Astrosaurs 3

by Steve Cole

  In the distance, rockets blasted off from the floating factories, filled with food to take home to Cryptos. And as Gipsy followed her friends off the shuttle, a large oily tugboat sailed in to the sea station, filled with gangs of chattering cryptoclidus.

  She turned to Cripes. “What do you need old-fashioned boats for? I thought you had spaceships to pull your nets?”

  “The tugboats ferry our workers to and from the floating factories,” Cripes explained. “Few of us dare to swim in the sea at the moment.”

  “Well, we’ll have to sea what we can do about that,” Teggs chuckled.

  “Have you marked where the monster attacks took place?” asked Arx.

  Cripes took out a map of Aqua Minor from his raincoat and Gipsy helped him unfold it. “X marks the spot,” he said. “Several spots.”

  “So all five attacks took place in the south of the planet,” noted Arx.

  “That’s right,” said Cripes. “All our other floating factories are in the north. We’ve been trying to build new ones in the south to meet the demand for shellfish back home . . .”

  “But every single one has been destroyed,” growled Iggy.

  “It looks like someone – or something – is fed up with you fishing here,” said Gipsy.

  “And it’s our job to find out who,” said Teggs bravely. “Once we’ve had a quick snack . . .”

  “Of course.” Cripes led them to the nearest café and slapped his flippers together. A waiter paddled straight over with a massive plate of sticky, slimy seaweed.

  Teggs took a cautious nibble. It tasted like a wet, salty dishcloth.

  “Delicious,” gasped Teggs weakly. “But perhaps I’ll skip the snack. I should start searching the sea.”

  “I’ll come with you,” said Gipsy.

  “You know it’s risky,” Cripes warned them.

  “Of course,” beamed Teggs. “But if we’re to help you, we need to find out more.”

  “I wish I could let you guys take a sub,” said Cripes. “But we don’t have any left. We tried looking for the monster in them. But the subs are so noisy, I guess the monster heard us coming a mile away. It chewed them all up!” Gipsy looked worried. “Did the pilots get out?”

  “Only just,” said Cripes. “They were lucky to escape with their lives! But by the time they’d wriggled out of the wrecks, there was no sign of the monster at all.” He clicked his tongue. “Oh, well. Maybe you’ll have more luck in the diving bell.”

  “What’s a diving bell?” asked Teggs.

  “It’s like a big metal case with a window in the side,” Arx explained. “It’ll take you underwater!”

  “We take you out to sea,” said Cripes. “Then we lower you down into the water on a chain so you can take a good look about.”

  “How will we breathe?” asked Teggs.

  “It’s completely airtight,” Cripes assured him. “But there’s also deep-sea diving gear on board in case of emergencies.”

  “What if we get into trouble?” asked Gipsy.

  “Just press the help button,” said Cripes. “We’ll have you back out again in no time!”

  “Fair enough,” said Teggs. “Meanwhile, I’d like Arx to check over those chewed-up subs for clues.”

  “No problem,” Cripes told him. “They’re all piled up in a storeroom downstairs.”

  “Can I see some wreckage from that floating factory, too?” asked Arx.

  “We’ll pick some up for you.” Cripes rose and adjusted his hat. “Well, if you guys are ready . . .”

  “We sure are!” Teggs jumped to his feet. “Let’s get going!”

  The shuttle’s engines were still soggy, so Cripes took them out in one of the tugboats to the wreck of the floating factory. Teggs was wearing his battle armour, and Gipsy had slipped on her combat suit.

  “I’ve never tried using my electro-tail underwater,” said Teggs thoughtfully.

  “Arx said our armour would work wherever we were,” said Gipsy. “And if we do meet any monsters down there, I’m glad about that!”

  Once they had reached the wreck, Teggs and Gipsy squeezed inside the orange diving bell. There was just room for the two of them and the diving gear.

  Cripes waved at them through the window. “On top of the bell is a special camera,” he said. “It can see through murky water. So if you do find a nasty sea monster down there, we should get a good picture of it.”

  “We’ll ask it to say cheese,” joked Teggs.

  “Good luck, guys,” said Cripes. Iggy pressed a big green button, and Gipsy squealed as the bell was heaved up over the side of the ship on heavy chains.

