The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp (Alfred Kropp 1)

I don’t know how long I sat there like that, shivering in the cold blasts of air, my knees actually knocking together and my teeth chattering in my head, but it seemed like a very long time. Then I heard the motor winding down and the wind dwindling. I took my hand away and saw Bennacio was pulling into the emergency lane. A tractor-trailer was coming up fast behind us, laying on its horn, and Bennacio gave the trucker a friendly little wave as he rumbled past.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

“We’re out of gasoline,” he answered as the car slowly rolled to a stop.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“I am not. Come, Kropp, we must walk now.”

“Walk?”

“We have no choice.”

“You keep saying that. How come we never have a choice?”

“Sometimes it is easier not to have one.”

We got out of the car and stood for a moment looking at it. It didn’t look cool anymore. I reached through the window and grabbed the shotgun.

“No, leave it, Kropp.”

I sighed and dropped it back onto the seat.

“Lemme ask you something, Bennacio. What’s with the swords and daggers and bows and arrows and medieval stuff like that? Aren’t you knights allowed to carry guns?”

“There’s nothing that prohibits us.”

“Then why don’t you?”

“It is mostly a matter of pride. You may think otherwise, but guns are far more barbaric than swords. There is no elegance to a firearm, Alfred.”

He smiled. “Besides, our way is more fun.”

We started to walk. We hadn’t gone very far, maybe a quarter of a mile, when I stopped walking. Bennacio, his head bowed, deep in thought, kept walking for several yards before noticing I wasn’t beside him. He stopped and watched as I sat down and wrapped my arms around my knees.

It had turned into a nice day, with just a few wisps of cloud and a light breeze from the south. I lifted my face to the sun. Bennacio came back to me and sat down.

“I’ll be honest with you, Bennacio. I’m pretty shaken up right now. I know this sort of thing must be normal for a knight, but what happened back there freaked me out a little. No. Not a little. A lot. You go to the movies and you watch these guys in car chases and shoot-outs and you think, hey, I could do that. I mean, you sit there in the dark theater and you kind of wish it was you up there taking out the bad guys. But it isn’t like that in real life, though this whole thing is starting to feel more like a movie than real life—which is weird, because I’m starting to miss my real life, even though it sucked. I’m not sure how much farther I can go.”

“I see.” He sighed. There was a sad look in his eyes. “Unfortunately, we cannot stay here long, Alfred. The police will be here soon—and perhaps worse.”

“More AODs?”

“AODs?”

“Agents of darkness.”

He smiled. “Yes. AODs. Quite so.”

“I don’t want to hold you up, Bennacio. You’ve got an important job to do—saving the world and everything, and it’s kind of selfish of me to tag along. Especially when I’m not even sure I want to be tagging along.”

“You do not give yourself enough credit, Alfred. Without you, I would not have survived this morning.”

He obviously said it to make me feel better, but I didn’t think he didn’t believe it.

“Broadway,” he said suddenly.

“Huh?”