age without {mistakes} // xanthus & sierra

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the girl who broke[/b][/size][/color][/font][/center]

“The weak never get anywhere. If I’m going to play these games I may as well be heartless –ruthless. Better to go down as a monster than a coward.”

(It echoes around my mind, slamming against the sides of my skull and cracking the edges of my soul.) In the darkness, I feel tears making the endless trek from my wide-awake eyes to the ground below. It is pointless to wipe them away. Tonight, the droplets of sorrow are here to stay. The reason for their presence is shameful - not Aka's death, or Luci's danger, or even my own imminent demise. I do care, but those things are the truth. They are now, happening, and beyond my control. The sinful pain etched into my skin is something far less understandable. Those words spun so simply, turning cartwheels from Opal's lips, matched with her hard eyes and defiant jaw.

Better to go down as a monster than a coward. Thoughts collide with one another in my head, splintering into millions of broken shards as they do so. Does she mean it? That she'd rather die without faith in humanity, in herself, in love - than die the way I live. She calls it cowardice - an accusation that cuts deep. It argues with the only thing I thought I knew about myself. If I am not brave - was the tiny, fragile little girl who never let a cage of bones stop her from adventure the same? Have I changed? Or was I never anything more than simply afraid?

Once, I knew the facts. Right and wrong, true and false. The word was split into two easy sections - distinguishable and clear as words printed onto a page. I dug for information; not for answers, but simply for the sake of knowing everything I possibly could. Now, I'd give everything I have left just to be sure of something. (Anything will do.) I want to know what is good and what is bad - if Opal is telling the truth or a lie - and if the only person I have left fighting for me in the suffocating world is genuine. (Once, I would have never questioned a friendship, a person, a child. Now, I cannot be sure of anything - this includes my own, ever-failing judgement.)

I am afraid to open my mind and see the anthem pass in the sky above me. (Another day, another dawn, another step closer to insanity.) No longer do illusions haunt me - at least, I don't think they do. Once final clock remains - not dripping from the trees in a deafening tick-tock chorus, but broken and fragile and useless, a heavy weight in my pocket. It reminds me that time is not running out, regardless of what others might believe. Time has already run out. The world has stopped spinning, the church bells no longer ring and we are suspended in the unknown before death. We are trapped in this tunnel, but there is no light at the end.

I never hesitated to jump, and I never cried when I fell, but I don't know how to begin feeling like Sierra again. (I have not hurt another person in this area, and I believe I am the only one without blood on my hands, but that doesn't make it okay.) Perhaps yesterday I was proud, but it is surprising how much can change in time between dusk and sunrise here. What does it matter if I hurt? What does it matter if I don't? They die, I die, we all die in the end. We're all hurting already. It almost aches to listen to my own thoughts - once they lilted with happiness and the kind of childish dreams that would never become a reality. I believed in happy endings. (What a fool.)

I greet the morning without comment, dragging hands through my tangled hair. Silently, I take a deep breath and appreciate the taste of the day. (I would die for each and every person in this arena, if that would save them. But it wont.) For a while I struggle, playing tug of war with my thoughts - I chase concepts around in circles until I am no longer sure what I want to find. Still, Opal's words haunt me, and I worry that I will die with the accusation of cowardice wedged between my temples. Would I rather be a monster - cruel and merciless, but hopeful, looking forward to the future and wanting life - or a coward?

I question what coward means. Study the glare of those who tried to kill me yesterday - the harsh, ruthless looks etched into my mind. (We're children, children, children, is all I want to scream but my lips do not part. Instead I scream inside my head, which is already full.) The girl from One believes that to be brave I must reach out and lay a blade upon another's skin - draw blood and not regret my motive. I must strike a match and let the fire dance it's way across the body of a tribute, curling my lips as it scorches their heart and snatches their breath from their lungs. Is bravery willing? Is it the power to forget about caring? I ask myself who's pain I would rather end: my own, or the pain of another.

My sister (my only sister, despite the names my fellow tributes like to refer to each other as) died only last year. It was not from lack of bravery - she fought, attacked, reached out and tried with all her might to wound. And did I not forgive her as soon as her body hit the ground? Did I not remember that all she was doing was running as fast as she can, fighting to get home? Did Meela Birdbrook not fight the way she did so that I would never be hurt? (Yet here I am, counting the bruises on my heart and unable to believe I have made it this far without snapping part of my skeleton in two, as I did so frequently back home.)

I decide that all I want in this moment is for someone to take my hand and tell me that everything will be okay. That I don't have to decide between what is justice and what is evil. (That I can rest for a moment and gather my thoughts and not have to fear for my life at all.) I wrap my arms around myself, trying to keep Sierra Birdbrook from falling apart. "Is it too late?" I whisper. I am not worried about losing my mind. I am not worried about losing myself. I am worried because I can't work out who I was to begin with. And that is terrifying. Scary. Petrifying, haunting, the kind of pain that stirs in my stomach and spreads through my spine until I can feel it everywhere. This creature - the one that is not me - consumes my entire being, and I cry until I am out of tears.

(Am I broken, or was I never whole?) As the sunlight begins to turn the darkness into day, I force myself to untangle my body from the roots and take in my surroundings. The blanket of darkness that provides some kind of safety has melted away entirely, and I am left exposed and alone. Only, I am not alone, because Luciana is beside me and she is all that I need, for now. I cannot force my lips into a smile, but I struggle up to my feet. "I'm sorry," I say. (What about you, Luci? Would you rather be a horror story or a failure? And why, my friend, is hero not an option?)

Opal said that the weak never get far, but I am the definition of weak - brittle and breakable and fragile. And here I am, far away from home, beyond Meela, beyond my mother and father, and well away from myself. I don't know how else to define far, but I feel as though in that sense at least, she is wrong. (I can't help but accept her fierce declaration of what can only be described as cowardice. After all, it's that or evil.)


I stand and wander blindly into the fog, glad that it is hiding me from the horrors of the world.



(I am Sierra Birdbrook and I might not be brave, after all.)



"X-xanthus, is that you?"

The birds are mocking me
They call to be heard
The birds are mocking me
They curse my return

How am I gonna get myself back home?

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