This chapter is made because of all of y'all who reviewed. I'm rarely encouraged to write anything anymore, so really, that's why people with more reviews tend to write even more, it's just this positive feedback loop that no one wants to admit, haha.

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TheAmethystRiddle – Was I mistaken, or are you really having a Holes play? If you are that's so frekkin khool! I love people who get into my stories. It makes my day, haha. Was that too narcissistic of meh?

IceQueen11 – Thank yer. I'm glad you find it original. It's my favorite fanfiction word! :P

Violingirl101 – Thank-e youh. *takes cooke* yum yum. Cyber flavored, my favorite!! :D you know, I can't help but always wish a German or Chinese kid would review. But they never do...

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10

"I thought that girl's head was as empty as a flower pot…" mused Nick. He had chewed away on his third toothpick and had then thrown it onto the ground.

"What do you find appealing about a piece of wood?" I stared down at the group of chewed up toothpicks on the duty ground.

"I dunno… just a habit I guess. Helps me get over ma addiction to the cigarettesss." He hissed the last part lazily and then just walked off.

Thomas was far ahead of us at the process of digging holes as usual. But at that precise moment he was helping Lou dig hers.

He was helping her a lot these days, and willingly, too. It was sad.

Numba One was gone. We never heard anything from him. But we did hear that both of his foster parents are in jail. I guess they had been abusing his baby sister after all.

Marcus's sentence was finished and he went free a week ago. Last I heard he went to Mexico or some shit like that. It wouldn't be until years later that I'd get a weird letter in the mail from a woman named Marie. She said that Marcus had died and he had left me much of his inheritance, which was not really that much.

"Doesn't he have any children?"

"Yes",

Nick never talked about their absences, but I knew he was affected by them.

"It seems like ever'body's goin' away 'sept for me," he said.

His pregnant slut girlfriend gave birth to a boy. That's all she said in the letter. He never spoke much anymore, and never attempted to help us with the escape attempts either. Eventually we stopped doing them.

Lights Out

"I think I love her," Thomas said, looking up from his bed.

"Boy, we all love her. She's a bombshell."

"What? I thought it was only me."

"No. I'm pretty sure everyone here wants to back it up on Rita Hayworth."

There was an awkward silence.

"Umm… what?"

"She was in that movie… you know…" I stammered. Didn't anyone appreciate classic beauty anymore?

"Dude, I don't know no Rita Hayworth."

"Well that's a shame. She is such a lovely woman."

"Listen, I'm not talking about Rita ho-Worth, kay?" he said frustratingly.

What huge ginormous insect crawled up his colon?

"It's Haywor—"

"I'm talking about Lou."

Another awkward silence.

"Ew…"

"God. I shouldn't have told you."

He turned away from me and covered his face with the pillow.

"That's really gross dude."

He didn't reply.

I decided I had tormented him enough and made an attempt to be empathetic and serious.

Hah

"Since when?" I asked.

"Since she made that call to Numba-One's dad . No girl that age does that."

"That's because she's Satan. How many times do I have to tell you this??"

He turned to face me again and lifted the pillow from his face.

"Dude. Shut the hell up about her. All she's ever been is nice to you. She's nicer to you than she is to me, and I'm busting my ass to get her attention."

I laughed.

"You're a freak," I stated honestly.

Thomas's sunburned face raged even a brighter shade.

"Fuck off."

I laughed again.

He sighed.

"I mean, did you even look at her lately?"

I frowned.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"What ever," he said, and stayed silent the rest of the night.

"Flower. Wake up!"

"Nooo mommy don't leav—HOLY SHIT WHAT IS THAT SMELL?"

I opened my eyes to complete darkness. It only took a few seconds to realize that there was a sock stuffed up my left nostril.

OH MY GOD!!!

Thomas shifted in his cot.

"Seriously dude. Don't wake him up, for God's sake! He'll ruin everything!" Nick hissed to me.

I sat up and realized Nick was packing a bag.

I struggled to find words.

"Man are you--- you're—"

"I'm getting out of here," he said slyly and smiled in the darkness.

I panicked. "Well let's get Thomas! Just let me pack my shit it won't take—"

"NO!" he hissed and leapt to grab my shoulders.

"No," he said again, faltering.

"If he wakes up, he'll want to come too. That's gonna fuck all this up."

I just stared at him. He smelled like a dead goat. It was obvious he's been scheming and planning all week. He didn't even bother to clean himself.

"Dude you smell like shit," I held my breath.

"Look. I'm going. Me. Not you. I'm going alone. Kay?"

"But but...

why?"

He sighed, and looked in panic to his right as though he was expecting someone to arrive any minute and seize him red-handed.

"Okay, you remember all those times we tried to—"

"Jesus, stop talking so close to my face. You're not gonna kiss me with that stinky pinky breath, mister!"

He backed away, covering his mouth, breathing into it and smelling it.

"Yo that's gross. Don't do that."

"You're telling me," he said, wiping his nose with his sleeve.

