For a moment they watched Graham, who was hard at work tending his feathers.
‘He’s normally much livelier than this, even though he’s an old bird,’ Annalie said. ‘But he’s really missing my dad.’
The longer Graham spent away from his home and Spinner, the more he seemed to lose his spark. The bird had always been a bracing presence, deploying a stream of opinions, squawks and insults, but as the voyage continued he had begun to sink into himself, spending more time huddled on his perch with his back to the room.
‘He’s sad,’ Pod said.
‘You know,’ Annalie said, ‘it’d be good if you tried to make friends with him.’
Pod’s face was caught between eagerness and doubt. ‘What do I know about birds?’
‘There’s nothing to know,’ Annalie said. ‘You just have to pay him attention. Tell him how clever and handsome he is. He loves all that stuff.’
Pod was good at following orders. As the days unfolded he courted Graham, offering him biscuits, talking to him, praising him, carrying him about, laughing at his birdy jokes. They even began to develop their own private jokes about the other people on the boat.
Will didn’t like the feeling that Pod and the parrot were laughing at him behind his back. ‘I think I preferred it when Graham was miserable,’ he said.
The journey proceeded uneventfully for the next few days. They saw other boats from time to time—fishing boats, small mixed cargo ships, even the odd passenger vessel—but no one gave them any trouble or even seemed terribly interested in them.
Soon they arrived at the Millinni Islands, a group of almost a hundred islands varying in size from quite large to little more than specks of rock. One of the Millinni Islands had a volcano on it, and the view as you sailed into the strait was spectacular. Essie, perched in the bow, was taking pictures of the volcano with her shell when something caught her eye.
She put her camera down, stared, could see nothing, looked back at the picture she’d taken, and zoomed in. Then she hurried back to where Annalie was standing with Will, checking some details on the charts. ‘I think I saw an Admiralty boat,’ she said.
‘Where?’
‘Up ahead.’ She showed them the photo she’d just taken. They all peered at it. ‘Look. There.’
‘Are you sure?’ Will asked.
Annalie studied the photo then looked at the chart, comparing them. ‘If that bit there is this bit here,’ she said, ‘there’s a bay they could be hiding in. Coming up the strait we won’t see them until we’re right on top of them.’
Will looked at the chart and could see that Annalie might be right.
‘Why do you think it was Admiralty?’ he asked.
‘Doesn’t that look like their flag?’ Essie said, pointing at a skerrick of colour on the picture.
‘It could be,’ Will admitted.
That was enough for Annalie. ‘So what shall we do?’
‘Better be on the safe side and go round the outside,’ Will said.
They changed course, taking a wider path around the island, although Will remained sceptical that it really had been an Admiralty boat.
They saw some fascinating things in the Millinnis. They came across a floating village in the calm waters between two islands. Houses had been built on rafts constructed out of natural and recycled materials. The rafts were lashed together and linked by walkways, and as they sailed by they saw kids leaping in and out of the water, swimming and playing like frogs, while the adults came and went in little boats. These people watched them go by, and some waved; they were neither hostile nor overly curious.
‘Look,’ Essie said, ‘the islands on either side are completely covered with crops.’ Although small, the islands were like market gardens, filled with fruit trees, vegetables and other edible crops.
‘Maybe they decided not to waste their land on housing,’ Annalie said. ‘I think a lot of these islands won’t grow anything any more because they’re salt-affected. Maybe they put the village out to sea so they could cultivate as much of the land as they could.’ Annalie sighed. ‘Wouldn’t you love to live somewhere like this?’
Essie shuddered. ‘Too wet.’
‘You sound like Graham,’ Annalie laughed.
Another day, still in the Millinnis, they spotted the patrol boat again, sliding past the tail end of another island, still a long way off.
This time it was Will who spotted it. ‘Guess you were right,’ he told Essie. ‘There they are again.’
Annalie frowned. ‘Do you think they’re following us?’
‘They don’t know we’re here,’ Will said. ‘They’re just patrolling. It’s what they do, being a patrol boat.’
‘Hmm,’ Annalie said thoughtfully.
They passed a number of islands which had clearly once been alive, but were now dead, graveyards for the skeletal, storm-battered trunks of palm trees. Others were still lush, green and tropical.
They continued on through the Millinnis, safely navigating several tricky passages. As they were about to clear the island group completely, they saw, yet again, the patrol boat cruising nearby.
‘There they are again,’ Annalie said.
‘We’ll take cover until they’re gone,’ Will said.
He took them into a rocky inlet and they waited there, watching as the patrol boat sailed to the end of the island group, then performed a slow arc, turned around and began cruising back the way they’d come.
‘What are they doing?’ Annalie wondered.
‘Patrolling,’ Will said, with a roll of the eyes.
‘Why here? It’s so quiet round here.’
‘Maybe pirates have moved in. The good news is they didn’t see us. Let’s get out of here in case they decide to come back.’
They left the Millinnis behind them and sailed out into the open sea again.
That night, over dinner, Annalie expressed her concerns.
‘That patrol boat,’ she began, ‘don’t you think it’s sort of funny it was hanging around the Millinnis like that?’
