Chapter 3

Almost ten hours had passed by and still no diamonds anywhere to be seen, leaving Naiya discouraged.  Five hours ago she realized that searching in the tunnel was an effort in futility so she decided to turn back.  Now she was back at the dark intersection where she started.  Before going down the other tunnel she decided to head back out for some fresh air.  The darkness was suffocating and she could only take so much before she either had to leave or risk going completely insane.  She ran a cold, dirty hand through her thick shoulder-length brunette hair and- with a defeated sigh- trudged out into the sunlight.  The setting sun shone its luminous rays right into her brown pupils making her wince for a moment.  Approximately ten minutes to sundown, she thought.  Not nearly enough time to fill up her cart. Not even enough time to get the cart filled halfway or a fourth of the way.  Scowling, she looked down at her cart. Yup, she was royally screwed.  Clock-out time was approaching and ‘Momma’ wasn’t going to want to hear any excuses pertaining to why she had not met her daily quota.  She looked down at her dull grey, dirty, oversized overalls and scowled deeper.  All of this dirt and nothing to show for it.   Now she was going to have to mine these stupid, illusive diamonds in the cold, frightening darkness.  Staring into the sunset, struggling to accept her fate, when ‘Momma’ herself strolled up along with her two henchmen from earlier.  After a moment of contemplation, Naiya decided that she didn’t want to get into any more trouble than what she was already in and removed the scowl from her face, replacing it with a blank stare.  ‘Momma’ stopped three feet from her, her nose twitching, and looked around.  Her two henchmen stood obediently 2 feet behind her, signifying her dominance over them.  She stood there tapping her foot impatiently as her sweeping red hair blew in the gentle breeze.

“Well?” she asked, “Where them diamonds at?”

“The mine is completely bare… I couldn’t find-”

“Likely excuse!” she exclaimed but stopped short as she heard the sound of a rattling cart approaching them.  Naiya bolted around- her dirty and probably matted auburn hair blowing in the gentle breeze that now felt like a slap in the face to her- dumbfounded to find Azazel’s cart filled with the oh-so-elusive rocks.  She felt like a complete idiot.  Here she was standing here at clock-out time with nothing to show for the ten freaking hours of working her butt off but aching feet, dirty skin, and the musty smells that accompanied her wherever she went.  Here she was at clock-out time with not even one stupid diamond while this b*****d had a whole cart full of the stupid rocks.  He held a blank stare on his face despite the deep scowl of hatred Naiya shot at him.  If they could, her eyes would’ve shot a barrage of daggers straight through him.  Well that’s what she got for even having a little bit of trust in him.  It just went to show you, if you put your faith in someone’s hands they would most certainly drop it.   Clenching her fists to her sides, she turned back around towards ‘Momma’ and stared at the ground, barring her teeth as she spoke.

“Well, well, well,” said the red-headed woman, her green eyes practically showing dollar signs as she stared down at the diamond-filled cart, “Looks like dat night shift really provided some encouragement, huh boy?” she smirked at him before turning to me, “Maybe it’ll do you some good too,” she spat on the ground and turned to walk away, her black heeled boots clicking in a steady rhythm as she strode away leaving only Naiya and Azazel. An angry silence filled the air between them and the tension seemed to put a strain on it.  Finally,  Naiya broke the silence.

“If you’re finished what are you still doing here?” she growled still staring at the ground. It took all of her willpower inside of her to keep from punching the sycophant square in the jaw.  She knew this would happen.  She knew the dangers of putting your trust in someone else; she knew that in the end she would find herself disappointed, and yet she did so anyway like a fool.  Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.  Those were the words going through her head that she heard from one of the henchman.  Those words were the motto she lived by.  She never allowed herself to trust anyone until now, and look where it got her: standing in front of the traitor looking stupid and pathetic.  That’s what she thought for thinking that he was like her.  Stupid, she scolded herself.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.  

“What the hell are you still doing here? You finished your quota, now go the hell away,” she spoke through her teeth, trying her very best not to just murder him right there and then.

Maintaining an impassive look on his face, he spoke, “I don’t know what you are so upset about.  Not my fault you picked a barren tunnel.  You of all people should know the dangers of putting your faith and your trust in someone else’s arms.  I don’t even hardly know you, so I don’t know why you are looking so dejected and betrayed.  It’s quite pathetic, really,” he said, his hazel eyes peering straight in Naiya’s rich mahogany eyes.  He saw the quick flash of hurt, but it was quickly replaced by one of absolute hatred.  He could practically feel her blood boiling; he could see the steam coming out of her ears.  She was one second away from going ballistic- not that he cared.  

