Chapter 2: Hell on Earth
I am sorry this chapter is boring, it really is just a filler chapter to explain the two weeks since the apocalypse to when Emily and Timothy show up or at least an idea of what could of taken place. Thanks for reading and let me know what you think (:
"Come on Mal, you don't really believe that do you?" the boy asked leaning further around the tree to try and reach me. I knew better though which is why I shoved him and hid further on the other side, effectively getting myself out of his grip.
"I believe in what I want to believe and that's that." the girl said adamantly.
I knew this was a dream yet I felt as though I was watching it from above, as if it was a memory I should of had. The only problem was I couldn't see anybody's faces, I could only see the things around them and hear their voices but no faces came into view. But for some reason I just knew. I knew it was myself on the other side of the tree and leaning into my dream self was a boy, rather I could only see the shape of his back side, not even the color of his hair was in focus. It was as if I was trying to solve a puzzle to my own dream.
"Mal, you're being childish if you really believe then let me just see one more time." the boy asked leaning even further out of view around the tree. I must have shown him something because he jolted back and looked up. Above him were hundreds of blue butterflies flying through the air towards the top of the tree as if they had appeared out of nowhere.
"Incredible" the boy breathed. But then suddenly he turned and in what should have been his face was a white corpse of a man, and rather quickly the dream turned from one of pure enjoyment to a nightmare. I stared at the man as if I had seen him before, his eyes black as coals, his skin taunt with scars running throughout. I should of been afraid but for some reason I felt as if I knew him and that brought a strange sense of comfort to me. I looked at him, staring into his pitch black eyes, and he stared back. Suddenly he lifted his arm and pointed at me. Then he uttered "Wake up Mallory. Wake Up." I shook my head in disbelief, unable to register if this is real or not but then my eyes shot open.
Standing above me was a hardened woman, leaning over my face with a wet rag, obviously the cause of my being awoken.
"Oh good you're up" the lady said. She had quite a menacing face, it looked as though it hadn't cracked a smile in its entire lifetime. Her hair was piled neatly onto her head in what looked like two swiss rolls folded in on top of each other. It was definitely an odd look for starters. I lifted my head up to have a look around. I don't remember arriving anywhere on the plane, nor do I remember leaving it and being placed in this bed. But looking around it was clear I was not in a 5 star resort.
The first thing I noticed was how dark it was, unlike normal rooms where the light was muted, this one seemed to suck the light out completely. The only source of light was a mound of candles in the corner of the room. The next thing I noticed was the simplicity of everything within the room. Grey sheets laid under my fingers, a small desk sat in the corner and a big armoire in the other. Besides the bed, which I was currently on, nothing else marked the room giving it any significance at all. I looked up at the woman again a question etched onto my face.
"I am Wilhemina Venable, the leader of this sanctuary. You may call me Ms. Venable and will address me as such." The woman said a stern look crossing her face. Ms. Venable got up and crossed the room to the door placing her hand on the knob but not pulling it open yet.
"I expect you dressed and ready to work in no more than 15 mins. You are a worker Mallory, you will obey those in purple and not step out of line. Is that clear?" Ms. Venable asked with a look that dared me to question her.
I nodded my head yes slowly, still unsure of everything but not daring to cross this women.
" cooperative took you in when Ms. Vanderbilt's family could not make it so if I were you I would give me eternal thanks to them." Ms. Venable said opening the door to leave. Taking one look back the woman stared directly into my eyes, peering what felt like into my soul.
"Oh and one more thing Mallory," she said sternly, "No unauthorized copulation under any circumstances. Period." and with that she closed the door signaling her exit and the exhale of my breath.
I had no idea still where I was nor did I know who the cooperative was, but I knew to take her warning seriously. I got up out of bed and checked the armoire for my clothes. What I found was a uniform, slightly better than a maids outfit but completely gray and victorian looking. Shuffling through the racks I found that same outfit repeated 7 times. 'Great' I thought, 'One for everyday of the week nothing more.' I changed as fast as I could not wanting to disobey that scary woman on my first day. I put my hair into a low bun and cleaned my glasses getting a good look at myself in the mirror. It wasn't my favorite outfit, it practically swallowed my figure whole and made me look old but it was better than nothing I supposed.
Turning to go I left my room and faced a hall of doors. Presumably this is where the other helped slept as well. It was a long corridor with one opening at the end. Walking to the faint light I came out right by the kitchens to a shock of grey everywhere. Though it was dim lighting I could make out the faces of the other grays I passed. One man was washing dishes in the sink, another was placing small cubes onto plates, and another was cleaning glasses no doubt for the purples to use. As I walked past the others one girl looked up and smiled at me, the one cleaning the glasses.
