An Unlikely Friend. part 1

Chapter 8: Captured

Nero

Nero looks out at the piers and the dark boats floating in the water. I wonder where those ships have been… or who could be watching us. He hurries to catch up with the singing Totos, while Ryder and the others faithfully follow.

There’s something about him I don’t like… I guess there isn’t much I can do, unless I say something. He plunges his hand in his pocket and grabs his bracelet. But then they’ll just make fun of me for being scared.

He glances at the ships and then into the shadows of the buildings, constantly feeling like he is being watched. Totos turns the corner of a warehouse and plunges into its shadow.

Hey!

Nero whips his head around to look behind him and then around the docks. He shakes his head and puts his hand on his chest, where his heart is thumping against his ribs. I’m definitely losing it. Suddenly he catches a glimpse of light at the side of a building, a ways up ahead, a faint violet light. What’s that? Nero quietly hurries over to the building, staying in the shadows as much as possible.

He carefully pokes his head around the corner and sees the light further away, off behind another building.

“Errrr.” Nero runs after it.

He turns the corner and again the light is further away. “What the heck!” The run turns into a sprint as he continues to chase the light but every time he turns a corner it is farther away. He speeds around another bend, but this time the light is gone. He searches the lane but is unable to find any other sign of it.

“Dang it!” The darkness of the quiet alley starts to creep in on him. He slowly turns around. Where am I?

He sprints back the way he came, hesitating at each turn, struggling to remember where to go. Dang it, dang it, dang it! All the warehouses and alleys look the same. What if I can’t find them? Where will I sleep? What if I can’t find them tomorrow? He sprints down another alley. Why do I always get separated!? “I’m so stupid!”

Finally Nero pops around the corner of a warehouse back in the vicinity of the piers. He slows down and tries to recover his breath. Okay, this looks familiar, I just need to remember exactly where I left them and maybe I can yell out to get their attention.

He walks up to the warehouse he remembered seeing Totos dip behind when he hears muffled voices from inside. Nero quickly jumps behind a pile of old wooden grates stacked to the side when the large garage door in the front of the warehouse begins to roll up with a clanking of metal. It jerks to a stop and the night suddenly seems particularly quiet.

A man dressed in black steps out from the opening. “Alright hurry it along. Get the cargo back to the ship before the Cap’n gets upset.”

Two other men and a small boy tug on a rope attached to a giant crate with wheels.

Totos! What the heck’s he doing?

The first man leads the group down the road to the water line, muffled banging and voices echo faintly through the night from the crate.

Who’s in the crate? Nero gulps. No no no… What’s gong on?

As the crate moves along the edge of the bay, Nero scuttles in the shadows of the buildings in a frantic haze of thought. He follows as the man in black leads the crate to a pier with the silhouette of a large warship docked along its length. From a distance Nero watches as the crate stops and a ramp extends from the boat, where other workers quickly pull it aboard. The ramp retracts immediately and the people disappear as if nothing had happened.