A/N: Welcome back everybody! I'm so happy to announce that Life is Abominable Episode Four: Hostiles is ready for posting! And yes, I changed the episode title because I figure it sounded a lot better and shorter than Hostilities. I could tell based on the last episode you were excited and were wanting to see what would happen to Max, Chloe, Everest, Yi, Peng, and Jin since the events of Episode Three: Departure. So, let's start part one now. Enjoy!
Previously on Life is Abominable...
Jin had been tortured and interrogated by Dr. Emily Zara until he gave them the information she was wanting from him concerning where Max, Chloe, and the others were taking Everest. Jin also overheard a plan by Zara to capture Max and weaponize her time powers to get rich. He was then set free by Dave, a member of Burnish's goon squad who knew Rachel and Chloe back during their Blackwell Academy days. Max, Chloe, Everest, Yi, and Peng landed in the Gobi Desert, and Everest healed Max's wound that Burnish's drones had given her during their brief battle in the sky in the mountains. While continuing their path to the Dahe Village, Max admits to Chloe she doesn't want to let Everest go and that she is really starting to see the young yeti as her own child. Chloe reassured Max she'd be there to figure everything out when the time comes to finally let Everest go back to his family...
Max woke up gasping, she found herself back on the mountain from her previous vision from when she passed out after the blueberry avalanche. She stood up in the middle of the snowy terrain to see everything was the same as before, only for one difference, there were giant pools of blood staining the snow, and each one was in the shape of gigantic bodies lying dead on the ground. Max was now even more scared and confused than she was the last time, she didn't understand what any of this meant.
"What happened? Where did all this blood come from?" Max asked herself out loud as she couldn't do anything except stare at the bloody body-prints in horror.
"When the time comes, you will have to make one last choice" the loud booming voice from before said in Max's thoughts. Hearing the voice again caused Max to jump where she stood and began looking around her. There was no gigantic beast, nor was there anybody around for miles, not even the spirit deer.
"I don't understand! What do you mean? What choice!?" Max screamed out into the distance, hoping the voice from before would say something.
"The most important choice you'll ever have to make" a new voice said. Max looked behind her to see a nineteen year old girl standing where the gigantic silhouette stood before. She had beautiful snowy white skin, blonde hair, and hazel eyes that stared down at Max as a smile formed on her face. Her clothes consisted of a blue flannel that was torn at the right shoulder, a blank brick red tee-shirt, black skinny jeans that were torn at the knees, and black converse high-tops. Standing next to her was the spirit deer. Max recognized her from the various Missing Persons posters that were pinned up all over Blackwell Academy. It was Rachel Amber, Chloe's closest friend and previous girlfriend.
"Rachel?" Max whispered loudly. Rachel smiled and began to walk towards her, the spirit deer walked alongside her as she continued to approach Max. She stopped once she was right in front of her, Rachel smiled and placed her right hand on Max's shoulder.
"I told you I'd be seeing you real soon. Just didn't think it would take this long" Rachel said to Max in an awkward tone of voice. Max knew she was referring to the text message she was sent by Rachel in her nightmare she had while she was unconscious and Chloe was carrying her to the lighthouse while the storm was approaching Arcadia Bay.
"Rachel, why am I having these visions? What is all this?" Max said as she looked to her right to see another bloodstain the shape of a dead body appear in the snow just right next to both her and Rachel. Rachel looked at the bloodstain for a few seconds before looking back at Max and speaking again.
"You're on the right path, Max. You have to keep going" she said, not even bothering to answer Max's questions.
"What? No, that doesn't answer what I just asked. And... why are you even here? We got both Nathan and Jefferson, we avenged your murder" Max told her. Rachel's smile disappeared as she shook her head and let out a light chuckle.
"No, you didn't. There's still one more" she said in a serious voice this time. Max then noticed Rachel was looking at something that was standing behind her, so she turned around and she couldn't believe what she was seeing right now. Nathan Prescott was standing right behind them, five feet away in the middle of the blizzard. His face was also covered in bruises, which looked the very same ones Warren Graham had given him while beating him up in the Blackwell boy's dorms.
