Survivors

The lunch in the crew dining room at the end of the tour was noisy and fun. Robert Charles asked Jordan about how the gauges worked. He asked if an alarm went off when a gauge goes into the red. Jordan told him an alarm would go off any time a gauge or a readout went into the red. Sometimes alarms went off when a reading was even close to the red zone, and that there was always plenty of warning. Robert Charles was satisfied with Jordan’s explanation and went back to talking to Lisa.  Within a few minutes he forgot all about the jumping gauge.

 

After lunch the students went back to class. Mr. Z had their test scores and assigned the students their computer programs. He informed them that he was there to provide assistance as needed, and for them to see what they could do getting started while he left for a few minutes. Before leaving, he announced that Robert Charles was in charge.  He left and walked up the corridor to where Robert Charles's father was waiting in the teacher’s office.

 

"I want to thank you for making my son your leader. Like I said, I can help you out a lot, either on Alpha Orion IV or on Earth with a good position,” the ambassador told the teacher.

 

"That's not why I appointed him. I did it because I thought he was the best candidate."

 

The Governor looked at Mr. Z with a look that said, Yeah right. "Has anybody decided to run against him yet?"

 

"Not yet. I’m sure some of them are considering it. Usually nobody runs against whomever I appoint as my temporary helper. I pick my class leaders carefully and the rest of the class usually sticks with my choice. They don't want to chance crossing the teacher. The only student I can see running against him has been discouraged from doing so."

 

"Good. And if you can discourage anybody else I would appreciate it. I want my son in leadership positions. This one will be very good for his growth."

 

"Understood."

 

As soon as Mr. Z left, Robert Charles sat at the front of the room looking important. Mike looked up from his computer and glared at him. He would do anything to take the smug smile off his face.

 

"You have some kind of problem, Mike?"

 

"Yeah I do. You."

 

Fifteen other heads looked up. This was sounding interesting. A lot more interesting than what was on their computers.

 

Robert Charles stood up to his full height. He was a big kid, but Mike was a big kid as well. He stood up and stared down Robert Charles. Every student sat quietly and watched as the two biggest boys on the ship glared at each other.

 

"You really want to get yourself into trouble don't you? Let me remind you who got put in charge here,” Robert Charles growled.

 

"You sure as hell didn’t get put in charge by any of us," Mike retorted.

 

"Let me tell you two things, butt breath. Thing number one, I've seen big-mouthed jerks like you before. And like you they're all nothing. Number two, like I told you before, you try anything against me you will spend two months locked in your room. Trust me on that.”

 

"And don't you even think about running against me, because you don't have a prayer of winning. You might have Ryan fooled, but you don't have too many others fooled." He pointed to the students who were staring at the two of them. "And the rest of you can forget about running too. None of you have a chance of winning, and you will be very sorry you even thought about crossing me. Because after I beat you, I won't forget who ran against me."

 

Right then Mike decided he'd had enough of the big headed, big-mouthed asshole and it was time to shut him up. He took two steps toward Robert Charles when Mr. Z walked into the room.

 

"Something wrong here?" he asked.

 

Robert Charles looked at Mike and grinned. "No, sir," he said. "Mike was just telling me what a great job I was doing as class leader and how he hoped nobody would run against me because there’s no doubt I was the best choice. Right Mike?" He smiled his evil grin at Mike.

 

"Whatever you say." Mike was so mad he could’ve kick a hole in a wall, but he was also smart enough to know he was being baited and he was going to have to wait his turn to get at Robert Charles. He hated to back down in front of the class, but doing something right now would be exactly what Robert Charles wanted.

 

After school was out almost everybody headed for the games room. Ryan and Mike got together and talked.

 

"Don't let that big goon get to you, Mike. He's not half the person you are,” Ryan told him.

 

"You must really believe it wasn't me who hit you."

 

"I more than believe it, I know it. I think somebody needs to run against that big butthole."

 

"I agree," Mike said, “but it can't be me."

 

"Why not?"

