by Paul Gamble
Jack laughed. “Of course not. We outnumber you four to one. And even if that wasn’t the case, we can use The Speed. Just because you’ve got fancy undersea armor and a mean-looking sword, do you think you can really beat us?”
“The sword? I’m not even going to need my sword to defeat you, you little fool.”
Jack found the queen’s absolute confidence more than a little unnerving.
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
SAVILE ROW SUITS
BUYING THEM ON CREDIT
A lot of Ministry agents buy their suits from Savile Row. Many people wonder how they manage to afford such splendid and expensive clothing on a government salary. The truth is that, generally speaking, Ministry agents are in such a dangerous job that they have a tendency to buy almost everything on credit cards, assuming that they will have been flattened by a runaway octopus or roasted alive by a fire-breathing moose before the bill ever comes due.
It is interesting to note that if you ever come across someone who claims that the world is about to end, a good test of their sincerity is to ask to see their credit card bill. Anyone who claims the world is ending and still doesn’t max out their credit card is almost certainly not to be trusted.
* * *
53
THE ADVANTAGES OF AQUAROBICS
The queen drew her sword from its scabbard and dropped it to the ground. That couldn’t be a good sign, thought Jack. What was her secret? He began to wonder if instead of attacking they should …
Trudy launched herself at the queen using The Speed. Whatever Trudy had been thinking must have been the saddest thing ever. Her fists and feet blurred as she threw a thousand punches at the queen at once. Jack could barely count the punches as her fists lashed out. And yet the queen blocked each blow as if it were moving in slow motion. Finally the queen grabbed Trudy under the shoulder with an armlock, heaved her against her hip, and sent her flying across the deck of the drilling platform. Trudy came down with a heavy crash and skidded a dozen feet along the metal surface.
Grey had torn open one of the bags containing the bath bombs and, using The Speed, licked a dozen and threw them at the queen. Jack thought there was no way she could possibly avoid them all. The queen blurred into action, grabbing her sword from the deck. Using the blade, she effortlessly swatted each of the fizzing bath bombs straight back at Grey.
Grey’s face fell as the fizzing, spitting, perfumed grenades sped toward him. Even though Grey was almost as fast as Trudy using The Speed, he was still not swift enough. He dodged three, then four, but the fifth bomb hit his rib cage and exploded. Grey was tossed backward like a rag doll. He hit the deck and lay limply. Jack’s face froze. For the first time he began to contemplate the very real probability that he might be on the losing side. But the good guys never lost.… Did they?
“Now I don’t seem to be quite so outnumbered, do I?” observed the queen smugly.
Only Jack and Tim were left. “Aren’t you going to try?” Jack asked Tim.
Tim shrugged. You have never seen someone shrug until you have seen someone with four sets of shoulders shrugging. It’s a very powerful shrug, which makes you understand that there really isn’t anything to be done about the situation.
“Okay, you’re right that it’s a fairly hopeless situation,” admitted Jack. “Still, it’s a bit spineless.”104
The queen expertly spun her sword around her hand. “Do you fancy your chances?”
“No,” said Jack honestly. “But just before you cut me into two pieces105 with that thing, I was wondering how come you’re so strong and fast?” Even facing certain death Jack found that his curiosity prompted him to ask questions.
The queen smiled, happy to be flattered. “Easy—the original intention of the Atlanteans had been to wrinkle their brains further and make them smarter. But living underwater gave us another advantage. It’s like your entire life is one long session of aquarobics and resistance training.” The queen flexed an arm to show Jack her impressive muscle tone. Jack wondered whether, if he’d spent more time watching his mother’s yoga tapes, he would possibly have been able to fight the queen more effectively.106
In the background Jack heard the enormous drill start whirring and crunching.
“Sounds like my warriors have gotten the drill working. So the only question is, should I kill you now or wait and let you drown?”
Jack sighed. “I think you’re probably going to kill me now because there’s no way I’m letting this country sink.”
Jack spun as quickly as he could and kicked all the bags of bath bombs off the side of the platform. They bobbed and floated around the nearest giant metal leg that reached deep down into the lough.
The queen screamed in anger. The sea began to bubble and fizz as the chemicals did their work. She turned to Jack. “You little fool, you’ll pay for this!” She raised her sword above her head, ready to slice Jack in two.
Jack tensed his body for the blow and, thinking of magicians’ assistants, shouted, “Wait a minute—shouldn’t I be wearing something spangly?”
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
SAWING A WOMAN IN HALF
THE TRAGEDY OF THE GREAT MONSTRO
It is generally agreed that one of the greatest magicians ever was the Great Monstro. He could perform the most wonderful magic tricks, and the cutting of a lady in half was the centerpiece of his act. However, one day he quarreled with his assistant, who was understandably upset that all her costumes consisted entirely of sequins and spangles, while Monstro wore a cloak and pretty purple turban.
His assistant stormed out of the room in a rage (which is pretty impressive in and of itself. It’s hard to storm out of a room when wearing spangles—you generally just lack the gravitas).
However, when she slammed the stage door, the resultant vibrations caused a cabinet (used in Monstro’s disappearing act) to fall from the theater rafters, striking Monstro on the head.
