The Note

Chapter 22 Fourth Expedition: Finding the end at Kindergarten

That day I woke up just as if I had a terrible nightmare. My breathing was heavy, I was covered in sweat and I was having a bad time realizing that the nightmare was over and that I was awake.

I started to scratch my right arm believing that would tear apart whatever Max injected me with even if I knew it was impossible.

I did that until my arm went red and until I realized it hurt.

I was panicking. I knew Max was in the school but I have no idea what he was doing there or what he injected in my arm

I knew I had to do something about it, so I got dressed up and looked out for Laureen who was in The Church with everyone else. The just had the ceremony I planned for The Gone ones and Luca said they didn't wake me up cuz it looked like I really needed a lot of rest.

When everyone started to walk back to The School, I grabbed Laureen by her left arm so we could talk privately and I told her I needed a favor from her. Of course I couldn't tell her anything related to Max because she didn't believe me the first time I saw him, so I just asked her to check my blood periodically. When she asked me why I wanted that I told her I just wanted to keep track of my health after all the times I'd felt sick.

She agreed and I have been weekly checked for a complete month now.

Spending five months here would make anyone go crazy, but we have survived a lot together and it has been in the last month that we have become even closer.

Because of the fact that we have lost a lot of people, we kind of broke or teams. There is no longer a "Medical Assistance" group or an "Electrical Workers" one; there is just a group of thirteen individuals that help each other in whatever they need. If someone needs to be treated we all take care of that, if we need to find supplies in a specific area we all look up for those, if a light isn't working well we all try to find and fix the problem and today, we need to explore the last part of The School together.

Kindergarten is the last place we need to check.

Kindergarten is connected to Primary School through the Little Dinner and The Park. It was thanks to Aoued that we could check Primary School because it was him the one who knew which places were dangerous and which weren't after all the time he had spent there.

But we didn't decide to enter Kindergarten through any of those places. We walked down the Main Road and crossed the tiny door that separated it from Kindergarten and, just before starting, I decided to give some instructions first.

-Alright,-I said- we are going to do just what my team and I did back when we were six members; we walk in, check the parameters, write things down and leave, except that this time we will also be looking for food and supplies just as Luca's team did. Try not to get away from each other and if you find something odd, call me, understood?

Everyone nodded.

By the time we walked pass the door we could tell how much influence time has had in there; the grass was kneel-high, the swings were oxidized and some were even hanging from one chain only, the slides were missing parts, there were toys all over the place but, strangely, there was not a single Rock in sight.

We started with the classrooms that were to our right. We checked them and found some papers, colors, crayons, tiny backpacks with inedible food and nothing more.

The atmosphere was dark, cold and with all those toys around us was definitely creepy too. The cold air made some swings move and some leaves fly, making the place look even lonelier and making it look like it has been that way for years, not months.

Maybe we've been here for years and I'd been counting wrong all this time.

Once done with the classrooms, we moved towards the Little Dinner where we found plates on top of the tables, napkins and benches on the floor and more inedible food everywhere.