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 Posted: Sat Oct 06, 2007 2:57 pm
The Carribean...
When most people think of the Carribean, they probably think of pirates, sandy beaches, umbrella drinks and bananas. Just a place of bliss and vacation, they think. Nothing but fun, sun and surfing they say. The truth is quite far from this, though. The truth is, at times, terrifying.
The truth is that countries and sovereign island nations the likes of which exist in Latin America have been brought where they are through tremendous strife and in some cases, even war. This is the story of one country in particular, one so small and obscure that it is commonly referred to as "the coffee bean in the Atlantic".
This is the story of the island of Tropicosa and of its people, the Tropicans.
Our story begins...
In 1660...
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Posted: Sat Oct 06, 2007 3:35 pm
For years, the Tropican people bristled under the iron fist of the Spanish government. When the Spanish first came, they stole the land from the Picos indians, taking their men as slaves and their women as "company". After years of internment, the Picos and the Spanish had planted and managed to maintain small coffee plantations on the edge of the island, the Picos villages demolished to make way for the new trade ports of Spanish domination. One man saw what was happening and foolishly, some said, spoke out to his people in front of a Spanish officer. He recieved a whipping the likes of which had not yet been seen, but he lived. He lived, to see his fifth birthday. Techuadal Anehak was his name. His headstrong demonstrations never let up. He was such a charismatic figurehead growing up that the Spanish Empire was beginning to fear losing its coffee crop interests, all on account of the great and rebellious leader he was becoming. The Spanish needed to take action to secure that island and, on July 17th of the year 1660, authorized the order that fired the fatal shot into the 20 year old Techuadal's heart. He perished almost instantly but before dying, the legends state, he muttered some kind of spell in Picos language. Where once stood not a single tree for many hundreds of yards would later inexplicably become a thick jungle, rich in life. But for those who were left to mourn him on his day of death, it seemed as if there was only death in the air. Techuadal's death alone on that day sounded the signal for attack and all over the island, Spanish soldiers were massacred. Only one soldier was left to live and he was given a war canoe ride to the nearby island of Cuba, courtesy of the fact that he was just a messenger. The heads of the slaughtered soldiers were set up on pikes and placed all along the coast to serve as a warning to all outsiders, the Picos indians were in charge! It did serve as a sign, but not the way they would have hoped. Instead, it only served to anger the Spanish. As soon as the messenger told the governor of Santiago what had happened, he dispatched a war party to kill every last being on the island and take it back for good. The only reason that the Picos survived on that day was for the generous actions of a group of pirates who had secretly made a haven on the island and alerted the French Navy that they could have a huge trade opportunity if they defended the island from their already blood enemies, the Spanish. To make a long story short, the French decided not to dominate the Picos and enter into trade with them instead, proving lucritive for both nations. The descendent of the last long-dead tribal chief re-crowned himself and the nearby colonies of the French, English and the reluctant Spanish recognized the nation as free and sovereign. Tropicosa was free!
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Posted: Sat Oct 06, 2007 4:16 pm
Fast forward some many years, 317 years to be exact. Tropicosa is a small island, but has gotten somewhat wealthy from its trade in coffee and tobacco. The island has done very well in the eyes of its people, the Tropicans. They have evolved from their dark ages as feudal tribes and have united under one man, the Tropican King. A direct descendant of past chiefs, both male and female, the King governs every aspect of Tropican life. Although every other country in the area has long dumped the Monarchy system, the people have seen not much reason for change. A small depression here, a tiny famine there, they have discovered ways around these obstacles. So imagine their surprise and dismay when one night, the butler and personal assistant of His Majesty walked out onto the balcony of the palace to give a speech. He told the people, for those who didn't know already, about the King's failing health. He spoke of how the King had recently become bedridden with illness and how he had to deliver speeches in the Majesty's stead. "Now..." he said "I bring you crushing news..." He breathed in and out for a few seconds before continuing... The King was dead. Instantly there were shouts of mourning from below as the butler disappeared into the balcony doors behind him. The following morning, the King's only child Sophia was crowned Queen. She was young and for the most part, the people noticed, a shut-in and introverted type. But when the crown touched her head, it is said, something changed about her. Something changed...
