Alex Neptune, Pirate Hunter, page 4
Alex smiled sweetly at his sister. “We’re just really interested in the history of lifeboats.”
It was unlikely she would buy this excuse because Alex knew she wasn’t particularly interested in lifeboats either. As well as earning her a place on the weightlifting team, the events of the summer had given her a taste for using her incredible strength to help people and look heroic doing it. Becoming a weekend lifeboat volunteer was supposed to provide regular opportunities to show off her muscle. Instead, she had spent most of her time so far scraping barnacles off the bottom of the boat.
“There might not even be a presentation anyway because my co-host has totally bailed on me.”
Footsteps thudded along the beach towards them. Gene Lennox, a fellow volunteer, huffed towards them, flip-flops slapping with every step and quiff of dark hair bouncing on their head.
“Sorry I’m late,” they panted. “Somehow I lost my phone, glasses and car keys this morning.”
Anil sighed and reached into his pockets. “I might be able to help you there.”
“We need to talk to you about—” Alex began as they filed into the building, but Bridget and Gene hurried off before he could finish.
The lifeboat took up most of the space, its grey-and-blue-painted hull spotless and orange cabin bristling with antennae and other equipment. Zoey eyed it all hungrily while Meri gaped in amazement.
“It’s so new.”
“Some of the tech is really cool…” Zoey trailed off – this was usually when her friends zoned out. But Meri nodded eagerly for her to continue.
“I want to know everything.”
Zoey narrowed her eyes as if it might be a joke. Then she realized Meri was being serious and launched instantly into a detailed explanation full of words Alex didn’t understand.
A few tourists waited for the presentation, snapping selfies with the boat or studying the framed newspaper clippings of dramatic rescues that hung on the walls.
“It seems like Bridget takes this really seriously—” Alex began to say, before tinny K-pop music blasted from unseen speakers, bouncing around the walls of the station. “Oh no.”
Bridget reappeared, biceps bulging as she hefted a wide tin basin above her head, swaying it roughly side-to-side as if it was being tossed on stormy waves. Gene was crouched inside it, skinny arms frantically drawing an imaginary oar through thin air.
“These rough seas are a big yikes!” Bridget shouted.
Gene mimed losing their oar to a vicious wave. “I can’t control my mighty vessel any longer!” they cried. “I’m getting swept away!”
“Making the right decision could totally be life or death!” Bridget swept her eyes across the audience. “What would you do?”
“Swim for it!” shouted Anil.
Zoey cleared her throat. “There used to be this device called a breeches buoy that stranded sailors wore like a big nappy that fired them along a zipline on a rocket—”
“Wrong and wrong. You’re both dead!” Bridget declared.
“Call the lifeboat service,” Meri muttered behind them.
“Correct!” Bridget dropped the tin basin a little too heavily and sent Gene spilling out onto the floor. “Who said that?”
Meri put her head down and stayed quiet.
“If you’re going out on the sea, you should always carry a radio and an emergency flare.” Gene held up examples of each. Zoey sighed wistfully at the sight of a bright red, snub-nosed flare gun.
Despite being a year or two older, Gene was half Bridget’s size, their baggy volunteer T-shirt draped over their slight frame like it had been hung there to dry. Bridget glanced sideways at them and beamed. Maybe showing off her strength wasn’t the only reason Bridget had decided to volunteer…
“I don’t understand why the heck she likes Gene,” grumbled Zoey. “They’re such a weed.”
Alex couldn’t help but wonder if she was jealous. “And you’re not?” he whispered.
“I’m stronger than you!” Zoey flexed an arm to prove it and Alex knew it was wiser to back down than be proved wrong.
“As soon as we’re alerted to your peril, this lifeboat will launch to rescue you,” said Gene, patting the boat proudly.
Zoey had stopped listening. “Bridget could literally break Gene in half with her bare hands.”
“Storms! Whirlpools! Mutant sharks with seven mouths!” bellowed Bridget.
