Subjects

21- So That I Can Hear You Better

"The power source has to be somewhere on this ship, I don't know where to look anymore," Emily says.

"Maybe it can only be accessed from outside the ship," Roger offers.

"You're right! That's it!" Emily walks to the small window. "I can't believe I didn't think about it." She tries to look at the side of the ship but can't really see anything so she ends up sticking her face to the glass for nothing. "I don't know how are we going to find it, though, or fix it. I was never great at swimming."

"I can do it," Ben suggests. "I don't know exactly what to do but you can instruct me. I am not that bad when it comes to swimming."

"Are you sure it's a good idea?" Eva doesn't seem to like too much, and for good reasons. "Aren't there, I don't know, sharks? And what if suddenly there's a wave and it drags you away from the ship and we never find you again?"

"First of all, I don't think there are any sharks around here. I didn't see any when I was on watch," Ben does his best to assure her, not with great success if I may say. "And you can tie me to the ship so that worst case scenario you pull me back."

Now all Eva can think of is her pulling a rope out of the water and discovering that there's nothing at the end. "I really think this is a bad idea," she says.

"I don't like it too much either but..." Emily still has a round circle on her cheek from the window, "we don't know how long it's going to be until someone finds us. I think we need to try."

"I think I saw a rope at the back," says Roger.

Ben tries, and fails, at hiding how much he's excided for his swim. It's been weeks since his last shower and even longer since the last time he did any sport, who would have thought that Ben Langley himself would be in this situation. He certainly didn't.

He ties himself up at the waist and hands Roger the end of the rope. Eva and Emily immediately grab the rope as well and hold on to it as if their life depend on it, which they sort of do. Angie is looking at them all and thinks about the days she used to go sailing with her mom and dad. Of course, there weren't any people getting tied up but the look Eva has in her eyes does kind of looks like her mom whenever there was a big wave heading their way.

"If there's anything wrong pull on this rope immediately," Emily says. "We'll pull you back up."

"Yes and please don't stay in the water for too long," Eva does sound a bit like a worried mom.

"I know, don't worry, it won't take long."

Ben jumps off the edge of the porch and into the water. It's so cold, and yet it's the best he felt in so long. His eyes burn when he tries to open them but soon he gets used to it. It's nothing like swimming in a pool, or even at the beach. The water are different, more powerful than anything he ever felt. A sudden wave pushes him and he hits the side of the ship. He goes over the water for some air.

"Wow! This is amazing!" he shouts before diving back under and starting to scan the ship.

At this point his waterproof flashlight would come in handy. He barely sees anything in the darkness of the underwater land. Ben reaches out to the side of the ship and feels his way around it. He goes up for air a couple of times and then dives right back. To be honest, he's having a blast, this is even better than he expected.

When he's done scanning most of the ship he swims back to the porch.

"Oh, thank god you're back," Eva was never one to hide her emotions, when she's afraid, it's full on panic attack.

"You won't believe how the ship looks from outside!" Ben doesn't come up to the porch yet, he stays in the water as long as he can. "I think when it hit the water then it's bottom somehow got completely smashed. I don't know if there is any power source down there but either way I think the whole ship got completely deformed."

"Do you think there's any way we can get it to work?" Roger asks Emily.

"I don't know, there are so many things that can be the problem. I'm not even sure where to start," she starts pulling the wet rope out of the water and the wet boy along with it.

Roger is helping Ben back up on the ship but he is a little distracted with what he is about to say. Those newfound friends of his never gave him any reason not to trust them and yet, it doesn't make it any easier to peel another layer and let them closer to who he really is.

"I want to have a show tonight," Roger says. The three aren't too sure how to react, this is probably the single most unexpected thing he could have said right now. Only his partner in crime isn't surprised, although she really isn't an example because Angie has a frighteningly accurate ability to read into people's hearts. "I mean, like a theater show, for Angie."

"This is actually a really nice idea," Emily immediately supports him. "I'd love to help, even though I'm a terrible performer."

"What did you have in mind?" now that Ben is out of the water, he is freezing to his very core. He tries to stop the shaking but it just feels like he's been put inside one of those industrial freezers, plus they don't have a towel.

"Little Red Riding Hood, maybe?" Roger mistakes Ben's tone for disapproval, when in reality it's just the tone of a person who is slowly loosing his ability to speak because of how cold he is. "I used to be in Drama Club, we did those sort of things all the time."

"This is so cool!" Eva says and Roger smiles at her. "I wish I did more things like that."

"Why didn't you?" Roger asks.

"Just didn't have time," right, or maybe didn't have guts to try, just saying.

That's how Eva ended up asking Roger, "why do you have such large ears?"

"So that I can hear you-"

H O O O o o O o O O N K !

The entire pod starts shaking. They hear nothing as their ears are flooded with the loud ground shaking sound of a horn. They all run to the porch to see what's going on and there they find the largest ship they have ever seen in their lives (besides the alien mothership but that doesn't count because it's a spaceship).

The New Age Panther.