Piece By Piece ~ Snippet 9

Elise

“I knew you,” Aiden admits, eyes locked on Savannah. 

“You, what?” Her breathy response lacks her usual sass. Clearly she’s as shocked as Aiden. 

He nods. “I was a bartender at a restaurant, and you were a waitress there. I think that’s where we met.”

Viren interrupts. “We all woke up fairly close to each other. Should it really be that shocking that we may have known each other before?”

“We are a bit of a ragtag bunch,” I add in. “We don’t seem all that similar to each other, so maybe it is unusual for us to have known each other.” 

Viren shrugs. “Touché. I am way cooler than the rest of you guys.” I roll my eyes as everyone males some noise of disgust or disbelief. 

“Hey, we’re trying to learn useful information, remember?” Danger’s practicality cuts through the digression, redirecting our course as usual. “Aiden, do you remember anything about currency or regulations at your job? Anything relevant to our society?”

Aiden shakes his head, and then his cheeks redden. “No, the only thing I remember about my job, is Savannah.” Her eyes widen in shock, before she quickly looks away. Aiden adjusts his glasses, not that they truly needed to be fixed. 

After a moment of silence it’s clear that Savannah isn’t going to prompt the next question. “Aiden,” I start. “You answered, so that means it’s your turn to ask a question”

“Oh.” He nods. “Okay.” I see his eyes go to Danger, but they quickly dart off to his right, to Lana beside me. “Lana, what currency did we use before we lost our memories?” 

“Well,” she muses. “Let me think for a moment.” She purses her lips in thought, clearly concentrating. “It’s an old currency, paper money. They used it even in the old government. Ooh!” She raises a finger in the air as she remembers something. “Our money was in dollars, represented by paper bills.” 

“Did anyone have any of these dollars on them when they woke up?” Danger looks around at us. Everyone shrugs or shakes their heads. 

“Hey!”  Viren points at Danger. “You’re breaking the rules of the game. It isn’t your turn to ask a question.”

Danger sighs. “We only came up with this game an hour ago. I think the rules can change when they need to.”

“We came up with our names less than a day ago,” I point out. “Besides, it’s Savannah’s game, so I think she should be the referee.”

Savannah smirks. “I agree. Although, in this case, I have to agree with Danger. If someone can remember something, I think it’s a good idea to try to help them when we can.”

“Did you just side with Danger?” Viren’s mouth is wide with disbelief. 

She shrugs in response to their question. “I can, you know.” She points to herself. “I am the one who recruited him to our little gang, in the first place.”

Danger raises an eyebrow. “It certainly wasn’t because you agreed with me then.” 

Her eyes narrow. “That’s not the point.” She aims her finger at him. “Do you want me to agree with you or not? You’re irritating the ref, here.” His eyes roll. 

I sigh. “Okay, ref. I think we’re all getting a bit distracted now.” I look to Lana. “Do you remember anything else about dollars?” She shakes her head. “Okay, then ask away. It’s your turn.” 

She exhales. “Alright, Viren, what is the name of our supercity?”

“Pssh.” Viren waves a hand at her. “That’s an easy one.” 

“Oh, yeah? She smiles. “So what’s the answer?” 

Viren opens their mouth to say something, but then closes it. They exhale, and mutter, “I don’t know.”

“Haha!” Lana seems excited and I shake my head slightly. 

Aiden interrupts her celebration. “Isn’t the point of this exercise to recover our memories?”

“I believe there’s a secondary objective to this game.” We all must look confused, because she elaborates. “It’s the objective of all games, to win.” Viren’s eyes narrow and she sticks her tongue out at them. “Okay, it’s my turn to ask another question since Viren couldn’t answer.”

“I’m not sure how useful that information would’ve been anyway,” they grumble. 

Lana shrugs, before scanning the circle for her next victim. “Danger, how are the buildings powered in the supercity?” She glares across the circle at Viren. “You can’t say that wouldn’t be useful to know.” They glare back with their arms crossed over their chest. 

Danger remains silent during the exchange. It’s obvious he’s trying to remember, but despite his lack of facial expression, it’s also obvious he isn’t finding much. Eventually he shakes his head. “I really can’t remember.” 

