WARRIORS HIGH
ISLAND OF THE LOST
CHAPTER THREE
TRANS-CONTINENTAL TARGETS (PART I)
A black-masked figure stepped forward to a table holding a map of the United States of America. Two X's were drawn to its immediate right, about a hundred miles off the coast of Manhattan, and another drawn a couple hundred miles southwest of Alaska.
She held out her hand, and one of the seventeen black-covered soldiers tossed her a thick red pen. She uncapped it and got to work.
She began by drawing dotted lines across the Atlantic to every major coastal city, New York City, Miami, D.C., etc. Using the mildly accurate scale in the bottom right, she made approximations about the distance between the crossed island and the destinations marked. After tapping the butt of the pen on the table four times, she drew a large circle around New Jersey.
A couple of the soldiers glanced uncertainly at each other as she circled the near-circular indent in Minnesota and drew a line between the Twin Cities and the Jersey Shore. Using her two fingers and the scale on the bottom right, she calculated the distance at around 1,200 miles.
"There," said the woman, pointing to her handiwork, "They'll be taking a plane from Lindisfarne to New Jersey, probably Williamsport, then find some way to get to MSP, which is the most stable hotspot to get access from America to Forrestlake."
She threw her hands up in the air at the bewildered looks of her comrades. "Do I have to explain everything to the lot of ya? Okay…" she pulled a tablet out of a drawer, punched in the passcode and pulled up an archived yearbook page from the year 2022. One of the kid's friends was named 'Blackwhisker,' but he was nicknamed "Jersey Shore.' That means he must have had something to do with the area, like studyin' it or somethin'. If we can get there first, we can kill them before they even have a chance to make it over to Forrestlake.
"Thank you, Fir," said a distorted voice, stepping forward menacingly, "Your contributions to ARS are always beneficial."
Fir put on a wavering, terrified smile. "My pleasure, ma'am."
"The black-figured woman placed a figure on her left temple, likely signaling an earpiece, and spoke. "We have their location. Assemble a strike team and move out immediately to their location. Execute with extreme prejudice."
She lowered her hand. "Everyone, you know what to do. Prepare for battle. Dismissed."
Everyone shuffled out of the room except Fir, who the woman tapped on the shoulder and asked her to stay behind.
"Take off your mask," was the first thing she said.
Behind her all-black, protective and face-shielding mask, the woman's eyes widened. "I'm sorry, ma'am?"
"I have an assignment for you. One that I can only look you in the eyes to deliver."
There was so much wrong in that sentence that it unsettled her enough to undo the latches and disable the breathing apparatus around her mouth, taking off the mask and revealing a face of natural beauty, slightly tan and covered with marks, likely one of the sacrifices that she suffered from having to wear a mask for community-wide face-associated anonymity for sixteen hours a day.
She stared down the leader's facemask, her vibrant amber eyes adjusting to the light of the environment around her.
"We found their destination," began the leader, to which she cut off Fir's conventional congratulations for all positive endeavors she completed, "and we have decided to proceed with the Replacement Procedure."
Her heart skipped several beats, her face slackening. Surely she didn't mean…
From her back pocket, she pulled a small picture of a girl with long, pale blue hair in a ponytail and glimmering blue eyes and handed it to the girl. "You'll have the plane ride to Forrestlake to perfect your American accent."
The picture quivered in Fir's hand. "Ma'am, with all due respect, I'm not sure I'm capable enough-"
"I thought you'd say that. Which is why I have a bargain for you. Have you ever read The Giver?"
Fir shook her head.
"It's about this...community revolving around Sameness. Everyone is the same, no variation in race, emotion or thoughts whatsoever. All around a pretty stupid idea, but their methods of 'release,' relieving the community from its irregularities, the old, the sick, the ones who break the rules…"
Oh no…
She pulled back the visor on her facemask, revealing one eye of vibrant, threatening shades on black and blue and the other stripped of color in blindness and crisscrossed with scars. "I have become aware of your...affair of sorts with one of our own. You know well how I feel about...misplaced feelings in this little community of our own."
She grew a gun equipped with a long silencer, holding it in the air, and allowed the girl to finish the threat in her head.
"So, do we have a deal?"
"I worry about him."
Daffodil sighed, not moving from her nestling place on Ashtooth's shoulder, "You always worry about everyone. Which 'he' is it this time?"
"Okay, I'm worried about everyone. Again."
Almost everyone from the resistance was now cramped together in a small plane, flying off the island and towards an undisclosed location in America, the shades drawn and the only light in the moody cabin being the reading light above Mallowleaf's head, the dim, reduced light of Jaywhisker's laptop and the promise of a sunrise in the thin hours of the morning.
"You worry too much."
"At least it's a way of life."
Daffodil smirked. "You're also too cynical."
