Perijee and Me

by Ross Montgomery

  ‘Perijee, help!’

  … And then it stopped, just like that. The wind disappeared and the roar became a hush.

  I opened my eyes. Perijee had wrapped his hands around me – but he’d changed them. Now they were big as boat sails and as clear as glass. It was like sitting inside a bubble. And outside it …

  ‘Oh wow,’ I whispered.

  We were above the clouds. A world of white stretched out endlessly beside us. The Monster flew and dipped and twisted like a ribbon in the wind, the rest of his body forming a great rainbow road in the sky behind us. There was nothing holding him up at all. It was like magic.

  ‘But – I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Wasn’t the Monster supposed to disappear?’

  I looked up at Perijee, and I was surprised by what I saw. He suddenly looked … different. Like something behind his eyes had changed.

  He knew what was happening.

  ‘Perijee,’ I said. ‘Do you know where he’s taking us?’

  Perijee smiled. He took my hand and placed it over one of the symbols on his chest. It was glowing harder than all the others combined, throbbing and fading like a nightlight.

  ‘Home,’ he said.

  I gasped.

  ‘The Monster’s taking us home – back to Middle Island? That’s what that symbol means?’

  Perijee shook his head. I didn’t understand at first – but then it hit me. My face fell.

  ‘Oh crumbs,’ I said. ‘You mean … he’s taking you to your home?’

  Perijee nodded, smile after smile appearing on his face and floating across his skin. I gulped.

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘I’ve never been into space before. I wish I’d brought a thicker jumper or …’

  I stopped. Clouds were streaming past us again.

  ‘We’re falling,’ I said.

  We were getting faster and faster. The Monster was plummeting back to the sea, spinning and diving like a flock of birds. Suddenly he made a great dipping arc like a rollercoaster through the sky and reeled to one side. The rest of his body followed, until we’d formed an enormous spiral above the sea.

  ‘What’s he doing?’ I shouted.

  We were in the middle of nowhere, high above the ocean. It was just me and Perijee and nothing else for miles and miles. You could just make out the moon in the sky above us, fading into place like it had never gone away. I looked up at Perijee, confused.

  ‘I … I thought you just said you were going home,’ I said. ‘What are we doing down here?’

  Perijee said nothing. He was gazing down at the water, his face covered in smiles, the symbols on his body still glowing. The Monster’s tail was lowering to the sea, his tentacles twisting their way after it.

  ‘Wait – what’s going on?’ I cried.

  The Monster started spinning in the air. Bit by bit his great body was coiling down into the water and disappearing under the waves.

  ‘Perijee … he’s sinking!’ I said. ‘He’s going to drag you down with him! We have to get you free!’

  Perijee didn’t seem to understand. He was still smiling. I grabbed his head.

  ‘Perijee, listen to me,’ I said. ‘If you go under too, you’ll drown. Things like us … we can’t breathe under water.’

  The Monster kept on sinking. It was only a matter of time before his head reached the water. But Perijee just kept smiling.

  ‘Aren’t you listening to me, Perijee?’ I said. ‘You’re supposed to be going home …’

  There it was again – the change in his eyes. They were so clear all of a sudden. He had never looked happier.

  And suddenly it clicked.

  I looked down at the Monster’s body beneath us as it twisted into the black sea. Then I looked up at Perijee.

  ‘… That’s home?’ I said quietly. ‘Down there?’

  Perijee glowed in my arms. The symbol on his chest burned brighter than ever. I could feel its warmth against me.

  ‘But … but I thought you were an alien,’ I said. ‘From space.’

  Perijee shook his head. He pointed down.

  ‘Mariana Trench,’ he said.

  I looked down at the Monster as it snaked into the deep, hundreds and hundreds of tentacles winding into the darkness.

  ‘So that’s why you were so good at swimming,’ I said, amazed.

