The dreamers (Working-title)

Chapter 1: Chloe

I wake up.

I see that I am in the middle of a corridor. Closer inspection shows a lack of wall on the right hand side, instead there are rows of seating. I must be on a set.

I have to check, looking down at my right hand I see the symbol imprinted on it. Only a day or so until I need to replace it. It currently displays an image of a toad. It's surrounded by circular text that reads "run you clever boy and remember" a reference from an old show that I can vaguely remember from back when I used to have the time to watch TV. Back before I was on the run.

I pick up my pen and start to draw over the top where certain lines have faded. As I do this, I ask myself the question. Instinct tells me no, so I pick up my hand mirror and study my face. I see a large variety of scars, my short stumpy nose, my sickly green eyes, my wonky teeth, it's all in the right place and there's the right number of each.

I'm feeling the no quite poignantly now so I pick up a book from my bag, 'Heroes of Olympus: The Lost Hero' - I've read it before, I've read the whole series, but it's not fresh enough in my mind that I could have memorised it. I open the book, every single sentence is covered with a black plastic piece of tape. I pull back the first one to reveal the sentence, "Even before he got electrocuted, Jason was having a rotten day." I read it perfectly easily and so the no was backed up for a third and final time.

I put the book and hand mirror back into my bag, swing the bag around to my back and make my way up onto the seating.

Sat on seat 7D, I look down upon the room. My friends are all asleep. I do a head count and count 11. Stunned for a moment considering there should be 13, I recount. Still the number is 11, I realise I hadn't counted myself so it was actually 12, but that's still not 13. I check around me on the seating to see if someone got up early. Sure enough, right behind me, I see Tark.

Tark is a little taller than me and a lot more bald. He doesn't have a single hair on his body, at least that's what he says. No one has actually seen the rest of his body so they can't comment. His skin is a very pale white, his eyes are bluer than the sea, he wears a long sleeved shirt buttoned up to the top, and pants that are at least one size too big, they're held up by a belt just above what I assume is his belly button, the shirt is tucked in, but it doesn't look neat. The bottom of the trousers curl around his shoe-less but sock coated heels.

"'Sup chief?" That's his little name for me, our group has no leaders but I often take charge in times of distress.

"You scared the crap outta me, Tark," I tell him before looking around the room and then back to him, "Did you check?"

"Whatta you take me for, chief?" He says before quickly looking away and at the symbol on his hand.

"You've gotta get better at doin' that. If I have to remind you each time there's not much of a point." Then I notice a stirring in the corner of my eye. Another one of my associates begins to wake up. Robin, our tracker. She's beautiful, her long braided black hair running down her back and into her tank top. Pulling the hair up and over her shoulder, she stands upright and jogs on the spot. As she does she checks the back of her hand, she nods, jogs faster and then goes looking in her bag for something. I'm not entirely sure of her process past the hand symbol stage but it is inspiring how quickly she can move.

"Why don't you just ask her out?" Tark asks and I turn to face him, my face reddening.

"What?" Then I realise he just read something from his book.

"That's what it says, right?" He asks, holding his copy of 'Five Fine Fellas' right up to my face. I push it down and onto his lap.

"You're not supposed to ask other people what they see if you've already read it. Also you need to have more than one book, if you keep reading 'Five Fine Fellas' your subconscious will start to memorise it." As I tell him this I realise that more or less everyone is getting up. They all check their hands and go about the rest of their checking routines.