Misery peeked around the corner of the house, taking care not to be seen. About a hundred of her siblings sat and roughhoused with one another behind her, making her wince at every noise. She turned around and hissed at them to be quiet, not really expecting it to help. It didn’t.
She turned her attention back to the scene ahead of her. In front of the house was the local elementary school. On a normal saturday, it wouldn’t be worth noting, but lucky for Misery, that day was not a normal Saturday. A large charter bus was parked in the drop-off zone, with a few teachers and students standing outside going through roll call. Misery needed that bus, and she had a plan.
Her inner musings were interrupted as she heard a startled gasp from the porch. Misery turned around to behold a woman, looking to be in her thirties, coming out of the house behind them. She seemed shocked to find a hundred eerily similar children parked on her lawn. At the sound of the gasp, they all turned to face her at once, definitely not helping the situation. Misery sighed and waved a hand, turning her attention back to the bus.
“Get her. Things are about to get messy anyways.”
Two changeling boys, Jet and Pocket, looked at one another with the same mischievous grin. They stood up and walked to both sides of the shocked woman, carefully skulking along the ground to remain unnoticed in the horde of their brothers and sisters. Synchronized, they each dug deep down within themselves, finding that one organ that humans lacked that allowed them to do what they were about to do. With no effort to suppress the noise, similar to that of making a spitball in the back of one’s throat, they simultaneously released globs of thick, green fluid over their target. The woman didn’t even have time to scream as it blanketed her, pinning her to the ground and preventing her from making any more noise.
The boys beamed and stepped away from the green mess, taking pride in their work. Misery rolled her eyes and looked back to the bus.
“I’m going to lure them over here in a minute. Everyone, get ready.”
Misery cringed as a deafening chorus of affirmation rang out from the horde of children, likely drawing attention the attention of the entire block. Eager to start her plan before her siblings had a chance to ruin it, she started across the street towards the parked bus. As she approached, several children turned their heads to watch her. Misery stopped in the middle of the street and waved her hands, attempting to get all of them to look in her direction. Through the use of jumping up and down and several loud noises, she finally had the eyes of every child and teacher upon her.
“Hey! The ice cream man is giving away free ice cream over there!” She pointed to the row of houses where she had just emerged from.
In a collective agreement to disregard any rules the teachers had set in place, several children immediately ran away from the group and ran for the houses. Misery smiled as the teachers cried out in anguish, chasing after them. Soon, most of the other children figured they would join in, and the entire group had left the sidewalk and ran out into the street. She didn’t even turn around to see if her trap succeeded, pushing through the panicked crowd and and towards the vehicle. She heard shrieks of surprise as she rounded the side of the bus and entered through the door on the side.
The bus driver was an older man, around fifty years of age. He turned at the sound of someone entering the bus, confusion clear on his face.
“What’s going on out there? Where did everyone run off to?”
Misery stepped forward and pulled out a slip of paper, handing it to the bus driver. “This is a map. Follow it.”
The bus driver unfolded the slip of paper and scanned his eyes over it. “But... the field trip is going to San Francisco, isn’t it?”
“Just take us there.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, little girl.”
“Then get out. I’ll drive.”
“I don’t think you know how to drive this bus, sweetie.” The driver frowned and tucked the map into his pocket, grabbing Misery by the arm and leading her out of the bus. Misery kicked at his legs and struggled to pull her arm free, to no avail.
“Look, missy, we’re going to find a teacher and-” The driver gasped in pain as a kick dug into his knee.
Misery was too close to give up now. She had found a lead, a clue to where her mother was. She had a bus to take her, and all of her siblings, to it. She had a goal, and she had a means, and the only thing standing in her way was an old man. Misery hissed and kicked off of the ground, climbing up the front of the man’s shirt. She pinned him to the bus and stared into his dull, brown eyes, gazing into them with such fury and intensity that he was left speechless. Her eyes flashed, glowing a fiery green for a split second before fading back to their normal emerald hue. The man’s eyelids drooped from a surprised upright position to a relaxed slouch. His once brown eyes now shone a dull green.
Misery pulled her arm back, and the man released, his grip now eased. She took a few deep breaths to calm herself, the moment of fear and instinct passed. Her chest rose and fell with the breaths, leaving her standing there on the sidewalk as confused as the bus driver had been moments ago. Now, he just stood there, like a pole, staring off into the distance.
