It was silent, despite approximately every worker from fuel station A attending the funeral. The only sounds that echoed throughout the cave were the shuffling of the shovel in Alstro's hand and the water dripping down from the stalactites into the large pool of water in the center of the cave. The pool was still, allowing the droplets to ripple the surface in a perfect, circular shape.

Alstro grunted as he stepped aside, sticking the shovel into the dirt. The hole he dug was deeper than the others. The many, countless other mounds of dirt with various flowers decorating them. This was their graveyard. The workers, when they died, were never taken to be buried in the surface, where they longed to be, but their bodies were instead thrown in front of the other workers to deal with.

With Alstro and Cam's help, Aran slowly lowered Somnia's body into the hole, and stepped away. Alstro started to shovel the dirt back in, forever sealing Somnia's body down below, in her eternal rest.

Aran held her flower— a pink opium poppy and planted the stem into the mound of dirt. He turned around and cleared his throat.

"... I met Somnia six years ago. I was...one of the first of our generation to be sent to FS-A. Back then, in our dorm, it was just Helian, Somnia and a bunch of other new workers— me included. I remember us complaining about how hard it was to fall asleep, witch the machine always being on. Helian was fast asleep, and the rest of us just couldn't get any rest.

At some point, she just started to hum, then sing. Some, if not most of you here were there. I can still hear her voice putting me to sleep. I... Felt something. It was like... Love."

The small crowd collectively lowered their heads.

"It was like a powerful force that was there to protect us all from harm. To save our future.

Somnia was more than kind. She was strong, caring and..."

He chuckled under his breath.

"Very, very stubborn. Stubborn enough to convince all of us to support her on her mission to raise the next generation away from here. The plan was...well, it was foolproof at the time. I just..."

He lowered his head, exhaling deeply as he raised his head to speak again.

"I just wish I had stopped her when I could."

He said, and they stood in silence. Alstro unplugged the shovel from the ground and cleared his throat.

"We have to get back to work. Of course, I'd rather you all take your time to mourn, but that's not how the Masks want it."

...

They'd been in there for hours now. Moea used the time to fly through the papers. Various maps and other kinds of information. Something about waiting for nighttime for an airship in the surface.

"Mom worked really hard for those papers." Rosa mumbled, Moea looked at her, then at the papers.

"I bet she did. Uh... Do you know anything about what they mean?" Moea said, holding one of the papers that wasn't a map. Rosa parted her lips to speak when the heavy door creaked open, and Angela peeked out through the opening.

"Come with me." She said simply, as they both stood up from the cold floor and went with her. Moea started to miss the comfort of her group. She complained about it before, but now it's everything she yearned for. She shouldn't have left. She should have listened to Quill.

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Angela took them deep into a cave system, where they saw glowing stones and several carvings of names, some where scratched out. Rose stood close to Moea as they navigated the bumpy floor. The soon approached a fork in the cave. The left showed a large entrance behind which they could only see pitch blackness. Angela turned to the right.

"We don't go there. Not anymore." she finally said, facing a giant stone on the right. She picked up a rock nearby and threw it over the stone, between several hanging stalactites.

Moea waited for the sound of stone hitting stone, but it never came. Instead, the stone was pulled seemingly into the wall where they saw a dim lighting, and Aran staring at them from behind the rock. He sighed as Angela stepped into the room, the two following in behind her.

The room was large. It was just another clearing in the cave, yes, but one with furniture. Several couches were carved into the walls of the cave. Again, Moea and Rose saw carvings all around the walls. But this time around, none were scratched out, but instead artistically carved in, some with hearts, some with poor attempted fire symbols and so on. The room was filled with only Alstro, Cam, Aran and

"Welcome." Aran said quietly. "Before I begin, I want to ask you two to be silent when you talk. This cave has been around for a while, as you can see. Noise could make something fall. It's happened before." Aran said, gesturing to the ceilings. Moea looked up to see carved out stalactites. She didn't bother to ask how they got up there to carve them out, but at this point, anything was possible.

