Outpost Three

Chapter Two ~ Dinner as a Purple

I woke and sat up suddenly to a loud knocking on my door, taking in my surroundings and remembering where i was.
"Uhm come in" I said in a loud enough voice so that whoever was behind the door could hear me. The door opened slightly and I instantly knew who it was by the now familiar sound of her cane tapping along the floor. Ms Venable walked into my room and planted her cane about a meter away from my bed, where I was sitting.
"Dinner is in half an hour. You will need to get dressed into something more..." her voice trailed off as she looked me up and down, obviously referring to the joggers and tee I currently had on, "Appropriate." I had taken my bra off while I was napping and the t-shirt I was wearing was quite thin, so I'm pretty sure she could see my boobs through the shirt. It did seem like she hovered her eyes on my chest for a few seconds when she was scanning my body, but maybe that was just in my mind.
"The dining room is down the hall and to the left." She stated in her usual deep tone. "Don't be late. Lateness results in punishment." She added with what I thought was a small smirk. She never took her eyes off of me the entire time. With that, she lifted her cane and left the room, closing the door behind her.

As the door closed I threw myself back onto the bed and let out a sigh - but the good kind. I don't know what it was about her but every time she spoke to me I went weak, I wanted more alone time with her but I was so sure that she was straight. I shook the thoughts out of my head and got up to see what was in the wardrobe for me to wear tonight. I wanted to wear something flattering on the first night to give the others a good first impression but mainly to impress Ms Venable. I went straight to the tight fitted stuff so I could show my body off. I've got a good body that I worked hard for so when I get to show it off, I do. After rummaging through the hangers I found a beautiful deep purple satin bodycon dress and slipped it on to look in the mirror and study it. It was off the shoulder but tight fitting and hugged me in all the right places. It stopped just above my knees - classy but sexy. I found a matching pair of stilettos and put them on before I sorted my hair and checked the time.
6:50pm. Ten minutes until dinner. I headed out closing the door behind me and made my way to the dining room.

As I walked in I realised that I was the last one to arrive. There was a long black table across the room with four chairs either side and one chair at the end. Nine people in total. All of the chairs were filled apart from mine and the one at the end, which happened to be next to each other. I recognised the blonde guy and the girl with curly blonde hair from the van, who were both seated at the table, but I couldn't see the other girl who came here with us. There were five other people also dressed in purple occupying the other seats, none of which I recognised. As I walked over to the table everyone went quiet and gave me a look up and down before starting conversation.
"Hey, you were in the van with us right? I'm Coco and this is Gallant." The blonde girl said referring to the other guy we arrived with. "What's your name?" She asked.
"Yeah that's me. I'm (y/n) nice to meet you." I said as I gave her a smile. The others introduced themselves as Dinah, Evie, Timothy, Emily and Stu. We had small talk as a group for a few minutes about our lives before the bomb and what we all worked as. They all seemed like decent people, some a little on the stuck up side but nothing too overbearing. Stu and Gallant were obviously gay which made me feel a little better about myself, knowing I wasn't the only gay one of the bunch. I was pretty sure Timothy and Emily had something going on as they kept giving each other looks across the table, so that ruled her out and Coco, Evie and Dinah I was yet to figure out - but I was ninety nine percent sure they were all straight.

Emily was in the middle of speaking when her voice was cut off by the sound of Ms Venable's cane approaching from the corridor and we all turned to look at her. She had changed her outfit from earlier on and was now wearing a dark purple gown that hugged her waist and flowed out towards her feet, which were in black stiletto heels. I felt a tingling sensation just by looking at her, all I could think to myself was how sexy she looked. Before speaking she did her usual scan of the room, making sure to check that everyone was dressed appropriately and had followed her rule. Her eyes stopped once she got to me and they widened slightly, I'm pretty sure she was holding back a smirk but I couldn't tell. She looked me up and down and settled her gaze on my eyes, staring as we held eye contact in silence for a while.

Breaking the silence, she tapped her cane twice on the floor and four more people entered the room, wearing grey, with a plate for each of us. They layed the plates out on the table in front of us and went to stand against the walls, as if waiting for another command from Ms Venable. I figured this is what she meant earlier by the 'Purples and Greys' so I didn't take much notice - apart from the fact that one of them was the other girl from the van earlier, the shy looking one. I wondered why she was a grey and we were purples, and I put a mental note in my mind to try and speak to her later. With that Ms Venable took a seat next to me at the end of the table.
"You may eat." She said in that deep, raspy voice that was growing on me by the second. Everyone began eating and went back to the small talk but I kept quiet, my attention was only on Ms Venable and I wanted to know more.

"So, Ms Venable, what was your life like before the Outpost?" I asked. She seemed shocked at the fact that I was speaking to her. The others made sure to avoid any kind of conversation with her because she terrified them all.
"I won't discuss such matters with you, or anyone else for that matter, ms (y/l/n)." She stated in a stern voice. I looked down at my plate, slightly embarrassed at how quickly she had shut me down. Realising I wasn't going to get anywhere with her, I turned my attention to Timothy next to me and began talking to him. Although that didn't seem to be what Ms Venable wanted either. As soon as he started to respond to me and begin conversation, she slammed her cane down and stood up abruptly from her chair.
"Dinner is over, you may leave." She stated through gritted teeth. She seemed annoyed, jealous even at the fact that I had given my attention to some one who wasn't her.
"You must be back in your rooms by 9pm, in time for night hours. No one may leave their room until breakfast tomorrow at 8am. Tardiness will result in punishment. No exceptions." She instructed, before she gave me a glare and exited the room, followed by the greys.

I wasn't majorly interested in anyone else at the table, so I left the dining room and decided to explore the Outpost a little more. For an underground shelter I already knew it was pretty big, and if I was going to be living there for god knows how long I wanted to at least know my way around. This place was going to take some getting used to, especially all of Ms Venable's rules. I wondered to myself what would happen if someone broke one of them, there was definitely a small part of me that wanted to find out.