The Omega Children - The Return of the Marauders (A young adult fiction best seller): An Action Adventure Mystery (9 page)

Argus leant over into the speedboat and a man popped his head up and hopped out. Older and stooped he watched and listened as Argus waved his arms around and pointed out to sea.

‘Who is that? Why is he here?’ Lexington said.

‘Maybe they are pirates,’ Quixote said.

The old man beckoned Argus to follow him and they walked to the end of the wharf and Argus suddenly pushed him into the sea.

‘RUNNNNN,’ Argus screamed, sprinting for the speed boat.

Melaleuca screamed at her cousins to move and as if the hounds of hell chased them, they scrambled for the speedboat carrying Antavahni. Their cloaks flapped behind them and they kicked up sand as they tried to move faster.

Argus dived into the speedboat and floundered around with the controls. The motor burst into action with a high pitch scream.

‘MOOOVVVVVEEEEE,’ Argus screamed.

They neared the wharf, though slowed down when they saw the wrecks of many ships under the water. Half hulls, broken masts, railings and propellers broke the water’s surface, giving off an eerie sensation almost similar to the plains they had woken up on. Onto the creaking wharf they trod entranced by the sunken ship graveyard. Incoming waves bashed against the loose mooring posts and shook the wharf.

The old man hauled himself halfway onto the wharf and Argus pulled his pistol out and took aim at him.

‘HURRRYYY OR I WILL HAVE TO SHOOT HIM!’

Spurred on, they ran as fast as they could, jumping over the missing planks in the wharf until they reached the speedboat, and together they lifted Antavahni up and leapt in.

The old man spluttered and pulled himself fully on to the wharf and yelled at them with a croaky voice.

‘Come back you *@#%&$.’

Argus gunned the speedboat and it smashed its way through the waves, heading out to sea, while Melaleuca watched the old man jump up and down hollering in the other direction.

‘There,’ Ari said, pointing to the far end of the beach.

Another speedboat lay moored there and another man ran down to it.

‘I think you will have to hurry Argus,’ Ari said.

Argus wrestled with the controls. He pushed the throttle to full speed. The motor screamed at him, and the speedboat tried to slice its way through the choppy water.

‘This is going as fast as it can. Tide’s against us.’

The speedboat rocked in all directions and Lexington tried to stand but ended up sprawled in the lower keel at the bottom of the cabin steps. Quixote laughed and Melaleuca held on tight while motioning to Ari to check her.

‘I’m okay,’ Lexington said from below.

Melaleuca worked her way forward to Argus

‘There’s another speedboat coming after us.’

Argus looked back. Two men sat in a similar speedboat that had just left the beach.

‘And we appear to be heading out to sea,’ she added.

Quixote yelled and screamed in ecstasy, trying to hang his head over the side but kept on being pushed back by the speed.

‘Grab that rope,’ Argus said. ‘Tie him in. We won’t have time to fish him out if he falls over board.’ He muttered to himself, ‘Can’t believe I’m doing this.’

Melaleuca tied the rope to Quixote’s body as his light frame jiggled up and down, threatening to stay airborne.

‘What about them?’ Ari yelled, pointing back to shore.

The pursuing speedboat appeared sleeker and faster.

‘All will be fine. All will be fine,’ Argus said. ‘Hope what moon face said is true or we will be caught,’ and turning to Ari said, ‘Can you steer?’

‘I will,’ came Quixote’s voice.

‘Show me,’ Ari said.

‘No other choice really,’ Argus said. ‘God I hope this works.’

Argus pulled the throttle back and told Ari to hold the wheel and steer straight ahead. Argus rummaged through his bag and pulled out a sextant and a compass. He pointed it at the sun and then took a reading off the compass.

Argus grabbed Antavahni and hauled him upright.

‘Okay paleface. Time to shine. What next?’

Antavahni stirred and though weak, peered over the side. ‘Good,’ he said and reached into his robe. He pulled out a rolled up piece of parchment and handed it to Argus. ‘It is all there.’

