•~The Demon Thief~•

•CHAPTER 5.Ding Dong•

Chapter 5. DING DONG
___________________________________

Two dabs later. The orange light is still pulsing and changing size. Although I can call it closer like the other patches, I can't send it away more than twenty or twenty-five feet. It's started to bug me, like an insect which keeps buzzing in front of my face. An uneasiness chews away at me every time I catch sight of it. I know it's crazy, worrying about a light, but I can't help myself. I have a bad feeling about this.

It's a lovely sunny day. Our teacher, Logan Rile, decided not to waste the weather, so we're having lessons outside, in one of the fields around Paskinston. There are thirty-four of us, a variety of classes and ages, sitting in a semi-circle around Logan. He's telling us about tectonic plates. Logan's not the best teacher. He sometimes forgets he's talking to children and gets too technical. Very few of us understand everything he says. But he's interesting, and the bits that make sense are fascinating. It's also fun when you do understand him - it makes you feel clever.

Some of the younger children from the cr��che have come with us. Their normal minder has gone to the fair and her replacement's finding it hard to cope with so many little ones. She was delighted when Logan offered to take a few off her hands for the day.

Art's playing with the orange marbles beside me. I shouldn't let him have them, but he really likes them. Anyway, he hasn't put them in his mouth yet. I keep a close eye on him, checking every couple of minutes to make sure both marbles are in sight - not in his stomach.

"So these plates are moving all the time?" Bryan Colbert asks. Bryan's one of the eldest children, nearly seventeen.

"Yes," Logan says.

"Then why don't countries move?"

"They do," Logan says. "The continents are drifting all the time. It's very slow, but it's happening. One day Australia will collide with America or Africa - I can never remember which -  and the effects will be catastrophic. New mountains will be thrust upwards. There'll be tidal waves. Dust will clog the air. Billions of people and animals will die. It might be the end of all life on this planet."

"All life?" Dave English - a kid a year younger than me - asks.

"Yes."

"But I didn't think that could happen. Everybody... everything... can't just die. Won't God keep some of us alive?"

"No god can prevent the end of life on this planet," Logan says in his usual serious way. "Or the end of life in this universe. Everything has an end. That's the way life is. But maybe there'll be a new beginning when our world ends. New life, new creatures, new means of existence."

"That's scary," Dave mutters. "I don't want everything to die."

"Nor me," Logan smiles. "But our wants are irrelevant. This is the way things are. We can accept the truth and deal with it, or live in ignorance. Death is nothing to be afraid of. Once you think it through and get it into perspective, it's not so bad. In fact, many people - "

"Now!" a woman screams, cutting Logan off. All our heads turn at once, as if our necks were connected. I see Mrs. Egin lumbering up behind us, fingers twitching, frothing at the mouth. "Now it happens! Up the throat, past the gums, look out world, here it comes!"

The pink light which I saw her stroking a few days ago has grown much bigger and now seems to be touching her just behind her head. It's pulsing quickly. Other patches of light around it are pulsing too, and moving towards it, as though magnetically drawn to it.