 

Just then Alex and Travis wandered over.

 

"What's going on?" Alex asked.

 

"We were just talking about how Mike should run against Robert Charles for class leader."

 

"I like that idea," Alex said. "What about it Mike?"

 

"I think it has to be somebody else. Not everybody believes I didn’t hit Ryan. I bet I wouldn't get a single girl vote to start with. It needs to be somebody else."

 

"Then who?" Alex asked.

 

"Let's go to my room where it’s private and talk about it," Ryan offered.

 

The four boys headed for Ryan's room. Jeremy was playing pool with Warren. Jeremy wondered where they were going, then shrugged and returned to playing with Warren, Stevie, and Brandon.

 

Meanwhile, Douglas was sitting on a couch watching a vid as Scooter played a video game on the other side of the room. They were ignoring each other, while at the same time wanting to be together in the worst way. Both of them were afraid to make the first move.

 

Douglas knew Scooter was still a special friend with Brandon, or was falling for Jordan, or both. Scooter knew that Douglas didn't seem to like him much and had been saying bad things about him and his dad. In their hearts, they didn't really believe those thoughts, but their minds weren't ready to follow their hearts yet.

 

Up in the crew area Jordan was with Matthew. He was showing Matthew his collection of coins and stamps from the different planets. So far Earth had colonized fifteen planets. Six of the planets were far enough along in their development that they were self-governing.

 

Alpha Orion IV was the newest colony and very little of it had been developed so far. The resident population was around 75,000. Life there was hard, especially for the farmers. But ships like the "Starkeeper" were bringing more and more colonists to tame the planet. Living on the "Starkeeper" Jordan had seen his share of them. Jordan loved collecting stuff from the colonists no matter where they would be settling. Earth had five exploration ships that were looking for new planets to turn into colonies. Jordan thought it would be real cool to be on one of those ships and go places nobody had ever seen before.

 

Jordan let his hand rest on the ten-year-old's knee. Matthew looked at him but didn't move. Jordan's hand crept up the boy's leg until it was resting right next to Matthew's crotch.  Matthew still didn't say anything, but Jordan could feel his body tense up. He let his thumb slide over until it was right next to Matthew's cock. Matthew's eyes opened wide and he stared straight ahead. He knew what Jordan was doing and he didn’t like it, but wasn't sure what to do about it.

 

Jordan let his hand slide over Matthew's crotch and planted it on the young boy’s dick. Even though Matthew was uncomfortable, his cock was hard as a rock. Jordan started rubbing along it through Matthew's pants.

 

"W..w..what are you doing?" he whispered tensely.

 

"Shhhhhh," Jordan said. "It's okay. This will feel good. You will like it."

 

"B...b..but...you're touching my...me...down there," he stammered.

 

Jordan rubbed Matthew’s cocklet a little harder. Both boys' hearts were pounding hard, but for different reasons.

 

"Does it feel good?" Jordan could hardly get the words out he was breathing so hard.

 

Matthew didn't say anything. He just looked at Jordan with big eyes, breathing hard, his heart racing, his body tense and not moving.

 

Jordan started unbuttoning Matthew's pants. Then he slowly pulled down the zipper. Matthew knew he was supposed to stop what was happening, but he couldn't do it. He just sat there and let Jordan fondle him.  Jordan started rubbing Matthew's hard boner through his bright red briefs causing Matthew to squirm from the surprisingly good feelings. He knew he shouldn't let Jordan touch him down there, but at the same time he didn’t want to stop him. Jordan’s hand on his privates felt so good he wanted it to continue.

 

Jordan kept rubbing Matthew's hard dick through his briefs. Then he started tugging at the young boy’s pants, and Matthew lifted his butt so Jordan could pull them off. Matthew was sitting in his shirt, briefs, and socks while Jordan kept rubbing him and feeling up his balls. Then Jordan slid his hand inside Matthew's waistband and down to his little puppy boner, which wasn't even two inches, but hard as rock. Matthew couldn't believe the feelings he was experiencing from what Jordan was doing. It was the first time he had ever really thought of anything sexual, let alone done anything.

