The Adventures of Trina: The Return of the Staff - Part Three

     “I think this tour is really lame. We should leave now, Trina,” Cassie complained to the spotted Wocky.

     “We’re in the middle of the desert!” Trina whispered back. “Where would we go?”

     “We could go play Pyramids or something. I think it’s not too far from here, but I’d rather take the chance of being wrong than hang out with those losers,” Cassie spat.

     “Fine,” Trina agreed since she was too drained to think of an argument.

     “Stacey, we really have to leave now. We have many things to do today,” the Usul told the tour guides and smiled sweetly.

     The two brown Meercas stopped in their tracks. They turned around and their gleaming eyes focused right at Trina’s sleepy face.

     Cindy hesitated for a few seconds, and then snapped, “Like I said before, you can wait! Once we get into Sakhmet, we will take you to the city’s finest restaurant! They have the best tasting Tchea pasty thingies around!”

     “Fine, but we must be at the shop by 5 o’ clock sharp,” Trina said ungratefully.

     The four friends and the Meerca tour guides gradually made their way to Sakhmet in the desert heat. The air was so searing, likely you could cook a deluxe cake in less than five minutes. It felt like twenty thousand dreadful steps later when they had finally reached the royal city of Sakhmet.

     “Now that we’re here, fellow tourists, we can show you something incredible that my sister and I found out. It’s a secret tunnel that may take you deep into the active city if you know your way around. Please take off your backpack when demanded so we all can fit inside.”

     Trina watched Stacey when she spoke. She looked like she was about to grin, but yet resisted at the last moment.

     Cindy, Stacey, and the tourists walked around the city’s large golden walls and began to rummage around. There was a small spot with a diminutive grey pebble positioned there. It seemed to be the only rock in the sand in the whole area. Cindy started to dig hastily in the spot. Trina and her friends watched closely as the sand began to uncover a secret brown door. It was made of wood and appeared to be very elderly.

     “We are now going to take the secret shortcut into the city. Please place your backpacks right in front of the door so we can... uh... not lose them.” Stacey smiled.

     Trina and Linny carefully placed their backpacks in front of the dusty secret door. They were so excited to go into the passage. Trina thought that she might find some answers to why the staff was in there and the purpose of the hidden passageways.

     Cindy pulled open the trap door. It was so dark you couldn’t see the ground.

     “Our rule is that tourists always go first when in comes to secret places. It takes all the fun out of the adventure if we guide you every step of the way. In fact, you should go on ahead; we’ll catch up with you shortly.” Stacey spoke clearly, holding the door wide open.

     Trina went in first, then Pat, Linny, and Cassie. It was again awfully narrow. The only nice thing about it was that it wasn’t deep at all. They began down the passage until they heard the door slam shut. Trina hurried toward to the door while her friends followed. They listened to the voices that were outside. They were no longer the familiar girly voices they heard from their tour guides. Trina suddenly knew trouble was just a few short moments away.

     “No time to check them, just grab them both!” a voice yelled.

     “Master will be so proud!” another voice replied, but was quite similar to the former.

     Trina tried pushed up the trap door. It was covered up with a lot of sand. Her heart began to pound as she franticly twitched.

     “I think someone is stealing the staff!” she screamed.

     “We’ll get out of here! Let’s push harder!” Cassie shouted.

     They pushed and shoved the door many times. Fortunately, the wood planks on the door were extremely weak. The door split apart and Trina sprung out as quickly as possible. The warm golden sand that was resting on the door was blown onto Trina’s spotty fur, but there were much too many things on her mind at the moment to care.

     The first thing Trina noticed was that the white sheets and the dazzling golden jewelry the tour guides were wearing were now whirling dejectedly in the sand. She looked deeper into the distance, only to see that her day was at its worst.

     She saw the two brown Meercas; one was wearing goggles and the other was wearing a dark blue wooly hat. It took less than a dire second for her to identify them. It was indeed Heermeedjet and his brother, Merouladen. She saw them running off into the desert with her green backpack. It wasn’t the backpack itself that she cared about; it was the outstanding treasure that was in the backpack, the broken staff of Alhasutek. Without any more delay, Trina scurried after them.

     Pat quickly whizzed in front of her. “Grab my foot! It would be much faster to catch up to them by air!”

     Trina grabbed Pat’s left foot and held on tight with both of her paws. Cassie and Linny were running close behind. They needed to catch the thieves, even if they had to pursue them to the moon.

     About 30 seconds later, they were gaining up on them. The desert heat was slowing the Meerca brothers down. Unfortunately for Trina, Pat had never flown for a long time in intensive heat. They also began dropping speed.

     “Trina, you need to start running or we’ll never catch them!” Pat was so exhausted she plunged into the desert sand face-first.

     Trina started to gallop after the thieves. In less than a minute, she was right behind them. Heermeedjet, the Meerca wearing the goggles, turned his head and saw Trina rushing after them.

     “We’ve got trouble!” the Meerca yelled.

     Merouladen turned around while running and threw both backpacks at Trina. It hit her in the face and caused her to fall backwards. The two Meerca thieves kept on running into the flat distance. The golden pyramids and palm trees were much too far to see, so she had nothing else to watch. Trina closed her eyes for a few seconds to see if it was just a crazy mirage. She slowly opened her eyes. It was indeed no mirage. An extremely powerful artifact was now in the hands of evil and all she could do was watch as the two figures vanished into the deserted side of the Lost Desert.

     Trina’s three friends ran up to her, trying to catch their breath. “Don’t worry, we’ll get it back, I promise.” Cassie tried to comfort her.

     Trina stood, besieged by her actions. It was her job to protect it and she failed. She had been selfish putting her dream before her best friends and now they were in danger. Everyone and everything she knew was in danger and she of all people was responsible. She had failed the world.

     The long moment of silence continued until Trina finally spoke. “I let them get away. It’s my fault. They stole Coltzan’s crown before, and now they have the staff. What do we do?”

     “If only I had the strength to fly over to them. They could be miles away from us right now. I think we should go after them by foot before it gets dark,” Pat suggested while panting hard.

     “But I have to be home before dark! My sister will go berserk if I’m late!” Linny shrieked.

     “Your sister should be the least of your worries. That staff is much more powerful than you think, Lin,” Cassie said, almost half-leisurely, “It can cause severe trouble to Neopia and beyond if one knows how to use it correctly, but I know we’ll get it back before then.”

     “I think we should all go home and have a night’s rest. Then we could come out at around 2 A.M. and meet outside Peopatra’s tent,” Pat again suggested. “We can seek for the thieves before dawn.”

     “Okay, we’ll do what Pat said, but don’t tell ANYONE about the staff and the secret doors. We don’t anymore want more dilemmas,” said Trina.

     “Sure, we will be here 2 A.M. sharp. Goodnight everyone, I’ll see you later!” Linny picked up her backpack, left the conversation, and disappeared into the dark blue sandy horizon.

     Soon everyone else left the desert and started their long trip back. When Trina got home, she had a large helping of chokato crisps and half a can of caffeine free Neocola, and then went to bed.

     As the four friends lay in their warm beds, they had a strong feeling the night was going to be far from a “goodnight”. Trina lay still in her bed, nothing she wouldn’t give to have her problems fix themselves; nothing. She closed her eyes and hoped nothing bad would happen in the next few hours.

     Besides, Trina thought, the staff is broken anyways. My day can’t get any worse, can it? Then she went to sleep.

To be continued...