“What…did you…put in that blasted…tea… ?” he managed. Then the big pilot toppled onto his side, landing with a hard thump on the wooden bench. Betty’s and Dotty’s eyes were already closed, and Abigail was lying beside them. Andy tried to fight the feeling of fatigue that was washing over him but felt himself sliding inexorably toward oblivion. As his eyes closed and gray mist filled his vision, he caught one last sight of the giant looming over where Rusty was lying, apparently unconscious.
“I’m truly sorry, but I never said it was tea,” Zeus said.
And then the world as Andy knew it faded away.
The first thing Andy noticed when he woke up was that his wrists hurt. He gazed around the incense-filled room groggily for a moment, then glanced down and immediately realized the reason. His hands and feet were both bound tightly with ropes!
His head was pounding from whatever had been in the “tea” that Zeus had given him. Looking around, he saw that the others were still unconscious and also bound like he was.
Crumb betrayed us! The thought ran over and over in his mind as he tried to nudge Abigail awake with his shoulder, something difficult to do with his limited mobility.
“Abigail…Abigail!” Andy whispered hoarsely, trying to keep his voice low in case Zeus was nearby. “Wake up!”
When she didn’t move, Andy nudged her harder. “Wake up!” he hissed.
“Huhhnnnh…” Abigail groaned.
“Wake up, Abigail! We’ve been captured!”
The girl’s long eyelashes flickered and she raised her head slowly from the cushion she’d been using as a pillow.
“What?” she began. And then, seeing that she was bound, like Andy, she snapped into focus.
“It was a trick!” she exclaimed.
“Shhh,” said Andy. “Not so loud. Zeus might be nearby.”
The two set about waking the others the best they could, worming their way across the benches and cabin floor to the sides of their comrades. After several difficult minutes, the entire group was alert and ready to make plans to escape the situation.
“Good thing Zeus doesn’t know about my hook’s abilities,” said Rusty. “If someone can help me twist the activation knob, I can change it from hook mode to a knife. We’ll be out of here before you can say ‘warthog whiskers.’”
Andy edged himself over so that he was back-to-back with the bush pilot.
“I can’t reach it!” Andy whispered as he strained. “The angle is all wrong.”
“Keep trying,” encouraged Rusty. “Remember, a J.E.S. member never gives up.”
Easy for you to say, Andy thought as he continued stretching his fingers toward the switch on the side of Rusty’s hook. You’re not the one trying to do this.
It took some doing, but eventually Andy just managed to get his fingers around the switch and turn it. After a couple of attempts where the hook changed to a crowbar, a telescope, and a lighter, he finally managed to get it to knife mode.
“Well done!” encouraged Betty and Dotty in unison.
A clumping noise above their heads froze them into silence. Someone was walking above decks and headed toward the cabin.
“Quick, back to your places, everybody!” hissed Abigail.
Everyone quickly obeyed, and Rusty made sure that he was lying in such a way that his Swiss Army hook was carefully hidden.
The thumping grew louder. Then there was a loud creak of hinges as the hatch was thrown open and someone descended the stairs with a heavy, limping gait.
Nicodemus Crumb grinned at his bound captives, exposing his crooked yellow teeth. When he got to Andy, the boy watched, horrified, as the old man reached into his pocket and pulled out Andy’s ring of J.E.S. keys.
“The Potentate will pay me well for these,” he said, examining them closely. “You really shouldn’t have told me that Andy is the Jungle Explorers’ Society Keymaster, Mr. Bucketts,” Crumb added with a glance at the bush pilot. “That was a mistake on your part.”
“The only mistake I made was trusting you,” growled Rusty. “How long have you been a traitor, Crumb?”
“Not a traitor. I’m not on any side. I’m simply a businessman. Always have been and always will be.” He walked over, leaned close to Rusty, and said in a low voice, “Lostmore is too trusting. That’s how he got his head shrunk. You’d do well to remember that.” He punctuated the last word with sharp clack of his yellowed teeth.
