Supernova

by Mia Rodriguez

Chapter 38: Journey

  “I can’t leave?” questions Donny, his voice upset.

  “Nope, they’ve revoked our permit.”

  “That’s just great!”

  “I know how you feel, Donny. I don’t envy you having to tell our boss. He’s expecting the stuff tomorrow, and he’ll find a way of blaming the storm on you.”

  “That’s right,” Donny retorts.

  “Remember that time his girlfriend took off into the woods because she was angry at him?”

  “How can I forget? She tripped on her own two feet and bumped her head. Who goes into the woods in high heels?”

  “Mr. BO60 blamed you for not clearing the forest of all dangerous elements.”

  “He docked me a week’s pay,” Donny growls. “And I couldn’t do anything about it!”

  “He did the same to me when lightning struck one of his trucks and shattered the glass. He blamed me when he’s the one who mapped out where he wanted his trucks. That jerk! That cheapskate!”

  Their conversation is interrupted when a ringing cell phone blares again. As Shane answers, a much welcomed breeze flows through from the back opening of the big rig. It’s getting hot and muggy in here.

  “You’re in luck!” Shane exclaims, after hanging up.

  “What do you mean?” Donny asks.

  “They had given me old information. It turns out that the storm changed directions.”

  “That’s great!”

  “Looks like you’ll be able to deliver the junk after all. You won’t get docked a week’s pay!”

  “I’d better go,” Donny declares, “before I’m late with Mr. BO60’s furniture.”

  “Be careful on the road. You know how the cheapskate is about his stuff. A scratch on one of those things could send him into a frenzy.”

  “I know. I’m going to get on the truck and check one more time that everything is perfect.”

  “You do that, Donny.”

  A few seconds later, heavy steps resound on the semi-truck. Royce and I are quiet until we’re certain who they belong to.

  “Where are you,” Donny whispers, moving towards the back.

  “Here,” Royce answers lightly.

  Finding us under the bulky desk, Donny quickly says, “I’m sorry I couldn’t put you in the cab, but there are several checkpoints from here to Region 3.”

  “It’s okay,” Royce responds.

  “My boss likes to keep the wood of his antique furniture breathing, so he had this truck specially made with ventilation holes all over. You should be okay riding in here.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “We’d better leave.”

  “Okay.”

  Donny steps off the 18 wheeler, slamming down the metal sheet in the back and shutting Royce and me in. I try to not let the feeling of suffocation drown me. When the ignition starts and we pull out, the claustrophobia slightly eases. Royce and I had been living in a wide open space for weeks. Now we were completely enclosed. Fortunately, a few miniature lights on the sides of the ceiling keep us from total darkness.

  “We’re on our way,” Royce declares, smiling with confidence.

  “We’re on our way,” I repeat, trying to keep my distance as best as I can when we’re squeezed together under the bulky desk. I constantly have to keep from melting into him.

  “We’ve made it this far. We only have a little more to go.”

  “That’s a relief.”

  “With your ability for visions we should make it to headquarters easy.”

  “They don’t always work, though,” I frown.

  “I’d say your ability to see the future has worked very well so far.”

  “I didn’t see the private in the tree that time he caught us in the woods or even the colonel when he sneaked up on us,” I remind him.

  “That’s probably because we weren’t in any immediate and total danger like the tornado.”

  “Maybe.”

  “You’re still learning to work with your abilities,” explains Royce. “They’ll get stronger as time goes on.”

  “I guess you’re right. Immediate danger seems to trigger my visions and so do key words.”

  “You mean like when Donny said Peter’s name?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Peter,” murmurs Royce, painfully wincing. “I’m sorry I had to wipe away his memory.”

  “It had to be done.”

  “Yes,” he expresses, his face still tight.

  I gently place my hand on his arm. “Come to think of it, there’s been something I’ve been wanting to ask you.”

  “What is it?” he asks, his steady eyes on me.

  “About the memory pill.”

