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Don't Look Further



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Mon Jul 08, 2019 6:18 pm
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Clairia says...



DON'T LOOK FURTHER

Image


Round One: The Plague



We have been conditioned to fear the differences of society. To push away those who don’t fit the blindly labeled “normal” status. The system is built to ensnare humanity and we follow it like hungry dogs, desperate to fit in and remain hidden among the rat race.

What happened to our youth?

We sit in enclosed spaces, searching for constant entertainment. Staring at devices. Trying to find that raw, feral freedom that we've been locked away from.

Nature laughs at us whilst also screaming in our deaf ears to return. She swears she'll be good to us this time. She swears she won't let us down.

But humanity doesn't believe in second chances. Not anymore.

So where did we end up when there was nowhere to go?
Chaefetis.


In 2078, a team christened ”The Last Hope” discovered a planet within the Milky Way that could, in fact, support life. By this time in our history, the entirety of Earth’s population had fallen victim to brain disfunction. This was due to Blue Light, a newly categorized disease that affected everyone looking at a screen during Our Darkest Hour, in which a virus was released that temporarily blinded its victim. The virus then dug itself into the brain, shutting off necessary components for basic human function and sending the human into electronic overdrive. Hundreds of millions of people were affected, leaving only infants and a few others scattered across the globe.
The Last Hope gathered a group of survivors; young children, barely able to walk, hastily packed them into a rocket, and sent them off. One adult was sent with them to ensure their safety and teach them the essentials of survival.
Chaefetis, a wild planet, was designed to keep all of its inhabitants from harm. They were protected from the universe, hidden beneath the shadowy barrier from those who had been infected.

But the barrier has started to weaken.

present day
Ms. Ariana Daniels passed away at 2000 hours last night. We will miss her terribly. She has been a mentor, a mother, and a friend.


The children are stripped of their guardian only fifteen years after their arrival. Now, with no one left to lead them, they have been left to fend for themselves. However, they are unaware of the danger coming. After over a decade of peaceful survival, they don’t feel the need to worry.

But the infected are coming. Earth has been stripped of its majesty and has become a barren, cold wasteland. Chaefetis is the next target for their reign of terror. And it is the job of the children to defend it.

Cast of Characters


Note: The children were not given last names.

Jaylin - Unavailable (Claimed by @Jaybird)
Cosette - Unavailable (Claimed by @Clairia)
Richard - Unavailable (Claimed by @XxXTheSwordsmanXxX)
Kayla - Available!
Margaret - Available!

Character Template
Spoiler! :

    Name:
    Preferred Name:
    Nick-Name:

Age:
    Place of Birth:
    Birth Parents:

Gender:
    Romantic Orientation:
    Sexual Orientation:

Appearance:
    Eye Color:
    Hair Color:
    Face Shape:
    Height:
    Weight:
    Body Shape:
    Distinguishing Features:
    Uniform:

Personality:
    Traits:
    Hopes:
    Fears:
    Strengths:
    Weaknesses:
    Hopes:
    Secrets:

Relations:
    Intrapersonal Relations:
    Interpersonal Relations:

Skills:
    Proficiencies:
    Combat Skills:
    Social Skills:

Other:


Other characters will be introduced as the story progresses.

WFP | DT
Last edited by Clairia on Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:15 am, edited 10 times in total.
"If you have
a painting in you, paint.
Just create it.
Banish doubt and fear
and step out of your own way.
Write if you're a writer.
Do what you were born to do.
--Toni Sorenson






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Wed Aug 21, 2019 12:58 am
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Clairia says...



