Arthur and the Andarran Rescue

by Craig Speakes

  After a while, he began to wonder what Sky could be thinking. He also started to wonder what he was feeling. He had never really tried to understand girls before. It had always seemed enough to listen to the clever observations and interesting facts his friends and often their older brothers had gleaned about them. Apart from Serafima, an odd girl in his class who didn’t like to play with other girls and whom he talked to quite often, he didn’t really know any girls, and hadn’t thought much about them. Now, though, a mash of feelings were making him more than a little curious. He caught himself glancing at her when he was sure she wouldn’t notice and trying to think of how to start a conversation to find out what she was thinking, without actually asking her or appearing interested.

  He was building up the courage to try when he felt a sharp pain shoot through him. Dropping her hand, he clutched the sides of his head and yelled out in agony.

  ‘Arthur what is it?’ cried Sky, shocked at seeing him fall to his knees.

  ‘I don’t know!’ He groaned. ‘It’s like a high-pitched noise, drilling through my head!’

  Arthur began to rock backwards and forwards, holding his head tightly and trying to breathe deeply. Slowly the noise faded and was replaced by a new sensation. It was like a feeling of being connected to something. He stopped rocking and took his hands away from his head. He was aware that he could no longer see Sky next to him. He wondered if he had somehow touched the red stone on the sword, but that was impossible – it was still on his back. No, this was different. Out of the darkness grew the vision of a white tree, shining brightly. Wait… I know this tree, he thought. He had seen it before. Yes, on Tresk, it was in the room where the cat and I met with Insuro before we went to try to rescue my father. Opposite the tree he could see Insuro, his head partially obscured behind a hooded robe.

  ‘Welcome, Keeper, I am relieved to see that you are still alive. Are Sky and the cat with you?’

  ‘Yes, we’re okay,’ replied Arthur. ‘Are we on Tresk?’

  Insuro removed his hood. ‘Yes and no. I am pleased that you remember this place. I hope that my calling you here did not cause you too much discomfort.’

  ‘Um, no, it was okay,’ said Arthur, not wanting to admit how painful it really was.

  Insuro smiled at him knowingly.

  ‘Are you still in the crevasse?’ asked Arthur.

  Insuro nodded. ‘At first light we must break cover and make for the Noric mountain. We cannot risk more delays. As dawn breaks on the day that follows tomorrow, the attack will commence.’

  ‘I don’t know where we are or how to get there,’ said Arthur anxiously, not wanting to miss the chance to rescue his father.

  He caught the look on Insuro’s face and knew what he was going to say.

  ‘I fear there is no time, Keeper. As hard as it will be for you to hear it, we cannot wait for you. Make your way as best you can up on to the glacier and wait. If we do not come for you, wait no longer than three suns, and then find your way to the Northern Defence Front in the Kempin mountains. They will help you return to Tresk if that is your desire.’

  In that moment, Arthur understood that Insuro was not at all certain they would be victorious. He didn’t know what to say.

  ‘Remember what I once told you, Keeper. Our fates are written long before we come to play our parts. Let us hope that we will see each other again. Fare you well and may the Star of Aris shine upon you both.’

  With that, the vision was gone, and the crevasse once again reappeared in front of him.

  ‘Arthur, what happened? You completely zoned out and it sounded like you were having a conversation with yourself, but nothing was understandable at all.’

  ‘It was Insuro,’ said Arthur. ‘He found a way to contact me. They’re going to make the attack the day after tomorrow, at first light. Come on, we need to get moving!’

  ‘Were the others okay?’ asked Sky, quickening her pace to keep up with Arthur.

  ‘I don’t know, he didn’t say.’

  ‘Why didn’t you ask?’

  18

  An Unexpected Friend

  By Arthur’s reckoning, it was in the very early hours of the following morning that they finally came across a hole in the roof that led out to the crevasse above. Climbing the wall didn’t prove to be a problem. During their time with the Argon brigade, they had been trained exhaustively in how to climb on snow and rock. The Andarrans had created clever boot attachments that fired spikes into the rock or ice, and then retracted when the user tried to take a step. Glove attachments also worked in a similar way.

