The Merchant of Death

by D. J. MacHale

  I now realized where this was going. They were going to make a bomb. They weren’t satisfied with throwing little bits of explosives in slingshots. No, they wanted a big bang, and I had delivered the means for them to do it. They were going to use the electricity in the battery to set off a huge bomb. Nice going, Bobby.

  With a flourish Rellin pulled away the brown blanket that was covering the big box. What lay beneath wasn’t a box at all. It was one of the ore cars from the mines. To my horror, I saw that it was filled with tak. There must have been a few hundred pounds of it. Judging from the big explosion that came from a very small bit of tak, if this load blew up it would be like a nuclear bomb going off.

  “This is a mistake, Rellin,” Uncle Press pleaded. “You think this will save the Milago? You’re wrong. If you use this weapon, you may find yourselves free of the Bedoowan, and slaves to a new power. The power of tak.”

  I immediately realized what Uncle Press was worried about. The Milago were on the verge of creating a weapon of horrible power. If they used it, it would alter the course of Denduron forever. Not only would there be devastating destruction, but once these simple people used the power of this explosive, where would it end? Already they weren’t satisfied with using small bits of tak. They wanted more power. It was like the Milago skipped over gunpowder and jumped right into the nuclear age…and Armageddon.

  The crazy thing was, this all came about because of two people who never could have foreseen the outcome of their actions. There was me, who stupidly brought the last piece of the bomb puzzle from home. And there was Figgis, this strange little man who lived by scrounging things and selling them to whomever had the coin to pay. Figgis had struck the big time now. He wasn’t selling sweaters and knives anymore. No, Figgis was now a merchant of death, and the people he was selling to were eager to buy.

  It was clear to me now. The turning point for Denduron wasn’t the battle between the Milago and the Bedoowan. It was the introduction of this strange and horrible new power into the territory. As I looked at that deadly load of explosive in the ore car, there was something else that became clear. I wasn’t going home. Even if I could get to a flume, there was no way I could go back now. No way. Not after the damage I had caused. I had no idea what to do, or how to stop this horror from happening, but I resolved then and there to stay and see this through to the end…even if the end meant my own death.

  This may be the last journal I write to you, Mark and Courtney. If it is, then please know that it wasn’t your fault about the flashlight. All you did was help out a friend. The blame is all mine. If you don’t hear from me again, then please know I did everything I could to undo the mess I created. I may not be successful, but at least I tried. Thank you for reading this, and for being my friends.

  Hopefully this isn’t a final good-bye.

  END OF JOURNAL #3.

  Second Earth

  Mark threw the parchment pagesdown onto his bedroom floor angrily.

  “We should have known!” he shouted. “It was as much our fault as it was Bobby’s!”

  Courtney and Mark had waited until they got back home to Stony Brook before reading Bobby’s latest journal. After saying good-bye to Bobby in the abandoned subway station, their journey back home was uneventful. They traveled the same route as the one that brought them to the flume in the Bronx, taking the subway to 125th Street and catching the first commuter train back to Connecticut. Once back in their hometown, they went straight to Mark’s house and locked themselves in his bedroom where they could read Bobby’s journal in private.

  “It’s not our fault!” argued Courtney. “The Milago are like a step above primitive. How could we know they’d figure out how to make a bomb with that stuff?”

  “Because we read the journal,” countered Mark. “We knew the same things Bobby did. Press told him never to bring anything from one territory to the next. We read that, but we did it anyway!”

  Mark paced the floor out of sheer nervous energy.

  “We helped Bobby,” argued Courtney. “And maybe we helped the Milago, too. To be honest, I hope they do make a bomb that’ll blow those Bedoowan creeps away. They deserve it!”

  “You don’t get it,” argued Mark. “The Milago aren’t ready for this kind of power. They don’t know how to control it.”

  Now Courtney was getting angry. She jumped up and said, “What are you saying? Only socially evolved, brilliant people are allowed to blow themselves up?”

  “No,” Mark shot back. “It takes socially evolved brilliant people to figure out hownot to blow themselves up. Look at it this way. The Milago are pissed off and they should be. The Bedoowan have been torturing them for centuries. Now suddenly they’re given a weapon that’s so powerful they can wipe out their enemies with the push of a button. They don’t really understand it. They really don’t know how to control it, but they’re angry enough to use it anyway. If that tak stuff is as powerful as Bobby wrote, then they could end up killing themselves as well.”

  This made Courtney stop. “Is it really possible to use a battery to set that stuff off?” she asked thoughtfully.

  “I don’t know,” answered Mark. “I suppose so. If tak is that volatile then a small electric charge could set off a chain reaction and…boom.”

  The two fell silent for a moment, imagining the consequences.

  “I guess the trick is to be somewhere else when the button gets pushed,” said Courtney. “I don’t think they’re smart enough to figure out how to make a timer.”

