S-S-S

The droplets of tears were falling from the eyes of a little girl, like she was held back from her freedom.

Inside a room, there had been three other individuals that had held her captive while they had been smoking and drinking casually without speaking.

The girl could not do anything to liberate her self from these 3 people. As they were criminals and had plans to steal, sell, and possibly get whatever they could to their own hands.

However, the girl did not know what to do, sitting on the corner at the end of this small apartment room they had been only held her from her will.

"Look, if we don't get anything from this girl we should just kill her and get it over with" Said one of the three.

"But that fucker won't do anything, because of how "scared" he is, see? This is what happens when you push too much Ray" Said another with a hard accent.

What had recently occured is that this trio of misfits had stumbled upon a girl that had worth value to a family of the higher districts in the more wealthier states.

The thinker of this small group, Ray, thought that they would take the girl, and hold her hostage, without even knowing a thing about how it would go. Word would soon travel in the streets of the10th district, even past and before as there is a saying that always goes like this: 'these streets talk, and sometimes its best not to hear them speak'.

The girl they had abducted was a little girl around the age of 11.

On that day the girl had decided to leave her own district to explore but had gotten stuck behind a convoy and had fallen off the end-zones of the district grids.

Those end-zones traverse towards the outerlayers of the cities into different channels that pass through the lowered depths of the system, for her to even be at the 10th district is pure luck.

For anyone to fall through those zones can get lost, and maybe even killed without warning.

She had looked towards the three each selectively for brief amounts of time, shaking and cold.

She was not restrained, the room was too closed off to even move without the trio in front of her.

The only thing that looked open was the window sill.

This room was dark, and although it was raining outside would make things even darker were it not for the light of the candle that was on the coffe table along with a telephone in front of the red couch.

The walls of the apartment had been dirty, and the floor was hardwood, it was seldom ever cleaned.

These three individuals were just in the job for the money.

One seated in a wooden chair close to the closed apartment door. Another on a broken red stained couch, could possibly be blood or anything else. And the third with his back against the wall.

Although the other two had no selective purpose, Ray however had a different objective to this.

He never wanted the money. He wanted to change something, although he wasn't sure why he even agreed to this, he still decided to join in.

Ray looked outside through the tiny crack in the small window sil that was in the room. The sound of rain was soft but loud.

He felt the nostalgia from the sound and closed his eyes, but he could also hear the whimper cries of the girl. Much like the ones he used to have when he was younger.

He felt sorry, and wished this world was different, but nothing will ever change.

upon slightly opening his eyes again, the ring of a nearby telephone had gone off.

It was the corded telephone on the coffee table.

The one laying down on the couch moved and sat up towards the phone anxiously.

Hovering his hand over the ringing phone he then grabbed the head of the corded phone and reeled it close to his ear.

"So, deal or no deal?" with a sweat droplet sliding from his forehead slowly, this slightly bearded man was the one that offered Ray the job.

A small voice tone could be heard from the phone but it was hard to deter what exactly was bieng said.

"Very well, but you better not change anything, you have to keep your end of the bargain" The slightly bearded man's rough voice echoed throughout the room as it had Ray and the other one on the seat edged towards the phone. 

The little girl watched helplessly with teary eyes, however, upon looking up behind both the other two with his back arched against the wall, Ray and the little girls eyes met.

As they spoke on, Ray was on the move.

With his mouth, he spelled out words trying not to attract the attention of the other two, not very sure if she would understand.

But as the girl copied him hesistantly, she held a small confused expression, and slighlty nodded.

Pushing his back off from the wall, he stumbled and fell towards the hardwood floor with a loud thump.

"Ow"

This caught the attention of both the other two men that were in the room paying close attention to the phone rather than the girl.

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"You idiot, stay back there" Whispered the bearded one.

Quickly though he gauged back his attention to the phone.

"Uh... Sorry Helck"

After his apology he got up in a very odd manner, but moved as if it was natural, and once again stood up, the other two shifted their attention back onto the phone attentively.

Ray once again, glanced back at the girl.

Spelling out the word down, and moving his eyes toward the floor, there had been a small object under the coffee table that was not there before.

When the girl understood, her eyes had pinpointed onto the coffee table, however with a few more seconds, she would see it then.

It was a key, and what could be the key to the apartments main door.

After noticing it, she glanced back at Ray, He was not looking back like he would have though.

He was Arched onto the wall and staring out the windowsil again.

Ray was smiling with eyes that were calm. It was like as if he was saying 'I will get you your freedom' Without him even saying it.

With a few moments left to spare on the phone, Helck, the slightly bearded man had was finally ending the call.

"All right, well then, keep in touch ah... Mister Corvonts was it?"

Helck cracked up a crooked chuckle, he only needed time before it would all begin.

S...S...S...

(A/n:These three S..S..S.. from now on will either mean change of pov or time frame pass, mainly because theres still so much about this story I have prepped up, please pay attention to the smaller details of POV of this story as it will cause lots of misunderstanding if no attention is paid)(Back to the story)

I woke up on my bed again, yesterday me and Jack talked about what we were going to do next to see if we could help those kids. 

I have no honest idea about why I am agreeing to do this, I personally believe its a waste of time. 

