Chapter Two

It’d been what seemed to be 72 hours. What would’ve been three long days, two long nights, and one thing had circled Cassandra’s mind. Who did it and when did it happen? The skies in Tenarum were constant. Always day in some areas and always night in others. There were no clocks when she first entered this world and she couldn’t find one anywhere else for that matter. How was Leo keeping time to know when drop offs would be? She would have to ask him when she next saw him.

During these long hours she stayed by herself, still not knowing what to do or where to go. Her time was mostly, as planned, spent in the Cosmic Land. The stars became her sanctuary and the ground her preferred thinking spot. She honestly didn’t know what to do. Seeing people in their groups almost made her feel insecure, yet she chose to speak to no one unless spoken to. Almost as if on queue, Leo approached behind her.

“Doing okay? I’m making my rounds to all the newbies, just checking up.” She crossed her legs and put her hands behind her, feeling the softness of the grassy field against her fingertips.

“I guess. Depends on what you’d define as okay,” she commented, flatly. Leo walked beside her and knelt in the grass, his jeans swishing as he did so. There the two sat for a few moments in silence as Leo thought of what to add.

“Want to talk about it?” Leo asked, no longer looking at her. Both of their gaze was focused at the stars now.

“Not too sure I want to share. It’s about the reason I’m here. At first, when you mentioned it, I didn’t understand why it mattered if you disclosed why you’re here. Now that I actually know my own reason, it’s a different story. I don’t want to say and have people look at me with pity or something.” Cassandra turned to the left and the two locked eyes.

“I’ll give you a tip, blondie. Not that many people actually care. If it was a suicide, there’s no shame in it here. People are all focused on one thing; rebirth. Yes, you’ll make friends, but rebirth is still the ultimate goal for everyone here. Well, most people here. Even if they don’t want to be reborn though, your story isn’t a big deal at the end of the day.” Leo shrugged and let out a small chuckle as if what he said was some kind of joke.

“Is that supposed to help me? Knowing that nobody cares? It almost makes everything even worse.” Cassandra stood up, prepared to walk away, and remembered her burning question right before she was to walk away.

“By the way,” she started. “How do you tell time in this place?”

“Whoa, whoa, I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad. Some people find solace knowing that their death tale won’t make a huge impact. I’m sorry. To answer your question, though, only the ambassadors are able to really tell time, and it’s with one of these bad boys.” Leo pushed his left sleeve up, revealing a watch. It looked to be digital and its square face was just as big as the strap. This made Cassandra turn to face him again.

“Why aren;t we allowed to have one?” She asked, puzzled.

“Keeping time isn’t really important for you guys. The ambassadors only really get to see the day of the week anyway. This tells us the day of the week and the amount of time left until there’s a dropoff.” Leo adjusted his left sleeve back down and over the watch with a small shrug.

“I guess that makes sense, but a part of me feels like I’m going crazy not knowing. I don’t even really do anything besides sit here. How do you all keep from going stir-crazy?” Cassandra pushed her hair back out of her face with both hands and left them behind her head for a moment before the hair would immediately fall back over the right side of her face.

“Talk to people, make friends, make your own fun! The possibilities are endless. Once you get items from the drop off it’ll help things, too. The first week or two is always like this for newbies. You all are so used to having what you did in the living world that being in a strange, new place without all of it seems like the worst thing. If I were you, I’d try actually opening up to someone. You’re not the only newbie and definitely not the only one alone. Go find some others! That boy that opened the door for you is a good start, I’d say. I saw the two of you talking briefly.” Leo stood now and brushed the dirt off of his jeans with a smile and Cassandra couldn’t begin to understand why he was always so cheery. Especially knowing that everyone she would meet would be someone that died made her feel uneasy and made her stomach tie in knots. She supposed he had a point. Lots of the people she saw in groups went everywhere in that group. The people she saw alone, though, looked content even.

“Yeah, good idea. Thanks.” She quickly made her way back to the Courtyard, on the search for Abdul. Scanning through all of the people, she couldn’t see him. She decided to bite the bullet and start asking around. After all, if she was supposed to make friends, she had to start a conversation with people somewhere. She decided it would be with the first group she happened upon. There were five in total. Two of the girls and one of the guys had vibrantly colored hair. The other two, another girl and boy, had bright highlights.They saw Cassandra approaching and a few of them smiled and nodded to her, bringing the others attention to her as well.

“Hey, sorry to bother you all, did you happen to see a small indian kid around? He’s got black, rectangular glasses and was in a red T-shirt. He’s one of the newbies like me.” Cassandra tried her best to sound upbeat and cheerful to make a good first impression.

