by LL Helland
Quill got things ready for the search party for Brittany. Kaver and Bihydrant would also be going; Tompack would stay behind. They had a good idea where to look, thanks to the sightings that had been relayed back to Tompack
Tompack said, “They have been sighted by Bat Cave.”
Bihydrant gave out a moan. Chris dug through his lacrosse bag. He got his helmet, gloves, and even his game jersey out and gave them to Bihydrant.
Chris said, “Now, if any of you need to go into the cave, Bihydrant can do it. He will be well protected with my equipment.”
Bihydrant quickly put on the jersey, which hung to the ground, then the helmet. The helmet fit his large Bundlebob head perfectly, as long as he bent down his ears. His ears, very sensitive to loud noises and assault with a lacrosse ball, were also very flexible. Kaver and Quill brought a wooden sleigh around to wait for a transporter.
Chris said, “Wow. Now we’re ready for the twenty-first century. Where did you get that old thing? It looks like some kind of dogsled. Where are the dogs?”
Quill pointed to the three of them. “The transporter will drop us off at the cave. When we find your sister, we will bring her back on the sled.”
Chris said, “Why can’t the transporter bring her back? That would be so much quicker.”
Bihydrant attempted to answer while trying on the mouth guard attached to the front of Chris’s helmet. “Becuz the tranpoter needz to go make oter drop-offz.”
Quill said, “We have a limited number of transporters, and they also serve as protectors against the giant flying animals, so they are very busy.”
Chris said, “What are the giant flying things?”
Tompack said, “Actually they are large birds about a foot tall.”
Bihydrant interrupted, “They are not all that menacing to us, but our king is only six inches tall. A good, tasty meal for the flying birds.”
Chris thought, About the size of a hawk. “I guess.”
Tompack said, “Chris, what about your watch?”
Chris looked at his watch, but the silver-and-black button was no longer there. Chris started pushing and twisting all the knobs and buttons; nothing happened. “This is a piece of junk.”
Kaver said, “It is urgent that we find your sister, but with all these supplies, we don’t have to hurry back. If you want to know our progress, just ask Tompack.”
Chris wanted to go, but he knew he should stay behind with Jon. The healer had promised he could see his brother soon.
The Bundlebobs loaded up the wooden sled with supplies and waited for the next transporter to arrive. When the ground started to shake, they knew one was getting close. Chris almost laughed his head off when he saw the giant transporter. He was a just another enormous Bundlebob. In each hand he had about ten Bundlebobs of various sizes, and, attached to the fur on his back, he had all their sleds hanging. He looked like a Christmas tree hung with ornaments.
Chris noticed that the giant Bundlebob had tufts of fur missing from his back. “Why does he have bald spots on his back?”
Quill said, “We are only supposed to tie our sled ropes to his fur with one knot. But some Bundlebobs lost everything when that knot came undone and their stuff crashed to the ground. So now some of them tie their sled on with two or more knots. When they reach their destination, the giant can’t untie the sled so he has to pull his fur out. No one has thought up the right punishment for these double-knot Bundlebobs.”
Chris would have laughed if the giant’s back did not look so bad. He actually felt sorry for the giant. He decided that, when his brother got better, he would ask Jon to invent a better way for the transporters to carry their cargo.
As Bihydrant, Quill, and Kaver boarded the transporter, Chris could hear Bihydrant saying, “Oh, great. We have the one that drools.”
The giant made good time. There were several other stops along the way, but at the fourth stop, the giant stopped right in front of the cave. Bihydrant adjusted his helmet, and the giant untied the single knot and put their sled on the ground. Liquid drool hit the hardened, snow-covered ground and made a pool of slimy clear gel. Kaver got out of the way just in time, but some of it splashed up on him. As he made a face and wiped it off, he heard some noise coming from the cave.
Brittany and Chad had slept for several hours as Tommy was getting something to eat for their long journey. Brittany heard something outside of the cave. She used the cave wall to pull herself up; the sharp rock cut her hand in two places. Brittany cautiously walked toward the mouth of the cave, peering out carefully until she spotted a strange creature in her brother’s lacrosse uniform.
