CHAPTER 30: DINING HALL

He arrived at the second table –if counting from left to right– which held dishes that were likened to myths by the time he was born on earth, Seafood!.

Yeah, seafood, they had become totally nonexistent on earth. Extreme technological endeavors had caused the water on earth to dry up gradually, all sea life going with it and at about the year 102 ATR, only 20 percent of the water that occupied the earth was left, and even that plummeted gradually.

By Brayden’s generation, fishes, other sea creatures and even the seas themselves were only taught as earth’s distant history as dinosaurs were.

On normal circumstances, Xenon wouldn’t have identified the dishes –there was no such thing as seas, talkless of seafood by the time he was born. The only thing that made him realise was the large, red crustacean with two, big claws on one of the plates. He recognized it as a lobster, one of the very few sea creatures he remembered.

Xenon got to the table, took his seat right in front of the lobster –Jeage beside him, disoriented by the sudden acceleration– and surveyed the rest of the dishes in his vicinity. He saw food containing fishes, crabs and lobsters, some smaller version of a lobster –he forgot it’s name– various shelled sea creatures, an octo-something and a lot of others he couldn’t remember.

His stomach rumbled impatiently as he struggled to make a choice. He ignored Jeage’s complaint about being brought to this table, he apparently prefers not to eat meat, seafood especially, because of his ability.

Xenon tuned out Jeage’s grumbling and decided to go with something light first. He spotted a plate of some long, rectangular, golden brown things.

’Scan’ He said

_________________

DISH: FISH STICKS (7)

INGREDIENTS: FISH... (INSUFFICIENT INFO)

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’Let me start with this.’ Xenon ignored the insufficient information and reached out his left hand to grab the plate, only for his hand to bump against another going for the same plate.

He looked up to the left to see who wanted to rob him of his fish sticks, only to see a pair of glowing, green, slitted irises. The person’s face was obscured from view by the shadow cast by the hood on the person’s head, the rest of their body too was completely covered by the large cloth they wore, leaving only the palms bare.

Xenon’s eyes traveled back to the person’s overturned palm. On the fingers were long, pointed, cool-grey coloured nails that resembled claws. Xenon also noticed some hair at the lower back of their palm, he leaned forward to study it but the person drew back their palm.

Xenon swiftly grabbed the retreating palm and brought it closer to his face, his thumb gently brushing the hair which he now noticed was actually not hair, but fur, grey in colour.

He raised his head away from the palm to look at the person, who’s hood had fallen back after being startled by Xenon’s sudden grab. Xenon stared at her in surprise, he wanted to say something but was interrupted by Jeage’s frantic whispers into his ear.

"Xenon! What are you doing? Release her immediately, weren’t you taught anyt... ah, I should have know this would happen" Jeage whispered to Xenon.

Xenon glanced at him, he was confused by his cousin’s words but ignored him anyway and faced the girl whose right palm was still in his left hand.

"Xenon, I said leave her!" Jeage whispered, louder this time that the girl heard.

She tried to pull her hand out of Xenon’s grasp, but before she could succeed...

"Are you human?" Xenon asked.

She froze and looked up at him and stared directly into his eyes, a mixture of emotions, fear, anger and annoyance playing on her face, before Xenon or the girl could do anything Jeage quickly stepped in.

He gently removed her hand from Xenon’s grasp while giving his cousin an intense frown. He bowed slightly to the girl and apologised.

"I’m sorry for the inconvenience my stupid cousin mighy have caused you. You see, he grew up locked away so he knows little to nothing about anything." Jeage spoke nervously as the girl rose to her feet.

"It’s nothing." She said lightly as she pulled her hood over her head and walked away.

Jeage sighed and sat beside his cousin, where the girl stood up from.

"Seriously? Were you taught nothing at all! What was Elsa thinking, letting you go out without some basic knowledge?" Jeage said furiously to Xenon in a low voice.