  “What about it?”

  My eyebrows come together. “Why haven’t I been inserted with one?”

  “You’re the Supernova.”

  “And?” I ask, puzzled.

  “We can’t insert anything in your head, Madrigal. What if it affects you?”

  “What if I’m captured? What if I’m forced to spill the beans?” I’m horrified just thinking about it.

  Royce’s hand reaches into his pant pocket and pulls out a small, long, plastic container. Twisting the lid, he extracts a gold pill-like device from it. “This is your mind scrambler. I’m instructed to give it to you if anything happens. All I have to do is put it in your mouth, and it does the rest.”

  “I’ll take that,” I say, extending my hand with my palm facing up.

  He places it back into its container and hands it to me. I stuff it in my pocket. Having it eases me. I’d like to think that I’d keep my mouth shut in case of capture, but the government has torturous methods for extracting information. My fake parents mentioned several occasions where people died during interrogations. They were later found to be innocent of all charges against them.

  “I wonder how Peter is,” I murmur, thinking about interrogations unnerves me. Royce’s eyebrows came together. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring him up again.”

  “He’s fine.”

  “He is?”

  “I’ve checked on him. After losing his memory, the guardians wanted to throw him in prison for playing a joke on them.”

  I take in a sharp breath. “Did they put him in jail?”

  “Constanza warned his parents of what was happening, and they took off for the main United World headquarters. It took a lot of smooth talking, but they managed to convince the guardians that Peter wasn’t right in the head—that he had fantasies about being a guardian so that’s why they knew where to find him when he went missing.”

  I exhale with relief. “Good plan.”

  “A risky one. If the guardians had dug a little more—asking for his doctors or more proof—the gig would’ve been up, but they were tired of messing with him and his talky parents and they were happy to get rid of them with the warning that next time something like this happens, Peter will definitely go to jail.”

  “I’m so glad he’s okay.”

  One of Royce’s eyebrows shoots up. “Are you?”

  “Of course!”

  He eyes me carefully before speaking. “Madrigal, do you still have feelings for him?”

  “Feelings?”

  “I know there was a time you liked him,” Royce mumbles.

  I shrug my shoulders. “He was very nice to me.”

  “Stop being coy!” he blurts impatiently.

  “I’m not being coy,” I state with my own impatience. “For heaven’s sake, Royce, say what you mean.”

  “There was a time you had romantic feelings for him, right?” he demands to know.

  “Yes.” It’s best to be clear and to the point.

  “Are some of those feelings still lingering in you?”

  “No.”

  His tight face softens. “Are you sure?” he mutters softly.

  “Positive.”

  “Then why are you so worried about him?” he asks suspiciously.

&nb
sp; I exhale a long exasperated breath. Why is he asking me such a silly question? “He’s your cousin, right?”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “You care about him—even almost losing your steady composure when you learned what he was up to, right?”

  He nods, still puzzled. “Right.”

  “What hurts you hurts me,” I tell him nonchalantly, irritated that I had to explain it at all.

  His eyes widen, steadily staring at me as if taken aback. Why is he surprised? I hope I don’t have to explain any more than I already have. Thank you, fake parents for my inability to express my emotions.

  “Thanks for caring about me, Madrigal,” he murmurs.

  I nod, trying to put an end to this conversation. Noticing my jittery mood, he grins.

  “You’ve got a soft heart,” he says, teasing.

  “I don’t,” I counteract.

  “Yes, you do—we both do. If I can admit it, you can too.”

  “I’m not admitting to it,” I state.

  “You’re stubborn.”

  “You’re not?” I ask, challenging him.

  He chuckles darkly. “I am too.”

  “So stop calling the kettle black.”

  “Okay.” He chuckles again.

  “You’ve got your stuff to deal with, and I’ve got mine.”

  “You’re the one who said I was almost perfect,” he says mischievously, his eyes dancing.

  “I was trying to be nice.”

