"Alastair, wake up!"
I opened my eyes. Crumbling white. I sat up and looked around. Scattered books and dirty sheets. I released a sigh of relief. Thank God—I was finally out of that nightmare of a dream. I turned to the owner of the voice. It was Esmae. Though this is atypical, thank the Lord for her, too. I brushed my long bangs back with my fingers, feeling the sticky grease in it.
Murmuring, I said, "Thank the Lord for Esmae today."
"That's gonna change pretty soon if you don't start moving soon," she remarked. Putting both of her hands on her hips, she said, "Because of you, we're already behind schedule. You know, for someone who goes to sleep really early, you sleep in a lot."
"Yes, yes, I hear you," I said and then groaned as I stretched my arms.
Getting out of bed, I maneuvered over to my closet. Drowsily, I opened it and scanned it for my gear. Like usual, resting at the southern right corner of it, was my old uniform. I grabbed the white shorts and black tee. It was already gathering dust despite being used one week prior. Brushing it off, I began to change. Well, not before noticing that a certain carrot top's gaze was still on me.
Turning back, with an unamused look, I stated, "I thought privacy was a thing."
"But you're a guy, Al. Why does it matter?" she asked, cocking her head. Snickering, she added, "And besides, your figure is a lot like mine, so there's not really anything new for me to see."
I threw a shirt at her. She left.
Sighing, I finished getting dressed. Like usual, as routine states, I looked at myself in the mirror. My locks were unruly, but I didn't bother with them. After all, what was the point of fixing something that was only going to get messed up again? Attention was going to be drawn to my gas mask, anyway...or to my ridiculous knee-high socks. One or the other. My white hoodie and shorts were also a bit wrinkled, but I didn't really have time to do anything about that. As for the status of my face—well, I appeared as approachable as a masked man could. That's good enough, right? Still, despite that being on my face, I couldn't help but notice the growingly noticeable dark shadows underneath my eyes. Although they were already there, as per the night before, they had become a darker hue. But still. It wasn't too bad—it could be worse.
Deciding that I looked presentable enough, I walked out my room and to the younger teen. As predicted, she was standing out my door, quietly whistling some tune. I patted her on her head and she looked up at me.
With a dorky smile, she said, "Wow, you still look like a mess. Not even a hot mess—only a mess. Didja even try, Al?"
No response.
She sighed. Murmuring under her breath, she said, "Man, Al, you're only amusing in the very early mornings—why can't you give me any satisfaction?"
"I don't want to be your second Phillip," I replied, "I'm not interested in pointless small talk."
She pouted. "You know, Phil and I don't just talk about whatever random thing pops into our heads. Anyway, we don't even talk that much—I talk to you lots more."
"That's hard to believe."
"I'm telling the truth!"
"Don't we have somewhere to go?"
Still murmuring under her breath, she submitted and dropped the subject altogether. Instead, she scurried to the stairs and I followed suit. With a bounce, she skipped steps all the way down the stairs. Slowly, I followed behind. Below, I could hear the conversation of the team, discussing the details of the mission.
"We should go somewhere with water," Chris said. "After all, because of someone, we're running low on supply."
"Hey, I get a lot of grime on my skin—it's not my fault! I don't wake up looking or smelling this good!" Dani cried.
Esmae snickered. "Another reason you should stop working out so much. Speaking of which, why do you work out so much? It's not like you have anyone to impress here."
"Everyone, let's get off this topic. This won't be beneficial for us in the long run," Ben said. But then, off to the side, added, "But yeah, you do need to stop working out so much, Dani—it's not good for your skin."
Crying out, she cried, "It's me against the world! Only Al is with me!"
I stopped.
"Well, Al's with everyone," Phil remarked with a faint smile, "I mean, as long as he doesn't have to really care about it, he's with us."
"Wow, you're sounding as though you know Al really well, Phil," Esmae commented, a hint of sass in her tone. "If you know him so well, why don't you just marry him already?"
No response. I continued walking.
Breaking the silence, Dani exclaimed, "I vote for a place with livestock! I need meat, I tell you, meat. Down with tofu! Down with vegetables!"
"E'en if we do go, ya're just gunna eat it all," Axel said.
I turned the corner.
Hurt, she said with a fake choking voice, "How could you say that to me? I don't eat everything."
"Yeah, she's right," Ben interjected, "she left us an entire turkey leg once."
"See?" she said. "I don't eat everything."
I made it to the group and pushed my way to take my place between Phil and Esmae. Jumping into the conversation, I asked, "Didn't we already discuss where we are going yesterday?"
