Chapter One
Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang-BOOM!
A tan, mud-caked jeep hastily wound its way down a filthy, dirt road in the middle of a dense expanse of rainforest. Muddy water and debris flew up behind its tires as its driver rounded a tight corner with precision.
"Work, you stupid radio!" Nick Stokes pounded his heavy fist upon the jeep's dashboard. Dots of mud flecked his short, brown hair, and bits of leaves and twigs stuck to his muscular arms as he drove along the pathway. The topless jeep allowed the remnants of his driving to fly into the vehicle.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid!" he cried, smacking the dash with each syllable. All that was heard from its speakers were the faint echoes of what could be static.
Nick halted his frustrated actions and stared partially at the faulty radio and partially at the crude road ahead. Why? Why must the radio refuse to work on long car trips like this? He had spent the last half-hour driving through the rugged terrain of the Nevadan rainforest, searching for the corpse of a dead elderly woman Brass had phoned in about. Why there was a rainforest in the middle of arid Nevada was another question Nick wanted answered. However, what was much more important at present was the fact that he had no musical entertainment to satisfy his boredom.
"WORK!" he shouted in a final, futile attempt. Nothing but an increase in the volume of static reached his ears. Nick breathed heatedly through his nose as the jeep rounded another sharp turn.
"You know what?" he muttered aloud to himself. "I'm just going to make my own music! So there you stupid radio!"
The machinery didn't respond.
"Ooohhh…" Nick began, undulating the note as the car dipped into a pothole. He searched his mind for a song beginning with the note he had uttered and began singing the first one that came to mind. "Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang, Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang we love you, Hey, ho! Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang…something, something, something! We love you!"
He continued as further palm fronds scratched his face, wetting it with tiny fragments of green. "Hey, ho Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang!" he shouted stridently, as if in spite of the failing speaker-system. Nick closed his eyes in a slight passion for the song, or perhaps for finally foiling the radio's diabolical plan.
"Chitty—"
CRASH!
Quite unexpectedly, Nick's jeep rammed forcefully into the felled trunk of a tree, tumbling sideways down a slippery, foliage covered slope. It rolled slowly to a stop at the foot of the hill, and Nick's seat ejected him powerfully, sending his unhurt body through the wall of dense forest.
Why is there a dead woman in Nevada? Why did Nick sing Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang? And most importantly, why is there a rainforest in Nevada! Stay tuned and find out!