A cough broke the morning silence. Misery turned to see Whistle, standing in front of the horde of changeling children. A few of them had green slime still dripping from their mouths, eliciting the occasional wipe of the sleeve. They all stared at the scene in front of them, first at the docile old man, and then to Misery. The changeling girl stared back, at a loss for words. Finding it too hard to speak, she simply raised a hand and pointed at the bus’s open door. The changelings filed in, one by one, without a word. Whistle stood behind, letting the others go first, before taking a stance next to her sister.
“... what did you do to him, Misery?”
Misery looked up at the old man in silence for a few moments. “I don’t know. Get in the bus.”
“Did you hurt him? Why isn’t he-”
“Get in. The bus.” Misery ended the word with a sharp hiss, letting it be known that the conversation was over. Whistle frowned and climbed inside.
Misery stepped before the old man, waving to get his attention. The bus driver’s empty green eyes slowly fell down to look at her, without a single spark of thought. The changeling girl pointed into his pocket, where he had stored the slip of paper.
“The map. Drive there.”
The driver slowly dipped a hand into the pocket, pulling out the map. He unfolded it with his bony hands and scanned over it, the spark of life returning to his eyes for a moment as his thoughts returned to him long enough to fulfill his mission. When finished, he nodded, folding the slip back up and stepping into the bus without a word. Misery followed behind him.
~
“Daaaaad, my feet hurt.”
Anon ignored her and kept walking, knowing she’d keep following behind anyways. He didn’t have the time or the patience to stop for a rest. Not while they were still out there, his... unholy spawn, probably destroying the lives of innocents virgins or something. He had walked through half of the city with his daughter, now, and had found no trace of the insectoid children. He would have found it delightfully ironic that the things he had wished away for the past seven years would suddenly be the most sought after thing in his life, were it not so infuriating.
He glanced behind him to check on Mistake, who trudged forward in an over-dramatic limp, complete with agonizingly slow speed. He sighed and scooped her up under his arm, throwing her over his shoulder like a viking warrior bringing home a kidnapped villager. Mistake giggled and went limp, enjoying the free ride.
“Dad, why are you so scared?”
“Because all of your brothers and sisters are gone.”
“But I thought you didn’t like us?”
“I don’t.”
“Then why do you care?”
Anon sighed. “Because if they get into trouble, or get captured by the government, or open some interdimensional portal to wherever the hell they came from, then it’s on MY ass. And I don’t like things riding on my ass.”
Mistake wriggled out of her father’s grasp and fluttered down to the ground, now walking beside him without any of the previous melodramatics. “You never really cared before, though.”
“I always tried to keep you close by, at least. And disguised when you were outside. Those were my only two rules.” He threw his arms in the air in exasperation. “With so many of you, it was the only thing I could do to keep you guys out of trouble, and you all went ahead and broke the rules anyways.”
Anon rounded the street corner, coming to face a small park. Several children ran around in the shade of the trees, throwing a frisbee between each other. None of the kids with half-bug. Anon groaned in frustration and headed further south, Mistake in tow.
It just didn’t make sense to him. Bakersfield wasn’t that big. With a hundred or so children on the loose, each with magical abilities and a knack for causing issues, he was expecting the scene when he walked out of his house to resemble something out of Gremlins. But to the contrary, he had seen absolutely no sign of any of them. No screams of terror, no crashing vehicles, no strange insect hives spawning out of the ground. Eventually Anon came to the conclusion that with such large numbers in such a small space, the only way he wouldn’t run into any of them was if they were traveling together in a group. But why would over a hundred bug children who were constantly at each other’s throats travel together?
Anon’s thoughts were interrupted as he heard a soft squishing noise underneath his left shoe. He grunted and tried to pull his foot off the ground, finding it cemented to the concrete. Try as he might, the shoe refused to separate from the ground. He sighed and undid the strings, leaving the shoe behind. He glanced around, trying to find out what he had just stepped in.
In front of him was a scene he wasn’t prepared for. The entire stretch of sidewalk before him was covered in splotches of some sort of green slime, extending all the way out to the end of the street where it turned. Giant mounds of it seemed to be more present near the center, where it was in higher concentration. As he looked into the mounds, he noticed something inside of them: living people, suspended in the gel and looking terrified.
One of the nearby mounds contained an adult. Anon leaned in, careful not to touch the mess. His eyes darted around, a terrified expression glued on his face. He was obviously aware, and still alive, but incapable of moving.
