Spoiler! :
Prologue
This was the time in my life that I never would've thought would happen. I, Alyson Kaleigh Timmons, was wanting to be back at our small, slightly dilapidated, old, crumbling town in Arizona. I wanted to feel excluded from my sisters' friends like usual, I wanted to sit around the house bored with absolutely nothing to do, I wanted to be rambling on about how English grammar made no sense to the other odd ball teenager in our town, Mia, I wanted to have no more drama than a regular fourteen year old girl, where broken nails, tripping, tangled hair, not being able to find something fashionable in the morning to wear, and just plain, simple embarrassment was all that could happen and leave relatively small emotional scars.
All those seemingly important things before were immensely trivial now that I was facing death on a daily basis.
Or at least I thought I was. Who knew what was really going on? I couldn't figure it out. But what did I know? I was just a mere teen, a kid really. And all at the same time that I was still quite immature and inexperienced, I was realizing something more and more.
This whole mess was bigger than I had anticipated or dreamed of. I could tell that this something was being revealed to me by me, slowly but surely.
Surely, perhaps, but I knew it was the slow part of it that could determine life or death for me in a sense. In fact, it was worse than death. Instead of simply dying I would have to live my life for the next seventy years or so with lacking knowledge and having my memories controlled by another person. That was not something I would allow, and I would try with all my might and power to prevent it.
All my thoughts, my experiences could all disappear in a second. I was at the mercy of whatever this was that was holding this destructive program at bay.
I couldn't trust anyone or anything, not even my own family and certainly not this strange delay from the mind erasing that was becoming more frighteningly common as the minutes ticked by.
I was abandoned, alone, in my life that was now surrounded by suffocating confusion, like a millions miles of desolate desert around me. Unless I could find a way to escape this land, this situation, I would perish. I needed more time to fight this. I needed more strength to battle it off. I needed so much, but having needs didn't mean I would get them fulfilled.
Whatever was truly going on, I knew without a doubt that I would need some help other than just myself, who was weak and completely powerless.
-:~:-
CHAPTER 1
[i]Beginning of the Beginning
I pedaled my bicycle as fast as I could, racing back home from school. My heart sped and my lungs heaved as I struggled through the weed ridden road.
I looked down at the ground below me, as it was whizzing by at a dizzying speed. I wasn't surprised to see mainly green colors with only a tint of grey, the result of being neglected in our small town for years. I started to breath heavily in the blistering Arizona heat; it was thirty five or more degrees out and not a hint of a helpful cooling breeze in sight, but even with the sunlight glaring in my eye I pushed my pedals in a pace faster than the one I had been on before. The sooner I got home the sooner I could pack for the summer holidays I was itching to leave for. Our family was planning to go to San Diego, California for two weeks in a month's time but when it's this exciting everything has to be perfect – an expectation I knew I wouldn't fulfill, but I could always aim high.
And as corny as it sounds, finally, a dream come true. I had wished for this vacation as far back as I could remember.
I didn't think that this day would ever come, could ever be even possible. And yet, here it was, right in my reach.
I would have smiled smugly, but since I had just raced back from all the way across our small town, Highler, I was out of breath, using all of my effort to relieve my oxygen thirsty, desperate lungs.
In a way I was kind of ashamed of myself, since our house was only located a few blocks away from the elementary school, but I did have a slight excuse, however, as the street I was on was going uphill, plus the weather was hot enough that you could just sit outdoors and you'd be sweating within a few seconds.
Our house was parked at one of the last houses before the road broke off onto another avenue.
Even though my throat was burning, I wanted to go faster, as if to push myself closer to Ocean World, the aquatic park that we were headed to.
Just a month, I repeated in my head, miserably failing to convince myself that it was only thirty days left. Right now, thirty days felt more like thirty years or longer.
I had already waited my entire life for that day to come, when I could feel a dolphin's glossy, smooth skin with my own hands, or watch them soar, leaping across the waters, flying more graceful than a dove. That made me feel even more impatient.
I pumped my bicycle harder, starting to stand up on the pedals as I steered my way over to our house.
