The End Of Nothing And The Beginning Of It All

Chapter Eighteen: Hope

"Henry there is something wrong about this place" I exclaimed quickly.
"Wait, slow down. What do you mean?" he asked reassuringly touching my arm clearly noticing my frantic state.
"I started in the foraging section today" I began before I was interrupted.
*That's amazing. I knew you'd find something" he said happily.
"No" I stopped him abruptly. Almost turning his smile upside down. "It's not right. One of the guards punished a forager for smuggling some magic mushrooms" I continued.
"That's what they were told when they started. There is a strict no stealing rule. Everyone needs food to be equally shared in order to maximise survival." he replied sounding like an automated robot.
"That doesn't mean beating them with a wooden cane. That's not humane" I replied raising my voice.
"What do you mean?" he said in complete confusion.
"I saw the guard hit the man with a wooden cane as punishment" I reiterated.
"No you couldn't have. The punishment is not being allowed out to forage the following day. They have to help prepare the food in the kitchen instead. You must have been mistaken for something else" he tried to justify the information he had just received, still looking in complete shock.
"Trust me I saw it with my own eyes. And so did the others. Ask Tanya. She said that it's happened before" I stated. "Anyway I'm not finished. On my way back here, before I saw you, there was an old man asking me if I had seen his wife Justine. He says that one of the guards took her?" I explained.
"Oh don't worry about that. We have a few elderly people that forget that they had lost their wives before coming here" he said.
"That's what a guard said to me but it sounds like a fabricated excuse to me. I saw that man yesterday and he didn't seem crazy or mistaken then. I really think something has happened to his wife and I'm going to find out" I said feeling some of the weight lift off my shoulders now that I had told someone else.
"Look I can look into it ok? You don't need to worry. I'm sure everything can be explained. I'll see what I can find out tomorrow and I'll let you know" he said trying to comfort me. But it didn't work, I didn't need anyone else doing my investigating.
"Why do you always see the good in everything? Why can't you see that there are bad things happening?" truthfully I was starting to get annoyed by his positivity. I commended it but it also seemed like he had been brainwashed by this place.
"You have to see the positive in things when the world is in the current state it's in. If you don't, then you will spiral  into the darkness that's around you" he explained as if those words were meant to mean anything to me. He continued to reassure me before leaving us to get some rest for the night. Henry seemed like such a good guy. However I was starting to think that he was either massively oblivious or may have been protecting them and knew more than he was letting on...