I don't know how long I've been in this blue tribe, a year? The days blur together when all you do is fight and entertain a coward.
Tonight is no different. I know I'm in for a fight when Knox feeds me a good meal to give me more energy
So when the two kids clad in their best white come to get me, I know it's time.
"Give me your hands," the girl commands, looking terrified. I put my hands forward, letting the two bind them.
They pull me up out of the basement, the entire warehouse is empty, meaning all of the kids are at the fight. I can tell as much from the cheers.
The kids walk me outside, waiting for Knox's signal to bring me out, the big reveal.
"Bring her out!" Knox yells over the voices of the other kids. They cheer louder at that statement.
We make our way toward the broken down building, I let the two kids guide me, making it seem as though they are more powerful than me.
The crowd parts to let us through and I get a good look at the two girls inside the ring.
One has electric blue hair. Her face initially holds anger but as soon as she sees me, my eyes, my face, her expression softens. "Jia...?" She whispers. Her eyes seem to begin tearing up.
I don't react, nor question it, I'm not supposed to. The other girl has brown hair, she seems a bit scrawny.
The two kids guiding me stop, giving the girls a chance to realize who they're fighting and Knox a chance to say something.
The blue-haired girl still looks shocked, staring at my face. "What the actual fuck?" She states, saying something in a whisper to her fighting partner.
"Ladies may I introduce you to our pretty little resident Red. Picked her up in Nashville after killing the PSF holding her leash. She's an obedient thing, does whatever I ask, no matter what. Including, attack," Knox smiles at the girls' expression. He waves his hand and the kids unchain me, releasing my hands from their bondage.
"I think you girls are gonna get along real damn nice," Knox calls. Once I'm completely free, the two kids bolt, leaving me to walk through the flaming ring of cans.
A ripple goes through the glowing circle, dimming for an instant, then glaring up to a blinding white.
"Those ass-sucking mofo's. They turned Jia into this! Ruby, it had to be really bad," the blue-haired girl says while I prepare myself, letting the fire from my core spill out into the rest of my body, causing my left arm to give a sharp jerk.
Knox whistles behind me and my brain goes into attack mode.
Using my mind I shoot the fire from the trash cans between the two girls, separating them. With the precision drilled into me, I catch the brown-haired one on the pant leg.
She crashes into a flaming can, giving me the opportunity to guide the fire over the side and along the ground toward her. She rolls away from that one.
Lifting my hand in front of me, I snap, a burst of flame appearing between my curved fingers. I lob the flame towards the brown-haired girl like a ball.
She quickly pushes herself up off the ground and looks around. My attention turns to the second girl in the ring who's currently running at me, anger filling her face.
I force the fire from the trash cans up again, making them cross the circle to connect in a series of bridges, hoping to keep the girls away from me.
The blue-haired girl winces as one of my flames catches her across the shoulder blades. She keeps coming, though. And a second too late, I realize what she's doing.
I try to move but she's already on her hip, sliding into my legs. Falling, I let out a grunt, hitting the ground.
I surge up immediately though, throwing the girl off of me as hatred and fire flow through my veins, feeding the flame inside.
The brown-haired girl catches the one I threw, standing her up immediately.
They're too close for fire now, so it turns into a fistfight. My movements are precise and schooled, the training from my camp kicking in.
The girls also seem to be trained as they skillfully dodge each of the punches I throw their way.
"Come on, ladies. This is so boring," Knox heckles from above.
The girls backup, refraining from charging at me. I don't follow them, instead, I pace on my side of the circle, planning out my next attack.
I see a look of thought on the brown-haired girl's face. "Jamboree," she exclaims. That name sounds familiar... no, I can't think about that.
"No shit? Cate stopped checking on her one day. That's why," the blue-haired girl exclaims, putting something together.
"Hey, boo. We have to double-team her," the blue-haired girl says but I don't pay attention nor listen to this. My only command is to attack and kill.
"What good is that going to do?" The second girl asks.
"She can create fire and control it, but look at how much concentration it takes her. She stops the second you go for her like her brain can't handle both at once," they speak to each other but I focus, waiting for the two to attack.
"Shut up and fight!" Knox yells, getting bored.
"Distract her, I'll end it,"
I try to step towards the two but the brown-haired girl kicks over a can and I look towards it, confused. The crowd lets out confused gasps.
But as the girl moves on to the next can, the other one comes at me with a low cry.
As fast as I can, I move out of the way, putting my hand out and shoving the fire in my palm towards her.
