One of the other ladies, who was maybe in her mid-twenties, gasped. "But that can't be, the Leader, he-"

"She," Maddi corrected. "And yes, indeed I am the Leader of the Resistance. I was chosen by the old Leader, who passed away late last year. I've been organizing things for a while now."

The only thing I caught from that was the Resistance. Either they'd read my mind and liked my idea or I was an incredibly good guessed of secret superhero rebel group names. Or there were a limited supply of good names and I'd managed to stumble upon one of the better.

Probably the last option.

"Oh, and Thera, Tom, Stacey? These are our new reqruits. Samantha, Abbot, and Lindy. You know Liam. I've asked you three to come to help them get settled in. Tomorrow we go on a little mission of our own, and we need them as prepared as possible." She paused. Dramatic effect, I supposed. "You eight are also my new Council. You are dismissed." Maddi walked out of the room, leaving the rest of us to figure things out for ourselves.

A Council must have been a big deal, because all of the not newbies squealed like little kids getting ice cream. One of them- Thera, maybe?- grabbed my arm.

"I'll give you the tour. Lindy, right? I'm Thera." I nodded, and she led me out of the room, rattling off names of places I honestly didn't care about. "The government is pretty simple," she explained after we stopped to catch our breath. "On top is the Leader, obviously, and then the Council- us!- and then everybody else really. I assume you know about the other side of things, so we'll just be-"

"Actually, I don't," I said. "We didn't learn about it in school. You do mean the Executives, right?"

Thera nodded. "They have the High Executive and the Executive board instead. Their H.E. at the moment is actually the principal of the school. Harold Prent."

I laughed. "Harold? That's his first name?"

"Yes, and I suggest you don't make fun of it. He was named after the first H.E. and very proud of it." I quieted down.

"Can I go to sleep?" I asked. "I've kind of had a busy day today." Thera's face softened.

"Sure. You remember where the dorms are, right?"

I headed off without another word and hanged a right ten doors down from where we were talking. Sam was already collapsed on her bed, so I know I've got the right place. I flopped down on the narrow cot and grab my phone from the small table.

Wait.

What's my phone doing here?

There isn't really anyone to ask, so I shrugged it off and decided to ask Maddi tomorrow. She was the Leader, she'd know.

Which brung me to the next point: How the pineapple was Maddi the leader of this place when she was barely a year older than me?

She was smart, I knew that. And motivated towards the Resistance's cause. And was working on the inside. And was physically capable to carry out missions. And-

Suddenly, it wasn't too surprising that she was in her position.

I sighed and scrolled through all my missed texts from my old friends. I deleted all their contacts from my phone's memory (after sending a short and explanatory email that explained the gist of why I was cutting myself off from them, Super details removed) and sat back up. There was no internet (unsurprisingly) so I couldn't read any new books. I had to download them, and you needed wifi for that.

So I was bored. And no way was I tired enough to sleep. Tired enough to lie to get away from Thera, who was a very annoying and chatterbox-y person? Yes. But not sleepy one bit.

The room had nothing in it. Other than a trio of beds, of course. And a few end tables. It was bland, so it wasn't like I could just study the walls (something I'd done before) or anything. There wasn't even a bathroom, or an extra blanket, or a second pillow.

I guessed I could just steal the other bed's.

I grabbed it and stuffed it under my head, laying in the cot for another half hour before drifting off to sleep.