Surprisingly Easy

Rowan actually woke up the next morning.  I was surprised.  He was paler than usual (which was saying something) and all sweaty even though our cell was freezing cold.  The vultures were watching him outside the cage, cawing and murmuring to each other.  I sat on the floor, beside his bed, glaring at those creatures.  There was no way in this world I would let them make Rowan into their next meal.

"You don't…have to do that…" Rowan whispered to me.

"Shut up," I hissed at him.

He shut up on cue, shutting his completely black eyes and sighing against the mattress.  Last night had been just as bad as the day before.  He was coughing, hacking, vomiting all night.  At one point I wondered if I should just…help…him along.  I could easily do it.  I never had, by the way, you know, killed a person.  Never had the inclination to.  Sometimes you want to kill someone, want to wring their neck and smash their faces in, but those are passing thoughts.  I never really considered killing someone.  But helping Rowan along wouldn't be murder.  It would be euthanasia.

Except I couldn't ask him if he wanted me to.  All night, as I heard him and watched him from my bunk, I wanted to ask.  I wanted to offer it to him, to give him a choice in the matter, but I couldn't voice the words.  Wanting to kill someone, even if killing them was helping them, was a hard subject to bring up.  And beyond smothering Rowan with a pillow or hanging him with his sheets, we didn't have many options.  Smashing his head into the wall would be messy and then I'd be sent to the scientists.  Neither of us would want that.  What made it worse was that I knew today was a blackweed day.  Another dose of blackweed would put Rowan down.  Maybe that's what he was waiting for.

The guards came by to take us to the mines.  I winced as Rowan rose.  He looked like some sort of stick-bug—all limbs, no meat.  I didn't want him to move.  I wanted to shove Rowan back onto his mattress and force him to rest.  I wanted to be like my father, always helping people and trying to heal them.  My father was a surgeon.  He was calm and gentle with us.  Mother was calm too.  Greg was calm.  Somehow I was explosive.  Maybe I balanced out my whole family.  Someone had to be the crazy one who tore the family apart.  I fulfilled my purpose well in that respect.

Still, Rowan stood and was somehow able to move.  We were forced into line and marched into the mines.  Rowan was behind me, and every couple of seconds I would feel his forehead hit the back of my head.  Part of me was pissed that he couldn't stand straight, part was terrified he would collapse and die on me, and another part of sure he was going to die walking.  It's hard to focus on walking when the guy behind you might croak any moment.

As usual, Rowan and I were shoved into a little pocket together.  An overseer stood behind us, beady eyes watching Rowan.  Like the day before, I prodded and hit him to keep him going.  He was tiring out quicker than the other day.  Still, if I hit him he moved faster.  So I just kept hitting him.  Maybe when we got back to the cells tonight I'd ask him if he wanted me to end it for him.  I'd probably botch up the asking, since I never speak straight, but hopefully I can get the point across.  Dying of starvation or death by guard isn't any way to go.

Halfway, or what felt like halfway to me, through our shift something felt…off.  Rowan's dead.  I quickly looked over my shoulder to Rowan.  No, he was fine.  He was struggling with pulling the pickaxe out of the wall, but he was fine.  I carefully turned my head to the guard.  He was picking at his nails, not even paying attention to us.  We couldn't fight him anyways.  This pocket was somewhat removed from the others.  The guard had a baton and rifle.  No one would fault him for shooting the uncontrollable prisoner.  No one would fault him if he shot the dying one either.  Everything was in its proper place.  We were all doing our jobs.  And yet something still was wrong.  There was an odd pressure behind my eyes.  It wasn't a migraine or headache.  It was…I can't even describe it without sounding even more crazy than I usually do.

I swear for a second I saw a pair of eyes in the rock in front of me.  Not regular eyes, big eyes.  Giant gold eyes watching me.  In the rock.  There was nothing alive in these mines but the prisoners and guards.  I hadn't even seen a cave spider down here.  But there they were, eyes the size of dinner plates, just watching me.  They even blinked.  For a moment I froze, not sure if I was officially off-the-walls-nuts or if there was something on my glasses.  It was probably something on my glasses.  The blackweed isn't supposed to make us hallucinate, just make us sick and weak.  Rowan nudged his heel at my foot.  I blinked and the eyes were gone.

