The Greenbrier Forest *Completed*

"I have lived my whole life asking questions that nobody could answer for me! Truly you of all people, our leader, can answer them for me. But you won't get off your throne to do anything about our survival! I went to school for 4 years just to learn about a land I may never see, the people I may never meet, the hope that we might go back to the mainland that has slowly died in every one of us. Why haven't we tried to get across the ocean to go back to the United States? Why were we dumped here? Have we been abandoned or are they coming back? How are we going to survive here with all our livestock dying? Why haven't we gone back? I demand to get some answers, you're obviously not telling us the entire story!" I slammed my hand down on The Commander's desk that was merely just a slate of wood laying on upturned stumps brought in here by the strongest of us. Her office is a sad excuse of a building; a ragged shack on a hill with the inside wallpapered with animal pelts, and the floor was just dirt. Her desk was almost completely covered with papers.

The Commander softly spoke while sifting through her papers, as if she was looking for an answer on a paper, "Dear child you need to stick your head back in your books and study a little more, that's the story as we know it is. We were put here by the military, if we go back they will shoot on sight. You need to stop asking questions and start listening to authority figures instead of punching their desks and demanding answers to topics you've already gotten answers for."

"I don't have the answers though, nobody has ever given me answers! The answer is always 'I don't know'!" I slammed my hand back down on the desk.

"Carla, that's an answer. We don't know, nobody does. So we wait, and until then, this is our home," The Commander spoke in a soft, monotone voice like she's memorized her answers. 

I rolled my eyes and turned towards the door. As I was halfway out the door the Commander started talking again, "Carla, seriously. It's nothing to worry your about."

I turned back around, "The survival of your people, and my friends, should come before anything else on those papers scattered on your desk. If you won't give me answers then I will find them out for myself." And slam the door on my way out. I probably didn't sway her mind but I walked back to my dorm anyway. Our island is split into 4 sections: Section 1 is our farming grounds, Section 2 is our sleeping areas, Section 3 is our eating area, and Section 4 is an unused forest. The Commander's office is on a hill overlooking section 2. The sun was directly in front of me so it was almost dinner time, I had argued with the Commander since after lunch. I started jogging due to the sun going down and I was about to lose the light. I got to the dorm with plenty of time to spare; my best friend's little brother hugged me upon my entrance into the dorm. 

"Sarah Turd how was the Commander? You've been gone all day," He squeaked, still hugging me. Sarah turd was my nickname from him. 

"Hey Peanut, she still doesn't agree with me. It'll be okay though," I spoke softly so those who weren't in our group wouldn't hear. His real name is Will. 

"Carla! You're back," My friend Carter, Will's older brother, and my best friend. He shouted and came running in my direction. Carter almost ran me over to give me a hug, pretty much tossing his brother aside. "You've been gone all day, I thought something happened to you."

I took a step back and put my hand on his shoulder, "I'm okay, I'm safe."

He hugged me again, "Good."

"If you were worried why didn't you go to The Hideout? I thought Nathan said he fixed the radio?" I softly asked. Nathan is Carter's older brother, he's good with tech. 

"Number one: you dont have a radio on you. And number two: he couldn't figure out the circuit board, or couldn't find one or something," Carter confessed, "It's hard for him to learn this stuff when we were never taught it."

"Is he still down there?" I asked

Paige, Nathan's brat of a girlfriend, walked behind us and stood infron of us and answered my question, "Yeah he's been working on that radio since breakfast, I had to bring him his food."

"Hey Paige," Carter smiled

"Glad to see you're still alive Shortcake," Nathan's voice echoed from behind us. 

"You literally haven't been out of that room all day but you choose to come out right as Carla gets back?" Paige snapped.

"For your information I came out here so I could eat dinner, and quit with the jealous stuff. It's getting annoying." Nathan explained. 

We stood in silence for a few seconds.

"Perfect timing for dinner," Carter smiled. 

"Well I was going to go to lunch but I lost track of time," Nathan explained.

"We've got a few minutes until dinner, not quite perfect timing," I teased.

Paige rolled her eyes.

"Got something to say?" I snapped.

She walked away.

"Where's Kathy and Cleo? Shouldn't they be back by now?" Carter worriedly asked. 

"They're at the hideout, they had their food with them. They were talking about a boat design that Cleo is going to test out since she can't drown," Nathan explained, "They're going to test it out tonight so nobody notices that we're building a boat."

"Why doesn't Liam help them take the boat down to the water?" I asked, "He can tear a tree out of the ground with one hand, lifting a little boat shouldn't be that hard for him."

"Liam and Madelyn have been under super surveillance by the Commander's henchman for the past few hours. A guard had grabbed Madelyn's arm and Liam punched him. They've both been under lockdown, no communication," Carter clarified, "The guard he punched was Oscar, so he healed himself within a few minutes. He's really the only person who can get punched by Liam and not instantly die."

I got really confused, "Wait, if Liam was the one who punched someone why is Madelyn being watched too?"

"I think they're on to us and know that Madelyn is helping," Paige pointed out as she came back. She had put her blonde hair in a ponytail.

"If they were on to us than we wouldn't still be alive Paige," Carter defended. Carter was being jittery, he seemed to have a slight anxiety over the situation. I shared the same anxiety over getting caught.