I was starting to get tired, and I sighed in relief when I pulled up into the bumpy driveway, which was filled with jean blue, dirty beige, and an earthly brown gravel set in pavement. I nearly had the patterns of them memorized, as I had lived in this town my whole life. I could remember far back, farther back than either of my sisters, when I was maybe around six, trying to draw a hop-scotch pattern on the driveway. It finally occurred to me that the rough gravel wasn't the greatest canvas, so I tried to find the prettiest, shiniest rocks that were embedded into the cement. Of course, now my optimistic spirits had dwindled down to nearly nothing. If that had been me with my personality now, I would have given up and had nothing to do with the aggravating driveway. Too bad I wasn't always so carefree and easily joyed now, when I was twelve. I had to grimace, though, at my current age. I couldn't imagine what my enthusiasm would be like when I was in my twenties.
I wheeled my bicycle into our olive green garage, which we had just painted last weekend. How odd, it seemed, that that was just a week ago. Now that I was focused on one thing and one thing only, Ocean World, everything else that had happened recently felt like it was months ago instead of just days.
My parents had been extremely enthusiastic about renovating our entire property, our garage, to start, then our porch – which was a good idea, since it was practically just some wooden planks and stumps nailed together – and then the final, larger project, our house.
They had already shown my sisters and I the walls they would knock down, where they would relocate our bedrooms, etcetera, etcetera. The whole let's-rebuild-this-house attitude was getting on my nerves, as the renovations were all that we talked about now.
Sighing as I thought about all of the long, boring conversations that our family recently had about fixing our place up, I rested my bicycle against the garage's inside wall, not bothering to try to balance it upright with the kickstand, something I knew I would fail at before trying – I had terrible hand-eye coordination – then walked back out, watching my footsteps closely as I placed them with equal spaces between each stride. I was a little dizzy from the heat and all of the effort I had put into my fast bike ride, pushing my balance off more than I liked it too, so I was attempting to fight it by watching every step that I took. That would hopefully help me slightly.
I reached our creaky porch, then lightly stepped up onto the steps, half afraid I would snap the nearly paper thin wood planks if I stomped. I walked over to the door and turned and pulled the handle.
The door didn't budge. I twisted it again, and for a moment I was perplexed about it, then I remembered that I would be the first one home from school, since I had been going so fast on my bicycle that I could've raced trains.
I laughed aloud at myself, causing our neighbor's unfriendly bulldog to start to bark at me. He was so small, but acted like a rottweiler, as if he could take down a full grown man. He rocketed himself at me through the four foot chain link fence, his stubby legs barely lifting him more than a few inches off of the ground. Still, determined as ever, he kept jumping up towards me, ramming his body into the fencing.
If a person could be as stubborn as an animal, I couldn't imagine what someone would be capable of doing. He was – in a way – smarter than me. At least not forgetful, like I was being right now, as he hated laughter from a past experience.
In my excitement to pack, I had completely forgotten that Marygold was the only one with the key.
Her and my other sister, Callie, were twins, but Marygold was older by a few minutes. Callie had agreed that Marygold more mature and was better at keeping things safe – such as our house key – including me.
Strangely enough, me and Callie were more similar to each other than she was to Marygold, even though Callie and Mary were twins.
Callie was closer to me, too, as we both had extremely similar personalities, except one major difference. Callie was so entirely selfless and caring, while I was more self centered. Much more. Callie thought of everything from everyone's perspective, thought about what everyone else would do before she thought she would do. She would always – or nearly always – weight every option and consequences that came with it before deciding the final choice.
It was something I wished I had - the sheer thoughtfulness.
I, on the other hand, had a much more closed mindset. I would nearly always ignore other people's opinions and just stick to my own.
Sighing, I found a spot on the porch that the wood wasn't splintered into pieces, then sat down. I wished we hadn't moved the bench off of the porch, but it did make sense, since we were going to destroy the whole porch soon. The only things left on it were the wind chimes I had gotten from my birthday a year ago.
That thought caught my attention, and I glanced up at the chimes that were lightly singing from above me. The dolphin that sat above the silver four chimes was spinning around from the sudden whoosh of breeze. Too bad the wind hadn't been kind enough to give me that gush of coolness when I was riding my bike.
I then drove my mind to the birthday that I had gotten the gift, when I was being overly obsessive about dolphins. I had planned out my entire room to be a deep, aqua blue and to have dolphin posters plastered around it. My enthusiasm had shriveled, though, after a few months. I knew it was because of the sudden thrill of discovering my love for the creatures, and now it had worn off a little bit. Kind of like the excitement I was feeling now for California. If I had always lived there, the rush of adrenaline wouldn't be so profound.