"You must be new here." she said smiling.
"How can you tell?" I laughed.
"Your hair isn't up in the bun." she replied. Only then did I notice that all the other women had their hair stacked up into a bun, although the buns looked more like dicks on top of their heads than fashionable hairstyles.
"You might want to fix your hair before Ms. Venable see's you." The girl said returning to her task in front of her. In all honesty I wasn't excited to have my hair up in that hairstyle, it looked rather unpleasant, but I put it up anyways just to avoid the wrath of Ms. Venable and not to stick out anymore than I already was. I walked out of the kitchen doors into a dining area. It was unspectacular in a sense with one big table taking up most of the space and, as with every room in the house so far, the only source of light coming from candles along the wall. Walking along I entered into a circular foyer and at the heart of it a fire pit. I looked up at the ceiling and saw two bridges running across the entire length of the foyer. I knew this place was huge but after marveling at the sheer scale of it all it made me wonder who, or what, had been here before. Suddenly I heard the distinct taping of a cane behind me. Turning to look up at the grand staircase I saw Ms. Venable descending them with who appeared to be a shorter woman beside her. Ms. Venable stopped at the bottom of the stairs and it was then that I noticed I wasn't the only one standing staring at her. Surrounding me where even more grey's than I had seen in the kitchen. 20 to be exact. She commanded the room like a war general, every eye was one her, the only thing heard was the sounds of everyone in the rooms breathing.
"You will be assigned your posts today, unlike normal when we rotate these will be permanent. If you change your shift at all repercussions will be given. " Ms. Venable said with a snide appearing across her face.
"First," she said while pulling a list out of her pocket, "Jessica M. you will be assigned to take care of Ms. Evie Gallant." I turned to see the girl from earlier in the kitchen curtsey and take off in the direction of what I presumed to be Evie's room.
"Next. Daniel G. You will have the pleasure of assisting Mr. Gallant." Ms. Venable said, then the boy standing next to me bowed and left the room the same way as the other girl had. This continued, everyone getting assigned to assist the other various rich people living in the sanctuary. It wasn't until my name was called that I got a sinking feeling in my stomach.
"Mallory _. You have the great pleasure of assisting Ms. Coco St. Pierre Vanderbilt. With whom I know you are very much familiar with" Ms. Venable said smirking just the tiniest bit.
'Fuck.' I thought in my head, I had forgotten that Coco was here as well. Of course I would still be taking care of her, not much had change even after the apocalypse. I curtsied like the others had done and turned to take the same path they had. I walked through the kitchen again and back up the stairs. I walked down the hall again towards the bridge across the main opening. Looking around I had a sense that I had been to this place before, in the back of my head I knew it was true and I knew if I turned to the left I would find the room I was looking for. My feet were on autopilot, looking down below from the bridge I could see everyone else had been given their assignments and were gone. It was eerily silent now. I turned to the left and saw a door. In my mind I could hear someone behind the door, whispering. I leaned in close but it was still so faint. As I pressed my ear to the door I could just make out the first part of what was being said.
"Malloryyy." someone hissed. I jumped, as if shocked by an electric current.
'That couldn't of been my name.' I thought. I leaned closer to the door again to prove myself wrong when suddenly...
"There you are Mallory. I swear to God you would not believe the terrible service in this place. It's almost as bad as staying at the Hilton in downtown LA." a voice called.
I jumped up again and turned to the right seeing Coco walking towards me. I adjusted my skirt and faced her trying to show that nothing had happened.
"Like you will not believe they don't even have wifi here. How the fuck am I supposed to keep with anything now, this whole apocalypse really sucks the fun out of life." Coco whined. Coco stopped in front of me her head tilted to the side as if she was studying me intently.
Her face puckered up as if she was sucking on something sour. Then she started laughing hysterically, as if I had just told the funniest joke she ever heard.
"Your hair looks like a giant dildo. Oh my god." she cried. Of course that would be what caught her attention.
"Come on Coco. I have chores to do in your room." I remarked. Coco, still laughing like a hyena, lead me away from the creepy door down the bridge to her room.
A couple hours later and I was sitting on the floor of Coco's closet, naturally her room in this place was big, with a huge closet and separate bathroom. Not to mention her sitting room. Even in this hell hole she would be treated like royalty. I had spent two hours scrubbing her shoes and shining them because she couldn't bear for them to look dusty. I was holding one of her many Louis in my hand when the door opened revealing Gallant. He entered wearing purple dress clothes and an extra air of arrogance that had been missing before would've thought that being distinguished as a top dog for once in your life could change a man so much. He strode in to Coco's bathroom where she was sitting in front of the mirror getting ready for dinner.
