A/N: Here I am with another chapter ALREADY! –gasp- Many thanks to my newest reviewer, Anshu, and also to RedWheeler and Desastrus for being so regular in their reviews.
On with it:
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The stop had been fairly uneventful; the ship stopped, was refueled, stocked up on supplies, and set sail again, leaving Julia, Raul, and the Barthezes behind. Julia and Raul had done everything in their power to convince the Barthezes not to go through the trouble of staying back just for them, but in the end they had relented. It was always nice to have friends around.
They had spent the day in a hotel, restlessly counting down the hours until the circus would arrive. They phoned Greg at regular intervals… and now they were finally going to reach. Their circus was an old-fashioned one and they used to travel by road in caravans and trucks. No matter how long it took. The group of teenagers had gone to the outskirts of the city, where they were supposed to be arriving, and were now waiting impatiently for the circus to arrive.
Raul was leaning against a tree, eyes closed, and absent-mindedly humming a carnival tune. All five of his companions were staring at him, amused. When he opened his eyes and realized he had an audience, he went red and glared back at them. "What?" he said aggressively. But at that moment, he heard a familiar noise behind him. Twirling on the spot, he saw a large decorated truck driving towards them slowly. Behind it stretched a long line of caravans and cages with animals.
The truck suddenly stopped and a nineteen year old with spiky black hair jumped out. It was still a kilometer or so away from the group but the boy sprinted across as if was nothing, in about five minutes.
"Raul! Julia!" he said when he reached them, out of breath. "Long time no see!"
"Yeah," replied Raul with a grin. After giving both of them a brief, one armed hug, he turned to the other four. Extending his hand to Miguel, who was standing closest to him, he said, "Hi. I'm Greg."
"I'm Miguel," replied Miguel, shaking his hand. Then, turning around and pointing to each of the others in turn, he said, "This is Matilda, Claude and Aaron."
"Pleased to meet you," he said, putting two fingers to his forehead in an informal mock-salute.
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Miriam looked over the top of her magazine at Max, who was sitting right in front of her and had been constantly staring at her for the past ten minutes. She looked straight into his blue eyes and held his gaze, but he didn't even blink, the corners of his lips curling upwards into a grin. Sighing, she snapped the magazine shut.
"Why are you staring?" she asked exasperatedly.
"Most of my friends think it's annoying when I do that," commented Max, not answering her question.
"I think so too," she replied, rolling her eyes. "And exactly why do you want to annoy me?"
"Because I'm bored," said Max, his gaze not wavering.
She got up, annoyed. "Well I don't care."
"Oh, come on," whined Max, getting up too. "Maybe we could do something?"
"Yeah?" scoffed Miriam, beginning to walk away. "Like what?" Irritated by the fact that Max was now following her, she left the room at a brisk walk, banging the door shut. Or at least that's what she tried to do. Instead, the metal of the door made contact with Max's nose. Miriam turned around at the sound of his exclamation. He was standing there with his hand clasped over his bleeding nose, letting out a string of swearwords that Miriam didn't even know existed.
"Oh my gosh!" she exclaimed. "Sorry, sorry, sorry!" She rushed to him, craning her neck to see who else was sitting in the room. There was only Kai, sitting in the corner. He directed an amused smirk in her direction before picking up a book and starting to read it.
Muttering something about unhelpful Russians, she pulled Max back into the room and made him lie down on the sofa. "Now look up," she instructed. "It'll stop the bleeding."
"Can I have some ice?" said Max in a thick voice.
"First get your hand off your nose," she said, extending one hand towards him to try and pry his fingers away.
"Gah!" he exclaimed, sitting up. "Stay away from me!"
"Oh, come on!" said Miriam, rolling her eyes. "Don't be a baby. Lie down and I'll get you some ice… although it doesn't really need ice but whatever…"
She left the room at a run, going towards the kitchen. Max stubbornly folded his arms and stayed bolt upright.
"It's a good idea to do what she said," Kai spoke up from his corner. "It'll stop the bleeding."
"I know," said Max, gingerly feeling the bridge of his nose, and easing himself back down.
"And you don't really need ice, like she said," said Kai.
"I know," replied Max from the armrest of the sofa.
"And if you like her you should just tell her," said Kai, his smirk widening.
"I know…" replied Max, and then, realizing what Kai had just said, and worse, what he had said in reply, sat up again. "HEY! I didn't mean that! What I meant was, I don't like her! I mean, I do like her, but as a friend, not like that… as in…" he groaned, sinking back down. "You suck, you know that?"
"I know," said Kai mockingly, returning to his book.
"It's not like I was staring staring at her, I was just trying to annoy her," babbled Max. "It didn't mean anything." He craned his neck to look at Kai. "Right, Kai? It didn't mean anything."
"First sign: denial," said Kai, not looking up. He was not just teasing his naïve American friend, although that was mostly the reason. No, he also meant some of it.
Max mumbled something under his breath, trailing off to an unintelligible stream of words.
"What are you babbling about?" asked Miriam, appearing at the doorway holding an icepack.
"Nothing," replied Max shortly. "And I like to annoy people."
"I noticed," said Miriam dryly, sitting on the edge of the sofa and giving him the pack. "Now be quiet."
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That night, Salima and Miriam met their new cabin-mates at last. And they were very disappointed indeed. There were no two more unfriendly girls anywhere in the world.
They entered the cabin late at night, around 11:00. One had a thick waist-length golden braid and blue eyes, and the other one had wild-looking shoulder length navy blue hair and black eyes. They merely shot contemptuous glances at Salima and Miriam, who were lounging on their respective bunks, reading, and went to sit on their own bunks. The navy-haired one was on the top bunk and the golden-braided one on the bottom.
Salima shot them a look before coughing politely and saying, "Hi."
The navy haired girl looked up briefly. "Hi."
"Er… I'm Salima and this is Miriam."
"I see," she replied. Then, suddenly realizing she was expected to give an introduction too, she said, "I'm Mona Howlett…"
"And I'm Laura Gardner…" said the golden braided one. "It's a… pleasure to meet you." Her emphasis on the word pleasure clearly showed she didn't mean it.
This was going to be a long night.
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A/N: I know it was a really abrupt ending but whatever… in the next chapter you'll probably find out more about mother Inka. REVIEW!