She yelps, patting the end of the hair I singed. The flames lick at the strands. The girl drops to her knees, panting and cussing between her sobs.
The second girl in the ring starts toward us but with my mind, I cause the fire from the bins around the girl in front of me and I to surge up and out, twisting into shimmering webs of intense heat and light.
"Don't, Ruby!" The blue-haired girl screams.
I close one hand around the back of her neck and raise the other high above my head.
A sliver of fire slips up from the nearest garbage can, curling around my fingers and wrist like a snake.
I wait for the call to stop, to let the girl go and declare them losers but it doesn't come. I'm supposed to kill this girl.
Before I can act, take this girl's life, the name I've come to know comes from the second girl. "Red!"
I look up at her and a weird sensation enters my mind.
Images are flashing before me. This girl is an orange.
She's stabbing her way through the barrier put in place by the trainers. Stabbing and stabbing at it, removing it piece by piece until it's gone, the film that keeps my memories away.
The connection between my heart and brain reconnects as my life flashes before me.
Dad. Mom. The PSFs, Cate.
Mud, so much mud. The pinch of a muzzle, feeling of metal on my hands.
The screaming trainers, the pain. Clancy, that bastard, watching and ordering another round of torture. When I lost my will, when Cate saved me. Jude at HQ. Knox using me. It all comes streaming back.
When my vision returns I'm still in the hands of the orange. She has me at her disposal and I'm still waiting to be given another command, do something.
As my memories continue filling her mind, abusive mum, the first Op, she stumbles.
The connection between our brains is snapped when one of the memories from the camp comes streaming through, of the first night there, the terror.
The girl falls to her knees, a hand on her forehead.
I fall a short distance away, hands banging into the side of my head as I try to comprehend what just happened.
My name is Jia. Not F13. No... they took that from me. The trainers. Forced it on me. What's happened? What am I doing? Vida is here... she's here!
My head shoots up, confusion filling my face as I still try to comprehend the thoughts. But I know one thing and that is that Vida is here. She's actually here. After months of fantasizing about it in my cell, she's here.
I spot her a few feet away, looking at me with an unsure look. It's so good to see her face.
She's gotten older since I last saw her, the hair still a vibrant colour, the same venom in her. But she's still here. It's the same Vida that I haven't seen in ages.
"Vida!" I exclaim, launching toward her and wrapping my arms around her in a Jude hug. Finally, the tears start flowing. The longing for her too much to hold back.
"Vida I missed you so much-" I'm cut off by Vida's own sniffles. I've never seen her cry.
"Jia. I'm so sorry. I didn't want to leave you but they dragged me to the van. God, what they must have done to you. You are never leaving me again. You understand?" She rambles on, her arms squeezing me.
But I look up into the rafters and see that bastard, Knox. He used me instead of helping me. Kept me as his little pet, made me do things for him and his sick friends, knowing I couldn't refuse.
Knox pulls out a silver handgun and points it at the girl who got into my mind, who saved me. Not on my watch.
I detach from Vida quickly, she protests but I have to ignore her, I need to save the other girl.
Before Knox can shoot, I thrust my hands out and up, sending fire up towards the rafters and him. My fire disrupts his shot, sending it wide of the girl.
She finally turns from her place on the ground, rage and hatred filling her face. "Oops, I missed. I guess our little red toy has a brain after all. Not like it was much use anyway," Knox taunts, smirking.
I go to thrust my hands up again, wanting nothing more than to lob a fireball right at his face but Vida grabs my arm. Knox falls to his knees and I look to Ruby, she's in his mind.
"Knox-?" The boy next to him says, his gun still trained on all three of us. The air has been sucked out of the room as all the blue kids watch this unfold, watch the ruthless leader who made them fight a red, rock back and forth.
"Come down here. Right now," the orange commands him, her teeth clenched.
I sit back down with Vida and hug her again, loving the feeling of affection, something I haven't had in... how long?
A few kids make weak attempts to grab Knox but he fights past them. Like I would have done. He's getting a taste of his own medicine.
Knox flips a rope ladder over the side of the walkway and begins to work his way down. "What's going on? Knox! What the hell?" Someone shouts.
Knox stumbles past Vida and me as we stare at him, watching as his facade falls away, seeing how easily he's controlled.
I lift my face and kick my foot out, tripping the boy and sending him sprawling towards the orange.
"Are you happy? Did you get off, watching that?" Vida yells to Knox and the kids around us, all staring at the scene playing out with Knox and the orange.
