The hallway was crowded with kids talking, shouting, teachers barking orders. Suddenly, I feel a buzz in my pocket. I pull out my little communicator. It has a picture on it. A coded message. The picture means HQ alert. Which means we need to get to HQ. I look around, and see Zeena, Alec, Autumn, and Jake pull out there's too. They are spread out, so only a trained eye could see 4 people in a crowd of 100's pull out a communicator. We all look up, look at each other, and do the slightest of nods. Then we turn our heads back forward. We all know where to go. Don't act suspicious. We all join up in the Main hallway. We take a right to a set of doors that lead us outside. Silently, and calmly, we join the crowd to the trailers. We make small talk to look normal. "So, how much homework did you have already?" I asked Alec. Code: How many assignments have They put you on. "Not a lot, so far. Mrs. Gringer gave us 2 days to gather info for a essay due next Tuesday." Code: 2 assignments so far. "Yea. Me too." Code: I have 2 assignments as well.
The teachers standing out on the trailers watch us with eyes like hawks. We kept walking. We turned a left, into the bus lane. Then we started running. We needed to make it to the forest. It was about 1 mile away from the school. We've been trained for stamina. And speed. So a mile we can run quickly. We finally let our emotions take over. "I bet I can beat you Jake!" I laughed over to him. "I bet you can't!" He yelled back. I grinned, and sped ahead. "Hey guys! Wait up!" Zeena yelled. "Last one there is a rotten egg!" Alec yelled. Autumn, as usual, was quiet. But she had a smile on her face. Alec matched my pace, and I pushed ahead. "Unless you want to be the egg!" I grinned to Alec. My feet hit pine straw and dirt. We had to keep running.
Suddenly, Autumn burst out of the trees, ahead of all of us. "What the?!" I exclaimed. Soon, we made it to the Big Oak. We weren't even that tired. Autumn smiled. Who's the rotten egg now? It seemed to say. She turned back to the Big Oak, and tapped the code into it. The code was just a series of taps in different places on the tree. Soon, a crack appeared in the tree. The crack made a crescent shape, that soon turned into a door. She tapped it, and it moved back, revealing a metal elevator. It was a cylinder, so it fit the tree. It opened, and we all stepped in. The elevator went down so fast it was almost like a huge fist punched it. Ding! The doors opened. We all stepped out and into a room that looked like the Houston control room for NASA. It had those rows of computers with people glued to them, and side panels with screens on them. There were glass tube where people entered and exited their own elevators to HQ. It looked like those tubes that people put those cylinder containers in for the bank.
In the front of the room was a gigantic screen, with 100's of little screens surrounding it. They where all cameras set up all around the world. The big one usually showed a map of an area that was a threat. But it was black. I looked around. I'd just noticed that it was getting pretty hectic. A man in a Military suite walked up to us. "Hello. You were called to HQ for a reason. Your mentors will tell you more. I am here to escort you. My name is Cal." We nodded and followed him. "Why do you think we're here?" I asked Zeena. "I have no idea. But something is wrong. You can tell. Look at everyone." Autumn nodded in agreement. I took a closer look at people's faces. They were either grim, long, panicked, or scared. A few had no expression. Someone threw there hands up in the air.
Cal led us down a narrow hallway filled with pictures of past Elites. Other pictures included past presidents of the organization, donars, etc. etc. But they had no pictures of Them. We made a few turns until we ended up at our lounge. Our lounge, where only us 5 go. Cal opened the door, and we saw our mentors. Mine is Dan, a man in his early 20's with a brown shag and blue eyes. He was strong, sturdy, and clever. Dan was on the couch. I took a seat next to him. Zeena took a seat next to Raina, her mentor. She was skinny, with green eyes, and long blonde hair and was in her late 20's. She was a science wiz, but very witty, and could beat you at any argument. Autumn's mentor, Eugiene, was a kind of a short guy with black hair, brown eyes, and in his early 30's. He was a little impulsive, which served as a good and bad trait, as well as smart and agile. Jake's mentor was a quiet woman name Lizzy in her mid 30's with brownish hair that had some blonde highlights. She had hazel eyes, and was very smart, patient, and an amazing architect. Alec's mentor was Theo, who was a guy in his late 20's with blonde hair, and brown eyes. Theo was strong, brave, and smart as well.
