The Last Battle

Chapter 9

It's the next day and I'm feeling pretty good, besides the constant aces and pains from my soreness.

It's almost time for us to go meet the leader of the Raiders, so I decided I would try to get up and walk around a few minutes before we leave, since I haven't walked in almost two days.

I stand up. Ok, Ok this is good. I step forward, shaking. I'll be fine, I think and grin to myself.

I walk around for a couple more minutes until Stone walks in.

"Practicing?"

"Yeah," I smile.

"Ready to go?"

"Yep." I respond reassuringly, but inside I'm really scared and excited and happy and sad all at the same time.

We walk out of the peach colored room. I haven't been allowed out of that room, so this is the first time I've been able to walk around the compound. Once I step out I notice that the walls were black and looked like some sort of rock, but I wasn't sure. Every once in a while there was a little light but otherwise it was dark and eery.

We turned a corner into a large hallway with a door at the end. Stone walks up to it and knocks it gently.

"Come in," I hear, coming from inside the room.

Stone grabs the door handle and turns it to the right, then he pushes.

We walk in with wide eyes. "Wow!" is all I could think. The room was ginormous and had the nicest furniture I have ever seen. I notice a woman standing at a desk in the middle of the room. She has blond hair, blue eyes, and is thin but strong and muscular.

"Come sit," she gestures at two chairs sitting in front of a very large desk.

"Hi I'm Jennifer." She extends her hand to me and I take it gratefully.

"I'm Emma." Then she moves over to Stone and they shake hands while he tells her his name.

"Ok, let's get started," She sits down in her chair, and we follow. She opens a file and hands each of us a small stack of paper.

"I just need you to sign here, here, and here," She points to the spaces where our names should go, and hands us a pen.

I look at the papers, skimming through it then writing my name on the line in cursive. A few seconds after I finish, Stone finishes also. We hand her the signed papers.

"Alright now that that's done, why don't I show you guys around?"

"Ok," I reply.

She stands up and moves out of the room, towards the peach colored room I recovered in.

"These are the hospital rooms, but I'm pretty sure you guys already know that so uh.....yeah"

We move down another hallway to a big set of doors.

"This is the cafeteria." She opens the doors to a big room with many people sitting, laughing, eating, and talking.

She closes the doors and walks down another hallway. Wow! How in the universe am I supposed to find my way around this ginormous compound!!!

"Alright, this is where you will be staying Emma." She opens the door and walks in a little. I see girls and boys that are probably in my "group" just standing around talking to each other.

She puts her hands on my shoulders and announces, "This is Emma, she is new here so be nice and show her around."

I look in the crowd of faces and see Miranda smiling at me. "At least I know someone here." I think to myself trying to be as positive as I can.

"I need someone to assign her to a bed and give her a uniform....alright?"

"I'll do it." Miranda says happily.

"Alright, well I'm gonna leave you to that and uh.......yeah. See you later at the ceremony."

"Ok," I said and gave a quick smile.

She leaves the room and I get chills up my spine very quickly.