Chapter Twenty-Four:

The next morning, John and Mason, who had both had a troubled sleep, left their bedroom and walked down the stairs to The Headquarters. Mason checked his watch and sighed; it was 5:23 am and neither of them got much in the way of sleep. They both watched the jellyfish and the Whale-dragons gliding passed the circular windows.

"Do you think they notice the change? Is it harder for them to breathe?" John whispered.

"I don't know. If so, I would like to help them somehow," Mason replied as he walked over and turned on the lights. John nodded as he sat down on one of the sofas.

"Do you remember how we used to play hide and seek in the pilots room of our childhood Space Pod?" John asked, smiling over at the other young man.

"Of course! I can still remember how frantic our parents were when they couldn't find us. We did the washing up for a week afterwards," Mason said, laughing at the memory.

"Oh yeah, that's right! I forgot about the washing up," John answered, earning himself a look from Mason as he continued, "I can't believe that! You did enough complaining for the both of us, if I remember correctly,"

"Fuck off," John replied lightly, laughing. Just as Mason was about to respond, Isla and Freya walked towards them. He walked over to them.

"Hey,"

"Hi, how did you sleep?" Mason asked, looking over at Freya, who had just spoken.

"Badly and you?" was her response.

"I didn't," Isla commented, going over to sit next to John who was still sitting.

"Same here," he muttered, "how are your bruises by the way? I still haven't had a chance to treat them,"

"I'm fine honestly. How are Estelle and Finley the rest of the passengers?" Isla asked, talking Freya's outstretched hand as she came to sit next to her.

"I think they're okay," John answered. It was then that Elliot came through the open doors.

"Who's okay," he asked, coming to hug Isla who had her arms outstretched.

"Just asking how Finley and Estelle are," she replied. Elliot was quiet and Mason looked at him in concern.

"Is something wrong?" he asked him.

"Don't worry about it," he replied quickly, trying to smile. Mason glanced over at John, who raised his eyebrows at him. They knew he wasn't telling the truth and Freya knew that something was wrong; Elliot was never particularly good at lying.

"Where is Finley, by the way?" John spoke up.

"He finally managed to go to sleep about two hours ago. I didn't want to wake him up so I came down here," he responded, not wanting to tell them about the wings; that seemed private somehow. Looking at Isla, Elliot wondered if she had had the same thing happened to her.

"I'll tell you more later," he whispered to Isla discreetly. She nodded slightly. They looked up as they saw Charlotte, followed by Rosiee, who was carrying her laptop.

They chatted for a while, each one avoiding the real questions they all had.

"I'm hungry. I guess you all are too? Shall we go to the cafeteria? Then we can show you the article we found about the father of the journalist that died getting arrested," Charlotte suggested.

"We found something else as well," Rosiee added and smiled when everyone started asking her questions, "let's eat something first, shall we? By the way, did you hear anything from Taylor?"

They shook their heads and walked to the cafeteria. Turning around to face Isla, Freya realised that there were sleeping bags with the remaining passengers sleeping. She followed Freya's gaze and stared at her. They had completely forgotten that people were actually sleeping here.

"I'm glad we didn't wake anyone up," Isla whispered.

Mason glanced back and said, "Oops,". Elliot smiled at that and he looked away quickly.

They found their seats in the cafeteria and each got something to eat. They were the first ones down since it was so early.

"So what did you find?" Elliot asked, as they had all sat down putting their plates and bowls on the table.

"Well, apparently Lewis Strong was arrested for accusing the IGF of poisoning his daughter, Laina Strong," Rosie started explaining as the others ate their very cereals and bread.

"Do you think he was correct?" John asked, looking up from the table.

"Not sure. Could be. Especially now that we've seen what they're capable of. Even the Trials. They were just horrible," Charlotte said, shivering.

"Hello,"

Freya and Elliot smiled up at Finley as he sat next to Isla. She looked up from the laptop and said, "hi are you alright? Sleep well?"

"Yes and yes; surprisingly. Where did you go? I thought you had also gone to sleep?" Finley responded. He turned his attention to Elliot, smiling softly.

Isla turned away from him and turned her attention to the laptop. She let Rosiee show her who to change websites and articles. Isla thought it was some kind of magic. Smiling at her curiosity Rosie answered all her questions. The twins and Finley then discussed the possibility that The intergalactic Federation had been hiding things for so long that they have twisted it in their own minds.

Freya looked around as more people thought of gathering in the cafeteria to have their breakfasts. They all looked really tired and she wouldn't have been surprised if no one had slept at all. Just then she noticed Taylor and Melody coming towards them. They sat down with a sigh and Rosiee turned to greet them.

"How is Star?" Mason interrupted worriedly.

"Yeah, she's okay. She is still asleep but I've managed to bandage her wings with Mel's help," Taylor replied. Melody nodded, not saying a word.

"Where is Estelle? Is she okay?" Isla asked, looking around as if she might come through the door at any minute.

"Yes, as far as we know she's fine. She didn't talk much to be honest. We could tell she was in pain, but it seems to be under control," Melody answered, "I'm going to get some food,"

"I'll go with you," Mason announced, much to her delight. Melody took a plate and studied the options on the food machine. She'd seen all the options before, of course, but at that moment she just couldn't think.

