Evalene unbuckled at the same time as Olive, landing awkwardly on her shoulder and struggling to get upright. Everything hurt. A bright spot of red caught her eye and she startled when she looked at Sol, where he still hung upside down in the driver’s seat.
His forehead bled heavily and a matching red mark on the steering wheel showed where the injury came from. He was sluggish as he tried to reach his own seatbelt and unbuckle. Usually his movements were graceful, but once the seatbelt clicked free, Evalene watched Sol fall hard and crumple on the floor in a heap.
Through the broken windows, the whooping yells of the Riders floated down to them, making Evalene’s heart pound. Everyone scrambled to get out of the car through their windows.
But the moment Evalene stood up straight, a rope flew out in front of her eyes like a whip, circling her chest in a split second and lassoing her arms to her sides. It glowed and buzzed against her skin like electricity. The Rider holding the other end gave it a flick of the wrist, wrapping her tighter in the thick white rope, encircling her three more times from shoulder to feet. With a yank, it tightened around her like a boa constrictor, squeezing the air out of her lungs in an instant and throwing her off balance. Unable to take another step, she fell forward with her momentum and couldn’t catch herself before she hit the sand, hard.
She lay there gasping, face down, breathing in bits of sand, the air knocked out of her once more. Though she thrashed and fought against the strange rope, it didn’t give in the slightest. If anything, the electric hum grew louder and the rope more snug.
She rolled to her side so she could breathe without sucking in sand, and discovered Jeremiah running back for her. Before she could yell to run, another rope swung out and he fell, roped liked cattle, in front of her. They hog-tied him just like her, right where he landed.
Wriggling her arms within the ropes, Evalene ignored the way her body ached all over and struggled to get a hand free. Jeremiah met her eyes. She could tell he was doing the same, but he was barely moving. It was a waste of effort. The rope reacted to their squirming as if it was an actual snake, tightening it’s grip even further until she was completely immobile. Her lungs felt constricted.
Taking shallow breathes, Evalene tore her eyes away from Jeremiah to look for Sol and Olive. Had they escaped? She couldn’t see past the wreckage of their rental to find out.
Sweating heavily in the desert heat, Evalene refused to give up, but the moisture didn’t help her efforts to get free in the slightest.
“We got a good one!” A Rider crowed. He spoke Common as if he had food in his mouth, chewing on every syllable, drawing out each word. He was heavily muscled and wore the black leather clothes and mask like all the others, that showed only their eyes as they all leapt down from their bikes, leaving their vehicles standing on their own with those massive, thick tires. At least a dozen of them surrounded the upside-down rental car and passengers. They ignored Evalene and Jeremiah entirely, peering into the broken window of the backseat where their packs and supplies were stored. “Oh yeah!” One Rider whistled, turning to the others. “They were going far!”
“Omega, Theta, take care of the prisoners,” a large man hollered at them in the same accent as he climbed down from his enormous bike. He pulled the black mask off his face revealing long, white hair and a handlebar mustache.
“Yes, Boss,” the two Riders he’d named said, turning away from the crashed car.
Cheers sounded from the other side of the vehicle as another Rider found their money bag. Evalene struggled to make out what they were saying. Some of the words were in a language she didn’t recognize. But after another whoop, she heard one of them yell clearly, “Boss, we’re rich!” He hollered for the others to come look.
“Nice going, Delta,” they yelled, clapping him on the back. Then one of them punched him in the gut. As Delta doubled over, the one who’d punched him snatched the bag out of his hands. The open bag spilled half the money out onto the ground in the process, causing the others to swarm around them picking it up. “Mine!” They hollered. “Get back!” The shouts turned to shoves and then punches, two of them even fell over wrestling on top of the spilled money, causing others to shove them away.
