The Professor (Tentative Title) Chapter Three

Chapter 3

"What are we doing, Professor?" she asked, the early morning sun smiling on her face, making her hair glow.

He smiled at her, then turned his attention back to the railway. "We're playing with trains."

She was slightly confused. When she woke that morning, he was gone. This wasn't uncommon, so she waited till he returned. She didn't have to wait long, but when he did arrive he was filthy. She asked what he's been up to. "General mischief," was his answer. Now they were on a bluff overlooking a set of tracks. There was a bridge that would carry the train to the other side of a ravine. A train was making its way to the bridge at top speed. The royal blue of its cars identified it as a government supply train. The gold griffin on the side of the engine told her it was headed for General Tringham. "Those must be his personal supplies," she thought.

All of a sudden, an explosion rumbled its way through the valley. Birds flew off in a panic, the ground shook furiously for a moment. Time seemed suspended as she watched the engine first then then the cars, all crash and tumble into the ravine. Another smaller explosion rocked things as the engine hit the earth below and was blasted into several thousand pieces and chunks of iron. A huge train, now merely scrap metal.

Her ears were ringing, but she could still hear the giddy laughter from her professor. His face was red and tears creeping down his face. He was sitting in tall grass, holding his sides, laughing.

"'General mischief?' You blew up a train!!" she shouted.

"Yes, I did. Beautiful, is it not?" He was still laughing.

"People could have... You just killed the people on that train!"

That sobered him up quite effectively. "Then its redemption. Theirs for ours. Besides, I happen to know that particular train had a skeleton crew of only five men."

"You still killed them, Professor." Her voice had the ton of pure disgust.

"Monroe, in case you haven't noticed, we are war. Its never pretty, its never clean, its never easy. War is cold, ugly, and brutal. So General Tringham is without his supplies and a few men, what of the hundreds of innocents he has slaughtered? I refuse to sit idle and watch," he said, standing and brushing off the dust. "We better go. The general will have sent his troupe before long and we shouldn't be here for too long."

He started walking off the back part of the bluff and away from the plume of thick, black smoke that was starting to pollute the air. Monroe grabbed up her pack and followed quickly. She could sense the change in him as she walked at a steady pace beside him. Recently, he had become more edgy than usual. In fact, that was the first time she'd heard him laugh in ages. The exact time had escaped her, but it had been a long while. The Professor was wrapped in his own world much of the time now. He was more curt when and if he spoke. He wasn't really saying much of anything any more. Something was going on and he wasn't telling her. Monroe didn't like that, she had stuck with him all this time. Didn't she deserve his trust?

"Don't," he said suddenly, in a hushed tone.

"Don't what?"

"Don't look at me like that. I have my reasons. That's all you need to know right now."

"Sir, what are you planning? I know when you're thinking on something, please just tell me."

"I'm going to restore this country to what it once was. People will be able to hear whatever music they like, see art from the grand masters, read stories of long ago. They'll be free again. You'll see them smiling, you'll see them happy again, Monroe," he was grinning in an almost wistful way.

"How do you mean, Professor?" she asked.

He signed heavily, as if the weight of the world were on his shoulders, like Atlas from mythology so old it didn't need to be recorded. "I can't tell you everything, not just yet."

"After all this time, sir, you still don't trust me?"

"That isn't it. The less you know at this point, the better." He couldn't tell her, not yet. He hoped that she could see, though, that he cared about her. Everything he was doing was for her. All this time they had shared together, he hoped she knew why he was doing it all. His plan was under way, things were going to start happening. People were going to be forced to wake up and smell the desecration. Soon a new world would start and this old one would die, if everything went well. This country would be left to people like Monroe to reshape, to mould into greatness and freedom once more.

She'd have everything she's need to succeed. She was intelligent, diplomatic. HE was leaving everything to her. All the books, music, and art in his warehouses and bunkers would go to her. He knew that Monroe would be the one to bring about a new age. With her cool head and kind heart, she would be the next Wise Solomon, he was convinced of it.

"Professor!" she hissed, bringing him back to the present, "listen." Her voice was urgent, almost frightened sounding.

"Choppers. Looks like Tringham disagrees with having a train blown up." He smiled ruefully, "Come on, Monroe. There's a place we can hide over here."

He led the way through the saplings and trees to a small dug-out cave. It wasn't very deep, but it would serve the purpose. He sent Monroe in first, her small form could fit more easily in the crevice in the back than he could. Crawling in behind her, it was a bit of a struggle to wedge himself in far enough. The choppers flew past and started their circles, hunting for the people they knew could not have gotten too far. He kept out of sight while trying to keep an eye on the birds of prey searching from above. The sound of a frightened voice made him turn to face his student.

"I can't... I can't stay here," her face was stained with tears, her voice shaking with terror.

It took a moment before it finally dawned on him. "You're claustrophobic?"

She managed a nod by way of response. They'd never been forced to stay in a cave before, she had never shared her fear with him. If she had, the Professor would ever have made her go in there. She tried to push her way past him, Tringham and his choppers could go to rot for all she cared, there was no way she was going to stay another minute in that cave. With a strong arm, the Professor held her inside. She started to scream and he was forced to cover her mouth. He didn't know if there were any ground scouts, he couldn't let her go out there yet, as much as seeing her in terror broke his heart. Alive and scared was better than dead and cold.

As the choppers continued their search, she started to thrash in the full effects of a panic attach. All he could do was hold on to her and cover her mouth. It took what felt like an eternity before the searching helicopters finally left. As their rotors died into the distance, Monroe gave up fighting and stopped moving. Her breath was laboured, her skin sweaty. The Professor waited a few moments to make sure there were no troupes or choppers close by before he pulled her out of the cave and into the open. She still wasn't moving, she had passed out.

The brain can only handle so much. When it can no longer handle what it sees, it can sometimes simply shut down as it had in Monroe's case. Whatever memory that made her claustrophobic was brought to the fore and her mind told her she was brave long enough.