Alex blinked a few times while stretching his arms apart. He yawned, surprised that he had fallen asleep so early and woken up so late. Alex noticed the train was stopped and abruptly got up. Penelope sat next to him on his right, her dazzling face particularly noticeable in the dark room, however the seat usually occupied by her brother was empty. "I thought I was the only one allowed to leave without notice," Alex joked, unsure if Penny (of course he could never call her that) was even awake. "Well, I'm going to go out," Alex announced loudly, hopeful for a response. All he received was a grunt and then continuous snores from the man sitting on Alex's left, Humphrey Gordon. Humphrey was an obese clown who challenged Alex to card games every night despite the fact that he could never win. Alex realized he never took his winnings from the night before and discreetly took Humphrey's wallet out of his bag, pulled out a few dollars (however Alex took more money than he was supposed to take), and then slipped it back in his bag. Humphrey abruptly woke up and snorted, "Huh?", the smell of alcohol reeking from his mouth. "We've arrived," Alex said in an excited tone before continuing in feigned anger,"however is a drunken clown really what you think parents bring their children to a circus for?" To Alex's amusement, Humphrey yelled, "Scram off kid!"
Alex pushed open the doors of the train compartment and headed outside into the beautiful and dark scenery, wondering where Zachariah could have went. Suddenly, Alex felt rain trickle down his face. He smiled, nearly jumping of happiness. Rain was one of his favorite things in the world, however he was sure that something like this wouldn't excite Zach too much so Zach was almost certainly inside. Alex was just about to push open the compartment doors to head back in, as he wanted to find Zach, when one of the workers called out, "Hey kid! Come over here and help me set this tent up!" Alex turned around, revealing his face to the worker. The worker, realizing who Alex was, shooed the kid away. One of the perks of being so troublesome was that Alex didn't have to do any work. Only three days after Penelope and Zach convinced the ringmaster, Bartholomew (Barty for short), to let Alex join the train he broke one of the tents, which caused a worker to fall of the tent and break his hip. Penny and Zach were mortified and afraid that Barty would kick them off the train. Luckily, Barty was extremely forgiving and let the kids stay under the "punishment" that Alex's only job would be selling tickets, passing out posters around town, making art to be sold at the concession stand, and singing for the crowd before the show started.
Alex reopened the compartment door and passed by Penny again. He went by a few more train cars and to his disgrace he never found Zach. Maybe Barty called him in for something. Zach was always Barty's favorite, so it wouldn't be surprising if this was true. Alex headed outside to the ringmaster's tent, a beautiful tent decorated with multiple colors. No one appreciated the tent as much as Alex did, which was also true for most artistic things. He was disappointed to see the rain was smearing the colors off the tent, which was in Alex's opinion the only negative of rain. Alex pushed over the tent covers and entered Barty's awkwardly designed room. Something about this room always gave him the creeps. Just as Alex had suspected, Zachariah was standing in the room with an unfamiliar girl, both with their backs facing him.
Normally Alex would take advantage of a situation like this to jump up on someone and scare them, however he learnt the hard way that this wasn't the smartest thing to do with Zach. "What is it, Zachariah?" the ringmaster mumbled, obviously just awaken from sleep. Zach motioned to the girl to step forward. The situation was very unusual, who was this girl? Zach usually didn't do well with strangers, maybe he had a secret girlfriend and was asking the ringmaster to let her join them at the circus. Alex snickered at the thought, knowing that obviously wasn't the case (Zach wasn't too good with secrets or girls and he couldn't have met the girl earlier considering that he'd been travelling for so long). Alex walked to the side of Zach and cheerfully sprouted,"Good morning Zachariah,". The disappointment on Barty's face when he saw Alex was immediately obvious which saddened Alex a little. Alex noticed the girl was around Zach's age and had blonde hair and blue eyes. Alex continued, "Who's this pretty girl you've got with you?"