I put my hand on his shoulder to comfort him, "Don't worry, we won't leave without them."

Carter looked and his shoes, then me, then to Nathan and Paige, both simultaneously were nodding in agreement. "I could go get them in less than a second," Carter urged, "it would take a second and I could hide them in the Hideout."

"Carter you know if you do that they'll look for them, and then we'll never be able to get the boat in the water," I explained, but he had already realized it would've been a bad idea. 

"I know he's your best friend Carter, but it's Liam, if he thought it was a good idea to break out, he would've already. Which means Madelyn gave him a good enough idea not to," Paige was jittery too, she really didn't trust anyone outside our circle or me honestly.

The outside bell rang, alerting everyone it was dinner time. We looked at each other and followed the rest of the group to Section 3. The room was well-lit as always and the tables had white cloths on them. After the last few people came trickling in everyone gathered in a big circle and grabbed one another's hand. With our heads bowed and eyes closed our Commander prayed over the food before saying amen and everyone got in a line. Tonight we were having the usual: hamburger and fries. It was easy because potatoes are easy to grow and we have tons of cows. They never gave the general population anything actually good. Our group grabbed our food and slipped out the door, like most people do so they can eat privately. We walked to the Hideout; simply just an underground cave on the far end of Section 4. It was where we hung out most of the time, and nobody walked into the forest anyway. It was only about a half hour walk so most of us had already finished our meals by the time we got there. Everyone was asking me questions about what all the Commander said and if it still fits the stories she's given us in the past. Most of my answers were short, nothing too elaborate. Nathan asked most of the questions, he didn't really let anyone else talk; probably why he was the only one to not finish dinner by the time me got the The Hideout. "It sounds along the same lines as everything else she's told us, almost as if she had rehearsed it," Nathan spoke wisely and with pride.

"Yes Nathan, you've pointed this out everytime we ever talk about what the Commander says to Carla," Carter snapped, "It's always the same story, 'I don't know, they're coming back, don't worry Carla' what we need to worry about is who to get off the island and how to get them to the mainland."

"Why is Carla the only one to talk to the Commander? Shouldn't we have someone else, someone more qualified to talk to the Commander?" Paige said in a snarky tone.

I rolled my eyes, "Hope you aren't volunteering, talking to people isn't your strong point."

"Shut up," Paige angrily snapped.

"Everyone needs to calm down," Carter snapped.

We arrived at the cave and Cleo and Kathy bursted out of the cave entrance, "We've crashed into a big problem."

"What do you mean?" We all nervously asked.

"Without Madelyn here to theorize why the boat sunk and Liam not here to pull it out of the water, there's no way we can get off this island by the end of the week like we hoped," Kathy explained as she walked out from behind Cleo, "So someone's gonna have to either get them out manually, or persuade someone to let them go."

"I can get them," Carter bravely stepped up.

"We need to think about this," Paige explained, "If we get them out manually, they will need to work twice as fast because there will be people looking for them. If we try to persuade them, then someone will know somethings definitely up. If we try to persuade them and it doesn't work and we break them out anyway, then they will know it was us and we could all potentially be in danger."

"It's risky but I have an idea," I blurted out.

"All of our options are risky Carla," Cleo quickly commented.

"What if we set the prison on fire? Like really on fire, we send Carter in to grab the two of them, and for the rest of the night they'll be trying to put the fire out, leaving us with about an extra day before they realize Liam and Madelyn are gone, unless they think they're dead," I calmly stated trying to make it sound like it would work.

"How would we get something like that to work? How would we get that fire even started?" Paige condescendingly judged.

"Easy, there are torches all over the place, right? We have the kids playing ball by one of them. Knock one over on the prison and have Will set fire to the place. It'll look like an accident and the kids won't get in trouble because they're kids," Kathy theorized, "We could actually pull this off."

"What if the kids do get in trouble?" Paige asked, "What would we do?"

"Rescue them and pray they don't find us before the boat is finished," Carter proudly stated, "It'll work."

"Are we all doing this now?" Nathan asked.

"No," Carter paused to look at everyone, then the ocean, "I am."

A burst of red lightning appeared where Carter once stood and he was gone. The force of how fast he was running blew most of us onto the ground.

"Did he really have to be all heroy about it, all he's doing is starting a fire," Nathan rolled his eyes as he stood up.

"Are you jealous your nanobots can't create fire?" Kathy teased.

Nathan put his index finger over his mouth and jokingly shushed Kathy.

"He's also saving 2 of our friends, he volunteered before any of us," Kathy said as she started to stand up.

I stood up and walked toward the open ocean. We had dug a wide path from the cave entrance to the beach. The water was so pretty with the moon rising on it. A lot of times I like to just lay on the beach and watch the stars move with the moon. It's just too gorgeous not to admire. I walked down the beach and stood with my feet in the warm ocean water. The little waves that could've knocked ships apart further in the ocean were merely little waves hitting my feet. Those little waves could've knocked a ship apart that was coming to save us or bring us back to the mainland. Those little waves could've been powerful enough to knock that kind of ship to pieces. The little waves that could barely knock water over my feet.