Off Planet (Asterism Chronicles Volume One)

Chapter 6

Alex, Jack, and I walked out to the Jewel District. This district is the middle class of society. They have enough money to survive happily and even go on vacation. We walked through the district and into an area I've never been. It was part of the Jewel and Rose district. No-one knew which it really was apart of.

"Are we going there?" Alex asked pointing with his small hand.

"Yes we are." Jack said holding him on his back. "It will be fun."

My eyes widened as I looked at it. I had always wanted to go, but I was never able to.

"Really?" I said excited. "I can't believe it!"

Jack smiled as Alex laughed happily to himself. "I thought you guys would be happy. I know the guy who runs the tickets so we get a discount. And Alex gets in for free."

"That's so cool!" I said happily locking arms with him.

As we looked up at the sign that read Pirate Land. Pirates aren't like they used to be. But I love the old ones. Swashbuckling and everything. They even have a real pirate ship here.

"Hey, Jack," the man behind the counter said.

"Hey, here you go, as agreed." He said handing over credits.

"Remember when you go through the gate keep him on your back, so no one knows he came in."

"Okay." Jack said walking to the gate. "I haven't been here in awhile" he told me.

"I've never been here." I said to his shocked face.

"Well then we need to do everything." He said grabbing my hand and pulling me forward. He looked back at me and smiled as Alex pointed to the pirate ship.

"Can we go?" He asked softly.

"Of course!" Jack told him.

We all walked to the pirate ship and climbed up. It was big, but not as big as the ship's are now. The main difference was it's made of wood. And instead of solar sails it had cloth. I looked up at what is called the crow's nest and longed to go up.

"Arrgh, little lady." Someone dressed as a pirate walked up to me. "Do you want to go up?"

"Yes!" I said ecstatic.

He helped me put a harness on and showed me what to do when I climbed up. Excited I started immediately. I looked down when I reached the halfway point to Jack and Alex waiving with eyepatches on. I smiled to myself and continued to climb. At the top there was a wire that I attacked the harness to and looked out to the rest of the park. It was not as big as I thought it was, but it looked like an old pirate city I would see in history books. I climbed down and told Jack how amazing it looked from up there.

"You should go up, I'll watch Alex." I told him grabbing Alex's hand.

"Okay, I will. Alex listen to her."

Alex nodded and waved as Jack started to climb. I watched as he made his way to the top and sat there looking at the view. Then I got an idea.

"Alex, do you want to mess with Jack?"

He nodded smiling. So I took his hand and his at the base of the mast. The one place on the ship you can't see from the crow's nest. We waited until Jack started to come down and his on the other side. Jack started looking around for us when Alex and I jumped out behind him.

"Boo!" Alex said as Jack turned around.

"You scared me! Why did you do that?" Jack said with fear in his eyes but joy in his voice.

"To have fun!" Alex said hugging him.

Jack laughed and picked him back up. His hands had been shaking. "Let's look at the rest of the ship."

I nodded and followed after him. The ship was full of old barrels and fake gold. They had fake skeletons in the cells and someone in the captain's quarters. After we finished looking through the ship we wandered the city. They had people acting out throughout the whole city. Even the taverns had people playing drunk.

"I'm tired." Alex said.

"Okay, we can go home." I told him as he struggled to keep his eyes open.

Jack agreed with me and we started to head back to the entrance. After we scared Jack he seemed to be normal again.

"Sorry for scaring you." I told him as we walked.

"It's fine. I just thought that you had been taken again. And then I thought Alex was taken too.

We walked the rest of the way in silence with Alex asleep on Jack's back. About halfway home I started to carry him. As we got near to Martha she came out to meet us.

"I knew he would fall asleep." She said taking him into her large arms. "Thank you for taking him. Did you guys have fun?"

"Yes we did." I told her.

"Yeah, Alex loved it too."

We said goodbye to Martha, and went back to the house. I sat down on the couch and Jack sat down beside me. We sat there for a while in silence until I spoke up.

"I am really sorry about what I did today. I just was having some fun."

"It's okay," he said. "I overreacted. It's just, I've had someone get lost before. And i don't want it to happen again."

"Was it that girl?" I asked reluctantly. "I found a couple pictures of her in the room."

Jack stood up and walked out of the room. I stood up and followed as he went to the back of the house. He dug through the clothes until he found the pictures I had been looking at.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked."

"It's fine." He said sitting down on the bed. "I have to talk about her sometime right?"