Davina Dupree's Bizarre Birthday Balloon Ride (4 page)

‘Are we seriously going to jump off the side of this thing?' Amy's voice was shaking and I have to admit I felt exactly the same as her.

‘I'm afraid so, our vandal – one of us standing here right now – has finished the balloon off properly this time. There's no
way
I can repair that hole while the burners are on, I'd be fried to a crisp in seconds. And I can't turn the burners off or the balloon will plummet to earth. But don't worry, you don't need to be scared,' Giles said, as Amy wrapped her shaking arms around herself. ‘Let me do an extra check of your parachute to make sure it's all safe.' Amy turned round and Giles checked every part of the pack on her back. ‘Yep,' he said, patting it. ‘In absolutely top working order. Now, I'll quickly explain what to do when you jump overboard, then we'll have to go straight away before the balloon loses much more height. It's dangerous to jump with a parachute if you're too close to earth.'

So while the balloon floated lower and lower, Giles explained, in the
FREEZING.COM
moonlight, that we'd take it in turns to jump off the edge of the balcony (eek!), crossing our arms over our chests. Once we were clear of the balloon and cabin, we'd tug on the ripcord, the chute that opens up the parachute, before feeling the parachute open up behind us and catch the air resistance. Then we'd simply float down to the field below (luckily we're currently over a patchwork of dark fields and not the sea or we'd be in real trouble) and wait for everyone else to arrive.

Sounds simple? Well let me tell you, at that point chaos ensued. Amy sat on the floor of the balcony and refused to get up. The twins started screaming because they were so excited, which made Crackers bark and run around like a mad thing.

‘Who wants to go first?' Giles yelled above the hubbub. ‘I'll go last, so I can help each of you safely over the balcony.'

‘Me and Crackers will go first, won't we old thing?' Mr Duffy picked up his dog, grinning. Giles pushed a table and chair up against the side of the balcony.

‘Stand on the chair, Mr Duffy, then step up onto the table. When you jump, pull Cracker's ripcord before your own, then enjoy the ride down. I'll meet you in the field as soon as I can.' He looked round at all of us and I guessed he was wondering who on earth was capable of ruining everyone's luxury hot air balloon ride.

Without further ado, Mr Duffy and Crackers mounted the chair and table, and with one loud cackle, were gone. I peered over the side and saw two parachutes burst into life in the near-darkness. Phew, I thought. At least the parachutes actually work. Perhaps this won't be too bad after all.

‘Aiden?' Giles said. ‘Would you like to go next?'

‘I'm just packing my laptop away safely,' Aiden muttered. ‘Do someone else, then I'll go.'

‘We'll go next,' the twins shouted at the same time. ‘That means you'll have to jump too, Amy, to look after us.' Amy looked sick at the thought.

In seconds the two black headed terrors had jumped overboard, and again, I saw two parachutes burst into life seconds later.

‘Grr. Suppose that means I'll have to go now,' Amy huffed. She got off the floor, stomped up to the table and threw herself over, her fear banished by anger.

‘I'm ready,' Aiden clutched his laptop bag to his chest as he quietly mounted the table. In one quiet move, he was gone too.

‘I guess it's us next,' Arabella took my hand. I thought I was going to pass out as we stood on the table next to each other, but before I knew what was happening, Arabella had jumped and had dragged me with her.

‘Wheeee!' She screamed. ‘Isn't this fun! Don't forget to pull your ripcord, Davina.' I scrabbled around, for one second forgetting what a ripcord was, but my fingers settled on it and I gave it a sharp tug. I felt the parachute spring into life and balloon out behind me. At that point, a funny thing happened. I actually began to
enjoy
my journey down to earth, can you imagine? Once I knew the parachute was working and that I'd be safe, I realised what an amazing feeling it was to be literally FLYING. I felt so free, I didn't actually want the experience to end. So I was a bit
gutted.com
when a large, dark muddy patch in the middle of the field ended my adventure rather suddenly.

After rolling around in the mud, trying to untangle myself from the dratted parachute, I looked up in the sky and saw Giles' parachute burst into life. We're all safe, I thought. Phew.

