Bonez

by Susan Berran

  The other groups were already completely out of sight. We couldn’t see, or hear them. They’d already vanished without leaving a trace. But there was no time to think about them, we had to worry about ourselves. And we figured that the quicker we got in, then the quicker we could get out . . . hopefully. And we kind of figured that the little kids had little legs so that gave us a better chance to outrun something if we had to. And anyway they were younger, their parents wouldn’t have grown as attached to them yet.

  It felt as if we were entering the mouth of some giant ALIEN animal and walking towards our own certain DOOM.

  Of course I wasn’t scared at all, but Jared was a bit nervous. We could hear WHEEZY right behind us sucking away on his puffer like mad. Booga’s teeth were chattering so much that we reckon they’d start breaking up and falling out of his mouth any second . . . and TOFFEE was just being TOFFEE; sooking. We could hear his tiny whimpering and sniffling and we sort of expected him to SCREAM and run away at any second.

  The only way we could go was forward, but there were so many different paths to choose from.

  We’d barely entered when we heard the BLOOD-CURDLING SCREAMS of the little kids, somewhere far off in the distance. They sounded absolutely TERRIFIED as their screams bounced all around us, echoing through the dark chambers.

  Maybe we should run . . .

  Maybe we should hide . . .

  Maybe we should go back . . .

  Maybe we should have brought clean undies with us, but more than anything . . . we wanted our mummies.

  Well, not me of course, just the other guys.

  WHEEZY was puffing like crazy, he reckons the dust was getting up his nose, but he was suckin’ more air than a vacuum. Booga was shoving chocolate bars down his throat so fast that the wrappers were still on most of them and he was making this disgusting gagging sound as he choked them down.

  He reckons he only needs chocolate when he’s nervous . . . or tired . . . or hot . . . or bored . . . or awake . . . or cold . . . or for a midnight snack . . . or breakfast . . . or on days of the week that end in ‘y’.

  And TOFFEE was nervously sucking on his thumb so hard that I reckon soon all that would be left was BONE. He said he was just scratching his thumb with his teeth . . . YEAH RIGHT. More like he wanted his widdle mummsy wummsy.

  It didn’t take too long before we were so far in that we weren’t even getting the reflection of light from the entrance anymore. We were completely and utterly alone and as I shone the torch just up ahead, we could see the first junction.

  “Ok, which way?” I asked the guys.

  Booga held the map up to the dull torch light and started to twist it one way, turn it the other, then upside down and back again, as he tried to figure out our direction.

  “Hey Booga, you said you could read a map!” Jared said nervously.

  “I can!” he replied proudly. “The last time Mum took me to Macca’s in the city I got Hamburgler all the way across Big Burger Island, through the French Fries Forest, around Sundae City and all the way to the Golden Arches castle to save the Pickle Princess.”

  GREAT! We were following the champion of fast food placemat maps!

  We were DOOMED!

  For the next ten minutes me and Jared sat down and watched as Booga, WHEEZY and TOFFEE all huddled around like leeches to a fresh blood blister, trying to decide which way we should go. And after ten minutes of WHINGING, sooking and arguing, they eventually decided to take turns at reading the map.

  We were on our way. Finally it seemed like we all knew where we were going.

  We wandered along in the dull torchlight for what seemed like hours, but was probably more like five minutes . . . it was just soooo damn boring! We just had to be careful not to lose track of where we were and to keep an eye out for junctions along the way.

  The system seemed to be working. When we eventually came to the first three-way junction, Booga told us which way to go . . . then at the following ‘T’ intersection WHEEZY knew that we had to go right . . . and then at the five-way junction it was TOFFEES’ turn and he had it all figured out. Then it was back to Booga for the next direction and so on and so on. Yeah . . . this wasn’t so hard after all. We were rockin’ along.

  “Wheezy?” I called.

  “Right.”

  “Toffee?”

  “Second on the left.”

  The next junction was coming up just ahead. It was a four-way intersection.

  “Booga which way?” I called back.

  “Left” came the reply.

