Caged

2 - Test

A loud popping noise echoes through the room.  A puff of white smoke in the wall in front of us pervades the room slowly, exposing a large hole in the wall.  I quickly check around me, looking for someone with a gun.  It has to be a gun, right?  It sounds just like one, or what I’ve heard of guns.  Usually guards will fire blanks into the air to try to initiate silence when crowds of people swarm and riot when the government does something they don’t approve of.  It sounds just like that.

Another popping noise.  A cloud of smoke right next to the last one.  And another, and another –– the pack of us duck down when the room is filled with popping noises and so charged with white smoke, it’s almost impossible to see my hand in front of me.

“What the hell?” I hear Copious growl.  “Where’s the Panel?  Hey!  You still in here, lady?”  He’s yelling to Certa.  Did she leave?  When?  I never saw her go.  I glanced over at the little boy when the first pop sounded, and then she wasn’t in front of us anymore.

“What are we supposed to do?” Copious says to no one in particular, but quietly enough that I know he’s given up on Certa still being here.

I hear footsteps and my senses are piqued, but when they start to get farther away from me, I’m confused.  The clicking sound of a door opening behind us makes everyone turn.  Momentarily, a gust of light from the hall illuminates through the smoke.  I recognize the oldest of us, the women, her stout silhouette moves through the door.  Did she just quit?  Is that an option?

I turn back around and look at the contours of the remaining five of us.  The screen begins emanating a beeping noise and the name Lily Lee flashes in red and then is crossed out.

“T‘sup, Velvet,” the girl in the blue laughs.  When I don’t immediately respond, she adds, “I didn’t know if you were Lily or not, but now Lily’s gone and there’s only one girl name left that isn’t mine.  So I thought I’d announce that I’ve figured it out.”

“She’s not one for small talk,” Copious says, and for a moment I think he’s defending me or something of the sorts.  “She’s not one for talking to anyone, ever, actually.”

“Oh, can it, will you?” she, Elena, the only other name left, says.  “If I wanted to hear your opinion, I would’ve asked for it.”  She talks in my direction, or what she thinks is my direction being that the smoke is still too thick to see anyone.  “I’m guessing this one is Copious, as you have the same last name?”

“As much as I’d love to stay and chat” someone else says, “I don’t think we have much time for that.  Turn around.”

I don’t even have to turn around to know there’s something behind us.  Orange and green light beams on the smoke.  But when I do turn around, my jaw drops.

The other half of the room has turned into a something like a swamp or a lake, only there is no muck in the water.  Calm, completely clear waves sway up to my feet.  The teal lake stretches farther than the room once did, and there are trees rising up through the water, touching the orange sky.  Some are mere sticks in the sand, dark and charred like they were the victim of a forest fire and then a flood.  But then others are full-fledged, one-hundred-year-old trees, full with leaves and sturdy looking branches.  It’s like a forest on the water.

“Dad!” the boy next to me pipes up.  I open my mouth to comment on the swamp-lake, but the boy isn’t looking at that.

“Yes, Gray?” the man says.

“I think it’s a city,” Gray says.

Copious snorts.  “Are you cra––”

He shuts up when he turns around.  The room is divided.  One half the swamp-lake, another what appears to be a city that has gone through unimaginable havoc.  The tide sweeps over little bits of rubble.