The Elusive Prince

Chapter 14: We Just Wanted Snacks

Merideth

After celebrating about our spontaneous trip with Helena’s absolutely delicious brownies after the filling dinner, the class then settled in the living room to discuss about how we should go with our plan tomorrow with Amity in the middle as always. Sir Hexford was also with us because for some reason Luna convinced him to just come plan with us because he will be stuck with us anyway. He is currently in the corner, grumbling about being dragged to this stupid trip, his words not mine, while munching on the brownies spitefully. I just laughed a little and listened to their suggestions.

“Okay so since we’re all going together, I will assume that there will be different groups and seeing as we all have something to buy, we should group people according to the types of things to buy or see. We can then split up in these groups by the activities and then we’ll all meet at the food court for lunch. Are there any objections?” Amity as always, went with this as civil as possible which made Sir Hexford comment on how she is the only one keeping this class together and without her there would just be utter chaos which I really can’t blame him for thinking that way. Amity really was one of the pillars of this class.

There were a chorus of “Aye’s!” as response to Amity and she just nodded and got out a Pad where she intends to list everything. Seeing as she probably needs help, Hailey volunteered to be the one to take notes while she was talking in which Amity accepted with a beaming smile because she probably needs all the help she needs.

Once Hailey gave the go signal for us to start pitching ideas and what we’ll be doing on the mall tomorrow, once again there was chaos because of course there was, as everyone wanted to start talking at the same time. I think Sir Hexford would want to drink alcohol if he was allowed to but first of all that’s not allowed in school and second of all it would be a bad example to us kids. Not that that stopped some of us who were curious as to how alcohol other than wine tasted and tried one. One thing they can say however was that it was bitter and they didn’t want to do it again so that’s good. Less problems to face, although I think Sir Hexford really needs one at the moment.

Anyways back to the ongoing scream fest which apparantly Amity stopped, thank goodness, they started to go one by one, narrating what they would want to do tomorrow for us to establish the groups. It went surprisingly smooth after Sir Hexford looked ready to bail out and we decided to calm down so we can get this planned before bedtime. Not that we had one on Friday nights but we need sleep for tomorrow so we intend to finish this before midnight which we did.

By the time 10 PM rolled around the groups were established, we were drowsy already, and Sir Hexford still looks ready to quit his job and move back to the Underworld as usual. Amity then clapped her hands together as she prompted Hailey to send us our “groupmates” for the trip tomorrow. We each received a notification as Hailey mass sent us the list and here’s how the groupings turned out.

Group 1: Clothes and Apparell

Sumire (of course)     Ava (of course)   Layla     Reiss (is that even a question?)   Faye   Maria (Layla’s attendant)

Group 2: Snacks and foods

Merideth (me)  Cassian  Hailey  Levine   Helena (for her baking)   Blake(Kellen’s attendant)

Group 3: School Supplies and Stationary

Amity      Reagan   Luna    Sir Hexford (yes he says he needs pens) Shiloh

Group 4: Books

Spie    Kellen  Yuma (she doesn’t talk much but she likes books)   Kairo (I know shocking)   Eiler (Kairo’s attendant)   Tobias (Reagan’s attendant)

That’s the list. I mean there are just 15 of us and 7 attendants plus Sir Hexford which makes us 23 in total for this trip. It got quite some time before we got to deciding the final groups because others wanted to do more but in the end they grouped us based on the interests and the closest stores to each other and the wings of the mall. However if we wanted something that's not in our side of the mall we can just message the group chat about it and let the other groups buy it for us, if it ever gets to it.

How they got the floor plan of the whole mall that I don’t know but it was big help because now we’re finally done! All that’s left is for us to sleep and get ready for the possibly chaotic trip tomorrow because of course it’s Leontine, and when we're together, always expect chaos wherever we go.

We were up early, well too early for a Saturday at least because we still had to prepare and of course Amity wanted us all up before the bus arrives as to not inconvenience the driver and to not agitate Sir Hexford anymore with our tardiness because if we are tardy in our own trip I'm sure he will not hesitate to punish us.

The mall opens in 9 AM and it was currently 8:00 AM where we are currently riding on the bus going there. It takes about an hour to get to the main city from Irini because of course we were secluded in a forested area away from the busy streets and the heart of Wiyelt to help us focus better and intensify the feeling of despair that is being in a boarding school.

At the moment, Layla was singing something very high pitched with Kellen trying to hype her up by banging the seat in front of him which I'm sure is going to give Reiss a headache if only she wasn't banging her own head to the beat, Maria sort of joining Layla for background vocals and Kairo trying to “play” the instrumental part of the song with his mouth which had us howling in laughter because they look silly. These kids from Vian can be very rowdy sometimes but I guess that’s because their kingdom specializes in Arts and Music so I guess they were born like that, I don’t know, I'm not trying to stereotype them.

