, the front office secretary, leaned around the guy as she heard Cassia's voice.
"Cassia! There you are!" She turned to the guy. "This is her."
"What?" asked Cassia. She was sounding really intelligent today.
"This is Sean. He's new here. He has a lot of the same classes you do, so you'll be showing him around today, till he's got an idea of the system. That okay with you?"
"Yeah," she said. "That's fine, I guess." She turned to him. "Nice to meet you."
He smiled. "Nice to meet you, too."
Her smile was like the other girl's smile. She reminded him of her.
And the boy that had run up, smelling of coffee and smiling like nothing had ever gone wrong, he was like him. The wild hair, the coffee cup, the glint in his eye.
The memories were breaking through the barriers. He couldn't allow them to do that. He had to keep his head. He was here for a reason, and when that reason was fulfilled, he would leave. He had to remain disconnected.
He would remain disconnected.
Her smile….
They sat on the billboard platform, the girl and the man, in front of the massive smiling face of "Mark Evanston, 2012!" They were both slim, almost doll-like in their perfect beauty. They had skin like ash and dark, dark hair. The girl sat on the edge, seemingly unaware of the 30-foot drop to the ground below, swinging her legs and humming quietly to herself. The man lounged back against the billboard itself, eyes hidden by curls of dark hair, smoking a cigarette.
They had watched the red-haired man enter the building, and, minutes later, a brown-haired girl run in after him. And, though they couldn't have heard the conversation in the office, they seemed to know what had transpired regardless.
The girl giggled, high and ecstatic. The man smiled, took a slow draw from his cigarette, and exhaled.
"The final pawns step onto the chessboard," she said. "Now let the games begin."
A/N: So, do you like it? Do you hate it? Should I jump off of a building so that the vile creator of this horrific piece of crap is dead forever and can never do anything so horrific again? The only way I'll know is if you review.
Disclaimer: If I owned DGM, I would not be writing stories about it on fanfiction.