Culling

Part III • Chapter I

I could only stare, entranced. I had never seen anything like this before in my life.

Owen glanced at me. He seemed nervous, like he was waiting for something. "Do you like them?"

Sean nudged my arm, "Aren't they cool?"

They were so pretty!

I rushed forward into the clearing, unable to stop myself from laughing.

"What are they?" I asked. I slowly turned around in a wide circle, trying to see everything at once. The lights reminded me of fairies; and of princesses, and fairy tales, and everything good.

The kinds of things that Papi used to read me stories about before he got sick.

"Fireflies." Owen responded.

He and Sean watched me, as they remained unmoved from their position near the edge of the woods.

Fireflies? I loved them. I could stay here forever. No matter what, I would never forget this night.

It was magic.

☜♡☞

"Sang, it's time to get up." Someone lightly shook my shoulder as they urged me awake from my dreams.

Darnit.

I felt like I had just shut my eyes. And now here was Khloe, already waking me up.

"Sang. You need to get up now." She called as she shook me again. I fought to open my eyes.

Curse you, Khloe. Let me sleep. I had been on the verge of remembering something important. Why couldn't I stay asleep for five more minutes?

But even in my groggy state, I felt as though that might be kind of mean thing to say.

I blearily blinked. I felt like I hadn't slept in ages, and my mind rebelled against the idea of returning to reality. But then I remembered why reality kind of sucked for the momemt, and gasped as I shot up in bed.

It was morning.

It was morning, and I had fallen asleep before Khloe even had a chance to go over the itinerary for the day. Why hadn't she woken me up? She knew that I needed to know! We were supposed to discuss this last night!

"Khloe-" I looked at her in panic as I hugged the blanket to my chest. "Is it morning already? There's not enough time! What do I-"

"Shush." She put a finger over my lips, cutting off my barrage of questions.

I blinked at her, and she moved her finger and pointed to a tray that she had placed at the foot of my mattress. "Eat, and I'll talk. You needed to sleep, and now you need to eat. I just woke you up earlier, it's ok."

But I wasn't hungry, I was too nervous to eat.

I spotted what appeared to be eggs, toast, bacon, and coffee. Well, maybe I'd have the coffee. If there was some cream and sugar in there. Coffee was always a good thing. The rest of it though...

I didn't know if I could eat over the knot in my stomach.

Her eyes narrowed, as if she knew what I was thinking. "Eat."

My god, she was almost as bad as North. Still, I didn't argue. She looked extra grumpy today, after all. Plus, she kind of did have a point.

I should eat before going into the arena, even though I really, really didn't want to.