marlon maynes | district nine | fin

I am the oldest of the group. We are castaways -- unwanted by our parents and definitely unwanted by society. We all have different stories. Some of us ran away. Some of us had nowhere else to go. Some of us were dropped off at orphanages, or left to die somewhere in the cold. The point is we aren't exactly the image of perfection when the word "family" pops into our heads. We fight, we bicker, perhaps we don't fully trust each other.

The one thing we all have in common, though, is that we want revenge.

They call us "The Broken Toys." But really, we are more of a magic show these days: we get in and make them look one way while the magic happens elsewhere. The distraction can be anything, really. A simple lie about an animal attack, a claim that they've won a contest, a fake job interview -- the options are endless. They don't have to last forever. Just long enough to let us work our magic.

What is this magic, though? What can we do that makes us so well-known?

Our parents didn't want us. Society rejected us. We only have each other now, and that's all we need.

So we are killing everyone whose ever laid a finger on us.

The great thing is that, besides the similar backstories, none of us are tied together. The Capitol has no leads. (It turns out there are perks to being invisible after all.) We see it as getting even. They hurt us, we hurt them back. And eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. It's only fair, after all, those rules are ancient.

It started when I was eleven and my sister, (my real sister,) Nina was ten. Our mother and father sat us down in the pretty leather couch we used to play board games together on. It was early in the morning, hours before school. "Your mother and I can't do it anymore," my father said simply, "we were not built for this life."

"We do love you. Both of you. No matter what they'll say when we are gone." My mother promised. "Gone? Where are you going?" It was an instinct to grab for Nina's hand. Suddenly the leather on the couch was itchy and the color was sickening and it was not a place for playing games. It was a place for parents telling their children they were leaving them.

"Away. But you'll be fine -- both of you. I have a sister who might take you in until you're old enough."

"You told us we didn't have any family!"

"I lied. It was just easier that way, Marlon."

They took a moment to stare at us. Now that I have grown older, I hate looking in the mirror because I can see my father. These are his gray eyes. This is his ashen hair, his pale skin. I am wearing his pointed, elfish features, his crooked smile, his long neck. I am not this person. I am not my father. I want to be Marlon Maynes, the boy who fought the lions and tigers of darkness and loneliness, not Orval Maynes, the man who opened the cages.

"Come, now. We have to be going."

They left us on the doorstep of some beaten-down house neither Nina nor I had ever seen before. The ragged mail box was labeled "Dawes." Perhaps it was once supposed to say something else. I couldn't tell from all of the chipped paint and dry rot.

We never knocked.

Instead we cried: both of us.

And we ran as soon as they disappeared.

For the longest time we tried to find them, but there was no luck. It isn't easy to find people who don't want to be found, especially when the ones searching aren't even teenagers yet. It had been four days since either of us had eaten anything other than some bugs we found under an old log, and we were on the fast track to death.

And they found us.

None of them were much older than me. The oldest couldn't have been more than thirteen. They were like us: lost, dead to the world. They taught us their ways of stealing food and stealing nice things for money. They showed us how to find nice places to sleep and suddenly things weren't so bad. We were okay.

We weren't alone.

But eventually, bad things started happening. They caught a few of us, including the oldest and we didn't know what to do. We were growing weak and they were growing strong and we had to remind them that we were dangerous. So we upped the ante. "I'll see your theft and raise you murder."

It worked.

No one wanted to fuck with a bunch of scorned children. And they were smart for that, because anyone who tried to stop us from what we were doing ended up face down in a ditch: minus a wallet, some pride, maybe a few nice articles of clothing, and sporting pretty crimson slices on their flesh. We also changed other things. We couldn't just continue being a homeless horde. People would find us every time, no matter how well we hid. We all got day jobs. Mine, building weapons for the peacekeepers. (Oh, the irony.) It's actually sort of sickening: "Here's a gun so you can shoot me and my friends for fighting against this corrupt system we are living in!"

But in another sort of way, it's brilliant. I know just how much they are buying. I know just how much ammo they have, how long it would take them to run out. I know which weapons they've purchased and everything about them. When the time comes, I can devise a way to wait them out. When the time comes, I can make sure we beat them, this time for good.

Then we'll be the ones no one can ever hurt again.

For the first time in our lives, the broken toys will rule.

ϟ
table by zoe