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Posted: Sat Oct 06, 2007 4:46 pm
Tropicosa, Costa de Realeza, 2007
Another fast forward in years brings us to the present day. Tropicosa has been declining, some times faster than others, for many long years since the Queen took power. Among her various acts of power, she has declared herself Queen-without-question-for-life, arrested, tortured and re-educated those who don't agree with her and placed a serious gap in between the ruling class and the working class. In essence, she has become what the Spanish only wished they had the time to accomplish. A noble-blooded monarch who rules with a iron fist, gives to those who agree with and support her and abuses the peasant population like they are slaves. There are three provinces on the small island and each details a different way that the Queen abuses her power. In Costa de Realeza, the capitol, she has made the center of town like a giant wall, her palace surrounded by the mansions of the people who have earned her favor while outside that, crime runs rampant. In the town of Puerto de la Papa, she allows student immigrants to come and stay in a glamorous tourist setting that disguises what monstrous acts happen on the other side of town where the students aren't allowed. And the Red Jungle province is underdeveloped and is where all the unemployed and homeless go to build shacks and make sometimes feeble attempts at survival. Although it is the site of the legendary death of Techuadal and an enormous jungle now grows where there once was none, poor human beings die by the bushel every day. Still the Queen does not change and continues her reign of terror, each day more miserable than that which preceded. The people have had enough! Once divided political groups now stand together in a united effort to put down the government that betrayed them. From all three provinces, there flock members of this new alliance. Criminals, farmers, barmaids, hookers and everything in between now stand together in the fight against tyranny! The Red Jungle grows in population now not with homeless peasants, but with disgruntled rabble-rousers who give a damn! THE REVOLUTION HAS BEGUN!!!
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Posted: Mon Oct 08, 2007 5:52 pm
The palace gates opened and a jeep drove out, driven by a hispanic man in camoflauge fatigues. In the back, there sat a very non-hispanic white man with a short-sleeved, white button-down shirt and jeans held up by suspenders. He poked the soldier on the shoulder with his fist and pointed to the left, leaning forward to say "Cantina por favor, senor." before sitting back and resting his eyes and sore limbs. He had been working all day and was itching for a drink and a dance.
On the other side of town, near where the buildings stopped and the jungles began, more fatigue-clad men with AK-47s slung over their shoulders patrolled the streets. An old, 50s model Ford truck rolled toward two of them who were acting as a checkpoint. The one on the left stepped forward and signaled the driver to stop. "Si, yanqui? Where you going?" the soldier asked. The man inside rolled down his window and produced a paper stamped in the upper right Authorized Lumber Work Order. Just as quickly, he rolled the window back up and left the paper with the soldier.
Two youngsters, a boy and girl, wandered through the jungle not too far from there. "So what now, sis?" "I have no idea. We'll figure it out. Now shush!" They came to a clearing in the trees simultaneously with someone else. And they knew precisely when, because it grabbed their attention and didn't let go.
BEEEP! The yanqui in the ford screeched to a halt on the dirt road. "HEY! Salga del camino!" he yelled blaring the horn "Move it, I gotta- OH! Damn it!" The truck backfired like a cannon. He slapped the steering wheel several times in serious anger with one hand and used the other to grab his tool box. He kicked the dented door open and popped the hood. "Damn kids..." he muttered.
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Posted: Mon Oct 08, 2007 6:08 pm
While he worked, someone else poked in on the situation. Just out of view, back in the jungle, Antonia peered through the trees at the furious american man. She had been running for several minutes straight and now that she had stopped, all the adrenaline was rushing to her head. "He might be a Royal Guard spy, sent to head me off." she thought to herself "I mustn't reveal myself." She hid herself a little better and continued to observed the man as he spoke to someone who was obstructed by the trees. The longer she looked at him, with his bulging muscles and angry face, the more she felt like she would be better off if she kept on running. But even through her chemically-induced paranoia, Antonia couldn't help feeling the need for help. After all, it wasn't her fault that her number was pulled for conscription. It wasn't her fault that the soldiers told her she was going to be fighting the rebels in the field. It wasn't her fault that... The memory came back again, and Antonia broke down in silent tears. She leaned against the tree and buried her head in her arms. Even when she kept her eyes open, she still saw them. There in her head. The dead, bleeding faces of her mother and father. The images played over and over and Antonia's skin crawled in a cold sweat. She felt as though she might be sick. She just might have emptied her stomach there if not for the sound of a pistol clicking. "You! In the trees!" a voice called from the road "Don't you move, I see you! Come out with your hands in the air!" Antonia snapped back to reality and recognized the voice as belonging to the man in the truck. She did as she was told and accepted her fate, hoping for a quick death.