Gene gave her a sideways glance. “I don’t think there are mutant—”
“There’s all kinds of gross danger we can save you from!” Bridget concluded.
Alex knew his sister had been disappointed to learn that new volunteers didn’t go on rescue missions until they had completed a bunch of training. Now he hoped he could turn her desire for drama and excitement to their advantage. A boat in distress would be sure to get the lighthouse keeper out of the way.
“Now we’re going to teach you how to deal with common problems out at sea until help can reach you,” said Gene. “Bridget will hold up some pictures and you tell us what you’d do.”
Bridget lifted a placard showing a cartoon jellyfish with an angry face. “Jellyfish sting!”
“Pee on it!” shouted Anil.
“Ew, no, incorrect.”
“Remove any spines, rinse the sting with seawater and soak it in warm water,” Meri said quietly.
“That’s right!” Next, Bridget held up a picture of a man who had turned bright green, leaning over the rail of a ship. “Seasickness!”
Zoey lifted her voice eagerly. “Rig yourself a full body harness from ropes and belts and suspend yourself from a high ceiling so you sway with the ship!”
“Creative but not quite,” said Gene.
“Chew on ginger root and try pressing on the inside of your wrist,” mumbled Meri.
“Yes, both effective!”
Zoey frowned. “That all sounds so old-fashioned.”
“Sometimes the natural remedies are still the best,” said Meri. “People have been sailing the seas for millennia. They managed just fine without all the technology we have today.”
Zoey nodded thoughtfully. “How do you know all this?”
“We don’t have much equipment on the rig.” Meri smiled wistfully. “People learned the natural remedies instead and passed them on.”
“Maybe you could pass them onto me? It could be useful to combine the old ways with my cool new inventions.”
Meri blinked in surprise and then smiled. “I’d like that.”
The presentation ended with Bridget and Gene playing out another short scene that saw them both swallowed by a whale. It wasn’t entirely clear how a lifeboat could save them from such a scenario, but it gave Bridget the opportunity to act out prising open the whale’s mouth using just her brute strength.
While Gene led the rest of the audience on a tour, Alex and the others stayed behind to talk to Bridget.
“That was…interesting,” he said.
Bridget scoffed. “It’s not interesting. I thought I’d be leaping onto sinking boats and throwing people to safety.”
“Well, if you’re looking for some excitement…”
Bridget narrowed her eyes at him. “You only trail off tantalizingly like that when you’re planning something dangerous.”
“It’s important,” Alex clarified quickly. “Like, save the world important.”
He briefly outlined his plan. Bridget listened carefully, trying to remain expressionless even as excitement shone in her eyes.
“Gene does have a boat we use for sailing practice…” she said when Alex was finished.
Now his sister was trailing off tantalizingly, he knew he had her.
“Does Gene really have to be there?” said Zoey sulkily.
“They won’t say anything.” Bridget smiled at Gene across the room. “All right, we’re in. See you tonight.”
Sneaking up to the lighthouse in a boat under cover of darkness made Alex feel like a secret agent, though he suspected secret agents didn’t usually have sea otters hiding up their trouser legs.
The blazing yellow beam of the lighthouse swept around in an endless circle, briefly banishing broad strips of the night before darkness pressed back in its wake. Each return of the light revealed treacherous rocks creeping closer, jagged shapes outlined in white sea foam. Before the lighthouse was built a couple of hundred years ago, ships had regularly been chewed up in the mouth of the bay.
The short-masted boat jounced Alex, Zoey and Anil in their hard seats. A wave slapped the hull and the boat swayed towards a spur of rock. Bridget wrapped her arms around the mast to keep from falling while Gene, at the helm, deftly steered them back on course.
“Maybe we’ll see a ghost ship,” whispered Anil. “The legends say you can hear the cries of drowned sailors haunting the wind in the dead of night.”
“You probably shouldn’t believe every story you hear,” said Alex.
