Once inside the warehouse, Dakota limped over to a tattered couch and collapsed onto it with a grunt of pain. The noise didn't sound good to Milo, who rummaged around in his backpack to see if he could find anything that could help. To his disappointment, the only helpful thing he could find was a bottle of painkiller pills.
"Are you allergic to anything?" Milo asked, slinging his backpack onto his back.
Dakota slowly shook his head. "Nothing."
"And are you in a lot of pain?"
"Um…it HAS gotten worse." Dakota tenderly felt his chest with his fingertips. "Ow."
Milo shrugged. "Good enough."
The boy shook out two pills from the bottle and gave them to Dakota, who swallowed them immediately. "I read the label, and there's a bit of sedative in there as well, apparently," Milo told him. "So that should help you sleep."
"Then you're gonna have to flag down any of my future friends who come this way," Dakota said, his speech slowly becoming slurred. "They'll be easy to spot; they'll probably all be wearing clothes that are out of place in this time."
Milo nodded. "Got it. You just rest now, okay?"
"'Kay," mumbled Dakota, barely awake now. "Be careful."
"Careful's my middle name," Milo grinned.
He turned and headed over to the door of the warehouse, not bothering to add that his real middle name was "Danger".
…
"What did you guys get for question five?" Vinnie asked his friends as they exited the examination hall.
"I only managed to think of nausea and headaches," sighed Carnelian, tying up her red hair in a bun. "That really disappointed me."
"Fainting," Marvin said, pointing at her. "I got headaches and fainting."
"Guys, the possible symptoms of first-time time travelling are headaches, nausea, fainting, dizziness, temporary loss of memory, inability to speak, and in some extreme cases, coma and death," Neptune sighed. "We covered this in our study session two nights ago."
"We're not all extreme nerds, though," Marvin laughed, punching Neptune in the shoulder.
Neptune rubbed his shoulder, scowling. "Firstly, don't do that. Secondly, I'm not an extreme nerd. And thirdly, you don't need to be a nerd in order to do well on an exam. Do you guys WANT to fail?"
"Of course we don't," Carnelian said softly. "You know that. Remember our dream?"
The four of them fell silent, remembering what they had planned for the future.
"The explorer," Marvin said finally.
"The healer," Neptune added.
"The adventurer," Carnelian said.
"The saviour," Vinnie finished.
"The four of us will become the best time travel team in the world," Neptune declared. "You know why?" He didn't wait for anyone to reply. "Because we look after each other."
"And we're awesome," added Carnelian, smirking.
"We ARE awesome," laughed Vinnie. "So do you guys wanna head out for some food?"
All at once, the three of them turned to look at him. "Uh, no," Marvin said, glaring at Dakota. "You're not coming with us."
"What?" Vinnie frowned. "What do you mean?"
"You're not really our friend," scoffed Carnelian. "We just let you tag along with us."
Vinnie flinched. "Th-That's not true…"
"Yes it is," Neptune snapped savagely. "We all know you'll never amount to anything. Why would we want to be friends with YOU?"
The pain in Vinnie's chest was growing as he struggled to hold back tears. "Why are you doing this?!"
If his friends answered, Vinnie didn't hear it.
Because the next thing he knew, Dakota jerked awake and found himself on the tattered couch, his chest stinging. Whether from the pain of his injuries or his dream, he didn't know. He lay back again, unable to stop tears from falling down his cheeks. He felt unspeakably angry at his subconscious mind for making up such horrible nightmares that tainted his memories of his best friends. His best friends who DID care for him and WERE his real friends. Now every time he thought about their old dream, he felt a melancholy kind of longing.
"The saviour," he murmured aloud.
He was going to save people. That was what he meant by that word. Back in time travel school, he had had a great ambition to become a time traveller in order to save people. His lifelong dream was to be able to save the world one day. But since that was an extremely big dream, he had settled for being able to save and help people in need.
Oh, Neptune…
Dakota hated not being able to think about his friends without feeling sad. What happened to them was incredibly unfair. The only one of his friends whom Dakota could still contact was Marvin, and knowing that he was on his way here was a comforting thought to Dakota. Marvin and Stephanie were probably his current best friends. Excluding Cavendish, of course. Not that Cavendish thought of Dakota and himself as friends.
Now that Dakota had seen TWO of his best friends being dragged—one of them with fatal consequences—into the timestream, he was more determined than ever to protect any other time travellers that he could. Including Milo Murphy. The kid may have been the most tough and resourceful person whom Dakota had ever met, but that by no means meant he was indestructible.
Wincing, Dakota pushed himself into a sitting position. The door to the warehouse was slightly ajar, and outside, Dakota could just about see the figure of Milo Murphy, keeping watch. He sighed, wishing the kid was nearer so that he could get some more of that medicine; he was tired and sure that he wouldn't be able to sleep with the pain in his chest. Besides, he was afraid to go to sleep again, in case his brain showed him more warped memories of his best friends.
Outside, Milo had spotted that Dakota was awake, but he seemed to settle back down quickly enough, so Milo kept his position. Everything was quiet; it was a Sunday evening, and most everyone was inside with their families. The few strangers who did happen to pass by didn't really seem to be bothered by the fact that Milo was there.
Just as Milo decided to head inside and check on Dakota, a large crash snapped both of them back to reality. Milo spun round just in time to see a pickup truck come flying out of nowhere and crash into a tree in the park opposite them.
"What was that?!" Dakota yelled from the other side of the warehouse.
"A pickup truck," Milo called back.
Marvin! Dakota gasped internally.
"What happened to it?!"
"I don't know." Having dealt with Murphy's Law his entire life, Milo was strong. But nothing had prepared him for how mutilated the pickup truck was. "But whatever it was…I don't think the occupants of that truck survived it."