Zeus came down the stairs behind Crumb, his long shadow filling the cabin. “The sails are set, Captain,” he said. “We should arrive at the Forbidden Islands by nightfall.”
Andy glared at Crumb. “The Forbidden Islands? Where’s that? You lied to us—you said you were taking us to the start of the path that leads to the Eternal Tree.”
“I never lie,” said Crumb pointedly. “But I also don’t always reveal all of the truth. The Forbidden Islands are just off the coast of South America. Mostly jungle, pretty much an extension of the Amazon forest. It is where the legends say the Eternal Tree exists, and that is where I will take you. However, after that, I’ll be moving on, selling those keys of yours to the Potentate for a pretty penny. As I said before, my shop hasn’t been making much money lately.”
Andy felt waves of impotent rage wash over him as Crumb and Zeus exited the cabin and closed the hatch behind them. He wondered if the jujus that Zeus had distributed to the group were truly magical items. If so, why had he decided to help them?
There’s more to this whole situation than meets the eye, Andy thought. Maybe Zeus is on our side but is working as a spy.
On Andy’s last adventure, he’d been fooled by the Potentate’s use of the Golden Paw, a talisman capable of transforming the appearance of its user into almost any form imaginable. Could it be possible that Zeus was keeping an eye on Crumb? And if so, did Ned know what was going on?
Trying to figure such things out only made his headache worse. He glanced over at Rusty and saw, to his immense relief, that as soon as their captors had left the cabin, he’d commenced cutting the ropes that bound his wrists with his knife attachment. Andy suppressed an urge to cheer when he saw Rusty’s arms pop free of their bonds and the ropes fall away from his gleaming appendage.
“Now, for the rest of you lot,” said Rusty with a fierce grin.
After everyone had been cut loose, they gathered in a close huddle. Andy rubbed at the raw welts on his wrist as he leaned in close with the others, formulating a plan for what they should do next.
“There’s six of us and only two of them,” said Rusty. “How hard could it be?”
“That giant might give us a bit of a problem,” muttered Abigail.
“I’m not so sure,” whispered Andy. “I think he might be secretly on our side.”
Rusty’s eyes narrowed. “How do you figure? Just because he gave us a bunch of useless trinkets doesn’t mean he’s with us. It was just a ruse to keep us occupied while he drugged us.”
Andy and Abigail exchanged glances. He had to admit Rusty had a point. Andy shrugged and motioned for the bush pilot to continue.
Rusty nodded at Andy, then gazed at the others in the huddled group. “Now then, we’re going to take over the ship. Ladies and gentleman, it’s time for a good old-fashioned mutiny.”
For Andy, the hardest part about the plan to take the ship from Crumb and Zeus was the waiting. It seemed like hours since they’d taken their positions in the cabin, waiting for Crumb to return. Everyone was armed with whatever they could lay their hands on to defend themselves, since Crumb had made sure to remove all their regular weapons.
Fortunately, the old man hadn’t known about Andy’s Zoomwriter, which looked like an ordinary fountain pen. The boy was glad to have it safely in his front pocket. He would use it if needed. But for now, he was armed with a boat hook, and he held it at the ready as he stared intently at the locked hatch, waiting for their captors to return.
The cabin was stuffy and the sweat stung his eyes as it dripped off his forehead. Andy
tried to keep his adrenaline in check as he gripped his makeshift weapon.
Finally, after what felt like forever, they heard the footsteps of their captors approaching the hatch.
But when the hatch opened, things didn’t go precisely as planned.
Because he was feeling anxious, Andy lunged too soon. Instead of tripping Crumb and Zeus as they descended the stairs as he was supposed to, he ended up tripping on the boat hook himself, sprawling headlong along the stairs that led into the cabin!
Rusty, seeing that the ambush attempt was threatened, responded immediately, shouting, “Charge!”
And from that moment on, everything was chaos. Fists flew and kicks landed on both friend and foe, and for a long moment, in spite of the difference in numbers, it wasn’t apparent which side was going to win. The tangle of bodies on the floor of the cabin writhed and shouted, cursed and fought until finally, with a last, mighty blow from Betty and Dotty to the jaw of Nicodemus Crumb, it ended.
