I'm glad that those monsters still left us with water to bathe with.

Sure, it's not as luxurious as, say, an infinity pool in a seaside mansion with a view that's overlooking the deep blue, or even as standard as a creek that stretches all the way up from the mountaintop, but at this point in the earth's timeline where animalistic survival of the fittest is the new normal, there is no room for complaints. Either I work with what is left or continue to drench my body in my own sweat until something better turns up—which seems unlikely.

This puddle of rainwater in what looks like a sinkhole will do, I suppose. My fear of getting some skin allergies or gastroenteritis from soaking in here is just downright paranoia, is it? This is, nevertheless, where everybody else is taking their daily baths, and they all seem perfectly fine. Some of them are glowing, even.

Admittedly, the water isn't crystal-clear. It's milky, similar to what would come out of the faucet during cold months—because of tiny air bubbles, as they say. But, at least, I can still see a reflection (albeit distorted) of myself in its surface.

And, man, I've changed a lot in the looks department during my three-year stint in the nonexistent astral plane.

Okay, I still have the same green eyes, the same pale, thin lips and the same crooked nose that's twisting a little to the right. I can see that I even have the same hair, which is a light shade of brown, only longer. The Charlie Puth-esque slit on my right eyebrow is very much noticeable as well. On the whole, I'm still recognizable as Logan, just with some minor upgrade (or downgrade, depending on how one sees it).

These transformations come in the form of my cheek bones and my jawline. They are more prominent now than when I last looked in the mirror, which to me still feels like a few days ago. The only bright side of wasting away, perhaps.

Have I really lost that much body weight?

I look at my unclothed torso and realize that the lean muscles that I had gained from football are now gone. The slight belly that I collected from all the stress-related overeating that I had, following my exile from the popular kids' table, was now gone too. Now, I'm back to being the skinny kid from middle school: flat chest, flat tummy and maybe even a flat behind.

I hardly care, though. If I hadn't concerned myself much about my appearance when I still had a life, there's no point in making a big deal about it now.

Wendy isn't here for me to impress, after all.

That moment for me to woo her—overtured with days hunting for the perfect suit online and months saving for it, as well as that half hour I spent in front of my bathroom mirror fixing and redoing that hair—had come and gone. Maybe for good.

Stepping into the warm water, I untie my hair. As I run a hand through it, which is now greasy from the dust and humidity in the air, every strand falls to my shoulder. The tickling sensation of my tousled mop brushing against my skin remains to be something that necessitates some getting used to—along with the constant need to tie it.

It's funny I've never once fantasized rocking this hairstyle, and now I kind of dig it, making me look like a badass Jon Snow circa season six onwards. I can't deny it's invigorating to be able to take these liberties for once.

I wonder why my beard hasn't shown up yet, though. Or maybe it has, but Peyton's just constantly trimming them down because, you know, she's nursing not just my health but my overall well-being, which of course includes my grooming.

Really, the lady's a sweetheart.

If it weren't for my enduring devotion to Wendy, I maybe would've liked her. She seems to have everything I would want in a girlfriend. She's caring, empathetic, smart and strong-willed. Most striking of all, she's optimistic—a firm believer on humanity's ability to thrive beyond this temporary conundrum. One of the very few who has yet to lose faith.

With half of my frame submerged, I close my peepers and draw a deep breath, feeling my lungs expand from under my chest. It's nice to finally have a bath—despite the water not being the temperature I would have preferred—after hours of weapon training with Brad. A much-needed respite from everything.

The heatwaves that have been plaguing the atmosphere ever since my wandering consciousness returned back to the real world are really getting to me. It's making me wish that maybe it would have been better to not have woken up yet, at least not until winter time has come, assuming there will still be one.

Four days have passed since, but this is my first time to actually have a full bath. They've only been giving me bed baths for the first two days, thinking that I still would have some difficulty moving. Yesterday, on the other hand, was such a taxing day, with so much going on—the frustrated escape, the psycho attack, its fallout—that I didn't have the time to even bother. I simply washed my face with a wet towel before forcing myself to sleep.

After being rescued by Brad and Johann yesterday, we rode back to the camp, which the campers are referring to as the Village, with the kind of reverence as if it's some promised land, like an oasis in the middle of the never-ending desert.

