The Base

P.O.V Elizabeth Harmon.

"Come on. Let me show you the rest of the base."

Donny urged and started walking toward one of the main buildings. I had been so focused on the training-like- area in front of me, I'd barely noticed anything else. The entire- base? Is that what Donny's been calling it?- looked to be in a giant square, with four walls that looked like it was made by a mix of brick and silver metal that someone had combined together, like two pieces of cloth being sewn into one. There were three buildings lined up in a row with only one building standing a bit far off from the others. The building that Donny was directing me to was the one In the middle. It was the largest of the three and didn't seem to have but a few windows. It looked slightly worn, stable yes, but still worn down a bit, as if it had been standing for hundreds of years and just wanted to crumble into the dirt. Donny must've seen the look on my face because he said,

"Yeah, yeah. I know, it doesn't look like very much. But it's all we got."

The large metal door was cracked so all Donny had to do was push it slightly and it swung open. For some reason, I doubted that the base would actually hold up in battle. The first thing that I saw was a girl with bright red hair jogging over to us.

"About time, Don." She said, folding get arms over her chest in fake annoyance. "Jacob's been waiting for you, says to get ready for training. And you're late."

"Where is he?" Donny sighs, the look of annoyance on his face wasn't faked.

"How the hell would I know, do I look like a Commander to you?"

She glares playfully at him and after a moment, she smiles. "He's in the training building."

Donny obviously knew which building she was talking about because didn't ask questions, but didn't go out the door, instead went up a flight of stairs behind the girl's back but stopped on one of the steps and looked back.

"Hey Renae, can-" he started, but the girl was already answering his question.

"Yeah, me and Tommy will show Liz around." She said.

Donny nodded and raced up the stairs to 'get ready for training' as the girl had said.

"Come on, Liz, I'll introduce you to Thomas." Renae said sweetly.

"Sorry, but how do you know my name?" I ask, realizing that Donny couldn't have told her since he didn't even know at first. As I turned to her, I got a closer look at the girl. She looked to be about my age with freckles covering every inch of her light skin. She had bright green eyes like emeralds and long blazing red hair that glowed like wood that had been set a-blaze on a dark night.

She was wearing ripped blue jeans and a violet tank top. As I looked closer, I realized that she had a pure white wristband that looked like the one that Donny was wearing.

"I can see things, before they're supposed to happen." She explained to me and smiled at me. I got the feeling that someone like Renae would've been the nice girl at my school, the one who's friends with everyone. But there was something fierce about her expression that made me think otherwise.

"So you're physic ?" I was proud of myself for remembering that one, since there're so many terms for different mutants it's hard to keep track of them, but Renae shook her head.

"I prefer the term 'Prophesier', and my visions aren't always right, either." I had no idea what a Prophesier was, but I guess it was a type of physic, only I'd never heard of it.

"It's kinda like she sees different versions of the future, and has to figure out which one is actually going to happen."

I jumped, startled by the voice, because it wasn't Renae's voice. And because it was right behind me. I turned around to see a boy with strangely white hair leaning on the wall by the metal door. He looked about sixteen, maybe seventeen. He had shorts that went a little below his knees and a short sleeved blue Nike shirt. He was built like Donny, with a strong build and tall, though he might've been a little shorter than Donny. Also around his wrist was a dark green wristband. Renae cracked up and the boy joined in, chuckling right along with her.

"Sorry Liz, but you just scare too easily." Renae smiled and shook her head at me.

"Sorry, I really didn't mean to scare you." The boy said, but he was biting back a laugh. "My name's Thomas Woods, but everyone calls me Tommy." He offered his hand and, after a moment, I shook it.

"Elizabeth Harmon, but people call me Liz." I introduced myself.

"So you're mutant." It wasn't a question, if Renae could see the future, she's mutant.

She nodded and started walking. "No, I'm gifted." she says sarcastically and rolls her eyes.

I followed Renae, while looking around the odd building. I'd been so caught up with Renae and Thomas, I hadn't even really noticed the inside of the building. The walls were made of what looked oddly like a mix of brick and cement and as I looked around, I noticed that there were no doors to the large rooms, like someone had build a large entry way, but never bothered with a door. Along the walls was more of that strange writing that was on Donny's knife, that odd mix of words and symbols. This part of the wall seemed more of soft cement, not soft enough that if you touch it it'll fall into your hands, but soft enough that it can be etched on and written on with a weapon or something. But the writing, for sure, wasn't English. At first glance, it might seem like sloppy English, but when you really try to concentrate on the words, it seems like they start to mix up so it's like trying to untangle the actual word.

