Crimson Red, Cerulean Blue
CLapter 10

(Blue)

I woke up to something that smelled unbelievably deliciousand a ray of bright sunshine blasting directly in my face, like it was saying, Wake up, Blue! It’s daytime already!

For awhile, I lingered under the covers, keeping my eyes closed. This was thewarmest and most comfortable I’d ever been, and I was tempted to just stay inthere for the next hour or so. (Or maybe even the next eternity – why not?) Butthe smell was beckoning, and in the end, I couldn’t resist.

Pushing thetwo thin blankets off me and wondering how in the world I’d been so warm withonly that much cloth over me, I sat up and stretched. The room was empty, Greenhaving gone somewhere else. She was probably the one doing the cooking, Idecided. Neither Red or Orangeseemed like they were good cooks.

The doorcreaked when I opened it, making me wince at the sudden announcement of myarrival. (Seven paranoia at work again, as always.) I closed it without takinga good look at the room beyond, and Red’s voice greeted me as I did.

“Morning,Blue. Or, actually, I should say afternoon. You slept even more than I usuallydo!”

I turned,completely ready to give some kind of witty response, but the words died on mytongue. What came out instead was: “Sweet cupcakes. What’re you doing?”

Red foldedhis arms. “What does it look like I’m doing?” he asked, obviously miffed by thecomment. “Making lunch, no duh. You missed breakfast.”

My jaw hit the ground and stubbornly refusedto close. Red was standing at an old stove that looked like it was about ahundred years old, wearing (For jellybeans’ sake, what has the world come to?)an apron of all things and flippingwhat looked like bacon strips on a pan. My voice finally decided to come backto me after a couple seconds of staring.

“Isn’tbacon a breakfast food? And what areyou – ”

“Not oneword about the getup,” he warned. “Not oneword.”

He flippedthe bacon. “And normally, yes, it’s a breakfast food, but it’s all we have, sono, right now it isn’t. The food’s almost done, so sit down and grab a plate ifyou want to eat, which I’m pretty sure you do.”

His stomachgrumbled, and he cringed. “I know I do. Stupid Green won’t let me eat anybefore they’re all done. She is the pure embodiment of evil, I swear.”

I sat downon the floor, the only place to sit, and dragged the pile of paper plates overto me. “Nah, that’ll be Argot and Mask you’re talking about. So…where is Green, anyway? And for that matter,where’s Orange?”

“Orange is holed up in hisroom like he always is, and Green’s out shopping with my pickpocket moneybecause she can’t steal if her life depended on it. Even though she’s going toget ripped off like nothing you’ve ever heard off. I just told you about ourfood problem, didn’t I?”

I justnodded, because in Rogue City, stealing was anatural part of life. “When’s she coming back?”

“In timefor lunch. Oh, there she is.”

Greenbreezed in through the front door, weighed down by a ton of shopping bags. Herlong brown hair was slipping out of its messy braid, but her emerald eyes weresparkling.

“Well,we’ve got food!” she sang. “And heat, finally, now that you two are here! Blue,mind helping me jam this stuff into our cabinets?”

I droppedthe plate and went to help, digging out jars and cans from the bags. (How Greenhad managed to carry them all by herself was beyond me.) When I pulled out afrozen package of hash browns, I just stared.

“Uh… Youguys don’t have a refrigerator.”

“Oh. Westore the frozen goods outside, in this hollow in the roof. Keeps ‘em coldenough,” Red responded, dumping the contents of his frying pan onto one of thepaper plates. “Rogue City’s pretty darn cold.Guess that’s why I control fire. Balances it out a bit.”

Iremembered with a jolt that Rogue City was Red’s hometown, his personal city to ruleover and protect, just like my own Sapphire City. No wonder he was soreckless and carefree. Rogue City was also known as the Home of the Outlaws,after all, and like its name suggested, and the city ran on a complicatedsystem of laws that not only allowed thievery, as long as you didn’t getcaught, but also publicly encouraged it. It stood to reason that Red wouldreflect the nature of his city, always defying authority, logic, and death,sometimes all at the same time.

“So, Blue,what happened to you guys, anyway? You and the moron over there looked prettybeat up when we got to you,” Green said breaking into my thoughts.

“Argotcaught up to us,” I replied simply, unpacking three fuzzy stuffed animals. (Idecided not to ask.) “We barely got away.”

“Yeah, buthow did he? I suppose Red messed up somehow?”

“Well… Wekind of left a trail in Sapphire City.” I glancednervously at Red, who was currently flinging more bacon onto the frying pan,whistling like he didn’t have a care in the world. “Remember the robots?”

“Oh, yeah.That was epic.”

“Robots?”Green interjected. “Oh, the robot police you took down?”

“Yup. So Iguess Argot knew another one of us had joined up with you guys, and he wasfollowing our tracks.”

