"Natty!" Natalia groaned at the boy who was stood in the doorway. She had, by some miracle, managed to get some sort of sleep, the quality of which was undetermined, but would soon be realised by how grumpy she was that day.
"Carter! Stop! Let me sleep!" She grasped a pillow in one hand and threw it at him, he laughed and dodged out of the way, the pillow sailing past him and into the corridor. He was blonde, but of a darker blonde than the boy in her dream, there was more of a dark, sandy colour to his hair. he was taller than her, and of quite a stocky build, noticeably fairly broad shouldered.
"Come on! It's a brand new day!" Carter laughed again as he tried desperately to wake the girl up and coax her out of her bed. "You can't just lie there forever, tell her Zac." He turned to the boy who had appeared at his side.
"Come on Tals, it's almost lunch time!" Isaac added, she groaned and finally sat up, looking at the two of them as though they were particularly disgusting beetles.
"Fine!" She gave up, getting out of bed and grabbing her favorite jumpsuit from her wardrobe, which was of a bigger size than the rest of them and she liked how oversized it was on her, although she wasn't a hundred percent sure where she actually got it from, and everything else she needed and headed towards the bathroom. "Give me five minutes."
There was one bathroom on their corridor that the three of them had to share, depending on the day there could be races and arguments as to who would be first in the bathroom. Luckily for Natalia, both boys had been up for an hour or so before her, so she could spend all the time she wanted in the bathroom.
When she was finally ready, and after definitely not in keeping with the five-minute time limit she had promised, Natalia joined the boys in Isaac's room.
"You took forever!" Carter exclaimed dramatically from his seat in the chair by the desk, she rolled her eyes at him and sat beside Isaac on the bed once he had moved to create room for her.
"It takes effort to look this good!" She joked, fluffing up her red hair, where it fell at the shoulders of her faded blue jumpsuit.
"Your effort was wasted then." Isaac joked, Natalia made a wounded sort of noise, clutching her heart dramatically.
"You hurt me!" She exclaimed, falling back against Isaac's arm. He laughed at her, shaking his head.
"I do try."
At that moment, a loud gong sounded, echoing down the draughty corridors and reaching the three as they sat in the small room.
"Lunch is ready." Carter commented, pointing out what was already obvious to the other two.
"No? Really?" Isaac asked with widened eyes, Carter rolled his eyes and stood up.
"Stop it you!" He warned jokingly, before opening the door and waiting for the others to follow him. "I'm starving."
"You're always starving." Natalia pointed out as she joined him in the corridor. "Or so you claim."
"What? Now you don't believe me Natty?" Carter pretended to be hurt, closing the door as Isaac came through it and whacking his heels with the heavy wooden door.
"Ow!" the boy complained, swiping at his blonde friend as they made their way to the canteen. It was the only part of the day that they mingled with the scientists, and only then it was at a distance, they never seemed to want to get close to the three of them.
"Salad." Natalia said in an emotionless voice. It shouldn't have been a surprise, they were rarely given exciting foods, nor did they get a choice, their plates were set aside for them. Whilst the scientists were fed burgers and chili and lasagne, they were fed salads and potatoes and facility grown fruit and veg. it never seemed fair to them. "It's always bloody salad." She grabbed her plate and cup of water and followed the boys over to their table in the corner.
"Why would it be anything else?" Isaac asked, spearing a piece of cucumber with his fork. "they've never given us anything else, not even once."
"They haven't done any experiments for a while either." Carter commented as he shoveled a spoonful of leaves into his mouth. "It's weird." He added through a mouthful of lettuce and rocket.
Natalia stared at him in disgust, before nodding in agreement. "Yeah, what do you think they're doing?"
"Nothing good." Isaac answered simply, he put his fork down for the moment and looked at his friends thoughtfully. "The question is what will they do to us because of it."
"I hate this." Natalia sighed, she had yet to tuck into her salad. "I know it's been a while since they experimented on us, but I hate feeling like we're just waiting for them to do it again."
"I know Tals." Isaac agreed with her. "But what can we do? It's not like they'll listen if we ask them to stop."
"I wish there was something we could do." Natalia agreed, giving up her sulking and finally starting to eat her salad.
"Well, we do have one option." Carter told them, they both looked at him, confusion in their eyes.
"Like what? Raid the lab and break the equipment?" Isaac suggested, frowning when Carter shook his head.
"We could run away. "He told them, his eyes shining with the brilliantness of his idea. The other two did not share the same sentiments as him.
"Car, we don't know what it's like out there, it's dangerous!" Natalia exclaimed, looking around at the scientists to make sure they weren't listening in. "We won't make it out there alone!"
"Says who? Them? They could be lying to us." Carter replied, lowering his voice to a hushed tone, lest one of the adults overheard them.
"Maybe they aren't, it's a big risk Car." Isaac added. "We've never left here before, none of us have."
"That's why we should! We don't know what we have missed out on!" Carter was trying his best to convince his friends to run away with him.
"I mean it would mean we wouldn't be experimented on." Natalia considered. "That would be nice."
"Exactly, and you two are always talking about how you want to be at the locations in our geography textbook." Carter agreed.
"I guess… I guess it wouldn't hurt to try." Isaac finally relented after a moment or two or thought. "But what will they do to us if they catch us?"
"We won't get caught, not if we make a proper plan." Carter promised him.
"Alright, heck let's try it." Isaac gave in and agreed to running away with his two best friends.
"Okay, meet me in my room tonight and we'll make a plan." Carter told them, and they both agreed.
Although they had online lessons all afternoon, the three could not focus, all of them thinking up plans that would help them escape the facility unnoticed. It would be risky, yes, but their freedom was surely worth it.