by Paul Gamble
Kneeling on the sea floor beside the anchor, Jack found the end of the long, rusty, snapped metal cable that was attached to it. His fingers had begun to wrinkle and it was difficult work underwater, but he tied the end of the cable into a rudimentary knot. He had seconds before the narwhal was upon him.
Jack looked up and realized the narwhal’s horn was only inches away from his eye. If it hadn’t been for The Speed, he would have ended up wearing an eye patch.78 As it was he managed to pull himself down using the anchor, allowing the narwhal to sail over him. Once the narwhal had passed, Jack threw the knotted end of the cable, praying that his aim would be good.
The knotted loop caught on the end of the narwhal’s horn and tightened as it swam rapidly away. The cable underneath Jack’s feet was dragged through the sand on the seabed, silently snaking away.
Now Jack had to pin his hopes on the cable’s running out before the narwhal could slow itself and turn. Jack watched the narwhal still swimming on; there were only a few feet of cable left. The slack left the cable, and there was an audible ping as the narwhal stopped, pulled backward by the cable around its horn—the cable that was attached to the anchor.
As Jack looked up he heard a popping noise.79 The sudden stop had worked so well that the narwhal’s tusk had neatly popped right off. Trudy had let go of the narwhal’s tail and was giving Jack a thumbs-up. A narwhal without a horn doesn’t look particularly threatening. The narwhal didn’t even seem to be in pain, just slightly sheepish and embarrassed. Using The Speed, Jack swam rapidly through the water and caught the sinking horn. Holding the blunt end, he pointed it menacingly at the narwhal. The large, de-horned, gray-white fish knew when it was beaten and swam off.
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
THUMBS-UP SIGN
GLADIATORS
Everyone knows that the thumbs-up sign originates in ancient Rome. When a defeated gladiator had done a good job and the emperor wanted him spared he would give the victorious gladiator a thumbs-up sign to spare his life.
This was why gladiators were extremely upset when Tiberius “Thumbless” Severus became emperor.
Tiberius was famous for two things. One was presiding over the most deaths in the gladiator arena. The second was for the time as a child when he had tried to feed an alligator by hand.
An interesting footnote is that Tiberius also had the slowest time of any Roman emperor for completing the Rubik’s Cube.
* * *
42
A CONVENIENT TOOTH
Trudy was the much stronger swimmer and made it back to shore before she had totally overcome her shock and started breathing again. Jack took slightly longer and so had to swim the last fifty meters on the surface. It was made harder by the fact that he was using one arm to carry the narwhal horn.
Trudy waded out the last few meters and stood, dripping, on the shore. “Are you really keeping that thing?”
Jack looked at it. “Yes. Firstly, because it’s pretty awesome looking. And secondly, because the next time we get attacked by an evil narwhal we’ll be able to fence with it.”
Trudy squinted skeptically. “You are full of brilliant ideas, Jack. But sometimes it seems like the top layer of ideas you’re filled with is mostly made up of the stupid ones.”
Jack tried to look annoyed, but it was difficult to muster up a stern look when you are wearing a dripping school uniform and carrying a narwhal tusk.
Jack and Trudy put their shoes back on and made their way back to the aquarium. They could hear a dull ringing noise from inside the building. “What’s that sound?”
“Sounds like bad news for us,” Trudy guessed. “They couldn’t attack us with giant crabs when the aquarium was filled with visitors and tourists. So they’ve set off the fire alarm. Once the place is empty, the giant crustaceans can come out to play.”
As they walked farther through the aquarium, Jack could barely believe what he saw. There were still some staff/henchpeople in the aquarium. It was just that none of them were conscious. Their bodies lay slumped, battered, and bruised every step of the way. There wasn’t a single one of them who was capable of standing up, much less trying to fight two Ministry operatives.
“This is a bit of good luck,” said Jack as he got used to the scene of carnage.
Trudy, however, was less sure. “Maybe we don’t have to fight the henchpeople. But what happens if we have to fight the thing that fought the henchpeople?”
