Dean

Three weeks. Tomorrow it will be three weeks of traveling out here in this God forsaken desert, and I'm not sure how much longer I can take of this. I want to ask Ella how long it took Dorothy and her friends to get to the Emerald City, but I don't. I actually don't say much, not today, not after yesterday. After I held Ella in my arms as we just stood there, I haven't exactly known what to say to her. I love having her in my arms, I care for her so much, but I don't know what we are, or what we're ever going to be. I want to be friends, but what does she want? I only want what she's willing to take, and that makes me wonder how much of her I truly want. None of that matters though, and I push all those thoughts out of my head before they travel any farther.

It's early in the morning, we've only just started traveling not that long ago, and I already wish it was night. I want to sleep away the day, my body feeling more tired today then any of the days we've been out here. I also want to devour everything in my pack, and when we get to the base, I think we should. We at least deserve that, to eat what we have, plus the food they provide. I never imagined I would find food as special as I do now, but like Ella said, I've taken enough things for granted, and you don't realize what you have till it's gone. I don't want to lose anymore things, though, from lives to planets to supplies, I can't afford to lose anything else. I don't know how I would respond.

I think of Ducke, trying to get my mind off my aching and tired body. I miss him, I miss him so much, and it reminds me of the night I broke down and cried. I haven't cried like that--for forever, I think. I don't like the idea of crying, I feel weak, but I need to remember what I once told Ella. Crying means that you've been strong for too long, or maybe she told me that. I can't remember anymore. Whoever said it, it's true. Despite not wanting to admit it, it's true. I don't want to ever do it again, but there's no denying that strong people break down. Even if you don't cry physically, everyone cries inside at a time or two.

The humans believe in a Heaven, a place where they go once they die. I don't know what I believe in, I'm not too much into their religious ideas, but I'd like to think of Ducke and my mother and father in a better place. A place much more beautiful then North and much more plenteous then Earth. A Heaven, almost, and that makes me feel somewhat better. I now know why a lot of humans are religious. If you don't believe in a better place where your loved ones go once they depart from their bodies, how are you ever able to go on in this life? If I didn't hold on to the idea of them being in a better place, I'd cry a lot more. Maybe religion isn't so terrible after all.

I look out across the desert, the air hazy from the heat, and that's when my eyes catch something. It's afar off, but it's there. It's there, and it looks quite large from where we're walking. "Is that...?" Mark begins, but his voice is cut off as what looks like a hovercraft lifts off the ground near the building, before it begins to fly toward us. "They couldn't have possibly seen us from here, could they?" Mark questions, a bit of fear in his voice.

"Radar. If they have radars, they could, and if that's the base, they more then likely do." I can't help but smile. If this really is the base, then we made it. We didn't die, we didn't fail, we didn't give up. We got this far despite this world being torn apart from space debris. We did it, and I feel like screaming and shouting, but I keep myself composed. I don't know what's behind those walls, but I'm hoping it's more then we expected, just like Dorothy got.

It only takes a few minutes, but eventually the hovercraft is directly in front of us, its door opening as it hovers above the sand, the noise of its engine practically blowing out our ears. I've never seen one of these, only in films, but never in real life.

A guy dressed up in a white soldier uniform, appears at the door before holding what looks like a megaphone, before speaking into it. I then realize the speaker is connected to the hovercraft, for his voice booms out from the sides of the aircraft. "State your purpose!" He yells over the engines, and I begin to wonder what is going on. Our purpose? We want to freaking survive. That's our purpose.

"We're trying to get to the base!" I shout back as loud as I can, my voice slightly scratchy. "To get out of the meteor shower territory." He nods in response, before sending a hand signal, and the craft eventually lands, causing him to climb off and walk up to us.

"Then you're at the right place," he greets, his face showing no sign of amusement. "Climb on! We'll get you there faster in Old Everson. Fastest hovercraft around," he gives us a smile at this, but it's an uneasy one, and I suddenly begin to feel odd about all of this.

Needless to say, we climb aboard the aircraft, and sit in the seats he tells us, before buckling up. The door shut, which blocks out the engine's noise, and lights immediately go on once darkness encases us. "How did you know we were here?" Ella asks, a slight panic to her tone that only I notice.

