
-
- She wanted
to escape the damp black fog that was inching up her legs.
- Collin
held the coal between his fingers, twisting it until its notches
matched the notches in the hole. He leaned over slowly. Courtney
and Morgan leaned over, too. Collin lowered his hand until it
was level with the hole, and let the piece of coal fall.
- Thunder
erupted around them.
- The coal
crackled, stretched and burst into flame.
- You
win -- this time,
the thunder exploded, loud and angry. The
next time won 't be so easy. The thunder rolled
around them, quieter now, quieter, then slowly it disappeared.
- The fire
burned away, and the hole was no longer empty. Instead, it was
filled with a large piece of black coal with the fossil of a
leaf embedded in it.
- Collin
looked at Morgan, relief and question in his face. "I don't
understand. It was a stick when we left the jungle. How could
it turn into a piece of coal?"
- Morgan
ran her fingers over the imprint of the leaf, then looked up
at Collin. "Remember when we were talking about dumps and rotting
stuff and the smell of gas?"
- "Yeah,
but what does that have to do with coal?" Collin asked.
-
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