Tracking down the frenzy was surprisingly labor intensive. Not for Adam as much, since he hadn't been part of that 'math' or science group or whatever it was (he realized all too quickly how little attention he had paid it when Anton had first shown it to him), but he felt like he had barely seen Curtis since the battle. He was constantly inside the room with a few of the others and newbies, tracking and calculating. Adam had poked his head inside the room once and had been greeted with a room of scribbling pencils and heads bent intently over maps. It had given him a rather bittersweet feeling; he found that he missed the scratching, soothing noise of several pens far more than he thought he would. It was interesting what noises he missed. He hadn't bothered to enter the room fully and had turned and made his way back to the training grounds and to the welcoming, familiar feeling of Fabayo trying to draw forth every dark bloom of broken blood vessels from the flower bed of his body as she could possibly manage. He was nothing more than a blood-letter. Now, in the training rooms, in the blood room designed to find the frenzy on full moons, and, worst of all, when he had sullenly joined the others and beat the new Ensigns to the brink of death. The frenzy had been too far away to justify chasing them across the ocean to kill them, though Adam had protested to Fabayo that he was more than willing to walk 500 miles to get to them if he needed to. Instead, Fabayo and a few others had insisted that it was time for another Culling, and there was no option to sit out of it this time.
Being on the inflicting end of the ritual felt... indescribable. His emotions drained out of him in steady drops, like his blood on the strange machine that could locate the frenzy. The night before the Culling, he hadn't slept at all, not even the poor, fitful sleep that had been his only constant since the battle. He had walked alone to the room with the frenzy finding mechanism and he had placed his fingers one by one on the little fingerpad and needle, drawing up the image of the frenzy's location over and over and over again. He stared at it. The little dot on the map, too far away for the others, but far, far too close for him. It didn't matter. The following day was the Culling, and he had participated in it just as he was expected to. The moon waxed, blowing out like blown glass into a perfect sphere of white, watching over them all. As usual, his bloodlust increased. His foot connected. His shame grew.
The worst Culling had been an unexpected trainee. He knew a decent number of the new Ensign, if only by a passing glance to their faces, but when they had walked in the trainee he had passed over, the one that resembled Chase so much, his heart stuttered nervously and then started to thrum a bit faster. The Chase-like trainee's presence meant two things. One, that one of the Ensigns who had survived the ritual after Adam and Curtis had selected him, though he was so new, and two, that that brand new Ensign hadn't made it out of their first battle. It was a serrated blade, one that tore an enormous hole in his gut and left him with ragged and painful edges. He couldn't decide what was worse: going into battle or inflicting the Culling. The way the Chase-like trainee's face was so open. His eyes had been wide, brown, trusting. All of their eyes had been trusting. But these eyes, these eyes were too familiar and it scared Adam.
He had walked into the room and Fabayo had been the one to apologize to him, as Anton had apologized to Adam, and someone before Anton had probably apologized to him. Another Ensign had flipped the switch, the one that would send that horrible noise out to dominate the air, and he had fallen to his knees. His face screwed up. His hands were on his ears and then he was doubling over. Adam's very bones vibrated with the force of the noise. But maybe it wasn't the noise. Maybe it was that horrible shame. Filling up his body with bubbles like carbonation. Or a pot boiling over, steaming water bubbling and frothing as this little skinny kid shook and cried. But there was no time to feel bad. The Ensigns surged forwards, their boots aimed for his little head. They crushed him and broke him, kicking him until the trauma and noise was so bad that his head was a mass of lumpy red. Adam's fingers shook with the force of the bubbling water inside him. But this is what they had to do. This is what the trainee had asked for. What he himself had asked for. He had to remember that. He was just doing what he was supposed to. This boiling feeling rising up inside of him was doing so for no reason. He didn't know why it was making him shake and why it was poking angrily at the backs of his eyes until they stung with the pain of the carbonation.
He had lifted the cup of blood, collected carefully and dutifully after the battle, to the trainee's lips. He was missing a tooth. Someone had aimed their boot poorly. Adam had to consciously make sure that he held eye contact with the kid. There was blood dripping onto Adam's wrist. Those terrible, familiar eyes. He urged the blood down the trainee's throat. He drank in confused, erratic gulps. The maintained eye contact was more painful than inflicting any of the pain on the kid. Brown. Like wet, healthy dirt. Something else could have bloomed there, other than the pain and suffering, other than the death the sirens had inflicted on this young boy. But here he was instead, drinking their blood and falling to the floor, convulsing with the pain of the transformation. He was still for one, heart stopping moment, and Adam felt his throat start to close guiltily, but then the trainee–no, he was an Ensign now–was drawing breath. He had made it.
His name was Arnav, he told Adam and Curtis the next day. He had adjusted painfully well to the lack of noise. He had kept his composure for the most part. There was the usual bit of brief crying, but he hadn't flown off the handle the way Adam had. In fact, none of the other new Ensigns seemed to react the way Adam had. Arnav was calm, collected, and enthusiastic about training. He was also enthusiastic about following Curtis around. Despite Curtis not being particularly good at being an Ensign, Arnav asked him a million questions, determined to coax as much information about Curtis' life out of him he possibly could.
So much so that, the night before Adam's second Hunt, and coincidentally the same night Adam finally grew sick of staring out at the darkness of the ocean all night and he had decided to push open Curtis' door to see if he was awake instead of laying awake all night, he found the two of them seated on the floor in discussion. They looked up at the motion of the door opening and Arnav smiled evenly at Adam. His teeth were rather crooked, so when he smiled he looked alien. Chase had suffered through years of braces when he was younger, so his smile was perfect, white, and even. The crooked toothed smile of Arnav's wasn't quite right. He didn't know who Arnav was when he smiled.