One we were all seated, Cal shut the door and took a seat, too. "Someone, or something, has hacked into our system and is shutting down all of our resources, all out cameras. Our computer people are working on trying to keep us online, but it's too complex to keep going. We have no idea what this is. As of now, all of your previous assignments have been canceled, and this is your new one. We are calling this Project X. Not even the President knows about this." Cal explained. We all nodded, but we all made a glance at each-other that held shock. "But our systems have never been breached before." Jake spoke up. "We realize this. Our systems before had been deemed unbreakable." Raina answered. "Because of this, we need you all to become extra cautious now. Be extra aware of your surroundings."
"Why? It's not like they know about us, whoever these people or it is. For all we know, it's just some glitch in the system!" Zeena said with a hint of anger.
Our mentors made a knowing glance at each-other. "This is not some glitch, Zeena." Raina said. "We know, because our computers won't let us in, but something is controlling it. We watch as most of our information is being viewed right before our eyes. All your files are in our system. So, yes Zeena, it or whoever is doing this, does know about you." Zeena looked embarrassed. Her head hung. Suddenly, the lights went out. A chill went through the room. I grabbed Dan's arm. I felt something in my head. A voice. "Summer..." It whispered. "Summer...I know who you are...." It whispered again. An earsplitting sound ripped through my head, making me scream in agony. The others heard it too, because they were moaning and screaming as well. "I know....I'm coming...be scared..." It said.
Suddenly, the lights went back on. All five of us were on the floor, curled up in balls. Cal and our mentors looked astonished. Dan kneeled down to me. "You okay, sport?" He asked, concern on his face. "Yea, I'm fine." Shakily, I stood up. "What is our mission, exactly?" I asked. "To find who did this, or what did this, and what's their purpose." Cal said. "I-I must be going. I need to check to see what happened." Cal left quickly. I stood up silently, and left the room. I didn't want to know any more. I heard footsteps behind me. I looked over my shoulder, seeing the others. "Did you hear that? What did it say?" I asked. "It said like it knew about me and it was coming." Alec shuddered. We all nodded. Everyone was silent after that. We walked down the hallway and took a left down another hallway. It opened up to a long corridor with 5 doors. Each door had our name on it. I ran to mine and locked the door. I didn't want Dan to come for me. I didn't want anyone coming to me. My room was a long rectangular shape. I painted it blue, ocean blue, and added star fish, and sea coins, and sea shells, anything that made it feel like the ocean. My bed was a loft bed, with a workspace/desk below it, and it sat on the right side of my room. Next to my bed was a flatscreen, and across from that a couch with a coffee table. I had a few beach chairs to give it an accent, and a surf board. There were some rectangular shelves with books and things I like to collect. I like to collect seashells and snowglobes, so, that's what most of the shelves are filled with.
I wanted to lock the connecting doors that led to Alec and Autumn's room, but couldn't find the strength in me to. Sometimes I wished that I'd never been put in this job. That I was the one that needed saving from the villain, not the person who saves you.
I never knew who my mom was. I never knew who my dad was. What if I had a brother, or sister, or both? I'd never know. What if my name really isn't Summer? What if I had a family, and a pet? I would never know, because I was chosen at birth. Ripped from my mom's arms. Or at least, that's what I hoped happened. That I was taken away from my family unwillingly. I refused to even acknowledge the other chose. That my parents gave me over, either for money, or just they didn't want me. I refused to believe that.
I heard a soft knock on Alec's side of the room. Wobbly, I stood up, walking to his connected door. "Hey." He said, walking in. "How you feeling?" I sat down on my couch. "Not so good." I said. He sat next to me. "I'm very...disturbed." I laughed nervously. He smiled. "I think we all are." I leaned back. "Do you ever think about what happened? Like, who our parents were and stuff like that?" He breathed out. "All the time."
I huffed. "Where are we gonna start? I mean, usually we have a lead like, 'He's in Paraguay working on a nuclear missile lab' blah blah blah. But all we got were these giant migraines and a breakdown in HQ." He nodded. "Well, I gotta start on my homework."
"Yea, me too." He left my room after that. I didn't want to do my homework, but I had too.
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The next day, I had an enormous headache. I wobbled as I walked, and the pain in my head was excruciating. I slowly got ready for school, and it wore off with time. I looked at my clock. 6:00 am. I had 45 minutes to eat breakfast. I walked over to the intercom on my wall. I pressed a button. "Hey, guys, why don't we have breakfast together, for once?" I waited a few minutes. "Sure." Alec's voice came up first. "I second that motion." Jake said. "Autumn and I would love to." Zeena replied. Alec came in, then Jake and Autumn, then Zeena. We all settled down around my room. I dragged my coffee table out a little, and brought over 2 beach chairs. "Ok. Lets order!" I clapped my hands together. I walked up to the intercom first. I pressed a button, and waited. "What would it be today, Ma'am?" Reynold, one of our best friends and our head chef, asked in his Scottish accent. "Ok, for me, I'll have...One cup of hot chocolate, one pitcher of OJ, some muffins, blueberry and chocolate, and some chocolate chip pancakes."