Jack looked at the crumpled forms of the aquarium employees and felt his blood run cold. As they turned the corner into the foyer the alarm stopped ringing for a very scary reason.
The fire alarm in the foyer had stopped ringing because an enormous man had reached up to the wall and crumpled the red metal ringing bell with one enormous hairy hand. The bell folded into a ball as if it were made of tinfoil. The other enormous hairy hand was around the neck of a barely conscious aquarium employee.
The enormous man looked at Jack and smiled. He dropped the red bell, threw the aquarium employee over the back of the ticket kiosk, and strode over to where Jack and Trudy were standing. He was still wearing the pink tutu that was far too small for him.
“Thought you’d lose me?” the Tooth Fairy asked. “I always get my teeth.” The Tooth Fairy had pulled his pincers out.
A feeling of panic rolled over Jack and he broke out in a sweat. Perspiration rolled down his forehead. In his head he saw images of chomping apples and chewing bacon sandwiches floating away from him. The future held no solid food for him. He would have to cope with a world made up of soup for lunch and liquefied sandwiches sucked through a straw for tea. And then a thought occurred to him.80
Jack stepped forward with the narwhal horn outstretched. Trudy reached out to pull him back, but he shook her off. Surely Jack couldn’t be thinking about fighting with the Tooth Fairy? The narwhal horn was long and pointed, but the Tooth Fairy was practically invulnerable.
Luckily Jack wasn’t thinking about fighting—he was pretty sure that even if you skewered the Tooth Fairy with the largest narwhal horn in the world he would just shrug, put a Band-Aid over the hole, and then tear out your incisors.
Jack had decided to make another bargain. “You could have my teeth.… Or alternatively, you could have this instead.” Jack waved the narwhal horn enticingly. “Potentially the largest tooth in the world.”
The Tooth Fairy’s eyes focused on the narwhal horn, which he hadn’t noticed until then. His eyes bulged disturbingly (as his tutu also generally did). Then he put on an emotionless poker face—the Tooth Fairy was a shrewd businessman as well as a psychopathic maniac.81 “What’s to stop me from taking your teeth and then just relieving you of that?” The Tooth Fairy pointed to the horn.
Jack shook his head vigorously. “Because I know you, and that isn’t the way you work. You’re insane, but you’re fair. That’s why you have the contract clause about teeth under pillows belonging to you put into people’s birth certificates.” Jack held the narwhal horn toward the Tooth Fairy. “You wouldn’t just take this from me. You’re are a psychopath, but an honest, decent psychopath.”
The Tooth Fairy’s mouth wrinkled in annoyance. Then his face assumed an expression of grudging respect. He ran this fingers through his beard thoughtfully. “All right, boy, we can maybe figure out a deal.”
* * *
“And if you just sign here, and initial here.”
Jack did as he was told on the last of the paperwork that the Tooth Fairy had put in front of him.
“And now your teeth are your own again.”
“Thanks,” said Jack, who felt it was safe to smile again. “And this belongs to you.”
The Tooth Fairy took hold of the narwhal horn82 and looked at it lovingly. “Think of the number of piano keys that I’ll be able to make with this.”
Jack decided to test his luck. “Look, I don’t suppose you can give us a lift back to the Ministry?”
The Tooth Fairy shook his head. “Not
this time, sunshine. I’m the Tooth Fairy, not a taxi service.” He took out the golden key ring made from a tiger’s tooth, spun it once around his finger, and strolled out to his black Ford Cortina.
Trudy and Jack breathed a collective sigh of relief.
“I really don’t know how you do it,” Trudy said.
“Mmm,” Jack agreed. “To be honest, I’m really not a hundred percent sure myself.”
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
THINKING QUICKLY
WHY PERSPIRING IS HELPFUL
Many people wonder why we think so much more quickly when under pressure or perspiring. The answer is of course obvious to anyone who has ever seen a brain.
