The Connected Worlds (ON GOING) ENGLISH

Chapter Three

The grains of time-space curl around Milley like sand and the voice from before is heard.

"Where'd you go? It sighed. "Nevermind. I'll find you later."

Before she knew it, someone is shaking her.

"Hey Milley, get up. We gotta get going." Zack's voice is heard. "Tamicka put some warm water in the sink for you if you're going to wash up, but hurry." The sky outside is still dark, but the rain has stopped.

 Milley groans and moves from the side while her eyes were shut."Five more minutes...tsk."

"Five more... Are you kidding? We gotta go in 20 minutes. You better get up before Jerryn comes out."

Zack sounds slightly amused but a bit annoyed

"But it's still dark.. I..." Milley murmured.

Zack rolls her over. "Just get up so we can go." He takes the cover and puts it away.

She wiggles like a worm as she sat up, then opens her eyes while pouting.

Zack comes back with a bag in his hand. "Ready yet?.... Milley, you're still sitting there? Come on."

Milley stood up and smells herself."Ugh! What a smell is that?! 

Zack sighed. "Fine, get ready. There's some water in the sink for u to use." Zack stands and waits for her to wash.

 Milley goes toward the place where the sink belongs then washes quickly. After she was done, she quickly hooks her bag to her shoulder and looked up at Zack.

Zack waits. "Ready yet?

She looked at him then nods. "Let's go."

"You kids have fun!" Tamicka says as she and Jerryn goes out from the door.

"Finally." He opens the door and a cool breeze comes in.

The sky is light grey on the horizon.

"Its this way." His voice echoes off the buildings around them.

Milley looks above the sky. "Why is it the sky has a grey color?"

He leads her down an alley then turns right towards a larger cubed-shaped building.

"Hm?" He turns for a second.

"What, you've never seen a sunrise before?"  He smiles a little.

She follows him then shrugs. "Well, I wake up late so I don't."

"Hehe. Well, I guess that explains it. We're almost there." he smirked.

She nods slowly while walking beside him when her stomach grumbled.

They both get to the building.

"Oh, they have food inside. Don't be surprised if you don't like it."

Then they both enter a large room with a few other people walking around.

She groans. "Awwww. I guess I should bring some foods back home.".

 It has a low ceiling and bright lighting. The floor is stone and the walls have pipes along with them.

"Well if you got food, feel free to share... And don't let Jerryn know."

"Are we in some kind of like the work of plumbers? Wait, where are we going? Miley was confused by a sudden. "If I do know about coming to your world, I would be packing a lot of foods in my backpack," she whispered.

"It's a vocational training center... Basically hell." Zack said.

Milley stops then turns her head slowly to him. "Hell?"

"He just says that because he sucks at everything." Another guy's voice says from behind.

"Hey there beautiful. My name's Micah. A pleasure to meet ya!'" Micah bow his head like a prince.

Milley turns to the guy and raises her left brow. "And?"

 "You shut up Micah. It's not like you do that great."Zach snorted. Milley watches them while quarreling like babies. 

"Aw don't get mad, Zack." Micah turns to Milley.

"So tell me, how did a princess of your caliber get mixed up with a rug like him?"

Milley looked at him then to Zach. "Is he talking to you?"

"Zack, a princess? Surely you jest." Micah laughs.

"I think he's talking to you," Zack says with a sour and irritated look on his face.

Milley nodded slowly while turning her head to Micah. "Ahm. Can you shut your mouth for a while or I'll eat you."

Micah scoffs, "Eat me? Wow, maybe you two make a better pair than I thought," Then turns to Zack. "Anyway, you better get inside if you still wanna eat. Luckily some people aren't here today, so there's some for MunchMunch to eat too." Micah turns back to Milley. "Your name is now MunchMunch by the way. Enjoy that." He then walks off. "See ya, Zack, I'll miss ya MunchMunch!" He waves as he heads towards another door inside.

Zack puts his hand on his head. "Kkyaaaa...  I hate when he does that. Ignore him. We better get going." Zack starts heading for the same door.

Milley pouts as she looked at Micah until it disappeared in her sight before she follows Zach inside. "Tch. Munchmunch. What a creepy name." She rolled her eyes. 

"Well, you did say you were going to eat him... who says that?"

Milley snorted as she dramatically waved her hand in the air. " I was just joking, okay? Anyways. I hate his guts."

"Besides......I think it is kinda cute....." Zack mumbles this under his breath as he walks in but bursts out laughing to cover up his previous statement. "Haha! Well yeah, he's kind of a jerk."

She looked at him confused. "What?"

"I said he's kind of a jerk," Zack answered.

Milley chuckles then playfully slap his arm- "Maybe you're right."

Zack flinches at the sudden touch. "Well yeah, you saw how he was acting."

They both head inside to see another similar room full of people walking around. In the center is trouble with paper plates and small cracker-like things on them.  A tall woman with short black hair is standing at the table handing out plates to each student as they pass by.

"Morning Zack, who's your friend?" She says as Zack and Milley approach.

"This is Milley. She's staying with me for a little bit." Zack said.

"I see." The woman looks at her up and down.  "Hm, doesn't look like you're from around here. Oh well, I'm sure you'll fit right in. Here, take one." She hands her a plate. It has two of the cracker-ish things on it.

"I'm hungry." is all Milley can say.

She looks at her plate and then at the woman and grabs the plate- "Thanks."

The woman laughs kindly. She has a somewhat deeper voice for a woman. "Well, there you go. Eat up."

As Milley eats it, she realize that while it has the texture of sandpaper, it tastes kind of sweet and salty. Sort of like a very scratchy ritz cracker with a hint of sugar.The woman hands her a cup of water. Zack takes a plate and some water as well.

