About The Scarlett Kite
Hi! I'm Scarlett Kiteway, I'm 20 years old, a journalism student in Perplex City and this is my blog all about the excitement over the search for the Cube. I'll be keeping track of what the media over there is saying about it, and maybe a little bit about my life as well!
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Friday, October 21, 2005
Recovering, slowly
Category: story, 03:50 PM
It's been a strange week. Not in the exciting way that my weeks have been strange up till now, just strange and horrible, both scary and boring. I've talked to Violet and my dad, have managed to persuade them not to come up here by sounding extremely cheerful. I don't feel that cheerful though. Brede has been in surgery to repair his leg and in between times I've been sitting talking to him. He's getting better. Not a lot better, but a bit. He's awake a lot of the time now, and even able to talk himself. Margot, Sanj and I have taken it in turns to sit with him. He remembers even less than the rest of us, nothing of that final day at all, barely anything after we left the train. That's something none of us understand; how foggy our minds have become about that time. The doctors say it's because of the shock, or the exhaustion, or the fall.
Brede's angry. When he's awake, when he has strength, he's angry. I guess he has a right to be. Whatever happened to us wouldn't have happened if we hadn't been *there*, off the beaten track, walking an unregistered path. He says he's not angry with me, but I don't know if that's true. His parents are here and, whatever Brede feels, *they're* angry with me.
We had a long talk a few nights ago, the four of us. We put our memories in order, piecing together as much as we could. We talked about odd things that we thought had happened on the walk. Sanj said he remembered feeling frightened when there was nothing to be scared of - just that the trees seemed to be suddenly unexpected and strange. Margot remembers being lost - she says she remembers all of us together being lost, staring at the maps, trying to get our bearings, not being able to get a lock with our keys. Neither of them remember the building I think I saw - low-slung and grey. Put together it doesn't amount to much.
We've told what we remember to the mountain rescue people and the police. We've told them that there was a fifth person with us, but the truth is that none of us really know anything much about him - none of us even knew his second name. The police say they've checked but there's no one called Allain registered with Edyta College. They're following it up but there are no good leads. The mountain rescue team have scanned the area several times but there's no sign of anyone lost in the area.
And so I'd basically come to a decision. I didn't know what had happened to Allain, but there really wasn't anything I could do to help him. Sometimes, when I'm tired, I think that we just all imagined there ever *was* an Allain. As I thought about it, I became more convinced than ever that it'd been him that I met that day in the military archives, that he'd dressed up for some reason to persuade me to come here, to bring my friends. It's the only thing that makes sense, although it doesn't make a lot of sense. Maybe it was Allain who smashed Brede's leg. That doesn't make much sense either. Last night I'd decided that it was time for all this to be over, for me to go back to the city with my friends, to try to forget that any of this ever happened. That was last night.
But today it's all different. Because, this morning when I was quietly reading in my hospital room, there was a knock on the door.
I said: "Come in?"
And the old man from the military archives walked in. He looked just as I'd remembered him, tall, white-haired with pale blue eyes.
He said: "You are Scarlett Kiteway, yes?"
I nodded. I couldn't say anything.
He said: "You have to help me. They've taken my grandson. They've taken Allain."