Speaking as a kid I only know what I need to. 

I didn't know why though, but my body feels as light as a feather today. I'm feeling kind of great in terms of condition. 

I sat up from the bed that I again had been resting in, I moved one leg after another, and took a step on the ground. 

The floor rug was cold as much as it was comfortable to the feet. 

I also noticed that my clothes weren't that great. 

I was wearing slacks, a button up shirt and under it I was wearing a black t-shirt. But the clothes I was wearing was dirty, and smelled. 

I either needed to wash them, or needed to get a new set of clothing. 

I wanted to know where Jack got his clothes from, I was thinking it would be the market, I guess he would need to show me around.

I left the room and went to the living room. 

The halls of this mansion were pretty neat, apart from bieng destroyed and abandoned. Makes me wonder how something like this fell from the surface into the sewers. 

In fact I have never really thought about that in the first place when I came, it just didn't seem so important at the time to me I guess. 

As I was walking closer to my destination, I was beginning to hear humming from a familiar voice.

A door at the end of where I was headed barely creaked open and the humming sounded like it was Jack. 

I pushed the door forward and it had let out a wooden creaking noise.

I didn't think it would startle Jack, he had stopped humming the second I made that noise, I saw him sitting by himself on the couch with a book open in his hand. 

He had been writing something. The book in his hands though looked as if it was a small handmade notebook. It was in tatters but still looked to serve its use as a notebook. 

"hey, morning" He said.

He quickly put down the book, and grabbed something that looked like a ruffled up black linen blanket. He pulled it over himself.

"Look at this, I was thinking we could use these today". 

I looked at what he was trying to show me and I guess it was a sort of cloak, or hoodie for us to cover ourselves. 

"Today we will be ascending to the Birchten marketplace, we need to look for a few things to buy". 

We were only kids. What the hell would kids be buying in a marketplace? And with what money? 

I thought that to myself but it was interesting at what he was saying. I looked at what he had though, a cloak? Why would we ever need a cloak? 

"Here's yours, I have a feelin' you'd be askin' me what th' cloak is for, but don't worry, you'll understand soon enough" He had a smile to his face whilist handing me that black linen cloak. I was suprised but still I wanted to see for myself completely about what this specific marketplace was really about. 

S.S.S 

 Rain poured, and the scent of metal and dirt filled my nostrils, the taste of the air was clear.

This was Birchten Marketplace of the 10th district. I could see people hiding their faces and covering themselves with cloaks too, but not for the rain. It was to hide their faces from anyone who could pose danger. 

On the way here though, there were rules that Jack told me to follow, since we were a slight bit far from where we slept or lived. I don't even know where Jack gets his money or where he gets all this food. 

Everytime I ask he always responds with something stupid or just has a very declarative response. Either he hides something or he just really does as he says. 

There were people who were tall, big, Small, some of those people didn't have cloaks, there were also some who were drunk or others who were just disparent, but one thing is for sure that no one stood on the streets. 

No one sat around, no one stayed except for those who were the ones selling the good stuff. 

There were also billboards up. Electronic displays showing fancy words. They had shown gagets and many other gizmos. Stores that bartered with there customers furiously and those that just walked around showing others their wares. 

This marketplace was something else compared to the one on the regulatory street that we would usually see above from where we lived. 

I kept an eye around me, making sure no one would try to surround us or whatever, but Jack didn't care. It was as if he knew what these streets were made of. 

I recall him telling me something of the sort: "If you act like your from there, you lose attraction from the many living there, they won't care as long as you don't care" 

That bieng said, I still felt off. 

I looked around for a bit while trailing behind Jack. I caught my eyes on a girl that was walking with other three people.  

This girl. 

Her eyes seemed like she was empty. Something also seemed wrong it didn't look like she was able to leave. Upon closer inspection, it was like she was chained to one of the three that were in a group alltogether. 

It was hard to see from all this pouring rain, but she was covered in a dark red ragged cloak that looked like it was damaged. 

The other three people with her wore street clothing, one of them had a mantle with a hoodie to cover his face. The other wore a long coat that had no sleeves on it. and the third just had a leather jacket. 

One of them had a beard.

And that didn't seem like the girl was with them for any good purpose from what I thought or could see. 

"Jack" 

I called out his name from behind him, and he stopped turned around to face me to hear about what I was going to say. 

"Look..." 

I pointed in the direction that the three people and the girl could be seen at. 

"what... Whats wrong?" 

He was confused as to what I wanted to say. 

"I don't feel right about that.... Is there anything we can do?" 

Jack looked at me profoundly, and briefly glanced back at those select individuals. 

They seemed like they were bartering with a few others. Jack seemed like he had noticed at this point, and had turned to face me. 

"We can try to help her out, but its still too dangerous, remember what you said?" 

'How can we help others out if we can't even help ourselves out?'  I recalled what I said exactly from the time I had woken up before. 

He had a point but I couldn't help myself. Oddly I had a strong desire to help her but I had no Idea why. 

Still. Its only a matter of time before they leave.. right? 

"Come on, we have a lot to do", Jack grabbed me by the arm and dragged me with him.

S... S... S...