 

Jordan was close to puberty and feeling his hormones. Jordan thought about sex a lot, not only what he wanted to do, but also about the things that he had already done. Sexually, he was an experienced twelve-year-old boy.

 

Matthew lifted his hips again and Jordan pulled his underpants off. He didn't know why Jordan was doing this nor did he care. He just wanted it to keep going and not stop. He was wearing just a shirt and socks until Jordan pulled off the shirt.  He played some more with Matthew's dick, then stood up and started undressing himself. Matthew's eyes were glued to the older boy as he pulled off his shirt, unbuckled his belt, opened his pants, unzipped, and then pulled his pants down, his green boxer briefs tented out. Matthew's eyes bugged out when Jordan pulled his underpants off and his almost four-inch dick popped up.

 

Jordan knew what he wanted now. He looked at the cute, skinny, naked ten-year-old-boy with the beautiful little puppy boner, then went to his dresser, and got out some Vaseline.

 

Matthew started shaking. He had an idea of what was going to happen and started to get cold feet. He wanted to run but couldn't.

 

"It's okay Matthew. It's okay. This will be good. It won't hurt. You'll like it. I love you."

 

Jordan started rubbing the Vaseline over Matthew's butt, fingering his little hole, trying to relax his pucker muscles. Matthew moaned, it felt good, better than he thought it would. Then Jordan rubbed the goo over his own hard cock making it feel good. He looked at Matthew's smooth, round butt. All he knew now was that he wanted it. He wanted to be inside it, knowing it was tight and warm.

 

He told Matthew to lie face down on the bed. He pushed a pillow under the younger boy, which made his white bubble butt stick up in the air. He pushed his hard rod up against Matthew's virgin hole, and slowly shoved his cock in.

 

Matthew cried out. "Please stop, Jordan, it hurts."

 

Jordan stopped and thought back to when he was nine, just a little younger than Matthew, and he had his cherry taken by a fourteen-year-old passenger. He remembered how it hurt and how he begged the teenager to stop and how the boy wouldn’t. Their sex play had felt so good until then and after that it had made him cry.

 

He pulled his cock out of Matthew’s ass. Jordan was an egotistical, controlling, sometimes evil boy, but he had his limits. He realized at that moment on his bed that rape was one of them. He remembered his own feelings that night in the teen’s cabin; he couldn’t even remember the boy’s name.  He’d taken it up the butt since, but as something he wanted rather than something that was taken. He preferred being the top, but he’d give himself up to the right person.

 

He planned to get Matthew’s ass again before the voyage was over. Only this time he’d go all the way, which meant he had to set things up so Matthew would want his ass fucked. Jordan was more into the process of taking than he was into seducing. He saw this as a new challenge.

 

"It hurt. It was all feeling good, but it hurt when you did that."

 

Jordan leaned over Matthew and talked into his ear. "I know, that’s why I stopped. But you can’t tell anybody we tried to fuck, or I’ll let everybody know you liked taking my dick up your butt.”

 

"I don't like it," Matthew said. "You made me."

 

"But I stopped, right?  I love you Matthew. I won't ever hurt you. I’ll teach you how to do it and we’ll try again sometime, but you can’t tell anybody about this, and I mean nobody."

 

He kissed Matthew's cheek and then turned Matthew over on his back, took his cocklet into his mouth, and brought it instantly back to attention. Matthew started feeling good again. He couldn’t believe Jordan had put his wiener into his mouth, but he was happy again because of the even better feelings he was experiencing.

 

“That feels good,” Matthew sighed.  Matthew started moaning and it didn't take long until his back arched and he began to shake.  He begged Jordan to stop—he knew something very strange was happening. Suddenly the little boy shook even harder, let out a squeak, and had his first ever orgasm. He fell flat on the bed, breathing hard.

 

"What happened?" he finally asked.

 

"You had a cum," Jordan explained, "an orgasm. Felt good huh?"

