Sea-ing is Believing!, page 9
‘Stop it, boy!’ Grandad Abe cried.
‘Oh, I will. Once you’ve all been dealt with!’
‘Oculus!’ It was Mum. ‘There doesn’t need to be any revenge.’
‘I think you’ll find there does!’ the boy scoffed back at her.
‘No, you’re wrong,’ Mum said. ‘You were with us today. You saw Abe’s office and all those photographs! He never abandoned you!’
‘Rani’s right!’ Abe pleaded. ‘I loved you, Oculus. I still do! I searched for years!’
Oculus threw his head back and practically screeched with laughter.
‘You think I want revenge on YOU?’ He snorted down at his father. ‘HA! I stopped caring about you a century ago! I’ll admit I was surprised to discover you searched for us when I was rifling through your REVOLTING memories today, but that photograph means nothing to me and neither does your stupid pleading.’
‘Then why are you doing this?’ I shouted.
‘MAGICALS!’ Oculus roared, screwing up his face like the word tasted disgusting in his mouth. ‘MAGICALS ARE THE REASON I’M LIKE THIS, AND I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU ALL PAY!’
‘No good can come from this, my wee lamb.’ Nancy said as she clambered over the crowd from where she’d been watching near the carousel. ‘It won’t make things any better.’
‘BORING!’ Oculus mocked as he turned to head back into the tree-office. ‘I think that’s quite enough family time. Shall we get on with this?’
‘I don’t think so!’ Maudlin grunted through gritted teeth, raising the wand again.
‘Oh, don’t you?’ Oculus guffawed. He wriggled his fingers in her direction and the wand flew straight out of her hand and into his. ‘Finders keepers!’
A SPECTRIL’S REVENGE!
Using his ghostly powers, Oculus snapped the wand in half and tossed it to the dance floor below.
‘Now that everybody’s down here together, it’s time for the real party to begin!’
I watched with my heart pounding in my ears as my great-great-uncle crossed the high platform and stopped next to the perfumerator machine.
‘Ooooh! I wonder what this does?’ he jeered.
The spectril twitched his fingers at the cupboard of sea creature scents and it creaked slowly open.
‘Hmmmm … These look like fun!’
‘NO!’ I yelled.
‘What is it, Frankie?’ Maudlin asked, panic spreading across her face.
‘He can’t use the machine!’ I yelled. ‘We have to stop him!’
I sprinted across the packed space to the gold symbol in the floor, then wracked my brains.
‘What were the passwords!?!?’
Mum, Dad and Nancy clattered along behind me and were soon at my side.
‘OUTSIDE IN, DOWNSIDE OUT!’ I shouted, but nothing happened. ‘INSIDE OUT, OUTSIDE DOWN!’ Dad joined in.
‘DOWNSIDE IN, INSIDE UP!’ tried Mum.
‘Ugh! What is it?’ I cried in frustration. I turned to glance at Oculus and saw that he’d magically wrenched the cage door from the bottom shelf and was laughing to himself as a small red jar was floating up towards the perfumerator.
‘WHAT AM I DOING!?’ Nancy suddenly blurted. ‘I’m a spider! I don’t need to use the lift!’ The Orkney Brittle-back flung herself across the dance-floor towards the base of the tree, scattering guests in all directions. ‘I’ll stop him!’
‘Keep trying, Frankie,’ Dad said to me. ‘Nancy can’t hold off a ghost and stop a machine at the same time.’
I mentally ran through all the different options in my head, and…
‘UPSIDE OUT, INSIDE DOWN!!!’
Suddenly the shining tentacles started writhing under my feet, and just like before, they quickly lifted me high into the air and out across the room. ‘There’s something that’s dying to meet you all!’ Oculus cackled, as the bottle clicked into place at the base of the cannon. ‘But what am I saying? It’s you who’ll be … oh, you get the picture!’ Nancy was hauling herself up over the edge of the tree-office and my toes were just touching down on the mosaic floor when the perfumerator let rip with an almighty BANG and I watched in desperation as what looked like a red firework shot from the end of the machine’s cannon and arched across the Briny Ballroom. It burst straight out through the bubble ceiling and exploded in a huge scarlet cloud above us.
The air inside the bubble filled with the foulest stench I think I’ve ever smelled. It was the stink of rotten fish and mould and decay.