"Well," the man sighs, before sitting in his own seat, but not buckling up. "We have a radar of what comes within four miles of the base. Safety purposes, strictly. We were getting a lot of crap from some of the survivors, they didn't like the idea of housing both Norovians and humans so closely together, thought it might cause a riot. What a joke." He huffs, and I look over at my team, a confused expression on all their faces.

"Anyway," he continues. "We've gotten a few stragglers that wanted to take us down, needless to say, they're no longer with us."

"You killed them?" Ella gasps, and I can tell she's thinking this whole thing is a bad idea already.

"Sometimes you have to sacrifice a life to save many. If we didn't, he could have gone radical, they weren't all there in the head anyway. But you have nothing to worry about," he promises, "this is for the safety of all the citizens of America, a haven where you can all come and know that nothing will happen to you. Especially with all the hell the universe has been giving us. A few meteors struck nearby, but not close enough for us to feel it."

"Did you just build this base for this purpose? Or was it already here?" Ella questions, and I can tell the guy is getting sick of her curiosity, but what does he expect from us? For us to just roll with whatever is going on? They're going to have our lives in their hands, they need to tell us whatever we want to know, especially since he's acting as if there are no secrets here. If there's no secrets, old man, then share whatever information you have. He's a human, and you can feel the cocky and arrogant tension from over here, and I'm the farthest from him.

"It was a military base, but since it wasn't in the direction of the space shower, we knew we could evacuate the survivors that survived that asteroid that took too many lives. Be thankful for what we're doing, kid, we're saving lives, trying to help rebuild society." I was going to ask and how exactly do you plan on doing that? but I'm interrupted by the sound of us landing, and the engines being cut just as the doors open. "Follow me," he sighs as he stand up and we unbuckle ourselves. "And welcome to the Safe Base, or in other words, your temporary home."

We follow him off, all of us unsure of ourselves, but we can't turn back now. If everyone was so eager to get here, and they really do help the survivors, then it can't be all that bad, right?

But as we walk through the front doors, I find out I might just be wrong.

A mass of people, both humans and Norovians are grouped in the same room, crying and fighting with the men in white uniforms. "What's going on?" I ask the man that brought us here.

"We send them off in sections, boys in one area, girls in another. Then we split them again where there's only the same species in one area." I want to ask him why, I want to ask what's going on, but I'm cut off as they begin to separate Ella and Carol from Mark and me.

"Ella!" I scream, now knowing exactly why the lives in here are already yelling and shouting.

"Dean!" She yells back, before reaching out her hand and I take it, only for it to be pulled apart by the man that helped us here, the one I'm beginning to hate.

"She's going to be okay, you'll see her once again, I promise. Now," he mutters as he hands Mark and me a stack of white clothes. "Follow this line, you'll be taken to the showers where you can clean yourselves up, then to your rooms. Hurry now, so you can get through all of the confusion."

I get forced into the line as everybody around seems to shove and push, but I try not to lose Mark, no matter what. "Do you have the same feeling I do?" He mutters loud enough just so I can hear and no one else.

"If it's a bad one, then, yes. Why are they separating us? What's the purpose of this?" I ask, but am shoved along the line, and decide just to go with it. Maybe we're being paranoid, for they wouldn't do anything to harm the only survivors, right? The base is way bigger then I even imagined, I can't possibly begin to comprehend how many survivors are housed here, and they wouldn't want to destroy us, no. We're just overthinking. "I think were just overthinking all of this," I semi shout to him as I begin to move with the line, the people slightly calmer now. "They wouldn't bring all of the survivors here to just destroy them after they cleaned them up."

"I guess you have a point," he mumbles, and I can tell he's not quite satisfied with all of this. Of course, I'm not either. I don't want to be separated from Ella, especially since I do not know when I'll see her again, and finding her in this huge area will bring some difficulty.

We continue to move, and that's when I look around at my surroundings. We're walking down a white hallway, the line moving swifter now. The walls are lined with military memorabilia, along with lights dotting along where the wall and ceiling meet. It's almost brighter in here then in the desert.

Eventually, we come to what looks like a large shower room that would belong in a school, which makes it feel not so foreign. Mark and I are one of the first people to enter the shower house, and I'm glad. I want to get clean and not have to wait behind all of the people that were fighting when we walked in.