“Beta, Iota, Epsilon,” the one they called ‘boss’ hollered, “Fall in line! Gamma, Delta, one week garbage duty.” They groaned as the fight broke up. The one who looked up when he’d called Delta dropped the woman he’d been about to punch in the face. Her mask had come off in the tussle. Three others had lost their masks as well, two more men and a woman. One of the men swiped his mask off the ground, sneakily adding a few coins while he was bent over, causing the woman standing next to him to give him a swift kick in the gut. The one sneaking money groaned and dropped the coins.
Evalene’s gaze flew from the wild group to the two women approaching her and Jeremiah. Both women were heavily muscled, tan, and frowning. “Omega take the girl,” said the blonde woman to the brunette. As her captor drew closer, Evalene saw her dirty hair was a mix of braids and almost intentional-looking knots. The red sand lightly dusted her hair, leather clothes and skin. Streaks of sweat where she’d wiped her face created a design almost like war paint.
Jeremiah tried to reason with them, “Let us—” The woman’s fist connected with his jaw, cutting him off. Jeremiah grunted in pain.
“Prisoners don’t speak,” she growled at him, and proceeded to pick him up by the ropes. She hoisted him up and over her shoulders, muscles rippling, laying him across her back on his side.
Feet blocked Evalene’s view as the woman called Omega stopped in front of her and picked her up the same way. Wrapped up and carried like an animal, Evalene kept her mouth shut. She had enough experience with bullies to recognize them immediately. There would be no reasoning with these ‘Riders.’
As she was raised above the woman’s head and placed on her back, the height allowed her to finally see the other side of the car. She had only a split second before the woman turned to walk, but it was enough to confirm that Olive and Sol were captured as well, lying on their sides in similar ropes. Olive squirming without success, and Sol lying in a small pool of blood, unmoving. None of the other Riders had given these two a second glance; it was as if their little group’s presence was a nuisance, and the real trophy was the possessions they’d brought with them in the rental.
Carried on her side, Evalene couldn’t quite twist her body enough to see where the woman was taking her, but she had a unique vantage point of the back of their broken vehicle as the Riders set into looting the rest of it.
One of the women held a regular rope, but when she pressed a button at the stem, the whole length of the cord lit up white just like the ropes holding Evalene and the others, with the same electric current. Evalene watched, fascinated, as she lassoed the supplies in the middle of the car. A backpack, wedged between two seats, broke free and flew out of the car when she gave the rope a tug.
Once retrieved, she pushed the same button and the white glow stopped, returning the rope to its regular form, a plain coil that she wrapped lovingly around her arm.
Without warning, Omega flung Evalene over one of the enormous bikes. Nearly six feet off the ground, she lay facedown, staring at the red sand underneath. Jeremiah was tossed onto the bike next to hers, facing away from her. Despite the shifting sand, the bikes stood on their own without a kickstand, sturdy and solid with those thick tires.
Mind racing, Evalene studied Jeremiah’s ropes where they ended around his feet, searching for the button she’d seen the Rider press. It wasn’t until Sol and Olive were each deposited on a bike nearby that Evalene finally spotted it. There, around his left ankle.
Behind her, the roar of the looters continued, growing louder as the two women rejoined them. One single Rider stood guard, frowning, barely sparing a glance for the prisoner’s as he watched the wreckage below.
The whooping escalated each time someone scored a prize. Their lone guard edged closer, trying to get a bet
ter look, disappearing from Evalene’s view.
All their clothes, food, water, and money were down there. Not to mention their only transportation. But they still had their lives. Evalene made her decision.
This was going to hurt.
17
Evalene
THE WHITE ROPES SQUEEZED tighter around Evalene’s body in reaction to her struggles, until it became difficult to breath.
Just a little further…
She angled her body the best she could for the fall, knowing if she landed wrong she’d be of no help to anyone.
When she hit the ground, her shoulder landed first, wrenching painfully. She lay there trying to catch her breath, praying the guard hadn’t heard the soft thud of her body hitting the sand. No one appeared. Her heart pounded at the possibility of his coming around the corner any second, but the shouts from the wreckage continued without pause. After a few seconds, Evalene rolled to the side until she could see around her bike’s tire. The sand blocked her view of the wreck, but she found their guard with his back to her, staring down at the chaos below, engrossed.
