The Arks: Over Heaven (by Ben)

Chapter 20: The Book Club

Part 1/2

The raft sailed smoothly down the river, carried by a gentle current. Neddy and Ruby still seemed content about chatting away, but there was a clear, awkward tension between Aurora and Samuel.

“I really hope she isn’t too upset about how I feel about… Life,” Samuel thought as he looked onward into the peaceful day. Despite being on an island filled with bloodthirsty creatures out to get them, he found it quite peaceful. These mindless beasts were no smarter than a chicken, all they did was hunt or free constantly. It was like they were built to be this way. In a way, this was like a break for him from school. In school, people were unpredictable. Irrational. And Samuel felt as if that just made life more complicated.

“But here, I don’t really need to worry about any of that,” Samuel thought with a smile.

And steering the raft was Ben, who had decided to take the wheel, or in this case, the lever, in turn of Samuel as he would know where to go from there. But Ben, who was usually a lot chattier than this, was awfully quiet on the way there.

Neddy seemed to notice his unease, so he decided to lighten the mood.

“What’s wrong, bro?” Neddy asked Ben as they traveled upstream.

Ben didn’t respond for a second, but after a minute he finally answered his question.

“The problem I’m facing isn’t for you to solve,” he ominously said, “You don’t have to worry about me. Only about yourself.”

“Ooookay, dude…” Neddy murmured, turning away.

Ben looked ahead for a moment, and he spotted a standing torch that was lit ablaze.

“Ah, here we go! That torch over there marks the camp of the Book Club!” Ben grinned.

~

The group soon docked near the river coastline, where a row of lit standing torches paved the way to a small cluster of huts made of thatch. A perimeter of wooden spike walls surrounded the camp, and stone irrigation pipes ran from the river into the camp’s entrance. One of the three obelisks floated in the sky eerily nearby, its green glow humming so intensely that the friends could hear it from here. It almost sounded like the bellow of a beast. Creepy.

“Wow, you’ve got a lot set up,” Samuel stated with suspicion.

“I didn’t think they’d progress so far,” Ben replied, “I have been gone for pretty much the entire time here on the Ark, though, so I can’t really blame them.”

“This place looks really cool!” Neddy commented happily.

“I agree, this is like a cozy little village,” Ruby replied with a smile while looking around.

“Where’s the leader of the Book Club’s camp?” Aurora asked while crossing her arms. She seemed cautious of the place, still believing Ben and his Book Club to be untrustworthy.

“The leader is right this way,” Ben answered, waving his hand at a thatch hut that was guarded by Raptors.

The five walked down the pathway and up to the thatch hut. One of the Raptors had a significantly more muscular body than the others, including Samuel’s Raptor. Samuel’s Raptor snarled at it, and the big Raptor snapped its jaw at it, causing it to leap back.

“Hey! Knock it out, Special Raptor!” Ben scolded the Raptor. Neddy looked at Ben with a weird expression.

“Really? Special Raptor?” Neddy asked.

“I’m starting to reconsider letting you name mine,” Samuel admitted to Ben.

“Hey don’t blame me! I’m not the one who named her anyway…” Ben said with squinted eyes, “The leader did.”

Ben looked back at the door and knocked on it softly. Footsteps approached the door, and it creaked open, revealing a girl with flowing white hair that seemed to emit a subtle ethereal glow. Some of her white hair had dark spots, it was almost as if she was wearing the Moon atop her head.

“Skyler,” Ben said grimly.

“Hey Ben, I’m glad to see you’ve returned safely!” Skyler chimed cheerily. She looked at the friends Ben had brought eagerly, “And I see you’ve brought more members!”

“Where’s Tiffany? And why are you in her home?” Ben asked immediately.

“So this is not the leader of the camp,” Samuel thought as he looked at her, “Something happened while Ben was gone… And I’m assuming that Tiffany is the leader of the Book Club.”

“My my, Ben,” Skyler explained with a sigh, “Tiffany’s deserted the camp. Overnight she had disappeared. We looked everywhere for her, all around the area but she was nowhere to be found. So I took her stead.”