You, the apocalypse and me! [YiZhan FF] Fantasy

Chapter 19 - A New Man

After only a few days I was fully recovered and really happy about it. Still, I wondered what made me so sick? Probably out of fear I did not even dare to consider the bite for it. I finally convinced myself, and it sounded plausible, that it was simply stress. After all, not every day ended the world we knew.

Since I was well again, I did as many chores as I could on our sailing yacht to keep me moving and to keep from getting bored. I cleaned, cooked, and learned with Yibo from Haikuan how to set and adjust the sails and when. We even did little emergency drills in case one of us got hurt, the yacht was on fire or we would be attacked.

I must say, all the drills we did, even at night, were especially fun. They reminded me of my days in the military. The drill sergeant back then was so good at his job that we really could never assess whether a real emergency had suddenly occurred after all or whether it was just another nighttime exercise.

I don't know how many times the alarm would ring and our drill sergeant would come storming into our quarters barefoot and dressed only in his underwear, breathing heavily and with a terrified, worried look on his face. He shouted almost desperately, "Get out of bed, get dressed, grab weapons. Time to defend our fatherland!"

To keep us entertained and to get us to continue to react to the alarm with panic and racing hearts, he once even went so far as to smear his chest and arm with fake blood. He glued a knife blade to his chest and screamed, sounding gasping as if he was about to choke on his own blood, and ordered us to go out and fight.

He was a real bastard, but he pushed us to do our best and all of his recruits ended up being among the best trained soldiers or agent candidates after training. Maybe that's why I didn't go crazy right away when the first attacks of the creatures took place and those explosions could be heard.

I told Yibo about my drill sergeant on one of our night watches on the sailing yacht and he laughed. He said he knew exactly who I was talking about because he had also had the pleasure. But, as Yibo told me, only for a month, as the drill sergeant fell ill and then honorably retired from the military. They assumed at that time that he must have had cancer. Anyway, no one had seen him after that and Yibo had been given a drill sergeant who was fresh out of training and often seemed overwhelmed.

Yibo and I generally talked a lot in the last few days about our past and about our lives as they once were. I suppose because we slowly realized that we would probably never live a normal life again. At least not as we knew it.

We had little contact with our parents. At sea, it's not so easy to make contact by cell phone. Most of the time we called them with the satellite phone. But it did not always work. Either it was because of our device or the cell phones of our parents had no signal. But, when we reached them, they always told us how well they were doing and that they had clean water from a borehole and a spring and a large supply of food.

They also told us that they have a doctor nearby, there is enough medicine and that they are busy every day working in the fields and go to sleep early every night because they are so exhausted. They also have electricity and hot water.

But even though our parents were doing well, I could also hear how worried they were. My mom said she prays for us and our safety every day. And she even told me that she loves me very much and misses me a lot, which is unusual for her because she actually always tells me I'm an annoying smart-ass punk who never knows when to shut up.

My dad has always been more sensitive and emotional than my mom. He cried on the phone and said he couldn't believe we couldn't see each other because we were so far apart. He said he would like to hug me and just hold me in his arms like when I was a little boy.