"He jumped the railing of the overpass on that dirtbike of his."

"He did what?"

Razell knew that it would be very bad for his continued health if he said something snarky in response to Lord Imakarum’s question, so he just answered with the bald facts as he’d witnessed them. "He rode up over the hood of a car, and he jumped off the edge of the overpass."

"So he would be dead now," His Excellency said flatly, making it very clear that he wasn’t really asking a question.

Razell took a deep breath and hoped that he would still be breathing when he finished making his report to Lord Imakarum. "I… I don’t think that’s true in this case, Your Excellency. He wouldn’t have done something that drastic if he wasn’t sure he would survive. At least, I don’t think he would."

"Then follow him," Lord Imakarum ordered calmly, cutting off contact from his end.

"Yes, Your Excellency," Razell said belatedly.

"All right; we’re going to catch that little bastard, and we’re going to drag him back to Chronos!" Delcasse growled as he pressed down on the accelerator and turned the truck around.

XxXxX

Sitting down on his dirtbike, sipping from the bottle of water he’d bought for himself, Ryan looked back to see how Sho was doing. He was eating the jerky that Ryan had bought for him, so that was a good sign.

+How are you doing back there, Sho? I know that water, crackers, and jerky don’t make for the best lunch, but it was really all I could get us here.+

+I really don’t mind,+ Sho said, as he took another bite of his jerky. +It was nice of you to get them for me at all.+

+I’m still not too clear on what happened back there,+ Ryan said ruefully. +So I really couldn’t say.+

+Yeah,+ Sho nodded. +I can’t really remember what happened then, either. I guess I was still kind of out of it.+

Looking back again, Ryan saw that Sho was pretty downcast, staring at the pavement like it alone had some sort of answer for what they were both going through right now. Ryan decided that, besides being time for them to leave for more practical reasons, getting back on the road would probably help Sho forget about what was getting to him.

+Sho, we’re going to get moving again. You might want to hold on.+

+What are we going to do now, Ryan? And, what are we going to do with the food?+ Sho asked, even as he wrapped his arms around Ryan’s waist and squeezed slightly.

+I’ll take care of that,+ Ryan said, removing the remains of the jerky stick and the half-empty bottle of water and stuffing them into the bag he’d attached to the side of his dirtbike for situations like this.

Okay well, maybe not situations exactly like this, since no one in their right mind would ever be able to predict a situation exactly like this. Being chased by some nuts in a truck that were determined to turn the both of them into roadkill wasn’t really something that the average person was mentally equipped to handle, let alone suspect. Ryan gave thanks again that he’d never quite been quite normal—it’d probably saved his ass.

Once the food and water had been fully stowed away, Ryan cranked up the engine of his dirtbike and roared off again. He had a more concrete destination in mind this time: his paternal uncle’s cabin up in the hills was a good place to lose oneself, or anyone else that was trying to follow him. The road to get up there was steep and lined with hairpin turns that would be very bad news for the huge truck following him, at least if the goons inside ever managed to catch up to him again.

The only problem with that idea was that his uncle’s cabin was pretty far outside the city, farther than he could get on just this one tank of gas. The food hadn’t cost that much, so money wasn’t so much of an issue at the moment, but if the way Sho was acting was any indication, then those Chronos guys weren’t done with him yet. He was going to have to find a way to keep those guys off his back when he inevitably had to fill his gas tank again.

+Where are we going, Ryan?+

+We’re heading out to my uncle’s cabin up in the hills,+ Ryan said, steering in that direction. +It’s hard for most people to find, which why my old uncle chose it—he’s not too fond of people outside of the family. Course, that means I’m going to have to convince him to let you stay with us until those goons give up looking for ya, but he likes me. It shouldn’t be too difficult to get him on our side.+

+Thank you, Ryan. I hope I’m not being too much of a burden to you.+

+Nah,+ Ryan said, shrugging off Sho’s words as he continued to keep a lookout for any suspicious trucks. +If you were whining and crying, then you’d be a burden. As it is, you’re less annoying than most of the people I’ve met at school.+

+Oh.+

Sho didn’t really seem to have anything else to say about that, so Ryan turned his attention back to the road. Getting lost would just give those Chronos guys more of a chance to catch him, something that Ryan wasn’t going to do. Turning his head to look for the exit that would lead him up the first leg of the trip. Spotting the first exit, Ryan turned to the right and took it.

+I can understand that,+ Sho said, sounding a bit more subdued than Ryan had ever heard him.

+It’s not that I don’t want you here, Sho. I just don’t know you well enough to make any definite decisions about whether I like you or not, you know?+

+I guess that does make sense,+ Sho said, sounding a bit less down about himself than he had originally.

The guy really didn’t seem to have a high opinion of himself—either that, or he just wasn’t so good with people. Whichever it was, though, Ryan really didn’t have time to think about it. He needed to keep his mind on finding the next exit on the way to his uncle’s cabin. The sound of revving truck motors prompted Ryan to take a look in his left-side mirror. Sure enough, there was a large, nondescript truck bearing down on him.

Checking his right side, Ryan swore creatively when he saw that there was indeed another truck coming up from that side. He was about to be boxed in, and then… Well, Ryan wasn’t too clear about what was going to happen then, but judging from the way Sho had reacted to even the idea of Chronos, he was fairly sure that it wasn’t going to be anything good. One of Ryan’s frequent – at least today – bursts of insane-genius-under-pressure made itself known then.

Keeping an eye on both trucks, switching his gaze from one mirror to the other, Ryan waited until the two trucks were right alongside him. Then he throttled down, dumping speed fast enough that the trucks overshot him by one-and-a-half car lengths. Laughing, Ryan turned his bike around and headed for the next exit. There were still a few roads between him and his uncle’s cabin, so that meant that he was going to have to lose these chumps on the way there.

Still, with the way he knew these roads, it’d be pretty easy to lose the losers without getting himself lost.

When the road five feet in front of him exploded, Ryan had to turn extremely quickly to keep from running into the giant pothole that up until ten seconds ago had been a flat part of the road in front of him. Dealing with the trucks would be a hell of a lot easier than trying to drive across a pothole that stretched across the entire road. Driving head-on at the truck like he was setting up for some grossly unfair game of "Chicken" freaked out the driver enough that he didn’t react nearly fast enough when Ryan turned slightly and blew by on his left side.

Of course, the move freaked Sho out pretty thoroughly, too.

+I can’t believe he fell for that a second time,+ Ryan said, chuckling and trying to ease Sho’s obvious tension.

The death-grip that Sho had around his waist was a pretty good indicator of just how freaked out the other boy was.

Checking his mirrors, Ryan saw that both of the trucks had turned and were tailing him again. He really wished one of them had managed to crash into that big damn pothole in the road, but these guys were obviously not as stupid as your typical movie bad guys. There wasn’t really any doubt in Ryan’s mind that these were the Bad Guys, they were just really smart Bad Guys. That wasn’t a very good thing, but it would make it more fun to get away from them.

They wouldn’t be expecting it, Ryan was sure.

When the road in front of him exploded again, a fair amount closer than it had been last time, Ryan nearly didn’t make it out of the way in time. He had to work to rebalance his bike, though he did manage to right it with a bit of help from Sho. But now there wasn’t really any place for him to go. Even the two trucks didn’t have any way to get over those giant potholes, at least not without tipping over and crashing.

+Well, I’d say we’re now officially fucked. That is, unless you’ve got some ideas on how to get us out of this fix. Got any, Sho?+

+I’m sorry, Ryan, but I-+

"Sho!"