The blow from the cabinet caused Monstro a severe concussion. In point of fact he was only saved from certain death by the voluminousness of his purple turban.
When Monstro came around, he found himself on the empty stage of the theater with a wooden box that had been cut in half, a pile of sawdust, and a saw in his hand. Without anyone to tell him otherwise, the Great Monstro therefore assumed that he was a carpenter and wandered out of the theater to look for work.
Eventually the Great Monstro was offered work laying a floor in a local restaurant. Unfortunately, he didn’t realize that the saw that he was using was a trick magic sword. Fifteen years later he is still trying to saw his first plank in two and the restaurant has yet to get a new wooden floor.
From this story we can learn two things. Firstly, sometimes being the person who saws someone in half can be as dangerous as being the person who gets sawed in half.
Secondly, although you may feel silly having your name sewn inside your underpants, when you get an amnesia-causing concussion, it can be a lifesaver.
* * *
54
BANG BANG
The queen’s sword swung downward just as a mushroom cloud of water exploded out of the water. The force of it threw Jack, Tim, and the queen halfway across the platform.
Jack wiped the water from his eyes and peered across the platform. Tim was lying on his back, twitching. This was not turning out to be a good day for Ministry operatives. Still, twitching was a reasonably good sign. A better sign would have been if Tim had been up and tap dancing, but at least twitching was better than being absolutely motionless.
Jack struggled to his feet with difficulty. The bath bombs had done half their work and one leg of the huge platform had buckled, throwing the entire structure off balance—one edge of the platform was now dipped into the water. Jack found it difficult to balance on the platform’s tilted, wet, and slippery surface.
The queen had also managed to regain her feet, but she looked quite different indeed. The
sudden blast of water had restored her heavily wrinkled appearance. Jack realized this was why she had run from the sprinklers in the school. When she got wet, her real wrinkled appearance was revealed.
“You may want to reapply your moisturizer,” observed Jack.
The queen let out a startling battle cry and leapt at Jack, swinging her sword arm. Which would have been the end of Jack if only her sword had not been knocked from her hand by the explosion.
Considering his options, Jack felt that the most appropriate action was to run and hide. However, he knew that trying to run on a wet, tilted metal surface in school shoes when you’ve been battered by an explosion is inadvisable. Jack felt as if it was all over. Trudy had been defeated, Grey had been defeated, Tim had been defeated.… Okay, maybe Jack himself hadn’t been defeated, but he was fairly sure that was coming pretty soon. Therefore, he decided that he would leave life the way he had lived it—being sarcastic. “If you want that to be more dramatic, you might want to try that while holding a sword.”
The queen paused and stared at Jack. “I don’t need a sword to kill you; I can pull your head off with my bare hands.” She threw a fist at Jack’s head.
When Trudy and Grey asked Jack about this moment later on, he would claim that he had elegantly dodged the queen’s blow by rolling his shoulders and bending his back like the perfect blend of ballet dancer and limbo expert. In reality he tried to duck and fell over, clanging onto the metal platform. The queen had put too much effort into her blow and tumbled over Jack. She slid down toward the edge of the platform and had to scrabble with her hands to avoid falling into the water.
For a moment Jack thought about throwing her a rope in case she fell off the platform entirely. Then he realized that falling into a lough probably wouldn’t be desperately dangerous for someone who was the queen of Atlantis.
The queen hauled herself upright and, taking tiny baby steps, made her way across the treacherously slippy metal floor toward where Jack was sprawled. Jack decided to crawl rapidly away instead of trying to stand. It was the most preposterous slow-motion chase.107
Jack was saddened by the thought that if only Grey and Trudy were conscious now, they might be able to defeat the queen. With the tilted, slippery deck the queen’s years of aquarobics practice would be less useful. Now it was all about balance.
And then Jack had an idea. He turned to face the queen, who was barely ten feet away from him. “This is a dramatic moment.”
The queen ignored him. She was concentrating too hard on keeping her balance.
“And dramatic moments call for a drum roll.” Jack used his hands to beat out a drum roll on the metal platform. It echoed and rang loudly.
On the other side of the platform, Tim stopped twitching. The reverberations rattled through his head and brought him back to consciousness. Tim shook his head and sprang up, placing all eight legs on the platform.
“What use is the spider going to be? I already defeated your two strongest fighters.”
Jack nodded from his crouched position. “You did. But that was before you could barely stand on a wet metal deck without slipping. Tim can balance easily—there are a few advantages to having eight legs.”
Tim scampered across the deck to where Jack was sitting. He looked at Jack expectantly. Jack smiled. “I reckon she’s going to be moving slowly enough for you to be able to web her.”
Tim nodded enthusiastically. He shot one end of silk onto the deck and then set about capering around the queen like a medieval jester.
“What are you doing? You can’t do this!” Within minutes the queen’s legs were bound together and she fell to the ground. Tim took this opportunity to leap over her two or three times, pinning her to the ground.
And yet the queen still wasn’t quite finished. “You think you’ve won, don’t you?”
