CHAPTER SEVEN

The mallrats all stared at Amber and Jay in amazement. They had all gathered in the canteen to hear the news from the tribal leaders' meeting, but now that they had, they almost wished they hadn't. No school and no hospital supplies…..what were they gonna do?

Lex was the first to recover from the shock, and voiced the opinion that everyone was thinking,

"God, that's just like Ebony! I said she couldn't be trusted! Don't you remember me saying so? Well, now what? People are counting on us to deliver thanks to Jay!"

Trudy interrupted, "Wait a minute Lex! You can't blame all of this on Jay! He wasn't the one to break his promise…that was Ebony! If you ask me, this is all Ebony's fault!"

"You would say that about lover boy! So he didn't exactly break his promise, but he was the one who told the other tribes that he promised he would get the extra medical supplies for the hospital and he would ensure that a new school is up and running as soon as possible. Now as I see it, they're gonna be after our blood when the find out we can't give them what they were promised and that's Jay's fault. Who made him a mallrat anyway? Last time I checked, he was a Techno!" Lex ranted.

Trudy blushed furiously upon hearing Lex's words. She hadn't exactly made a secret of the fact that she liked Jay as more than a friend, but whilst Amber was still deliberating her feelings, she would never consider doing anything about them.

"Well while we're on this topic, since when did Siva become a mallrat?" Jay shot back.

"JAY! LEX! Stop it! This is getting us nowhere!" Amber pleaded.

Picking up on Trudy's embarrassment, Ellie turned the conversation back to the topic of what they were gonna do now they knew Ebony's stance.

"Look, Ebony's not gonna help us with the school or the medication we require, so we're gonna have to do something ourselves, and quickly if the crowd today are anything to go by!"

"Yeah," Siva agreed. "They were so mad at us, but Ellie was a legend; she really saved our necks."

"What crowd?" Amber queried inquisitively.

"Oh nothing!" said Lex sarcastically. "Just virtually everyone from just about every tribe in the sector….they just wanted to…..if I say that they were angry, it'd be an understatement – they were furious with us! And you weren't there to help us, cause you two were at some dumb meeting that Ebony called!"

Choosing to ignore the latter part of what Lex had just said, Amber asked,

"Why were they so angry at us? What did we do apart from taking down the Technos, and hence sparing the world from a life of torture and virtual reality?"

Ved spoke up here, "They believe that we know where the missing prisoners are being kept. They think that just because we defeated Ram and the others, that we must have discovered where they are…what they don't realise is that nobody but Ram…and maybe Mega, knew the exact location of the prisoners."

"Yeah right!" Lex scoffed. "So Ram never shared any of his secrets with you? You were his loyal followers….and it's not as though he could get up and feed them himself. It's obvious that you knew….or at least that SOMEBODY did! Jay…" he said, turning towards the former Techno, "…you were his second-in-command. You must have known where they were?"

Jay didn't like where the conversation was heading, as he knew that if this got much deeper he'd have a weeping Amber on his hands. He didn't want her to be thinking too deeply about the father of her son. If she never stopped talking about him, there was no chance that she would relinquish her heart to him. Of course he didn't know where the prisoners were, but even if he did…..there's no way he'd tell them…after all the time and effort he'd put into making Amber his, there was not a chance in he/l that he'd allow Bray to come waltzing in and snap her up from right under his nose! She already had tears glistening in her eyes.

"Sorry, Lex." Jay announced nonchalantly. "No idea….now can we get back to the matter in hand – the school and the medication. Anybody got any ideas?"

"Actually, I do," Ellie piped up. "Why don't we open a school here? There's plenty of space, and there are enough of us to act as teachers. It doesn't have to be all day….perhaps just for a couple of hours a day. Isn't it worth a try?"

Jack marvelled at his true love. He really regretted what had happened with Cloe. Even though he and Ellie had sort of broken up at the time, there was still the possibility of them getting back together…..at least there was before Cloe discovered that she was pregnant with his baby. He had always longed to be a father, but ever since he had gotten together with Ellie, he had always imagined her as the mother! He brought his thoughts back to what was going on around him in time to hear Amber excitedly say,

"You know what, that just might work! For a few hours a day, we can educate some of the kids around here!"

Seeing Lex's expression, she added,

"Look I know it's not ideal, but it's all we've got! We have to at least offer it up as a possibility, and if nobody's interested….well we tried!"

Jack suddenly had an idea.

"And I think I can help with the medicine thing…..remember Dal's father was a doctor? Well, his surgery's in sector three…I think I know where it is! There might be some medicines there that we can use…at least until Ebony can sort us out with some!"

Amber looked as though she could kiss him. She was so relieved that everyone seemed to be pulling together to find a solution to what had seemed like such an impossible situation. But there were something that still puzzled her….like why was Jay acting so shifty about his time with the Technos? She reasoned that maybe he was just embarrassed about it, but then what did he have to be embarrassed about? Sure he had caused pain and death even, but that was so far in the past she couldn't bear to think about it….he had changed so much since he had left the Technos and helped the Mallrats to overcome them. But not wanting to ask him in front of the others, and seeing them all buzzing about their new ventures, she left it alone, and resolved to ask him later.

Meanwhile, Jay was dreaming up situations where he could get Amber alone and force her to fall for him. Ebony hated Amber, and he knew that she was completely over him…..so perhaps he could count on her for help. He had decided that she wasn't worth waiting for…he wanted her now! With a little help from an old flame, he would ensure that he got her. After all, what Jay wanted, Jay always got!