“Right, right, of course that's how you would open up the lock, Callie,” I recognized Marygold's voice, which seemed to be on the same tune as the wind chimes, but it still broke into my train of thought.
“No. . don't you do this?” I could hear some clinking of metal pieces, but I didn't bother wondering what it was.
However, I kept listening to their uninteresting conversation from the porch; they probably didn't even know that I was there, wrapped up in talking to each other on the front lawn.
Then, after a few, silent seconds, I decided to save them some embarrassment and just tell them I was there.
I walked down the porch steps, letting my feet sluggishly plop down on each of them. Marygold, as well as other people, would have gotten frightened if I appeared out of thin air. I was trying to forewarn them with my noisiness, ignoring my earlier fear of breaking them. My family was going to tear the whole thing down sooner or later.
“Hey, guys,” I said, my voice low. Making conversation was generally easy, but today I had nothing to talk about. To them, at least. Their enthusiasm was so insignificant compared to mine that it was nearly depressing.
Why couldn't there be someone that shared the same passion I had about aquatic animals? How I wanted to work with animals for the rest of my life, to save endangered species and work with injured animals, such as sea turtles? I started to rant in my head – something that usually kept me awake into the late hours in the night – and I stopped myself before I began a never ending debate.
But that was the only thing I had ever even thought of doing, of becoming. A marine biologist.
I knew I had tunnel vision with careers, and I was only twelve, much too young to even decide what I was going to do with my life, but I couldn't help it.
It was like I was born with the desire to work with dolphins. No, more like an instinct, and it was unstoppable. Like a predator's instinct to hunt, or a prey's instinct to run, I was preprogrammed with my career.
I finally reached the bottom of the porch steps when Marygold's head whipped up to look at me.
“Oh,” She said, then quickly looked away, letting her golden, wavy locks hide her blushing face, “Hi, Aly. ”
She obviously didn't like getting caught talking about such a topic as lock picking.
I was surprised to see Faith, my sister's friend, sitting there. Not so much that she was with them as she was being quiet. Generally, Faith's words would always dominate any conversation she had was my sisters, but now, it was Marygold's. I wondered if I should submit this to a world record book, as I couldn't recall Faith ever going more than a minute without having to say something in her scratchy, high pitched voice. Unlike Marygold's songbird tone, hers were more like fingernails on a chalkboard. Just as high, but unpleasant.
“Hey!” Faith said, causing me to cringe at her voice. It was nothing personal, it was just that my ears weren't at all accustomed to the noise.
The world record had been broken, apparently, now that Faith had greeted me.
I just smiled at her, trying to be polite. Callie snorted quietly at my face, then quickly looked away, too. I was probably failing at my attempt to look welcoming to Faith, and I was more than likely grimacing right now.
There was a silent pause, and no one was looking at me. I blushed slightly, then asked, “Mary, I kind of need the key for the door,” I asked, getting straight to the point. No reason for delays.
“Oh,” She said again, then she dug her hands into her jean shorts pocket. “here you go. ” She tossed me the bronze colored key.
“Thanks,” I said, nearly catching it – but failed. It flew through my hands, then I had to go chase after it for a few seconds. I would have thought Marygold had picked up on my clumsiness by now, but now I didn't think so.
Once I found it in the scarce grass, I was a little happier that I'd get to start packing right away, and also thankful that she hadn't started the whole lock picking discussion because she had lost the house key and was scheming of a way to get back in her own home.
In the back of my head, I wondered if they were planning to break into something, or just making conversation. Anyways, it didn't matter right now.
I raced back up the porch, tripping on the last step, then quickly regained my balance and unlocked the door.
I flipped the lights on, even though it wasn't entirely necessary with the brilliant sunlight streaming in through the large kitchen window.
I kicked my dusty runners off, then passed the entrance. I walked to the left, where the kitchen was. But there was something at the entrance.
I looked back at the doorway, where there were four plump suitcases by the front door, making me suspicious.
I wouldn't have thought that Marygold and Callie would have packed so early, storing their precious clothes away for a whole month, or even my parents. I was usually much less practical than they were, choosing not to use more than half of my wardrobe until we were in San Diego.
