Three Days Later

Elizabeth was currently in a fashion store at Paradise, Las Vegas. Over the past couple of days, she had come here to pass the time until the expedition was on its way.

Elizabeth didn't know why she found her way to this specific town, but she guessed it had something to do with missing John, Henry, Cindy, Marina, and the others.

Maybe, she even missed Alice and Zeel since everything started in Paradise Hills, Ohio.

'It feels like hundreds of years ago,' Elizabeth thought, missing a time when things were simpler.

Using her nanites, Elizabeth altered several things about her appearance, but it was not necessary to alter much more than her eye color and hair color, since they were her most distinguishing features.

Trying on a new pair of high heels, Elizabeth posed in front of the mirror to check the flexibility of the heels. Maybe, just maybe, she could also be attractive while also fighting.

The best part was, she didn't even have to pay for anything, she just had to wear it long enough for the nanites to scan and save the dimensions of the object.

Truth be told, she was enjoying her time away from all the pressures she had been forced to live with since childhood.

Running from the Mogadorians, fighting against the Mogadorians, choosing Alice and Zeel over her home, and now finding them amiss all the chaos that will no doubt soon appear.

Her entire life had been running, and fighting so far.

So this period away from Alice and Zeel was surprisingly refreshing, but also very dull, who knew she would miss both of them so much?

Zeel especially, knew all the right buttons to push to make her obedient to his every whim. A girl never falls for the nerdy guy; she falls for the guy who knows how to make her feel important even when he didn't have much else to offer.

Luckily, Zeel was both the nerd and bad guy wrapped up in one silver-haired, red-ruby-eyed package. Elizabeth was about to try on another pair of shoes when her Mbeamer blinked and codes began flashed across her retina.

Elizabeth began speaking aloud the information that was currently displayed on her retina.

"James Conrad: A former British Special Air Service Captain who served in the Vietnam War with the Australian Special Air Service Regiment, hired as a hunter-tracker for the expedition.

Preston Packard: A United States Army Lieutenant Colonel and leader of the Sky Devils helicopter squadron, assigned to escort the group of explorers on the expedition.

Bill Randa: A senior official in the government organization Monarch, who is in charge of the expedition.

Mason Weaver: An anti-war photographer and investigative photojournalist.

San Lin: A biologist working for Monarch.

Houston Brooks: A geologist and Yale University graduate, recruited for the expedition by Monarch for his ground-breaking theories on seismology.

So a bunch of nobodies, and a huge army to compliment them, huh?" Elizabeth murmured after reading the information of everyone that would partake in the expedition.

"Yes?" The store Clerk asked watching Elizabeth talking to herself constantly.

"Oh, nothing," Elizabeth waved as she exited the store in long strides, she had done enough virtual shoplifting for today.

It was a bit shameless to wear everything in the store and save them in her database, but being around Zeel for that long has taught Elizabeth the art of 'Not Giving a Damn'.

After exiting, she once again went over the list of those who would be going on the expedition, she didn't exactly know what to expect so she also added her name to the computer list that would later be printed.

'Liz' was the name Elizabeth added.

While Elizabeth was more than confident at being able to handle almost anything, Zeel had taught her to be cautious but not to the extent of holding herself back too much.

'Zeel huh?' Elizabeth thought as she turned her eyes to the blue skies, thinking about everything that had occurred so far.

Maybe, she didn't feel time pass over the past 29 years spent in her mindscape but her body did – it longed for Zeel's caress.

One of her favorite pass times during her 29 years' slumber was to relive the memories of Zeel and Alice, but in Alice's place instead.

She saw how they fought, and argued during the apocalypse of Alice's world. How they had mad makeup sex after, and their nights together staring at the stars in a ruined world.

Everything made her envious, but her intuition was telling her that she would also soon experience those feelings of realistic bliss.

It was kind of beautiful, seeing that Alice and Zeel had a much deeper history than she initially thought.

After all, they could all access each other's memories, but Elizabeth spent more time access Zeel's memories than Alice's.

Elizabeth shifted her attention to the matter at hand, she had previously conducted extensive research on Skull Island but found only myths about Ancient Beasts and Beasts Kings.

Had she read such fiction before meeting Zeel, she would have dismissed it as just that – fiction, but after meeting Zeel, she had long since learned the world is much bigger, and scarier than it would seem.

Sometimes to stay alive, you have to accept that you can't do anything while being weak.

That's why she trained so hard day in and day out, to stay close to Zeel and Alice; so that no day would come when they had to leave her behind for being too weak.

Elizabeth had found her power to be substantially more powerful ever since using the particulates ejected by the supermassive black hole, which quite frankly, she wasn't sure how she mustered up the strength to control them in the first place.

It was almost an instinctual action to contribute to their survival as a group, almost as if she was more scared of being useless than actually dying.

Walking for a while, Elizabeth then made her way to an apartment complex, and with a wave of her hand, infiltrator components' materialized in front of her.

She spent the next two hours putting the infiltrator together using her minor TechnoMancy skills, and intense mental effort on her part.

This made her realize that she relied heavily on Zeel's memories whenever it came to anything technological.

The nanites could access Zeel's memories as long as his nanites were also active, but should you lose the connection to his memories, you would have to rely on whatever you learned yourself.

While she could save the information with her nanites, it was a great deal different from learning and understanding how certain technologies work.

Especially, when it came to future technologies that required precise manipulation of the nanites to function.

"So if the expedition is tomorrow, and they're taking six nukes…. Then I guess I'll disable three and take two with me to the island, leave one behind as a gift," Elizabeth mused as she hopped into the infiltrator and blasted off into the blue skies above.

The destruction of the roof was not a part of her concerns.

Her destination was the extraction dock where briefing for the expedition would be conducted the following day.

She was more than ready to dodge this entire Universe, the smoke in the air, reminiscent of the industrial pollution, got on her last nerves.

Why can't humans treat the Earth better? Is there any Earth out there that took the same path as Lorien did, by living alongside their planet?

After all, despite everything else, Elizabeth was first and foremost a Lorien.