A/N: As characters as introduced, unless the name is obvious, I'm going to make a note about what name which countries have. This chapter, it's Liechtenstein (who doesn't have a canon name, from what I can tell) as Erika Vogel-Zwingli.
Edit: All of the chapters are going to be updated, then further chapters released.
Erika Vogel-Zwingli
Western Romania
I wait until the guard passes me and makes his way down the corridor. I make sure to keep out of sight, though it's not very hard for me. I doubt that he'd know to look for me, anyway. As soon as he's gone, I step out from the unused store room and into the hall. There shouldn't be another guard passing by here for awhile.
I managed to get a look at the scheduled patrol times earlier. It was surprisingly easy, considering that the patrols are what is supposed to guarantee our safety. I'm not sure from what, though; they never specify. Maybe once a month we get called into the dining hall outside of dining times for a big 'meeting'. They go over the rules, the 'mission statement' of UWEG and sometimes updates about research or outside patrols. The updates are usually vague though. They only approve of certain people going out, and they are the ones to whom the outside patrols are assigned. Those that are 'capable' of handling the difficulties.
Unfortunately, I don't meet those standards. Fragile my-
I try not to curse. Always try to avoid it, whether out loud or just in my head. It's not something Basch would approve of. And, really, there's not much I can do about being confined to the Sanctuary. I can do plenty of other things to help inside, so I might as well leave actually going outside to the others. But that doesn't mean they get to keep it all to themselves.
It doesn't take me long to reach my destination. A simple room, one of several at the end of this hall. Every room in this compound is one of maybe four designs, and are assigned purposes as such. For example, all the residential rooms look identical, so all our bedrooms are close to looking exactly the same. There's also the dining area, but I think there might be one especially designated for the officials and guards, because I rarely ever see them eat with the rest of us. There's also office-like rooms, for whatever the officials have a need for, which make up most of the rooms here. The final type would be the records rooms.
What I enter is one of these records rooms. It's dark when I enter, and I grope around the edges by the door for the light switch. This room's lights are on a dimmer switch, so when I find it, I turn it up just barely enough for me to see. Hopefully it's not that visible from the outside. The room reminds me of libraries that my brother used to have in the house we shared, though on a smaller scale. Rather than hundreds of rows of books, there is only a handful, spread from wall to wall. The room itself is pretty small. On these shelves are records of observations and scouting missions. Another room somewhere else in the building holds reports on research and levels of contamination.
I haven't been outside in so long. I know that someone found and salvaged a camera about a month ago, because everyone started arguing about how it should be used. Elizaveta wanted to use it to keep track of our daily lives. I agreed with her, to an extent, but there isn't much about our lives worthy of documenting. It's been the exact same, almost every day since we were all gathered here. Sometimes I try to keep a journal, just to pass the time, but it just ends up being filled with descriptions of whatever we had to eat, or what guards and officials I run into on that day. There's not a whole lot of activities to do down here; we mostly have to depend on human interaction, although there are a lot of books around. There's cards, and some board games as well, but nobody's ever really interested in using them. Hungary likes to tell stories, either about her early life, or ones that she makes up on the spot.
Eventually, one of the officials in charge of running this Sanctuary for us stepped forward and decided that the camera would be used on excursions outside. Officials don't tend to venture outside, because they're in charge of making sure that everything inside runs smoothly. The officials are really just members of what is left of our governments. There's not much of a hierarchy among them anymore, because our governments joined together when everything went critical. I don't know what happened to the leaders, because there doesn't seem to be any of them here. Maybe they didn't make it. I know most stayed in the larger cities. That thought upsets me, because many of them were great people. I wonder what happened to their families...
The officials take care of everything now, working collaboratively with each other. Poland claims that their only purpose is to make the rest of us do the work for them, and that the whole thing with the camera was a perfect example of that. The camera was a way for them to see what the situation was without actually doing the work.
The pictures from those scouting missions are what I'm looking for. The photos of the outside, from other parts of Romania, from other countries, anything that's worth –or maybe not even worth– documenting. I want to see those pictures I just want confirmation that there's something left out there. I don't want to take the word of the scouts and the officials.
There's six shelves total in each row, of which there are two, and they seem to be pretty much evenly split. An observation for every report, a folder for each folder. The shelves on the right half of this room are the ones dedicated to observations. The ones on the left are written reports on anything taken from the outside. Scavenging (or 'salvaging', as the officials demand we say to refer to this) is not something taken lightly. Heren's a lot more dangerous than it was originally given credit for, so there are strict regulations on what is actually brought into the Sanctuary. pThe files are sorted by proximity to our location. Little faded post-it notes line the edges of the shelves, illustrating what lies where, with those closest starting on the shelves closest to the wall. The newest ones will be the ones with pictures, and will be at the end of each respective section. I choose a folder from the five-kilometer-distant section, which is on the end of the first shelf. I figure that if we haven't been put on lockdown, the immediate area must be safe enough, and therefore the same as usual.
Rifling through the folder, I try to skim the reports. They're folders like you would have seen in office buildings and at hospitals. Just worn Manilla folders, with confirmation of the proximity and the range of dates written on the front. Finally, towards the back of the folder, I find a few images attached to some of the papers.
I'm not quite sure what I was expecting. Maybe glowing plants, or flat, empty expanses like you would see in movies. Maybe mutant animals, or the skeletal remains of people everywhere. Really, it just looks the same as it does just outside the compound. Plants that look like they may or may not be dead, and dry, cracked earth. I think it rains still, but I don't think the ground absorbs it as well anymore. As disappointing and anti-climactic as the pictures might be, I feel kind of relieved at the same time. Maybe it means that we could spread out farther. That we can send out more patrols, that we could even travel to see if there's anything left in other countries. I'd like to visit my country, if only to feel the comfort of being home, of being in a place that is mine. I used to visit my country often, and spent about half my time there. I still lived with my brother though. I'd... I'd also like to visit Switzerland. Just to check. Just to see.