 

"Yeah," Matthew admitted.

 

"I will make it better for you and for me. Just do what I tell you and it will be good for you and me. And nobody will find out what you like doing."

 

Matthew was confused about what Jordan was saying but he knew he wouldn't tell about what happened. He liked everything except when Jordan went up his butt. But he appreciated Jordan stopping when Matthew told him how much it hurt.

 

“Watch this,” Jordan said. He was on his knees next to Matthew’s supine body, masturbating his four inches. Within two minutes he was shooting his light preteen cum on Matthew’s torso.

 

“What’s that?” Matthew asked, his eyes wide with surprise.

 

“That was me jerking off and shooting cum. Don’t worry, Matthew, I’ll teach you everything. We’re going to be really good friends.”

 

The boys got dressed and Jordan walked Matthew back to his own cabin. Matthew decided to keep all of this to himself because he wanted to do it as many times as he could with Jordan. Without knowing it, Matthew had developed a huge boy crush.

 

 

Travis, Ryan, Mike, and Alex were in Ryan's room talking. Ryan and Travis were sitting on Ryan's bed while Mike and Alex were sitting on Jeremy's.

 

"Somebody has to run against Robert Charles," Alex said. "Somebody who can win."

 

"Who?" Ryan asked.

 

"Let's talk about that. It shouldn't be that hard for the right person to beat him. I mean we all know that Robert Charles is an asshole," Alex said.

 

"We've all studied history," Mike said. "We know that assholes win elections."

 

"Then let's figure out who can beat the asshole," Alex said. "First, we can eliminate Lisa. She has the hots for Robert Charles. As for the other girls, they all strike me as too ditzy to ever want to run. They would rather giggle and talk about boys than do anything, at least Felicia and Carmen. Michelle doesn't say anything to anybody. She’s a mama’s girl who spends most of her time in her cabin. So that leaves out the girls."

 

"So then which one of the boys runs?" Mike asked.

 

“First, let's talk about how many votes we think Robert Charles will get. I'm talking about right now. He has the four girls and himself. Face it, the girls all think he’s hot macho shit. That's five votes. He needs nine to win. Jordan is tight with him. That's six."

 

"And Matthew seems to be following Jordan," Travis said.

 

"Yeah, but we don't know yet which class he will be in. But if he stays in the upper group then that makes seven votes. If people think who ever runs is one of Mike’s friends, then Jeremy, and maybe Warren, will vote for Robert Charles. And that is nine votes to eight. We lose. What we need is somebody a couple of girls will go for, or somebody Jeremy trusts."

 

"I can work on Jeremy to vote for whoever we pick," Ryan said.

 

"Now as for who runs, we’ll start with you Mike. I think you would be a good leader. But you have that thing with Ryan on Mars hanging over you. Plus bad blood is brewing between you and Robert Charles. That's going to turn off the girls totally. They all have a thing for Robert Charles.  They are acting like girls, of course." Alex was on a roll. "Ryan and Travis are both too quiet.  The girls will want somebody with a little more pizazz. I think you both would be good. I just don't think you can win."

 

Travis was a little hurt, but he didn't say anything. Ryan agreed and didn't say anything.

 

Alex went on. "Stevie is too young to stand up to Robert Charles. Jordan is friends with Robert Charles, and we don't like him, anyway. Brandon is too new. He missed the bullshit at the start of this trip and none of us know him that well yet. Scooter is a good candidate. He is pretty friendly to everybody and doesn't seem to want to fight. But that is a problem. You need to want to fight some, and I don't mean with fists, Mike, to win this. Douglas has experience being a class officer, but he doesn't seem interested in running at all. He doesn't even like being with us half the time. So that leaves nobody to run."

 

"Don't write off Douglas," Mike said. "He did a pretty good job standing up for me with the whole Ryan thing."

 

"And he helped me with a problem," said Travis, who looked quickly at Ryan. Ryan saw the quick look, but didn't know what to make of it. All he knew was he wanted to spend a lot more time looking at Travis.