"Not bad." said as she eat the cracker then looks at the other crackers on the plate. "Geez." mumbles as she ate the crackers fully.

"Thanks" Milley grabs the water and drinks it.

"Glad you like them. Sorry though, only one plate per person." the woman says as she sees her eyeing another plate. "My name is Miss Serana by the way. And what might yours be?"

"Her names' MunchMunch." Micah says as he walks by.

"It's not MunchMunch. Look, Zack." the last words were like a whisper as she look at Zack for a help. "I'm Milley." and then she looked back at the lady.

Zack looks at her. "I didn't say that."

"Milley huh?" Miss Serana says ignoring Micah. "Well Milley, glad to have you. You'll find things here can be a little harsh at times, but we try."

At that moment, a bell sound is heard over a loudspeaker.

"Well, looks like it's time for classes to start. Luckily it's the beginning of the semester, so you won't be too behind."

Zack leads Milley to a side rom with tables and chairs with slightly less people in it.. "Just ignore Micah," he says to her. "He does that to everyone.

Milley stops as she heard the lady said, 'class'. "Is this a school?" She looks at Zach with wide eyes.

"Um... yeah." Zack says as if it was obvious.

"Oh. I'm not ready yet." She said as she sat on the chair beside him.

"Ready for what--"

"Ready for all teh CRAAAAAZZY action that's about to take place like BOOOOM WEEEEEEEH!!!" shouts a girl from behind Milley.

She then pops up from behind her desk. "HI!" she screams in her ear. Milley looks behind her and saw a girl with a cute face. The strange new girl flops over and lays across her desk as if exhausted.

"Ugh! Why are you screaming?!" she said as she covers her ears. "Who is she?" she mouthed Zach.

 "I'm Ravren," she whispers loudly in her ear. "But my friends call me RAVYYY!!"

Zack puts his head down on the desk not knowing what to do.

Flinched as she whispers which tickles her. "Oh. Hi Ravy." She said sarcastically.

"Helloooo!" she says as she steps back and waves to Milley.

"Hey, Zack..." Ravren walks over to Zack, places her hand on his, and then lifts it up. "You should know not to sleep in class. That's rude."

"I wasn't sleeping." Zack states.

"Alright class, let's settle down. Ravren, get to your seat please." the teacher says. He is a man with short black hair and carries a clipboard.

"Aaaw, okay." Ravren says sadly as she walks back to her seat. It's a few chairs over from the two.

 Milley looks at the teacher as he settled down.his things to his desk.

"It seems we have a new student visiting us for a while. Milley, would you like to tell the class a few things about yourself before we start?"

Strangely enough, his voice sounds exactly like the voice she first heard right before entering this world and like the one in her dream the night before.

Milley stood nervously as she walked towards in front and looks at everyone then at Zach. "Hi. I'm Milley. I-I...-looks at the teacher then looks down worrying about how to say next.

The teacher smiles reassuringly. "Don't worry Milley. That'll do. Can someone share their book with Milley?"

Zack is about to raise his hand when Ravren beats him to it. "OH, ME ME ME ME ME!!!!!"

"Oh, very well Ravren." the teacher said.

Ravren slaps a seat next to her. "You can sit right here by me!" Ravren slaps a chair next to her.

Milley makes a face then frowns when the teacher didn't choose Zach. "Alright, Ms. Screamer,"  she mumbles as she sat next to her and looks at Zach then smile assuredly that she was fine even though she is uncomfortable.

Ravren grins to herself slyly. As Milley sit down, the teacher talks something about the lesson when Ravren leans over to her with a mysterious glint in her eye as she whispers. "So rumor has it you're staying at Zack's house. Is that right?" All the super cheerfulness from before is gone.

Milley looks at her then smiles awkwardly. "Yeah. Why?"

"Hmm.... interesting......" Ravren looks at her book. "Here you go." She hands her the book and begins to doodle on some paper.

Milley grabs the book then opens it. "Boring." she closes the book then looks at her with her doodle. "What are you doing?"

"huh?" Ravren looks up. "Oh, it's umm... nothing." She quickly hides the paper.

"So how long have you been staying with Zack?" she narrows her eyes at RMilley as she hides the paper as Milley answered. "One night?"

"Hmm... I guess that's not too bad...." She then looks at her with a serious look." Listen, you may not know this b--"

"Ravren..." The teacher calls out. "You have something you want to share with the class?"

"Uh... no!.. I mean, yes! I really enjoy fruits and really wish we could have more!"

"Ah well if you train hard, you will be able to harvest many things for The Valley. Now, if you don't mind, we will continue."

"I'll talk to you after lessons," Ravren tells her.

Milley nods slowly as she turns her head back to the teacher. "Weird." she murmured as she glances at Zach when suddenly a pain strike her chest. "Aghh!" she said loudly which everyone turns their head to her confused or annoyed especially the teacher.

"Is something wrong, Milley?" the teacher asks her.

Ravren looks at her like you're crazy. "What the heck is wrong with you??" She whispers.

Milley looks at them then shooks her head. "Sir, Can I go to the comfort room?" 

"Comfort room?... You can step outside if you need to." the teacher said. Milley stood up and carefully ran towards the door. 

"I'd better go see what's wrong." Zack follows after Milley with speed. "Wait, Milley! What was that about?" Zack said as he grabs Milley's hand before they came out from the room.

Milley didn't answer. She walked fast heading towards the hallway while breathing hard. Her hand was at her chest while the other was on Zack.

Zack was trying to ask again when she suddenly feel pain and can hardly breathe and the last thing she heard was the sound of her name-calling her and then darkness invaded her mind.

                                                                                  TBC