Hesitant

The funeral ceremony had started and so had the rain. People started the open their black umbrellas reflecting the sky above and the current state.

However, due to the body not being present as they were not able to recover the body. In any unfortunate event, if a person goes missing in a URC related incident, they are referred to as being taken away. Merca was one of these cases.

Everyone stood there for a moment of silence. Vihaan looked into Nina's eye and he noticed that it was lifeless just like those Wanderers who had returned from the expeditions being traumatized. He understood the effects, not only on the Wanderers but also on their family and kin if they were to be taken away or be killed by URC.

Vihaaan, Easter, and Saul went to school after the completion of the funeral. They were only a single learning center for each district and they lived in the Maristo district, one of the nine that the remaining humanity lived on. Each of the districts had a hexagonal border and a tunnel that connected them to the other districts. Maristo was the outermost district and had the only proper way to go beyond the edge. Due to being the outermost district, there were no trade routes so the economic condition was a bit lower than the other district.

Vihaan entered the school. It was just another day to learn. The school structure was simple, a student had three learning courses to choose from. There were those to wanted to go to be a producer, those who wanted to trade, and at last, were to be involved in a government-related activity.

However, Vihaan was still at the intermediately level, so he still had time to choose. Vihaan was walking to his class and he bumped into Carlos.

"Hey watch it, Tart! Look where you are going."

"You should know where you are going, don't just bump into me."

"Watch your mouth or..." Easter was approaching from the back and Carlos exited saying, "Later Tart."

"Easter, why did you intervene? I was doing fine on my own."

"I didn't even do anything. Besides, why does he keep calling Tart, is it because your height keeps fluctuating?"

"Easter why are you too teasing me like that?"

Saul comes between both of their ongoing conversations and tells them that the History lesson for today was starting. This was their first school day of the year. Everyone entered the class and Mr.Smith was inside. He was a very good teacher and liked by his pupils.

"So everyone, welcome to the first class of the year 120. Today we are going to be studying our early years of humanity or "THE RE-HUMANITY" as some call it. Many of you must have been taught this by your families or elders but I wanted to delve into this topic a bit more."

Just when he was about to say something, a person came near the door. Mr.Smith saw him and approached him. They both started to whisper about something. Vihaan was in the second seat so he sneakily tried to listen to their conservation but he could only hear something like "𝒷𝑜𝓇𝒹𝑒... 𝓌𝑒𝒶𝓀...". They ended their little chat and the person left. Mr.Smith had a grim look on his face but he started the class.

"All of mankind was on the brink of extinction when a certain catastrophe had befallen on them. Humanity was enjoying its normal and day-to-day lives one day some kind of gas started to come out of nowhere and with them, the URCs also came. Humanity started to collapse and most of them died. But some remaining percentage of humans escaped to this place that had been built by someone and took refuge here. This was an ideal place for humans to survive and they were safe from the poisonous gas as well as the URCs. This was a haven for our ancestors and they thrived and here we are now."

Saul raised his hand and asked, "But sir, who built this place before?"

"Oh that, yes it..." He suddenly paused for a moment and it looked like he remembered something out of the blue and changed in his course by saying "Perhaps it was God that took pity of us and now the government HELPS us in his name."

Saul noticed the change in Mr.Smith's tone as he never used to speak like that and also never talked about God or any religious kind of stuff. The class ended after a while after Mr.Smith told the students about how we should be thankful to the government for providing the citizens with the "Fragment of all".

After the class had ended Saul and Vihaan were walking to the ground.

"Did you notice something was wrong today with Mr.Smith?"

"Huh? I didn't notice anything wrong with him" Vihaan kept walking while talking to Saul.

"It was like, he was hesitant or something. It was like he had something in his mind and was saying the other."

"Anyway, I brought this book that I was talking about earlier." He then moved to his bag. And then said, "Wait, I think we should go to a secluded area before comparing the books. If any of the teachers see this, we might get in trouble."

"Ok, let us do that."

Easter saw the book that Vihaan had been holding, "Wait, isn't that the book from the basement? What will dad do if he knows about this?"

"Come on Easter, can you please not tell our parents about this. I ought to return this book to the basement and no one will notice us."

"Only if you do the dishes."

The three of them went to the outskirts area of the school which was also near the tunnel entrance of the district. Vihaan carefully took out the book from his bag and started to compare them.

Saul exclaimed and said, "Oh! It looked the same but yours is a bit older than mine. Can you open it?"

Vihaan gave the book to Saul and Easter. They both started to look at the contents of the book. There was visible confusion in both of their eyes and Saul started to speak in a slow voice and said something that would surprise him and also leave him in utter confusion. The thing that Saul said was...

"VIHAAN, WHAT ARE THESE LETTERS, I CAN'T UNDERSTAND THEM. THESE ARE JUST SCRIBBLES."