When the chimes drifted across the dawn air, she was not quite sure that she could trust her ears to believe it. But she had to: for there was the parachute slowly dropping down from the sky. For me, Velvet thought. It must be. It could not be otherwise, she was the only one in the area. And even if it wasn't for her, well, who could stop her from taking it?
No blood, no parachutes. That was what grandfather had said. Then why send one now? She wondered how he was doing; and more importantly, what had made him change his mind.
Had she been anyone else in her position, she would probably have exclaimed loudly and joyously and opened it in great haste, but Velvet wasn't anyone else, she was a Marble. The word surprise was not to be found in the Marble vocabulary (unless sandwiched between the words "to pose a" and "attack".)
Calmly and deliberately, she opened her gift.
Inside was neither weapons nor sustenance (though she had little need of the latter, being able to steal and scavenge with surprising proficiency) but flints, matches and fuel. Velvet could hear in her head as clearly as if they were standing next to her, her sponsors cry:
"We don't care how you build the fire, just build one, damn it!"
"This is not to kill my prey," she said aloud. "This is to ensnare it." Any tributes seeking a fight would make a beeline for it; and they would find her more than willing to engage in one. Smarter or more wary tributes might sense a trap and stay away, leaving her the idiots to pick off. Even the truly desperate might make their way over, pleading friendship in exchange for food- or a quick death.
She set to work straight away- there was no sense in delaying. This was the time to speed up her progress through the Games. Tomorrow would be the middle day of the week and after the next cannon, there would be only half of the tributes left.
The fire crackled angrily as it caught the dry wood and clung higher at the air. Velvet was sure it could be seen for miles. She concealed herself in a tree to provide a vantage point from which to observe any arrivals at the fire.
Bare hands. Nothing said ferocious like killing with only your hands. But just in case something went awry, she thought as her hands brushed the rough nail holding her wild hair up, there was always the nail.
Aden usually hated being alone. Hated the emptiness of the room, the silence, the absence of everything he was and could be when he was with his family. But in the arena, isolation could actually be ok... compared with the alternatives.
And of course, he wasn't really alone. The birds had returned not long after the rain had stopped. But he felt more alone than when he had had Jenny and Sable with him. How he missed them. How they might miss him. How they haunted him.
"I'm sorry," he would tell the birds. "I'm sorry I didn't protect you. I'm sorry I expected you to protect me. I'm sorry you'll never see your baby live and grow. I'm sorry your family can't see or hear you anymore. I'm sorry I failed. I'm sorry that sorry can't be enough."
They cooed and twittered gently, as if to say; "that's all we can ask from you now. We're sorry too. But you're forgiven. Forgiven because you're only human; and in a world of demons that doesn't feel quite enough."
He buried his head in his hands; and wondered if the emptiness was only hunger. He was hungry. Food supplies dwindled at a frightening speed, no matter how accustomed you were to skipping meals, they still ran through his fingers like the water of the stream. The more meagre the meals were, the more he wanted to eat.
The arena remained as enigmatic as ever. In silence he was uneasy, at the slightest noise, more so. The dark terrified him and the dawn filled him with dread, while the unending cycle of both exhausted him from fear.
Sometimes he was so lonely he wanted to run, run until he found people who might still be able to laugh or smile or walk rather than trudge. But every time he stood up, fear and caution pulled him back down again.
"A-den." He looked up. It was the jaymocks, the only perfect thing in the arena,with their piercingly white, thick plumage that layered softly like the petals of a rose, the scorched black just peeping from underneath their wings.
They were all perched on the branches of the trees above, in long, unusually uniform lines. The way they were all spaced exactly the same distance apart was freakishly unnatural, which prompted him to slowly stand up. They had flown before like free creatures, their wings applauding the sky as they soared. Now they stood regimented, as if to attention.
It began as a whisper, one tiny little hatchling whispering his name out as its first cry, chillingly beautiful. "Aaaaden. A-den. Aden." Then the bigger, stronger birds took up the song.
"Aden," they chorused. "Aden. Aden. Aden. Aden. Aden." The chorus became a chant; and the chant became louder, as one. One pitch, one volume, one tempo, one voice. "Aden. Aden. Aden. Aden."
