(A/N) one review for 1, then two for chap. 2. Think we can make at least 3 this time? Special thanks to THEHUNTRESS06 for reviewing BOTH chapters! Keep 'em coming. I do feel real stupid though since one of my reviews said ppms and I have no idea what that means. Oh well.
Still getting out of town so still no path choosing until probably the next one. The big things to chose for are going to be hills, rivers, and illnesses. Have fun anyway.
Chapter 3
"How the hell did we end up in the 19th century?" Helena demanded.
"It doesn't matter how we got here," Barbara pointed out as Wade lowered her to the ground to let her lean against the wall of the Independence Messenger, "The question is what do we do now?"
For a little while all was silent. No one could even think of an answer. Dinah continued to look back to the snow covered road where the people carried on with their lives, some returning her confused gaze. Every now and then it would flick to a boy who was leaning against the same building as them with his black hat over his eyes.
"If we don't know how we got here then how can we figure that out?" Reece asked.
"What about the snake?" It was Wade who brought it up, "You said you all had a dream about it and so did we. If that's the case it must have something to do with why we're here."
"That's what I said, but somebody didn't want to listen to me." The younger heroine nudged her.
"Sorry for trying to make sense for once."
"We're heroes," the paraplegic had to remind them, like she always did, "nothing ever makes sense. So what did the snake tell you all?"
"What, it didn't say anything to you?" The good detective asked and squatted beside her.
"If it did I don't remember a word." She replied regretfully shaking her head, "Wade was the one to first tell me about it after he found me. At first I thought it was stupid but now, I'm not sure. So what did it say?"
"Everyone heard something different." The Huntress told her, "Dinah says he said something about a game and mine about a sun-drowned place."
"The dream I had said we had nine months of peace to give way to nine months of pain." Jessie added.
"So this talking snake is giving us nine months to reach the sun-drowned place and he's watching us because he thinks its fun." Barbara sighed. "So how do we know where the sun drowns?"
At the sound of the question the boy who was apparently sleeping against the wall sat up, pushing up the rim his hat up with his thumb. With the wide rim of his hat out of the way his face revealed his relatively young age. The long black pants, plaid red and black shirt that buttoned from his waist to his collar, and the animal skinned vest had thrown them off before. But now they saw just how soft his face was and the way his green eyes glittered with childish delight. They flicked to Dinah's bare legs for only a moment as a smile crossed him.
"If it's a drownin' sun you want," he said with a voice heavy with his Irish accent. "Then it's the Willamette Valley you're lookin' for. It's not right on the waters, but it's close enough. Oregon City's right around there, pretty little city. It's the closest you'll get to seein' a drownin' sun."
Helena's senses sharpened. She didn't know this guy, yet he jumped right into their conversation like he was their best friend. Not to mention the way he looked at Dinah made her less than uncomfortable.
"Oregon City's got to be real far from here." Barbara told him, "That can't be where we need to be."
"I'm just sayin' it's a good place to start looking."
"I really don't think we're in any position to argue," Reece pointed out as he stood and went to stand beside the boy. "You know anything about getting there?"
"Yeah. It's plenty far, few thousand miles. I went the trail twice. Went with a few friends and came back to bring back my family. I still have the scars to prove it too."
"You think we can make it in nine months?"
"Puttin' a time on the trail?" He thought for a moment, "Can't say you'd want to do that. The Oregon Trail's dangerous enough with snakes and storms. Why would you want to do that?"
Reece opened his mouth to answer, but Helena spoke first. Lying was never something he was all that good at and they couldn't take chances. "Friend of ours made a bet," She lied easily, "There's a few hundred dollars on the line saying we can't make it."
"Nice money." He nodded. "Well, if you are thinking about going there's no way you can do it alone. No one travels the trail alone. At least you're in luck, there's plenty of wagon trains all ready to head out. You can always hook up with one of them if you have the supplies."
"We really don't have anything right now." Barbara admitted, "but we'll take care of that before long. You've been a great help, um . . . " She trailed off and he finished.
"Connal Burke," he answered with a nod and a pleasant little smile. "My family's off somewhere getting our wagon train ready."
"Then I'm sure they'll be needing you." Barbara told him. With another nod and smile, this one aimed for Dinah, he left. The blond watched him a little ways longer before he turned a corner and disappeared, just long enough for Helena to notice.
