He was surrounded by an empty fairground, twinkling with white lights. There was a towering big wheel, a colourful carousel and a corkscrew roller coaster called the Black Maria in the distance. The stony land was reddish-brown and so flat you could see all the way to the horizon in every direction.
“Soon after I arrived here, I connected to a Wondernews feed and learned what Tiburon had done to all of you in my absence.” As his face returned to the frame, he lowered his head. “I am ashamed to say that the technology he is using to travel through time is something I designed, something I should have destroyed long before Tiburon was able to steal it.
“Using scavenged parts from this realm, I was able to transmit this recording to Cloud in the hope that he would share it with each of you. Tiburon has eyes everywhere, so Cloud is programmed to do so only when safe, and to only trust those he’s sure are from a foreign time. Please, if you’re watching this now, you have to find me. With your help, I can escape and stop my brother once and for all.”
With that, the hologram vanished and Cloud’s ear went floppy again.
“So Cloud’s on a mission,” Cecily said, smiling proudly across the table at him. “Ever since he received Milo’s recording, he’s been travelling around the Wonderscape, finding heroes to play it to. That must be why he was on the Principia – to locate Isaac Newton and show it to him.”
With the first officer lurking around, Arthur figured Cloud had never got the chance. He wondered how many other heroes Cloud had managed to share the recording with over the years. “Perhaps the time-key also allows you to move between realms, like a realm-key does?” Arthur guessed. “Newton said it could be used more than once, so that would explain how Cloud has been able to move through the Wonderscape. But we still don’t know why Cloud opened a Wonderway to our time, or what caused that massive explosion at Number Twenty-Seven.” He suspected something else had transpired, something neither Cloud nor Milo Hertz had ever intended.
Ren reached over and tickled Cloud under the chin. “At least we know why the Fuzzball’s been helping us – we’re from a foreign time, just like the heroes. He thinks we’re one of them.”
If Professor Maathai was surprised by the fact that they were from another time, she didn’t show it. Instead, she gathered up the architectural drawings that were scattered across the table. “After Tiburon Nox’s broadcast this morning, I had a hunch something might have happened to Cloud, so I sent a covert message to the activist ring to prepare themselves. We communicate through song. The idea was inspired by something I learned fighting the Kenyan government: the more voices you have, the louder the noise you make.”
“Well, your tactics still work,” Cecily said, describing what had happened during their hot-air balloon encounter with Amaros Ba. Wangari added Amaros’s name, which she hadn’t yet learned, to a list of others she had pinned to her noticeboard, along with their respective realm numbers.
“I’ve shared an escape plan with the others,” Wangari revealed. “They’ve been told to acquire a shadow patch and a Wondercloak, and to steal a realm-key off a wanderer. When the time comes, they’ll travel to Milo’s realm and free him. The trouble is, I don’t know which number it is.” She hurried to the bookcase and fetched a large leather-bound volume with green writing on the spine. As she opened it on the table, Arthur read the title: Trees of the Known Universe. “I’ve watched Milo’s recording several times, and the only clue I’ve spotted in the background is this.” She pointed to an illustration of a thorny-barked tree with silvery leaves. “The Taran’yu tree, found only in the Jingsell Galaxy.”
With a thought, Arthur removed his Wondercloak and spread it reverse-side up on the table. The stars on the Wonderscape map glittered like diamonds. “Maybe we can figure out which realm he’s in using a process of elimination. We can start by identifying any realms located in the Jingsell Galaxy.”
Wangari traced her finger over the map, like she’d done this before. “There’s one here,” she said, pointing to a small purple-blue sphere with a cratered surface. The text around the edge wasn’t flashing, but it was still easy to read the word Jingsell. “And another here.”
“And here,” Ren added.
Seconds later, Arthur found two more. “Here too.”
Altogether, there were six. Arthur tried to stay positive, but his spirits plummeted. His watch showed they had just over nine hours to go, so there wasn’t time to try them all.
