The Arks: Over Heaven (by Ben)

Chapter 44: Tomfoolery

Part 1/2

Both Loki and Mr. Mo made haste, traveling through the village to find the cause of the fire. As they made their way to the home which was up in flames, they noticed more bodies lined up on the ground, their tongues out and their arms wildly sprawled across the cold snow. The wind made an intense assault and began to push the two forward.

Mr. Mo crouched down to one of the bodies and placed two fingers on the side of his neck. Mr. Mo looked back at Loki with relief written on his face.

“He’s not dead. He’s still breathing!”

Loki rushed to the body and stared at it. Sweat rushed down his face, and he noticed a small trickle of blood slowly making its way down to the boy’s chin. Loki moved his hair to the side and saw a small metal dart with a red plume sticking out his temple.

“Huh? A tranq dart?” Loki realized with a raised eyebrow. Mr. Mo gritted his teeth and yanked the tranq dart off his face. He studied the tip, and then crushed it within his right palm.

“These are Dr. Aston’s tranq darts!” Mr. Mo barked, tossing the metal fragments to the white snow.

“Dr. Aston’s?! You think he did this?” Loki blurted in surprise.

“I don’t think HE did this,” Mr. Mo countered, his face scrunching up and his pupils shrinking. Loki, with sudden realization, clenched his karambits.

“It was Brad!”

The two left the body behind and rushed near the burning house, where they saw two people carrying a strange contraption. It was Brad and Dr. Aston. Water shot out of a strange cannon that extinguished the flames as it made contact. Dr. Aston was sweating, and Brad even moreso.

“Brad! Dr. Aston! What is going on here?!” Mr. Mo demanded with stride in his steps. He twirled the red pike around in his hands, and Brad let out a visible gulp, letting go of the cannon contraption.

“Uhh, Mr. Mo! Fancy seeing you here! Didn’t think you’d return so fast,” Brad said. His eyes darted to longneck rifles that were laid on the floor. Brad continued, “Uhhh, so about those things you asked us to do… Um, there was a bit of an accident. And so…”

“Accident? Yeah right,” Loki thought as he narrowed his eyes at him. Mr. Mo let out a visible sigh, rubbing his forehead and walking toward the two. Brad let out an “eek!” and stepped back. Dr. Aston looked at Mr. Mo with tired eyes, and saluted him with one hand.

“Greetings sir. I see your trip for the artifact was safe and sound. Did you manage to find it?”

“Yes I did, thanks for asking,” Mr. Mo replied. He nodded toward Loki, “I had Loki to help. So of course it went well.”

Loki smiled.

“So. What exactly happened here?”

Dr. Aston squinted his eyes and turned away for a split second, extinguishing the last of the flames before clicking a button and turning the cannon contraption off. All that was left of the house was a smoldering ruin, and a few remains of what seemed to be beds. Dr. Aston wiped the sweat off his face with his gloves and put his hands on his hips.

“Brad and his friends decided it was a good idea to shoot at each other with the rifles and darts to see what it was like to fall unconscious. One moment led to another, and a torch was knocked over, lighting the house on fire.”

Dr. Aston closed his eyes with sadness.

“I should have stopped them, but I had fallen asleep at my station and couldn’t supervise them. I’m sorry, Mr. Mo.”

“Fallen asleep?” Mr. Mo said with a raised eyebrow, “Don’t tell me you’ve been staying up again…”

“I know I have, but it’s necessary, how else will we-”

“You need your rest. You know that as a scientist! Don’t jeopardize your health for our betterment.”

Brad had his mouth agape and put his arms up in protest.

“How is he supposed to know that if he was asleep?!” Brad argued. Loki glared at him. Dr. Aston pointed at the complex building which towered over the home that had caught up in flames. There was a bullet camera pointed at the home, and it had a single red LED light on the front. Brad’s jaw dropped in shock.

“Since when was that there?!”

Mr. Mo turned to Dr. Aston.

“Go to sleep.”

Dr. Aston sighed, and without argument stumbled away like a zombie.

Mr. Mo turned to Brad.