Ignoring the suitcases, I grabbed a cup from the dishwasher, then filled it to the brim of ice cold water from the tap.
Starting to gulp down the water, I glanced around our house, which was in no condition to renovate yet.
Our small but surprisingly roomy home was now crowded with flashy vacation items, even without the suitcases. Pamphlets and tourist brochures were strewn across our kitchen island, the bright paper laying open, as if they were asking me to read them. I didn't, though, because I already knew what they would say.
The marine blue colors gave away that it was from Ocean World, and what else what it be? But a month away? I couldn't think of anyone other than myself that would be that desperate for information.
I myself, though, would know more about Ocean World than a few pieces of paper would hold, so the chances that I would even want to look through one of the shallow facts on the pages was slim.
I heard the front door creak open.
“See you later, Faith!” Callie said, waving to Faith from the doorway. Marygold walked past her, taking her fuchsia, flowery flip flops off. I personally didn't see the point of wearing such footwear in Highler, since the roads were so unkempt that every few meters a sharp stone would be sure to be picked up in a flip flop, causing a killer bruise, but I didn't sound my opinion.
I was done the huge cup of water before Callie closed the door.
Both of my sisters were being awkwardly silent, something I wanted badly to break. Unlike them, I hated silence. It was too still, too calm – it made me nervous, like any sound would be louder than a nuclear bomb exploding.
“So. ” I finally said as they stood there, staring off into space. They weren't acting at all like they usually were.
No reply.
“Okay, so what's up?” I asked as I rested myself against the blue-black marble kitchen island.
“Hmm. The ceiling,” Callie replied, tilting her head and glancing up above her, smiling at her own words.
It was so like her to use an old joke. Not to mention to use an old, overused joke. Her tone, though, almost made it funny, but not enough to make me laugh at her words.
“Haha,” I said sarcastically, then my tone turned serious. “Really. ”
“Nothing that I know of,” Marygold said.
“Well, Mom and Dad's suitcases are packed, if you haven't noticed,” Callie said, her eyes briefly flickering to the luggage which were to the her side.
Way to state the obvious.
“I've noticed,” I said, “and there's yours, I'm assuming. ”
“No, at least I didn't pack them. All I know is that half of my clothes are gone,” Marygold said, almost a moan.
Well, at least we wouldn't have to wait for long for our answer about the sudden vacation plans, as our parents closed their printing shop down before six o' clock, and it was three fifty, according to the stove clock.
A little more than two hours, and I'd figure out why it seemed like we were leaving tomorrow instead of in a month.
I froze as the thought crossed my mind.
Callie and Mary started to walk away from me, down the hallway that was opposite the direction of the kitchen.
“Wait,” I murmured, unable to force my voice louder than a whisper.
They, too, froze.
“What if we're going tomorrow?” I asked breathlessly, the realization starting to sink in. Tomorrow. In two days, we'd be at Ocean World. My mind was starting to do calculations, trying to figure out how many hours that would be.
I couldn't be completely sure of the exact hours, since I didn't know what time our flight would be, but I knew that two days was sooner then thirty, and that much was positive.
My thoughts were in a traffic jam, like I was making to many questions at once. I finally sorted everything out, then concentrated.
If we're going tomorrow, that means that I get to watch those amazing dolphins thirty days sooner. . . I thought, grinning to myself.
In two days, that would be one of the most memorable moments in my life – seeing Ocean World for the first time, touching the Pacific ocean for the first time, smelling the salty spray of sea water. So many firsts, so much was new and fresh.
Redoing the calculations again, I did the math.
At least a four hour drive to Phoenix, then maybe an hour or so flight. . .
“Oh. Tomorrow,” Callie finally said, my words sinking into her, too, as well as disrupting my thoughts.
“Well, that does make sense,” Marygold said, her voice trailing.
“Perfect sense!” I chirped, adrenaline flowing steadily throughout me.
I glanced at the suitcases again, searching for mine, then I frowned as I couldn't find my bright lime green luggage.
What? They hadn't packed it for me? I suppressed a sigh, then darted off to my room, leaving Callie and Mary to ponder about what I had said.
I entered my bed room, having to grasp onto the door frame to slow me down and avoid a collision with my bed, then I turned to my closet on the far right of my room, about to strangle the clothes in my closet.
