The Takers: Book One of the Oz Chronicles (15 page)

We started out for Atlanta an hour later. Wes took Tyrone, Valerie, Ajax (who was still convalescing), and the puppies in his bus. They moved faster than us so they took point. They were miles ahead of us within just a few minutes. We kept in touch through a pair of high-powered two-way radios we'd picked up at Rankin's Outdoor Outfitters.

It was risky to split up like that, but Wes could not contain himself when he got behind the wheel of his VW bus. He had to drive as fast he could, which by his standards wasn't as fast as he was used to driving, but he still could out pace our horses and wagon by a good bit.

Lou and I didn't talk much. I think we had said all we could stand to say. We just sat and lost ourselves in the rhythmic clop-clop-clop of the horses' hooves on the pavement as we methodically made our way south.

The purple crack in the sky remained stamped on the horizon. It taunted us, letting us know that the Takers were not our only foes now. There were new creatures we had to deal with, and we knew nothing about them. Ajax had called them the Day Longs, although we couldn't be sure if that is what he really meant or if they were just the closest words in his vocabulary. We looked through Dr. Fine's book, but there were no references to these new monsters, or demons as Ajax called them. We had no idea what they looked like, or if they followed the same rules as the Takers. The comic book may have had some answers, but we could not chance another reading until we were all rested and healthy.

We got a call from Wes on the two-way that he was stopping at the Calhoun exit to wait for us to catch up. I could hear Valerie and Tyrone laughing through the static-filled airwaves of the radio. It made me smile. They were good kids who deserved a little bit of happiness. Unfortunately, that's about all the happiness you could find on this side of our planet's history, a little bit.

As soon as I put the radio down, I got the funny feeling we were being watched. I couldn't pinpoint from where, but I definitely could feel the eyes on me. I didn't tell Lou because I didn't want to ruin her moment of relative peace. I gave Phil and Ryder a light tap with the reins and urged them to pick up the pace.

As we went under an overpass, I got my first look of what or who had been watching us. I saw a shadowy figure on a horse. I got just a glimpse, but I could see that whoever it was, was not a master horseman. I watched the chubby figure in the saddle sway from side to side trying to get the horse to move behind an abandoned semi truck off the exit. The horse kicked up its back legs and whinnied. Lou was now aware of our visitor.

"Somebody's following us," she said.

"I know." I looked to my left and saw another amateur horseman skulking his horse behind a row of trees in the median. "I've seen two so far."

With Nate around her shoulder she carefully stepped to the back of the wagon and retrieved a crossbow. "There's a third one behind us," she said.

I turned to see a long slender figure riding a white and black spotted Tiger horse. I couldn't make out her face, but I could tell by her stance in the saddle, it was Reya. Another horse and rider joined her from the median, the kid who had no name. That meant Devlin and Miles were the ones to our sides. I pulled the wagon to a stop. Kimball barked. We both jumped off.

"What are you doing?" Lou asked.

"Stopping," I said.

"But why?"

"Because we need them."

"What for?"

"Even a warrior needs some friends to help him win his battles."

She shook her head. "These guys are losers. I don't trust them."

"We've got no choice." Kimball and I stood in the middle of the interstate behind the wagon. Reya and the other kid trotted up to me.

"Where's your monkey, horse-boy?" she said, trying to get the horse to stop. Instead of pulling back on the reins, she leaned back in the saddle and nearly fell over the mare's rear.

I tried not to laugh. "Gorilla. He's up ahead of us in Calhoun."

The other kid rode up and grabbed Reya's reins and stopped her horse. "I told you, you gotta pull back on the reins."

"I am," she snapped. She spotted Lou holding the crossbow to her side. "Your girlfriend going to shoot us?"

I turned to Lou and motioned for her to put the crossbow down. She refused. "She's not my girlfriend." Kimball started to growl. I placed my hand on his head and tried to sooth him. "Doesn't look like you're too popular around here," I said to Reya.

"What of it?" she said. She peered into the back of our wagon. "What you got in there that we might want?"

"A lot," I said, "but you can't have any of it."

"You best look at Devlin and Miles. They got something to say about that."