  The Monster’s head had reached the water now. It plunged into the foam and the waves, and with a great burst of air the mouth sank from sight. Perijee shrank his hands back to normal size and held on to me tight. We stretched over the ocean like a lighthouse, slowly being swallowed into the sea.

  ‘It’s getting closer,’ I said nervously. ‘Are you sure you can breathe under water?’

  Perijee nodded. I saw how certain he was. How much it finally made sense to him.

  ‘But … I can’t, Perijee,’ I said.

  Perijee kept sinking. The last of the house he had built touched the sea below and scattered across the waves. There was something terrible in the air between us – something neither of us wanted to say.

  ‘That means I can’t go with you,’ I said.

  Perijee’s smile vanished. His whole body suddenly felt cold against me. The Monster kept pulling him down. The water was getting closer and closer.

  ‘You can’t just … go,’ I said quietly. ‘I came all this way to get you. I’ll never see you again.’

  Perijee nodded, but his face had turned grey. He was up to his chest in the water now. He carefully placed me on the last of the giant floor tiles that floated on the waves beside us.

  ‘I am sorry,’ he said.

  Perijee let me go, hand by hand, and I realised how tightly he’d been holding on to me.

  And suddenly I couldn’t let him go.

  ‘Perijee, wait!’

  I grabbed his hand and held it tight as he kept sinking.

  ‘Caitlin …’

  ‘Promise you won’t forget about me,’ I said. ‘I never stopped thinking about you the whole time we were apart. And even though you were miles away, even though I couldn’t see you … it was like you were still there. So if we both keep thinking about each other, then we’ll always be together. No matter how far apart we are.’

  His head was almost touching the water. I kept holding on, clutching the hand to my chest as he stretched further and further away from me.

  ‘Please, Perijee,’ I begged. ‘You’re the best friend I’ve ever had. You’re my brother. Remember me. Please.’

  Perijee smiled and looked up at me. He was changing again. Something was appearing in the place above his eyes – a new set of symbols, glowing across his skin where the bottom of his hat would be.

  ‘Promise,’ he said.

  His head reached the water and I let him go. I watched as he sank down into the deep. The symbols on his body shone brighter than ever, until he was just a white shape in the darkness, a star at nighttime. He waved up at me, and I waved back. He looked so happy. He wasn’t lost any more.

  The lights on his body faded, one by one. Soon he was barely there, and then he wasn’t there at all, and then he was gone.

  I sat back on the giant white floor tile. There was nothing around me now but the first of the evening stars, sparkling on the waves, so bright you couldn’t tell where the sky ended and the sea began. I had never been so alone in my whole life.

  But I didn’t feel alone. Not any more. My whole body glowed where Perijee had held me. The stars were like a whole other world above me, and the moon had never been closer.

  And right there, its reflection glimmering on the water where Perijee had been …

  ‘Sirius!’

  It wasn’t until the Japanese fishing boat picked me up the next morning that I realised how far I was from home.

  I told the fishermen my name, and about what had happened, but that was obviously pointless because they didn’t speak English. I figured if I kept talking lots they might eventually work out what I was saying. They didn’t, but they did give me my own Japanese name a
nd wrote it on a sign to wear around my neck! How cool is that? It looked like this:

  Then when we got back to land, they couldn’t have been more helpful! I suggested that I stay with them for one more day, to sleep, but instead they drove me straight to the embassy and dumped me at the doors and drove off as fast as they could. They didn’t even want thanking!

  The rest of the journey home was even better. When the embassy worked out who I was, everything changed. They put me in an amazing hotel room all by myself, with a Jacuzzi and a massive TV. It was brilliant, obviously, but to be honest it just reminded me of when Mum said we could go to the Hilton together, and that made me really miss her.

  I couldn’t wait to see her again. I hoped she wasn’t too angry with me. She’d probably want to have a good shout and wave her arms a bit, but I figured that was fair enough.

