Vitality In A Wasteland

21

It had been a long, long journey until Madeline could recognise something. She told Claire to stop in the middle of nowhere and said, "Hidden in the sand is a door."

"Right here?" Asked Claire.

Madeline nodded, "We can find it on foot."

Out in the Sands so far from Capital became a familiar sight. Walking upon its hardened ground became oddly familiar until now when Claire seen a large circular shape in the sand, barely hidden by yellow and dust. She felt her fingers to find a knob and pulled hard. The trapdoor led down a concrete stairway of darkness. Claire raised a red flare.

"You first," she said.

Madeline flushed. "What? In there!"

Claire smiled. "It's a joke, now come along." When she ascended down the stairway, she found the biggest door she had ever seen. It was so deep underground yet towered halfway to the height of Dalia.

"This is it," she said. "We came all this way for this."

"Do you believe it really is what was promised?" Asked Madeline.

"I don't know what to believe anymore. All I know is that today my mission finally ends."

There was no key or pinlock to open the massive gateway. All there was, was as singular hand scanner. Claire cleared her throat and let Madeline place her hand.

The next second the ground shook with a mighty tremor as the massive doorway disassembled itself into four slices and disappeared into the walls. The sight within was truly obscure. For it was nothing Claire nor Madeline could have ever imagined. Just looking through felt way too unreal.

For it was no underground complex it was an entire city. Stacked with towers that went down way too deep and with strange machines buzzing all around.

Claire and Madeline walked to a railing way that had a large elevator. Cautiously they entered and noticed seven hundred floor buttons. Claire looked to Madeline before clicking level one. The lift slowly descended giving the true view of the massive city they were in. High above was concrete and steel banisters, yet around was towers that loomed beyond eye view. The strange machines, like drone helicopters serviced around high up roadways while a train snaked around several towers with bright red colours like old television commercials. The streets below had thousands of faces roaming, all ants from such an impressive height yet their clothes looked so clean and white, it was like a perfect image from a science fiction book.

The lift lowered into a tunnel of darkness that finally ended with bright lights. When its door opened there were a dozen firearms pointed at Claire and Madeline, red dots directly at their foreheads. A woman with black heels and a black dress came forward. She looked exactly like Madeline.

Her smile was crooked like Madeline's. Yet when she spoke, she had no similar accent. "Well, this is a strange sight. Welcome to the Oasis."