I volunteer an idea. “I don’t know how the buildings are powered. I can’t remember anything about that either. What I have made is an observation.” I point to the window. “Even though the buildings don’t appear to have power, the streetlights still do. They must be powered differently.” 

Danger nods. “You’re right. That could be important.” 

Savannah interjects. “My turn, and I came up with a good one this time.” She rubs her hands together mischievously. “I’ll ask you, Lana, since you want to ‘win’ this game.” Lana straightens her posture, as though readying herself for the challenge. “What’s the name of the supercity?” 

Viren seems happy to have the question directed back at her, but the rest of us groan or roll our eyes. Danger literally face-palms. “Not this again. I don’t even think that’s relevant.” 

Savannah shrugs. “Tough. I’m the ref. Now,” She turns her gaze back to Lana. “Answer the question, if you can.” 

Lana concentrates so hard I can almost see the smoke coming out of her ears. Finally she huffily crosses her arms over her chest. “I don’t know, okay?” She looks away from the group pointedly. “Happy now?”

“Yes,” Savannah says, but not in an overly triumphant way. “Now, can we all agree to focus on the task at hand? We may be playing a game of sorts, but it’s with a mission. Recovering some of these memories could very well mean the difference between life and death. We have to work together, alright?” Everyone nods their agreement, even Lana, who shivers when she feels Savannah’s glare burning into the back of her head. 

Viren raises a hand. “I know we need to work together and all, but can we take a pee break?” 

I shake my head and Savannah sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Fine.” 

The circle breaks up when Viren leaves, and by the time they come back, only Savannah and I are still in our original positions in the circle. Lana’s taken Danger to show him the organization of our food stores, and Aiden’s moved to his own bed where he idly flips through an old magazine to amuse himself. 

“Hey, guys, this magazine doesn’t have a date on it, but do you think if it did, we could figure out what the current date is?” He holds it up to show us for emphasis. Savannah doesn’t respond, possibly a little miffed that her planned game has fallen apart. 

I shake my head. “Even if we knew when that magazine was printed, we don’t know how long ago that was. There’s enough dust around here that I doubt it was printed yesterday, but that’s really all we know.” Aiden nods, seeming thoughtful, before he goes back to the magazine. I notice he has a stack of them next to him. “Why do you have so many magazines?” 

He doesn’t look over at me. “It seems I like to read. Besides, I thought maybe it could give us some clues as to what happened.” 

I walk over and find him staring at a page of likely bygone celebrities in swimsuits. “Really? You look pretty interested in that page.”

He jumps, not having realized I walked up beside him. “I, um, it’s just the page I was on.” He quickly flips the page and his cheeks redden. 

I laugh. “I was just messing with you. Read, or look at, whatever you want.” 

Savannah comes over and picks up a different magazine from the pile. “I’ll help you read through the conspiracy theories.” She turns a couple pages. “Ooh, look! Hot guys in swimsuits!” She sits down on the adjacent bed. “I like this one.” Aiden blushes an even deeper shade of red, burying his nose in the magazine. 

As I shake my head, I start to see something else. It’s hazy, blurred even, but as I focus on it, it starts to clear a little. The screen on the wall is lit up with a live feed of straight haired reporter. “It’s clear that this act of ‘joint charity’ is only a ploy of the ruling families to save face in the aftermath of the recent takeover and liquidation of the Joens family assets.” 

The screen suddenly goes dark and my father steps in front of it. He tousles my fluffy hair. “Don’t believe what you hear in the news, Elise. Reporters are usually just fishing for a conspiracy.” 

“Okay, dad.” After all, why wouldn’t I trust my father? 

“Elise, Elise!” A different voice brings me back to the present. Viren stands in front of me, snapping their fingers and making all sorts of wild gestures. “Oh, good, you’re back.” 

“Back?” My brow furrows. “What do you mean?”

Lana cranes her head around to look at me. “We were worried about you for a moment there, Elise. You were completely zoned out.”

I put a hand to my head, still remembering the sensation of my father running his hand through my hair. “I’m sorry. I think I just relived a memory.” 

-Thank you for reading this week's snippet of Piece By Piece. I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope everyone enjoys the holiday weekend. I'm planning to use the extra time for writing, myself, but I hope everyone stays safe and doesn't get caught in traffic this weekend. See you next week for the next snippet of Piece by Piece!