Author's Note:
Look.
I have a perfectly logical reason why I haven't updated in a long time. My sister was using my laptop for photoshop. Her laptop didn't have one. So I had to get off the computer and do something physically active. Like walking across the living room and parking my bottom on another couch and doing my homework there.
Also, just a note, I promised (pinky-swore) my friend (who made Zee) that there would be romance in this chapter. Yay!
... hate to break it to you, but because of writers' block and a hole in the plot, there would not be any romance, unfortunately. Also, before you say anything else, this might not be the best chapter I have written (again). I'm sorry, okay? Sheesh. Read ahead.
"Wow," Marlin says.
"It's... it's..." I say, unable to finish the sentence.
"Sunny," Zee finishes.
"Bright," Mercury agrees.
"Brilliant," Horus chimes in.
We are all in a trance, but I am looking at the flower.
"No, no. It's a flower."
Everyone looks down. They all collectively sigh.
"Yeah," Zee says. "It's pretty."
"It's stunning. It's beautiful."
"It's the most natural thing I have ever seen."
"It has come down to shower us with it's splendid powers of floral godliness."
Marlin said that. I stare at him incredously. He just shrugs and continues looking at the flower. It must have been comical to any normal pedestrians, if there were any in this wild, untamed beauty. We were a group of bloodied kids lying on top of each other staring at a flower as if we were the thirstiest person in the world looking at a glass of water. Marlin gets up first, pulling himself from the mess. He's in the back of the elevator and he picks his way gently in to the front. He trips on someon's limb but he eventually gets out. He steps over the daisy, and looked out to the forest over the fence. He starts running to the fence and presses his face into the fence. I can practically hear him inhale the fresh air.
Zee crawls out and stands. She offers her hand at me and I took it. She has a grin plastered on her face.
"Smells like home. Except for the lack of coal dust." Zee closes her eyes as if deep in meditation. Then, in snaps up open again. "Race you to the fence." And she's gone.
I chase her through the dusty clearing, laughing harder than I've ever did. It felt good to drown your sorrows in laughter. Zee reaches the fence first and is already helping Marlin climb over the fence. Marlin drops down the other side. Zee jumps down shortly. I hook myself on the rusty metal fence and pull myself up. I hear Mercury and Horus behind me. When I reach the top of the fence, I don't immidiately jump down. Instead, I look back at the ruins of District 13. The elevator is actually disguised as an old house. My eyes travel up and down the landscape. It has the same feeling of neglect and destruction as the last time I saw this place. Vegetation was growing on the walls of the buildings and rust and rain dominated the ghost town.
"When smoke fills the skies and chaos the ground,
Death shall come like a starving hound."
I look to my right and see Mercury hunched over and staring at the same landscape. I look at him, horrified at his choice of words. He sees me staring.
"It's an old wives' saying from New Brooklyn. My mom's full of them. It's about the destruction of District 13."
"Oh," I say, not knowing what to say. The abandoned town looks even more sinister. A cloud passes over the sun and it gives the impression that it is blanketed with fog, the day the bombs striked.
"Are you planning on staying up there all day?" Zee calls from the ground. Horus is already down. I turn and jump down ungracefully. Mercury thuds down behind me.
"Oh oh oh!" Marlin was jumping around in little circles around Mercury like he was an Indian pumped on caffiene. "What do we do next? That was so awesome, the way you beat those guards! Are we going to build a fire or something! I just saw a lady bug!"
Mercury hovers a finger in front of Marlin's nose and the kid went cross-eyed trying to look at it. Mercury then spins the finger in tight circles and Marlin's head follows the finger's every movement like a dog. It was hilarious. I try to swallow my fist in an attempt to kill the laughter but failed. Zee is clutching a stomach and Horus is grinning like a fool. Can't blame him, though, can't I?
Then, Mercury snaps his fingers. Marlin blinks. "Hey!" he protests. "Did you hypno- hipe- hyn- did do something to me?"
