Fighting for a Purpose

Chapter 2

I am awake. I just don't want to open my eyes.

What happened yesterday? I woke up, ate breakfast, met Chase, got in trouble, just a normal day... Until everyone was called to FortGage and Mayor Jocken announced about the-

I muffle a scream even though I managed to shut my mouth and my eyes burst open. In front of me were two pairs of hazel eyes, watching me. I knit my eyebrows together, smelling an aweful stinch of air. "Hi Saphire," the eyes cheer. 

I scoot up the bed that had me tightly wrapped in a white blanket. These blankets are the sheets of the infirmary, why am I in the infirmary? 

"You okay sis?" Adam asks, standing on the bed. His hand touching my forehead to check if I had a temperature. I flick his hand away. He giggles and sits in front of me. "Help me!" yells a high pitched voice. I look down and see a young girl holding onto the side of the bed. I push the button beside me, making it sldie down 4 inches.

Alice topples off the edge and onto the floor, landing on her little butt. Adam cracks up. I grin.

"Why'd you push me off the bed?" jumps Alice on the bed, slapping Adam across the face over and over again, "Huh? Huh?"

I grab both of them by the ear, "Stop that! Why are you guys hitting each other anyways? Who showed you this!"

The twins look at me with their eyebrows up. 

"What?" I loosen my grip on their ears.

"You taught us this!" Adam smirks, sticking his tongue out. Alice nods.

"What? No I di-" I stop midsentence, remembering one morning or almost every morning where I slapped Chase for making me even more grumpy in the mornings, "Ha...oops."

My eyes narrow at the twins who were smirking at me. I wave them off, "Big deal. I don't slap him that hard anways." 

"Yeah, uh huh," Adam mocks, standing up on the bed and poking my nose. 

That aweful stinch comes back, I look around and notice its Adam's breath, "You didn't brush did you?"

Adam's hazel eyes turn to orange and widen, he jumps off the bed, running out the infirmary. I smile.

"Saphy, why were you sleeping here instead of our compartment?" Alice asks, playing with her brown hair.

"I'm not sure," I reply, wondering why am I here. Alice looks at me with a frown.

"What's wrong?" I ask in a goofy voice.

"This big girl hit me today!" she pouts, crossing her arms.

"Aw, well she probably didn't mean it."

"Really? Shes been hitting me all week!" Alice jumps in a training position I taught her, her eyes flaming red. 

At that moment, Chase rushes in. He closes the curtains, "Hey Alice, you think you can let me and your big sister talk?"

"Mk!" Alice jumps off the bed and skips out of the infirmary. Chase walks up to my infirmary bed.

"Hey," I greet.

He greets with a smile but his eyes look tired. His mouth was smiling but kept itching into a frown. 

"What?" 

He watches me for a moment then moves his eyes to the window and back to me. I don't understand his gesture. 

"You know what is happening right?" Chase asks quietly.

I shake my head, "what?"

"Mayor Jocken announced it yesterday," Chase says slowly. I blink. All I can remember is bandaging a kid that got stuck in FortGage's fan system. 

"Just tell me, my memory is still jogged from getting hit," I say, annoyed. I hate guessing games.

"Okay well he mentioned about four people... two female... two male...people over five years old..." he says in slow motion.

I look at him. Then it hit me. The scroll. How can I not remember that? I'm just sitting here acting joyful but its possible that people I love can be thrown out of FortGage for some stupid expedition that the past ancestors had written for us. It could be anyone. Chase. Alice. Adam. Me! 

"Alice! Adam! What about them! This isn't unfair! Why are we even considering this? Science! Screw Science! We have lives! Alice and Adam! They can't go out there! They're only children! They'll- they'yll..." 

"Calm down Saphire!" Chase puts his hands on my shoulders, raising his voice, "Aren't you listening dumb ass? They'll be fine! They're only four years old. People over five ar chosen." 

I narrow my eyes at him and he narrows his eyes back at me. We both start to laugh but quickly went quiet. 

"...But you and I can get chosen," I remind him, getting a bitter reaction. There's a long pause.

"Be realistic Saphire," he sits down on the bed, "there are thousands of people in FortGage and only four people get chosen. There's an unlikely chance that we won't get chosen at all."

"How can you say that Chase?" I look at him unbelievably, "those people have lives too. Loved ones, hopes and drea-" Chase cut me off with a cough. 

"The thing is, there isn't any hope on Earth anymore. We destroyed it. It's been destroyed. No going back. The only thing that is keeping us alive are the technology that the past has left us and that's bound to give up soon," Chase says carelessly.

I can't believe what he's saying.  Then...he says something else.

"I don't believe in hope." 

Chase stands up and begins to walk away, to leave me with my own thoughts. He stops at the elevator pod, "They're choosing it tomorrow. The possibility is that we won't get chosen." And he left.

I sit on the infirmary bed. I'm allowed to stay here until I feel better. Physically, I'm fine but mentally? I'm not. I'm far from ok...I feel sick. 

I smooth and feel the soft fabric of the white bed sheets. I look up at the steel ceiling, thinking.

There is hope.