A pause. "Ok. Anything else?"
"Oh, yea, the others are here, so, stay on! Thanks Reynold." I backed away, and everyone else ordered. "Alright, guys, I'll get crackin'!"
"Thanks Reynold!" We all said in unison. There was a chuckle on the other line, and then his connection was off.
We waited for our food patiently. It never took that long because there were so many people working in the kitchen. There was a knock on my door, so I jumped and raced toward it, opening it up. Five carts filled with food came in. "Ok, so I have Zeena's order on this cart," Reynold pointed to a purple cart, "Jake's on this cart," He pointed to a red cart, "Autumn's on this cart," he nodded to a pink cart, "Alec's on this one," pointed to a green cart, "and Summer's on this one." Mine was the orange cart. We all raced to our carts, oohing and ahhing at the smell of the wonderful food. Alec went and came back with a short, wide table he used, and added that to my coffee table, so it was longer. We all placed our food on the table's, and started to stuff our mouths. "Well, I'm glad you love my food." Reynold said, beaming. We nodded together, and said thanks as well as we could with food in our mouths. Reynold laughed, and left with his carts. 30 minutes later, we were all stuffed. "Ohhhh, I love Reynold." Jake said in a happy food coma. "Yea, this was nice. Great idea Summer!" Zeena said. I smiled. "I'm just glad you all came." I smiled. "Ok, guys, we better get ready." We all took up our dishes, and took it to our shoots. In every room, there was a dishes and laundry shoot. So we put all of our dirty dishes down the shoot.
Everyone resided back to their rooms to get ready for school. I grabbed my bookbag, and outside was a lunch bag, with my name on it, just like everyone else had. I took it, and then raced up to my shoot. Nobody was here yet. Too early. "Hey, wait up!" Zeena said. "Come on, the bus can't wait for us!" I grinned. She joined me in the elevator, and light filled in when it opened. We got out, tapped it, and it went back to looking like a regular old tree. We walked in silence through the woods so nobody would know we were here. We looked twice at the edge of the woods to see if anybody was here, and seeing that nobody was there, we calmly walked out. "Ok, so, there's this boy." I groaned. I, for one, was not good with relationships and whatnot. "His name is Sam." I looked at her. "And?" "Well, we started talking, and I really like him. I don't like telling boys that, though. How do I get the message across, I mean, comeon!" I moaned. "I don't know, I'm not good with this kinda stuff!" Zeena laughed.Four other girls were at the bus stop. Bad thing about riding this bus? There were the popular girls. "Oh look, looser alert." Said Pasley, the most popular girl at school. Here crowd nodded in agreement. We just ignored her. "Where'd you get those outfits, the thriftstore?" They laughed. Jake and Alec came up, and they started to brush their hair and check their make-up. "Hey Alec." Pasley said, posturing herself so that her boobs stuck out. Pasley had the biggest boobs in the 7th grade.
"Hey Pasley." Alec said smoothly. One of Pasley's followers started to talk it up with Jake. But then came Autumn. Poor Autumn. Everybody had to pick on the silent girl. "What's wrong, mute girl? Can't speak?" They laughed. Autumn looked like she was going to cry. I walked up to Pasley. "For your information, Autumn's my friend. And I bet if you were mute, you wouldn't even be little miss pageant queen around the school." Pasley laughed. "Oh, Summer, but I am! And I can do whatever I want to. What's wrong Autumn?" She turned her head to her. "Can't speak because your too ugly and your too ashamed?" They laughed.
"At least Autumn's hair is natural, and so is her color. I wouldn't want to risk the chance of letting the whole school know that you have extensions and your unrealistic blonde hair that you call natural really isn't." Zeena said. Pasley looked petrified for a moment. Her group started to whisper. "But I can make your life so miserable if you do." She smirked as the bus came.
It pulled up, and Pasley's group walked in first. "What a group of-" I started to say, but Zeena shot me a look. I got a look on my face that meant I had a plan. "So, I hear Pasley hates worms." A smile worked it's way onto my face. Alec raised an eyebrow. Jake started rubbing his hands together. "So, what's the master plan, my evil twin?" He said.
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