Here is the second chapter!
In the next chapter (Which I already have half written) We see the home lives of our unlucky students.
BTW: Claire is not a self-insert, she is a reference to my favorite character from the actual book, Ransom.
Please R&R
The time passed slowly, well, it seemed to pass slowly. Really it was only moments until a white truck with a giant plastic cupcake pasted to the top of it pulled up beside the bus. Chef opened up the door to the back of the truck and threw Courtney in. He then, keeping a hand on his gun all the while, ordered the others to follow suit. It was Duncan who stood up to him, yet again. "Why?"
"Why?" Chef regarded him with distaste; he was not expecting the boy to question him when there was a gun involved. "Because I said so, now move, you maggot!"
"The joke's gone far enough." Duncan said casually, as if he were discussing the weather with an old woman. "I have things to do, places to be, I can't be wasting my time here waiting for some psycho on crack to finish 'Kidnapping' us." He put air quotes around 'kidnapping'.
Chef's face contorted in ferocity, and he gripped the gun tighter. "Boy, you don't' know who you're messin' with."
The brunette man spoke next. "This is not a joke. Guns do not make jokes."
Trent, feeling brave at the time, moved to stand next to the pierced teen and said. "You wouldn't dare shoot us; you're using the gun to scare us. If you let us go now, we'll know that you were only kidding, that this was a... an initiation to a club or something!"
The green-haired boy next to him nodded in agreement. "Yea, we'll all just go home and act like this never happened."
Gwen thought about what they were saying, and she noticed that they were giving their captures a chance to give up, to let this whole thing fall in the dust before they got to the point of no return. "Either way," she added, shrugging Cody's hands off her shoulders where they were still firmly clamped. "I don't even live in Garden Springs; I'm staying with Duncan 's family for the month while my parents are out of town."
"No! What if he really does shoot?" Cody squeaked, looking at Gwen and his brother as if nothing else mattered. "Then you'll all be dead! Did you ever think about that?!"
Claire finally spoke.
She placed a hand on her Trent's arm and said quite plainly. "Don't try and be the hero, it won't work." She then turned to Duncan and said. "Just because you're strong and brave doesn't mean he's going to get scared of you and back down. This has probably been planned for a long time and, like he said, we don't need to be alive in order for them to get the ransom from our families."
"She's right." Noah's voice declared. "You're all being idiots."
Chef grinned and all his ugly yellowed teeth shown in the light of the setting sun. "Okay, then get 'em, Bruce."
But it was at this moment that the woman in the driver's seat of the truck decided to get annoyed. "What the hell is goin' on here? What is with you mother fuckers! We've got to go before someone finds us and we get arrested." The woman had lilac shadows under her eyes and looked as if she had been pretty at one time. She was overly skinny and she had a kind of sultry saunter that suggested either on drugs, or a heavy alcohol addiction.
"Bette isn't happy! Make me mother fucking happy!" She screeched at them with a Joplin-like wail.
"I'm gettin' 'em, Bette, don't worry." The brunette man answered her, his eyes showing the slightest bit of sympathy in their inky depths. He then grabbed Gwen and Claire by their wrists and shoved them into the back of the truck with Courtney, who was petrefied with either fear, or her love of following orders.
Chef pinned Duncan's hands behind his back and walked the teen into the car, and, surprisingly, Duncan didn't object.
All it took to get Cody into the truck was a glare from Chef, and Trent was already placing his guitar in the truck when the two turned to capture him. Noah didn't put up much of a fight either.
The brunette man sat in the passenger's seat next to Bette (who most of the students took to be his wife), and Chef sat in the back with the students.
Courtney, being a C.I.T, found that it was easier to make a plan after knowing everyone's strengths and weaknesses. She planned to do this by asking everyone about themselves, and sharing a bit of information about herself also. "I think we should get to know a little about each other." She cleared her throat, straightened her shirt, and began. "My name is Courtney Evans, I'm 16 years old, and I hate piercings, like nose rings and such."
