Just as Ace had expected, the figure advancing towards him was a human, and a guy of his age at that. The boy had short brown hair, black eyes, and a slightly muscular build, standing a little taller than Ace. He wore a blue sweatshirt and black shorts
Ace had previously thought he could stop the guy but suddenly the new guy just doubled his speed making Ace doubt whether he could stop the guy but the new guy just became faster and...tripped...
Falling on the surface of the ship face first, he immediately stood up and grunted, glaring at the surface as if it had caused him to fall. Ace looked at him and suppressed a laugh, despite the seriousness of the situation who could blame him-this was just too funny.
And again the only one who could blame him was the guy who tripped himself, rest were busy gazing at the sun-well against their will of course.
"Ouch, at least no one saw me fall." He mumbled to himself though Ace still heard it. Moving his gaze in front of him, the new guy suddenly froze when he looked at the normal boy of his age in front of him, a faint red tint appearing in his cheeks embarrassed.
The new guy was still a few feet away from Ace, and just a few little less feet away from the door. Ace himself only saw him because he had left the door open behind him forgetting to close it after he looked at the man.
Both of them stared at each other, both uncomfortable. Ace was uncomfortable because he was not used to talking to others and the novels he read rarely portrayed scenes where someone sees a complete stranger fall face front on the ground, and in a serious situation on top of that.
Well, he did not know what to do either.
Well, the new guy did free both of them from their uncomfortable state as he ran again towards Ace clearly wanting to run past the gloomy and loner kid and go into the embrace of sunlight.
Well, Ace would be fine with this in other situations-hell he would not even care of the guy's existence but now, given the circumstance of what may happen to the guy, Ace moved his hand and caught the new guy's hand in a tight grip.
Ace was momentarily shocked by the sudden speed but held tightly and tried to pull the clearly stronger guy. Well sadly for Ace, he could not pull him instead it was the other way around and Ace went crashing into the other guy's back as they both fell to the floor.
The guy got up with a grunt and glared at Ace with an angry expression. "Is something wrong with you, you gloomy looking asshole."
He sighed but then saw that Ace's hand was still tightly gripping his own hand.
"WHAT IN THE WORLD IS YOUR PROBLEM, YOU LUNATIC!"
Ace stood up still holding the other guy's hand and scanned his surroundings, they were still a safe distance away from getting out of the shadows, he sighed and then whimpered at the pain in his body.
Any normal human of course would recover from something like this but sadly no matter how normal Ace was, his body was a little weaker than other normal human bodies.
'I should definitely hit the gym.' Ace thought remembering the advice of one of his old friends and then looked at the new guy who was standing in front of him, his only reason for standing this close to Ace was that Ace was gripping his hand-unwilling to let go of it.
"Sorry but sadly you can't go into the sunlight." Ace said letting go of the new guy's hand, his voice a little raspy due to pain but it was mostly normal like his usual normal voice, he tried to stand up and only succeeded after the third try only to see the new guys on his feet.
"What a weirdo." The new guy said to himself and turned to go towards the sunlight but was instead slammed towards the wall, he saw Ace trying his best to pin him to the wall and snarled but then stopped resisting.
"Why try to stop me?" He asked finally noticing the expressions on the faces of the few visible people he could see from below the roof and the narrow pathway to the sunlight. Utter terror on their faces.
Ace let go of him and turned towards the other people in the deck, who were sucked off of their energy and maybe even dead and one of them, was his mom too.
"I don't entirely know what happened, when I came up to go out, I stopped right here in the shade of the roof and saw the expressions on their faces and then." Ace paused for a while, his eyes moved downwards to look at the girl who ran past him just moments ago.
She was standing in the deck, her energy sucked out like everyone's else and Ace had seen all of it, too slow to save her.
"A girl ran past me into the sunlight and looked at whatever it is in the sky and..." He trembled slightly. "Some sort of energy was sucked off of her from her mouth and flew to the sky."
Ace gritted his teeth, his mother was among those who's energy were sucked off, or maybe she hid somewhere safe in time and now was in a similar situation as her son or maybe there were only few unique individuals like the little girl who's energy could be sucked.
'But then why are all people still?' His eyes narrowed, a dark expression on his face, no there were no special individuals-he had a strong feeling that everyone's energy would be sucked off of them. He could only hope his mother somehow escaped this and was safe.
"You expect me to believe that?" The new guy questioned him, his voice low and cautious, he seems to understand the depth of the situation but obviously there was still a part of him questioning this.
"Well no soul will go past me, so maybe how about you go yourself and see if something is sucked off of you."
Well it seems that fate took that personally as just as he finished those words, an especially fast kid ran past them and even though Ace tried to stop him with both his body and words, the young boy was just too strong.
And well the same thing which happened to the girl happened to the little boy as well, another scream and his expression was as same as everyone else. Ace was proven wrong right after saying those words but come on, on the brighter side the other guy understood the situation and even reluctantly believed it as well.
"What the-" The new guy's pupils widened and suddenly he rushed forward but stopped right after his third step-his rational side of brain winning against his impulse.
'Maybe there was someone dear to him out there too.'
The new guy gritted his teeth, and took in a deep breath and sighed, a dark, determined look appeared on his face as he turned back to face Ace. "What to do now?"
