chapter five

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"'Candidate Training'?" I spoke in my mind. Sammy was completely oblivious to the situation, he just had such composure.
"Did you see what the door said?" I quietened my voice as I reached his ear, he shivered a little.
"No? What?" His head rotated to my direction.
"'Candidate Training'." I whispered again. His brow furrowed, creasing the inner corners.
"What does that mean?" He seethed.
"I- don't know. I'm starting to worry again." My teeth began to chatter - something that would normally happen.
"You're okay." He reassured with a smile, squeezing my arm against his side.

For being in such a secluded area, through hallways and other doors, it was impressive: an acre of equipment - ropes, bars, weights and climbing frames with buzzers. A separate section contained targets with axes on the side. There was also a girl with a suppressed pistol, headphones on and both hands cupping the trigger, shooting things behind thick glass - I couldn't really see.
"I need to go on that climbing frame." Sammy muttered.

"Huh." I muttered, quite astonished. I was definitely not expecting this; some entire underground organisation. My arm was still intertwined with his as we were escorted to a bench, we were the only ones there, and that's when I finally but reluctantly took my arm out of his. I seated myself comfortably. I was calmed by surroundings - it seemed fun, but I also wanted to know when I could see my house again. And Cassie. And Frasier.

Sammy observed his surroundings, then leant towards me.
"Do you think we're gonna be secret agents or something?" He mumbled.
"Imagine." I smirked, "But hopefully not so secret that we're just kept under here."
"I don't even wanna know about that. I'm just gonna remain optimistic." He responded, and I was glad to know that he had that outlook.
"Did you see that girl shooting the gun? That's gonna be me." I gestured finger guns whilst muttering pow pow pow.
"Look at that climbing frame though, I wanna just run up it." He gazed.
"Maybe you'll be able to soon."

The door behind opened, and a tall, lean girl waltzed in. Three more people followed behind her, one sitting in-front of us and two sitting behind. The first looked pretty professional and experienced, so I was ready to be told what to do. She wore grey clothes - similar to the guard. She had a vest, a jacket that stopped at her waist, dark khaki trousers and boots.

She stood tall in-front of us, ready to explain something.

"Welcome, candidates."

Here we go.

"I will be your Coach for the foreseeable future - call me Hennessee, Henny for short. Presumably, you all came from a lake, right? Whether you arrived here by accident or purpose, your curiosity brought you here. Collectively, we are the CPC - the Citizen Protection from the Church. If you haven't realised it already, the Church is full of money-hungry, low-life mongrels who couldn't care less for their people. So, to put it simple, we're going to overthrow them."

That's a lot to take in.

"Now, don't be alarmed, this is not going to just involve you lot, this has been years in the making and you will be apart of the outcome. Take a short break to converse with your members." Henny turned around, monitoring the girl with the gun. I assumed she'd be part of our group as-well.

Sammy and I turned around to the two sitting behind us - a boy and a girl. The boy in-front stomped away from us. All four of us had a blank look as he went away. We shared a look of confusion and chuckled.

"What's your name?" I blurted, looking towards the girl who adorned semi-dry, curly ginger hair.
"Kees." She smiled, reaching out a hand. I took it comfortably.
"Hailey." I returned. Sammy introduced himself to the boy, known as Fritz. "Do you know the other boy?" I asked.
"Doyle." Fritz chimed in, his mid-pitch voice clasped my ear. "He's a friend of mine and Kees'. He came down with us but landed right on his head." I winced at his explanation. Poor boy. "I'm gonna ask soon if someone can, like, examine him or something."

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