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Posted: Mon Oct 08, 2007 6:18 pm
But none came... Instead when she stepped out into the road, the american man noticed she was unarmed and lowered the pistol from her head. Seeing that he was not quick to kill her right away, Antonia remembered something she was taught. "Please senor. I'm just a girl!" she said in a delicate tone, producing some tears "Don't kill me, I'll do whatever you want." Somehow she managed to get her eyes so glossy that they took on the look of balls of glass. Off to the side, Antonia noticed that the people he had been talking to were only about her age. Now that she thought of it rationally, she had no idea why she thought the yanqui was a spy. There wasn't anyone chasing her anymore and he didn't even look Tropican. His muscles were explained by the faded logo on the door of the truck, among the circling words were 'Lumber Company'.
"He's just a lumberjack, girl." the boy off to the side said "Who are you?"
"Antonia." she answered.
"Why have you come here? It's dangerous out." the girl asked Antonia in a lecture-like tone.
The american waved his arms about, and shushed everyone. "Christ kids, don't you know what kind of people there are in these woods?!" he projected at them all in a whisper "You don't wanna bring 'em down on us! It doesn't matter anyway, cause I'm taking you home. All of you. Now get the hell in!" The boy and girl attempted to open their mouths but they only met another SHUSH by the american and the sound of a rickety old motor kicking to life again. Antonia did as she was told and climbed into the passenger seat and buckled her seatbelt. All she wanted was a safe and secure way to return home and lay low. Probably the last place the government would expect, right? As the siblings joined each other on the flatbed, Antonia extended her hand to the yanqui. "You know my name senor, but might I ask yours?" she asked while he did a three-point turnaround. To this, he responded rather perturbed "Keith. Now hush, I gotta give the guards an excuse for why I'm carrying three children in my truck instead of lumber." Antonia and the siblings looked upset at his unpleasantness, particularly the part about them being children. They weren't. Not Antonia, anyway, at least by her standards. She was just nigh on her 18th birthday, worked hard every day with her family and friends in the fields and even schooled herself in a few trades to one day get off the plantation. Nali, the girl sibling, was no child either. In fact, she worked as a teacher in an Adult School for the Royal Guard. The only one remotely juvenile among them was Felix, the younger brother of Nali. This was easily noticable in the way he never seemed to be able to keep still. They approached the blockade and Keith prepared to do his work. "God help me." he thought as the bad-tempered one stepped forward.
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Posted: Fri Oct 12, 2007 4:54 pm
Keith was able to get them through the blockade, but only after he fulfilled the tradition of 'rip-off the yanqui for all he is worth' by paying the soldier a couple Ben Franklins for wasting his time, whatever that meant. Antonia guided Keith to her plantation home and let him go on his way. She hadn't realized she had run so fast and so far, she only remembered coming this far once or twice in her life on the island. Since the ride was going to take a while, and since she needed something to take her mind off the day's events, Antonia asked Keith if she would be so bold as to start talking, now that they were past the blockade. He shrugged and nodded, apparently needing something to clear his head as well. They conversed in Spanish for the next few minutes.
"You were not born here on Tropicosa, right?" she asked him
"No, I'm from the States." Keith responded, turning into a bumpy alleyway
"You speak Spanish very well, have you lived here long?"
"Long enough, I guess."
"My mother is Tropican, but my father immigrated from Germany."
"I thought so, your skin is a little lighter than most."
They continued while he drove, the ride quite bumpy on the unevenly paved streets but otherwise quite pleasant. As they crossed over into the district that Antonia said she lived in, Keith noticed something about the area. The further into it they drove, the more rural it became. Keith recognized the area as the bread basket and cash crop region, he had come across it before. But it was not this that struck his attention, it was the large amount of Royal Guard troops that seemed to swarm the area. This was far too much for a simple nightly patrol, particularly in an area like this one, most likely deemed unimportant by the military and monarchy. His headlights only covered ground a few feet in front of him, so it took a while to notice, but Keith was quick to react when his eyes caught the cause of all the commotion. He peered down the road at a stretch of farmland cordoned off with barriers and humvees with their headlights on. Antonia was tired and was resting her eyes, so she didn't notice that the plantation she told Keith she lived on was now swarming with troops, like ants to spilled sugar. On a hunch, Keith carefully moved the girl's head so the face was in the opposite direction of the commotion as they drove by. He pulled over a number of yards from where the blockade began and pulled out his binoculars to have a look.