Ace replied with a deadpan expression, then sighed-did he seriously think Ace knew something about this situation?
"Well first let's introduce ourselves-I'm Ace. Nothing else to brag about." Ace outstretched an arm for an handshake which the new guy accepted outstretching his arm as well.
"My name is Ariel."
After some time, both of them entered Ace's room and sat on the chair, opposite to each other, thoughtful and serious expressions on both of their faces.
"What is your guess about what we are facing?" Ariel asked, Ace shifted slightly and thought back to everything he had seen up until now.
"I don't know of any technology that does something like this, and that energy sucked out. I am sure it has to be something special, maybe our life force or...maybe magic."
Ariel nodded accepting this. "I had the same thing in mind, but about its powers and maybe about itself and more. Any ideas?"
Ace nodded, "Yes but to test it, we have to wait for night. If my guess is correct, it has to do with something related to sun and daylight." Ariel raised an eyebrow, it was a common guess but what he needed right now were some solid proofs or maybe justification on his guess.
It seemed like Ace had some saying to prove this as well as he began to talk again, with somewhat confidence.
"My guess is good according to me, what I think is that the powers of the sun is strongest during sunrise, most go out in sunrise and maybe that's why we did not hear any sort of scream but when noon came its power diminished a great sum and maybe that's why the girl and the boy could at least scream before being sucked off of their energies"
Ariel was momentarily shocked-if Ace's guess was right then he could see him become a detective already.
"Your guess is all right but it has one flaw- then what happens at the night?" Ariel asked, he was clearly impressed by Ace's detective ability but this was not the time to believe in stuff that had even a single flaw, no matter how small it was. Ace smirked then looked at Ariel and grinned.
"I'm not done yet, first things we still have not passed our first night since this started... and secondly moon reflects sunlight."
Ariel nodded but still a frown managed to creep up to his face. "You make sense but the powers are supposed to decrease a lot, if not barely there-and will that be enough to keep all these people still?"
Ace stood up, and looked towards his door, a serious expression on his face as he spoke. "That's why we wait till the night and watch, for now we must find more people who maybe did not go to the deck like us."
Ariel nodded, they had enough food in the cafeteria which was clearly covered by shade, even if Ace's guess was wrong, they could find people, survive and solve this mystery as well.
Room after room, door after door-they were careful while opening, after all the sunlight could creep up from the windows as well, it was pure luck that both Ace and Ariel had closed their windows and shut it with curtains, not letting any sunlight in their room but others were not so lucky. Though some were also locked.
Ariel took out a thin needle he found in Ace's room and inserted it into the keyhole. His fingers moved carefully, nudging the inner pins of the lock while applying slight pressure to the handle. A few quiet clicks later, the lock gave in with a sharp snap.
They still carefully opened the door afraid that they come in contact with the sunlight and they saw a guy sleeping covered by blankets leaving only his legs and face visible and even he had a terrified expression.
"It seems like he was sucked while asleep." Ariel said then paused and looked at Ace "That was a weird thing to say, you should be thankful he can't hear you."
Ariel gave out a nervous laugh then closed the doors. "Well we don't know, he still might hear, maybe they are just paralysed completely, unable to even see around or speak." They moved to another door but right before opening it, a slight frown appeared on Ariel's face and he turned to Ace.
"But if it is sunlight that is sucking our energies, then why are we completely safe?" Ace blinked then suddenly grew silent in thought.
"That..." A new voice arose, from the darkness in the pathway, several feet away from them, both Ace and Ariel stood facing to the direction with grim resolve burning in their eyes, whatever it was laying in those darkness-they would survive-had to survive.
"...because we did not gaze upon the thing itself" Ace and Ariel calmed down seeing the figure of another human, and from what it seemed-he looked their age as well.
The figure soon came out of the darkness and Ace had a closer look to seeing the new human he and Ariel had ran into. The newcomer had black hair and striking red eyes, wearing loose black pants and a matching black shirt. He stood about the same height as Ariel, though his frame looked slightly more muscular.
"That is my guess."
"Uhh, not to sound rude but how do you know that even if it is just a guess?" Ariel asked, he was clearly the more cautious person among Ace and himself with Ace being the smarter one-at least in matters like what they were facing now. And how the new guy held himself, calm and confident-he was clearly the stronger one.
"Hmmm, well I happened to see some things that backs my guess."
Ace frowned and then looked at the new guy. "Well then how did these guys sleeping go still, surely they did not gaze upon the thing in their sleep did they?" Ariel nodded siding with Ace.
"There are two factors from what I saw, gazing the sun or being directly open to the sunlight. The curtains in most rooms were half open, letting sunlight slip inside. Most people sleeping had their energies sucked due to the second reason, and the people on the deck, for both the reason."
Ace nodded accepting the guess, then a thoughtful look appeared on his face. "Well if we consider that energy as the life force then surely it must need time to replenish itself and maybe so it does during when we are asleep leaving our body most vulnerable at that time, this can be a third reason."
Both Ariel and the other guy were silent for a few moments and then nodded impressed by Ace's quick way of understanding things.
"Well before you say what you saw, who are you?" Ariel asked to the new guy who relied with a cheerful smile.
"Ray, my name is Ray."