Chapitre 1: Ships
It was a really hot summer, hotter than all the summers I had lived out before. I liked it when it was really hot. It meant that it was way easier to convince mom and dad to go to the beach. Sometimes I could even get them to go out on a boat or something. It was awesome when we did that. So naturally you can guess that when I saw that today it was going to be almost 89 degrees out, I was so excited. I knew that I would be able to convince mum to convince dad to go out. During breakfast, dad had made scrambled eggs with cheese and bacon, but I didn't like the bacon, so I gave it to my younger brother, I asked if we could go out on a boat. I was never really sure if it was our boat or not, but then again I didn't think it was that necessary to know. All I knew is that sometimes we could go on a big boat and it was fun. A lot of times there were other kids on the boat and it was a lot of fun. We got to play and swim and sometimes we played pranks on the older kids. The older kids never really reacted much, but I still thought it was hilarious.
Mum looked at Dad and gave him this weird look she got sometimes when she didn't want us to know what she was thinking. Sometimes, I think that they can read each others thoughts. One time a fifth grader told me that it was because moms and dads gained superpowers when they got married, and so they were able to do freaky stuff like that. That fifth grader lied a lot though. Dad smiled and nodded, his beard covered in little bits of scrambled eggs. He was bad at eating food. He always got it all over the place.
"Well mom and I were planning to take you guys on a special boat this time around. Its a cruise ship, and we would be gone for a little over a week. Doesn't that sound like fun?" Dad asked, looking more excited than I felt. It was cool though. I liked the idea of going out on a ship for that long. I could only imagine the awesome adventures we would have. A week wasn't even super long anyways. Except when I was in school. In school a week felt like a million years. During the summer though the weeks always felt super short. I don't know why that is.
"Woah! A whole week? But what about nana?" my younger brother asked. He always asked stupid questions.
"Nana is going to go with us. Grandpa too." Mum said, smiling nicely. She had a nice smile. "And we even get to take Turtle." Turtle was our cat. She wasn't an actual turtle cat, although that would have been awesome. She was this most adorable little orange cat with bright green eyes and a happy face. She always looked like she was smiling. She was my most favorite person in the world. Even as we ate breakfast she was sitting by my feet trying to steal food. Sometimes I dropped a bit so she could share. Mum got really mad any time she caught me doing that.
"Wait-- we are bringing Turtle on a boat?! Won't she be like Tom?" Tom from Tom and Jerry. My brother loved that show. I thought it was fine, but he thought it was the best thing ever. Tom from Tom and Jerry did not like water.
"She won't be in the water, she will stay in our suite with us. Isn't that cool? And on this ship they have a whole indoor waterpark just for kids!" Dad said, taking a sip of his gross coffee. "What do you think about that, Aelita?"
"That is pretty tempting… I like that I can bring Turtle. She gets sad when she has to stay at home." I said, trying to play it cool. I hated when they knew I was too happy or excited. They always got so weird.
"We are leaving today. Mum and I have already packed everything up. I think you both will love it. Thomas, do you think you can be a big boy and help me pack up the car after we finish up here?" Dad asked my brother. He looked so damn happy to help out. That was another reason he liked Tom and Jerry though. His name was Tom too. Well, it was Thomas but he liked to be called Tom sometimes. Other times he hated the name Tom and wanted to be Thomas only. I used to make fun of him and call him Thomas the Tank engine but Nana said that wasn't nice of me. I love my Nana, so I usually listened to what she would tell me to do.
We finished eating our scrambled eggs and bacon and all got into our car. The drive to the beach was about twenty minutes, so not really that long. We lived by the ocean on a place called the cape. I think the full name was Cape Cod, but that made me uncomfortable. I hated fish ya see, and so I called it by the better name of "the cape". This beach though wasn't a beach with sand and stuff, but it had this dock that we all stood around on forever until they let us on the boat. It was boring as all heck. I got the job of carrying Turtle in her case. It was a really cute case, I had helped mum pick it out. It had these pink flowers on it and it said Turtle in letters I couldn't read. I only knew it said turtle on it because that's what mum told me.