A hand clamps down on the file, closing it. "You probably shouldn't be here."
I look up to meet the reddish eyes of Romania, the host of our Sanctuary. My cheeks burn; I hadn't expected to get caught, and it's nothing if not poor manners to go rooting through someone's belongings. Because, while the files might not belong to Romania personally, they belong to his country, which is more or less the same thing. I don't say anything. I can't think of anything that would be appropriate to say in this situation. I just let him take the file from me and fit it back onto the shelf. He doesn't seem angry, but without waiting for him to turn back around, I hurry out of the room.
Making my way through the maze of halls and corridors, I end up in Nation's living quarters. This is divided into a central living area with a bunch of small, adjoining bedrooms for the Nations that reside here. It's on the edge of the residential area, but we're kept separate from the civilians. Civilians taken from each country that resides here. We still intermingle with them, of course, because it's a simple comfort, to be able to converse in our own languages. The decorations in our rooms are minimalist, with only the bare necessities, although the central area has many couches, chairs and tables arranged in a circular fashion. More than the few of us here need. This is our special place, we were told. Nobody else was allowed to be in here, except for officials.
Elizaveta, who is sitting on one of the couches, looks up from her work when I enter. "Where've you been, Erika?" She holds up a bundle of cloth that trails across her lap. "We're on repairs today."
"I'm sorry," I say. "I was just trying to find something."
Elizaveta gestures to the large table in the center. Two large pile of various colored fabrics sit there, all of them variations of dark shades. One pile is folded nicely, meaning that Eliza's already sorted through those. I grab something from the other pile and run my fingers over it, checking for damage. The maintenance of the scouts' protective clothing is one of the few tasks that I'm ever assigned. Elizaveta nods her head in approval as I start, mending a small hole in the cloth she holds. "Did you find it?"
"I found what I was looking for, but it wasn't what I was trying to find."
"So it goes," she says.
We fall into a companionable silence as we work through the pile. I've known Hungary for many, many years, but we only started to get close since we gathered here. I think she likes to view me as a sort of little sister to her. I'm not quite sure what I see her as. Whatever it is, it's a role familiar enough that we can call each other by something other than our country names. She's been so insistent, that I find it hard to think of her or to refer to her as Hungary anymore. I grab a needle and some heavy-duty thread from the table, so that I can repair a rip in the sleeve of what I discover to be a jacket.
The two of us manage to make our way, ever so painstakingly, through several pieces of gear before someone shows up to inform us that dinner's being served. We immediately stop, because we can always come back and finish later. It's early, only about 5 o' clock, but they only serve food for half an hour at a time, to maximize productiveness, the officials claim. So that everyone gets in there and out in time enough to keep us all busy. Sometimes, if we go through an especially successful period, in terms of reports and general productivity, they splurge on meals. They give us better food than usual, and let us stay for longer.
The food here is usually fairly simple. At best, we get almost as many nutrients as we would have before. At worst, our meals are meager and just-barely sustaining. Both scenarios are rare, with the worst of the two only having happened once. It was a period of three days, back in the beginning, when we had an influx of population from outside. They had hidden out in a bomb shelter, but ran out of supplies. Somehow they ended up finding the Sanctuary, and we took them in.
The officials had probably panicked about the numbers, because they gave us the bare minimum, trying to ration the food until they realized that they didn't need to. I guess they did a refiguring of what steps were necessary to sustain ourselves, and adjusted accordingly. Meals quickly went back to the food we usually receive, which is good enough that we stay healthy, even if the dishes aren't very fancy. I like to think that my brother would appreciate the simplicity of the food.
Elizaveta and I enter the dining hall, which is about sixty feet by fifty feet. Two rows of five metal and ceramic tables span the length of the hall, with plain, metal chairs. On one side are restaurant-style swinging doors, which open into the kitchen. Food is brought out in platters, plates and cutlery are handed out, and we can choose what we want to eat. We're encouraged to eat as much as is set out, because they try to avoid serving leftovers. The kitchen staff have gotten the proportions down to a science, so just enough is made to feed everyone.
Only a few people are gathered here so far. More will come soon, and almost every seat in this hall will be filled. I don't know the exact numbers, because I've never bothered to ask. I think that I don't really want to think about how few people there are left. Eliza and I take our seats at the end closest to the door, which is the place that we try to take every meal. Nothing's assigned, but most people tend to choose the same spots, with the same people. We look for familiarity where we can find it. Soon, we're joined by Austria and Poland, who were working down in the kitchen stores today. Down on one of the sub-levels, where residents aren't allowed to go, there are more store rooms, but only officials and guards go down there.
Poland and Hungary chatter to each other, but I don't think they pay much attention to what's being said. They were part of the Visegrád group, those two, but they don't seem to be very close. I don't pay attention to what they're saying, either. As much as I like my meal mates, I'm feeling kind of drawn, exhausted. Austria pipes in with a sarcastic comment occasionally, and Hungary turns to ask me something every now and then. I respond, but my heart's not into it.
Maybe it's because I had really worked myself up before I snuck off to look at the photos. I had been hoping for something more. Something to give me hope. Maybe it's because I felt so conflicted about the result, that I found nothing that I could use to fuel my hope. Maybe it's neither of those two.
Really, regardless of my nation's people that stay here, regardless of the other Nation's here, I'm still alone.
No matter what, my brother is gone, and there is nothing to suggest otherwise.