"N-Nathan? But... you're dead" Max said. Nathan said nothing and pulled out a square slate of cardboard from behind his back and held it up to his chest. On the slate were four words written in bright red paint in large letters. "You Talk, You Die" it read. Nathan then smiled and gave a sadistic sounding chuckle and made a cut-throat gesture with his thumb being dragged across his throat.
"Max" Rachel said, causing Max to turn her head back around. The sky was now dark with storm clouds, and orange lightning emitted from said clouds. The snow that once fell from the sky was now replaced with ashes that looked like they came from a raging wildfire.
"Max! Max! Max! Max! Max!" Rachel kept on repeating. The more she said it, the more her voice changed, now it sounded like Chloe's voice was coming out of Rachel's mouth.
On Board A Cargo Train closely approaching the Yangtze River. 9:22 AM
"Max!" Chloe shouted. Max woke up gasping and she looked absolutely terrified. She looked around her to see where they currently were, and she was relieved to see it wasn't on the mountain with Rachel Amber and Nathan Prescott. She then began to remember they were able to jump onto this train without being noticed by the conductors or anybody else working on board.
"Are you okay? You overslept for a while now and we were staring to get concerned" Yi asked, a look of worry on her face was visible to the brunette.
"I'm alright, just had a really long unpleasant dream is all" Max said as she sat up and leaned against a tall stack of wooden crates. Everest then walked up to Max and sat down next to her.
"Are you sure you're okay, mama?" Everest asked in Max's thoughts.
"I told you, I'm fine. It's my job to worry about you, Everest, not the other way around" Max replied using her telepathic link with the young Yeti. She then gave a small smile and gave Everest a gentle and loving scratch underneath his fuzzy chin, which made him smile and hum happily at the attention he was getting. While she kept on scratching her surrogate son's chin, she turned to face Chloe and Yi.
"How far are we to the Yangtze River?" she asked.
"Not too far. We can see the village we're supposed to meet Jin at over the horizon" Chloe replied.
"How long before we have to jump off the train?" asked Max.
"Best guess, I'd say about fifteen minutes. We're still pretty far away though" Yi answered. Max then reached into her camera bag and took out her earbuds and connected them to her phone before placing one in her left ear and then held up the other one to Everest, who just looked confused.
"Wanna listen to some music with me?" Max asked out loud. Everest still wasn't sure what his temporary mother was doing with the earbud though. She let out a small chuckle before she stood up and placed it into his right ear.
"There you go. Now, you'll be able to hear whatever song is playing on my phone" Max told him using her thoughts. She then looked down at her phone and began to look though the music library app. After a short while, Max found a good song and tapped on the screen to select it. Everest gasped and looked around when the song began to play, the sound of "Young" by The Chainsmokers filling his right ear with sound.
"It's okay, Everest. It's just music" Max said calmly, reassuring him this was normal. Max then leaned back against the stack of crates and began gently bobbing her head up and down to the beat of the song. Everest then began sitting against the wall of the train and began bobbing his head too, copying his surrogate mother's actions. Seeing this made Chloe, Yi, and Peng chuckle a little.
"Like mother, like son I guess" said Chloe, not taking her eyes of her nephew or her girlfriend. Yi then turned to Chloe and spoke up.
"You know something, Chloe? I can't seem to figure Everest out" Yi said.
"What do you mean?" asked the blue haired girl, curious as to what the younger teen meant.
"I mean, how does he do all this stuff? He can control nature and heal wounds. This isn't the kind of thing you see on a normal day-to-day basis" Yi explained.
"Maybe it's his gift. Like when you play the violin, or when Max takes pictures with her Polaroid, or when I play basketball. Everest just talks to nature" Peng suggested.
"Okay, now THAT is a gift" Chloe said before she looked to Yi again and spoke.
"And truth be told... I used to think the same thing when Max first proved to me she had her time powers. But sometimes, there are just some mysteries that are just beyond our knowledge" Chloe told her.
"Woah. What you said just now sounded really cool" said Peng, his eyes widened and jaw slightly agape in awe at Chloe's words. Chloe just rolled her eyes and smiled before walking over to the open side-door of the train car and saw the Dahe village getting closer and closer. The time to get off was coming pretty soon, so she'd have to snap Everest and Max out of their moment so they could jump off safely and rendezvous with Jin.
