Chapter Thirteen
The Supermarket
The next morning, when Mai woke up, Wyatt, Dakota were still asleep. Celie was gone, so Mai crawled out of the earth-tent to stretch her legs a bit. When she stood up, she was greeted by the fresh morning air. There was a gentle breeze blowing over the grassy field. The sun was just rising, so Mai thought she would watch it. She walked out of the small patch of trees and sat in the long grass. She felt very much at ease, and quite relaxed. It had been a while since she had had some time to herself. And in this time, she thought of everything that had happened to her in the past week. So much had changed. She wondered what Sam was doing at this very minute. Then, she heard footsteps behind her and a second later she heard Dakota’s voice.
“Can I join you?”
Mai looked over her shoulder. “Of course,” she said.
Dakota walked up beside her and sat down. They could just make out the sun. The sky turned a dull red, then changed to bright orange and as the sun peeked over the city of San Diego, turned pale lavender.
“Wow, it sure is beautiful,” Mai said breathlessly. She had always loved to watch the sunrise, but she very seldom got to do it.
“Yeah, it is. It seems especially nice today.” Tito came running over and sat between them. He looked from Mai to Dakota. He gave Dakota a funny look and jerked his head towards Mai. Dakota frowned and shook his head. Tito shrugged and walked away.
Mai gave Dakota a curious look and asked, "What did he say?"
Dakota hesitated for a second. “He was just telling me…about…” he gave a quick glace around as thought looking for something, “about how Amo, umm…ate a lot of grass.” He gave a nervous laugh and smiled awkwardly.
He sure is acting funny lately, Mai thought. She didn’t know Dakota that well, but it didn’t seem like he was acting right. For the next few minutes, they sat there and watched the sunrise. A few minutes later, Celie walked out from the small patch of trees and sat down next to Dakota.
“Good morning sleepy heads!” she said loudly.
“Where were you?” Mai asked.
“I was off with Amo. He gave me a ride around the field. He sure can fly fast,” Celie remarked. “Don’t worry, he only flew a few feet off the ground so I guarantee we weren’t spotted,” she added wearily at Mai and Dakota’s worried expressions.
“I’m bored. I’m going to go wake up Wyatt,” Celie said, standing up.
“Okay, just be careful, he tends to be crabby when he’s woken up,” Mai warned. She was remembering the many times when she had tried to wake Wyatt for his softball games on the weekends. He had always snapped at her, or occasionally smacked her arm away. It had never been a pleasant experience.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’ll be extra careful,” Celie said with a smirk. Dakota and Mai exchanged confused looks as Celie went back over to the earth-tent. Mai looked at Dakota who shrugged. Celie faced the earth-tent and tilted her head to the side as her eyes started to glow. Then Black Light formed around the tent, leaving only a white outline. The outline of a sleeping Wyatt rose through the top and hovered above it. Celie moved him over so that he was floating one yard from Mai and Dakota. Mai saw Celie smile just before she let Wyatt fall, five feet, to the ground, where he landed flat on his back. Wyatt sat up suddenly.
“Ow! What was that?” he shouted, rubbing his back. The glow in Celie’s eyes slowly went out and she walked over to him.
“Wake up call for Wyatt the Pig!” she announced.
“Stop calling me that!” Wyatt yelled.
Celie shrugged. “Have it your way…Pig.”
Wyatt scowled. “Come on, let’s get going,” Mai said, standing up and picking up her suitcase. She didn’t want Wyatt to get into a fight with Celie. Wyatt normally didn’t win any fights, but still, Mai didn’t want them to get mad at each other. It wouldn’t be any fun to have her brother and her friend upset.
Dakota followed her and picked up the picnic basket. “That’s strange,” he said opening it.
“What’s strange?” Mai asked.
“All the food is gone,” Dakota replied.
All eyes looked to Wyatt. “Don’t look at me. I didn’t do it,” he said, crossing his arms.
“Sure, right. Of course we believe you, Wyatt,” Mai said sarcastically. She had learned that Wyatt hardly ever told the truth about that sort of thing. He had once eaten Mai’s entire birthday cake, and said he had no idea how the cake could have disappeared. But Mai could clearly see the frosting on his face.
“I swear it wasn’t me!” said Wyatt more seriously.