COSETTE

ROUND 1 ENTRY



Ariana was dead. Cosette had realized it first.
What it was that gave it away, she didn’t know. Not exactly. Maybe it was the fact that food tasted like ash in her mouth. Or the brilliant, bewitching scarlet of the bad moon that had glared at her as she glanced up from dinner that evening.
Maybe it was just seeing the woman’s lifeless, cold body for the first time. Cosette was fairly certain it was the latter.
No matter what had made her realize it, reality had grabbed her by the throat and wouldn’t let go.
It crushed her voice.
But it didn’t take away her tears.
Oh, god, it didn’t take away her tears.
Cosette barely had the strength to tell the others. She wandered into the living room, cheeks pale with indecision and grief.
The group was gathered around the area, most either sitting on chairs or on the floor. This was what they did most nights; told jokes that never got old, had debates that would often never end, and listen to Ariana.
She’d describe Earth to them. How it was. Before everything went wrong.
Chaefetis was supposed to be where nothing was ever wrong. And now, it seemed like nothing was right.
How did her peers not understand what she was feeling? How did they not know?
“—there is so much I could say to prove you wrong. So much, Richard,” Jaylin was saying, climbing on top of the coffee table. He kicked off a book in the process, smacking their lips. “Global! Warming! Was! Inflicted! By! Humanity’s! Ignorance!” They clapped their hands together with every word, glaring at Richard with what Cosette had silently christened “The Angry Nerd Look” at a happier time.
Richard had opened his mouth to fire back (most likely with a pointless argument. Cosette, straining her logic, had given Jaylin the point for this one.) when he saw her gripping the doorframe.
“Shut up,” he said, still staring at her.
“Say that to my face!” Jaylin howled, glancing behind them.
Cosette opened her mouth to speak, but words didn’t come. Words were dangerous.
Danger felt much closer now that she was gone.
“Are you okay?” A soft, concerned voice rose from Kayla’s lips, but it sounded so foreign.
Cosette mustered a nod that should have been a shaking of the head. Her brain wasn’t responding. That must have been a side effect. “Something happened,” she murmured, more tears threatening to fall from her eyes.
You're such a baby, her self-doubt screamed. Lay off the tears.
She lifted her head before anyone could reply. “Something happened,” she repeated, forced, gritty anger in her voice. “Something bad.”

[-]


A smoky mist rose from behind the little house as dusk fell over the planet. Cosette sat on the back porch, wrapped in a soft blanket that was worn from many years of use. A small fire crackled on the ground in front of her, illuminating the yard.
Grunts of effort and frustration could be heard from both Richard and Margaret, who quietly dug a grave for Ms. Daniels. Cosette watched them, wrapping the blanket closer to her. She couldn’t bear to contribute to the process; her head hurt like hell.
Besides, burying the woman she had thought of as her mother was far too painful of an experience for her to endure. Why she was watching her friends do it, she didn’t know.
Perhaps the night brought along the idea that everything that had happened was just some sort of hazy dream. Everything would be gone by morning.
Her eyes fell closed briefly, listening to the quiet shoveling and soft murmurs between Kayla and Jaylin, who were in the kitchen. The smell of cinnamon tea lingered in the air, and it brought her brief comfort. The drink was the house’s comfort not-food.
It was Ariana’s favorite.
Cosette stood, taking her hair out of a messy bun and allowing it to fall back over her shoulders. She gazed out at her friends, watching them work, and then turned, heading back inside.
Kayla looked up from her tea. She’d been gripping it tightly, and her delicate fingers looked more fragile than ever. “Hey,” she greeted Cosette quietly.
The other girl glanced at her, something flickering in her eyes. “Hey. Did you make some tea?”
“I did,” Jaylin cut in, their usually aggressive, hasty tone having calmed. “I thought..”
“Yeah,” Cosette murmured. “I know.”
The kitchen was a small one, but it was cozy. Comfortable. The ground was littered with a relatively distasteful tile pattern that the children had managed to find endearing. Style was something they all lacked, to a certain degree. They had grown up without the pressures of social status, and were all neutral in regards to what looked good with what.
Cosette set herself down onto the tiles, reaching for a mug of the tea before doing so. She raised the drink to her lips.
Ecstacy.
Swirls of cinnamon mixed with a touch of vanilla spice.
It reminded her of home. Or what she remembered of home, anyway.
Fields of green. Rolling hills.
What Earth used to be, but never would be again.
“I’m going to bed,” Kayla placed her tea onto the dining room table. She hadn’t even touched it.
Jaylin had a hint of sadness in their eyes as they glanced over at the almost-full cup, but they said nothing, giving Cosette an indecipherable look.
Kayla’s door shut.
"If you have
a painting in you, paint.
Just create it.
Banish doubt and fear
and step out of your own way.
Write if you're a writer.
Do what you were born to do.
--Toni Sorenson






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Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:52 pm
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Mageheart says...