"Hey, it’s neither her nor my fault, blame your grandfather" Xenon retorted. "What did I even do that’s so bad?".

"You’re rea... ah, you’re gonna get me in trouble sooner or later..." Jeage mumbled, Xenon looked at him and raised his left eyebrow in confusion. "Let’s eat first, I’ll explain to you later" Jeage stood up and walked away from Xenon. "I don’t like dishes on this table, I’ll be back soon." He explained before mixing in with the crowd of students.

Xenon shrugged, picked up the plates of fish sticks and ate. He moved from dish to dish, relishing every bite, Jeage joined him at the table at some point but he was so immersed in the food that he didn’t notice. He looked up after being satisfied and saw Jeage looking at him, he was frowning slightly.

"Does Elsa not feed you enough?" He asked in amusement, cut a slice of pie and chewed.

"You can’t understand." Xenon muttered.

Jeage shook his head slightly and continued with his strawberry pie, sipping some lime coloured juice from a glass cup occasionally.

"What’s that in the cup?" Xenon grabbed the glass cup, put it to his lips and sipped.

He dropped the cup immediately and spit out the content he sipped. He turned to Jeage with a flushed, angry face.

"What the fu... is that thing? How is it so sour? How the hell are you drinking something like that!?" Xenon hollered.

"It’s a combination of all the sour fruits I could find. You know I eat a lot of things because of my ability, so I usually drink something sour to erase the occasional awful or funny aftertaste that’s left in my mouth."

"Can’t you use something sweet... or spicy instead!"

"I don’t like sweet things...they attracts bugs, and spicy things make me hot... I only eat those if I want to boost my fire power." Jeage replied and sipped his drink. "Besides, drinking something sour has become an habit, so I’m not bothered by the taste anymore."

"Damn! Well you could’ve at least warned me." Xenon washed his mouth with some water and turned back to Jeage. "So... what about the girl?"

"Let me finish my pie." Jeage answered.

Xenon hissed and stood up from the table, he decided to walk around the hall but didn’t go far before a hand landed on his shoulder.

"Hey, Xenon." Jason spoke in Xenon’s ear.

Xenon flinched and drew away from Jason, rubbing his shoulder against his ear furiously. He turned around and stared at Jason.

"What the... can’t you fucking talk normally? Now you’ve sprayed your spit into my ear!" He flared.

"Hey, calm down, I just wanted to give you a little scare." Jason chuckled. "Anyways, I just wanted to congratulate you for grabbing a spot behind me." Jason grinned and stretched out his right palm

"Fuck your congratulations. You and I both know the ranking was rigged. I beat you fair and square, and yet they placed you above me." Xenon slapped Jason’s outstretched palm away.

"Maybe I just have more potential than you. I mean, who wouldn’t be impressed by my Super Sonic Barrier Field Bubble Pop and Exploding Fist Gut Punch." Jason’s grin widened.

Xenon’s eye twitched. "I should’ve killed you on stage."

Jason laughed lightly and slapped his palm on Xenon’s shoulders once again. "See you in classes." He turned and disappeared into the crowd.

Xenon shook his head and walked towards the entrance of the tent they entered through, he poked his head outside and saw two people, who were supposed to guard the tent talking to each other, he withdrew his head, opened the tent a bit, and blinked several metres away Into the forest.

He ran for a few seconds till he reached the shore –which was also a beach— they entered the island from. He strolled around the beach, illuminated by the orange light from the tower under the starstruck, moonless sky.

He found a nice large rock to sit on, reached into his inventory and brought out something.

’Scan.’

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OBJECT: WHISPERING CARCANET

INFO [] ...

[Activate First Function]

[Activate Second Function]

"Activate first function." Xenon spoke, putting the necklace on. The red gem pendant glowed red and blinked in and out continuously for a few seconds. The red stopped blinking glowed a bit brighter, a voice came through immediately after.

"Xenon?" Elsa’s voice came through the necklace.

"Hey Elsa, can you hear me?"