Within The Dark

Chapter 4: A new home

Unity was not at all what Willa had expected, it looked, so normal, just like earth, just with much less buildings and many more trees.

It wasn't in space like she had first thought when she heard the world planet but in the air, hidden above the clouds, it was astonishing.

In front of her was the village, known as Woodland because of the long line of wooden cabins, that seemed to go on forever, there must have been at least fifty, all in pairs, like a mirror, each cabin had a twin exactly opposite it, with just a graveled area between them, about five meters across from each other, everyone who lived there must have been close, just like a community should be.

Willa took a second to absorb it all as Erwin and Olivia waited patiently, allowing her the time she needed.

"We should probably get to the meeting at number one now ladies" Erwin cried after a minute.

"Shhh" his wife told him as she watched Willa's fascinated, adventurous eyes wander down the path.

"Meeting?" Willa cried snapping out of the trance.

"...For the new comers, it's like a welcome speech, almost a ceremony, most of the people there are new and need categorizing, just like you" Olivia explained.

"...But I thought you said I was the only one, that it had never happened before, someone new here I mean? I thought this had all happened before?" Willa's eyes narrowed.

"No, no, you don't understand, it has happened before but- but not like this, not on this sort of scale. The team, the scientists who helped create Unity, who came up with all the back up plan, they choose who lives here, they choose who gets to stay in this world, there's a process we go through, a way for us to stay grounded to the earth, but most of us, the times before, we never actually got here, only the most important researches and head scientists came. This time is different, we may not be able to get everyone back this time, so we have no choice but to be here. And you, you're a clinger, you haven't been through the process, you haven't been grounded.

There's been clingers before, you saw in the hospital? They are able to hold onto the world but not completely, their bodies stay but their not here, like in a coma, they don't wake up until the others return, until the world is restored, but you, somehow you did" Erwin explained.

"How?" Willa's voice shook.

"...That's what we need to find out, Willa, you could really help us, you could save us if we just figure out what it is within you that helps you stay grounded here" Olivia grins.

"The process? What is that?" she asks curiously.

The doctors avoid the question.

"...Come on, we need to get to number one" Olivia cried abruptly.

Number one was a building at the top of the village, the first one to be built on the planet, where the government lived.

Outside where lots of stone round tables, all full of people, their faces pointing to the large building.

At the front was a woman speaking to everyone.

She was very tanned, with medium length black curly hair, she was dressed very strangely, in a long sleeved beige gown, with white trousers and a silky white scarf hanging from her neck.

"That's the governess, she's in charge of everything here, her father was the creator of Unity" Olivia whispered, explaining to Willa.

"How many people are here now?" she asked looking over to the tables.