Attica (32 page)

Though the bortrekker had never made the voyage he had spoken with others who had, and had given Alex instructions.

‘You follow this star pattern, as the skylights
appear over the horizon one by one, bearing in mind that this constellation here must always remain on your right shoulder, and this one here on your left. If you sail between those two groups of skylights, you can’t go wrong. Then there’s the swell, which always comes from the near left corner of the tank. It will carry you naturally to your destination, but beware of a maelstrom …’

‘Maelstrom?’ Alex had repeated.

‘Um – a whirlpool. A huge whirlpool, somewhere in the centre of the tank. It’s a drain hole that serves the pipes which lead to all the smaller tanks of the attic. It’s about a mile wide and if you get sucked in, you’ve had it, so keep a sharp look-out. Watch out, too, for obstructions – hidden underwater reefs and shoals you can’t see when you’re level with the surface. The way to spot them is to study the dust clouds above the lake. They’ll reflect what’s below them, to a degree. So you’ll expect to see dark shadows on the dust clouds, in among the golden specks.’

‘What are these reefs and shoals?’

‘Oh, clusters of pipes, mostly, and there’ll be moving stuff – flotsam and jetsam – junk thrown in by irresponsible vandals. Just keep your eyes open and you should be all right.’

Alex said, ‘Thanks,’ and, feeling slightly facetious asked, ‘No giant squids or submarines?’

‘Ah, as to those, if you run into one, pray like mad.’

Alex’s face fell.

The bortrekker’s own face creased as if someone
had screwed it up like a piece of paper. ‘Got you,’ he said. ‘No, no squids or submarines but – but there is a monster of a kind in there, now that you mention it.’

‘Ah, you won’t get me a second time!’ said Alex, wagging his finger.

‘No, this is serious. There’s a sort of blanket creature – huge, bigger than a football pitch, it’s the only way I can describe it – which rises up with large waves and falls on to unsuspecting craft, enveloping them. I don’t know how to tell you to avoid it. Again just keep your eyes open. It enfolds ships whole and sinks with them to the bottom of the tank.’

‘Oh heck – what is it then? A live thing?’

‘It looks like green blanket-weed but it’s not a vegetable. It’s wholly animal. It’s developed an instinct, a killer’s mind. With a sharklike predator’s intellect, but a thinking mind nonetheless. It floats, imitating the water’s surface, and strikes along with the rearing waves which crash over the sailing vessels. The good news is there’s only one of them. Any new blanket-weed creatures which come about are quickly swallowed by this monster and become part of it. That’s why it’s so big.’

A lump formed in Alex’s throat.

‘Where’s it come from? I mean, how did it come about?’

‘It’s an ancient prehistoric beast, which has grown from live organisms in the tank. Minute one-celled creatures which have sought each other out and locked together for defence against larger eaters and have themselves become a feared predator. That’s all any of us are, after all – a mass of single cells – tiger, cobra, man, whatever. Any live being. This amorphous mass, which we in the attic call the Loving Flounder, will enfold you in its winglike form and drag you down, there to digest you whole.’

Alex had swallowed hard after this warning.

‘Loving Flounder – that’s a strange thing to call a horrible beast.’

‘It loves you to death.’

So, there was much to think about while he steered
his makeshift craft over the surface of the tank’s water. Navigation, monsters, gales. On the first night he witnessed one of those electrical dust storms they had seen when on dry Attican boards. Entrancing, but also dangerous. Lightning flashed down around Alex and the waves were roused to turmoil by the atmospheric disturbances. If the Loving Flounder came now, he thought, I could do little to save myself, for the waves were rearing high and crashing down on the deck, draining away through the gaps in the bottles and planks.

The storm lasted all night. A howling draught accompanied it, which blew as if it had come from the pursed lips of gargantuan demons, almost stripping the raft of its sail. Alex managed to reef in the bed sheet before it was ripped to shreds in the terrible draught which whipped up the waters. The raft held up well under such a battering. The reason was it was very flexible, having been built in a loose fashion, the pliable ropes tied with firm knots. Had it been of a more rigid construction, the vessel would surely have perished in the blast, for it was a night of white blinding spray, of deep, seemingly bottomless, watery hollows, and terrible sudden squalls which spun the raft like a top while Alex clung on to the decks with all four limbs.

