Starcatchers 01 - Peter and the Starcatchers

by Dave Barry, Ridley Pearson

  “Maybe we should what, Smee?”

  “W…well, Cap’n,” stammered Smee, “with that…that thing flying around here, and those children, them flying, too, it’s just all so strange on this island, Cap’n, and it bein’ night and all, I thought, that is, we thought, that is, me and the men here, we thought maybe if we waited ’til daylight, we could…”

  “You thought?” interrupted Stache. “You thought?” He glared at Smee, then at the men standing nervously behind him.

  “Y…yes,” began Smee. “I, that is, we…”

  “YOU DON’T THINK!” thundered Stache, causing Smee and the others to jump like a gaggle of puppets all attached to the same string. “I do the thinking, you understand?”

  “Aye, Cap’n,” came the chorus of replies.

  “Good,” said Stache, and resumed walking.

  The fact was, Stache—although he would never let his men know—was also quite uneasy about going the same direction as the croc. He was not fond of crocs, having fed people to the beasts on a number of occasions, and seen firsthand the terrible things their jaws could do. And a croc of this monstrous size, flying...

  No, Stache did not relish encountering the thing. But he had to find those children. Flying children. He had no doubts about it now: They can fly. And Stache meant to have the source of that power.

  Overhead, the thick tangle opened a bit, and then more, the full tropical moon shining down, nearly as bright as the English sun, illuminating a clearing where two paths intersected. A jungle crossroads.

  Stache considered the paths.

  “Crenshaw! Bates!” he said. Two men stepped reluctantly forward.

  “You two are volunteering for the scouting party,” said Stache. “Crenshaw, take this path to the south. Bates, you’ll head west. You listen and you look, but you will not be heard and you will not be seen. Am I clear on that?”

  “Aye…”

  “Aye, Cap’n.”

  “We’re looking for them kids, or the treasure, or both. You report back to me the moment you see anything of interest. You have ’til the moon’s straight overhead. Then we’ll be taking the south path…that’s toward you, Crenshaw. Am I clear on that?” He didn’t wait for their answers. “Go!”

  As the two scouts trotted off, unhappily, in different directions into the dark jungle, Stache and his men made themselves comfortable in the moonlit clearing. Nobody spoke, but each man, Stache included, was thinking the same thing.

  Glad it’s not me, going out there alone.

  CHAPTER 59

  AMMM’S MESSAGE

  PETER TROTTED DOWN THE BEACH toward Molly, who was now waist-deep in the moonlit cove, squeaking and chittering as she waded toward the upthrust, grinning snout of Ammm.

  James, trotting alongside Peter, said, “What is it? What’s she doing?”

  “She’s talking to the porpoise,” said Peter. “His name is Ammm.”

  “Fish can talk?” said James.

  “This one can,” said Peter.

  “What’s it saying?” said James, as they reached the water’s edge.

  “I dunno,” said Peter. “I don’t speak Porpoise. But Molly does. She’ll tell us.”

  They were now standing next to Molly, with Ammm several feet in front of them, listening politely. Molly, desperate for news from her father, forced herself to remember the mandatory opening formalities of porpoise talk.

  “Greetings,” she said.

  “Greetings,” said Ammm.

  “Molly teeth green,” said Molly.

  “Yes,” agreed Ammm. “Molly teeth green.”

  “Molly happy see Ammm,” she said. The Porpoise language has 237 words that mean “happy,” and Molly had actually chosen the one denoting the happiness derived from having one’s belly tickled by seaweed. Ammm doubted that Molly was feeling this particular happiness, but out of politeness used the same word in responding.

  “Ammm happy see Molly,” he said.

  With the formalities concluded, Molly took a breath and frowned in concentration, not wanting to make any mistakes as she got to the critical question:

  “Molly father come?”

  Ammm paused for several moments, during which Molly did not breathe. Then Ammm said, “Yes. Molly father come.”

  Molly exhaled, and, in English, said, “Thank heaven.”

  “What?” said Peter.

  “He says my father is coming,” said Molly.

  “When?” said Peter.

