Xaiden almost left without leaving a note for Jax, who was snoring loudly on the mattress beside the desk with the radio. He quickly scrawled out a message letting Jax know where he was meeting Nivra and when he would be back, though Xaiden was pretty sure Jax would still be soundly sleeping off the cold he was nursing when he returned.
Once the note was written and placed prominently on the radio where Jax was most likely to see it, Xaiden grabbed his backpack and jogged his way to the fence line. He slipped through mindlessly, the area so well covered by overgrown brush that they never had to worry about wandering eyes from the road or school. He slowed his pace down as he stepped onto the sidewalk and matched the rhythm of the people walking towards the nearest portal hub. He bought a ticket for a hub near the coordinates Nivra provided and waited with the rest of his group for the departure time.
35 minute wait, just as the maps in his imprint had predicted. Getting here only took 15 minutes and it would take even less time on the other side of the portal to reach the coordinates, so most of the time until meeting Reader, no, Nivra, would be spent sitting on this old plastic chair. He tried to think of what he should ask her when they met, and wondered if he should have tried waking up Jax or asking Ewen or even Eliana to join him.
Nivra may feel more comfortable if there was a girl with him, and he would feel much safer if he wasn't meeting a cult member alone. What if she brings someone with her? he wondered anxiously. He tapped his imprint and pulled up his contacts, then decided against it. I shouldn't involve them too much in case things go sideways.
He tried to work on his web novel while he waited, but didn't get very far. He kept absentmindedly bouncing his knee, and his vitals spiked every time he remembered where he was going, making his imprint go off with reminders to take a deep breath or to start a timed workout session. Eventually, his group was called to enter the portal and he made his way over to the imposing monolith.
This was one of the biggest portals he'd used, given the destination was one of the most popular ones. There wasn't much need to travel to many locations on the planet unless you worked as an overseer or in maintenance, but some spots had still become quite popular as natural wonders or for the novelty of it. This fell in the latter category as it led to the planet's oldest tree. There were hotels and amusement parts built around it, making it a popular place for students, especially during Flowering and Harvest. He joined the many other young people in neat rows of single file lines as they waited to cross through the flickering white light in the middle of the carved stone block.