Surviving the Improbable Quest

by Anderson Atlas

  The orange-marked salamander-person shovels a large bite of cake into its mouth and licks its lips with a long black tongue. “Oh, ho-ho. This is good. I’m enjoying this vacation though I cannot see a thing now that the fog is in and the day is leaving.” It takes a fork and reaches for the cake. The fork lands off to the side clinking on the plate. “Oh, ho ho. I just had you cake, now where have you gone?”

  “The cake is good, but the tea is better. Can you acquire a sugar cube for me please?” The yellow-marked salamander-person asks. It fumbles for a teacup, bumps the cup then catches it, but not before spilling half the tea on the table. The spilled tea releases steam into the air. “Pardon me,” the yellow one apologizes then lifts up the cup and holds it closer to its friend.

  The orange one reaches out blindly and searches the table until it finds the plate of sugar cubes. It tries to drop a cube in the other’s cup, but the cube hits the lip, falls off the side and rolls off the table. Neither creature notices.

  “Thank you.” The yellow one sips from the cup. “That sugar cube is just what the tea needed.” It sips again. “Though I might need one more.”

  “You’re so welcome. Now where is that cake?” The orange one fumbles with its fork, but can’t find anything.

  Allan feels like laughing because he can’t believe his eyes or his ears.

  The orange salamander-person finds the cake and crams a bite into its mouth. “Have you heard the bad news?”

  “Oh my, what now? Has the Testing gone terribly wrong again? Has someone passed on?”

  “No, but there were sightings of Jibbawk this week. Three times. It leaves ‘X’ scratch marks on the trees. The ‘X’ marks bleed. Oh, I shiver to think of it. They say it’s hungry and looking to kill.”

  “Who will it kill? It’s picky you know.”

  “How should I know? Maybe one of us. It might be hunting in this very forest.”

  Rubic had said something about Jibbawk, but Allan had thought it was just a scary story. If these salamander-people are real, then maybe Jibbawk is real too. Allan makes a noise that sounds like a peep. The salamander-people look in his direction. Though they cannot see, they know he is there.

  “Who’s there?” The orange one cries, its eyes open wide. “You are trying to scare me, aren’t you?”

  “I did not make that noise, and I am scared, too. Roggy will protect us.”

  “We have cake.” the orange one says, looking back and forth, as blind as a rock.

  From the fog Allan sees a head pop up. It is a furry, shaggy head with large floppy ears. It has a dog snout with large jowls and thick sharp teeth. It growls then leaps and gallops toward Allan. It slides in the moss and stops just inches from Allan’s face. Another peep comes from his mouth as fear hits him over the head with the force of a sledgehammer. The dog speaks. “What is this? A human boy?”

  “Oh my! How did a boy get out here?” asks the orange one. “We vacation out here to avoid the riffraff.”

  The yellow one slaps its head. “Oh, thank the DoGo it wasn’t Jibbawk.” Holding its three-fingered hands out so as to ensure it doesn’t run into any obstacles, it stands and stumbles toward the growling dog.

  “Mr. Killian will want to test him.” The orange one remains seated. “Whether or not he survives.”

  Roggy leans so close that Allan can smell its rancid, dead-squirrel breath.

  “Help me,” Allan says. He hears his voice. He spoke! The vibration warms his throat and sends a tingling sensation into his brain. His voice isn’t broken. Rubic was right. “P-please help. My uncle is hurt.”

  “Zip it boy,” Roggy growls. His deep voice gurgles. “It is illegal to speak until you get Tested. If you don’t come with us we’ll take you by force. Everyone gets Tested.”

  A cold rain begins to drizzle.

  Then, as if things couldn’t get any worse, a dark metal object crashes through the canopy of trees and slams into the trunk of a tree. A rope, frayed and oily, is attached to the metal anchor that is securely imbedded in the tree trunk. Someone crashes through the canopy, zipping down the rope. The person hangs on to bicycle handles that stick out of the sides of a copper box. The box has wheels in front and back that pinch the rope.