"Now," Aran said, taking a seat on the stone couch. "I'm sure you two have a lot of questions. And so do we, but we don't want to put any pressure on you, since you're both still so young, so... Me, Angela, Cam and—"

"Where's my mom?" Rosa asked, cutting Aran off. Moea could tell that it took her a lot of confidence to speak up, as she had been clammering to her coat since they went in.

She could see his heart break everytime Rosa made a sound.

"Your mother, is..." he stammered

"She's gone. You won't see her again." Alstro finished where Aran left off. Angela hissed at him.

"Alstro!"

"What? What point is there in hiding it from her. You think this place gives a damn about anyone without a mask? The sooner she learns, the better. Isn't that right, Aran?"

"Your mother was very strong, and she wanted to get all of us out of here, but... It's not that easy. We're all being kept here an monitored by the Masks. If any of us are missing, they will know."

"The Masks?" Moea asked.

"Right, I guess you'd know them as adults. On the surface, you have caretakers, right? Well, those caretakers are not what they seem. They raise you to be obedient children until you're strong enough to work for them."

Despite Aran's explanation, Rosa and Moea looked at each other confused.

"Uh- okay," He said, standing up from the and walking over to them. He kneeled down before them and took Moea's cloak into his hands. He brushed his thumb around the pattern at the end of the cloak. It was a design with a star shaped symbol among other decorative patterns.

"See this?"

"Yeah."

"This symbol stands for combat. When they give you this cloak, the adults expect you to fight for them. To go to war with the beasts for their sake, so that they don't have to."

Moea swallowed, slowly nodding as Angela approached them.

"We're... Sorry you had to find out this way but..."

Angela pulled out the end of her cloak and showed it to the two. It showed a fire symbol as well as a pickaxe.

"The adults gave us the task of mining and providing fuel for the furnace..."

She decided to not mention that it was the safest job to work on the furnace, as opposed to to military or construction.

"Wh...what about me? I don't have a cloak...." Rosa said, worriedly as she looked at the designs. Aran placed a hand on her shoulder.

"That's because they don't know you exist. I promise, you'll never have to go through any of this. We're gonna protect you, and many others from putting your lives on the line, okay?"

Rosa nodded, and Aran smiled at her and Moea.

"Okay, so who's hungry?"

Their eyes lit up and they nodded.

...

Alstro kneeled against his shovel, watching the two dig into the meal they stole from the cafeteria. He saw Aran approach him, but didn't avert his gaze from the two.

"If you're feeling guilty, you don't have to." he started. Aran shrugged and dug the shovel another inch deeper into the ground.

"You didn't tell them about you?" he asked

"No need to. This whole situation's confusing enough."

"Fair point."

They stood in silence, watching Angela make small talk with the two.

"Surely you must be hurting." Alstro said eventually.

"What do you mean?" Aran asked.

"You wanted that to be your kid at some point."

Instead of a response, Alstro got a more than personal smack in the head.

"Too soon, idiot." Aran said simply and sat down against the wall.

Cam, who hadn't said anything at all since they saw what had become of Somnia, walked past them. He left the hideout, but not without giving Alstro a murderous glance.

...

"Okay, you two have to stay and sleep here. It's a bit cold, but you can use the fire to keep warm. You can't follow us, because the Masks do a role check, and they can't under any circumstances, find you two okay? Tomorrow, at this time, we'll meet again, and we'll get you guys out of here as soon as possible." Angela kneeled before them to reassure their safety.

"What about you?" Rosa complained, having already taken a liking to Angela and Aran.

"Huh?"

"Won't you come with us?"

Aran chuckled and placed his hand on her and Moea's head.

"If everything goes well, we'll see each other again when you guys are out of here."

"O...okay..." she smiled, and hurried over to sit near the fire.

Moea looked at them, unsure of what to say.

"I... I saw what they did to Somnia and I... I didn't even want to be there when it happened-"

Aran nodded understandingly.

"We'll get you to a safe place. It might not be the home you know, but it's somewhere even safer." he assured her. And she nodded and joined Rosa by the fire.