Chloe was in no mood to play nice with the town announcer. First thing in the morning she rolled out of bed and trudged through town, ignoring her irritable eyes and frankly alarming appearance. Aunt Lauren's last request of her was to get this announcement done so she would do it however unpleasant the announcer decided to be. She hammered on his door.
Crossing her arms and standing in front of the door, she waited for an answer briefly before hammering some more. There were no signs of life on the other side but the neighbours seemed to be stirring. "Chloe?" Derek asked, rubbing his eyes. His hair was tousled and he had pretty obviously just woken up, she had forgotten the Bae's were in this part of town. "Are you trying to break down the door?" he asked.
"Trying to speak to Mr-" she was interrupted by the door in front of her opening abruptly.
The woman standing framed in the doorway frowned down at Chloe, "What do you want?"
Mrs. Rogers was just barely taller than Chloe, but managed to look down her nose at her despite the very meager height advantage. Chloe knew it was nothing personal, but they had a bit of a vendetta against teenagers, same as most of the adults in town. Add to that the fact that Aunt Lauren was noticeably of a lower financial class than the other residents – and by extension Chloe was considered to be as well - and Mrs. Rogers was noticeably disapproving.
She and her husband had been one of the very first residents to come to the hidden city, and as the owner of several newspapers and a former TV meteorologist, they were in charge of town announcements. On paper the responsibility belonged to the both of them but in practice it was always Mr. Rogers who took care of it. Forgetting about Derek standing in the doorway, she turned to the older woman.
"I need to speak to Mr. Rogers," Chloe stated.
"He's still in bed, dear, you'll have to come back a little later."
"It's about an announcement. It's important and it needs to go out today," she insisted.
Mrs. Rogers sighed, "You're not leaving here until you speak to him, are you?"
"No." With a slight, melodramatic sigh Mrs. Rogers turned around and went to collect her husband.
"Everything ok?" Derek asked, noticeably uncomfortable. He seemed to have picked up on her emotional distress and decided that he couldn't get away with not asking. Standing stiffly, looking around, and refusing to make eye contact, he looked like he wished anyone else was around to offer comfort.
Chloe looked at how uncomfortable he was, "Yeah. Fine," she replied, shortly. Derek nodded, evidently at a loss for what to say. Luckily he was spared by Mr. Rogers's appearance at the door.
Mr. and Mrs. Rogers were a funny looking couple. They had been multimillionaires back before the virus had shown up and Mr. Rogers, who again had only a measly height advantage on Chloe, was the taller of the two by far. They were both tiny and frail looking, but possessed a strange aura akin to every stereotypical snobby rich couple in the movies. Mr. Rogers even had the trademark moustache, overpowering most of his tiny boney face.
"Can I help you?" he asked, hint of curiousity in his voice. Mrs. Rogers crowded behind him in the door. For all their usual disdain toward Chloe and her Aunt, the town really couldn't have picked better news announcers because they were desperate for stories.
"I need you to put out a call for a scientist to take over my Aunt's research," she said.
Mrs. Rogers frowned, "Well if that's what you two are so concerned about then why doesn't she just keep on with it?"
"Well she would but she's busy waiting to turn into a zombie," Chloe replied, hard expression on her face.
The Rogers's both noticeably paled. "Right, of course. We'll put out the announcement," Mr. Rogers said, looking rather stricken.
"Just tell them to come speak to me," she said. She would have to show them around the lab, and she wanted to stay involved in the research anyway. They would need a runner and there was no one better suited than her; she wouldn't give up hope on a cure for her Aunt just yet.
"Would you like to come in for coffee, dear?" Mrs. Rogers asked.
Chloe idly wondered whether it was the conspicuous absent of her Aunt or the promise of gossip that suddenly gave her an in with Mrs. Rogers as she turned the offer down. She turned and started walking away as the Rogers's closed the door on her.
"Chloe," Derek called after her from his own doorway. "If you need to talk…" he looked highly uncomfortable, Chloe's eyebrows raised at what he seemed to be about to say, "I… I could go wake Simon up if you want?"
Chloe smiled, "No thanks. See you around," she said, walking away. She could practically hear the sigh of relief behind her as the pressure to be comforting was taken away from Derek.
On the way back home Chloe passed a woman dressed all in black. She had a bandana stretched over her mouth so Chloe couldn't get a decent look at her face, but she didn't look familiar. The way she was dressed it looked like she had just come from the surface, but if Chloe had cared to pay closer attention she would have realized there weren't any planned excavation or recon trips, and without her or Aunt Lauren to monitor the door no one from the outside could have gotten in either. As it was, Chloe passed her by without a second thought; on her way home to sit around and stare at the wall in silence until she could go listen to the town announcements.
