The next morning, Angie easily appeared at Elias' residence on time, since he lived just two blocks away from her. As her lot reached Elias' floor by the stairs, they witnessed a few young women leave Elias' flat. Angie recognised them as part of the group that surrounded Elias the previous week. Did they sleep over?[No, they didn't.] BaoBao responded fast. [They just came earlier this morning. Since it was for nothing important, I didn't tell you. I didn't want to spoil your mood.] He explained./How's my mood ruined? I'm fine./ "Angie, you're here!" Elias happily greeted her. "Ms Dawson." Elias bowed in respect.Her mother was slightly taken aback by how he addressed her. This was the first time someone addressed her by her last name without her asking for it. "I like this boy." She whispered to Angie to praise him."And-" Elias' smile turned stiff and his eyes rounded a little bit. "Jeffer
"Look, you don’t have to accept this.” Angie suddenly said. “I told you, I had another plan in store. If you don’t agree, we’re just different and we’re each better off not working together. You wouldn’t want any issues from our differences coming up while we’re out there.”[Angie? What’re you saying? What if she really disagrees?]/We can’t forget about keeping negativity to a minimum. I don’t want her displeasure with me to cause any trouble, especially when she’s the lead in this story./[Oh… How burdensome.] BaoBao grumbled on Angie’s behalf.Meanwhile, Valerie sucked on her bottom lip. There was a perpetual frown between her brows. Angie had caught on to her. She wanted to agree just because she was the only one with the issue. However, Angie was right. If they did not settle their differences now, more issues will app
Time crawled painfully slow for those who did not enjoy the gathering.Angie’s cheeks felt stiff from wearing a smile for so long.Meanwhile, Elias had his hands full with the girls. It did not help that Angie gave him a sharp glare every time he pushed them away. Eventually, Elias gave up trying. As upset as he was about seeing Angie so close and intimate with everyone else, he ended up mingling with Angie the least, out of all the military personnel present. He slouched and sulked in one corner, like a shunned little child. Even then, the girls stayed with him. In fact, it became a competition between them to see who could cheer him up.In another corner of the apartment, the mothers naturally congregated together to gossip and chat."You must be elated that Valerio hooked such a big fish.""How did he do it? Just recently, everyone still thought that Conrad was asexual!""Who'd expect that such a mischievous boy could ac
Elias' eyes flew open and he staggered back. He quickly sat back down and put his hands up with his palms facing her. "Sorry, sorry, I just haven’t felt this urge in so long that I couldn't control myself." "What urge?" Angie asked as she sat up cross-legged in her bed. Elias could see her displeasure and he hastily explained, "Your back just looked so vulnerable and inviting. It made me want to do things to you and before I knew it I was already smelling you and going for a kiss. I'm really sorry." Silence dragged out between them. While Angie thought about how she should react to what was equivalent of Elias admitting that he was gay, Elias freaked out on the inside. /Did I just say that? Did I just? What? What the hell. What. The. Hell! Dude, get yourself together!/ Angie decided to react the same way she would react if he had been talking about a heterosexual attraction. "You couldn't control your sexual urges? What are you? A child? That's a poor and sorry excuse for taking ad
"How's it going?" Angie asked once she reached the back."Almost done."While Angie pitched in to help speed up the process, Valerie whispered, "Angie? I hope you aren't too mad at Elias."Angie threw her a questioning glance."I contacted him to come over. Something seemed odd between you and the doctor. I was the one who disobeyed you. Not Elias." Valerie explained.[I was just about to tell you that!]/What's this, though? A woman's intuition?/"I see." Angie smiled and ruffled Valerie's hair. "Thanks for that."Angie finished up fast since she knew where everything was. Then, they grabbed their loot and left. Valerie looked shy but followed close behind Angie. They still had the research facility to go to. It was easier this time, because the researchers worked at odd hours and their teammates did well distracting patrol. Everything else went as expected, until Kyle's appear
Her eyes shot everywhere and landed on the occasional sparks flying off the electric fence. Following her train of thought, BaoBao proactively turned off the electricity before she had to ask him to. The ever ongoing buzzing suddenly went off. Without it, the soft rumbles of the vehicles suddenly felt far too loud. It prompted all of the soldiers to turn their engines off.They could not possibly leave this place vulnerable when their main line of defense was down. The pin drop silence was like Death's call. A distant roar of the monsters beyond the wire cage caused panic to erupt among the civilians. The control room was in a similar state. The higher ups shouted and yelled at technicians. Languages became colourful with expletives. Scoldings became abusive as personal attacks spilled forth."Leader Angie, you're also responsible for this, right? There's nothing to worry about, right?" Hamilton checked. Brandon and Wilbur looked at her for the same reassurance.&nb
Ferdinand’s team arrived at the scene only to be devastated that they were too late. Their readied rifles and blades lowered as they looked at the hanging bundles of thick vines in horror. Those emerald green vine bundles that were at least as thick as their arms told them all they needed to know. Their dry mouths hung agape. The silence of the forest suddenly felt a lot scarier. The towering trees suddenly looked a lot more intimidating.“We should go.” Ferdinand tried to usher his team back to where they came from. “There’s no point in staying any longer.”All the soldiers looked at Ferdinand at the same time.“But, it’s Commander Covington. It can’t be.”“He may have escaped. He may be hidin
“One of the vines I took turned out to be a real snake. It tightened around my arm but Conrad helped before anything happened, and my mum fixed my arm. So, like I said, I’m fine…” Angie recounted all that happened with a dispassionate tone. “Were those snakes the unplanned attack on Ferdinand’s group?” Jeffery clarified. Hamilton nodded. “Lucky you were there to cut them up. Otherwise, Ferdinand would die far too easily. THEN, Angie would really be upset.” “About that, thank you, guys.” She thanked Jeffery and Elias. However, Elias still looked as gloomy as ever. “I don't care about that… It doesn’t look as fine as you say…” His focus was still on her injury. Her entire arm had thick streaks of red and purple bruises from being squeezed too hard. Fr