Raindrops streamed diagonally down the window as we sped down the motorway in the pitch blackness. The only light was that which streamed across my eye-line as a car moved past in the opposite direction. No one was speaking. Actually, I was pretty sure my mother was sleeping. Lily and I, however, sat in silence, not having our usual backseat squabbles. Motion-less. We were in a state whereby we were too shocked to sleep and talk, but tired, so very tired. I had texted Mattie about how I was moving away in such a rush. I wasn’t allowed to give details about where and why, which I personally found weird. Maybe they just needed to test whether the dome was liveable using a sample and then they would evacuate everyone else. I turned my phone off afterwards though. I couldn’t bare thinking about my previous life at this present time. Minutes felt like hours, hours felt like days. Everything felt like it was in slow motion, it was rather surreal. Occasionally Lily and I would catch each other’s eyes. We both felt the same hurt of leaving everything behind. It must have felt worse for her though, she’d been going out with Tony for a reasonably long time now. She would smile a little each time though, to keep my morale up. I would smile back in order to say that I understood. For the first time in years, I felt I shared deep bond with my sister.
I must have gotten some sleep during the journey because the next thing I remember was pulling up at some gates and the sound of my dad’s voice speaking. I didn’t take notice of what he was saying, but I knew we had arrived at father’s project. As the car parked, my senses started to pick up again. The air smelt artificial, the temperature was quite muggy and contained, like a greenhouse. The structure we were in, I soon learnt was basically a large radiation-proof greenhouse. The expanse of the area it covered was amazing. It included a huge housing area, a town (complete with town hall and church for the religious people), a large expanse of countryside (including a mountain and valley). Our house in the “greenhouse”, as I had now named it, looked like a cheesy futuristic building you commonly see on television. The interior matched the building with its stereotypical futuristic furniture. Although my room was bigger in our new house, it didn’t feel right. I wanted my old room back; at least it felt warm and comfortable. The room I was assigned was as comfortable as a hospital waiting room... with a bed. School wasn’t much better. The teachers didn’t seem engaged within their subject at all... I don’t even think they were proper teachers. My grades started to drop quite considerably; but so had everyone else’s. I didn’t really make any friends. The kids here were nothing like as weird or friendly as my friends back home. I was more content making friends with a brick to be brutally honest. This made me look hostile to my fellow students. I quite often sought psychological refuge in the fields around the mountain, sometimes skiving lessons to just sit there and mourn the loss of my previous life. The loss of my friends. The loss of Mattie.
