Gunny gave them both a big hug, then they made their goodbyes to the klees.
“Thank you for everything,” Kasha said.
“Absolutely,” Boon added.
“Hey, it goes with the job,” Mark said cockily.
Courtney gave him a playful shove. “Yeah, right. Let’s go.”
Bobby walked the two of them through the curtain of vines and stood with them in the mouth of the flume. “What are you going to tell your parents?” he asked.
“Good question,” Mark said.
“Any suggestions?” Courtney asked.
“Yeah,” Bobby answered. “Lie.”
The three joined in one last hug, then Mark and Courtney backed into the flume. “Write soon,” Mark said. “You know it,” Bobby answered.
“See ya, Bobby,” Courtney said, then she and Mark turned to face the tunnel to infinity. “Ready?” Mark asked.
“There’s no place like home,” Courtney replied.
“Second Earth!” Mark called out. And things were never the same. The flume began to collapse.
The light appeared in the distance, along with the usual musical notes, but the stone structure of the flume was crumbling.
“Wh-What happened?” Mark shouted.
The stone flume writhed and shuddered. The sound was deafening. Giant chunks of rock fell from overhead. The whole tunnel shifted. Mark was knocked off his feet. The light grew brighter. Bobby ran in and helped Mark to his feet. All around them, the rock lining of the flume came tumbling down.
“Run in!” Bobby shouted over the roar. “Meet the light!”
He gave them both a shove, sending them running into the flume. A crack appeared between Bobby’s feet, opening up a deep chasm beneath. The flume was breaking apart. Bobby dove to his right, hitting the floor of the tunnel with his shoulder. Above him, another rock broke loose and fell. Bobby rolled out of the way, and right to the edge of the crack that was now a chasm. He glanced back into the flume to see that Mark and Courtney were nothing more than silhouettes running into the light. Above him, rocks continued to break loose and rain down, crashing all around him. He crawled away from the edge of the chasm in a desperate attempt to get out of the flume, when the floor beneath him crumbled.
An instant later Mark and Courtney were gone.
SECOND EARTH
The light from the flumeblasted into the root cellar of the abandoned Sherwood house, along with the jumble of musical notes. A second later Mark and Courtney came running out of the tunnel, safe. They turned around quickly to examine the flume.
“It’s still in one piece!” Mark announced.
The light and music quickly receded, leaving the tunnel dark and quiet. Courtney felt the stone at the mouth of the tunnel.
“Solid,” she proclaimed. “Mark, what happened?”
“I–Idon’t know! It was like an earthquake.”
“What should we do?” Courtney said, frantic. “Should we go back?”
“No!” Mark yelled. “We b-barely got out of there. Why would we go back?”
“But what about Bobby and the others?”
Mark didn’t have an answer. “Let’s just… relax. And think. We can’t go back. All we can do is wait. That’s what Bobby said, right?”
“But Bobby didn’t know the flume was going to collapse!”
“I know, I know! But, what can we do?”
Courtney deflated. “Nothing. This is going to be torture.”
The two changed out of the Cloral swimskins they had been wearing, back into the Second Earth clothes they brought to the flume so long ago. Courtney didn’t even make fun of Mark for wearing the bright yellow sweatshirt with the “Cool Dude” logo. They left the basement not even worrying if they’d run into a quig-dog. When they stepped outside the abandoned mansion, they discovered that it was nighttime in Stony Brook. They were able to scale the wall surrounding the mansion and get back to the quiet, suburban street without being seen. As soon as they hit the ground, their thoughts turned from what had happened on Eelong, to what was about to happen on Second Earth. By their estimation they had left for Cloral over a month before. Neither could begin to imagine how frantic their families were.
“Now what?” Courtney asked, as they walked. “You realize we’re about to catch hell.”
“I know,” Mark said. “I’ve got a plan. We’ve got to be together on this or it’ll never work.”
“I’m listening.”
“Let’s tell everybody we ran away together, you know, to go on an adventure.”
“Well, we did.”