She screamed.
Bihydrant screamed and started to run.
Chad yelled, “Bihydrant!”
Quill introduced himself. “My name is Quill. We have come to rescue you. Your brother loaned us his uniform so that if Bihydrant had to go inside the cave he couldn’t be attacked by the bats.”
Kaver put out his paw to shake Brittany’s hand. “You must be Brittany.” As she extended her hand, Kaver saw the blood on her palm from the two cuts.
Brittany looked down. “I’d better clean that.” She dipped a piece of her smock into the clear gel and dabbed at the wounds on her hand. “Did it rain? I don’t think that puddle was here earlier.”
Bihydrant yelled, “Don’t do that!”
He startled Brittany, who asked, “Why not?”
Bihydrant continued more calmly. “That is not water. It’s drool from one of our giant Bundlebobs.” He pointed in the direction the giant had taken. They could still see the massive outline of his figure on the horizon.
Brittany said, “Do you come in different sizes, or are you three babies?”
Bihydrant was insulted. “We are not babies.”
Quill said quietly, “We are born all the same size, but then we are given a number. And a Bundlebob with a number ending in zero will grow up to be our leader.”
Bihydrant said, “Our leader is a full six inches. The smaller we are, the smarter we are. So you can see that the giants are not exactly brilliant.”
Kaver said, “Very few numbers end with a zero. If your number ends in nine, then you grow up to be a giant. The rest of us come in sizes between the zero and nine.”
Chad came out of from where he’d been hiding behind Brittany. He liked Bihydrant, and the other two Bundlebobs seemed nice.
Brittany patted him on the head. As she glanced at her hand, she noticed the two large cuts were healed. She said, “I think your giant’s drool is magical.” She showed the Bundlebobs her hand. By the time Bihydrant examined her hand, there was not even a scar.
Bihydrant said, “I guess we don’t understand the giant’s full potential. It is hard to examine them, and they talk very little. When we get back, I’ll have Professor Mend get a sample of their drool and test it for any healing properties.”
Quill said, “We need to get going, but you need to eat first.”
Thomas was out scavenging for something the three of them could eat. He would be delighted to find breakfast already there. It would be a lot better than berries and bark.
The Bundlebobs took out two large jars of yellow liquid. Bihydrant said, “This is golden ear jelly.”
“What is it made out of?” Brittany hoped it was not what she thought she heard them say.
Bihydrant looked at the jar thoughtfully. “With such a large amount, I would say that this came from one of our giant Bundlebob’s ears.”
Brittany said, “I thought that is what I heard you say.”
Bihydrant pulled out some huge, hard curved things. “The giant who dropped us off here kindly gave us a few of his smaller toenails.”
Brittany said, “And what do you do with those?”
“Let me show you.” Kaver broke off one of his toenails and dipped it into his ear. He quickly licked the ear jelly off and then ate the toenail. Just then Thomas showed up, carrying berries and bark. Brittany had never been so glad to see the rat
.
She did not want to hurt the Bundlebobs’ feelings, so she said, “We have grown very fond of the berries, and the bark is quite tasty.”
Meanwhile, Chad laughed at the Bundlebobs’ eating. He went up to Brittany and tried to look in her ear. “You have tiny ears.”
Brittany said, “I have to empty the yellow jam out of these two glass jars.”
Bihydrant corrected her. “Golden ear jelly.”
Brittany poured the thick yellow gel out of the jars and dipped the containers into the drool the giant had left behind. She filled both containers to the very top.
Kaver said, “We need to go back to Jon and Chris.” He handed Brittany and Chad some outer clothing to keep them warm. Brittany quickly got into the sled with Chad in her lap. The Bundlebobs harnessed themselves to the sled, and they were off. The sled glided along smoothly. Brittany thought they needed to slow down a bit, but Chad was laughing. The Bundlebobs seemed to bring out the best in Chad. She had not heard him laugh until today.