Half of them then chimed as one: "Jenny. Jenny. Jenny. Jenny. Jenny. Jenny." Both names were chanted at once so that they overlapped in his head and deafened his sense. Then half of those chorusing Jenny changed to "Sable. Sable. Sable." Then half of them changed to "Mom. Dad. Mom. Dad. Mom. Dad." Then half of them again, to the unkindest cut of all: "Hunter. Hunter. Hunter. Hunter." The smallest and the fewest of the hatchlings were the criers of "Hunter. Hunter. Hunter." yet in Aden's heart, their song was the loudest. Jabberjays mimicked a loved one's screams of agony, but all the jay-mocks had to do was say the names of the dead, the murdered dead; and let the victim's imagination do the rest.
Aden couldn't move, he couldn't speak, he couldn't think. All he could feel was the noise ramming through his ears to roar through his head the voices shouting Aden Jenny Aden Sable Aden Mom Dad Aden Hunter Aden Aden Aden. And their faces, he saw their faces with each chant, blurring and morphing and fading and colliding and it was too much, too much. Their faces and their names pushed and pulled at him until he was dead to everything but the noise the noise that kept going and chanting louder and faster until he was sure he would go mad if it couldn't, if it wouldn't ever stop-
The silence happened so quickly he barely recognised it, the noise still ringing and churning through his head. The birds watched him as if it had never happened.
"Aden," cooed the smallest hatchling halfheartedly, before it was hushed by its neighbours.
He was shaking, his teeth chattering unnervingly like a death rattle and his head seemed to pitch and roll until he wasn't sure how much longer he could stay standing. Over. It's over. It ended. It could end.
The birds still had not lifted their gaze from him and stood like piles of snow clumped on the branches, still waiting.
Aden began to shift, inch by inch, further away from them. Don't move too quickly. Don't look away. Don't let them frighten you. Just words. They were just saying words. Words can't kill. Not unless the gamemakers had made walking book-mutts or something. He guffawed hysterically at that, though he had no idea why, it wasn't even funny.
Everything is funny when you're relieved, he thought, when you're safe now and the danger has passed on.
He jumped at the sight of the smallest bird titling her little head at him, they had been so still that the slightest movement seemed filled with energy. The two watched each other, locked in place. Aden wondered what would have to happen to break the strange trance the stare created.
"Aden." She whispered.
Then as one, as one pitch, tempo, volume, voice- they dived.
No sooner had he flung up his arms to protect his face did he feel their wings drum against him, their talons and feet burning streaks across his arms, his legs, his hands, his fingers. Engulfed in the searing white cloud he raced through the forest, but the slam of trees and branches did not deter his aggressors and they pulled and grabbed at him. He could feel their feet trying to wrench his arms away to snatch at his face. He felt the sting and release of his hair leaving his head. Don't take your arms down. Don't. Whatever the pain, keep your arms up. He wanted so badly to grab at his wounds and smother the pain and staunch the blood but only the thought of his eyes disappearing beneath taloned feet was enough to hold his face tight in his arms.
Through a slit he spotted the wavering light of a fire somewhere in the distance. The sudden brightness made his eyes water and close, but it was a relief too strange and beautiful to deny.
Only one thought remained. Burn them. Burn them all to hell.
The fire was coming closer, growing brighter and stronger. Yes. The bigger it grew the more his hope desperately and without sense or reason purged its way through him until with a scream he leaped through the fire and felt all weight leave him, all fear singe and blacken as the birds screamed as they roasted, he could hear them flapping their wings in an attempt to kill the fire, kill the pain. He knew without looking that that would only enrage the fire further until it swallowed and dissolved them all.
The smell of burnt flesh and blackening feathers was disgusting, but Aden breathed it all in in his relief. He could feel the stab and burn of fire at the back of his calf and he collapsed and rolled around until it was gone. Now that the adrenaline of the chase had gone, his wounds seemed to double in intensity. He lay back and breathed in slowly and o-
Hands were around his neck, long hands and tense with strength. He leapt up and flipped Velvet over, but she sprung up again with a kick, sending him staggering backwards. She aimed a punch at his solar plexus but he grabbed her arm and twisted it back, aiming one of his own at hers but she dodged and rolled her arm to twist it free.
