They mixed the chemicals in with some mud. Seconds later there was a puff of smoke and a pool of liquid plastic appeared. When Adelaide pinched this substance and tugged it slightly, it started stretching like mozzarella cheese. She shaped a circle with her thumb and index finger and pulled the plastic through it as she tugged it further. It was forced into a tubular shape and, stretching three yards, five yards, ten, began to resemble a makeshift rope. By the time she produced thirty yards of the stuff, the material had stiffened into something like nylon.
“It’s strong,” Todrus said, testing the substance. “And as good as any rope I’ve seen.”
“Then let’s use it!” Alfonse cried, eyeing the leeches below.
“Can anyone tie knots?” Adelaide asked, flinching as a leech rammed the mud beneath her.
Lewis grasped the rope. He had learned to tie knots from an early age, understanding they weren’t all that different from locks. That was why he arranged the group in a line, separating everyone by six feet. He then looped the rope about their waists and secured it with a “lobster pinch” — the strongest knot in existence. Within minutes they were fastened to one another. A good thing, too, since the mud was cracking up.
“They’re breaking through!” Adelaide shrieked as a leech smashed the surface and scrabbled with its suckers.
“Follow me!” the Stranger cried. “And just keep moving, no matter what!”
Wading through the mud, it crossed into the Pother. Todrus followed, then the Pangettis, Lewis, and a nervous Gibiwink.
They heard the mud dissolve behind them. A mass of leeches flew into the air, slurping, burping, and stabbing with their suckers. Lewis felt one of them graze his neck. When another three lunged, he threw himself forward. The Pother absorbed him as the ground gave way and with a gasp of fury the leeches vanished.
Caught inside the Pother, Lewis glanced around him. Whatever the substance was — mist, gas, vapours, shadow — it was impossible to stare into, however hard he peered. His friends were invisible, as were his arms and legs — he couldn’t spot his fingers when he held them to his eyes. This wouldn’t have been shocking had the Pother been black, but it was white, bright, bedazzling, in fact, as if he were standing at the heart of a light bulb.
“Alfonse!” he called out. “Isn’t this weird?” He received no answer but was bombarded with sound — “FONSE FONSE ISSSNNN THISSSS IIISS EEEEERRD!” The lesson was clear: within this Pother, they were on their own.
Falling silent, he “followed” the rope. Because the ground was invisible, walking wasn’t easy. He closed his eyes, but that didn’t help. And when something brushed against his leg — it was probably Alfonse who had stumbled briefly — he yelled in alarm, the sensation was so strange.
He counted a thousand steps. That done, he counted a thousand more, not just once but ten times over. Lewis was tired, and his legs, if they existed still, were sore. He hoped to reach their destination soon unless — the thought struck him — he had broken loose of the others and was wandering stupidly about on his own. The idea was so frightening that he started to panic until the rope reminded him he was joined to his friends.
No sooner had his panic waned than he felt the presence of something else. Not his friends, that would have been fine, but something odd and … hair-raising.
It was calling his name in a ghostly voice. “Lewis Castorman, Lewis Castorman!” There! A shadow was taking shape, like a vault of some type … it was an XPJ! Lewis tried to work it open — he could see its parts and move them at will. Yes, the tumblers were rolling and the bolts were slipping back. The door was opening and … what was that?
A human head stared back at him.
He strained his eyes. The head belonged to … his father!
“Dad, are you okay?” he whispered.
“DAADAADDDAADDD … YERYERYERYERYER … OHOHOHKAYKAYKAY” came booming back as the head began to fall apart, losing its eyes, ears, nose, and hair until nothing remained except a grinning skull. A second skull appeared, then another, and another, until he was surrounded by a crowd of them, their sockets black, their smiles blood-curdling. One skull bore the face of Ernst Grumpel! Its mouth yawned open and sprayed a chemical cloud.
Lewis missed his footing and hit the ground. Aha! So he was solid still! And his friends were near. These thoughts chased the phantom skulls away.
