Chapter 3: Trusting Friendship!
Simon sighed, and looked at the cloudless blue sky. He knew Rob was beside him. It had been like this for the last ten minutes. It seemed that both were lost in their own thoughts about Mary-Anne's journal. Things had been very different for their Kiwi friend, very different than either of them very imagined.
While they didn't share the same load of responsibilities as her, it was a shock for Simon to discover that to gather the information; she had placed her life in danger, right from the start.
Shaking slightly, Simon knew he was in need of a ciggie he had promised to never to touch again.
"Don't give them the satificasatition of seeing you like this, Simon," Rob spoke with one open eye.
"Like hell I am," Simon responded, "they have already done heaps of damage already and I have no intention of making it worse, only to expose them."
"Yeah sure." Rob teased with half a grin on his lips, "let's get back to reading and see if it give out more information"
Growling at Rod, Simon agreed. Once the doe were back in the house they picked up the next chapters of the journal from where they had left off.
Three weeks after the discovery of the cave, I discovered another horrible secret. I was sneaking around and found an underground chamber. By sheer look of the place I could tell that it was used for a ceremony or meeting place for - a secret cult well that's the team I have given it since I'm unsure as to what I should call these things.
There were statues of dragons, halberds and torches with flames lighting up the room in a way that would belong in the Dark Ages. Ancient symbols covered the walls – that I found impossible to read – and similar ones on floor of the main chamber room. None of these symbols looked like they were from Earth, but I did recognize some of them from ancient history textbooks and did not know their meaning.
I had become so lost in my find of this room that I almost would have gotten caught, if I had not hid behind a huge stone statue of a dragon after hearing sounds approaching my direction. From there the view to the room was at a full, I could watch the incoming and outgoings of this creatures and not be seen. It wasn't long before five strange men entered the cavern. They all wore a brownish-red cloak with hoods that hid most of their faces. The sixth man brought one of the kids from the surface – I knew him.
Last week he was caught disobeying the Founders, not only that, but he also tried to escape a few times. So I guess he tried to escape too many time. I felt fear creep on me, for him. Something bad was about to happen to him, I could just tell.
I watched and listened to the cloaked men - in silence - talking to the boy. It took me a while to notice that the boy had been beaten till he bled from the top of his head all the way down to his feet. His cloths were torn and blood was all over it; his eyes looked tired. There seemed to be a distant look in his eyes, and his once colourful aura was all of a sudden dull.
I suddenly noticed within the dark shadow of the cloaked men's face, their eyes glowed. That's when I heard the Illuminati member say, "You are just too much trouble, and not worth the cause we will bring to this world. But do not worry, young one, you will give us one thing before you are, em, discharged from this school."
"What's that?" The boy asked calmly.
"You will give us our weekly meal!" Another one blurted.
It was then that the unthinkable happened. I watched in complete horror, as my nightmares became reality. They all transformed into vicious animals, giant humanoid reptilian creatures that looked like they came from Hell. At first I thought I was dreaming, but realized what I was seeing was real. I had to cover my mouth in order to muffle out my scream of horror and of shock.
As I sat there behind the screen, I saw as they just ripped and tore at the child. I could feel the tears streaming down my face; I could not stop them. All that was running through my mind was that I had to be completely still so that I would not get caught and end up like the boy. A part of me even felt like a coward for betraying him. Like there might have been something I could have done to prevent this from happening to him. But I knew there was nothing I could have done to help him.
At that moment I knew, that I had to do to something to stop these…these…abominations of nature from doing what ever they wanted…like that over Earth. It had suddenly accrued to me, that these were not humans like the spirit of Mr. Manor said. It was a fact that these were indeed aliens! This notion even scared me more then if I were really dealing with real people.
As I carefully walked down the hallway, back towards my quarters, I accidentally ran into one of the Founders. Immediate I panicked but I tried to stay calm and to blur out the first excuse as to why I was out of my quarters. I looked up at him and found him starting at me, like he was reading my face as if it was a book.
"You saw them, didn't you?" His tone had been sharp and cold, making me shudder in process. "You saw them transform and eat that child."
I just couldn't answer him, no matter how much I tried, when I really wanted to tell him. The only thing I felt like doing was crying. How could he know that? Was I so scared and shocked that he was able to bypass my block from the Founders. I blamed the horrible images that are now forever glued to my mind. Fear is what I felt and there wasn't anything I could do to stop it from showing. What was this Founder going to do now? Report me? Kill me? And what could I do about it? Well, I just stood there like a weak fool with tears running down my face.
"Shh, don't let them see you like this." The Founder said; to my surprise in soft caring tone, like a mother hushing a baby.
This startled me; from all my experiences with the Founders, not one treated me with compassion. I instantly thought this could be a trick, but the look in his eyes, didn't seem to lie. I didn't hear myself whimper, but he knew it, he covered my mouth with his hands, before the whimpering got out of control, soothed me in words that I will never forget.
"Be silent. Like the gentle current of the river, let your fears wash away. The images will no longer control your mind. Listen to my voice. Breathe. Begin to take control once more."
I did as I was told; remarkably the more I took deep breaths the more I regain control of my emotions. Once he felt that I felt in control, he let go.
"Before you say anything, I just want you to know that I am here to help you." He said calmly.
I looked up into his eyes and could see his reality but somewhere in there was also a sense of sincerity in him, there was something about him, I couldn't put my finger on it, but knew that I could trust him, if given the chance to do so.
"Look, I know who you are. You have been chosen, due to your gift of seeing thing beyond a normal person of your kind. Trust me you are more then what you may think. I have a good feeling you will be able to start something that will bring down my people's greed and carnage."
