"Men have always been evil, in no means should anyone trust them. They are filthy beasts. All they want is to kill you," Elena's history teacher said, slamming her metre stick on the blackboard, making the drowsy kids jump out of their seats.
Elena sighed, it was the same story every day, how The War started, that men were horrible beasts. Elena could recite the story backwards with her eyes closed.
It all started in the year 2050, about 950 years before, when The War broke out. Every man, husbands, brothers, uncles, grandfathers, went out to fight, leaving the woman behind. The men trained, turning into bloodthirsty murderers. That's all they did, kill each other, day after day, for years until there were no survivors left. The women ended up taking over from there, a small group of them roaming and scourging for any resources left over. They found plenty of supplies in the army tents, non-perishable foods, blankets, coats, and seeds, enough to help them get through the long winter, and to plant crops when summer came. The government, now made up of those same women, instituted Camps, all based on your financial state.
Elena was in a lower class Camp, ranked number 459 of 500. The buildings were made of tall red brick, nothing compared to the sleek metal buildings of the upper class. It had barely enough space, squeezing two people into each small bedroom. In some ways, it brought them all closer. Everybody knew each other's names and got along just fine.
"Class dismissed," her teacher said, beginning to bore herself with the repetitive speech.
Elena grabbed her books off her desk and walked out the door, eager to finally get outside. They were only permitted to go outside once a week, only for an hour, in the fear that they might try to escape. Mondays were for the youngest of the children, Tuesdays for elementary school aged children, Wednesday for the middle school aged children, Thursdays for teenagers, Fridays for college aged people, Saturdays for adults and Sundays for the elderly. She didn't see why they couldn't just let everyone outside every day, whenever they wanted to. She knew it would never happen, but it was something she always hoped for.
She burst out the front doors of the complex, breathing in the fresh air. She set her books down on the ground before falling back into the soft grass, taking in the smell of the flowers planted by the gardeners in the hopes to make the place seem a bit more cheerful.
One by one, the other girls trickled out of the building, all giggling with their friends. Elena envied them, they all had someone to laugh and to talk to. They were all in pairs by roommate. Elena, being the only girl who didn't share a room, made no efforts to try and talk to anyone, they all seemed perfectly content with their each other.
Elena waved her arms and legs, making snow angels in the grass and earning a couple disapproving stares from the other girls. If Elena ever got a roommate, she would make sure they liked to make grass angels too, that way she wouldn't be the only one.
Suddenly, Elena jolted upwards, hearing a slight rustling in the bushes next to the building. Nobody else seemed to notice it, so she decided to check it out for herself. She creeped around the side of the building, certain it was just a squirrel. She saw a large figure move behind the fence. She rubbed her eyes, it wasn't possible, nobody could get behind the fence.
The figure moved again. A small piece of paper fluttered through the bars of the fence as the figure disappeared. She picked it up, flipping it over to show the message scrawled in red ink.
Meet me back here a 10:00 tonight. Don't bring anyone with you.
-D
She tucked the note in the pocket of her peacoat just as the bell sounded for her to go back inside. What could 'D' stand for? She didn't know of any girls at the complex whose name started with D, other than Mrs. Dakota, her science teacher. What could Mrs. Dakota possibly want from her? All she knew was this was too big of a risk to pass up. She needed a little adventure in her all too predictable life. She did the same thing every day, go to school, eat, do homework, sleep, repeat.
She grabbed her books off the ground, following the other girls inside the building. Elena climbed the tall staircase to the attic, where her room was. Opening the hatch, she climbed up, throwing her books on the floor beside her.
Her room was one of the biggest, nobody wanted it, as it was filled with dust and cobwebs. She didn't mind though, she found ways to make it a bit more lively, like hanging colourful origami over her headboard. She sat down in the worn desk chair, blowing off a bit of dust and pulled the rainbow of origami paper she had accumulated over the years out of her desk drawer, not in the mood to start on her homework quite yet. She pulled out one of each colour of paper, to make a modular origami star ball (A/N: Pic in media).
---
By the time she was finished, it was already 9:30, she had been doing origami for two and a half hours. She pushed the pile of flowers and cranes away from her, rushing over to her wardrobe. The dorm lady would be here any minute to check on her. Elena stuffed some pillows under her duvet, not the most effective, but the dorm lady was going blind anyways. She threw her soft brown hair up into a ponytail, changing into a pair of black jeans, a black crop top and slipping into her combat boots. She opened her window, grabbing the note out of her coat pocket, and climbed out.
First entry for #JustWriteIt Valentine's Day! It all adds up to 1015 words!
-Kat