Professor Mend was strictly the scientist of the Bundlebobs; he was not their leader. Nevertheless, he had a lot of power, especially in how his lab was run and who he would let into his lab.
Professor Mend was a small man, four and a half feet tall, with close-set eyes and big ears like the Bundlebobs, but the similarities ended there. He had no fur, just the gray hair on his head, which looked odd with his huge ears sticking up. He had a fairly long, pointed nose and very long, skinny fingers. On his right hand, he had an extra finger.
Professor Mend walked over to Jon. “That was your brother Chris. He is worried about you. Let me finish my examination. Then I can treat you and let your brother in.”
Jon looked at Professor Mend intently, waiting to see what he turned into. He must have been exactly what he claimed to be…unless Jon’s intuition was not working in this realm. When Jon focused on the professor again, he was reciting Jon’s complete medical history. Jon knew he had not told the professor. He had not said a word.
“Let’s see. You had chicken pox when you were two, the flu when you were twelve, broke your arm in sixth grade.”
Jon said, “How do you know all this?”
Professor Mend replied, “Your body tells me these things.”
“I must have been talking in my sleep. I do that sometimes.”
“Well then, ask me something not even you would know the answer to, and you can check it at a later date.”
Jon thought for a moment. “How much did I weigh when I was born, and how long was I?” Jon had no idea what the answer was, but he could ask one of his sisters. They always knew that kind of stuff.
Professor Mend said, “Very well, Jon. You were eight pounds and one ounce and twenty and a half inches long.”
“I don’t have a clue. You could have made that up.” Exhausted from just this short conversation, he laid his head back down and closed his eyes. Jon mumbled, “No one could ever feel this sick and feel normal again.”
“That is exactly what you said when you had that really bad flu. You wanted your mother to make your funeral arrangements.”
Jon was surprised. He knew that statement was true. Jon rested while Professor Mend talked and wrote things down.
“Jon, I know what you have. It is called the black plague, or bubonic plague.”
Jon said weakly, “I could have told you that.”
Professor Mend continued. “Now that I know what you have, relief will be coming shortly.” A huge silver wall opened up, and a gigantic blue-and-white globe floated into the room, glowing. “Jon, you will go into the Sporbit here, and when you come out, you will no longer have the black plague.”
Jon wanted to believe the professor. He looked down at his arm. He had the black spots all over now, and he felt like he would die very soon. He did not have any ideas, and he was too weak to argue. Professor Mend did not see Jon’s hesitation. He continued getting the machine ready, programming all of Jon’s medical history into it.
“This is my invention, the Sporbit. It took me years to work out the problems, but now I believe it to be perfect.” The Sporbit opened up, and Professor Mend rolled Jon into the sphere. “Don’t worry, the brightness will subside in a few minutes. You may even fall asleep.”
Jon did not know if he was dreaming, but when he closed his eyes, it felt like the life was being sucked right out of him. His mind flipped through memories of his whole life. But after only a few minutes, all was quiet in the sphere. The sphere opened, and Professor Mend rolled Jon back out.
Jon looked down at his arms. The black spots were gone, along with the nausea and fever. He had grown fresh skin in place of the black spots, and it itched a bit. He rubbed his arms and said, “The black plague was so much worse than the flu.”
Chris, beyond impatient, burst through the door. He looked at Jon and then looked at Professor Mend again. “Jon, how do you feel? You look like hell.”
Professor Mend said, “Jon, your brother has an uncanny ability to know when to come into a room. Chris, your brother is fine. He may be a little tired, but otherwise he is healthy.”
Jon said, “I don’t know about the uncanny ability. He just has no patience.”
“Hey, what’s that?” Chris walked over to the sphere and saw a glass jar with greenish-yellow smoke in it and black spots stuck to the inside of the jar. He picked up the jar and started shaking it.
Professor Mend yelled, “Stop that! Do you have any idea what that is?” He took the jar carefully out of Chris’s hands. “This is the bubonic plague that the Sporbit extracted out of your brother.”
