Momentum (Completed)

Chapter Twenty: Do A Barrel Roll

(Nephele)

We'd been driving for about eight hours and within that time we'd almost crashed three times, our Animus' were playing twister with each other in the back and we'd discovered a SatNav that informed us we were going the wrong way. A small part of me realised I hadn't seen anything as technologically advanced as a SatNav in quite some time, but strangely enough, I didn't miss it. Sure, every now and then my mind would wander back to life behind the walls of Uxor; what had become of the women I once trained with? Who was the newest pop-star? What was the 'film of the year' this time around? How was my mother?

All of those questions paled in insignificance when I asked myself the most plaguing one of all: how was Lyra? Everything was resting on the answer to that being good; I mean, of course it would be good. Lyra was a tough as nails. She made it through anything and still came out smiling, right? The Insurgo's needed a name, just one name to look up to, and it was hers. It had to be; mine would not be wanted and even if I was, I didn't have the skills Lyra had. I couldn't cut it. 

I shook myself out of my train of thought and realised now that we were back on the right track, things in the truck had quietened down quite a bit. I found that Allissa liked to terrify everyone by being completely silent for ages and then burst out into fights of laughter, humming, or saying out loud disturbing parts of conversations that she was having with Conan... At least, I hoped she was talking with Conan. 

Aside from Allissa, I realised that Dimitri and Felix had quite a friendly bond between them both. I felt kind of bad; I'd been so distracted lately that I'd hardly noticed the world around me change. According to their conversations, they'd been out on multiple hunting and fishing trips together - they'd even tried to include Lexio - they discussed their relationships quite openly which, I'll admit, irritated me slightly and I made a mental note to ask Dimitri more about it later. On top of all, it turned out that Dimitri was quite a celebrity among the labourers of Uxor-America; it made me flinch, but I gathered from his stories that he was notorious for his almost escapes, his defiance and ability to survive that long with the worst kind of beatings. 

My Dimitri was a hero. 

'So, he's yours now, is he?' said Imara, suddenly making his presence in my thoughts known. 

I rebuffed his comment immediately. 'Oh, be quiet, kitten.' 

'Whatever you say, cub. I know how you feel better than you do sometimes.' I opened my mouth to argue but Imara was talking again, cutting me off. 'You're going to have to pull over soon Nephele, the four of us can't bare it in here much longer. I'm so bulky I can barely move without smacking into someone, Athena's all legs and the constant jolting isn't doing much for her balance, poor Noir has to curl up as small as she possibly can and stay in a corner to avoid being trodden on and Conan... well I think he's all but five seconds away from chewing his own leg off.' 

I didn't like the thought of them all being cramped up, but the thought of stopping and avoiding breaking out Lyra for yet another day didn't please me either. 'How much longer do you think you'll all cope?' I asked him. 

'We're trying our best,' Imara said, 'but now we're all so hungry...' 

At the mention of food my own stomach growled. How long had it been since I'd eaten a proper meal? Two days? Three? I wasn't sure. Of course, we'd been foraging for fruit and plants to eat while we were trekking but so few of us had the energy - or the bravery - to venture out into an unknown forest and hunt for an unknown food source that we all had to rely on Allissa to remember the good hunting spots and lead us to food.