Hourglass by Lamb of God

Rapture of the dying age, a shattered hourglass

Wrath of the warring gods and so this too shall pass.

Pre-Reapings Part Four

Caprice Neviere, 16, District Four

It's always a mystery what time I get up in the morning. I wish I could know by the sound of the birds or the position of the sun. I'm sure someone could teach me, if there was anyone here. But there's not. There is just me, like every morning for such a long time now.

I sigh and kick the covers off of the bed. As soon as my feet hit the carpet I have already decided that today is going to be the day.

You say that every morning, I think to myself. You never go.

I roll my eyes at myself and go to the drawers at the front of the room. I look in the top drawer and sigh. I really have to do laundry soon, but it's such a hassle. The few times I have done it I was not even sure I was doing it right. We always had servants for that, but now it's just me. At least no one is here to tell me I'm doing it wrong. Only the chaffing of the stiff fabric against my skin can tell me that.

I kick my discarded clothes into one corner of the room, deciding to deal with it later in the week. Maybe when I am not so tired.

But you can't be tired, I remind myself. You're going into town today, remember?

I sigh and begin the trip down the main stairs. It's true that I will probably not be going into town today. In fact, I will probably not be going into town at any point in the near future. It's not that I am scared, because of course I am not scared of anything. It's just that, well I'm not sure what it is actually that is stopping me.

It has been so long now since I have seen anybody except the occasional passerby. I haven't left the house since I returned to it a couple weeks after the war was declared over. By then it was nothing but a bunch of empty, extravagant walls with too many security features for the rebels to get through if they could have even found the place. My parents had this house built on the outskirts of town for the reason of privacy and I'm sure that no one besides our few lonely neighbours even know that this place exists.

I become aware of my hunger as soon as my eyes catch sight of the kitchen. I have had no reason to be hungry for most of my life. The closest thing to starving that I have ever been was the months I lived in the family boat dock. There was plenty of food stored there, but I guess it was never meant to be anything more than an afternoon getaway spot.

I draw open the pantry and walk inside. The walls get more bare everyday that I am here taking from them, but I still have enough of most of my favourite foods to last a while before I will have to break into the reservoirs of my father's dried fruit obsessions or my mother's sweet teas. I have never been fond of either, but living how I did has humbled me. I cannot imagine wanting more than I have right now in this house.

Sometimes I think ill of my parents, who fled to who-knows-where before I returned from hiding. After all they did leave me, their only daughter, to live alone in this house wondering if there will ever be a time that they come back. Often, though, I thank them. I was always a bit of an isolated girl. I have found comfort in the peace and silence that I can synthesize in my own mind since before I can remember. Now I am able to live in it. What do I have to scorn my parents for? They gave me what I had wished for for a while.

It's early in the morning and I wonder what I will busy myself doing today. I would love to go venture into the garden, but I fear that my presence would become far too known. I believe that it is best for me to live in animosity, at least for now.

I throw a handful of cashews into my mouth and sit down at the dining table. I remember the time when I would be chastised as a child for making a mess in the kitchen. Well, at least there is no hope of that happening, probably ever again. I'm not sure if I am pleased with the fact that I am probably going to be alone forever or if maybe I have just gotten used to the idea.

I seal up the bag and push it into the middle of the table, suddenly not quite so hungry. It is strange to think that at sixteen I am already all alone. I mean, I figured that I would be after my parents died. Back then I thought I could never love anyone as much as I loved my parents.

Such a long time alone has changed my perceptions of them. What I thought was love and peace in my house with my family was really just a love for the quiet, easy lifestyle that I grew up with. I'm not even sure that I ever really loved them or if they ever really loved me. Can love be expressed just in a beautiful house and an easy life?

Flint Calloway, 14, District Twelve

"Flint is that you?"

I cringe when I hear my mother's voice calling me from the kitchen. It's not that I didn't want her to notice I was gone. I left her a note in my room telling her that I was going into town, just in case she went looking for me and started to panic again. I just hoped she would read the note, not catch me at the door.

For a moment I consider the odds of making it back up to my room without her knowing that I was here. Those chances drop to zero as soon as I see her pop her head out the door and look right at me. I drop my hand from the doorknob and sigh.