As I listened to him I wanted know why he would do what he was planning. It felt eerie that I could feel his thoughts inside my mind.
"You want to know why I would betray my people." I nodded, before he answered, he did a quick visual scan with his eyes to see if anyone was within earshot. "Not all of my people are greedy. We don't all agree with the way they have formed the Illuminati and wanting full control of this planet."
I slowly nodded, understanding a bit of what he was explaining to me. It occurred to me that his was confessing the crimes of the leaders of this "Illuminati". I saw him thinking, I could see that there was more to be said.
"There are three other kids on this Island that are not effected by the Founders control, you will meet them today. It is your job to work with them. My advice is to play along with the Founders rules, make them think that you are on their side. This way you will be able to receive more privacy enabling you to make bigger plans to bring down these people, do you understand?"
I digested all of what he said and nodded in agreement. Even though I had no idea how I along with the three the told me about would bring down this powerful enemy.
"Now, go get cleaned up. Class will begin in thirty-seven minutes." He quickly announced and he suddenly pushed me towards the hallway where my quarters happen to be.
I was about to do what I was told when something suddenly started eating at me an answer to the question I had to know, I stopped and turned to the mysterious Founder; heck they all were mysterious, but this one had a different feeling to it. "Wait," I spoke loud enough for him to hear, only him, "What is your name?" I could hear traces of pledging in my own voice.
"You can only know me as the 'Guardian'." He simply replied before turning and started walking away from me.
With a deep breath, I started heading to my quarters. Could it be possible that I found a new friend? Someone I could trust? I wondered over the promise of other three who were on this Island. This was something that I have hoped for, ever since coming here. It was like a dream come true for me.
The day was almost over and I hadn't found a single person to be an all; not even the three I was told about; this was becoming so frustrating, all I wanted to do was scream. As the last class was coming to an end, the same Founder that I ran into in the hallway called the Founder that was watching us out of the class.
It was then when I heard them talking behind me. They talked about how it was horrible staying on the Island and how the other kids they knew slowly turned into a 'zombie'. I slowly turned my head to see them - four desks behind me. There were three boys, one was a Caucasian with blond hair, another was Korean, and the third was another Caucasian with dark hair. They were all my age, and appeared unaffected by the Founders control.
I felt my heart soar with feelings I can't even write about. When they noticed I was looking at them they became silent. I immediately smiled at them to let them know I was to be trusted. But for some reason that didn't seem to really work on them. They turned away, ignoring me, unsure if I could be trusted.
Getting an idea into my head, I turned around and wrote a note, then hopped out of my chair and dropped the note into the blonde's desk. As I sat back down on my seat, I watched him read the note:
"Friend in need? Meet me after dark."
The blond looked up at me in shock. I gazed at him and noticed that the other two were reading the note, and then all three looked at me. I allowed them to read my mind so they could tell that I was sincere to what I said on the note. We all nodded in unison as we came to an understanding.
We were no longer alone.
As the years went by, Jeff, Rob, Mark, and I had worked towards the purpose of their cause, impressing them with all our efforts. The four of us worked well as a team. We worked hard to gain their trust and we were rewarded with small amount of freedom for ourselves. As far as we knew the Founders had no clue that we were plotting against them on the side, expect for the one called Guardian.
Eventually we were offered our own laboratory to continue our studies and work on projects for them…no doubt the Guardian would have thought this up. It seemed that as soon it came close that we would get caught in doing something that went against the Founders, he would be there to protect us.
I shared all the information I had on Mr. Adam Manor with the boys. The only thing I didn't share with them was the secret cave. That would be my only salvation from this Island. That and if anything went wrong, I could hide all of Mr. Manor's information in that cave before the Founders got to it and leave the secret with a trusted person.
However, I did find a field that had the same protective field from the Founder's power. I took the boys there for our secret group meetings, and relaxation. It was a nightly event for us.
One day the Dean and Mr. Grafton came to us and told us that we were accepted to join a team of Founders to the real world. We would help them gather information for 'new recruits'.
Seeing that this would give us more of an opportunity to not only a chance to get off this Island for a while, but to also gather extra things for us to work with in order to bring down Founder's Island.
Each time we went to the real world we would discover and try out a few certain things that the regular people did, like smoking. When the Founders caught us the first time, we thought we would certainly get wiped for it, but Mark suggested it would help to 'fit in' as regular people in order to get further information for the cause.
The four of us made fake ID's in order to go in Liquor stores to buy alcohol. We would then secretly bring the forbidden beverage back to the Island. Needless to say, we were determined to experience all we could on what the regular teens our age would do. It became a nightly ritual that we would go to the field, and get drunk. The feeling of letting go with alcohol had become quit addictive.
One day, Rob managed to sneak back some drugs called ecstasy. Afraid of what could happen if he were caught with them, I quickly confiscated them. When we got back to the Island I took the illegal drug to the cave. The best spot I could think of was to hide them in the black box that I cleaned out and placed nothing but information that would eventually ruin Founder's Island and the Illuminati.
I felt that no matter what we were doing drugs would not be apart of it, unless as a last resort. On top of that, I didn't want the Founders to catch any of us with it. I figured that this would be the best place to put them until I could find a more suitable way to dispose of them.
Simon sighed as he stopped for a breath. Those things they were fighting against were the aliens. He gave a low whistle.
When Rob gave him a raised eyebrow, Simon smirked and shook his head, "you better read this section on you, Rob." And picked up another chapter to read on with.