Careful not to step in any more of the stuff, he made his way into the center of the mass. This shit was NOT natural, he knew that much. Anon tiptoed through the patches of clear ground, careful not to step in even a single spec of the green trap. He made his way from the sidewalk onto the nearby house’s lawn, where the concentration of the stuff was higher. Mistake watched from a distance with an interested look in her eye, slightly amused by her father’s ballet act among the slime.
Anon cursed under his breath and gestured around him. “I’m guessing this stuff is from you guys?”
Mistake nodded. “That’s sticky goo. Jet showed us all how to do it a long time ago. He caught a bird with it.”
“Where does it come from?”
“We just spit it out.” Mistake shrugged.
“Well, that’s... something.” Anon stepped around a particularly large mound, with two adults trapped inside together. “How do you get rid of it?”
“If you get water on it, it goes away.”
Anon nodded and glanced around the yard, eyes landing on a hose left unraveled in the middle of the grass. He took it and made aim at a nearby mound of slime, showing it in water. As soon as the water made contact, the strange material began to mix with it, losing its solidity and becoming liquid again. Soon it began to wash away and shrink down, receding from the mound and flooding down into the grass, revealing what was kept inside: a very scared looking child. The kid shuddered on the lawn, gazing up at the sky as if paralyzed with the thought that he was finally free.
Anon waved a hand in front of his eyes and got his attention. “Hey. Kid. You alright?”
The child nodded slowly, still out of shape. “Y-you can b-breathe in t-there... but it’s s-so cold...”
“Hey, kid, stay with me.” Anon snapped in front of him to get his attention once more. “Where are the things that did this to you?”
The kid sat up and pointed down the street, towards the elementary school. “B-bus. They took the bus.”
~
“I can’t believe we took the bus.”
Whistle gazed out the window, Misery sitting next to her. While most of the changeling children behind them had already forgotten about the scene with the bus driver, including Whistle, Misery was still trying to wrap her head around it. The old man seemed healthy, physically, but mentally, he was gone. She had tried speaking with him, with no amount of success, finding that he would follow orders if she gave them, but was not able to speak his own mind. At this point, Misery questioned whether or not he still had a mind.
A smaller changeling, named Faith, tugged on Misery’s shirt, pulling her out of her thoughts. She smiled up at her in a way that made her suspect she was about to ask for something. “Misery, can we stop and get a snack? We’re hungry.”
Misery scowled at her. “Star says we’ll be with Mom before the sun is even down. We’ll get something to eat there.”
Faith pouted and retreated to the back of the bus with the rest of her brothers and sisters. They were all in their disguises still, a hundred little girls and boys with a rainbow of eye colors and clothes. The bus was well past it’s capacity, many of the children sitting on the floor and on top of each other, some places with four to a single seat. Misery guessed the bus only held about fifty or so passengers, but they were making do with the space provided. She sighed as a couple of brothers scratched at each other over a tiny spot of space, knocking over another small group that sat on the ground next to them. With a loud whistle, she grabbed their attention, and motioned for them to cut it out. They gave each other death glares, but obeyed.
And Misery had to admit, her brothers and sisters had been strangely obedient. Their usual off the wall, violent behavior had calmed down substantially when she started to give them orders, and they usually followed said orders to the letter. Still, they weren’t like the bus driver: the bus driver was mindless, she could tell that much. He was driven to do whatever she asked, with no thought of his own unless called upon. Her siblings that she ordered around, they still had working brains. They chose to follow her, either through determination to see their mother or a lack of anything better to do, but they could stop following her at any time. Misery had to wonder how long that control would last, and whether or not it was even worth it.
As the bus drove on, she even started to question whether or not it was a good idea to bring the hive with her in the first place. They were big, noisy, and hard to lose. She was almost sure that she could have snuck away by herself and made it to her destination without her siblings. She had thought, at the time, that more people meant more help, but now that she dwelled on it she realized they may just slow her down in the long run. Finding a bus that would fit them all had taken most of the afternoon anyways, longer than this entire trip was even supposed to take. Star had promised her that the map said they would be there in about four hours, and even that was four hours too long.
She turned to the bus driver, finding that she, too, was already getting impatient. “Driver. Where are we?”