“Cloud, can you show me Milo’s recording again?” Cecily asked, frowning. “The bit where he moves the camera around the landscape.” With a twitch of his ear, Cloud helpfully obliged. “OK, I need you to pause it right … there,” she commanded.
The video froze on an image of the horizon. The misty shadows of mountains loomed in the distance and the prickly figures of Taran’yu trees dotted the rocky earth.
“If this realm is somewhere in the Jingsell Galaxy, then those stars must be part of the Eighth Constellation,” Cecily said, gesturing to a cluster of pale dots in the dim sky. Out of the corner of his eye, Arthur noticed Tyrian symbols glinting on the petals of her sunflowers and figured Amaros Ba was helping her out. “It’s only visible on planets with a thin nitrogenous atmosphere. So with that criterion in mind – ” she assessed the map on Arthur’s Wondercloak and pointed to three of the planets they’d identified – “it must be one of these three.”
Wangari hastily pulled the cloak towards her. “Realm Sixty-Eight, Realm Ninety-Four and Realm One Hundred and Fifty-Two,” she read. With a glance at her noticeboard, she smiled. “Well, it can’t be Realm Sixty-Eight – one of the heroes in my activist group resides there.”
Arthur examined the geography of the planets on which the two remaining realms were situated. Annoyingly, they both had barren, rocky landscapes with reddish earth. “That narrows it down to one of these two – but which one?”
Wangari shook her head. “There’s no way of knowing.” Standing, she pointed to Realm One Hundred and Fifty-Two, labelled: PLANET NAERES, JINGSELL GALAXY. “You three journey to this one. I’ll send a command to my activist group to travel to the other.”
Arthur shared a nervous glance with Ren and Cecily. It was a decent plan, but it had risks. Big slimy ones. “The thing is, Milo’s the only person who can help us get back to our own home,” he explained, “and we have a seriously tight deadline. Will you tell your activist group that if they meet Milo first, they’re to explain our plight?”
“Of course,” Wangari said, slamming Trees of the Known Universe closed. “There’s a Wonderway behind the farmhouse. You’d better hurry – my instincts tell me we’ve lingered here too long.”
Minutes later, Arthur, Ren, Cecily and Cloud found themselves gathered on a shady patch of grass at the rear of the farmhouse, beside a swirling vortex of petrol-blue mist. A wooden door in the centre was bordered by dazzling light bulbs. Wangari put her hand on each of their shoulders. “Good luck. Those of us who know the truth must not tire or give up,” she said firmly. “We must persist.”
Arthur’s mind flooded with worries. Time was tight, and if this realm was the wrong one, they’d have to complete another realm-challenge just in order to leave. He guiltily wondered if trying to save the heroes was going to mean he would never make it back home to his dad …
… but then he considered how threatened and alone the heroes must be feeling after all the terrible things Tiburon had done to them. He had to help them; it’s what his dad would want too. He glanced over at Ren and Cecily. “Let’s go.”
Together, they stepped into the unknown.
22
The rainbow-coloured lights of a huge fairground twinkled in the distance. Shielding his eyes from the whirling dust motes in the air, Arthur spotted the same Ferris wheel they’d seen in Milo’s recording. “Over there, look!” he exclaimed. “We must be in the right place!” His legs wobbled, giddy with elation. Ren and Cecily were beaming at him. Finally, they were close to going home. It felt like they’d been c
limbing a mountain and had just seen the summit for the first time.
As they set off, he took in the details of their surroundings – the wind whistling eerily over the plain, the cracked red earth, the grey sky looming overhead – and shivered. “What a miserable place to be stranded,” he commented, imagining how Milo Hertz had survived alone in a place like this.
Cecily wrapped her arms around her. “I know. Four years he’s been here, and all after his own brother double-crossed him.” Cloud sniffed the ground and barked joyously as if to say, Yay, we found the right realm! Then, he went running off to explore.