Argus unfurled it and ran his eyes across it.

‘This is so precise.’ He poured over the parchment. ‘Secret lands my arse. Can’t miss it by an inch my arse. What the...’ he said and then looked around and yelled at Ari, ‘Steer a little to your right.’

Argus carried on staring into the sky and barking directions to Ari while Quixote yelled out he wanted a turn at steering the speedboat.

Antavahni chuckled a little and spoke, slurring his words. ‘Just spin spin spin spin. That’s all heh heh heh. Spin spin spin. Through the photaic wall.’

‘The other speedboat is catching us,’ Melaleuca said.

‘Shut up all! I muck this up and...well, just shut up!’

Argus squinted and appeared to measure something back on land. ‘We are nearly there.’

He leant over Ari and pushed the speedboat’s accelerator to idle. The motor died away to a spluttering noise, idling and surging forward from the speedboat’s momentum. The ocean washed all around in a slow-forming, giant-green swell that rose and fell. The mountain range still looked large and foreboding, though the south side appeared to have clouds tumbling down from its obscured peaks to the sea, rendering it as hidden as the top.

‘When the two lands meet and the valley closes,’ Argus read from the parchment with doubt. ‘Then spin and travel upward.’

A resolved expression fell across his face.

‘Let me take over Ari. Okay here goes. It either works or we are sunk.’

Argus swung the speedboat’s steering wheel hard right and slammed the accelerator to full speed. The motor screamed a high-pitched whine and it started to turn a tight circle in the same spot over and over and over again, smashing and crashing through all the swells and white foam it churned up. The drone of the approaching speedboat got louder and louder, sounding as if it would soon be upon them.

The spinning halted and the speedboat lurched forward. It felt as if something yanked them out of the water with great force. They fell backwards onto each other and all at once the choppy sea flattened out, becoming still, and a sense of calm descended. Argus latched onto the steering wheel again and the front of the speedboat tilted up as if travelling up a hill.

Finding her trust tested, Melaleuca gripped the side of the speedboat and thrust herself up.
What on earth is happening?
The ocean slanted upwards for a vast distance and beyond it only the blue sky could be seen.

‘Everyone. Look,’ she said.

While Antavahni lay facing upwards lapsing in and out of consciousness, they pulled themselves off one another and gazed at the phenomena. The calm seawater behaved like normal water except it clung to the seabed at an angle, and as far as the eye could see the ocean stretched out before them like a huge sheet dropping down from between two tent poles.

‘Water runs downhill,’ Lexington said. ‘Not...not this.’ She took her notebook out to write but paused unsure what to jot down. ‘Can I see that parchment?’ She reached past Argus and grabbed it.

The pursuing speedboat cruised past the point where they had spun around in circles. It sped back and forth several times, stopped and searched all around.

‘They can’t see us,’ Ari said. ‘And look at that. That fuzzy line.’

Like a force field, a faint visible line where the sea tilted upwards appeared to stop the other speedboat from seeing them. Without questioning, Melaleuca accepted the strange nature of the sight and felt they were headed exactly where they needed to go, not that she knew for a second where that was.

Trust.

Lexington looked up from her notebook and Melaleuca saw that she did not trust at all.

Antavahni lay on the floor too helpless to tell them anything. Lexington examined him with her eyes only, dying to ask him questions but instead looked to Argus though he shrugged his shoulders at her.

‘Not supposed to tell you anything,’ he said.

‘You won’t need to. I will work it out.’

Melaleuca heard the excited sincerity in Lexington’s voice.
Yes. Yes you will. You are suited to this.

Ari held the side of the speedboat, giving off the air of an explorer approaching a new land, and Quixote waved and yelled, making gestures at their fast shrinking-into-the-distance pursuers.

‘Where are we going?’ Ari asked Argus.

‘Don’t know. He said to just go up.’