‘Not really,’ Will said. ‘Why?’
‘Well, for one thing, they don’t really patrol the Islands that much. That’s why there are so many criminals here. But they seemed to be patrolling those islands pretty thoroughly.’
‘Not that thoroughly,’ Will chortled, ‘they never noticed us.’
‘Well, we got lucky,’ Annalie said. ‘But they were spending a lot of time hanging around those islands, don’t you think?’
‘What are you getting at?’ Will said.
‘Do you think they were looking for us?’
Will stared at her, his colour rising. ‘How would they know where we are?’
‘Do you think they noticed that search Will did back in Southaven?’ Essie asked, catching Annalie’s drift.
‘They couldn’t trace it back to us,’ Will said, his face now very red. ‘I didn’t give the guy any information.’
‘You did optimise the search for a boat just like this,’ Essie said. ‘And they knew we were in Southaven. There can’t have been that many small sailboats leaving for outlaw country that day.’
‘You’ve got no reason to think that patrol boat was looking for us,’ Will argued, but he also had a creeping sense that he might have unwittingly led them into danger. ‘They could have been looking for anyone. Could be pirates. Could be just a coincidence.’
‘I think we need to change our route,’ Annalie said.
‘No,’ Will said. ‘This is the best route. It’s the quickest. You agreed with me, remember?
‘I know, but—’
‘After we leave here we’re not even following the route from the sat nav,’ Will said, exasperated. ‘I couldn’t remember the rest of it. We’ll be going a different route anyway.’
‘Yes, but not that different,’ Annalie said. ‘I think we need to take another look at it, maybe go somewhere they really won’t be expecting—go south, or north—’
‘That will take weeks longer,�
�� Will said. ‘If we take too long, we could miss him!’
‘But if they catch us—’
‘They’re not going to catch us!’ Will shouted. ‘I’m the captain of this boat and I say we follow the original route!’
For a long, terrible moment, Essie and Pod looked at Annalie, waiting to see what she would say next. Will could feel his control over the voyage teetering, and he hated Annalie for it.
She drew a breath—her mouth opened—there was a moment’s pause. Then she said, ‘Okay.’
Will turned to Pod and Essie. ‘Okay?’ he said aggressively.
Pod gave Will a nod. Still on his side.
Essie looked dismayed. She turned to Annalie, but Annalie was looking at her hands. ‘Okay,’ Essie said.
‘Right then,’ Will said.
Dinner ended in silence.
That night, when the girls were in their bunks, Essie asked, ‘Why did you back down like that?’
‘Because it wasn’t worth fighting about,’ Annalie said.
‘It wasn’t? But what if you were right? What if they know where we’re going, and they catch us?’
‘I don’t know that they are following us,’ Annalie said. ‘It was just a feeling. And Will’s right about one thing—if we take too long, the whole journey’s pointless.’
Essie thought for a moment. ‘Remember when we were back in Port Fine, you told me you didn’t trust Will because he always wanted to do the dangerous thing, not the smart thing?’
Annalie didn’t reply for a while. Then finally she said, ‘I did say that.’
‘Then why did you let him say that he was the captain of the boat?’
‘Because he needs to believe that he is.’
‘But he isn’t,’ Essie said.
‘Then who is?’
‘Well, you are, obviously.’
‘No I’m not,’ Annalie said. ‘I didn’t come on this trip because I thought it was a good idea. I mean, it all happened so fast, for one thing. But the main reason I came was because I knew he wouldn’t make it on his own. Apart from anything else, he can’t tell one end of a sextant from the other. He needs me.’
This seemed, to Essie, to prove her point, but Annalie did not agree.
‘I couldn’t do this without him, either. I couldn’t sail this boat single-handed. The thing you have to understand about him and me is, I’m happy to be part of a team. But he can’t be, unless he thinks he’s the boss. So let’s just let him think that.’
‘Yes, but what if he’s wrong about this?’
‘We’re all sailing blind out here. His guess is as good as mine. So why not let him decide?’
Essie would have much preferred to see Annalie cut Will down to size. But she could see now that perhaps Annalie had a point.
She just hoped Annalie’s suspicion about the route was wrong—otherwise they were sailing into big trouble.
Mangoes
There were many strange sights in the Moon Islands. One day they sailed near a large island that stood alone and unneighboured, some distance from any other island groups. It was thickly forested and there was one tree in particular that caught Annalie’s eye.
‘Look!’ Annalie cried. ‘Mangoes!’
A huge mango tree, laden with fruit, was clearly visible from the sea. The others all came to look.
‘I’ve never seen a mango tree,’ Essie said. ‘Big, isn’t it?’
‘That one’s huge,’ Annalie said.
‘Hey Pod, you ever eaten a mango?’ Will asked.
Pod shrugged.
Annalie looked at the others. ‘Do you think anyone lives there?’ she asked.
‘You want to go and get some mangoes?’ Will asked.
‘Don’t you?’ Annalie said, grinning.
Annalie and Pod took the dinghy and rowed it over to the island. It was lush and beautiful and smelt strongly of overripe fruit. It didn’t take them long to find the tree, and they got busy picking the ripest mangoes and placing them carefully into the bags they’d brought with them.
