Vida lifted her head off the bed, her dreadlocks raising off her pillow as she looked around in confusion.
She had awoken in a small room, barely able to fit the bed she was laying on.
Sunlight came through a single, round window above Vida's bed. The window was made of thick glass, bolted down with reinforced steel.
"Where…" Vida cut herself short as her momentary confusion subsided.
It was her first morning on the ship heading for Australia.
They had left the compound the night before, so late in fact that they didn't have a chance to say goodbye to the other compound residents.
Alex guided them to the harbor, where the small boat they had set up the night before was still tied to a broken down wooden pier.
After rowing a couple miles into Tokyo bay, Charlotte's ship found them. The kids were so exhausted by the time they boarded the ship that Charlotte didn't even introduce herself, instead opting to just show them to their rooms.
Now, in the light of the pacific ocean's sunrise, Vida got up, following the signs hanging from the hallway's ceiling to the cafeteria after trying her best to keep her morning routine in one of the ship's small restrooms.
"Hey!" A tall blonde woman wearing a brown cowboy hat ran up to Vida, who was still only half awake.
"Hi." Vida smiled politely, trying to remember the woman's name as she rubbed her eyes.
"Oh, right. We weren't able to get our introductions in before you guys hit the hay." The woman pointed to one of the tables on the other side of the lunch hall. "C'mere, we can get introductions out the way first thing in the morning."
The woman walked over to the table, where Vida saw all of her friends sitting side by side, just as tired as her.
"This is the first time you've been the last one up." Akilah groaned, fixing her glasses as she let out a small smile, the biggest one she could muster at the moment.
Vida sat down in the one empty seat between Hendrix and Amora as the woman with the cowboy hat began to speak, standing at the end of the rectangular table.
"Alright, now that you're all here, my name is Charlotte. I'm the captain of this ship and the leader of the Sydney compound." Charlotte scratched her head as she thought to herself for a second before continuing. "Well, I guess both of them are the same thing… What I'm trying to say is this ship is the compound!"
The kids looked at each other, all but Biggie and Slim being surprised by the revelation.
"Yeah, they blend in with the cargo ships going in and out of Sydney harbor." Slim nodded, the compound being old news to him and Biggie.
"We have a building in one of the rural districts of Sydney, so we'll use that once we get to Australia since we're heading into the outback." Charlotte explained. "But for now, just relax. We'll be there in a few days."
Charlotte gave a thumbs up before walking away
"If anyone needs me, I'll be up on the deck." Charlotte waved to the kids as she exited the lunch hall.
"Did she say a few days…?" Chase's brow furrowed as he clutched his stomach.
"Yeah, this isn't a plane." Biggie shook his head.
"Babe, it'll be okay. You were just getting used to the waves last night-" Amora's reassurance was interrupted.
"I'm gonna lose my fucking mind!" Chase shot up and ran towards the restroom, his head spinning as he felt the ship rock back and forth under his feet.
Amora sighed, standing up and out of her seat as she went after him.
"Yeah… Diddo…" Kai muttered, his head hanging over the back of his chair as he tried his best to keep himself from vomiting.
"You barely made it through the flight to Tokyo, I don't know what you expected, bro." Taro chuckled, giving his brother a light punch to the shoulder.
"I guess it'll be cool to get a few days off." Hendrix scratched the back of his head. "I wonder how people train on a boat."
"I'm not training shit." Biggie interjected, crossing his arms as he leaned back. "I'm already good, plus who would wanna spar on a rocking boat?!"
Hendrix shrugged and nodded, simultaneously agreeing and trying to prevent an argument.
"Well, we're gonna be stuck on this boat for at least a week, so we might as well find something to do." Slim turned to Biggie and raised his brow.
Biggie scoffed in return.
The day seemed to go by at a snail's pace, every hour passing by with little to nothing to do.
A few hours later, Hendrix decided to go onto the deck to watch the sunset.
