Hidden Paradise

Go...outside...?

And Jason was right. There was always going to be something bound to happen. We were all gathered on the field and tents were already set up. Elena woke us up early in the morning to tell us all to pack our things and go outside and now here we are. Also,I think Elena woke up in a pretty bad mood today since she's basically yelling at everyone. Earlier, she was scolding one of the teammates for doing nothing and when she did something, Elena scolded her again.

Marie didn't even try to talk to her because when Hope tried to, it just made things worst. "You guys are SO annoying!" Elena breaks a rolling pin in half before harshly throwing it to the ground. What's wrong with her now? I slowly approach the kitchen tent and saw that there was none beside her. They were all in front of her, around 8 feet away from each other.

Elena got another rolling pin and started to roll it into the dough harshly. "What are YOU looking at?" she turns to me and I quickly shake my head before walking away. Seriously! What is her problem today?

"Did she blow up again?" Hope approached me as I nod my head "Apparently, I don't know why though" Hope looked worried as she slowly bit her nails. "Maybe because she's stressed right now" I slowly took her arm away from her mouth and sat her down with me on the bench.

"Athena's right. She could have been stressed from last night's party" Marie sat down next to us. "I mean, what could have triggered her being THIS stress" I let out a sigh, having a clue what it was.

"ARGH" another loud crash came from the kitchen tent. Wooden spoons and utensils were everywhere. "I think we should go" Marie whispers as she nudges both Hope and I to walk away.

"YOU GUYS ARE SO ANNOYING" she yells at them, while they stood there with their head down low. "What happened?" Oliver whispers next to me as we watch them "I don't know..." I shrugged both of my shoulders.

"You guys VOLUNTEERED to make breakfast. And yet, HERE I AM, making it instead. What were you guys even doing? I mean obviously, not helping me! You guys were just standing there while I do all the work here"

Which was obviously not true. Elena got mad at them for trying to help earlier which made her mad and said that they shouldn't help her. But here they are...getting scolded for listening to her.

"That's not what I saw how things happened" I look over to see Amaris crossing her hands and stood up firm. "What?" Elena sounded angry while looking at her "You walked over here to the kitchen tent, didn't like how they were working, THEN you interrupted them and told them that you're going to do it all on your own instead. And they were doing great, by the way. And now, YOU'RE telling them that they did nothing? Of course they did nothing...-" Alex quickly takes her to the side by carefully wrapping his arms around her and carrying her to the side.

"Put me down please" Amaris slide off his arms but Alex still kept her next to him. Elena, however, wasn't pleased about that since she clearly looked like she was about to blow any moment now.

Elena let out a chuckle before taking a deep breath "This ain't good" I heard Marie mumble. Let's just pray that Amaris would be safe this time. "You guys" Elena points at everyone around her with the wooden spoon. "Are so damn annoying" her eyes glaring at each one fo us.

"And for being annoying, I should punish YOU" She points at Amaris "And a few more others" she finally puts the wooden spoon down and crosses her arms. "Since we ran out of Rafflesia flowers, a group of you would go down to get it from the forest."

"What are Ra-rafflesia flowers?" Marie looks at me worriedly "Those flowers are very poisonous and dangerous"

"Why...why would Elena want that flower?"

"I think it's just for a punishment. Not every one knows what that flower is, but...Elena has thing thing that whenever she hates or despise someone in the camp, she'll sent them out in a whole group to find Rafflesia flowers and none came back" My eyes widened at what Marie had just said.

"Well said, Marie" We both look at Elena, she was watching us as if we were her preys. "But, you guys can't disobey me, right?" No one dared to speak. "Now, Amaris and that guy behind her, Marie, Athena, Haruki aaaaandd, Oliver. Yes!"

"That's not-..." Alex pulls Amaris back and covers her mouth "Go and wear your uniforms and Chelsea here will guide you outside to the gate" Chelsea nods her head while motioning for us to follow.

"This...is all your fault" Alex points at Amaris as we got unto the gate. "It's not like I was wrong! Elena could have calmed down" She argued back.

"You could have kept your mouth shut!"

"Alex, please shut up. Amaris did have a point and Elena should have just calmed down and accepted that she was wrong. She's our General after all, a leader. Elena could have done better" Alex glares at me and walks past us. "You guys should hurry up" Chelsea slowly closes the gate. Oliver catches up on his brother to calm him down.

"Well, good luck and see you guys...If you'd still be alive that is" Chelsea shrugs her shoulder before walking away. "What kind of flower were we getting again?" Amaris runs up to Marie "Rafflesia Flowers"

"Rafflesia flowers exist in here too?" Oliver tilts her head to the side. Sometimes, her mouth runs on its own and when it does, it always somehow manages to stat a fight. "I don't think I know the route or where we should go." Marie stops in her tracks and looks at Haruki.

