CHAPTER 5

My hands were throbbing,but I finally finished my chores.They had me shovel snow,but that wasn't the worst part, the worst part was eating the leftovers from the cafeteria, because I'd have too much work to do, dinner was the only time I ate something. She really had it out for me this time. I started to hate her even more after this.Why'd she make it so hard to get on the mission? That was so aggravating. And trust me, not even the cruellest of the cruellest human beings would give me this much work to do and I still didn't know what "ISTACES" stood for.

I went to the design room to give the "scientists" their lunches, and they were talking about which model is gonna be strong and firm to use, one of them said. I knew something about these designs and stuff, because my dad was an interior designer, and my mom was an astrophysicist,so I decided to butt into their debate.

"Use the one with the dimensional Calumeter," I said absently, "which mentions when will the world end in that particular dimension." Tisha and the moleskin girl glared at me maliciously, but the others looked surprised and impressed

"Tisha." a man with a leather trench coat and brown eyes and hair, said, "Who is this 10 year old girl?"

"I'm 13, actually…" I groaned, "By the way… I'm Natalie Wilson."

"Why don't we add this… Natalie to the Designing department?" a girl about 17 with a white hoodie and black jeans, she had her name taped towards the left side of her chest, "Mia" it read, said "we do need a couple more hands there. I was wondering if we could add her. I mean… she does have enough knowledge and brains to do that and be more than just a maid"

A shot of pride crossed my heart. Finally, I'll finally get to know what's going on this mission utopia, here at PAOMAS.

"Well," Tisha said with a grin, I knew it wasn't real because her eyes said otherwise, she wasn't happy with all the "SCIENTISTS'' " decision, "Since most of you wanted Natalie to be one of the scientists then fine, She'll help you, in one condition, She doesn't have to interfere with what PAOMAS's order system. Her work starts tomorrow"

I smiled, and walked into my Makeshift bedroom, Mia walked towards me and stood there in silence. Oh, boy… that's awkward!

"I asked Tisha to give you one of the real bedrooms," She said while fiddling with a piece of paper and her thumbs, And… guess what? You're sharing the room with me, because there were no rooms left for you."

"Wait, what?" I took a minute to process the information, "I'm getting a real room?"

"Yep, you heard me." She said, her face gleaming like she'd found a long lost friend of her "Now, pack your things."

It was a mix of emotions for me, First they treated me like crap, and now they're giving me all the respect they can manage, Mia really seemed cool though like an actual friend, unlike Tisha, who seemed to be using me for something i'm pretty sure was for chores but, Mia seemed like she genuinely wanted to be friends with me. First time since the ice age 2 started, I felt wanted.

as we were carrying the luggage to the room, I asked Mia, "Hey! Mia, what does ISTACES stand for?"

"I don't know really, but it's some sort of an escape ship…"

I found a closet, stuffed all of my belongings inside it, I ate my dinner, and ran to the room, and leaped on to the bunk like I was fighting for something and I leaped up on it to not let anything take it away from me. When did I ever sleep like this before last year? I asked myself, I kept thinking of what ISTACES would mean as I drifted off to a restless sleep.