Forever for Rose

Chapter Thirty Six.

"So you have a plan then?" Tiwen's voice is hopeful but I know I'm about to give a less than favorable answer.

"I have a message to tell, and then together in conference we will work together to come up with our plan."

"Oh dear." He shakes his head but Dalton's strong hand squeezes mine in reassurance. "Our media rooms are through here," Tiwen moves us through the glittering corridors. "We are in lockdown currently." He mutters answering my unspoken question of where the heck everyone else is.

We follow him around two turns and down a set of white marbled stairs, coming to a stop outside of a room marked 'Conference Room 1'.

"You still have national media access, correct?" Dad asks as we pass into the long dark wood paneled room. The center of the room nearly completely taken up by a dark red brown table that could easily fit fifty people.

"We do," he bows to Dad before leading him up to the front of the room where a dark wood podium stands in front of a wall with two different flags sporting simple crests. The first one is a brilliant blue like the tiles out in the corridors with a shimmering white S surrounded by deep green leaves. Tiwen catches me admiring it and he smiles proudly as he runs his hand over the crest. "The flag of Clach Caisteal, the only settlement of our kind located in Scotland."

"It's beautiful." I say simply though it doesn't quite do it, or this place justice. "Everything here is."

My eyes drift slowly from their flag, over to mine.

A strange feeling of pride fills me now.

I've seen our flag and crest more times than I can count, but now, standing before the black silk, staring at the raised white crescent moon adorning the center I feel it all hit me at once. I'm about to claim this world as my own. This will be my life from now on, no matter how much longer our lives may be.

I push the dark thought away and stare at the crest again, running my fingers over it gently. "I'm really doing this." There isn't question in my voice anymore, but instead confidence. I owe my people to give this my all. I turn around and face my friends and family, taking a deep breath. I'm doing this for them too.

For us all.

"So how do we do this?" I ask Tiwen, looking around for a camera set up or something.

"What kind of broadcast are you wanting to do?"

"What do you mean?" I ask, risking sounding like I'm clueless. It's not like someone can fault me for never having given a news conference before.

"Closed circuits or open?" He thinks he's clarifying when really I'm only getting further confused. He must notice the look on my face because he sighs, pointing up at the ceiling over the center of the table. "The camera is up there, so you'll just look there while you speak. If you do a closed circuit broadcast then you'll just be recorded and your message will be posted to all media outlets and to every settlement." He explains, "however, an open circuit broadcast would be live and you'll have a screen that will have our media broadcasters live with you to question you."

I nod, turning back to my family. "What would you do?" I ask Dad and he sighs, rubbing his chin.

"You should probably stick with a closed circuit considering how huge this announcement is going to be." He finally says.

I nod too, but then bite my lip. "I don't know. Maybe because of how monumental this is, I should be open with them. What better way to gain some trust than to hear them out for their concerns?"

"Rose, that's going to be too overwhelming for your first broadcast to be bombarded by their questions and accusations. You have no idea how brutal those broadcasters can be." Dalton shakes his head at me, setting his jaw firmly.