“How am I supposed to attach him to the rope while driving?” I scream.
I pull my umbrella and squeeze it between the chair and the clutch so the Jeep keeps speeding, then grip the rope and jump in the back. There is a metal belt that I bind to the Scientist’s body, and then I tell the chauffeur to pull it up.
Another lion slashes his paws at me in an acrobatic move, and I fall back to the driver’s seat.
“I’m sending it back!” the chauffeur shouts.
That’s the same instant when the car starts slowing down.
“No!”
One look at the dashboard, and I realize I’m out of fuel.
In a flash, I grip the rope and begin to tighten the belt around my waist. For some reason, it’s not working. It won’t click closed.
“It’s not working!”
“That’s not good.”
“No shit. I know it’s not good.”
“No, Alice, you don’t understand,” the kids shout. “There is a cliff ahead of you.”
“This is some Hollywood movie I’m in,” I mumble again. “Lions, Reds, and a cliff. All I need is an earthquake.”
The Jeep keeps slowing down, and one of lions manages to jump inside.
I can’t even scream now. I don’t remember Alice in Wonderland dying in Wonderland.
The belt finally clicks and I tell them to pull me up.
The lions snatches my shoe away then pulls on the tip of my jeans. He could easily have my feet for an appetizer now, but I guess he’s into the whole meal.
Embarrassed, I have no choice but to pull off my jeans, but not before I pull out the key and tuck it between my teeth.
I stare at the roaring lions and the maddening Reds below me, and let out a sigh.
But it’s not long before the Reds start laughing hysterically at me. The kids too.
Damn my pink underwear, shining bright in the dark of the Brazilian jungle.
Chapter 72
The Pillar’s Chopper, Midair, Brazil
Up in the plane, the children welcome me and give me a blanket to cover my legs until further notice.
“Thank you,” I tell the chauffeur.
“You’re welcome,” a voice answers.
Then the Pillar appears out of the cockpit. He smiles and high fives a few kids.
“How did you get here?” I say.
“I stepped through the door,” he winks. “Never had a thing for entering a plane through a window.”
“Pillar!”
“Ah, you mean, how did I fight hordes of Reds on my own without even staining my suit with their blood?” He rubs a feather off his sleeve. “I’ve always had a thing for staying clean and tidy, right children?”
“Pillar clean!” They raise their hands.
“Besides,” the Pillar continues, “if I hadn’t survived, you wouldn’t have been saved from the Reds.” He leans back into his favorite couch and presses a button. A screen of the beach rolls down behind him, and sounds of chirping birds fill the plane.
One of the kids strolls over, wearing an ice cream man outfit. “Ice Cream. Banana flavor. Mango flavor. Even strawberry. One penny each.”
The Pillar leans forward and tips the boy, rewarding himself with an ice cream crone. “Ice cream, kids?” he turns to the others.
“Yeah!”
It’s a shame I’m drooling over the ice cream in this humid oven of a chopper.
“Ice cream, Alice?” He smiles.
I sneer at him.
“And, please, no need to thank me for saving your pink butt.”
The children can’t stop laughing, their noses stained with some red strawberry flavor.
“I had to leave you behind.” I stick out my neck. “The same way you betrayed me in the Garden of Cosmic Speculation.”
“You left me?” The Pillar pouts like a bratty child. “I’m shocked. I thought you had to save the Scientist and didn’t have the chance to think about me.”
“Stop playing with my head. You know I left you on purpose.”
“But you’re glad that I’m alive, right?” he says. “Come on, aren’t you children glad I’m alive?”
The children gather around him, some of them kissing him. I wonder why they like him so much. It’s as if they’re sharing a special connection I can’t put my hands on. The same way I sensed he and the Executioner kept a secret.
“Are you glad I’m alive, my chauffeur?” He cranes his neck at the cockpit.
“Of course, Professor. I need someone to tell me how to drive this plane properly.”
We hit another air bump.
“Watch out for those clouds you keep bumping into.” The Pillar raises his ice cream cone.
“It’s not a cloud, Professor,” I hear the chauffeur snicker from inside the cockpit. “It’s a big mushroom in the sky.”
The kids laugh at this, too. Suddenly I’m the most boring person on set. But I don’t care. It’s time for the next step in stopping the plague.
“I think we better know who the Scientist really is.” I point at the comatose body on the plane’s floor.
Chapter 73
“First I need to know where I’m going,” the chauffeur interrupts.
“London, of course,” the Pillar says. “Alice needs to find Carolus and kill him.”
“Oki doki!”