“But then who did?” Dakota wondered out loud. There was a small hiccup from behind them. They turned to see a much rounder Tito, lying underneath a tree. They all looked at each other and burst out laughing. “Tito,” said Dakota sternly. “You can’t go eating all our food.”
Celie grinned. “I think he’s been hanging around you too much, Wyatt.”
Wyatt rolled his eyes. “Would you just lay off it?” he said irritably.
“We need more food, guys,” said Dakota, trying to stop the fight before it started. Mai was glad he was thinking along the same lines as her. The fewer fights that broke out between them, the better off they would all be.
Wyatt rolled his eyes. “We should go see if we can find another store that gives out lots of free samples like the other one,” he said, looking out to the city.
“What are you talking about?” Celie asked.
“We don’t have any money so we have to collect free samples,” Wyatt replied.
“We don’t have to collect free samples. My dad gave me some money before we left and I brought along the money I’ve been saving,” Celie said, gesturing to her suitcase, which she had just picked up.
“Really? Wow, that’s great!” Mai said excitedly. It would be a relief not to have to go from store to store, to collect their food. And they would be able to eat much better now.
“Alright then, let’s go! Amo, here boy!” Dakota yelled. Amo came trotting out from behind the earth-tent and came running up to Dakota. “Hey, Amo, you and Tito stay here, okay?” Amo nodded and Tito gave a little burp of acknowledgment.
“I think we should leave our things here with Tito and Amo, but Celie, you need to bring your money,” said Mai.
Celie took a small pouch out of her suitcase and put it in her pocket. “Okay, I’m ready. Let’s go!” she said.
“Wait! I think we should take our robes off, or we’ll attract too much attention,” Wyatt said. The others nodded and began removing their robes. Mai was left with her light blue shirt and navy blue pants. Wyatt was left wearing dark blue pants and shirt. Celie with light purple shorts and a lavender shirt with puffy sleeves, and Dakota with his red top and short gray pants. It was much cooler without their robes on, but Mai still liked wearing them, even if they made her hot.
“Amo, I’m trusting you to guard our stuff,” Dakota said. Amo whinnied and nodded. So the four kids started walking towards the city, Wyatt leading with Celie right behind him and Dakota and Mai walking side-by-side behind her.
As they walked, Mai said, “You know, I’ve been thinking. We should find you a real Water Master, Dakota. And besides, Master Chung even said I would have to find a Water Master if I wanted to learn anymore.”
Dakota smiled. “Yeah, that sounds good. But you’re a great teacher though.” Mai smiled back. She had noticed that for the past day or two, Dakota had been smiling at her a lot, and laughing. He was acting different for sure. But Mai pushed the thought from her mind. As soon as they reached the first row of buildings, Dakota pointed out a supermarket about a block away. They started walking on the sidewalk. People gave them weird looks as they walked by.
Finally Celie got so fed up with them she yelled, “What are you all looking at?” Mai even swore she saw cars slow down to look at them, but then, it could have just been her imagination.
When they finally reached the market, Celie pulled her pouch out of her pocket. “Okay, we’ll split up. I’ll go with Pig to make sure he doesn’t go crazy spending all my money,” she said.
Wyatt made a huffy noise.
“Okay, I’ll go with you, Dakota,” Mai said. Dakota smiled broadly. Why did he keep smiling at her like that? It wasn’t that Mai didn’t like to see him smile. It was just that he hadn’t smiled at her like that before. It was starting to get a little uncomfortable. But still, she didn’t mind.
“Here, I’ll give you five dollars to spend and we get five dollars,” Celie said, counting the one dollar bills as she pulled them out of her pouch.
“Don’t buy anything that will spoil,” Wyatt reminded them.
“Right, we’ll meet back here in fifteen minutes,” Celie instructed. The others nodded, walked into the store and went their separate ways.
“Let’s go over to the bread aisle,” Mai said, pocketing the money.
“Good idea, bread keeps for a long time. And maybe we should buy bottles of water too.”
Mai smiled. “Good thinking. I’ll go get the water and meet you outside.” She handed Dakota two dollars and the two split up and Mai looked over her shoulder just in time to see Dakota walk behind a shelf. When she reached the bottled water aisle, she walked over to the shelf and grabbed a pack of twelve water bottles—which cost two and a half dollars. It was very heavy so she used a little of her Water Powers so she wouldn’t drop it. She walked to a checkout line and set the pack down on the counter. As soon as she was done paying for it, she lifted it up again and carefully carried it outside and set it down on a bench. A little to her right was a man, standing with his back to her. He was reading a newspaper and was bouncing on the balls of his feet. The man turned around and Mai recognized him as the forgetful man who had been working at the other grocery store.