Even though this was only Jack’s second week in the Ministry, he knew that gloating from an enemy was never to be considered a good thing. Enemies only ever felt the need to gloat if they had something hidden up their sleeves. Normally something sharp and deadly.
Jack responded cautiously. “Well, to be honest, I didn’t think we were losing. But I get the feeling that I’ll be reconsidering that soon, won’t I?”
The queen jerked her head toward the shore of Lough Neagh. Three enormous objects were swimming toward the platform through the murky water.
“There was a reason I freed the hammerhead sharks, the octopuses, and the sawfish from your Ministry prison. They’ve been helping build my insurance policy.”
Jack carefully stood up and gazed out over the lough. He could see what was coming for them and would have taken a step back in terror if that wouldn’t have risked his falling over in terror. Tim had scampered over and was standing beside him.
“It’s the remains of the Atlantean army in enormous crab machines,” Jack said forlornly. “That isn’t something that you see every day.” The crab machines were made of shiny silver metal. Each had two glass pods in place of eyes. Groups of heavily armored Atlanteans sat in the pods, ready to do battle.
Tim nudged Jack’s leg and pointed to Grey and Trudy, who were both beginning to recover. Jack had all but given up on trying to save the country from sinking. But perhaps at least he and his friends could escape somehow.
His heart sank when he looked over and saw that the buckled leg of the platform had tilted so far that the zip line was pulled taut and half underwater. That certainly wasn’t going to be an escape route for them.
Jack looked back to see the crab machines clambering up the remaining unbuckled legs of the drilling platform. There was no way that Jack and Tim could possibly defeat an entire army, even if Grey and Trudy did regain consciousness. The warriors with their weapons and aquarobic training would make mincemeat out of them.
Jack despaired. He felt so lonely. What he needed was a creature of almost impossible size and strength. A creature capable of wanton destructive acts who hated all life and longed to destroy it wherever it could be sought. A creature who wanted to see the world burn.…
And then Jack had his best idea ever.
* * *
MINISTRY OF S.U.I.T.S HANDBOOK
AQUAROBICS
THE FATAL FLAW
The natural resistance of water makes aquarobics a great exercise and can help you become fit incredibly quickly. The problem, however, is that spending all that time in water will make you all wrinkly.
Therefore the most you can hope for is that you’ll end up looking like a really fit senior citizen. Which isn’t the best of results.
* * *
55
THE CAVALRY HAS TENTACLES
The crab machines were standing on the far side of the platform. They were solid metal, Atlantean engineering. Each was filled with dozens of warriors. Occasionally one of the machines would snap its enormous metal claws in the air, sending out a dull ringing sound.
If only the sound had had a slightly more bass effect, it might have been exactly what Jack needed. But the noise he needed was a much deeper one. What Jack needed was the world’s longest guitar string.
“Warriors!” called the queen of Atlantis from inside her spider’s web cocoon. “Destroy this human filth and his pet insect.” The crab machines started clanking directly toward Jack and Tim.
Tim poked Jack with a long leg. “He’s an arachnid, not an insect,” Jack corrected the queen. “And speaking of matters biological—those giant crab machines are walking forward, and that’s cheating.”
The queen glared at Jack. “You might think you’re funny, but you’ll be dead soon.”
Jack nodded at her. “You might be more right than you think.” Jack was fairly certain his plan would destroy the crab machines and the drilling platform. He just wasn’t sure that it wouldn’t also destroy him and his friends in the process.
He looked over to where Grey and Trudy were beginning to stir. Now was the time for all or nothing. Jack stood up and dived forward, sliding toward the e
dge of the platform. His aim was almost perfect, and he hit the water where the zip line was attached. Tim followed him.
“Right, help me with this.” Jack was betting that the spider’s web silk, strong as steel, would act like the world’s largest, most bass guitar string. Jack braced his feet against the edge of the platform and pulled with both hands on the zip line. Although Tim wasn’t really sure what was happening, he followed Jack’s lead and helped him pull the zip line back. Atlantean warriors and enormous metal crabs were slowly stalking across the platform toward them.
Jack looked directly into Tim’s eight eyes. “Now let go!”
Jack and Tim let go of the zip line, which vibrated, emitting an enormously deep humming note just as you would expect from a taut guitar string.
Two of the queen’s warriors had just finished cutting her free from the spiderweb cocoon and had helped her upright. “What is this? Do you want music to accompany your doom?”
Jack ignored the queen and was looking out toward the middle of the lough. If the note had been bass enough … if his guess had been right … if he was correct about the Loch Ness Monster, then something pretty amazing was going to happen.
It did.
An enormous gray tentacle flung itself out of the water. The entire surface of the water was distorted as an ear-piercing screech made it ripple. The tentacle was topped with a tentacular club that was the size of a football field. Each of the suckers on it was the size of a house. The tentacle stretched a mile into the air.
Jack knew that he was probably facing almost certain death, and yet he smiled. Even if he died, Northern Ireland and the rest of the world would be safe. And that was good enough for Jack. The cherry on top of the ice cream was the look of sheer horror on the queen’s face.
“Ohh, haven’t you met my friend?” Jack asked innocently. “Queen of Atlantis, meet the Kraken. The Kraken, meet the queen of Atlantis.”
