Licence to Fish

by Justin Richards

  “In that case we need to catch it first,” Beth said.

  “Maybe we can go monster fishing in PE,” said Alfie.

  “Yeah, like the Chaplain will let us do that,” Jack told him.

  “Maybe we can persuade him,” said Beth. “If we tell him that Rod and Annette are SPUD agents…”

  “We don’t have any proof of that, though,” Alfie pointed out. “Just what Mr. Trick said.”

  “We need to catch them in the act,” Jack agreed.

  “The act of what?” Alfie asked.

  Discussions were interrupted by Miss Jones arriving at the end of break. “I’m glad you’re all here and haven’t gone off to your next lesson,” she told Class 3D. “Lunch today will be in the school hall, and not in the canteen. There’s some problem with the roof and the ceiling’s fallen down.”

  “Nice one, Beth,” said Jack quietly.

  “No one can understand it,” Miss Jones went on. “Apparently the Major was nowhere near the canteen when it happened.”

  After lunch—which was sandwiches in the hall—Class 3D gathered in the Design Technology Workshop to help convert Sam’s wheelchair into a Monster Catcher.

  Beth cut the girder and hinged it so that Sam could keep it upright like a flagpole when he wasn’t actually catching monsters. The enormous reel of rope was fixed to the back of his chair.

  “That will counter-balance the rod,” said Beth. “So he doesn’t tip forwards.”

  As she was speaking, Sam’s wheelchair tipped backwards.

  “Well, it will work when you’re using the rod,” Beth told Sam.

  “This is fine,” said Sam. “I can do wheelies.” He demonstrated—and smacked straight into the wall.

  A massive steel girder stuck up from the front of Sam’s wheelchair, hinged and bent and attached to a rope. The rope looped round the chair and on to the enormous drum welded to the back of Sam’s seat.

  If the Chaplain noticed these adjustments to Sam’s wheelchair, he didn’t mention it. Sam waited with the others as the Chaplain explained what they were doing today in PE.

  “And whatever you do, avoid the landmines,” the Chaplain was saying. “Any questions?”

  Alfie stuck his hand up. “Can we just run round the lake instead, sir?”

  The Chaplain’s eyes narrowed. “Run round the lake?”

  “Oh yes, please, sir,” said Beth.

  “Is that dangerous?” the Chaplain asked.

  “Er, could be. Quite dangerous,” said Jack.

  “Doesn’t sound very dangerous. I think we’ll stick to the land-mines, barbed wire and exploding Space Hoppers.”

  “There’s a monster,” said Alfie. “That’s quite dangerous. More dangerous than barbed wire. Probably.”

  “A monster?” the Chaplain didn’t sound very convinced.

  “And a giant duck,” Harry said.

  “Though not any more,” Jack pointed out.

  “Sorry, Alice.”

  “We could put land-mines on the path round the lake,” Chloe suggested. “And barbed wire.”

  “So long as we don’t hurt any fish,” Alice added.

  “Well, I’m not sure,” the Chaplain said. “I was going to surprise you with an automated artillery barrage behind the bike sheds.” Sam sighed. “I’ll never get to catch the monster now.”

  “Catch the monster?” the Chaplain was astounded. “You were actually going to try to catch this enormous, dangerous monster you say is in the lake?”

  “With Sam’s wheelchair,” said Alfie.

  “Specially modified to make it into a Monster Catcher,” said Beth proudly.

  The Chaplain inspected Sam’s wheelchair. He prodded at the girder, and for some reason kicked the wheelchair tyres.

  “What you suggest is appallingly dangerous and you must all be completely mad,” said the Chaplain. “Let’s do it!”

  “Right then,” said the Chaplain as they gathered on the path by the lake. “What are you using for bait?”

  “Bait?” said Beth.

  “We didn’t use bait at Fishing Club,” said Alfie “I think we do that bit next week.”

  “Got to have bait,” said the Chaplain. “Can’t catch monsters without bait. So I’ll need a volunteer.”

  “To go and get the bait?” Jack asked.

  The Chaplain glared at him. “To be the bait. Monsters probably eat school children. I would if I were a monster.”

