Chapter 1-Not useful anymore

Chapter 1: 1-Not useful anymore

The ocean was supposed to be beautiful, Aymara had always thought so.

Standing against the polished railing of the luxury cruise ship, she had spent the first few weeks of the apocalypse believing that perhaps the world had not completely ended and there was hope for survivors.

The sky was dark, but the sea still glittered beneath the occasional flash of lightning. Far beyond the cruise ship, however, there was no longer a recognizable coastline.

There was only water. Endless, terrifying water.

The city where she had lived her entire life had disappeared beneath the ocean weeks ago.

The roads were gone, most of the houses were gone, the airports were no more.

Millions of people had been swallowed by the first wave and others fell to the endlessly flowing water, while others were still desperately fleeing from the hurricanes tearing across continents, some struggled against the strong incoming tsunamis.

Meanwhile, Aymara pressed one trembling hand against her chest. Her heart was beating painfully fast.

Yet despite the fear squeezing her lungs, she turned around and looked at the man standing behind her.

Dylan, her boyfriend of six years and the man she had trusted with everything. He was standing several meters away with his arms folded across his chest.

His expression was strange. He looked cold, not frightened or worried but cold like he was looking at a pebble beneath his feet that he couldn’t be bothered to care for.

Aymara frowned. "Dylan?" she called out to him, frightened and in disbelief.

He didn’t answer her, his eyes continued to be cold and full of disdain. Instead, the woman beside him stepped forward to address her.

It was Sarah, his first love. They had broken up eight years ago and when the apocalypse arrived, he insisted Aymara takes Sarah on board the cruise.

At that time, she didn’t think much of it, she just wanted to extend a helping hand to someone in need.

Aymara’s gaze landed on her, and something inside her went cold. Now, seeing them stand side by side, she had a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.

She noticed that Sarah was wearing one of the expensive white dresses Aymara had personally bought for her at the start of the apocalypse.

Her long hair was tied neatly behind her head and she looked completely composed, almost happy.

Aymara stared between them. "What’s going on?"

Still, Dylan said nothing. He couldn’t bring himself to waste words on her.

Aymara’s fingers tightened around the railing. "We’re supposed to be heading toward the northern waters," she said, forcing a small smile. "The captain said the storm should weaken there and those seas should also have less sea monsters. Once we get past it, we’ll be safe," she added.

Hahaha! Hahaha!

Sarah laughed softly. Her mocking laugh echoed.

Aymara’s smile disappeared. "What?" she asked. "Why are you laughing?"

Sarah looked at Dylan. "Should we tell her?" she teasingly asked him.

Dylan finally looked at Aymara and the expression in his eyes made her stomach drop.

There was no love in his green eyes, no concern and no trace of the man who had held her hand six years ago beneath a summer tree and promised that he would never leave her.

Instead, his eyes held an enormous irritation that she had never seen before.

Aymara swallowed. "Dylan?"

"We’re not going north, Aymara," he spoke, his voice was flat.

Aymara blinked. "What?"

"We’re changing course," he added, indifferently.

"Why?" Aymara asked, unable to shake off her shiver and the knots inside her.

"Because this ship doesn’t belong to you anymore," he let out, barely concealing the pride in his eyes.

The words didn’t make sense to Aymara. How can the ship not belong to her anymore? She had bought it with her own money.

Aymara stared at him and then she laughed nervously. "What are you talking about?" she was hoping he’d laugh it off and call the dreading moment a joke.

Dylan’s lips curved into a faint smile. "You really don’t understand?"

Sarah stepped closer to him, her arm slipped through his and she leaned her head slightly on his shoulder.

The sight made Aymara’s heart stumble. She looked at their intertwined arms and then into Dylan’s eyes.

"Sarah?"

It sounded more like a question than her calling out to Sarah.

Sarah smiled. "I’m sorry, Aymara," she feigned an apologetic look. "Dylan and I... We’ve rekindled our love and... I’m afraid we can’t be separated."

The world seemed to tilt beneath Aymara’s feet. With the world destroyed and the apocalypse upon them, Dylan was the only family she had left in the world.

She couldn’t believe that he would turn away from her at such a critical time. "No, Dylan... this can’t be..."

Aymara shook her head. Her voice trembling as she hugged her body. "No, wait. This..." She fell into huge denial, she looked at Dylan again. "What’s happening?"

"You’ve been useful, Ayma. I’ll give you that," Dylan’s words were almost casual. "You had the money, the ship and were able to stock up on the supplies needed for survival, not to mention the crew."