  The person is a girl. Her short leather boots crunch the dried leaves when she lands on the ground. Her hair is brown and tied in a ponytail. She has a narrow face and big golden eyes. She wears a faded, blue tank top, shorts and a pack held by a single strap crossing her chest. Water cascades off her body like she emerged from a car wash.

  The surprise visitor’s skin is tan, scratched and scarred. Her arms are well defined by muscles. Strapped to her thigh is a large buck knife. She quickly steps toward Allan.

  Allan squeaks, “Help?”

  “What is this?” The girl unsheathes the large, crooked knife from her thigh. “A boy? Crawling on the ground like a walrus?” she chuckles. “You need to be hung by your feet and left for Jibbawk.”

  The orange salamander-person says loudly, “Oh, you’re always late, Asantia. But you’re just in time, I think.”

  “He should be Tested,” croaks Roggy. “It is the law.”

  Asantia laughs. “That’ll do him in. Though maybe someone will pay for him.” She kneels and takes a good look at Allan. “Prat got your tongue?”

  “My u-uncle. H-he’s hurt.”

  “I came for some cake with these two cotton-candy heads, and instead I stumble upon you. It’s amazing what comes out of the Waiting Place,” she muses. “I’m a little hard up for cash, so I’ll sell you to the highest bidder. I hope you can work. If not, you’ll have to be fed to Jibbawk.” She touches the tip of her blade to her chin. “Now how to get you out of here.”

  Chapter 8

  The Great Ship in the Sky

  Allan panics and pushes himself back. His palms sink into the mud and he barely moves. Asantia pulls out a rope to tie Allan’s hands. He can’t look away from her rope as she approaches. Anger builds in his mind. Since he can’t run he should be able to fight. He’s got fists, one of which he clutches and holds up like a one-armed boxer. Too bad he was never taught to fight. He’s furious that he never was. The world is so dangerous. It’s only logical to teach everyone to defend themselves.

  Asantia grips the rope tighter and comes at Allan. The talking dog growls. The salamander-people laugh and clap. The yellow one says, “Oh how I wish I could see this action. This is all terribly exciting. Get him!”

  The orange one cries, “I hope he gets you a good bit of money. You can buy us tea next time.”

  “Leave me alone!” Allan takes a swing at Asantia. How could he have thought these things would help him? How could he be so stupid? These strangers are two-faced and dangerous. Rubic had warned him. Everyone has two faces. The one face people show the world and the other they see in the mirror. When that reflection is ugly, the person becomes selfish and dark with anger. Since Allan wound up in a wheelchair, he’d see smiles and receive phony platitudes, but then hear people talking about him behind his back. Or they’d talk about his mother or father or uncle behind his back. More and more people are proving themselves to be governed by that ugly reflection.

  Asantia closes in when she suddenly stops. She widens her stance for balance as the ground begins to shake. The ground rises and falls, almost like liquid and quickly loses its identity. Large trees topple as a roar echoes through the forest like a deep purr of a colossal dragon. The dog barks. His eyes widen like full moons and he turns and runs.

  A crack breaks the ground apart near Allan, and another crack branches off. No! Allan reaches out and grabs a young sapling. Its shallow roots hold Allan as the powerful earthquake ripples through everything.

  The two smaller salamander-people fall off their seats and stumble away. The servant trips and falls, gets up and falls again, but is able to follow his friends.

  Allan uproots the sapling he is holding as the dirt loosens and becomes soft. He’s got to find something to hold onto. Allan spo
ts Asantia’s thick rope. He pulls himself to the rope and holds tight. For the moment, the anchor remains hooked to a tree.

  The crack that circles the area widens, causing a huge chunk of earth to fall into the darkening crevice. The ground Asantia stands upon, falls. She jumps away and grabs the edge of the table the salamander-people were sitting at. The table’s foot pedestal digs into the ground and catches Asantia. Her feet dangle into the crack, but they find a thin ledge and she stands. She holds on to the top of the overturned table and reaches for another, more secure hold, but can’t find one.

