Chapter 12: Chapter 12: The Chase

Will was pouting. No, Will didn’t pout, he brooded. Will was brood pouting. He had blank face number three in place, the pouty brood. Chleo wondered for the millionth time why her mom was forcing him to discover his Twist on his own. She had a reason. She always did, but Chleo couldn’t help but question it. Her mom wasn’t infallible, and she wondered if all it was really worth blank face number three.

It was something to ponder later. At the moment, there were more important things to deal with, like the D.I.M. wagons up the walkway and the woman sitting across from them. Chleo bit her cheek. They needed to get away.

There were three, maybe four, more turns before they hit the main road. The open space would allow the driver to speed up, and they would lose their chance to jump out.

She needed a way to tell Will… or she could use the same technique she’d used to escape the watering hole last summer…

Randy Putter, the son of the town’s metalsmith and rich enough to think his common blood ran royal, was offended his little sister had to share the river with a relo. Embarrassed and wanting to avoid the scene he was making as he yelled at her from the bridge, Chleo started to wade out to the bank.

There was a commotion, a surprised shout, and a splash. When she looked up, Putter was sputtering to the surface still wearing his day jacket, his top hat slowly drifting down river. Will stood in Putter’s place, his hands in his pockets with a smug grin on his face.

A few of the adults grabbed him and Chleo and made them sit near the trees to wait for the Patrol. Will apologized to her. She laughed and assured him Putter’s face was worth spending a night in a crowded cell.

As the Patrol wagons pulled across the bridge and the adults were distracted trying to wave them down, Chleo had grabbed Will’s arm and took off into the shrubs. Ol’ Man Jimmy let them hide out in his orchard for the evening in exchange for harvesting five boxes of apples each.

Chleo’s hand tightened around Will’s elbow. Grab and run. It had worked before. It would work again. The wagon rounded the last bend. They would need to jump soon. The mouth of the walkway appeared, planetlight spilling through the opening.

Chleo moved into a crouch. Will noticed, following her without prompting rocking into a crouch at her side. They were almost there.

Suddenly, the driver hit the steam. They barreled forward out of the trees at top speed. Only Chleo’s hand on Will’s elbow kept her from falling over. Once they were in the open, she saw why.

Three more D.I.M. wagons blocked their path. She’d never seen so many agents gathered in one place. Two to a wagon, every man was standing pistols drawn, their trench coats swirling at their feet.

“Eelock, to the right,” Merk shouted. The driver angled them to the right, blowing through a shrub and past the roadblock. Chleo watched as one of the agents held a whistle to his lips and blew.

She flinched. It was the same whistle agent Miles had used back at the Shack. The sound echoed after them as Eelock pushed the wagon faster.

Chleo wasn’t sure which to fear more, the wagons chasing them or the one she was in. She wished they had her board. It would have given them the perfect escape.

Back at the Shack, the relief she had felt when the hooded figure appeared seemed like a lifetime ago. When losing a hand or a foot was her biggest worry, the figure’s interference felt like a gift. Chleo scoffed at herself as they rattled over a bump. How often did Luna give her a gift that didn’t bite back?

Once, Putter gave her candy. She was on a metal run for her mom, the shop needed a new batch for gears, watch covers, and the like. Putter acted the consummate gentleman. It should have been her first clue. Instead, she took the candy he offered, freshly stamped with Sugar Shoppe’s logo, and shared a smile as she popped it into her mouth.

Her tongue was swollen for a month. It took years for him to stop mimicking her garbled speech every time he saw her.

Then there was the barmaid's bonfire. On a visit with Minnie, Chleo overheard one of the barmaids, Bonnie, talking about a bonfire at the swimming hole. It sounded fun and Chleo found herself lingering a little too long by the door. Bonnie caught her eye and smiled, asking if she wanted to come. At the time, Chleo thought she was being kind. She rushed home to get her chores done early.

Will would have talked her out of it, but she hadn’t known him at the time. She went.

The fire was the only thing there when she arrived. Disappointed, thinking they’d already finished, she turned to go.

“Finally,” an annoyingly accurate impersonation of her swollen tongue mishap stopped her. “We thought you’d never show.”

Chleo spun around. Outlined by the fire, Putter and Bonnie stood backed by a group of boys from town. They laughed as they circled her. She was trapped.

Putter turned to Bonnie and handed her a few coins. “Here you are, dear,” he said, returning to his cheap imitation of a high-born's lilt. She shot Chleo a vaguely apologetic look before rushing off.

“Tell me relo-rat, have you ever been to a bonfire?”

She refused to answer.

“I’ll take that as a no.” The circle of boys laughed. “At bonfires people tell scary stories. Would you like that?”

“I’d like to go home,” she said, struggling to keep her voice even.

“Such manners,” he scolded. “I understand you must not practice them often, but do try to dust them off when in my presence. When someone invites you to an event, a civilized person accepts.”

“And you’d know all about that, would you? Civility?” she asked.

A set of arms grabbed her from behind. Apparently not. She kicked, punched, and scratched as they dragged her toward the fire. If she wrestled away from one boy, another took his place. There were too many.

