Meadowview Acres (27 page)

Pulling Eli’s limp body behind, Darren started to crawl.

Shasta didn’t like the text from Darren. She didn’t want Darren anywhere near that lab. Who knows what the rock would do to him? It had killed his father with the curse.

Shasta took her apron off and handed it to her mother. “I’m sorry, Mom, I have to go. Darren needs me.”

Her mother looked surprised that she was leaving so quickly. “Is everything okay, Honey?”

“I’m sure it will be. I just need to go. I’ll call you in a little while.” She ran out the door of the Hut and hopped into her Ranger.

It took her no time at all to get to the school. She saw Darren’s car parked next to Eli’s and pulled up beside them. Her stomach rolled over as she noticed smoke billowing out of the door that had been propped open. She grabbed her bag and pulled out her phone.

Rachel answered on the first ring. “911, what’s your emergency?”

Shasta’s trembling voice answered, “There’s a fire at the high school! It’s coming from the science lab! The entrance by the student parking lot is the closest! Hurry!” She punched “end” on her phone, not waiting for any questions.

She jumped out of her car and ran to the entrance. The smoke had an awful smell to it. It was so thick. Shasta yelled, “Darren! Darren!” She listened for a response and heard none. She made up her mind then. She knew that help was on the way, but it could be too late already. She took the Hot Dog Hut bandana from around her neck and secured it over her mouth. Taking a deep breath, she plunged into the entrance.

She knew the science lab was one of the first few classrooms on the right. She would just crawl in that direction and call for Darren on the way. Dropping to all fours, she started out.

The first doorway was there in no time. She was sure this one wasn’t it, so she kept going. At the second doorway, she tried to peer in through the smoke. “Darren!” She coughed out. “Darren, are you in there?” She heard his voice, but couldn’t make out what he was saying. “I’m coming in!” She called and started to make her way forward. She could feel more heat now. It was getting a lot harder to breathe.

Once inside the room, she couldn’t figure out which way to go. She called out for Darren again and listened. She felt like she could hear him, but he sounded so far away. Shasta tried to yell again, but the smoke was restricting her throat. She moved in the direction she thought the voice was coming from. She had gone only a few feet when she felt very disoriented.

“Darren!” She tried to yell, but her voice was only a whisper. She heard Darren say, “Follow me,” but she couldn’t get a sense of where he was. She was getting really tired now. She crawled slowly on.

“Follow me!” Darren called back to Hunter. He was worried that he would be able to drag Eli out but lose Hunter on the way. “Two more doorways on the left and then we’re out!” He heard a faint cough and thought it was Hunter, but it seemed like it was coming from beside him, not behind. Maybe Hunter was closer than he thought. Darren couldn’t see anything of his surroundings. He was still dragging Eli with his right hand and hopping forward while feeling his way with his left. Passing the second doorway, he thought he heard something.

It was sirens. Someone must have called to report the fire. Hope spurred him on. “Come on, Hunter. We’re almost there now, push on buddy, push!”

The sirens were getting louder. Darren could tell that they were in the student parking lot just a few yards away. He felt the first classroom doorway on his left and pushed himself to the exit. Just as he made it to the door, it swung open revealing a yellow and red clad member of the Hallston Fire Department. The man looked down at him and yelled, “Got survivors,” to his counterparts who came running.

Strong hands grabbed him and carried him out of the school to a safe spot away from the smoke. He was coughing heartily now. He noticed Hunter being carried out and Eli as well. “Thank God.” He thought. Then he remembered Mr. Just. Grabbing the sleeve of the firefighter closest to him he said urgently, “There’s a teacher in the third classroom to the right along the hallway! He’s in the middle of the classroom!” He broke off coughing.

The firefighter ran to relay the information to the others. Darren looked over to where Hunter lay. He was lying on the ground fighting for breath. A firefighter was giving him oxygen. Darren looked at Eli. Paramedics were giving him CPR. Suddenly, Darren felt a plastic cup attach to his mouth and a rush of sweet, pure oxygen. He laid back and closed his eyes.

A few minutes later, one of the firefighters came to him and asked, “Do you know the girl who called 911? Is she here somewhere?”

Darren didn’t know who he was talking about. He had assumed it had been a passerby or a staff member who was still in the building. “No,” he replied. “I don’t know who it was.”

The firefighter then said, “Well, we have you three out and we’ve located the teacher now. They’re getting him out. So the three cars in the lot belong to you three?” He nodded towards Eli and Hunter.