I looked at her two minions. They were pointing what looked like two nine-millimeter guns at us. I chuckled. "I guess you didn't get the memo. Guns don't work any more."

"The kinds that fire bullets don't," she said smugly. "But these kind shoot darts. They're air pistols."

I pointed to Lou. "In case you aren't of aware of it, arrows do a lot more damage than darts."

She looked confused. She searched and searched for a reasonable retort to my logic, but she couldn't come up with any.

The other kid climbed off his horse, "Reya will you stop trying to bully the kid."

"Shut up, Roy. I'm in charge." She shot him an evil look.

"Hell of a lot of good it's done us. We're about to starve to death." Roy walked toward me. "Look, just ignore my sister," he said. "All we really want to know is if you'll share some of your food with us."

"Sure," I said, "but why don't you just go to a grocery store and take what you need."

He looked embarrassed. "Ask her." He shot a thumb toward Reya.

"Because we're bandits," she said proudly. "We don't shop in grocery stores. We take from unsuspecting travelers."

He turned to her. "Look around, Reya. There aren't that many travelers to take from."

"What are you doing, Roy?" She hopped off her horse. "You shouldn't be undermining my authority." Devlin and Miles still had their air guns trained on us, but they were more than mildly amused by the fight between the brother and sister.

"You're a real idiot, you know that?" Roy said. "You're too busy playing bandits to know that me, Devlin, and Miles are about to fall over from hunger."

"Guys," I said, but they didn't hear me. They continued their argument.

"I suppose you think it's easy being the leader," Reya said.

"You're not the leader," Roy shouted.

I went to the wagon and pulled out a box of granola bars. I walked over and handed bars to Devlin, Miles, and Roy. All the while, Reya and Roy were arguing over her role in their troupe. I tried to hand a granola bar to Reya, but she slapped it away.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"I'm sharing our food with you," I said.

"You are not sharing your food with us." She looked at the others in her gang. "Put those granola bars down." Devlin was just about to raise the bar to his mouth when she gave the order. He wanted to disobey, but he thought better of it. Miles followed Devlin and dropped the granola bar.

Roy looked at her defiantly. He ripped open the granola bar.

"Stop that," she said.

Roy smiled and took a bite.

"That's it. You're out of the gang."

"Fine," Roy said with his mouth full of granola. "I'd much rather ride with…" He turned to me. "What was your name?"

"Oz."

He turned back to Reya. "I'd much rather ride with Oz, anyway. At least they eat."

She let out a low frustrated scream and headed back to her mount when Devlin's horse suddenly reared. The jolt almost threw him from the saddle. He reached to grab hold of the horse's neck and inadvertently pulled the trigger on his air gun. Reya yelped and put both hands on her backside. Devlin had shot her in the right butt cheek.

Lou and I struggled not to laugh. Roy did not show the same restraint. He bent over in spasms of laughter as he watched his sister hop around the interstate trying to pull the dart from her butt.

I looked at Lou. "You better help her." Lou jumped from the wagon and handed me Nate in his sling before she walked over to Reya.

Reya was dancing in little circles now. "Get it out! Get it out!"

Lou reached her and calmly stopped Reya. The injured bandit was a full foot taller than the little warrior. "Breathe deep," Lou said holding Reya's arms and looking up at her. Reya did as requested. Lou reached around and pulled the dart from her rear end. It had penetrated fairly deep. "C'mon," Lou said, "we've got a first aid kit in the wagon."

Reya looked at Lou suspiciously. She thought about declining her offer, but realized that, given the location of her wound, riding a horse was probably next to impossible. She grudgingly limped to the wagon following Lou.

Devlin and Miles immediately jumped from their horses and picked up their granola bars. They frantically tore off the wrappers and started chomping away.

"We've got somebody waiting for us in Calhoun," I said to Roy. "You want to come along?"

He smiled and said, "Absolutely."

***

When we reached the Calhoun exit, Valerie and Tyrone were justifiably unhappy at the presence of Miles, Devlin, Roy, and Reya. Reya had ridden in our wagon on her belly the whole way, her horse tied to the back. She moaned and complained the entire way. She mostly wanted us to be aware that just because we were helping her didn't mean that she was beholden to us in any way. I assured her that we expected nothing in return.