Haruki had black hair and looks a bit sleepy with his eyes "You're quite familiar, right?" he nods his head before taking the lead. "He's actually stayed on Elena's camp quite longer than me or Chelsea" Marie explains.

"Actually" Haruki stops and looks at us "Rafflesia flowers...don't actually exist here" his voice sounded husky while placing both of his arms on his hips. "Well...what does Elena want us to get?" Alex sounded frustrated as he sighs. "Marie said that Elena would send out groups of people to get Rafflesia flowers, but non of them came back, right?" Marie nods her head and looked at me curiously.

"So, that would mean that Elena never saw what Rafflesia flowers look like, right?"

"What are you trying to say?" oliver crosses his arms together

"What if, we get a weird looking or unique looking flower and give it to her. She probably wouldn't know that it's not Rafflesia flowers, right?" They all nod their head and gave it quite some thinking.

"Honestly, none of us knows what Rafflesia flowers look like...I don't even think that's a real flower" Marie confess as she sat down on a fallen tree. "Rafflesia flowers are huge and color red. There are different types of it and their shapes are...weird looking" Alex explains

"Then we could give her a red weird looking sort of flower instead, great idea" I smile at Amaris as she sat between Marie and Oliver. "Are there any you know, weird looking flowers or plants here?" Oliver turns to Haruki, he was still trying to think of any.

"Well, there are tons of uh plants here. I don't know if you guys would consider them weird looking or not. But I know a place" We were all lost in our own thoughts; I don't know what the others were thinking-probably to go or not, but I was just waiting for a go signal. "So...are we going or not?" Haruki sat down

"I was just waiting for you guys. You guys going or staying?" I look at them. Alex and Marie seemed to still be lost in their own thoughts. "We're going, come on. Lead the way, please" Oliver stands up as Haruki starts to lead the way. The others soon followed us after.

"You alright?" I walk next to Amaris. She looks at me and shakes her head "Yeah, no I'm fine" she speeds up before me. Even Alex and Marie looked like they've seen a real ghost.

"The road is a bit uh..messy and muddy, by the way. And also a bit dangerous and shady" Haruki warns us "It's alright. But we should be back before sunset or so" Oliver said as we continued to walk "Oh and it's a bit far away...maybe not a bit"

We continued to walk for what seems like hours. Sweat was already dripping unto my face. However, the three- Alex, Amaris and Marie, still looked dead. None of them talked along the entire walk. And normally, Alex would complain about things while Amaris argues with him. Their faces held no expression and there hasn't been a sound that came out of them.

"Oliver, don't you think it's been a bit too..."

"Quiet?" I nod my head while he looks at the back "Something's up.."

"I have a theory to test on later" he whispers after taking a good look at them. We were wearing boots, but not rain boots or boots for mud.

Mud was sticking to our boots, it was near our knee level and it became heavier and heavier as we try to walk "Hey Haruki! Not to be a bummer or anything, but...are we there yet?" Haruki looks back to us. He was clearly sweating and struggling with the mud too. "Quite almost there" he pants and continued to walk.

There was nothing except for mud, rocks and a few plants here and there. I wonder where Haruki is taking us. Hopefully not into a death trap; I barely know the guy but I should trust him anyways. Cause in the end...if we die, then we die. We can't change the fact that we're not immortals.

"Come on! We're almost here" Haruki yells at us. He was about 10 feet away from us and mud-free. "Guys! We're almost there faster" I yell at the back. The three slowly nod their head, their eyes still kept in focus forward.

After getting away from all the mud, Haruki leads us to what seemed like a large garden "This is where the forest's endangered plants are taken care of and make sure that they don't go extinct" He explains as we walk past a few more plants. "Well, here we are...find anything that you'd like though. Some of these are probably dangerous and poisonous...I don't really know which"

I look back to see the three of them sitting on the floor together "What's wrong with them?" Haruki questions as he starts to approach. "Hold on" Oliver slightly pushes Haruki away and stares right in front of them "Is there something wrong?" I tried to take peak.

"Ah" I heard Alex whine as he held his right eye. Both Amaris and Marie were shaking their heads too. "Why are we sitting down?" Marie stands up and notices the flowers "What happened? Amaris approaches me as I take a good look at her.

Her lips didn't look pale anymore and her eyes or her whole face didn't look dead...to me. "Uhm..we walked here to find flowers to give to Elena" she nods her head. "You, alright?" Oliver takes care of Alex as he nods his head.

"We should pick those Dahlia flowers...about 10 of them should be enough" Alex points off to some pink-ish colored flowers. They looked round and beautiful...and in different colors too! "We don't have much time" Alex started to pluck them out, one by one. "Let's pick these that haven't fully bloomed yet" He starts to collect some more and fast. "Come on" he quickly exits the garden.

"We should go back NOW" his voice sounded urgent as we all started to follow him, picking up a pace.