However she wasn't as uninterrupted as she had expected. Almost the second she got home and sat down on the couch there was a loud, obnoxious knocking on the door that startled her. She jumped a little and stared owlishly at the door.
"Chloe!" Hearing the shout Chloe deflated, laughing at herself. She got up, answered the door, and was pounced on by Rae. "Oh my god! I am so sorry about your Aunt!" she told Chloe, in a muffled voice. "I came as soon as I heard!"
"Thanks, Rae," she told the other girl.
"What happened?"
"I just… I don't really know, I checked on her after the power outage and she was infected," Chloe replied.
Rae insisted on peppering Chloe about what had happened to her Aunt for a while until Chloe convinced her it would probably be better for her to think about something else for a while. When Rae switched back into her usual chatter mode, time until the town meeting practically flew by. They walked down to the theatre together, Rae thankfully talking the entire time and distracting Chloe from what she would otherwise be thinking about.
"Good morning everyone!" Mr. Rogers stood on a crate behind the lectern that had been returned to its usual place at the center of the theatre. "If everyone could quiet down please!" he asked. He had a voice the size of his moustache – large. "Thank you!"
"Well first of all I'd like to thank everyone for coming!" he started off as usual. "In minor community news Miss Stevens' baby has been born! Let's all wish their new family good luck. Her wedding with Mr. Walker is one month from now on the 28th. Mrs. Green would like to know if anyone in town is capable of fixing the large clock in her living room."
It was really very lucky that Mr. Rogers had such a large voice because the hum of voices never really died down. There was still a very distinctive buzz underlying the announcements. As he went on to talk about "Young Ms. Abbott who's family is looking for someone to make her a wheelchair ramp to get down the small flight of stairs to their door," Chloe looked around at all the people talking and was immediately and forcibly reminded of movie night.
The Banks family, consisting of Royce and his uncle, Dr. Banks, stood closely together. Royce looked as if he was trying to get away from his uncle to speak to a teenage girl sitting nearby but Dr. Banks was having none of it. Chloe supposed that after he had lost his other nephew to the virus he must have become overly protective. It had been a tragedy, really. One day everything was fine and the next morning they were told that he had gotten outside during the night and been infected.
Near to Chloe and Rae sat Mr. Bae and his family. He and Simon seemed to have made a lot of friends since they had gotten to town and chatted amiably with the people around them as Derek sat nearby scowling at the boring news report. Liz's mother and grandmother sat together huddled side by side and still grieving. Milos, having just seen Chloe, was waving but too far into the crowded stands to be able to make his way over; she gave him a small smile in return.
"Mr. and Mrs. Williams need a babysitter for Friday night," Mr. Rogers continued, and Chloe began to focus on what it really was that reminded her of the other night. The incessant gossip and suspicion.
"Wonder what they need a babysitter for?"
"Don't they know we're all too busy? They need to take care of their own kid."
"What happened to the last babysitter anyway?"
"Didn't you hear? Mrs. Williams walked in on her earning her tip, as they say," a middle aged man elbowed his brother suggestively.
The other man snorted in return, "Serves her right, have you seen her around town? Always such a fowl look on her face, I bet she never puts out."
It was starting to make Chloe's head spin, but Mr. Rogers continued to prattle on in the distance.
He raised his voice ever so slightly, "And now that we've given the latecomers a bit of a chance to show up we have three important notices!" he stated to the group, who sensed that the dirty stuff was coming and finally quieted down.
"Firstly, Mrs. Watts, who is in charge of the vegetable patches, has requested more workers for the slight increase in population we've had over the past few months. She's left a signup sheet at the front and anyone interested should come forth and put their name and address onto the sheet so she can get back to you in the next few days."
Oh, a signup sheet, Chloe hadn't thought of that. Although she supposed there weren't as many scientists here as there were people with the capacity to learn how to garden.
"Next, we have a bit of sad news I'm afraid. The other day when the power went out our town researcher Lauren Fellows had an accident at the lab and was exposed to the virus. She's left town, but we're in need of a new researcher. Anyone interested should see her niece Chloe Saunders."
A hundred heads, roughly the amount of people in town who knew who she was, whipped around to stare at her. She was already anticipating the recommencement of gossip but it was cut off before it could begin by Mr. Rogers's last address to the audience.