  After a few days, the embassy organised a private plane to take me back home – all the normal ones had been grounded after the Monster attack. That meant I was the only passenger on the flight, which meant I could lie down across five seats if I wanted to. And I did. The stewardess said if I needed anything then all I had to do was ask! So I asked for a Scotch on the rocks, and she said no.

  We finally got back to the city, and as we flew over I couldn’t believe how different it looked. Now that the Monster had gone, all the water had drained away – but it had taken everything else with it. There were trees sticking out of buildings, and a tank on the clock tower, and whole streets covered in sand. There were sheep grazing on the runway when we landed.

  And then when I stepped out of the plane, I got the biggest shock of all. There were hundreds of reporters and people with cameras waiting for me! They all went mad the second they saw me – waving posters with my face on them, and taking my picture, and asking me questions about the Monster and how I knew him.

  But then I heard someone shouting over them, really loud. I turned around, and there she was at the front of the crowd.

  ‘… Mum?’

  ‘CAITLIN!’

  She looked insane. Her hair was all over the place and her eyes were mad and her clothes were torn. I’d never seen her look at me like that before.

  She leapt over the barrier to get to me. A soldier tried to stop her but she kicked him right in the nuts and kept running to me. I thought, Oh, this is it, I’m in trouble now … but then she fell to her knees and grabbed me tight against her so hard it was like she was trying to pull me into her. Everyone was cheering and clapping and taking pictures, but for a moment it was just the two of us. I couldn’t believe how much she was crying.

  ‘Oh Caitlin,’ she said quietly. ‘My wonderful girl.’

  And then it didn’t matter where I was, because I was home already.

  *

  We couldn’t go back to Middle Island straight away. First of all lots of people in suits had to ask me questions about Perijee, and where he had come from and where he’d gone and how I’d found him. I gave them really good, extra-long answers, but for some reason this seemed to annoy them so eventually they let me go.

  Then, of course, there was the big interview.

  I sat in the visitors’ section of the dark studio and watched as the cameras turned on and the music started. The newsreader looked up.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said. ‘This is the news.’

  It was the exact same presenter I’d seen talking to Dad just days ago – only since then he’d had his hair cut and dyed into a giant green Mohican.

  ‘Well, it’s been exactly one week since everyone thought it was the end of the world and made, er … some bad choices,’ he said, trying to flatten the Mohican and failing. ‘But we are still left with hundreds of unanswered questions about the Monster: who was he? Why did he disappear? And of course: will he ever come back?’

  (On the screen behind him they played a shot of the ocean where I’d last seen Perijee, filled with boats and helicopters scanning the waves.)

  ‘Perhaps the strangest thing about the Monster is how little we still know about him,’ the newsreader continued. ‘In particular, where he came from. After a number of wildly incorrect theories about him arriving from space on a meteor have left some people’s reputations in tatters …’

  (Cut to a shot of Dad’s convertible being publicly pelted with his own books.)

  ‘… and the members of the violent cults worshipping him have been locked away for good …’

  (Cut to Mother and dozens of other soaking wet old ladies being piled into police vans, spitting at police officers.)

  ‘… we have to accept that the Monster might have come from somewhere else entirely. Here to discuss it with us is the leading world expert on deep-sea marine life: Dr Emily Williams.’

  There was Mum, sat beside him. She was a bit nervous but she looked amazing. I’d never been more proud.

  ‘Go Mum!’ I cheered.

  After the security guards had got me to stop cheering, they continued with the interview.

  ‘Dr Williams,’ said the newsreader, ‘perhaps you can tell us where the Monster came from?’

  Mum coughed lightly.

  ‘Well, to be perfectly frank – no, I can’t,’ she said. ‘Because we still don’t know for certain. We do know that he comes from somewhere within the Mariana Trench – the deepest, most unexplored part of the world. The part we know the least about.’

  The newsreader nodded. ‘So why did he come to the surface?’