As Chris asked, “What is a Sporbit?” Jon pointed to the glowing blue-and-white sphere. Chris did not skip a beat. “If that glass jar is so fragile, why don’t you put it in a plastic jar?”
Professor Mend said, “Good question. The bubonic plague will deteriorate the plastic in a hundred years, give or take a few years.”
Chris rolled his eyes. “You got to be kidding me. You won’t even be alive then. Besides, can’t the next person, say, put it in another plastic jar, ninety-five years from now?”
Professor Mend rubbed his forehead. “No, Chris, we bury these jars in the ground in metal containers. We have all kinds of diseases buried underground, and we wouldn’t want any of them getting out. The Bundlebobs don’t have immunity to any of these diseases. I will have to give all the Bundlebobs, and anyone else who had contact with your brother, a shot.” The professor pulled out a large syringe with a needle that must have been ten inches long.
Chris said, “I’ll pass. I think I’ll take my chances with the black plague.”
Startled, the professor looked at him, then chuckled. “This is not for you. This needle is for the giant Bundlebob that carried Jon here. I will give you the first shot, though.”
Chris made a face. “I don’t see any need for getting the shot. I feel fine. I wonder if the Bundlebobs have found Brittany.”
Chris further distracted Professor Mend by asking him to contact Bihydrant, but the professor could not. “I don’t know how to communicate with them. They use some kind of invisible language, typing their messages out on what appears to be thin air. With my large ears, I’m able to hear the messages, but I don’t know how to send them. That is why I have a secretary. Besides, they bother me enough. Why would I want to get in touch with them?”
Jon said, “I think I know how to get a message to Bihydrant. I watched Tompack do it once. It’s fairly simple if you know anything about a keyboard.” Jon slowly sat up and typed in the air. He lay back down when he was finished. “We’ll see if he gets the message.”
No more than a few seconds later, Professor Mend said, “I think Bihydrant is sending you a message.”
Chris said, “I don’t hear anything.”
Professor Mend pointed to his oversized ears and said, “They have found Brittany and a small boy. They are on their way to the village. We can expect them anytime now.”
Chris started for the door, bu
t Jon stopped him. “Where are you going? You are not going to meet Brittany without me. Get me that wheelchair.”
Chris looked around the room. “What wheelchair?”
Jon pointed to the corner, where a rickety, rusty old wheelchair waited with a high back, large wheels, and a thin seat.
Chris said, “Looks like it was left over from last century!”
Jon wondered why, with all the knowledge that Professor Mend had, everything in his lab was so primitive—with the exception of the sphere. It surpassed anything that the twenty-first century could have produced.
Chris rolled the squeaking, rattling old wheelchair over to Jon. “I don’t think this old chair will make it to the unloading dock.”
“Let’s see how far this will go, Chris. If I have to, I’ll crawl, or you can pull me by my arms the rest of the way. I want to see Brittany.”
Jon and Chris were glad they would be seeing their youngest sister, Brittany shortly, but they thought about their older sister. Poor Trisha had the least amount of moxie. She was easily scared. They hoped she was handling her adventure on her own. Maybe it was easier than theirs. They didn’t think so, not with Godfrey wanting her for his bride. They hoped she wasn’t as gullible as she used to be.
CHAPTER 31
Great-Grandfather sat talking with Great-Grandmother. She said, “Alastair, do you think it’s time to end Trisha’s adventure?”
“I don’t know. She seems to be handling it all right. Has she learned that all males are not equal? She needs to make a dream list of her ideal date and stick to it.”
Great-Grandmother said, “I know there are worse things than being alone, although I’ve always had you to rely on, even after your death. Being with someone rude or abusive is not worth being with that person at all.”
Alastair said, “Let’s give her a little bit more time for things to sink in—if you could keep a close eye on her. I really have my hands full with Chris.”
Trisha and the girls had loaded up the wagon with the caskets for the big bonfire. They threw a large tarp over the caskets and started pushing the wagon out the huge doors. The bonfire site included a large pit in the ground and actual stone bleachers. Godfrey really did think this was a party of some sort.