"No, little brother. And it's hypnotize. I was just messing with you. My sister back home falls for it all the time," Mercury chuckles.
Marlin genuinely looks hurt for a while and Mercury opens his mouth to apologize when Marlin says, "Like I said, what are we supposed to do now?"
Mercury looks amused now. "We walk."
"I spy with my little eyes, something green."
"A tree."
"Aww. How do you always get it right?"
"I spy with my little eyes, something red."
"Umm..."
Zee has walking beside Marlin for the last half an hour. We take turns playing 'I spy' with him because he needs an outlet for his hyperactivity. I shake my head and mouth, ten more minutes.
Zee rolls her eyes and says to Marlin, "It's your hair."
"Oh!"
We've been walking for practically hours, with Mercury in the lead. He looks like he knows what he's doing, but sometimes he pauses worryingly as if confused where to go. This is the stupidest thing I've ever done.
"Hey Mercury," I say.
"Hmm?"
"Can we stop now? I can't feel my legs."
"No. We have at least an hour until nightfall and I want to put as much distance between us and District 13 as we can."
I sigh. No point in arguing with him now. We walk for a bit until Zee suddenly appears next to me.
"Right. Your turn."
I walk up to Marlin and start playing. I let Marlin win.
"I spy with my little eyes," I say. "Something black and crawling." I make a point to stare directly at the bug.
"A cockroach!" Marlin says triumpantly. "That reminds me of the time me and Flyer found an old closet full of them and released them in class! That was so funny! Did you see the look on Ms. Lentil, Fly-"
Marlin suddenly stops walking. I stop too. "What?"
"Rooba! I forgot to tell Flyer we're leaving! She's going to be expecting me! I should run back or something!" His voice has risen to hysterics.
He turns to run but I grab his wrist. "You can't go now! It's too far!"
Marlin twists free under my grasp. I reach for him again but he leaps back. "No! You don't get it! She's my friends and friends stick together forever!" And he starts running.
Before I get a chance to react, Horus comes out from behind a tree and Marlin smacks into him.
"Grab him!" I yell to Horus.
He didn't need me to tell him twice. In a blink of an eye, he's holding Marlin in the air. Marlin kicks out and lashes out.
"Umm... I think we can stop for the day," Mercury says behind me.
After Mercury trying to teach us how to make a fire and then doing it himself, everyone falls asleep around the raging campfire. Except for Marlin. Mercury assigns him to first watch because he's too restless to fall asleep. He's looking at the flames with such blankness that I'm afraid that he fell asleep with his eyes open. But I know better. He's still thinking about Flyer.
He'll see sense in the morning, it's not my fault, I think.
I close my eyes and wait for sleep to take me. It doesn't. I wait in silence, listening to the flame crackle. I involuntarily open them again and I see Marlin still staring into the the inferno. A wave of guilt washes over me.
I sit up but Marlin doesn't look at me. But his head turns sideway a bit, away from me. He's really mad. He's not even talking.
"Sorry about Flyer," I say. He doesn't reply. "I mean, I know you're friends but Flyer still has her parents. She's better off back in District 13." Marlin still doesn't say anything.
I sigh. "Go to sleep. I'll take over the watch. It's going to be a long day tommorrow."
To my surprise Marlin curls into a little ball, still facing away from me. Then, he talks.
"Last year, Flyer told me that if I leave her, she'd be really sad. But if I ever do, she'll send me an message everyday. I promised her that I wouldn't ever go, not in a billion thousand and one years. I pinkie promised her. I guess she doesn't know how far away I'd be going, because I don't think that there are any communicuffs in New Brooklyn."
Ouch. I can hear the sadness in his voice, which makes him sound years beyond his age. This time, I don't say anything. The first watch lasts two hours but a few minutes into the second hour, I get another conversation.
I was just staring up in the stars when Mercury wakes up. Actually, he sat up so fast I thought that there was an attack. But then I realized he was yawning and rubbing his eyes. I guess he saw me looking because he says, "Sorry. Just some crazy dreams."