They entered the fairground under a torn TRAVEL WITH WONDER! banner, which was surrounded by the red, blue and white stars and stripes of the American flag. A wide path stretched ahead of them, flanked by various souvenir stands, a water-pistol shooting gallery and a hook-the-duck stall. The stuffed toy prizes included unicorns, bears and a lizard-headed man that reminded Arthur uneasily of their safari-bus-tour-guide-cum-driver-of-the-Pipsqueaks-mobile. In the distance, the sideshows and amusements gave way to beautiful white architecture, domed greenhouses and a vast blue lagoon moored with old-fashioned sailing ships.
“Look alert,” Ren blurted, quickly withdrawing her bow and nocking an arrow. She swivelled left and right, covering all angles. At first Arthur wasn’t sure what had spooked her, but then he spied the body of a T-class mimic lying up ahead.
“He must have been assigned to work here when the realm was originally due to open,” Arthur realized. “Before Tiburon made the last-minute decision to use it as a prison for Milo.” He reminded himself that thanks to Ren, the realm was now open and would be working normally. The mimic was dressed in a red and yellow striped suit with the word STAFF embroidered onto the jacket pocket. Judging by the dents in his chest and his broken hover-wheels, he’d been in a fight. Narrow tyre prints circled the ground around him, as if he’d had an altercation with someone riding a bicycle.
“The tracks lead that way,” Ren said, pointing with her arrow.
They followed the tyre marks deeper into the fairground, passing more defunct T-class mimics along the way. Every time a breeze blew, one of the attractions would creak, making the three of them jump. Arthur’s senses were on high alert. This place had been closed for four years; who knew what they were going to find?
Soon, they came to a crossroads between a ghost train, a stall selling science-fiction novels, a towering helter-skelter and a fortune-teller’s tent. Arthur peered along each path and sighted another T-class body on a track heading north.
“Have you noticed the mimics are all leading us in the same direction?” Cecily said. “They must have all been moving towards the same target when they were attacked. Do you think it has something to do with Milo?”
Arthur’s skin went cold as he realized something. “The recording Cloud showed us of Milo is from years ago. What if Tiburon ordered the T-class units to attack Milo and he’s been injured – or worse?”
Cecily gasped. “Then we’d be stuck here and turn to slime!” She grabbed Cloud’s lead and they all sped up. Following the tyre trail, they hurried across the dodgems and past a waltzer, where they almost tripped over the headless remains of another robot. This one wasn’t a mimic. It had basketballs for fists, a unicycle for legs and the torso of a carousel horse.
“Creepy,” Ren remarked, kicking one of the basketballs. “Maybe Milo built it to defend himself?” Further along, they found another robot cobbled together from fairground junk; this model had a stuffed-toy panda for a head.
Finally, they turned a corner and came to a portico trimmed with white lights. Beyond it was a long concrete platform with a glossy black train pulled alongside. Even though it had wood-framed windows and old-fashioned doors, Arthur saw no steam engine at the front. Painted in fancy gold lettering on the side was the name Menlo Express. Something about it felt familiar to Arthur, but he wasn’t sure why.
The grisly remnants of a dozen T-class mimics lay scattered around a door to the rear carriage. “Come on,” Ren said. “Hopefully Milo’s this way.” She swung her bow round to her back and began clambering over the mimic remains to get onto the train. As Arthur followed, he glanced towards the driver’s cab at the front, and saw that the train tracks led out of the fairground and across Naeres’ barren landscape.
The Menlo Express was easily the most luxurious train Arthur had ever been inside. The carriage was finished in polished mahogany and decorated with velvet curtains and sinkable armchairs. Delicate glass ceiling lamps hung overhead and a plush wine-red carpet covered the floor, feeling spongy underfoot. The dry air smelled of furniture polish and popcorn, like in an upmarket cinema.
Cloud had just leaped onto a chair and started bouncing, when two puffs of red gas shot across the carriage like a pair of arrows and wrote a message in the dim light:
WONDERSCPE
REALM 152: WORLD OF THE WIZARD
Loot: 1500 DIRT and realm-key
Travel with wonder,
“World of the Wizard – do you think there really could be a wizard here?” Cecily asked excitedly. “You never know, they might exist somewhere in the Known Universe and the hero could be like Amaros Ba – someone from our future?”