Jaylin

[ Goodbye ]


Ariana was dead. Jay had never dreamed that it would happen so soon.

They stared up at the ceiling of their room. If they focused on the familiar designs, maybe everything would feel like a horrible, horrible dream. They would close their eyes, go to sleep, and be woken by Ariana gently shaking them awake the next morning. This was just a nightmare – or, maybe, the beginnings of an especially imaginative panic attack.

Jay could handle panic attacks. All they would have to do was call for Ariana through the crack in their door, with the same distant tone that they always used when it felt like their chest was crushing them – they knew they just seemed moody to the others, but Ariana always had known what that tone meant. She had always come into Jay's room, had always rubbed their back and made the pressure go away, and had let them curl up close against her side as long as they needed to.

Jay couldn't handle a world with no Ariana.

They could feel themselves on the verge of another panic attack. The reasoning, Jay decided, was stupid – a panic attack because of the possibility of a panic attack. A panic attack because there wasn't anyone to help anymore. There was no guidance. It was just a bunch of kids against the world. Jay knew that this was their world and that it always had been, but “they” had always included Ariana.

Jay wasn't ready for something like this.

None of them were.

Jay sat up and tore their gaze away from the ceiling, pulling their legs close to their chest with shaking arms. The tea they had brought into the room was cold now – it had been worrying when Kayla had drank practically none of it, but they didn't feel the same concern when they saw their own full cup. They needed to make more, or do something. Jay knew they weren't going to get to sleep when fighting off the beginnings of a panic attack, and grief unlike anything they had ever felt before. It was one thing to grow up without parents; it was another to suddenly lose the one source of guidance they had in their life.

They slipped out of their room.

The house was dark and quiet. Everyone had retreated into their rooms for the night. Jay didn't bother guessing if they were awake or asleep. They just kept their gaze focused on their goal of some nice, hot tea. The warmth burning in their chest would fend off the metaphorical monsters underneath the bed.

But the rest of the house was even worse than their room had been.

Jay stopped just a few feet away from the door. For the briefest of moments, they thought they saw Ariana standing just a few feet away. They saw her for barely even a second – just a little glimpse of the face they desperately wanted to see again, and a glimpse of the face that had always been there during late night excursions no one was ever supposed to know about.

Jay blinked.

Ariana was gone as quickly as she had appeared.

Somewhere, in the back of the Jay's mind, they knew that ghosts weren't real. That the Ariana they saw was just a figment of their imagination, and that the real Ariana was buried underneath a gentle layer of dirt. But their already present anxiety made them humor the thought that it was Ariana's ghost – just for a handful of moments – and Jay decided they'd rather hide away in their room than face the truth.

Ghost or not, Ariana was no longer with them.

And Jay was going to have to face this world on their own.
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

queer and here.





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Sat Nov 02, 2019 3:26 am
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XxXTheSwordsmanXxX says...



RICHARD

ROUND 1 ENTRY



The chill of the night air cause Richard's breath to fog as he moved outside. Most everyone was still in their room. The news had been shocking. Arianna, the woman they had known all their lives was gone. The central pillar for all of them was no longer there. A void that no one could possibly fill. It was a wound that would heal...eventually.

But if there was anything that Arianna had beaten into Richard's head more. It was that there were certain responsibilities that had to be done, even when things were at their worst. They had to survive.

So there he was. Cleaning the game he had just hunted so that they would have food for the week. The knife gliding through hide and meat to prepare for storing. His hands working to keep him busy so he didn't have to think about it.

