The 13.5 Lives of Captain Bluebear

by Walter Moers

  by Professor Abdullah Nightingale

  Kackertratts. Unpopular animal mutation combining the genes of pigeons, rats and cockroaches. Four to five feet long, Kackertratts are large canal rats with pigeons’ wings, birdlike beaks and legs, and the antennae and digestive organs of cockroaches. Their sole legacy from the rat is a long, rubbery tail. Even the most painstaking autopsies have failed to discover the Kackertratt’s brain. The body’s control mechanism is therefore assumed to be located somewhere in the gastro-intestinal tract, which forms the bulk of the creature’s innards. Also lacking is a heart, but this deficiency is offset by an outsized liver capable of digesting the most poisonous foodstuffs and facilitating the circulation of the blood, which resembles putrid egg yolk in smell and consistency. Kackertratts prefer to hunt for their food under cover of darkness. Their diet consists mainly of household trash and carrion, but they will also attack sizeable living creatures in times of famine. Kackertratts are the only known scavengers that devour the bones, toenails and eyelashes of their prey.

  ‘Ugh! Are you sure there aren’t any Kackertratts here?’

  ‘You can never be absolutely sure of anything, gah?’

  I was beginning to have my doubts about Chemluth’s qualifications as a tourist guide.

  ‘How often have you spent the night here?’

  ‘Oh, often!’

  ‘How often?’

  ‘Lots of times.’

  ‘Come on, how many times?’

  ‘Er … Once.’

  ‘Once? Honestly? When was that?’

  ‘All right, tonight’s the first time, gah? There always has to be a first time. Happy now? Can we get some sleep at last? Gah?’

  It took Chemluth Havanna only a few minutes to make the transition from rhythmical breathing to a dreamer’s happy little whimpers, whereas I lay awake for ages. The events of the day, the many impressive sights I’d seen, my pangs of hunger, and, first and foremost, our eerie sleeping quarters – all these conspired to give me no peace.

  Even if half ruined, why should such a magnificent building be deserted? I had seen people living in tents and corrugated iron huts, so why not in this part of the city, where hundreds of grand buildings stood empty, mouldering away to no purpose? I remembered how the local inhabitants had stared after us, shaking their heads, as we made for the cathedral. I thought of my uncertain future in this bewildering city. And then I fell asleep after all, overcome by sheer exhaustion.

  A dream

  I dreamed that Chemluth and I were moving into an apartment in one of the marble lions. It was really a vast kitchen-living room equipped with several luxurious stoves on which mighty beefsteaks were sizzling. I dreamed of big ovens in which sybaritically-topped Pooph pizzas were blowing cheesy bubbles, of huge saucepans in which rich soups simmered over open fires.

  It was my job to sample these soups with a ladle several feet long. Whenever I managed to spoon some up, however, the apartment grew bigger and bigger and my ladle longer and longer, with the result that I couldn’t put it to my lips. I lost my temper and hurled the ladle through a window, whereupon dozens of Kackertratts came fluttering in through the hole and proceeded to gobble everything up. One of them alighted on my chest and began to nibble my eyelashes. Its weight was unendurable. I felt I was suffocating, because the creature was also devouring my breath. Then I woke up – and the reality was almost worse than my nightmare. An eight-legged Lesser Olfactil sat perched on my cheek, inhaling my mouth odour with avid squeaks. Meanwhile, a fat Chimera had hunkered down on my chest and was regarding me with an impudent grin.

  No dream!

  I let out a yell and brushed the Olfactil off my cheek. It landed on the flagstones, scuttled off zigzag fashion, and disappeared down a crack. I lashed out at the Chimera with my fist, but it skilfully dodged the blow, fluttered into the air, and vanished into the shadows with a bleating laugh.

  I leapt to my feet, screaming, and bombarded Chemluth with reproaches. Still half asleep, he hadn’t a clue what was wrong.

  ‘You had a bad dream, gah,’ he said indifferently. ‘Go back to sleep.’

  ‘It wasn’t a dream! There was a thing on my chest, and another on my face!’ (At that stage I didn’t know what Olfactils and Chimeras were, but it wouldn’t have made much difference to my state of mind if I had known.)