  ‘Well, he first appeared after the meteor showers,’ Mum explained. ‘These caused extremely strong storms all across the world. So strong, perhaps, that they swept the Monster up from the bottom of the ocean floor and onto land by accident.’

  The newsreader frowned. ‘But then … why did he wait so long to go back?’

  Mum shrugged. ‘Well, perhaps that’s what those tentacles were searching for – a way back home. Maybe he could only go back when the time was right, or when the moon was causing the tides to fall in a certain pattern … who knows? We think that when one of his tentacles finally found the Trench, the rest of him just followed by instinct.’

  I shifted on my chair. I had no idea if what Mum said was right or not. I was there when the Monster took Perijee home – it happened when he became happy again. Of course, it could have been a coincidence … like how Mother thought Perijee was the creature from the Prophecy, and he wasn’t – unless he was, of course, and the Prophecy hasn’t finished yet …

  I shook my head. There was no point asking those kinds of questions right now. I looked at Mum, who was happier than I had ever seen her, and none of them seemed to matter.

  ‘So what you’re saying, Dr Williams,’ said the newsreader, leaning forwards, ‘is that we might not really know what there is on our own planet?’

  Mum sighed.

  ‘There’s always something we don’t know anything about,’ she said. ‘More than we like to admit. The more we discover, the more we realise we don’t fully understand. Our world, our solar system, the universe … It all adds up. I mean, when you think about it – do we even know that much about ourselves?’

  *

  After her interview, Mum was probably more famous than the Queen. The next day she had calls and letters from universities all over the world, wanting her to start researching again. They even wanted her to go back to the Mariana Trench and lead the investigation into Perijee.

  Mum said she’d get back to them, and put the phone down. Then we went out and spent the day together – just the two of us.

  *

  They put me and Mum on a train heading back home. Not just any train – we had our own carriage, with beds and a kitchen and everything! It turns out that when you become friends with an alien that tries to take over the world, everyone’s really nice to you.

  The next morning I walked into our private dining carriage, and there was someone else sitting at the table. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

  ‘Frank!’ I cried.

  ‘All right, sprat!’
r />   He was looking really good – wearing shoes and everything. I gave him a hug.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Your mum invited me!’ He gave her a sheepish look. ‘Which was very kind of her, seeing as, er … seeing as I’m not her favourite person at the moment.’

  Mum gave Frank a dark look.

  ‘He’s not?’ I said.

  ‘Well, no, Caitlin,’ said Mum. ‘He put your life in danger. He let you climb onto an alien’s back and get carried to the other side of the world.’

  ‘He wasn’t an alien,’ I pointed out. ‘Remember? He was a “subterranean megabeast”.’

  ‘Whatever,’ said Mum. ‘Either way, Frank’s lucky I haven’t killed him.’

  She scowled at him again, then smiled.

  ‘That said, if he hadn’t gone after you like he did …’

  Frank shrugged, but couldn’t hide how much he was blushing. I looked at them both, confused. She was angry, but she wasn’t. Adults never make any sense.

  ‘So … what are you doing here?’ I asked Frank.

  Frank coughed. ‘Your mum said something about a plan, sprat. Something she wants to talk to both of us about.’

  We looked at Mum expectantly. She shuffled on her chair.

  ‘Er … yes,’ she said. ‘But before I get into all that, first of all I should say … well, even though you should never run away like that again, Caitlin, and if I ever find you trying to raise another alien …’

  ‘Subterranean megabeast,’ I corrected.

  ‘Yes, well.’ Mum sighed. ‘What I’m trying to say is … I know I’m not free from blame for what happened.’ She held my hand. ‘I mean, if I’d actually listened to you, Caitlin – if I’d spent more time with you on the island, known you a bit better, understood how unhappy you were at school, how lonely you were, and how much Perijee meant to you … maybe none of this would have happened. At the time I was too sad to see what was wrong with everything … but that doesn’t make it OK. I’m so sorry, Caitlin. I really am.’

  She gave my hand a squeeze. I smiled.