9.1

“Oh my god, Cass! We’re having a better shot of going above the ground this year!”
      Arah had been screaming about the moved up Ascension Rite that was announced yesterday for at least an hour straight already. Cass had completely missed the message during the morning mass, because she had been too focused on not hearing the loud sounds and awful singing in the church due to her headache.
      “Yes, I get it,” she laughed, faking her excitement. “We have a great shot at a good life. Please don’t get your hopes up.”
      “Don’t be such a buzzkill.” Arah pouted. “You should hope. Hope is the only thing we can have down here. Hope and soda.” She held up one of her unicorn soda cans as a toast. “And maybe friends. Just kidding, definitely friends. But we might have a shot of living in actual air. Of seeing actual vegetation. Y’know, all the good shit we’ve been dreaming about together.”
      “But what if we don’t get chosen? Or what if you get chosen and I don’t? Or the other way around? I don’t want to live without my friends up there, or without you down here. Life would be fucking boring without you.”
      “You’ll be fine! Cass, you’ll make new friends. You just learnt how to make them – yes, I noticed you saying “friends” just now – so you can always make more. Either here or above the ground. If you keep being this negative, you’ll never be picked to go up. Manifest it. Come on, do it with me. “We are going to get chosen and will leave this place.”, say it.” Arah grabbed Cass’ hands and closed her eyes as she was “manifesting”.
      “What even is manifesting?”
      “Just do it, it’ll be fun,” Arah whined.
      “Fine.” Cass closed her eyes and began chanting. “We are going to get chosen and will leave this place. We are going to get chosen and will leave this place. We are going to get chosen–”
      “Yeah, okay, this isn’t working. It sounds stupid.” Arah interrupted the ritual and let go of Cass’ hands.
      “It was your idea! Why did you let me make a fool of myself?” Cass shouted quasi-mad at her.
      “I just thought it would work. If you want something really badly and put it into words, it might help. One of the girls at work was talking about it and I wanted to try it. On second thought, it was a dumb idea and I’m sorry for making you join me. Are you mad at me?”
      Cass paused and crossed her arms while giving her a stern look. “A little.”
      Arah pouted again and tried using her puppy eyes.
      “Okay, fine, I give in. I’m not. I can’t be mad at you when you do that.”
      “I know.” Arah smiled widely. “I’ll make it up to you. Lemon soda?”
      “Oh yes, please. That would be great.” As Cass smiled, the bubbly and energetic girl swiped her tag across the sensor and pushed the button for the lemon soda. Her wavy blonde hair bouncing a bit as she did a little dance when she pulled the can out of the machine. She handed the can over to her friend and looked at the lights on the ceiling.
      “Is it me, or are they starting to dim already?” She squinted a little to check another time. Cass followed suit and stared into the burning lamps to see. She saw no change.
      “Nothing’s happening. I think it’s your sugar rush. Maybe you should go back to your bunker after this can and call it an early night. Your brain has probably been working overtime after the announcement and the sugar isn’t exactly helping.”
      “That’s not true, I am performing perfectly fine. It’s fine, honestly.” Arah paused for a moment, her excitement fading a bit. “I just hoped that you’d be more excited. We could have a chance, both of us have been working our asses off and picking up work our co-workers couldn’t finish. We deserve to get picked…”
      Cass wanted to take a sip, but lowered her can and set it down atop of the trash can next to the machine. “Arah, I don’t know what to say, okay? I’m not the best for this, but–” She wrapped her arms around the small girl who was only a moment away from crying it seemed. “–it will be fine. If we don’t get chosen, there’s a next time, and a next one and then there’s another one. And if we never get chosen, we can have a great time here, together.”
      She heard Arah chuckle. “You’re right. We have each other, it’ll be okay.”
      “If you’d like, I could introduce you to my bunkermates sometime?” Cass carefully proposed, trying to cheer Arah up.
      “Bunkermates? You talked to other people?” She stared at Cass, the confusion clearly visible on her face.
      “They talked to me first. One of them opened the door for me the last time we were talking until late, so I would be inside before the lights were off. And then he asked me if I wanted to join their group to see if I liked it.”
      “You talked to other people! Cass, that's huge for you! You made new friends!” Arah was shouting and jumping in Cass’ arms, almost knocking her head into Cass’ jaws multiple times. “Of course I'd love to meet them, I want to know who got you to open up more.”
      “I'll ask them when would be the best time and where we should meet up then. Our bunker might not be the greatest option, since you'd have to leave early to get back to your own room.”
      “If that's the best option, then that's fine by me. I'll manage.” Arah had difficulty containing her excitement, which was quite noticeable to Cass. She knew Arah would rather come to the bunker right now than wait until a meeting had been set up. She would even follow Cass home right now if she had the freedom to do so, just to meet the people who had taken down Cass’ wall a little bit more.
      “Let's go to our bunkers then. It has been a long day for you and the quicker I get to my room, the faster I can ask them when you can meet them. Sounds like a fair deal?” Cass asked.
      “I guess. See you tomorrow then? I'll be bringing home some drinks, so don't wait for me.”
      Cass nodded and picked up her drink before walking away, peeking over her shoulder every once in a while. Arah hadn't left yet, she kept swiping her badge to take more of the unicorn drinks. When Cass finally saw her leave, she had at least ten cans bundled in her arms, trying to carry the bunch without dropping any of them.
      Cass chuckled. Now that she knew Arah was also on her way, she changed her pace to her normal walking pace. She turned the corner at the intersection she normally split up with Arah and went on her merry way to the warmth and welcome of her bunkermates and her own bed.