  His chuckle turns into raucous laughter. “Nice?”

  “I know I said it at the getaway, but don’t you be getting a big head, okay?”

  “How can I? Your opinion of me changes so often. You used to think I was the most horrible person on earth—remember?”

  “Those times are long gone.”

  His eyes, shifting from amused to serious, search through mine. “Are they?” he asks gently.

  “Yep,” I announce with a jittery voice. It’s getting uncomfortable for me again.

  “Okay, now we’re getting somewhere.”

  “We’ve always been somewhere,” I announce. “Now we’re in this semi-truck going to our destiny.”

  He nods solemnly, letting the conversation drop. Neither of us says anything as the lull of the traveling truck speaks for us. My even breathing gets in tune with its motion. The claustrophobia is gone as the calm envelopes me. We’re not fighting beasts or dangerous humans. We’re not avoiding booby traps or staying constantly on guard—never fully resting even in sleep.

  It’s good to be here, I decide. It’s feels safe even though I know it’s really not. But I’ll take this tiny sliver of peace. I’ll take it with both hands. I stretch out adjacent to the desk, and Royce does the same. Soon I’m drifting off to sleep with Royce lying next to me, his hand gently caressing my face.

  “Madrigal,” Royce whispers urgently.

  My eyes flutter open. “Yes?”

  “We’ve stopped. I think we’re at a checkpoint. We need to be awake in case something happens. Let’s get into our hiding place.”

  We scramble back underneath the massive desk. Even though it would be impossible to see us from the front, Royce and I are only too aware that we shouldn’t take any chances and that we’ve got to be prepared for anything. My hand feels for the slingshot in my pocket.

  Because of the ventilation holes, we hear what’s happening outside. A checkpoint guard asks Donny for his documentation allowing him to be on the road with the merchandise. The guard leaves to check the paperwork inside the small station on the side of the checkpoint. Donny disembarks from the semi-truck cab.

  “Don’t worry,” he whispers to us through the ventilation holes. “This is routine.”

  A few minutes later, quick steps move towards Donny. “You’re out of your truck,” the guard snaps accusingly.

  “I was just stretching my legs,” Donny says apologetically. “They were full of charley horses.”

  “Well, everything’s in order,” the checkpoint guard declares. It seems like he’s satisfied with Donny’s explanation. “You can leave.”

  A few moments later, we’re on our way again. This time when I fall asleep, I try not to plunge in too heavily. A few hours later when we stop at another checkpoint, I immediately wake up and Royce and I rush into our hiding place. When the checkpoint officer comes back from checking Donny’s documentation, he demands the opening of the back of the semi-truck.

  “I’ve got to see if you’ve got what you say you do,” he snarls.

  “It’s just furniture,” Donny tells him.

  “We’ll see.”

  I huddle underneath the desk with Royce as the back of the 18 wheeler goes up. Clamorous footsteps resound through the entire truck—the checkpoint guard’s arrogant strut hits the wood bottom heavily.

  “So much furniture!” he groans.

  “My boss is crazy for antiques.”

  “It’s just old junk,” the official retorts.

  The steps start coming closer to Royce and me. They stop at the filing cabinets in front of the desk Royce and I are scrunched under. I curl my fingers around my slingshot.

  “It’s all furniture,” the guard snickers.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I suppose I should let you go.”

  “I’ve got a deadline to meet,” Donny explains.

  “Why should I care about your deadline?”

  “My boss would be very upset if I didn’t deliver this on time.”

  “Why should I care?”

  “You know who my boss is, right?” asks Donny. “You saw his name on the paperwork.”

  “I know he’s a top guardian, but I have my work to do!”

  “What?”

  “I just hate how those idiots pull strings and think we have to jump.”

  “Sir—”

  “I’ll teach those idiots at headquarters who really rules the roost,” he snorts sardonically.

  “But--”

  “I want everything off this truck NOW. I’m checking every corner of this thing!”