‘When life gives you a lemon, make a lemonade.’
I have heard this phrase in some movie or Facebook or somewhere. I don’t know.
But the situation I’m in, can’t be just, life-giving me lemons. It’s a truckload of lemons. Is this phrase even applicable in this planet?
About a month has passed since we came into this planet. Me with several other passengers from the flight. I had made a resolve to leave my past life and turn a new leaf. I never knew my resolution was so strong that I could pass several billions of lightyears and reach this planet.
When I first opened my eyes on this planet, my reasons came later before instincts kicked in. I was running around saving people before I knew it. I had been face-to-face with death plenty of times. It was natural for me to take action in such a situation. There were many civilians injured. In that precarious situation, they were helping each other.
When initial confusion died down, reason took place. I had never seen a place like this. The moon or whatever it was, was too big. The days were unusually long. The nights were blue. I felt a premonition that we were in an utterly hopeless situation. But informing others could spread panic. And we needed as many calm people as possible for our survival.
When Kiara mentioned the strangeness, I passed it off as nothing. It was problematic if others start noticing the strangeness. What good knowing that would it do?
Slowly, few more people started to notice it. It became tacit understanding among us not to talk about the strangeness. Those who noticed were calm and collected people. The ones who didn’t were busy worrying about themselves.
Apart from the strangeness, this place had ample vegetation only thing I feared was wild animals. The animals looked monstrous. We had put traps and snares around our shelter. We were taking rounds keeping watch
As the days went by, we got divided into two factions. One under my leadership and another under James or Jake (or whatever his name was). The other faction was mostly some rebellious teenagers (mentally), uncooperative and irresponsible. Mostly James didn’t like following orders (or my orders particularly). I don’t know why he was at odds with me. I guess I will never know.
I hope they don’t starve to death. Looking at the topography of this place, starvation is least likely to happen. Well, I can’t take responsibility for the life of those who willingly don’t want goodwill. It was for the best they left on their own. Well, I mostly instigated them to leave our group. I already had my hands full. I didn’t have time and energy for some stray kids.
Surprisingly, the Korean group stayed behind. Because of the communication gap, I couldn’t ask them to help. They looked hopeless case, even more than Cindy. Well, Cindy is a pampered princess, she might have never lifted a finger her whole life. But they were men. They looked too delicate. Yeah, I’m prejudiced against them. How the hell can men be so beautiful? Especially that guy Suho, I can say he is the most beautiful person I have met in real life.
As time went by, they weren’t that bad as their first impression. They tried to follow orders. They were also helping others.
Asahi became like a brother to me. He was very smart and good in following orders. He stuck to me like glue. Not that I minded. I never had a younger sibling.
Talking about yesternight’s events, they were so surreal. I don’t have enough words to describe what happened. I felt so helpless, so weak. I have never felt so weak. We were surrounded. I was not afraid of those bandits and I was not afraid of dying. But I was afraid for Kiara. I felt responsible for her. Her safety was my duty. And I failed her.
My heart broke when I saw her shivering, bent on her knees, afraid to face ahead. Pitiful girl. She never deserved to suffer like this. Those bastards, I will kill them all even if it’s the last thing I do.
Or that’s what I had decided. But suddenly the tables turned.
All of a sudden, a silver wolf, a huge silver wolf came striking them down like flies. I felt relieved. It’s better to die in the hands of an actual animal than those disgusting things who have no shred of humanity left in them. I turned to look towards Kiara. She was covered in a huge shadow. No, the shadow was all over. I raised my head further, only to see something unbelievable. A silver wolf as huge as mountains. A majestic being, in front of whom you can only bend your knees. A feeling of unimaginable pressure entered my mind. I felt weak on my legs. I bend down from the pressure I was feeling. So weak. So insignificant. In front of my eyes stood a legend, in flesh.
After a few minutes, which felt like ages, the guardian deity vanished and all the wolves that came with her howled once and left. I was alive. Relieved that’s how I felt.
Kiara had been silent throughout the way. Living a sheltered life and then see something so violent, so gory, it can leave a toll on anybody. I remember my first kill. It was an enemy, a threat to the country. I couldn’t come in terms with it for a long time. It weighed on my heart. It still does. I needed to do it and deal with it because I was a soldier. Here I cant give the same logic. I was never great with words, comforting someone, never done that. I know I should do something for her. But I’m clueless.
“Next time. You should only protect yourself. Don’t get dragged with me”, Kiara said in an extremely feeble and low tone.
“Pardon!”, I heard her loud and clear. Even though her voice was feeble but there was a conviction. I just can’t believe she said that.
“….. Just…don’t put yourself in danger for me. I won’t blame you even if you leave me behind”
“…Haaa_ I’ll do whatever I want”
What kind of scum would do that? Leave you behind. Are you crazy? After all the silent treatment you gave me, you come with this. Unbelievable. I wanted to lash out on her. What’s the point of it? At the end of the day, we both are strangers who know each other’s first name and nothing more. Seriously, it has been like a month and I only know her name. Well, I do know a few things like she is picky eater, some habits you can’t help but notice after spending so much time. Jeez, Aarav you suck! Even in a different world, your interpersonal relationships are as scant as stars in the daytime.
Kiara was a friendly and social person. She had become friends with almost all the survivor. With Fiona and Cindy, she was like a sister. She and Asahi were similar in that way. Being silent didn’t suit her at all.
And then again, I’m not your friendly neighbourhood guy. And this situation is not helping at all.
Few more days went by. We were mindlessly following the path.
The silence had become unbearable. I wanted an ice breaker. How do we initiate a conversation anyway? What did we talk about earlier? Was it movies, games, songs, what else? I can’t even come up with a conversation topic. While I was breaking my head to start a conversation, Kiara pulled my sleeves.
She was standing still. Her sense of hearing was amazing. Her face had turned pale. Soon I could hear some rustling noises.
We hurried and hid behind some rocks.
The noises grew louder. There were sounds of rustling leaves, slashing sound and also sounds of metal clanking. Soon trees were getting flung around. Whatever it was, it was huge. Friendly or not, I had no interest in getting trampled.
Rustling and ruffling stopped and now there was a fire which was not far away. The noise grew louder. Some voices could be heard, they sounded like yelling from humans. More like a war cry.
Are humans fighting nearby? But the scale is huge for humans to fight. Who knows? It’s a different world.
A loud deafening roar sounded and it cleared all my queries. Because in front of my eyes I could see what can cause so much destruction. Seeing that I don’t believe we are in a safe distance. What is even a safe distance in front of a being as huge as that? Is that a dragon?
“D…Dragon”, Kiara voiced my thoughts and turned towards her. That expression was not of fear. What the hell? She looks amazed. It’s a dragon. Right there in front of us.
“Um…Kiara, we should run away”
“Ah….Yes, it’s a real dragon. I don’t think we can outrun that.”