  “I volunteer Alfie to be the bait,” said Chloe.

  “Good idea. Tie him to the rope,” the Chaplain decided.

  “Er,” said Alfie. “Couldn’t we just tie a loop in the end of the rope? Like a lasso?”

  The Chaplain frowned. “Doesn’t sound very dangerous,” he said.

  Which, oddly, was why it appealed to Alfie.

  After three circuits of the lake, Alfie was getting out of breath. He was not sure they really needed the added incentive of a pack of Hungarian attack dogs chasing after them. But at least he wasn’t swimming monster bait.

  One of the dogs behind him took a corner too quickly and shot over the edge of the bank, landing in the lake with a splash. Another leaped at Jack, who quickened his pace. Beth was out in front—but Alfie reckoned she was

  cheating by wearing rocket-boosted wheelietrainers. They worked very well, except when she hit a bump in the path and shot ten metres up in the air.

  Sam was moving slowly in his wheelchair.

  The girder was extended in front of him so he looked like a crane. The rope was trailing in the water as Sam moved, trying to get the monster to bite. The dogs were ignoring Sam now, after several of them had broken their teeth on the metal of his chair.

  “No sign of the monster yet,” Sam reported as Alfie raced past.

  “What about the…” Alfie had to pause to take a gulp of air.

  “Duck,” the Chaplain shouted.

  “Yes,” Alfie said. “The—waaaa-ouff!” The trailing rope from Sam’s Monster Catcher rod hit Alfie on the head and sent him sprawling.

  “Told you to duck,” said the Chaplain.

  “Sorry, Alfie.” Sam was grinning. But the grin seemed to freeze on his face as his wheelchair suddenly lurched and then shot forward at high speed.

  Everyone stopped to watch in amazement as Sam went racing down the path. Even the Hungarian attack dogs. The rope was taut, dragging him rapidly along. Sam’s baseball cap flew off and his chair tilted backwards. The girder was bending under the strain.

  “I think Sam’s caught the monster,” said Harry.

  “I think the monster’s caught Sam,” Alfie told him.

  With a crack like a gunshot, the rope

  snapped. Sam kept going in the direction he was already heading—straight for an oak tree at the side of the lake. Alfie and the others closed their eyes at the moment of impact.

  When they looked back, Sam was lying in a heap next to his toppled wheelchair. They all ran to help.

  “I’m all right,” Sam assured them. “Anyone seen my cap?”

  “Haven’t even seen the duck,” Beth complained. “Let alone the monster.”

  “If there is one,” Chloe muttered.

  Alfie said nothing. He was disappointed they hadn’t seen anything, and he was beginning to wonder if the monster had just been a trick of the light. But he was sure he’d seen it.

  “Sorry,” the Chaplain told everyone as he hurried to join them, “but I still don’t think it was dangerous.”

  “It seemed pretty dangerous to me,” said the oak tree.

  Chapter 5

  It was break straight after PE. Beth took Sam off to remove the Monster Catcher from his wheelchair and straighten his wheels. Alice went to help.

  “That was useless,” said Chloe. “I blame Alfie for not being bait.”

  Alfie felt a bit upset that she thought it was his fault that Sam had nearly got hurt. But he didn’t say anything.

  “Well, we know there’s something in the lake now,” said Jack.

 
“Maybe it really is a monster,” Alfie suggested.

  “Might have been the duck,” said Harry.

  Chloe wasn’t impressed. “An underwater duck?”

  “With flippers and goggles,” said Jack.

  “Could be. There’s something fishy in there.” “A fish?” Harry suggested.

  “Lots of them, I expect,” Alfie told him. “That’s why we have the Fishing Club here, after all.”

  “After all what?” Harry asked.

  “After all the other lessons,” said Jack. “At the end of the day. You know.”

  “So what do we do now?” Chloe wanted to know.

  On the other side of the lake, Alfie could see Rod and Annette getting ready for Class 4A’s Fishing Club. They were taking equipment out of a big bag. Funny, Alfie thought, he hadn’t noticed them earlier.

  “Haddock,” Jack announced. “That’s the answer.”

