Day 1 12:40

Barrett sat with Presley in the corner until the stampede finished before they even attempted to go outside It didn’t seem like anyone had been hurt too badly but there was no reason to risk the crush. It also gave Presley some time to calm down but although he was no longer crying, he was still clearly on the verge of another breakdown.

“Come on, let’s go see what’s going on outside.” Barrett stood up and offered a hand to Presley who looked at it before quickly shaking his head no. That wasn’t surprising, it could take hours for him to calm down, a panic attack in the morning would lead to him being anxious for the rest of the day. Still, they needed to know what was going on outside and Barrett couldn’t leave Presley alone in this state so he would have to come with.

“Common, we can’t stay here, we need to go outside and find out what’s going on.” Barrett watched as Presley reluctantly raise his hand which he grab and used to gently pull Presley up onto his feet before he could change his mind. “Fresh air will help calm you down.”

Once he was up Presley laced his fingers behind his neck and brought his arms in close to his chest. His eyes darted around looking at every little thing like he expected a lion to appear out of thin air to attack him. Still, he followed closely behind Barrett as he walked to the exit.

The door had been left open so before they even left the building Barrett could see the wall. It was a cold grey concrete color with no imperfections throughout its entire surface. As he stepped outside Barrett saw just how massive of a behemoth it really was. It was at least 200 hundred feet tall and stretched from the far end of the parking lot into the wood behind the school.

Three more walls loomed over the school, each one just as imposing as the first. Together they formed a perfect square that surrounded Altim trapping the students inside. Above the walls, there was no sky only a back void from which thousands of lights hung all arranged in perfect rows.

Barrett had never seen such an imposing sight before and there was nothing that he even began to compare it to. With nothing else to do Barrett sat down on the steps just ahead of the front entrance and tried to understand just what he was looking at. There were no seams where one section of wall could be fitted against another, only a perfectly smooth finish across the entire surface.

Many had begun walking along the length of the wall looking for any gap or opening they could use to escape. Others simply looked at the gigantic construction as they tried to wrap their heads around the true side of the wall before them. Just like Barrett, they had realized the crushing truth no openings or exploitable weakness existed in the wall. Any search for one would be pointless, there would be no escape from this prison.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Barrett couldn’t look at the wall anymore, instead he turned to look at Presley who had sat beside him on the stairs. Instead of looking at the wall like so many others, Presley stared at the ground playing with the strings on the old jacket he wore.

“Hey, Presley, we’re going to be okay. You know that right?” Before the words even left his mouth Barrett knew they were more for his own sake than Presley’s and that they were probably the biggest lie he had ever told.

“No, we’re not, we’re all going to die in here.” Presley spoke in a quiet depressed voice. The unfortunate truth was that he could very easily be right. They simply had no way of knowing what the administration had planned for them but either way, it was far too early to give up hope.

“Hey Presley, your not going to die. Think about all that money you’re going to get after you sue the school for violating your IEP?” Barrett hoped the joke would cheer Presley as he had often threatened to sue teachers for breaking the rules of his Individual Educational Program. His threats were often ignored like half of the other stuff he said.

Mostly because they had already learned to tune out everything he said and if they actually followed the IEP there wouldn’t be any classwork for him to do meaning he could sit in the back of the class and watch anime all day. Presley already ignored all of the work they gave him and stayed in the back watching anime regardless but at least they could give him zeros for uncompleted assignments this way.

“They wouldn’t give me anything.” Once again Presley was probably right but this time it didn’t really upset Barrett. Had Presley attempted to do his work only to be screwed by the system he might have actually been owed something. As things were however Barrett didn’t really care but saying that would probably only make Presley more depressed.

“What are you talking about? An alien abduction ought to be worth a couple of million right?” To Barrett’s relief, Presley did chuckle a little before going back to his usual self.

“You really think so?” Presley looked a Barrett with a faint glimmer of hope in his eyes.

“Of course,” Barrett stood up and stretched before offering a hand down to Presley. “Let’s go inside, looking at that wall is hurting my eyes.”

To his surprised relief, Presley took it much faster than he had in the lunchroom and used a little of his own strength to help pull him up. Together the two bodies started walking towards the doors.

“Hey, did you know that subways have unground speed limit signs to stop the conductor from going too fast and crashing.” Presley asked the question clearly hoping to show his knowledge of trains.

Barrett did in fact already know this, mostly because this was the 7th time month that he had asked this exact question. “No, I didn’t. Tell me something any else cool about subways?”