ATLANTIS | j. grace

twelve

ELLE WISHED SHE'D brought a speaker. Music was exactly what she needed to fill the awkward silence that came with trudging through Porta-Potty slush with a boy you barely know.

Of course the stupid dragon had to crash on a row of Porta-Potties, she thought bitterly. Just my luck.

The silence between them was consuming. Elle could barely focus on finding Festus when tension made her stomach twist and her mouth open and close like a fish as she tried for a conversation starter.

It didn't help that they were trudging through porta-potty slush. Elle pulled her shirt over her nose to try and block the smell, but it did little. As the cherry-on-top to her already nightmarish situation, the snow beneath her feet was covered in a sheet of ice, causing her to slip frequently. It was a miracle she hadn't face-planted into the slush yet.

A glimmer of bronze caught her eye, and Elle stood straight in excitement.

Thank the gods. I don't think I can take another minute of this.

"Leo!" she exclaimed, pointing forward. "It's Festus!"

Leo's eyes snapped up and he too stood taller. As his eyes caught on the bronze metal, he broke into a jog, carefullying jumping over broken pieces of Porta-Potty.

By the time she caught up to Leo, he was stepping around the dragon, searching under its limbs and poking at its metal surface.

"What happened to him?" Elle asked.

Leo continued his search, but answered, annoyance laced through his words. "Nothing. He's in perfect condition. The fireball came from the built-up gasses in the Porta-Potties, not Festus."

The boy pried open the control panel on the back of the dragon's head and Leo released a nasty curse. "Oh, Festus. What the heck."

"What's wrong?" Elle wondered, stepping through the snow to get closer. "Oh shit."

The wiring inside Festus' head had frozen over. Every inch of the control panel was covered in icy swirls.

"I don't understand," Leo muttered. "It should be too hot in here for ice to form.

"Khione," Elle spat.

Leo turned his head, eyes meeting hers. Elle's heart hurt for him. While his face was scrunched in thought, his eyes were sad. He'd worked so hard on this dragon, and here it was, laying in a steaming mess of crushed Porta-Potty.

"You think?" he asked.

Elle's hands curled into fists, nails biting into the skin of her palms. "Who else? You said it yourself, it's too hot for ice to form naturally and Wannabe Elsa already has it out for us."

Leo sighed. "Sucks that she's evil. She's so pretty."

Elle couldn't help herself from releasing a short laugh. "Isn't that the point? Ice is pretty but it's cold and awful?"

The boy shrugged. "I guess."

He was clearly in no laughing mood, so Elle returned to her silence.

She stepped back, giving Leo space to work as she watched. His fingers moved nimbly, drawing items from his belt, cleaning the control disk, and summoning fire to melt away the ice. Elle assumed being so in his element would ease him, like when a baby gets rocked by its mother, but Leo's hunched shoulders, frequent mumbles, and twisted expression proved he could not be more distressed.

Elle wished she knew what to say to lighten his mood, but it was hard when she too was distressed. Nothing was going right and it didn't seem like things were going to get any better. Elle thought back to her conversation with Aris, when he'd mentioned that they pushed through. She wondered again if this was what her life was like, if things always went this way, or if she was just suffering from a particularly bad batch of luck.