Disclaimer: I own nothing besides my own characters. In no way, shape, or form am I making any profit and this is purely for entertainment purposes.
A famous explorer once said "The extraordinary is in what we do, not who we are." At least, that's what my dad has always told me. I'm pretty sure that I'll continue to remember that for the rest of my life. It reminds me of the days when I was feeling down and he would tell me that and then he would get me a bowl of ice cream and tell me how much I meant to him.
I guess you could say that I definitely take after my dad. He was always the one that I looked up to and who I always turned to for advice. I guess you could also say that's why I'm where I am right now. In my bedroom, looking at notes and maps and anything else that could help me in my upcoming expedition. Books were stacked almost two feet high, and I had a pretty bad headache from staring at words for too long.
My upcoming expedition would be with my best friend Lara Croft. She has always been my expedition buddy, from age five to twenty-one. Her dad and my dad were best friends, and, of course, that automatically meant that Lara and I were destined to be best friends and become attached to the hip. I am not going to deny that that is what had happened.
They were both very famous archaeologists and explorers and did everything together, just like Lara and I. We went on to do the same thing as them, and this is why we are going on an expedition to find the lost queen Himiko. The only problem is that nobody knows where she is, hence the name 'lost queen'. I guess that should have been obvious.
I look up from my work as someone knocks on the door to go let them in. "Hey Ashton." Lara says, walking into my apartment like she lived here too. I mean, she might as well. She stayed over here for the majority of the time while we were in college studying archaeology and mythology. "The boat is leaving at three. Are you almost ready to go?" she asks as I look at the clock. It was two in the afternoon.
"Yeah, all my bags are packed. I've taken all the notes that I can on these books, so I'm not going to bring them with me. Can you hand me my laptop bag?" I ask Lara and she nods, handing it over to me. "Thanks." I smile and grab my other bags, taking my keys and lock the door behind me. We head down the staircase of my apartment building and get into Lara's car as she starts driving us to the docks where the boat would be.
We get there half an hour later as we unload our bags from the car. I could see our ship, the 'Endurance', in the distance. I could also see people making last minute adjustments to the boat before it was ready to take us out to sea. The only problem was that our destination was totally unknown, so who knows how long before we'll even get to where we need to go.
We start walking down the dock, and are approached by Roth, who was a really good family friend to Lara. "Hi Roth!" she says, giving him a hug. "It's good to see you." He shakes my hand as I tell him my name. Hopefully this awkward stage won't last long at all. I hate awkward moments. He helps us load all of our bags onto the boat and then we come out and help everyone else in the crew get theirs loaded up. By the time we got done, it was almost three.
When it was three o'clock on the dot, we were still waiting for my boyfriend Riley. He was always late. I hadn't talked that much to Alex in any way, but I knew immediately that he would wind up being just like him. They were both really techie guys. I guess his knowledge of technology had never rubbed off on me while we were hanging out together. That's probably a good thing though.
I was glad to get on the boat and just start going somewhere. I spent most of the first two hours on the boat getting to know everybody. There was Sam, Alex, Jonah, Grim, Reyes, Roth, and then the very annoying Dr. Whitman. I barely spent ten minutes with the guy, and I already have decided that I really don't like him all that much. He was really obsessed with his own success and fame.
During our first dinner as an expedition team, we decided that we should start by heading west. According to Dr. Whitman, it's where the people that have tried finding Himiko went before us. I don't really know what that is going to get us, considering we only know the general area of where we should be going, and that is a large area to cover. Who knows how long we'll be out here now?
After dinner, I spend my time on my laptop, writing about what had happened so far. Supposedly this was going to be a really famous story, so Dr. Whitman asked me to keep a journal about what was happening. I didn't care too much for fame and fortune, but I did it just to make him happy. Just for now though. Sam was recording everything by video, so remind me to lock my door when I go to take a shower.
"So what do you think so far?" Lara asks, coming into our shared bedroom and sitting on her bed that was directly across from mine. We decided to share rooms since no one else wanted to. Seriously, what's the problem with sharing a bedroom with someone? It's not like they'd be sleeping in the same bed. I take my ear buds out to answer her question.
"I like it so far, but Dr. Whitman is definitely an annoying twat. I already can't stand him and I barely even know the guy. What do you think?" She nods in agreement about Dr. Whitman and we laugh about it. It was nice to be able to laugh with your best friend. It's one of those little joys in life that not many people pay attention to.
We spend a little bit more time talking before we decide to call it a night. I was really worn out. I don't know if it was just the whole idea of what lies ahead, or it was just my brain tricking me. Either way, I fell asleep pretty much as soon as my head hit the pillow. That's about how tired that I was.
