300 years ago, the world descended into a long ice age, with humanity barely surviving.
Today, twins Alek and Amber have to deal with the new society that has emerged from this environment. Alek is an anti-social geek with not enough research materi...
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We quickly walked through the commons to her table and sat down with our packed lunches. All of her friends looked shocked to see me.
"Is this the same Alek as this morning?" asked Drew.
"He was feeling a little down back then. Let me introduce you properly," she answered.
She pointed to Drew. "This is Drew, we've been friends since middle school. She's really good at soccer, and plays on the team with me." Drew waved hello.
Sitting next to Drew was the small boy. "This is Noah," she stated, "He's a little shy, but he's brilliant." Noah blushed at the compliment and tried to hide in his shoulders. His dark blonde hair was messy and fell over his face in chunks.
She pointed to the tall girl with huge blue eyes. "This is Natalie, she plays basketball. We don't have too much in common but she's super nice and friendly." Natalie flipped her hair over her shoulder and gave a little wave.
"This is Jack," she pointed to the dark boy. "He's from Equadan and just moved here this summer."
Jack ran his hand through his curly black hair and smiled. "It's hard to adjust to such a cold place," he mentioned.
"Does the snow really melt during the summer there?" I asked brazenly.
He grinned and nodded. "Sometimes, it's warm enough to go outside without a coat,"
My face must have been ridiculous, because they all started cracking up.
Amber moved on quickly. "Finally is Kali. She's been over to our house before, so you probably remember her."
I nodded and smiled. I could hardly feel the seat under me, my attention was focused completely on the new friends I was creating. Perhaps logically I wasn't thinking quite straight, but in the moment it didn't matter.
We all talked for a while, and I surprised myself by contributing to the conversation every once in a while. Amber seemed stunned at my sudden change in behavior, but it made sense to me. After all, I was just in a good mood.
The only person who didn't talk very much was Noah. He laughed and made small comments, but he never was the center of attention. Although, at one point in the conversation he tried to talk to me.
"So um... Alek?" said Noah in a quiet and soft voice. "Amber told us you like engineering and things, what do you think of this design?" he slid a piece of paper over to me.
I picked it up and looked at it for a second. It was like I had forgotten everything I know. I could tell it was a blueprint for a machine of some sort, and I could recognize shapes, but I couldn't name them or make out what they do. It was like a word on the tip of your tongue, I couldn't quite place what the paper was saying to me. I slid the paper back to Noah quietly.
"Looks great Noah," I said offhandedly, hoping it was the right response.
"It does?" he asked, confused. He muttered something under his breath and stuffed the paper in his bag. It was strange, but my attention was soon taken away by the force of conversation.
