The Firing

Chapter Two

Chapter Two
    Emera walked through the village, grasping her bag which she had filled with a change of clothes, water, stale bread, and a knife.  “Okay,” she said aloud, “what do I do now?”  She stopped a corner, where the market had been.  She sat down and buried her head in her hands.  Never again would Mr. Masto help her steal something from the market and Mrs. Natterly would never wink at her when she noticed.  Mother would never tell her stories about her father or about life in The Center before bed again.  Her life had completely changed.
    “No, don’t start crying, that won’t help anything,” she remembered her mother saying.
    “Just follow the plan,” she whispered to herself.  She unfolded the piece of crinkled paper that was in her pocket.
Step One: Get to the hiding place
Step Two: Check the village
Step Three: Go to Inkya and take an airtram to The Center
    The steps were written in her mother’s shaky, cursive writing.  Emera could remember her mother teaching her how to read and write and how to know all of the territories by memory, all to prepare for this day.
    “Inkya is directly south of Ryne, Tryle is east, and Madne is west.  Never go north, only bad things happen up there,” her mother had said.
    This was the hardest step, to her.  Getting into an inner sector would be tricky, but getting into The Center would be even more difficult.  People from outer sectors couldn’t enter inner sectors without identification and a Purpose, and Emera had neither.  She had heard of people from Ryne trying to enter an inner sector without identification or a Purpose, and they had been sentenced to death.  It was a dangerous task, but her mother had trusted her to do it, and she knew that she would have to.
    She got up and walked to the edge of the village.  “Goodbye.”
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    “Eowyn Marlei, please enter.”
    A timid thirteen year old girl stepped into the large room.  The walls were circular and the ceiling had intricate designs on it.  It was all gold, with pillars from the red velvet carpeted floors to the high ceilings, in front of a stage, which took up nearly half of the room.  There were six small chairs, covered in red velvet fabric, on either side of a larger chair, which was covered in the same fabric, but with gold detailing.  6 men and 6 women sat in the smaller chairs, alternating male, female, male, female.
    A heavily built man sat in the largest chair, his arms resting on the arm rests.  His dark hair was graying, and his brown eyes look lifeless.  He had an aura surrounding him that suggested that he was strong and powerful, a leader.
    Eowyn slowly walked toward the stage, which was on the opposite side of the room from the entrance.  The huge, wooden double doors slammed shut, and she cringed.  She stood directly in front of the man in the largest chair.  A high-pitched cough sounded from one of the women to the man’s left.  She turned her head toward the noise.
    A short, thin woman with scraggly blonde hair and a pointed nose stood up and took a step forward.  “Miss. Marlei, I am sorry to report to you that something very tragic happened two days ago.” The woman walked toward Eowyn and then stopped once she was a foot away from her.  “You’re parents worked for us here, as I’m sure you already knew.  This time, they came to The Center, they were ordered to go on a mission to Tryle and start a Firing there.  I’m afraid to report to you that they are no longer with us.”  The woman dropped her head and looked at the floor.
    Eowyn didn’t move.  She looked forward, over the woman and straight at the man in the largest chair.  “It was you, wasn’t it?  You were the one who told them to go.  This is entirely your fault.”  The man continued to look over Eowyn’s head, and didn’t say anything.  “Well?  Are you going to answer me?” she said a little louder.  “It was you who killed my parents!” she yelled.  “You aren’t going to get away with this!  I will be back here, and you will pay!”
    Two dignitaries in burgundy uniforms stomped into the room, each grabbed one of her arms, and pulled her away.  “You will pay for this!”
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    Emera yawned, and slowly opened her eyes.  She was lying on a thick branch of a large tree, where she had fallen asleep the night before.  The sun was rising, and the sky was orange and pink.  In the distance, she could see large buildings, skyscrapers she had heard them called, a sign that Inkya was near.
    Without taking her eyes off the skyscrapers, she reached her right hand behind her, blindly searching for her bag.  Once her hand found it, she put it in her lap, and took a sip of water from the bottle that was inside.  She slowly climbed down the large tree, and once she was a few feet from the ground she jumped, her bare feet landing on the hard earth.