Ogreness, Black Lake-book5

Chapter 47
~

“Hey, boss.” Ponwr didn’t turn around. Stared ahead at the traffic. “You ever read Dale Carnegie?”

Great. Now a troll wanted to school me on socially significant behavior. I told him I never heard of ’im.

“He was a human dude, a while back, wrote about—”

“His tenants were part of the curriculum in management school,” I said.

“So you opt for a different approach, huh?” Ponwr mumbled.

“Just drive.” I could sense Nuel smilin’ beside me.

“Think we’ll make it to the airport without getting shot again?” Frip asked.

“You didn’t get shot,” Ponwr said.

“I know how to duck. I should teach Ike to duck, huh?”

I pulled my phone out to go through some messages. I didn’t need to be harassed by trolls.

“So, humans really don’t believe in fairies?” Ponwr asked. “I didn’t know that, and I was born up here.”

“They’re real?” Frip asked.

Ponwr shrugged. With two bullets in his chest, that should hurt.

“We’re taught in school they’re fantasy.” Nuel spoke too softly to be talkin’ to the trolls in the front.

“To what purpose?” I asked Nuel.

She remained silent for a ten count, then she shrugged. “To keep the Range from sounding special?”

It occurred to me we’d missed a conversation. “Are ya flyin’ out with us?”

“Uh, no. Why should I, uh—”

I waited for her to figger out her own thoughts. But after a minute I gave up. I’m only so patient. “Ogreware can always use a network guru. Ya can bring yar parents—”

“It's just my papa,” she said.

Should I ask? “Brothers? Sisters?” I prompted, instead.

She shook her head. I couldn’t see a single thing holdin’ her back.

“So I can sit around and wait for your phone call?” she murmured. “Like Darshee and Wizper?”

Why was she makin’ this about us? Her world is at a turnin’ point. The mass exodus I expected, would leave anyone stayin’ behind an easier target.

If I was half-way smart, maybe I’d be able to figger out what she wanted me to say. We only met a little more than a week ago. She wasn’t lookin’ for some kind of commitment, right? We’ve, we’re, almost strangers. Just found out she had almost no family.

Ponwr was noddin’ to his phone which he had pressed against his head. When he pulled it away, I caught his glance in the rearview mirror. “Hate to interrupt. Is there something wrong with your phone?”

I looked back down. I had started to bring up my texts, but the list was empty.

“Your papa called me,” Ponwr said.

My contacts worked. I pulled up papa and pressed, Dial. A five note tone preceded a message about a network issue.

“They’re blocking your account,” Nuel gushed.

“They can do that?” I mumbled.

Ponwr cleared his throat. “Your papa says not to head for the airport. They’re waiting for us. There’s a warrant out, for the murder of the guy who shot you yesterday.”

“Are ya kiddin’ me?” He didn’t have to nod. I meant it rhetorically.

“A long way to drive,” Frip said. “The direct route would be no good. Single highway south, if they’re crazy enough to blame you for, you know, they’re likely to set up a road block.”

“Where can we take ya?” I asked Nuel.

“Police took her name yesterday,” Frip said. “She might not be safe either.”

“This is insane,” I said.

“Lots of rumors imply it isn’t a first,” Frip said.

“What’s not a first?” Nuel rasped.

“Hiding blatant persecution by blaming the persecuted.”

“I crushed a human’s head yesterday,” Ponwr said just above the noise of the traffic. “They find me, no one will ever hear from me again.”

“Any of us,” Frip said.

“If you’re trying to scare me to get your jollies,” Nuel roared, “It isn’t gonna work.”

“No jollies.” Ponwr’s dreads flowed back and forth.

“Maybe Zug—”

Frip headed me off. “We can’t pull anyone else in this, especially the chief, unless things get really bad.”

I asked, “Why especially Zug?” And what’s the definition of, really bad?

Frip and Ponwr shared a long gaze, before Ponwr checked back into the traffic. Frip explained slowly that Zug had been under a magnifyin’ glass for a while. He felt they were looking for any reason to fire him, or better.

“I’m not one to believe in conspiracies,” I drawled.

“Can you believe in rampant corruption driven by a warped ideology?”

No. Not to this extent. But I didn’t say that. There are people here that don’t believe in fairies of all things. Just because I’m naive, doesn’t mean I’m gonna speak up and look like an idjit.

“You don’t think I’m safe?” Nuel asked the trolls. I guess she wasn’t trustin’ my belief system. Smart hen.

“You have a nosey neighbor,” Frip asked, “who might have noticed if a lot of unusual interest was being shown at your place?”

“We all have that one neighbor.” She pulled her phone out of a pocket of her breezy skirt. A moment later she explained she didn’t have service.

No calls necessary to the nosy neighbor, then. And with that, the skin of my arms crawled and a sense everybody in the cars, the sidewalks, were studyin’ the pickup, flowed over me. I think that’s called paranoia.

Frip and Ponwr were throwin’ out ideas in the front seat. I mentioned a gravel runway used by crop dusters, on the edge of the near plains. That was maybe three, five hundred miles away. If we veered west—I really don’t know the roads around here. There’s a lot of North between us and the safety of the Range.

My contacts still worked. I gave Frip the number of the council’s orc pilot that toted me around before. Thankfully his phone was still workin’. He and the orc, I really should know her name—I don’t think I ever introduced myself, just keyed her in as orc pilot into my contacts. Anyway, Frip and she seemed to have a nice conversation.

I asked Ponwr, “Ya think that cop that tried to stop us this morning, maybe keyed in the license plate of this truck?”

He mumbled a Trollish word I only know not to use.

Stuck inside enemy lines, as it was. No safe place. No friends that could help us. Surrounded by distrustin’ humans. The day could only get better. Never wise to have thoughts like that.

~ Nuel ~

Stuck in a truck with two paranoid troll ex-cops and an arrogant politician that sounded three decibels from panic-ville. The cops appeared to be after me now too. We were headed away from my home. My life.

Ike asked where I wanted to be dropped off? He got me into all of this. I could twist around and strangle him, if I didn’t think Frip would stop me. Even smacking ’im wouldn’t be right. He’s struggling to breathe with all of those bullet holes in him.

How did he even make it down those stairs? How does he manage to sit up next to me without falling over? He’s blanched spring cloud white. The idjit has to be in a lot of pain. Doing a pretty good job acting half normal.

That much pain, his mental function is prolly diminished. With an IQ that topped off at four, he didn’t have a lot to give up. Maybe none of us should listen to a word he says.

This is not gonna end well.

~