“We haven’t, but I love your hair! My name’s Sarah, what’s yours?” The girl with bright purple hair spoke and ushered toward the stripe of Cassandra’s hair that she had dyed blue. From the looks of things, it may seem like she was already part of that group. She thought it a bit weird for them to all be grouped based on hair, but didn’t question it or dare bring it up.

“Thanks, and my name’s Cassandra.” She tucked the blue stripe behind her ear as she spoke.

“I hope you find your friend then, Cassandra,” a boy with spiked, crimson hair replied. She looked at him and nodded with a smile before turning around only to pause and look at the group again.

“Actually, I was really only looking for him so that I could try to make a friend. You all seem nice though, mind if I pal around with you? I can always go look for him if not, I’m just feeling a little lonely I guess,” Cassandra could feel herself rambling and barely managed to stop before she’d made a mess of everything. All members of the group looked at each other before nodding. Thus, the group of five became six and Cassandra felt like she’d finally ‘made it.’

“We’re happy to have you. To introduce all of us, you met Sarah and now Jake, I’m Tiffany, this is Tasha, and that’s Kevin.” The teen introduced the rest of the group and Cassandra took a seat between Tasha and Kevin. The dark skinned girl spoke then.

“Yeah we’re all here because we’re the impulsive hair dye gang,” Tasha laughed and the other girls joined in.

“We also have depression.” Kevin added on. This got everyone laughing more, even Cassandra who let out a chuckle at the slightly-morbid joke. The longer she sat with the group, the more comfortable she became. They were all so different, yet brought together by such a strange and similar reason. Sarah had ivory skin that matched her own, but was a natural-brunette as her eyebrows indicated. Jake was a tan boy, but his natural, dark brown hair was beginning to peek through his red spikes. Tiffany had golden skin that looked like what the sunlight would on a sandy beach. Her hair was long, wavy, and brown with red highlights. They suited her, Cassandra thought.

“Lighten up, Kev, damn. You’re going to scare her!” Tasha spoke with a strong voice. She was the darkest out of all of them with her rich, umber skin and purple highlights peeking through her black curls.

“I’m just speaking the truth, T. She laughed, it’s fine.” Kevin and Tiffany looked like they could be siblings, though instead of his natural brown hair, he had navy blue hair. Tiffany and Kevin both had matching dark brown eyes in addition to their other striking features being similar.

“Not to break up whatever we’ve got going on, and not to intrude, are you two related? You just look like you could be twins.” The group became quiet at Cassandra’s words and she began to feel self conscious for the first time since she showed up to Tenarum. She crossed her arms over her chest and watched as Kevin and Tiffany both stood and walked in seperate directions.

“I’m sorry, I- I didn’t think before I spoke and I remember Leo telling me not to bring up death, but I didn’t know not to bring up anything involving the living world.” Cassandra put her head in her hands, and Tasha rubbed her back then.

“Don’t worry, honey, you didn’t know. To answer your question though, yes, they’re siblings. We don’t really bring it up though because of personal stuff.” She rubbed her back for a moment more until Cassandra looked back up to find the other three looking straight at her.

“Now I know, I guess. I just feel like I ruined everything and I literally just got here,” Cassandra said, worry strong in her voice. She tried to put a smile on as she saw Tasha with a worry-filled grin.The group sat there in silence, looking to the ground for a few minutes before Kevin returned to the group.

“I’m so sorry, Kevin. I didn’t know not to tal-” Cassandra stopped speaking as Kevin waved his hand at her and spoke.

“No need to apologize, we’re fine. Tiff just took some time to herself and went to the forest. She’ll be okay. She likes it there.” Kevin quickly took a seat on the other side of Cassandra and she felt the group slowly come back to life, so to speak.

“So, Cass, when Tiff comes back it’s initiation time,” Sarah rubbed her hands together and Cassandra jumped partially at being referred to as Cass for the first time and partially also at there being a supposed “initiation.”

“Can I ask what the initiation is?” Cassandra gulped loudly. Her mind spun at the possibilities of what an initiation could be, especially knowing that everyone is dead.

“Nope! Not until Tiff gets back!” Sarah exclaimed. Cassandra shook her head, trying to make it seem like she was not plagued with curiosity.

“Well then if it’s all the same to you, I’m going to go try to find the guy I was originally looking for.” Cassandra stood up shakily as the feeling returned to her legs. She found her balance after a moment and Jake finally piped up.

“You tired of us already?” He asked. Cassandra chuckled, shaking her head.

“No, I just want to try to find him like I was originally going to. I can have more potential friends than just all of you, can’t I?” She replied.

“I suppose we should share,” Jake replied. Cassandra let out another chuckle before leaving the group anyway.

