War on Whimsy (7 page)

“I think we've landed face-first on a mountain of volcanic ash,” said Shimlara huskily. “I've got some lodged right at the back of my throat.”

“What about the others?” said Nicola.

She stood up and her feet sank into the ash as if she were standing on a sandy beach. Another ash-covered figure appeared in the distance, choking and coughing. It was her brother. She could tell by the careless way he was swatting at the ash on his clothes.

“Over here, Sean!” she called.

Sean jumped, yelled, and held up his arms in a defensive karate position.

Nicola giggled. “It's us! Nicola and Shimlara!”

Sean dropped his arms and called out, “Yeah, yeah, I knew that!”

He stomped through the ash toward them, and there was a shout of terror as he nearly stepped on Tyler.

At the same moment, Greta and Katie emerged from the ash, screaming when they saw each other, and then screaming more in response to the other's screams.

Finally, everybody calmed down and stood in a circle, brushing ash off their clothes and hair, and tearing off the burned remains of their parachutes.

“How could you have forgotten lava screen for the parachutes?” said Greta to Nicola. “We really need checklists. That's what I'd do if I were the leader. I would have checklists for
everything
.”

Nicola managed not to say, “Well, why didn't
you
remember lava screen?” She'd learned that the best way to respond to Greta's criticism was to ignore her. Instead she said, “Oh, look at those giant fans! I was wondering what happens to the ash from the volcanos!”

She pointed to a row of fans as big as windmills on the side of the volcano. They were efficiently blowing the ash and cinders from the volcanos into the mountain of ash that they'd landed upon.

“XYZ40 told us about the fans,” said Tyler.

“Did she?” said Nicola. “I don't remember that part.”

“You were thinking about the lava screen and remembering a time you forgot to put sunscreen on at the beach and everybody at school called you tomato face,” said Shimlara.

“
Shimlara!
” said Nicola, embarrassed. “Why were you reading my mind? That's private! That's so rude!”

“Sorry.” Shimlara looked down and kicked at the ash. “I was just wondering what you were thinking about.”

“You should have been concentrating on XYZ40's briefing, Nicola,” said Greta. “I mean if you're thinking about
sunburn
at such an important time, you really have to ask yourself, are you the right person for the job?”

“Oh, be
quiet
, Greta!” snapped Nicola, because the thing about criticism was that it always stung the most when it was true.

“Well!” said Katie brightly. “What next?”

“Now we have to get off this mountain of ash,” said Sean.

He ducked as the nearby volcano erupted again, showering them with lava.

“And maybe we should reapply our lava screen,” said Shimlara. “I'm sweating.”

They all were. The heat from the erupting volcanoes was intense. It seemed to suck the air from Nicola's lungs.

They all pulled out their lava screen tubes from their backpacks and pasted thick layers across their faces.

Nicola walked over to the edge of the ash mountain. “It's going to take us ages to walk down.”

“I was thinking we could sit on bits of parachute and
slide
down to the bottom,” said Tyler.

“Good idea! That'll be fun!” Sean examined the remains of his parachute.

“This mission isn't about fun,” said Greta primly. “There is a terrible war goiong on. And we're here to find Shimlara's family.”

“I don't think my family would mind if we have some fun along the way,” said Shimlara. “In fact, Dad would encourage it.”

Nicola didn't say anything. She was still recovering from Greta's earlier comment.

A short time later, they were all sitting on pieces of parachute silk on the edge of the mountain of ash.

“Last one down is a rotten egg!” said Sean, and he slid off.

I bet he didn't like it that I was the first one to parachute out of the spaceship,
thought Nicola and grinned to herself. As the big brother, he was always supposed to be first.

“It probably killed him that you jumped first,” said Shimlara, who was sitting next to Nicola.

“
Shimlara!
You've got to stop reading my mind!” said Nicola.

“I didn't!” protested Shimlara.

“Mmmmm,” said Nicola distrustfully.