Arthur shook his head, the Menlo Express still tugging at his memory. If the hero was from their future, he wouldn’t find it familiar. “Wizard might just be another nickname – like leopard was for Professor Maathai.”
“Wait for it,” Ren said, holding her hand out expectantly for another riddle scroll to drop out of thin air. But it didn’t come. Instead, Arthur spotted two tea-stained sheets of parchment pinned to the wall at the far end of the carriage. One of them had a riddle written on it in small, precise handwriting:
All aboard the Menlo Express,
On a journey heading west.
Use your logic to decide
How to progress through this ride.
Only dreams and innovation
Will bring the train into the station.
Ren folded her arms, thinking. “How to progress through this ride – that sounds like you have to make your way through the train. In the recording, Milo mentioned that he couldn’t complete the realm-challenge on his own. Maybe he only got halfway?”
“We can easily test that idea,” Cecily said, reaching for the door handle to the second carriage.
But before she had a chance to open it, Arthur cried, “No, leave it closed!” He ran his finger over the text on the second sheet of brown parchment pinned to the wall. “These look like instructions for the realm-challenge – and it says we can only open that door once.”
The others gathered next to him to read the list.
WHICH SWITCH?
1. All the doors on the Menlo Express are currently locked.
2. There is a standard light bulb hanging in the next carriage along. The light bulb is operated by one of three switches – A, B or C – located in this carriage. It is your task to find the correct switch. When you do, all the doors aboard the Menlo Express will unlock.
3. You may open the door to the next carriage once, but the light switches can only be activated when it is closed.
Travel with wonder,
Arthur’s mind was reeling as he puzzled through the instructions. “All right, so there should be three light switches in this carriage. Can anyone see them?”
After only a minute’s search, Cecily found them in the very corner of the carriage, half hidden behind a velvet curtain. They were similar in design to the Hxperion-branded button Arthur had pressed to evacuate himself from the safari bus, except they were labelled A, B and C.
“I don’t understand – why don’t we just open the door so we can see the light bulb, flick all the switches and see which one works?” Cecily posed.
“I wish we could,” Arthur said, rubbing his temples. “But the instructions say the switches can only be activated when the door is closed. That’s the difficult bit about the challenge – how can we tell whic
h switch works when we can’t see the light bulb?”
Ren kneeled by the door. “There’s some sort of rubberized seal around this. I don’t think we’d see any light escaping.”
“Yeah, and the next carriage has no windows either,” Cecily called, hanging her head outside.
They each flopped into an armchair to mull it over. Arthur reached for his Wonderskill, hoping Newton might have some answers, but all that hovered at the edge of his mind were facts about the properties of light – speed, refraction, polarization and dispersion – nothing that would help in this instance.
“You’d think we’d be good at puzzles by now,” Ren groaned. “We could turn on switch A, open the door and check to see if the light bulb is working. But if it isn’t, it means one of the other two switches is the correct one and we’d have to shut the door again to try each of those.”
Cecily chewed on her lip. “That’s exactly the problem. The riddle scroll said, Use your logic to decide – so there must be a reasonable way to determine whether the light bulb is working without actually seeing it.”
Arthur stared at the sealed door, picturing the light bulb switched on behind it. He imagined shadows being cast around the room and the bulb’s warm glow radiating out from it. Hang on… His breath caught in his throat. “I’ve got it!” he spluttered. “Bulbs don’t just emit light. They release heat too – that’s how you can tell if a light bulb is working without being able to see it. You feel it.” He stood up and hurried to the switches, running through the various options in his head. “OK, how about we turn A and B on at the same time and leave them for, like, ten minutes? Then, we turn A off and open the door.”
Ren’s forehead knotted, but she nodded slowly. “If the light bulb is on, the correct switch is B. And if it’s off but still warm, then the correct switch is A.”
Wonderscape Page 19