P L A N B E T A

Chapter Twenty-Two

November 28th, 2042

Baker-Crane

I wake up once we get to New York City. As we are taking our luggage off of the train, Maia tells me everything that happened as I was asleep. She shows me the video and the letters. She only tells me about the fish because she threw it away as soon as she could.

We start walking around, but soon realize that we have a long time left before we must be at the Liberty Island Ferry and this is New York City, so we find the route, and start walking to Chelsea Market, a familiar place to us from past years.

It's about a fifteen-minute walk, but it doesn't seem like much because of all of the gorgeous sights and many memories that come back to us. The memories go from being memories to being real and vivid. Reality and memory merge until I am finally focused on the world around me. We then walk into the market.

I hadn't been here in years, and as much as I had wanted to come back, I had decided that this wasn't in my time management notebook, I had too much going on to convince my parents to go on a little holiday to the city.

The air smells like baking bread but then like fresh linen the further we walk. The market is homey and not bright, it feels cozy and local, despite its popularity. We keep walking, but then we are stopped by our parent's old friend Poppy, who runs a candle shop.

"Girls! Girls! Oh, my sweet little peaches how are you?! I missed you girls so much! Why are you carrying luggage through here? Let me take those for you at least while you walk around the market," she insists. Poppy has always been persistent and sort of demanding, but we weren't about to deny her taking a load of weight from our hands to give us some time to relax.

We greeted her sons who worked inside of the shop but then continued our walk around. We look at many, many clothes, and questioned if we should purchase any or not. Maia gets some comfortable warm clothes that will help her survive the trip over to GZU.

Our trip to the market is not allowed to last long. Although we wish to have fun, we are too focused on getting back to our family than we are on having to have. We say our goodbyes to Poppy and her sons, and then have them call an Uber. We offer to pay them for it but Poppy declines and tells us that it was good to see us.

It only takes about five minutes to get to the ferry, and we still have another twenty minutes before it leaves. A woman and children come up to Maia and I and smile. I sigh and tilt my head. "Hello," she says. "I've been on the same trains as you this entire trip, and I was just wondering if you were going to uhm... Kit-Island?" she whispers. I smile and nod.

"Indeed," I say. "Do you have family there or something?" She nods and pats her daughter's shoulder while putting her other hand on her son's head.

"Yes, my boyfriend is there. You might know him?" She asks. "His name is James Wagner."

I shoot my head over to Maia and her eyes widen. "W-what?" Maia asks shakily.

"What's wrong?" she asks. I look back at the woman and scowl at her.

"That's her dad," I say, pulling Maia back. "There's only one James Wagner on Kit-Island, and that's her father, he's also married." The lady steps back and takes in a sharp breath.

"I didn't know he had a daughter," she says, but it looks like she's lying.

"He has four," I say. "And a wife."

"She's lying, Lee. She knew, she knows. She knows he's married, but I don't know why she decides to show up now. You are not allowed to come to the island, if you do, you will be executed," Maia threatens. The woman looks shocked and hurt, but just turns away with her kids and walks toward the ferry.

Maia is shaking. I can't tell if it's with anger or anxiety or what but she's shaking violently. I put my hand on her shoulder but she's vibrating so viciously that my hand falls off. I'm thoroughly surprised but shrug it off. I don't expect Maia to be okay but it looks like she's about to explode. A person who works for the ferry comes and offers to put our luggage on the boat and we let him, there were only clothes, all of the important things we had were in our backpacks.

As we started to board, we saw the woman without her children, and yet I still couldn't put two and two together when Maia asked me to hold her backpack. She sprinted off and fully attacked the woman. The lady yelped but Maia covered her mouth. I dropped our bags and ran over to them, flinging Maia off of the lady and apologizing.

"Don't you dare even try to talk to him you hear me?!" she screamed. "If you do you'll have something coming for you! He doesn't want to talk to you so take your kids and leave! Leave! You bitch!" She screamed from the floor. Security guards came over to us and asked what was going on, I for sure thought that we were getting thrown off of the ferry, but instead they somehow calm and had us continue on.

We sat down inside of the ferry and I raised a brow at her. "What the hell was that?" I ask.

"My dad was captured during the War of Generations, so he was gone when I was born and didn't return until I was three. That woman right there had him for three years. She—she did some bad things to him, Ara. She baby-trapped him and got pregnant. She was in prison for a while but then got out because she argued that she was being made to capture him and be impregnated, but we all know that it's not true. Twenty-twenty-seven was anarchy, and she's a living nightmare for my father. She's psychotic, Ara," she explains, tearing up.

"How did you find out about this?" I ask.

"My mother wanted me to know from an early age what things like rape, sexual harassment, nonconsensual drugging, and abuse were. So when I was about five, I figured out that my father was a victim of rape and nonconsensual drugging but he didn't let that get to him on a day to day basis. However, in a time like this, we can't have him feel suicidal or damaged in any way from his PTSD." I nod and then look down at my hands, I had no idea that James Wagner could have gone through anything like that, but I thought that maybe that was what the Wagner family wanted, and they were no longer just a bunch of pretty faces to me.

The ferry leaves, and after a short fifteen minutes we are at Liberty Island, preparing to board the next ferry to Coral's Cay. We sit on the grass with many more people who I am guessing are also going to Kit-Island, but I say nothing in fear of them not going.

The small ferry comes, and only about twenty of the thirty people are allowed to board, and we are pleased to get in. The winds have started to pick up and it's colder than I thought it would be, but after the smell of the salty sea water stinging my nose for two hours, I am utterly pleasured when we arrive at Coral's Cay, in which I am glad it's not as far from Kit-Island as Coral's Cay is to Liberty Island.

Eventually, after another hour of a cold underwater subway ride, we are home. We walk quietly up from the basement into the building, pass the first floor, and onto the second, where I thought our families would be waiting, but I only saw Orren. He stood up and smiled at me. I had only been deprived of seeing him for a week and a half or so, but after the worst twenty-four hours of my life, it was good to see his bright face and newly trimmed hair.

I let Maia attack him first, of course. She had been going through a lot and missed her brother about half as much as she missed Jack Peter, but that was still much, much more than I could even fathom.

When Maia signals me over to attack him with her, all of the cold evaporates from my body and I feel a warm inviting feeling. When I hug Orren, the feeling gets stronger, and it's an overwhelming feeling of happiness and holiness that I never thought I would be able to achieve. I finally feel as though I am brought back to earth.