Don't Think To Escape (1.14)

Elizabeth sighed as Dominic chewed loudly on a poorly made sandwich. She didn't say anything as she knew it wouldn't fix anything anyway, so instead she just sat quietly and zoned out.

"Those new ones are pretty powerful don't you think Reaper?" Dominic cut into her thoughts before she could even have any. "It's too bad they have to stay here.."

"Hm? What do you mean too bad?" Elizabeth muttered. "Remember that you and everyone else should be treating being here like an honor, leaving this place would just be even more dangerous." She hissed, her stomach twisting as she spoke those words.

The truth is, she didn't know a life outside of Malachite's rule, and neither did any of her siblings and friends. Her brother Zane, was always being punished for being too weak, but she couldn't do anything, she had to worry about herself and only herself. She was the strongest, fastest, smartest and scariest of them all, and Malachite made sure she knew that every day of her life. She didn't have time to deal with the whines and whimpers of Zane or Dominic, they would always be in last place if they acted like that.

But deep down, she knew something was wrong, Malachite was always reminding them that their families and friends abandoned them when they were young, but sometimes, he made it very clear he was lying. Especially now with the new masks, it was an obvious reveal that they were not abandoned from their families, seeing as Elizabeth, Sarah and Riptide had lead the missions to capture all of the new masks from their schools and families.

Elizabeth envied some of them, seeing as they actually got to learn, read and write, play with toys their parents gave them. She could see that some of them really missed their normal life, she could see the ones who had loving families that were probably worried sick about them. But she had taught herself not to care about the feelings of others, as it would weaken her and make her soft. If she was the strongest then she had to make sure everyone knew, and that meant not letting others get the better of her.

"Reaper are you even listening to me..?" Dominic cut into her thoughts again. "I asked about your team, are they powerful or mediocre?"

"They're powerful alright." Elizabeth sighed. "Storm may have made it to second rank, but he's disobedient and it'll prove a challenge for him later." She muttered.

"Well, the boss will beat him into shape pretty quickly." Darren joined their conversation. "He's going to either topple down to last place or smarten up anyway." He sat next to Elizabeth.

"You've been here the longest Lantern.." Dominic pointed out. "I'm sure you've seen this happen a couple times right?"

"Yes, but you should ask Reaper how it went." Darren sighed before heading out of the room. "We have training tomorrow, you'd best rest up and prepare your team."

Dominic looked at Elizabeth expectantly. But she rolled her eyes and stood up, stretching her arms out for a moment and tapping on the harness that held her bowstaff. "Not a chance." She hissed before leaving the room.

She knew exactly how Malachite would torment Storm, but she wouldn't warn him because that wasn't her job, her job was only to train him in battle and order him around. She didn't care if he got hurt or not, why would she?

As she got lost in her thoughts she continued to walk, until she ran into Swansong, one of the new masks. Elizabeth looked up at her and narrowed her eyes, the white haired girl didn't even look apologetic as she walked past.

"Aren't you--"

"No." Swansong smirked. "I'm not apologizing if that's what your asking." She continued to walk away.

Elizabeth glared at the white haired girl and reached to extend her bowstaff, she was supposed to show new masks what happens when they were disrespectful to the higher ups, but Swansong was already gone. She knew how difficult it was to keep track of someone who could slip in and out of the shadow world, so she just headed to her room.

Her brother came catching up to her, his eyes sparkling. "Don't you think it's great how strong the new masks are?" He said, a bounce in his step.

"Why are you so excited, it just means you're even further down the ranks, meaning you'll be pushed around by more people now." Elizabeth reminded him, her eyes narrowed as she unlocked her room door. Unlike the other team leaders, Elizabeth got her own room, since she couldn't risk accidentally killing the new masks.

"Well uh yeah I guess.." His eyes dropped and he seemed to understand. "But it's still promising how good they all are." He smiled weakly.

"It doesn't matter how promising they are if they can't follow the rules." She muttered before entering her room and locking the door behind her, keeping her brother out.

Why were so many of her friends such idiots? Couldn't they see they were doomed to stay here forever, she could tell Dominic was only excited because if there were so many he knew at least one would try to save everyone and escape. But that wouldn't happen, did he not remember what happened to Bloom? And what about the other three who had escaped, they never came back for the rest of the group, instead they went and hid like the cowards they were, either that or Malachite found them, killed them and didn't tell anyone. Thinking of escape was the last thing they needed to do, instead, they just needed to survive.

Morning came and she woke up her team, she didn't bother lecturing Swansong since they were going to training anyway and there was no point. Instead she just headed to training yard and had them line up with everyone else.

Why did escape seem so good to everyone else when it was obvious it wouldn't be possible.