  I was far too agitated even to sit down. I stood there, breathing heavily, and scanned the bewildering maze of shadows in the cathedral’s interior. Darkness flickered over the walls like black flames. Something uttered a snarl.

  ‘There are animals of some kind in here,’ I whispered.

  ‘Poof! A few rats, perhaps,’ said Chemluth, trying to reassure me.

  ‘Lie down again, gah?’

  The timbers overhead creaked, and I was briefly showered with flakes of plaster. Tiny particles of some ancient mural painting rained down on me. Peering at them in the moonlight, I made out beautifully painted foliage, fragments of hands, apples, angels’ wings, eyes. Then a little bell tolled – a single, muffled note as if a large bird had flown into it.

  The sound lay heavy on my heart.

  Silence returned.

  Chemluth slowly sat up, staring past me wide-eyed. He pointed to something behind my back.

  ‘Gah!’ he said.

  I heard the flutter of heavy wings; then something raked my head with its hard, sharp talons and disappeared, snarling, into the darkness. Warm moisture was trickling down my neck. Afraid that some disgusting creature, probably a Kackertratt, had excreted its unspeakable bodily fluid on to me, I explored the warm, sticky substance with my paw. Although it looked jet black in the moonlight, I knew it was blood. It took very sharp talons to pierce a bluebear’s fur.

  ‘Blood?’ I queried.

  ‘Vampiros!’ Chemluth replied.

  Then came the first attack.

  Vampires

  Snarling, a streak of black lightning sped towards me from the darkest corner of the cathedral. A muscular cat the size of a full-grown mastiff, it had the face of a maddened baboon and accelerated its progress through the air by flapping the short wings that sprouted from its shoulders.

  And then, just before it reached me, something strange happened: the whole sequence of events seemed suddenly to go into slow motion, and I was pervaded by a profound feeling of calm.

  The cat (monkey? bat?) took an infinite length of time to cover the last yard between us, time enough for me to study its musculature, draw my own conclusions therefrom, calculate its angle of attack, take one step forward, and simultaneously lean over backwards, with the result that my attacker missed me altogether.

  I had a clear view of the monkey-cat’s grimace of dismay as it soared over my head. I even had time to draw back my forepaw, slowly and powerfully, and deliver a well-aimed blow to the creature’s solar plexus that catapulted it out of its trajectory and sent it sailing through the air for yards. With a crash, it landed on its back on the hard marble floor, then bounced around the nave like a broken clockwork toy, yelping with pain.

  ‘Gah!’ Chemluth said respectfully. ‘That was quick!’

  The process that had seemed so infinitely slow had actually lasted only a split second. Although it didn’t dawn on me until later, this marked the awakening of my innate predatory instincts. I was a bear, after all. Those instincts had been dormant, thanks to my previous upbringing, but something had now been unwise enough to attack me and activate my atavistic, ursine defence mechanisms. I threw back my head and let out a spine-chilling roar whose reverberations took a long time to die away.

  Then two of the vampire cats sprang at me simultaneously. I ducked, and one went crashing into the remains of a column behind me. The other I plucked out of the air by the hind leg. Whirling it around my head three times like a hammer thrower, I hurled it back in the direction it had come from. It must have hit some of its own kind, because a chorus of angry, agonized snarls went up when it landed.

  Then peace returned.

&nb
sp; ‘Haha!’ chortled Chemluth. ‘That’s that, gah, they won’t be back. Vampires are cowardly creatures!’

  He spat contemptuously on the ground and tried to give me an admiring slap on the back, but only succeeded in patting my elbow because of our difference in height.

  At that moment, some fifteen vampire cats converged on us from all directions while five more attacked us from the air.

  Like all Tobacco Elves, Chemluth was ignorant of fear. It wasn’t that he was courageous, because you can’t be courageous unless you know what fear is and overcome it. It was simply that Tobacco Elves were completely devoid of that emotion because they had green blood in their veins and no adrenalin. Tobacco Elves noticed when they were in danger but simply didn’t care. If attacked by a nine-foot jungle gorilla, they wouldn’t stop to think that they might come off worse but plunge into the fray without more ado. Infinitely superior opponents were often so disconcerted that they turned tail. This made Tobacco Elves extremely efficient and redoubtable fighters despite their small stature. Being a jungle dweller himself, Chemluth knew where best to hit predatory apes and jungle cats: on their moist, sensitive noses. Hit the mark, and one well-aimed thrust with a finger was enough to put a vampire cat out of action for minutes on end.