In the morning he was drenched, fatigued, but whole. Lightning had zig-zagged about his head, lighting up the attic sky for brief brilliant moments, but had not burned him to a crisp. Mountainous seas had all but engulfed him but had fortunately passed over, leaving him battered and breathless. Screaming draughts from the mouths of heaven and hell had nearly wrenched him from his handholds and flung him into the maw of monstrous waves, but had not managed to prise him from his grip.

There had been the thought that the Loving
Flounder – such a pretty name for such an ugly monster – might enfold him, but it hadn’t. Here he was still, now sailing gently on a freshwater ocean which looked for all the world as if it were dressed in its Sunday best and off to church. It was calm. It was peaceful. It was a day for drying out in the pillars of the sun, among the warm motes of dust, while contemplating the vagaries of nature.

A white-painted sign with black lettering floated past the raft at about noon. Written on it were the words:

NOTICE

No Dreaming.

No Wishing.

No Swimming.

‘Weird,’ muttered Alex. ‘Totally weird.’

Next he saw two other craft, sailing together, passing him within hailing distance. One was an upturned table, the legs used as masts, the other was a bookcase on its back, the mariners aboard using shovels as oars. They waved to him and smiled. They were obviously sea-Atticans, small brown people with quick, light, graceful movements, not at all like land-Atticans. The latter were lumpy awkward creatures, used to manual labour in a heavy environment. These people were like the fresh draughts, nimble creatures with bright eyes and ready grins which flashed greetings even to strangers. Alex waved back and cried, ‘What are you doing out here?’

One of the sailors held up a battered fishing rod and a child’s seaside crabbing net as if they understood.

‘Fishing?’ questioned Alex.

That was plain enough. But on board the sea-Atticans
also had goods, presumably to trade with. There were feather boas and other such items on the decks. Alex hove alongside one of the vessels and indicated he would like to trade one or two of his exotic paperweights. He had onyx pyramids, glass hemispheres with rainbows locked inside, mythical brass animals. The sea-going Atticans seemed delighted. They gave him a thick quilt coat in exchange for two of his treasures, happy with the bounty.

Alex had not really wanted the coat, but he had enjoyed meeting with other beings. He realised at this point that he actually needed company sometimes. That was all right, he thought, because there was company to be had. He didn’t have to deteriorate into a complete hermit in his quest to become a bortrekker.

After waving goodbye to the Attican water tank farers he set sail again on a day when the sky was reasonably clear of dust clouds and the many skylights lit up his seapath like searchlights. The mariners had given him a fishing line, which he now proceeded to employ, using bits of weed as bait. However, either the bait was no good, or the fisherman was no good, for he caught nothing. Fishing in the deep sea, Alex decided, was a difficult occupation.

He suddenly remembered he
did
have a companion and spent an hour or two chatting with Makishi, who was willing enough to talk, but because of his limited experience of life did not have a great deal to say. He knew about jungles, rainforests and tropical storms, but he’d already talked a lot with Alex about these and tended to get repetitive. After a while the conversation petered out and a silence fell between the pair once more.

In the afternoon Alex slept. He lashed his tiller
to the mast so that the raft kept a straight course, checked his bearings with all those visual aids he had been given by the bortrekker, then dropped off into a deep and dreamless sleep. The long night of the storms had kept him awake and he was always a boy who liked his bed.

It was the tiller banging against his knee which woke him. He sat up abruptly, startled to find his tiller had worked itself free and his rudder was finding its own course. All too late it seemed he was caught on the edge of a great swirling body of water which was, at the moment, spinning the craft gently round in wide circles.

‘The maelstrom!’ he yelled, grabbing the tiller.

It was indeed the central whirlpool. Somewhere deep below him was a drain hole which was sucking water down by the thousand-gallon. If he did not free himself of its power he would taken down too and used as a plug. Not only would he drown and rot in the weeds below, but with his corpse stopping up the exit hole the tank would overflow and flood the attic, perhaps drowning many others in the process. Naturally, at the moment, he was more concerned with his own life than those of others, but if he failed to save himself he would leave behind a terrible legacy, of death and destruction.