I have never thought of it as such, considering how far its setup is from my visual concept of the word, but, okay, I'll be calling it that from now on. It is, at the end of the day, the only place—in a ten-mile radius, at least—where one can see water and plant life.

Upon reaching the Village, I got all defensive and blamed them for not being transparent enough with me, almost scolding them that it's the reason why I left without saying anything. My voice was strident when I interrogated them (mostly the president and the council) about their motives in keeping me in the dark. Then, I demanded that they tell me everything, especially what those monsters roaming the earth really are, or I'll have to part ways with them for good.

I know it was a total dick move.

Alexander was especially critical—or might I say, hypocritical—about it. A dick sure hates it when somebody else is being a dick.

But I did what I had to do, or all that running under the punishing heat, subjecting myself to the possibility of heat stroke, and that brush with death at the hands of one dumb, hideous beast would have been for nothing. My grand act of protest would have been a waste. My reason for coming back would have been in vain.

Perhaps regretful of how their vow to secrecy in order to protect me rather alienated me—which, by the way, is also kind of a dick move—they were given no choice but to disclose their dirty, little secrets, and they did. Or at least, I think they did.

And those things they told me were a lot to process, to unpack.

Like I said, I hadn't slept much last night, ruminating about all of these revelations, the amount of truth in them and the possible repercussions in case they were all true. Just thinking about them again now makes me shiver amidst the warmth.

According to them, the earth was shook by a series of catastrophic events which lasted for weeks: earthquakes, hurricanes, flash floods, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, extreme heatwaves, you name it. It was like the forces of nature were purging the earth of the creatures who were responsible for its downfall, which are of course the human race. In its wake, it left the world shattered and beyond repair, hence the name the survivors gave it.

Then, just when the earth was seemingly done with its revenge came the infestation of these humanoid, anthropomorphic creatures who call themselves the Antes, using violence to take back the planet they claim to be rightfully theirs—which, also according to them, were robbed from them by the humans at the beginning of time. Hence, whoever had survived the cataclysm were enslaved, massacred or enslaved then massacred.

Essentially, it was all a reenactment of the events in my recurring visions, which even a part of me back in the day didn't believe would actually materialize.

It turns out that I wasn't losing my mind. They weren't symptoms of schizophrenia or ADHD, like what my therapist suspected; they were premonitions. And to my surprise, I wasn't the only person in the world who kept having them.

Johann Gallant.

It turns out that he is a freak as well.

Possibly an even bigger freak than I am, considering how he is not just a fortune-teller but a walking tracking device as well.

Fortunately for him, he was never treated as such. In fact, he was regarded as a hero, a savior, an asset. He was lucky that the information he was doling out didn't fall in the hands of the wrong people—especially those with the names Brent Mendoza, Seth Henson or Ashley Metcalf. He was lucky to have been friends with a Mr. Hanks: Cora.

He was an orphan and one of Vice President Bundy's top scholars, whom the latter has developed a fondness with overtime. He would frequent the vice president's residence and became good friends with his only daughter, Cora. So, when he started having these visions, he never hesitated sharing it with Cora, who then told her father about it. The vice president, who trusts his daughter so much, believed it and confided it with President Moore, who then greenlit the covert engineering of a space ship they called the Vessel.

So, when Johann's visions started coming true, the Moores and the Bundys, along with the families of the selected elite who invested in the creation of the Vessel—basically, the rich and powerful—boarded the ship despite it not being fully ready for takeoff, and flew to a place just outside the earth's atmosphere, where they waited out the apocalypse.

Barely eighteen months in space, the Vessel started malfunctioning, even threatening to blow up. So, some of the passengers were then compelled to retreat back to earth earlier than planned, by riding the escape pods, while the others chose to stay until their deaths during the Vessel's explosion.

Reaching the earth's surface, they had become nomadic dwellers who would camp from city to city, not staying for long in one place in order to throw these Ante hunters—who are after every human being still living—off their scent.

While on their exodus to their next location, they claim to have found me lying in the ruins of the school gymnasium unscathed, breathing but unconscious and brought me with them to Fort Wayne where they have been settling since. It was President Moore who insisted to adopt me, arguing that there's strength in numbers—a rationale I'm not sold about.

Fishy.

Almost as fishy as the idea that they squandered fuel—a very scarce resource—just to pursue me. Because letting a random person go is that big of a loss, apparently.

