Jack James and the Call of the Tanakee (4 page)

PUD’S MIGHTY LEAP PROPELLED HIM so high he actually came within reach of Takota’s back tire. No way, Takota thought. He’ll never get me.

But he did.

He clasped the spokes, scratching his nails and digging into the rubber. Takota heard his tire whining and losing air. The least of his concerns. As a direct result of Pud’s abrupt and vicious interruption, his direction had changed. Dramatically. Instead of sailing on a perfect course for the landing zone, he was now looking at a dead-drop into the muck.

Twisting, turning, he managed to kick Pud free, sending him end over end, and falling into the swamp. Pud didn’t seem to mind.

“Ha! Gotcha! You’re not going anywhere now!” he watched Takota flail helplessly.

Pud’s self-satisfied smirk faded quickly when, somehow, Takota righted his bike and, with the skill of a daredevil, landed on both wheels. He shot forward into the steering wheel and lost his breath. His front tire dug into the ground. He thought he was going to flip end over end, but, miraculously, he regained balance and, much to Pud’s dismay, was still in the running. And only feet from the finish line.

“NO!” Pud lamented. “He can’t beat me!”

“He can, and he will,” Ayita answered, taking the jump with ease and flying over him. Enola and Cheyton were directly behind her, both cheering loudly.

Takota pedaled out of the soft earth and eyed his destination, still in disbelief it was finally going to happen.

“GIMME MY MACHINE!”
DILLON MIMICKED Jack with a sickly squeak. He tossed the gadget to his partner.

“Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!”
Mike tormented in an even more disgusting voice. He lifted the machine high and Jack jumped feverishly, pulled on the boy’s arm, even stomped on his toe. Nothing worked. Mike simply laughed and hurled the device once again to Dillon.

“He’s not tough at all,” Dillon caught it, barely, letting it slip through his fingers over the blacktop. More groans and moans. “Not when his teddy bear isn’t around to protect him!”

Please, Takota!
Jack screamed inside.
Come to me, please!

His inner cries went unanswered. When Dillon reached back, bent at the knees, and let the machine loose with the strongest, highest throw yet, it made Jack’s stomach burst with fluttering butterflies. He tried to position himself in place and catch it, but Mike stood in the way. Both kids got their legs tangled and toppled to the ground. The last of the O/A Jack saw, it was soaring over the asphalt, nobody to catch it, nobody to stop it from smashing to the ground.

“No!” Jack shouted out loud. “Takota!”

“YES!” TAKOTA PROCLAIMED his elation. After all the failed attempts. After all the humiliating crashes. The skids and tumbles. The rocks embedded in his knees. After all of Pud’s taunting and teasing, he, for the first time in two weeks, had the finish line in his sights. It was all his. An unblemished, undeniable, unchallengeable victory.

“Takota!”

He heard Ayita one last time before securing that ever-elusive triumph. Then, in a fraction of an instant, he realized it wasn’t Ayita. That voice. He knew it in his sleep. Jack was in trouble. Takota lost his breath. Everything from his spleen to his kidneys jumped into his throat. Somehow he managed to scream when, inches from the finish line, just before he was about to taste sweet victory, the entire forest fizzled into a shimmering, blinding, twisting chasm. Then he fell directly in.

Spinning, churning, he was a feathery, weightless cloud. It only lasted milliseconds, and it left him breathless. Not that he needed to breathe. The trip, wherever he’d gone, was so brief that if he’d blinked, he would have missed it. But he didn’t blink. And he didn’t miss it. It was like watching a constant stream of never-ending comets and supernovas and meteors all rolled into one. Then, without any fanfare, he felt a sudden
Thud!
and the cold, wet wind of the real world. The human world.

He didn’t have time to think. All of a sudden, he was in the middle of a crowd of children. He felt a tremendous pull to one of them, and knew Jack was there before he even saw the boy. Then he
did
see Jack’s face, fraught with worry.

“Takota!” Jack gestured to the air, to the O/A as it sailed toward certain destruction. Without another thought, he soared over Willow School and its playground, way up, to the same elevation as Jack’s machine.

