Chapter 24
~930 words
Jay peered behind him, after getting over the shock of being
on Earth again. There was no purple portal on the sidewalk. “How are we going
to get home?” Jay asked. But Cabot was too busy craning his neck, trying to see
the tops of the buildings. So was Fleta.
“I didn’t end up in a place like this before…” he murmured, awestruck.
Jay could see he would get nothing of use out of Cabot. He
noticed the train station down the block a ways. Jay had been to Chicago once
before. His mother had wanted to see the sights and to visit relatives. They
had taken a plane out to O’hare airport, driven to the suburbs to visit
cousins, and then taken a train to see the city. The train station was
immediately recognizable, with its glass front spewing surges of people. “Come
on,” Jay said pulling on Cabot and Fleta. They stepped forward, as if
hypnotized.
When Jay had visited the city before, he had developed a
kind of uneasiness about the place. There was a kind of sadness and desperation
that clung to the buildings and hung in the air. Perhaps it was the lack of
trees, or the fact that no one looked at you except the homeless people who
begged for coins. Smoke scented the wind, and while the sidewalks were generally
clean, dirt had worked its way into every crack and every corner.
Jay led Cabot and Fleta through the revolving doors of the
train station. He located an empty bench and sat them down. Fleta looked like
she had seen a ghost playing a flying piano next to a chimpanzee doing calculus
with his eyes shut.
Cabot, at least, was finding strength to speak. “It’s not
possible,” he moaned. “I came here before and all there was were cornfields.
And the second time I came it was snowy. And the third time I was in a forest.
Those buildings… they’re monstrous! Obscene! Impossible!”
Jay put a hand on each of their shoulders and waited until
they met his eye. “We have to be calm about this,” he said. “There are things
in this world that you can’t imagine. It’s a shame we had to land right in the
middle of them before I could give you warning, but here we are. It exists,
it’s existed for hundreds of years. We just have more technology and more
knowledge of science. Pull yourselves together.”
Cabot immediately sat straighter, but a haunted look
remained in his eyes. Fleta just set her gaze at the floor and refused to make
a noise.
“Now, how do we get home?” Jay demanded.
“Oh, there’s a way, but I will not tell it to you until we
get that dagger,” Cabot said.
“That’s another problem. The dagger, if it exists, would probably be found in California—where the movie
it was in was filmed. We’re in Chicago, which is halfway across the country.”
“I never said this would be a short trip. I hope you’re
wearing shoes suited for much walking?” Cabot glanced down as if he was
checking Jay’s shoes.
Jay laughed. “There is no way we’re walking to California. It’s
not going to be possible.”
Cabot looked troubled. “Then how will we get there? There
isn’t a river that brings us all the way there, is there? And horses… well,
they’re a lot more trouble than they’re worth. I can’t abide horses.”
Jay laughed again. “Good luck even finding a horse in
Chicago. And no, there’s no river. We’re going to have to fly.”
“Don’t jest with me.” His eyes took on a fiery anger. He
yanked Fleta by her hair—at which she yelped—and snarled, “Do not forget that I
have the bargaining token: your friend’s life.”
“I’m being serious. We have invented great machines that can
travel across countries in just a few hours, flying through the air.”
“Impossible,” Cabot said, but dropped Fleta’s hair. She shot
him a nasty look and rubbed her head.
“It’s very possible.”
“Then let’s fly. Let’s go!”
“There’s a problem,” said Jay. “We don’t have any money.
From Earth. And everything here is based on it. We can’t fly if we don’t have
lots and lots of money.”
“We’ll just sneak into this great flying contraption!”
proclaimed Cabot, pounding his chest.
Jay nervously looked around, hoping desperately that they
weren’t being noticed. They weren’t. “That won’t work,” he said. “They have
intense security procedures on airlines. They won’t let us on unless we pay for
it.”
Cabot’s eyebrows knitted together in frustration. He ripped
a large pouch from his belt and threw it on the ground with a heavy thud. “Fat
lot of good all that will do now.”
Jay picked up the bag, looking into it. Gold and silver orbs
winked back at him. If only we could use
this money, he thought. Then an idea hit him. “Cabot, are gold orbs really
made of gold?”
“Yes,” answered Cabot tersely.
“Well gold is valuable here too. We could probably sell
these to a gold-buyer. There seems to be tons of those around recently.”
“What are you waiting for, then? Let’s get some of your
earth money!” Cabot roared.
This time when Jay turned around, people were staring. Quite a few of them. He
gave a weak smile and a little wave to them. They turned back to whatever they
were doing, but Jay could see they were slipping peeks back over their
shoulders.
“We’re going to have to be a lot more careful in the
future,” said Jay.
Points: 3733
Reviews: 1417
Donate