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Posted: Mon Oct 15, 2007 4:16 pm
All over the entrance to the plantation grounds, the Royal Guard troops scrambled around and spoke in such rapid Spanish that even Keith, a fluent and rather studious speaker of the language, couldn't make out more than a few random words. The soldiers appeared to all be gathered around something, but he just couldn't tell what. Keith wished for a second that he'd have come up at a different angle so that he could have made it out. But suddenly, the guards began to spread out in all directions to someone who drowned out all of their Spanish ramblings with one firm command in a language Keith could understand perfectly "MOVE BACK MUCHACHOS! I need to snap some pictures!" Once they had all gotten out of the way of the Royal Police corporal, the flashes of a large poloroid camera began to light up the area. The man's back was turned to Keith, but he could see perfectly what the police photographer was snapping photos of. Two civilians, a man and woman, were on their knees with their heads being held in place by their hair. Keith realized immediately why they were being held like this, and it wasn't because they were being resistant. It was because they were dead. Two large bullet wounds protruded from the victims' foreheads and bled down their faces. Keith wasn't too surprised nor sickened to see this. He had lived in Tropicosa long enough to know that the government ran a tight ship and didn't take kindly to dissention. He had also spent several years in the service of the US Marine Corps and had seen far more death in the Middle East than this. Out of the corner of the lens, Keith noticed what looked like a couple of bare feet standing at attention and looked over to investigate. As he suspected, the soldiers were also taking tallies of the remaining farmers on the plantation to see if their were any rebels in the ranks who lost nerve and ran after the shooting. "Protocol for a death involving suspected rebel terrorists or their families." Keith muttered to himself, keeping his eyes focused intently on the line-up. An entire line of vanilla-plain farmer folk was standing at attention while an officer read off their names and struck check boxes on a notepad with a pencil. Keith put down the lenses and perused the line-up looking for anyone out of the ordinary, anyone from out of town. The line was quite long, but Keith got a good enough look to see that there were no white men among the farmers. They were all Tropican... Suddenly Keith's worst suspicions and fears were realized when a tremendous scream erupted from inside the cabin. Keith threw down his binoculars on the floor and grabbed Antonia by the scruff of the neck as she attempted to charge out the door to rush to her parents side. He punched the gas and skidded away from the scene, almost plowing through two soldiers leaning up against a Humvee, having a smoke. As the busted-up truck pushed itself beyond its limits to escape, Antonia kicked and screamed like a 2-year-old "LET ME GO!! MOMMA!! PAPA!!!"
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Posted: Mon Oct 15, 2007 9:55 pm
Shots rang out and bullets pierced the air in the direction of the busted Ford with the crazed yank at the wheel. Keith yanked the wheel to the left and headed back to town "Jeeesus CHRIST ALMIGHTY!" he shouted as a handful of stray bullets shattered the side window of his truck and whizzed past him "Hang on girls! Time to take a ride on the Bolt-Bucket Express!!" The bullets continued to fly in the direction of the truck quickly making Nali and Felix wish they had packed themselves into the cab. Nali laid her brother down on the flatbed and got on top of him so that they were as flat as possible. But just not soon enough to help the fact that Felix had already been struck in the wristbone. Keith noticed this almost immediately as he worked his offroad mojo over bumps and uneven surface. Just the sound of one screaming kid was bad enough, but another who was likely hit and bleeding made Keith feel like he had just adopted three war-scarred refugees. And getting out of range of the gunfire only landed him in deeper quicksand as the Royal Guard soldiers quickly took to their Jeeps and Humvees, intent on giving chase. Keith didn't pay any attention to the large amounts of green camo trucks in his rear-view. In fact, he smacked the mirror off it's hinges when he thought he felt the engine beginning to stall. Up until now, he hadn't been paying attention to Antonia's repeated screams until finally she started screaming directly at him.
"Why the hell are those soldiers shooting at you?!" she cried over the gunshots.