"Yeah, I'm working on that."
"And a liar."
Ashtooth rolled his eyes, resting his head back on his girlfriend's.
"So what'd you think of the new gun?"
"Eh," he said, "So-so. The concept was cool, but it needs some tweaking to make the assembly smoother, it's a pain in the ass to reload…"
"You do realize that I helped make the gun, right?"
"BUT it's also got a great hold, the trigger's the smoothest I've ever pulled and it has incredible range. Why didn't you tell me before I started?"
"Eh. You're really cute when you're flustered."
"You're so evil."
"I know," she said, leaning in and kissing him lightly. They broke apart after a moment, their noses still touching slightly.
"Stop worrying. It's bad for you," chided Daffodil, smiling.
Ashtooth smiled back. "Well, I'll give it a shot, but only since you asked nicely."
Coalstrike never meant to doze off. He only realized he did when he noticed he was dreaming.
He was suspended, genuflecting over an endless expanse of oceanic water. His wrists were invisibly bound to his hips and neck was frozen in position.
He couldn't move.
His eyes drifted around his surroundings. Everything looked, felt blurry and foggy like his mind was active beyond his will, but in the murkiness, he saw a great black figure emerging from the depths, causing alarm to flare in his idle state of mind.
He hadn't dreamt in a long time, which caused him to forget what to expect.
But the figure began to split apart as the surface became closer to them. He felt his heart lose all sense of pace when their faces emerged.
The jaws of the sea released three children all of them flailing helplessly and screaming, wailing for a savior, for help. Coalstrike realized he didn't want to see this, so, with the knowledge that he was helplessly tied, he scrunched his eyes shut and willed himself to wake up. But the screams got louder, more poignant and able to be dictated.
"DAD!"
"Please, Dad! Help us!"
"DAD! WHERE ARE YOU?!"
Coalstrike opened his eyes and saw the children, realizing that one of them had soot black hair like his own, the second had long brown hair like Seashell's and the third was a male with short brown hair and a face just like his father's.
Him.
Now Coalstrike was sobbing, tears clouding his vision and his wails of helpless grief taking their long-removed place in the ears of his slumbering mind once again.
And he woke up.
He didn't even acknowledge Seashell staring at him as he rushed to the back of the cabin, locking himself in the small singular lavatory so quickly that he was in pitch black for four seconds before the violet lights flickered on.
Coalstrike unzipped his fuzzy coat and used it to wipe away the sweat and tears from his face, staring his reflection down with enough hatred and rage that it would make the coldest hearts quiver with intimidation. He almost punched the mirror, but decided against it.
His hand drifted to his right pocket, where he grabbed a small pharmaceutical bottle of tiny white pills with its sticker smudged off and ripped. He pried the airtight cover off and took the pill dry, washing his mouth with the airplane tap water, which made bathwater taste passable in comparison.
He stared himself down once again, flipping off his reflection one last time before flushing and unlocking the door to see Seashell, arms crossed and her eyes filled with frustration.
"You brought the pills with you."
The man didn't even bother lying. "So what? Do you not want me to sleep at night?"
Seashell snatched the bottle from his hand. "I want you to learn to tolerate your nightmares instead of hiding behind these. If you keep running, you'll get nothing but an OD in five years-"
Coalstrike tore the pill bottle out of the woman's hand, cutting her off. "You don't get it, do you? I need these! Chances are you would keep them, too, if you saw what I see without them."
Seashell didn't stop Coalstrike as he stormed back to his seat. Now she was concerned about how the things he saw today were worse than what they were before.
At 4:51 AM on August 17, 2024, the plane touched down in the airfield in Jersey Shore airport, a couple of miles from Philadelphia.
After dropping off a wad of hundreds to the pilots, the group hustled to a silver compact bus, where they would be discretely transported about 1,100 miles to Terminal 1 at MSP, sneaking their way on a plane to Forrestlake.
That was the plan.
But where would the fun be if everything went according to plan?
Everyone got settled into the comfy environment of the bus pretty quickly. That was a good thing, considering the ride was supposed to be 15 hours long.
Mallowleaf was in the far corner, casually reading the memoir of some ex-soldier, it seemed–Dusty had only glanced at the dust-cover–that looked to be about seven meters thick, Coalstrike and Seashell were passed out in the seat behind him, Ashtooth was half-heartedly watching a soccer replay on some cable network provided with the convenient seat-back entertainment (requested by Jaywhisker behind Coalstrike's back under "Special Modifications") and Dusty was dueling off with Jaywhisker in some good ol' fashioned Rocket League from his monitor, comfortably nestled between the headrests of the seats above them.
Considering how Jay was the tech whiz, he was kicking his ass.
"Jesus," muttered Dusty as Jay knocked in another goal, making it 17-1, "I feel like you made the match twenty minutes long just to mock me."
