Guard and Scythe

The Dark Woods

Apologizing in advance for spelling/grammar errors

The picture on the side is of a younger-looking Trisnae :)

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It's a fine line we walk between survival and insanity; to survive we must hide inside a world in our heads where we can still lie to ourselves, say everything will be alright. It will never be alright. Insanity is only one step further ahead because then we forget the difference between our world and reality, so the two mash together to form a sort of twisted version of reality where we can no longer tell what the truth is, and what we only have created inside our heads: like looking through a glass window that allows you to only see the other side through the distortions it creates. You suddenly find you can't see one without the other.

In my head, I can feel the tight line punctured through both ends of my skull: through the center of my forehead and all the way through and out the back. I can feel the line wobble uncertainly, waiting for me to fall. It goes slack when my head becomes fuzzy, when I feel so worn and beat that I have to remind myself to keep breathing in. I can feel it pull tight when my head feels like its been spilt in half and it feels like the inside of my skull has become a fiery pit of torture.

Sometimes I want to give up. Somedays I can't see why choosing insanity would be worse than living in reality. It's all going to end one day right? Does it matter if I'm fully "there" anymore if they are just going to kill us all? Do I want to feel the fear as they come for me and end my life? Do I want to understand anymore when it only causes more fear?

It's her who has made me hold on this long: Mickenna. Something about her gives me reason to hold on. I'm hanging on the edge of this cliff, and only she still holds me from falling. What it is about her that has given me this strength, I don't know. Is it because she herself has suffered much longer than I have, yet she still remains unbroken? Or is it that she is guiding me by the hand through the thorn bushes and ground covered in sharp rocks and fire? 

Could it be that some part of me wants to please her? To prove to her that I am a worthy companion, and not just some sniveling, pathetic child?

The wheels of the trucks just keep turning round and round, bringing us closer and closer to the unknown location of our destination. I haven't moved since the men threw me into the back of this truck yesterday morning. There is nowhere to move even if I wanted to: we are packed in here tighter than anything near comfortable. Children still cry and their pitiable wails pierce sharply through the thick clattering hum of the engine and motor.

For the next day and a half, I mostly drift inbetween a half state of consciousness and restless sleep. As long as I'm asleep, I don't have to think and worry about what lies ahead. Slowly the cries and moaning from the children begin to die down. There is no more water left in us to cry; we have dried up, and now our throats crack like dusty clay pots left out in the desert. Without food for days, even the thinnest of us shrink even more, so that we can see our bones fighting for room beneath our taut yellow skin.

Someone begins to cough up blood; it is dark red, almost black, and looks sticky and thick. The child tries to scream but her throat is so dry that almost all the sound is stultified inside her thick, blood coated throat. The others scoot as far away from the girl as possible, making the rest of us even more crowded. The little girl dies an hour later. Nobody tries to approach her corspe.

More children begin to die: some, like the girl, begin when they start coughing up the dark sticky blood, others pass out from the heat and dehydration and never wake up. Some fall into a fever that breaks into burning sweat all over their body until the fever overcomes them and they too fall into the darkness of death. One girl, already looking emaciated, roles over clutching her stomuch, her body convulses, and the violent spasms only end when the girl is dead and few minutes later; a boy said loudly that her stomuch must have exploded, but I don't know whether to believe him or not.