Author's Note: Haha, ONWARD! Forty miles and counting to Jajowe...almost there, guys. I've noticed...I'm being oddly nice to my characters. Seven chapters in and there has been only one traumatic and/or injury-causing incident. And hardly any blood to be found. What has happened to me? Am I becoming less sadistic! Oh no, now I have scared myself. Bloody hell, I need to make a character BLEED! I need to cause a deep flesh wound! Preferably a stab wound! Because guns are bad. I will need to pull my arm trick again. I hardly ever injure legs, because I don't want to hinder the movement of my characters TOO much. Meh. Oh well, maybe I have taken a turn. I hope not, it will ruin my trademark characters-in-agony sequence. I need more bad things to happen.
I wondered what Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael were doing right now. Probably sending out search parties, alerting the police, et cetera. Scouring the woods. They wouldn't come looking this far, I would think. Unless they had come to the conclusion that we had gotten kidnapped, they would pretty much stick to a twenty mile or so vicinity. They'd simply think we'd all gotten lost in the woods.
Then there was the case of Mr. and Mrs. Walsh, Mikey and Brand's parents. They were more likely to have gotten the idea that their sons were on an adventure. And they would inevitably tell the other parents, and the vicinity would be widened. However, I don't think anyone would suspect that we had gotten on a livestock train, of all things.
I wondered if anyone had alerted my dad and stepmom.
Everyone would probably get grounded when we got back. For the rest of their lives. A little voice in my head was saying, 'run, run forever!' I'd always wondered what it would be like to do something like this. It reminded me of all the adventure or escape stories I'd read. Like The Count of Monte Cristo or The Transall Saga. Walkabout. They all had interesting predicaments and ways of surviving, escaping, and getting around, but none of THEM had gone on a livestock train. This was a unique way of traveling.
But we weren't just traveling to travel, or survive. We were after something! We were going to find Daniel Bradford in all his corpse glory! I hoped. Part of me still hoped, though, that we wouldn't. I hoped we'd find his tomb, and some precious artifacts and perhaps even oil, but not the corpse. I didn't want to see it.
"Hey guys?" I called. "Did you see any corpses on your last adventure, besides the one of One-Eyed Willy?"
"Of course, they were everywhere!" Mouth said menacingly. "Staring at you with their empty sockets, reaching for you with their bony hands, rotten flesh dripping off of their–"
"Stop it, Mouth," said Mikey. "Yes, there were...too many. Chester Copperpot, then numerous men on the pirate ship."
"Oh, I hope we don't see any on this adventure," Data said, shuddering. "Data is SICK of coming face to face with dead people!"
"Don't forget the one I was stuck in the freezer with!" Chunk piped up.
Mouth laughed. "Yeah, we accidentally closed Chunk in the freezer with a stiff."
"He's the one who went in," said Andy. "He opened it."
"They had ice cream," Chunk said defensively.
We all laughed at that.
"Why do you ask?" questioned Brand.
"Eh, nothing, just...don't want to see one."
"Oooh, Loony, afraid of dead people!" Mouth tormented. He stuck out his arms and rolled his eyes back up in his head, walking towards me, moaning.
"Oh yeah?" I asked. "Get a load of THIS!" And I used my fingers to arch my eyebrows and hide my irises so you could see the whites and blood vessels in my eyes.
Mouth leapt backwards. "Ok, you beat me."
Twenty minutes of scattered chatter went by, and everyone, including me, was beginning to get restless. I fidgeted and squirmed on my hay bale, eager to get out of the musty train car. I was surprised I hadn't had to go to the bathroom, and I was glad. I did not want to use the cow's car. Besides, every time I read an adventure story, I always wondered what the people used for toilet paper. But I wasn't really in the mood to think about that right now. I was in the mood to get out of the train.
We'd been lucky, though. It was very convenient for us that the train happened to be leaving on the very day that we found the map. In fact, if I wasn't aware that it has no significance to our story, I would say it was TOO convenient. But that's what went through my head.
God, I was so bored. I was in the mood where you had nothing to do, but you really didn't want to do anything, you just simply did not have the energy. I suppose that I could have struck up a conversation with someone in the train car, or ask someone to relive their last adventure for me in more detail, but I just...didn't. I decided to go to sleep, because there was nothing better to do. I noticed I'd been sleeping a lot lately. Probably because there really wasn't much to do in a boxcar full of hay. You couldn't run around and play hide-and-seek, there wasn't any electricity, nothing to play or fiddle with except for hay.