"Hey Renae," I murmur, walking closer to one of the walls to get a better look. "What's this?" I ask, still looking at the wall.

"Oh that?" Renae says, coming to stand beside me.

"A while back, people started writing stories and tales about Hamado and Da Kenshi's past, what they've done."

She explained, running her hand along the wall softly, like she was scared it was going to give way under her touch. Maybe I was wrong, maybe it was soft enough to fall apart. When she spoke next, her voice was soft. "Some of these are stories of Gate Keepers who died in combat, died on missions or have done incredible things."

I noticed that Renae was staring at a certain piece of the wall and she looked like she was going to cry.

"Renae, do you need a minute?" Thomas murmured, putting a hand on her shoulder softly.

She jumped a little, but after a few seconds, nodded to Tommy and walked away. Thomas quickly took her spot beside me.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make her upset." I apologize, taking my eyes off the wall to follow Renae as she turned and almost ran up the stairs and out of my view.

"Don't be sorry, it's nothing that you said." He sighed and ran a hand through his short white hair. "Renae's older sister, Cayla, died about two months ago in battle." He explained sadly. "She tries to be strong for Mia, her little sister, but it gets her sometimes, ya know?" I nod.

I definitely know that feeling. For the first few months after my mother died, I would walk past a shop that my mother had mentioned to me or had gone to often and just break down crying. Eventual I got better, but I still find myself doing it from time to time.

"That-" He points to a paragraph of the weird writing, "Is a story about the battle that killed her. It gets hard for Renae, even though she can only understand some of the words."

"The writing is in an old mutant language." He stated simply, like it want anything out of the ordinary. Like a new mutant language wasn't odd.

"Back when people thought that mutants were witches and the children of the devil, mutants created their own language to give others advice on how to hide their powers or tell them how to run away, stuff like that." He explained, gesturing to the wall. "Now we use it to tell stories and occasionally for directions and stuff, but very few, and I'm lucky to be one of those few, who can completely understand all the words."

"This boy had the same type of writing on a knife that he had, but I couldn't read it right." I murmur, turning my attention to the wall.

"Wait, you talking 'bout Don?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh, you know him," I mumble. "Well yeah, Donny had some writing on a knife. Do you know what it means?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I'm fluent in Katane. It means 'No Victory Without Sacrifice."

"Why would his father have that on a knife?" I ask, surprised. I'm not sure exactly what I'd been expecting the words to mean, but it wasn't that.

"Don's dad was a Gate Keeper before..." Thomas said, starting to get uncomfortable with the conversation.

"Crap, I'm, uh, I'm doing horrible at my job, aren't I?" Tommy said, hurriedly attempting to change the subject. "Come on, let me show you around."

He started to walk to the closest opening, and stood waiting for me. I sighed, telling myself that I'd ask later. "This is our 'cafeteria' of sorts."

He gestured to the large room filled with wooden tables like you would see at a summer camp. There was a part of the room that was cut off and looked like it was used for making the food and such.

"We shift out people every few days, usually we got dozens of people per day in here. We have breakfast and supper, but usually everyone's too busy around lunch time so we don't have it. Not everyone can fit in here so a bunch of us eat out in the training field, you're welcome to eat out there with us." He offered casually.

"Who's 'us', just you and Renae?"

He shook his head. "No, usually Donny, Jacob, and sometimes Logan eat with us unless they're busy. " I didn't bother to ask who Jacob or Logan was, my brain was already fuzzy enough.

I nodded and he showed me the rest of the building. The other floors of the building mostly consisted of good sized bedrooms with as much as five or six beds in them. There was enough room here to fit a normal high school.

"How many people live here?" I asked in bafflement as he lead me up the third and final floor. How many people could possibly fit in this place?

"About three hundred, maybe a little more, including kids." He shrugs and walks down the stairs, which were made of the same odd mix of brick and cement. Once we were on the second floor, Tommy directed me to one of the rooms are the end of the long hallway.

"You'll share a room with Renae and three other girls. We usually keep the boys and girls separate unless they're family or something like that." He opens the door and Donny and Renae were sitting on a bed, their mouths moving like they were talking and he had an arm around her shoulders. Neither seemed to notice us until Thomas made a loud, fake, cough. Both Donny and Renae looked up in surprise.

"Oh, hey Thomas. Hello Elizabeth." Renae greeted us with a small, sad smile. She looked like she'd been crying and her eyes were slightly puffy but I pretended not to notice.