“I’m not saying we tell the truth! Give me a break. I’m saying we tell everybody we got sick of having to be the good kids all the time and school was too intense and we were being pressured by peers into doing stuff we didn’t want to do and, I don’t know, all those things they say on TV talk shows make kids go crazy. We’ll say we needed a break before we did something really stupid, so we ran away to go to, I don’t know, to California. To surf!”
“That’s ridiculous,” Courtney said. “Why? Kids run away all the time.”
“I know, but nobody will believe you and I did it together.” Mark stopped walking and gave Courtney a sour look. “I’m kidding,” she said. “It’s a good idea, but it’ll get us in huge trouble.”
“Maybe. Or maybe our parents will feel sorry for us because we’re troubled youths.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Whatever. We’re in huge trouble no matter what we do. At least this way we might have a chance of sliding by without having to talk about flumes and territories and Travelers-“
“And get locked up,” Courtney said, finishing the thought.
“Exactly.”
“It’s a plan.”
They decided to go to Courtney’s house first, since it was closer and Courtney was already having big arguments with her parents. They figured her parents would buy it quicker than Mark’s, since Mark had never done anything remotely spontaneous in his life. At least as far as his parents knew. On the way to her house, they fabricated an incredible story of how they put enough money together to take the bus to California, then spent a few weeks on a beach just north of Mexico trying to learn how to surf and pretend like they weren’t who they were. They worked in every detail they could think of-the towns they went through, the food they ate, the people they met. Everything. It didn’t take long for them to feel confident enough with the bare bones of a story to run it by Courtney’s parents. Finally they made the long walk up the path to Courtney’s house.
“Let’s ring the bell,” Courtney said. “I don’t want to barge in and give them a heart attack.”
“Good luck,” Mark whispered.
She rang the bell. A few seconds later Courtney’s door opened. Mr. Chetwynde stood there, staring at them, as if he couldn’t believe he was actually seeing them. Mark and Courtney weren’t sure how to begin, so they didn’t say anything. They had already figured that it was better to react than to offer any info. They stood that way for a good thirty seconds, when Courtney’s father finally spoke.
“What happened?” was all he asked.
“It’s a long story, Dad,” Courtney said, trying to sound tired and remorseful.
“Very long,” Mark added.
“Was the library closed?” Mr. Chetywnde asked.
Mark and Courtney didn’t know how to answer that one. They had figured out answers for most every question that could have been thrown at them, but not that one.
“Excuse me?” Courtney asked tentatively.
“The library,” Mr. Chetwynde said. “Weren’t you guys going to the library?”
“You mean, like a month ago?” Courtney asked.
“I mean a half hour ago when you left the house,” Mr. Chetwynde said; confused.
Mark asked, “Courtney left here half an hour ago? Was I with her?”
Mr. Chetwynde frowned at Mark. “Unless you’ve got an identical twin. Am I missing something?”
Courtney said, “Well, yeah! We’ve been-“
“No!” Mark jumped in. “You’re not missing anything. The library was open, but we were starved so we went to McDonald’s first and ended up getting our work done there. It didn’t take as long as we thought.”
“Oh,” Mr. Chetwynde said, satisfied. “Not exactly a long story. I’m sorry to hear it though.”
“Why?” Courtney asked, still trying to understand what was happening.
“It’s not good to eat junk food for dinner. It’s not good for your health.”
Mark and Courtney gave each other a sideways look. “I can think of a lot of things bad for your health,” Courtney said. “Burgers aren’t high on the list.”
“Don’t be a wise guy. You know what I mean,” Mr. Chetwynde said with a half smile.
Mark tugged on the back of Courtney’s shirt and said, “Uh, I left something on my bike I meant to give you.”
He tried to pull her away from the door, but Courtney stood firm. “Bike? You don’t have a-“
“Yeah!” Mark interrupted. “The bike I left out front so we could walk together.”
Courtney was reeling. Nothing was making sense to her.
“C’mon, Courtney,” Mark said vehemently through clenched teeth. He turned quickly and hurried away from the house.
“Be right back, Dad,” Courtney said, and jogged after Mark. When she caught up, Mark kept walking. “What’s going on?” Courtney said under her breath.