When we got onto the boat, it was so cool. It was all fancy and it had these pretty rugs once you got inside. Our room was pretty big. Nana and Grandpa were already there. They got this separate room, and mom and dad got their own room too. My brother and I had to share a room, which sucked. I hated sharing a room with him, but that didn't really matter too much. Once mum said it was okay I let Turtle out of her carrier. She was so happy to be free from it. She started to run around like a crazy person and smell everything. Sometimes I thought that Turtle acted like a dog. We used to have a dog named Dixie, but she passed away. I miss Dixie. She was a very good girl. But I loved Turtle a lot too.
The first day I stayed with Turtle. I ate this stupid pasta dish at dinner, and I ended up getting really sick. I had never been sick on a boat before. Man it sucked. I didn't mind hanging out with Turtle though. She was in good company and she laid by my side. I read a lot, even though the waves made me feel even sicker. I read this great book about these three friends, well one of them wasn't a friend, but three friends who ended up getting magic Avalon powers. Nana told me that Avalon was where fairies and stuff lived. I liked that idea. They had more of those books in the gift shop, so Nana bought the whole set for me to read while I was sick. I guess I was sick for a long time though. I don't really remember it too well. I remember the Circle in the Streams Web of magic books though. Those were awesome.
I was a little sad that I couldn't play with the other kids. When I finally started to feel better and not sick, my whole family decided that we had to stay in our room. I didn't get why. That night I do remember Turtle waking me up. She was freaking out and meowing like crazy and she kept trying to climb into my shirt. Mum, dad, Nana and even Grandpa all came into the room and closed the door. We stayed there for a long time. I think the waves or something were really bad. It felt like we were on some really crazy rollercoaster. I held onto Turtle the whole time, and my books. I fell asleep at some point. I think everyone else did too.
Waking up things felt a bit weird. Turtle was happily moving around again, and everyone seemed fine. I am not really sure why, but everything looked super blue. Actually, not really super blue. But it looked blue. Mum said we were underwater. I didn't really get it. She said it was like it was like we were mermaids now. I thought that was pretty awesome. I didn't look like a mermaid though, and neither did anyone else. Plus I could breathe and it didn't really feel like we were underwater. Last time I checked mermaids had cool tails and magic powers. I had none of those.
"Alright Aelita, you need to be careful if you go out.. Make sure to keep Turtle with you at all times, and don't stray too far from the ship." Nana said with a stern look on her face once everyone calmed down and stopped worrying so much. I don't really know how long it took, but I was sure that it didn't take that long. Turtle chirped cutely once I picked her up. She was the cutest cat in the world.
"Okay Nana. I will be. Don't worry, I won't let Turtle out of my sight!" I immediately got out of the suite as quickly as I could. Since I hadn't had much of a chance to explore, I thought it would be good to get my bearings first. Turtle laid herself across my shoulders as we traversed the halls. The lights still worked and everything, but they had this kinda dulled look to them. It was bright enough to see everything though. Everything smelt so salty, but I liked the smell of the ocean. In a way, it felt like home. Maybe it was because we always went to the beach when it was hot in the summertime. I wasn't sure. At the end of the hall there was this huge mirror type deal with a pretty fancy gold frame. I looked at myself with Turtle on my shoulders and pictured myself being a noble woman looking for her husband. Turtle looked a bit like a fur scarf, though I quickly decided that she was more like a familiar. One of the girls in the Avalon books had a familiar wolf. I thought that was just the coolest thing. Looking at myself, I felt a bit different than before. A little bit more refined. My hair looked way more.. Swoosh.
Going down the hall further I found a staircase. I flew up the staircase as fast as I could, and immediately I found a door to the outside. I grinned, going to it and swinging it open too much. It didn't slam though. It was actually kinda hard to open at all.
It was beautiful outside. I couldn't feel a breeze or anything, but the ocean was very nice looking. I made my way out and held onto the rails, feeling like I could so easily just float away if I didn't hold on. There were fish and stuff in the water, and it looked like a lot of seaweed. The sun wasn't out, so it wasn't like I could see out too far. After a few I got bored of that spot and traveled around the deck. The storm had knocked out some windows it seems. Some of the worker guys were trying to fix them, but I didn't know how much luck they would have. After all, without new glass what could they do? I waved at them anyways to be polite. I don't think they saw me, but that didn't matter. There were some other people out too. Some little kids were playing around, but they were closer to Thomas' age than mine. At least thats what it looked like. Finally however when I got towards the front of the ship I found something actually cool. The gift shop.