  “Hey you. Help me!” yells Asantia. “You! On the box in between the handles is a little door,” she says calmly. “Inside is a rope with a harness. Unroll the rope and toss the harness to me.” Her eyes are wide and full of fear. Dust cakes her skin, and her previous toughness seems muted like a dull knife.

  The ground stops moving, but it is impossible to tell if the earthquake is over.

  Allan stiffens and feels anger electrify his nerves. “Why? You were going to s-sell me.”

  “I won’t.”

  There is no way to know. Her intentions are locked in her head. Is she heartless? There was a girl in Allan’s class named Tammy who always tried to cheat off his tests and bullied him on the playground. She was tall and thick. Her baby-blue eyes and blond hair gave her an innocent look, but she was nasty inside. She wouldn’t steal anyone’s lunch money or start fights. She would do nasty, sneaky things to you, instead, things she couldn’t get in trouble for. Allan remembers her giving him a hug one morning. It was a bear hug that intentionally caught his lunch bag in between them. She squeezed so hard on the lunch bag his fruit cup broke and gushed all over, and his sandwich got pulverized. At lunch, everything he had to eat looked like something someone vomited up. During a field trip, she intentionally distracted Allan and led him right into a pile of dog poop. And worst of all, when Allan would answer questions or speak up in class she would fake a sneeze or cough so he wouldn’t be heard. Thinking of Tammy makes Allan’s skin crawl.

  No, she is like Tammy. I’m not helping this Asantia person. Allan looks away. An aftershock rumbles the ground.

  “Please!” Asantia pleads. “I just need to get to my cable. Then I can get up to my ship. I’ll make you some Hantahen eggs and salt ham. Come on, boy!”

  Allan looks up at the handles that are a couple of feet above him. They have two buttons on one end. One button points up, the other one down. Allan takes each handle. The wheels that pinch the rope don’t move under Allan’s weight. They feel solid and safe. Allan’s thumb hovers over the up button.

  The table shifts and the metal creaks. If it dislodges from the ground, Asantia will fall off the ledge and into the dark crack. “I’m slipping! Hurry! I won’t hurt you, I promise.”

  What is the right thing to do? Is she wearing her other face? Is she manipulating me? Allan pushes up. Instantly, he’s hoisted off the rumbling ground. He rises up into the canopy and, after being whacked by a few branches, emerges from the trees into the big sky.

  Asantia screams.

  A large craft hovers above Allan. It resembles a blimp of some kind. Different colored fabric panels are stitched to a ribcage-like frame. Propellers extend beyond the craft, and a large pipe sticks out from the side belching black smoke. Two shark fins hang below the back of the craft and one above. The front window is long and wraps around a third of the body.

  It amazes Allan and it is stunning. But Allan can no longer ignore Asantia. She is in trouble, and no matter what she tried to do to him, he has to help. He pushes the down button.

  “Thank you,” She says as Allan nears the bottom of the cable. “Now throw me the harness.”

  Allan opens a small cubby on the copper box, unrolls the line and harness. He notices a clasp that connects the line to the box and decides on a safer course of action. He unclasps the line and reconnects it directly to the cable. He’ll get her to the cable, but he’s not going to stick around in case she grabs him. He tosses the harness at her and then presses the up button.

  She catches the harness. “I need the handles to get up to my ship.”

  Allan doesn’t listen. He zips to the top of the trees and stops at the door underneath the floating ship. It’s got black marks and grit staining the fabric, and the metal struts are rusty, but thick. There’s no discernible handle or lever on the door.

  Now what? How can he get Asantia to help him without her stabbing him in the back and selling him to Mr. Killian? Or Testing him? It’s impossible. At any second she could overpower Allan and take him wherever she wanted him to go. He can’t fly her ship. He can’t even figure out how to open the door. He pounds on the metal hatch in frustration.

  Just as he is about to go back down to get her, there’s movement on the horizon. Glowing balloons float toward him. Their internal lights flicker like fluorescent lights. As they get closer, Allan can see faces, strange and sad faces. Their eyes look toward the horizon, and some of their mouths are wide like they’re feeding off the air itself. Below their balloon-shaped bodies are tentacles that sway in the wind.