The bus driver didn’t turn away from the road, but slowly lifted a finger to the map that was propped up against the dashboard. It landed on the eastern border of Bakersfield. They hadn’t even gone more than a few miles. She looked out the window to confirm it, finding that the houses of the city were beginning to fade behind them, slowly being replaced by more and more farmland. They had only just breached the city limits. It was going to be a long, long ride.
Misery felt a nudge on her arm and turned to face Whistle. “Why isn’t dad coming? We should have brought him. I’m sure he wants to see momma too.”
Misery waved a hand dismissively. “I’m sure he does. But he’s got a life to get to. He wouldn’t go out of the way to find her. And I didn’t want to ask him, because he’d probably try to stop us. He doesn’t like us going too far.”
“Do you think he’s going to try and come after us?”
Misery looked out the window once more at the city, retreating behind them. “No. Like I said, he’s got a life. He won’t follow us. Not like he even knows where we’re going.”
~
“Daddy, where are we going?”
Anon kept walking down the street, heart pounding and mind racing. He looked up from the sidewalk, trying to get his bearings. Somewhere downtown, it seemed. “I don’t know. Shut up, I’m thinking.”
Mistake waved through a window as they passed a cafe, apparently knowing some of the people inside. She sped up a bit to catch up to her father and looked up at him. “Well, shouldn’t we go find the bus they took?”
Anon sighed. “Yes, Mistake, that would be ideal.” He looked down toward her with a scowl. “Unfortunately, we have no idea where they’re going with that bus.”
Mistake glanced back in the direction they had come from. “Shouldn’t we have used the hose and got the rest of those people out of the goo?”
“They’ll be fine. The sprinklers will come on eventually.”
“I don’t know, some of them looked pretty scared, an-”
“Mistake.” Anon dropped to his knee and put his hands on her shoulders, looking her in the eye. “They will be fine. We have something more important to take care of right now. Do you have any idea where they would be heading? I mean, you’re one of them.”
The little girl bit her bottom lip in thought, looking off to the side. “... wellllllll...” she let out a breath, “... nope. If they made a plan, they did it last night, when I was sleeping with you.”
Anon groaned and leaned against a light post, resting his feet for a moment. He realized he had been walking around most of the day, now, doing nothing but panicked thinking. And he had dragged Mistake with him the entire way. Her face was red and her hair dripping with sweat. She sat on the sidewalk and heaved a sigh of exhaustion, happy to take a break from walking. Anon took a seat next to her and tussled her hair, getting her attention.
“Alright, let’s think about this. Obviously they can’t walk to where they’re going. They wouldn’t need the bus if they did. So, they aren’t going anywhere inside the city.”
“Right.” Mistake nodded.
“And since they’ve never been out of the city, they had to learn about this place from somewhere else. Right?”
“Mhm.”
“So, maybe they left clues behind. A trail to follow.” Anon pointed towards the direction of his house. “Something, anything that could be a hint, would probably be at the house.”
Anon pushed himself back up to his feet, making causing Mistake to groan in contempt. “Then why didn’t we just go there first? We’ve been walking for ages...”
The walk to their home took substantially less time than the walk they had spent their morning on. Anon threw open the door to the house and stepped inside, Mistake cradled in his arms. He dropped her on the living room couch unceremoniously and started poking around the house, looking for anything that could help. A thought suddenly occurred to him and he headed for the hallway.
“Mistake, see if there’s anything to go on in here. I’m going to check the computer.”
He didn’t even stay behind to hear her protest. The door to the computer room squeaked open with a slight push. Anon didn’t like the children touching his computer, but he found that one of them, Star, knew how to actually use it properly. About a month ago Anon had let him use it on the promise that he wouldn’t break anything, and he had done a pretty good job on keeping that promise so far.
He pulled out the chair and took a seat, wiggling the mouse to bring the computer to life. Whoever had used the computer last (and it wasn’t him, so it had better been Star or else he was going to have to slap a bug) had left it open on a few pages. The first was some kind of conspiracy website, like the kind that have “explanations” about vampires and ghosts. This one in particular was about aliens. Anon skimmed through the page. Apparently the alien under investigation here was some kind of shapeshifter. Anon sighed and sat back in the chair, realizing what had happened.
He had searched for answers himself, the first few years after she had disappeared. He spent hours, days, entire weekends glued to his computer screen, looking for some sign. He hadn’t found anything. A few conspiracy sites, like that one, but nothing substantial. As the abominations had gained a foothold in his life and entered a hatchling phase, he had given up on finding her ever again. But it was obvious that with the details he had given her, Misery had started her own search. And whatever she had found, she had taken all of her brothers and sisters to go see.