"Max!" Chloe softly called out. It was loud enough to get both the brunette and Yeti's attention.
"We're getting closer to the Dahe village. Time to go" Yi said. Max then turned off the song and walked over to Everest, taking the earbud out of his ear and cramming them into her camera bag.
"We're about to jump off the train, alright? Just follow my lead and be careful. Got it?" Max instructed to Everest, who nodded at what she said. The four of them were now standing on the edge of the box car and kept their eyes fixed onto the village, watching it get even more closer and closer by the second. Once they got close enough, everybody gave a lone nod to one another and then jumped off the edge of the car. All of them landed on their feet without any problem.
"That was pretty easy" Chloe said after jumping.
"Don't jinx it. We still have to find Jin" Max reminded her blue-haired girlfriend.
"She's right. It's going to be like finding a needle in a haystack in such a large crowd of people who live here" Yi said while pointing at the entrance to the village. There were a ton of people walking all over the place, and several stands were set up, selling fruits, vegetables, and various other goods.
"Looks like we've got a farmer's market going on here" said Max, not taking her eyes off the large crowd.
"C'mon, let's get moving" Chloe said, encouraging everybody to start walking with her towards the village. Max, Yi, Peng, and Everest followed suit.
Somewhere Miles Outside the Dahe Village. 10:00 AM
Dave was now on his knees, being whacked in the back by Zara's electric cattle prod. The beating had kept going on and on for forty five minutes now, and there was hardly ever a break from a zap from the prod or a hard whack with a cold metal police baton to somewhere on his body. His hands were also bound behind his back with rope, so he could barely even defend himself.
"Dr. Zara, don't you think this is a little too much?" asked Mr. Burnish.
"Absolutely not. I saw him on the wireless security footage on our trucks help the boy escape and gave him an entire duffel bag full of weapons. That makes these kids even more dangerous" said Zara, justifying her treatment of Dave.
"That wasn't all I included in there you sick prick!" Dave said through his gritted teeth. The redheaded woman got down on one knee and looked him straight in the eye.
"What? What else did you include in there besides half of our entire armory?" Zara asked in a demanding voice.
"Your entire mental health record" Dave replied, smirking as he spoke.
"You what!? That's confidential information!" Zara said before whacking Dave across the face with the prod, which also gave a light zap to his cheek, and leaving a small pink burn-mark below his right eye.
"Every single diagnosis made by four different mental health professionals. Each and every one of them list your sadistic personality disorder, delusions of grandeur, obsessive compulsive disorder, pathological liar. And let's not forget the most important one of all... antisocial personality disorder" Dave said before Zara began stomping on the side of his face with her boot. Mr. Burnish couldn't help but look disturbed as Dave listed every last one of Zara's diagnoses to her.
"Those "Professionals" are trying to tarnish my good name by making me look like a whack-job" Zara said.
"But they're right! You stalked Rachel Amber and tried to torment Chloe Price. And I know something else... you played a part in her disappearance. You don't think I didn't notice? The way she disappeared a month before she was supposed to graduate Blackwell with me?" replied Dave, not regretting that he was outing the psychotic woman out in front of her boss.
"Again, more lies!" said Zara before this time, kicking him in the jaw.
"I know what you did. With Nathan Prescott and Mark Jefferson's help. Before that storm wiped out Arcadia Bay, you payed to get rid of Rachel. And you used Nathan's family's money to bribe that sicko Jefferson for it" Dave continued before Zara decided she had enough of Dave's talking. She took out a gun and shot him right in the abdomen, which Mr. Burnish was taken aback by, and felt sick the minute he watched Zara pull the trigger. Surprisingly enough, Dave was still alive.
"Be lucky that bullet was just a blank. Next one's going to be real" Zara snarled to Dave before placing the gun back inside her trench-coat pocket and turned to the head goon.
"Take him to the trailer. We'll decide his fate after we secure the Yeti and capture the children" Zara gently ordered. The lead goon only nodded and picked the injured Dave up over his shoulder and carried him over to the same trailer where Jin was kept and tortured the night before. Mr. Burnish stayed quiet and only watched as Zara got back inside the truck that she and him were driving together in, and his eyes remained as wide as two dinner plates. He had just witnessed a side of Dr. Zara he had never seen before, and he did not like this violent and sadistic side of her at all. The older man then snapped his fingers and signaled for one of his goons to come closer.