  “This is better than a funfair ride!” Teggs declared. He looked out through the large window in the side of the bell. On the ship’s deck, Iggy stood beside Cripes. He gave a small, worried wave to his captain.

  Slowly, the diving bell was lowered into the water. Teggs and Gipsy were soon staring out at an undersea world. Curious fish swam up to see them.

  Deeper and deeper they went. A friendly squid blinked at them as it drifted by. A weird, spindly fish spiralled lazily past.

  The bell came to rest on the sea bed with a soft bump. The water through the window was cloudy and dark. Nothing moved. Nothing stirred at all.

  Gipsy felt a shiver go through her. “I hope this thing doesn’t leak,” she said.

  Teggs nodded. “Let’s put on the diving gear, just in case.”

  They helped each other strap oxygen tanks to their necks. Then they put on special diving helmets.

  “Now we’ll be ready for anything,” beamed Teggs.

  But neither of them was ready for what happened next.

  Wham!

  The diving bell shook with an enormous blow.

  “What was that?” gasped Gipsy.

  “I don’t know!” said Teggs. He peered out of the window – and wished he hadn’t.

  A massive sea monster was staring in at them with huge, yellow eyes. Its skin was a deep blotchy blue and white. Its head was the size of a sofa, and the top of it was wrapped in a tatty bandage. It was easily three times as long as Teggs, and its flippers were the size of small trees.

  The sea monster smiled, revealing a long row of terrifying teeth. Then it attacked the diving bell. Its teeth tore through the metal like it was wet cardboard. Sea water flooded in through the gaping hole in the wall.

  “Hit the help button, Gipsy!” cried Teggs. “It’s coming to get us!”

  Chapter Four

  THE MONSTER

  Up on the tugboat, the chain holding the diving bell was swinging about like a piece of string in a gale.

  “Something’s wrong!” gasped Iggy. “Quick! Bring up the bell!”

  Cripes hit a yellow button on his control panel. The chain clanked and heaved – but the diving bell wouldn’t rise.

  “It’s jammed!” cried Cripes. “Something’s got hold of it!”

  “I’ll boost the power,” said Iggy. He fiddled with some wires beneath the control panel. “Try it now!”

  Cripes pressed the button again. This time, the bell began to move from the sea bed.

  He beamed at Iggy. “You did it!”

  Iggy and Cripes waited tensely. Finally, the diving bell emerged from the foaming waters.

  Or what was left of it.

  The bell had been mangled and squashed. Half of it was missing altogether. But most worrying of all, it was completely empty.

  “Teggs and Gipsy . . .” breathed Iggy. “They’ve gone!”

  “But so has their diving gear,” said Cripes, peering inside. “Maybe they got away.”

  “If they did, they’re still too heavy to swim up from the bottom of the sea!” wailed Iggy. “We have to find them – fast!”

  Cripes clapped his flippers. Two cryptoclidus sailors in white caps and overalls slithered up to him.

  “We need to get a search party down there, guys,” said Cripes. “Ten of your fastest swimmers, right now!”

  The two sailors nodded. “
Straight away, sir,” they cried, and then dashed off.

  Iggy sighed, wishing the shuttle worked better underwater so he could look for himself. “How long can Teggs and Gipsy stay down there?”

  “Let me see . . .” Cripes counted on his flippers. “They should have enough air to last three hours. After that . . .”

  Iggy looked very glum. “I suppose I’d better tell Arx the bad news,” he said.

  “We won’t just tell him,” said Cripes gravely. “We’ll show him.” He pointed a flipper at the mangled diving bell. “The undersea camera is still there. We’ll take it back with us and see just what happened.”

  “Well, what are we waiting for?” cried Iggy. “Let’s get going!”

  Iggy and Cripes found Arx busy working in the storeroom full of broken subs and wreckage from the floating factory. When the triceratops heard what had happened to the diving bell, his horns seemed to droop.

  “Don’t worry, Arx. The search party will find them soon and carry them safely back up to the surface,” said Iggy stoutly. “Right, Cripes?”

  “I hope so,” said Cripes. He pulled out the camera from under his cape. “In the meantime, these pictures should be ready. Let’s see what happened down there.”

