When All The Adults Were Gone

Chapter 23 - The Offices

There we all stood. A group of seven. Three girls, four boys. There was me, of course, Darcy and Lara, one of the tech girls who was good with computers. We made up the girls. The boys were made up of Tom, Sam, a boy named Adrian and another named Scott. Adrian and Sam were both part of the guard slash mini army we had going on and Scott was another one of the tech people that was good at wiring.

You may wonder how we came across such an odd bunch, but let me just elaborate. As soon as Tom had calmed down and stopped hopping we ran down to the school to call an emergency meeting. We explained that we were going to break into the offices and try to find out some more about this equation that had all of the physics nerds buzzing with excitement when we told the group. We asked for volunteers that would be useful to the mission and well, I've never seen so many people raise their hand before. We eventually had to narrow it down to who had the best skills and here you have us. We seven of mixed skills, mixed ages and mixed backgrounds.

 So there the seven of us stood, outside the offices, looking up at the large glass windows and doors that loomed several stories high. The white painted walls seemed all too intimidating and cold to what they usually represented. On a normal day, when the base was busy and loud, the white walls would represent our superiors and their protection over us. Today, the base was silent except for the odd clatter or loud laughter from where us kids tended to stay. So yeah, there we were looking up at this massive, white building wondering how we were going to get in.

I looked around at the others and said "Right. Shall we get this thing done? I don't know about you but I want answers." I took a few steps forward and pulled out the keys that my mum had left me in her chest of drawers. I wondered if this would be the time that I would need them, but there was only one way to find out. I pushed the door to test if it was locked. It was shut tightly and wasn't showing any sign of budging without a key. I tried all of the keys that my mum had left me praying that one of them would fit, but alas it didn't.

 Lucky thing we had Scott with us. As I said before, he was supposedly good with wires and changing the wiring. I think he was the kid that decided to rewire the fire alarm system at school so it wouldn't stop no matter what the caretaker tried. "Scarlett, don't bother trying the keys again. None of them are going to fit. Let me just find the disabled button. One second." He walked around by the door, looking amongst the ivy and plants that had grown wild over time because I don't think any of the adults cared. While he looked I turned to Darcy while Tom and Lara talked. "Do you think we will find anything useful in there?" I asked her, grabbing her arm. She calmly grabbed my shoulders, a strand of her red hair falling in front of her eyes. "Scarlett, listen to me. There has to be something of worth in there otherwise it wouldn't have all of this security.

I have to admit, I was losing it slightly. I was just worried that I would let the rest of the group down and everyone would lose hope in ever seeing their parents again. "Anyway, if you didn't think there was something in there you would never have suggested going in there. Even since we were little you've always had that kind of instinct." Darcy stared me straight in the eyes, her green eyes boring into mine. Our little staring competition was interrupted by Scott standing up from the left of the door exclaiming "Found it!" quite loudly. It made us both jump out of our skins which just made us start laughing.

As Darcy and I just cracked up, the others looked at us with judgemental stares. But hey, I'm only human. Me and Darcy together are not good in a serious situation. One of us always ends up laughing so then the other starts. "Right," Scott said slowly. "I'm just going to need a few minutes to rewire the disabled door. I've found the panel, I just need to get it open now."

Giving us one last funny look, he crouched back down and started pulling screwdrivers from the belt he had around his waist. He began unscrewing bolts, pulling out blue, green, brown, yellow, purple and white wires and began twisting and pulling and clipping. The six of us waited, Darcy and Sam began talking and Tom and Lara continued their conversation from earlier. I just stood and watched Scott working on the wires. It was so clever how he twisted wires together until he stood up and pressed the button.

The door opened and I led the way inside, patting Scott on the back as I passed. I walked into a large entrance hall, fake green spiral trees stood either side of the lift door and the three other doors in the room. There were framed images of all of the important people who lived on the base, including my dad. His picture was one of the last on the wall next to his best friend's, those two were like Darcy and I, inseparable. There was a dark wooden receptionist's desk that took up the majority of the space. On the desk was a computer, a few mugs and stacks and stacks of paper with appointments and other important information written on them. The floor was what surprised me, it was littered with tatty brief cases, paper, pens, the odd mug of coffee. It was as if people had just dropped what they were doing and left.

Lara went straight to the computer whilst the rest of us rifled through the papers on the floor and on the desk. Tom and I went through the brief cases, Scott and Lara started to do their technology thing and Sam and Darcy stood in a corner 'looking' at paper. "You know, I think something is going on between those two." Tom stated, totally oblivious. I just gave him a look to say 'really? Have you only just noticed?' Noticing my facial expression he chuckled and picked up a black handbag. "You know, I sometimes wonder if we're like that. All starry eyed and giggly," just as I giggled "Sometimes, I wonder if this whole thing hadn't have happened we never would have spoken." He looked up from the contents of the black bag into my eyes. Oh, those dreamy, hazel eyes that I fell for every time I looked at them. Instead of giving him an answer, I just leaned forward and kissed him softly. "Well, I'm glad it did happen. I'm glad I have you."

"Guys! Look what I've found. It's a map of each department in the building. We want research or science which is on the third floor. Perfect!" Lara squeaked excitedly. "That's brilliant Lara! That means we're one step closer to getting the answers we need." I replied, equally excited. The emotions started running again. The sudden jolt of energy that burst from my stomach into my veins, filling me with a warmth and comfort that was the fact we were just a little bit closer to getting our parents back.

Sam and Darcy had retreated from their corner to join us in the excitement. Sam bent down and grabbed a small, white card off the floor. "Let's get going to the third floor then people!" He cried, holding up a key card in the air. Tom ran to the door to the stairs and held it open for everyone as we all raced to the third floor, up steep flights of wooden stairs. We reached a solid metal door that had black writing on it that read "SCIENCE, RESEARCH AND EXPERIMENTS". Sam scanned the card onto the small silver device next to the door, and with a loud beep the door opened.