Unordinary: A Dream...? More Like A Nightmare

Chapter 16: Preparing For The Future



John didn't know where he was. He could feel nothing. He could see nothing. He could move nothing. Despite this however, he was content. Content to simply bask in the feeling of not moving, not working, not fighting. To lay still and breathe For the first time in what felt like years, John was finally at peace…

"John… wake up, John…" , a whisper forced the void around him to retreat for a moment as John managed to flicker open his eyes for a brief moment to take in the inky black surrounding him. For a second everything was still, until a bright white light flared to life where his heart should be and chased away the comfortable darkness.

Amber gold eyes snapped open and a scarred hand struck like a viper to wrap around the dainty hand reaching towards his shoulder. Red eyes met gold as Remi lost herself in smoky amber eyes and John slowly woke himself up. Remi felt the calluses rubbing against her palm and traced the many ridges covering his knuckles flowing down his arm like a waterfall. He flexed his hand for one long moment, making the scars ripple and shift with his skin before he let go.

Remi swallowed lightly as she trailed her eyes up from the palm now resting on Seraphina's back to resume tracing imaginary drawings, allowing the magenta haired queen to snuggle tighter into his side under the blanket. She followed the arm up to his bare shoulder, still dirty from an entire night of keeping her and everyone safe from yet another army of mutant monsters, and met his half lidded eyes once more. Those golden amber orbs of light had dimmed from being piercing spotlights to softly glowing eyes once more, though the pupils seemed to have forever disappeared, leaving luminescent eyes in their wake.

He seemed happy for a moment, she noted as she tried to stop staring. His muscles were loose and rippled with every small movement, tensing and coiling before loosening once more as he stretched himself out under her nervous red eyes. John's eyes had squinched shut while she had been… not ogling… she was a lady, thank you very much.

"John.", her voice squeaked a bit as she said his name again, she chose to ignore this and clear her throat before continuing. "It's almost time for theeep!", her voice squeaked once more as a single blue eye flared to life from behind a curtain of magenta hair on top ofJohn's chest to glare up at the pink haired girl for daring to wake her and try to take her pillow. Just before the situation could get ugly for the electric girl, John yawned and slowly sat up, ignoring the noises of protest the three girls in his bed made.

He reached for the hands that tried to guide him back to sleep and gently squeezed them as he pried them off his arms and stomach. He looked down to lock eyes with disgruntled blue skies that warned him of horrors yet to come if he didn't lay his ass back down righ-

A coarse yet gentle hand reached towards the back of her head and intertwined with the hair at the back of her neck to slightly scratch at her scalp, her body melted into John's, molding herself against him as he hummed low in his throat. He reached down and picked her up, softly placing her back into the spot of warmth he'd left behind before standing up to his full height.

"Sorry, Sera.", his rough voice called out as he stretched his spine and arms towards the heavens. "But I think we all could use a shower right about now."

Under the sleepy eyes of his queen, John slowly padded his way to the door only pausing to look her in the eyes, "You good for a bit, Sera?"

The magenta haired young woman allowed herself to wake up just a bit more to seriously consider the question. She looked across the empty room, then met Remi's own wide eyes, before looking at the other two girls resting fitfully in bed next to her, reaching for John's warmth.

"I'll be ok.", was all she said as she got herself out of bed herself.

Remi, who had been frozen since John had grabbed her wrist before he could touch him, reacting from being dead asleep to ready to kill in a heartbeat managed to stutter her words out past the deep red blush rising from her neckline, "Y-you've got a-about four hours until sunset."

"Perfect."

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Sera had no idea what was going on. She'd taken her shower after Remi had so rudely stolen her snuggle buddy, and one way or another had ended up outside the Wellston's principal office an hour later. Standing beside Arlo and herself, with John nowhere to be seen, was the rest of Wellston's royalty. They had all showered and changed into tight fitting jeans and loose t-shirts, all in the school's favored colors, navy blue and forest green.

Isen and Blyke stood next to Remi, who refused to look them in the eye or answer them and was nervously rubbing the hand John had grabbed, occasionally breaking into a small blush that rose from her neck once more, restarting the cycle of concerned questions from her two friends.