  Arx and Iggy gathered round him as he pulled the back off the camera. Inside was a set of pictures, bone-dry and crystal-clear. Always impressed by a good invention, Arx was about to compliment Cripes on his clever camera. But he lost his voice when he saw what the pictures showed.

  One showed the massive blue and white monster swimming up to the bell.

  Another showed its enormous flippers and terrible tail.

  “Look at the size of that thing!” gasped Cripes. “It’s as big as a battleship!”

  He quickly sorted through more of the pictures. They showed the monster grinning wildly, and then tearing through the metal of the diving bell. It seemed dead set on getting to Gipsy and Teggs.

  “It should pick on someone its own size,” said Iggy fiercely.

  Cripes gulped. “There is no one else its own size!”

  The second-to-last picture showed Teggs and Gipsy standing on the sea bed in their diving gear. They were looking up at the fearsome creature.

  “No!” groaned Iggy. “I don’t want to see what happened next!”

  “I’m afraid we must,” said Arx quietly.

  But the last of the pictures showed only the empty sea bed.

  “Where did they go?” demanded Iggy. “It’s like they just vanished!”

  “At least there’s no sign that they were hurt,” said Cripes.

  Arx nodded slowly. “And at least now we know that a liopleurodon is hiding down there in the deeps,” he said.

  Iggy frowned. “A what?”

  “Back on Earth it was the biggest, nastiest killing machine in the water!” Arx went on. “You’re looking at one hundred tons of swimming death!”

  “It . . . it can’t be true!” stammered Cripes. “The liopleurodon rule those huge water worlds on the edge of the Jurassic Quadrant. No one has visited them for hundreds of years – they wouldn’t dare!”

  “Maybe not,” said Arx darkly. “But it seems the liopleurodon have dared to visit Aqua Minor!”

  “If it is just a visit,” growled Iggy. “This could be the start of an invasion!”

  “But I don’t understand!” Cripes started shivering. “A liopleurodon ship couldn’t land here without us knowing about it. And we’ve been fishing on Aqua Minor for five years without any trouble!”

  “Oh, come on! Wakey-wakey!” cried Iggy. He waved the pictures in Cripes’s face. “What more proof do you need? There’s a liopleurodon out there! It’s been smashing up your factories, eating your subs and scaring everyone silly – and now it’s got Teggs and Gipsy!”

  Chapter Five

  A STRANGE FRIEND

  Back at the bottom of the sea, Teggs and Gipsy were facing up to the massive monster with the bandaged head.

  Once the liopleurodon had ripped apart the diving bell, he floated in the water, watching them closely. Teggs had pulled his scariest face and swished his armoured tail through the water. Gipsy was ready to jab their attacker on the nose if he came any closer.

  But they were both surprised to find that the liopleurodon had no plans to eat them alive.

  In fact, he was very polite.

  “Right then!” he said brightly. Bubbles streamed out of his mouth as he spoke. “I’ve got you out of that horrible prison. Now you can come home with me!

  Teggs and Gipsy stared at each other in amazement through their diving helmets.

  “What do you mean?” Gipsy cried. “That wasn’t a prison!”

  “Of course it was!” said the liopleurodon. “You were both squished up inside! Trapped by those flipper-flappers! Locked up and hanging from a chain! But now you’re free!”

  The sea monster smiled happily. He was clearly very pleased with himself.

  Teggs turned to Gipsy. “What’s a flipper-flapper?”

  “It must be his word for the cryptoclidus,” Gipsy whispered back.

  Teggs cleared his throat. “Well, thanks for trying to help,” he said. But without that, er, prison as you call it, we can’t get back up to the surface!” “Why would you want to do that?” asked the liopleurodon, baffled. “The flipper-flappers would only lock you up again. No, no, the likes of us should stick together”

  “What do you mean?” asked Gipsy.

  “Well, you’re not flipper-flappers. I’m not a flipper-flapper. But everyone else on the planet is!”

  Teggs looked at him thoughtfully. “Who are you?”

  “I think my name must be Mira,” said the liopleurodon. “That’s what is written on my outfit, anyway!” He spun round to show them a torn scrap of blue uniform that clung to his middle. The word MIRA was spelled out in gold thread.

