That night Alice went to the address. Her heart was beating fast on the way there. She rang the doorbell, holding her breath. The door swung open and Julieta stood there holding clipboards. She gave one to Alice and beckoned her inside. Five people were already sitting there, around a small table, writing on there clipboards and speaking about there lifes, all of them were around the age of twenty to forty years old,

“This is A, she works with me, this is C,” Julieta said, pointing at a dark haired man. “This is F,” pointing at the youngest girl in the group. “This is O,” pointing at a man with a big beard. “This is K,” pointing at a man smoking, “And this is N,” pointing at a rough looking woman.

“Hi,” Alice said. They started asking her questions about her job, her life before they got stuck here and then it went on to them telling her about themselves. At the same time this was going on they were having another conversation on their clipboards.

“I understand that you have been asking about what is going on?” N wrote.

“Yes,” Alice wrote.

“We don’t know much, but we have figured out a few things.” O wrote. “Like the fact that we can’t speak freely without the people in uniform intervening.”

“We have figured out that it only seems to be people around the age of twenty to forty, without any diseases.” O wrote.

“How do you know that?” Alice wrote.

“We have asked and looked around, no children or old people and no hospital,” K wrote. Alice sat there dumbstruck. She hadn’t realised that, but now that she thought back at her customers and other people she had passed, that it was true. Julieta bumped her arm and pointed with her head at N.

“We also know that the city is closed in on all sides by a big wall that we can’t see the end of,” N had written.

“Why would they do that and how would they have had the time to build it?” Alice wrote.

“We don’t think it is an accident that we are here,” K wrote. She looked at him confused.

“Everything points at it being planned and that the rest of Earth is completely fine. It’s just some kind of experiment,” N wrote.


That night Alice turned in her bed thinking about what kind of hell they really were in. She kept on going to the meetings and searching the city for anything useful when she was out of work. Not much changed for a few months, Alice felt frustrated and stuck, until one night O came to the meeting fidgeting.

“What have you found?” N wrote.

“I have been keeping an eye on a building that is standing next to the wall,” O wrote with a shaky hand. “Noone has been walking in or out of it while I've been watching, until yesterday when I saw two men in uniform run out.”

Everyone stopped talking and just stared at O.

“Uhm, I heard they are thinking about opening a theatre in town,” K said, lighting a cigarette. Slowly the others joined in the conversation except O and N. They were writing with each other without showing the others.

“What are you talking about?” Alice wrote, trying to join in the conversation.

“Give us a minute and we will tell you all what we have come up with,” N wrote. Alice bit her lip and shook her leg. The air in the rum felt heavy.

“We have to get into the building and see if there is any way out from there. Do we have any volunteers?” N wrote. Everyone in the room raced their hands. N shocked her head.

“We should just choose two people to go and check. We don’t want to bring too much attention to us,” N wrote.

“N I don’t think you should go, you are needed here,” K wrote. N nodded. “I think we should choose two people with combat training. As I was in the military, I think I should be the first choice.” Everyone in the group agreed.

“I think the other person we send should be an engineer, if we have one, we don’t know what technology they have to keep us locked in.”

“I went to school for Software Engineering, third year,” Alice wrote.

“I worked in cyber security, before we got stuck here,” O wrote.

“I think we better send O,” N wrote. Alice sighed but accepted the situation.


During the next meeting neither K or O came. There was nothing the group could do but wait. After a month of no one seeing or hearing from either of them, something needed to be done.