“You know staring at me trying to bore a hole through my chest isn’t going to put diamonds in your cart.  You already have to be out here at night; believe me when I tell you that you want to get started filling your cart now while there’s some light because those caves get even darker at night- they’re even darker than our cells.  And if it’s cloudy you won’t be able to see jack, and you definitely don’t want ‘Momma’ to come back in the morning to find your cart still empty, do you?” he asked mockingly as he started walking away from her with his cart.   

Tears threatened to flow like rivers from her eyes, but she held them back not wanting to give him the satisfaction of knowing he hurt her.  Holding her head down, she grabbed her cart and ax and started back into the cave whispering the words, “I hate you, Azazel,”. He watched as  her skinny, pale figure disappeared into the dark cave before walking in the opposite direction.  He heard what she said, though she whispered, but he didn’t care.  He was tired and his bones ached.  Dog-eat-dog world, kitten.  You should know that by now.  

…

As the cold, nighttime air set in,  Mara and Addilyn lay (with their backs facing each other) shivering in the dark on their lumpy mats in silence.  Two hours had passed by and still, Naiya was nowhere to be seen.  She missed dinner and did not arrive with the others.  Mara’s heartbeat and pulse was now through the roof thanks to her never-ending anxiousness.  Her mind kept on coming up with possible scenarios.  Each one worse than the last.  Did the cave collapse?  Did she get dehydrated? Did she come down with the dreaded virus after all?  Endless questions raced through her young mind like cars on a racetrack, causing her to develop a grueling headache.  Brushing her matted hair out of her eyes, Mara turned to her sister who was lying on the other side of the room shivering and humming a foreign tune to herself.   Her small silouhette rocking back and forth in a rhythmic way that had Mara smiling.  She was so oblivious to this entire hell and Mara wished that she would remain that way.  However, she knew that pretty soon little Addilyn’s fantasy care-free world would come to a shocking end.  Her bubble would be shattered in the most cruel way possible, and she would be left only a shell of the person she was before.  The thought made Mara grieve and angry.  She wanted better for her little sister.  Her and Naiya did.  She didn’t want her to lose that gleam in her eyes.  She didn’t want her wide curious eyes to become dull and lifeless.  She didn’t want her soul to be cracked or shattered into a million tiny pieces with no hope of being put back together again.  She wanted better for her little sister.  That’s what she deserved: a better life beyond this hell filled with endless possibilities; a better life where she would be free to grow happy and healthy; where she would make friends and find love and bloom into a beautiful, bright young woman and live out her days in complete bliss.  However, Mara knew that such things like that did not exist.  Such thoughts had no place there.  They died a long time ago.  Her will was broken a long time ago.  She and her sisters would live out the rest of their miserable, pathetic lives in this hell until fate finally took pity on them and put them out of their misery.  This was their lot in life.  What had she done to deserve such a cruel fate, she wondered, cold tears stinging her eyes.  What had she possibly done to end up here?  Why were the Fates so cruel?  Small tears flowed down her cold, dirty cheeks and into her mouth.  Sniffling she closed her brown eyes and tried to rock herself to sleep despite the cold.  At least in her dreams she could temporarily be free.  At least in her dreams she was safe and warm.  At least in her dreams she could allow herself to feel an emotion she had never knew before: hope.

...

Anger- a dangerous and highly explosive emotion.  That emotion was the only thing Naiya was feeling right now, and her cold, wet, dirty clothes and aching bones were only adding fuel to her already burning fire.  She felt nothing but anger towards that backstabbing sycophant Azazel,  anger towards that red-headed cigarette-smoking witch and her brainless goon-squad, anger towards her birthers whoever the heck the were for sticking her and her sisters in this hell-hole, and anger towards the world and the Fates for her stinking lot in life.   Here she was, out in the dark of night in a stinking wet cave with nothing more than a rusty, creaky old cart that was STILL empty, by the way, a dim headlamp which was doing her little good, and the constant drips of water echoing in the distance.  She was cold, tired, and hungry- so hungry that she would readily and happily lap up anything that ol’ Barry sat in front of her (and that was saying something considering that all his cooking were the equivalent of tasteless crap).   Her skin- if one could see it through the thick blanket of  intense darkness- was so pale that it would stand out against a perfectly white piece of paper, and her brown eyes were dull from fatigue yet burned with that simmering anger inside of her.   She would never find any diamonds, she thought, for even though her eyes were quite used to the dark conditions of the caves, she never ventured inside of one at night- because she always managed to finish her load before clock-out time, she reminded herself.  Letting out a fatigued sigh, she ventured deeper into the tunnel on Azazel’s side.  She was bound to find some more eventually, she concluded, if there was any more to be found.  She knew that she would be in deeper trouble if the light of dawn crept in and she still didn’t manage to find anything.   That hardly happened to anyone and to those unlucky few that it did happen to- well they were never seen again, so she had an idea of what the consequences would be if she failed to meet her quota.