  Flamencação

  Chemluth excelled at a South Brazilian sport known as flamencação (he even possessed a colourful embroidered belt that marked him out as an adept of the ninth grade). When performing this elegant cross between flamenco dancing, karate, and bullfighting, he simply stood there, scarcely moving from the spot, with one hand on his hip and the other poised above his head like a cobra about to strike at any moment. Simultaneously, he turned on his own axis with little, mincing steps and stamped his foot from time to time (lending the contest an almost balletic rhythm), then swiftly stepped aside so that a vampire cat sailed past him into space or went crashing into a wall.

  Every now and then, clamping two fingers together and striking downwards with lightning speed, he would drive them into an adversary’s nose or a sensitive spot below the ribs, humming a bossa nova as he did so.

  Less deliberate and well-rehearsed, my own technique was spontaneous and instinctive. I was amazed at the strength that had been slumbering unutilized within me. The bear is regarded as one of the most dangerous wild animals on this planet, but that I had yet to grasp because I’d been too busy roaming subterranean labyrinths, sitting on a school bench, and engaging in other non-ursine activities. One blow from my paw sufficed to send a vampire cat somersaulting through the air; one bite, and another of the creatures retreated into the shadows, whimpering with pain. I dished out punishment with speed and vigour, never missing the mark, never making an unnecessary move or neglecting to keep my guard up, like a professional boxer equipped with claws.

  If the vampires had really been as cowardly as their reputation suggested, they would long ago have quit the field of battle. But they persevered no matter how much we hurt them or how hard they landed on the ground. They merely withdrew into the dark corners of the cathedral and then resumed the attack.

  They had a simple but effective tactic: they operated in shifts. When half of them became tired they withdrew to lick their wounds and the other half took over. Chemluth and I were exhausting ourselves, whereas they could recoup their energy again and again. They were bound to defeat us in the end.

  One big vampire cat had crept up behind me and buried its fangs in my fur, another was crouching in front of me, clawing painfully at my legs, and a third was fluttering overhead, snapping at my muzzle. My strength had run out at last, I realized. Scarcely able to lift a paw, I was debating whether to drop my guard and abandon myself to my fate when the vampires backed off and withdrew as if in response to a secret word of command.

  Badly dishevelled and gasping for breath, we were suddenly all alone. The air was throbbing to an unfamiliar, ominous sound, an electric pulsation rather like the chirping of enormous crickets.

  ‘Cacatratas!’ said Chemluth.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Kackertratts, gah! Lots of them.’

  Kackertratts

  Twenty or thirty feet away the floor of the cathedral seemed to have come alive. A jostling mass of creatures was advancing on us. Here and there I could see long antennae quiver in the night air. From time to time, when a Kackertratt fluttered wildly into the air, one could briefly discern its hideous silhouette in the moonlight before it sank back into the milling throng.

  ‘I thought there weren’t any Kackertratts in here!’ I hoped the subdued reproach in my voice was clearly perceptible.

  ‘Oh, Kackertratts – they’ve no style!’ Chemluth snorted contemptuously. ‘Always turning up where they’re not wanted.’

  That wasn’t altogether true. The Kackertratts had temporarily saved our lives, at least. Only so as to kill us themselves, perhaps, but still: the vampire cats had beat a retreat. They were obviously creatures endowed with common sense.

  ‘I know,’ Chemluth suggested. ‘We’ll simply make a dash for the door.’

  Of course. Why not?

  Kackertratts [cont.]. Persons who encounter one or more Kackertratts would be well advised not to move too quickly, but to favour a fluid, balletic mode of progression. Kackertratts react to abrupt, hurried movements only. Not possessing a brain, they assume that anything in fluid motion is water.