 

"You left out somebody pretty important," Mike said.

 

"Who would that be?"

 

"You, Alex."

 

"Nonsense. I'm a musician, not a leader."

 

"Yes you are. Look how you ran this little meeting. Besides, nobody holds anything against you.  And even if you weren't a leader, all you have to do is keep things in line in the classroom sometimes. You know all of us would have your back, so there wouldn’t be anything to it."

 

"Keeping Robert Charles in line is the thing. He will be big trouble if he loses,” Alex pointed out. “Hell, he will be big trouble even if he wins. My solution would be for all of us to kick the shit out of him.”

 

“No, if somebody beats Robert Charles it has to be somebody who is used to leading and to being in an election. Douglas is that person and we have to persuade him to do it. Besides I could never win. I don't like girls at all and they know it. We’re going to need some of their votes and I don't know if I could get them. Douglas has been elected before, which means he had to get girls to vote for him since he didn’t go to an all-boys school. I think he could get some girls to vote for him. He’s got the personality. And I know something Douglas did for all of us, which I will tell you about later."

 

Mike started chuckling. "What's so funny, Mike?" Ryan asked.

 

"I was imagining little skinny Alex kicking the shit out of Robert Charles."

 

"It's not as funny as you think," Alex said. "Me and Stevie took martial arts lessons after…something...something unfortunate happened to us. There is no doubt we could do it."  Looking at the feisty look on Alex's face, none of them doubted it.

 

They finally agreed that they would try talking Douglas into running. If he refused, Alex said he would consider it, but that there would probably be bloodshed if he ran. The four boys decided Douglas was going to be their choice.

 

Alex, Mike, and Travis got up to leave the room. Ryan asked Travis if he could stay a moment.  After the other two left, Travis sat on Jeremy's bed.

 

"What's up?" he asked.

 

"I don't know. I just wanted to talk. I guess I was hoping we could be really good friends during the trip. I really like you." Ryan's heart was pounding. He was very nervous and was hoping Travis wouldn't take what he said in the wrong way. Or maybe he was hoping he would.

 

"That would be cool," Travis said. "I like you too."

 

Ryan relaxed and smiled. Travis smiled back. Ryan thought of Jeremy jacking off on top of his bed and wished he could watch Travis doing it. The boys got up and headed for the games room. It was time to talk to Douglas about the election. But for Ryan and Travis, becoming friends was more important than any election.

 

 

After dinner everybody in the upper class was in the games room except Michelle. Alex and Travis were working on having a meeting of most of the boys. Alex had even arranged a meeting place. He had tried talking Marie into letting them have the spa on Deck Five to themselves. There were three spas on the ship.  Usually they were set aside for adults, but Douglas had decided during the tour to see if kids could get a chance to use one of them sometimes. He had talked to the recreation director who told him it was okay for them to use a spa as long as they arranged it ahead of time.

 

Douglas was going to tell everybody in class the next day, but Alex and Stevie had both been close enough to overhear Douglas arranging it. It was the thing that convinced them that Douglas would be a good choice for leader. He was doing something very quietly, on his own, that would help all of them. They liked that he worked on getting the spa without any fanfare or tooting of his own horn.

 

But Marie said they couldn't get the spa until the next afternoon. They needed to make reservations at least a day or so early to get the times they wanted. So Alex had reserved the ship's theater instead. However, he did get the spa reserved for after school the following day.

 

Robert Charles, Jordan, and Matthew weren't invited. The three of them and the three girls noticed everyone leave the games room. Robert Charles and Jordan were upset because they had a pretty good idea what all the chatter was about. Matthew was disappointed that he hadn’t been invited. He was realizing that while hanging out with Robert Charles and Jordan was getting him some privileges, it was also losing him some friends. The girls watched the boys go and shook their heads. Lisa was hanging onto Robert Charles, but the other two girls wanted to latch onto a boy and they were sorry to see them leave.

 

Jordan walked over to Robert Charles. "I think they are working to run somebody against you."