Not knowing how long that would last, Evalene tried to hurry, but the rope seemed designed to somehow paralyze a person. She rolled herself painfully toward Jeremiah’s bike. Every quick movement caused the rope to squeeze harder. By the time she reached his bike, just a few feet away, she was gasping for breath.
Forced to slow to a snail’s pace, which didn’t antagonize the rope as much, Evalene used the tiny range of motion to shove herself up by her fingertips, twisting onto her knees. She finally reached the bike. Jeremiah’s legs hung down in front of her.
Wiggling her fingers out one at a time, she grasped the massive treads of the bike’s tire, inches deep and perfect for gripping. Using the tire for leverage, she fought to stand. Forced to creep along as if they had all the time in the world, her heart pounded harder each time someone hollered on the other side. She stood upright. The bike was so tall, it hid her from view completely.
“I have an idea,” she whispered to Jeremiah.
No response. She worried he hadn’t heard her over the chaos going on a few yards away.
Lifting herself up on her toes, she struggled to reach the button on Jeremiah’s ropes. It was nearly out of reach, but once in her grip, she pressed down, hard. When the white light of the cable dimmed, she nearly cried in relief.
Jeremiah must have immediately felt the difference, worming out of the rope within seconds. Pushing himself off the bike, he landed softly in the sand beside Evalene. Before she could blink, his arms were around her, squeezing the air out of her lungs even more than her ropes. “You’re okay.” He breathed. But he pulled back quickly, as startled by the hug as she was. In a calmer tone, he repeated, “You’re okay?” She nodded. He bent down and ripped the rest of the rope away from his legs, throwing it away like it was a poisonous snake.
“What do I do?” he whispered the moment it was off, studying her ropes.
“Look for a button,” Evalene whispered back, twisting even though it caused the ropes to pinch. Unable to point, she could only nod at her ankles and say, “There.”
Jeremiah was quick to figure it out. Once he turned off the power, the rope’s pressure released and Evalene drew a long, deep breath. She shimmied out of her cords and they peered around the bike. The guard still had his back turned. The sounds of celebration from the Riders below hadn’t faded in the slightest. But eventually they would run out of discoveries. What then?
“We have to hurry,” she whispered, pulling back out of sight.
“I was going to say the same thing,” he whispered back, waving over his shoulder for her to follow, running from one parked bike to the next on silent feet, careful to stay out of sight. Olive and Sol were swung over two bikes at the opposite end of the makeshift parking spot.
Jeremiah ran to set Olive free, while Evalene moved past him to help Sol. But when the strange cord released, Sol half jumped, half fell to the ground. The left side of his head was covered in blood, dripping down the side of his face and neck in a strange pattern from lying upside down on the bike. Some of it was already dark and drying, but most was a fresh, bright red, still bleeding heavily.
Evalene struggled to untangle Sol, and he shakily tried to help, as Olive and Jeremiah joined them.
“You’re hurt!” Olive cried out softly the moment she saw Sol’s face.
“I’ll be okay,” Sol told her, as he wiped away the blood near his eye. Somewhere along the way he’d lost his wrist brace. “Only knocked me out for a few seconds. We need to get our supplies.”
“No,” Jeremiah said grimly, as he eyed Sol’s injury. A shout in the background emphasized his point. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Well, then, at least let’s each take one of their bikes!” Olive hissed as she took in Sol’s face and the way he moved as if in shock.
Evalene glanced at the foreign machines looming over them on every side. She couldn’t spot keys anywhere, or a steering wheel, only handle bars on each side directly behind those detailed horse-heads on the front. “We don’t have time to figure them out,” she whispered. “Plus, the noise would have the Riders chasing us before we even got back on the road. We need to run.”
“I agree,” Jeremiah said, moving away from the bikes and the road as he spoke. “And right now.”
Evalene turned and smacked right into the guard as he came around the bike to check on them. In his shock, he paused. The moment was just enough time for Jeremiah to grab him from behind in a chokehold. He held on, even as the big man flailed and kicked, gasping for enough air to scream, until finally, the Rider lost consciousness.
