The Commander of The Founders: Book Three

Chapter Seven: The Ring Part 2.4

As the door got closer, voices got louder and clearer. Already propped open, the double set of doors were black with glass windows looking into the large room. Raven spotted Bellamy, Echo, Monty, and Harper in the room. Echo was circling the room looking at the appliances.

There were large monitors hanging on the back wall with turned off black screens. Across from it was a long curved table with computer monitors on it. The wires were still hooked in while the devices slept. Abandoned keyboards, mice, and office supplies were left in the last users' preferred spots. On the left of the room there was a window that allowed someone to view the Earth below them.

Echo lightly tapped a button on the keyboard. She jumped as soon as the screen lit up with the generic screensaver.

"Relax, you just woke it up," Raven said as she entered the room with Murphy and Emori behind her.

The other trio in the room turned to address the bombastic entry.

"What do you mean, I just woke it up? How can it sleep when it's not a living creature?" Echo asked.

Raven giggled and the other sky people joined in.

Echo frowned, deeply troubled. "Don't laugh at me," she barked. She didn't want to be undermined. She worked her whole life to have people respect and fear her - to see her as the best in her field. She did not want to be laughed at like she was some stupid novice.

Continuing to laugh, Raven walked up beside Echo. She placed her hand on her shoulder playfully. "We're not laughing at you. We're laughing because our cultures are so different." Raven wiggled the mouse and woke the screen again. "We call this sleeping, because the device isn't off but in stasis. Then after you do this." She typed in the passcode and the screensaver swiped up to show a blue screen with little icons on it. "Then the computer is considered on."

Echo nodded while her stomach twisted from feeling really out of place.

"So has everyone seen all the rooms they want to?" Bellamy asked as he leaned on the top of the table.

"Well, we only really made it to one place - the nuclear reactor. Did you know that Raven brought us up here knowing that the reactor might've irradiated us too?" Murphy asked.

Bellamy looked at Raven with large surprised eyes. "There's a reactor on here?'

"How did you think the Ark made gravity?" Monty asked.

"Well, uh," he stuttered as he scratched the top of his head, "well, honestly, I never gave it much thought."

Murphy rolled his eyes and blew out air. "Does this not bother anybody?"

Emori rubbed his shoulder. "Oh, John, just let it go. We made it here. We're not on Earth burning to death. Don't stress about something that could've happened."

Murphy rolled his eyes and pulled the left corner of his lips up in unamusement.

"Please don't mention burning up," Bellamy wearily whispered, thinking about who they left behind.

Emori glanced briefly at Bellamy with a pained expression. She went to apologize and he waved it off.

Monty smacked lips, "so, I'm assuming that since you are running around like we're about to die, the reactor was fine."

Raven put her hands on her hips and nodded. "Yup," she popped out.

"How do you know this stuff?" Harper asked at Monty's side.

Raven glanced over at Harper, "Sinclair taught me some of it when I was training on the Ark as an engineer. Allie also had a lot of information on nuclear reactors. Were Monty and you able to locate the algae farm?"