Darren thought, “Three cars – no, just mine and Eli’s.” He craned his neck around the fire truck and saw the third.
No!
A girl called 911!
Shasta!
At once, Darren remembered the faint cough coming from the second classroom doorway. He had thought it was Hunter.

Darren was on his feet in a flash. Running toward the entrance of the school he yelled, “She’s in there! In the second classroom! Hurry! Hurry!”

A fireman grabbed him around the waist as he tried to reenter to school. “Hang on there, Son. Who’s left in there?”

Darren was breathless. “Shasta! Shasta Port! The second door on the right!” He slumped back to the ground in a coughing fit.

He watched the man relay the information to the team still inside the school. There were tears in his eyes. His heart was pounding out of his chest.

Hunter was at his side then, asking what was happening. “Shasta’s in there,” Darren said.

“Shasta? Where did she come from?” He asked through his coughs.

“I don’t know. I didn’t know she was here.” He put his head in his hands and tried to breathe.

Hunter was still using the oxygen mask, but he pulled it away to say, “Don’t worry, Darren. They’ll get her out. They’ll get her out the way you got Eli. He woke up, and he’s going to be fine. You’ll see. They’ll bring her out any minute.”

The next time the firefighters came out, it was with Mr. Just. The boys watched as they took the teacher over, put him on a gurney and loaded him into the ambulance. The emergency siren and lights roared to life as the vehicle sped away to Community Hospital.

Another ambulance sped into the parking lot and parked close to the entrance. They had obviously been called and given some information. One of the paramedics got out and opened the back to retrieve the gurney. Just as he finished, two men carried Shasta from the school and placed her immediately on the gurney. The paramedic jumped in the back with her and closed the door. The lights came on and it was speeding away before Darren even knew it was happening.

“Shasta!” He jumped to his feet and tried to run after the ambulance. The same, kind firefighter that had stopped him before stopped him this time. “Come on, Son. You need to get checked out at the hospital anyway. You can see her there.” He led Darren over to a deputy’s cruiser and asked that he be taken to Community. Darren got into the car and prayed.

As he was riding out of the parking lot, he noticed Hunter putting the backpack into the trunk of Eli’s car. It occurred to him only then that he hadn’t been affected by the rock at all. He was well within its range the whole time he had been guiding Hunter out of the school.

Fury built up inside of Darren as he thought of the curse, the rock. It had killed his father, now had it killed Shasta?

BOOK FOUR

CHAPTER 30

Bug & Mr. Hamilton

E
verything was out of whack for Bug. Hearing about Professor Monroe had made her feel strange. She remembered the frail, white-haired man that she and Shasta had spent time with only yesterday morning. She could still see his peculiar stare. He was weak, yes, but Bug didn’t get the sense yesterday that he had been close to dying. Yet, he had; a mere hour or two after they had left – he had passed away.

Bug felt weird about his death. She was not a big fan of the man who had set this curse upon them over forty years ago, but she felt empathy. He had lived all of those years knowing that the Rock Of Varuupi could be discovered. Bug thought he must have been constantly afraid of that possibility, and now the possibility had been realized. She wondered if the knowledge that more people had died because of him was what ultimately had killed him. Bug was having trouble reconciling her anger with her pity for the man.

“Finish eating, Hon. We’ll leave right when you’re through,” Mr. Hamilton said to his daughter sitting across from him at the kitchen table.

It was Monday morning and Bug’s father had told her that he needed her to come to the office with him that day. She would miss a day of school, but this was more important. They had talked it over last night after he had broken the news to her about Professor Monroe. The plan was to do more research on the curse. More specifically, counter curses, breaking curses or anything else that they could find out about the rock.

Bug shoveled in the rest of her Wheat Squares and drank the cereal flavored milk from the bowl. Wiping her mouth with her sleeve, she said, “I’m ready. Just let me grab my bag.” She jumped from the table and ran to her room.

Mrs. Hamilton had already left for the hospital. She was on the early shift that morning. Mark had woken her up the night before and told her everything. There were no secrets in the Hamilton household, and this was a biggie. Ann had taken the news well enough. Even as crazy a story as it was, she hadn’t questioned her husband. After almost twenty years of marriage, she knew that Mark was serious and reliable. Ann had been extremely worried about Bug, but Mark had reassured her that Bug would stay by his side until the mess was over. He had also asked her to keep her ears open at the hospital. If there were any other emergencies or unexplained deaths in town, he needed to know ASAP.