He felt a flash of crippling pain as she stabbed the nail into one of the gashes the birds had left. Black spots shot through his vision but he gritted his teeth and ignored them, as well as the swelling pain that erupted as he ripped out the nail and flung it right back at her. Velvet ducked and dived under to close her hands around his throat again but he slammed his elbow onto her arm until she was forced to let go.
He spotted a pit behind her and before he knew what it was for he slammed his hands against her shoulders and she fell with a scream into the pit, her hat tumbling from her head to land at his feet.
He yelped in horror as the branches weaved around her in the pit's lethal embrace, but her breath came as measured and controlled and regular as the terrible birds and their cries. Her face was slick and luminous with fear, but she remained as calm and detached as she had been in their struggle.
And still, she was so still. Aden shuddered as he remembered how still the birds had been. How quickly peace could shatter.
He picked up her hat on a whim, holding it to steady himself, turning it over and over in his hands. For a few minutes it worked and he was able to collect the pieces of himself back together.
Until the gold-tipped mockingjay feather slipped out from the hatband; and through his nervous slippery fingers, to land on the branches of the pit.
Daisy stared at the nail pinched between her thumb and middle finger. The blood had dried now, coating the black metal in a fine layer, like rust. She turned it, end over end, watching as the blood drank the light, drank the life out of the air.
She remembered its colour, its rich, fascinating colour before it had dried. That hadn't been quite the same thing. She wished to see it, feel its warm caress again.
Daisy pressed the point of the nail into her left forearm, watched it sink, watched the flesh rise up in an even, sloping ridged circle around it. The symmetry of it was pretty. All of it was pretty,
She smiled at the sting and the warmth.
For a moment, there was nothing but for the catch of Velvet's breath, Aden's shrill moans of panic and four eyes wide with shock.
The branches tightened their grip on Velvet and she opened her mouth for what could only be her last words-
And then they didn't. Slowly, like they were leaning back down to rest, the branches lifted up to wave farewell. The thorns slowly rising out of her body leaving only tiny dots of blood from the puncture wounds to mark their ever being there. The branches stretched and turned and withdrew, sinking down into the ground, into the bottom of the pit and through the edges, turning and draining like the last dregs of water down a plug hole. All that was left was one deep pit, at the bottom of which Velvet sat cushioned on fine, crumbly black dirt, covered in sweat and small smears of blood from easily healable, tiny, puncture wounds. Aden breathed a sigh of relief. Killing other tributes was one thing, watching them get ripped apart in front of you by terrifying pit-plant-beast-thingies was something entirely different. He held out his hand to lift her out.
Her eyes flashed as she realised where she was, then immediately narrowed into aggressive suspicion. She grabbed his hand and pulled him down with a lurch into the pit with her before snapping around the spot and scrambling out. He had only a second to acknowledge the hoof of air being whacked out of his lungs before he lurched up and scrambled after her.
He grabbed her ankle just as she had reached the edge and in a split second realised his mistake as her foot collided hard with his head, knocking him back down again. He got to his feet again, more wearily this time.
But she did not attack from above, as he had feared, but kept running until the trees and the lip of the pit swallowed her from sight. He turned back and his mouth sagged like a corpse's when he discovered why she had run.
"Digging your grave, Eight?" Calion was either grinning or baring his teeth for a bite. "Bit big, wouldn't you say? Could fit twenty of you in there. But then again, you lower district people never have a sense of proportion."
He sighed in a world weary fashion. "I haven't killed for three hours. I'm so bored. You'll be fun to kill, won't you? I do hope so. Would be such a waste if you died too easily."
"you won't kill me." Aden's voice had more certainty than he could dream of. "I won't let you kill me."
"I don't intend for you to let me kill you." Calion's grin grew wider. Aden wished, ridiculously, that he had fewer teeth. "Not at first, anyway. I intend for you to struggle right up until you realise I've won. Then you'll let me kill you."
Aden remembered a time, as a child, when he had promised himself, promised his parents too, that he would never beg, that he would never be at the mercy of anyone but his own conscience. That time was for dreamers. That time was over.
"Please," he whispered. "Please, let me go. I have a wife. I have childr- I have a child, at home, watching everything I do. Hurting me hurts her too. She's too young to watch me die. Please. I have a family."
"Hi Eight's child!" Calion's voice was shrill with mocking glee. "Enjoy the show!"