  “I don’t know,” said Molly. Switching back to Porpoise, she said, “When Molly father come?”

  “Day,” said Ammm.

  Molly frowned. “What day?”

  Ammm hesitated, as if confused by the question, then repeated: “Day.”

  “Day,” said Molly.

  “Day,” said Ammm.

  “What’s he saying?” said Peter.

  “I’m not actually sure,” said Molly. “I think he’s saying ’day,’ but my Porpoise is not very good, and the Porpoise language is vague about time. If he is saying day, he could mean my father is coming tomorrow, but I think he also could be saying it will be more days.”

  “I hope he means tomorrow,” said Peter.

  “Yes,” said Molly, “but even that might be too late, if the pirates have the trunk. We must…”

  She was interrupted by more chittering from Ammm. Molly listened, struggling to follow the sounds. The only part she caught was “bad man.”

  “Again, please,” she said.

  Ammm spoke again, more deliberately. This time Molly caught “bad man” again, and “light.”

  Molly pondered that. Light. What could he mean by…

  “Oh, no,” she said.

  “What?” said Peter.

  “I think he’s saying the pirates have the trunk,” said Molly.

  “Does he know where they are?” said Peter.

  “Where bad man?” Molly asked Ammm. “Where light?”

  “Molly come,” said Ammm. He darted a few yards to the left, toward the rocky, wave-lashed point at the left end of the cove, then repeated: “Molly come.”

  “He wants us to follow,” said Molly. To Ammm, she said, “Molly come.”

  Ammm whirled and plunged into the water, surfacing just moments later twenty-five yards farther along the beach toward the point of land, chittering “Come!” Peter and James trotted diagonally back to the beach, then on a parallel course with the porpoise, who kept popping up to make sure they were with him. Alf and the other boys, thoroughly mystified, trotted along behind.

  “What’re we doin’, lad?” panted Alf.

  “Following the porpoise,” said Peter.

  “But why?” shouted Tubby Ted, bringing up the rear.

  “It’s a talking porpoise!” shouted James. “It’s taking us to the treasure!”

  “It’s what?” said Alf and Tubby Ted, at the same time.

  “He’s right,” said Peter, over his shoulder.

  “But who has the treasure? It’s them pirates, is that it, lad?” Alf questioned.

  “Yes, we think so,” Peter admitted. “And we…I mean, Molly, has to get the trunk back from them.”

  “Well, then! Why didn’t ya says so? I wouldn’t miss it!” said Alf.

  “Same!” said James.

  Thomas and Prentiss said nothing, but—not wanting to be left alone on this increasingly strange island—trotted along with the group, as did the panting, incessantly complaining Tubby Ted.

  They trotted for a hundred yards, at which point the beach curved sharply to the right, along a steeply rising lava slope. At the end lay the point, where huge ocean rollers—having traveled, unhampered, across thousands of miles of open ocean—slammed, thunderingly, into massive lava formations, sending spray high into the air. Ammm continued to follow the coast, heading out toward the end of the point.

  On shore, the little band of humans followed, but as the hard-packed beach sand gave way to sharp, treacherously hole-ridden lava, the footing instantly beca
me near-impossible, and the going very slow. Peter stopped for a moment, and studied the slope.

  “Look,” he said to Molly. “Ammm has to swim ’round that point. He can’t use the land. But we can. It would be a lot quicker for us to just climb this hill and meet him at the water on the other side.”

  Molly considered the hill, then shook her head.

  “We don’t know what’s on the other side of this hill. It might be another cove, but it might also be more island. We could be back in the jungle, and lost. Besides, Ammm may be leading us to the end of this point.”

  “But we can’t keep up with him, not on these rocks,” said Peter. He gestured toward the others, who were picking their way over the dark lava rock by rock, with agonizing slowness. Ammm was far ahead now, an intermittent speck of light gray in the dark roiling water.

  “I’ve got to try to stay with him,” said Molly. “I don’t dare lose him.”

  “All right, then,” said Peter. “I’ll climb this hill, and see what I see. Water or land, either way I’ll come back and tell you.”

