Fiona gave him a long, hard look. “You’re sure that’s the right stuff? You’re not going to just make them sleep longer, are you?”
“Of course, it’s the right stuff,” he said. “I don’t make those kinds of mistakes.”
She continued to stare at him.
“I don’t make those kinds of mistake any more,” he said this time.
“Use it on Keira first,” Fiona told him. “Just in case.”
“Perfectly logical as always,” Uncle Carl said.
He leaned around the front passenger seat and placed the gun against Keira’s upper arm. When he pulled the trigger, the
Uncle Carl moved the gun away, but stayed between the seats and watched his niece.
It took about thirty seconds, but then she twitched. A few seconds later, she moved her arm, then her head began to roll, and sigh-like grunts seeped out of her mouth.
“I think it’s working,” Uncle Carl said.
“Give it to Maggie,” Mr. Trouble told him.
Uncle Carl happily placed the gun against Maggie’s arm and pulled the trigger.
In a few minutes, both girls were groggy, but awake.
“Ow!” Keira exclaimed, her hand rubbing the side of her head. “Did someone hit me?”
Eric shared a look with Fiona, both of them remembering Mr. Trouble knocking his sister’s head against the side of the car.
“Hit you? Not that I know of,” Mr. Trouble said.
Keira rubbed some more, then looked out the window. “When did we get in the car?”
Between Eric, Fiona, Uncle Carl, and Mr. Trouble, they filled the girls in on what they’d missed.
When they finished, Maggie did not look happy. “You kidnapped me out of my house while my parents were sleeping?”
“Technically, I’m not sure you can call what they’re doing sleeping,” Uncle Carl said.
“Technically, it doesn’t matter what they were doing. This is still kidnapping,” she shot back.
“You weren’t
“Like I’m really going to believe a bunch of zombies are lying all over my front lawn.”
“Technically, they’re not zombies,” Uncle Carl said. “They’re surrogates.”
“Enough with the technically, already!”
“Maggie, trust me,” Eric jumped in. “It happened. I saw it.”
She glared at him. “Okay, tell me this. If you left my parents a note saying we’re doing homework at these…” she looked at Fiona, “…people’s house, then where are our books?”
Eric stared at her for a moment, then turned and glanced at Fiona. “She’s right. We only brought my backpack.”
“You left our books?” Keira asked, no doubt more concerned about her copy of
“We can’t worry about it now,” Mr. Trouble said. “If it becomes a problem later, we’ll figure something out.”
Maggie groaned and began rubbing her temple.
“Are you all right?” Eric asked.
She frowned. “All of this is giving me a headache.”
“It’s probably a reaction to the sleep,” Uncle Carl told her. “And then what I gave you to pull you out of it, of course.”
“Can you please just take me home?”
When they’d first woken her, she’d just looked annoyed. Now she looked miserable.
“As soon as we can,” Mr. Trouble said.
Maggie groaned again, then laid her head back and closed her eyes.
Outside, the town of Tobin started falling away as they drove into the countryside. Eric looked out the rear window. For as far as he could see, there were no other headlights.
He thought about asking where they were going, but it didn’t really matter. He trusted Mr. Trouble now. He trusted the whole Trouble family. After all he’d seen, he’d be a fool not to. And if they said these Makers were after him, then he believed that, too.
After fifteen minutes, Mr. Trouble leaned forward, his chest nearly pressing against the steering wheel, his eyes searching the road ahead.
“It should be here somewhere,” he said, more to himself than to anyone else.
“What are you looking for?” Eric asked.
Mr. Trouble squinted at the road for a few seconds longer, then said, “Ah.” He pointed out the window. “That.”
On the side of the road, partially lit by the sedan’s headlights, was a short stack of rocks, the top one of which had been painted white.
“Should be another one pretty soon,” he explained.
Eric eyed the road, then a minute later said, “There it is.”
Indeed, there was another stack a few feet off the edge of the blacktop. This time the top rock was unpainted and the one below it was white.
Mr. Trouble cut the car’s speed in half. At the farthest reach of the headlights was an entrance to a dirt road. Mr. Trouble slowed the car even more and turned onto it.
The second the front tires touched dirt, a light flicked on between a couple of trees to the left. Mr. Trouble stopped the car and rolled down his window as Mother Trouble walked up, carrying an electric camping lantern.
“I see you made it,” she said, leaning down so she could look in the window. “Run into any problems?”
“Plenty,” Fiona said.
Mother Trouble held up the lantern and took a quick look through the car. “Well, I count six heads, so it mustn’t have been that bad.” She paused for a second then added, “No sense in just standing here. Keira, you’re going to have to sit in my lap.”
23
The seven of them traveled down the dirt road in the sedan designed to hold only five.
“You see that big tree ahead?” Mother Trouble asked her son.
“I see it,” Mr. Trouble said.
Eric could see it, too. It was tall and wide and still had most of its leaves.
“The road you’ll be wanting is just beyond that on the right.”
Eric leaned toward Fiona. “How did your brother know they’d be out here?”
“Do you think my brother and sister and I are the only ones in our family with cell phones?”
“Oh. Right.” He felt stupid.
The road Mother Trouble promised was exactly where she said it would be. Only it wasn’t really a road at all. It was a long driveway that led to the shadowy form of a house, maybe the length of a football field away. Beyond it was a larger structure Eric guessed was a barn.
There were no lights on in the house. In fact, there were no lights on anywhere, no matter which direction Eric looked.
As the car neared the house, Mother Trouble said, “Just around the back, dear.”
Mr. Trouble steered the sedan along a couple of tire ruts to the right of the house.
As they passed the old building, Eric realized there probably hadn’t been lights on inside it for years. The place was a wreck. Big gaping holes in the roof and not a single visible window intact. It might have been nice once, but not now. Now it just looked horror-movie ready.