We were all enjoying this moment of happiness of us just being able to relax and enjoy the silliness of our classmates together on an almost a field trip on a fine Saturday. Well everybody was enjoying this except maybe Sir Hexford because he was grumpy which is nothing new. The only thing good about him being grumpy and him giving up as soon as we boarded the bus was that he doesn't try to spoil the fun with his teacher authority which most do by the time someone even tries to let out a peep but he doesn't so now Luna was out of hand and so were the others.

Thankfully, for Sir Hexford's sanity, Amity calmed everybody down saying that we should preserve our energy later so we can explore the mall without complaining about being tired which worked like magic because by the time we reached the city, everybody was sitting still in their seats much to the satisfaction of our teacher who looked at Amity with respect. Well it's not like we don't calm down when he stops us but sometimes, due to the influence of Luna, the more angry and annoyed he was the better because we're little sadists that like seeing our teacher suffer, no offense to Sir Hexford though.

Finally after an agonizing hour bus ride we finally arrived at the mall. It was only a few minutes after opening time so there's not that much people but seeing as this was the most famous mall that was located in the heart of Wiyelt, the amount of people in the mall was still considerably large.

"Okay, you know your groups, where to meet and when. As agreed if you do need anything that isn't in your group description, do not hesitate to message on the group chat. I guess that that's out of the way we could split up now." Amity instructed one last time which made us mock salute at her and she just shook her head at our antics before leaving the bus with her group in tow.

Right after we head inside, we immediately split us because the groups were as I have said, split into which stores are closer with each other or by the wings of this mall. Helena, who almost went flying to her favorite shop but not before Levine yanked her by the collar telling her that we should stick together, was possibly vibrating right now as we approach her favorite shop, Sweet Heaven where you can buy sweets and the ingredients to said sweets. We decided to head here first because we're sure Helena will take the longest to buy stuff but also because this place sells the absolute bomb pastries and desserts and was also my favorite snack shop.

As soon as we entered, Helena immediately dived on the raw ingredients section, just looking at them before grabbing a cart and started dumping what she wanted to buy. Judging by the amount of things in her cart, I guess we're having a lot of treats next week.  

We just laughed at her before respectively grabbing our carts and started dumping stuff on it too though in a much more calmer way than Helena. Levine was on his phone along with Blake probably telling them if they need anything they should message us while Hailey was passive aggressively looking at the white chocolate section probably thinking what to get. Meanwhile I was dragging Cassian along pointing at different snacks I recommended him to try and excitedly grabbing the jar of cookies that I offered to him that night and waving it in his face and him looking at it thoughtfully before putting it in his cart which made me laugh a little.

Hailey still didn't get anything and was now on the pastry section but I just know that she was looking at the white chocolate section still probably having a debate on whether or not she should buy it. I laughed a little before sneakily grabbing her favorites off the shelf and covering it with my own snacks. I'm going to give it to her as a surprise because she deserved it after all the stress I put her into this week because I was also stressed.

We were currently carrying a load of bags of snacks for ourself with Helena having the most followed by Cassian surprisingly. Although we had spent quite some time trying to drag Helena outside the shop in which she insists is where she lives now, Levine suddenly got an alert on his phone about our other classmates asking us to buy their snacks because they were too far away.  We knew this was going to happen so we agreed on the grounds that they share some. Reagan also apparently requested we grab him a few tarts and a bowl of truffle from Dipin Dough and seeing as he still had his right from when he won the bet, we had to oblige even if the store was too far away.

Currently, me, Cassian, and Blake, who volunteered to carry the insane amount of snacks back to the bus, were left to stand on one the fountains near the tart shop as the others went to purchase what has been requested. I was currently on my phone, talking to the others about them possibly buying me a new set of pens (in which they agreed) when there was a sudden loud commotion that caused us to turn our heads a little too fast.

We don't know exactly when and where it started but before we knew it we were being pushed by the people trying to escape from something coming from the west side of the mall where we were close at. Of course, since there was panic and caused a stampede of people, we didn't have a choice but to get pushed around but thank goodness for posture training because we were able to stand our ground. Well at least me and Blake was because Cassian certainly didn't take posture training and now he was part of the ocean of panicking people, lost in the sea of people trying to run away. Run away from what, that I don't know but it must be something bad enough to cause mayhem this large.

I looked at Blake who was now standing in front of me, trying to protect me from the shoves and trying his best to look beyond the sea of unending people pushing past us when I heard it. There's no mistaking that sound, the sound that should be foreign to the people now and can be only known in movies. The sound that a lot of people last heard before they succumbed to the lull of death during the great wars and outside it. The sound that reverberated into the mall that caused fear to cloud the people's mind and heart and there it was again, the loud ring and deafening sound of bullets dropping as it hit the tiled floor, the sound of gun shots firing as it resonated against the terror filled screams filtering the mall.

As soon as I confirmed that there was indeed an attack I pressed the alarm button on my watch which hopefully reaches the school and get back up. The screams were louder now however as the people begin to panic.

Great it looks like we're caught in an attack and to think all we wanted was just snacks.