Chapter Six

"I don't believe a word of it," Mya announced as soon as I was done explaining. I shrugged.

"Believe it or not, that's what happened," I said.

"It's insane," Nick said, shaking his head. "We can't be from a book! We're here now, and alive!"

"I don't know how this works, okay! All I know is that it did! Your probably just a parallel universe or something. There's supposed to be one for every different possibility, right?!" My anger was going through the roof at this point.

"You think I want to believe it? Because if you do, then you're the insane one! All I want to do is go home! Might I remind you, World War III is about to start and all of my family and friends are going to be caught in the middle of it. And with all of the nuclear missiles, it makes it really deadly for us! I need to get back to my sector of the army to get prepared!"

"What are nuclear missiles?" Hilltop asked. I groped around in my head for a suitable answer for the deadly bombs.

"A nuclear missile or bomb is an explosive device that gets its destructive force from nuclear reactions. Once it is set of, chemical reactions release huge amounts of energy from only a small amount of matter. A nuclear bomb weighing around a thousand kilograms can cause an explosion of about the same force as more than a billion kilograms of normal high explosives. Basically, they can completely destroy an entire city by blast, fire and radiation and kill hundreds of thousands of people in seconds." I cringed as I explained. It made the people of the future seem even more deadly and brutal.

"Who in their right minds would make that?" Mya demanded.

"You'll see at the end of this war," I said wearily. "America is going to drop two on Japan to end World War II. Over half a million people will die."

"I don't want to believe it, and I won't," Nick said stubbornly. I raised my eyebrow. I was too tired to do much more arguing.

"Believe it or not. I'll go home eventually and take the craziness with me.... as soon as someone figures out how to get me back." No one spoke. I nodded my head slowly. It was nothing more than I expected, but it was still crushing. I really wanted to go back to the time that made sense!

"While we're figuring things out, you should travel with us," Hilltop said. "You can hide with the elephants while we go down to the villages to get food."

"Or, we can alternate," I said. "I go down, get some food -"

"No," Mya said. She didn't sound angry anymore, but neither did she sound friendly. "Everyone will look at you because of your clothes and burned hair. Just stay with the elephants."

I felt like I was being brushed off as unimportant. I wanted to argue, but if I got on these people's bad side I wouldn't have any help in this strange time.

"Fine, where are the elephants anyways?" I was truly curious. Not even that raging bull was enough to scare me of my favorite animal.

"Just a few hundred yard this way." Nick said with a smile. He seemed much friendlier than Mya, but it was very hesitant. I guess I would have to earn their trust. After fighting our way through the dense underbrush we came to an area that had been trampled down. I saw a smaller but undeniably beautiful elephant hobbled to the left.

"That must be Miss. Pretty. She certainly lives up to her name!" I laughed excitedly.

"That she does." Mya said while staring happily at her elephant.

"That's right, isn't she practically your elephant?" I asked with curiosity. Her smile immediately disappeared.

"Girls are not allowed to be Mahouts." She said with a weary tone, like it had been pounded into her.

"I think you should be able to. You are much better than most of the men." I said with conviction.

"What would you know?! Oh wait, you're from the future and you've read our book. You must know everything!" She turned away from me angrily. Before the argument could get any more heated, Nick tapped my shoulder and pointed me in the direction of the other elephant.

"That's Hannibal. He's my father's elephant. Isn't he huge?" I wanted to answer, but I was frozen. The elephant, Hannibal, looked exactly like the elephant that had caused all this trouble. The elephant that had tried to kill me.

"Okay, really bad sense of déjà vu!" I squeaked, taking a step back. I still loved elephants, but I was terrified of this one! I mean, for crying out loud, he nearly killed me!

"Sarae? What's wrong?" he asked. I took a deep breath.

"That's the elephant that knocked the tree over and set off the mine!"

Nick nodded slowly, gazing at Hannibal curiously. There was no fear at all in his eyes. "I actually believe that," he said. "Hannibal is a really dangerous elephant. You can't go too fast with him or jump in surprise or anything. He'll attack you instantly. And," Nick added, "He hates anything that looks like a tiger. Pelt, something with stripes. You name it and it looks close enough, he'll hate it."

"Because of the one who got him," I said before he could explain why. Nick nodded.

"Yeah. Don't feel too bad, he scared me to, when he knocked -"

"Knocked his tusks into your ribs and sent you flying in the village. I know." As soon as the words left my mouth, I realized how that must have sounded to someone who didn't believe me. But Nick just gave me a wry smile.

"Right. You would know." He didn't imply because of the book like Mya did. He seemed like a generally great guy.

"Hope Mya can become a mahout soon," I murmured. Nick nodded, and then stopped.

"Wait, don't you already know if she did?" he asked. I grimaced sheepishly at him.

"Um, about that? I never finished the book," I said, raising a hand to the back of my head awkwardly. Nick glanced at me.

"So you don't know if one of us will die?" he asked skeptically. I shook my head.

"I've got no idea," I said grimly. Nick shook his head too.

"Now do you see why it's hard to believe you?" he said. I nodded, thinking. There had to be something to prove that I was right! There had to be something....

"What's tomorrow's date?" I asked, not sure if it was the same date just a different year from my time. Nick gave me an odd look.

"Tomorrow will be August first, 1943. Why?" he asked. I gave him a not very happy or nice smile.

"Because tomorrow, the Japanese will say something to the public. Tomorrow, go down with Hilltop and Mya to a village to get more supplies, and you'll hear what's going on. Be careful though," I said a little worriedly. "The Japanese soldiers will be there to make sure the crowd doesn't go out of control when they hear about how Burma is now the State of Burma."