Albert POV

"I got one!" I screamed over to Andy, arguably my best friend. We had been fishing in the creek near town for over an hour now and this was the first bite either of us had gotten.

"I got it. Boy, Albert, you caught a big one." Andy smiled, carefully unhooking the fish from my line.

"Just when I thought our luck had run out. I was about to give up on fishing for today too." I commented in return.

"We probably should." Andy glanced up at the sky. "Those dark clouds are moving in pretty fast."

"Yea. You're probably right."

Andy and I got all our stuff together and started to walk back home. We have been great friends ever since the Ingalls took me in and got me off the streets of Winoka. Even though Andy is almost two years older than me, we get along great and have had a lot of good times together, sometimes including Laura. My adopted sister did not want to come out fishing with us today because she wanted to visit with Almanzo Wilder, the man she has been obsessing over for months now.

Personally, I believe Almanzo is a good guy, but too old for Laura. He seems ready for marriage, while Laura should get out and do more with her life before settling down. But annoying as it can be sometimes, she loves him...if she even knows what love really is. It is hard for me to imagine Laura as a Wilder. I joked with Andy once that may be him and Laura should get together instead. He pushed me into a pile of mud. Those two are just meant to be friends.

"Do you like all those different projects Miss Wilder has been assigning us, Andy?" I asked, referring to the schoolwork that we probably should have been doing instead of sitting around fishing.

"I guess so. They sure have helped my grades some." He responded.

"You ever miss your mom teaching?"

"No way." Andy immediately stated. "The only good part about having my ma be the teacher was that I didn't have to walk home alone everyday."

We both started laughing. Andy looked back up at the sky again as the wind picked up.

"That cool air feels good. I've been waiting weeks for a nice storm to role through." He said with a small smile on his face.

"It sure would be good for the crops."

As we kept walking, the clouds above began to take over the entire sky. The darker they got, the more I could smell the upcoming rain. I looked down the road and noticed something strange. As I stared at it, I realized it was a wagon and some men pulled off on the side of the road. For some odd reason I had a bad feeling in my gut about what I was looking at. Unfortunately, we had to walk past them to get home.

"Hey, Andy. Do you recognize those men on the side of the road?" I asked, motioning over to the wagon.

"Not really. They might be lost." Andy's head seemed in the clouds as he just now noticed the people up ahead.

I wanted to turn around, but instead we walked right up to them.

"Hey! You two boys." One of the men walked over to us. I noticed that he had a limp as he came forward. He really looked dirty and tired. "My friend's wagon has a busted up wheel. I was wondering if you boys knew of anyone out here who could help repair it."

I quickly answered him. "There's a mercantile back in town. You could get some supplies and maybe some of the men working at the mill could help you repair the wheel if need be. The town is right down this road here." I pointed to the path Andy and I had just walked down.

I looked over again and saw there were two other men starring at us. All three of them were dirty, had tattered up clothes and did not look particularly happy to see us. One man, near the wagon, had really blonde hair, while the other was really tall and skinny.

"Well...there are some problems with that." The limping man replied. "You see boys, we don't have much money to spare and it's not very safe for us to go into any town."

"Why not?" Andy asked over my shoulder.

"Because people might recognize us and we can't have that, can we fellows?" The man glanced behind him to see his buddies' heads shaking.

"Why can't you have people recognize you?" I asked in confusion.

"Because we're...how should I put this...criminals, who really don't want to go to jail." He smirked at us.

"We gotta go." Andy quickly said, grabbing my arm to make a run for it.

"Oh no you don't!"

The man grabbed each of us by our shirt collars. We both tried to shake him, but he had great grip strength.

"You two aren't going anywhere, now that you've seen us."

"We won't tell anyone you guys were here." I rushed to say to save ourselves.

"Honest. We don't want any trouble." Andy said after me.

The blonde man came up behind Andy and grabbed him. We tried to get ourselves free, but the men were too strong. They dragged us over to the wagon and the tall man brought out some rope. They started to tie our hands behind our backs and then tie our legs together. We were thrown in the back of the old wagon and the tall man came up to us. He forcefully gagged the two of us with pieces of cloth.

I looked over at Andy. I could tell he was getting scared. I was getting really scared too. Growing up in the city and the orphanage, I knew how bad people really can be. These men were going to take us away from our families, all because we saw them. My mind was racing with thoughts of what might happen to us. Terrible thoughts.

I started breathing heavy and my body was sweating with anxiety. I could hear rain start to fall and then a huge crack of lightening flashed through the sky.

"You boys better not cause us any trouble, for your own sakes." I could make out one of the men say.

I looked back at Andy, then a tarp was thrown on top of us, turning the world black.