The Travelers of the Tree

Chapter 38 - The Right Side

Tommy sat up with a start. His head ached, and there was a sharp pain in his chest. He wasn't sure where he was. The last thing he had remembered was that he had fallen before he could push the lever in the tree. He opened his eyes, expecting to see the worst. Instead, he saw the best site he had ever seen. Katy's smiling face.

"How?" was all he could ask.

"When I saw the hole in the tree, I just got a feeling like I had found something in it before. I guess that is how I got to that other world." Tommy tried to shake the cobwebs from his mind.

"Do you remember anything else about that night?" Katy shook her head no. Tommy stood. He looked at the ground and saw that Matt and David were still unconscious.

"Water wakes them up." Together, they went to the tree and used their cupped hands to bring water to the other boys. When the water was splashed on their faces, they both sat up slowly.

"We made it," David yelled. Matt just pumped his fist into the air.

"Why don't you think they came after us?" David asked. Tommy shrugged.

"Ramsey said his dad had warned him that coming through here would lead to the destruction of their world. I don't know, maybe they tried and were unable to. I'm just glad they didn't." When all of them could stand, they looked for the bags they had left behind several days earlier. They were nowhere to be seen.

"My friends probably took them," Matt said with a smile.

"What do we do now?" Tommy asked. He looked at Katy. "How do we explain where you've been all of this time?" David interjected.

"We don't. We can't. We were camping in the woods. We found Katy wandering by herself. She has no memory." They all looked at each other for several moments. No one could think of anything better. Matt looked at Katy.

"How are you going to be able to handle this Katy?"

"I have to handle it. That's all. I'll manage. Nothing could be as bad as if you had left me there. I'll have my parents." She choked up, thinking about the lone memory she had of them, and wondering if she'd regain more.

"You have us too," David said. The other boys nodded yes. As they starting walking down the path that would lead them out of the park, David stopped and turned toward the tree.

"I can't help but feel that we have unfinished business back there," he said. The others stood and looked at the tree in silence, all thinking about the various injustices that they had witnessed and suffered in that cruel world. Then they turned their backs on the tree and continued walking.

When they got to the police station, they felt that it would better if Katy went in first. As they watched her walk up the stairs, each boy felt the pride of a mission accomplished. They had set out to rescue Katy and they had. Their pride was only tempered with their knowledge that there were thousands of "Katy's" on the other side of that doorway.