AN: Hello! Or, welcome back!
I can't believe we're already at Chapter Seven of 'Certain Death!' Even so, I am thinking of changing the title of my story to 'Certain Doom', since that sounds more Invader Zim-like. –GIR sings the doom song-
Lol poor GIR. He's only been in this story for one sentence in Chapter Two. ;~; I would write about the little guy some more (he's my second favorite character, after all), but he isn't really casted as anyone. .;
ANYWAY, back on topic. Here are the review replies…OF DOOM!
Monochrome Masquerade: I'm so very glad you aren't loosing interest anytime soon. :-D LOL, you'll find out more about the slave girl in this chapter.
YaoiGirly: Again, you'll find out more about her in this chapter. ;D I'm trying to make my chapters longer, but right now I'm just sticking to them being as long as they have to be.
Nel: GIRL GIRL YUS. MUST I REPEAT MYSELF. Lol jk. The actual games will start in about four chapters. I wish it could be sooner, but I still have a chunk of story to cover. Hang on, though…it will come…it will also be the most fun to write, so I'm looking forward to it, too.
I'm so glad you are taking an interest in dear old Slave Girl! –Slave Girl waves hi- And you might be confused once you find out who it is. Well, don't be. It will be explained later in the chapter.
Enjoy!
I woke up, panting. My scythe was drooping in front of my face and sweat was dripping off of my face and my arms.
I took a few deep breaths. But I knew it wouldn't calm me down. I mean, how could I calm down, now?
How could I possibly calm down when I had just figured out who that odd girl was?
I had a dream…well, sort of. It was more of a flashback that popped up in my head as I was sleeping. Everything that happened in my dream was real. I shut my eyes, and the images came flashing back to me.
"Hey, Tak!" I called. I ran up to her. We were still both fairly well sized. Not skinny, but not fat. This was only about a year before the whole climate change and ll that other stuff, so we hadn't started starving just yet.
"Dib!" Tak called, running up to me. She had a wild look in her eyes. I cocked my head in confusion.
"What's wrong?" I asked.
"It's the…the…" she paused and twitched, her body stiff as stone. It was then that I realized that she was bleeding. And I didn't have to ask who it was.
The police were here.
I acted quickly, pushing Tak behind some bushes before settling in with her. Tak was still shivering like a Chihuahua, so I held her close, squinting my eyes as I looked to find the police.
Instead, all I found was a girl with odd purple hair held back by a headband. It was…Zita…?
"Tak! Come out, Tak!" she was yelling. I wondered for a moment why she was calling for my Tak…I looked over at her and tightened my grip on her, being unusually possessive of the female Irken.
And that's when the girl spotted me.
"Dib!" she cried, relief dripping from her voice. She ran to me, and took my arms, causing me to let go of Tak. She dragged me out of the bush, and I let out a startled yelp.
"Oh, Dib…thank goodness you're here! The police are after me…you'll help me? Right?"
It was sort of ironic that right after she said this, the police began to race towards us. I would've run back to my bush and hidden, but they had already seen me. If I ran away they would suspect something. So I did the next best thing.
I ripped my arms out of her grip and gripped her wrists. I locked them behind her back, and I put on my best angry face.
"I found this girl, officers. I'm guessing she's the one you're looking for?"
The police nodded at me. "Good job, young man," they complimented me. I held Zita's arms in place as they linked her wrists with handcuffs. Then I shoved her over to the authorities.
Zita gave me a shocked look, which quickly evolved into a betrayed look…then a look of pure hatred. She began to struggle in the cop's grip, and cried out, "But Dib poaches! Poaches! Why else would he be here? Trust me, I know! He sells our family rabbits!"
I froze.
"Don't you dare lie to us."
And with that, they took her away. And as I recall, I remember one of the cops saying:
"Should we make her one of the Capitol's slaves?"
I was snapped back in the real world by the sound of chattering in the direction of the dining room.
"Where's Dib?"
"Ah, Dib-filth is always imperfect at everything. You shouldn't expect him to get here on time."
Damn. I was late for a meal. Again. But before I walked in, I wondered…how could Zita be this slave girl and be in the Games at the same time? But it was just then that I realized…I had thought the girl who was in the Games had their hair color dyed purple. But now that I think of it…it was a dark midnight black. I blinked, satisfied with my resolution, and walked to breakfast.
I sat down next to Zim, much to my own surprise. There were many other seats I could take now, but I chose Zim. Maybe it was just habit that I sit by him now.
"Good morning, Dibbeh!" Zim greeted. I just shot him a glare and started to eat my cinnamon toast.
