The three children stand together, heads down, bowed as if ready for punishment. Two of them are crying. The dust of their friend is still between us. Their other friend fell off and died.
“Ah, Master Mind, Joy,” I use a gentle tone, sitting on the Shroom, leaning against its stem, feeling the bullet wound in my shoulder. “I don’t think they’re dangerous now.”
“They are armed, scared, and we cannot communicate with them,” says Master Mind.
“No, no,” I shake my head. “They were kidnapped like Joy and trained to be slaves. We killed one of their own. They see us as the enslavers now. They won’t do anything.”
“We are not your enslavers!” Joy says. “We set you free! You’re free!”
But they bow their heads and huddle together.
“This is terrible,” I say. “Everything that happened here is terrible.”
“Little Pirate,” Master Mind says. “We cannot take them back home. They are unpredictable. They can choose at any unexpected time to kill you and I will not be able to prevent that.”
“They have to go with us! Where will they go?”
The girl looks up. “Go,” she says. “Yes. Go.”
Joy looks at her with shock. “You understand English?”
“Go,” the girl says, her fingers miming a person walking. “Go.” She thumps her chest. “Go.”
“Yes. You’re free. We are not villains,” says Joy, then looks at Master Mind. “They have to come with us.”
“How would they come with us if we killed their friend?” I say. “Plus, Master Mind is right.”
“Go!” the girl says.
“So what? Do we just let them back into their dream? They’ll just live a life of slavery!”
“We can’t decide for them,” I say. “That’s still treating them like slaves. You shouldn’t have made them permanent!”
“Go!” the girl says and points outside the shroom. “Go!”
Joy looks at the girl’s eyes and tries to understand what she means. Then, Joy’s demeanor changes. She points in the same direction the girl does. “Go?”
“Go!” the girl nods.
Joy raises a finger. “Wait! Yes, go! Wait!”
She runs into the tunnel. What is she planning?
In a couple of minutes, she comes out dragging three out of the four jetpacks in the tunnel: Justin’s, Madelyn’s and Charlie’s. “Go!” she says, pointing at them. “Go?”
The girl and the two boys look at the jetpacks and talk among themselves. They know what the jetpacks are. They’ve seen Master Mind use them.
The girl then looks at Joy. “Yes. Go!”
“Yes!” Joy smiles happily. “I’ll help you!”
(To be continued…)
—Told by Grampa Walt