"I was showing Liz around, but, um, we can come back later." He offered, his hand still on the door nob.

"No, I have to go train with Jake. He's probably going to kill me for being late. See you guys at supper." Donny sighs and gets up.

"Have fun with that, he probably is going to kill you." Thomas says, laughing. "Hey, if we find a dead body, we'll at least know who it is."

"Screw you Tommy." Donny smiles and jogs out the door.

"Sorry, we didn't know that you two were in here, really." Tommy apologizes, closing the door behind us.

"It's fine, we were just talking." Renae shrugs.

"Oh, just talking, Renae? You sure about that?" Thomas smirks, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm warning you Tommy, I'll kill you in your sleep." But it was obvious that she would never do that. "You can take that bed over there, Liz." Renae said, turning her attention to me.

"My little sister sleeps in that bed over there," she points to the bed opposite of mine.

There were three beds on one side of the room and another three on the other. There was one small dresser on the left of each bed. Renae's bed was to the right of mine and on her dresser she had pictures of her and a smaller girl with the sane bright red hair and also with an older girl with the same hair. These must be her sisters. I looked at the older girl, Cayla, Thomas said her name was. I would never be able to fight again if I was Renae. I'd never be able to do it knowing a family member died doing the sane thing. Then a thought of Brannon or my father dying in one of those bases struck me and I turned away from the picture, my chest tightening in a pain that was all in my head.

"We'll get you some clothes later, but for now I want to show you the rest of the base." Renae urged, jumping up from her bed and pulling me to the door. The three of us headed out of the door and down the stairs. She pushed Thomas and I out of the door and to the building on the left. My eyes caught sight of the smallest building because I now saw what I had missed earlier. Though it was the smallest building and looked like it would barely fit a few small rooms, it seemed to command attention, like it just wouldn't be allowed to be ignored. It looked to be made of pure black type of metal that seemed to twist and turn as you looked at it.

"What's that building?" I ask, looking at it curiously.

"We don't go in there,"Renae said sternly. "Ever. That's the Commander's building. It's only for the three Commanders."

"Who are the Commanders?" I ask.

"What - Thomas, didn't you explain anything to her?" Renae scolded him.

"No, I didn't get the chance. I was going to after we stopped by the room." He defended himself.

"Boys!" Renae sighed, turning to me. "Alright, so in every Gate Keeper base, there are three commanders. Each Commander has an 'apprentice' if you will. The first in Command is appointed by the council members. You know what the Council is, right?" She asked, and stopped walking.

My brother is on the Council, so of course I know a bit about it. The council is made of every Commander of every base. They make and vote on rules and guidelines for people to follow so that there is a little bit of control in all of the chaos.

"Yeah, I know what the council is."

She nodded. "Good. Well, like I said, the council picks the first in command for every base. Then the first in command, our first in command is a girl. Kaylee Sears. Well every commander, except the third in command, has a apprentice. A student that they teach everything they know to. Later, that student becomes a commander. Kaylee's apprentice is Jacob Wills. He's now the second in command." She said as we reached the door to the building. I guess that I probably should've known a bit more about how the bases worked, considering that Brannon was a Commander of one, but I guess I'd always tuned it out because I never wanted to hear it.

"This is our 'training area' of sorts," she gestures, walking in through the door.

Unlike the other building, this one seemed to be made entirely of that soft cement with the same writing lining every crease of the walls. Even the ceiling and floor had writing on it. Oddly enough, though I thought that the writing was a bit creepy earlier, it now made me feel calm and relaxed. Unlike the other building, this one only had one room. One humongous room. The room had weapons ready to use and areas to train with them. There was a target shooting area for bows and throwing knifes. There was an area for boxing, an area for what looked like mutant training and more areas for different weapons that I couldn't even count or name. The room was about the size of two gyms and had enough space to probably fit the whole base. About ten feet away was a mat for wrestling, or maybe sparing. Donny and another boy was sparing on the mat, each trying to get the other down. The boy that Donny was sparing with seemed to be in his late mid twenties or early thirties. He had short dirty-blond hair and looked like he was a little taller than Donny, though he had the same build as him and Thomas.

"I bet Donny will get him on the ground first." Renae said, smirking at Tommy.

"Yeah right, you say that all the time, Renae." Tommy rolled his eyes at her. "I bet Jacob does." He added.

"Your on!" She said and shook his hand.

"He's one of the Commanders, right? Jacob Wills?"

Renae nodded. "Yeah, Jacob Wills, second in Command."

I nodded and we watched Jacob and Donny spar for a bit more.