I Had Hope

They gathered around me, wide-eyed.

"I told you that once you enter, you cannot come back out, right?"

They nodded.

"It's true. Unless you are a Seeker. I've been inside. I helped build Operations. I put people in place and I set up the rules. But I refused to stay inside. My family was outside somewhere."

"Did you find your family? Your real family?" He asked.

"No. I don't think they believe that we have inside is real enough to end the war. They would rather get government rations, go to government schools, and stay in their own homes."

"But you had hope?" His eyes had a glisten in them. We were more alike than he thought.

"I had hope. I searched. I followed the rules. I saved many people, but I also had to turn away many. It's too dangerous to let in those that could be spies. People had to be truly suffering for the cause. They had to be against the government with their very souls."

"But you can't come back out and search again!" He realized what I had just given up for him and his family.