Aria had only been dozing, mulling over things in her head. The others... Chloe seemed like a nice girl. She seemed trustworthy, if a little callous towards the people around her. Dan... That man irritated her, and not just his vile language or accent. His cockiness and moral ambiguity made her want to claw his eyes out.
And Jaden? A blush came to her cheeks and she was desperately glad that the room was too dark for the other people to see. Cute and nice, but... terribly protective. And he always got into fights with Aura. That could be problematic.
"Aria?" the faint whisper came from the next bunk over. Aria's eyes blinked open instantly.
"Yeah, Aura?"
"Obviously you're not asleep then."
"And neither are you."
"I'm scared... I want to text Mother and Father and tell them we won't be coming home for a while... They must be worried sick."
"But if we text them it could jeopardize our chance of escape."
"Can't we at least tell the rest of the school that they need to re-cast Air and Ice?"
"That'll cause even more havoc than telling Mother."
"I just... I don't know. I feel bad for leaving them... We're the only kids they've got."
"But we have a chance of getting back to them someday. If we tell them now and the people after us intercept the message, we'll die and never get to see them again."
Aura sniffed. "I love you, Aria."
"And I love you." She reached her hand across the gap to find Aura already stretching her hand out. "You're not supposed to be the one crying, Aura. It's my job to be the little fragile sister."
~~~
They both bolted upright at the father's comments, yanking on each other's shoulders. Sometime in the night they'd fallen asleep, and were still holding each other's hands. Not wanting to talk about the previous night, they both quickly got up. Aria felt her hair, gritting her teeth at how tangled it was, only for a bit of cool gas to blow through it, unraveling the knots. She grinned at Aura, whose hair was flying around her face in clouds as she brushed it with high-pressure helium, too. "I don't understand how you have such awesome control," Aria said. "I'd light you on fire if I tried to do that."
"Just practice, little sis. Just not on me or yourself, kindly."
Both girls laughed as they tugged on their tennis shoes, ready to go after just five minutes of their allotted thirty.