"PLEASE!" Aden bellowed as he launched himself at Calion, but the boy winded him with a blow and knocked him on his back. Aden's muscles screamed and however hard he tried to struggle up again, his strength had tasted exhaustion and deserted him, leaving him limp on the floor of the pit.
"If you've ever wondered what your entrails taste like," Calion's voice was distorted, conversational. "Today is your lucky day."
"NO!" He screamed. His hand flew out to reach the syringe, the syringe of poison, the syringe Jenny died for, that could set him free-
"Going the coward's way out, eight?" Calion spat in his face. "I don't think so." He kicked the syringe and Aden's eyes closed slowly as it span out of reach. Calion bent to pick it up and sealed it into his pack, drawing out a long length of black coiled rope as he did so. Aden blinked. His head drummed. Was it a rope or a snake?
"You want to get out of this pit, don't you?" Calion kissed Aden's forehead tenderly; before discreetly wiping his mouth. Aden tilted his head an inch down to nod.
"You want to see the sun? Feel the wind and the leaves? Be calm and still again? I can give you all that, forever and ever."
Aden's eyes were swimming, everything he saw distorted and twisted in the tears, like the mirrors at a funhouse. Calion's face twisted and blurred and morphed into that of a grotesque, a monster. His own head was swimming too, swimming in the whispers of Aden, Jenny, Aden, Sable, Aden, Mom, Dad, Aden, Hunter, Aden, Jenny, Aden.
Make them stop. Shut them up. Give me silence. Please. Make them stop.
Somewhere in his field of vision he saw Calion's hands working the rope- the snake- the rope, turning it and twisting and knotting it. He hummed something as he did so; and it took a few seconds for Aden to recognise it as the national anthem.
Aden stared deep into Calion's laughing eyes as the boy leant down to caress Aden's neck with the rope. Calion gave him a peck on the cheek and sighed in satisfaction.
"you're not quite so cute up close, did you know that?" He said sadly. "Oh well. Can't be helped."
He pulled on the rope. Aden jerked, the rope tightened around his neck as Calion dragged him out of the pit, step by step.
Aden's hands slipped over the rope as he grappled with it, but the harder he struggled the tighter it felt. Was this was it was to hang?
"Struggling makes it worse," Calion chided him, but the moment Aden calmed he yanked the rope again, eliciting a choking gurgle from the other end. "Oops. I lied."
How can you do this? Aden tried to ask, but the rope was tightening again and air came thinner and shallower until the only air left was trapped in his mouth.
Calion swung the rope carelessly over the branch of a tree, still humming; and made sure Aden could see that it wasn't nearly high enough to be quick.
And then he seized the rope in both hands and began to heave. Still humming.
Aden felt a jerk pulling him off his feet and he went flying through the air, flying like the burning birds, the rope tugging and catching on the branch until he hung suspended, feet inches from the ground.
He kicked at nothing, desperately trying to brush the dirt, find footing, keep his feet on the ground until-
He stopped kicking, his efforts dying into twitches. He had no more words, but a few more scant thoughts.
There is no sun. The wind is flat. The leaves are gone. They have taken the peace and the calm, shattered them and scattered their pieces on the floor, to stamp into dust. Only stillness remains, that time leave for us, the stillness of despair and the stillness of death.
That is our gift, forever and ever.
Calion knotted the rope around the tree and slapped his hands together, admiring his handiwork. The cannon fired, signalling that half of the tributes had perished.
That was enough killing for the day. Time perhaps for a nap. The hanging corpse sadly offered little by way of shade, so he may as well clear off. Humming a different tune now, he left his latest victim still swinging slightly as he helped himself to a snack.
Behind him, the hovercraft lowered down a long metal arm with shears for fingers that closed around the rope, releasing the tribute. Aden flopped back into the pit and the claw reached down to scoop him out again. As he was lifted into the hovercraft, the sun peered around the corner of a cloud, catching on the red of his hair, turning it to gold.
13) Aden Hanran
*ducks down under a hail of hostile weaponry*
Yes. I did it. I went there. I killed a favourite. Really quite gruesomely. And it was terrible, considering he was the most morally dedicated and mentally stable character I ever written and probably more moral and sane than all of my OCs combined. It was nice to have the chance to write a character with such a strong moral compass, not so nice to kill them off. Pax tecum, red-headed Aden.
And then there were 12...