  Molly looked doubtful.

  “You’ll come right back?” she said.

  “I’ll find you,” he said.

  Their eyes met for a moment.

  “All right,” she said.

  And with that, Peter was gone, clambering up the steep, rocky hillside, leaving the others to struggle along in pursuit of Ammm, wherever he was leading them.

  CHAPTER 60

  TOO QUICK FOR A CLOUD;

  TOO BIG FOR A BIRD

  BARELY RIPPLING THE SURFACE, the trunk glided toward the waterfall at the mouth of the lagoon. The brackish water grew clear, so that from above, long, powerful green tails could be seen propelling the trunk as the mermaids triumphantly bore their prize back to their lair.

  Feeling safe now, they raised their heads from the water. The one in the lead—the others called her, in their strange, throaty language, Teacher—turned and smiled at her school. Her long, thick hair was blond. Her teeth, white and even, were human now, exposure to the trunk having completed her transformation from fish to mermaid. The other mermaids smiled back at her. Human teeth, all.

  So elated were they by their triumph, so absorbed with their prize—their creator—that only one of them, a young mermaid in the back of the school, happened to see the thing that flew across the face of the moon, too quick for a cloud, too big for a bird. She grunted an alarm and slapped her tail twice on the water surface.

  The other mermaids responded instantly, diving in fright. All but Teacher, who would not leave the creator. She wrapped her arms around the trunk defiantly, and looked up at the blackened silhouette swooping toward her.

  She recognized it at once, and snarled.

  “Lean forward!” shouted Slank from the bow of the flying longboat. He was still getting the feel of it, his ability to steer shaky and imprecise. In the bright moonlight he could clearly see his target below, as well as the blond-haired she-fish hissing up at him. At the stern, Little Richard, gripping both sides in terror, shifted his weight slightly forward as the longboat dove. Slank leaned to port, lining up the bow with his target. “Steady…Steady…” The boat hurtled downward. The mermaid did not move.

  She’s brave, I’ll give her that….

  As the boat was about to hit the water, Slank leaned back. The bow lifted slightly, avoiding a direct collision with the trunk, but striking the defiant mermaid. Slank felt the thud in his feet.

  That’s one less to worry about. The longboat splashed down into the lagoon, its sharp bow sending up waves on each side. Slank and Little Richard tumbled to the bottom of the boat, which rocked violently for a moment, but did not capsize.

  “The trunk!” Slank shouted, struggling to his feet.

  “There!” said Little Richard, pointing.

  The trunk bobbed in the water astern. Slank thought about diving in after it, but quickly changed his mind.

  She-fish.

  There were a dozen or more of them, between the boat and the trunk, diving and surfacing frantically, apparently searching for something. It took Slank a moment, but then he understood: They’re looking for the one I hit.

  Whirling, Slank lunged to the bow and looked into the water.

  There she is.

  Her body was wedged under the prow, floating motionless. Slank grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the boat. Her face was covered with blood. She was breathing, but barely.

  Suddenly there was a wail from the water, and then more. The mermaids had caught sight of their wounded sister, and were surrounding the boat, snarling.

  “Throw her back!” shouted Little Richard. “They’ll capsize us again!”

  “No!” shouted Slank, drawing his knife. “She’s our barter!” He grabbed the unconscious mermaid and hauled her upright, holding the knife at her neck. The mermaids wailed and keened in horror.

  “LISTEN!” shouted Slank. “I give her to you”—he made a gesture of throwing her over the side—“and you give me that”—he pointed at the trunk. “You understand?”

  The mermaids showed no sign of comprehending. Instead, responding to some signal neither man heard or saw, the mermaids flashed their tails and disappeared, leaving only ripples.

  Five seconds passed. Ten.

  “I don’t like this,” said Little Richard.

  “Get your whip,” said Slank, dropping the unconscious mermaid at the bow.

  Little Richard uncoiled the bullwhip he kept wrapped around his waist.

  “Here they come,” he said.

  The two men crouched, watching the water. Suddenly, the dark shifting shapes shot up at them through the moonlit water.