  At the top of the lower crevasse, they were fortunate to find that there had been an upper roof collapse a short distance away, and the storm had now passed.

  ‘I think the sun will be up in a few hours,’ said Arthur, searching for tracks or other signs of their group having passed by at some point. ‘You know, I can’t find anything that indicates we came this way. I know it’s been snowing, but I checked back there under the roof and it’s like we were never here. If that’s true, then I really have no idea where we are now.’

  ‘Maybe the glacier has several cracks. I mean, no reason why not, and why they might not cross each other, I guess,’ offered Sky by way of an explanation.

  ‘I suppose. Maybe tomorrow we’ll get a better idea.’

  For the remaining hours left before dawn, they sat on the floor of the upper crevasse and, using their heaters, did their best to keep warm. Sky fell asleep with her head on his shoulder, but try as he might, Arthur couldn’t fall asleep that night. His head buzzed with all that had happened. He also couldn’t stop thinking about what was about to happen. He wanted more than anything to be there when his group attacked. He was supposed to be, he was sure of it. But how? He’d lost count of the number of times he’d checked the stone on the sword, as if it might hold the answer somehow, but it remained an unchanging dark brown.

  The sound of Sky breathing was soon joined by the cat, and a gentle sleeping chorus touched the silence. As he sat there waiting for the dawn, watching the stars far above them and listening to Sky and the cat sleeping, Arthur had, for a while, the feeling that there was nowhere he would rather be at that moment.

  ‘Sky, wake up,’ he said gently. The first rays of Andarran sunlight had reached the Elizian glacier. ‘Sky,’ he said again, lightly shaking her.

  ‘I don’t want to wake up,’ moaned Sky without opening her eyes.

  ‘I know, but if you don’t wake up, that giant snow lizard is going to eat you for sure.’

  ‘Well, I hope it gets you for dessert,’ grinned Sky, her eyes still closed. ‘I’m starving!’

  They had been living on a diet of green sludge ever since leaving the port of Sa. It had even become an effort to remember to eat sometimes. The sludge tasted of nothing. And now they didn’t even bother to heat it up, unless they were feeling particularly cold. The only exception had been the meal that Ama, the old woman in Sa, had prepared for them the night they spent on her floor. She had also given them little packs of dried fish and tubes of spices to take with them, and Arthur still had a small amount of his left: a spice that tasted vaguely like paprika.

  ‘We have food for another four or five days,’ said Sky, after getting Arthur to lay out what he had in his pack and comparing it with what was in hers. ‘We should try to make it last longer, just to be sure.’ She proceeded to ration out a portion of the food for them to eat now and Arthur added a little of the spice.

  After they had eaten, they climbed up and over the top of the crevasse wall and out onto the glacier. There the snow was considerably deeper than in the crevasse, and it was hard going.

  ‘Argh! It’s useless,’ exclaimed Arthur, angrily kicking the snow in front of him. They were already exhausted and had hardly moved more than a hundred metres from the crevasse. ‘We’re so far from the Noric mountain, we’ll never reach it i
n time. Even if we had several days, we couldn’t make it. I think we’ve been going in the opposite direction!’

  Arthur took off his pack and put it down in a snowdrift.

  ‘Everything will be okay!,’ said Sky, trying to sound reassuring. She took off her pack and put it down next to his.

  ‘Sure,’ he replied.

  ‘We’ve got to be positive, that’s all.’

  ‘Sure,’ he said again. ‘It’s easy to say, but anything could happen tomorrow and we’re stuck here.’ Arthur sighed and stared out across the glacier towards the far-off mountain.

  ‘We should try to set up a camp here, I guess. It’s far enough away from the crevasse,’ he said finally and bent down to unclip a spade-like object from the side of his pack. ‘Do you remember how they taught us to dig a snow hole?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Sky. ‘Dig down and then in and up.’