The windows of the gift shop were broken too, but it looked like everything had stayed in its place somehow. I made my way inside, a bit worried that they would tell me to keep Nami away. They didn't, thankfully. Actually the person in the shop was really nice.
"Oh what a cute cat! What's his name?" He was this old guy with white hair that looked a bit like a pirate's.
"She's a girl. Her name is Turtle." I said, tilting my head so it laid against hers. She chirped in response. She really was the cutest.
"Turtle huh? That is a bit of irony right there. Well I am happy to welcome Turtle into my humble shop. Looking for anything in particular today?" He asked me with a smile. I liked this old guy.
"I am in the market for some books, I think. My nana got this great series here, and I need something new to read." I felt very adult saying that. Grandpa said that sort of stuff all the time when he was getting new books from the library. I loved the library.
"Some new books, huh? Well, I don't know how much I have left. The storm and all made books hard to come by commodity." I didn't really get that, but whatever. "Hmmm I have some thoughts over here, made especially for reading by the water or pool. Have you read The Lord of the Rings before?" He asked, handing me this book. It was a weird book. The pages were all plasticy. "It's a classic of fantasy."
"I haven't but my Nana read The Hobbit to me. Its by that guy, right? J K Tolkien?"
"Close! J.R.R. Tolkien. J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter." The man laughed. He had a nice laugh at least, so I did not feel too upset that I made a mistake.
"Yeah him. His name is too similar to the Harry Potter writer."
"He's a great author. Here, why don't you take this? On me. I am always happy to share such a classic with a young person. It's nice to see a kid so interested in reading, especially at your age." I thanked the guy. I took the book, which was kinda heavy, and I looked around the store a bit more. The other stuff there was fine I guess. A lot of jewelry, snow globes, and big ugly earrings on those turny displays. After I was done I thanked the guy and went on my way to find more excitement. It didn't take long. Someone loudly yelled 'whale' and then everyone went out running to see the whale. It was huge. The biggest thing I had ever seen move. I was almost surprised by how graceful it was. Everyone made lots of noise over it, but I think that made the whale uncomfortable so it left. I tried to play it cool but it was too late. The whale left. Turtle played it cool too. She just stared at it and flicked her tail. I tried to tell her that it was a fish she absolutely could not eat. I do not think that Turtle cared too much about what I told her though.
After we all watched the whale go by in awe, a new sight came into our view. Sudden cheers went up in the crowd around me. I didn't get it all that much, but everyone was cheering cause we saw a boat. My dad came up beside me, out of nowhere, with Tom.
"Woah, thats a big boat! Do you think they are like us?" Tom asked, his eyes wide as he held onto the rail of our ship.
"They must be.. Thank god. It means we aren't alone out here…" He muttered. I only caught that because I didn't care too much about looking at the boat.
"What do you mean we aren't alone out here? Why is everyone cheering?" I asked, suddenly feeling the need to actually hold Turtle in my arms. Dad looked at me, his face hard to read. He looked tired and his grey hair was way more noticeable right now. He smiled then, though it wasn't his normal goofy smile.
"I guess because we weren't sure there was anyone else out there like us. But now we know that we aren't alone down here."
I didn't care too much about listening any more. I looked at Tom and waved my hand, telling him to follow. He nodded and told dad that he was going to go play with me. Dad sighed and just said okay. He was being very weird.
Tom and I made our way down into the ship. I wanted to explore the bottom floors, since I hadn't had a chance to see much of what down there looked like. However we didn't get too far before Nana found us. It was like they wanted to make my life more difficult. Then again, I couldn't ever be too mad at Nana.
"There you two are. Come along now. Its time for dinner." She said, petting Turtle's head very nicely.
"Already? It feels like I have only been out here for like… an hour, max." I sighed and kissed Turtle's head. My brother groaned as well, but he wasn't really allowed to make too many complaints. I would get mad at him if he did.
"Time flies when you are having fun! Oh, what do you have there?" She asked me, motioning towards the book I had completely forgotten about.
