Dangerous books

I thought Jason was mad. But I was wrong. I was mad! Mad to get imprisoned in this library. It started like this...

TRING! TRING! TRING!

My phone was ringing! With sleepy eyes, I turned back and took a look at the clock. Damn! It was 11 PM! I attended the call.

The voice shouted, "Hey, it's me, Jason."

"Why did you call now?" I asked him sleepily.

He answered, "I have to submit the library book, Drake. Its due date is today."

"Are you mad? At 11 PM?" 

"Please, Drake." And that sentence did something to me.

"Ok, I'll come to your house now."

"I'm standing in front of your house, Drake."

I hung up the call, put on my mask and slowly tiptoed on the stairs, hoping my parents won't wake up. I looked at their locked room and sprinted to Jason. He looked sober and his blue eyes glittered in the night.

"You look sleepy," he said.

"Ah, at 11 PM everyone looks sleepy." I gave him an annoyed look and he turned his face to the other side.

"Ok. Chill." He puts his strong forearms on my shoulder.

Then only it hits!

"Jason, do you know what day is today?" He thought for a while. 

"Aw, man! Magic day."

"Anything can happen to us. The roads, trees can behave weirdly and people have no guarantee of their life today."

We sat down and made a decision.

"We are going, whatever it takes," he said and stood up.

I regretted being his friend!

*****

We started our dangerous journey, holding our hands together.

"Is submitting this book really necessary?" I asked him, expecting a no as a reply.

"Yes. I have to submit it today," he said, breaking all my hopes.

Jason stopped me on my path. A whirlpool on the road! There were many whirlpools, all over the road. 

"Do you still think we should continue?" I asked him.

"We are submitting the book, for sure." He stressed on the book a lot.

We took our steps carefully and who would want to lose their lives for submitting a library book?

His backpack slided and fell into a whirlpool!

Jason would have jumped too but I caught hold of him.

"NO," he shouted at the top of his voice.

"Idiot, it's just a backpack. Don't risk your life for it," I said, keeping him in my grip.  

"The book is in that backpack."

"Calm down, Jason." I patted his back. He was  short tempered.

The bag flew out from another whirlpool. I opened my mouth in awe. Whirlpools always suck in but this whirlpool threw it out. Jason ran to the bag. Man, he was relieved! 

As much short tempered, he loved having fun. He jumped into one whirlpool and came out of another. He signalled his hands to me.

"No thanks."

We continued our journey. The night was filled with wonders!

This time, I stopped him on his path. The ground was cracked! There was no road in the middle! We carefully walked in the sides.

We panted and took long breaths. Then we heard a siren!

"Police are standing there, Jason," I alerted him.

"We should go to the library, we are almost there."

The library was in our sight. But the police stood between us and the library.

"It's lock down today. We shouldn't come out at this hour of night," I stated the facts to him.

"Look there!" He shouted and I ducked.

Stones were flying around the place. We ran and hid behind a tree. We had to plan an escape!

Jason gave a wild grin to me. He signalled me to look down. The roots of the tree were loose in the ground.

"No, Jason. Don't do this."

He won't take my words into account if he decides what he wanted to do. 

He lifts the tree with his strong hands. I gave him a hand but it wasn't necessary for him.

We took that tree as defence and slowly approached the library. We walked for a distance and the stones stopped coming our way. We planted the tree again and stood helpless behind the police jeep.

Jason was clever and loved adventures. But he hated being late in anything and never gave up. I'm his only companion and he takes me everywhere, whether it's a problem or fun. 

Again, Jason gave me a wild grin. This time I was happy that he had an idea. He saw a whirlpool under the jeep.

"Drake, this is our only chance to escape the police and go into the library. Follow me," he said and slowly crawled near the whirlpool.

I crawled after him. He fell into the whirlpool and I prayed to all gods to return home, safe and sound. I fell into the whirlpool and it was just for a second. I flew out of the other whirlpool near Jason.

"We did it," I said.

"Yup, let's go in," he said and opened the large grilled gate of the library. We tiptoed into the flower bedded garden.

We heard the sound of footsteps and hid behind a tree. We slowly peeped onto the other side. There were two people, a man and a woman in my sight.

He was thin and had brown hair. The woman was fat and had black hair.

Something hit me! The door of my parent's room was locked outside!

I slowly went near them and touched the woman. She opened her mouth to shout. But the man shut her mouth with his hands.

"Mom! Dad! What are you doing here?" I whispered.

"We came to submit the book," my Dad whispered back.

"What's the hurry?" I asked them.

"Ask Jason," my Mom said as she saw Jason standing behind me.

"I'll tell you on the way, Drake," Jason said.

The four of us marched to the stairs of the library. To my astonishment, there were hundreds of them waiting to submit the book.

"What's the hurry?" I ask Jason again.

"I'll tell you."

My suspicion increased. I ran to a man standing in the row and asked him, "What's the hurry to submit the book today?"

"Look at the board at the starting of the stairs." He pointed to a yellow coloured board.

I rushed down and took a look at the board.

It read, "The books are behaving badly on Magic day. Please submit before 12AM."

I thought, "What? The people have no sense. How can books behave badly?" and laughed. "You are fooled, Jason."

"Nope. The librarian never lies," he told.

I looked at my watch. It was 12 AM.

"Let's see what happens," I mocked at him.

The book in his hand suddenly flew in the air.

"Why did you throw the book up, Jason?" I asked.

"I didn't do that, Drake," he said slowly.

That's when I truly believed the librarian. All the books jumped and hovered in the air.

"SURRENDER," they shouted in unison.

All the people were scared and ran haywire. The books chased everybody and covered them with paper. One by one, they made the people surrender. Jason and I stood frozen.

"Now do you understand why I wanted to submit it?" he asked.

"Yes," I replied, giving him a helpless look.

We stood there and surrendered ourselves.

*****

I wouldn't have been imprisoned by these bunch of books if I had just been quiet and followed the people.

Thanks for your amazing work, Mind of Drake!