~

Chapter Forty-eight

~

“That ain’t a mirage either,” Jam mumbled.

I could see that. Must have been a thousand of ’em. More than that. And they were between us and the community’s gate. They were riled. Doubted Jam could make out the nasty thin’s on the signs they were wavin’, and I wasn’t gonna read ’em to him—Trolls really ought to embrace spectacles. Lots of humans wear ’em. My mama taught me not to have the kinds of thin’s on those signs in my mouth. These weren’t just concerned folk. These were folk who wanted to kill giants.

I pressed myself against the wall next to the sidewalk. To make myself small? Wouldn’t help much.

“Jeez,” Jam muttered.

A speaker system blared, encouragin’ a rant. And it wasn’t, we love giants. The crowd exploded, and the speaker hit the high notes again. The crowd went nuts again.

“We can’t go through that,” Jam said.

Never knew trolls like to state the obvious. I asked for suggestions. “Back way?”

“Nice back entrance, connected to the West Coast Highway. Arches and columns just like the front. But a good twenty mile drive to get around these folk.”

No Internet, no Ride Share app. I would’ve been good with a human-sized coupe even. Jam could curl up in the trunk, or hold on to the top.

“Think they’ll go away when it gets dark?” I asked. The sun already edged the top of the city wall. Jam’s as bad at estimatin’ distance as Nuel.

Jam grunted. In my little mind, hmm is maybe. A grunt is, never in yar life. But hidin’ til dark was the only option comin’ to me. I looked around. On this sidewalk we stood out like huge zits on an actress doin’ a closeup, even if we were on a six-lane boulevard. On a normal day it was probably full of traffic. Not so much today. Like none. Hadn’t seen a car pass us the last two miles we walked.

“We gotta get out of sight,” Jam said.

Mr. obvious, but the highway was lined with an eight-foot-high block wall on both sides. Okay, we could make it over ’em but right into neighborhoods that wouldn’t be invitin’ to our kind. No businesses to our left or right. No gas stations. No nothin’. A shady knoll would be handy.

“I think we’ve been seen,” Jam said.

“I thought ya trolls are half-blind,” I hissed.

He pointed. Yep. There was quite the crowd headin’ toward us. Nearsighted, not halfblind. “Think we can make the corner and head into the brush?” Seemed like there was some scrub north and south. I hoped there’d be brush. This wasn’t the desert. Anythin’ to hide behind would be nice, even if we are hundreds of miles away from the nearest forest.

Us to the end of the wall, to the crowd, was about even distance. We needed to make up our minds quickly. And I saw no benefit of runnin’ away from the troll city. I jolted into a sprint, for an ogre, and hissed at Jam not to worry about me, “Just run.” ’Cause I knew he could run faster than me. We ogres are big, muscular. Not meant for speed. Never, ever win a world record on the track. Built to tire out a muskox in a wrestle, not outrun ’em.

With the distance between us and ’em shortenin’, it became more obvious we didn’t want to mess with that mob. They weren’t just holdin’ placards on sticks, but toted bats, lengths of pipe, and yep. There were more than a few guns.

A few of those words Mama told me she’d beat me for usin’ may have been slippin’ out of my mouth. “Faster, faster,” Jam shouted at me. My round, chubby ogre butt would never run faster than this.

Ten feet from the end of the wall I heard a few loud pops. And a bunch more as the wall angled to our right. Maybe Jam was irritated that I didn’t make a tighter corner, but I was doin’ the best I could. There’s a reason I hated PE. And it wasn’t because I was the coach’s pet.

Jam ran beside me, between me and the mob, fool tryin’ to protect me from the increasin’ number of pops. Chips flew off the block wall to my right. My feet stumbled on the uneven ground, slowin’ my chubby ogre butt even more. “Faster, faster,” Jam shouted.

The community we skirted reached westerly, in a zag I hadn’t noticed. I reset my trajectory, which forced me to veer closer to the folk I didn’t want to meet.