The purplish-blue luster dazzled his vision, and when he snatched it, he got a sudden shock. Surprising, but not unpleasant. A friendly, warm embrace. With another subtle notion, Takota closed his eyes and when he opened them, he was where he wanted to be—right next to Jack.

A mob of elementary school kids rushed to meet him, dozens of smiles and laughs. All but two. He recognized them by their sullen stares, and thought those two boys should have learned by now.

“Dillon and Mike,” Takota shook his head. “Isn’t it about time you two grew up and stopped picking on people?”

“Grow up?” Dillon spoke almost too quickly to be understood. “If there’s anyone who needs to grow up around here, it’s Jack. I mean, come on. Best friends with a teddy bear?”

“We’re not teddy bears!” a tiny yet powerful voice intervened. Heads turned, stunned eyes searching for the issuer of the proclamation. Takota knew who it was. Suddenly, so did everyone else. Up in the oak trees, a silver and black figure peered back at them. An audible hum percolated the schoolyard. Kids watched in wonder as Cheyton exhibited his acrobatic prowess, swinging from one branch to the other.

“We’re Tanakee!” Ayita appeared, quite out of nothingness, on the opposite side of the schoolyard, another tiny, silver and black creature bouncing from the swings to the slide and back again.

“And all we want is peace and happiness…for everybody,” Enola materialized near Cheyton. She didn’t move or jump around or display any of her naturally athletic gifts. Instead, she merely stood among the leaves, her snowy coat glistening with its trademark green afterglow.

“Hey, guys! Where’d you go?” Pud blinked in. He clung to one of the uppermost tree limbs, but lost his grip and fell to the ground as he rejoiced. “Wait a sec…the race! Takota didn’t win!”

“Pud!” a little girl threw open her arms, rushing at him, ready to capture him in a friendly embrace. She stopped, though, and her giant smile turned sour when she noticed Pud was covered head-to-toe with sticky, soupy mud. “Ewww!”

Laughing and cheering, the overwhelming majority of students in the schoolyard were genuinely happy to see the Tanakee. And the Tanakee were just as pleased to greet the kids. Dozens of boys and girls gathered round to rub elbows with the tiny heroes.

Pud especially enjoyed the attention. He made fun of chasing the little girl who’d shown the revulsion to his filthiness, trying to get her to hug him. Takota wanted to join in the fun, but what just happened was weighing on his mind.

“Jack, you’ve got to take better care of this thing,” he handed over the O/A.

“I know, I know,” Jack sounded mad at himself. “Sometimes things just get out of hand.”

“That’s an amazing machine,” he said. “But it won’t work too well for you if you can’t keep hold of it.”

Jack responded by looking at Dillon and Mike, the two troublemakers. They both backed off. Jack had Takota by his side and the O/A in his hands, so they made themselves scarce, melding into the crowd. That didn’t matter much to Takota.

“I appreciate there are times when you might feel threatened and need my help,” he said. “But you called me here because of them? Do you realize I was about to win a bike race—my first one, against him,” he pointed at Pud. The scruffy bum only chortled.

“Sorry,” Jack said. “I didn’t mean to. It’s not like I was using the O/A to contact you or anything.”

“That’s right. You weren’t using the O/A, were you?” Amelia pointed out.

“It wouldn’t be the first time, either,” Takota added. “Remember, Jack?”

“I do,” he shrugged. “It’s happened a couple of times, now. What about it?”

Amelia smiled. “Your telepathy is getting stronger.”

“That’s good…right?”

“Well,” her hand traveled to the feather on her beaded necklace. “It’s good…”

Jack sighed. Amelia raised her finger, putting a halt to any further sense of ease.

“…AND it’s bad.”

“What does
that
mean?” both Jack and Takota said simultaneously.

Ayita stood next to Amelia.

“It means we have a lot of work left to do.”