Brains are incredibly wrinkly things. This is one reason why it is often assumed that old people have great wisdom. Because many of them are so wrinkly that they actually look a bit like brains.
Any neurologist worth their salt will tell you that the more wrinkly the brain the more intelligent the creature. The brains of rats and mice are quite smooth compared to dolphin and human brains. Wrinkly brains have more surface area and therefore more space to do the actual thinking on.
When you sweat or perspire, your head gets wet. As we know, when parts of the human body get wet enough they start to get wrinkly. Therefore when your brain sweats a little, it gets a little bit more wrinkly and you get a little bit smarter. This is why panic, which creates sweating, helps people think a little bit faster.
Interestingly enough, this is also the origin of the phrase “Go and stick your head in a bucket of water.” These days many people use the phrase as an insult. However, in the olden days people knew that wrinkly brains made you think better. Therefore it wasn’t really an insult and would probably have been best translated as—“I disagree with your theory; please go and wash your brain until it is more wrinkly so you may rethink your philosophy.”
The wrinkly brain is also the reason many people do their best thinking in the bath. Please see Archimedes: Eureka Moment.
It is also why many people find it almost impossible to think intelligently about anything in the morning before they have had their first shower.
* * *
43
THE WORLD’S LARGEST PLUG HOLE
Trudy and Jack called for a Ministry car and were taken back to the headquarters in the museum. Trudy kept badgering Jack to tell her what he had figured out when they had been in the underwater cave, but Jack refused to say anything. “I’ll explain when we see Grey. I have questions to ask and I don’t want to have to repeat everything.”
Trudy clenched her fists in annoyance.
* * *
Grey was waiting for Trudy and Jack in the passage room of the Ministry. “You had something that you wanted to see me about?”
Trudy looked expectantly at Jack.
“Yes. I think I’ve figured out what all the fracking is about.”
“Well, we know that it can’t be about finding gas under the ground,” said Grey.
Jack had figured out what the drilling was about, but wasn’t sure what made it particularly unlikely that it was about gas apart from the lack of gas tanks at the drilling locations. “Why not?”
“Well, isn’t it obvious?” asked Grey. “I mean, think about things that are filled with gas. They either float, catch fire, or smell bad. And Northern Ireland doesn’t do any of those things. So there can’t be gas underneath it.”
Jack considered Grey’s argument. It seemed sound, although Jack could have argued that occasionally bits of Northern Ireland caught fire and other bits smelled bad.83 However, he decided that this was not the time to start an argument of this nature. “I think I have most of this figured out. We’re fighting some kind of undersea army this time. That explains the sponge and soap shops. But why would they be drilling holes in Northern Ireland?”
Trudy thought about this. “Because they’re trying to find something underground?”
“No.” Jack shook his head vigorously. “They aren’t digging underground—that’s what the pirates were doing. These bad guys are drilling through the ground. And they’re drilling the biggest hole right in the center of Lough Neagh. Why there? And if it’s sea creatures that are attacking us, why would the seals be on our side?”
Trudy and Grey stared at Jack blankly. They were failing to make the connection. Jack sighed and rooted through his schoolbag. He took out a copy of the atlas they used for geography. He flicked through the pages until he came to a map that showed a picture of Loch Ness in Scotland. He paused for a moment as he realized Loch Ness was shaped like the bodies of water he had seen in Cthulhu’s book. A thought occurred to Jack. Could Cthulhu be related to the Loch Ness Monster? It was an intriguing thought. That would have explained all the photographs in Cthulhu’s book and the strange shapes rising out of the Loch.
Jack shook his head. Now was not the time to be solving the age-old mystery of the Loch Ness Monster. He hadn’t been looking for Loch Ness in the book. He kept flicking pages until he came to the page that showed a map of Northern Ireland. “We already know that the pirates have dug around the edge of Northern Ireland. Now what’s this?” Jack stabbed his finger into the center of Northern Ireland.