“It’s notthat easy to follow you guys, you know,” Green informed me. “Orange didn’t get a lead on you untilYellowton, and that was only because he hacked into the police reports andcommunications. Somehow, Argot caught up to you before we did. What I want toknow is, how?”

“Well, heprobably had all the cities on high alert. We got caught by some randomofficial performing a customary check. I didn’t have any hair dye on me, and hewas asking me to lift my baseball cap, so I took him out as neatly as I could.Not neatly enough, I guess.”

Greenraised an eyebrow. “And…this was suggested to you by Red?”

“Uh-uh. Shedid it all by herself. By the way, could you quit blaming me for everything? Igot us here safe and sound, didn’t I?” Red picked up one of the bags, squintingat it in disbelief. “You bought asparagus?!Why in the world would you freaking buy asparagus?!”

“Eatingjust bacon all the time’s going to give us heart attacks, moron. And what doyou mean, ‘safe and sound’? That’s a bit of a stretch, seeing as when Orange and I showed up,you were barely even alive.”

“Hey, but Iwas alive. That has to count forsomething.”

“Not to me,it doesn’t. Well, those’re the last of the goods. I’ll go take these outside.Blue, could you please go call Orange out for lunch? I swear, if we didn’tremind him, he wouldn’t even remember to eat.” And with that, Green headedoutside.

I got up,striding across the small room that served as both a living room and kitchen.The hideout (stolen, Red informed me, just like everything else in Rogue City)was a pretty good replace, with three rooms: the tech room, where Orangeapparently slept, lived, and did his work; the girls’ room, which I now sharedwith Green and had spent the night in; and the living room/kitchen, where Redcrashed, using a folded up blanket for a pillow. (He didn’t need the blanket,since his abnormal body temperature kept him warm enough.)

I knockedhesitantly on Orange’sdoor. “Hey, uh, Orange? It’s time to eat.”

Noresponse.

I knockedagain, louder this time. “Orange?”

Still noresponse.

Deciding totake the risk, I opened the door. The shutters were closed, and the roomwould’ve been completely dark if it hadn’t been for the insane amounts of techin it. There had to be at least five computer monitors, and blinking lights wereeverywhere. I didn’t understand any of the images displayed on the screens, andI didn’t try to. (Because, you know, I kind of want my brain intact, notexploded from sheer information overload.)

Orange was seated on theground, on a folded blanket, his laptop balanced on his lap. His glasses wereperched on the very edge of his nose, and he shoved them back, making no signthat he even realized I had entered.

“Um…” Ibegan, trying to figure out how to approach the guy. He seemed pretty cold, notat all like Red, even though they were so close in color and city. Orange Villageis the next area over from Rogue City, after all.

“What?” heasked, sounding irritated at being interrupted. (Which made me really want torun back outside where it was safe, but it wasn’t like I could do that without seemingever so slightly rude.)

“It’s timefor lunch,” I told him simply, sticking to what Green had told me to say, sinceit was probably the thing least likely to bother him. Or, you know, make himfreak and punch my lights out.

(Actually,that seems more like a Green kind of thing. Note to self: Don’t mess with her,either. I wouldn’t want to take a punch to the stomach like Red did. Ouch.)

“I know. Icould smell it.” Orange’seyes never ventured from his laptop’s screen.

“So… Areyou going to come out and eat, or…”

“I’ll beout in a minute. When I’m finished.”

I shrugged,and walked out as fast as I could without actually running, closing the doorbehind me. Red was whistling as he flipped the next batch of bacon.

“Takesome,” he told me, nodding to the plate of already finished bacon. I sat downnext to Green, who was already eating, piling some food onto the plate andtaking a bite.

My eyeswidened.

It was delicious.

Like, sodelicious, it was Delicious, with acapital D. Plus italics.

Or maybe itwas just the bacon talking. Bacon’s default mode is delicious, after all.

“Good?” Redasked, turning to see my expression. I gave him a thumbs-up.

“It’sgreat!”

“Of course it’s great; I made it.” And with that extremely modest statement, hewent back to watching the food cook.

“Youshouldn’t encourage him, his ego’s big enough,” Green said dryly. (Which wasactually kind of true, now that I think about it.)

“I’ve beenwondering,” I said thoughtfully, “Did Red do something to you or anything? Ican’t figure out why you two hate each other so much.”

I should’veknown that wouldn’t turn out too well.

They bothexchanged glances.

“Hate is such a strong word…” Red said.

“Yeah, Iprefer barely tolerate,” Green added.“And as for why, what’s there not to dislike? He’s arrogant, rude, reckless,clumsy, stupid…”

“She’sannoying, yells too much, gets in other people’s business, and won’t shut up.Did I also mention annoying?”

“See?Stupid. Can’t even remember what he said a second ago.”