"So then we know where we're going. When do we leave?"
"We can't go there." Wade was the one who answered, "We'd never be able to make it. Like he said. It's thousands of miles and we have only nine months and we're not entirely sure that's where we need to go. What some random kid shows up and tells us one little thing and we automatically believe him."
"I think we should at least give him a chance." Dinah told him as she wrapped her arms around herself.
"Of course you would say that," Helena teased.
"But it is our only option right now." Reece told him. "It's not like we have any other leads. Besides, what he says makes since in a way. The sun does drown in the Pacific ocean every night."
"But that could mean anywhere on the west coast."
"Then if we have time we'll do some walking after we get there, but first we need to get there. Now, what do we need to do."
Almost out of instinct every one of them looked to Barbara. Surly the great, all-seeing Oracle knew what to do. This time she only shook her head as if defeated. "I don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know? You always know."
"Well this time I don't." There wasn't anger in her voice. It was more of some kind of regret. "I don't know this place Helena. I don't know anything."
"Yes you do, you're an English lit. teacher."
"That doesn't make me know the place."
"Wait," This time it was Dinah who cut in, "You told me that English and history walked side by side. That the books of the time period reflect the age they were written in."
"Well yeah, but-"
"So you're saying you've never read a book on the Oregon trail?"
"Not one that wasn't sugar coated."
"Sugar coated's good enough. What do we do?"
She sighed knowing she had been beaten by the girls she trained. "We'll need to gather up as much supplies as we can, get a wagon and a team of oxen and start out as fast as possible. Also, it'd probably be best for us to hook up with another wagon train already headed that direction. No one who's anyone travels the trail alone unless their runaways or crooks."
"So how do we know what to buy?"
"The usual. Food, clothes, spare parts for the wagon, animals, medicine, some tools, and anything else we might need. It'd probably be best for us to see if they can offer a basic supply package for us to get us a head start. But we should start with a wagon and animals first. Any cash we have needs to be used. Thanks to inflation over the years we should have plenty."
They all dug through their wallets and pockets to get to all the money they had. The unusually long night's sweep that Helena and Dinah made to let the others get the tower ready for the celebration had proved to be extremely helpful. Both the girls decided they had gotten the money from crooks who would be using it for their own sick gain anyway. At least they were putting it to good use. Barbara had nothing but a small gift she was going to make to Dinah, nothing more than twenty dollars. Wade practically had his pockets lined with dollar bills he claimed was cab faire. Reece had a bunch he used to buy ammunition since the NGPD didn't do it for him and he didn't want someone following his credit cards saying he bought too much firepower. At least this way his name was never traced. It was only after everyone put it all together that Wade finally gave them a massive chunk of money he had been saving for a while. None of them needed to ask who it was for. All together it had given them $1,900. Barbara quickly put it to use sending Reece to find a wagon merchant and buy the biggest one they had.
"Now we work with what we know since obviously being able to run the Delphi system doesn't get us anywhere here."
"I got pretty good at tracking over the years. Maybe that'll help us find food if we need to hunt or something."
"I knew there was a reason you called yourself Huntress." Reece said coming back with the wagon. "They did have one of those basic packages things. Went ahead and bought it. Everything's inside it right now. What are we doing now?"
"Conestoga," Barbara identified it immediately, "Good choice. But we might need another later. We need to know things we're good at that can help us while we're out there."
"We'll I'm useless. Spent too much time in the twenty-first century. I did live on the water for a while as a kid since my mom left the city so I know my way around a river. Think we'll be crossing any?"
"Definitely. What else?"
"What about all that tinkering you do with your toys?"
"Well yeah, but that's all tech stuff."
"But you'll be better at fixing a broken wheel than the rest of us."
"I suppose so." She sighed "What about you Wade?"
"I have a decent amount of medical knowledge since I went to college majoring in medicine a few years."
"And you didn't think to tell us this why?"
He only shrugged.
"Great, now all we need to do is decide what supplies to get. We'll separate and buy all that we need, then meet back here. That ok."
"Sounds like a plan."
Continue to the next chapter
(A/N) I kinda forgot that continue thing last chapter, but don't think it's gone. On the next one there should be some trail choosing so there might be some trickiness on my part and some waiting on yours. so there's the third part. The next is up to you with your little reviews. Not sure where I'm going with Connal. That's kinda for you do decide isn't it? Sort of anyway.
