INTERIM · BEN PARISH | ✓

Fourteen

I missed Zombie so much omg finally he's here! :)

RINGER SWINGS THE blade upward, and it feels like she's grazing my skin. Then the sting comes. I feel the pellet taken out.

"I remember this area," I say to myself quietly. "The camp I went to before transferring to Wright-Patterson." Where I thought Levi was killed, and where I shot him now. Ashpit.

"Nice to know, can I see Barrel now?" Stiletto demands, stomping her foot on the ground. "Please?"

"Fine," Scarecrow says, and she takes off. I give Scarecrow an I got her look and chase her down until I'm right next to her, but that's right after she enters the first floor.

She slows down her pace, jogging lightly until she sees Barrel's makeshift bed next to Dot, who's sleeping. Both are hooked up to an IV bag (Scarecrow is a miracle worker, honestly). "Barrel?"

"Stil-" I begin to say before she hurries over next to him.

"He can't be dead.. he can't," she says. Her voice is just above a whisper now. I can hear her whimper quietly. She wipes her eyes and nose, falling on her knees beside him. "How can death be so cruel?"

That's not true. Death to me is never sentimental.

I'm a few feet away. I say nothing, and let her grieve.

She take his hand and opens the weak fist he's made. She tucks something in his hand then closes it back up. After she stands, she turns around and doesn't look back, but her cheeks are wet with tears.

As she leaves, footsteps approach and stop next to me. "Barrel mentioned Stiletto."

"Before he died." Scarecrow.

"What did he say?"

"He forgives her. He likes her. Something like that. I can't remember," he shrugs. He looks down as if thinking hard. "He did say... Musket... protect her. I'm not Musket. Shoulda told him."

"He knows that Musket cares for her?"

"We all did. You didn't see."

"Please. The emotional tension between them made it awkward for all of us for literally six months," I point out. I hear him laugh.

"Point taken. Now... Open his hand."

"Okay." I walk over to him and pry open his fist. For some reason, it had unfurled willingly for Stiletto while it took some force for me to open his hand.

After finally getting it open, I see he was holding onto a small, smiley faced eraser, one similar to the one that Stiletto had rubbed down, only this one had a full smile and the color was pink.

Stiletto had found it, the day I talked to Private Bramble at P&D. I didn't know it was a new eraser, and I definitely didn't know that it was for Barrel.

"Well, this love story just got a whole lot more confusing," I mutter sarcastically. Scarecrow snorts from behind me.

"Sergeant Red?" a boy named Dumbo calls. "We need you."

Scarecrow nods in my direction.

Over the campfire, all of us devise our plan. Ringer explains Zombie's choice to go back for Nugget, and everything she says is absurd. I still find it hard to believe that all this time it was a death camp to see who would survive and turn on each other. Her points are somewhat true but not credible.

"Okay. You got this, right? Now we have to pick someone o go inside and inform him on our plan's revision," Ringer says. "I'll go."

"No. I will." The words fly out of my mouth before I can stop them. I correct myself immediately. "I still don't believe you.. but I'm here anyway so if they stop me, my mind's an alibi. Just in case."