Anil pouted. “But they’re all so cool. If the Water Dragon turned out to be real, why not ghost pirates?”
“I suppose if Brineblood really is back from the dead,” Alex conceded, “it means anything is possible.”
“Quiet,” whispered Zoey. “We’re almost there.”
Alex, Zoey, Anil and Meri crouched on the floor of the boat so they could hide behind its benches. The otters tried to wriggle out of Alex’s trousers but he pinned them firmly against his legs, their fur tickling his skin.
“Okay, time to reduce our speed,” said Gene at the helm. “You remember how to do that?”
Bridget scoffed. “Of course I remember.” She yanked on a rope and the sail opened wide, catching the wind to send them flying towards the rocks.
“Abandon ship!” squeaked Anil.
Gene grabbed another rope and the sail fell away. The boat immediately slowed, cruising to a halt at the base of the rocks.
“You see,” said Bridget. “Perfect teamwork.”
The waves chopped and slapped around the rocks. One by one, they hopped out of the boat until only Bridget and Gene remained aboard.
“We’ll hide until the lighthouse keeper spots your diversion and comes out to help,” said Alex.
“Fire your flare gun to make sure he sees you,” added Zoey.
Bridget looked confused. “We don’t have a flare gun.”
“Volunteers aren’t allowed to use them,” said Gene.
“I have something.” Meri reached deep into a pocket and produced a glass bottle, half full of a thick, glittering green substance. A cork was pushed firmly into its top.
“Thanks, I am a bit thirsty,” said Anil, reaching for the bottle.
Meri lifted it out of reach. “Do not drink it! It’s seafire – made from bioluminescent algae. When you break it open, it reacts with the air and looks like fire, but it doesn’t actually burn. Pour a little bit into the boat and the lighthouse keeper can’t miss you. But only a little bit!”
Zoey gaped at the bottle. “Another old-fashioned sea recipe?”
“My mum taught me to make it. Now I can use it to help save her.”
Bridget took the bottle and shoved it into the waistband of her shorts. “All right, let’s go.”
“Take us gently away from the rocks,” Gene instructed.
Bridget snatched the tiller and the boat lurched away, Gene staggering to keep their balance.
“They might get into actual peril,” said Anil.
Zoey shrugged. “At least it’ll look convincing.”
The lighthouse loomed above them, a pointed spire with its pinnacle ablaze. The natural rock foundation had been chiselled flat, the sides sloping gently to the sea, making it easy for them to pick their way up. The otters spilled out of Alex’s trousers and went ahead as scouts.
A cracked concrete slab at the top offered firm footing and an old metal container provided a hiding place. They peered at the front door of the lighthouse and the rusted steps that led up to it. Now they just needed to wait.
“That’s weird,” whispered Zoey. She pointed to a square patch of concrete where severed cables poked from the ground, as if something had recently been torn away.
Before Zoey could study it any further, they caught sight of the boat steering around to the far side of the lighthouse.
“Aren’t they moving a bit quickly?” whispered Anil.
Alex squinted through the darkness. “I’m sure Gene knows what they’re doing.”
Then he saw that it was Bridget holding the ropes that controlled the sail.
“Oh no.”
They watched as Gene lunged across the boat to seize a rope and reduce their speed. That left the tiller unattended and the boat veered towards the rocks.
It ran aground with a heavy crunch, jerking to a halt violently enough to send Bridget and Gene sprawling. A brief moment of quiet passed before a green light sputtered to life in the bottom of the boat.
“I think the bottle broke,” said Meri.
Silent green fire spread across the boat. Bridget and Gene sprang up, shouting and slapping wildly where it caught their clothes.
Alex moved to help but Meri caught his arm.
“Remember, it doesn’t burn. They’ll be fine.”
“You have to show me how to make that stuff,” said Zoey.
Across the top of the rocks, the lighthouse door banged open. A man with a grey, heavy beard stumbled out, clumsily belting a silk dressing gown around his bulky body, hairy legs ending in slippers that slapped on the metal stairs as he ran to help.