"Lastly we have a bit of news straight from Mayor Williamson. She has asked all citizens of the town to report to her offices in the next week for a census of the town. Anyone present is asked to pass the news on to their neighbours and alert the Mayor's office to anyone who hasn't complied. The Mayor has also asked that citizens be reminded that any mysterious figure should be reported to her offices."
"That's all, folks," he announced with a flourish, "Have a good week, and we'll see you next Saturday!"
"Dad!" Chloe called out. Her Dad hadn't attended a town meeting almost since they had moved there, but now, without warning, there he was, making his way to the front of the room.
"Good morning!" he said, walking up to her and Rae.
"What are you doing here?"
"Good to see you out and about Mr. S," Rae said.
"Nice to see you too Rachelle," he looked back to Chloe, "I was thinking of signing up for that gardening job, actually," he said.
"Wow, Dad, that's great."
He smiled, "Well then excuse me; I need to go sign up." Chloe watched him walk to the front of the room with no small amount of surprise. Still watching him, she noticed Milos also in the small swarm of people volunteering to be gardeners. Meanwhile, around Chloe there was a very conspicuous lack of people and without Mr. Rogers's announcements the gossip had finally been able to start for real.
"It just figures that Dr. Fellows would abandon us," said an elderly man with an upturned nose.
A woman near him jumped in, "I've heard she wasn't even doing research in the first place, just sitting around at the lab all day using up our resources."
"Wouldn't be surprised, we shouldn't have let her in in the first place."
Someone laughed, "Why did we?"
"Apparently she had relatives in high places. Probably the only reason she got her degree in the first place; my old neighbour had a very unpleasant son with a Ph. D, the little twerp probably couldn't point out where the brain was if he had a map."
"Oooo, they are just the worst sort of people," said someone next to her, who was apparently very worked up.
"So what do you think about the niece?" a man asked in a malicious tone of voice.
"You know, when we first got into town she showed us to our house" at this admission, the man's fellow gossipers noticeably quieted and moved away slightly, ready to backtrack. "I always thought she seemed rather unpleasant," he continued, to his friends' relief. For a minute it looked like they might be held accountable for their constant stream of slander.
They dug into their new victim with vigor but Chloe was luckily distracted by the timely appearance of Simon.
"Hey!" he greeted, walking up to where Chloe and Rae were sitting.
"Hi," Chloe replied. "Don't suppose you're a scientist?" she asked, with a small smile.
"Afraid not. If you're really that desperate then Derek would be a better bet," he laughed. "Before the world went to hell he was doing university stuff."
"Well what's the big deal with that?" Rae asked.
"He was in ninth grade," Simon replied.
"Wait, so he's one of these genius kids? You're kidding!" Rae said, leaning around Simon to try and get a better look at Derek.
"Nope. So, Chloe, how are you doing with everything?" he asked.
"Um, well," Chloe hedged. This wasn't Derek, who was visibly uncomfortable at the prospect of comforting people. Simon was a great guy from what Chloe knew of him. She couldn't just pretend she was doing great with her Aunt probably dying right now.
Luckily she was spared thinking of an answer by the timely arrival of Dr. Banks, "Chloe, could I have a word?"
"Yeah, sure! I'll talk to you guys later," Chloe latched on to the excuse and was off after Dr. Banks before Rae or Simon got another word in. Royce followed after the two of them sulkily. It looked like his father had laid down the law and he wasn't to get too far away.
"Well firstly, I'm sorry for your loss. Your Aunt was a very dedicated researcher, and she will be missed," he paused, evidentially waiting for some response from Chloe and getting only a thin smile. "But, things as they are I'd love to be involved in the research again," he said.
"Oh, that's great," Chloe said; relief obvious in her voice. "You were involved at the beginning, weren't you?"
"Yes, yes. Unfortunately after my youngest nephew Austin went missing I needed to take some time away from it."
"Of course," Chloe nodded in understanding. They stood there for a moment with nothing to say. "So when would you like to see the lab? I think my Aunt moved things around a bit since you left."
"No time like the present," he replied. The two of them walked off to the lab, Royce a sulky presence trailing after them.
A/N - Turns out the way to get me to update is to threaten me with exams. I haven't given up on the story I swear to god, I just update slowly because I like to switch between stories a lot. I'm planning on sticking with this one for a while. I know where it's going and there should only be about three more chapters tops. Then I'd ideally like to go over the whole thing and edit again because I feel like it must flow strangely since I'm very much writing chapter to chapter.
So I don't know how to writer Chlerek interaction though? They haven't really spent a lot of time together and they won't until just before the climax of the story since they aren't in this tiny little group home that forces them together all the time.