Separated

Chapter XV

SHANNA

Music: Fleet Glide Galaxy from Super Mario Galaxy 2

Shortly after the video call abruptly ends, Luke pulls up the "human GPS" feature on the hovercraft to see if it's possible to track the others down. By some stroke of luck, he's actually able to pick them up on the radar.

"Whatcha got over there?" Mia calls out. The rest of us are just sitting with our backs against a nearby tree while Luke's examining the radar.

"I've got five dots moving in a northeast direction... one of them is farther away from the rest, so I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that's Mackenzie," Luke replies. I peek over his shoulder to take a look at the screen, and sure enough, one of the dots has stopped and the other four dots are heading toward it.

"What do you think happened?" I ask.

"Hard to say... but I doubt it's good," Luke answers, never diverting his attention away from the monitor. Less than a minute later, the other four dots stop in place as well. Now, all five dots are in a small huddle, and they're now moving in the same direction.

Sean looks up with worry. "Could that army have gotten to them somehow? I mean, they're probably close to their base."

Luke's already activated the hovercraft's "Plane Mode" and is stepping up to the controls before he answers Sean's question. "I don't know, but there's only one way to find out. Come on."

Mia, Sean, Elle, and I join Luke, and he sets our destination to the military base we had encountered hours ago. The hovercraft is set to autopilot, and before long, we take off at a moderately brisk pace. During our flight, Luke keeps the human GPS radar open to examine the location of our friends relative to our current location. As we expected, the hovercraft's own dot is almost on a direct path to the huddle of five dots.

By now, a sudden sense of urgency and excitement washes over me. Just a couple of days ago, I was about to accept the fact that the rest of our friends were likely gone forever. But now, we know for a fact that they're all alive, and the fact that we're close to reuniting is such an overwhelming feeling of ecstacy for me. Luke has a similar look of determination on his face, and Sean, Mia, and Elle are all displaying some signs of excited anxiety. This could really be it, I think to myself.

The flight back is only a little shorter than the flight to the island. The hovercraft's dot is practically right next to the huddle on the radar. To our dismay, we're faced with a slight issues upon arriving at the base: The entrance is guarded.

To make matters worse, the two guards catch a glimpse of us and quickly recognize us. One of them starts firing at us, but luckily, Luke's able to activate the hovercraft's force field just in time (not like he needs to, it can activate it on its own). Then he flies us around the building to a small set of bushes. The bushes do a decent job of obscuring us, as the guards are unable to locate us after a quick scan of the area.

"How are we gonna get in now?" I ask, worried.

"Just give me a minute. I'll think of another way," Luke answers. He definitely seems to have an idea of what he's doing, so we nod and let him check out the building from afar.

SKYLAR

Music: Dusky Doomed Dale from Super Mario 64: Last Impact

After our capture, all five of us were led into a prison hallway. Most of the natives that were captured from the island have been stashed here in various cages and cells. Three guards took us into a dimly lit room and had us each sit in a wooden chair. The chairs were all arranged in a pentagon. Next, we were bound to the chairs tightly by rope.