"ME?! What makes you think they're shooting just AT ME?!" Keith retorted before going over a particularly big bump and losing sight of the road for a second.
"They can't be shooting at me, I'm innocent! Kind of..."
"Not innocent enough, senorita. They only shoot at people who they think deserve it... Most of the time."
They raced through the streets shouting back and forth at one another before Nali gathered up her bravery enough to lift her head just enough to shout into the cabin "SHUT UP AND DRIVE! They're getting closer and- Oh..." Nali stopped talking and slacked her jaw at what she saw looking back. Keith looked into the side view and realized why she had stopped scolding. One of the soldiers was aiming at them with an RPG Launcher and looking just crazy enough to do it. Not really knowing what he was doing, Keith jerked the wheel into a storefront built into an open, double-ended house. Antonia's life flashed before her eyes just seconds before the truck was to collide with the first fruit stand. Just as they made a mess of the watermelons, Keith heard the sound of the RPG firing and said his prayers!
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Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 4:42 pm
The truck smashed it's way through the fruit stands and made punch out of the pineapples, melons and papayas while behind them the RPG exploded, blowing the tunnel to smithereens behind them and shooting smoking chunks of wooden fruit stand flying through the air. Keith had to act fast as he screeched out and almost went headlong into a wall. He regained control of the dangerously waving truck and began to make a beeline back toward the edge of town. "Those damn Royal Guard cronies are getting stronger every day, but for each ounce of strength they gain, they lose some intelligence." Keith noted, peering into the side-view mirror and seeing the vehicle that shot the rocket at them, still following them but with it's tires caught on fire. Antonia noticed him looking into the mirror and took a look, also noticing this. "Why do the tires burn?" she asked. "Because," Keith quickly responded, turning a tight corner at an intersection "Each of their RPG Grenades is packed with a Phosphorous charge. Burning Phosphorous is VERY hard to put out. We should lose them shortly." Antonia didn't believe what she was hearing. Being an uneducated farm girl, this all sounded like alchemy to her. Suddenly, she heard a large sound that startled her and she stuck her head out the window to see. Much to her surprise, (but not to Keith's, obviously, or he wouldn't have been calmly driving and listening to Latin music on the radio) the Guard vehicle had shed it's tires and was now driving on four rims. Keith's bucket of bolts actually outran the superior paramilitary vehicle and he snapped his fingers and tapped his hands on the steering wheel to a particularly lively beginning to a mariachi beat, just as the soldiers gave up driving and started to shoot again. To no avail, however, he had already reached another turn and taken it, leaving their line of sight for good.
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Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 8:48 pm
Keith, who seemed to Antonia to be drunk with testosterone and male pride, continued pushing his old Ford through town. Back toward the Red Jungle they went, not hardly a word being said between them the whole time. Of the few comments that were passed around, none of them seemed to affect Keith in any noticable way. This was much to Nali's annoyance as this included the reminder by Nali that her brother was now bleeding all over the flatbed and needed help. "Just put pressure on it, he'll be fine until we get away to where we need to go." he called out the window to her. Antonia wondered where in the Red Jungle they could possibly get something which would help Felix, there was nothing in there but tiny shanty villages and snakes. Maybe he was friends with one of the voodoo priests who she was told lived there in her bedtime stories. They reached the blockade in short time and Keith hit the gas, kicking up lots of dust and causing the guards to dive in either direction to avoid getting hit. The bad-tempered guard used his walkie-talkie to call headquarters and respond on the APB that was set out.
"Headquarters reads, over." HQ answered to his hail.
"Call one jungle scout team to canvas the area, fugitive has been located at entrance number four to the Red Jungle. Over and out." the guard said, and hung up.
They retreated a safe distance into the jungle. Keith slowly brought his truck down to a stop and gave it some much-needed rest, which relieved everyone else. He pulled over and turned off the ignition. After running his fingers through his hair with a now-surprising look of agitation on his face, he got out and made his way to the flatbed to give Felix a look.
