A/N: Diversity Writing Challenge, A85 - write a fic that does not use up to three consonants (j, q, x)
The Building Blocks Challenge, drabble collection, complex word prompt #176 – self-preservation (2 pts).
Enjoy!
Pebbles Paint the Path
Momo XIII: When She Turned
When She Turned Nine
When Momo turned nine, Midori had reached her menarche and was whisked away. They wouldn't know the results until they themselves entered the training rooms. A new Midori greeted them, this one dark and cynical and who seemed to take delight in prodding poor Pinku.
It was no surprise to find Pinku gaining more and more reprimands because she was skipping meal times. But meal times were their free times. They couldn't be properly punished for starving themselves, if they chose to. And Momo would be sure to sneak some of her own meal to her when she dared.
The white coats were stricter with taking food back to their zones. At least the Momo and Pinku zones were close by. Aka's was on the other side but she refused to have a part in it. 'If she starves herself, that's her problem,' she said, somewhat coldly. Momo had known her long enough to know that was simply her way of hiding her own fear and anger.
Momo was sure Aka was going to do something about the new Midori. It wasn't allowed, and it wouldn't affect their chances until the affinity matchings had passed, but if Midori had passed hers, it would help that one of those coming below her had been eliminated, she supposed.
She doubted that was all Aka was thinking. She also doubted she could do something like that, and she hoped Aka could not as well.
But she could. And did. And Momo was left with a shell-shocked Pinku who would now not even eat what Momo brought her, and Murasaki.
Murasaki, at least, had been a bearable replacement. She'd learnt. She'd sobered up in the year she'd sat with them. She'd become one of the group.
And then, suddenly, only she and Momo were left of the group, waiting for the time when, somewhere in the coming few years, they'd reach their own menarches and be whisked away like Midori. And maybe they'd see Midori again, because who know what they'd done to Aka, who knew what Aka had done to the new Midori, who knew how much longer Pinku would survive when she went through classes like a ghost and couldn't even be force-fed.
And then, one day, it was a new Pinku, bleak but not as blink as her predecessor. The old Pinku had gone without a word, without a trace. 'Maybe she's in a better place,' said Murasaki. She still clung to some of her idealism, and Momo only wished now she knew where it had come from.
The time to their menarche had never looked so bleak, and when she was seven she'd learnt how bleak the world beyond that was.
There was a new Aka and Midori as well, of course, but for Momo and Murasaki, it was only the two of them. They didn't want new friends, so close to the time they'd part ways. Or people like the Midori in between who'd destroy them.