"Oh! This is a waterproof copy of Lord of the Rings. The nice man at the shop gave it to me. He said a lot of the other books are gone. Whatever that means."
"Oh how lovely… I always wanted you to read these. I know you loved The Hobbit so much. This is incredibly precious… Make sure to keep it close, okay, Aelita?" Nana hugged me then. I don't know why, but it made me want to cry. I was almost sure I was crying, but it was impossible to tell. I held her tightly and vowed that I would read this all book, even if it was super heavy and long.
That night we all sat around our little suite together and ate fish. I didn't like it, and everyone seemed to be in sour moods. I couldn't really tell why, but I was beginning to think that something was even more wrong than I thought. Nothing felt quite right. Turtle seemed okay at least, so I had that. When I went to bed that night, it felt like the moon never shone overhead.
The next morning I woke up feeling rather sluggish. It took awhile to pull myself out of bed. Turtle seemed extra tired too. I didn't even bother with breakfast and instead I remained in my room to read. Nana checked in on me a few times, as did Tom and Mom. I insisted however that I just wanted some time alone, and I read. The book was awesome. I could so vividly picture the journey that Frodo and Sam went on, and I wanted to experience it myself. Once I finished the whole thing, it felt like it took no time at all, I started it immediately over. I didn't want the adventure to really end. It seemed better than this boring stupid ship that we were stuck on.
In truth, I have no idea how long I spent in my room. I barely took breaks, but I also barely felt tired. Night never seemed to come either so I was certain that it didn't take that long. For such a long heavy book, I was zooming through it like nothing. Finally after I had read it a third time I got up. I stretched, looked at Turtle who was rushing around in circles. She looked restless. I sighed and picked her up, kissing her cute forehead before I made my way out to the rest of the suite.
"Look who has finally emerged." Dad teased me. He seemed to be in a better mood, although I wasn't sure why. "You missed a lot. Want the long rundown or the short sprint through what's happened?"
"That sounds important, so I guess the short sprint." I said, smiling as I stretched out. Grandpa laughed gruffly at my comment. I was proud he found me amusing.
"We finally were able to make contact with several other ships, all in similar situations. It took awhile, but it seems like we are stable and safe here within our little community now. We elected a president… and we got attacked by pirates."
I stared at my dad, expecting him to say it was a joke. But it was not a joke.
"Wait, how in hell did I miss us getting attacked by pirates???" I asked. Nothing else really interested me that much.
"You were safe inside, and well, we didn't want to bother you while you were reading. This has been hard on everyone, and if you had some sort of escape then.." Mum spoke up. She looked concerned.
"Mom, how long was I in my room for?"
"Around 2 and a half days." She said. As she spoke Nana handed me a plate of something. I could not tell what it was. I didn't care. I ate whatever it was, mushy and all. I was suddenly really hungry.
"Thats a long time.." I said, looking at my mom and then my brother. "How long have we been out here now?"
"They think its been at least a month. Longest they say is a year, but it is so hard to tell." Grandpa said, his expression tired. "For you kids I imagine it is even harder to tell. We don't feel tired any more, and we barely need to eat. We cannot see the sun or the moon or anything. Everyone feels strange."
"I guess I noticed that things were weird but.. I mean, does this mean this is our home now?" I asked, trying to process. "It must mean this is our home now. If we have been here that long.."
"Yeah. For now at least, this is our home."
I suddenly felt very sick. I missed my room. My bed, my sheets and covers. I missed my school, my friends. I thought a lot about my friends. Where were they? Did they miss me, know that I was in this strange place? Were my teachers okay, the guy who gave me ice cream at the beach, what about him? My head swirled with thoughts, but soon they drifted to the Lord of the Rings. I focused on that, the story of Frodo and his adventure from home. I think it was around this time that it became a true inspiration to me. I followed him, in my own way. He wasn't the same after his adventure, and home never really felt like home again. So he left Middle Earth. Maybe that is what happened to us.
They were right. Time felt weird now. We had no idea when days and nights went, and it didn't matter too much. During this new era, I found myself exploring with Tom a lot more. He became my Sam, until he found his own Frodo. A young guy named Ty. Tom and Ty, it sounded nice together. They soon went off and spent their time together doing whatever it is that boys do. I didn't really get it, but I didn't think that I needed to know. So I spent a lot of time going in and out of the boat, exploring a nearby shipwreck, exploring the reefs nearby.. That is where I met her.