He remembered the day that he was first given the skinning knife to learn how to do this. How Arianna showed him where to cut and how to prepare it. He could feel the remorse of not having thanked her for it welling up. But he couldn't deal with that right now. He had a job to do. The others needed their time to mourn right now. He could address it later.

He dealt with life and death on a regular basis. Every time he drew back and arrow to loose at one of the many creatures on the home world he knew that it would be for the purpose of killing it so they could live. In a sense...he was prepared for this. He understood that, eventually, everything dies, but that didn't make this any easier.

Setting the cuts onto the cart to move them to the prepping area, he quickly began rinsing his hands of the blood that covered his hands.

"I thought I might find you out here," Cosette said stepping into the room.

Richard smiled. Of everyone that would come looking for him, it was likely to be Cosette. It was her way. "I find comfort in familiarity. This is what I know. What I'm good at."

"You can take a break, Richard. Take some time to you know...accept it."

"I accept death, Cosette. Kinda have to when you're a hunter," he said as he began salting and setting cuts of meat to cure. "Accepting that someone you care about is gone...well...no one is ever really ready for that. And it isn't something everyone is going to get over with a good night's sleep. It's going to take time. And with where we are...we can't afford for everyone to grieve. There has to be someone making sure that everything is running as it should be. Getting food. Supplying water."

"Richard," Cosette sighed. "You have to let yourself grieve."

"And I will..." he said giving her a soft smile. "When everyone else has gotten passed it. Then it will be my turn. Until then...I'll deal with it, by doing what she always told us."

Cosette smiled in return. Nodding as she remembered it too. "Support each other by doing what you can, when you can."

"Right now, everyone needs the time to process the pain they are feeling. I can give them that time," he said as he put the last piece up in the dehydrator. "I appreciate your concern. I'll find my own way of dealing with it. I promise."

Cosette nodded before giving a small wave and headed back to her room. Richard sighed, leaning against the table that he had just finished cleaning off. He said that he could hold out. Letting the others deal with their grief before he did. But truthfully, he was barely holding it together. The line that separated cool and collected from broken and depressed was as thin as a sheet of paper. One bad gust and he would tear apart.

Instead he picked up his bow as the morning light was peaking over the horizon. Taking a walk in the forest seemed like the best way to hide the tears that were slowly rolling down his cheeks.





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Mon Dec 23, 2019 11:58 pm
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Clairia says...



COSETTE

ROUND 2 ENTRY



Support each other by doing what you can, when you can.
It was unfair how right he was; how right he always was. Richard had this sort of wisdom around him that only emerged when he really, really wanted it to; and Ariana’s death had seemed to allow him that escape.
Dawn sleepily rose over the shadowy planet, illuminating their small domain through the clouds. Cosette had refused herself sleep, buried in heartache and worry. She rose from her bed as the sun peaked through her window, the color carrying somewhat of a pinkish tint. Its glare bounced off of a mirror that she kept in the corner of her small bedroom. She’d found it as a child amongst Ariana’s things, and the woman had allowed her to take it. Her reflection stared back at her now, displaying a picture of anguish. Her blonde hair, usually well-kept, was a mess, and the sharpness of her blue eyes had faded. Grief was taking over her, though she did not realize it.
She shuffled into the living room, dragging her feet across the shaggy carpet. Margaret, sitting in the armchair, looked up. She seemed relatively unconcerned, as per usual, which was strangely comforting to Cosette. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Cosette replied quietly, staring at the coffee table. “Where is everyone?”
Margaret put the book she was reading down. “Richard’s off killing animals, Jaylin’s…” she glanced at their bedroom door. “I don’t know. Kayla’s probably crying again.”
Cosette swallowed. “Oh.”
There was an awkward silence.
“I miss her too,” Margaret said after a moment. “And I know..” she gestured to the book. “I know it doesn’t look like I’m grieving, but I am. She was like a sister to me.”
A sister. Cosette knew that’s all Ariana would get from Margaret; she had loved her mother too much to ever replace her. Her memories, out of all of theirs, were the most vivid—and she had gone through a lot of trouble to keep them alive while the others had struggled to let go. What Cosette remembered of her own family wasn’t pretty, but her friend’s life had seemed to be nothing short of perfect.
Sometimes she wished that all of them had forgotten.

