We arrive at the Legion's base as the sun hangs above the tree canopies as if contemplating wether or not to plunge the world into a starry darkness.

Joanna had been going at a pace that seems painfully slow to match my power walk. The group must've been expecting Joanna to arrive sooner because her bike gives her extra speed, and they weren't expecting another fifteen year old girl approaching.

And I've seen many base camps before, but I have never seen a ginormous library fortified and converted into a secure home base. Actual walls made of what looks like the side panels of a train boxcar or something like that are put up around the entrances, allowing a narrow courtyard for small gardens.

I'm in complete awe. Literally a library base.

"Aviva!" Joanna waves to the girl standing guard on the wall. "It's me—Jo! I've brought back a friend and extra supplies!"

The girl on the wall—Aviva—glances towards me and nods to Joanna approvingly. "Open up! It's Joanna!" She yells down and a large door-like gate swings open like a double door. Two men are pushing it open. Not an efficient system, but it sure works.

Joanna walks her bike through the gate and stops next to the gate keepers. They ask for my weapons and I hand over my gun and knife to them.

Joanna and I then walk into the library together. "You'll meet up with the leaders for some welcomes and trust initiation and all that jazz. The main leader is my friend Aviva's dad. He has two daughters: Edith and Aviva. And a son: Kyler." Joanna briefly explains as she rolls her bike into a cozy corner with a mattress and a cluster of comfy pillows. Her corner is sanctioned off with large blankets hanging from a plank between the two bookshelves on my left and right.

"You have pretty much your own alcove." I gasp in awe.

"Yeah, I was one of the earliest members of the Library Legion." Joanna says, shrugging but smiling proudly at how cool her abode is.

"The 'Library Legion'?" I chuckle. "Is that what we're calling it now?"

"I like it! I'm gonna run it by Aviva later." Joanna smirks. Her mattress takes up the space from the left wall to the large bookshelf that houses fantasy novels to her right. She made a little nightstand out of the Harry Potter books to put a flashlight on.

"I'm sort of jealous of this place!" I admit. She has such a spacious area. As a newbie, I'd probably hardly get a pillow.

"Well, if I can scrounge up another mattress, we could be roommates." Joanna suggests. Of course, I accepted. This would only be temporary, right? It's definitely a good place to stay for now.

Maybe when I find my group I can invite them to join the Library Legion. Unless Rick decides "what they're doing isn't working" and takes over. Happened before.

"Come, I'll take you to the leader. His name is Ethan Mercer."

----------

Becoming a member was easy. Especially since I have no ulterior motives other than finding everyone else. Mr. Mercer was a good person and the kind of person you'd look to for leadership.

He said he'd help me find my friends. And Aviva showed me around. There's an eating area near the study desks in the center of the huge library. The library two stories as far as I know and the Legion has so much people in it. It's like a community that is super smart. Because pretty much in their free time they resort to reading.

Aviva is a history fanatic. Thus she knows about history and points out how history repeats itself, which is helpful because Aviva is also kind of their strategy expertise. Her older sister Edith is the twin of her brother Kyler. They're about nineteen. I haven't met them yet because Aviva thinks they've gone to sleep.

I met a few more people. Some guy named Dan, some girl named Carly, another dude named Hunter (surprisingly he's a hunter).

The night flew by. And Joanna had acquired a mattress for me to stay on and crammed it into the other side of her space parallel to her mattress.

Now all I have left to do is lie awake at night, questioning the survival of everyone else I know.

Zaremareth