Nicole, an ambitious but overlooked student at elite private school, Waterbridge Academy, is ready for her junior year to be all kinds of fun.
While her focus should be classes and homework, they take second string to Highjinks, the epic prank battl...
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Squads in full gear hurtled either in or out of camp, as they ran drills with extra gusto and without complaining. With Jess and Emma on a mission to find us a rescue, we needed to do everything we could to stay alive till then.
Including getting Jackson and myself to lie to everyone and tell them Jess' departure had been planned. Telling them she'd gone rogue could result in some of them doing the same, and that wouldn't help us survive.
Jackson had taken his sister's departure just as hard as I had, if not more. Or maybe because he'd had no one to hold him till the chaos passed, it had seemed worse. Poor Kellen, unfortunately, had taken the brunt of both our freak outs. I could only imagine how bruised the poor boy was under the layers of warm clothes. But Jess was being stronger than any of us had given her credit for, and she was doing it for all of us, so we sucked up our fears and dove into our duties.
-.-
Kellen was across the clearing, working on fixing a blind that had somehow been knocked down this morning. The news of Jess' departure had energized people, so there was more activity than normal down on the ground, and I had to hold a shushing finger up to silence people several times as I neared Kellen.
"Tank, can you pass me the thingy?" He held two evergreen panels together with one hand, his other hand waiting outstretched for the wire that would attach them.
Clearly he'd been working hard enough to break a sweat, because his jacket was discarded beside him on a pile of rocks. He hadn't even noticed it was me and not Thomas―who he was now apparently calling Tank―standing over him.
"Tank! The thingy!" He waved his arm behind him urgently. It was a little silly of me, given that he was trying to get things done. I leaned down, and made the most rabbity noise I could think of.
"Whahaaa! What the heck?!" He jumped up so fast, he overturned the tool bucket beside him.
"Wha-? Wha-? Why-?" His inability to form words made the spiders-in-his-clothes shimmy he was doing even more comical. I doubled over, laughing so hard everything was blurring. Beside me, Tank had dropped to the ground, shaking with silent, tearful laughter.
"Cole?" Kellen stood there looking so confused it sobered me quickly.
"Aww, Kels!" I grinned as I hugged him, "Sorry, but that was just... aha... oh, you're too cute!"
"I swear, Cole! I shouldn't even talk to you for that," he grumbled with a reluctant smile as he picked up the panels he'd dropped.
"What?" I asked innocently, "I can't have a little fun? Who said we have to be all work all the time?"
"You did, actually. Remember two days ago? 'No time for fun, lots of things to get done.' Your words." He eyed me with a smirk; I had said it, to avoid being the potato in their pass the potato game.
"Aye aye, Captain. All work!" I saluted him, forcing a serious look onto my face. "Jacks took off already to help the Hunters. Where am I needed?"