 

"I think so too. And they are going to be very fucking sorry if they do. This is our ship, Jordan, and it looks like they need to be shown who is running it."

 

Jordan nodded in agreement. Robert Charles and Jordan wanted to be sure that no matter what happened, Robert Charles would be in charge after next Wednesday.

 

The ten boys sat in the theater. Alex stood up to talk to them. He noticed how the seating was arranged. Brandon, Stevie, and Scooter sat together, as did Travis and Ryan.  Warren and Jeremy were another pair. Mike sat by himself and so did Douglas.

 

Alex opened the meeting. "The reason I wanted us to meet is to talk about the class leader. Some of us don't want it to be Robert Charles. We want somebody to run against him. Mike, Travis, Ryan, and I met this afternoon just to talk about it. First we want to know if anybody wants to volunteer."

 

Jeremy spoke up. "I'm not volunteering, but I don't see what is so bad about Robert Charles.  He's a little pushy at times, but he gets things done." Warren nodded in agreement.

 

"Maybe he would be less pushy knowing that we all are willing to stand up to him and run somebody against him," Mike said. "Besides some of us think he was the one who slugged Ryan."

 

"And some of us don't," said Jeremy staring right at Mike. Mike glared back at him.

 

"Any volunteers?" Alex asked again.

 

"What about you?" Warren asked. "You seem to be running things right now." Jeremy smiled at Warren. His little buddy was speaking up. He liked that.

 

"I'm not interested. Like I told everybody in our little meeting, I'm a singer and not a politician. I'm just doing this because nobody else but Mike will speak up, and some of you still don't believe in Mike."

 

"So what did you guys decide behind our backs then?" Jeremy asked.

 

"We didn't decide anything. We just talked things over. The decision is up to the whole group. We came up with a name of somebody I think we could all agree on. He's already done some cool things for us.  That somebody is Douglas." Alex reminded them how Douglas got Mike and Ryan talking to each other, then told them about the spa. Douglas blushed. He didn't know anybody knew about his securing the right to use the spa.

 

"I appreciate that you guys want me," Douglas told them, “but I'm not running. This is just a short trip and it doesn't really mean that much. Let Robert Charles have his fun. He can't hurt any of us. I'm just not interested in getting involved."

 

Scooter spoke up. "I think Douglas would be a great choice. Maybe he should think about it real hard overnight. Sleep on it and give us his decision in the morning."  Douglas was surprised at hearing Scooter speak up for him considering how Scooter felt about him.

Travis and Ryan both spoke up in agreement with Scooter. Finally, Douglas decided to try to shut everybody up and end the meeting by agreeing to sleep on it and tell them his decision in class the next day.

The gathering broke up. Warren headed back for his own cabin and the rest of the boys headed for the games room.

 

 Scooter caught up to Douglas and touched his arm. "I think you should run, Douglas. I don't even think you should think about it. I think you should just do it."

 

"Why do you care Scooter? I know how you feel about me."

 

Scooter looked at Douglas. He could feel a couple of tears welling up. He knew exactly how he felt about Douglas, and he knew Douglas didn't feel that way about him.  Maybe Jordan was right about Douglas and all his own feelings were wrong. He kept thinking there was something between them, he felt some kind of aura, and he was sure Douglas did too. Maybe it was time to tell Douglas exactly how he felt instead of hiding it.

 

When they got to the games room, Scooter led Douglas to the lounge section. They sat on a couch, with Douglas keeping his distance.

 

Scooter started talking right away while he had Douglas next to him. "I'm going to tell you how I feel about you. I think you are special. I think I liked you a lot when I first saw you. I think the night we spent together was awesome and I want to do it again. I think we might only know each other for two months during this trip, but I want to be your very best friend ever for those two months. And I think it's time for you to come out of yourself and to quit feeling sorry for yourself and to start living. You aren’t going to be going back to Earth, so you might as well do the best you can every day starting right now.  I've seen how awesome you are when you act yourself.  And today is the day for you to start doing that."