  “Er sorry, what’s the question?” said Harry.

  Was that a bottle Rod was holding? Alfie couldn’t quite see, but it looked like Annette was pushing something into it and then Rod threw it in the water.

  “Haddock live in the sea,” Chloe was telling Jack.

  “Specially trained rare freshwater haddock,” Jack decided. “With little cameras strapped to them. We let them loose to hunt for the monster.”

  “And what if the monster eats them?” Chloe asked.

  “Alice will get very upset,” said Alfie. He’d given up trying to see what Rod and Annette were doing.

  “Right,” said Harry. “That’s the plan then—don’t tell Alice the haddock have been eaten.”

  “I like the idea of a fish,” Alfie agreed as they walked

  back up to the school.

  “I can swim as well as a fish,” said Chloe. “I won all the races we had when we did swimming in PE last year.”

  “We all won,” Jack reminded her. “If you didn’t win, you got eaten by the shark.”

  “Or crushed by the octopus,” Harry added.

  “Well, I came first out of the winners,” said Chloe.

  “So what’s your plan, Alfie?” Jack asked.

  Alfie wasn’t really sure. He’d just been thinking out loud. “I don’t know. Maybe there is some way we can make a fish. Perhaps Beth can build an electric one that we can remote control or something. But I’m not sure electricity and water go well together. It might not work in water.”

  “Do electric eels stop working then?” Harry wondered.

  “It might be easier,” Alfie went on, “just to disguise one of us as a fish. Then the monster won’t get suspicious.”

  “Might eat them though,” said Jack.

  “So,” Harry asked brightly, “who is the best swimmer in the class?”

  They all looked at Chloe.

  “I won all the swimming in PE last year,” she said. “But that was before Alfie joined the class. I bet he’s the best swimmer of us all really.”

  Alfie was beginning to think he might have done better to say nothing.

  By the end of the next day’s Design Technology lesson, Alfie was sure he should have said

  nothing. Beth, Sam and Alice had all loved the plan—which was somehow now all Chloe’s idea—to disguise Alfie as a fish. Alfie became more and more anxious as the lesson went on…

  Everyone else was very excited as they spent the lesson designing and building what Beth called a Special Aqua-Ready Disguise Involving New Equipment. Or SARDINE for short.

  It was built around an old-fashioned diver’s

  wet suit. With scales painted along the body, and a specially made tail added it did look quite like a fish. Except for Alfie’s head poking out the other end, complete with goggles and a small underwater camera.

  “I still think we should have given the camera to a haddock,” Jack complained.

  “Fish don’t have cameras,” Beth told him. “They can’t work the flash.”

  “I’m not sure fish have oxygen tanks strapped to their back either,” Alice said.

  “They might,” said Beth. “If they want to be safe.”

  “We need to make a head for the fish now,” said Jack. “Any ideas, Beth?”

  “Maybe Alfie can just open and close his mouth a bit, like a goldfish.”

  “Big goldfish,” said Chloe. “Though Alfie does look ugly enough to be a fish.”

  “If he swims really fast, no one will have time to see he’s not a fish,” Sam said.

  “Do fish know what other fish look like?” Harry wondered.

  No one was quite sure about this. “I suppose the other fish might just think Alfie is a funny big fish or something,” said Jack. “Nice one, Harry.”

  “Or,” said Alfie quietly, “they might think I’m some kid dressed in a painted wet suit with a plastic tail.”

  “Don’t worry,” Beth told him. “It’s what the monster thinks that matters.”

  “And whether you’re a boy or a fish,” said Jack with a grin, “you might still make a great lunch.”

  They decided to launch Alfie in afternoon break. That way he’d be able to search the lake for the monster before the after-school Fishing Club. Class 3D gathered at the lakeside, while Alfie struggled into the wet suit and Beth attached his tail.

  “I hope the paint’s waterproof,” she said.

  “Bit late to worry about it now,” Jack told her. “Are those oxygen tanks fitted securely?”

  Sam positioned himself at the top of a slope down to the edge of the lake. Jack and Harry lifted Alfie up and laid him sideways across the arms of Sam’s wheelchair.