"Well, who do we have here?" someone from behind me calls out, disrupting my train of thoughts. A cacophony of footsteps accompanies the honeyed voice of the speaker as it pierces through the serenity of the moment. "Why, it's prison-breaker!"

I turn my head around to see (well, who else?) Alexander.

He, together with his two henchmen whose names I can't recall and couldn't care less regardless of the fact, approaches. They traverse the distance in their usual Draco-Malfoy-and-friends formation: Alexander in front, while the two trails on either side. Their faces are all smug as if they're onto something wicked—and based on what I've heard of their reputation from the grapevine around here, they probably are.

"Care if we join?" Alexander asks, taking his shirt off and baring his toned physique—which is apparently his most prized possession, considering how he spends most of every day lifting improvised dumbbells instead of helping out in communal chores. Standing right in front of me, he puffs his chest out and props both hands on his waist.

Catching sight of what appears to be multiple scars on his ribs, I can't help myself from staring at them, pondering what happened to him. Even a non-gym-rat can tell that these reddish marks—made palpable by his pale complexion—are not workout injuries. They are either from deep scratches or dogged lashes.

Strange, since he has never gone to any battle nor has attended training.

Maybe he was beaten by the people he once bullied as payback? That would have been a satisfying back story.

With my concentration stuck in hypotheses, he prods me by the arm using his nasty foot, like I'm some undignified slave. "You're not deaf now, are you?"

Peeved off, I silently count to ten to calm myself down.

He crouches and tips my chin up, so I can get a load of his grimace. "I said, would it bother your imaginary friendship circle if we join the pool party?"

Mentally rolling my eyes at the banality of his clever remark, I answer, "Suit yourself. I don't own the place, anyway."

"By the way, I saw that you were working your way with a spear quite nicely, huh?" Alexander makes an attempt at a conversation with me as he strips down to his boxers and dumps his clothing on the ground. "What do you intend to use it for? You're not planning to kill us with it in our sleep, are you?"

Just you, perhaps, my mind's compelling me to say.

Preventing the rest of my day from being ruined, I look away without a response. I sink into the water and swim to the other side of the basin. As I emerge out, I notice that the unholy trinity has taken their seats on the decking opposite me, dousing their legs in the water. I swim back to where they are to grab my shirt from the traffic cone behind them and leave.

There's no reason for me to stay. Thanks to them, me-time is officially over. I also am not in the right headspace to entertain whatever tired trick the Death Eater gang has up their sleeves this time.

"Mass murderer and prison-breaker doesn't sound like a good combination for a nickname, if you ask me." Alexander slides down to the water, and his lackeys follow. "Same with coward and stupid."

"Or parasitic and traitorous," adds one of these nameless lackeys—the one with the thick brows and shaggy, ginger hair.

So, they're trying to agitate me, in order to paint me as a violent person and have me evicted from the Village. They have wanted me out since day one. Alexander, especially, had frequented my tent before my escape, just to feed me with suspicions. Now that it's no longer an option, they appear to have switched strategies and plan to feed the others with grounds to second-guess readopting me.

Sucks for them, I'm not going to take the bait. At least, not yet.

Turning a deaf ear, I proceed to hauling myself off the water. My arms tremble, struggling to carry my emaciated body over to the concrete decking that's slowly caving in under my weight.

"Hey, where are you going?" Alexander clinches my forearm, making it more difficult for me. "We're just starting to have fun."

Pulling my arm away, I take one more crack at it and manage to climb successfully.

"Oh, dude's super broody today," he quips in a poor-little-kid kind of tone. "You're menopausal now, Thomas?"

Like clockwork, his entourage guffaws at the ageist and misogynist banter, in a way that's comparable to an automatic laugh track following an unfunny joke from some shitty sitcom. The cartoonish act only proves how much of a thoughtless, blindly obeying, ass-kissing, two-dimensional minion they both are.

Continuing to ignore them, I walk away with my shirt in one hand and the pumice stone Peyton gave me in the other.

I guess I have to clean myself up another day.

Before I could go far, one of them calls out, "Hey, wait up!"

Rubbernecking at them, I see the sidekick with the shorter, dirty blond hair, helping himself up. Barefoot on the concrete that's practically fizzling with every drop of water from his sodden body, he scampers to me, with what seems like an urgent matter.