I nod but say, "You owe me an explanation."
He stops rubbing. "What?"
"You know what I mean. Is leaving Marlin depressed worth it? Getting to New Brooklyn, I mean. I still don't understand why you have the Evacuation. What's so important about it?" I ask, unable to stop the words from spilling from my mouth.
"Oh. That." He sits up and pulls something from his pocket. It's looks like a necklace. He fiddles with it. "Well, since you asked. Around three centuries ago, way before the Hunger Games, an entire household of Avoxes revolted against their master and killed his family. They were caught and sentenced to death. But this act stirred up a tiny rebellion. Avoxes rioted. They were quickly crushed though, but a group of around fifty escaped north into New Brooklyn. There, they met people."
"People?" I say, confused. "Everyone in North America was divided into the Capitol and the Districts. No one escaped."
"That's what you think," Mercury countered. "These people, they're just like District. Before the disasters, they were homeless people. When everyone's houses were swept away with the tsunami, left broken by the earthquakes and swallowed by the landlides, those people survived. When everyone went to the Capitol for help, those people hid and they thrived. It's amazing, really. By then, they've set up a small working town. Long before District 13 got bombed. It was the only peaceful, free town there is. Now, this town wasn't technologically advanced, but they knew how to survive. Then came he disease. Swept across the population like a raging fire. No one knew how to cure it. It became known as the White Disease, because everyone turned pale before they died. When the disease finally faded, the population was left crippled and little. There wasn't enough healthy people to feed the entire town. So the remaining avoxes told-"
"Told?"
"Wrote," Mercury corrects himself. "Communicated. Mouthed. Which ever you want to hear. The point is, the avoxes informed the people about the Capitol and the Districts. They came up with the Evacuation because they wanted more people to rise up the population and bring it back to it's former glory. They take people from different Districts, occasionally the Capitol, to gain new skills and knowledge. They they recruit young boys on the verge of manhood, like yours truly, to become messengers and Evacuators. We've been training for a few weeks until we're assigned a mission."
"So... we're called in to New Brooklyn to work?"
Mercury looks shocked. "Well, we only Evacuate people who has problems. Who won't protest if they're taken away from their home. People like orphans, homeless people, people who want a new life, people who have tyrants for mothers. They're usually glad to be whisked away. It's a win win situation. Think of us as social service."
Mercury ties the ends of the necklace together behind his neck and hides in behind his shirt. I feel compelled to ask.
"What's that?"
"My little sister's token for me. She made it just before I left. We're allowed to take tokens with us. An idea from the Hunger Games." The word send chills in my spine, now that it's the cause of Zee's home getting destroyed.
"Is this like the Games?"
"Not even close, though some Evacuators have been known to have been... well, MIA."
"Missing in action?"
"Yeah. No one knows what happened. Most think that they got, you know, caught. They were there one day, gone the next. That's why we have spies stationed in the locations. As backup. That's how I knew that there was a way in Alcatraz and how Zee didn't get caught in the headquarters. We've got the escape planned out weeks ago. But sometimes, even that doesn't work."
"Wow. You guys are willing to do all this to save your town? You must really be in trouble. Do we have a good chance of, you know, dying?"
"I sure hope not. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go get some more wood. The fire's dying. Just go to sleep." Mercury stands up and disappears to the shadows of the night, without the aid of a flashlight or anything flammable.
But I didn't care. The story was interesting, though I was quite tired. We had walked forr the entire day. So I do what he asked and bury myself in my blankets. I didn't dream at all. Maybe my brain knew that I was having too much trouble and wasn't going to handle nightmares. I excuse myself from reality and sink into the glorious silence of unconciousness.
Author's Note:
Told ya so. This was mostly a filler chapter, what with Mercury explaining his life story down to how every single gene in his body was created. I hate myself. A sucky chapter is usually accompanied by a sucky ending. This chapter was to mostly assure everyone that I am not stopping this story. You are free do browse the fanfiction archives now.