"We have digital copies of all staff members medical records and criminal histories right?" Mr. Burnish asked.
"That we do sir. You ordered we always have them saved on our main hard drive just in case if we ever lost them" said the goon.
"Alright, do me a favor and look up the mental health record of Emily Zara, criminal record too. Bring them straight to me so I can see if everything Dave said about her just now was true" said Burnish. The goon only nodded and ran off to one of the trailer trucks to go grab his work computer and email the records to his boss so he could read them for himself.
Back at the Village
Max, Chloe, Yi, Peng, and Everest were hiding in an alleyway behind two large red slabs of wood that were large enough to be doors. Max and Yi were peeking their heads out from the sides of each door to keep a lookout for Jin.
"Well, here we are. This is the Dahe Village" Max said out loud.
"Do you see Jin?" Peng asked.
"Yeah, any sign of pretty boy?" Chloe piped in.
"Though that mob? Are you cereal right now?" Yi said. Chloe and Max looked at the Chinese teen in shock.
"What?" Yi asked with a confused look on her face.
"I think your hipster lingo is rubbing off on her, Max" Chloe said, making Max lightly chuckle.
"Hey, she's said "Hella" a few times, and I'm pretty sure she got that from you. So you're just as guilty as I am here" Max said while she still kept her eyes on the crowd, looking for Jin.
"Well, regardless of who's the most guiltiest about my vocabulary right now, we need to be looking for Jin right now" Yi told them. Everest nodded in agreement with her.
"I just hope Zara didn't capture him and make him say anything" Max said as she didn't take her eyes off the crowd.
"Me too, Max. If she did, add it to the list of all the other crimes she's gonna pay for. I still owe that sadist POS a punch to her nose" said Chloe. Her blood was boiling at the thought of Zara hurting anybody else just to get what she wanted, like she did back during her Blackwell days.
"Alright, let's split up. Yi, you can come with me and we'll do some supply shopping while we're looking for Jin" Max suggested.
"Good idea. We're almost out of food and water too, so we may as well buy what we can" said Yi in agreement.
"Chloe, Peng, you stay with Everest and keep a sharp eye out for Jin. Make sure he stays hidden from everybody else, we don't know if Burnish's goons are hiding in plain sight here and we have to be cautious" the brunette said after turning around to face her blue-haired girlfrield, adopted son, and his best friend.
"You got it, but how are we gonna move him around here without anyone noticing him?" Chloe asked. Max then turned to her right and saw a farmer herding four yaks through the streets of the village. He told the yaks to move along before slapping one right on it's rear end and making it move ahead of all the others. Max then looked behind them to see a rusty old bicycle and a gigantic pile of old rope.
"I got an idea. We're gonna give Everest a disguise" she told everyone.
"Peng, grab all that rope and throw it on top of Everest's body. Yi, take the handlebar off that bike and place it on top of his head once Peng finished putting all that rope on him" Max instructed. Yi and Peng nodded and ran off to do their assigned tasks.
"Disguising him as a yak!? Max, you're a mad genius!" Chloe exclaimed before wrapping her arms around the brunette girl and gave her a kiss on the cheek. This made Max blush and place a hand on the cheek that Chloe just kissed. Everest let out a grunt that made it sound like he was saying "Aww" at how his mama and auntie showed affection.
"Well, I'm no Thomas Edison, but... I do have my moments" Max said before turning her head to see Peng had just threw all the rope from the pile on top of Everest's back. Yi then placed the handlebars on his head, and Max had to admit that she was impressed. Everest went from Yeti to yak in a matter of seconds and she could barely tell it was him.
"Good job guys. Now, remember your assigned groups and let's get a move on and try to find Jin before Burnish and Zara find us" Max said before she looked over to Everest and began speaking to him using her telepathy.
"Mama's going to look for Jin with Yi, alright? I want you to stay with Auntie Chloe and Peng until we find him. Do you understand?" she asked. Everest nodded before he began responding using his own telepathic bond with her.