The only thing that strikes me as odd, is why they're wearing uniforms. It's as if they're ready to enforce the law any moment, but that reminds me that maybe they are. If they have radicals that come and go, maybe that's only for our protection, and my muscles begin to relax.

The steaming water burns my skin, but I try not to show my pain as I use the soap they have available and wash my body as quickly as possible. I want to wash away the grime, the dirt, the cuts, the burns, everything. But no matter how hard I scrub, they cuts and burns don't go away, just like I knew they wouldn't.

After washing my hair, I dry myself off and put on the clothes they've given me, which consists of a white T-shirt and white drawstring pants. Is this a hospital or a military base? "Mark?" I ask as walk out of the shower room, finding him in another line that leads in the opposite direction from where we just came.

I cut in front of a few people that send me glares, but I don't care. Cutting is literally the least of their worries when we're all huddled in a base because the planet might be destroyed. "You look a lot better," I comment when I get up to him. "I finally don't have to smell you," I laugh.

"I got a shower every day at home, thank you very much. Unlike you who hasn't showered in what? A month?" He smiles, and I ruffle his hair.

"Practically," I shrug, before another guy in a uniform walks to the front of the line and announces loudly to us--

"We are now going to split into another group!" He yells, which causes groaning and moaning to erupt from the line. "Norovians are going to go to the left, and humans are going to go to the right. Everyone will have a roommate, so pick someone of your species that you like. Walk back the hall until you come across another Guard, he will put you in the desired rooms where you belong. Obey orders, and we'll be done with this in only a few minutes. You may now go!" He shouts, and the line begins to move rather quickly. Either everyone is tired or they want to get the roommate of their choice. At least we get to pick, that doesn't make it so bad.

The line splits off, and Mark and I go left, the line stopping every couple seconds as Norovians are given the destination of their room. Before much longer, Mark and I are at the front of the line, with what is called a Guard. He's dressed in the same white uniform the other military people are, and I'm glad I finally have something to call them besides a few words you couldn't find in the dictionary.

"Who's your roommate?" He asks me and I motion to Mark. "Alright, well you're going to go to room 323A. It's down the hall, almost to the end," he huffs, before writing on a clipboard as we walk away.

"Of course our room would be way down here," Mark scoffs. "It's not as if we've done enough walking for the rest of our lives." I laugh, enjoying his complaining.

"We'll get there, at least we made it. You've proved Carol wrong, that should make you happy right there," I state.

"What do you mean?"

"Remember? She didn't believe there was a base?" He lets out a dry laugh.

"Right, I forgot about that. So glad we don't have to deal with her," he rolls his eyes and I find myself nodding. I'm glad she's not around, but I'm uneasy about Ella not being here. Who did she get for a roommate? Were the Guards nice to her? I then have the notion to go find her right now, but I'm not exactly sure if that's allowed.

Eventually we make it to our room, and upon walking in, it looks sort of like a jail cell. A white door marked 323A with only a tiny window on it. The room is all white with two twin beds, one on one side and one on the other. There's window near the ceiling, but besides that, it's empty. And plain. But it's better then sleeping on the road. That's when I finally realize that Mark is carrying our packs. "I totally forgot about these!" I say as I throw mine on my bed.

"I figured you did. They searched them for safety purposes, then gave them back," he shrugs, before sitting on his bed and sighing. "Do you really think we're safe here? I mean, doesn't it seem a little weird to you?"

"Yeah, it's weird, but I've been in the desert for what's going to be three weeks tomorrow. I don't know what's weird or normal in this life anymore. I think we're safe, I want to believe that we're safe, because if we aren't that means that Ella is somewhere in this God forsaken base and she might not be alright. I don't know how long it would take for me to find her if there was something wrong, so I don't want to think like that. I have an uneasy feeling, but this is all new, I'm just trying to shrug it off."

"Okay, thanks," he mutters, before laying his head back against his pillow.

I don't respond. I don't know what to really say. Is it safe here? I want to think it is, but I don't know. What I do know is that I hope to see Ella soon, I don't like being parted with her in a place so large it's easy to get lost. I'm keeping that guard to his words, I will see her again.