[-]


Richard had returned about a half hour later. The three sat together in silence at the table, minds still on the night before. Cosette picked at the food on her plate, rubbing her neck. Richard glanced at her. “Dally?”
“Huh?” Cosette snapped out of her trance. Margaret made a noise. Dally was what she’d been called as a baby. Ocassionally, (usually to get her attention) the nickname was still used. “You’re not eating.”
“Oh.” Cosette turned a little red. “I’m just not hungry. Still tired. I didn’t…sleep much.”
“None of us did,” Margaret tried to reassure her, but it didn’t transfer well. “I don’t know what we’re going to do.”
“We’re going to survive,” Richard said simply. “Just like Ariana wanted us to. She prepared us for something like this.”
“No. She didn’t,” Jaylin’s voice emerged from their room as they closed the door behind them. “We aren’t prepared. We’ll never be prepared.”
“Jaylin, please,” Margaret rolled her eyes. “This is really not the time.”
“They’re right,” Cosette said quietly. “Ariana shouldn’t have died. We weren’t ready for her to go.”
Richard scowled, looking back at his food. Jaylin gave him a look. “Richard, you may think you’ve ‘moved on’, but we all know you haven’t.”
“Jaylin,” Cosette warned.
“No,” Jaylin retorted. “He’s acting like this doesn’t bother him. He’s acting like we’re not all screwed!”
“Shut up!” Margaret demanded. “You’re making it worse. We can’t argue; the last thing any of us want is to seperate. We can’t survive—“ she threw a glance at Richard, “—by ourselves.”
Jaylin backed down. The group was quiet once again.
Reality was upon them.
They were alone.
"If you have
a painting in you, paint.
Just create it.
Banish doubt and fear
and step out of your own way.
Write if you're a writer.
Do what you were born to do.
--Toni Sorenson






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Mon Jan 06, 2020 8:51 pm
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Mageheart says...



Jaylin

[ Secrets ]


Jay could only stand the silence of the room for so long before it gained a weight of its own. The heavy air became a pressure pushing down onto their chest. Jay knew they were on the verge of having another panic attack, but also knew that there was nothing they could do about it now. They weren't Richard. They weren't pushing the feelings away and pretending they didn't exist. They were taking a deep breath of air, getting to their feet, and storming out of the room like they always did.

If Richard and the others thought they could repress their own grief and fears, then they would have no qualms forcing Jay to do the same. It was common sense – even though the thought of the others belittling Jay for their reaction made another wave of anxiety go slamming into them.

Jay didn't return to their room this time. Their room wasn't private enough. With Ariana gone, the system that had been carefully constructed over years of living on Chaefetis was gone, too. Someone was bound to try becoming the new leader and go marching into their room to bring Jay back out. Probably Margaret. And Jay really didn't want to explain why they were breathing heavy and curled up on their bed.

So, instead, they went outside.

The sun had already risen, but the morning was still fresh and new. Jay made their way through the forest, fingering the necklace that hung over their chest. They didn't really know where they were going. They just knew they needed to get somewhere away from everything else. That somewhere ended up being the base of a tree among many trees, about a five minutes away from the place Jay was reluctant to call home anymore.

Home had been a person.

Home had been Ariana.

They took a shaky, deep breath and plopped down on the ground in front of the tree. With every new breath of air rushing through their lungs, some of the fear subsided. They tried to do all of the exercises that Ariana had told them about. She had known that she wouldn't always be there to comfort Jay; Jay doubted that she had ever guessed it was her death that would finally make them face a panic attack on their own, but it was the foresight that counted.

And, eventually, the panic attack faded.

Jay rose to their feet and began the trek back to the others.