  “No, right!” TOFFEE suddenly jumped in “I looked ahead on my last turn.”

  “Nah uh, you’re both wrong it’s straight ahead” WHEEZY then piped up.

  Me and Jared pulled out a water bottle each, sat down, and watched the show. The three of them were ranting and raving, snatching the map off each other, flipping it around in the torchlight. Then they placed it down, walked on it to try and retrace our steps and then all stood around it trying to figure out exactly which way we were facing. It took only fifteen minutes to work it out that . . . yep; we were completely lost. Apparently each of them was reading the map ok, but in the dull torchlight they had been holding it a different way. So when Booga read it, North was actually East . . . when WHEEZY was reading it North was really South . . . and when it was TOFFEE'S turn he had the map completely turned over onto the wrong side and was following ‘how to make a solar powered fan’ instructions.

  HE'S SUCH AN IDIOT!!

  Now we had absolutely no way of knowing where we were.

  And I thought Jared’s head was full of belly-button fluff, huh. Compared to the other guys Jared was looking like a total genius.

  “Hey, what’s that?” Jared said. As the torch was being yanked and tossed and grabbed between the other guys. For a split second the beam shone across something really faint on the wall, way up ahead. The guys stopped yelling at each other for a second and we all stared off into the darkness. Even with the torch slowly scanning the area, we could barely see that far ahead, but Jared was right. There was definitely something strange on the wall up ahead.

  Huddled way too close together, we headed off towards it in total silence, trying to focus our eyes as we got closer and closer. We’d finally found signs of life!

  WOW . . . it was so . . . weird! I’d never seen anything like it before. All around us were markings of some sort. Scratches, squiggly lines, straight lines, shapes, patterns, weird designs and even stranger symbols, all over the wall. There was heaps and they seemed to continue along and off around the next corner as well.

  We’d stumbled across some sort of ALIEN message, it had to be ALIEN because it definitely wasn’t from our language.

  We spent ages just staring at it, studying it, trying to figure out what it could all mean, what it was trying to tell us. Maybe the ALIENS were trying to pass on the secret to life. Or maybe they were letting us know the exact date that they’d be back to destroy the Earth. Maybe it was some sort of message claiming ownership of the Earth as their newly discovered land. But whatever it said, it had been left behind on purpose for other ALIENS to read.

  This was sooo AWESOME. The others would be so jealous, but of course we couldn’t mark where it was on the map; we didn’t even know where we were! So, we decided to take back some proof. I started to feel about the wall, trying to find a way of getting a part of the message off to take back with us. Booga was busy shuffling through his back-pack and the others were still just standing there with drool hanging from the corners of their mouths.

  CRACK! I fell backwards as a piece of the message suddenly broke away into my hands, but as I smacked into Jared behind me, the fragile message crumbled away to dust.

  “Crud!” Just then Booga found what he’d been searching for and pulled out a pad and pencil from his bag. Then he ripped out a page and held up the piece of paper against the scrawls. He then started to carefully rub his pencil very lightly across the paper. It was sort of like doin
g a cheap photocopy . . . and it was WORKING. As he scribbled all over his paper the strange markings on the wall underneath suddenly became visible on top.

  Yep . . . I was just about to suggest that. Dumping our bags down we each decided to do some as well. Booga was trying to get down as many of the weird scrawls and symbols as he could. He was taking forever though. It was actually the longest time we’d ever seen him not eating! Me and Jared just did a couple of quick rubbings from other parts around the wall as well, but we also knew we had to keep moving.

  “C’mon Booga we want to get out of here” I told him sternly.

  “Done!” he finally exclaimed.

  “Ok let’s go then! Now, who’s got the map?” I said turning to the guys. There was utter silence. Booga looked at WHEEZY, TOFFEE looked at Booga, WHEEZY looked at TOFFEE and then each of them looked at Jared and me. Yes, they each thought that the other one was looking after it. And that’s when we realised that . . . YEP, it was obviously still sitting where they’d placed it down. All the way back where they’d had their stupid argument as they tried to figure out where we were, great!