"What's wrong, Mel? Not hungry anymore?" He tried to joke that both of them knew that it was a fruitless attempt. She managed to crack a smile and just chose the first thing she thought which happened to be a pizza.

"Nice breakfast food," he commented as he chose his own.

"Shut up," she mumbled, still smiling.

"This is my second bowl of cereal to be fair," Mason replied. Melody didn't answer and then walked back to the table in silence.

"So what are we actually going to do today?" Elliot said, starting to get restless.

"You've barely sat down for two minutes! You always were the most restless one around," Finley joked. Isla laughed slightly, trying not to show how much it actually hurt to do so. It was true, Elliot was always the first one to wake up in the morning when they were children and the first to wake up everyone else.

Has anyone seen Cosmo by the way?" Isla asked suddenly, worried when she remembered she hadn't seen him in her bedroom as always.

"Oh sorry, I thought you knew. He is with Star," Taylor replied, sipping her apple juice, " he was producing tears so that he could try to accelerate the healing process."

Isla nodded, getting increasingly worried about him. He had told her on another occasion that the more he cried to produce his powers the more it drained out of him. She knew how much Cosmo cared about Star though so she couldn't feel she could stop it.

"Don't worry, we'll keep an eye on him," Freya whispered, guessing her thoughts. Isla looked at her gratefully.

"Wait a second!" Exclaimed Charlotte making them all nearly jump out of their skins.

"What?" Rosiee said, staring at her wide-eyed.

"Has anyone thought about finding Mrs. Thomas yet? What's going on?"

"Right! Did you know? I completely forgot about her!" Isla said loudly.

"I hope she's okay," Finley answered quietly. They stared at him as if he'd grown a second head, "What? If it hadn't been for her, we'd still be locked up!"

"She poisoned me, Finley,"

"She poisoned you?" Freya and Charlotte asked, shocked.

"I thought we told you that already," Isla said, confused. Charlotte looked away, watching Rosiee tapping away at the keyboard.

"I know. And I'm sorry about it, but without her, Cosmo and the Whale-dragons, we might be dead," he whispered, voicing her thoughts.

"Has everyone finished eating? Then we can actually sit down and see what we know," Charlotte suggested.

Elliot sighed; he knew his sister meant well, but he was getting tired of just sitting around and waiting. He knew it would take some time before they knew all the and so he responded, "good idea."

Everyone got up and put their bowls and plates away and Finley and Elliot walked to the headquarters first, hand-in-hand. Charlotte and Rosiee went next and Taylor couldn't help noticing the locks they gave each other. She turned away feeling sick to her stomach and she shook her head as if to clear her thoughts. Mason and Freya entered the headquarters just as Noah walked towards them.

Melody and Isla hung back, watching their friends leaving the cafeteria when Melody called out, "Isla, wait,"

"Yes?" Isla asked, still watching the others, before turning back to face her. She didn't really know Melody all that well yet so she thought the request to stay behind was somewhat odd. She watched as the other girl fidgeted and didn't speak for sometime.

Just as Isla was about to speak, Melody beat her to it by saying, "this might seem strange and I know we haven't spoken much, but how did you know you first loved Freya? I-I just see the way you look at her." What am I doing? Melody thought, mentally slapping herself.

The blonde sitting opposite her didn't know how to reply and didn't for some time.

"Umm, I'm not sure really. We've known each other since we were both tiny. She's turning 19 in two weeks time and I'm 23 now. I guess I first noticed it about 3 years ago, I'd say," Isla replied eventually, still not knowing where this was going.

"Okay, but how?" I'm sorry about the questions; I'm only asking because I think I like someone too. I've never liked anyone before though so I don't know if it's just a 'best friend' thing,"

Now it was making more sense and Isla smiled at the 21-year-old fondly. She had seen the way she looked at Mason and had a pretty good idea who she was talking about.

"Hmm, well, how do you feel around this person?" Isla asked and Melody smiled. This time it was her turn to take awhile to answer, thinking about Mason.

"Are you both coming?" Finley asked, popping his head around the door.

"Yes, we won't be a minute," Isla called back.

"Alright. They've found Mrs. Thomas by the way," he replied, walking off in the direction of The Headquarters once more.

"We should probably go," Melody said, shifting uncomfortably.

"That's okay. They can wait a few minutes. Can't they?" Isla responded gently. She smiled at that.

"I just feel like a better person when he's around. He's caring and," Melody started, turning away from her, her cheeks reddening.

"And?" She prompted, smiling slightly. She never realised just how shy Melody was.

"And he's funny. I first realised I might like him when I noticed that he might like someone else," Isla nodded, thinking about Finley with Elliot.

She waited for Melody to continue talking and was surprised by her answer, "you know what? Forget it. I'm sorry to bore you with all this, by the way."

Before Isla had the chance to answer Melody stormed out of the room leaving her stunned. Had she said something to offend her? She thought about it, but she couldn't think of a single thing. Shaking her head, Isla followed her. 

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