Now I fall asleep pretty quickly, especially since everyone was being fairly quiet and absorbed in their own thoughts and anticipation. So naturally, I had drifted off in no more than three minutes. I don't know how long I was asleep though, not very long, fifteen minutes at the most. I assumed we had pulled into the station and that was what had woken me up. But as I lifted my head, I heard Chunk say, "Oh, no!"
"What is it?" I asked. "What's wrong?" Was the station closed? Was something holding us up? It didn't seem to, because we were still moving.
Andy put her finger to her lips. "Listen."
I strained my ears. At first I didn't hear anything, but as I listened longer, I could pick out something hitting the roof of the boxcar. It got louder and louder, and I recognized it as rain. A clap of thunder sounded, and I felt the vibrations underneath my feet. "Oh, you're kidding me," I moaned. "What time is it?"
"I dunno," said Brand. "Data, what time is it?"
Data smiled widely and opened a compartment on his belt, which held a small screen that displayed a series of numbers. He pressed a button on something extending from his sleeve, and the numbers flashed and settled on 12:34. "Does that answer your question, Luna?"
I nodded. "Thanks." My face was turning pink from trying not to laugh.
Data noticed, and smiled in confusion. "What? Why are you laughing at Data? Did I do something funny?"
"Your face," said Chunk.
"Chunk..." Andy reprimanded.
"No, you didn't do anything funny, Data," I told him. "I'm just...amused, that's all. Partly because you have all these gadgets on you. It's really cool."
"Wow, you're one of the first people who's ever said anything like that," said Data, smiling wider, the confused look gone. "Finally, someone who appreciates all the time I spend on my inventions. I'm so tired of people telling me they're stupid!" He punched a hay bale on the word 'stupid.'
"Who said they were stupid?" I asked. "I love your inventions, Data. I'd love to see them..."
Data looked proudly around at the rest of the guys and Andy.
"Yeah, Double-O-Negative, show us your inventions," Mouth broke in.
"How many times do I have to tell you, I'm James Bond!" Data yelled at him. "James Bond, 007!" He pressed a button on his belt, and two incredibly bright lights came on and shined in Mouth's face.
"Auugh!" Mouth screamed, covering his face with his hands and collapsing to the floor.
"These are my Bully Blinders, Luna!" Data said happily, turning around. My eyes watered with pain, and I shielded my face from the harsh lights.
"Don't worry, Luna," said Brand, next to me. "The batteries give out quickly."
"I have a story to tell you all," said Data. "I didn't get to tell you last time because you were too busy yelling at me...oh, there they go," he complained, and the light ceased and went out. "Anyway, there was these two big guys who stopped me on the street, and asked for my lunch money. I shone these in their face and they both fell over!" He wore a triumphant look on his face.
"I don't blame them," I said, laughing. "That thing really hurts!"
"Tell me about it," said Mouth, sitting up and holding his head in his hands, still partly covering his face.
"That'll teach you to call Data Double-O-Negative," Data spat.
The train slowed to a stop. Everyone raced to the windows, and we had halted in front of a small station in the country with a special dirt path that I suspected was for the sole purpose of leading livestock. It was separated from the somewhat sparse forest by a rickety fence, upon which hung cow yokes. On the other side of the boxcar was a large grassy meadow dotted with picturesque oak trees, and a barnhouse complete with a silo. Wildflowers had sprouted up here and there, and it was absolutely beautiful. It made me wish I had brought my camera...wait, Data probably had one. I was about to ask when Brand said, "Now, I'm in charge, and I say that we get out now before Grover comes looking for us. I want to be gone as fast as possible, but I also want to circle back around to make sure the train leaves, actually leaves, instead of pulling onto the turntable." He pointed to a turntable and a housing station a little ways up the tracks. "Andy and I will do that. You all, find somewhere to stay." He pulled a wad of money out of his pocket and handed it to me. "Then meet me back here. You can lead us back." He slung his backpack over one shoulder, reminding the rest of us of our packs. We all put them on.
"I know of a place," said Chunk. "It's where my dad stays when we visit my grandparents, because they don't have any room in their house. It's an old fashioned tavern, really good food. They have battered shrimp and butter biscuits and..."
"Chunk!" Brand burst out.
"Fine," Chunk muttered. "I'm just saying, it has really good food. But anyway, they have a few rooms. No house-cleaning, though, so it's real cheap. We can stay there. In fact, it's not too far from the train station."
"What's it called?" Brand asked.
Chunk screwed up his face, trying to remember. "Um...something country-ish...It's like, Ye Olde Lighthouse Tavern or something."
"Ok, fine, meet you there," said Brand. "Now let's go! Run! If Mikey gets an asthma attack out here I won't know what the hell to do." He flung open the door of the boxcar and we all rushed outside into the rain.