‘That wathn’t tho bad!’ I heard the Molar Sisters hooting to each other somewhere in the throng. ‘Thmellth like bad breath! It’th quite nithe!’
‘Was that it?’ Reginald Blink smirked from the staircase as he held his nose. ‘That bratly boy thought he’d scare us all to death with a smelly firework!’
‘What drivel and snotlishness!’ Berol Dunch shouted as she swam overhead.
‘No!’ I yelled over the room. ‘You don’t understand…’
But the hundreds of guests started laughing and going back to their partying. The anemenonk orchestra started playing again.
‘What monster have you called?’ I growled at my great-great-uncle. ‘Tell me!’
Oculus shrugged and grinned.
‘Can’t remember!’ He sniggered. ‘But you’ll soon find out.’
‘You tell us what you’re up to, you wee jobby, or I’ll waft you into ghosty globs! I’ve got a lot of hands!!’ shouted Nancy.
‘Do it, spider!’ Oculus chuckled. ‘You can’t hurt me. I’m safely frozen on the other side of the world, remember?’
Trying to talk to my bonkers uncle was completely useless. Anyone with half a brain could see that. I ran to the perfumerator to look for any clues of what Oculus had done.
‘The jar is still here!’ I shouted to Nancy, yanking it out.
‘What scent was in there, Frankie?’ asked Nancy.
‘I wouldn’t even want to know if I were you,’ Oculus teased.
‘It’s. . . I could feel my hands trembling as I raised the little red container and turned it over in my palm. ‘Gundiskump!’
The book I’d been reading earlier today swam to the front of my memory and my legs turned to jelly beneath me. I wobbled to the railing and looked down at my parents and Maudlin who were right below on the dance floor.
‘IT’S A GUNDISKUMP!!’ I screamed as loud as I could, and everyone froze in their tracks. There wasn’t a single magical in the whole ocean who hadn’t heard the terrible tales of these dreadful beasts, and I could see heart-stopping fear on all their faces.
I was about to yell, ‘GET OUT OF HERE!’ but Oculus whooshed past me and flew high into the air above the tree.
‘NOBODY MOVE!’ the spectril bellowed, and as quickly as he brandished his arms above his head, I started to hear yelps and cries of fear as mercreatures darted away from the bubble walls.
I looked up in horror to see that, outside, in a circle surrounding the entire ballroom, was an army of skeleton mermaid warriors. They were clutching long rusted forks and spears and they gnashed their rotten teeth menacingly.
‘BOO!’ Oculus squealed with delight, singing like he was reciting a nursery rhyme. ‘I’ve got you surrounded!’
The bony mermaidens slowly swam in through the walls and everybody huddled tighter and tighter together, trying their best to get away from the rancid things. Their spiny tails and gnarled ribs dripped with slime, and the hair growing from their skulls was a mass of tangled seaweed.
‘Did you all forget about my powers?’ Oculus laughed. ‘If it’s dead, it works for me. Ha ha! No one is leaving until our guest of honour arrives. Isn’t that right, disgusting daughters of the deep?’
The mermaids all gurgled a sickening squelchy laugh.
‘Oh. . .’ Oculus trilled, pointing into the depths beyond the coral garden outside. ‘And it looks like we won’t have to wait too long.’
GUNDISKUMP!
It started as a faint blue glow in the darkness, dimming and then brightening as it got closer.
‘I bet it’s hungry!’ Oculus cackled. ‘Who’s first? Any volunteers?’
Nobody made a sound. We watched in petrified silence as the strange flickering blob grew nearer and nearer. I didn’t seem to be able to take my eyes away from it. Even the gristly mermaids had twisted their grinning heads to watch it through their empty eye-sockets.
‘Oooh, it’s a big one!!’
The glimmering shape was gliding high over the pleasure garden now and in only a matter of seconds would be right outside the bubble.
‘Who’s wants a fish supper?’ Oculus cheered. ‘Sorry . . . who wants to be a fish’s supper? Ha ha!’
Eerie and graceful, the glowing orb stopped just beyond the ballroom walls and bobbed there gently. It was about the size of the great big inflatable beach balls they sell at the end of Brighton Pier, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t do anything but stare. I couldn’t even blink.
