James
Five piercing beebs sounded from my alarm clock. Its display reading 0600 as it did every day. I quickly got out of the bed and walked across the room to the closet. I changed into the uniform required to be worn by all. The uniform was ill fitting as sizes were mass produced then handed out by age group and I was shorter than the average. As I changed I recalled that as of today I had been alive for 16 years. I put the thought to rest as I went into the connected bathroom and brushed my teeth, washed my face, and brushed my hair. I pinned on the purple pin that symbolized my job to the front of my uniform. The pin easily slid into the previously holes it had made right above the patch reading E.S.N.W. I looked into the mirror at my brown hair, brown eyes, and pale skin and determined my appearance to be adequate. I then returned to the main room and sat on the sofa in front of the screen. I looked at the clock in the corner and saw it read 0615 and was relieved that I was not late or early, right on time. The screen turned on and I was faced with the graphic designed for the AI therapist assigned to me.

“What emotions have you been experiencing.” It asked in its robotic voice. I quickly explained the joy I felt at my promotion yesterday and the relief I felt at my being on time moments ago. The AI was quiet for a moment before informing me that I would be assigned new meds to combat these distractions. I thanked the AI and turned on the news. It had two brief segments one on the breaking of the water filtration system and another on the work schedule for today. It was basically the same as every other day, just some rearranging to compensate for the workers having to go fix the filtration system. At 0650 a ding signified the delivery of my nutrient packet and liquid medicine. I got up, grabbed them, and ate them quickly. I was out the door by 0655. You could hear the sliding open of doors all over the hall as one, almost unanimous sound as we all left for work. One door that I saw on my way wasn’t open yet and I found myself caring less and less as my new medicine started taking effect. Finally those hindering emotions were gone.

The walk to work was short, hindered only by the crowds. After all the room assigned to me was as close as available to my work designation. I sorted data for our enforcers. The enforcers were both our military and police, though mostly police nowadays. They made sure the rules were followed, order was kept, and hindrances were reported. I was assigned to sort through the reports each enforcer sent in on cases they closed and sorted through data to determine possible future cases. At 0700 I entered my workstation, work station 017, to 1.5 GB worth of data to sort through. This was most likely due to the fact half of my co-workers were working on the broken filtration system. I immediately applied for overtime and began to work. At 0815 my over time was approved, but other than that nothing out of the normal happened. No hindrances. This statement was unfortunately true until 1127 when a hindrance occurred. A huge explosion tore apart the wall across from my station. Its bright, orange tinged light blinded me momentarily. A piece of shrapnel knocked me out seconds later. When I came to the room was swarming with dozens of people. Their lack of uniforms identified them as invaders, uniformed bodies lied around their feet. The bodies almost all had arm bands identifying them as enforcers. The Invaders were spreading throughout the room and some were heading in my direction.

Blaike
I woke up to the roof of our tent. I laid there a minute to look at how the sun shined through the canvas, enhancing the colors it was dyed with. A little slice of paradise in this God forsaken, resource drained plain.  When I heard my sister start crying for attention, I knew I had to get up. I stood up and walked to the other side of our tent and picked up Sofia, my baby sister. She quickly quieted when I started to softley bounce her. I grabbed a nutrient pack that someone grabbed on a raid. Nutrient packs are a good substitute for baby formula and as much as I hate anything made by E.S.N.W., it was the only way to feed my sister after our parents died. I opened the pack and squirted the gel inside into a bowl. I mixed the gel with some milk and fed it to Sofia. She squirted some out  of her mouth and generally just made a mess of her face as I couldn’t help but laugh at her antics. I did eventually manage to get her to eat most of it and she pulled at my hair while I attempted to clean her up. When she was finally clean I got ready myself. I was running a bit late but it was no big deal, I was usually early any way. I pulled my shoulder length brown hair into a low ponytail. After that I looked through my bag for a semi-clean shirt and pants. When I was successful I pulled them along with my jacket and wrangled Sofia into a onesie.

“You ready to go face the world?” I asked her when I deemed both of us ready to leave the tent. I was holding her by her bum, the rest of her up against my chest leaving my ponytail in her line of sight and she was much more interested in grabbing it then anything I was saying.

“I’m going to take that as a yes,” I said with a smile. I left the tent, carrying her over to the dining hall. It wasn’t so much a hall as an old fashioned picnic area with a bunch of fused together food trucks that served as a kitchen on one side. I looked over at the area that was already bustling with activity. When the world ended generations ago the rich went into city like shelters that became known as the E.S.N.W. and the rest, our ancestors, were left to fend for themselves. My parents joined up with a group of revolutionaries that wanted to make the city shelters, especially there tech and medicine, available to all. I hated them for hogging that medicine. If they hadn’t mom would still be alive.

Snapping out of my thoughts I handed Sofia of to a family friend, quickly devoured my breakfast, and got to work. I rushed into the kitchen with my breakfast dish and winced at the dish pile up.
“There you are you good for nothin’ teenager! I’m not paying you to show up late. I’m paying ya to wash dishes!” My boss called at me as his way of greeting me.

“Good ta see you to Boss!” I called back as I got to washing. I continued to scrub until ten till 11 and the person I asked to cover the rest of my shift showed up. I rushed out to join the group doing the raid today. I wasn’t participating in the raid itself, I couldn’t risk not coming back to Sofia, but I did volunteer to help carry whatever they looted back. I knew from experience that once the adrenaline wore off those backpacks got mega heavy. Twenty minute ATV ride and a ten minute jog later and the group was by the shelter. I stayed in the tree line as I saw them set up explosives by where we thought they kept the guns. We were hoping to destroy some of their weapons and take whatever was left for ourselves. Minutes later I watched through squinted eyes as an orange explosion lit up the sky.