 

Douglas looked at Scooter. He blinked his eyes. He couldn't believe what he was hearing.  Nobody, except his parents, had ever talked to him like that before.

 

"But Jordan said...."

 

Scooter interrupted him. "I don't know what Jordan told you. But I know what’s been happening with Jordan and me was wrong and it shouldn't have happened and it won't ever happen again.  I...I...I want you, Douglas. If you will have me. Jordan told me things about you too, and I even started to believe them."

 

"What kind of things?" Scooter told him what he’d heard from Jordan. Douglas looked at him with his mouth open.

 

"Scooter, I swear I never said those things. Jordan was working to get between us for some reason. He's a real butthead. This really pisses me off. Scooter, I feel stuff for you too. I mean I want to be your friend. That night was special for me too. I was stupid for believing that butt-faced baboon, Jordan."

 

“I was just as stupid,” Scooter said quietly.

 

Scooter and Douglas moved closer together on the couch and looked at each other with what could only be called love, even if they didn't know it yet.

 

"Jordan and Robert Charles are tight, Scooter. If they are doing stuff like that to us, then they are going to do it to others too. They want to run everything and be the bosses. Robert Charles can't be in charge. If nobody else wants to run against him, then I'm going to do it. I've decided."

 

Scooter was so excited he kissed Douglas on the cheek. He pulled back all red with embarrassment. Scooter and Douglas both looked around to see if anybody noticed, but apparently no one had. What they didn't see was that Jordan had noticed everything.

 

"So, are we spending the night together again tomorrow, Scooter?"

 

"Yeahhhhhhhhhhh. I think we have things to talk about."

 

"So do I"

 

"When are you going to tell everybody that you’re running?"

 

"Tomorrow before class, just like I said I would."

 

Jordan walked over to Robert Charles and told him what he'd seen. Robert Charles wasn't happy, nor was Jordan. He and Robert Charles had been trying to split them, but instead the two suddenly seemed to be closer.  The big question now for Robert Charles was whether anybody else was going to run in the election, and if so who?

 

The games room was closing and Scooter and Douglas got up off the couch to walk back to their cabins together. Robert Charles stopped Douglas on the way out while Jordan stepped around and stood next to Scooter.

 

"Is somebody going to run against me?" Robert Charles asked.

 

"You'll find out in the morning," Douglas replied.

 

"Maybe I want to know now,” Robert Charles snarled.

 

"There is nothing to say now, but there might be in the morning." Douglas stepped around him.  "Now if it's all the same to you I need to get some sleep."

 

Robert Charles watched Douglas walk away and made his decision. No matter what happened, no matter who ran against him, after Wednesday, he would be the class leader. There was no question and no doubt in his mind about that.

 

Jordan was walking beside Scooter. "Is Douglas gonna run?"

 

"You have to ask him."

 

"I saw what happened on the couch between you two. If he's running he's just kissing up to you to get a vote because he doesn’t care about you at all. Douglas is nothing. Robert Charles is the leader here. Douglas is going to use you then spit you out."

 

A few hours ago Scooter might have stopped and almost believed Jordan. Instead he turned to him and said, "Douglas is my friend. I am his friend. And don't you ever forget that."

 

By then Douglas had caught up to Scooter. He glared at Jordan, and then the two friends walked down the hall together. Scooter made his own decision. He could see right through Jordan.  He decided he would never again trust a thing Jordan said.

 

Jordan walked with Robert Charles with Matthew following along behind them.

 

"I don't know if he is going to run," Jordan said.

 

"I am positive that he is. And I can tell you this, if he does he will be sorry. He will not win, and after he loses I can make life really hard for him. Even after we get off of this barge, we’ll still be living on the same planet together."

 

“I think I know ways to help you," Jordan said. Matthew listened to them talk not knowing what to think.

 

In their own minds Robert Charles and Jordan had made their decision. If there was going to be an election, it would be more than just an election. It would be all-out war.

 

Next: The Spa