“Ain’t gonna make it,” Jam gushed. “Ain’t gonna make it.”

There were a lot more loud pops now. We crossed into clumps of shrubs that blocked my view of ’em. How could we use that? Nothin’ good came to me. Jam was shoutin’ at me to run faster, as though he couldn’t figger out ogres aren’t track stars.

“When we meet ’em,” Jam huffed, “don’t slow down. Plow through ’em.”

“Why aren’t ya runnin’ way up there?” I hissed. “Don’t wait for me.”

“I ain’t missin’ out on my bonus,” he said.

I don’t know what kind of joke he was goin’ for but it wasn’t workin’. We cleared the current slash of cover and a tangle of humans blocked us in, about fifty yards away. “Keep goin’,” Jam shouted, and veered left.

There went my troll protector. Somethin’ inside my brain told me I should’ve gone with him. A fear stretched across my chest, or maybe it was the lack of oxygen. Maybe they feel a lot the same. I sure could use a helicopter with a mini-gun about now. Never learned what a mini-gun is. A stretch of scrub hid Jam from me now. Then it didn’t. What? What was he carryin’?

A stinkin’ street barricade, a good six feet across, like the saw horses Grandpa uses in his shop, but bigger. He was swingin’ it, and growlin’ somethin’ fierce. Maybe the mob slowed down a bit. He hit the leadin’ edge and humans flew in the air, and then I lost sight of him.

I entered my own fray, the edge he didn’t clear. I grasped onto the first idjit I struck and used him as a batterin’ ram. He looked a little surprised. We locked eyes for a brief moment, but I was havin’ to do a little leapin’ over fallen-over fools, so I quickly stopped worryin’ about him.

The pipes and bats bouncin’ off my shoulders, back, and head kept my mind pretty focused. But my brain did note they hurt. A lot.

At least those pops and booms had stopped. At least slowed down.

I cleared my thread of idjits about the same time Jam broke out ahead and to my left. Ah, stink. Then the pops began in earnest.

~

Nuel

~

“Don’t go out in public,” Ike’s text read. “Appears it’s gettin’ bad out there.”

I replied, “Ya shoulda told yar cuz that hours ago.”

Didn’t expect he’d take long to respond. But he seemed to think about it a moment. “Why?”

“He left. Headed for the western troll community with Jam.”

“Left, as in left ya behind?”

I nodded. Then texted him, “Yep.”

“Well. Then. Stay safe.”

I waited. That was it? He wasn’t gonna add to that, the jerk? I waited. Pa stared at me. He asked, “What?”

But I was checkin’ to see if by miracle my app would connect. But no connection. No news. No Internet. A month ago that would have seemed impossible. Pa repeated his what.

“Ike said it’s gettin’ bad out. Not to go out.”

Pa nodded. I guess he was choosin’ to be a bull of few words.

I waited. Seemed somethin’ should be goin’ through my brain, but there was nothin’ but a lot of white noise. If Kriz got killed, it’d be my fault. That was certain.

“Not yar fault,” Pa said.

“Of course not. They made their own decision.”

He nodded.

And there was nothin’ I could do about it. And Ike wasn’t curious enough to ask why Kriz left. Left without me. Could probably guess that I finally sent him over the edge. Ike would say Kriz’ death wasn’t my fault, but he’d feel it. We would be done. Probably done anyway. Darshee and Wizper would have been happy to tell me that.

“Fix ya somethin’?” Pa asked.

I thought back to that day in the atrium. The troll had said somethin’ about an upset ogre could always use a snack. My eyes glistened. Am I really such a bad ogre?

I traveled to the Hamlet to be with Ike, wanted to be there to support him. Be where he was makin’ decisions. Or did I want the power that billowed around him? Had I turned psychotic, seein’ what Kriz and Ike were capable of accomplishin’? Wanted to be part of that?

And I criticized it all. Threw it into Kriz’ face.