“We build a lighthouse and people still crash into the rocks,” the lighthouse keeper complained loudly. He grabbed a coil of rope and began to pick his way down towards the luminous boat. Behind him, the door hung open.
“Let’s go,” said Alex.
Together, they hurried up the steps and inside the lighthouse.
The otters lined up across the top step to serve as lookouts. Alex nodded a thank you before the door closed with a thud that echoed up through the lighthouse.
The first room was cold and round, stone walls stained black with damp and dripping moisture. Steep stairs curved around one side of the cylinder, coiling up to the rooms stacked above.
“It smells like a seal’s armpit,” said Zoey, voice echoing.
“Or a bath of tuna water,” added Alex.
Meri crossed the room and peered at the wall on the far side. Beneath a patch of damp some words were visible, carved into the wall.
Find a new perspective and follow the light.
“It’s the same riddle I heard Brineblood telling,” said Meri.
A chiselled line underscored the words. Alex reached out and rubbed away some of the damp. The line extended away from the riddle towards the stairs. He ran his finger along the wall, the line leading him upwards. The others followed.
A complete loop of the ascending spiral staircase brought them to a low doorway that opened onto another cramped, circular room. A flowery perfume piggybacked on the smell of damp.
“This is definitely not what I was expecting,” said Anil.
Thick pink carpet cushioned the floor and the stone walls were almost entirely covered by specially fitted shelves. These were stuffed with fluffy toys: teddy bears and plushie sea lions, beanbag dolphins and cuddly octopuses with trailing arms. In the middle of the floor was a low table, a child-sized chair on each side. Three fluffy toys had been served empty plastic teacups and plastic cakes. The fourth (slightly larger) chair was tipped over where the lighthouse keeper had run to aid the stricken boat.
“I guess it gets pretty lonely out here,” said Zoey.
Anil nodded. “Come on, we’ve already crashed the party enough.”
The carved line continued up the stairs, Alex running his hand along the wall to expose it. They ignored the other rooms they passed until the air grew warmer and bright light began to wash down the steps.
At the top of the staircase, a final chamber took up the entire width of the lighthouse. A gigantic lantern of ruffled glass, fitted inside metal brackets, hummed and clicked in the centre of the room, flinging a sharp yellow beam through panoramic windows.
The top of the lighthouse certainly offered a new perspective. On one side was a view of the wide mouth of the bay, the lights of the town sparkling beyond like rare gems inside a cave. The other side simply looked over an endless expanse of dark ocean.
“The riddle must mean the lighthouse beam will point us where we need to go for the next clue,” said Alex.
“But it’s always moving,” said Zoey. “It’s impossible to follow it anywhere.”
“Maybe we find a new perspective by stopping the light so it only focuses on one spot?”
Alex’s hand was still pressed against the wall. The carved line ended at the doorway. It had led them up here but now they would have to discover the solution by themselves.
“The answer must be here somewhere.” Anil began searching frantically around the room.
“We don’t even know what we’re looking for,” said Alex.
The others gathered in front of a control panel at the base of the lantern, a grey box covered in old plastic switches, blinking bulbs and cracked dials.
“I did some reading on lighthouses,” Zoey said. “The lantern is a combination of polished prisms and lens arrays arranged concentrically to funnel light into a beam brighter than its source. There are eight bullseye lens panels that the light passes through.”
Alex blinked at her as if she was speaking a different language.
Zoey growled in frustration. “You could at least try and understand! It means if we knew the right spot, we could jam the wheels or ball bearings so the light stops—”
Meri cleared her throat to interrupt. “Or we could pull this secret lever I just found.”
The metal casing of the control panel had buckled slightly at its base, allowing Meri to prise it open. Inside was a scuffed brass handle.
“You’re kind of annoyingly a genius,” said Zoey.
Alex watched Meri closely. “How did you find it so easily?”