Cecile stood next to both Claire and Elaine, the two girls interrogating the healer quiet enough to escape the ears of the distracted time manipulator, however the way the healer was staring dazedly into the distance let Sera know exactly what she was gushing to the other two girls about.

Darren and her sister Leilah were leaning against each other next to the open window, just quietly holding each other. She tried to not allow herself to think about dragging John back to bed to resume their little nap, because the strangled noises Arlo was making in the back of his throat assured her that wasn't going to happen.

Judging by the veins bulging from his neck, the former king wasn't taking the tardiness well despite not needing to be present for another ten minutes. She watched with half a mind as Arlo grit his teeth and opened his mouth, no doubt to rant about a 'king's duty to be present before everyone else' and 'he needs to set an example' until they heard childish giggling from down the hall. All eyes turned and widened in surprise at the sight of the scarred and still shirtless form of their king, as well as his little entourage.

Kids hung from his outstretched hands like limplets, they ran around his feet playing games and having the times of their lives if their shrieks of laughter were anything to go by, however it was the smallest child with beautiful raven hair running down her small back held to his chest by vines made of black aura that drew their attention, barely noticing the handful of attentive adults following in their wake. The young girl who couldn't have been more than three had her hands palming the cheeks of John slowly moving around to brush against his jawline and play with the twitching lips from his small warm smile.

He made his way towards them, shepherding the children forward until he came to a sudden stop before the group. He laughed softly as he took a knee and allowed the improvised harness to fade away as he held the tiny ravenette to him. Her small giggles and innocently shy smile was adorable, however it was when she turned to look at them that stole her breath. After all, it wasn't everyday she saw a toddler with John's hair and her eyes.

She was beautiful, Sera noted distantly, stuck in a daze as she was, and pure with the same peach skin she had. She was delicate and precious, and Seraphina had no clue when she had moved forward to crouch beside the two, however the faded colors around her and the slight strain on her recovering aura gave her a few ideas.

She took a second to really look at the toddler John still cradled to his chest, her delicate body slowly unfreezing like the rest of the people around her. Her eyes alit with her own young aura, matching sky blue glowing eyes meeting each other as the world resumed. John looked amused behind the curious child, probably because he could feel as she used her abilities, she was reaching out to cup her cheek as she still did to John.

Sera let out a shuddering breath as she held the tiny hand to her face, she stared into the child's eyes and saw a vision of the past; wonder that she had never had the chance to experience. She saw the gratitude that the little girl couldn't let out because she didn't have the words, she saw the pain of loss that she knew the girl saw mirrored in her own eyes, and she saw the awe that left her breathless when she looked between her and John.

"You're… the queen right?", she asked, hesitantly gnawing at her bottom lip as John placed her on his knee. "Like he's the king?", she said, patting John's cheek with her other hand.

She had to swallow past her suddenly dry throat to answer in a weak croak, "Yes. Yes I am… What's your name sweetheart?"

"River.", she said quietly as she seemed to realize what she was doing and turned back to bury her face into the still softly smiling king. However, she refused to pull back the hand Sera still loosely held and continued her exploration of John's face with the other.

"River.", she said slowly, exploring the sound of the name until she felt an impulsive need to know more. "What's your last name, River?", Sera said as softly as she could, gently caressing the hand she held to her cheek.

Here she hesitated for a moment, taking peens at her from the safety of John's chest. It took her some time to whisper out a small, "Evans."

"River Evans…", Sera repeated back to herself a handful of times before she brought her focus back to the small girl in Her John's arms. "What are you doing here, sweety?"

The small girl seemed to have decided that Sera was okay because she allowed herself to pull back slightly to offer the king a small timid smile. A smile that seemed to have shocked him if the sharp inhale she heard and the slightly wider eyes were indicators, however it was when the girl turned to answer that confused her.

"I know him.", she said the same way people said the sky was blue or the grass was green.

"You… know him?", Sera repeated as she tried to puzzle out what the young girl meant. "How do you know him?"

"My power.", she said like it explained everything as she turned to stare off into the distance, watching the sun slowly make its way down in the clear blue sky.

Sera locked eyes with John, the question held inside obvious to the young king. He leaned forward a bit to not attract the girl's attention and whispered, "I found her alone on my way here so I asked her where her parents were. She latched onto me and refused to let go. And then I really looked at her and…well?", he said. Sera understood; she had captured her whole attention the moment she'd seen her face, however she decided to completely ignore the feelings and the imagery of a child with John's hair and her eyes. Yup! They had more important things to talk about right now. While she had been distracted John had started talking however, and she chose to pretend nothing happened.

"...and then she wouldn't let go of me so all the kids started crowding around. I just didn't have any good enough reason to tell them off so I let them follow me up here, with a few minders.", he finished pointing towards the handful of adult refugees that had been following him. Sera however wanted to get back on track and refocused herself back onto the child who seemed content to rest her head against his chest and listen to his heartbeat.

"River.", she called.

"Yes?", the child yawned out as she made herself comfortable against John once more.

"What do you know about John?", she decided to ask after a moment of debate.

"Hm.", the girl hummed as she molded herself into the chest of the young king. "He's done things he's not happy about.", she finally decided to say as she closed her innocently sad baby blue eyes.

The answer stole her breath for a moment, and seemed to hit John like a freight train if his wide eyes and open mouth were any indication. Before either could think of anything to say, the petite child continued.

"His papa had to leave. People hurt him. He hurt them. He hurt himself. He wanted to make up for it. He protected me and mama. He made the monsters go away. Mama said that I should stay with him. She said she had to go away for a long time.", the child whispered out, each word like bags of bricks to the two teenagers. They looked at the accompanying minders only for an older woman to mouth two words that froze their hearts for a moment; monster and poison.

"You're very smart, especially for your age River.", John said as he absent mindedly rubbed small circles into her back.

"Mm-mm. Momma said it's cuz' of my power.", she grumbled out as she gave up on trying to sleep and propped her head back up against his shoulder.

"And what's your power sweety?", Sera said as she finally released her hand and joined Her John infubbing the girls back.

"I look at things and know about them.", she said proudly as she pointed at a leaf that had been blown in by the afternoon wind. Before either could ask for any clarification, both were assailed with the knowledge of how the leaf had come to be there. It had sprouted from a branch just a short while ago and had grown day and night until a monster had rammed a victim into the base of its tree and knocked it loose. It had been blown by the wind across the emptied town until it had made its way to the floor and remained in place for the last hour.

The answer hit both teens like another sack of bricks; she was reading the history of whatever she was looking at and passing what she understood onto whoever else was looking at the same thing. They only knew it grew day and night because what three year old understood photosynthesis? Sera's eyes widened as she connected the dots.

"It was you! You were the one who showed us those things about John!", when said boy king looked at her in confusion, she waved it off with a mouthed later as she turned back to face the half asleep toddler. "What else-" however before she could finish her question the door swung open, allowing Keene's smiling face to be seen.

"Hello there! The headmaster will see you no-… Am I interrupting something?", the beige haired head of Wellston security said as he took in the confused group of people watching the wide eyed forms of his king and queen.

John and Sera both snapped their heads to offer the man twin stares that were sharp enough to slice through steel, and if the increasing glow in John's eyes were any indication, then violence would be his future. Quickly the sensor thought of a way to distract the two powerhouses to save his own hide. "He's ready for you now.", Keene said as he ducked back into the office to escape the rather threatening air the queen had, not to mention the feeling or rather lack of feeling from the king; rather than a threat, this was a promise of painful violence.

Sera turned back to see the child had somehow fallen asleep on John's shoulder, and the children's minders had guided them away while they were talking, most likely assuming the king and queen had taken a vested interest in her. Sera exchanged one last look with Her John before standing up with him and slowly making their way to the office, shortly followed by Arlo, her sister, and Darren. The last thing she saw of the rest of Wellston's royalty was the boys' horrified faces as they gazed at the young girl and the frozen faces of the girls. She looked back at John one last time before throwing a small smirk at them with a wink, closing the door behind them.


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