  “Come back down. I’ll get you!” Asantia yells from below.

  A bluish creature floats by Allan. He can see through its translucent skin. The next one bumps into the side of the airship. “Oh my,” it says in a deep, slow voice.

  Maybe they are friendly. The balloon-like creature floats under the ship.

  “C. . .can you help me?” Allan asks.

  The balloon-like creature looks at Allan. “Of course I can. Grab hold of my tail.”

  This is better than helping that crass Asantia girl. Allan reaches out and grabs one of the tentacles below the balloon creature. It’s soft, but strong. The end of the creature’s tentacle wraps around his hand then tightens like a boa constrictor.

  Allan looks down at Asantia. Just before he lets go of the handles, he presses the down button, and the handles zip down the cable toward their owner. Meanwhile, the balloon creature bobs with Allan’s weight, but continues. There are hundreds of them in the sky, no, thousands. Some glow green, some blue.

  “Okay, you can lower me down now. Somewhere safe.” Allan points toward the river. “Can you go that way? My camp is way over there.” He squints, but the ground gets farther and farther away. “I think camp is that way.” Allan doesn’t know any more. The floating creature looks down at Allan. Its sad eyes quiver, but it tries to smile. “I can only go one way.”

  It’s game over for Allan. His vision blurs as tears flood his eyes. He watches his tears drip into the wind succumbing to the lure of gravity. The same gravity he feels pulling on his legs, fighting him, is not strong enough to break the grip of the tentacle.

  They soar above the clouds, bathed in the purples and reds of the sunset, though there is no sun, just a swath of remaining daylight. Come to think of it, Allan can’t remember the last time he’d seen the sun. It was when he was with Rubic.

  Sun or no sun, wherever the balloon creature takes him, there’s still a possibility there’ll be a phone or a park ranger or a policeman, unless the creature has other plans. “Where are we going?”

  The balloon-like creature doesn’t answer. The surrounding swarm flies at the same speed and in the same direction, to somewhere just over the horizon.

  “I’m thirsty,” Allan whispers. He also has to pee, but he’s holding it as best he can. If worse comes to worse, he’ll just let it go. Maybe the pee will rain on someone that deserves it. That thought makes Allan chuckle.

  Chapter 9

  The Greatest Wall There Is

  The balloon-like creature flies for hours, and eventually the night comes. The dark of deep space turns the clouds below to mere shadowy shapes, and the stars seem to flicker on. The balloon creatures appear brighter now that the daylight has completely left. They leave colored trails behind them like flags waving in the sky. Allan has never seen such beautiful color trails. Like snakes made of plasma, they trail behind then eventually fade.
The balloon creatures weave in and out of formation like a coordinated dance.

  Allan had seen a similar show last year during the opening ceremonies at the Olympics. Fifty thousand people held up lights in a meticulously coordinated show. Their lights created images: different flags and messages of hope, triumph and peace. It was so beautiful that his mom had made him watch it again.

  Then, as a further distraction from the increasingly isolated feeling that sits heavily on his back, Allan notices a sliver of light poking up from the horizon like a nail being driven up through the clouds. It reveals itself as a sliver moon. The moon is large in the sky like a great majestic bird. It’s brighter than a sliver moon should be. Midway through its ascent, another sharp sliver peeks from the horizon. Another moon! It can’t be real. It has to be his imagination. Just like these balloon creatures. They can’t be real either, can they? As the two moons continue to rise in tandem, a third moon appears. Allan laughs out loud. If the balloon creature hadn’t been holding onto him, he’d have fallen to his death with the widest grin across his mud-splattered face.

  The moons brighten the clouds below, illuminating their fluffy cotton surfaces. A lightning flash snakes through the cumulus behemoths and splits into a thousand, million branches leaving light trails in their wake. It’s such a dreamy space Allan is in and is similar to the comfort he feels when falling asleep. Allan wonders if time has stopped and whether or not he’ll hang from the balloon creature until the end of days.