  That was a tip from the same stable as the one that adjured you to remain absolutely still when a Tyrannomobyus Rex swam towards you or an angry Phorinth charged you with its horn lowered. I found it very difficult to muster sufficient faith in this piece of advice. My instinct would have been to run down the steps screaming and waving my paws, but I did my utmost to move like a ballerina in slow motion.

  ‘Walk very slowly!’ I hissed between my teeth. ‘Then they’ll mistake us for water.’

  Chemluth stared at me mistrustfully. ‘Gah? They’ll think we’re water? What gives you that idea?’

  ‘I’ve got an encyclopedia in my head. It sometimes tells me things like that,’ I whispered as I descended the steps with my forelegs out sideways like a tightrope walker on a slanting rope.

  ‘Gah, so you’ve got an encyclopedia in your head. I understand …’

  ‘Well, not an encyclopedia exactly. It’s really a Nocturnomath with seven brains. He can see in the dark and open a can of sardines by will-power. I can hear him inside my head.’

  Chemluth gave me the sort of look you give a delirious fever patient.

  ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘you’ve temporarily lost your wits, but that’s all right, gah? It’s no disgrace, considering the danger we’re in. I’m taking over command, gah? We’ll simply run down the steps with our arms out, yelling blue murder.’

  I looked down the steps.

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘that’s just what we won’t do.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because.’ I jerked my snout at the bottom step.

  Another contingent of the Kackertratt army was climbing the steps. Thousands more were following in line abreast from the cathedral door. The huge insects were pouring into the cathedral through broken windows and cracks in the walls. We were completely surrounded.

  ‘We’re going to die,’ I said.

  ‘Gah, we’re going to die.’ Chemluth didn’t contradict me for once, but I could tell that he was looking for some way of putting a good face on the situation.

  Nothing occurred to him.

  The Kackertratts came swarming up the steps in a broad black wave. The electrical crackle of their Kackertrattian language was amplified many times over by the cathedral’s echoes.

  Something was moving beneath my foot: in the gloom, I had trodden full on a Kackertratt! I leapt aside in disgust and picked up a piece of stone, intending to smash the insect’s skull. I was raising it above my head in both paws when I saw I hadn’t trodden on a Kackertratt at all. The step was sinking. So was the one below it and the one below that.

  In the midst of the flight of
steps was a hole big enough to admit a horse.

  Chemluth jumped into it without a moment’s hesitation.

  ‘Gah!’ he called from below. ‘Come on, jump! It isn’t deep!’

  I hurled the stone at the mass of Kackertratts, shattering one of the insects’ chitinous shell with an ugly splintering sound. It was the worst thing I could have done at that particular juncture.

  The Kackertratt emitted the kind of sound a saw would make if it could scream. Hundreds of its fellow insects took up this cry, shot into the air, and flew straight at me.

  I jumped into the hole.

  I landed on my hind paws less than six feet down, suffering only a slight pain in the ankle joints. Above me, stone grated on stone as the steps slid shut. A Kackertratt just managed to wedge itself between them, only to regret it a moment later when they neatly cut it in half. The darkness below was as profound as in Nightingale’s darkroom.

  A talking trumpet

  ‘You’re safe here,’ said a voice. I couldn’t even tell whether it was male, female, or demonic. It sounded like a trumpet endowed with the power of speech.

  ‘Follow my voice, I’ll guide you to the surface. This way … this way …’ Those were the only words the voice uttered, again and again, as we stumbled after it through the gloom: ‘This way … this way …’

  I don’t know how many times I fell over. It was pitch black, and there were plenty of obstacles. Now and then, one of the shafts of greased lightning that had startled me so much would go snaking along the wall of the tunnel, but so swiftly that it failed to show up our guide. I couldn’t make out where he (or she, or it) was, even in its blue glow.

  At last we entered a tunnel that was at least dimly illuminated. Thin fingers of light stabbed the darkness through some little holes in the roof.

  ‘That’s a manhole cover,’ said the voice. ‘You can get out here.’

  Although the visibility was a little better, I still couldn’t make out the owner of the voice. He (or she, or it) must have been standing right beside me, but there was nothing to be seen. We climbed an iron ladder, pushed up the manhole cover, and emerged into the open air. We were in a dark side street leading to a main thoroughfare humming with big-city life. There was no sign of the voice.