She threw a pointed look at Duncan and he figured that she wanted him to speak now. He mockingly cleared his throat just as Courtney had and straightened his shirt. He finally caught her glare and stopped his clowning around. There were chuckles from Noah, Chef, Gwen and Cody, but, seeing as Trent was too nice to laugh as jesting and Claire thought the action was childish, from no one else.
"Seriously though, I'm Duncan Webber and I'm 16. Everyone in my family except me is a cop, and that's why we live in Garden Springs. I've been to juvie twenty-one times." Chef gave a small snort that might've been a laugh while Trent and Cody looked a bit frightened. Claire looked interested and Noah was rolling his eyes. Gwen, having already known the information, looked board just as she had been since the Courtney joke had ended.
"What about you, Kirtland?"
"Which one?"
"The skinny kid."
"I'm Cody." The gap-toothed boy said with a friendly grin. He was leaning close to Gwen, and Clair thought she saw him sniff the Goth's hair once. It was no secret in the Kirtland home, or anywhere for that matter, that Cody was completely in love with Gwen. Claire was the most sympathetic of Cody's siblings, seeing as she was very fond of her little brother. Cody was hopelessly in love with Gwen, who had a huge crush on Trent, who was secretly dating Lindsay. It was all very complicated the Kirtland family's love lives. Their love-lives were so complicated, in fact, that Claire was jotting down every bit of information for a book, or possibly the script for some Soap Opera.
Cody continued the conversation by describing himself, and putting a defiant emphasis on the fact that he played the keyboard. After Cody finished, Gwen Stolarz told us about her art, and showed off her sketchbook. Trent told everyone about his band, and Claire simply stated her name. Claire was waiting for Noah to speak, waiting to hear more about the rude boy who had been so fascinated with her on the bus.
Noah himself did not speak until at least five minutes had gone by. He lazily looked over at Chef, who was asleep, and then, taking a deep breath, began his story. "My name's Noah Burton and I live with my bachelor uncle who probably won't even notice I'm missing." Claire actually flinched from the coldness in his voice when he mentioned his uncle.
Noah motioned towards Chef. "Is he asleep?"
"That or he's pretending to be." Duncan answered, crawling over to the man as he spoke. He took a marker from his pants and was just about to draw on Chef's face when Courtney grasped his hand and gave him the most scornful look anyone there had ever seen.
Noah was just about to continue when, suddenly, the truck stopped, and Bette's face appeared at the door out. "Come on, damn it! I ain't got all day." She opened the door wide and motioned for everyone to get out. Chef had been simply pretending to be asleep, and was following every one of the students, making sure that they did not try to sneak away.
They were led into a small cabin, and appeared to be near the top of a mountain. The little cabin was heated solely be a large fireplace in the front room. The brown-haired man was still in the truck. Chef left with the brown-haired man, and Bette was the only one watching the teens. She simply went into another room and returned with a bottle of beer.
"Okay, kiddos, if you don't tell my man that I got this beer here," She lifted the bottle up and listened to the sloshing before continuing. "I'll let you stay in the spare room on the bunk beds with some sleeping bags to keep you warm." Bette seemed to be calmer knowing that she had her beer.
It was Cody who spoke first. "We won't tell. But, if you don't mind my asking, why would it be bad for you to have beer?" Courtney rolled her eyes at this.
"'Cause," Bette answered, uncapping the bottle. "He thinks that it makes me crazy. That I'm a weird sort of drunk." She took a swig and swished it in her mouth like most people would mouthwash. "But I'm not. I'm a happy drunk!"
"Oh, okay. We'll just go then." She waved them away happily and slumped into the lumpy couch just in front of the fireplace, watching the flames with delight. Cody checked one door while Duncan checked another, and Trent watched for the catering truck's tell-tale neon pastry.
Cody's door revealed a bedroom that was obviously Bette and the Brown-haired man's.
Duncan's door ended up being the bunk room, and he slipped inside as soon as he deduced its significance. It was a small room with thick, padded walls and at least ten squishy sleeping bags stacked onto four bunk beds. He closed the door and leaned against it, then pulled out his phone. He scrolled through his contacts until he found the one he was looking for: Geoffrey Sullivan.
