Chapter 4 - Opus Dei
Second Day
Morning rays caressed Bliss' face, and for a few short moments, she forgot where she was. She gazed at the dust caught up in the light, dancing through the air, as it did in her bedroom. The illusion shattered as Lily groaned and huffed, consciousness overtaking her. Bliss rolled her eyes. She seemed to be doing that a lot lately.
Plum was supposed to be awake on last watch, but Bliss could hardly blame him for falling asleep after yesterday's events. She imagined she might not be as forgiving towards Lily, but Plum was Plum. He turned over, eyes squinting open, and gave her a sleepy smile. Bliss returned it easily.
"Sorry, guys. I must have fallen asleep." Plum said, if it wasn't obvious. Perhaps he was worried his allies were annoyed with him and wanted to diffuse any perceived tension. Instead, he was met with a smile from Bliss and a hand ruffling through his hair from Lily. The circumstances prevented true anger, they were sleeping in likely one of safest positions in the arena.
"Don't let it happen again." Lily said breezily. Plum nodded.
Bliss turned her attention to the window, trying to get a glimpse of the careers (?). Her eyes drank in the sight below.
Overnight, giant letter had been carved in the red sand and gravel below:
OPUS DEI
Guess I don't have to wonder what to call them anymore. Bliss beckoned her allies so they could get a look.
Plum's eyebrows raised as he looked at the letters drawn into the courtyard.
"Anyone know what that means?" Lily asked, perplexed.
"No idea." Bliss responded.
"The Work of God." Plum said quietly. Bliss and Lily looked at him in surprise. "I took Latin courses earlier this summer, I thought it would help me get a scholarship for university. Not that it matters now." Plum said, somewhat distantly.
"D11 isn't usually known for their nerds." Lily replied, trying to lighten his mood. Plum lightly pushed her.
"Can't spend all my days planting trees." He explained.
Bliss studied Plum, considering the new alliance below. So goddamn pretentious. Who names themselves 'The Work of God?' 'Opus Dei'… ridiculous. The alliance stared at the declaration below.
"More like Oozing Dicks." Bliss said out loud, before she could halt the words.
Lily started cackling, then hushed herself, careful not to give away their position. Plum looked sideways at Bliss, but was also laughing. He composed himself first, then stared off towards Opus Dei, thinking. After a few minutes the mood grew somber.
"I've never seen anything like that before. Yesterday was insane." Plum said. Lily whistled in a low tone, in agreement. Bliss' thoughts were similar.
"Did either of you see the betrayal coming?" Lily asked, appraising her allies.
Bliss considered how much to share, but didn't want to implicate herself in having greater knowledge than she realistically did, as disjointed as her observations had been.
"No." Bliss replied.
"No." Plum said as well.
"You?" He asked Lily.
"Nope." Lily played with the handle of a knife she'd acquired in the bloodbath. Evasive. Bliss didn't address her reluctance. Not yet, there was more information to gather. Plum didn't seem any wiser to her tone. The conversation lulled. Bliss found herself speaking.
"We should scout the arena to know what we're dealing with and try and learn the positions of the other tributes." Bliss started. The others looked towards her, attentive. "The shakedown yesterday will probably give us some time to… breathe." Bliss didn't outright say the bloodthirsty Capitolites were likely satiated enough from yesterday's drama for the gamemakers to spring anything too deadly on the remaining tributes, at least for the moment. She hoped her allies caught her meaning.
"We got lucky finding the water supply up here. If it's any pattern to go by, we might be able to gather more water and whatever else on the more precarious, upper floors. We have to be careful to ration it, though, we can't assume we'll find bounties like this everywhere." Bliss added.
"Makes sense." Lily said, uncharacteristically peaceful.
The trio spent the better part of their next hour organizing their day. After brainstorming and debate, they set their plan into place. Lily and Plum broke off to crawl around the perimeter of the upper levels around the cornucopia courtyard, while Bliss ventured out by herself to try and map of the arena. It was risky to be alone and weaponless, but Bliss didn't forsee herself winning a head-to-head fight even if she were armed to the nines. She'd never wielded a weapon in her life, save for the thirty minutes of training at the centre. Not that that would do her much good. Her strategy was a Venn diagram of 'run' and 'hide.'