That's when I noticed Zita watching me intently from the dark corner in the right. She raised her eyebrows in question, and I could tell she was asking: Do you like it? I nodded, and she almost smiled.
"Alright, team." Dwicky says, catching my attention. "Today begins our training. Would you like to train together or separately?"
Just as I'm about to suggest we train separately, Zim butts in and demands that we are being coached together. He flashed me a grin. I returned the gesture with a pout. He just laughed silently.
Dwicky writes something down, then continues, "Now, what are your talents that you will be showing to the Game Makers in three days?" Dwicky asked us, tapping his pencil on his bearded chin.
"I can make stuff...like…muffins…" Zim shrugged indifferently and looked at the floor. He knew that wouldn't earn him points.
"I can work with a rifle. Though I'm not very good with it…" I mumbled.
"LIES! The Dib-worm speaks LIES! YOU LIAR!"
I looked at him in shock before he continued.
"Dib is phenomenal with a rifle, Dwicky. He could shoot anything…everything," he stated. "Don't believe him when he says he is not good. Like I said, he is not perfect at anything…except for handling a weapon."
I was totally stunned at this that I couldn't help but open my mouth and yell something back.
"No! Compared to Zim, I'm useless!" I interjected. "Zim can work with anything. He can decode anything, he can set countless traps…not to mention he can go a long time without water." I said. Technically, Irkens couldn't have water at all. If Zim drank it, it would burn his insides.
"Dib." Zim said, his voice suddenly calm. "Even my own computer knows you will survive. I put a piece of your hair in the DNA tester in my lab, and it studied you. It said that it wouldn't be surprised if you won the Games, due to your abilities and body structure. As for me, when I put in one of my DNA samples, all it could do is criticize me and guess how long I would be out there surviving. His highest guess was only forty eight hours."
Dwicky was now completely lost in this conversation, so he just leaned back in his chair, waiting for them to finish their squabble. And all Zita could do was nibble on the stubs of her nails, thinking about how much this reminded her of the old days when they were kids.
"But Zim, you know that if it wasn't for a certain extraterrestrial, I wouldn't even be standing here alive today!" I retorted, reminding him of the day when he threw me the bread.
Zim just sighed and ran a three-fingers hand through his wig. "Dib, you will hve thousands of sponsors. You have no freaking clue about what kind of effect you have on others."
After that, we were kind of quiet.
Taking this as a sign that their argument was over, Dwicky clasped his hands together and grinned. "Okay…word of advice for you both. Don't go off showing off your abilities to the other tributes. Save that for the Game Makers. In fact…you would do best if you didn't show off at all in front of the tributes."
I nodded, but Zim crossed his arms in frustration. It was second nature for him to show off.
"Also…stay together."
With that remark, Zim and I exchanged glances.
An hour later, all of the tributes gathered together. Time for training….whatever.
Zim and I stuck together as Dwicky told us to do, so we took turns choosing which booths to do. I chose knot-tying, much to Zim's dismay, but at least I learned how to create a trap there. To Zim, this was just all recap.
On Zim's turn, we went to the camouflage station. I huffed in amusement as he giggled and slathered himself with substances and all that crap which I didn't bother to do.
This all lasted about three days. We always took turns choosing stations, and Zim always had fun with it, not being serious at all. Even at the battle station he laughed and cursed at the dummies as he stabbed them in their leather chests.
But every single day, when Zim was too busy laughing at having fun, I couldn't help but notice that we were being tailed.
That girl who I mistaked for Zita was following us. Only she had changed her hairstyle, to my relief. It was now flowing down to her shoulders, her left eye covered in a dark curtain of hair. She reminded me of Gaz a little bit…I mean, even to the point that every time I looked at her, she scowled at me. I later found out that her name was Kennedy.
It was now the last day of our training. And it was time for the Game Makers to evaluate us. I sat in my seat, kicking my legs, nervous as heck. Zim was just laughing and joking, but I knew that deep down, he was just as scared as I was.
Much to my dismay, I had to be the one called first. I walked in and scanned for a rifle…ah! There it was!
I picked it up and walked to the Game Makers. I began to shoot random targets, but I wasn't hearing any mumbles or pens writing against paper. Confused, I looked up.
The Game Makers weren't even watching me! What the heck? They were too busy with their stupid freaking dinner! Ugh!
I was so angry…the anger boiled up until it was burning in my throat. The anger controlled me as my arms raised up and I shot a dumpling right out of a guy's hand. The guy wasn't hurt, but he was in definite shock.
As soon as I had done it, I knew that I was going to pay for this one. But all I did was say a mere, "Thank you for your cooperation," and walk out, feeling like an idiot.