“Excuse me?” he asked Mai. “I’m supposed to do something and I can’t remember what. But I do remember it has something to do with you and your little buddies.”
Mai stared at him. “What do you mean, sir?” she asked. She remembered that this man often made no sense at all when he spoke, and most of the things he said were quite random.
“I remember now! General Karan said that when I saw you I was supposed to give him the signal!”
Mai’s heart skipped a beat. “Ge-General Karan?” she asked, horrified. This was quite random, but not in a funny way. She knew that the forgetful man could not just be saying it because it had just popped into his mind. There could be no way that he could have just made up the name ‘General Karan.’ What he was saying was the truth—the awful truth.
“Yep, now if you’ll excuse me I have to give him the signal.” He took a walky-talky out of his pocked. “Sir, I found the girl,” he said into it. “And she helped me remember to give you the signal! Isn’t she nice? It seems she already knows you though.”
You ignorant fool! Karan’s voice boomed from the walky-talky. Mai didn’t stay to listen any longer. She abandoned the pack of water bottles and ran back into the store. There she found Dakota, Wyatt and Celie walking towards the exit, their arms full of different kinds of food.
“Mai, what’s wrong?” Dakota asked as she ran up to them.
“We have to get out of here, now!” Mai said urgently.
“Why, what’s wrong?” Wyatt asked.
“There’s no time to explain! We have to leave now!” Mai had said this so loud that a lot of heads started turning their way. The others looked at each other then followed Mai as she ran back out of the store. As they passed the water she left on the bench, Mai used her Water Powers to lift it and had it floating along behind them. Many people stopped to stare at them as they ran past, but they didn’t care.
“Dakota, call Amo!” Mai shouted back to him. Dakota explained quickly about how the Chosen Ones could speak with their minds, which meant they could talk over long distances as long as they had a general idea of where the other person was. It was like a walky-talky in their heads, as Dakota put it. Dakota closed his eyes, letting Mai lead him so he wouldn’t run into anything. When he opened his eyes a few minutes later, he said that he had successfully contacted Amo and he should be meeting up with them at any minute. Mai turned a corner suddenly and led them down a dark alleyway.
“What’s happening, Mai?” Dakota asked as soon as he had caught his breath.
“Do you remember that man we saw at the other store we stopped at?” Mai asked, letting the water pack fall to the ground.
“You mean the one who thought that we delivered his papers?” Dakota asked, grinning.
“Yes, him. Well I saw him outside the store and he—“
But before she could answer, Amo landed down right in front of her, making her jump. He had the picnic basket in his mouth and Tito on his back.
“Amo, did anyone see you?” Dakota asked. Amo shook his head. “He says he doesn’t think so,” Dakota translated.
“Good, now, everyone on!” Mai said, hurriedly. She wanted them all to get out of this place as soon as possible.
“Hold on Mai, Amo can’t carry all of us,” Dakota said sadly. “I told him before he took off to bring the picnic basket so he could take it back for us. Every one put your stuff in here.” Everyone hesitated, and then did as he said. But Mai left out two water bottles for her and Dakota to use, since she had left her pouch back at their campsite.
“Hold on!” Wyatt shouted. “I don’t have my swords!” Mai shook her head.
“It doesn’t matter; all we need to focus on is getting back to the campsite.” Dakota closed the picnic basket.
“Fly back to the campsite, Amo, but don’t get seen,” he warned. Amo nodded and took of again, Tito holding on for dear life.
The four kids ran back out of the alleyway and began to run to the outskirts of town.
They were almost there when Celie said, “Hold on! I still don’t know what’s going on here! What’s happening?”
Mai looked over her shoulder. “We’re being followed.” She looked back to the front just before she ran into a man in a suit.
“Hey, watch it!” the man shouted, shaking a fist at them.
“What?” Wyatt asked. “By who?” Mai looked over her shoulder again and was about to answer, when she ran head on into something else.
“Well, hello there. Long time, no see.” Mai looked up into the monkey-like face of General Karan.
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