Chapter4. Reckless plans

I don't know how much time has passed but we arrive at an island. We get off the boat and are taken to a city, it's a pretty city, and then we are left at a big hall, the bad guys lock us in. "Now what?" I wonder to myself. It looks like all the students who were kidnapped were in this hall so perhaps we could find our friends. Jay, Eve and I search around the hall and come across them, and our gang is finally back together, Jay's friends and mine are all here. we all decide to stick together no matter what.

"What are we gonna do now?" one of Jay's friends asks. "Shouldn't we try to escape?"

"But how will we do that?"another says.

"We are on some kind of island and what surrounds us here are the bad guys and out there is the ocean! How do you expect us to run away unless one of us knows how to navigate through the ocean." Liz reminds us of our helpless state.

"Hey! Your father is a sailor, isn't he? Hasn't he taught you how to run a ship?" Jay asks one of his friends.

He replies, "Yea, he has! I know how to run a small ship or boat but not a big one. And even at that I'm not an expert."

"Well then perhaps we could steal the boat on which we came here." Jay suggests casually.

"Are u guys serious about this cause I'm not sure if this is a smart idea. The ocean is vast, how will we ever find our way back home through it? And how do you expect to steal a boat? What if we get caught? Things could get ugly." I say, because I have a bad feeling this is gonna turn bad.

Just then the bad guys come in, yelling at us, imposing authority and load us onto another truck and take us all somewhere into the mountains.

During our ride there, we all just talk to each other about different things, our worries, home, and even manage to crack some jokes to keep us distracted. Eve was good at it. She was always the fun and cheerful one amongst our crew. She was also the youngest and also the most sensitive one. We were childhood friends and I remember that time when Jay, Eve and I accidentally ruined our neighbor's freshly painted wall. And I blamed it on the kids playing football in the yard and we got away with it laughing and giggling about it. Now here we were, forcing ourselves to giggle through harsh realities. How did it get to this?

Eve rested her head on my shoulder and fell asleep, she must have been exhausted from all the things that happened in the past few days. It's crazy, unrealistic even, how our life turned 180 degrees and now we were probably gonna be slaves.

We reached wherever it was that the bad guys were taking us.

It turns out this is a large scale criminal or terrorist organization and deals with all sorts of bad stuff. And we were brought here to be their slaves and work for them. All of us were sent over to someone under whom we would work. Some were made to work to make weapons, some forced to take part in some drug business, forced labor of all sorts and some simply did the cooking or cleaning of the place where the terrorists lived or worked.

We were lucky enough to have been made in charge of the cooking and cleaning along with some of the boys. But some of them were sent some place else, to do forced labor, I presume.

Me and my friends were made slaves or slave maidens as they called us, we worked at the big old, dirty building of theirs. We cooked and cleaned for the terrorists and it was absolutely frustrating how we had to work ourselves for people like those. And for nothing in return! Since I was thrown into the kitchen to work, I did think of poisoning their food. but where would I even find poison? And if by some miracle I did find it, what would the consequences be if I were to get caught? Would they kill me? I'd rather not act recklessly.

The day passed by and we were exhausted. We were sent to a nearby area for lodging. There were little old houses, more like old shacks which are used for storage, all concentrated in one area, which made it look like a little village but one that has completely gone to ruins. They were some sort of prisons for slaves and some guards guarded the place day and night. That's where we were supposed to spend the night. The storage houses were breaking, their ceilings seemed like they could fall off any moment and the wooden walls seemed years old. It was a very dirty and gloomy space, like abandoned haunted houses, hardly the right place for a person to live. And I guess that was where the slaves would live from now on and us too. We turned in for the night. A group of about ten people stayed at one little shack. Well we even preferred to stay all together. We were all too afraid, traumatized to be left alone, afraid that the darkness would engulf our minds and heart.

The good thing was that we were allowed to step out of the house if we had to, that way we could meet with our friends but of course the guards had their eyes on us all the time. And even then there was still a curfew, the moment the clock struck twelve, if anyone were to be seen outside, no matter what reason it may be for, they would be shot dead! We were warned about it by the terrorists themselves.

We met up with our friends, Eve, Vivi, Liz and also Jay and his friends. We decided to stay together in the same house. And now we were discussing what exactly we're gonna do. Were we still planning to escape? Then how exactly? I said that if we were planning on escaping we had to be familiar with the terrorists' timing as they guard our place at night, so that we can plan our move properly without getting caught and for that it would be better to wait til we're more familiar with all of this. That way we would figure out how this place works a bit. But the rest of the guys weren't content with the idea of staying here any longer.

"Stay here!?" Eve said in surprise. "I get what you mean, but I'm scared. I'd rather we just get out of here as soon as possible!"

"She's right. Who knows what's waiting for us tomorrow." Jay slipped in. And now everyone was firm on the idea of escaping tonight.

"I'm not sure about this, I think we are being too rash. What if we get caught? they will kill us instantly!" I said, hesitating.

"We will be super careful, don't worry, we can make it!"

"And how are we gonna navigate through the ocean?" Vivi asked.

"Nox will be in charge of that, he can run a small boat. And the provisions for the ride are hopefully in that boat, the one we came on here. I saw a lot of food stuffed there. And even if we can't get to the boat by tonight, we will hide in the city we passed by. It's a very big city and hopefully it will be safe."

"I'm still not sure about this. I really think we shouldn't act so recklessly." I opposed it.

"C'mon, Ray. I know you're worried but we can't just sit here and do nothing!" Jay tried to convince me.

And now the plan was basically to sneak out of here after midnight hidden in the cover of darkness, get past the guards somehow and make way down the mountain, through the city, to the shore and back home. Sounds simple enough right!? I seriously think this is a terrible idea, we're basically gambling our lives! But I couldn't convince anyone else to think otherwise.