"I understand, mama" said Everest.
"Good boy. We'll be back soon" Max said out loud before giving Everest a kiss in between his eyes before she walked out of the alleyway. Yi followed closely behind her, leaving Chloe and Peng alone with Everest. Yi and Max then wandered all around the farmer's market and saw all the stands that were set up. Various goods were being sold, as well as fruits, vegetables, even clothes and pottery.
"Anything specific you want to buy?" Yi asked.
"Not really, just... anything we can eat, drink, or something you think could be useful to us" Max answered. The two then began to browse around while also looking around them to see if they could find Jin anywhere. So far, no luck in finding the social-media savvy teen, but Max did see a store she really liked. It was small but there was a sign on the top of the building that had the logo for "Polaroid Originals" on the very top, and Max began to smile like a kid who just opened their presents on Christmas Day.
"Hey, Yi? You mind if we look in here?" asked Max after tapping Yi on her shoulder. Yi then saw Max was pointing to the Polaroid Originals store and nodded in reply with a smile. Max then grabbed Yi by the hand and led her right inside the store. The minute they walked in through the door, Max swore she was in heaven. There were packs of film meant for different model cameras hanging on the walls, as well as podiums with shelves on them that carried boxes that contained a vintage Polaroid instant camera. She saw 600 and Spectra models all over, even the new i-Type cameras as well.
"Wow, I didn't know Polaroid was making such a huge comeback" Yi said as she looked all around her.
"I've never been this excited about anything before. It's like... well, like being in a candy store" Max replied. She then turned around to see another camera on a podium, it was an SX-70 Alpha 1 camera.
"No way... Yi, look. It's an SX-70" Max said as she walked up to the podium, her eyes fixed on the camera itself. Yi then let out a tiny chuckle at how it looked.
"It looks like a tiny little accordion" she said. Max rolled her eyes at what her friend just said and then picked the camera up into her hands.
"This is the very first instant camera Polaroid ever released. They made them for only a couple years in the seventies. It's the same camera Ansel Adams and Walker Evans used" Max said with enthusiasm in her voice. Yi looked confused at the last part of her brunette friend's sentence.
"I'm sorry, who're those guys?" asked Yi.
"Oh, right, sorry. They were famous photographers. They're both the reason Polaroid photography is considered a form of art" Max explained to her. Yi could tell Max loved the camera she was holding in her hands from the was she talked about the famous people who've used it as well as all the rich history behind it.
"Why don't you buy it then?" suggested Yi.
"I would but..." Max said, pausing in the middle of her sentence.
"But what?" Yi asked.
"I need to focus on getting Everest home right now. All this will do is just distract me from the task at hand" Max said before her face turned somber and placed the camera right back on the podium it sat on before. Yi then watched as her friend exited the store and went back outside to browse the stands at the farmer's market. She then looked down on the podium shelves and picked up an SX-70 that was still inside it's box and then looked at the back to see the price. She then walked over to the wall that housed all the different types of film and picked six packs of SX-70 film.
"Excuse me, miss?" Yi heard someone say. She turned to her right and saw a man wearing a store uniform with the Polaroid logo on his shirt pocket.
"May I help you?" he asked.
"Oh, yes uh... I'm buying all this for my friend" Yi explained.
"That's very generous of you miss, want me to ring you up?" asked the clerk.
"That would be great. Thank you so much" said Yi before she followed the clerk to the checkout counter and placed all the money she had earned from her previous odd jobs on the counter. Once the clerk scanned the bar-codes on the items and counted all of Yi's money, he placed them inside a large plastic bag and handed it to her along with the receipt for everything she bought.
"Thank you so much" Yi gratefully said to the clerk whom had just helped her out and placed the camera and film packs inside her backpack that also carried her violin before exiting the store to rejoin Max in her supply shopping.
A/N: Part One is done everybody! Whoot whoot! Every minute they're getting closer to completing their journey. But what exactly is up with Max's vision of Rachel and Nathan on top of the mountain surrounded by bloodstains? And is Burnish going to find out who Dr. Zara truly is? Find out the further we get into Episode Four: Hostiles. Please review, thanks!