What could be his problem? Does he want to apologize for laughing at his ringleader's insensitive and unoriginal joke? Does he want to jump ship now, joining me and my imaginary friendship circle? Is he fed up with playing servant to a devil-incarnate who just wants to offend people for the joy of it?

Sorry, no vacancy.

"There's just one thing I have to confirm with you, Ross."

Hearing him address me by my (fake) name instead of that new nickname, I turn around on my heel to return the courtesy. With half-lidded eyes and lowered shoulders, I face him. "What is it?"

Drying himself with a towel, Blondie walks closer, rubbing his palms together, while the rest of the threesome lingers by the pool. "What's up with you and my brother?"

"Excuse me, who's your brother?" I inquire, my interest piqued.

"Bradford," Alexander exclaims, responding on his friend's behalf. "You know, that guy who rescued you and is teaching you how to use those weapons."

"Basically, your knight in shining armor," Ginger echoes.

"I know who Brad is."

"Oh, Brad?" Alexander asks, mockingly. "So, you two are, like, close now."

"Yes—I mean, no," I answer, not really knowing where we stand.

Mulling over it, I can say that Brad and I have really started to bond since yesterday. Not just in a me-trying-to-grill-him-for-answers-he-couldn't-give kind of way, but a real bonding, like sharing Ante horror stories with the other rangers around campfire, eating our entirely green salad dinner together, fooling around while sparring, that sort of stuff.

Maybe we're friends. But close? That's too soon to tell.

All I'm sure of now is he's a nice guy, unlike these three.

"Well, he was—" I try to clarify, dumbly thinking that we're having a non-malicious conversation. "Wait, what are you implying?"

That I'm homo?

You better not say it, buddy. Just don't.

Unless you want a broken nose.

I swear, if he's insinuating what I think he's insinuating, I will punch the shit out of him. I don't care if he's the president's son or the emperor's or God's; an entitled brat like him needs to be reminded that such entitlement doesn't include the world being at his disposal. And I know I've promised against retaliating, but I am exhausted, and I can't take any of this crap any longer. Especially not from him.

I've been ridiculed enough in high school. I'm not gonna allow the same culture to manifest here, especially now with no detention—or a working constitution, for that matter—threatening to punish me for what I might do.

Don't get me wrong; I have nothing against gay people. It's just that insinuating that a guy is gay just because he's having a close friendship with another guy is wrong on so many levels. It's presumptive, judgmental and an all-around dick move.

And even if I am gay—which I'm not—shouldn't the decision to come out be mine?

This guy definitely knows nothing about gender ethics or something. Which is sad, considering how much President Moore's campaign platform rested on advocating for LGBTQ+ rights. It's during instances like this when the father-and-son duo couldn't have been more different. If not for the undeniable physical resemblance between them, I'd be made to question whether they really are biologically related.

"In case he hasn't told you, and I gladly will..." Alexander's foul mouth opens again for another ill-advised take-down. "He and Gunnar are already sharing the bed, and I heard the other guy hates it three-way."

Oh, no, you don't.

As my brain absorbs these words, my body begins to tense up. I feel my muscles quiver as my pulse speeds up and my heart pounds. Then, heat washes all over me. Sweat mixes in with the droplets of water on my skin, and my nostrils flare as if there's steam coming out of them. Now, I'm fuming. Mad. Like a bull seeing the red flag.

This douchebag wants me agitated? Well, wish granted.

He has been asking for some more bruising; I'm more than willing to give it to him.

Pushing Blondie aside and tossing my shirt to the ground, I go for the homophobic son of a bitch. Upon jumping back to the water, I tackle him by the neck with my free hand. Clutching the stone in a tight fist, I raise my arm for the first blow. Before it could even hit him in this big nose of his, my eyes suddenly roll up.

This time it isn't mental. It also isn't intentional.

Fuck, I'm convulsing.

And I'm hardly seeing or hearing them around me, but I know they're panicking.

Shit.

Not again. I can't be going back to being the psycho.

Then, after what feels like several hours, I'm beholding these bastard's faces again, their overconfident, haughty expressions replaced with a mix of shock, alarm and fear. Eyes wide and a hand on everybody's mouth, they stand frozen. Ginger's especially looking like he has just peed his shorts. Lucky for him, his crotch is underwater.

I would've savored this scene more, if only I'm not troubled by something else.

My vision.