  “Here they come!” Slank said.

  In a flash of tails, the mermaids slammed the boat, rocking it violently. Slank stabbed blindly down into the water. Little Richard’s whip cracked once, twice, but he, too, was having trouble drawing a bead on the swiftly moving creatures. The boat rocked again; again Slank stabbed at the water, this time driving several of the creatures back.

  But only for a moment. The mermaids came at them again, then again. Slank and Little Richard lunged frantically back and forth in the boat, grunting, shouting, trying to keep them at bay, trying to keep the wildly gyrating boat from going over. From time to time the knife cut, or the whip connected, each time drawing a scream. The water around the longboat grew cloudy with blood. But the mermaids kept coming, coming, frothing the water around the unsteady longboat.

  “THERE!” Slank shouted, pointing, as the mermaids, working together, massed for an attack at the stern, their goal being to pull the transom underwater with their weight. A lash from Little Richard’s whip drove them off, sent the bow splashing down, and caused Slank to fall. Rising, he looked behind him to see that the wounded mermaid was…

  Gone.

  She had either slipped or fallen back into the water. The other mermaids, still battling Little Richard at the stern, apparently had not noticed. Slank searched the blood-clouded water around the bow but saw no sign of her.

  Meanwhile, as Slank peered into the water at the bow, and Little Richard battled the mermaids at the stern, the trunk, momentarily forgotten by all of them, drifted farther and farther from the longboat, into the night.

  CHAPTER 61

  CRENSHAW RETURNS

  BLACK STACHE HELD UP A HAND, silently stopping Smee and the others, and signaled them off the jungle path. Stache, too, stepped aside, concealing himself amid the enormous leaves of a plant.

  The sounds of someone running drew closer. A native? Stache crouched and laid his sword across the path. When the runner was upon him, Stache lifted the sword a few inches, and the runner, with a cry of pain, sprawled face-first onto the ground.

  “Crenshaw,” said Stache, stepping out.

  “Cap’n!” said Crenshaw, out of breath. He hurried painfully to his feet.

  “Well, man,” said Stache. “What is it?”

  Crenshaw attempted to answer. “I seen—�
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  “—that lizard?” said Smee, interrupting.

  “Shut up, Smee,” said Stache. “Crenshaw?”

  “The longboat, Cap’n,” said Crenshaw, still gasping for breath.

  “The longboat?” said Stache, bewildered. “Our longboat?” By his recollection, it should have been well down the island.

  “Yes, sir. I seen it just now.”

  “Where?”

  “It was…flying, Cap’n.”

  “It was what?”

  “Flying, Cap’n. Up in the air. Like a bird. But it weren’t no bird. It was the longboat, sure as I’m standing here.”

  The other pirates gathered around now, muttering about this strange and unlucky island, where things kept flying that were not supposed to fly.

  “Belay that talk!” said Stache. “Crenshaw, where did you see this flying longboat?”

  “Up this path, where you sent me. It leads to a beach…a lagoon, sir. I’d just gotten there when I sees the longboat pass right in front of the moon, plain as anything. And there was men in it.”

  More muttering from the crew.

  “I SAID BELAY IT!” said Stache. To Crenshaw, he said: “How many men? What men?”

  “Two, I reckon. One of ’em big as fright, he was. Right across the moon, they flied. Fast as a bird, they was. But it weren’t no bird. It was a flying…”

  “Yes, yes, a longboat,” said Stache, eyeing Crenshaw curiously. “And where exactly did this longboat go?”

  “Can’t says for certain, Cap’n. There was trees and such in me way. It went from this ways to that,” he said, indicating right to left. “Went past the moon and headed down.”

  “Down?”

  “Yes, Cap’n. Down. I reckon toward the water.”

  “What about the trunk? The treasure?”

  “Didn’t see nothing of the sort. Just the flying longboat. She went past and I turned high tail to run back to tell you, and then you tripped me up, and then you asked me what I seen, and then I…”

  “I KNOW THIS PART, YOU IDJIT!”

  “Yes, sir.”