34 Degrees (1-4)

34° Around

       Everyone murmurs around me while I stand silent. Fear pierces the hearts of everyone.

      "The Surface?" a voice rings out, as all heads turn to Erica. In an instant, everything goes quiet and Erica stands silent. Containment holds tight to their guns as the crowd grows restless.

      I stand in the center; there is no way to get to the back of the room in case things take a turn for the worst. I am stuck, potentially doomed, if things go down the same way they did last time. I'll be thrown into the mix and potentially blamed for a crime I didn't commit.

      Erica holds her own hands in front of her, and with a calm expression on her face begins to speak. "The Surface," she begins, nodding her head slowly while looking around the crowd, "For years we have stepped away from The Surface, fearing what may reside on top. Staying away from something that may be harmless," she lies. She knows that there are dangers far greater than anything we could begin to comprehend. Still, she continues. "We have nothing to fear."

      Disease is the first thing that I think about. The very thing I fear the most, the thing I refuse to be taken by, at all costs.

      "What about disease?" Another voice pipes up.

      Erica turns to face them, tightening her posture and pursing her lips as she begins to speak. "For all we know there could be no connection between the outside world and Achoysm." Another lie. "The majority of what lies in the outside world is still a mystery. In the past 29 years we have only had 10 brave souls venture outside of Erical, and-" she is abruptly interrupted, now she's drawn the line.

      "Yeah, and every one of them died," the same voice yells again. She has crossed a barrier that should have remained uncrossed.

      "There is no connection between the death of those ten civilians and their exposure to the outside world," she states calmly.

      "No connection?" I quietly ask as the room falls silent. I stare at Erica, something most people won't dare to do while confronting her. My boots clunk against the concrete and I feel my fingers curl into a fist. I try with all of my power to unclench them, but to no avail - she went too far.

      "What do you call it then?" The room clears as I make my way through the crowd. I stand in front of her and for the first time I realize how short she is, at least four inches shorter than I am, if not more. Containment starts toward me, getting their guns ready to fire if needed, but Erica raises her hand.

     "Let her speak. I want to hear what she has to say." She lowers her hand by her side, and looks at me with her narrow, gritting smile. "Continue".

       I have never seen Erica so close and I take in every detail of her face. Every wrinkle and sag under her eye, every grey strand in her hair. I stare into her desolate brown eyes. "My parents went out to The Surface during your test runs. Your 10 volunteers, we all know they were part of an experiment to see if The Surface was safe. Don't act like we've all forgotten - we've not." I stare at her, not near or over. She seems to be taking everything without a dent to her line of thought, unphased. "You think just because eight years have passed, we've all moved past it? We've not forgotten the screams. We've not forgotten the stories, the sights we saw from the ones that returned." I stopped for a moment, "The four that returned".

     "You make a valid point," she smiles at me. I feel my teeth grind and my fingernails dig into the palm of my hand. "But we simply must take the risk - there is no other choice." She snaps her fingers and Containment rushes forward, "I have a special place in Araca for you," she states.

      "You can't do that!" I shout as two officers grab my arms and pull me through the crowd. Two others accompany Erica back to the doors she had come through. "Actually, I can." She whips around and just like that, she's gone, deeper into the bunker of the elite. I feel the heel of my boots drag across the ground as I try my hardest to escape their grip. The crowd in the hub of Ceren shouts, they beat on the doors - locked by Containment to prevent progression deeper into Erical, preventing any potential harm to Erica for her decisions.