The entire group of Jungle Explorers was scratched, bruised, and exhausted. With some effort, they managed to tie up Crumb and Zeus, then stood over them, breathing hard.
Andy mumbled, “Sorry.” But everyone was too preoccupied to listen. Then he quickly retrieved his keys from the glowering, bruised Crumb and put them safely back into his pocket.
“Betty, Dotty, see if you can locate any navigation maps. We need to figure out where we are and where these Forbidden Islands are,” said Rusty. “Abigail, I assume you know about boats from your father. Can you get control of the ship?”
“Absolutely,” she said, then dashed up the stairs.
“We’re practically there already,” growled Crumb. “This is idiotic. I told you I would drop you off there, and I always keep my word.”
Rusty lowered his big face to Crumb’s and said in a dangerous tone, “So you say. But you stole Andy’s keys, and that alone is enough reason not to trust you.” He wheeled back to Betty and Dotty and barked, “Let’s go, ladies!”
“On it,” the sisters said in unison, and left to search the captain’s quarters.
Andy then found himself alone with Rusty, Zeus, and Crumb. Rusty stood over their bound captives, the point of his knife hovering threateningly over their throats. Crumb stared back at him with a baleful expression, bruised and swollen from the skirmish.
“Ned trusted you,” spat Rusty. “I can’t believe you betrayed us like this, Nicodemus.”
Crumb leered at the bush pilot. “A man has to make a living, Bucketts. Besides, your esteemed ‘leader’ has no chance now that the Potentate has the Doomsday Device. I told you—once it’s activated, there’s no way to stop it. You’re all doomed!”
He began to cackle, which only increased Rusty’s ire. But Andy’s attention was on Zeus. He noticed that the giant didn’t have the same attitude as Crumb. The big man didn’t look as if he cared whether or not he was captured, but instead sat quietly and serenely stared down at his huge-knuckled hands.
Rusty looked like he was about to deliver a powerful right hook to Crumb’s nose, but then he seemed to think better of it. Turning to Andy, he said, “Keep an eye on these two. If either of them makes an attempt at escaping, shout. I’m going to find our weapons and supplies.”
And with that, the bush pilot stomped up the stairs and onto the deck with the others.
Andy turned back to Zeus. He wanted to ask him if he really was on their side, and whether the jujus he’d given them would actually help.
But he never got the chance. Just as Andy opened his mouth to speak, a terrific CRUNCH! rattled through the hull of the ship. Shouts were heard above decks as Andy was thrown off his feet and sent crashing to the teak floor. The next thing he knew, turbulent seawater was flooding the cabin.
Andy splashed toward the hatch, the water quickly rising to his ankles. He raced above decks and saw the panicked expressions of his friends, all rushing to the port side of the ship to see what they had struck.
“We hit a reef!” Rusty shouted, then wheeled on Betty and Dotty, who were next to Abigail at the ship’s wheel. “I thought I told you to consult the maps!”
“We did!” Betty snapped back. “The reef wasn’t on the charts!”
Andy gazed toward the horizon, where he could make out the hazy outline of a shoreline.
“There’s land over there,” he said to Rusty. “If Crumb wasn’t lying, then I guess those are the Forbidden Islands. But we might have to swim for it. There’s water filling the cabin below.…I…I…don’t think we have very long, and I didn’t see any lifeboats when we boarded the ship.…”
His voice trailed off. He’d suddenly remembered that Nicodemus Crumb and Zeus were tied up in the cabin with the water rising. In spite of the fact that they were enemies, Andy couldn’t let them die.
“Crumb and Zeus!” he said by way of explanation as he turned and dashed toward the hatch that led below.
“Let ’em fend for themselves!” shouted Rusty. “They betrayed us!”
Andy turned back to Rusty, his expression serious. “They don’t deserve to die. That’s not what we do in the J.E.S. We’re better than that.”
Rusty started to protest, but Andy turned back and ran toward the hatchway.