A feeling of calm passed over me and I felt a massive urge to head towards it.
The only person it didn’t seem to have any effect on was Maudlin Maloney, and it was her voice that rang across the ballroom, breaking everyone’s half-trance. It felt like the world had suddenly rushed back in through my eyes and ears!
‘NOT ON YOUR NELLY!’ she hollered and threw a tiny talisman from her charms pouch at the nearest skeleton mermaid, which instantly crumbled to dust. Its rusted spear clattered to the floor and before any of the other undead guards could stop her, Maudlin snatched it up and hurled the pointed thing at the shimmering blue blob on the other side of the bubble walls.
There was a thunderous rumbly roar as the weapon hit its target and thousands of fibrous feelers that snaked down the grotesque monster’s face suddenly illuminated in the blackness!
I’m not sure I could ever properly describe the monster that flashed into view before us, my reader friend, even if I tried for the rest of my life.
The gundiskump was as big as the ballroom’s bubble itself and the glowing bob we’d all been gawping at was wiggling about on the end of a stalk that grew out of the creature’s forehead. Its mouth was stuffed full of sabre-like teeth that were as long as the Under-Oak was tall. I swear to you, there was an entire wrecked ship skewered on one of the
Its four yellow eyes were streaked with purple veins and were the size of the giant sun umbrellas that stand around the pool-deck back at the hotel.
The scales around its blubbery lips and gills undulated with scars and lumps. I could see hundreds of harpoons and anchors wedged between them. It was a horror to behold, and every bit of the ghastly beast pulsated and throbbed with a sickly orange light.
‘RUN!’ Maudlin wailed, reaching into her charms purse and lobbing whatever trinkets she’d thrown before. More skeleton mermaids burst into clouds of dust and that was enough to send the crowd of trapped magicals into a frenzy of movement.
‘Flee! Flee! Flee!’ a mergully cried as she sped through the air over my head and vanished into the darkness on the far side of the bubble.
‘RETREAT!’ the swelkies bellowed and in a single line, they sped out though the ballroom walls, click-clacking as they went.
The Gundiskump seemed as hypnotised by all the movement inside the bubble as we’d been by its lure. It flapped its fins and rose slightly, so that it was looking down on us from above.
‘Get to the Atilantus!’ I heard the real Abe yelling to any non-mermagical, as people tore across the dancefloor.
The hippocamps that had been tied up near the fountains broke their harnesses then galloped off in different directions, braying and snorting. They bolted into the outside waters, and … in all their panic … one of them raced straight towards the Gundiskump!
There was an enormous gulp and that’s when things got really … umm … interesting…
THE RACE TO DRY LAND
With a taste of warm food, the Gundiskump started its attack.
Four whip-like feelers snaked into the bubble and started snatching at people as they darted about. It definitely wasn’t a picky eater, let me tell you.
The first things to go were several daughters of the deep. The skeleton maidens wailed and screeched as the glowing feelers suddenly snared them by their tales and SWOOSH, down the creature’s throat they went, spears and all.
‘This is my cue to say “TA-TA!”’ Oculus sneered at me and Nancy as chaos clattered around beneath us. ‘I hate to leave, but this party is DEAD!’
‘OH, NO, YOU DON’T!’ Abe grunted as he sped up into the branches of the Under-Oak. ‘You’re forgetting who your father is, boy! I know a thing or two about spectrils, and I know what happens if you’re touched by a real ghost!’
Abe reached out and grabbed his son’s wrist.
‘GET OFF!’ Oculus howled, but it was too late. No sooner had Abe’s ghostly grip touched the boy’s flesh, Oculus’s spectril dissolved into a yellow and fizzing cloud. ‘NOOOOOOOOOOO!’
‘Quick! Don’t let the spectril float away!’ Abe yelled to Nancy. ‘Get the jar with the pickled pamplemoogs in it! It’s phantom-proofed!’
‘Right you are, Abe!’ Nancy cooed, grabbing the glass container and emptying its contents over the floor. Then, in one swift movement, she caught the little cloud as it swirled over Abe’s head, and clamped on the lid. ‘GOT YOU!’
Oculus was furious with rage! The ball of fog twisted and whirled inside its see-through prison and although we couldn’t spot any sign of my loop-de-loop crazy uncle among the streams and curls of smoke, we could hear his curses echoing around the inside of the jar.