She would probably be killed in the most cruel way possible, she thought bitterly, while Azazel would go on with his life.   Azazel.  His face kept on popping up in her head every time her anger would start to die down and transform into acceptance.  She KNEW that this would happen.  She KNEW that he couldn’t be trusted; that he would betray and hurt her, because after all, they had grown up in the same hell-hole.  They might not have ever crossed paths until now, but they both had abode here from birth and they both had experienced the same tortures.  Just then Mara and Addilyn’s face flashed through her head, and it made her heart sting in pain.   Pretty soon, they would be going through the same tortures she did, maybe not as intense depending on their willpower but torture all the same.  When a group became of age, they were taken from their cells to spend an entire year going through horrible tortures in order to break their willpower and crush their thirst for freedom.  By the time it was all done, they would be broken, complacent, and their once lively eyes and questionable mind would be dull and scarred.  Mara and Addilyn would be comparatively easier to break, she thought.  She, on the other hand, was one of those few ‘rebels’ who didn’t conform to the established system and constantly resisted any attempts to crush her spirit. Because of this, she went through one of the most- if not the most- cruel torture exercises daily, and at one point hourly, for an entire month before they decided that they succeeded, and they had… almost.  For although Naiya knew that her only escape out of this hell was the Death Angel, she didn’t accept it and she still kept a small flame of fire in her heart that she had been nurturing and feeding for years, but made sure to keep it hidden.  ‘Momma’ had a unique and irritating talent to peer into the souls of her victims to see if they were truly broken or not, for the smallest hint of resistance by ONE, would eventually lead to an uprising and rebelling by ALL, she would say.  Naiya lived by those words and those words were what inspired her to never let that will of fire in her heart die out.  Whenever the thought started to form in her head, her mind would go back to those words and the thought would be immediately killed and the fire would only grow.   A hint of a smile formed on her face.  If it killed her she would eventually free her sisters if no one else, though she would have liked to free them all.  Even the worst of the people here didn’t deserve to remain here until death took them, like it took her parents.   A lone tear flowed down her face at the thought of their demise.   Shaking her head, she stumbled even further down the path, hoping that she would spot something that would look remotely like a diamond.  The headlamp she wore was dull so she couldn’t really make out her surroundings, but the dim light would bounce be reflected back at her when it shone on a diamond, and if there were a whole bunch of them, it would illuminate that part of the cave.  However, she had been walking for another couple of hours and she still hadn’t come across anything like that.  Stupid probably took them all, she thought bitterly, just to spite her.   She vowed revenge on the stupid soul who would dare to betray her… Azazel will regret this day she promised… he will regret it indeed.  She would see to it.

…

“AAAAAAAAH!!!!” the little boy screamed in agony as yet another heartstopping shock wave passed through his body again.  Why were they doing this, he thought.  Why were they making him suffer like this?   He had been in the tiny room for what felt like forever, getting shocked and whipped repeatedly and alternately until he was at the point of death- when his heart would finally stop beating.  Then they ‘d revive him and do it all over again.  Another more intense shock coursed through his small body.

“AAAAAAHHH!!!! STOP IT!!!!” he yelled, his young voice now dry and hoarse.   Why  couldn’t they just let his heart stop for good?  Why did they have to keep on putting him through this?   Didn’t they know that it hurt like hell?  Maybe they loved to see him in agony, he thought.  That made him angry.  Very angry.  The fact that they would put a little boy through this much torture proved that these peo- no the monsters had no semblance of a heart whatsoever.    He wanted his mommy.  He wanted her to hold him and to make this nightmare end.  He wanted her to whisper sweet promises into his ear and to lull him into a blissful sleep.  He wanted an escape from this hell, and he wanted it now.  Yet another, stronger shock passed through him, throwing him into a state of oblivion.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!” he yelled at the top of his lungs making his voice go out.   “Mommy,” he whispered.    He wanted his mommy.   He needed her and no one was there to aid him.  His wide hazel eyes glistened with fresh tears that threatened to spill over like rivers. He hated feeling like this.  Weak.  Helpless.  They probably wanted to see him cry and ball his eyes out.  He didn’t want to give them that satisfaction, therefore he closed his eyes tightly.  The thoughts of his mother filled his head.  Her gentle smile.  Her kind, green eyes.   Her soft, curly auburn hair.   Another shock when through his body, but he didn’t scream out this time.  Instead, he bit the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood and focused on that pain instead.   Another shock, and another, and another, and still no scream came from him, but he could feel his mind slipping, slipping into unconsciousness.  The last thing that he heard before everything faded into nothingness is the sound of a door opening and the footsteps- more specifically, the clicking heels- of a woman approaching him.