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Posted: Mon Oct 22, 2007 5:20 pm
Felix's wrist was shot bad all right. It bled when pressure was taken from it and the bone was clearly fractured where the bullet hit. By Keith's observation, Felix was lucky to not have been shot somewhere else. There were numerous bullet holes on the flatbed just inches from where Nali was lying on top of Felix, but when asked, Nali said she was sure that she had not been hit. "Well, regardless, we need to head further into the jungle. Theres gonna be a few Royal pains in the a** lurking around and we need to get to safer ground." Keith said, pulling out his pistol and cocking it quickly. When she heard this, Antonia's dazed mind suddenly stopped spinning from the recent chase and she began to take her hands to Keith's truck. The sudden break of jungle silence caused Keith to raise his pistol towards the noise. After nearly drawing a bead on Antonia and shooting her, he holstered his gun and tried to stop Antonia from breaking her knuckles against the car door. "Stop it!" he cried, attempting to grab her rapidly swinging fists "Stop it right now! They'll hear us and come snap your neck in two!" To this, Antonia stopped swinging just long enough to change her target to Keith's stomach. "YOU!! This is your fault!" Antonia screamed at the top of her lungs "If it weren't for you, MY FAMILY WOULD STILL BE ALIVE!" Antonia's swings didn't continue much longer as Keith decided he had had enough and put all his energy into catching her fists in his hands with professional precision. Binding her wrists together in his left hand, Keith jerked her forward so that their faces almost touched as he leaned in. "Get something straight, sweetheart." he commanded "I didn't kill your family! The Royal Guard did! Now if you want to live long enough to make sure they get what's coming to them, I can help you. But you have to shut up, stop punching me and follow me where we're going!" Tears ran down the poor girl's face as he said this and she leaned her face forward to wipe them away when she realized Keith wouldn't let her move her hands. She simply nodded, causing Keith to release his death grip and re-procure his pistol. He motioned for the other three to follow and made his way off the path, into the jungle.
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Posted: Thu Oct 25, 2007 8:51 pm
They walked forever through the jungle, Antonia's feet now even bloodier than before from all the twigs, thorns and pebbles sticking into them as she tread on through the darkness. She heard Nali and Felix vaguely whispering to one another before Nali spoke up a little to Keith.
"Where are we going?" she asked, still in whisper.
"To a place run by a guy I know. He'll protect you from the Royal Guard." Keith answered, wondering for a second if the jungle squad was closer than he might have thought.
"Of course senor yanqui soldier man. But what if-" Antonia began saying in a tone of sarcasm, before she was cut off by a shooting pain in her right calf.
She screamed in agony and fell forward. Keith laid on top of her in the thick weeds and began firing his pistol off into the dark. Antonia started sobbing and closed her eyes tightly. This was it, she knew, it could only have lasted so long and now her time to live was all over. The gunfire above her continued another few seconds and then, surprisingly ceased. Keith got to his feet and turned Antonia over onto her back before reaching his hand down to help her up. Antonia refused and attempted to lay herself flatter. "It's a'right." Keith assured her, motioning in the direction he fired with his gun "I got 'em, the feeble bastards. But there'll be more of them soon, so we gotta press on. We're almost there, trust me." Antonia was just about ready to accept her fate it seemed, and she continued to lay down. But Keith wouldn't have any of it. He knelt down, shoved his pistol in his trousers and hoisted her over his shoulder. The top half of her body hung over his back and he got a good look at her calf wound before he began treading again. "Oh 'n by the way," he puffed as he increased his speed to a brisk jog "It barely grazed ya. In the Marine Corps, that ain't even a 99-cent shot!" Antonia just couldn't help herself. She shed a few tears and started chuckling at herself. "There ya go." Keith puffed again with a slight laugh to his tone.
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Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2007 8:33 pm
After a couple of minutes, their trudge through the jungle was a full-on run. Behind them, angry Spanish curses flew through the air and the sound of running footsteps behind them could be heard faintly at first. Keith continued running. The footfalls grew louder, now Antonia could hear all the boots clomping on the ground and rustling the bushes. Keith kept running. Seconds later they got even louder, now the only thing separating them from seeing their prey was the darkness and that would disappear as soon as their eyes got accustomed. Just then, Antonia thought she heard something. It sounded like someone blowing air through tightly puckered lips. She was just about to pass it off as her imagination, when she heard it again. And again and again and again. She was about to ask Keith if he had heard it, but quickly decided not to prey simply for the reason that the pursuing soldiers may hear them. It took her a few seconds to realize, though, that the footsteps were no longer falling behind them. Coincidentally, just as she realized this, Keith abruptly stopped running. Was it the power of suggestion? She was about to find out.
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