  “It wouldn’t matter,” said Mark soberly. “Tak isn’t like anything I’ve ever heard of. If a little bit can make an explosion that big, then the amount Bobby described in that ore car would not only destroy the Bedoowan palace, it would level the Milago village too. And if the explosion makes fire the way it did with those scarecrow targets, then it could create a firestorm. Every living thing for miles around would be torched…the Bedoowan, the Milago, the farm, the forest…”

  “And Bobby, Alder, Loor, and Press, too,” said Courtney slowly. “I guess this Figgis guy really is a merchant of death.”

  Mark picked up the latest journal and scanned it, looking for something. It didn’t take him long to find it.

  “Listen to this,” he said. “This is what Loor said to Bobby.” Mark read from the journal.“My mother explained that there are many territories, and they are all about to reach an important time. A ‘turning point’ she called it. It is a time when the outcome will either send the territory toward peace and prosperity, or plunge its people into chaos and destruction.”

  Courtney said, “Yeah, and if the Milago beat the Bedoowan then everything will be okay.”

  “I don’t think that’s it,” said Mark. “I think it’s all about tak. Think about it. The Milago have been slaves of the Bedoowan for centuries. If they fight them and lose, then it will be business as usual. But if the Milago tip the balance by using something as horrible as that explosive, then who knows what it could lead to?”

  “Then we’ve got to try and undo it!” countered Courtney.

  “How?” was Mark’s obvious question. “It’s not like we can go through the flumes. It doesn’t work for us, remember?”

  Courtney paced, her mind kicking into overdrive.

  “Then maybe we can send something to Bobby,” she said. “Like a…like a…”

  “Like a what?” shouted Mark. “We can’t send anything to him. It would only make things worse! The only thing we can do is—”

  Ding dong.Mark was interrupted by the doorbell. The two instantly fell silent.

  “You expecting somebody?” asked Courtney.

  “We skipped school today,” Mark said nervously. “Maybe they’re coming to check up on me.”

  The doorbell rang again.

  “L-Let’s hide,” said Mark.

  Courtney gave him a sarcastic look and said, “Hide? Gimme a break, I think we have bigger things to worry about than getting caught for skipping school. Answer the dumb door
.”

  Courtney was right, thought Mark. Who cared if they got busted for skipping school? Whoever was at the door he’d deal with them and get back to the bigger problem at hand. When he got downstairs, he hesitated a second and tried to look sick in case it really was somebody from school coming to check up on him. He gave a little sick cough and then called out with a weak voice, “I’m coming.”

  He got to the door, unlocked it, swung it open, and then shouted out, “Bobby!”

  Indeed, Bobby Pendragon was standing at the front door wearing the same clothes he had worn the night he disappeared. The Milago leather clothes were history.

  “Hey, Mark,” he said casually. “Can I come in?”

  Courtney came running down the stairs on a tear. “Bobby?” she shouted.

  Bobby stepped into Mark’s house and gave Courtney a little smile.

  “Miss me?” he said.

  Courtney grabbed him in a hug and Mark hugged the two of them together. Bobby was home. He was safe. Everything was going to be okay. When they finally pulled away from the group hug, Mark and Courtney looked at Bobby in disbelief. This was too good to be true. A few seconds ago they were worried about never seeing him again. Now here he was standing right in front of them. But Bobby looked different. Both Courtney and Mark noticed it. It was still Bobby, no doubt about that. But he looked tired, like he had gone through an ordeal that took a lot out of him.

  “Are you okay, man?” asked Mark. “You look kind of…sick.”

  “I’m not sick; I’m totally beat,” was Bobby’s answer. “I gotta lie down.”

  Mark and Courtney quickly led Bobby up the stairs to Mark’s bedroom. They watched him as he walked and saw that he was a little unsure on his feet. They also noticed streaks of blood on his cheeks that came from many tiny cuts all over his face. Obviously a lot had happened since they saw him leave through the flume on his way back to Denduron. To Mark and Courtney only a few hours had passed. But as they had already figured out, time here on Second Earth and time in the other territories weren’t relative. Bobby could have been gone for much longer than a few days for all they knew. Bobby looked as if he’d been through a war, but neither Mark nor Courtney wanted to ask him about it. They both figured that he’d tell them when he was ready. So without another word, they followed Bobby into Mark’s room and watched as he lay down on the bed.

  “I gotta get home,” said Bobby weakly. “But I want to rest up first. Is it okay?”

  “Absolutely,” answered Mark. “Whatever you want.”

  “Thanks, man,” said Bobby and put his head down on the pillow. Mark cringed, wondering how he was going to explain the streaks of blood on the white pillowcase to his mother. But then he felt bad for even thinking so selfishly and put the thought out of his head.

  “Will you guys come with me?” asked Bobby without opening his eyes.

  “Sure, Bobby,” answered Courtney. “Uh…where?”

  Bobby spoke weakly, as if he were nearly asleep. “To my house. Everybody must be going nuts looking for me. I’m gonna need you guys to help explain things.”