  “Can’t I just sort of jump in or something?” Alfie asked. “Walk, maybe? Well, sort of wiggle in on my tail anyway.”

  “Better this way,” Sam assured him. “More fun.”

  “Yes—but who for?” Alfie asked. No one heard him though, as the wheelchair was already accelerating down the slope. It went faster and faster. The edge of the lake seemed to hurtle towards Alfie, though in fact he was hurtling towards it. Then Sam applied his Inertia-Cancelling Brake Mode, and the

  wheelchair stopped.

  Alfie didn’t. He kept going at high speed—through the air and out over the lake.

  Then he was falling, splashing into the cold, murky water, and struggling to get his breathing tube in place. He felt frightened and alone—even without worrying if he was going to be eaten by a huge monster.

  Once he had sorted out his breathing, Alfie actually found it quite relaxing under the water. It was a strange, silent world. He soon worked

  out how to wiggle his legs so his tail propelled him along. He could see a few metres ahead as he swam.

  There were lots of curious fish, and all sorts of strange objects lying on the bed of the lake. In amongst the weed and the mud, Alfie saw an old boot, several plastic bags, a bicycle wheel,

  a garden gnome, and an abandoned shopping trolley.

  Alfie lost track of how long he was down there. His oxygen gauge was over half empty when he decided it was time to find the bank and report back to the others that he had found nothing.

  Then, as he turned, he saw the monster.

  It loomed at him out of the water. Alfie’s stomach did a flip-flop as a great, bulbous nose nudged him aside. Then a huge, grey body slid past him. A large fin stuck out from the side, and the water behind the monster was churning and white with bubbles. Alfie was struggling to breathe as he watched the monster go past.

  Despite being very frightened, Alfie remembered to use the camera attached to his

  face mask. He wasn’t sure whether the pictures would be any good, or even if they would come out. But he had other things to worry about—like swimming away as fast as he could before the monster spotted him.

  Suddenly, Alfie felt a sharp pain at the back of his neck. The next thing he knew he was being dragged backwards through the water so fast he felt his stomach do a back flip.

  Chapter 6

  As he was speeding backwards through the water, Alfie grabbed desp
erately at anything he could reach to try to stop himself. The shopping trolley whizzed past, but he missed that. Handfuls of pondweed came away from the lake bed and his hand closed on something smooth and rounded.

  Then he was flying through the air, and landing with a heavy thump on the bank beside a startled Harry. Who was holding a fishing rod.

  Which had a line running from it to a large hook. Which was stuck through the back of Alfie’s wet suit.

  “What have you caught?” Jack asked.

  “Er, Alfie,” said Harry.

  “Throw him back,” Chloe told him.

  “Thanks a lot,” said Alfie. He spluttered and coughed and struggled to get his breath back. But he was almost laughing with relief at being back on dry land.

  “At least we know my Extra-Strength Automatic Recoil Fishing Reel works,” Beth said.

  “Sorry, Alfie,” said Harry. “I was just getting in some extra practice while we waited.”

  Sam wheeled up, Alice close behind him. “Did you see the monster?” he wanted to know.

  Alfie managed to detach the hook and line from the back of his neck. “Yes. And I think I got some pictures of it!”

  “And what’s that you’re holding?” Jack asked.

  Alfie looked at what he’d grabbed in the water. “An old bottle.”

  The last lesson of the day was Information Technology. Instead of hacking into the United States Military Command computers, Miss Jones let Class 3D work on the digital photographs that Alfie had taken.

  “Provided Alfie stops dripping on the floor and dries himself off,” she added. “I think you can change back into your normal clothes now. And you’ll find it easier to sit at your desk without that tail.”

  By the time Alfie got back, Beth had loaded the photos on to a computer and was projecting the results on to the classroom whiteboard.

  “That’s a fish,” said Alice as the first picture came up.

  “That’s another fish,” said Jack at the second one.

  “Oh,” Chloe said as the third picture flashed up. “Guess what that is. A fish.”

  “Pondweed,” said Beth to the fourth.

  “And what is that?” Miss Jones asked as the next picture appeared.