I knelt down by my closet, then I scrambled for my suitcase, which was buried at the far back.
I pulled it out, knocking down half of my other things in there. I would clean up this mess when I got back – two weeks later, of course, which was something that bothered me. I liked my room spotless, clean, and organized, free of anything that might attract insects and bacteria. Oh well, it would have to wait.
I shoved the tangled junk out of the suitcase's way, then unzipped it.
I then attacked my clothes, which would for sure need a good, long ironing after I got finished with packing them.
I had never been able to fold any piece of material properly, or draw a straight line.
Those little things bugged me to death. Of course, that probably had to do with my lack of coordination with my hands, another reason to dislike that side of me.
After I had shoved all the clothes I could into my poor, bursting suitcase, I wheeled it out to the front door and set it with all the other ones.
Marygold and Callie had disappeared – probably outside again – but like usual, once I was focused, I ignored everything else, and I didn't wonder about their whereabouts anymore.
Ocean World was coming sooner than I had expected, not that I had any complaints about that. For all I cared, I wouldn't mind if I had to go right now, in fact I would gladly take that.
Just another day, I reminded myself. And unlike before, when I tried to lie myself into thinking that a month wasn't very long, I didn't mind waiting another twenty four hours or so before I could see the dolphins, and didn't have to convince myself of anything.
I would be in California soon, just a few more hours. That was good enough for me.
-:~:-
It turned out that my assumptions were right, and we were leaving the next morning.
I didn't remember much of it, since our flight was at seven in the morning, causing us to have to get up by two o' clock in order for us not to miss it.
I fell asleep for the plane ride – something Marygold had complained about, since I snore. And loudly.
I could vaguely recall her having to shake me every so often, which didn't lighten my mood much. But when we finally arrived in San Diego, the bright sunlight that shone me in the eye from the window did. I immediately was awake, and no sleep deprivation would keep my spirits down.
When we walked through the airport, it was if the whole place was glowing – something that was obviously just my imagination. To Callie and Mary, it was just another airport.
We hadn't done much traveling, as living in a small town and only running one business didn't quite give us enough funds for out of state vacations every year, but we had visited my father's family in Ohio once.
Once we had finally arrived at San Diego, we hauled our luggage to our hotel, which was surprisingly crowded with people – a lot more than I would have thought, since this week was going to be nearly forty degrees, I didn't think it was the best weather for tourists – including myself – but maybe some people liked the feeling of getting sunburn and overheating. The only reason we had chosen to leave sooner than we expected because the plane tickets had almost slashed their prices to half off. For what reason, who knows, but we took advantage of it.
Our room was obviously a cookie cutter one, and similar to every hotel in California – the bland, dull colors of the wall, the overpowering bleach scent covering every inch of space in the room, and the randomly placed sepia nature paintings framed by a thick black and bronze frame.
The bed covers were matching the walls and paintings – grey with streaks of bronze-brown and black.
It felt like everything was covered with a dreary fog, and the sunlight that managed to sneak past the heavy curtains of the window sent odd bursts of gold placed everywhere, the floor, the beds, and even the ceiling.
Once we got settled, I eventually got to pull out my laptop – something I had been dying to do since we landed.
I had promised myself that I would document all of my experiences in California on my laptop so I would never forget it. I could only do these things once, even though that hopefully, someday, I would be training dolphins and rescuing aquatic animals. I knew that the chances were slim, but I could always dream.
Setting up my laptop on the wobbly, scratched maple desk that had an odd, slightly metallic sheen to it, I flipped open the screen to it, waited for it to load, then started typing in my word program.
Saturday, June 12th, 2008
Day 1
9:26 am
We finally have arrived in San Diego! I can't believe it! Ocean World Here I come!
But before I could type any more my mother's words stopped my hands from moving to hit the space board.
“Alyson, time to go!” Mom called me from the other room.
Hurriedly, I slapped down some more words in my Diary to finish off the small entry.
Well, I'm heading off right now, apparently. Got to go!
I saved the file, slammed my laptop shut – probably not a very good idea, since if I had put anymore pressure on it, the screen probably would have cracked – slipped it into its case, shrugged the bag onto my shoulder, then raced after everyone.
Once we were back to the main floor of the hotel we exited the lobby out to the parking lot. The road that connected to the lot was buzzing with cars, something that looked more like a racetrack than a street to my small town eyes, and I could see my mom cringe out of the corner of my eye.