She wanted to go by herself because the journey would be more silent than if she had a companion travelling with her. Bliss also didn't want to get stuck in a situation where she was alone with Lily. The girl was unpredictable, deadly when she was pissed, and didn't seem to like Bliss that much. Not a good combination of traits in an alliance member, but Bliss had limited options to work with. It was going alright for now, anyways. She just had to keep finding ways to promote peace and space between them. Not provoking the other girl had been a challenge when Lily made nasty remarks or insinuations, but it had worked in Bliss' favour so far- if she'd spoken her mind, Lily would already be gunning for her. This way, they might be able to stick it out a few more days.
The pipe fixed to the exterior of the building creaked under Bliss' weight, but she quashed the panic, climbed down, and stepped onto the floor below. After a minute of listening, she decided she was alone. Bliss descended down the stairs.
There was a game, sometimes, that she played in her house. Trying to identify every sound. Natural? Mechanical? Human? If it was human- a cough, a sneeze, a footstep- she tried to figure out who made it, and memorize the repertoire of noises each family member made- and why. This information told if she should avoid them or not- if they were content or liable to cause her pain. She'd gotten good at it over the years, able to hear her father's footsteps from the moment he stepped out of the elevator outside their apartment and understand his temperament from their weight. Able to hear Bryce sneak around at night when he thought nobody was listening. Able to discern from the way her mother clinked the cooking ware, if Bliss would be berated or simply ignored if she showed her face.
A depressing existence to an extent, constantly wary of her surroundings, avoiding danger. It might not be all for naught, she could use the years of loneliness to her advantage now. As long as she was paying attention, it would be impossible to sneak up on her. Bliss remember the way Callum slunk up behind Saber and slashed his throat during the bloodbath. She suppressed a shudder. Callum didn't look any sneakier than Bryce, and after years of studying her brother's movements and behaviour, there might be hope for Bliss yet. Her life depended on it.
As Bliss stood looking out at the cornucopia courtyard, the chasm courtyard was behind her, through the lobby, west. To her left/ north of the cornucopia yard, through the row of buildings, was the garden courtyard with the cement mixer in the middle. Dawn's cries, and the lack of cannon, pried at the lid containing Bliss' sanity. She did not want to explore that way.
The courtyard beyond the cornucopia yard, farther east through the distant line of buildings, was unknown- if it was there at all- Bliss assumed it was based on the grid pattern she'd noticed so far.
The courtyard to her right/ west- the direction Chase, Sandy, and Cass disappeared to before winding their way back to the chasm yard was also unknown. That was as good a place as any to start.
There was no hard evidence Sandy had been aligned with Chase and Cass, other than the fact she was alive after fleeing with them, and was holding the rapier instead of the bow and arrows- a trade with Chase? With Sandy dead now, everything was unclear. Bliss wanted to know if Chase had the arrows. Unfortunately, he was adept with a bow. D7 had archery tournaments, Chase often placed on the podium.
Bliss walked to the the right, to the end of the lobby. She didn't want to risk going outside through the yard, hoping there was a way she could sneak through to the adjoining row of buildings. If she was able to travel far right enough, hopefully she would emerge in another lobby, with a view of the west yard. I wonder what joys await. She pushed through the door on the right wall. It opened to another lobby.
Doors creaked and groaned as she passed through them, one identical lobby after another. At least there was continuous adjoining doors, which seemed like an obvious arena addition because what city block in their right mind would connect all the buildings together? Bliss was glad for the cover, regardless.
After passing through several buildings, she saw a faded exit sign along the west wall, but it was blocked when Bliss tried to shove through it. I suppose they can't make it too easy for us. A window about a foot an a half tall and the width of the door frame, inlaid with wire, was fixed above the door. Bliss delicately picked up a chair and placed it under the window. She placed a box on top of the chair and climbed up. The window cranked open easily and she was able to shimmy through it.
Bliss hovered awkwardly on the sill. She looked to her left down the alley, but the yard was not visible. It was blocked by a pile of rubble. The building across had another doorway and another window fixed above it. She didn't trust that the door was open, and if she jumped down there would be no way to get back up. Imagine dying in the Hunger Games, in an alley, twiddling your thumbs, dehydrated to death. Riveting stuff.
Bliss leaned out the window, as far as her body would allow, and was able to grab the exterior crank on the other window. She huffed and puffed in her awkward extension until the window was open. First, she tried stepping across, but would have ended in a split, and she was not that flexible. Having a pulled groin in the Games would suck. Instead, she reached until she tumbled, but her hands caught the ledge of the other sill. She bridged her body over the gap and shimmied through the adjacent window.
As she landed, her feet crunched under red dirt that had collected in this building's lobby. Wary it was a purposeful sound trap, Bliss remained entirely still, not a twitch of movement or sound emanating from her as she observed. She looked to her left and saw a broken window, and decided the debris was not a sound trap. It likely blew in from outside. Bliss took in the courtyard from her vantage point in the corner lobby.