"No, this is just how I play."
"How the hell do you even find the…"Dusty paused to clear the ball from his own goal, "...like, the time to get good at all this."
"Well, I do have chronic insomnia," he said.
Dusty paused the game. "You do? I didn't know about this."
"Good," he responded, "Because you're the first one to know. I don't know where it came from, but about seven months ago, I couldn't get myself to fall asleep under my own will. I tried melatonin, but I just couldn't fall asleep. So I stopped trying, and every five, six days or so, I pass out for 18 hours."
Dusty scrunched up his face in confusion. "That's not how sleep works."
"I've just stopped questioning it." Jay reached over and pressed the start button on Dusty's controller, allowing another goal. "There we go. 18-1. Good game. Play again?"
"Sure, why not. We've got hours to burn."
"Hey, guys?"
Both boys turned to Ashtooth, who looked much more awake and much more concerned. "You guys should come see this."
Dusty and Jay scrambled to the seat directly behind him and Daffodil while Mallowleaf woke Coalstrike and Seashell. On Ashtooth's screen was a breaking news telegram from the local station. The sniper unplugged the headset he was listening to and turned up the volume.
"After being labeled as "Dormant" by the Department of Defense, action has been confirmed by the extremist terrorist group known as the Assassins of the Rising Sun. Earlier this morning, a message was sent on several social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram."
The telegram clicked away to a dark message , in which Dusty could barely make out about fifteen or sixteen black, masked figures, all armed with assault rifles and all in a silent, straight line.
"WE KNOW WHERE YOU ARE." said a distorted voice somewhere among the crowd.
"WE KNOW WHERE YOU ARE GOING."
Mallowleaf and Coalstrike glanced at each other in fear. "Search the car," ordered Seashell.
"WE KNEW YOU WOULD RUN."
"What the hell is going on?" whimpered Jay, "How do they know where we are?"
"This is got to be a bluff, right?"
"SO WE FOLLOWED YOU ALONG."
"GUYS!" shouted Coalstrike, "The driver's gone!"
"WHAT?!" shouted everyone simultaneously.
"THERE'S NO MORE USE IN RUNNING."
Daffodil was trying her hardest to rip open the side door, but it seemed to be binded shut. "MOVE!" shouted Mallowleaf, drawing her pistol and shooting the lock. The compression system keeping the door locked released and the door slackened opened.
"DO NOT RESIST."
"JAY, GET OUT OF THERE!" shouted Dusty as everyone else grabbed what they could and abandoned the car. This was most certainly a set-up.
The seventeen-year-old was trying to lug the console of his computer out of the trunk with one arm. Dusty ran over to help him, hoisting the console to his chest and sprinting off as fast he could.
Moments later, the group turned to see a fireball streaking through the sky, whizzing over their heads and careening with the van, causing it to explode immediately. Dusty hit the deck, his chest and stomach sheltering the giant console as his hands flew to the back of his head.
He felt the strong hand of Ashtooth grab the tag of his shirt and holster him to his feet, shoving him as the rest of the group sprinted away from the wreckage of their ride.
When he saw the harsh spotlights of three motorcycles turning off the road on his back, he didn't think twice, the silent air pierced by the crackling of incendiary flames and the roaring and revving of motorcycles.
We're gonna die! And we're not even at Forrestlake yet!
"YOU DO REALIZE THIS IS A HORRIBLE IDEA, RIGHT?"
"THEY'RE TARGETS! WE'LL BE TARGETS IF THEY KNOW WE'RE TAKING THEM IN."
"WHAT WILL THE THREE THINK? WHAT WILL EVERYONE WHO IS STRONGER, WHICH IS A LOT OF PEOPLE, THINK WHEN THEY SEE THEM?"
"WHAT IF THEY DON'T EVEN MAKE IT TO THE ISLAND."
Foxleap answered Midnight with the same answer every time.
"It's a gut feeling, Midnight. I need to save them, whatever it takes."
"SIR, NEVER ONCE HAS THAT BEEN A REASON TO ANYTHING YOU HAVE DONE."
"It is now."
Now the red-haired boy sat atop a certain bell-tower, casting his gaze over the silent, dimly lit city, it's scars from the beating it took more prevalent than ever.
He did have his reasons. The issue was that they kept changing and most of the time, they didn't make sense.
But he had a drive, a passion to save them.
He just had to figure out why.
And Foxleap the savior enters the picture.
I'm...not sure how I feel about this chapter. I feel like I've done action and tension better than I did here before, but this is pretty new for me, going into this much nitty-gritty detail.
Next chapter is part 2 of this big experiment. I hope you'll at least find it the slightest bit engaging, because that's the telltale on whether this story sinks or swims.
Best,
~Res