"Flint? Again?"

I shrug and do my best to put a smile on my face. It feels too awkward, so I let it drop from my lips a second later. "I'm just going into town for a bit. I left you a note."

"I told you to tell me," she sighs. "I'm right in there, Flint. It can't be that difficult."

"Sorry mom," I hang my head to avoid looking at her. I know that I should tell her when I'm leaving, but it's way too often more trouble than it's worth to her. She gets worked up and worried about the things that could happen, having listened to far too many gossiped stories from her friends. It takes me an hour minimum to get permission out of her. It's way easier just to go and suffer the consequences when I get home.

"You just have to ask me, Flint," she shakes her head and I can see tears filling her eyes. "It's not that hard. It really isn't."

"It is. You never let me when I ask." As soon as the words come off my lips I wish again that I had run back upstairs before she saw me. Her lips part open and she runs her hands down her apron. I want more than anything to have said nothing at all, but it's already happened so I stand firm by it. After all it is true.

"You would never know you don't ask," she says finally.

"Can I go into town?"

She looks at me sideways and I know that was probably the wrong thing to say. But it happened and there is no taking the words back. It's been three days since I left the house last. It's getting ridiculous. I know she is worries about what might happen, but meanwhile I am going crazy in this house. Town can't be any more dangerous than keeping me in here so long that I want to run away for good.

"One hour," she says sternly after a moment. "One hour and that is all. Do you hear me?"

This time it doesn't feel quite so awkward to smile. "Yes, thank you! I'll be back in an hour."

"You better stand by that, Flint." She sends a couple more warnings after me but I am already halfway down the path that leads from our house to the main road. I know she will be counting down the minutes until I am supposed to return, but for now at least I can get a change of scenery.

It's been months now since the last bomb fell, and District Twelve is still rebuilding. We were one of the worst districts hit, or so I have heard a lot of the older townspeople say. I wouldn't believe it if they said we were well off in the Rebellion, in fact. There wasn't more than a week during that time where I would sleep in my own room every night. Bombs and army parades made for many nights of uneasy sleeping in community bomb shelters.

I pass by a vacant lot that is about halfway between my home and the center of town. It didn't used to be so empty. In fact, my best friend practically since we were both born used to live here once upon a time. That time ended three months into the war, when District Twelve experienced the worst bombing we've ever had to get through. Normally the jets targeted city centers and busy areas, but this night they hit everything. Even a small ranch house with one door that would never close quite right.

The day my parents told me about Ember and her family, well, I think I can say with conviction that it was the worst day of my life. Before that it was always big, general areas that were hit. People that I had never met that were killed. It was terrifying, sure, thinking that my family might be next but I never believed we would be. As soon as I heard that Ember, my best friend, was gone I just couldn't look at anything the same way again.

If someone like Ember could be killed in such a terrible way, where the people that took her life didn't even care who she was, then how can anyone say that this world is good? I can't, I know that. If this place was just, it would have been me that died that night not Ember. I almost feel guilty that it wasn't.

I shake my head and force myself to walk past the dead plot of land. It doesn't do anyone much good to dwell on these things even if it is impossible not to sometimes. I have spent so long thinking about Ember, I still do actually. But none of that is going to bring her back here to District Twelve. It's just going to rot my brain until I can let go, which I expect will probably be no time soon.

Carina Ricter, 14, District Eight

I see the lantern walk through the darkness and my eyes glue themselves to the dim light. As the light gets closer, it suddenly disappears and I smile despite the fact that no one can see me. That means the coast is clear and it's finally time.

I jump down from the low branch that I have been perched on since just after sunset. My legs lock just before I hit the ground, causing vibrations through my body as I take on the impact. I jog silently closer to the house, being careful to avoid all of the lights that I spotted during my time in the tree. I'm not about to get caught for something so trivial.

I take out the mini screwdriver that I always keep in my side pocket and get to work unscrewing the bolts on the window. The same routine over and over again, making sure that I keep my small frame tight to the side of the house so that I will be hidden from anyone passing by. I'm not an amateur, I know what I am doing here. Get in, get out, fifteen minutes. Anymore and the risk for someone getting up for a glass of water in the night gets far too high. Any less and I'm not being careful enough.

