D. MacHale - The Merchant of Death

After I finish writing this journal, I’m going to put down some instructions on a separate piece of parchment. That way you can keep it with you. I think you should keep my journal separate and in a safe place. Osa was right. It’s important that I write down everything that’s going on. If I never get back, these words are the only record of what happened to me. Treat them like gold, buddy.

I don’t know if it’s fair of me to ask you to do this. I’m beginning to think that I don’t deserve it. If you can’t help, I’ll understand. No harm, no foul. I’m still going to do what I have to do anyway. I’m not even sure if the help I’m asking for will do any good. I’m winging it here. The real wild card is Loor. She may not give me a chance, and without her help the odds are going to be really against me. But you know, it doesn’t matter. One way or another, with or without her, I’ve made up my mind.

Tomorrow I’m going after Uncle Press.

END OF JOURNAL #2.

Second Earth

Courtney finished Bobby’s second amazing journaland placed it down on the table. Mark had finished a few minutes earlier and was already looking over the additional piece of parchment paper that Bobby had included with his latest missive. It took a while for her to say anything. The story contained on the pages from Bobby was getting more fantastic with each new paragraph, and she had to let it sink in. Finally she looked at Mark and asked, “What does he want you to do?”

Mark stood up and paced Courtney’s dad’s workshop as his mind tried to work its way around the task at hand. On the additional piece of parchment, Bobby had outlined a job for Mark to do that was fairly simple, yet still dangerous.

“It’s a list,” explained Mark. “He wants me to put together a bunch of stuff and get it to him.”

Courtney grabbed the paper and looked over the list. “Get it to him?” she exclaimed. “How?”

Mark grabbed the list back and shook it at her. “Th-That’s the hard part,” he declared nervously. “He wrote out instructions. First I’m supposed to try and use the ring the way Osa did. But if that doesn’t work, which it shouldn’t because I’m not a Traveler, then he wants me to find the gate to the flume in the subway station.”

“You mean the abandoned subway in the Bronx with the killer dogs?” asked Courtney in disbelief. “That’s like…suicide.”

“Y-Yeah, tell me about it,” Mark exclaimed.

Courtney and Mark fell silent. It was a dangerous favor that Bobby was asking.

Finally Courtney asked, “But you’re gonna do it, right?”

“Of course!” Mark answered quickly, as if he were insulted that she even had to ask. “You think I’d blow off my best friend? Gimme a break.”

“Then I’m going with you,” said Courtney without a hint of doubt.

“N-No way,” said Mark quickly.

“Yeah way!” Courtney shot back. “You need somebody to cover your butt.”

“Who’ll coveryour butt?”

“I can cover my own butt,” said Courtney with her usual cockiness.

It was hard to argue with that. Courtneycould cover her own butt. But Mark doubted that she ever had to do it in a place like the badlands of the South Bronx against a pack of vicious quig-dogs and a demon killer by the name of Saint Dane. No, he was pretty sure Courtney hadn’t encountered that particular challenge before. But then again, he didn’t want to do this alone. The idea terrified him. He thought over the dilemma for a good five seconds and then asked, “You sure you want to help?”

“Absolutely,” she said as she grabbed Bobby’s list back. She looked it over and then announced. “I get why he wants some of this stuff…a flashlight, a watch…but what’s he gonna do with a CD player?”

“You’re asking me like I should know?” Mark said sarcastically. “None of this makes any sense to me.”

Courtney scanned the list again and then said, “Uh-oh, he wants some stuff from his house.”

“Yeah, I saw that,” said Mark. “But I can substitute other things.”

This raised another tough issue. Courtney threw a sober stare at Mark and said, “If we can get things to Bobby, that means we can tell him his family disappeared.”

Mark had to think about this. Courtney’s instincts were right. Bobby had to know what was going on, even though they didn’t really know themselves. The only thing they knew for certain was that the Pendragons had vanished.

“Bobby should know,” said Mark cautiously while still working out his thoughts. “But not yet. There’s nothing he can do about it now.”

“But it’s his family,” countered Courtney.

“I know,” said Mark. “But so is Uncle Press. I don’t know what Bobby’s got planned, but he has a shot at saving his uncle. I’m not sure there’s anything he could do here to help find his family.”

Courtney realized that Mark was right. Bobby needed to do what he had to do on Denduron. There would be plenty of time after that to find his family. Besides, the police were already working on the case. What more could Bobby do?

“We’ll tell him after he’s back for good,” said Mark with finality.

“And what if he doesn’t come back for good?” asked Courtney. “Mark, I think we should tell our parents what’s going on.”

“N-No! We can’t!” shouted Mark.

“Why? Maybe they can help!” said Courtney hopefully. “It would be much safer if weall went to the subway with the stuff! Right?”

Mark really wanted to agree. He wanted to dump this all on an adult who had more authority than he had. But he felt certain he knew what would happen if they did. He chose his words carefully and said, “Courtney, I’d love to tell our parents and get their help and go to this subway station with Captain Hirsch and armed cops from the Stony Brook Police. But you know what would happen if we told them? They’d stop us. They’d probably lock us up. Then they’d all sit around and try to logically figure out what’s going on and by the time they came to any decisions it could be too late for Bobby…and for Press.”

Courtney let Mark’s words sink in. The guy was kind of a dweeb, but he was a smart dweeb. If they told their parents it would be all over. They had to do this on their own. Mark quickly gathered up the parchment papers and started rolling them up.

“We can get this stuff together in a couple hours,” he said. “The trick will be to sneak out without our parents knowing-”

“Whoa, whoa,” interrupted Courtney. “You’re not thinking of doing this tonight, are you?”

“Well, why not?” said Mark innocently.

Courtney spoke to Mark slowly and deliberately, as if he were a child. She wanted him to understand exactly what she was saying. “This is important,” she said. “But by the time we get this stuff together it’ll be dark and something tells me that going where we have to go isn’t too safe after dark.”

This made Mark think. They were headed into a rough part of town and rough parts of town got rougher after dark. They definitely had a better chance of pulling this off in the daylight. It was more important to get it done than to get it done fast.

“You’re right,” said Mark. “I’m not thinking straight.”

“Yeah, you are,” said Courtney. “You’re just excited. Let’s split the list, get the stuff, and then meet back here tomorrow morning.”

That made sense. Tomorrow would be the day. Courtney searched for a piece of paper and a pen so she could write them each their own list. She picked up the piece of parchment paper with Bobby’s instructions and looked at the yellowed paper with the blotchy writing for a long time. Mark could see that something else was on her mind. He waited for her to pull her thoughts together. Finally Courtney turned to Mark and asked, “What was she like?”