  It wasn’t actually that far, probably only a hundred metres or so back, well, that’s what we told the guys anyway. It was probably twice as far as that but there was no way me or Jared were going back for it. Why should we have to walk all that way, we hadn’t left the map behind. We were in charge of the torch and that was definitely staying right there with US! We figured that we shouldn’t have to wait for them in the dark, so they’d be fine going back without the torch . . . as long as they held hands and didn’t take any wrong turns along the way.

  We watched as the guys headed off around the corner feeling their way along the walls, still arguing, mumbling and sooking to each other about whose fault it was that we were lost and whose turn it was to hold the map. Moments later they’d faded away into the darkness . . . gone.

  We could hear Booga’s teeth chattering away for ages, like those little, wind up plastic joke teeth and then every few seconds, WHEEZY would make this really loud, weird hiccup that echoed. And of course TOFFEE was doing his usual thing . . . whimpering, sniffling and sooking as he wandered along.

  He’s such a SCARDY-CAT girl.

  Oh yeah. . . one time me and Jared found this totally DEAD possum on the road just outside the front of my place. We reckon it must have been run-over about ten times because it was reeeally flat and disgustingly gross. So naturally that gave us a fantastic idea. We got Mum’s big flat burger flipper’ thingy and very carefully slid it underneath the possum and then peeled it up off the road and took it home. Then we got my wireless remote control car and used the possum to totally camouflage it. We had to stretch the possum a fair bit. Then we draped it over the car like a bed sheet to completely hide it. The next morning we got up really early and waited until just about everyone had gone into the school grounds. Then we set it up on the road, right outside the school’s front gate. No-one’s allowed to go back out the gate once they get to school, so it was perfect. We knew that TOFFEE THOMAS was always the last kid to arrive and everyone else was already there. Me and Jared had gotten into position, hiding under one of those big umbrella bushes ready for the show. With a bazillion blowflies beginning to gather and buzz around the rotting carcass, it was only a matter of time before one of the other kids wandering by spotted it. We waited and watched, Dopey Sophie was heading our way. YES! As soon as she saw it she started turning all green and weird and making ‘sick’ noises. Within minutes the other kids all knew it was there and had raced down to the fence to get a good gawk at it. The girls were making ‘puffy cheeks’ and holding their mouths, as if they were about to chuck up. Some of them were sooking and whinging . . .

  “Eerrr, I’m going to be sick.”

  “Yuk, it’s sooo disgusting.”

  “Eewww, you can see its guts.”

  But all of the guys were hanging over the fence with their eyes popping out. . .

  “Cool, the girls are gonna be sick.”

  “Yeah, it’s so disgusting.”

  “Cool, you can see its guts.”

  And all they wanted to see was who could spit the closest to it, which just made the girls want to throw up even more.

  Beneath the bush, me and Jared were rolling around the dirt cacking ourselves.

  Just then, TOFFEE came up the road, right on time, just like we’d planned. He saw the bloated, dead possum laying there and immediately started to look around for a stick.

  He’s always trying to pretend in front of the other guys that he’s really brave but everyone knows he’s a sooky lah lah.

  With the other guys all cheering him on and the girls all screaming loudly, he reckoned he was going to poke the gross thing onto a stick and then chase the girls around the school-yard with it. He dropped his bag onto the ground and picked up a good strong stick. Then he swished it around in mid air, like an idiot, for a while before he crouched down beside the disgusting possum. As he got closer and closer to the ‘zombie possum’, he nervously prodded at it with the stick a few more times.

  Its guts are hangin’ out! It’s dead!” RATTY called.

  The blowflies were a buzzing black cloud surrounding TOFFEE'S head now and were landing all over his face and arms and then wandering about happily. . . and TOFFEE didn’t seem to mind!

  EeWww!

  Finally he lowered the point of the stick until it was just about to touch the gross body.

  We waited . . .

  He s l o o o w l y reached out his other hand to help push the mooshy beast onto the stick.

  We waited . . .

  Then just as the tips of his fingers touched the ‘DEAD’ possum . . .

  Vrrooom!! We hit the go button!

  EEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

  TOFFEE leapt high into the air squealing like the last Dodo bird finding out that he was on the menu. His girly high-pitched SCREAMS shattered the school windows and set off the fire alarm.

  Then, with everyone watching and rolling around in absolute hysterics, the ‘ZOMBIE possum’ chased TOFFEE off down the road, hot on his heels with eyes bulging and it’s dry tongue dragging alongside. They flew down the road, over the hill and disappeared around the bend and out of sight. With the possum dropping bits of body goop everywhere as it went and dragging its guts along the road, leaving a really gross, reddy-grey trail. Even when the possum finally stopped, because it was out of wireless range, TOFFEE kept on running, squealing far off into the distance, he never looked back.

  None of the kids saw or heard from TOFFEE THOMAS for the next three days. Tia Tantrum, his sister, reckoned he stayed under his bed all that day until their mum could convince him that there was no such thing as a zombie possum.

  Me and Jared got detention for a week . . . but it was sooooo worth it.

  So anyway where were we? Ah yes, back to the dark . . .

  While Booga, WHEEZY and TOFFEE headed back into the darkness to retrieve the map, me and Jared decided to check out the scrawls on the wall some more. If we could just figure out what they meant and unravel their secrets we’d probably get a medal or something. Wow, there was more than we realised. In the dull torchlight, we followed the ALIEN symbols around a few more corners for a while, when suddenly we noticed that we couldn’t hear the other guys whinging and mumbling anymore. And as we looked around with the torch we noticed we weren’t even in the same area as before anymore. Uh oH, we’d been following the scrawl around corner after corner and now we were even more lost than before. We called out to the guys but our own voices just bounced back and echoed around us. Just then . . .

  “We’re here!” came a muffled echo that sounded like Booga.

  “Where?” Jared yelled in reply.

  “Here!” it came back again.

  “But we’re here!” Jared replied.

  “No you’re not, you’re there!”

  “No, we’re ‘here’, you’re ‘there’!”

  “But if we were ‘there’ you’d kn
ow it because you’d say we’re ‘here’ with you.”

  “Well deerrr! So then you’re not ‘here’ which makes you ‘there’.”

  “We’re here, you’re there!”

  “I think I would know if I was ‘there’, I’m here and you’re there!”

  “Nah uhh.”

  “Ah haa!”

  “Nahh ahhh.”

  “Yahh haaa.”

  “Nah aahhh!”

  “Yah . . .”

  Wow . . . it was like listening to the grand final playoff in the WORLD DORK OLYMPICS and they were both winning.

  But as we wandered about trying to search for each other, the voices became softer and softer . . . thank goodness.

  Suddenly we realised that we were definitely all alone. No map, no idea of which way we’d come or which way we had to go.

  But at least now we didn’t have to listen to Booga trying to secretly shove food down his throat so he wouldn’t have to share . . . or WHEEZY'S annoying nose whistle as he breathed . . . or TOFFEE forever sooking about how his parents don’t like him.

  The silence was wonderful . . . sort of.

  If we were ever going to get out of there Jared had to start thinking as well, I couldn’t do it all on my own. I always had to come up with the incredibly brilliant inventions and the AWESOMELY wicked ideas, usually while Jared was comparing sweat smells . . . you know, like which armpit was worse . . . how many days before the stench in his socks started to grow mould, whether he could beat my record for the most days wearing the same pair of undies.

  I knew we needed to leave a trail to show where we’d been and once again it was up to me to do the thinking. I was going through everything in my utility belt and my back-pack, looking for something that we could use while Jared just sat there chewing gum really loudly and really annoyingly. Every five seconds or so he’d . . . pop . . . which at first wasn’t . . . pop . . . too bad. It’s just that . . . pop . . . after about the . . . pop . . . millionth time I just wanted to take . . . pop . . . all of his chewy, shove it in his ears and . . . pop . . . up his nostrils, stick a hose in his . . . pop . . . mouth and make the world’s first . . . pop . . . human water balloon. Hey, that gave me an idea . . . pop!