Just as Annalie was beginning to wonder whether they’d picked enough and it was time to go back, she heard something substantial making the upper branches rustle. At first, the thickness of the foliage meant she couldn’t see what was making the noise, and she began to feel frightened, because whatever it was, it was big.
Then a face appeared in the trees above her, and another, and another. The faces had dark, intelligent, human eyes, but they were covered in long red fur.
They were great red apes.
Annalie had seen pictures of them but had never seen a live one. There were a few surviving in zoos, but it was believed that they had died out entirely in the wild. Annalie stared at them in astonishment. What on earth were they doing here, on an isolated island in the middle of nowhere? Pod had frozen in fear, but now she saw him looking about for something—a rock, a stick—his hand reaching for a weapon.
‘Don’t!’ she said. ‘They won’t hurt us if we don’t threaten them.’ She hoped this was true. She knew they were likely to be territorial.
The trees around the mango tree started rustling. Apes were swinging in from all over. Most of them stayed up high, but two of the biggest swung down to the lowest branches, face to face with Annalie and Pod.
‘Hello,’ said one of the apes. The voice was strange, an electronic sing-song, and the accent was not Duxish. ‘We welcome you.’
‘Can you help us?’ said the second.
The island, it turned out, had been a wildlife sanctuary and scientific base. Before the Flood, apes had been rescued from zoos, bushmeat markets and logging camps, and brought here to be observed, preserved, studied, and returned to at least a version of the wild.
Some of the apes had been caught up in the scientific fad for making animals talk. They had been fitted with headsets that translated their thoughts into words, and sent these words to vocal simulators housed in collars around their necks. The younger apes had not been born until after the Flood, but the older apes had handed the translator units down to a new generation so they could share their new language. The apes had created epic ballads about their ancestors and their many paths to this island, which they regarded as a little paradise on earth. These ballads could take all night to recite, but now the apes had a problem.
The collars used longlife batteries. The apes knew how to recharge them, but the science station had lost power after a storm the previous year, and they could no longer recharge their batteries. One by one, the collars were failing. There were now only two of them left, and the apes were desperate to recover their voices before it was too late.
They showed a wondering Annalie and Pod through what remained of the science station where they had grown up. Although the apes themselves preferred to live outdoors, they were proud of the place that had given them the gift of speech, and had looked after it carefully.
‘Where did the scientists go?’ Annalie asked.
‘They leave after Flood, in boat,’ the ape said. ‘They say they come back, but they don’t come.’
‘Can you fix?’ asked the second ape.
‘Is it all right if I bring my brother here?’ Annalie asked.
‘You want to give a solar panel to some red apes?’ Will said.
‘We may not need to,’ Annalie said. ‘Their equipment hasn’t been properly maintained for forty years—it may just need fixing. Won’t you come and have a look at it? If you get everything working again we won’t need to give them a solar panel.’
‘But if we can’t fix it, we’ll have to give them something or they’re likely to tear our arms out of their sockets.’
‘Come on,’ Annalie wheedled. ‘They’re great red apes. They’re meant to be extinct. And they can talk! Don’t you want to at least meet them?’
Will had always been mad about animals, the wilder the better. As captain of the Sunfish he knew he ought to be guarding their precious supplies just in case, but this opportunity was something he couldn’t resist.
‘Okay, let’s go,’ he said.
Essie didn’t want to miss out either, so Will and Essie both got into the dinghy with Annalie and Pod, bringing Will’s toolbox and a few spare parts.
‘So did this lab used to run on generator power?’ Will asked, once the apes had showed him around.
‘Yes!’ the ape said. ‘The genny! Broken.’
‘If we can just get you some power, you can recharge these batteries again,’ Will said. ‘Then you’ll be able to speak.’
Will examined the generator, then clambered all around the station checking connections and cables, replacing a damaged solar cell, fixing this, repairing that. When he was done, he shouted to Pod, who was standing by the main switch. ‘Okay, try it now!’
Pod flicked the switch and the science station sprang back to life: power, lights, humming appliances.
The apes hooted excitedly.
‘How did you know how to do all that?’ Essie asked, impressed.
‘Spinner taught me,’ Will said casually, although he was secretly rather thrilled that he had been able to get it working again. He hadn’t been at all sure he’d be able to pull it off.
Annalie watched as the apes extracted batteries from their collars and put them in a charger, their great leathery fingers showing a surprising delicacy. The charging took a long time, but at last, at long last, the indicator light on the charger flipped from red to green. The batteries were ready. The apes put the batteries back in their collars and put them on.
‘I speak!’
‘Here I am!’
‘I am me!’
Words began carolling out of the apes, and they began to sing and dance and hoot and roar, magnificently.
‘Essie, do you know how to work those old computers?’ Annalie asked. The scientists had left some of their computers behind—big blockylooking antiques—and she had found microphones in the same supply cupboard as the battery chargers. ‘If they still work, we can show the apes how to record their songs and stories, and then none of it will be lost.’
Escape to the Moon Islands: Quest of the Sunfish 1 Page 14