…

He woke up with cold beads of sweat dripping down his forehead and with his breath coming in long-winded pants.  Another nightmare, he thought as he propped himself up on his mat.  His dirty dry hair was now slick with sweat and had began to droop down over his forehead.  He would have to cut it soon, he thought with annoyance.  It seemed his nightmares were getting worse with each passing year, and it felt as if he was going through that horrible torture all over again.  He ran a dirty hand through his damp hair and just stared into the darkness blankly.   Briefly his mind wandered over to Naiya and to how she was coming with the diamonds. The memory of him having to mine those allusive objects made him cringe.  He hated the dark.  It held too many monsters and other horrors- he learned that at a young age.  Finally catching his breath he laid back down on his mat and just let his mind wander again.   Naiya.  His thoughts kept on going back to the girl who was so much like himself, it was as if they were two sides of the same tarnished coin.   They had similar personalities which drew him to her like a magnet draws in a piece of steel.  However, as much as he felt drawn to her, he still did not regret saving himself another horrid night in that wretched cave.  It was the motto he lived by: if it was me or him, it would always be me.  He had never broke that motto and he’d sure as heck would not break it now- not for her or anyone.   He kept justifying his ‘betrayal’ of her over and over again as if he was trying to convince himself of his justification.   With a weary sigh, he closed his eyes once more in hopes that he could finally drift back into the nothingness he craved with a passion. God knew that he was utterly exhausted from the grueling night before.   Sleep, he thought.  Sleep.  He kept chanting that over and over and over until sleep finally took him.

…

The sound of clinking filled the nighttime air accompanied with the sound of water dripping onto the hard ground.   Her anxiety levels were now through the roof  right now and it took her entire willpower to keep from jumping out of her skin and running for the hills- or as far as she could run before getting caught and thrown into the chamber, or what she liked to call Satan’s own personal quarters, where she would get quality time with shock collars, whips, knives, and any other torture device one could come up with; you name it, it’s there.  At the thought of the tortures she was forced through, her back started to ache- or more specifically the long, deep scars that marred it, forever a reminder of how much her life was worth to these people.  At times, she felt as if the dirt she walked on held more value to them than she did- and she wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case.  She was nothing, her little sisters were nothing, her friends were nothing, that lying backstabbing Azazel was nothing, the ninety-nine others that survived in this hole with her were nothing.  Clenching her fists, she blocked out the pain and continued down Azazel’s side of the cave hoping and praying that she would find at least one diamond before the midnight moon arose.  

“Finally,” she whispered-yelled, almost jumping for joy.   After about ten more minutes of quiet- or almost quiet-walking and brood she finally came to an opening in the tunnel filled to the brim with diamonds.  With her pick in her weary hands she broke out into a dead towards the wall to her left and proceeded to hack away at the rock.  Though her headlamp was dim, her eyes had at last adjusted to the darkness and her skin had gotten numb to the biting cold until it was almost nonexistent.  A sigh of relief escaped her lungs for the simple fact that she wouldn’t have to find out what happened to those who failed to meet their quota or those who ‘failed to please’ as Momma would say.  Life was hell, but she couldn’t die just yet.  She had to live for her sisters.  Therefore, though cold sweat dripped down her forehead and soaked her already dirty back; though her brown hair felt all dry and itchy; though her eyes started to feel heavy and droopy; though every muscle in her body was burning as if they were being pierced by needles dipped in lava, she didn’t dare stop.  She continued to mine every single diamond her owl eyes could spot and load them in her cart.   Keep pushing.  Keep pushing.  Don’t stop, just block out the pain, block out everything but the here and now, but the who you are and what you are doing.   Block the pain.  Block the sleep.  Block the hole.  She chanted in her head over and over and over again as she clawed, picked, and whacked at the rock around her to reach those diamonds in the rough.   

Author's Note

I really don't think this chapter is good enough to tell you the truth but I'll let you be the judge of that. Now I gotta figure out how im going to continue this story. :/. Anyways sorry for the long wait, read, review/comment, and have a wonderful and blessed day.