Shady Baby

Shady Baby

Chapter 2

Watch the Hole in the Ground

Summary: Lucks tries to stop thieves from robbing a caravan and they have a little accident with the ground below them, although she knows not why.

Author's Note: Still doing ok. Thanks everyone for your reviews, its great encouragement. Oh, yeah, I don't care what the computer says…this is Chapter 2. Okies?

Disclaimer: We at Nightingale Productions would like to say: HELP! THEY'VE TAKEN ME PRISONER AND ARE MAKING ME THINK CREATIVELY! HELLLLP! Thank you and enjoy the show.

It was later in the day. Lucks' father had sent her into "town," if it may have been called such a thing as a town, to pick up a few things. She took Killer with her, just for company and protection against bandits.

She walked up to a tiny caravan holding iron skillets and kitchen sorts, all rather used and battered. You can't get many new articles of kitchenware in the Shades.

Looking around, she found the kind of skillet her mother wanted and took it down. The clerk was asleep behind a pile of spatulas.

"Hey" Lucks said. The figure didn't move.

"I want to buy this…I assume you're in charge," she said warily.

He didn't move. She was beginning to wonder if he was dead.

Lucks stepped behind the caravan and looked at the boy. He wasn't all that bad looking, considering he didn't even have the God-like facial features. His mouth was open and he was snoring loudly, but to Lucks he still looked all right.

She poked him on the arm. He moved a little. "Ok, so you're not dead, then" she said. "But you're not going to wake up."

Since it was painfully obvious he was enjoying his slumber, she leaned down and said in his ear, "Ok, I'm going to buy this skillet and leave the money in your pocket, just so you know…yeah, I'm going now."

The caravan clerk stirred happily in his sleep and snored louder. Lucks shook her head and walked away.

She picked up everything else her mother had asked her to pick up and headed back towards home. On her way, she passed the caravan with the sleeping clerk, which was now being robbed. Three oversized men were cramming kitchen implements into their pockets and laughing to themselves at their cleverness, getting the clerk while he was asleep…what a classic ploy.

Lucks sighed and headed back over to the caravan, Killer in tow. She cleared her throat, and the three bandits turned around. Killer growled.

"What, then?" one bandit asked.

"I'd just like to know what in the Disc do you think you're doing?" Lucks asked, placing a hand on her hip.

"We're robbing the bloody narcolepsy patient, if it's all right with you, little miss" a thief said, stuffing an eggbeater into his oversized pocket.

"Actually, I'd really like it if you left him alone" Lucks said. "I don't care if this is the Shades, you don't need to rob the poor blighter." Killer growled again, more menacingly this time.

The thieves laughed at her, and she began to get angry. No one laughed at Luoxanna Harbinger; it was against the lore. At least she thought so.

"Piss of then, girlie, we've got work to do," said a thief who hadn't spoken up yet.

"No," Lucks said, "I don't think you do."

Killer lunged at the thieves and began to bark loudly, enough to wake the clerk up. "Hey, what in blazes do you think you're doing?" he cried. He was young, Lucks decided, about her age.

"We're robbing your little cloth top shithole here…just stay still," said a thief, trying to kick Killer out of the way. The clerk shrunk back with wide eyes. He looked at Lucks, kind of in shock.

Lucks was now starting to get angrier. The switch in her brain that flipped her from crazy to deranged psycho killer clicked over, and she said, "Why don't you piss off?"

Just as the thieves turned to her to laugh, the ground opened up underneath them and they disappeared, their shouts still echoing after the last hand disappeared in the ground.

Lucks stared in shock. Her anger died down, and she stood fixed to the spot, wondering what had just happened.

"D…did you dddo that?" the clerk stammered.

"I…I don't know what happened" Lucks said. She looked up at him. Nerves started to get to her as she realized how cute he actually was. He was looking at her quizzically, smiling a little also.

"You shouldn't go to sleep at your post, genius, it's a good way to get robbed" Lucks said. "See you around."

She turned and started to walk away.

"Hey, wait a second."

She turned back around and faced the boy, who was now peering out from behind his caravan and smiling a little crookedly. "What's your name?" he asked.

Lucks smiled at him. "Mud," she said, "I was supposed to be home ten minutes ago."