As I led the group around the ship, I was slightly worried that people would be bothered by the noise we were stirring up. Even though there weren't any residents yet, there were still quite a few people wandering the halls and tidying up for embarkation day.

Flower had a habit of talking with a loud, boisterous voice, and Miki's ostentatious attitude didn't help the volume either. Piko ignored their tone most of the time, occasionally offering a retort to some of their comments. Rana was either quietly listening along or cracking up. Fukase was either bored with them, invested in the tour, or giving me sideways pitying glances as I tried to keep up.

"Oliver, where's the pool? We've been through half of the ship and I haven't even seen one," Miki commented.

"I agree with Miki," Flower replied. "How many pools are there? Are they indoors or outdoors? Also, is there a jacuzzi?"

"Do the big ones have diving boards?" Rana asked curiously. We all fell quiet and she blushed slightly. "I mean, I've never used a diving board, and I just thought it'd be fun..."

"I've only seen one of the pools, but I think there's two around the ship," I told her. "The one I saw didn't have a diving board, by the way."

"We might as well see them for ourselves," Piko piped up, seeming genuinely excited for the first time in the tour.

"Alright, follow me."

"We already are following you."

"You know what I mean!"

~~~

Both pools were on the second highest deck of the ship. I hadn't been to the nearest one, so I figured we'd go to that one first and all witness it as a surprise. To my astonishment, it was much bigger than the first one.

"Whoa, this is amazing!" Miki said. "Let's go swimming later!"

"Who cares about later? I'm going in now!" Flower exclaimed. She ran towards the pool and was only stopped when Piko caught the edge of her vest.

"Flower, quit being so immature. You're not even in your swimsuit!" he chastised.

She just grumbled something about Piko being a killjoy, whatever that was, but otherwise didn't seem to mind too much.

Fukase, on the other hand, was in utter amazement at the ocean patterns that decorated the walls and the inner sides of the pool; since part of it was indoors and part was outdoors, sunlight fell in ribbons down the length of the whole pool, and lit up the insides with waves of light. The water reflected around the room in shimmering caustics that further brought out the color of the aquatic designs everywhere.

Rana seemed to share his awe as she went to join him in examining the bright coral reefs, fish, and dolphins that were painted around. Miki and Flower went over to the pool, gazing at the family of orcas painted at the bottom and looking at them from different angles to deform the picture.

"Hey Oliver, come over here for a second," Piko called from across the pool. As I trotted over to him I noticed that he was scrutinizing the tiny fish that were intricately painted into a beautiful scene of anemones. "How many of these fish can you name?" He asked, eyes wide with curiosity.

"Well, there's the clownfish of course, then this black one with spots is the Domino Damselfish. And I think these over here are cardinal fishes, I'm not sure which kind though..."

He nodded his thanks, staring at the fishes as if he was burning them into his memory.

"Whatcha lookin' at, Piks?" Flower said, jogging up to us with Miki, Rana, and Fukase by her side.

"Don't call me Piks."

"Sure thing, Piks."

Piko rolled his eyes and continued, "Oliver was just telling me about these fish."

"You can tell what fish they are just from a painting?" Rana commented, seemingly impressed.

"Well, these paintings are really detailed..."

"Yeah, I wonder how long it took to finish just this room," Miki added.

"By the way, isn't part of the pool outdoors?" Flower commented. "Both parts look conjoined."

"That's because they are conjoined," I replied, grinning widely. "Come on, let's see the outdoor part."

Outside, the sun shone down brightly on us but the wind was starkly chilly in comparison. All of us were dressed accordingly save for Flower, who was shivering ever so slightly with her arms bare under her vest. Of course, Piko had to make it worse by splashing some of the pool water at her. She only flicked a little bit back at him, giving him a glare that said I'll get you back for this later.

Miki and I both snickered at the occurrence, but Rana was completely absorbed with something else. The sheer expression of wonder on her face was nothing too short of how Fukase had reacted to seeing the bridge.

She had somehow already gotten across the pool from us, and was slightly leaning out the railing and gazing at the water.

"Guys, come over here and look!" she called out. "The water's so blue!"

"No duh," Miki replied. "Of course it's blue. It's the ocean."

"But this is a different kind of blue. It's so pretty. Like a giant sheet of liquid sapphires."

"You're right," Piko responded quietly. "It's been a long time since we've had a day this clear."

"But the sun is annoying," Flower said flippantly. "See? Even Fukase thinks so," she added when she noticed him shielding his eyes.

"We can come back out later, in the evening. Besides, you guys wanted to see the theaters, right?"

"Yes, definitely! Let's go," Miki said, dragging Rana and Flower inside with her. Piko, Fukase and I hastily did the same.

The theaters were on the other side of the ship, and a deck lower than the one we were on. Hopefully they wouldn't mind the walk.

~~~

The concert halls and theaters were considerably more underwhelming than the pool we had visited in the afternoon. Rana and Miki had found the rooms' echoing tendencies quite entertaining, though.

After that, we briefly visited the bridge, but by then we had all had quite enough of the "tour" and decided to split up and go back to our rooms until dinner.

"I can't believe we get to stay here for three whole weeks," Fukase murmured softly once we got in and had settled on our respective beds. "The ship is huge! You're so lucky your brother's a cruise captain now."

I smiled. "Yeah, I guess so. He really wanted this promotion, so I'm proud of him."

"Speaking of which..." Fukase started nervously. "Is there any place you've always wanted to go, but never have?"

I thought about it for a moment. "The Americas."

"North or South?"

"Anywhere. Although I suppose Canada would be the easiest to get used to, since England has a similar climate."

His expression immediately lifted. "I used to live in Canada, when I was really little."

"Really?" I sat up straight, my curiosity piqued.

"Yup. My family had a big house by a large lake. But then, of course, some stuff happened and I had to move to Japan..."

I could tell that he was no longer interested in talking about it, so I dropped the subject. "Well, like I mentioned before, I used to live in England. But then, a close friend of mine and her brother were kidnapped, and since my parents thought it was too dangerous and couldn't stay near me a lot or supervise me, they sent me here to live with Yohio."

"You were eleven when that happened, right? You mentioned you moved here four years ago."

"Eleven when it happened, twelve when I moved."

"And you came here on your own?"

"Yup. My parents are busy people. What about you?" I immediately cursed myself for asking, but he didn't seem to mind too much.

"I came to Aomori when I was seven, but I had some friends of mine and their parents accompanying me."

"You have family here?"

"Yeah, just my grandparents."

We were both silent for some time, idly staring into space as the sun set below the sea and its golden light filtered through the windows. The reticence was finally broken when the clock tower from the promenade rang out. The sound was muffled since we were far from the main part of the atrium deck, but it was enough to make the growing quietness between us suddenly feel awkward.

I glanced at the clock on my nightstand. "It's past seven," I said suddenly. "Are you hungry yet?"

"Sure," he responded. "Let's go get the others."

With that, we left the room making mild small talk, with the orange sun winking through the windows behind us.

A/N:

Heyo! Sorry this chapter is so late. I've been studying for midterms and haven't had as much time to write... that being said, I might not update at all this week until midterms are over. We'll see :P

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Please vote and stuff if you did :3

See you in the next chapter!

~Stargazer