The Arks: Over Heaven (by Ben)

Chapter 38: Assembly

Part 1/2

“Alright, I know I know,” Chris said as he scratched the head of his pet dodo, “They’ll be back soon. You’ll make a friend soon enough.”

The dodo lifted its beak up into the air, before collapsing to the ground again. Chris sighed and looked around. Bobby and Simon had returned from their metal trip, and they seemed to be bursting in conversation over some sort of egg.

On the other side of the camp he spotted Gary cleaning the barrel of his pistol out. Lynx had its legs sprawled out, and it let out a big yawn. And of course, Ben was nowhere to be seen.

He sighed again, staring at the two small buckets that lay at his feet. One was filled with a sticky, gray paste and the other a green runny substance. Achatina paste and organic polymer.

“I’ve been doing nothing but picking this stuff up since the camp was created,” Chris wearily thought, “I want to do something more. To prove I’m more than just a reader.”

Chris clenched his fist, and suddenly he heard the pattering of footsteps across the soft grass. He looked up and saw the gate slowly opening up. Chris reached for his bow, but stopped as he saw the familiar recruit known as Samuel enter the gates with the rest of the expedition team following closely behind.

Everyone seemed to have made it back safely.

But something was off. The mood was somber and nobody seemed too pleased.

Chris looked around the crowd, and concluded everyone was safe and sound. So no one had died, but why did everyone seem so upset? Even the tames looked really angry, and they didn’t know emotion.

Special Raptor was distanced from Skyler, who had a nasty frown across her face. Chris didn’t know what happened to her, but, at that moment Chris felt really bad.

“Why is she so sad?” Chris thought. Chris noticed Gary rush up to the crowd with joy on his face.

“Ah ha! You made it back! So did the plan work-”

Gary paused as he saw Skyler’s frown. He suddenly turned white.

“Where’s… Where’s Sunny?!” Gary asked with shrunken pupils.

“Right here,” Sunny called out. She was carrying some weird thing in her hands and was riding Stream the Kaprosuchus. “And it didn’t go well, if you were wondering.”

Rick scratched his blonde hair.

“It was an accident, Sunny.”

“Don’t care. It was dumb to think that this book of Skyler’s was the TRUE story. That Obelisk almost had us killed. And it almost blew Rick’s brains out in the process.”

Skyler looked down at the ground with shame, and Samuel noticed this. He looked at Sunny with a solemn look in his eyes.

“It’s okay Sunny. It was a genuine mistake. Now Skyler knows that she was wrong, and it’s okay to be wrong. All that matters is that we’re all safe,” Samuel said. He turned to everyone else. Bobby and Simon seemed to be surprised by the news.

Samuel cleared his throat, before announcing,

“Attention folks! Let’s gather at the campfire. Starting now, we have a new plan.”

Gary, Bobby, and Simon made their way to the campfire, while the rest of the humans followed, Skyler sticking out in the back. Chris got up from the ground and rushed over to her.

“Skyler! What’s wrong?” Chris asked as he outstretched his arm.

Skyler looked back and shook her head.

“Don’t wanna talk about it.”

Chris frowned in disapproval, before putting his hands in his pockets and walking up to the campfire and sitting beside her.

“Okay. Fine. Don’t talk about it,” Chris muttered.

As everyone got settled down near the campfires, Chris saw Ben emerge from the shadows. The cheery smile on his face had faded away to more of an annoyed frown. There were vines covering his entire left arm, and the bags under his eyes had faded away.

“Okay. What happened?” Ben immediately asked the million dollar question. Paige let out a snort, and began to explain.

“Okay, so basically…”