  ‘Right. Come on,’ he said and began to dig.

  When it was finished, they had created a snow hole big enough for all three of them. To begin with, they had dug down several metres before clearing an area and then tunnelling into the snow bank and upwards at an angle. Finally, once a living area had been hollowed out, an air vent was made through the top.

  ‘Big enough to swing a cat in, I would say,’ said Sky slyly.

  ‘Yeah, well – don’t get any ideas,’ meowed the cat, keeping at arm’s length.

  ‘Arthur, help me get our packs into the snow cave,’ she said, trying to distract him from his thoughts. Arthur was again staring towards the mountain. His eyes were red with exhaustion and he was struggling to keep them open. Tearing himself away, he moved all their packs inside the snow hole and set up a heater which soon warmed it. When Sky entered a short while later, he was fast asleep.

  It was late in the afternoon when Arthur woke up with a start. He sat upright and looked about him; for a moment he had forgotten where he was. Seeing Sky and the cat asleep next to him, he lay back down and closed his eyes. He felt shattered, as if he could sleep for a week if only he could find a comfortable bed and a bath. He had even fallen asleep with the sword still on his back. Then Arthur suddenly sat bolt upright again. The thought had just occurred to him that maybe he had slept through the attack. He had nothing on him to tell him what time it was. Without a word to Sky or the cat, he crawled quickly out of the snow hole and scrambled up onto the higher snow, looking eastwards towards the mountain.

  ‘I haven’t missed it!’ He said to himself breathlessly. ‘It’s still the same day.’

  Arthur sat back in the snow. It was late afternoon and the sun was beginning to set, transforming the distant peaks. They glimmered and glowed as though consumed by fire, gradually burning themselves out before finally fading into blackness.

  ‘The dying of the light,’ he said to himself. ‘The dying of the light.’ He had recalled hearing those words somewhere back on Earth. Something about raging also. He wasn’t sure where he had heard it, or even really what it meant… but somehow, as he sat there, the words resonated with him.

  Lost in thought, Arthur never heard the scream far off in the distance. He never saw the giant creature, far above him, bank sharply and begin its steep dive directly towards him. The cat saw it. He had decided to bravely venture outside, despite the risk of getting cold paws. As he jumped out of the entrance to the snow hole, he heard the giant beast’s wings whip into position as it nosedived, creating a shrill sound as they sliced through the air. Having taken no more than a step outside, the cat looked up and froze mid-step. He would later claim that he’d reacted very differently.

  The first Arthur knew about it was when he felt a sudden rush of air and snow behind him, quickly followed by the ground shaking. He twisted round to see the cat frozen with one paw raised, being stared down by a huge merlock. Arthur instinctively got up and took a step backwards.

  Was it their merlock or was it a different one? He remembered they lived on mountain peaks – what could it be doing here?

  Realising he had left his plasma rifle in the snow cave, Arthur reached for the sword on his back and drew it. The sound was enough to distract the merlock’s attention away from the cat, who, regaining control of himself, darted back inside the hole, leaving Arthur alone to face the massive beast. Arthur stood motionless, sword slightly raised, his hand trembling, waiting to see what was going to happen next. The merlock’s large eyes watched him calmly. Then, unexpectedly, the huge creature took a step backwards and bowed its head towards Arthur.

  ‘It is you!’ cried Arthur, suddenly sure it was the merlock he’d helped. Arthur put his sword away and cautiously approached the creature, reaching forward and stroking its neck like he’d done before.

  ‘Where did you come from? Why are you here? Have you been following us?’ Arthur stopped talking and smiled. ‘You can’t understand me, can you? I forgot… but I’m very happy to see you.’

  Sky’s head appeared through the entrance to the snow hole. Seeing Arthur standing next to the merlock, stroking it, she slowly emerged and stood up, the dragon-like bird watching her every move.

  ‘It’s okay,’ said Arthur soothingly. ‘This is Sky, she won’t hurt you – you’ve seen her before.’

