Tillo Lando February 22nd,20XX

Kaja excitedly pulled me into the front of a new stall, but my attention was completely on Aaron and Joyce, who sat huddled in a corner of the park. They always made sure we could see them, but it was clear by their intense conversation and exaggerated hand movements they were unfocused on their chaperone duties.

Everything was weird.

First, Aaron had randomly taken us to an amusement park instead of the original location. Not that I knew where that was. Then he and Archer had had that weird conversation last night. Then Joyce had shown up, looking tired as a ghost, and had attempted to clothesline Aaron as soon as she’d seen him.

She’d tried to play it off as a hug when she remembered us kids were still around, but the panic on Aaron’s face had been too telling.

Something was going on between the two of them, and Archer knew what it was considering he purposefully avoided looking in their direction and winced every few minutes. I suspected he was currently reading their minds, but I didn’t know any way I could ask.

We weren’t that close yet.

“Tillo! Get out of your mind and focus! If we can shoot five down, we get a prize!”

Kaja, the ball of energy that she was, was especially hyperactive today. She wasn’t stupid, so I figured that she’d realized something was wrong with Aaron and Joyce and was trying to distract us from it all.

She was always like this. Whenever there was something that she didn’t want me to hear or see, she would go hyperactive and make herself the center of my attention. I wasn’t eight years old though, and I could choose to ignore her if I wanted, but most times I trusted her intuition.

When she started acting like there was something I shouldn’t see, I would trust her and try my best not to see it. I’d only sought the truth a few times, and each time I ended up regretting it a lot.

I came back to reality and watched as the girl that had come with Joyce attempted to shoot at the balloons glued to the platform. The program the balloons ran on made them wave obnoxiously in an invisible wind and solidified the attraction’s status as a money sinkhole. Archer and Kaja had already lost a solid percentage of the pocket change Aaron had given them, but Destia had already shot down three with her ten provided bullets. She only needed two more to win the prize.

Eva, who had looked more like a kid than ever, stared at the giant grey whale on display. Her grey eyes trained on it like a hunter watched its prey, and her small hands tightened around the smaller and pink version of the beast that she always carried around.

The animal was larger than she was, so I wondered if she planned to replace her smaller version with it, but since she wasn’t one to volunteer information, or even to talk at all, my unasked questions went unanswered.

The stall owner perspired as Destia used her seventh bullet to score her fourth balloon and discreetly used his foot to press down on something. I didn’t know exactly what he’d done, but the shot Destia had fired suddenly veered left and missed the last balloon.

She ripped off the virtual goggles and swore as the shot missed its target. She aggressively searched the board to figure out what had interfered with her victory. Eventually, she caught Eva’s glare and followed it to the old man, who avoided eye contact and whistled a jolly tune.

Instead of instantly accusing the man of unfair play, she instead crouched down to a single knee and lined up the toy rifle to her goggles. Her shoulders squared and her long fingers delicately wrapped around the trigger.

She’d held it for the first time only a few minutes ago, but the way she handled it made it feel like a real gun.

“Sir, could you please step away from that device?”

Her voice, which I’d only heard during her self-introduction and her offer to give Eva whatever she won, sounded casual, but from the posture she’d taken, it was hard to take casually.

The man got a weird look in his eye as he prepared to argue, but Kaja suddenly waved obnoxiously to Aaron and Joyce and grinned as they waved back with worried expressions. The stall owner suddenly realized that we weren’t just a random group of kids and took stock of the two adults that chaperoned us.

I looked at the pale expression that had seized his facial features and watched in amusement as he quickly stepped aside from the screen as Destia had asked.

It was such an exaggerated reaction that I looked at the serious couple and tried to see what he’d seen in Aaron and Joyce.

Joyce wore the clothes provided by the amusement park, a bright orange shirt and bright red shorts, but her expensive jewelry more than made up for the poor quality of the clothing. It sparkled in the intense sunlight, filtered by the barrier around the amusement park. Her heels were pointy enough to cause some damage, and the brands on her purse and sunglasses made it difficult to look directly at her. She’d taken a moment to freshen herself up in the bathroom and had come out looking more perfect and imposing than before.

Aaron looked casual in the same outfit, but he was a tall guy and his athletic build was enough to make someone think twice about messing with him.

They both wore masks and hats, but that did nothing to detract from how scary they both looked.

They were terrifying if one looked at them from a casual perspective. And I struggled to accept that I knew them well enough to have them chaperone us around an amusement park like this.

I adjusted the mask on my face but didn’t take it off. Aaron had suddenly handed them out and had tried his best to explain about protecting our identities since we would soon be public figures, but Kaja had cut him off and had started a fight for the best looking masks, despite them being the same mask in every way but in color.

Kaja had snagged the yellow one, Archer had once again ended up with a pink one, and I’d gotten the black one. Eva had gotten a white one that matches the bow Joyce had put in her hair. Archer had seemed annoyed by it, but after ‘talking’ with Eva, or maybe they just exchanged looks, he had said nothing.

Joyce had tried to take it back, but Eva had rejected her attempts and had pulled both hands defensively over the bow. I didn’t know what was so special about it, but since no one offered any explanations; they left me in the dark.

Without the interference, Destia shot down six balloons and had gotten the giant grey whale for Eva. Archer had eventually had to carry it over to Aaron and Joyce’s side, but Eva had followed it like a pet on a tether. She eventually settled in a seat in between the two adults and hugged the giant whale with a content expression on her face.

She’d hugged Destia before chasing down her beloved new possession, but hadn’t verbally thanked her. I didn’t know if that was why Destia suddenly had a cheerful expression on her face, but I thought it was a reasonable guess.

Eva taking a seat in the shade with Aaron and Joyce confined us to the area so we could only walk around the stalls that were close.

It was fun, but the dour figures of Aaron and Joyce soured the experience and made me uneasy. I didn’t know what they were arguing about, but I hoped they could resolve it soon.