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They shoved her against a post they’d driven into the ground and forced her hands behind her back. Rope bit into her wrists before it wrapped around her chest. It squeezed until the post dug into her back. She yelled. She fought. It didn’t help. She was stuck.

“Are you quite finished?” Putter asked as she tried to catch her breath. “Good, now listen carefully, this is important.”

She glared. The heat from the fire drew beads of sweat from her forehead.

“There are creatures in these woods.” He tied her to a poll so he could tell her there were animals in the woods? “No,” he said rolling his eyes. She was scared and stressed. Of course, she was thinking out loud. Chleo tapped her head back against the post annoyed at herself.

“I tied you to a poll so I could use you as bait.” She snapped her eyes back to his feeling them widen. He smiled and moved closer. “It’s a specific creature. It stalks the night searching for fresh meat. Some say it doesn’t bother to kill its prey first, just throws it straight on the fire or takes bites while it squirms.” Putter let his eyes wander. His tongue flicked out as if to taste her. “They say its favorite prey are unsuspecting humans. It could pass as one of us if not for its glowing skin.” He paused lifting a lock of hair from her cheek. “They are not from Luna.” He pushed it behind her ear. “Like you.” He laughed and took a step back.

“Beware, the Neon, dear Chleo.”

The sound of her name was jarring. He’d never once used it, not even Mathews. It was always relo-rat.

“Leave her,” Putter said. “We’ll hide in the trees and wait. Tonight we bag a Neon, boys.”

Cheers went up around the fire. She watched several of them pull pistols from their jackets. A couple fitted monocles into their eyes before melting into the forest’s shadows. She hoped it would help them aim. Eaten by some nightmarish creature cooked up in a mad biologist’s lab or shot by foolish boys playing hunter, what a way to go.

Chleo considered begging. Putter was still standing in front of her. Maybe she could reason with him. Her desperation must have shown. His eyes trailed over her face as he laughed. He turned and sauntered away. Putter was the worst.

She wasn’t sure how long she stood tied to the post. The dying fire spat an occasional flame in her direction. She clung to them like child would their favorite blanket, her only shield from the bitter nighttime chill. Her head nodded as she fought sleep. If she was to become some beast’s dinner, she refused to make it easy.

The gravel crunched. Her head shot up, eyes straining against the darkness. Was it the creature?

No, Putter said it glowed. Still, she fought the ropes as the sound came closer. It seemed to gain speed as it went.

Suddenly, Minnie rushed into the light a hand over her mouth in disbelief. Chleo let out a sob of relief.

Minnie never said how she knew to go looking, but Chleo never saw Bonnie step foot in Joe’s again. During the next few days, she looked for all the information she could about Neons. Her parents were quiet on the subject, but the townsfolk were ripe with stories. She determined to never go out at night again.

Chleo could think of a hundred other examples of times she found some kind of horror hidden behind a mockery of kindness. She should have known better. Luna truly was the worst.

The wagon was nearing the river when the first D.I.M. agent caught up. With the driving lamps unlit, Eelock hit another rock. The wagon creaked and jarred as a tangy, charred smell lay thick on the breeze. The Pits were close.

Chleo’s hand reached up to touch the small burn on her shoulder.

A shot rang out, the bullet pinging off the back panel. Everyone ducked. Eelock swerved. Bullets began peppering them on all sides.

“Mic, some of your wonderful, little surprises would be welcome, right about now,” she heard Merk mumble. The hooded woman looked at him with a put-upon sigh and crossed the wagon to sit next to her. Chleo leaned closer to Will.

A blast sounded as one of the wagons flipped in a white hot flash. Chleo was momentarily blinded. Her eyes squeezed shut as another went off. She heard the metal crunch as the second wagon flipped. Her ears strained listening to the third whir and hiss closer.

Merk whooped. “Way to go Mic,” he cheered.

The woman beside Chleo rolled her eyes under her hood, shooting Merk a good natured smile. “Let’s just hope this doesn’t end like that time at the Horn.”

“What was wrong with the time at the Horn?” Merk asked, looking like he couldn’t understand how anyone could possibly derive something negative from it.

The woman snorted and let it drop, grabbing the rail as they veered around another corner.

The river was close. Chleo blinked around the bright spot filling her vision. The third wagon drove close enough to bump them. Eelock spun them around the curve, chunks of dirt rained into the bed from where he scraped the cliff. The road narrowed, shear rock reaching up to their right and dropping off to their left. The river roared in the gulch below.

They hit a bump. The wagon pitched. The hooded woman reached for her.

It was a reaction, Chleo couldn’t have controlled it if she’d wanted to. The woman reached and Chleo kicked like a panicked horse facing a viper. The next thing she knew the wagon was gone.

With a detached fascination, she watched it teeter above her on the edge of the cliff. It balanced then fell back onto four wheels as she fell. She spotted Will’s blank face in the back watching her straining over the side as Merk held him in place. It was blank face number one… fear. Then, even he was out of sight and all she was left with was rushing wind, the hooded woman falling above her, and an angry river below waiting to swallow them both whole.

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