Just as I was about to hit the rock a painful lurching sound came from the walls.  The floor shook and little pebbles rained down from the crevices.  Rowan made a squeaking noise and fell against the wall, dropping his pickaxe.  I threw out a hand and grabbed onto the wall where the left eye had been.  The shaking stopped a second later.  Both Rowan and I were breathing shakily.  I could hear the guard behind us moving.  A tremor?  That didn't make sense.  This building and these mines couldn't have stood for so long if this area was prone to cave-ins and earthquakes.  The guard behind us took a breath; he was about to tell us to get back to work.  Rowan was feeling about on the ground for his pickaxe.

Something lurched, the pressure behind my eyes got worse.  I groaned and pinched the bridge of my nose.  Suddenly our little pocket shook violently.  Large stones fell from the ceiling.  I shouted and grabbed Rowan, jerking him away from the wall as an apple sized rock tried to smash his hand.  The guard behind us yelled and turned around to look for one of his fellows.  He turned his back on me.  He was trying to get out of our little pocket and head for the surface.

No.  No that wasn't fair!  As the ground below me shook and jumped up and down I grabbed my axe and darted for the guard.  If I was dying in a cave-in so was he!  If my friend was going to die of blackweed because of that bastard then he deserved to die.  I didn't even think about it as I did it.  I spun around and slammed the pickaxe into the guard's neck.

I had always imagined killing a man would be a lot harder than that.  I thought there would be a huge struggle and there would be death grunts and shouts and dying curses.  This…I guess murder…was nothing like that.  This was surprisingly easy.  The guard didn't make a sound.  My pickaxe went right through the side of his neck.  I released the handle and the man crumpled to the stone floor.

"ISAAC ARE YOU—" I wheeled around and slammed my palm over Rowan's mouth.

The man squeaked under my hand.  He was shaking and sweaty.  Rowan's hands reached up and gingerly tried to pry my fingers from his mouth.  I was about to tell him to shut up when I saw those gold eyes again.  They were right behind Rowan.  It sounds insane, but the gold eyes were…smiling?  I think they winked, and I blinked again and the eyes were gone.

"We're getting out of here," I suddenly said.

Rowan strained out a sound and cast a bewildered and terrified glance at me.  How the fuck do you propose we do that?  We don't even know how to get to the surface from here!  And the mines are connected to the prison!

"We have to try."

I released Rowan's face and grabbed the rifle off the dead guard.  Rowan was hyperventilating, clambering to his feet.

"There's no way we can get out of here," he gasped.  "We don't know the way."

The caves shook and a couple of lights fell from the ceiling, shattering beside Rowan.  The man shrieked and darted over to me.

"We follow whichever path goes up.  Now come on!"

I grabbed his wrist and darted out of our tunnel.  Horrible threatening lurching sounds came from the walls.  Rocks were falling from the ceiling, everything was shaking and bouncing.  People, prisoner and guard alike, were screaming and darting in any direction.  The bulk of the crowd was heading up the hallway, but the sounds of gunfire was coming in that direction too.  The guards were going to sacrifice themselves to keep us down here.  I picked the opposite direction and dragged Rowan behind me.  A second later that idiot had to have a fucking brilliant revelation.

"M-My girl!"  He said, trying to get away from me and head down a tunnel.

"SPIRITS ROWAN!  SHE'S PROBABLY DEAD!  WE CAN'T GO LOOKING FOR HER!"  I screamed frantically.

"NO!"  Rowan jerked his wrist free and rushed down the adjacent tunnel.

"YOU FUCKIN—SPIRITS DAMN YOU!"  I raced after him.

It wouldn't be worth it for me to get out of here and not him.  Rowan would die on the surface, not in a cave-in.  But apparently I'd have to knock him out and drag his body to the sunlight.  Fucking idiot.