Take on the World

Locked Up

Jade and I walked up to Tori, Cat, and Andre interrupting their conversation.

"Oh, hey, I just wanted to remind you guys that Eve and I are going away to Cancun with Beck's family and then Paris for semester break, and you guys have nothing fun to do" We then turned and sat at the table Beck saved for us to eat lunch, conversation flowed freely and smoothly between us but was disrupted by Beck's phone.

"Hey, what's up?" Beck answered and his expression went from calm to panic in less than a minute "Is she okay? What did the doctors say?" his tense form relaxed a bit before he sighed "Okay, keep me updated" he said goodbye then hung up.

"What happened Beck?" Jay asked.

"My aunt, she fell and they took her to the hospital, she has a broken leg" he explained and I placed my hand over his knowing that he loved his aunt "So the trip is canceled, we'll have to find somewhere else to go".

"It's okay, we'll think of something" I comforted him.

"I just wanted you to meet the rest of my family".

"I will on a later date" he smiled and pulled me into his arms.

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"Okay it's gonna be me, Andre, c..." we walked into the classroom where Tori and Sikowitz were talking, well Jade and Beck did with me dangling from Beck's arms "Cat...".

"No" I stated "I'm okay with staying home, you guys want to go, go ask her by yourself" Beck set me on my feet.

"What's going on?" her obnoxious voice questioned.

"Beck's aunt got into an accident so we can't go to Cancun," Jay told them.

"Aw, how come?".

"She fell, they won't give me the details but my parents are going to stay with her over the break and we have nowhere to go" Beck added, "So we hear some of you guys are going to Yerba?".

"Yes, we are" Tori's smug tone made me clench my hands tightly "Would you like to come to Yerba with us, Beck?"

"Oh, that'd be great" Beck smiled at her.

"Jade, Everest do you have a question for me?".

"Can we come to Yerba?" Jay asked for both of us since I was facing the other direction intentionally.

"Hmm, maybe but first, you gotta gimme a hug" she held out her arms to us and I glared at her still remembering her accusation "Come on".

"Touch me and your arm will be facing the other direction" she forced a laugh then lowered her arms.

"Okay you guys can come along" with that I walked away.

"Why did we ask to go with them when we could have planned our own vacation?" I asked as we went towards Beck's car.

"Because it's free" he trailed off but couldn't come up with another reason "That's about it" scoffing I entered the car "Look, I don't want to be dependent on you or your family, I know you could pay for our trip but I don't want you to, so let's enjoy this free trip" he kissed my cheek with a smile.

~Time Skip~
We entered a building with our luggage as Tori and Andre talked about irrelevant stuff, I looked around the place and wrapped my arms around myself, it reminded me of the house I had been in with Katy and Maya. Seeing my discomfort Jay and Beck wrapped their arm around me.

"This dump is our hotel?" Andre questioned.

"Yeah" Tori confirmed.

"Gross" Gina frowned.

"Now I'm kinda glad I don't remember this place" Sikowitz stated as his eyes roam the place.

"Hello, hello to you, buddies" a man greeted excitedly "Which is Tori Vega?".

"Oh, that's me" Tori walked up to the man "Are you Festus' brother?".

"Yes buddy, I am Sgrodis it's happy to meet you" he grabbed her hand, placed it over his face, and sniffed it, everyone gave a weird look minus me and Cat who had her pear pad out.

"Why?" Tori withdrew her hand.

"It's a Yerbanian custom, see?" Cat told them as she read from her pear pad "It says, 'In Yerba when people greet each other, they will often sniff each other's hands as a sign of friendship'" she finished with a giggle. Turns out that the picture Tori showed us on the website was a picture framed on the wall, Sgrodis called a bellman to take our luggage but he was arrested by soldiers, on another disappointing note they gave us screwdrivers as keys for the bedrooms, the others is 2 Yerbanian women were petting Beck's head after a literal hissing fit they left and Andre got bitten by a vampire moth and would probably die.

Third Person's POV
The group was divided into groups of gender, in the girl's room lay Jade, Everest, Trina, Tori, and Cat, the former 2 were sound asleep while the latter 3 were wide awake in fright, flinching at the sounds outside their window.

"How can they sleep in the middle of a war?" Trina questioned in disbelief.

"I don't like this hotel" Cat added.

"Oh, come on, guys," Tori said, "They're just bombs".

"You know, I'm sure that-" Trina started but got cut off as something crawled under the sheets, they looked and saw that it was Robbie "Dude".

"Robbie" Tori groaned.

"Hi" Cat grinned.

"Get out of our room".

"No, I'm afraid to sleep alone" robe pouted.

"What about Andre and Beck?"

"They made me sleep in the bathtub, and I saw a lizard in there".

"A lizard?".

"Oh my God," Tori sighed "You guys are such babies, just because this place isn't quite as cushy as America, you make it seem like we're in the middle of" she was cut off by the bellman they saw earlier coming through their window.

"Hide me, hide me!" he yelled as he crawled onto the bed, the occupants screamed as he did this, and soldiers followed after him "Let go, let go, let go!" the 4 watched as the man was pushed out the window with the soldiers in tow.

"We are getting out of this country" there were shouts of agreement and they rush out of the room to the lobby, leaving the still sleeping sisters. Tori and the others met the rest of their group and were concerned about Andre when they saw the state he and his neck were in, his speech was slurred and he was hallucinating.

"Hey" the attention was turned to the 2 new faces "We woke up and saw this on our chest" they synced as they held up a dead lizard and spider.

"Eww, a dead lizard and spider?" Trina questioned and the sisters turned to her.

"They're dead now," The group told Sgrodis minus Jade, Beck, and Everest that they wanted to go home, the Yerbanian man told them they made a promise and didn't take kindly to them wanting to break it, it took summoning the Yerbanian soldiers for the group to stay true to their promise.

The night of their performance, the group was doing their final checks with Andre seeing a doctor who turned out to be the 12-year-old son of an actual doctor, although they had not gotten the results they wanted on Andre's condition he said he would still perform with the others. The performance was going well until Tori's shoe fell off and hit the Yerbanian Chancellor in his only functioning eye, a man who stood beside him shouted orders and soldiers ran in grabbed Tori, and carried her out when asked where she was headed the man said to jail. Everest stared impassively as this all unfold, once the soldiers and Chancellor left she turned to her boyfriend.

"Still think it was worth the free trip?" she asked.