I was just looking around for everyone else, wondering if a mud monster was walking towards me before realising it was Arabella, when the whole field burst into a ring of light.

‘Blimey,' Arabella gasped, shielding her eyes with her hand. ‘What on earth's going on?'

‘Stay exactly where you are,' a man's deep voice blasted through a loud speaker. ‘This is the police. You are surrounded. Don't make any sudden moves. All of you, put your hands in the air RIGHT NOW.'

Arabella and I did as he said, and in the blaring torch and siren lights saw six other figures do exactly the same.

Immediately, a team of dark figures sprang into action from beyond the light and ran towards a small figure at the far end of the field.

‘Who are they going for?' Arabella asked, squinting. ‘Surely they can't be going for Hugo or Hattie?'

‘I think its Aiden,' I breathed, recognising the silhouetted shape of his laptop bag that was still clutched to his chest with one hand. ‘But how can
he
be the culprit? All he does is play games on his laptop. Surely the police have got it wrong?'

But as we walked closer, our hands still in the air, we saw that it was definitely Aiden the police were extremely interested in. Giles ran past us.

‘Aiden!' He yelled. ‘What's going on?'

‘Sorry Dad,' Aiden muttered, as the rest of us arrived.

‘Dad?' Arabella mouthed. ‘Is
Giles
Aiden's
Dad
?'

‘Officers,' Giles sounded panicked. ‘There must be some mistake. My son would never –‘

‘Aiden's your son?' Hattie said loudly. She and Hugo were standing in front of Amy, all three of them covered in mud and grass. ‘How come you didn't tell us that before?'

‘Because Aiden asked me not to. He's a bit embarrassed by me, I think,' Giles looked down. ‘All the rest of his friend's fathers are smart city bankers and barristers. And I just fly a poxy balloon.'

‘No it's not that, Dad,' Aiden's voice rose. ‘It's because you ignore me all the time whenever I come on balloon rides with you, so I thought there's no point saying you're my dad. We might as well pretend to be strangers, because that's exactly what we are. You care more about your job then you care about me, you always have.' His voice had turned into a strained growl. It was the most I'd heard Aiden say since we'd met him. He looked like a different boy, standing there in the flashing lights, his eyes filled with hurt and anger.

‘So what did you do then, Aiden, to get your Dad's attention?' I looked to see who'd spoken, finding it was a burley policeman who had a firm grip of Aiden's arm.

‘I just wanted him to NOTICE me,' Aiden shouted. ‘All he cares about is his stupid balloon and his stupid passengers. But what about me? It's my birthday next week and he probably hasn't even remembered about that.'

Giles' mouth was hanging open.

‘He's right,' he whispered. ‘I had forgotten it was his birthday next week.'

‘But how did you damage all those parts of the balloon?' Mr Duffy asked. He sounded more curious than cross. ‘All I've ever seen you do is play on your laptop.'

‘I don't think you were just “playing” on your laptop, were you, Aiden?' The burley policeman boomed. ‘We've been tracking your moves for some time now. I have to admit that when we first noticed your online activity, we thought we had a criminal mastermind on our hands, not a thirteen year old boy.'

‘The game was a cover up,' Aiden muttered. ‘I just switched back to it whenever I thought someone was watching.'

‘What he was actually doing,' the policeman said. ‘Was putting long distance, digital finishing touches to the remote controls and computers that would help to bring down his father's balloon. Aiden's obviously a bit of a whizz when it comes to digital technology and he'd masterminded this plan long before he boarded the balloon a few days ago. He'd set up a control in his bedroom that could be activated by simply tapping a code into his laptop. This control was designed to a set off chips Aiden had hidden in the clasps of the burners. The chips were easily flammable and with one spark could explode into quick drying glue, that stuck the clasps in whatever position they were in.'

‘Good thing I had my magic gel with me,' Mr Duffy cackled.

‘But Aiden was smart, he knew it would probably take more than one attempt to sabotage the balloon,' the policeman went on. ‘He'd also embedded some exploding chips in one of the ropes that held the cabin to the balloon. When the clasps were unstuck, he simply tapped the code into his laptop that set off these chips, and the rope exploded in two.'