What were they? A mirage? And would they return? Lewis couldn’t bear to see them again — they had been horrible, grinning in a vault like that. His worries mounted.
Wait! Was the Pother thinning? No doubt about it, it wasn’t as empty and, there, he could see someone’s outline ahead.
“You can relax,” the Stranger said. “The worst is over.”
“Lewis,” Alfonse murmured, “can you hear me?”
“Sure.”
“This will sound pretty weird, but I saw The Bombardier. I could have touched him he was standing so close.”
“I know what you mean.”
“But he tried to kill me,” Alfonse gasped. “He bared these fangs and complained I read too many comics.”
“I saw Beethoven,” Adelaide told them. “He said my playing is an insult to his genius.”
Lewis nodded. The Pother toyed with people’s thoughts, creating fear in place of pleasure. The worst part was that it divided its victims. Suffering was bad enough, but the worst thing was to face it alone.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he said to his friends.
They nodded back, too tired to speak.
The Pother was on its last gasp now. It was yellowing at its edges and spiralling off. With a final whoosh, it ended abruptly as they entered a landscape that exploded with colour.
When they were finally free of the rope, the group sank to the ground.
CHAPTER 10
After resting for fifteen minutes to ease their tired muscles, Lewis and the others surveyed their surroundings. Although the sky was still a continuous grey, with no clouds, stars, or sun to break its finish, the landscape was much more cheerful in appearance. The hardened yellow mud was gone, and in its place was an expanse of emerald grass. Long stretches of it resembled a well-kept lawn, but here and there lay patches that were taller than the frogs. Back and forth its lush stalks swayed, like waves at the seaside when the wind blew.
There were flowers, too. These were huge and brilliantly coloured — their yellows, reds, and blues were brighter than fresh paint. And their fumes were so strong when smelled up close that Adelaide almost fainted when she tested a rose.
There was moss, as well — it made the perfect bed — and ferns that were big enough to use as ladders. This lushness was an improvement over the mud and Pother.
“This is amazing,” Adelaide gasped, recovering from the rose’s fumes.
“The grass is lovely,” Gibiwink agreed. “And look at those ferns!”
“I’d be careful,” Alfonse cautioned. “The Bombardier travels through a beautiful landscape, and that’s when the Zagradorf just about kills him.”
Adelaide was about to insult him when the ground started shaking.
There was a disturbance on their right in a distant patch of grass. The moss, ferns, and flowers began trembling, and bits of debris filled the air. There was also a discordant sound in the background as if a hundred radios were playing high-pitched noises at once. As the ruckus drew closer, the friends grew more anxious.
“I don’t like this!” Todrus cried. “Let’s find a hiding place!”
Behind them was a stretch of giant stalks, and the group plunged into the thick of them. A good thing, too — as soon as they had concealed themselves, the commotion spilled into the clearing.
They gasped. Before them stood an army of ants. These weren’t the little insects that overran picnics. Each was almost the size of a car and armed with mandibles that looked like garden shears. If a plant blocked their path, they cut it to pieces.
“Don’t move,” the Stranger whispered. “Those are wood ants, and they’re very aggressive.
If they detect our presence, they’ll swarm us for sure.”
Everyone froze at the creature’s words and listened closely as the ants drew near. The trampling of the grass grew unbearably loud and the high-pitched garble more and more frenzied. Through an opening in the stalks Lewis studied the army. He shivered. With its oversized legs, antennae, and thorax, each ant resembled a miniature tank.
For two long minutes the ants plodded by — dozens, maybe hundreds. Lewis kept waiting for a scout to appear and lead its companions to attack the intruders. At one point he did feel something sticky on his neck and spun around with his fists upraised. It was Gibiwink’s tongue.
The last ant passed. Lewis was going to step into the open, but the Stranger held him back.
“There’s no point,” their guide whispered. “Not just yet. We’re heading in the same direction as these ants. Let’s give them some distance and in the meantime rest.”