I awake to blinding lights seeping in through the windows and I sigh, getting up and closing them so I could try and get some more sleep. On the way back to my bed, I trip over something on the floor, barely catching myself with my hands. I hear Lara start to wake up and we both start laughing at the fact that she was on the floor. I don't really know why. It really wasn't that funny.
We finish laughing and get up to go get breakfast. Jonah was making the food this morning, as he did last night. Let me put it this way. If Jonah's eggs are as good as his steaks, we are going to have a breakfast fit for a king. He is literally one of the best cooks that I have ever seen. He sets a plate in front of me and I immediately start to eat it. After I finish up, I head to the front of the ship to look out at the ocean.
It really was a beautiful sight. As I watch the waves flow, I can't help but wonder exactly how I got so lucky. Not only was I doing what I loved, but I was doing it with some really great people. I couldn't wait for this expedition to really get going. There is nothing better than being the one to uncover the truth about something that people had doubted all along. It's a magical type of feeling.
"Hi Ashton." I hear Alex say as he comes up to stand next to me, setting his hands on the railing like I was doing. "What are you doing up here?" he asks, looking out to the beautiful waters. You could almost see the amazement in his eyes. I bet if you looked into my eyes, you would see the same thing, just pure amazement. It was incredibly breathtaking.
"I'm just thinking." I sigh with content as I watch a group of dolphins in the water, making me smile. There wasn't really anything that needed to be said. It wasn't an awkward silence, but one that you could just feel comfortable with the silence. It was one of those times when it gave you peace.
"Do you think we'll find her?" he asks me, and I smile and nod at him. I was almost one hundred percent sure that we would find her. Surely we'd find something from heading west, right? Maybe one of the locals could give us helpful hints before we actually started doing anything inside of ancient ruins or anything like that. It's quite a good strategy if you ask me.
"Ashton, do you mind coming here for a moment?" Dr. Whitman asks and I turn around to see him about eight feet away from me. Well, I did mind, but I nod and follow him to the hallways and he pulls my notes from behind his back. I snatch them from him quickly. Where did he get those? I sure didn't give them to him! "Your notes, they're – uh – they're very amateur."
"Excuse me? How can notes be amateur? I just took what I saw in the books and wrote down the most important things so I wouldn't have to cart them all the way out here." I snap back at him. Exactly what kind of right did he have going through my things to find my notes, and then call them amateur? I'd like to see his so called professional notes. I angrily huff like an annoyed child and walk away from him, putting my notes back in my room, but hidden under my bed this time.
"What was that about?" Riley asks me as I emerge from my room as he was waiting for me in the hallway outside, and he obviously heard the conversation. I tell him about it, trying to keep my anger under lock and key, especially since I would be on a boat in the middle of the ocean for a long while. "Well, I don't think your notes are amateur. Lara and you have this archaeology business down to a science. There's no way you can mess up." I smile at him, even though he was a very bad liar.
"Well you look angry." Sam says as we head back into the main area of the ship, which is where she was set up trying to film some things for our documentary. I am angry, but it wasn't too much to fret about. I just hope that he would not snoop through my things again and maybe apologize? That'd be good. I shrug my shoulders at her and sit down at the table to watch her filming Jonah trying to teach Whitman to cut open a fish, but let's just say that he should just stick to archaeology and let Jonah handle the food.
Lara and Roth both come into the area and they sit down with me at the table. Grim hands us all some coffee. We thank him as he sits down next to Riley and I to see the mess that was unfolding. Grim reminded me so much of my grandfather. He was as hard-headed and stubborn as Grim was that it is almost creepy. They could probably be twin brothers.
I guess seeing him be so much my like my grandfather kind of made me upset as well. He died a few years back. Of course, nobody could replace him, but it also nice to have somebody around that reminded me so much of him. I was feeling luckier and luckier to be on this expedition by the second. I had a feeling that I was going to walk away from this with a lot more friends then I came here with.
"So, Ashton," Roth says as I direct my attention to him. "Lara tells me that you and your dad would join Lara and her dad on many expeditions." I smile at him and nod. "So you both learned your amazing skills from two amazing archaeologists?" he asks and Lara and I both nod again. I was glad that somebody was asking about my dad. Usually, everyone that I came across would know about what my dad and I did. It makes me excited that I came across somebody that wants me to give them the details instead of them just knowing.
Reyes comes out pretty soon, meaning that we were all finally here. It felt like a family reunion almost. Sharing stories, cracking jokes, and always trying to be nice to that one bitter one that I always try to pretend and like for the sake of not causing any family drama. Dr. Whitman was that guy. He was totally that annoying family member that no one wants to sit with at dinner but still loves them anyways.
It was nice to have a good expedition team. I could tell that we were starting to get closer and closer. I hope that it stays that way. A good expedition team means that I will definitely have a lot to look forward to in these upcoming weeks. I sure hope that I was right about this.
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