‘But it looked like someone had cut it,' Giles looked puzzled.

‘Aiden's a clever lad, Sir,' the policeman said. ‘He knows what to do to achieve different effects. But when you fixed the rope he knew he'd have to bring out the big guns and use his final trick. A flare he'd previously positioned high up in the balloon, several days before the flight was scheduled to take off. I presume that Aiden spends quite a bit of time in the field where the luxury balloons are kept, Sir? That there was ample opportunity for him to do this, undetected and, ahem, unwatched?'

‘Well, yes I suppose so, but –‘ Giles looked flummoxed.

‘So he simply tapped his final code into his laptop and set off the flare, which flamed into life and shot off into the sky, making a hole in the very fabric of the balloon. This was the final straw, the balloon was no longer safe, so you all had to jump out, hence why you're all standing in front of me looking like mud sculptures.' The corner of his mouth twitched slightly. ‘You're very lucky, young man,' he said, turning to Aiden with a more serious expression on his face. ‘Your pranks could have seriously injured someone. It's remarkable that everyone made it to the ground safely.'

‘But how did you find me?' Aiden couldn't resist asking. He was looking a bit guilty now, I noticed. Even in the police lights, I could tell his cheeks were red and there were sweat beads on his forehead.

‘We noticed a lot of high frequency radio waves burst into life,' the policeman said. ‘Believe it or not, us policemen do actually do some work from time to time, and part of our job is to clamp down on new, digital-style crimes. When we realised that these waves were full of complex codes, normally used by world-class criminals, we jumped into action and traced them back to your computer. But it took us a while,' he sounded almost impressed. ‘You used some fairly complicated methods.'

‘This is all my fault,' Giles looked at his defiant looking son. ‘You're right, Aiden, I have been ignoring you a bit.'

‘A LOT,' Aiden corrected.

‘Alright, a lot,' Giles gave a small smile. ‘I got wrapped up in my work, trying to make enough money to pay your school fees, trying to get promoted. I'm sorry son.' He stepped forward and gave Aiden a hug.

‘I presume that this means you won't be pressing charges, Sir?' The burley policeman boomed.

‘No I won't,' Giles said. He sounded tired. ‘But what I will do is take a holiday for two weeks, so I can spend some quality time with my vandalising son.' He ruffled Aiden's hair.

‘And one day,' the policeman said. ‘We'd like to have a word with Aiden about maybe doing some work for us. We could do with a sharp mind like his, and he obviously understands the digital world very well.'

‘I'd love that,' Aiden gave a properly big grin. It was the first time I'd seen him look really happy. ‘Sorry Dad,' he said. ‘I know that was a bit dramatic but I'd run out of ways to get your attention.'

Giles was about to reply when there was a swooshing sound behind us. I turned to see the magnificent black and gold hot air balloon sink gracefully to the ground and fall sideways, at the other end of the field.

‘Doesn't look too broken,' Giles sighed, as we all stared at it's capsized shape. ‘Nothing a good repair session won't fix.'

‘Coo-eee,' called a familiar voice.

‘Mrs Fairchild!' I turned and rushed towards the tiny figure who was picking her way delicately through the mud, enveloping her in a huge hug. ‘How did you know where to find us?'

‘Young Steven from the police station telephoned me to tell me what was going on. Known his mother for years, used to do karate with her,' Mrs Fairchild giggled. ‘My, my, girls, it looks like you've had another rather exciting adventure. And there was me, thinking you were floating calmly through the skies!'

We filled her in on the finer details all the way back to Egmont School, generally agreeing it was the most exciting birthday anyone could have. When we got back to our dorm, we found a note that had been pushed under the door. I picked it up and read it out to Arabella.

“
Hello you two, hope you had a good time flying around in the sky. Did you get up to any of your usual mischief? Just wanted to let you know that while you were away, Mrs Pumpernickle announced that all the first years will soon be going to stay on a local farm for a week of work experience. Just try having any adventures there! See you soon, Melody xx
”