Construction equipment spread out before her, a vast array. In the garden yard, there was only a mixer, but this yard looked like a storage facility for tools and machines that could be used to make anything. Heavyweight machinery- excavators, asphalt pavers, articulated trucks, backhoes, boom lifts, compacters, bulldozers, drills, and forklifts littered the arena. Bliss could only imagine the chaos if they were all functional, as the garden cement mixer in the garden was, but Bliss thought Opus Dei would be posted up here if any of the heavy machinery could actually be used. An inference, though, not a fact, she reminded herself. Some, or all, could be operational. Lumbering over all else was a crane in the northeast corner, arm extending all the way to the southwest corner. She couldn't test anything, though, without creating noise, so she decided to move on.
No sooner did she make the decision to venture into the yard, did she spot Cass in the southeast corner of the yard, image partially obscured by the metallic jungle between them. Bliss remained inside. Cass was speaking to someone. Bliss manoeuvred around the lobby, trying to find a vantage point to identify the other person.
The D4 girl- Mila, came into view, body hunched over her shattered ribs. Chase sat beside them. They were hidden, but observing the yard. They'd be able to see if anybody entered, from any direction from where they sat, but were hidden enough themselves. It took a while for Bliss to spot them, anyways. A good vantage point.
Mila had had quite an eventful twenty-four hours. Initially a shoe-in for the most powerful alliance in the Games, then chaotically betrayed, barely managing to escape with her life. And then sometime between her escape and the morning, she'd found a new alliance in those who'd also been betrayed by those they'd trusted. My friends are my enemies' enemies, or something like that. The enemies of my enemies are my friends? Bliss hadn't had the chance to finish high school English yet, damn the correct source material.
The D4 girl was resilient, Bliss had to give her that. How Mila was even standing right now with half of her ribcage pulverized was beyond Bliss. Anger was a powerful fuel, though.
Bliss watched them for hours. They didn't move, observing their yard, merely hiding when Opus Dei patrols came to check on the courtyard every now and again. If Bliss had to guess, she would say they'd declared this yard and the surrounding buildings their home base. She broke for lunch, then wiggled back through the set of windows, tip toed through the adjoining lobbies, returning to a cornucopia yard building lobby. Not the building her alliance slept in, though, she didn't want to bring attention to that lobby.
Again she watched for hours. Every thirty minutes or so, a pair of Opus Dei members waltzed into the courtyard, did a lap, and left. They didn't both to check any of the lobbies and always returned to the garden yard after scoping out the other courtyards. They'd moved the cornucopia supplies to the garden yard as well, red rebar horn empty.
Bliss began to understand their scouting pattern. She waited for the pair to return, and as soon as they cleared the yard, leaving through the lobby to the garden, Bliss darted out into open air. She sprinted a couple hundred feet, lashes on her stomach and calf burning, but made it to the eastern lobby. Quickly, but quietly, Bliss shuffled over to the other side of the room and exited the lobby to reveal the easternmost yard. She took cover and observed.
Dozens of platforms spiralled through the air, winding, connecting, stopping dead, branching off. It was a maze as much as it was a network of pathways. Massive plumes of white fabric were fixed to the platforms, creating cover, and a cloud-like appearance. It reminded Bliss of the alcove beside the break room in the training centre, and thought, perhaps, the D8 male- Rubal, would be hiding here. Again, rows buildings enclosed all sides, as they did in all the other yards.
Bliss tried to mentally tally who was left. Opus Dei was composed of D1, D9, and Callum- the D5 boy. Their true allies, the girl from D11 and D12, had fallen yesterday, so they only had five members left. They were in the garden yard.
The remnants of the Pack- Chase, and Cass, along with Mila, were in the construction yard. Rubal was likely somewhere in this maze of sheets, Bliss would put money on it.
Lily and Plum were with her- metaphorically- not physically, at the moment, but she had no need to track them. They'd report back to her, and she to them at the end of the day, anyways.
Who else? She saw the D3 girl- Filament, escape the bloodbath. A small, wily, outlier. Bliss wouldn't be surprised if she never saw her again, the girl seemed like the type to hide to death.
That left only… the D10 male- Ken. Bliss hadn't seen him escape, but hadn't seen his picture in the sky, so he was still alive. Like Chase, Cass, Dawn, the D2 pair, and Saber, Ken had been betrayed in the bloodbath. Since he wasn't with Chase's group, he probably wandered alone now. Bliss wondered if he was close enough to the garden yard to hear Dawn's screams.
