D. MacHale - The Merchant of Death

“Mallos isn’t there,” said Uncle Press. “My guess is he’s on a horse riding as fast as he can to get as far away from here as possible.”

Indeed, Mallos was nowhere to be seen. That was further proof that everything was happening according to his plan.

And that’s when it hit me.

“I…I’ve got an idea,” I said without even thinking. Even as I said it I was still working it through my head, calculating the possibilities and the chances of it working.

Uncle Press and Loor looked at me, but I didn’t respond to them at first. I still had to work things out.

“Don’t take your time, Bobby,” said Uncle Press. “We don’t have much.”

“Okay, okay,” I said nervously. “There might be a way, but if it doesn’t work, we’re all dead.”

“We are all dead anyway,” said Loor.

Good point. I looked down to the stadium and realized that I was about to volunteer to do something crazy. If I did it, I’d probably die. If I didn’t do it, we’ddefinitely die. Probably was better than definitely.

“I think I know how to stop this party,” I said with as much confidence as I could muster, which wasn’t much. Before I said another word, two more chimes sounded and the crowd fell silent. Rellin and the miners stood next to their wicked gift. Queen Kagan dropped her roast and leaned over the railing to look down on them.

“Tell me what it is you’ve brought me!” she shouted greedily.

If we were going to do something, now was the time.

Denduron

“Good day, Queen Kagan!” shouted Rellin from the center of the stadium field.

This was probably the first time a Milago miner had addressed a Bedoowan monarch. Ever. It was probably going to be the last. Rellin had everyone’s attention in the stadium. I hoped that he had a lot to say, because if he decided to keep it short and reach for the bomb button, my plan had no chance of working. But if he took this opportunity to say what was on his mind and make some kind of grand political statement for the history books, then maybe we’d have a chance.

For my plan to work, we each had a different task.

Unfortunately my job was probably the most dangerous. It’s not that I wanted the most dangerous task, but it was the only job I was capable of pulling off. Lucky me.

I quickly told my idea to Uncle Press and Loor. They didn’t even stop to discuss it. The time for debate was over and since nobody had any better ideas, my plan was a “go.” The plan called for the three of us to split up. Before we had the chance to share a “good luck” or a “good-bye,” Loor was off and running. Typical. Uncle Press didn’t run off as quickly. He stayed long enough to give me this look of unclelike concern. I felt like I needed to say something important, but the only thing that came to mind was, “I really wish you had let me go to that basketball game.” Okay, maybe not the most eloquent last words, but it was how I felt.

Uncle Press smiled and said, “No, you don’t.” Then he took off running.

I hesitated a moment because, well, I was scared. But I also had to think about what Uncle Press just said. Sure, if I had gone to that basketball game I wouldn’t be lying here facing certain death. But that’s not where my head went. This is going to be hard to explain because I’m not really sure I understand it myself, but as dire as the situation was, it somehow felt right. Believe me, it’s not like I was having fun or anything. Far from it. But when I took a few seconds to do a gut check, I got the strange feeling that this was the right place, no, theonly place for me to be. What was that Traveler motto? “This is the way it was meant to be.” Okay, stupid motto, but it really felt to me as if this is the way it was meant to be. I don’t mean to make this sound any more dramatic than it was, but the word that came to my mind right then was “destiny.” Maybe this was my destiny. Now I could only hope that I’d get the chance to play a basketball game again sometime. But that wouldn’t happen if I didn’t get moving. So I jumped up and ran to do my part of the plan.

As I ran along the top of the stadium, I wasn’t worried about getting caught because all eyes were focused on Rellin. It must have been amazing for the Bedoowan people to see this Milago miner addressing their queen. It was a spectacle that never would have happened if Mallos hadn’t orchestrated it. I guess that’s the kind of thing Uncle Press was talking about when he said that Mallos never did any of his own dirty work. He said how Mallos would influence others to do it for him. Well, Rellin was definitely about to do some dirty work, courtesy of Mallos.

“People of Denduron,” Rellin continued. “I come before you today with a gift that is more valuable than you can imagine.”

It seemed as if Rellin was indeed about to give a speech. That was good. Hopefully he was long-winded because I had no idea how much time it would take to pull off my plan.

“My gift is more valuable than the glaze you see before you,” he bellowed. “It is more valuable than all the glaze that has ever been taken from the mines. It is the gift of a wonderful future, and it is forall the good people of Denduron to share.”

Was this guy dramatic or what? Well, why not? He wasn’t planning on being around long enough to hear any bad reviews. This was his moment in the spotlight. Keep going Rellin, I thought, make it good and long.

As I ran I saw that Loor and Uncle Press had already managed to pull off the first part of their jobs. They had each snuck up on a Bedoowan knight from behind, whacked them and taken their armor. They needed to wear the armor so they could make their way down to the stadium field without being noticed. That’s why I gave them the jobs I did. There was no way I was going to knock out a knight and steal his armor. And even if by some miracle I was able to do that, I was too small. If I put on the armor I’d look like a little kid wearing his daddy’s clothes.

No, I had another job and I knew exactly where I had to go. It was only yesterday that I had been there. At the time I swore never to go near the place again but here I was, headed right back. It only took me a few minutes to get there. I was pretty fast, so running three hundred yards was nothing. But as I approached my destination I had a moment’s hesitation. I thought that maybe if I ran fast enough and far enough, I could survive the blast from the tak bomb. But that thought lasted only about a nanosecond. There was no way I was going to bail on the plan.

At this point it wasn’t even the bomb I was afraid of. That’s because I had arrived at my destination: the horrible hole that looked down into the dark depths of the quig pens.

Yup, if my plan was going to work, I was going to have to climb down there and make my way to the stadium through a minefield of hungry quigs. And I didn’t have my trusty whistle to protect me either. This could hurt. I stood on the edge of the hole trying to get the nerve to climb down. The rope ladder was in a heap at the bottom of the hole, right where it had fallen yesterday. But the thick rope that Loor had climbed to make her escape was still hanging there. That was my ticket down. I had to stop worrying and kick myself into gear because Rellin could hit that button at any second. So I grabbed the rope, swung my legs over, and slid down the rope into the pit of hell.

When I got to the bottom the first thing that hit me was the smell. It was as nasty as I had remembered it. Then I realized I had landed in a puddle of some kind of thick brown goo. I realized what it was and I nearly barfed. It was a congealed pool of blood from the quig that Uncle Press had skewered. I fought back the rising puke and quickly looked around. The injured quig wasn’t there. Maybe it was dead. Better still, maybe it had been eaten by the other quigs. Can you believe this was the way my mind was working now?