And her search had been much more successful. Maybe it was because the information just hadn’t been there when he searching for it, but Misery had gathered entire stores of information that he had never seen seven years ago. There were maps, essays, pictures, the whole lot. Anon was almost entirely convinced most of it was complete bullshit, but obviously something on this page had been enough for Misery to go off in confidence. As he reached the bottom of the page, he saw immediately what it was.
A very blurry picture sat at the bottom of the webpage, but what could be seen was definitely enough. A younger woman, somewhere in her twenties, was looking into the camera with glowing green eyes. Her flowing blue-green hair fell down almost to her waist. A glint of a shining white fang shone out from her mouth. The picture was cut off from her midsection down by a few trashcans. The picture was taken in an alley, and from the picture’s description, it was taken in Las Vegas. He didn’t even have to look at it twice to know that it was his “lover”, Chrysalis.
The paragraph of text below it went on to explain how the photographer had been chasing after the mysterious woman for months, after swearing he saw her in her “true form” one night in the back of a hotel parking lot. Her current whereabouts were unknown, but presumably she was still in Vegas somewhere, hiding from whoever knew about her existence. Anon scrolled back up and stared at the photograph for a moment longer. It was definitely her, he knew it. Misery must have known it too. That was reason enough for them to head for Vegas.
Anon tabbed to the next page, which was Google Maps. He didn’t have to stare at it long to know what it was: a map between Bakersfield and Las Vegas. 281 miles. The route traveled through the mountains and down South, through Barstow, and then back North to the shining city of sin itself. Las Vegas, the gem of the Mojave desert. It was almost like a beacon, beckoning from across the sea of sand, as if Chrysalis was calling back the children that she left behind. Like bringing moths to a flame.
Anon printed a map for himself and headed back out into the hall. Mistake hadn’t moved from the spot where he had dumped her on the couch. She began to speak, but Anon cut her off before she even had a chance to whine about her legs again.
“We’re going. Now. We need to find a car we can borrow.”
She groaned loudly. “Oh, come on! We’ve been walking all day!”
“We’ll rest when we have a car.” Anon went to the couch and picked her up, throwing her over his shoulder once more, her legs dangling behind him. She was actually exhausted this time, he could tell, but they didn’t have time to rest. “Do you know anyone with a car we could borrow?”
Mistake scoffed. “Why are you asking me? You’re the grown-up.”
“Mistake, let me explain something to you.” Anon opened the door and started walking down the street, not even sure where he was headed. “I’ve lived about 20 years longer than you. Half of those years were spent in this city. And I can guarantee you, you still know more people than I do. That is how far out of the way I go not to associate myself with the hicks that live here.”
Mistake giggled lightly and poked her father in the cheek. “You need to get more friends. And I know lotsa people, but none of them would just give you a car because you asked.”
“Well, the only person I’m even on remotely good terms with is Katie. And she’s too sane to let me borrow her car for some crazy mission to Vegas.” He sighed. “Guess we have to ask though, don’t we?”
Katie’s house was on the other side of town. By the time Anon arrived, his own legs were beginning to ache and beg for the sweet release of sitting. He ignored their pleas and stepped up to her front door, setting Mistake down on the ground beside him. He knocked a few times and stepped back, waiting for a response. After a few moments the door opened and Katie came into view, wearing a pair of sweats and a loose t-shirt. They looked at each other for a few moments before her brain flared to life, registering who was standing before her.
“Oh! Anon! Uh, I didn’t think I’d see you today. I was going to call later tonight and ask you how you were doing. Say, you’re lookin’ pretty well rested. Did you get in a few hours of-” She stopped and gasped as her eyes fell on Mistake, who sat on the porch with a prize winning beam.
“Yeah, hi, Katie. This is my daughter-” His lips glued together, almost calling her by her true name. Doing so was probably unwise.
Before he could even finish, Mistake finished for him. “The name’s Lauren. Nice to meet you.”
Katie smiled. “You named her Lauren, after your mother? That’s so sweet.”
Anon had completely forgotten that was even his mother’s name, but he was thankful for Mistake’s save. “Listen, we, uh... we need to borrow your car. Just for today. Maybe also the first half of tomorrow, depending on how things go.”