'Adam!'
'You can't sleep either?' Curtis asked him at the same time. His face was a strange blend of impassive and something else, something that had no business taking up so much of Curtis' usually kind face. Adam had noticed the change since the battle. Curtis didn't emote with his eyes anymore. Every expression was coupled with the immovable sadness of his drooping eyes. Like Arnav, the strangest expression was Curtis' smile. His eyes stayed drooping down, old and otherworldly sadness and a steady detachment that scared Adam a bit were always coupled with his smiling mouth. Adam wondered how Arnav didn't notice the strange juxtaposition of smile and basset hound eyes that didn't curve up with his lips anymore. Maybe Arnav had never seen the version of Curtis that had existed before their first battle. Maybe soon, only Adam would know that version. Or, worse, there would be no version of Curtis at all. Adam felt his fingernails force their way into the flesh of his palm, allowing a familiar sprig of pain to send its branches up his flesh. He had to consciously release them so he could sign a response.
'No. I can't sleep,' Adam said.
'I asked Curtis what the bunker was like when he first woke up, since Rose said that Curtis had been here even older than the lead Ensign who died... what was his name? I don't remember what it was. I think it started with a J... Maybe it was Kyle or something. I'm terrible with names. Anyways, he doesn't remember. Isn't that crazy? He says it was too long ago and he doesn't remember waking up at all,' Arnav said. Adam looked slowly at Curtis, his eyebrow raising.
Curtis said, his shoulders raising and falling as he looked away from Adam's gaze.
'His name was Anton,' Curtis said, his eyes still stubbornly avoiding eye contact with Adam. Curtis had told Adam about his first day waking up. Why he was pretending not to remember was beyond Adam.
'Iit's been a long time since Curtis died. I guess our brains can only store so much information before some of it starts to slip away. Why aren't you sleeping? We have a Hunt tomorrow,' Adam said. There was this tiny little flicker of curiosity alight inside him, like the quiet, dying bulb of a nightlight in a hallway, that wondered what this kid was doing here the night before something so crucial. They'd pinned down the frenzy the night before and they were close enough for Fabayo to agree that it was time for them to go knock out as many as they could. She looked uneasy about it. More uneasy than she had the first time. There was overall an uneasy air around the more seasoned Ensigns, so strong that Adam wondered how he hadn't felt it last time.
'I'm too nervous to sleep.' Arnav's hands hovered uncertainly in the air as he spoke. He shook his head.
'What is it like? Is it satisfying? I'm kind of excited. I know it's stupid, to be excited to go kill some monsters, because it'll be kind of scary, but I am. I just feel like I can finally make a difference. Killing them. They killed us. We kill them now. Like revenge. An eye for an eye.'
'I'm sorry, Arnav. I kind of want to be alone. Just the night before. I don't want to... I'll see the two of you tomorrow,' Curtis broke in suddenly. His face was stone. Unmovable. Arnav's eyes widened.
'Oh. Of course. I'm so sorry,' he said.
Curtis shook his head, 'You're fine. It's not a big deal. Besides, you should sleep. It's confusing and exhausting. You'll need your strength and all the sleep you can get.'
Arnav nodded thoughtfully. 'True. I wouldn't want to be tired. Fighting for our lives, or something. I don't know. Nobody will give me a straight answer when I ask. I'll see you guys tomorrow.' Arnav rose from the floor and turned for the door, stopping right before the door. He slammed his right fist into his chest, where his heart would be.
'Death can only make us stronger, right?'
Slowly, Adam and Curtis parroted the motto back to him. He left with one of those unfamiliar crooked smiles.
Adam remained seated on the floor next to Curtis, the two of them staring out at the soft water and the fish darting back and forth like an old arcade game. Pinball.
Curtis tapped Adam's knee to draw his attention.
'I'm scared.'
Adam nodded, 'Same. I'm nervous for him. He's too young. He didn't train for long enough.'
Curtis nodded.
'Somehow, I don't think we did either.'
They sat in silence for the rest of the night, until sleep time was over and it was once again time to go to the mess hall. Fabayo's face had lost that uneasy quality as she banged on the doors, her face now twisted into a mask of determination and almost... excitement. The mess hall vibrated with the energy of the trainees. They were all so excited. Adam stood at the center of the line, gazing through all of the trainees. His eyes met Rose's. Her brows pulled together slightly. She was asking him something.
Was she asking if he was ok? He thought she might be. It was a word too long. He couldn't figure out what that last word was... Was it sweetie? It couldn't be sweetie. It was. The thick tubes that held his heart in place in his chest wrenched roughly to the side, sending a shooting pain radiating through his body. He nodded, slowly, making sure to keep steady eye contact so she knew that he was answering her question. He was alright. He shrugged, the movement so small that he knew she could only catch it because she was paying attention. Beside her, Joel leaned over, his mouth opening widely and excitedly as he siphoned her attention away from Adam. Adam's gaze shifted back to the back of the room. Trainees were being selected, one by one. Rose was going to be selected by Fabayo, as she had been before. She had been lucky last time. Would it be the same this time? Would his feet be flying into her head with punishing blows she didn't deserve this time. He swallowed.
An eye for an eye.
It was a common saying.
But he didn't think the world could handle being completely dark on top of being silent.