“Uh, hello?I could totally remember, that was added on for emphasis.”

“Ooh, lookat you, using such big words.”

“Excuse me?I know tons of big words. I know that you’re a lousy, annoying, exasperating,snitching… uh… snitch!”

“Wow, real smart.”

“Of courseit was, thanks for acknowledging it.”

“It’ssarcasm, moron. If you actually had a brain inside that empty skull of yours,you would know.”

“If you had a brain, then you’d realize thatI was using sarcasm as well!”

I watched asthe argument escalated into a full-blown fight, complete with shouting and handgestures, trying to figure out how the heck I’d managed to cause such a hugefight with one simple question. Then the cavalry arrived.

“WILL YOUTWO JUST SHUT UP?!?!”

Orange barged out of hisroom, looking more annoyed than I’d ever seen him. Which was really sayingsomething, since his default state seemed to be annoyed.

“Can’t youtwo idiots,” he stressed, “shut upfor just one minute?”

Red andGreen glanced at each other, the dislike in their gazes clear (crystal), then backat Orange.

“Sorry,Orange,” Green said. “It kinda got out of hand.”

“Yeah,sorry, man,” Red added. “Were you working on anything important?”

“No, onlyerasing your freaking descriptions from the police and government files,” Orange snapped. “Which isyour fault, by the way, and if I have to spend an hour cleaning up your mess,I’d rather not do it while listening to your pointless bickering!”

“In allfairness, Orange, that was his fault,” Green began, but he shot her a glare soangry, she didn’t continue.

“Allright.” Orangetook a deep breath, his facial expression going from furious to just merelyannoyed. “Now, let’s get to lunch.”

Red andGreen sat down, but they were still scowling, and I bit my lip. It really wasmy fault for asking a stupid question like that in the first place, so Orange shouldn’t havebeen yelling at them. Which was why Istared at my plate and blurted out, “Um, actually…”

Red’s handshot out and grabbed my wrist. I looked at him, confused, and he shook his headjust slightly. But I’d already spoken.

“Actuallywhat?” Orangequestioned, eyebrows raised.

“Uh… I hada question for Red!” I squeaked, which just so happened to be the first thingthat came to mind. Red gave me a quizzical look, playing along.

“What’sup?”

“The sky,”I replied instinctively, then corrected myself, ignoring Green’s startled laughat my response. “Well, it’s not really important, but I was wondering… Who isReuben?”

Bad question.Really bad question.

Green frozein the middle of eating. Orangeflicked a glance at Red, laying down the piece of bacon he was about to eat.

Red’s grinvanished, and he stiffened, an expression of pure pain appearing on his facefor just a second before being replaced by one that was unreadable. His fingersflew up to the bridge of his nose, to the scar, I noted with a mild interestthat immediately vanished at his expression. In an uncharacteristically quietvoice, he asked,

“Where didyou hear that name?”

Well, that didn’t seem like a good reaction.

Feelingconfused and worried by the response (because I was going to feel really guiltyif I made him cry or something), I said, “It’s okay. You don’t have to answerit if you don’t want to.”

“Where didyou hear that name?” he repeated, looking incredibly terrifying without hiseasy grin and cheerful attitude. As in, guy-who-could-roast-you-in-a-heartbeat-and-was-possibly-pretty-darn-mad-at-you-at-the-current-momentscary. The kind of scary you don’t mess with, even if you were talking to aperson who was generally an easygoing idiot.

“Well, whenyou were unconscious yesterday, you kept repeating it, so I wondered…” My voicetrailed off.

Red bit hislip, dropping his gaze. His voice still quiet, he said,

“So I hadthe dream again, huh?”

“Yeah,”Green responded shortly, not looking at him.

Feelingeven guiltier, seeing as I’d caused two bits of trouble in the span of an hour,I stared at my plate.

“I’m sorryfor asking.”

The secondthe words were out, I realized that it was the first time I’d apologized toanyone so sincerely in a long, long time. Unable (and unwilling, I realized) totake any words back, I stayed mute until Red sighed, saying,

“It’s notyour fault, Blue. It’s not like you…”

“I what?” Ikept my voice quiet, hesitant.

He didn’tlook at me. “Nothing.”

Orange shot him a sharplook, but Red sent one back that was so angry, he didn’t say anything. I wasconfused beyond measure, but I was too scared to question anything. I’d alreadymessed up enough.

An awkwardsilence ensued.

Greenfinally took over, her voice all bright and cheery as if I hadn’t just asked atotally taboo question. “Well, since that’s over, why don’t we continue withour lunch? There’ll be plenty of time for secrets later. I mean, we have justfound another member of the Seven, so today’s a happy day, you know?”

“Yeah,” Redreplied, a little too quickly. “Yeah, that’s right.”

He took adeep breath, then exhaled. “Let’s get on with lunch.”