His sleeve, in fact, was not orange, but green. He had left his uniform neatly on his pillow. It seemed Nick was extremely certain he was going to get away.

"Why are you leaving without us?" I asked as pitifully as I could.

He continued stuffing random things near his cot into the bag.

"You remember all those times we tried to escape? Together? The reason why all the plans went to shit was because there were too many of us trying to get out at one time. You understand? It's like when there's a fire in a huge building and all the people rush out in panic towards the door and get stuck there. And some people also get trampled."

He wiped his nose with his sleeve again.

" Well, kid we all kept trampling over each other to get out of this shithole when the best method was to get out of here discreetly. As non-big-dealio as possible. That way we'll all have our chance."

"Dude that was a horrible metaphor."

"Whatever. I can't stand this shit any more. I'm fucking nineteen and I'm still not out of a juvenile delinquent facility? Somethin' smells fishy to me, yessir!"

I took a deep breath and looked at Thomas. He was snoring. Good sign. Or not.

"So I guess you're gonna go find your pregnant slut girlfriend."

"Yeah. I'm gonna find my son, run away with ma lady, and raise that boy good."

"What if she doesn't want to run away?" I asked.

Nick snorted then laughed just loud enough to humiliate me.

"You kiddin, boy? Me and her, we planned this together. She drove all the way to Camp Greenlake and she's waitin 'for me 'bout six miles North."

He pulled the chord of his bad silently as he could to close it.

Then he stood up.

"So you're going now, huh?"

"Yeah. But you just gotta do me one favor. I'll owe ya."

"What?"

"Chase after me."

And he ran out of the tent.

Wow, what a surprise. I became the bait again.

As Nick ran for his life and I staggered behind, I heard a gunshot.

"You stop runnin' boy, or you'll lose a leg!"

"Oh shit oh shit!" I squealed, while attempting to pull my pajama pants up.

Nick was way ahead of me now, but I managed to hear what he called out,

"Let them catch you!"

"WHAT?" I screamed back. Nuh-uh. Oh noo he didn't!

"Let them catch you! Please!"

Another silence and then Nick had almost disappeared into the desert night.

I couldn't catch up.

"DAMN YOU, CHICKEN LEGS!"

I heard his last words as I tripped and fell into a hole, which hurt very very much.

"I'll owe ya!"

I looked down at my ankle, and although it was dark, I could tell it looked much differently than it usually did.

Oh yeah.

It's facing 180 degrees the other way.

Now I haven't told a lie since the beginning of this story and I'm not gonna tell another lie, no matter what.

But I saw my deformed foot.

And I fainted.

And I was out for an hour.

Actually the previous sentence was a lie. I'll never tell you how long I was out because it pains my soul to remember what fucking chicken shit I was.

The last thing I heard was,

"I got you now, fat boy!"

"Wow, Grandpa. You killed Flower. That's just great."

"He ain't dead. He's just gonna lose a leg."

I heard Lou gasp and then I was completely out.

I woke up to a scratching sound.

Well I wasn't in C-Tent that was for sure. But whatever I was laying on was just as bad as a C-tent cot that was for sure.

It was a sofa. It was the old sofa that belonged to the Walkers' old dead dog, Onion. By the smell of the couch that my body had been bathing in for the past how-long, I now knew why they called him Onion.

The scraping noise came from the corner of the room where Lou had her back to me, absent-mindedly scratching something on a desk.

"Was he caught?" I asked. My voice was hoarse.

Lou turned around with a start.

Her expression quickly turned calm.

"Took long enough. We was thinkin' you was in some coma or something," she said with her back turned to me again.

"How long?"

"Pretty darn."

There was a very awkward silence with me strapped to an onion couch and she having her back turned to me, still scratching.

"Why did your freak grandpa shoot at me?"

The turned around and looked embarrassed. Just slightly. She was still making an attempt to look indifferent. That was new. She never seemed the type to care what emotion she showed.

"That was me," she said. "I woke up and heard some noise and grabbed the gun first. Grandpa got up a few minutes later."

"You... shot at me?"

YOU SHOT AT ME?"

"We thought it was a robber. I mean, no boy was ever stupid enough to escape! I was surprised you managed to run a whole mile without gettin' yerself in a five-foot hole."

"I ran a mile?"

Lou smiled. Her teeth were blunt and white. Kinda pretty...

I mean they weren't!

They weren't! AHHH!!!!

I fainted again out of the mental stress.

...

Hey, I promised you the truth.

*ATTENTION S'IL VOUS PLAIT*

First there were five, now there are two. I am currently giving anyone reading this to create a new character that will pop up in the story. I am looking for a new tent member, but if you have another non-juvenile delinquent character then go for it! I always enjoyed characters that I made appearing in other people's fics, and I'm sure you will, too. At any point from here on, you are allowed to submit a character.

Girl characters are also allowed to be submitted! But I'll only choose one. Tell me their
names,
past lives,
attitudes,
disabilities/special abilities,
and what they look like.

Relationships to other characters are also permissible.

Ciao.