Burial

"Burial" is a short story which takes place at the same time as the end of "River of Pain". It was written as an assignment rewrite a scene from the perspective of a minor characters

## Burial

Catherine Jive was a girl who lived in the Land of Roots. She was a member of the Uda village, who had a long feud with the Enja. Since she was a child, she had resented the Enja simply because everyone in the village did. However, for the past two months she felt nothing but sympathy for them. A group of radicals from the Uda village stole a truckload of radioactive cesium and crashed into the river next to the Enja village. Several dozen villagers died, and hundreds more got very sick. The Enja village had to be evacuated, and almost everyone in the village lost their home. But to Catherine, the worst part was that her own father was a member of the radical group. Catherine thought her father was good man, but it had been only two months since she saw him being arrested by U.N. soldiers.

Catherine left the village one day to sit by the river. She had been doing that for months now. She still had trouble believing that her father had been responsible for so much pain and destruction. She also felt guilty for not doing more to  help the Enja villagers. Catherine then heard two jeeps suddenly stop behind her. She turned around, her view was obscured by shrubbery. She the doors of each jeep open. She heard one voice, but couldn't make out the words. Another voice answered, but it was also too quiet to hear.

Catherine heard shouting, "You're no better then those terrorists!"

"How dare you! I'm paying evil onto evil!"

Catherine began to panic.

"What's he talking about?" She thought, "Is something going to happen to the terrorist group? To my father?"

"No, you're not!" The other voice answered, "The U.N. already arrested everyone responsible. You're hurting people who never did anything to you!"

Catherine then realized that something was about to happen in the Uda village. An Enja was going to take revenge on them. Catherine was at her breaking point. She thought about her mother and siblings.

"They're in danger" she thought, "I need to do something. I need to help."

But Catherine was paralyzed with fear. There was some more conversation that she couldn't make out. She finally snapped out of her frozen state and prepared to run back to the village. But right as she was about to leave, she head a loud bang. Catherine was shocked, she was almost sure it was a gunshot. She stayed concealed behind the bushes, not wanting the shooter to see her. Catherine then saw a man walk up to the river bank. He threw in a gun and what looked like a remote. Catherine recognized him. It was Dr. Robert Darin. He was visiting the Land of Roots to do charity work. Did he just shoot somebody? Catherine watched as Robert got into one of the jeeps and drove towards the Uda village. Catherine looked down at the corpse in the road. She recognized him to. She didn't know his name, but he was a community leader in the Enja village. Catherine realized that he must have been the one planning an attack on the Uda, and Robert must have stopped him. Catherine realized that the Uda would likely be blamed for the man's death, but she didn't want to turn in Robert after he had just protected her village. Catherine decided that it would be best if the death was never discovered, and she started digging a hole.