  “You mean you don’t even know your own name?” asked Teggs.

  “Nope!” said Mira cheerfully. “I must have been bumped on the head at some point. I’m sure I’m not just wearing this bandage because it looks pretty.”

  “That’s for sure,” murmured Gipsy.

  “Anyway,” said Mira. “Now that I’ve set you free, you must help me find my spaceship! I’m sure I parked it round here somewhere, but that was a long, long time ago.” He gave a sad little sigh. “I’ve been searching ever since.”

  “You parked a spaceship under the sea?” Teggs turned to Gipsy. “Bump on the head or not, this so-called sea monster is a nut!” he hissed.

  Gipsy nodded. “But he’s a very big, very dangerous nut with extremely big teeth!” she pointed out. “We’d better not upset him.”

  “Well?” asked Mira. His gleaming eyes narrowed a little. “Are you going to help me?”

  Teggs gulped. “Umm . . . Yes.”

  “Hurrah!” cried Mira, brightening again. “I know it’s round here somewhere. We’re bound to find it soon. Follow me!”

  Gipsy cleared her throat. “Actually, I think we should stay here—”

  “Follow me!” Mira yelled crossly, cutting her off. “My cave is this way.”

  Teggs and Gipsy couldn’t move very fast underwater. They shivered in the awful cold. Their heavy bodies ached as they trudged over the thick dark sand.

  “We have to get back to the surface,” muttered Gipsy. “We don’t have enough air to stay down here for long.”

  “I know,” said Teggs. “But how?”

  Mira kept swimming round them in a big circle. “Keep up!” he yelled. “I can’t wait to show you my cave! It’s ever so cosy, and you’ll love the colours! I’ve chosen brown rock, with bits of darker brown rock and just a hint of very, very brown rock . . .”

  “This Mira is as batty as a belemnite,” said Teggs quietly. “But he seems friendly enough.”

  Gipsy nodded. “So why has he been attacking factories and submarines?”

  “What?” asked Mira, zooming up behind them. “Me? Attack factories and submarines? Why would I do th
at?”

  “You tell us,” said Teggs bravely. “That’s what you’ve been doing, isn’t it?”

  “Don’t be so silly,” said Mira, floating upside down and going cross-eyed. “I’ve never attacked a factory in my life! I stay well away from those flipper-flappers with their big nets. I don’t want to get caught!”

  Gipsy turned back to Teggs. “Do you believe him?” she whispered.

  “I don’t know,” said Teggs. “But why would he bother to lie? He could eat us alive in a couple of bites!”

  “Stop chatting and get a move on!” nagged Mira. “Honestly, dinner will be ruined!”

  Teggs perked up. “Dinner?”

  “Yes!” cried Mira, waggling his flippers. “Din-dins! Come on! Come and get it!”

  “Brilliant!” Teggs quickened his step. He was still starving.

  “But Captain . . .” Gipsy tapped his diving helmet with her hoof. “How are you going to eat through that thing?”

  “Arrgh!” Teggs groaned. “I’m going as nutty as Mira!”

  But when they finally reached the liopleurodon’s lair, Teggs found he was glad to miss Mira’s meal. It was floating all about them in the cold, dark water – tons and tons of raw, rotten squid!

  “Come on, chaps! Dig in!” Mira beamed. “Took me ages to catch this lot!”

  “Oh.” Gipsy swapped an awkward look with Teggs. “Sorry, Mira, but we’re, er, not really hungry.”

  “Not hungry?” Mira looked hurt. “But . . . I wanted to celebrate meeting you.

  I’ve been very lonely down here on my own, you know.” Mira opened his giant jaws and guzzled down fifty squid in a single gulp. “So take those glass hats off your heads and tuck in!”

  “We can’t!” said Teggs.

  “Of course you can,” said Mira briskly. “No need to be shy.”

  “But we can’t breathe in water like you do,” Teggs protested.

  Mira folded his fins firmly. “Take them off.”

  “If we do, we’ll drown!” cried Gipsy.

  “Drown? Don’t be so silly!” said Mira crossly. “Only the flipper-flappers breathe air. We live in the sea!” He came closer. “And if you won’t take off those silly glass bubbles yourselves . . . I’ll take them off for you!”