  Sky eased herself out of the snow cave. ‘I thought the cat had gone mad or something. He ran in shouting that a giant winged beastie had appeared out of the heavens and had been about to eat him for sure, if he hadn’t been clever enough to dodge its lunges and escape into the shelter.’

  ‘Good story!’ laughed Arthur.

  ‘I guess,’ she said, coming closer to the merlock.

  ‘I wonder what it’s doing here. I thought Sava told us they only live high in the mountains and rarely come down.’

  ‘Yes, she did,’ he nodded. ‘I think he’s been following us. I wonder why.’

  ‘Maybe because you helped it and now it’s looking out for you.’

  Arthur and Sky stayed with the merlock until the temperature on the glacier fell away as the night deepened. As they got onto their knees, ready to crawl back into their snow hole, the merlock rose up and flapped its enormous wings several times, creating a massive cloud of snow.

  ‘Do you think it’s leaving?’ He asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  They waited to see what it was doing. When the snow settled, the merlock was barely visible beneath it.

  Relieved that it hadn’t gone, Arthur followed Sky into the shelter. As he lay down and closed his eyes, his thoughts were chaotic until finally an idea began to form. At first he dismissed it as silly, crazy even, but as the night wore on and he still couldn’t sleep, he thought about it more and more. What had at first been a mad idea came to seem, by the early hours of the morning, worth trying.

  Giving up on sleep, Arthur crawled out of the shelter and sat in the snow near the merlock. Sensing Arthur nearby, it snorted and opened its eyes.

  ‘Sorry,’ he whispered, ‘I didn’t mean to wake you. I can’t sleep.’ He carried on talking to it as though to an old friend. ‘Do you remember, I think I told you once, why we came to your planet, looking for my father and the other members of our crew? They were captured by the Solarians. Well, in a few hours, my friends will try to rescue them from the Solarian base over there in the side of the Noric mountain.’ Arthur gestured in the direction of the mountain, no longer visible in the darkness. The merlock’s eyes followed where he was pointing.

  ‘We got separated from the others when the crevasse collapsed, and now we’re here and we can’t help them.’

  Arthur went quiet and watched the merlock watching him. They were both looking each other in the eyes, calmly and questioningly. It was then that Arthur came right out and asked it: ‘Can you take me there?’

  The merlock snorted and lifted its head out of the snowy blanket it had made for itself, shaking its wings clean.

  Was that a sign? Arthur w
ondered excitedly. Is he really going to let me ride him? Have I gone mad? I can’t even ride a pony, he thought, remembering the time he had tried at the summer cottage. Arthur got to his feet, and as he did so the merlock raised itself up. He was sure that it had somehow understood him. As he approached, the giant creature lowered its thick neck to allow Arthur to get on.

  ‘What? Where do you think you’re going?’ came Sky’s angry voice behind him.

  ‘I think he’s going to let me ride him,’ said Arthur, trying to keep his voice calm in case the merlock became spooked by Sky’s angry tone.

  ‘And you were just going to leave me and the cat here and fly off there and get yourself killed?’

  ‘Well, no… I… ’ Arthur really had no idea what to say. He barely knew what he was doing. He hadn’t expected to get this far.

  ‘And what are you going to hang on to him with? Your knees?’

  ‘I… um…’

  ‘That’s what I thought. Wait there!’ She commanded and crawled back into the snow cave. She returned a few minutes later, dragging their packs, their equipment and a complaining cat.

  ‘I don’t see why you can’t just let him go by himself,’ muttered the cat. ‘If he wants to end up a merlock’s breakfast or frazzled by a Solarian plasma gun, then, you know, freedom of choice and all that. Think about it – you and I can stay in this nice warm snow home we’ve made and wait for someone to come and get us after all the blood-and-guts bit is finished.’

  Sky scowled at him. ‘Would you really let Arthur go by himself? Without the support of his friends? Without you being there the Arnac may not protect him.’

  ‘Well, you know…’ replied the cat, struggling. ‘Anyway, you said yourself he was trying to leave us.’