I am on my daily walk around the small town I call home. This place really isn’t home at all, just a small town with a large castle-like building in the center with a large glass dome surrounding it. The large building has always been a mystery to me. Everyone in my town calls it the O.B.O.L.A.S (official building of law and surveillance) but nobody knows what it’s for or what’s inside. They only know that it’s the building The Man - who is the owner of our small town - works in.

Everyone here believes their world is perfect. They are going through the same routine every day and no thinks twice about. They don’t care that they don’t ever get any say in what is done or how things are run. They simply do as they are told and leave it at that. Well, at least everyone except Noah and I.

“Hey, what do you think is in there?”

“I don’t know, I have never really thought about it, actually. I don’t think anyone knows what’s in the Obolas except the officials and The Man,” replied Noah.

“Hey, I have an idea, we should sneak into the Obolas to see what’s in there!” said Noah. 

“We could get into serious trouble,” I responded.

“Well, you always say that you want to know what’s in there, so this is our chance!”

“I don’t know…”

“We’ll sneak out late tonight and meet up at my house when no one is awake. Then we can find out for ourselves what is inside the Obolas.”

“Fine, I’ll do it,” I finally agreed.

That night, as we had planned, Noah and I met up at his house. We began making our way through the woods toward the Obolas.

The Obolas was in clear view after about five minutes of walking. A black car pulled up with dark, tinted windows. A man in a black suit got out, looked around and went inside without saying anything.

Noah and I ran as fast as we could, caught the door, and peeked inside. We stepped inside, shut the door quietly and began walking into the long, dimly lit hallway.

We noticed that at the end of the hallway were two doors made of thick, solid steel.

“What do you think is in there? Should we go in?” I asked nervously.

“We have to go in, that’s why we came. Come on, just trust me,” said Noah.

I eventually agreed to sneak into the room and we slowly opened the doors. 

As soon we processed what we were seeing, our jaws dropped to the floor and we froze right in our tracks. Noah and I both saw familiar faces looking back at them. Friends and family members that we had previously thought had vanished, were here inside the Obolas. All of them were here!

“I can’t believe this! What are we going to tell people!” Noah said almost screaming.

“Don’t look at me, you’re the one who convinced me to come in here,”

Suddenly, we heard footsteps coming from the hallway.

“Nice going Noah, now we’re going to get caught!”

“No, we won’t… hide!”

We quickly scrambled to hide before whoever was in the hallway saw them. A man later entered the room and we both immediately recognized him from earlier that night. Then it hit us, he was The Man, owner of the city.
“I like the new room, are you sure none of them can escape?” The Man asked.

“I am absolutely positive, we have guards around here all day, every day. And besides, no one is ever going to believe you’re controlling them.” responded the guard.

“I wish it were that easy. These citizens had their chance to live by my rules and they chose to defy me. Now, I can truly control their every move as I see fit.”  The Man said intensely.

As the two of them left the room,  Noah and I sat there astonished by what we had just heard.

“We HAVE to tell someone!” I shouted.

“You’re right! We have to get out of here before we get caught!” said Noah.

We slowly crept out from our hiding place and put our ears softly to the door to see if anyone was outside. We slowly pushed open the door and carefully navigated back through the building until we found our way out.
It was odd, though, once we were outside, some of our memories of the Obolas slowly faded away. Why are we here so late at night? Is there something we have to do?

The next day, Noah and I were on our way to the park to sit at the picnic table, as always, when Noah said:
“I had the craziest dream last night.”

“Yeah, me too,” I replied.

“It was the weirdest thing, we went into the Obolas and… Huh, that’s odd.”

“What?” Noah asked.

“Well, I don’t remember anything else,” I said perplexed.

“It’s ok, it probably wasn’t important.”

“Yeah, your right.”