She figured she wouldn’t be able to find Abdul in the eternal forest, as there were so many twists and turns. Too easy to get lost, she thought. Instead, she turned her attention to the Azure Sanctum. It reminded her of the cosmic land but with a clear, bright, blue sky instead of a starry one. There were also fountains and trees there, unlike the cosmic land which was all grassy and flat. Looking out, she shockingly was able to find Abdul. At least she’d hoped that the short, skinny boy with the red tee was Abdul. As she approached him, he turned in his seat on one of the benches and she could see the frames of his glasses aside his head. She hurried her pace a bit and took a seat on a different bench nearby.

“Hey,” he said, not looking in her direction.

“Hey, how are you?” She asked.

“I’m here. Did you ever find out what you wanted to find out at the service building?” He turned to her and offered a half-smile.

“Yeah, I’d rather not talk about it, though if it’s alright with you,” she replied, shrugging. She didn’t meet his gaze and instead stared at the ground with a firm frown.

“You don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to, I was just curious,” he stated as he looked down to where she was also, almost as if trying to find what she could be looking at. “Things going okay for you in general?”

“I guess so. I was just walking through the courtyard when I basically got myself into a possible friend group and then almost got myself kicked out at the same time. Apparently we’re friends though. They say they’re putting me through an ‘initiation’ of some sort. No idea what that means.” Cassandra looked up and shrugged with a sideways grin.

“Exciting. I haven’t managed to make any friends. Probably just because I don’t reach out. I’m glad you found some people, though.” Abdul smiled but Cassandra could still see the sadness in his eyes.

“Well hey, I’ll be friends with you. No initiation required,” she let out a laugh trying to lighten the mood and Abdul seemed to be feeling better as he even let out a giggle.

“Well I’m glad for that. When is your ‘initiation’ anyway?” Abdul questioned and used his fingers to make air quotes as he spoke.

“Sometime soon, we were supposed to be waiting for one of the girls to come back from the forest, but then I sort of left them to come find you. You seemed nice and I wanted to get to know you more, I guess. We’re two newbies, so I figured we’d have plenty to discuss while we get acclimated.” Cassandra swung her feet around to sit sideways on the wooden bench. She contemplated getting up to rejoin the group in hopes that Tiffany would be back though it hadn’t been long.

“Well don’t let me keep you from your initiation, by all means. I’ve just been here thinking about everything that happened before I got here, in the living world I mean. I’m fine with just chilling here while you go. Besides, I don’t think I’d fit in to a group. Not yet at least.” He looked at the fountain in front of them then, almost as if waiting for Cassandra to leave.

“I’ll come back after and tell you all about it,” she chuckled before getting up.

“I look forward to it,” he replied.

Cassandra got up and slowly made her way back to the courtyard. She wasn’t expecting to see Tiffany returning but, sure enough, she was also making her way back to the courtyard. Cassandra jogged over to her before she could reach the group.

“Hey I just wanted to apologize for making you feel uncomfortable. I didn’t know not to bring that kind of stuff up,” she said through huffs and puffs.

“No sweat. I know you didn’t mean to, that’s why I just kind of had to walk away and get some air. We are related though, you’ve got a good eye about you. We didn’t grow up together or anything though. We didn’t even know of each others existence until the people at the service building told us. We don’t really see each other as siblings though, it’s a little weird since we never knew each other. I don’t really want to give you my life story, but that’s the gist of that part.” Tiffany ran her fingers through her hair as the two approached the rest of the group who had moved to a different part of the courtyard.

“Welcome back you two, Kevin and I are trying to see who’s stronger. Want to arm wrestle?” Jake flexed his arm where he’d rolled the sleeve all the way up.

“Jake--” Tiffany began before cutting herself off to reword her thought. “Nobody wants to arm wrestle with you just so you can get an ego.”

“Excuse me, but they all have and we’re in the finals. We both arm wrestle the two of you and whoever wins faces off. Lets face it though, it’ll be Jake and I,” Kevin smiled slyly toward Jake, who playfully glared back at him.

“Does this happen often?” Cassandra stood with her hands on her hips, laughing.

“With these two? It’s always something new,” Tasha replied, shaking her head.

“Boys, boys, we can do this later. We have business to take care of first,” Tiffany took a seat on the ground and patted beside her for Cassandra to sit.

“Business?” The other four said in almost unison. Cassandra was a bit taken aback hearing all of them actually speak at the same time.

“Yes, business. How could you all forget about initiation?” Tiffany tapped her fingers against the side of her face and all of the others looked at each other and then to Cassandra.

“Is anyone going to tell me what initiation is yet?” Cassandra asked, getting fed up at all of them beating around the bush. Tiffany playfully rolled her eyes before, finally, giving Cassandra the answer that she’d been stewing over.

“Initiation is when you tell the rest of the group why you’re here.”