Takota had so many questions. However, by then the onlookers had grown anxious, almost to the point of getting out of control. Pud, in his usual manner, whipped them into hysterics by running along the fence lines, crashing into tree trunks and basketball poles, sometimes on purpose, sometimes not so much. Ayita couldn’t seem to help herself either—jumping and running and showing the kids what she could do. Even the all-business Cheyton got into the fun, putting on a display of speed and reminding Takota of their epic confrontations. The kids loved it. The teachers didn’t.

“Okay! Okay!” Principal Humbert stood in the middle of the schoolyard, his slick, reddish hair ruffled in the commotion. He spoke to groans of disappointment. “Everyone settle down now. You’ll all get to see the Tanakee at the parade this weekend. Right now it’s time to get to class,” he smiled at Jack in frustration. “Jack, I thought we agreed about this. No talking teddy bears and no, um, interdimensional devices at school.”

Jack offered up a sheepish grin.

“It wasn’t his fault, sir,” Enola said to the rotund gentleman. “Two boys were bullying him, and we had to come help.”

The principal’s eyes got wide. “Gosh, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to you little guys talking. But I’m glad to meet you,” he let his smile travel from one Tanakee to the next. “All of you. You’ve done a great thing for this town. But we still have a few more days of school before summer break,” he eyed Jack, and then Amelia.

Takota shot Jack a questioning look. Jack patted his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Takota. I’ll be fine from here on out.”

“Are you sure? What about your machine? Jack, you need to keep it with you.”

The boy slid the O/A in his jacket surreptitiously, winking at his protector.

“I’ll be fine.”

“Nope!” said the principal. He held out his hand. “Give it here. Rules are rules. You’ll get it back at the end of the day.”

“Now hold on a second, Mister Principal,” Pud rushed toward the man. It took both Enola and Ayita to hold him. “That machine’s important.”

“He’s right,” Takota said. “You don’t know what kind of power you’re dealing with. That’s an Eteea machine.”

“Listen, I understand your concern,” Humbert replied. “But Jack agreed to this. He said he wouldn’t bring it to class, and I intend on taking him up on the promise.”

“Jack? Are you serious?” Amelia sounded skeptical.

He nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

“Not a good idea,” Takota narrowed his eyes at Humbert.

“Yeah,” agreed Cheyton. “Just how much do we know about this guy, anyway?”

Pud and Cheyton both got close to the man and sniffed him up and down, growling. Principal Humbert stepped away, clearly vexed by the two tiny yet intimidating creatures.

“Listen, guys,” Jack called them off. “He’s okay, really. We can trust him.”

The principal sighed big when the Tanakee duo lowered their claws and stopped flaunting their fangs. He relaxed enough to speak.

“I won’t do anything bad to it or anything like that.”

“It’s not you we’re worried about,” Amelia pointed at the O/A. “That’s not just a smartphone you’re used to confiscating from normal kids. If you haven’t noticed, Jack isn’t normal.”

“Young lady,” the principal’s jowls quivered like jelly. Humbert was getting a little red under the collar. “If you and your friend are so special, then maybe Willow Elementary isn’t the place for you.”

“NO!” at least two dozen people shouted in unison. The school kids became uneasy, many sounding desperate, begging Jack to stay. Jack had to raise his hands to get them to quiet down.

“This is my hometown, and this is my school. I’m going to Willow Elementary, Mr. Humbert,” he gave the man his father’s invention. “Here you go.”

“But,” Takota pulled his hand, drawing Jack down to his level. “What if you need to use it?”

“Yeah, Jack,” Amelia said. “What if something happens and you need the O/A? How are you going to get it back?”

“I guess I’d have to go see Principal Humbert and get it,” he said matter-of-factly.

“But what if that’s too late?”

“Why?” Jack had a pit in his stomach all of a sudden. “Do you see something?”

She lowered her eyes.

“No, I don’t…not now, anyway.”

Humbert smiled wide and showed off a gold-capped molar.

“Rest assured, young lady. I’ll keep this thing under the best of security. Nobody will so much as get a peep at it.”

“I hope you’re right,” she frowned.

FOUR