My mom was known in the family for not holding up in traffic very well, and honking the horn much too often to be useful.
My dad was no better, but he hid his fear of traffic quite well – something we were all grateful for.
The drive to Ocean World felt longer than it actually was, but at least I had an interesting view to look at when we switched to a freeway and I could see all of the amazingly green and lush hills, a sight that was unusual in Arizona.
Once we reached the park, we payed for the whole two weeks at the soaring arches at the entrance that was covered in sculptured sea stars, three foot long dolphins, and waves that seemed to erupt out of the arch. The entire entry was painted with a light, yellow-gold color.
The park was amazing, just like I had pictured it. The entrance had given us all maps, and I kept glancing back down at it and the sight before me.
Straight ahead, behind the sea lions and sea turtles, was the arctic area, with the polar bears, belugas, walruses, and penguins. To the right of them was the large killer whale exhibit, then another tank that was for the shows that were held at three o' clock.
To the left was the dolphin tank, which also had an adjoining tank for the shows. On the right of the entrance was an ocean themed restaurant that had a large fountain spraying a mist of water that drifted over all the way to the entrance.
Further back, behind the arctic area, were shows that were being held that included different animals, including penguins, sea lions, and walruses.
More exhibits contained stingrays, sharks, and they even had an entire building that held different – hundreds – of salt water fish.
I sighed, then turned my attention to Callie, who had paused by my side to also look at the map and the park.
“Well,” I said to her.
“Yeah,” She replied, agreeing to my unsaid words. The place was breathtaking – not perfect or dreamlike, but it was still amazing. The planning of the side walks weren't quite laid out the best possible way, and the decorations were a little bare, but other than that, it still lived up to my expectations.
“So, where do you want to head first?” Marygold said, suddenly appearing besides us, as well as Mom and Dad.
“Uhh. . . ” I trailed, still taking in the park, memorizing all of the paths and exhibits.
She laughed once.
We then decided that we should get a bite to eat, and then walked over to the restaurant that was near the entrance.
Sitting down at the table in the restaurant, I clasped my hands together, holding my excitement in.
When would the food come? It wasn't so much that I was hungry, but it was that the sooner I ate, the sooner I got to go to the dolphin show, which soon started in less than half an hour.
After a while, I was bored taking in the details of the restaurant's ocean décor, so I pulled my black and silver laptop out of its case, setting it up on the table.
Once it started up, I started to type away again.
Saturday, June 12th, 2008
Day 1
11:52 pm
Here we are – Ocean World, San Diego. We stopped at the restaurant inside of the park to eat before we continue to the dolphin show, which starts at 12:30. Can't wait!
I glanced over at a man who had sat down at a table behind me.
He was wearing a black suit with large, black sunglasses and gelled, slightly spiked brown hair.
Not exactly the normal outfit for a place like Ocean World, and it stuck out like a sore thumb in the midst of all of the basic t shirts and shorts everyone else was wearing.
“Aly, could you move your chair over? We all need to fit on this table,” Marygold told me, tossing her messy braid over her shoulder.
“Sure,” I replied, moving my chair closer to the person, glancing at him out of the corner of my eye.
What if he's some investigator, I wondered. Perhaps from a multi-billion corporation for the development of aquatic themed restaurants worldwide.
I had to stifle back a laugh from my own thoughts, but I failed and it came out as a mumbled snort – a sound much more embarrassing than a normal laugh.
Marygold's eyes flickered over to me suspiciously, then ignored me.
They had seen enough of my random spurts of giggles that they didn't care anymore about what the cause of them was.
I brushed off my concerns, then stared back at my computer screen, but not before I got cut off again.
I looked up from the laptop's screen as Mom and Dad walked up, carrying a tray of burgers and drinks.
Routinely, I saved my diary, closed my laptop, slid it into the case, then plopped it on the floor to the left of me. I idly wondered if I would ever get to type more than a few sentences in my Diary.
Once the tray of food was placed on the table, I grabbed my burger and bit into it like there was no tomorrow. I was much more hungry than I had realized, as the adrenaline rush must have masked it.
I swallowed the huge chunk of beef, then asked, “Are we going to the dolphin show after this?”
Dad nodded at me three times, so fast I wondered if he could have gotten dizzy.