“It’s Lough Neagh.” Trudy studied the picture more closely. “Have you ever noticed that Lough Neagh seems to have five points to it? If you squint, it’s almost star-shaped?”
Jack ignored Trudy’s suggestion.84 “But doesn’t it remind you of anything?”
“Umm, well, I suppose it looks like a big lough.”
Jack ignored her sarcasm. “It’s a big hole in the middle of Northern Ireland. Like a plug hole in the middle of a basin.”
Trudy thought about Jack’s recent adventures with plug holes. “Are you suggesting that underneath Northern Ireland there’s an enormous spider waiting to burst out?”
“Not at all,” said Jack. “That would be ridiculous. But there’s no other country in the world that has a hole that large in the center of it. We’re like a land doughnut.”85
Grey’s forehead wrinkled. “Jack, are you suggesting that someone is going to eat Northern Ireland? Even with all my experience in the Ministry I think that’s fairly unlikely.”
Jack exhaled impatiently. “Okay, that was a bad simile for me to use.”86 Jack tried to think of a better simile. “Do you remember the Titanic?”
Trudy and Grey nodded. Every schoolchild in Northern Ireland knew the story of the Titanic. In many ways Northern Ireland was a strange place. Other countries tried to ignore their major disasters. Germany rarely mentioned the World Wars, England tried to pretend that the last time the World Cup had been played was in 1966, and Ireland frequently tried to pretend that Jedward were from Australia. For some reason Northern Ireland’s people were proud of their disasters, and every schoolchild was forced to spend at least three weeks of their lives undertaking a project to find out about the Titanic.
“We did a project about it in elementary school,” said Trudy.87
“What happened to it?”
“It hit an iceberg. So what’s your point?”
“And what happened to it when it hit the iceberg?”
Trudy was getting fed up with the succession of questions but answered anyway. “It put a hole in the hull and the ship sank.”
Jack nodded. He pointed to the center of Lough Neagh. “And they’re drilling a hole here. Right in the center of an enormous body of water. What do you think’s going to happen?”
It took Trudy a moment to understand what Jack was saying. Then the enormity of it all hit her. “They’re going to try and sink Northern Ireland!”
Jack nodded solemnly. “Exactly.”
Grey let out a long whistle. “That makes sense.”
“That’s why the seals are on our side. Seals live in the sea, but they also need bits of land to live on. That’s why they were trying to help us. I think we’re up against an army of merpeople. Mermaids and mermen.”
Trudy
spoke. “And you think they kidnapped my mother?”
Jack looked at Trudy. “Your mother must have been at the aquarium because she realized something was going on with the seals. They tried to tell her, but before she could get back to the Ministry she must have been caught by one of those crabs.”
Trudy’s face dropped. “That’s how Regina Maris knew my name—the staff must have recognized me. They guessed we were from the Ministry and used us to get the crab into the prison tanks to break out the criminal fish.”
Jack nodded. “Exactly. I think they wanted the hammerhead sharks and the sawfish especially. Think about it. They’re building things under the water—imagine how helpful fish with tools for heads would be.”
“I think you’re almost right, Jack,” said Grey. “But it isn’t merpeople. Merpeople aren’t evil and they’re generally friendly with seals—they used to use seals to carry mail to humans. No, if the seals were being captured, it must have been because the merpeople were trying to warn us what was going on. I think a different kind of undersea denizen is behind this plan.”
“Who?” Jack asked eagerly.
Grey fixed Jack and Trudy with a deadly serious stare. “The Atlanteans.”
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
SEALS
THEIR USE AS A POSTAL SYSTEM
There are rumors that a time existed before there was such a thing as e-mail. If you believe this (many don’t), there were different ways of sending mail. A long time before the post office existed, kings and queens used to send mail to each other via pony couriers and carrier pigeons.
However, on occasion messages would need to be sent under the sea to the merpeople. Therefore a messenger was needed that could carry a letter over land and then through the sea. Naturally, seals were chosen for this duty.
