The Land Before Tomorrow

Chapter 10

The next few weeks continued as the past few did. I went to work and went about my normal day in Norquelle. And for those of you wondering, yes, Zander does call me Tater Tot.

Right now, it's about 10:30 pm. I'm laying in my bed reading a book that I got on the history of Akmondeza and the nuke. A knock on arrives on my door and I assume it to be Zander so I tell him to come in. When the door opens, sure enough, it is Zander. But he is acting strange. Nervous almost. He comes over and sits next to me on the bed. Almost the same way Carter did. He puts his arm around me. He looks at me. His amber eyes burning through me. "I need to tell you something..." the fact that he put his arm around me was a little alarming, and confusing, but it felt... right. It felt like something I had been missing for so long.

"Someone found out."

"Found out about what?"

"About us being from Akmondeza and all,"

"No..."

"Yes,"

"We need to get out of here immediately," I said. He agreed with me and we decided to go to Norquelles police station. We asked if we could talk to someone on the authorities. They said yes, and we got to talk to someone named Officer Dunn. The first thing he asked is "Do you have anything that could hurt me?" and obviously, we replied with no. We calmly explained to him that we were illegal fugitives from Akmondeza, and we realized what they have been doing wrong and we would like to help the government take them over. When we finished telling him everything, he went out of the room we were in and told us to stay there. When he came back in, he had two other officers with him. They put our hands behind our backs and cuffed us there. They then proceeded to take us to a jail cell where we stayed until the mayor of Norquelle came in. "Hi, I'm Floyd Hopkins. I was informed that you two are illegal fugitives from Akmondeza?" 

"Yes sir that is correct," I responded

"And you realize that-"

"Please, let me explain," I said desperately, trying to fake cry. "Fine, you may explain," 

"Thank you. Every year on June 27th, Akmondeza holds a raffle. Everyone's name gets put into a box, and our leader Ramsay draws ten names. We were told that those ten people get to go to a new better life. Well this year, my name got drawn and I realized, that is not what happens. They take us to an- unregistered mind you, I checked at the city hall- building here in Norquelle where they take us into a white room and kill us. Zander here, his name was drawn last year." 

"I see," 

"And we would like help from Overground to take down Akmondeza so no one else has to suffer."

"Well, then that is what we are going to do. I will talk to some of Norquelle's board members and see if we can get others to help with it as well. For the time being, do you and Zander have a safe place you can stay?"