The Truth Will Set You Free

Can You Understay Your Welcome?

-Peter-

            The air train skidded with a halt and the door opened again, and we stepped out to find ourselves in the middle of a city. The buildings were tall, colored in varying shades of blue, the lightest shades near the ground and the darkest navy blues spiraling towards the sky. The roads were paved with a smooth, almost rubber like navy material, and there were no sidewalks. Only a frantic mess of hoverboards and miniature speeding air trains zoomed across the paths, with pedestrians staying to the sides.

            “It’s like we’ve entered a time machine,” Poppy said, looking around as more people in olive uniforms ushered everyone off the trains and into the city, “and came out 100 years into the future.” We stayed close on Hector’s back, figuring it couldn’t hurt to be near someone we almost knew.

            I smirked as we started to walk down a small side street. “Yeah, but it would be really nice to get back to the past.” The group skidded to a halt, and I looked to our left and right. There were glass cylinders lining the sides of the building, and their sheer doors opened up towards us.

            “Three to an elevator,” one of the officials barked as we were slowly crammed into the tubes. We found Hector and squeezed into one with him.

            “Quick, hide behind me,” Hector gasped and we ducked into the back of the elevator. “I don’t know how you guys got out of uniform so quickly, but the Guards will kill you-literally-if they find out.”

            “Wait-Guards-uniforms-kill-what?-“ I put a finger to Poppy’s thin lips just in time, as a Guard came over and punched in some numbers on a small white keypad on the side of the elevator. The glass doors closed with a thud and slowly the cylinder started to lurch upward.

            It was almost nauseating, seeing the people below you slowly become smaller, with what looks like no barriers around you. The elevator abruptly skidded to a stop and we all fell towards the back wall, leaning on it until it opened up and we fell into a heap on the thin carpet. “Sorry,” Hector breathed. “I’ve seen elevators before, but we don’t have them back in the Counties.”

            “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Poppy breathed before I gave her a dead stare.

Why hadn’t she realized that this place-this strange city, the “Empire,” apparently, was very different from the Homelands? He had experienced things that we had not, and the same was true the other way around.

            We stood up and brushed ourselves off before turning to the oval door, colored dark blue to make it stand out from the lighter teal walls. There was a small green button where a doorknob would have been, and Hector pressed it, a small buzzing noise sharply hitting the air. He jumped and grabbed his head as Poppy and I awkwardly shuffled away. When the noise ended, I noticed his hands were still shaking. “Sorry, brings back…bad memories. I’m surprised you guys don’t remember it, even,” he breathed, his pale skin looking even more white than usual.

            The door slid open to reveal a woman with chocolate brown hair styled in a pixie cut and brown eyes. She had thin lips, and was wearing a green long sleeved shirt with blue leggings. She looked at us disapprovingly. “You’re the Mercybots that have to live with us? Alright, get in here.” We slowly shuffled into the apartment and the door slid behind us. As we stood in the small foyer-area, a door to a kitchen to our left, I noticed that the woman was eyeing Poppy and I very closely. “Did they change the uniforms for the Ringees? I haven’t seen anything as-well-interesting looking-ever.”

            Hector looked over nervously and stepped in front of us. Somehow, our cover-that-we-werent-supposed-to-have-cause-we-werent-supposed-to-be-here-in-the-first-place had been blown. “Er, yeah, the uniforms have been changed, er, miss. Girls and boys have different uniforms, and they also change based on age.”