VICIOUS (II) : peter pan ouat

How to Argue

 

Chapter 20

"Is there something you wanted?" I ask, leaning on the desk next to the cot.

The med tent seems barren, given there is a real war coming so very soon. All the supplies are tucked away neatly in drawers, and the bed made with clean sheets.

"You can't just kill people." Elizabeth chimes in, from where she sits on the bed.

I almost laugh. "Is that what you think?"

Jared looks from Elizabeth to me, running his hands through his ginger hair. He seems torn between taking Elizabeth's side or my side.

Elizabeth stands up, moving closer to me. She's taller than me, but not by enough to be intimidating. There's no height she could be to actually intimidate me. I just realised I'm shorter than both her and Blaize. Only Frank is smaller than I am.

"It's what I know." Elizabeth spits. "I was willing to let fighting Gregory drop, but this can't stand. You can't just murder boys-"

"Who attack us?" I question. "You'd rather I give him a pat on the back and a warning? You don't know what it's like here."

"And why is it like this huh?" She asks. "Why do you have to fight?"

She just doesn't understand. She doesn't know the things I've seen in the months I've been here. The murder, the blood, the horror. You have to adapt and move on, or you break and die. If I let those boys think I'm weak, I'll become a target. Like Lyle, like Thomas, like James, like Robert, like so many others. No one tells me what to do, lest I become like the lackeys of Dominique and Gregory. Lest I die.

"You haven't seen what I've seen." I snarl. "Let me guess, you're recently orphaned, never spent a day in the foster system, problem went to private school until Mommy and Daddy died tragically because of a drunk driver? Well guess what princess, that's not how the real world works."

"That's not what-"

"I've seen people die, burn to death, heads chopped off, stabbed to death, faces smashed in until their faces and skulls become a bloody stew spilt on the dirt. You want that to happen to you? That's what happens when you don't protect yourself." I argue, ignoring her.

She shakes her head, her ears turning pink as she backs away from me. "And why did that happen? There shouldn't be murder here, isn't it supposed to be some sort of ageless utopia? You've aged a decade in the months you've been here."

"I've become better." I argue.

"Have you?" I ask back. "Or have you just become vile?"

I haven't, and she's just being ridiculous now. Jared looks away, favouring to stare at the tent wall then to engage. That boy doesn't have a back bone in his body to stand up to anyone, me or her. I doubt he even has an opinion either way; he's been here too long to have Elizabeth's optimism.

"Why are you defending the terrible things that happen here?" She demands, not waiting for me to continue. "It's disgusting. Pan is awful to let all this occur."

"It's not his choice." I argue. "It's circumstance and-"

"He's supposed to be all powerful, he can stop it. You've let this island break you, and it's his fault."

That is also just a lie. This island has made me who I am today, for the better. It didn't break me, it shaped me into someone who is willing to survive. Elizabeth is weak, and so is Johnny, and so is everyone who thinks that for some reason I am somehow a bad person for doing what needs to be done.