The day was drawing to a close. There was one last job she wanted to accomplish today. She'd already mapped out four courtyards surrounding the cornucopia yard, all separated by layers of buildings, but didn't know what extended further in any direction. More courtyards? Endless buildings? She crept around the edges of the maze yard, to the eastern-most building. Once she crossed the lobby and opened the doors, desert stretched out before her. An endless expanse, nothing but ground. It looked like a red sea.
If there was nothingness beyond all the other courtyards as well, Bliss was right about the arena being relatively small. There was enough space to find cover in the courtyards and buildings, so there was no need for the arena to stretch out.
Okay…so the arena is a three by three grid, cornucopia yard that the centre, with four courtyards in each direction north- garden, east- fabric maze, south- construction, west- chasm. What about the corner blocks of the grid?
As Bliss stepped outside the border lobby, shrieking wind tore into her ears, she stumbled with the force of the air. Clearly not meant to travel here. Won't be long. Bliss gritted her teeth against the screaming wind and walked north until she could see the northwest quadrant of the grid. As far as her eye could see, buildings completely collapsed in on each other, and what was left erect was visibly unstable. It would be a death sentence to manoeuvre through the quadrant- probably the other three corner quadrants too.
At least now Bliss knew what she was dealing with when it came to the arena. Courtyards and the rows of buildings that lined them were the only parts accessible to the tributes. As soon as she understood what she was looking at, she high tailed it back to the border lobby.
Bliss skirted the edges of the maze yard, briefly locking eyes with Rubal high up in the plumes of fabric, and returned to the lobby separating the maze yard from the cornucopia yard. She waited until the Opus Dei scouts returned to the garden, spared a glance to make sure nobody from the Pack was looking from the direction of the construction yard, and sprinted across the space again.
She ducked into the lobby, and didn't stop running until she reached the top of the stairwell, pausing to catch her breath before scaling the outside of the building. Bliss climbed up and found her allies waiting for her. Plum was preparing dinner. They greeted one another, and shared what they'd learned that day.
Bliss updated her allies first, on the layout of the arena and the locations of the tributes she'd found, the movements of the Opus Dei scouting party she encountered. After she was done explaining, she asked what they'd learned.
"We searched the perimeter of the upper levels- a lot of them have tunnels of passageways on one floor or another, and followed a few different Opus Dei scouting groups. They mostly stuck around the cornucopia and garden courtyards. They searched all the lower levels in the buildings in both courtyards. Sometimes they were inside the buildings around the edge of the garden yard for a while- especially Callum, but we couldn't get close enough to see what they were doing. They couldn't be getting supplies- from what Lily and I saw today, there's only supplies on the tallest levels- we also found some more water and food, by the way." Plum reported. Lily was happy to let him talk, not adding anything else.
"They could be setting traps." Bliss mused.
"What do you mean?" Plum asked.
"The garden has the most supplies- everything from the cornucopia and the plants, itself. There are limited entrances to the yard. Booby-trapping the entrances would be smart." Bliss thought out loud.
"Checks out." Lily said.
"And people like Callum are slippery. It tracks that he'd set traps to avoid direct combat, not that he's lacking in fighting skills. He just doesn't have the same need that the other careers do to show off. A kill is a kill. And…" Bliss trailed off as her thoughts got too dark.
"And what?" Plum prompted, when it was clear Bliss wasn't going to continue.
Bliss tried to hide her the fear in her voice as she said, "People like Callum like their toys. A fast death is a boring death, not just for the people in the Capitol. Keeping Dawn alive like this is a choice. She probably would have died today from exposure- but she didn't- so they had to have given her some water, at least. Their message is clear, they don't need her anymore… So why draw it out like this?" Bliss swallowed heavily. "Some people get off on the torment. Makes them feel powerful." She finished, averting her eyes.
Lily looked forlorn, considering Bliss' words. Plum stared at Bliss curiously. Her stomach started to hurt, pain and nausea mingling. She shifted uncomfortably.
"We found a few more bandages today." Plum started. "Would you like me to redress your wounds?"
Bliss pulled her eyes off the floor and met his warmly. "Sure, Plum. Thank you."
They patched themselves up, ate, then listened to the sound of Dawn's fading cries as they fell into an uneasy rest. Bliss took first watch and tried not to let the madness take over her mind as the dark grew blacker and the screams seemed to amplify. She couldn't escape them, even in her dreams.
TOTAL DEATH COUNT (DAY 2): (9) - NO NEW DEATHS.