Wonderer's Wish World 2: Evolutionary Rebirth

Politicians in My Eyes

Day 34

Time: 7:56 AM

Location: Nightlight Hotel, Nightlight City

Stretching his arms up above his head, Darius yawned, sighing in relief as his back popped, soothing an ache that he hadn't realized had been bothering him for a long time. The bed, soft and alluring underneath him, beckoned, but Darius forced himself away. Last night was the best sleep he'd had in a long time and he still felt...

Exhausted. Still exhausted.

Ignoring that, Darius tugged off the sleep clothes they'd given him, no more than a ratty t-shirt and some old pants, but it was nice to sleep in something else for a change, even if only for a night. Still, Darius knew by now that these types of things, whether good or bad, didn't last. He would be ready when it did. He hoped.

"Hey, you," someone huffed, annoyed, and Darius jumped, twisting so he could look behind himself towards the curtain that separated his new room (more a closet, technically) from everything else.

Thankfully, he didn't meet any other peeping eyes as he turned. Rather, his curtain held the silhouette of someone standing outside of his room. Darius was surprised to find that the silhouette was tiny, like a toddler standing outside of his room.

What was a child doing here?

"I'm not a child," the voice chided him, childishly, and Darius blinked, surprised, before flushing. He hadn't realized he'd muttered that out loud. He must have been more exhausted than he thought...

"Sorry," he called apologetically. "I shouldn't have said that. Uh... did you need something?"

The silhouette huffed. "StarSpeaker wants you for something. And he didn't tell me what, so don't ask."

It took Darius an embarrassingly long time to connect the dots. "StarSpeaker...? You mean Brooklyn?"

"Sure," the voice said, and Darius got the sense that whoever was speaking was rolling their eyes. Now that he was paying more attention, he also found he could hear the beeps and boops of some video game or another. How much attention was this person paying him, anyway? "Just hurry up. I don't want to get in trouble when you're a no-show."

Darius frowned. "I'm not going to do that. Why would I do that?"

"You did the last three times I tried to get you up."

Darius paused, then winced. "Oh. Sorry."

"Whatever," the person said, and Darius listened as they turned sharply on their heel, descending the staircase that led down to the common room.

Standing, Darius sighed as he started getting dressed in earnest, pulling on the scratchy old shirt he'd been wearing for far too long... at least he had put it through the wash overnight, though he was certain that some of those stains were never going away. Still, at least it didn't smell like garbage anymore.

Suddenly, footsteps sounded from the staircase again, and Darius, panicking, rushed to put on his pants, socks, shoes, and jacket, just barely getting them on and throwing open the curtain as Five had his hand raised, seemingly ready to knock on the wall beside Darius' doorway.

He looked startled as Darius waved his hands at him.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," he cried, hopping on one foot as he tried to shove on a shoe that hadn't gotten on as well as he'd thought. He tried to give Five a reassuring smile anyway. "Sorry. I'll be right down."

"Oh, it's fine," Five assured him, still giving Darius an odd look. "StarSpeaker sent Gaz to get you up before she remembered, well, everything, including that you may have a concussion-"