[color=Silver][CENTER][h1][b]Natalie Ellis[/b][/h1][/CENTER][/color]
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Natalie was in the park, sitting on a bench, staring vacantly at the pond. This had become a habit. Ever since Homecoming. Things were going so well. She felt normal. She'd kissed Archie and it was like the floodgates opened. She felt happy and excited and trult content. Then it was immediately taken away. Airanna was there. Upon seeing Radvi....Natalie had shut down. There was chaos around her, but she'd frozen. Sounds became just noise. Archie had picked Eli up, said something and walked away. People came and took her to her room. She must have been walking with them but she didn't remember moving her feet.

There was no point. There was no point even trying to be a person while Arianna was out there. The toll Homecoming had taken on Natalie's mental health was very noticeable to her therapist, who was helping. Natalie's nightmares were worse. Her temper had gotten worse, and she would cry a lot. With little warning. Sometimes in public. She had seen Archie exactly once since Homecoming, just over a week after, but she told him she needed to get well before they had a second date.

Natalie wasn't sure if she was better now. If the pain has lessened or if she'd just grown numb to it. Either way, she would be seeing her friends today, and she now considered them all friends, even Archie. It was December the 5th. There would be new recruits to The Promise. Maybe some new blood might help things...somehow.

There was a new text from Cara.

[i]"New arrivals scheduled to board at 1PM! Be at the Loading Bay or be square!"[/i]

As her phone was already out, Natalie started writing a text to Archie. She ideally wanted to see him private first, and not in a big noisy group, in public. She deleted and rewrote her message several times, before just deleting the whole thing in frustration. She'd gotten rusty, and wanted this first text in a while to be good. Then she got an idea. She wasn't sure if it was a good one. But she was going to do it.

[color=Silver]"Cara?"[/color] She asked into her phone. [color=Silver]"Could you tell me the current location of Archie Anderson?"[/color]