Everyone agreed. And because they were hungry, the frogs plucked a few stalks — these were maybe eight feet high — and crumpled them together. Alfonse sprayed them with his food transformer and changed the tangle into strands of pinkish goop.
The group ate with gusto, convinced the goop was tastier than ever.
The Stranger alone refrained. Again it was conscious of its odd appearance and too embarrassed to eat in front of the others. When Adelaide saw it was holding back, she placed a mass of goop in its lap. At the same time she inquired about its history.
“I can’t remember much,” it sighed, nibbling the food. “I was in Yellow Swamp when a cloud appeared. The water started boiling, and I seemed to be drowning. The next thing I knew, I was running away. ‘Who are you?’ I kept asking myself, but my memories were gone. At one point I paused to drink from a stream, and that’s when I noticed my awful appearance. These tentacles, this skin, these hideous features — they filled me with disgust and I wanted to hide. Since that time I’ve remained in this region because I don’t belong in the outside world.”
The creature fell silent and stared at its food.
“We experienced the same confusion,” Todrus admitted, giving the Stranger a pat with his flipper. “Like you, we were simple beasts that were suddenly able to think like humans.”
“But you know what you are,” the Stranger wailed. “Whereas I know nothing about my past. Apart from a poem, my memory is a blank.”
“A poem?” Gibiwink asked, goop dripping from his snout. “Can you recite it, please? I love poetry.”
“I don’t know …” the Stranger said, hesitating. But Gibiwink kept pleading and the others joined in. With a sigh the creature began to recite.
“I have no walls, no chains, no bars
My prisoner’s free to view the stars
Yet move or be moved that cannot be,
Unless you find the appropriate key.
Three ingredients must be mixed as one
The first a pale blue precious stone
Hidden in the earth away from sight
Its glow most generously enkindles light
On its own this blue stone won’t avail
To release the treasure from my jail
Unless joined with forgetful daffodil
With petals pink and scent of caramel.”
“There are other verses, too,” the Stranger said, “but they’ve slipped my memory.”
“But not mine,” Todrus announced. Closing his eyes, he finished the poem.
“In addition there is substance three
A weed, yellow tipped, that embraces a tree
The tree grows higher than all its brethren
And upraises the weed toward the heavens
Find me, determine my lowest point
And upon my means of escape anoint
The ingredients three, mixed into one
And then my prisoner shall be won.”
“Very interesting,” Lewis observed once he and the others had finished applauding. “The question is, where did both of you hear it?”
“I couldn’t say,” the Stranger mused. “It’s in my head. That’s all I can tell you.”
“I know,” Todrus said with some reluctance. “Do you remember when we told you, Lewis, how your mother loved to sing while she worked? Well, that poem you heard was one of her songs.”
“That’s right!” Gibiwink burst out. “I knew it sounded familiar!”
“The Stranger lived in the swamp,” Todrus added. “And like us it must have overheard your mother sing.”
Lewis wasn’t listening. He was remembering how, when his mother was alive, he had awoken each morning, not to the radio’s jingles, but to her constant singing in the kitchen downstairs as she had fixed breakfast for him and his father. The early-morning warbler, his father had called her. At the time he hadn’t thought much of her singing, but in the weeks and months that had followed her death, more than anything else he had missed her cheerful, sunny tunes.
He also recalled something else. His mother had once shown him an Ambassador lock, and when he had some trouble with its operation, she had composed a song to help him pick it open. “Eight pins on the spinner / pick them you’re a winner” — those had been the first two lines. The point was her songs had had a purpose, had been designed to remind —
“Look at this!” Adelaide interjected. For the past few minutes she had been leafing through her instruction booklet. “There’s a brew that lets you see into the immediate future!”
Her announcement came as such a surprise that the group ignored the poem for the moment and crowded around to find out more about this potion. Already Adelaide was taking vials from her belt — iodidalienacalcidite, alienoxenophine, a milligram of nealienahydroxide — and pouring their contents onto a stalk of grass. A cloud of grey-black smoke erupted, together with a ghastly smell — like gasoline and tomato juice mixed together.