"Can you believe the help in this place." Gallant remarked staring in my direction while saying so.
"I know. I mean I know the whole world ended but some decent help is not that hard to find." Coco replied.
They both sat there laughing at their own cleverness. I ignored them and continued working on the job at hand.
It wasn't long until dinner was about to be served so I left Coco's room and headed downstairs to help with the production. The weird thing about being a grey is that most of us don't talk to one another, of all the other grey's I have encountered so far only one has spoken to me. It's not bad really, it just makes this whole thing seem lonelier than it really should be if the only person I can have conversations with is… Coco.
I entered the kitchen to see the girl from earlier, Jessica I believe, cutting up cubes and placing them onto plates. A tall boy beside her, the one that was standing next to me in the foyer, was placing glasses on a tray and filling them with what looked like water. Jessica looked up as I entered and smiled.
"Hello stranger." she said. "You must already know your way around here. Believe me when I first arrived it took me a week to not get lost, even now I still do." she laughed. I walked over to stand next to her, eyeing the block of cubes she had.
"What is that?" I asked
Jessica and the boy laughed, as if it was a private joke. "Oh nothing," she said, "Just our daily nutritional meal. I know they look gross but believe me they taste just as bad."
"Everyone eats these?" I asked.
"Duh, it's all we have." the boy answered.
Jessica turned to me and gave me a small smile. "The purples eat these three times a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner. Us grey's on the other hand get them only for lunch and dinner. It's not much, but each cube has all our daily vitamins and nutrition. Which if you think about it is cool, however they are sustaining."
I looked at the small cubes on the tray, they looked like nothing more than a sugar cube. The thought of only being able to eat those sat in…we really were fucked.
"Do you need help with anything?" I asked.
"Yeah, could you help serve these to the purples in the library. It's there cocktail hour. Not that they really need any more reason to feel rich." The boy said, making Jessica laugh quietly and, I thought, blushing a little.
"Sure. I'll bring them out." I said.
There wasn't much going on in this prison. Every day we did the same thing. Serve the purples their breakfast, lunch and dinner. Feel hungry all the time, and clean Coco's closet. Every. Single. Day. There was no end in sight and frankly I could feel myself going mad. Not only was I having the same dream every night, the one with that demon face, but I kept hearing my name around every corner. I never had imaged hell before, but if I had, this would definitely be it.
*Two weeks later
It was simply another day, another same day that kept on repeating itself. Around dinner time I was bringing the cocktails out to the guests in the living room. Usually Jessica, Daniel; who was the boy always with Jessica, and I would prepare the cubes and drinks and serve them together, but I haven't seen either of them since lunch. That caused me to worry a tad but I but it at the back of my mind. Entering the den I could hear Gallant becoming moody again, an occurrence that happened nightly it seemed.
"This song, the same one every night." Gallant complained, holding the bridge of his nose.
"Where is it even coming from? And why do we have to listen to it? What are we missing here?" Gallant asked walking around the sofa.
"About 99% of the world's population." Stu answered while grabbing a mineral water from the tray.
"Would've been better off dying with them." Gallant sassed.
"Speak for yourself darling." Evie chimed in.
"Wouldn't have to drink this, whatever this is." Gallant said taking a glass from my tray.
I knelt down next to Coco holding the other glass out to her while Andre explained to Gallant that it was mineral water in the glass.
"Did you get a chance to talk to Venable?" I asked Coco. As it had been a topic of our conversations recently as to how I was stuck as a grey when Gallant was a purple. Even though we both used her family's ticket to get into the sanctuary.
"No she creeps me out." Coco said while taking the last glass from my tray.
"It's not fair that they get to be purples and not me." I told her for what felt like the millionth time.
"Okay, he refused to touch my hair if he was a gray, and she's been to the Oscars, and was best friend with Natalie Wood, so fucking get some perspective." Coco said pointing towards Evie.
I had heard this excuse as well for the millionth time, and yet I had hoped that Coco would be able to at least see that I deserved to be a purple too. Wishful thinking that was.
"It just plays over and over, 24 hours a day." Gallant continued, even though no one was really listening to him.
"It's like Satan's Spotify playlist." Stu said causing Andre to laugh.
Then suddenly the doors to the den opened, and everyone in the den gasped.