‘Oh heck.’

He grabbed the tiller in a panic and tried to steer the raft out of the current. It was of no use. The raft simply spun in the current and continued to follow the ever-decreasing circles it was drawing.

Next he fixed the tiller again then tried to paddle out, using one of the light shovels which served as his oars. He made a little progress this time, but not enough. The raft neither moved out of the current nor went further in. Stalemate. But soon his arms began to ache and tire, he weakened, and he knew he could not keep it up.

‘Help me!’ he yelled, thoroughly frightened now. ‘Somebody, please? Anyone around? Help me.’

The waters around were bare of boats or any sign of life.

‘I’m going to drown if no one
helps me,’ called Alex to the attic in general. ‘Is that what you want? Eh? Get rid of the unwanted newcomers. Well, you’ve got your wish.’

He slumped back on the floor of the raft, staring up at the roof-sky, a bitterness filling his heart with black bile.

‘I hate you. I hate everyone!’

He was going to die. It didn’t seem possible. It wasn’t fair. He was only doing this to help Mr Grantham. The raft was going faster and faster now, spinning, turning, heading towards a slope of water that went down into a hole. In the centre of the mighty whirlpool was a hole where there was nothing but air. He would probably drop all the way without even touching the sides. Without even getting wet. Once his body hit the bottom though, the water would come gushing in around him and suffocate him, filling his lungs to bursting. His brain would explode in bright lights. He knew what it was like to hold his breath – most kids had tried it – and it hurt like hell. It was a horrible death.
Any
death was horrible.

A huge fat crinkled worm flew over the raft.

Red, green and gold.

With whiskers.

It was there and gone in a second.

Alex sat up quickly and stared.

What was that? Was he seeing things?

No, there it was, heading towards the horizon.

It
was
a worm. At least it looked like a worm from where he stood.

‘Hi! Don’t go,’ he yelled in panic. ‘Come back here.’

He stood there waving and yelled again, this time angrily.

‘Get back here, you rotten bugger!’

This time the worm-thing seemed to take notice. It flew
through the air with wavelike movements, flowing up and down like a serpent. When it turned back – and it
did
turn back – Alex could see it was an oriental dragon, the kind that Chinese people used for celebrations. It was long and tubular, with the usual mythical head and huge eyes. It flowed through the air like a kite and returned to the raft, its eyes blinking. There were long tapes dangling from its body and as it flew over Alex grabbed the end of one of these ribbons, expecting to pull the creature to a halt. However, it didn’t jerk to a halt, but almost pulled Alex off his feet. Alex quickly tied the end of the ribbon to his mast and stepped back, hoping for the best.

The flying dragon, roaring to bolster its strength, pulled hard. Gradually the raft began to leave the swirling waters of the vortex into which it was being dragged. With Alex encouraging his saviour, the raft was eventually pulled clear of the whirlpool’s clutches and out of danger. Until now most of the animated objects of the attic had been hostile. But here was one, like Punch and Judy, which seemed only too glad to help. The attic, like anywhere else, had good and bad about it. Alex was growing fonder of the place all the time.

Once he was clear he released the dragon’s tapes and the creature continued on its journey to an unknown destination.

‘I must not fall asleep again so soundly,’ Alex told himself. ‘I was lucky that time. Next time I may not be. I have to remain alert.’

The trouble was, he was alone, and had to sleep
sometimes
.

Over the next day or so, Alex met with more of the
brown fisherfolk he had encountered earlier. They were almost always cheerful, waving to him, shouting greetings. Once or twice he traded with them for food, his store of paperweights standing him in good stead. There was one time when a sullen one passed by his craft, rowing a canoe fashioned from half a car roof-rack pod, who refused to acknowledge him, but this was a rare occurrence. For the most part they were a delightful race of people, who seemed only too eager to make contact and help if at all possible.

Alex did of course fall asleep again – he had to rest – but nothing untoward happened to him.