When he got below, he saw that the water was rising fast. But then, to his surprise, he also saw that the ropes that had bound the two men had been cut and were now floating on top of the water. The jagged hole that had ripped the side of the ship had been opened even more, probably kicked to pieces by the two men, and they had apparently escaped and made a swim for safety.
With the water now up to his knees, Andy waded up the stairway and back above decks. He scanned the horizon, shielding his eyes with his hand, but there was no sign of either Crumb or Zeus as far as he could see.
But he didn’t have time to consider the matter further, for at that moment the broken hull of the Chinese junk lurched suddenly as the vessel sank deeper into the sea, sending Andy and the rest of the crew flying out into the dark water.
A large beam crashed into Andy as he fell, the impact shoving him down, down, down into the depths of the sea. As the water closed around him, he was dimly aware of other shapes in the waves, but whether they were sharks or people he couldn’t tell.
Andy clung to the beam with both arms, knowing that it was his best and only chance to survive and hoping against hope that the wood would float and that somehow his friends were okay.
The Potentate stood on a rocky outcropping high above the ocean. Her black hair whipped in the wind behind her like a pirate’s flag, and her face was covered by an expressionless ivory mask. She wore her traveling clothes, all black, and the effect was intimidating. Her appearance was certain to strike fear in the hearts of anyone who saw her.
And that, of course, was what she wanted above all else.
“Bring me the device,” she ordered.
A servant with a twisted back hobbled up next to her. He was as old and gnarled as a twisted oak tree. As he handed her the large carved clock, he said in a whiny, high-pitched voice, “Is it time, Mistress?”
She didn’t reply. After taking the Doomsday Device from his twisted grip, she set it down on a flat stone.
“Snapjaw!” She turned on her crumpled assistant.
“Yes, Mistress?”
“Bring the others,” she commanded.
“I hear and obey, Mistress,” Snapjaw said as he hobbled off.
The Potentate removed the scrap of parchment from the Library of Alexandria from a hidden pocket in her cloak. Behind her mask, she smiled as she gazed down at the single phrase written there in ancient Greek. She’d given up much to implement her plan, and many of her followers’ lives had been spent in getting her to this moment in time.
Time, she mused as she stared down at the horrible carvings on the clock. She was older than most people knew and had seen a lot of it.
But of all the time she’d lived, the next twelve hours would be the most torturous for her enemies—and the m
ost fulfilling for her personally. Soon, she would have the entire arsenal of the Jungle Explorers’ Society’s artifacts at her disposal, and her legions of criminal soldiers would be unstoppable.
She traced the first carving on the clock with her long-nailed finger. The bloodred nail traced the outline of a figure with its mouth wide open with terror. The Potentate had studied many dark manuscripts to find out exactly how the Doomsday Device worked. Every hour, she would visit new tortures upon her victims until they bent to her will. None would be able to withstand twelve hours of the torment she would inflict. In the end, even the great Ned Lostmore would prefer to give her what she wanted rather than endure the horrors that were in store for him and his followers.
The steady thud of several booted feet announced Snapjaw’s return. He was surrounded by ten of her most trusted members of the Collective, all of whom were the most dangerous cutthroats and master criminals ever known.
They had served her well.
She indicated the carvings on the clock with a wave of her hand. Even the most hardened of the criminals who worked with her looked nervous.
“Wind the clock.”
Snapjaw obeyed immediately, cranking the large stone winding key that was embedded in the side of the device. Once it was wound, the clock awaited the final command, the secret words of death that had to be spoken in order to activate it.
Beneath her mask, the Potentate’s lips were stretched in a feline grin. Hunger was in her eyes, like a tigress about to inflict torture upon her prey. When she spoke, her voice rang out in a guttural growl.
“Chronos Thánatos!”
And the magic words, which had never been spoken before, caused the second hand on the Doomsday Device to begin its fateful tick.…
Andy woke from unconsciousness with ocean water swirling around his toes. The broken beam that had saved his life was nearby, but aside from that familiar object, he could see nothing else on the beach.
He coughed, expelling seawater from his lungs.
Tales from Adventureland the Doomsday Device Page 4