“Here,” Olive snatched one of their abandoned ropes from the ground. “Use this!”
They tied him up, and Evalene felt along the coil until she found the button, turning on the tension once more. “Let’s go!”
They took off. Dazed, Sol stood still a moment longer, before he lurched forward to catch up to them. Running on the red sand made a short distance feel like a mile and the hills felt like losing battles as the sand slid away under Evalene’s feet. But Jeremiah urged them forward. He ran to the side to make sure they were all keeping up. Sol, normally in his comfort zone with running, wiped at the sweat mixed with blood that dripped in his eyes as they ran.
Topping a big hill, Evalene glanced back, certain the Riders would’ve noticed their absence by now. Instead, she found them in a massive pile of people, punching and fighting each other over some unknown item, still unaware of the escapees. She hurried to the bottom of the hill, anxious to get out of sight before that changed.
At the bottom of the hill, Olive ripped off a piece of her shirt at the bottom. “Give me three seconds,” she said, grabbing Sol’s arm and wound the long strip of fabric around his head as quickly as she could, once, twice, tying it tightly in a knot.
Sol grabbed her elbow the second she was done. “We need to keep going,” he said, breathing hard. “I’ll be okay.” He didn’t look it, but Olive nodded, and they ran on.
They altered between walking and running, never stopping, especially not on hills. A few times Jeremiah even directed them around a hill, if he thought it might be tall enough to bring them back into view. All four of them looked back frequently, watching for pursuit.
But none came.
After what felt like hours, but was probably only thirty minutes, Evalene looked back again. A gust of the wind, the beginning of one of the sand storms, wiped away all trace of their footprints as she watched. All they could see for miles in all directions were thousands of untouched sand dunes. The hills and valleys laid bare, and unlike Eden, they didn’t hold even a single desert plant as far as the eye could see.
Holding her bandana over her face in protection, thankful she’d worn it, Evalene walked closer to Olive until she could bump her friend’s arm and point behind them. The grains of sand bit into her skin and got in her eyes, but the dust storm ended as quickly as it had begun.
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When Olive saw the evidence of their footprints disappearing as their feet lifted, she yelled to Sol and Jeremiah, “We’re saved! Look!”
“Shhh,” Jeremiah said, although he wasn’t looking behind them as much anymore. They’d come a good distance. He nodded at Olive. “They can’t track us anymore, but that doesn’t mean they won’t happen to head in our direction. We need to keep going.” Evalene lowered her bandana as the wind died down. That was a sobering thought.
Olive checked the blood-soaked bandage around Sol’s head. The bleeding seemed to have stopped, but he needed a healer. Besides retying the fabric in a new way to place a bit of clean fabric over the wound, they didn’t know what else to do.
Now that the immediate danger had passed, Evalene tried to comprehend their situation. “Keep going where?” she asked Jeremiah after a few minutes of walking. She forced herself to say it: “We don’t have a map, or food, or water, or shelter…” She wanted to lay down and sleep for days.
Jeremiah’s mouth was set in a grim line. “Now would be a good time to pray,” was all he said in response. He picked a direction for them, based on the sun, but even Evalene could tell they often drifted off track, forcing Jeremiah to constantly redirect.
An icy fear settled over the group, despite the heat of the morning sun, which only grew more intense as it rose higher in the sky. By mid-day they dripped with sweat. Smaller dust storms raged over them frequently as millions of tiny specks of dirt attacked, covering them in layers of red sand.
They pressed on, covering their mouths and eyes. Sol used the neck of his shirt, having lost his bandana in the scuffle. When the dust storms ended, they often found they’d drifted apart. Other times, they lost visibility completely, huddling together as close as possible to keep the sharpest bits of dust and debris out, forced to pull the cloth over their whole face to protect their eyes. It had been a long time since Evalene had been so grateful for a piece of fabric.
Pearl's Number: The Number Series Page 11