“You’re not going to eat that,” Alfonse said, motioning to a tar-like substance.
“Why not?” Adelaide asked. “I’ve always wanted to see the future.”
“I don’t know,” Lewis cautioned her. “There are some things we should leave alone.”
“The Bombardier is exposed to radiation,” Alfonse mused, ignoring his sister’s look of irritation, “and suddenly he can tell the future. He reaches the same conclusion as Lewis — that we’re better off not knowing what the future holds.”
Adelaide laughed. “All the more reason to eat it. Anything The Bombardier hates is well worth trying.” Upon saying that, she swallowed part of the tar.
Everyone watched with bated breath, expecting her face to swell and her skin to change colour. A minute passed, but nothing happened. Then suddenly she began to shriek. “We’re about to be attacked!”
“What do you mean?” Alfonse said. “We’re hidden in this grass.”
“He’s right,” the Stranger reassured her. “We’re well protected —”
“In a moment,” Adelaide groaned, “Lewis will suggest we scout things out, Gibiwink will spill some goop on Todrus, and —”
“Maybe we should scout around,” Lewis recommended.
“I’ll go,” Gibiwink volunteered, only to stumble as he tried to stand. Sure enough, a glob of goop splashed onto Todrus.
“Be careful with that stuff!” Todrus clucked, but his words were lost in the chaos that followed. From every side at once the giant grass was collapsing. Even as Lewis climbed to his feet, a wall of shadows burst around him.
Within seconds the entire group was down for the count.
CHAPTER 11
When Lewis finally came to, he couldn’t get his bearings. He was stretched out and riding on some type of conveyance. He felt rested and that meant he had been out cold for a while. But his hands were tied, it was dark around him, and … where was he? Who had captured him? And what about his friends?
“Hey!” he cried out.
There was silence, followed by high-pitched gibbering. He should have known. The ants!
“Lewis?” Alfons
e whispered from nearby.
“Alfonse? Are you okay? What’s going on?”
“We’re underground,” Todrus murmured. “Those ants we saw earlier must have snuck up from behind.”
“And the others?” Lewis asked, probing his bonds with a pinky.
The rest of the group reported in and, apart from some bruises, were perfectly fine. The Stranger warned they might not be so lucky in the future.
“Don’t mention the future,” Adelaide groaned. “I never want to see it again.”
Assured his friends were safe, Lewis worked on his bonds. The knot was a tough one — a double-loop crustacean — but feeling out the pressure points, he slackened its tension and slipped his wrists free. Groping around, he discovered he was on a makeshift stretcher that the ants had woven from the giant grass. It was supported by a series of ropes that in turn were tied to …
“Ow!” Lewis yelped, grazing a razor-sharp surface. Angry noises revealed he had handled an ant’s mandible and was lucky his fingers were still intact. He shared this information with the rest of the group.
“Where are we headed?” Gibiwink asked.
“To their nest,” Todrus answered, “where there are probably another million ants like these.”
“That’s great,” Adelaide fumed. “We’re underground, surrounded by ants, tied up, and trapped in total darkness …”
“Not quite total,” Alfonse pointed out. “Do you see that blue glow up ahead?”
He was right. A few yards down a light was bleeding through the darkness. It came from a bluish stone embedded in the walls and ceiling. As they were carried forward and the glow embraced them, their eyes began to make sense of their surroundings.
“I preferred the dark,” Adelaide moaned.
The others agreed. They were travelling through a rough-hewn passage that continued downward at a fairly steep angle. The passageway was narrow and made them feel claustrophobic. But the cramped space wasn’t as bad as the ants. They numbered in the hundreds and filled most of the tunnel. Wherever the group happened to glance, antennae and mandibles greeted the eye. And the air was filled with an incessant gibbering that grated on the ears and sounded … insulting.
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