Aymara’s face slowly drained of color. It felt like he was reading a resume of an interviewee that was getting rejected for a job and not talking about his girlfriend.

"And now?" she asked weakly.

"Now we don’t need you anymore!"

She stared at him. All she saw was six years. Six years of loving this man, of believing that he was her future and years of choosing him over everything else.

Even Nathaniel, her former best friend wasn’t spared in her love for Dylan. The one person who had loved her quietly long before Dylan entered her life.

Nathaniel had warned her about Dylan. He had told her that Dylan wasn’t trustworthy but Aymara had called him jealous.

She had abandoned him because Dylan had said Nathaniel was interfering with their relationship. She hadn’t spoken to Nathaniel properly in years.

And now, she suddenly remembered the look in his eyes the last time she had walked away from him.

He hadn’t looked at her with anger or heartbreak just disappointment and right now, she knew that if she could look in the mirror, she’s see the same disappointment in her own eyes over the choices she made.

Aymara’s lips trembled. "Dylan... this isn’t funny," she said, refusing to believe that her choice would turn out to be wrong. "Just say that it’s a joke. Tell me that youre playing... even if it’s a lie..." Her own desperation made her heart tremble.

She bit her lip, tears already soaking her face and her lashes sticking together. It was hard to catch a clear vision of her boyfriend and Sarah.

"No one said it was," Dylan spoke and nodded towards the crew.

Two men immediately approached her. Aymara recognized them, she had rescued them when the tsunami first hit, they had been floating on rafts and we’re desperately calling for help.

Her tears welled up as she stepped backwards. "Marko, Pete... What are you doing?"

"Throwing you overboard. What else?" Pete uttered with zero empathy for her.

Her breathing stopped. She bit her lower lip until it bled. "W-what?" her voice continued to shiver with disbelief.

The people she had saved and risked her supplies for, they had turned against her and we’re sending her to her end.

It broke her heart to witness it.

"You heard me," He echoed.

Aymara stared at him as if she were looking at a stranger. Bitterness filled her heart as she looked at their heartless eyes.

"You can’t."

Dylan shrugged. "We can and we will."

"This is my ship..." She cried out in desperation.

"It was your ship... Now, it belongs to us!"

"I paid for everything!"

Aymara bit her lip and gritted her teeth. Her heart and soul clenched tightly.

"I have control of the ship, the crew and Sarah with me. What use are you to me?"

Aymara looked at Sarah, the woman she had trusted and had treated like a little sister through the weeks of the apocalypse.

"How could you do this to me, Sarah?"

Sarah smiled gently. "Dylan and I have loved each other for years, Aymara. The one who isn’t loved is the other woman... you were the other woman, Aymara!"

Aymara’s mind went blank. "What?" her body froze up.

"You didn’t notice?" Sarah’s smile widened. "We thought you would eventually. It turns out you are not just stupid but blind too."

Aymara couldn’t breathe. All the little things she had ignored came rushing back. Dylan’s late-night phone calls to comfort Sarah when the storms would get too hard in the night, the unexplained meetings that started way before the apocalypse and Sarah disappearing whenever Aymara from a room when arrived.

The secret messages she stumbled upon in his phone that he justified as inside jokes between him and Sarah. The strange glances they cast to each other across rooms.

Aymara realized that she had been too trusting, too stupid, too in love to realize she was being played for a fool.

"You..." her voice broke. "Y-you were cheating on me?"

Dylan didn’t deny it. "Don’t make this emotional or ugly, Aymara!"

"Emotional?" Aymara laughed but tears were already running down her face. "You’re throwing me into the ocean after six years of pretending to love me, and you’re telling me not to be emotional?"

Dylan looked annoyed. "The storm is getting worse. We don’t have enough supplies for unnecessary passengers."

"Unnecessary? Passenger?" Aymara pointed at herself, her disbelief grew another mile. "You mean me?"

"You’re not useful to us anymore. Just another mouth to feed!" He spat with disdain to the floor.

Something inside Aymara shattered. She looked around to see if there was anyone among the people she rescued who had a comcious.

The crew avoided her eyes, the passengers she had personally rescued from the flooded coastal cities stood nearby but said nothing in her defense.

People whose tickets she had paid for, people she had given food to and had allowed onto her ship when they had nowhere else to go. She searched their faces and found no concern or remorse for her, only cold indifference.

"Please," she still tried to call for help but nobody moved. "Someone..." her voice trembled. "Someone help me."