In every direction, heavy equipment clanked and droned. Conveyor belts carrying garishly multicolored bottles rattled past thundering mechanical arms and thumping pistons.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe boys in blue jumpsuits, dwarfed by the metallic maze of machinery, were scattered in clusters around the hall. Some were at the tedious task of picking flawed vitamins out of the batch, some were listlessly pushing buttons to infuse the vitamin mix vats with unnatural colors, and others were lugging boxes out of the room on handcarts. But they all looked tired and joyless as they carried out their assignments.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThey must not know the guards are off today,\u201d said Ari, not needing to whisper since he could barely yell loud enough for Arden to hear him over the din of the equipment.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cExcept for that one,\u201d she yelled back. She motioned toward a solitary man in a Daylatch guard uniform which was noticeably too big for him. He was sitting on a stool in the corner of the room and appeared to be completely absorbed in a motorcycle magazine called Zoom Squad. \u201cBut I doubt if one guy can keep two-hundred boys from running out of here.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cBut they\u2019ll never hear us,\u201d shouted Ari. \u201cWe\u2019re already yelling.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cOk then,\u201d Arden shouted back. \u201cMaybe we can fix that.\u201d She ran to the guard and stood squarely in front of his stool. \u201cGuard! GUARD!\u201d she screamed. \u201cThere\u2019s a boy pouring GRUEL WITH GRAVY into the vitamin mix! Their orangy goodness will be RUINED!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWHAAAAT?\u201d replied the guard in a whiny squeak.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cRUINED!\u201d Arden repeated. \u201cStop the equipment and maybe we can save the batch!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cCripes!\u201d screamed the guard. \u201cIf it gets into the shape squeezers we\u2019ll be shut down for two days!\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tHe scurried to a gray metal box mounted to the wall, inserted a key into the front, opened the cover and yanked an enormous green switch. All the motors on all the equipment in the room began to power down from a roaring surge to a dwindling hum to complete silence.<\/p>\n
\n\tThen the guard turned around. \u201cHEY!\u201d he cried pointing at Ari. \u201cYOU\u2019RE not in uniform! And…HEEEY! What\u2019s SHE doing in here? She\u2019s a GIRL!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAri ignored him and looked around at the boys. \u201cWe\u2019re here,\u201d he called out, loudly enough for the whole room to hear, \u201cto break you out! All of you! The guards are all in town!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThere\u2019s nothing stopping you!\u201d added Arden \u201cJust follow us!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cNo!\u201d cried the guard in the too-big uniform. \u201cNO! He\u2019s WRONG! This place is TEEMING with guards! SWARMING with them! And YOU\u2019RE coming with ME!\u201d He lunged for Ari who darted around an industrial tank and climbed a ladder to a platform at the top.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cNo!\u201d yelled Ari to the boys. \u201cHE\u2019S wrong! They\u2019re all in town to watch Dudge Hunker kill my uncle in an unfair fight set up by Wilton Daylatch! I need all of you to help me stop it!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t know about the rest of you,\u201d piped up a boy who\u2019d been pushing a box into the room, \u201cbut I\u2019m out of here!\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cME TOO!\u201d cried a boy from the vitamin sorting bin.<\/p>\n
\n\tMore and more voices began to chime in in excitement.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cTo Town Dock Park!\u201d yelled Arden. \u201cEveryone go to Town Dock Park! Stop Wilton Daylatch\u2019s fight!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cYAAAAAAAY!\u201d screamed two-hundred voices as the boys abandoned whatever they\u2019d been doing and streamed for the exit.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cNO!\u201d cried the guard \u201cYou\u2019ll get in TROUBLE! I\u2019LL get in trouble!\u201d But all he could do was get out of the way of the boys who were streaming through the doorway like a swarm of hornets screaming \u201cWE HATE HUNKA-VITES!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cCome on,\u201d said Arden to Ari as he jumped from halfway down the ladder. \u201cLet\u2019s not get stuck in here!\u201d
\n\tThey hurried through the doorway amidst the rampage of escaping boys.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cOh!\u201d cried the receptionist, catching sight of them as they were swept by her desk in the flow of blue jumpsuits. \u201cOh dear! Those children really are scruffy!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tAri and Arden ran with the crowd–out of the factory, past the dining hall, over the compass inlaid in the brick walkway–straight to the stone wall and the iron gate. The heavy, locked-tight, iron gate.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cNow what?\u201d wondered Ari aloud. But he only wondered for a minute. A white convertible sports car with the words Short Stars Modeling Agency emblazoned on the door zoomed through the mob as boys jumped out of the way on both sides.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI\u2019ve never been subjected to such dangerous work conditions,\u201d huffed the girl with the plastic-looking hair in a loud voice which was clearly meant for all to hear.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe driver jabbed the call button on the black box at the gate. \u201cShort Stars checking out!\u201d he called in reply to Helga\u2019s abrupt greeting. \u201cAnd it\u2019s good to see the boys out for exercise!\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe gate began to rumble open.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/em> squawked Helga\u2019s voice. \u201cWhat did you say? Exercise? Boys?\u201d<\/em> \n\t\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/em> squawked Helga again.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cSHUT THE GATE!\u201d<\/em> shrieked the voice of the guard in the too-big uniform through the call box.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI can\u2019t!\u201d<\/em> screamed Helga. \u201cFirst it has to finish opening!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \nBut by the time the gate had slowly rumbled to fully open, all the boys plus Ari and Arden were safely through, and by the time Helga got it closing, there was nothing left for the gate to catch but the rear bumper of the Short Stars Modeling Agency convertible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In every direction, heavy equipment clanked and droned. Conveyor belts carrying garishly multicolored bottles rattled past thundering mechanical arms and thumping pistons. The boys in blue jumpsuits, dwarfed by the metallic maze of machinery, were scattered in clusters around the hall. Some were at the tedious task of picking flawed vitamins out of the batch, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=239"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":241,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239\/revisions\/241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nBut it was too late. The gate had barely opened a crack before the boys in blue jumpsuits were squeezing through and stampeding down Duchy Street. <\/p>\n