Mark’s answer was to show Courtney his hand. The center stone of his ring was glowing.
“Oh man,” Courtney gasped.
Mark clapped his hand over the ring to hide the pyrotechnics. When they got to the street and out of Mr. Chetwynde’s sight, Mark ran next door and ducked behind a huge bush in front of the neighbor’s yard. By the time he got the ring off, it was already growing. Mark placed it on the ground and stood next to Courtney. The two watched it grow to Frisbee-size, opening up the conduit between territories.
“This is too much. I’m going mental,” Courtney gasped.
The bright light shot out of the hole inside the ring, along with the sweet musical notes. With a final brilliant flash, the event ended and the ring returned to normal. Lying on the ground next to it was a rolled-up piece of parchment paper. Mark moved to pick it up, but Courtney stopped him.
“Wait,” she said. “One thing at a time. Did my father snap or what? That was not what I expected from a guy whose daughter was missing for a month.”
“Because I don’t think we were gone for a month,” Mark answered.
Courtney gave Mark a blank look. “No way. That wasn’t someWizard of Ozdream we had. I’ve got the black-and-blue marks to prove it.”
Mark laughed. “No, we spent a month on Eelong, but I think we were brought back here only a few minutes after we left.”
Courtney shook her head, confused. “You mean, like time stood still while we were gone?”
“No. I think we went to a territory that existed in another time. When the flume brought us back here, it was to the same time we left.”
“So…we’re not in trouble?”
“Not with our parents, anyway.”
The implication was there. Parents were the last thing Mark and Courtney had to worry about. They both looked down at the rolled-up parchment paper.
“That was fast,” Courtney said.
“For us. Who knows if Bobby wrote it in the past, or the future.”
“Don’t go there,” Courtney scolded. “My brain already hurts.” Mark picked up the parchment. It was crunchy brown paper, wrapped and tied with leather twine. Mark’s hands were shaking as he untied the knot.
“What happened to the flume, Mark?”
“Maybe this will tell us,” he said, unrolling the pages. He took a deep breath and glanced at the first page.
“From Bobby?” Courtney asked.
“Uh-huh,” Mark answered.
“Where is he?”
JOURNAL #19
ZADAA
It was a trap.
Everything that happened from the first moment I set foot on Eelong was about leading me into it…and I went. The poison from Cloral, Seegen’s death on Second Earth, Saint Dane’s boasting to me that he would wipe out the gars, the attack on Black Water; everything! It was all about setting the trap. The thing is, I felt certain that Saint Dane was up to something more, but I wasn’t smart enough to figure it out.
Now it’s too late.
I’m real good at looking back and putting the puzzle pieces together. It’s looking ahead that I’m not so hot at, and we paid the price. Mark, Courtney, I want to go back and tell you exactly what happened from the moment you left Eelong for Second Earth. You need to hear it all. Be warned, this is going to be tough to read. I wish I didn’t have to tell you. But you’re in this now, more so than ever. We’ve had a lot of victories over Saint Dane. For that, we deserve to be proud. But we’ve also made mistakes, and we have to accept those, too.
This is what happened.
“Run in!” I shouted to you guys as the flume crumbled around us. “Meet the light!”
I saw that the flume light was coming and wanted to make sure you’d make it, so I gave you both a shove to go deeper into the flume. That’s when the tunnel started to break up. On the ground between my legs a huge crack appeared. If I hadn’t thrown myself to the side, I might have fallen in. I hit the bottom of the flume with my shoulder. The pain shot all the way down into my leg, but I couldn’t worry about it just then, because above me the rocks of the flume were breaking up and falling down… on me. I rolled out of the way just as a boulder hit the ground where my head had been. But I nearly rolled right into the crack in the floor that was already a couple of feet wide, and growing. I grabbed on to the edge and stared down into nothing. Absolutely nothing. That crack may have opened up a hole to the center of Eelong for all I knew. I tried to crawl away, but the floor crumbled beneath me. One second it was solid, the next I felt it break loose, and I fell with it.