They didn't want to enter through the front. Most of the time, they would have. But entering the front increased the chances of running into someone, and Jay wasn't ready for a confrontation just yet. So they headed for the back porch, bare feet gently plodding across the dirt and grass.

Jay didn't usually pay much attention to the back. There wasn't any need. But between the necessity for sneaking in without detection, and a gaze that couldn't help but linger on the grave and pay attention to everything around it, Jay noticed something they never had noticed before.

The ground around one wall looked strange.

Jay paused and stared, studying the difference in grass. The grass was shorter and a slightly lighter shade, almost like it was warmer than the rest of the yard. But Jay knew the house like the back of their hand, and the only thing there was a bookshelf Ariana had moved from another room years ago.

They frowned.

After a moment, they approached the odd grass and gave it a hesitant poke. They hadn't expected a reaction of any kind, but they didn't get one. It felt normal. Yet something was definitely off about that area, so why was the grass slightly less alive there than in the rest of the yard-

Their fingers brushed up against something metal.

Eyes narrowing, they sat down and started pushing aside the dirt in front of what was beginning to look like some kind of metal grate. The grate was tiny, metallic and filled with minuscule holes. But when Jay put their hand in front of it, they felt warmth.

They quickly drew their hand back.

Heart racing, they got to their feet again. They didn't bother sneaking inside anymore. The boards of the back porch creaked underneath their feet, and they slammed the back door behind them. The noise was loud enough to alert the others, but only Margaret tried intercepting them.

“Where were you?” Margaret asked.

Jay didn't bother giving an answer, even though they knew they should have.

They walked right to where the grate should have been, staring at the bookcase that just didn't make sense. Their gaze traveled across the wall it was up against and landed on the tapestry hanging up next to it. They had made the tapestry when they were kids, pressing flowers down to make a cute dried pattern. Jay had loved it; it was where they had gotten their idea for the tattoo they had made months ago.

“Jaylin, what are you-”

Margaret stopped when they lifted up the tapestry.

Because, when they did, a small indent in the wall was revealed.

It wasn't that large. It was just big enough to fit a person. Just big enough to hide a ladder that went into a room underneath the house that Jay hadn't even known existed. That none of them had known existed. And without waiting for anyone else to tell them what they should and shouldn't do, Jay took a deep breath and started climbing down into a room that shouldn't have been there.

Into a secret that Jay never realized Ariana had.

And when they saw what was in the room, their breath caught in their throat.

There was a moment before Margaret followed them down.

She stared, too, before turning back to the ladder and shouting for the others to come down into what they had just discovered.
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

queer and here.





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Thu Jan 09, 2020 4:59 pm
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XxXTheSwordsmanXxX says...



RICHARD

The Truth



Richard had been ready to jump across the table and throttle Jaylin. His emotions were getting the better of him. Margaret had to intervene. Richard wouldn't have done anything. They were just stressed at the loss of their guardian. He couldn't blame them for them. It didn't make it any easier. Everyone went their seperate ways after the meal. Normally there would have been some debate between him and Jaylin that everyone found amusing. But not tonight.

They were already fracturing.

Richard went out to the little forge that mostly consisted of a cutting torch and a section of the landing gear as an anvil. Using scraps of metal to hammer out arrow heads. The dull ring of the hammer striking the hot steel helped keep the yelling in his head out. He had to keep it together. Everyone needed time to grieve.

"You know they are just stressed right?" Margaret said walking in. "Jay didn't mean to snap at you like that."

"Yeah. Still pissed me off," Richard sighed as he quenched the little bit of hot metal in water with a loud hiss.

"You're the one that said we needed to survive. So how about you go and make up with them. Someone has to start."

"Why is it that when them and I have these little fights that you come to me to fix it?"

"You're the more rational one. Even if you are a little too blunt." Richard chuckled and shook his head. Margaret had his respect. The both of them worked together to protect their little family. He'll when he said he was going to dig a grave she didn't even say anything, just grabbed a shovel and helped him.

