Austin came back downstairs with his old leather backpack in his hands. Kyle started shoving stuff from his pockets into the backpack. Man, those must have been deep pockets, because he was pulling out small packs of dried fruit, jerky, and medication. Kyle looked down and clipped his metal water bottle off of his tool belt and tossed it to Lizzy. Lizzy filled it with water, tossed it to Austin and Austin put in in the bag.
Austin was closing up the flap of the bag when Lizzy ran up to me. She gave me a quick hug, said "Good luck. Don't die please." And ran upstairs. Hmph. Easy for you to say. Austin said that he would be back, he was just going to go pick some herbs to put in the bag. He went outside.
Kyle pulled me into a hug. I wanted to object, but my brain had a weird way of objecting. It made me wrap my arms around him and hug back.
"I can give you a map and gave you follow distantly behind me. I don't want anything happening to you. Understand?" Yes sir, I understand. But I have a question still.
"Yes. I have a question that's been bothering me for a while though. " I replied.
"Well, what is it then?"

"Your young for a Keeper."

Silence. We were still hugging, but he said nothing. I could almost feel his hesitation.

"Yeah. My dad is the leader of the Advanced civilization. When we turn 15, he reports us here to...help." So he has siblings now, does he? I can't help but feel bad. It's not like he wants to "help.".
   " You have siblings?"

   "Yeah. Older brother named John. Younger eight year old brother named Ethan. " he pulled away from out hug and smiled to himself. "Ethan looks like me but with tee hair and freckles. " His smile lessened a bit. "John is blonde too, but with Hazel eyes. We are all a bit different in our own ways."
"You care about them, don't you?" Kyle nodded.

"Of course I do. Ethan more than John, John can look after himself. I just...don't want to put Ethan through all of this. You know?"

"Yeah, I feel the same with Lizzy. Yet she keeps on smiling. Well, most of the time anyways."

   Austin came back into the room with the back pack in hands. He gave it to me and said "It has an extra change of clothes, Lizzy chose your regular black pants white shirt brown jacket to put inside." He placed the bag on the table and hugged me tight. "Stay safe." He whispered into my ear. "You too." I said back.

   Austin pulled away.

   And with that, he placed the backpack into my care and opened the door, letting Kyle and I out.