‘Frankie! Nancy! Abraham!’ a voice called from below. It was Mum. I looked down and saw her hurdle over one of the Gundiskump’s feelers as it swung in a huge arc across the floor. ‘WE HAVE TO GO NOW!’
‘She’s right, my wee beauty!’ Nancy huffed at me. Tucking the glass jar under one of her arms, our spider-chef scooped me up with her others and lowered me over the side of the office platform.
‘A bit more,’ I called up to her when my feet were nearly at the floor. ‘Just a bit mo. . .’
CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSHHHHHH!!
Another of the sea monster’s feelers lashed through the bubble walls and thumped into the Under-Oak, toppling it instantly.
There was an ear-splitting squeal and I was thrown halfway across the dance floor with Nancy skidding painfully along beside me as the tree was splintered into shards of scrap metal.
‘This way!’ Dad’s arm was suddenly around my waist and he dragged me back to my feet. ‘Are you hurt? Can you run, Frankie?’
‘I’m fine,’ I shouted above the din of the helter-skelter collapsing. ‘GO, GO, GO!!’
Nancy clambered back to her feet and was clattering along next to us in seconds. We sprinted towards the Atilantus station at the top of the looping staircases, and the last of the mergullies and kulpies wailed through the air.
‘GET OUT OF THE WAY!’ Nancy barked at a skeleton mermaid who darted into our path, brandishing a trident. The ghastly thing hissed at us and raked a dark green tongue over its jagged teeth. She raised her weapon above her head, and I was just about to grit my eyes tight and wait for the impact of it when a glowing tendril smashed down on top of her only a footstep’s breadth in front of us. ‘Jump! We’re almost there!’
Me and Dad dived over the flattened mermaid bones and tore up the cracking steps, two and three at a time, while Nancy practically cleared them all in one leap.
‘Quick!’ yelled Dad, grabbing at a home-sweet-home-hob who was desperately trying to sweep up the remains of a smashed statue with its little dustpan and brush. ‘Let’s get out of here!’
Mum and a gaggle of our regular guests were waiting for us at the top and we all piled into the only Atilantus carriage that hadn’t rocketed off to dry land already.
‘GO! GO! GO!’ Mum screamed. ‘START THE ENGINE!’
Gingiva Molar slapped her tiny hand over the green glowing button just as Grandad Abe materialised in the seat next to her with a small shower of ectoplasm.
He instantly spun around to all of us sitting in the rows behind as clouds of steam started to billow out of the sides of the fish-shaped machine.
‘Hello! It’s lovely to finally meet you all,’ he huffed to us all. ‘But, where’s Oculus? Who has the jar?’
I looked up at Nancy and caught sight of her face twisting with shock.
‘Och, no!’
‘Where is it?’ Grandad Abe barked.
‘BLUNKING BLUNKERS! I’ve dropped it!’ Nancy sobbed. The Atilantus started rattling on the spot, revving itself up for blast off. ‘It’s too late now!’
‘We can’t leave it!’ Abe replied. ‘He’ll escape again!’
And that right there, just as the Atilantus suddenly lurched forward, was the moment I dived out of my seat back onto the station platform and watched as my family hurtled out of the Briny Ballroom with my mum’s screams echoing in my ears. . .
‘FRAAANNNKKKIIIEEE!!!’
KA-BOOM!
There was no time to lose! I had to find the glass jar with great-great-uncle Oculus’s spectril inside . . . then figure out a way of getting back to dry land without being eaten by a sea monster!
‘Frankie Banister, you ‘BLUNKING BLUNDER-BRAIN!’ I hollered at myself as I ran back down the curvy staircase, trying to keep my head low.
The daughters of the deep seemed to have changed their minds after their leader was locked up in a jar, and now the remaining few were battling the Gundiskump themselves, which was a pretty honkhumptious distraction.
This was my chance. As the skeletons poked and jabbed their spears at the monster’s feelers that slapped this way and that across the floor and up the walls, I darted over to the wreckage of the Under-Oak and started yanking great pieces of twisted metal aside.
‘Where is it?’ I groaned, hauling more and more of the broken branches away. ‘Where is it?’