“I’ve got you!” shouted Kasha. She had fought her way through the curtain of vines and into the crumbling flume. It was a good thing, because she snagged the back of my clothes with her claw, just in time. She saved my life. Again. I was able to twist around and grab on to the craggy ledge of rock. Beneath me the crumbled ledge fell to oblivion.
“I got it,” I told her as I pulled myself up.
The horrible, wrenching sound got louder. It was like being inside a thundercloud. Rocks were being torn apart by some incredible above-ground earthquake.
“Get out of there, Pendragon!” Spader shouted.
I looked to see that he and Gunny were outside the mouth of the flume.
“Stay back!” I shouted. But I didn’t need to. Another crack appeared in the floor in front of Spader and Gunny, cutting them off from the flume. But worse than that, it kept Kasha and me from getting out. All around us, the flume was falling down and the ground was crumbling away. We were moments away from being crushed, or plunged into the dark pit. There was only one way we could escape.
“Zadaa!” I shouted into the flume.
The light sparkled from deep within, coming to our rescue. It would be a race. Would the light get us out of there before the flume collapsed on our heads?
“Run!” I shouted to Kasha.
She tried to help me to my feet, but it was like trying to stand up inside a washing machine. We both fell again. I heard the musical notes coming closer.
“Hurry, Bobby!” Gunny shouted from outside the flume. “Run toward the light!”
Everything changed in a single second. One second. A second is nothing. A tick on the clock. Seconds pass all the time and we never think about any one of them. But a second can be an eternity. I got back on my feet and reached down to help Kasha up. I had her hand. I was a second away from pulling her to her feet. One stupid second. If I had been a second earlier, the falling rock would have missed her.
I wasn’t.
Before I could pull her to her feet, a chunk of rock fell down from the ceiling and hit Kasha square on the head. It was so loud in the flume that I didn’t hear the sound it made, and I’m glad for that. But I will always remember the sight. Kasha’s head jerked to the side, and her body went limp.
I didn’t allow myself to think about what had happened. I pulled on Kasha’s furry hand, knelt down on one knee, and draped the big klee over my shoulders. I was operating on pure adrenaline.
“Go, shorty, go!” Gunny shouted.
Itook a quick look back to see Gunny pulling Spader away from the mouth of the flume. They disappeared back through the curtain of hanging vines. Safe.
The floor of the flume was rumbling so hard, Inearly lost my balance again. But through sheer force of willIwas able to stay upright and put one foot in front of the other. I was desperate to get us deeper into the flume and away from the destruction. The light blinded me…
“Hobey-ho, Pendragon!” I heard Spader yell.
And we were on our way. The last sound I heard from Eelong was a shriek and a hugeboomas the flume disintegrated behind us. I braced myself, expecting the entire flume to collapse. But it didn’t. All the damage was done at the gate. The rest of the flume was intact.
I don’t remember much about the trip to Zadaa. Kasha andIsailed along side by side. I held her in my arms, cradling her head. Blood was starting to blossom through the black fur above her left eye, turning it slick. Iput my hand over the wound, thinking direct pressure might stop the bleeding, but thenIwas afraid of putting too much pressure on her damaged skull.
“Kasha?” I said.
She opened her eyes, but couldn’t focus.
“We’ll be there soon,”Iassured her. “Loor can get us help.”Iwas scared to death. I knew that Loor would do what she could, butIhad no idea what the doctor situation was on Zadaa, let alone if they would treat a giant predator cat. I wondered if they had such things as veterinarians. AllIcould do was hold Kasha tight and wait for the trip to end.
It only took us a few minutes to get there, but it felt like days. Finally the musical notes grew faster and I felt the tug of gravity. I held Kasha tight to help ease her down once we arrived. Moments later I carried her out of the flume and into the large, underground cavern made of light brown stone-the sandstone of Zadaa. I laid Kasha down on the floor as gently as I could, then turned my thoughts to helping her. I quickly realized how tough that was going to be. To get out of this cavern, we needed to climb up through a cleft in the rock using footholds that were dug out of the stone. There was no way I would be able to climb out of there with an unconscious, two-hundred-pound cat. I decided to leave her and go for help.
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