Despite the jokes the group had thrown at Chase and Kai for their seasickness earlier, most of them were now stuck in their rooms falling to the same fate.
Hendrix, however, was able to escape that fate, now leaning onto the guard rails on the edge of the deck as he watched over the pacific ocean's calming waves.
He heard a sigh from behind him. "Finally time to relax."
Hendrix turned around to see an exhausted Charlotte.
"Here." Charlotte handed Hendrix an unmarked bottle.
"Ooh, I haven't had soda in a while." Hendrix thought, grabbing the bottle as popped the cap off against the guard rail in front of him.
The boy took his first sip of the soda-
"Oh god." Hendrix thought, trying to hide his disgust. It tasted nothing like any type of soft drink the teen had tried before, but he kept his opinion to himself in an attempt to avoid offending his host.
"Jason told me you're like the group's leader." Charlotte said, looking into the sunset. "But you're pretty quiet for such a rambunctious group."
Charlotte bumped Hendrix's shoulder and smiled, taking a sip of her soda before continuing.
"I've gotta see your skills once you land. You must be one hell of a fighter." Charlotte said.
"I don't know." Hendrix muttered in response.
"Oh, come on." Charlotte scoffed. "Even though you're quiet, I could tell from the first glance that your friends look up to you."
Hendrix looked to Charlotte with a confused face, awaiting an explanation.
"Oh, you really don't see it?" Charlotte chuckled and took another sip from her bottle. "Every one of those kids look to you when anything about combat comes up in a conversation, I could see it every time they talked to someone on board."
Hendrix went silent, mulling over Charlotte's observation.
He looked down as he noticed he hadn't taken a swig from his soda in a while.
Hendrix glanced at Charlotte, trying to see if she noticed his almost full bottle before taking a deep breath.
Gulp
Hendrix threw the bottle back and gulped the entire bottle, trying to get it down as fast as possible to taste as little of it as possible.
"Woah, I like your style." Charlotte chuckled and patted the boy's shoulder. "I'll go get you another one."
"Oh my god, please no." Hendrix screamed in his head, nodding to Charlotte as he attempted to get over the taste of the drink.
This cycle went on for a little over an hour. Hendrix would reluctantly down his soda, before Charlotte politely got him another one.
They talked, or, more accurately, Charlotte talked about everything under the sun, her rants swerving from daily struggles to philosophical questions.
"Woah, sorry kid. I get a little talkative when I drink." Charlotte shook the bottle in her hand.
Hendrix looked at her with a confused face.
"I think I'm getting seasick. I should go to bed." Hendrix thought as the last of the sun's orange light disappeared over the pacific ocean's horizon, replaced with thousands of stars twinkling in the night sky.
The boy's head began to spin as his legs felt weaker underneath him.
"Y'know what, I like ya kid. Thanks for talking with me." Charlotte smiled. "I'm surprised you can kick back beers that fast at your age. You don't look a day over twenty-five."
"I'm sixteen." Hendrix muttered, putting his hand on his forehead to stop his head from spinning.
"The fuck?" Charlotte said, beginning to slur her words.
"Holy shit, you're a kid." Charlotte squinted her eyes at Hendrix's face.
Hendrix looked down at what had to be the fourth bottle he's held in the last hour.
The boy suddenly began to feel a wave of warmth cover his body, slowly realizing what was actually inside the bottles.
"Alright, kid. Let's get you to sleep." Charlotte sighed. "I'm sorry about all that. I'll have to explain this to everyone in Tokyo later."
Charlotte softly guided Hendrix towards the staircase that led below the deck, the both of them stumbling over their feet as neither of them were sober enough to guide the other.
"One and two and…" Charlotte narrated their descent down the stairs, both of them cautious not to trip down the dozens of steps.
"Alright, almost there-" Charlotte was interrupted-
A scream echoed down the hallway, coming from one of the teen's bedrooms.
"What was that?" Charlotte and Hendrix both said, turning to the other like one of them would know more than the other.