They settled into waiting as the boat sped up the inclined sea water.

After pondering it, minutes later Lexington pointed to where they had started travelling upwards. ‘It’s the photaic wall he mentioned,’ indicating toward Antavahni.

‘You mean a magic wall,’ Quixote said.

‘No. Something is affecting the light and the water, and changing its behavior.’

‘Yeah. Magic.’

‘There is no such thing as magic.’

‘Then explain it.’

‘Given time, I will.’ Lexington buried her head in the parchment.

Quixote leant in close to the side of Lexington’s face.

‘Seems the impossible is possible.’

‘Quixote,’ Ari said and whacked his leg.

‘What? Lex is always telling me that what I think cannot ever be true.’

‘Anything CAN be true,’ Lexington said over her shoulder. ‘Though it must stick to the rules.’

‘Once people could not fly. And now they can,’ Quixote shot back. ‘So there. Something that was impossible was made possible.’

‘They simply discovered the laws of flight that were always there.’

‘Well then.’ Quixote folded his arms. ‘There are probably a bunch of laws doing this to the water.’

Lexington shifted her weight around and faced him squarely.

‘Yes and...’ She tapped her forehead. ‘...if you let me, I will work it out.’

Melaleuca motioned to Ari and he sat between Quixote and Lexington.

‘Enough. Both of you,’ Melaleuca said. ‘You are both right.’

‘Yes we are,’ Quixote said chuffed.

‘We both cannot be right,’ Lexington said.

Quixote stood and drew in a huge breath ready to argue again although Melaleuca placed a hand on him, pushing him back down. Despite this, Quixote hung his hands over the side and made zapping noises, pretending to chant magic words in an attempt to annoy Lexington.

‘Just ignore him Lex,’ Melaleuca said.

‘Actually he’s given me an idea.’

She reached into her pack and pulled out a compass and held it over the side.

‘The magnetic field is being warped. Look for yourselves.’

The needle of her compass spun around and around, lost as to where north lay.

‘Moon face told me,’ Argus said, ‘the whole land mass is pushed up out of the sea about a thousand feet, and the sea hugs it all around. I suspect the sea bed is pure magnetic iron ore.’

‘That would explain the compass,’ Lexington said. ‘But not the photaic wall or the water. Something else is bending light.’

Argus shrugged his shoulders again.             

‘You don’t care do you? How could you not even be curious?’

He rolled his head over his shoulder and Melaleuca caught his direct gaze, grasping in an instant a flame that had long since been extinguished. He pulled away as if he sensed her and said, ‘Don’t.’

‘Leave him Lex. You will work it out. I know you will.’

Not knowing how to take it, Lexington weakly smiled back and continued writing, while Quixote tried to untie his leg. The knot held fast so he inched over to Lexington, a troublesome look on his face.

‘Quixote,’ Melaleuca said. 
Man, he never stops.

Eventually the pair of them would have to work out their differences, even as Lexington and she would have to. Her instincts told her little as to where they were headed or what was going on, though it was becoming clear that one of her first tasks was to get them all working together. She thought on the words “trust,” and pondered why they were to keep playing.
Playing what exactly?

Trust.

None of them, except Quixote, looked in the mood for playing. Ari would take anything in his stride and Lexington? Well, at least she had found something to focus on, strange as the sea now was.

The speedboat burst up into mid air like it had just leapt over a ramp and flew forward, splashing down in the sea with a mighty watery crash. Again they fell on each other and sprawled all over the deck. The speedboat spluttered and surged back and forth. Argus reached out and turned the keys to off. The motor stopped and silence fell about them and the speedboat came to slow drifting halt.

Ari hauled himself up first and then helped the others up. Melaleuca held his shoulder to steady herself and Lexington searched on the floor for her notebook and pen. Argus lay on top of Antavahni both of whom seemed content to lay there. Quixote leapt onto the front of the boat and held his arms out wide with the rope on his leg trailing behind him.