Everyone turned to me. Axel snarkily remarked, "Nice for ya to finally join. Did ya get 'nuff beauty sleep?"
Ignoring him, I reiterated, "Didn't we?"
"We did," Esmae said. But then, she pointed at Axel, Luckas, and Ben. "But these four are against it."
"Why?"
"'Cause we 'ave needs that n'ed to be met!" the blond cried out. "We c'ant survive on ray-search."
I turned to him. "But isn't our purpose to liberate Libentina? We need to find a cure for the X.Q. virus to do that."
"But we should focus on 'er survival, first," he said. "If we'er dead, who's gunna do anything 'bout it? Da ray-search, I mean."
"I hate to take sides, but Axel's got a point," Ben said, resting his arm on the younger's shoulder. He brushed it off. "We should be focusing on our survival—our family's survival—first. That is, if we want our research to find its way to someone, somewhere, who can do something about it."
"Bear—"
"Bara."
"Bara's right, Adair. We can't help with anything if we're dead," Luckas agreed. "Searching for rations should be at the top of our list."
"But people are out there dying," I remarked. "They're innocent people, dying for the pleasure of the government—shouldn't they come before us? We're only a few people in Libentina. Besides, we can survive another week without food and water."
"Yeah, Al's right!" Phil cried. "The longer we wait to find the cure, the more people die. We can't just worry about something as insignificant as water."
Catching his mistake, I murmured under my breath, "Phillip."
"Yeah?"
"We need water to survive," I trailed, "we're made up of sixty percent water."
"I meant to say something that we can delay, like, water!" Pausing, he begged the question, "How much water do we have in our reserve, anyway?"
"About seven hundred gallons."
He turned to me. "How much is that?"
"It takes about seventy gallons for us to have enough water to fill our bathtub for one day."
"So...?"
"Assuming we don't cook, clean, or wash, we have enough water for everyone to take a bath for the next ten days."
His face fell. "Seriously?"
"Yes, Phillip," I assured. "Because seven hundred divided by seventy is ten."
His face fell more. Looking away, he began to awkwardly laugh and murmur things such as 'my poor hair' and 'zits everywhere' and 'goodbye days of clean water.' I looked away from him. Looks as though my main advocate has left me. Hooray.
"Um," a timid voice whimpered. We all looked at Fauna. Surprised, she glanced away. Continuing on, she said, "Why...don't we just go somewhere that's known to have both water and information? There has to be somewhere...right?"
Ben, our main informant, cupped his chin with his hand and looked up. Humming, he stroked his imaginary beard. After many minutes—too many minutes, may I add—he smiled and looked back at us. "Great idea, Fawn! Thanks for the great idea!" She beamed.
"And the verdict is...?" Dani asked. "How many places fit that criterion?"
With a merry look on his face, he said, "Exactly one."
We all groaned.
"And how far away is it?"
"About, I dunno..." He paused. "Six miles."
More groans.
"But that's taking the longcut."
Esmae covered her face. "Well then, how far away is the shortcut?"
"Five."
"Seriously?"
"I'm kidding—that's the shorter cut. The shortest cut is three miles away."
Under my breath, I said, "Why couldn't you have told us that before?"
Laughing, he claimed, "Because that's not as fun! And also, it's funny hearing you all unanimously sigh—I love it when we're all thinking together."
Ignoring the happy-go-lucky adult's claims, I began to walk towards the door. Esmae, confused, asked, "Where are you going?"
I turned back. With a slight grin on my face, I said, "That path's not gonna walk itself."
She laughed, and then followed suit. Soon, we were all walking together out the door, on our way to God knows where. Eventually, Ben was the one leading the way—just as everyone would've wanted. Watching from behind, I saw everyone happily converse with each other as if they weren't going somewhere where one of us wouldn't come back with us.
I looked at the sky. But then again, that overwhelming optimism can't be that bad, right? I felt the corners of my mouth turn again and let myself smile.
Even if the stars are fading, it's not a bad thing to live in the moment, is it?
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3/23/17: Agh! I'm so sorry for not updating this earlier—I went to a college meeting and completely lost track of time. Dx
But on another note, here's chapter 14 (finally)! It should be void of a ton of critical mistakes. Well, if you exclude Axel's dialoge, but that was done on purpose.
That's really all I've got to say (since I'm running late). If you liked it, please leave a comment or vote or something—anything helps! Thank you, and I hope you come back again!
7/6/17: I swear, the group's interactions give me life (which is kinda sad). I feel like it's really easy to make them interact with each other since everyone has an established role (like Newvy, who really just stands there and listen).
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this. If you did, please vote, comment—everything and anything helps! Thanks for reading, and I hope you continue!