The Journey The Only Survivors

Chapter III: The Newborn Savior

We had decided it was best not to tell the kings we were following them and to, rather, keep a safe distance between them and us. We had stopped in Jerusalem yesterday and left about twenty minutes ago to travel on to Bethlehem. Bethlehem was only about ten miles away from Jerusalem—I knew this from Bible class—but the kings were very slow when they walked, so we probably wouldn't make it to Bethlehem until the next day.

Our last amount of food was in our bellies, and there was no more water. We had filled our bottles up in Jerusalem at a well, but the water tasted like cardboard, and it was as dirty as a camel's trough.

We had also changed our clothes—Bryan and I had found dirty togas in Jerusalem on the side of the road, so we put those on. Amy and Luke were still in their modern clothes though, which was probably why we got so many weird looks in Jerusalem. Amy wore a bright pink shirt, which she had put on in Costco, with jewels that outlined a yellow sunflower. And her jeans had beads around the pockets, so she had very showy clothes. Luke, on the other hand, wore a brown shirt with a picture of a soccer ball on it and regular blue jeans, so he looked less showy. It would be easier, however, if we had found togas that fit them.

There was another major problem as well. Ever since the phone decided that it did not want to take us to any other time but this, we were stuck in the desert. The only thing the phone said when we unlocked it was "Stay," and we couldn't type anything in.

"It's so. . . h-hot. I'm s-so. . . t-thirsty. I n-need water," Amy said, breathing heavily. She began to walk more and more slowly until she fell flat on the desert sand. Her skin turned pale, and saliva protruded from the surface of her half-opened mouth and started bubbling. I jumped to her side, and my knees skidded on the sand. I felt the pain of a rug burn, but I barely noticed it—Amy was the most important thing right now.

"Looks like she's about to have a seizure. We have to ask the kings for water, or Amy might get worse," I said, panicking, each word toppled over the other.

Bryan had frozen as still as a statue. I glanced around looking for help.

"I'm quite certain they don't know English," Bryan said, unmoving, but the words came out of his mouth as if they were meant to. Luke began to cry, and he moved over to me. I rubbed Amy's forehead and then looked back toward the kings.

"Maybe they do, maybe they don't, but Amy needs water, so I'm going over there." I ran to the kings.

"My sister is. . . she needs. . ." I didn't know if they knew English, so I made a cup with my hands and pretended to pour water into my mouth. "We ran out of water. Can you please help us?"

"Yes, yes of course."

Oh my gosh, he can speak English!

The king looked at me oddly. One of the other kings scooped some water out of a bin on one of their camels and handed me a golden goblet with multi-colored jewels on it. I ran back over to Amy, being careful to keep my hand as steady as possible so I didn't spill the water.

I poured some water on her head and a little into her slightly opened mouth and then waited for her to wake up. Amy slowly opened her eyes, coughed, spit the water out, and looked at me asking for more. I gave her the cup. One of the kings had followed me, probably just being kind to see if we needed more help.

Amy gulped the water down and thanked me. She then proceeded to stare at the cup, her eyes wide and her mouth perched open.

"Thank you very much," I said to the king who followed behind me—his cloak a vibrant shade of crimson red. "You're so caring." I stood up. Bryan stood next to me; he had finally regained his ability to move and talk. It didn't make sense that he was okay when I got hurt, but suddenly froze up when Amy did.