“Cross my nose,” said Shimlara, and carefully drew a little cross over her nose with the tip of her finger.

“On Earth we say ‘cross my heart,'” said Nicola.

Shimlara giggled. “Really? How funny! Why would you cross your heart?”

“Why would you cross your nose?”

But Shimlara had already pushed off the edge, shouting, “Last one down is a rotten Earthling!”

Nicola watched her go. It was only her and Katie left.

“Remember how we loved playing on the slide at the park?” said Katie. She and Nicola had known each other ever since they were babies. There was an embarrassing photo at Katie's house of the two of them sitting together in a sandbox wearing nothing but diapers.

“I remember.” Nicola grinned.

“One, two,
three
!” said Nicola and Katie at the same time, and they slid off.

A cool breeze blew against Nicola's hot, sweaty face as she slid smoothly down the side of the ash mountain, her legs stuck out in front of her.

Suddenly all her childhood memories of sliding came back to her in a rush. She could feel that familiar mix of exhilaration and fear. She could see her dad's face at the bottom of the slide, his arms out wide, ready to catch her.

Except this was the
ultimate
slide experience. It was faster, longer. She could hear the other members of the Space Brigade crying out silly things like “Whooeeee!”

Greta would probably be highly disapproving.

Nicola lifted her arms up straight in the air and shouted, “
Whoo hoo!
”

The Space Brigade landed at the bottom of the mountain of ash in a shrieking, breathless tangle of arms and legs. They were all laughing hysterically, almost delirious from the excitement of the slide. Even Greta was giggling.

“Ahem,” said a serious, deep voice.

Nicola was still chortling as she sat up. Then she abruptly stopped laughing as she looked up at a very tall, very bald man standing in front of them, his hands on his hips, an extremely disapproving, raised-eyebrow, pursed-lip expression on his long, pale face.

“Lovely day for a stroll,” he snapped.

What an odd thing to say,
thought Nicola.

“Nicola!” hissed Sean. “That's the code phrase!”

Of course! She'd quite forgotten they were being met by a Globagaskarian secret agent. And now Nicola was supposed to say something back to identify herself. What was it? Finally, it came to her.

“I do enjoy a piece of pie.”

The man stared at her blankly.

“Oh, erm, I mean, I do enjoy a piece of rhubarb pie,” said Nicola hurriedly. Really! Who came up with these ridiculous code phrases? They didn't even make sense.

The man dropped his hands from his hips. There was an expression of pure disbelief on his face.

“I'm Agent JJ-11. So
you're
the highly trained Space Brigade?” he said.

“That's us.” Nicola felt fraudulent, as if she and her friends were all just pretending to be the Space Brigade.

JJ-11 looked around him, as if for an audience who could share his consternation. Finally, he gave a resigned shrug. “Well, if you'd like to follow me, I've arranged accommodation for the evening, transport, and fake identities for you.”

The Space Brigade stood up, trying to brush away the ash from their clothes and the leftover smiles from their faces.

JJ-11 went striding off and they all had to run to keep up with him.

“Imagine living here,” said Katie, as they followed JJ-11 up a steep, winding track around the bottom of the volcano. She gestured at the fiery explosions from the volcanoes and the dark, brooding city in the distance. “It would be like living in a nightmare.”

“In regard to your secret identities,” said JJ-11, “I decided the safest thing would be for you to pretend to be a news crew from Earth reporting on the progress of the war. I've set you up with various props—press passes, microphones, notepads, cameras, et cetera. You'll need to appear as authentic as possible. You'll be pleased to hear that I've arranged for some genuine Earthling transportation for you. A wealthy Globagaskarian once picked up this motorized conveyance as a souvenir while vacationing on Earth. It fits perfectly with your identities.” He couldn't hide the note of pride in his voice.

“Must be some sort of jeep,” said Tyler quietly.

They rounded a corner and JJ-11 gestured in front of him at a very, very familiar sight. “Your transportation.”

