Free The Scarecrow of OZ by S. D. Stuart

only two levers. One stuck up out of the floor by his seat and the other protruded from the dash.
    He glanced out the dirt-smeared window and saw that the last of the tether lines had been secured to the truck. All of the men huddled together, except for the foreman, who broke from the group and headed for the truck. If the foreman caught him trying to steal the truck, he would definitely decide that they had a problem.
    Caleb reached out and yanked on the lever on the dash. Several angry shouts came from the group of men who scrambled to grab the tether lines he had just released before the airship floated away without a pilot on board.
    A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed the foreman was now running toward the truck yelling at him to get out.
    Caleb grabbed the second lever and shoved it forward. The pilot of the airship had chosen to land at the top of a low hill, so when Caleb released the brake, the truck began to roll forward down the hill.
    Behind him, several men joined the foreman in running after the truck and barking orders at him to stop.
    Even if he knew how to stop the truck’s accelerating descent down the hill, he would have refused. The colony needed him now, more than ever, and he was going to do everything he could to get there before it was too late.
    Of course, he would need to learn how to stop this thing sooner or later. Preferably, sooner.
    As the truck barreled downhill at increasing speed, he twisted the wheel back and forth and felt the truck lurch from side to side. He quickly discovered that small adjustments of the wheel kept him going, more or less, in a straight path down the hill.
    He looked back with relief to see he was leaving the men far behind. But he was almost out of hill and the ground was leveling out. The truck was starting to slow down and he still had no idea how to make it move under its own power.
    He frantically searched around inside the cabin of the truck, but he’d already pulled the only two levers he could see. The truck slowed to a fast walking speed, and was still slowing down.
    He jumped forward in his seat, trying to force the truck forward with his own body weight. It was no use. The ground had leveled out and all the momentum gained from the hill had been spent. The truck rolled to a dead stop.
    He craned his neck back to see the men still running down the hill after him. If he couldn’t get this thing moving again, they would catch up with their stolen truck and most likely take their frustration out on him. As he twisted back around in his seat, his foot hit something on the floor and the truck lurched forward a couple of feet before stopping again.
    He peeked under the steering wheel and saw there were two more levers poking up out of the floorboard. He tentatively pushed down on the first lever with his foot and nothing happened. He pushed it all the way down to the floor and still nothing happened. Leave it up to the humans to create something with extra levers that didn’t do anything.
    He pushed down on the other lever with a little more confidence and the truck shot forward, throwing him back into his seat and knocking his foot off the pedal. The truck motored down to a stop again.
    A quick glance behind saw the fastest of the men were already at the bottom of the hill. But all was not lost. He knew how to make the truck go.
    He eased his foot down on the lever, and the truck rolled forward under its own power. It didn’t take long for him to learn how to alternate pushing on the pedal and easing up on it to keep the truck going at a more controlled speed.
    Stopping was another matter, but one he didn’t need to worry about until he got to his destination.
    Caleb motored along through the countryside, and as he got closer to the colony, what he had feared before was becoming the reality. The amount of smoke billowing up from inside the boundary of the electrified fence could mean only one thing. Half the colony was already in flames.
    He pushed the