"I want you to apologize. Now," she says, her features cold.
"To Jia. To all of these kids for what you did to them, for never giving them what they needed or deserved. For making them fight another kid and pretending like that's the only way to survive in this world," the girl leans down in front of him.
"I want you to apologize for the kids you left outside to die, the ones you said were worthless and who you treated like they were invisible. Because unfortunately for you, they weren't invisible, not to me," she finishes, the room deadly silent.
"Sorry," the word is a frail whisper coming from Knox's moth, a shadow of a word. Some kids gasp, the others stunned into speechlessness. But that doesn't cover it, not even close. A single word.
"Tell them your real name," she orders.
Knox shakes a bit before answering. "Wes Truman," of course his real name isn't Knox. He's just a little boy who wants to feel like a king.
"And are you the slip kid, Wes?" The girl questions. I don't know what the slip kid means, who that's supposed to be.
Kn-Wes shakes his head, keeping his eyes low to the ground like a submissive dog.
"Tell them how you've been getting supplies. What happens to the kids in the white tent when you need another cigarette?" The girl pushes further.
"I... trade them," Wes says, pathetically cowering on the floor.
"With the PSFs?" She presses. I pull my hand up to my mouth. No... the kids I beat, the ones that never get to come inside, they get traded?
Wes bites his lip and nods. The silence is cut by startled cries, wordless screams, weak protest and the repetition of one word: Orange.
"Someone take her out! Take the shot! She'll do that to all of us-" a boy shouts.
"You know what I am now. But that also means you know every word that just came out of his mouth is true. You've been lied to all this time and treated like you were worthless and incapable of making your own choices, but it stops tonight. Right now," The girl calls to everybody, turning back to look at Knox who stares at his hands.
"I want you to leave tonight and never come back- unless," she begins, looking up at the faces above us. "any of you have a problem with that?"
No one says a word, the boys who protested before fell silent the moment the orange looks to them.
The orange does something else, sways the others who protested, before looking back down at Knox, disgust written all over her face.
Knox stands, cutting his hands on the rough ground. He moves slowly, staggering out through the kids crowded around the broken wall.
The girl in the front of the pack, the one I burned on the face, takes a giant step aside. She crosses her arms over her chest, watching him go with cold, unflinching eyes.
I stand up, staring at the back of Knox with anger and hatred, my arm jerking. The joy I feel at him leaving is beyond comparable.
A noise rises from the rest of the crowd as they do the same, clearing him a path. A hissing, spitting, snarling noise that conveys what most words can't.
Then the ones who are perched above us echo it back, letting months, years, of pent up anger and fear and hopelessness escape with it. It's intense, all of these kids scarred at Knox's actions.
Once he finally leaves I can practically taste the relief from the others, the spice of their fear and anger finally gone.
"What's her name?" I ask Vida, supporting her as we make our way over to the orange.
"Ruby," Vida says, limping over to the girl.
We stop a short distance away, Vida looks at Ruby with wide eyes. But I don't see Ruby the way the other colours do, no. I know how people see Ruby. As a danger. Something that needs to be fixed. Us dangerous colours have to stick together.
Someone comes up from behind Ruby, looping an arm through hers and turning her around. It's a dark-skinned boy with big glasses, his lips pressed into a tight line, eyeing me from their hug.
But Ruby untangles herself and looks around the room, to all the timid and wary faces. Waiting for her.
Somebody pushes through the crowd, a device in their hand. My eyes must be deceiving me. That can't be Jude... can it? He's so much older than he was at the League. How long have I been gone?
The device lights up and he looks at Ruby, a grin on his face. But his eyes shift and they meet mine. A hand going over my mouth.
Jude's face drops, confusion filling his features. "Jia..?" He says quietly before throwing the device to Ruby and running at me.
"Jia! Oh my god! I thought you were gone, I-" he says, running into me and squeezing me tight. God, I missed his hugs.
"I thought you were dead. I'm so happy you're okay. Cate will be so excited," he says, continuing to hold me, my arms around him.
Cate. She must have killed herself about losing me, me being sent to a camp. Me being gone.
After a couple more minutes we finally release each other. I look into his eyes, smiling at the familiar face. "I'm so happy," I state, turning my head to look at Ruby, who saved me.
"Thank you," I tell her, smiling and on the verge of tears once again. She smiles shyly.
"We're okay. It's okay," Ruby says to everybody, not caring if they believe her or not. But I do. Because nothing else matters as long as I'm here with them, with Vida and Jude.
We all follow her out anyway.