“Well, how ridiculous!” said Greta.

Sean snorted.

“What is it?” said Shimlara uncomprehendingly.

“It's a bus,” said Nicola.

“It's a
school
bus,” said Greta. “How
embarrassing.
We're not going to look like traveling journalists. We're going to look like . . . school kids!”

Nicola refrained from pointing out that they were, in fact, school kids.

JJ-11 didn't seem to have heard their comments. He was walking alongside the bus, running his hand along the paintwork.

“It's a strange, wonderful machine,” he said. “The engineering is delightfully basic.” He turned to look at them. “I assume this is the sort of vehicle Earthling journalists would use?”

“Erm, possibly,” said Nicola. It seemed unlikely that anyone on Volcomania would recognize it as a school bus, and she didn't want to irritate JJ-11 any further.

“These are the
keys
,” said JJ-11, handing Nicola a set of keys.

“Thank you,” said Nicola.

“
Keys,
” repeated JJ-11. “That's what they're called. You use them to turn on the vehicle.”

“Yes,” said Nicola. “I'm an Earthling. I know.”

“I should think so,” snapped JJ-11.

Goodness. He really was a difficult person.

“This is where you'll sleep tonight,” said JJ-11. He indicated a small stone hut they hadn't noticed while they'd been looking at the bus. “You'll find food and drink inside, and all your props, passports, and clothing.”

“You've done a great job,” said Katie to JJ-11. “It must have been a lot of work setting all this up for us.”

JJ-11 looked startled. Suddenly he smiled and his sour face was transformed.

“Well, yes, it was a lot of work, but that's my job, so I obviously don't begrudge . . . but certainly, yes, it took some time . . . and, ah, I do like to do things properly, but of course any professional does, but, ah . . . !” He clapped his hands together and his smile vanished. “Any questions?”

“What about scuba diving gear for when we go through the Underground Sea?” asked Sean. Nicola shivered. Sean was obviously looking forward to that part.

“On the conveyance.” JJ-11 jerked his head at the bus.

“What about maps?” asked Tyler.

“No need for maps on Volcomania,” said JJ-11. “Follow the Blue-5 road. All the way to the Underground Sea. Once you get to Whimsy, you'll just have to ask people for directions. Not that anybody will give you any.They'll just recite poetry, or stare into your eyes for twenty minutes without saying a word. The Whimsian personality is somewhat frustrating.” JJ-11 gave an irritated grimace at the thought of the Whimsian personality.

“Any more questions?” he barked, as if they were all annoying Whimsians.

Nicola could think of lots of questions.
Where does the Blue-5 road begin? How will we find Georgio and Mully once we get to Whimsy? How safe is that scuba diving equipment?

But she could see JJ-11 trying to hide a yawn. He obviously wanted to get back to his own bed.

“No, that's all,” she said. She tried to follow Katie's example by sounding grateful and polite. “Thank you very much for your help.”

JJ-11 ignored her. For some reason, Nicola never got the same response as Katie did when she tried to be nice to unpleasant people. Perhaps they could tell she was faking it.

“Good night then,” said JJ-11. He suddenly bent over and shook each of their hands vigorously. “Good luck.” Then he turned around and vanished off into the dark, fiery night.

Nicola and the rest of the Space Brigade looked at one another. Their shoulders were slumped and their filthy, ashy faces suddenly looked deflated and weary. Nobody said a word as they followed Nicola inside the stone hut—exhausted and drained.

Nicola's mother was right: Everything did seem better the next day. (“One day,” Nicola's mother had once said, “you will realize that I am right about
everything
.” This day had not yet come. For example, her belief that Nicola looked so much “prettier” with her hair pulled out of her eyes was plainly, demonstrably wrong.)

Light was pouring through the windows of the stone hut. There wasn't much inside except for a row of stretcher beds, where the Space Brigade had collapsed last night. Nicola couldn't even remember putting her head on the pillow.