"Fine. Where are they?"

"I don't know. They went off somewhere. I can't find them in the house."

"They can't have been stupid enough to go out there are night!" He growled. Hurriedly getting his gear to start the tracking them when the both of them heard the creaking boards and then the slamming door.

Margaret went to investigate. He hear the muffled questioning of Margaret before she yelled for everyone.

The remaining three hurried out seeing the hidden panel and dark hole that the ladder descended into.

"Um...I..." Richard stumbled trying to think of an excuse.

Margaret's head popping out of the hole with a serious look on her face. "You three down here now," she ordered which had Cosette and Kayla hurrying to follow.

Richard felt his feet planted. Margaret wouldn't be so bossy if it wasn't important. Gritting his teeth he began shuffling closer to the ladder. Closing his eyes as he began working his way down the short distance. His hands shaking and his heart hammering in his ears. He almost didn't hear the whirring and beeping of computers. Richard finally opened his eyes when his feet hit the floor and scanned the room.

To call it a room was an exaggeration. It was more of a closet. The far wall was a large monitor that was currently off. A panel of switches, dials, and keyboards butted up to it. On the side walls were notes and books that were falling apart frankly. Read too many times for them to be sturdy anymore. A small collection of lab samples and scientific tubes in a corner that currently had Cosette looking through them.

All of this was overshadowed by just how small this room felt, even more so with five bodies in it. Richard felt his lungs tightening. He didn't like being here.

"What the hell is this place? What does it mean?" Kayla asked.

"It means that Ariana had something she couldn't tell us," Jaylin said moving to the keyboard. Hitting the space the screen blipped to life with a flashing cursor and the request of a password.

"Well great. Anyone got any ideas?" Jaylin asked. A few were thrown out. All of them failures. "Oh come on. This is ridiculous!"

Richard could hear the frustration and swallowed down the lump in his throat. Walking away from the ladder with uneasy steps before setting a hand on the chair. They were stuck. His mind racing both to get out of that small room and to help his family understand.

He remembered something from a long time ago. "Try...Artemis," he said rather suddenly. With the tapping of keys the display finally came up.

"How did you know that?" Cosette asked.

"Ariana told me once that she always related to Artemis. A woman of the mountains and in love with a hunter," he said with a smile. It was a better time.

The screen showed a large amount of things. Reading on the weather. A collection of information that all of them had taken part with discovering things on this world. But at the center was a plant.

But not theirs.

This one...did not look right. No color of life on it. The waters and lands seemed to merge into the same sickly grey color. Just the faint outlines of the landforms showing.

"Wait...that's earth!" Jaylin cried.

"What's wrong with it? It...doesnt look like what Ariana showed us." Margaret wondered.

"It's dead," Richard said flatly. Even through a screen he could tell that that planet was gone. The sickly grey of a rotting, infected earth.

The room was quiet. No one even thought to argue. To hope. They knew he was right.

"Guys...there are slides here with our names on them," Cosette said gently. "It looks like blood."

"Those yearly draws," Margaret commented. "She was probably just making sure we weren't sick."

Cosette picked up some of the papers on the small station. "She was seeing if we had something called Blue Light. There's just a diagrams of cells."

"Might be in one of these books," Jaylin said leaving the station and pulling out one of the bound books.

"Richard are you alright?" Kayla asked.

Richard had turned white a sheet. The room was spinning and he couldn't hear anything passed the drumming in his head. He didn't say anything. Just rushed to the ladder and scrambled trying to get out. He couldn't be in that room. It was too small...not enough space. He could hear the roaring and heart seemed ready erupt from his chest. Pulling himself free of the underground room he hurried outside. Everything was crashing on him he tried to breath but all that came from it was the feel of his food coming.

With the bitter taste of bile in his mouth he remained there on hands and knees. Trembling as his body felt I'll, slowly coming back down from the panic that had taken him over. He didn't know if he could make himself go down there again.








i don't need to search the stars to know myself
— soundofmind