  Mark and Courtney exchanged looks. Both knew what the other was thinking. Bobby’s house wasn’t there anymore. His family had disappeared and along with them so had any history of the Pendragon family ever having existed. His parents, his sister, even his dog were just…gone. The police had launched an investigation to try and figure out what had happened to them, but so far they had come up empty.

  “Whatever it takes,” said Courtney. “We’ll be there for you.”

  Bobby smiled.

  Mark, on the other hand, was dying with curiosity. He didn’t want Bobby to nod off before finding out what happened on Denduron.

  “So tell us what happened!”

  Courtney gave Mark a punch in the arm.

  “Ow!” yelped Mark and grabbed his stinging arm.

  “Go to sleep, Bobby,” said Courtney. “Tell us later.”

  Bobby didn’t open his eyes, but he chuckled at his friend’s curiosity. “Oh yeah, I almost forgot,” he said while reaching up to his shirt. He unbuttoned a few buttons, reached his hand in and pulled out a roll of parchment paper.

  “It’s all there,” he said fading fast. “Everything that happened since I wrote last. Wake me up when you’re finished.”

  That was the last thing he said. Bobby was in dreamland, the roll of parchment paper still in his hand. Mark glanced to Courtney, hesitated a moment, then took the precious journal. Courtney took the folded-up comforter from the bottom of Mark’s bed and laid it gently over Bobby, right up to his chin. This was probably the first time he had slept in a bed in a long time and she wanted to make sure he was as safe and comfortable as possible. Then the two of them walked quietly to the far side of the room.

  “Should we go downstairs and leave him alone?” whispered Mark.

  “No,” was Courtney’s reply. “Nothing we could do would wake him up now.”

  Mark nodded. He didn’t want to leave either. He slipped the familiar leather twine off the rolled-up scroll and opened it enough to read the very first line.

  “Journal Number Four?” asked Courtney.

  “Journal Number Four,” answered Mark.

  The two sat down next to each other on the floor and began to read the final chapter in Bobby’s adventure.

  Journal #4

  Denduron

  Ican’t believe I’m still alive. At least I think I’m still alive. Every muscle, every bone, every hair follicle I’ve got is sore as hell, which pretty much tells me I’m still among the living. As I write this final journal to you guys, I’ve still got one major task ahead of me before I can come home. But right now I don’t even feel like moving. Even the effort of pushing this pen across the paper is painful. I’m going to try and rest up, write this journal, and then get myself psyched for the final push.

  As hurting as my body is, it’s just as painful to remember the events of the past few days. But I’ve got to do it and write it all down because once it’s on the page, I’m going to do my level best to forget it all.

  I should warn you that some of the things I’m going to write about I didn’t see for myself. It has been an incredible few days and there was no way I could be everywhere at once to see it all. But I’ll do my best to re-create those events in my journal as accurately as possible based on what others have told me. I don’t have a problem doing this because I’m sure everything they described is true. So sit down, take a breath, and hold on. It’s going to be a wild ride.

  I finished my last journal right after we rescued Uncle Press, then got recaptured by the people whom we thought were our friends—the Milago. Their leader, Rellin, showed us the huge bomb of tak they planned on using to vaporize the Bedoowan. There is something you should understand here. The Milago are not our enemies, but they were afraid we would try to stop them from using that nasty weapon. And they were right. If they exploded that bad boy, the destruction would be horrible. If we could stop them, we would. So we were in the weird position of being friendly enemies.

  They brought us back to the hospital hut I’d been to a few times and locked us up with guards at the door. They said that as soon as the battle was over, they’d let us go. Great. If they detonated that bomb, there wouldn’t be any placeleft for us to go. So the four of us—me, Uncle Press, Loor, and Alder—were prisoners again.

  As soon as we entered the hut, Uncle Press looked around quickly. “Osa isn’t here,” he said. “She must be in hiding.”

  Uh-oh. We hadn’t gotten the chance to tell Uncle Press what had happened to her. I also realized that Osa’s body wasn’t there any longer.

  “What happened?” he asked quickly.

  Loor pointed to me and said, “She was killed while protecting him from the Bedoowan knights.”

  Perfect. As if I didn’t have enough guilt going on at the moment, she had to remind me about my part in Osa’s death. I guess I couldn’t be angry with her. Osa was her mother. She deserved to
be angry. But I wished she didn’t have to lay all of the blame on me. Mallos and the Bedoowan knights had a little something to do with it too.

  We all looked to Uncle Press for his reaction. It was a strange one. Rather than show any sign of grief, he simply nodded as if the news of Osa’s death were nothing more than a simple fact to file away. I think he realized that the three of us were taking it harder than that, because he put his hand on Loor’s shoulder and said, “Don’t be sad. This is the way it was meant to be.”

  That was exactly what Osa said just before she died. Was that some sort of Traveler motto? If so, it was a lousy one. It didn’t make me feel any better, and I doubted if it helped Loor at all.