A Circus of Eagles [An HG Fanfic]

Faint - Hugh

Hugh

A cab slinks past.

Nothing unusual about that. Normally the Graphene sector is thronging with cabs, busy people going to busy places, and Rosie and I take cabs between Mother and Father's houses every week, but today the sector is still and so this cab is something remarkable and I can't help but stare. The windows are blacked out, but in that sort of translucent way that gives only the illusion of privacy. Celebrities use cabs like this to pretend they don't want to be noticed. But nobody, not even the most stuck-up actress or model or the fattest politician - as if any of them are fat now - would be going around on a day like this. As it scuttles past everybody turns away. Everybody except me. Zorr would say it's rude to stare but I'm curious and he's not here, anyway. He'll be going to the reaping with Father.

So I stare at the cab, and what I see is this:

A girl, her hair dyed blue at the bottom, looking out of the window but right past me.

The faint curl of cigarette smoke.

A man in the front seat, middle aged, rebel. I don't know how I know this. You just learn to tell rebels and get out of their way. He has mean eyes and is wearing combats.

A boy just older than me, perhaps, with honey-blonde hair and startled eyes. His mouth is open in speech.

I wish I could hear what he is saying, especially now that I know what the cab is. It has a logo down the side. A pair of golden scales, below a face devoid of any features except a blindfold. Malachite. Those must be the Malachite tributes, on their way to the Tribute Tower, which Father helped rebuild. A little pride swells in me at that fact; a Vern did something useful, something which Mother would say was impossible, as if the Labodies single-handedly helped the President rebuilt the whole Capitol after it got burned, shattered, torn down.

Hubert Vern. Hubert Labodie. Hugh Vern or Hugh Labodie? I still haven't decided.

Rosie, who is Rosie Labodie or Roselyn Labodie to use her full name (except she's five and nobody does), tugs at my sleeve. "Bertie, what are you staring at?"

Patricia, the next youngest after Rosie and jealous of her in every way, turns to Emilia and pretends to pull at her dress, simpering. When Emilia doesn't respond - Emilia is always annoyed with Patricia and likes to pretend she isn't there, even or especially on a day like this - she twirls on the spot so her dress spins up and starts bugging me instead.

"Bertie! Bertie, since when have you been Bertie? Bertie is a little boy's name, isn't it? Hey, come on, Bertie, we're going to be late."

The cab containing the two Malachite tributes who are preparing themselves to fight to the death slips around the corner and vanishes down Snow Lane. The buildings down there are gorgeous, some of my favourite in the sector, all smooth silky lines and spirals that shimmer in the light. Some of the panels have water sensors so that when it rains little sparks chase the raindrops down the surface and it makes a slightly miserable day - because nobody can do anything outdoors when it's raining - into a happy one. Some days when it's raining I feel like skipping class just so I can go and stand there, unless it's Contemporary Design, which is my best class. But of course the Malachite tributes don't know this and if I were them I wouldn't notice the buildings at all.

Mother gives Patricia a nudge. "Leave Hugh alone," she says, giving me a quick tense smile that doesn't hide her worry at all. "Today is a difficult day for him."

"I'm fine, Mother," I say. "There's hardly any chance at all."

She squeezes my hand anyway. Mother is the panicking sort, much more so than Father, which is why I made sure that I spent the week before the reaping with her. Otherwise she'd be fretting while the girls ran wild all over the house. She's worried about Zoran too, of course she is, but he was always the son and heir and a chip off Father's block and somehow that means she focuses all her attention on me.