ISLAND ILLUSIONS (#2 PARADISE ISLAND duology)

--twenty-one--

The stale, sun-tan oil stench remained in his nostrils for weeks. That, and the smell of burnt skin, of vomit, and of chemicals being shoved down his esophagus, racing into his stomach. Of sticky sweet perfume coating a wet slab of fur, and of sickeningly thick honey stuck in his throat.

His nightmares were filled with the faces of those who'd hovered over him when he'd woken in the hospital wing. Kera, concerned and confused. The weird girl, mouthing strange enchantments in another language. And a few other students he thought he'd never see again, all come to witness his return from the dead, they'd later called it.

But his nightmares also contained others. Those he'd been unable to save, with their widened eyes and dropping jaws and cheeks reddening then blanching then caving in. Taryn and her doe-eyed but failed seduction tactics. Lorenzo and his brute strength. Several more he'd forgotten the names of, but whose faces would never leave his mind.

Weeks passed, and he still tasted the blood and dirt mix in his mouth, as if it were imprinted on his tongue. He still visualized the dried guts of those who'd been killed before his eyes, the echoes of their screams running rampant in his mind. He still saw flashes of Patrek, the stump of his severed foot bleeding profusely; and Kera, hunched over as she hurled her insides into a bush.

And Mr. Reynolds, stuck behind the sparkly pink wall, yanked up by the skin of his neck and carried off by the monstrous Jessa, with her furry friend Vick at her heels. The imagined vision of Patrek slashing at Taryn's throat; her lying in a puddle of her own blood, dead for having defended a slew of creepy aliens passing themselves as gods.

But Miles was alive. Patrek, Kera, the other students and professors—all alive. The instant Miles and Patrek were well enough to be transported, the entire group took off on the same plane that'd dropped them off, and never looked back. Well, Miles did—he glanced out the window as the plane departed, cursing the alien-gods for their cruelty, and swearing he'd expose them and their atrocities soon. Milla's journal—somehow thrown across the barrier before it solidified—sat in his lap, its pages burning with the desire to be read.

None of them wasted time. The instant they landed in Providence, Miles, Kera, and Patrek got to work.

Most of Patrek's work was from the hospital, as he remained in observation for his foot. The doctors were stumped at the eerily sparkly substance stuck to his skin, and that wouldn't come off. And the permanent damage caused to his heart from the blast of Jessa's power; he now had to wear a pacemaker to breathe properly.

After a day or two on fluids and heavy medication, Kera returned to normal. No more fur, and her bruises and scrapes were healing. Her bones were no longer as visible under her skin, and she regained her spunk, her love for life. She'd make a full recovery with time and insisted on getting back to work. Miles couldn't stop her.

Miles and Kera were able to start pursuing their goal of exposing Paradise Island and its not so paradise-like tendencies.

"First off, you're going to automatically pass Kera in all her classes, for what you've put her through," said Miles, five days prior to coming home, convening in the Dean's office.

The Dean was a cold, curt man, but he harbored none of Mr. Reynolds' darkness, nor did he harbor the same I can do anything I want attitude as him. This man knew he was in the hot seat, and that Miles and Kera had him by the balls. Miles had showed him Milla's journal and warned him that should he try to deliver anyone else to the island, should he deny Kera her scholarship and the education she deserved, he'd send the notebook to the press. "And trust me when I tell you they'll have a field day with it."

The Dean had had no choice but to let Kera back in—but what he didn't know was that she was posing. She had no intention of finishing her classes at Valence and was operating on the down-low to obtain more information to fuck up the government. She was the inside man. With the rage she held within for all that'd been done to her, Miles knew she'd succeed in helping him topple this asinine institution.