I took another bite, then nodded slowly once in return, half choking on my greedy portion that I took.
Sighing once I got the piece of hamburger down, I looked behind me, expecting to see the man in the black suit.
He wasn't there. He had just vanished into thin air.
Probably not, as that wasn't physically or humanly possible, and just left quietly, but still.
That just makes him stranger, I guess. . . He's probably just here for a meeting, I thought, trying to get him out of my head.
I gulped down the last bite of my burger, then reminded myself that I was just a few minutes away from seeing the dolphin show I had been waiting for a little more than half of my life for.
I wiped my mouth with the rough napkin, then pursed my lips before speaking.
“Can we go?” I asked, anticipation eating away at my patience.
“Okay,” Dad said, as he sipped the rest of his soda pop.
I went to pick up my laptop, and it wasn't there. I had put it down on the floor, didn't I?
That's strange, I thought, pursing my lips as I scanned the floor, as if it would be camouflaged in the brown tiles.
I looked to my right. . . nothing. Starting to panic, I then looked behind me, and there was the laptop.
Phew!
I stood up and grabbed it, happiness bubbling up in me as thoughts of seeing the dolphins started to flood my mind, not to mention that I just escaped a close call with loosing my computer.
“Lets go!” I grinned as I said it. We walked out of the restaurant, with me leading the way with my pace that was twice as fast as everyone else's, heading towards the dolphin show stand.
I started to jog ahead, my slow walk no longer keeping me satisfied.
We finally squeezed into the stands, sadly only getting into the back row, as all of the other hyper children had gotten to the splash zone before we had even gotten near the stands.
The music started to play from the speakers, then the one dolphin rocketed from the tank, somersaulting before hitting the water again.
Everyone clapped and cheered, noise so loud I couldn't hear myself think. I grinned, then joined in the racket by slapping my hands together, barely adding any extra noise to the crowd's roar.
Two more dolphins jumped out vertically, spinning as they went up.
The crowd applauded again, my ears ringing in protest.
All five dolphins swam along the front of the tank, the wall that was facing the crowd. They pumped their tail flukes and splashed anyone in the splash zone, causing a huge ruckus that echoed below us.
Children squealed and laughed in delight, becoming soaked in water.
I clapped again as the dolphins leaped and soared in the sky, defying the gravitational pull for a moment.
The dolphin then flew back into the water, making a huge splash.
That's when the show abruptly ended.
BOOM!
Everything shook, shattering the glass of the tanks. I clutched tightly onto the back of my chair, as if it would keep be safer from the explosion.
Water was flowing everywhere, the crowd was screaming in terror as the tank emptied itself. Thankfully, only the top of the tank was being dumped onto the streets, as the main part of it was embedded in the ground, but even still, the front row got completely immersed, but everyone managed to scramble up to a higher floor in the stands after a few seconds of the icy shower. One of the dolphins got beached on sidewalk, and there was broken glass flowing in a river throughout this area of the park.
I whipped my head to look behind me, where the water was making miniature rivers in the dry, parched ground, choosing the water's paths, then finally more gushes of water came, causing all of the first smaller passages disappear and cause one, large flow of water.
Behind the stands and me, more exhibits were completely destroyed and it seemed that there had been more than one explosion that I hadn't noticed, with my head seeming to be in a distant planet right now.
I glanced back over to the dolphin, which was now slowly being pushed closer and closer to the stand by the heaving waves. Glass too, was being pushed into the dolphin, and soon the water was tainted with blood, causing a stream of pink liquid to flow down the river that the water was making.
My stomach felt like it was being rolled in a barrel down a hill, twisting and turning every which way, threatening to catapult my lunch out of there. I swallowed, trying to forget about the stomach acid burning in my throat.
All my dreams, my future... gone. I had wanted to work at Ocean World when I was older, or at least an aquatic park, and this was the best one even near Arizona.
I stood up, looking at the disaster. It felt like I was having a bad dream that I couldn't wake up from.
So much lost, it was as if I was more attached to this place than just a one day tourist. It was as if I had been here my entire life, not just mere hours.
I looked down at my watch, and it read 2008, June 12th, 12:37 pm. The year, the day, the hour, the minutes; I would remember them forever.
How did this happen? Why? Who? What?
I had so many questions... and absolutely no answers.
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