It takes a couple minutes longer than usual to get the window free, but it comes off easily as soon as I have. Since people started to install these new 'efficient' windows it was almost laughable to get inside. It's hard to feel bad about what you're doing when they make it so easy. I slip inside, feeling around carefully with the tip of my shoe to see if there is anything underneath me.

Just as I begin to come to the conclusion that I'll have to just jump down, the tip of my shoe knocks against something hard. I have to stop myself from letting out a sigh of relief. That would have been very bad if I had jumped down. Cormac, er Dad, would have never let me live that one down. The last time I did that was two years ago and I had to jump right back up the window and run as fast as I could before someone could wake up. He still brings that up from time to time and it takes a lot to laugh off my lost pride. It was definitely not one of my proudest moments.

I slide myself into the room, both my feet landing solidly on the table under me. I slip the window back over the hole in the wall just in case a night walker takes a closer look as they pass by. Once I'm inside I take a quick look around.

Yep I can't see much.

Despite the fact that my eyes have spent almost an hour in that three adjusting to the darkness of the night, I am only able to make out the vague shapes of furniture. I blink rapidly, hoping to speed up the process so I can get to work. After a few seconds I feel about as ready as I'm going to be and I begin tiptoeing across the floor.

I am definitely in some kind of living room, which is nothing new. The best entrances are into either dining rooms or basements, and thankfully this house has a basement. Only the richest people have a finished basement area, which makes that tiny ounce of guilt disappear from my stomach. They can afford to lose what they're about to, probably more actually.

I've been groomed to thieving since I was a toddler. It's the family business after all. Cormac started just before the age of ten, and he was all alone. I still can't imagine how scary that must have been. Even the petty thieving he tells me he took part in for the first year and a half. At least I have always had Cormac, Dad I remind myself, to mentor me. I've learned a lot faster than he probably did, and with a lot less hard lessons.

Up until the beginning of the war, Cormac helped me work my way up from being the lookout all the way up to where I am now going into houses myself. The war presented a rather interesting, and much more profitable, opportunity for people like us. People that have been given the short end of the stick in life and chose to do something to even the odds. One of Cormac's long time friends recommended him to the main guy in charge of the thing, and he found us. Just that fact alone made Cormac both respect him and fear him. We were not easy people to find on any given day by simply asking around.

Both of us were taken in as Runners, in charge of running information between rebel groups when it was too dangerous for ordinary soldiers to do it. It was terrifying at first, then exhilarating a couple days later. For the first time I had more family than just Cormac. There were dozens of Runners, all of them moving around and living in groups. I made friends my own age, Darlene and Jarried, and meeting them was like meeting another version of myself. They had grown up with similar values and experiences. The hardest thing I have ever done was leave them when the war ended and there was no longer a need for Runners. I have yet to see them since and I'm certain the only place I would ever reunite with them is jail.

The life of a thief is a lonely one, that's what Cormac always told me growing up. It has broken me away from most of District Eight and detached me from everyone including my dad. It's hard to distinguish between the times when he is being a father and when he is being an accomplice. Usually it's a mix of both.

I've always had the opportunity to leave him. He has no desire to keep me anywhere I don't want to be and has told me that if I wish to leave that I am welcome to. A few times the thought has even crossed my mind. But if I left I would serve no purpose. This is the only thing I have ever been taught to do. I've never gone to school nor had friends other than my time as a Runner. I wouldn't know how to survive out there. I know I would never leave, this is my life and has been since I was born. There is nothing that can change that- I am a thief through and through just like my father.

Song: Hourglass by Lamb of God.

A/N: I told you I would update by Friday, so here I am updating on Friday! Next week should be a weird update day again. Oh the joys of midterms. Anyways, we are now halfway through the tributes so that is very exciting!

What do you think of these three tributes?

Who are your overall favourites out of the twelve you've seen?

Hopefully should be updating around the same time next week or possibly a day earlier depending on how much work I have to do. So yeah, see you all then I guess.