Turtle went with me this whole time, of course. She had become my companion on many levels, and she always followed along. She liked chasing the fish, and she liked being out of our new home. It was nice, since in our original home she wasn't allowed outside. Here, it was safe enough. Turtle is why I met Moni. Her name was actually Monika and she was from Poland. She had an accent, but it wasn't too bad. I could understand her well. She was a lot like me. She had been caught out here, but on another ship. She had very pretty hair that she insisted was wavy. I didn't really see it too much, but I also couldn't always tell.
Moni liked Lord of the Rings too. We started off by talking about Turtle, who had run into Moni by accident when we were looking around another ship. She loved Turtle, and said at home she had a similar cat. I felt bad, so I said she could pet turtle if she wanted to. She did, and from there we just kinda bonded.
She was nice to be around. I felt safe with her, and she was warm to hug. We spent a lot of time just staring up, talking, and slowly but surely we became close friends. She was everything to me, after Turtle of course.
One day, Moni got an idea with me. We went up. We weren't supposed to go upwards, the adults all said it was dangerous. But we wanted to, to see what it was really like there. Up was our Mordor, and we were determined to reach the peak even if it killed us. There was nothing else down here anyways. Plus, Turtle came with us. It felt safe with Turtle there.
When we did, we realized we were not alone. The sky looked wrong. It was gray, like there was a storm going on. Others were peaking up as well, looking around. The adults had lied it seemed, but we weren't surprised. When we looked around, there was nothing but water for miles and miles.
After our expedition we regrouped in what used to be the gift shop. It was empty now, and the kind old guy didn't mind letting us hang out there.
"What do you think that means?" Moni asked me, looking at a snowglobe that had cracked. "I mean, do you think that it's all like that now?"
"I mean that would make sense. Like we all can't leave, and everyone doesn't really get what's going on so I think something really big happened which is why we are all stuck here." I said, playing with Turtle's paws as she said on the ground with her belly up. She seemed rather content to be lazy after that adventure. "But then again who really knows. This whole place is a mess… We don't even know how long we have been out because of some stupid reason." I sighed, looking at Moni with a concerned look. "Do you ever like, miss home?"
"I guess… No, I mean, I do miss home. I just… I don't like thinking about it. If everything is really gone then… I don't know." She sighed loudly and flung her arms up in the air. "Its so stupid! All of it. I wish we could just run away."
"Yeah, I agree… but I don't think Turtle would be happy." I said, petting Turtle's tummy which resulted in a cute chirp from her. Moni sighed again. She sighed a lot.
"You are right… ugh this just sucks."
We had a lot more conversations like that. Almost every 'day', if you could call them days, we got together and talked about how stupid it all was and how we wished we could be off somewhere having an adventure. Instead we were stuck in a stupid ship.
Then like magic something happened. A ray of sunlight. At first, everyone thought it was just a light from another ship. But then, everyone began to gather around it and look upwards. It was coming from above. In large swarms we all went up to see, Moni and I, my brother and family, Turtle too. In the sky there were breaks in the clouds that had seemed ever present. And in the horizon there was land.
Everyone cheered and swirled around. In a hurry the ships were brought up too, like magic suddenly able to float once more. When it rose up we all got on and waited for when we reached land again, finally. Moni and I hugged each other close, Turtle in between us.
When we got there, there was screaming from land. A broken shoreline met us, as well as remnants of what looked to be those weird Russian mushroom buildings. It was just the tops though under sand or something. People gathered up on the shoreline, and we rushed out like everyone else to go talk to them.
Moni and I got there almost first. We were still in the water of course, Turtle now perched on my head. However, something was wrong. They were screaming and began to throw things at us, and tried to catch us.
Moni tried to translate for me. They kept screaming Rusalka rusalka and other things like that. Moni said it sounded weird though, not like normal Russian. My mom swam up by us and pulled us away from the shore, towards the ship once again. There were whispers around from those onboard.
Apparently, they said, it seemed like a lot more time had passed than we thought, and that land was no longer our home. I wanted to cry, but it's hard to cry underwater. The tears don't fall, they just mix in with the water.
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone