Aqua City

Chapter 04

The moment I opened my eyes, the first sight I caught was the unfamiliar white ceiling. I got up from the soft bed I was lying on and massaged my temples, trying my very best to remember what in the world happened to me before I got inside this familiar room. As I try to remember, my head started aching so I didn’t force myself to think and tried to calm my mind.

I climbed down the bed I was lying on and stretched my body as I roamed my gaze around the area. I was inside a pink elegant room. I walked up towards the door and opened it. I was surprised after seeing what’s on the other side of the bedroom’s door.

As soon as I stepped out, I saw a very large aquarium with mermaids swimming around. “Where is this place?” I thought, totally lost. As far as I remembered, I was trying my way out to escape from our mansion and when I got inside the basement, I found a monster who turns out to be my elder sister, Candace who got infected by an unidentified virus that miraculously spread around. We were chased by my sister and we ended up inside the mansion’s garage. Then I remembered that Jake chopped the back of my neck that caused me to fall unconscious.

“That little – why did he knock me out?! And where’s my dad?! I have to find my dad!” I thought in panic. I started jogging, trying to find how I found them when I accidentally bumped into someone. I was about to fall down the ground when a pair of strong arms caught me and helped me to stand steadily.

“Aren’t you the one who Jake took here?” a man with black curly hair told me. A short-haired girl, who looked my age suddenly came into the scene.

“Oh, she’s awake,” the girl reacted and flashed a smile.

“You seemed to know me. Who are you?” I asked as I stepped away from this young man who caught me before I fell.

“I’m Orion and this girl next to me is Tessa,” he introduced himself with a smile. “We are Jake’s friends and they asked us to watch over you.”

“Where am I?” I asked.

“You’re in Aqua City,” Tessa responded. “You are under the sea.”

My jaw almost dropped in surprise. I never thought that Jake was telling the truth – that the humans did really colonize the water underneath.

“So, Jake wasn’t lying when he said that survivors colonized underwater,” I said, totally mesmerized. “Where is he now? I need to ask him lots of question and I need to know where my dad is”

“Well, Jake went up to land. He said that he had some unfinished business that he needed to attend to,” Orion explained. “ Why don’t you wait for him? We can give you a tour while waiting for him, if you want?”

“Sounds good to me. I’ve got lots of questions too,” I said and smiled. And with that, Tessa and Orion started giving me a tour around.

The two led me outside the house and as soon as we stepped out of the house, I instantly saw the City. The house where I was taken was located on the top of the hill. It was dark when we went out so I assumed that it was already night time. I could see how the city glimmered because of the city lights. Watching the view almost made me forgot about the apocalypse going on up the land.

“The view is pretty,” I commented and found myself smiling. “Especially at night.”

“Don't be deceived. It’s still daytime,” Orion responded as he showed the time on his wristwatch

“It's just dark because we were living under water,” Tessa explained.

“Is it always dark in this place?” I asked.

“Yes, that's why the anti-monstrous cannibal foundation provided all the solar power and lights we have here,” Tessa said.

I guess the said organization really know how to find their way to survive, huh? Suddenly, I noticed that it was so easy to breathe even though we were underneath the water surface. We were into deep so it was kind of surprising that we could easily breathe as if we were on the land.

“Why is it so easy to breathe here as if we were actually living on the land?” I asked, to which Tessa responded.

“Aqua city was covered with a barrier that can provide oxygen,”

“How about food?”

“We grow crops and we swim outside for food”

“Wasn't that dangerous? Swimming out the sea to catch fish and other seafood.”

“At least there are no cannibals around, right?” She responded and smiled. “And we have safety gears, anyway.”

Since Tessa brought out about those monsters, I decided to ask a few questions about it. “Speaking of those cannibals...Jake mentioned that the mid-level can only be defeated using blades,” I started. “How about the low-level and the high-level ones? How do you defeat them?

“The low levels are easy to defeat. They could be defeated by just shooting their heads.”

Then Gail jumped in to our conversation. “The high ones seemed undefeatable. They could heal themselves and their regeneration was so quick. Furthermore, they could hypnotize the uninfected ones.”

“How would you know if you're facing a high-level, a mid-level or a high-level?”

“Low-level cannibals were the aggressive ones. As soon as they smell a human, they'll automatically attack them,” Gail explained then continued. The are the monstrous cannibals who have mixed personalities of an uninfected human and a low-level cannibal. Mid-level tend to disguise themselves like a normal person. I heard from Jake that your sister turned into a middle one so I guess you already noticed that.”

Tessa showed a sympathetic smile at the mention of my sister who turned out to be infected too and said, “W-We're sorry about her.”

Suddenly, flashbacks of what happened to my sister came back running inside my mind. I felt warm tears started flowing from my auburn eyes but I instantly wiped it away and plastered a smile on my face. I didn’t speak, I just heaved a sigh.

“Can we change our topic?” I asked. I don’t want to talk about what happened because it still hurts to see your own sister turning into a monster even before I get to know her. I have no idea that I have an elder sister. My dad didn’t tell me about her and I couldn’t remember her too because I was still a little kid back then.

“Sure thing. Do you have anything that you’d like to ask?” Tessa asked.

“Yes. It’s about the young scientists Jake mentioned about. I heard that she was the one who could create a perfect cure. Where is she?”