The Waitress

5 - Knowing the Guys

"Okay, can I ask a question?" Kaely asked over the quiet music and talk, and Dex and Eliot stopped arguing with scowls on their faces. Leo was now driving and Jared was up the back reading, but since they were all still in the same place, she decided it was a perfect time to get some burning questions answered. She still didn't know anything about them.

"Alright, so you're all wanted, right?" she continued. "So what did you do? I was never one for the news, so I've never heard of you before. It can't be that bad, right?"

Eliot, who was now beside Kaely nodded his head.

"Figured this would come up," he admitted. "That's a fair question. But whenever we tell the story, it's never accurate. We always try and put lasers and hand-grenades in the mix. Jared is the only one who can tell it how it happened. But... he doesn't like talking about it."

Kaely turned around in her seat and faced Jared eagerly. He looked up from his book and widened his eyes, surprised.

"What?" he asked suddenly, and Kaely cocked her head sideways.

"What's the story?" she asked. "How did you guys end up in a bus on the road?"

Jared sighed and put his book face-down by his side before shuffling around, crossing his legs beneath him. "Long story," he admitted.

"I'm not going anywhere," Kaely replied, and Jared chuckled before letting out a long sigh.

"It started in Canberra," he said, "about a year ago or more. We were all there with Leo's parents, who'd wandered off somewhere at the time. We overheard some stupid thing in one of the empty court rooms we walked past that we shouldn't have been listening to."

"What did you hear?" Kaely murmured, glancing sideways at the others as Jared scratched the back of his head.

"A plot," he answered, "to kill Wade Smith."

Kaely turned and looked at him.

"You mean the Governor-General?" she asked, the shock setting in. "Are you serious? Who would want him dead?"

"The people who don't like the way Australia is being run," Eliot explained. "Killing the Prime Minister would result in nothing because he can be replaced. People kill Presidents and Prime-Ministers all the time, and it doesn't say much. But the Governor-General? Not the same thing. It's more the people that want some kind of Republic instead of the democracy we have. If they kill the Queen's eyes in Australia, they're sending a message loud and clear to the Monarch in England. Not the best way to go about a change in leadership, but it certainly makes a statement."

"They're pretty stupid," Eliot agreed.

"And it would be chaos for the Commonwealth," Dex added. "And it's all being put on our heads."

"Oh, come on," Kaely frowned. "You don't seriously believe that, do you?"

"We've been targeted, Kaely," Leo called. "All because of some lousy information we heard on a stupid family trip. It was stupid to try and get us arrested instead of killing us, though. That I won't ever get."

"I think they might find it more to their amusement if we have to run for the rest of our lives," Dex growled. "They won't kill us because they want us to suffer. I want them to suffer."

"For what, for Mike?" Eliot shot back. "Or for Canberra? I want them to suffer for Perth."

"What happened in Perth?" Kaely asked, eyebrows creased up in confusion. Quiet followed. She glanced at Eliot, who was looking at the floor. She looked up the van and saw Dex and Leo exchanging sullen glances, before finally looking down to Jared up the back. His fingers were clenched tightly on the pages of his book.