Katie paused and leaned against the door frame, confusion etched across her face. “My car? Where are you headed, Fresno?”
“A bit further than Fresno, actually. But I can’t really tell you where, or why. You probably wouldn’t believe me anyways.”
Katie chuckled. “Come on, I’ve seen some weird things in my time. Try me.”
He sighed. “Well, to put it short, the rest of my kids are gone.”
Katie’s eyes widened as she turned around, heading back inside. She went to a small table off to the left of the entry hallway and picked up a phone before Anon could stop her.
“Oh god, we need to call the police. We can file a missing persons-”
“Katie, they aren’t missing. I know where they are. That’s why I need the car.”
Katie put down the phone and returned to the doorway, the look of confusion returned. “Where could they have possibly gone that you would need a car to get to? Lamont?”
Anon shook his head. “Further.”
“Arvin?”
“Farther than that, for sure.”
She scoffed loudly. “What, did they go to Vegas to play the tables?”
“Well, I highly doubt they’ll be doing any gambling there, but...”
She stared at him, no hint of amusement in her eyes. “Is this some kind of joke? Because it’s not funny.”
Anon shrugged. Katie stared at him in disbelief, her jaw hanging in the air. Her hand drifted to the door knob as she slowly backed away into the house, preparing to shut the door in their faces. Just before she did, Mistake stuck her foot in the doorway, blocking it open as it came to a sudden close. Normally that kind of thing would seriously injure the person involved, and probably break the leg of a normal seven year old, but the bug-child’s chitinous legs absorbed the blow without much more than a bump. She pulled it back quickly before Katie had a chance to see what had blocked the door, but it kept it open for the second that Mistake needed.
“Actually, Katie, my dad IS joking. But you and I both know he’s not very funny.” Mistake smiled apologetically up at the woman in the most charming way she could muster. “He wanted to drive me up to the Fresno water park! We’ve been planning this for months.”
Katie paused and looked back up at Anon, who took the hint and nodded vigorously. “Yes. Just messing with you, Katie, come on. How would someone even manage to lose their kids in Vegas?”
Katie sighed and turned around, taking her purse off of where it was hanging on the wall and retrieving her keys. She handed them to Anon. “Sorry, I’m not in high spirits today. Just make sure you fill it back up before you bring it back.” She smiled down at the little girl. “And you two have fun at the water park, ok?”
The door closed and the pair headed for the driveway, heading for the car. It wasn’t a fancy one, by any definition. In fact, it was a Dodge Neon from 1995, and it didn’t look a day younger than the twenty or so years it had riding on its back. Anon unlocked the front door and climbed in gingerly, as if worried that he might send it to a pile of junk before they even started it. Mistake waited for him to unlock the passenger door before climbing into the seat beside him.
“You’re a pretty quick liar. Thanks for that save. Well, both saves, including the name.” Anon brought the car to life with a turn of the key, the car almost sounding like it was whining to be in use.
“You are terrible with people. You should just let me talk from now on.” Mistake glaced at a label on the dashboard. “It says that children under ten should sit in the back.”
Anon pulled the car out of the driveway, his phone leading them on the same route Misery was taking. “Don’t worry about it.”
~
“Don’t worry about it.”
Star poked at the fuel gauge with a finger, worry etched across his face. “No, I’m pretty sure we should worry about it.”
Misery sighed and pulled Star away from the dashboard by the shirt. “I’m telling you, don’t worry about it. We’ll be fine.”
“Misery, the fuel gauge is almost empty. That means the bus is going to stop moving any second now.” Star scrunched his face and pointed up at the map. “And we aren’t even halfway there yet. Nearest place that isn’t just a load of sand is Barstow, a few miles ahead. Vegas is way past that. And I don’t think our friend here is in any condition to fuel us back up.” Star gestured up towards the bus driver, still completely focused on the road with his dull green eyes.
Misery took a look at the map. As Star had pointed out, the only thing even visible for the next hundred miles was Nipton. Either they stopped here and didn’t get caught in the middle of the desert, or they took their chances and just crossed their fingers. Misery didn’t like those chances.
“Driver. Get off the highway, we’re stopping in Barstow.”
Star breathed a sigh of relief and went back to the seats in the bus, forcing one of his sisters to squish against the wall to get himself a seat.
Whistle frowned. “So, we’re taking a stop?”
Misery nodded. “Hopefully this won’t be any longer than it has to be.”