Wes had gorged himself on three cans of chicken, and he was napping on the side of the road when we arrived. The puppies were climbing all over him licking chicken grease from his shirt.

Ajax gave our old adversaries a curious glance from the VW bus and then returned to resting comfortably. He looked terribly depressed. Valerie said she could not get him to eat. I invited Roy and the others to help themselves to any food we had. Lou was more than a little upset that I was being so nice to these self-described bandits, but I had a reason. We needed more allies. I had a feeling things were about to get a lot stickier for us.

I climbed in the back of the bus with Ajax. He had his back to me. His blanket and doll were uncharacteristically out of his reach. I grabbed them and crawled to him. I attempted to hand him the blanket and doll, but he shooed them away. "You all right, big guy?" I asked.

He huffed.

"What can we do for you to make you feel better?" It was a question my Mom had always asked me when I was feeling under the weather. Somehow it seemed to help me. I was hoping it would do the same for Ajax.

He rolled over on his back and signed, "Bring baby to Keepers."

"We will," I said. "You should get some rest. We need you at full strength." I turned to leave, but he grabbed my arm.

"Warrior friend," he signed. He cupped his huge hand and pulled me to his side. I tried to pull away, but he didn't want to let me go. After a few seconds of struggling, I gave up and lay next to him.

Minutes passed and Wes stuck his head inside the bus. "What's with these stragglers you picked up?"

I slid from a now groggy Ajax's grasp and quietly exited the VW bus. "They were hungry."

"They're bad seeds, Oz." He guided me to the back of the van. "The girl is full of piss and vinegar and the little fat one has already gone through a row of Oreos."

"We've got enough to go around."

"That ain't the point. We don't know nothing about these people…"

"Yes, we do," I said. "They've tried to rob me three times. They're bandits."

"Rob you?" He was incredulous. "What in the name of Knotty Pines are you doing letting a bunch of bandits eat our food?"

"They're not very good bandits." I laughed, but he didn't get the joke. "Look, we need all the reinforcements we can get…"

"Reinforcements?" He threw his hands up in the air. "You're letting this warrior stuff go to your head. We're one old fat redneck mechanic and a bunch of kids. We ain't warriors.

Now, I think this trip to Charleston is just a fool's errand, but you had your heart set on it, so I figured I'd come along, but this warrior talk and fightin' them Greasywhoppers is just plain dumb. There ain't no way around it. You're going to get yourself and all the others killed."

"Wes," I said as emphatically as I could without sounding angry. "This is something we have to do. I didn't want to believe it at first, but…"

"But what?" he asked.

"If we can get Nate to the Keepers, I think we can find a way to get everything back." I had tried to keep myself from believing it, but as the days went by, I was starting to convince myself that our mission wasn't just to save the Storytellers, but to restore our old world, to bring back our parents, and Wes's sister and everything else as it was before the Takers came. I had nothing more than a gut feeling, but it was a feeling I couldn't shake.

"You're nuts, boy," Wes said as he chortled at my expense. "You're just out and out nuts." He put his hands on his hips and dropped his chin to his chest. "But seeing how you're about the closest thing to a friend I got in what's left of this upside down world, I'm willing to lend you my support."

I smiled.

"That don't mean I believe a lick of this nonsense, but I got to admit, I've seen some pretty crazy things in the last couple of weeks." He massaged the back of his neck. "I guess your theory ain't any crazier."

I extended my hand and he shook it enthusiastically. We both smiled and turned to see the group of newcomers rifling through our supplies in the wagon. "You sure about these bandits of yours?" he asked.

"I'm not sure of anything," I said walking towards the wagon.

Kimball was sitting on the road watching the bandits with a distrusting glare. His ears were upright and he sniffed the air. The eight puppies had gathered around him and were playing in his shadow.

I stepped up on the wagon and perched myself on the side. "You all getting everything you need?"

Devlin and Miles didn't bother to answer. Their mouths were full with an assortment of food. Reya stood gingerly trying to pretend she wasn't enjoying the feast she had finally agreed to take part in.